Sunday is becoming prime rant day. Today, as so often in the past, I must take exception to a “balanced, pox on both their houses” article by Sheryl Gay Stolberg of New York Times.
The current trope is that Washington has become more partisan in the past 20 years. It may very well be true that, since so many house districts have been gerrymandered into safe status, the ideological difference between the typical members of Congress has widened. But when one talks about raw partisan behavior, including the take no prisoners obstructionism exhibited by the Republicans, there is simply no comparison between the parties.
It’s likely the case that Bush was warmly and rightly detested by the majority of Democrats. There is simply nothing in the historical record to compare with the Republican record compiled in just the last four weeks, and for which the pattern has now been set for the next four years. Unanimous opposition in the House, rigidly enforced. Promises of filibusters in the Senate, on everything.
What’s laughable about Stolberg’s article is that she attributes this opposition, apparently without irony, to ideological principles:
…[I]n the partisan politics of recent decades, another view developed, advanced by Congressional leaders like Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, that the minority party has the right, even obligation, to stick to its ideological principles
That would be the ideological principle against deficits, in case you were wondering. The one they stuck to with such fidelity when they were running things.
Then we have the token example of Democratic perfidy:
Republicans haven’t cornered the market for blocking presidential initiatives. Democrats were so successful at filibustering Mr. Bush’s judicial nominees that their Senate leader,Tom Daschle, was labeled “an obstructionist” and lost his seat in 2004.
A little deconstruction is in order. First, labeling someone an obstructionist does not make him so, and this article is purportedly about real obstructionism, not ginned up but baseless charges. Second, a judicial nomination is not a presidential initiative. Third, the “successful” Democrats blocked 10 out of 229 Bush first term nominations, hardly a huge number, and quite comparable to the Republican record in the last Clinton term. More importantly, it is well nigh impossible to come up with an instance of the Democrats blocking any Bush legislative initiative by using the filibuster. Would that they had in many instances. The Constitution might not be damaged, perhaps beyond repair, if they had. In fact, the record is pretty clear on Bush initiatives. Most of them passed pretty much as Bush wanted them, right up until the end, even while his numbers were only slightly ahead of Osama bin Laden’s.
One can argue about whether or not the Republicans are justified or not in adopting the strategy they have, but one can not argue that this behavior is symmetric. It simply isn’t. There are a lot of reasons for this. The Democrats are far more ideologically diverse. Rahm Emmanuel’s contingent of Blue Dog Democrats guarantees that. The Democrats in the Senate have had two recent leaders from Republican leaning states, both of whom have had to keep a wary eye out for their own re-election prospects while supposedly leading their party. (Republicans would never thing of giving such power to a Senator who had to worry about a substantial left leaning constituency.) Thus Harry Reid’s passive insistence that it takes 60 votes to pass anything in a Democratically controlled Senate, while 51 votes always did quite nicely while he led the minority. And there, once again, is the rub. Until the Democrats break the back of the filibuster, by forcing the Republicans to endure public scorn for utilizing it, they will be unable to govern effectively.
An added observation: It’s important to bear in mind that there is a world of difference between voting against a presidential initiative, and preventing a vote on that initiative. Bush, who promised to be a uniter, was never held to that promise and governed as a divider. His legislation came to a vote under both Democratic and Republican Senate Majorities. Obama is being held to account for failing to convert an obstreperousRepublican minority that announces opposition to his plans before they are announced, and who are prepared, in the Senate, to block votes on any legislation Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe, and/or Susan Collins don’t like.
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