Why we're where we are

When journalists are determined to find a way to assign equal blame to both sides in every crisis and foul-up, there can be no real accountability and without accountability, a democracy cannot function. If reporters were willing to go where the story led them instead of slavishly following a perverted view of 'fairness,' then politicians would face some consequence for gross irresponsibility.

Paul Krugman recently said

And look at what this does to incentives: no matter how badly Republicans behave, they don’t draw condemnation from the Very Serious People. All you get is tut-tutting about how politics is awful, and if only we had a third party to install Mike Bloomberg as dictator president all would be well.

Pundits who won’t call out extremism without pretending that it’s symmetric aren’t a big part of our problem, but they are a part of our problem.

He's wrong. They and journalists like the Washington Post's Felicia Sonmez are a big part of our problem and more; they are a necessary condition for the mess we're in.

Josh Marshall takes an in depth look at this idea here.