This senatorial country club gentrified civility will be the death of us.

[expatriot]

So Roberts is "well-liked" by Democrat beltway insiders; never mind his politics, his ideology, his interests, etc. When is our team in D.C. going to realize that we, the American people, count on them to fight for us on the battlefield of ideas for the future of this country. But instead it so often seems they think of it as a country club, with winks and nudges and secret lodge rituals that mean nothing to the lives of those they supposedly serve.

[ugarte]

1. How many times do we have to be seduced and screwed

by the Democratic Party to start feeling foolish? How sad is it that the Democrats are what passes for a left wing in this country?

[Fridays Child]

2. It's time to remind congressional Dems that their constituents...

...are NOT interested in what beltway insiders think.

[McKenzie]

3. Demopublican Party?

a rather snide comment by me there. However, it is true to say that the parameters of political debate in developed countries tend to gravitate towards a conventional wisdom that excludes anything that might be left of the dial. Anything right of the dial tends to be more readily accepted because the conventional wisdom is already conservative (with a small "c")

I don't know why this happens or, more precisely, why those who participate in the higher levels of government follow the conventional wisdom. I suppose it's partly the near impossibility of attaining high office unless one's ideas reflect the views of the established order. Radicals need not apply and all that which begs the question of how any idea is deemed radical as measured against "accepted" (sic) behaviour.

There is an interesting commentary in "American Psycho" that mirrors this veneer of civility that covers the underlying ruthlessness of corporate life. It's a bloody awful book, not least because it is misogynist. But the scene in the board room where the well-dressed yuppies are all warily eying one another's sartorial elegance is the one that struck me. Here were "successful" business types, dressed in clothing that graced the front of upmarket fashion magazines, yet at the heart of it all was an underlying core of coldness. The outward appearance is civil - the truth is somewhat darker.

So, this is a long-winded (and probably garbled) way of saying that your comment about Country Club civility is bang on the nail.