We Went That Way

No wonder our country finds itself in such monumental gridlock: In the New York Times' poll published shortly after Congress reached its compromise on the debt ceiling, 72 percent of respondents disapproved of Republicans' position on the matter, but 63 percent said the amounts of cuts weren't enough or sufficient, 44 percent said the bill should've relied on cuts alone, and 63 said they support raising taxes on households earning more than $250,000. Then there's Stanley Oland, a 62-year-old Republican from Kalispell, Mont., who told the Times, "Unless you have working people, you don't have revenue from taxes. If you cut spending, jobs will be eliminated and you won't get any revenue. Every dollar spent creates jobs."

It's impossible to rationalize these opinions: If you don't support Republicans on this fiscal policy, then you can't say the bill should've only consisted of cuts. Yet somehow 72 percent said the former and 44 percent said the latter; um, that adds up to 116 percent. And if you didn't find the cuts to be adequate in size, I doubt that you also want to raise taxes on the upper middle class. Trying to make these opinions compatible is remarkably difficult. It reminds me of goofy children's adventure movies where characters chase a bad guy, stop someone on the street to ask where he went, and the person replies, "He went that way," while pointing in each direction. When it comes to affairs of state like sovereign debt, it's very difficult to collectively support two stridently opposite positions at the same time and expect solutions. Politicians then find it easy to stay on the sidelines and shout, as they're wont to do.

As for Mr. Karabell, someone should send him a note telling him that one can't be a Republican in 2011 and believe that government spending helps create in jobs in some capacity. This is heresy to the party today. At least on fiscal and economic policy, what he believes fundamentally conflicts with the party's position. He should change his voter registration or otherwise he'll be a disappointed Republican for a long time.