The Growing Irrelevance of Establishment Pundits

Published at 10:20 on 16 September 2015

Is amply illustrated by this article.

First, there is the equating of Trump (who has no political experience whatsoever, and who engages in largely fact-free xenophobic rhetoric) with Sanders and Corbyn (both of whom have decades of experience and whose policy proposals, though on one side of the political spectrum, are generally fact-based and definitely do refrain from stoking the flames of ethnic bigotry).

Second, there is a complete lack of investigation into any of the Establishment’s many failings, and how those (and not mere New Media attention) might be playing a role in the popularity of all three.

Trump, whatever his failings, is a free trade skeptic, and most of the free trade agreements pushed by that same Establishment consensus have failed to live up to their promises. Take NAFTA: it was supposed to reduce illegal immigration. Its skeptics pointed out that illegal immigration would probably increase. In this real-world experiment, it was the skeptics’ prediction and not the Establishment’s that was proven correct.

Both Sanders and Corbyn opposed the Iraq War fiasco. This was so self-evidently a blunder that outside the English-speaking world, even some prominent conservative leaders (such as Jacques Chirac) opposed it. As did some prominent centrists, like Senator Byrd (who was I believe the only Senator who had also been in office when LBJ pulled the Gulf of Tonkin snow job on Congress and led the nation into the Vietnam War based on lies).

Meanwhile, both the “New” Democrats and the “New” Labourites decided to be “practical” and “realistic” by supporting the war.

At the time, the best the Establishment could manage was : “Oh, isn’t this interesting: the anti-war crowd is playing the national security card by saying that going to war will end up actually undermining it; there’s a controversy about which course is best for national security. Let’s present both sides as equally plausible — even though the preponderance of evidence favors the skeptics — because, heavens, we wouldn’t want to be accused of ‘bias’ or anything.”

And then there’s the financial deregulation that paved the way for the Great Recession, something else that the self-professed “responsible” “New” Democrats and Labourites united with conservatives to enact over the opposition of the left wings of both their parties.

If the Establishment wants answers as to why it is getting less and less respect, it would be better served by taking a good long look in the mirror rather than playing pin-the-blame-on-the-Internet and sermonizing about ignorant peasants.

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