Life, As The Signs In

A Generation Ago, Or Two, When There Were Three Channels, Plus Pbs, And When You Needed - When You Needed 15 Million People To Make A Living, The Media Could Focus On The Broad Country. And Most People Had No Choice About Getting Political Information. It Was There At 6:30 Whether You Wanted It Or Not.

Journalism Can Go Right Up To The Door Of The Room In Which The Decisions Are Made. A Novel Can Go Inside The Room - And Inside The Character's Heads.

Yet When The Hour Of Decision Arrives, It Turns Out That Many Conservatives Care As Little As Ever About Administrative Skill And Executive Accomplishment. Our Party And Our Movement Overwhelmingly Respond To Symbolic Cues. Sarah Palin Is Exciting And Appealing. But What Kind Of Executive Is She? None Of Us Have Even The Remotest Idea.

But The Thought Leaders On Talk Radio And Fox Do More Than Shape Opinion. Backed By Their Own Wing Of The Book-publishing Industry And Supported By Think Tanks That Increasingly Function As Public-relations Agencies, Conservatives Have Built A Whole Alternative Knowledge System, With Its Own Facts, Its Own History, Its Own Laws Of Economics.

I Have A Range Of Scenarios. One Of Them Is A Chaos, That What Could Happen Is Congress Does Step Up A Little Bit And The Administration Is Paralyzed. And We Go Through All Kinds Of Constitutional Crises, Impeachment Or The 25th Amendment Removal Process. Another Frightening Scenario Is Donald Trump Is Steering His Way To A Series Of International Confrontations At The Same Time As He's Appeasing Russia.