Reading Yuval’s post about the Treasury Secretary’s unease with the president’s bank plan, it seems pretty obvious that the political shop is running policy at the White House.

Of course, this was already obvious given the president’s turn from a creased-pants Niebuhrian pragmatist who mocks truck-owners (even though he runs the company that makes those trucks) and attributed his lack of support among Western Pennsylvania boom-stick owners to their distracting faith in a sky god and into a William Jennings Bryan cross-of-bonuses populist. But it does remind me that a lot of folks thought it was just terrible for Karl Rove to have any role in policy formation in the White House. Whatever the merits of this bank plan, is there any doubt that David Axelrod is playing just such a role here?

However galling the cynicism, dishonesty, and hypocrisy of the White House’s turn may be, I’m hardly scandalized that politics is influencing policy. That’s what politics is all about. My bigger concern is that such populist scapegoating rarely makes for good policy over the long haul.