How Republicans Made Congress Stupid -- Inside the Washington Monthly's new Issue

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Dear friends,

The latest issue of the Washington Monthly is out, with a cover story (co-authored by yours truly) on an under-appreciated cause of Washington's disfunction that you might find interesting--see below.

Best,

Paul

Paul Glastris

Editor in Chief, The Washington Monthly

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Washington
Monthly

June/July/August

2014

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In This Issue

How Republicans Made Congress Stupid

Why did Congress not see the health exchange disaster coming? Why was it caught unawares by the extent of the NSA's surveillance programs? Why are senior House committee chairmen in safe seats quitting Congress altogether?

These seemingly disparate phenomena share the same profound but poorly understood root cause: Congress is getting stupider. Not in terms of the IQ of its members (though that's debatable) but in the capacity of the institution to evaluate information and understand complex topics. The reason is a 25-year campaign by conservatives to cut congressional staff, shrink investigative agencies like the General Accountability Office, and generally lobotomize Congress' brain. As Paul Glastris and Haley Sweetland Edwards explain in the cover story of the latest Washington Monthly, the result is increasing outsourcing of policymaking to K Street lobbyists, think tanks, and other vested interests while Congress looses its ability to conduct oversight of the executive branch, thereby setting up government to fail.

Read "The Big Lobotomy: How Republicans Made Congress Stupid."

Also in this issue...

Tilting at Windmills

Mobilizing chick power ... Male menopause ... Can Dems match gun raffles?

By Michelle Cottle

Ten Miles Square

Can Listicles Fund the Baghdad Bureau?

How BuzzFeed and HuffPo manage to do real journalism. For now.

by Steven Waldman

Talk of the TOONS

Features

Why the White Working Class Matters

The bad news: Dems can't govern without them. The good news: Blue-collar whites are far more diverse than during the era of the Reagan Democrats.

by Stanley Greenberg

Beyond Identity Politics

To reach the white working class, promise an economy that "works for everyone."

by Ruy Teixeira and John Halpin

The Last Interesting Centrist

Can Michael Smerconish save cable from the tyranny of partisanship?

by Simon van Zuylen-Wood

Thrown Out of Court

How corporations became people you can't sue.
by Lina Khan

The Big Lobotomy . . .

Working the GOP's Weak Spot

How Barack Obama is following Bill Clinton's minimum wage game plan to try to hold onto the Senate.
by Paul Glastris

The Big Lobotomy
How Republicans Made Congress Stupid.

by Paul Glastris and Haley Sweetland Edwards

N POLITICAL BOOKS

Alone on His Own Ice Floe

How Antonin Scalia ceased to be a powerhouse jurist and became a crank.
by Michael O'Donnell

The Unkindest Cut

The visionary guidance counselor in a poor urban high school discovers why some top colleges don't want even his best students: money.

by Elias Vlanton

A Liberal's Call to Real Liberty

How FDR redefined freedom and changed America.

by Moshe Z. Marvit

Making School Choice Work

Two D.C. schools, a traditional public and a nonunionized charter, are experimenting with socioeconomic integration.

by Richard D. Kahlenberg

Enjoy the issue!

Regards,

Paul Glastris

Editor in Chief

Washington Monthly

@Glastris

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