A Brief Thought on Politics and Government

I like the distinction Lebanon Truth makes in this comment thread between politics and government. However, I think Rovian/Bush Republicans don't make that distinction anymore. Government is politics, to a degree never before seen.

Take, for example, any of the following:

- Department of Justice disqualifying anyone who worked for any kind of liberal or liberal cause from being hired under certain programs (google 'Monica Goodling').

- Karl Rove giving presentations to civil service employees regarding how to make sure Republican candidates win elections.

- That the Bush administration wants to require all recipients of aid under federal health programs to certify that they will not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion and even certain types of birth control (this was in the NYT recently).

- HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson saying outright that "of course" he would never give contracts to companies who have donated money to Democrats.

- Republican Senators setting records for filibustering once Dems took the Senate in 2006; this after trying to eliminate the filibuster as an option for four years when they had control (the so-called 'nuclear option').

Those are from a few minutes of thinking, and all are focused on those things that, in theory, should be the realm of government and not politics. I've heard dozens, if not hundreds of examples.

When I try to make this point to others, the most common rebuttal I get is that the Democrats are just as guilty, so let me address that now: Of course the Dems are guilty of patronage and bending the rules - but as I mentioned, this is a conflation of politics and government in what is effectively a new way (even if it's really just an old way brought back to life), one that actually threatens the functionality of government. It also shatters the understanding that certain things are best left unpoliticized.

Does this make me naive? Not at all - I am not terribly surprised at the behavior of Karl Rove so much as I am a little surprised the Dems haven't pushed back at all. However, the uneasy consensus that had existed around this distinction is gone, and people's lives are being rather negatively affected by the changes (see, for example, either the refusal to fund anything but abstinence-only overseas or the current housing crisis and the pathetic, ideological response of Ben Bernanke and the Fed). Rather, I'm deploring it not because it's the loss of some ideal state of existence - far from it - but because it's materially hurting people.