"...[M]any business leaders, media executives and others desperately want to duck the radicalism of the Republican Party. They suggest there is a sensible center that each party should aim for, and they cast left-leaning figures such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) as equally problematic as former president Donald Trump.
"A months-long, heavily hyped standoff that ended with a bipartisan compromise will encourage this wrongheaded analysis of what ails American politics. We are now headed toward a presidential election in which a truly radical, antidemocratic person (Trump or Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis) looks to have a strong chance of being elected president. And the biggest priority of many in the news media and the business community will be to play down that person’s radicalism to show objectivity and neutrality.
"We
didn’t default. That’s good. But the extremism of today’s Republican
Party remains a huge threat to the country. This deal is a relief. It’s
not cause for celebration." -- Perry Bacon, Jr., concluding a Washington Post op/ ed, summarizing the problems we still face after the debt ceiling disaster was averted: a radical Republican/ Seditionist/ Shooters Party and a craven media unwilling to stand up for the truth and democracy.
