In the Dog Days of the War, Recession and Health Reform

You know we’re in the dog days of politics when the esteemed NY Times Op-Ed columnist David Brooks writes a column about Obama’s education reform. After all the conflict and hoopla of the past several months it’s nice to read about something different. It’s time to move on.

The recession will end when it ends. No talking by the media gabinators or artful Op-Ed columns will hasten the recovery. The Dow continues to inch upward and unemployment appears to be inching downward. You can’t drive over any bridge or road in America that isn’t under repair with stimulus funds. It is what it is. There’s no changing it now.

Health reform is in the ninth inning. If you’re against it, you’re losing 10 to zip. If you want universal single payer, you were ejected from the game in the first inning. If you want the public option, you’re still behind by one run, and you have one more at-bat with 2 outs, and nobody on base. It’ll take a home run just to push the game into extra innings.

The President is showing signs of indecision on how to proceed in Afghanistan. The conservative gabinators smell blood. The war is in a holding pattern while he decides how to fight his war without appearing to look like the warmonger he ran against to get elected.

The 2010 election campaigns are starting to fill their war chests, but it’s still way too early to think about who will be Mr. October, better yet what the October surprise will be. The only thing that’s certain; Republicans will gain some seats. The party on the outside always picks up seats mid-term, and it won’t be any different this time.

So the brilliant David Brooks wrote about “The Quiet Revolution” in education reform today. A noble topic, but not the fire and brimstone we’ve become accustomed to lately. If we don’t get out of the dog days of politics soon we’ll all be putting our pens down.