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Wednesday, Nov 24, 2010 4:01 PM UTC

No. 4: David Broder

"The Dean" never met a problem that couldn't be solved by more serious calls for bipartisanship

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Topics: War Room's Hack Thirty, War Room,

No. 4: David BroderDavid Broder

The dean of the Washington Press Corps, David Broder has also been What’s Wrong With the Washington Press Corp ever since he stepped off the campaign bus and began applying his wisdom toward the great problems plaguing the country.

He has a simplistic understanding of politics and no understanding of the electorate except as an abstract concept. His hatred of partisanship is actually a thinly veiled disdain for popular rule itself. He defines extremism as principled adherence to any sort of ideology. When he wants to understand what The Voters are thinking, he asks a think tank academic. Despite his disdain for the fiery populists that the idiot voters repeatedly send to our sadly broken Congress, he remains convinced that The American People are a wise and noble breed who long for sensible, bipartisan moderation in all things.

Would that we could return to a time when partisan venom didn’t rule — like, apparently, the Reagan administration. You know, the one with Iran-Contra and Robert Bork. It doesn’t matter when, specifically, you decide that moderation or bipartisanship or serious journalism died. It doesn’t even matter what killed it! All that matters is that at some point, things were better, and now, sadly, they are less good, but they could still get better again, if we all appeal to our better natures.

And then sometimes David just up and writes something truly insane, like his recent column about how President Obama needs to start a good old-fashioned war to get the economy humming again.

Repeat offenses: Radical centrism, repetition of conventional wisdom, pathological need to demonstrate that “both sides do it,” hatred of partisanship/democracy.
Representative quote:

It may seem perverse to suggest that, at the very moment the House of Representatives is repudiating his policy in Iraq, President Bush is poised for a political comeback. But don’t be astonished if that is the case.

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

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We're listing the worst columnists and cable news commentators America has to offer. Think of this as our all-star team -- of the most predictable, dishonest and just plain stupid pundits in the media.

1. Richard Cohen
2. Mark Halperin
3. Thomas Friedman
4. David Broder
5.

Marty Peretz
6. Marc Thiessen
7. Jonah Goldberg
8. Maureen Dowd
9. Laura Ingraham
10. Peggy Noonan
11. George Will
12. John Fund
13. Roger Simon
14. David Ignatius
15. Mort Zuckerman
16. Michael Barone
17. Bill Kristol
18. Tina Brown
19. Joe Klein
20. Howard Fineman
21. S.E. Cupp
22. Tucker Carlson
23. Howard Kurtz
24. Dana Milbank
25. Mickey Kaus
26. Jeffrey Goldberg
27. Pat Caddell
28. Andrew Malcolm
29. Matt Bai
30. David Brooks

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