Both Sides Take Aim At Pryor

Mark Pryor is a rare kind of politician. And thanks to the poisonous climate in national politics these days, his kind gets rarer by the day.

You see, Pryor, the senior senator from Arkansas, is a centrist. Though he’s a Democrat, he sees government solutions somewhere between the raving-mad Right and the lunatic Left. He doesn’t subscribe wholly to theprogressive doctrine of his party, nor does he dismiss conservative concepts simply because someone from the other side of the aisle might get credit for having a good idea.

The result of this entirely reasonable approach to public policy is not universal respect or bipartisan consensus. No, in today’s political world, it simply makes Pryor a target for criticism from both ends of the political spectrum.

Case in point: Pryor spoke to the Rogers Rotary Club last week and talked about the nation’s debt crisis. During his presentation, he made the logical argument that part of the solution lies in reforming the federal tax code. As an example, Pryor commented that the code allows 45 percent of citizens to pay no federal income tax and relies on the remaining 55 percent to pony up. That, he reasonably concluded, appears to be unfair and in need of reform.

It was clear to everyone in the room that Pryor was talking about federal income taxes. The story about the speech that appeared in this newspaper also makes the reference clear.

However, a self-described liberal blogger issued a withering rebuke of Pryor’s remarks, saying that he was pandering to the largely conservative Northwest Arkansas business community by repeating a canard that poor people don’t pay taxes. Using the time-tested strategy of selective omission, the blogger excoriated Pryor for throwing poor people under the bus, that the senator knows good and well that they pay all kinds of taxes, even if they are exempt from the federal income levy.

The folks at Fox News, who have perfected this cynical game of misdirection and obfuscation, would have been proud of the flawless technique, if not the policy point.

This diatribe got John Brummett, a columnist who appears in our paper several times a week, to call the senator’s staff to find out if Pryor had indeed turned into Mitch McConnell when he crossed the Benton County line. The staff, of course, said the senator was only trying to point out the unfairness of the tax system - which is exactly what the original story said. The only person who claimed Pryor said something dangerously conservative was the liberal blogger, who was simply trying to drive Pryor out of the middle and to the left.

Meanwhile, Pryor’s valid and reasonable observation that the U.S. tax code is in need of serious reform was lost in an argument over something he never said in the first place.

But, such is the nature of our politics these days, where the great majority of Americans in the middle are overshadowed by the rock-throwers on one side and the demagogues on the other. As long as meaningless rhetorical brawls like this one take precedence over the search for practical, reasonable and logical strategies, we’re doomed to the kind of gridlock that led the national government to the brink of financial chaos in July.

Speaking of absurd spats, President Barack Obama scheduled a televised speech to both chambers of Congress at the same time as a Republican Presidential primary debate. Speaker of the House John Boehner insisted on the next night - the beginning of the professional football season.

Is there no limit on the triviality to which our leaders’ partisan pettiness will stoop while millions remain out of work? Both men should be ashamed of themselves.