During the recent presidential election campaign, we were invited by
sophisticates in the media to admire the skill with which President Clinton engineered his own re-election (with the help of Dick
Morris) by means of what was called “triangulation.” This meant that the President created his own political middle ground by a rhetorical strategy of distancing himself from many of his supporters in Congress, and from such traditional liberal Democratic issues as Federal welfare guarantees, while at the same time
characterizing his Republican opponents as “extremists.” Thus the
man at the very center of American politics was able to represent
himself as being, in some important sense, above politics, and a
moderating influence on both sides in an atmosphere of, as people
(or at least the press) had become persuaded, “incivility” and bitter
partisanship.

Naturally, such a strategy depended absolutely on the cooperation of
the media, which was obtained partly by their natural wish to elect a
Democratic president but partly also by the clever exploitation of three of the most
entrenched myths that the American media culture has for years
assiduously promoted. These are that the social programs, if not the
broader political views, of traditionalist liberal Democrats have in
some degree been discredited; that the Gingrich Republicans are
dangerously “extreme” in their views; and that the most serious
problem facing the Federal government is “gridlock” and strongly
held partisan positions. Each of these myths is based on some more
subtle truth, but its own truth or