Broder the Village Fool

If you continue to harbor some respect for David Broder as the “dean” of Washington journalists – there goes one of those oxymorons again – you will be severely challenged by this review of Broder’s work by Jamison Foser at Media Matters. Maybe his petulant and frivolous attack on Harry Reid as an embarrassment to the Democratic Party as much as Alberto Gonzales is to the GOP -- and the stinging rebuke signed by every single Democratic Senator -- will finally bring him down from the perch he never deserved in the first place. It's time for heads to roll in the DC media establishment, among the highly paid pundits as well as in the boardrooms and executive suites. They are the real traitors.

Here is a good sum-up by Atrios:

More Broder
We normally think of "High Broderism" as the worship of bipartisanship for its own sake, combined with a fake "pox on both their houses" attitude. But in reality this is just the cover Broder uses for his real agenda, the defense of what he perceives to be "the establishment" at all costs. The establishment is the permanent ruling class of Washington, our betters who know better. It is their rough agenda which is sold as "centrism" even when it has no actual relationship with the political center in a meaningful way. Democracy's messy, in Broder's world, and passionate voters are problematic. It is up to the Wise Old Men of Washington to implement the agenda, and the job of the voters to bless them for it. When the establishment fails, the most important issue is not their failure, but that the voters might begin to lose faith in and deference for their betters. Thus, people must always be allowed to save face, no matter what their transgressions, as long as they're a part of his permanent floating tea party.

While this basic attitude isn't unique to Broder, his apparent lack of interest in the actual details of policy makes him a more absurd figure than some. For him it's not about results, but about the right people being in the right places. It is terribly elitist in all the wrong ways. Arguments can be made for certain types of elitism - you do want a brain surgeon conducting brain surgery - but Broder's elites are simply aristocrats. It's their town.