free variable

Here’s an excellent and evocative one-liner from Peter Suderman’s recent Reason post about netroots disillusionment with the current administration, for whom charisma, control of all three branches of government, and regular bons mots are apparently insufficient leverage to establish an agenda that satisfies the truest of the true believers:

Unless you’re a character in an Aaron Sorkin show, that’s just not how national politics work.

The whole post is, I think, pretty well done and worth reading, but the point that many vocal citizens are apparently living in the onanistic and reductive political fantasy world of The American President &c. is one that probably bears repeating as often as possible.