POLITICS - Partisanship and Politics in Washington

PBS NewsHour Political Wrap 2/12/2010


"Shields and Brooks on Partisanship and Politics in Washington" (Transcript)

Excerpt

JIM LEHRER: And to the analysis of Shields and Brooks, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, New York Times columnist David Brooks.

JIM LEHRER: David, how do you read these new polls on people not going really strong for the government right now?

DAVID BROOKS: It is the -- it's like an emotion. It like a character, it is like an issue in the country, to me, the dominant issue, because, if you have these incredibly high levels of distrust, you can't do anything big. The country will not trust you to take a leap of faith.

I have said before in years past on this show that the single biggest poll number in American history is, do you trust government to do the right thing most of the time? Between 1932 and '64, you had high levels, 70, 80 percent. So, people would trust Washington, to take that leap of faith.

But, starting about Vietnam-Watergate era, it went down. And now we are about 17 percent, 19 percent, 23 percent, near or at historic lows. And that's just a gigantic, climactic force, which sort of paralyzing Washington. At the same time, people want change.

JIM LEHRER: Yes.

Mark, do you -- do you agree with those who say that the heart of this right now, at least, is the economy, 10 percent unemployment and all the rest?

MARK SHIELDS: Oh, I think the economy drives it, Jim. I think the biggest concern that voters express is, they want jobs. They want the government to do something about jobs. And they are concerned about unemployment and the economy in general. Those override everything else.

JIM LEHRER: But, to pick up on David's point -- he cited Watergate and Vietnam -- those were actions where -- where people did things wrong. There is no corruption attached to this downside in the polls, in terms -- it is a governing problem, right?

MARK SHIELDS: No, it really is, and David is right. I mean, we were talking, in the early to mid-'60s, right up until Vietnam started to go sour and go south, 65 percent, 70 percent, 75 percent of Americans having confidence, not only in their own future, but in the government, to do what is right, and Vietnam and the dissembling and lying and deceit, deception on that, followed by Watergate.

But this is -- this is sort of a new departure, and, really, an unnerving one, Jim, because, you point out, there isn't any scandal. There isn't any corruption. There isn't any great deception that the government has been guilty of or proven guilty of. And it's just -- it's just the failure of the economy.

We have been 27 years, and I think 28 years, if one thinks about it, since 1982, with really the bump in the early 90s, with George, the first George Bush, we have had low unemployment and low inflation. And this is -- this is, you know, a major, major departure.