L.A.'s Leaked City Council Tape Reminds Us Why 'Smoke-Filled Rooms' Are Bad

The rampant cable news attention seeking and kayfabe committee hearings that characterize politics today have an ideologically diverse set of pundits yearning for a return of the "smoke-filled room." There, the argument goes, politicians could hash out policy in private, frank conversations away from all the bad incentives created by TV cameras and records requests.

"Sometimes," wrote Jonathan Rauch in 2015, "the only thing wrong with smoke-filled rooms is the smoke."

The intensifying scandal surrounding three Los Angeles City councilmembers caught on a surreptitious recording making racist remarks during one such "frank" conversation shows how unwarranted that romance for smoke-filled rooms really is.