“No one has ever gotten into trouble by telling the interest groups what they want to hear.

(…)

Was it ever really that good?

In truth, there was never a golden age for political bravery in Washington.

The thought of limping back to Muncie as a defeated congressman has always filled legislators with existential dread. John Kennedy wrote “Profiles in Courage,” for which he was awarded the 1957 Pulitzer Prize, because gumption seemed so rare in midcentury Washington. Of course, JFK — who had himself gone AWOL when it came to standing up to Joe McCarthy — was not in the mood to hand out roses to Republicans like Margaret Chase Smith of Maine who had opposed the witch-hunting, career-destroying excesses of the anti-Communist crusade.

If senators were timid during the 1950s, Kennedy instinctively understood that the rise of television would only make things worse. As he put it, “Our everyday life is becoming so saturated with the tremendous power of mass communications that any unpopular or unorthodox course arouses a storm of protest such as John Quincy Adams — under attack in 1807 — could never have envisioned.”

This was all long before the hyperactive 24-hour news cycle…”

Walter Shapiro: Bygone patriots and the end of political courage - CNN.com
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  1. brooklynmutt posted this