"If there’s one through line in this administration so far, it’s the amassing of power. And if there’s another through line, it’s the destruction of anything that might restrain power, and that’s bureaucracy."

Said David Brooks, quoted in "David Brooks on Why the Democrats Are Losing to Trump" (NYT)(free-access link).

Why does he keep saying "through line"? It seems to mean theme... but on a time line... or narrative... but with one clear idea... except there are 2 "through lines" in Brooks's telling. Is it a vogue phrase? I don't think I've used it or quoted it before in the 20+ year history of this blog.

But I didn't quote David Brooks to muse on the words "through line." I quoted him because I was astounded to see bureaucracy touted as if it were part of the system of checks and balances in the American constitutional system.

Or am I misreading him? When he says "the destruction of anything that might restrain power, and that’s bureaucracy," I take that to mean he thinks bureaucracy might restrain power, and Trump is destroying that restraint. But it could mean that the destruction of restraint somehow equals bureaucracy. That seems unlikely. I've got to assume that Brooks embraces the idea of bureaucracy as a restraint on power!

Maybe I need to imagine a fictional character who loves bureaucracy and thinks it protects us and preserves our values.*

What values would those be?! At one point, Brooks's interviewer, Patrick Healy, says:

David, what about the Democrats who care less about strategy and seeming savvy, but instead feel like: “I have values, I have morals, I want to stick up for trans kids playing sports in school."

Astonishing! Healy wants to talk about people who don't care so much about practical politics but prefer to hold fast to their moral core, and he decides to name one issue and it's trans kids playing sports in school.

How on earth did Democrats decide this was the hill to die on? Is this even a moral core? I think it's more likely a corner they painted themselves into. Do they really believe male-bodied teenagers should play team sports with female-bodied teenagers or have they just committed to some propositions that they couldn't logically limit? Are they motivated by morality or by a fear of the loss of social standing with others who are immobilized by the same fear? It is the most absurd predicament. They want to be admired, but who would admire people who behave like that? 

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* I asked Grok, "Is there any fictional character who loves bureaucracy and thinks it protects us and preserves our values?"

The Circumlocution Office in Charles Dickens’ Little Dorrit (published 1855–1857) is a fictional government department that serves as a scathing satire of bureaucratic inefficiency and obstructionism. It’s one of Dickens’ most biting creations, designed to lampoon the real-life red tape and incompetence he saw in Victorian England’s administrative systems, particularly inspired by the government’s mishandling of the Crimean War.

It's always Crimea!

In the novel, the Circumlocution Office is where “nothing is ever done”—or rather, where everything is done to ensure nothing useful happens. Its unofficial motto is “How not to do it,” and it’s staffed by an army of clerks, officials, and aristocratic hangers-on (notably the Barnacle family) who excel at delaying, obfuscating, and burying any practical action under mountains of paperwork and protocol. 

Dickens introduces it in Chapter 10, describing it as a labyrinthine institution that “was before all other public departments in the art of perceiving—HOW NOT TO DO IT.” It’s a place where forms must be filled out in triplicate, signatures chased across continents, and simple requests—like Arthur Clennam’s attempt to uncover details about a debtor—vanish into an endless cycle of referrals and deferrals.