“Both of them realize there is a desire in the country for a different politics of national unity that transcends the current polarization,” Mr. Wittman said.
At the same time, both have endured serious presidential campaigns before and market themselves as independent power brokers within their parties.
“That’s their great commonality,” Mr. Wittman said. “Obviously, if they faced each other in a general, they would emphasize their differences.”
Basically there are people who imagine that there is a supermajority political consensus in this country which is shattered by nasty partisanship from politicians. There's a belief that fundamental disagreements about how this country should be run come not from voters but from politicians.
Magically, of course, this imagined supermajority political consensus always seems to match perfectly with the personal political views of the person calling for unity. And, unsurprisingly, it tends to roughly match up with the basic worldview of the Washington Post editorial board.
It's authoritarian because it calls for conformity and brands dissenters as the problem. Get on board the unity bus, they say, can't we all get along. That's what the nation needs. Stop your nasty disagreements, and let my team rule without criticism.
For all his railings about the blogosphere, the Bullshit Moose is about the most unhinged blogger there is. He's troubled by disagreement, especially anyone who disagrees with him. He assumes their motives, unlike his, are impure and base (odd for someone who has made his living getting paid to agree with other people, from the Christian Coalition to the Heritage Foundation to John McCain), while he transcends all that petty nonsense with his vision of a shining country on a hill. It isn't just him, of course. This basic view is possessed by many members of the elite chattering class. It's quite disturbing.