Hating politics

Wilkinson sums up my feelings of late:

God, I hate politics. It really does make people stupid, especially those whose tribe is out of power. When Sonia Sotomayor was nominated, I knew nothing relevant about her judicial philosophy or, much more importantly, about her actual record as a judge. You’d think you’d wait to learn something about this before saying something about her, but no. People just proceeded to go crazy on cue.

Like Damon Root , I’m in favor of libertarian judicial activism. But I know that Barack Obama is no libertarian, and I knew he wasn’t going to nominate Kozinski or Posner. Too bad! So I was hoping for a relatively centrist liberal who sees some merit in libertarian arguments, especially about the protection of economic rights. As far as I can tell, there is nothing especially worrying about Sotomayor. She’s obviously super-qualified. And from what I’ve read, she seems like a highly competent, fairly moderate liberal who sticks pretty close to the law (which nobody really likes when they don’t like the law!) and is perfectly willing to side with Republican-appointed judges when that seems to her the right thing to do. What are people going batshit crazy over? I don’t get it. And I really don’t get why many Republicans have taken this opportunity to reinforce the already widespread impression that they are morally odious morons. God, I hate politics.

Hence why my posting has died down—I'm not reading much political fare and don't know how soon I'll want to start again.

The last two cycles (2006, 2008) were exhilarating in a "throw the bums out" kind of way. And Obama was probably the most amazing presidential candidate ever, so following the primaries, general, and his first few months in office has been pretty interesting.

But I think the novelty has passed. He's The Man now—unlikely to foul things up nearly as badly as his predecessor—and covering the day-to-day insanity of the party out power is becoming repetitious.

Just remember Jane's Law:

The devotees of the party in power are smug and arrogant. The devotees of the party out of power are insane.

I'd say it's standing up pretty well, what with Democrats' new spend-o-rama and the right's lunatic flailings.

Meanwhile the WSJ wants Republicans to play grown up.  If only...