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There is a new strain of apologetics in the mediasphere, stories that strive to mitigate November's electoral trainwreck for the Democrats by invoking near occult powers of malevolence. It was the billionaire Koch brothers and their funding of the Tea Party that undercut Obama, claims Jane Mayer in the New Yorker; yes, it was, and Rupert Murdoch too, wrote Frank Rich in the New York Times. It's because Washington is "broke," argues Todd Purdum in Vanity Fair, meaning broken by an excess of lobbying money and not broke by dint of fiscal profligacy. Purdum learned this, in part, by reporting a day in the life of the presidency.

To be sure, there are plenty of stories from the liberal-left that pull no punches: John Judis in a recent issue of the New Republic presents a reasoned...