The New York Times editorial board spouted weird, bipartisan nonsense.  I think this has to be their own, personal, “…Good people on both sides” moment. The paper has always held their weird false ‘balance’.  The Times, over and over, simply refuses to hold Republicans to account.

The Times has published quite a few oddly biased articles and editorials over the past few years. (Tell me again about how Trump’s televised cabinet meeting proved he was open to immigration compromise.)  The Times has a determined ignorance and an amazing flexibility when they avoid talking about uncomfortable, obvious facts.  I get the effort, but this moment was the most egregious examples I’ve seen.  It was simply inexcusable.

The lead New York Times editorial yesterday was titled “Here’s Another Fine Mess They’ve Gotten Us Into“:

Once again, Americans are being treated to a Capitol Hill cliffhanger over a government shutdown. The themes and plot twists differ each time, but this is a formulaic drama that reveals Congress’s bipartisan failure to perform its most basic task: to fund the federal government.
— New York Times Editorial, Jan 18th, 2018, Here’s Another Fine Mess They’ve Gotten Us Into

“…Bipartisan failure….”

So the GOP can’t write a budget that can pass, and the government they run might simply stop working.  They failed in this basic task even though they have majorities in both the Congress and Senate, and they control the Presidency. As part of their tactics, Republicans shut out Democratic participation in most legislation, as the Times accurately describes in that same editorial.  And despite this amazing advantage, Republicans can’t even get a temporary, continuing budget resolution to pass.

And who does the Times believe is responsible for this basic failure of governance?  It’s a Congressional “bipartisan failure.”

Really?  Bad people on both sides?  That’s certainly an interesting position for the Times.  So why do they believe this odd bit of ‘bipartisan’ nonsense?  What’s their argument for including the Democrats and Independents in this unquestionable clusterfuck?

The Times agreed that Trump kept blowing up most bipartisan efforts, and the GOP spent all their time trying to appease their child-king.  I can’t disagree.  They talked about DACA, foreign tholes, CHIP, and the Republican inability to even know what their own President believes. They wrote about how Trump continued to ‘tip over the table’ every time a compromise seems close to success.

The editorial ends with:

A government shutdown is not political strategy — it is calamitous evidence of bipartisan dysfunction, and, in this case, chaotic and cruel directives from the White House.  Both sides should buy themselves whatever time they need to reach a broader budget deal that protects young undocumented immigrants without punishing Americans with another shutdown. Congress should send the president a credible budget and demand that he sign it.
— New York Times Editorial, Jan 18th, 2018, Here’s Another Fine Mess They’ve Gotten Us Into [emphasis mine]

So the Times insists that any federal shutdown, should it happen, will have been from bipartisan dysfunction, and a failure on both sides.  The Times had no argument about what Democrats had done wrong.  No examples of steps not taken.  They didn’t call out a single Democrat or Independent.  The Times listed several places where Democrats tried several good compromises that the GOP President then blew up, despite his promises and public assurances just a few hours earlier. The Times didn’t even suggest what Democrats should be doing, but weren’t.

But the Times concluded it was a bipartisan problem.  Despite it all, Democrats and Independents were at least partly at fault.

This is clear press bias.  This is an abject failure of honesty by our grand old dame, the New fucking York Times.  They still, despite such an extreme and clear failure, cannot say the obvious truth.  This isn’t ‘bipartisan’ anything.  This is a Republican failure to govern.  We’ve seen every step from the beginning, through the middle, and down to the end, hosed up by Republican politics and their poisoned ideology.

However the government works this, and however it plays out in a few hours, this New York Times editorial is an embarrassment.  At a critical moment, the Times fails us again.