Book Review: Why We're Polarized
I. Ezra Klein is great. I know a lot of people throw shade on him for founding Vox. But as Van Gogh said about God creating the world, "We must not hold it against Him; only a master could make such a mistake". Ezra is a master and I was happy to be able to read his Why We're Polarized. (Amazon recommended it to me as "Why We're Polarized By Ezra Klein", which I would also have been happy to read.) Did you know that seventy years ago, our grandparents were having an underpolarization crisis? True! In 1950, the American Political Science Association "released a call to arms...pleading for a more polarized political system". The report argued that "the parties contain too much diversity of opinion and work together too easily, leaving voters confused about who to vote for and why". Everyone agreed with each other so much, and compromised so readily, that supporting one party over the other seemed almost pointless.