Lieberman, Obama, Bush, and Congressional Oversight

Though I had no stake in the party uproar surrounding the Senator from Connecticut, I flinched at the purported reason why Lieberman’s peers considered punishing him in the first place; namely, they said they took issue with him speaking out and working against Barack Obama during the presidential campaign.

In Reclaiming Conservatism — a book I have potentially “over-referenced” of late — Mickey Edwards argues that a central failure of the most recent six years of Republican rule (2000-06) was the morphing of Congress, from the people’s elected check-and-balancer into a bodyguard/cheerleader for the Executive Branch. In other words, Congressional Republicans cared more about maintaining party power and cohesion with Bush than they did about performing the contrarian role assigned them by the Constitution.

Thus, when Senate Democrats first shared their desire to punish Lieberman in the new Congress because he defied party cohesion during the campaign, my initial thought was: “Damnit. Here we go again. Different faces. Different ID badges. But the same-old ‘party duties before constitutional duties’ crap.”

Then Obama stepped in and effectively forgave Lieberman. To be clear, Obama did not tell Senate Democrats how to treat Lieberman — and he shouldn’t have. If I remember my Constitution correctly, beyond the veto pen, the White House has no authority to prescribe Congressional action. But Obama did make it clear that, whatever action Senate Democrats took, they should not take it on the grounds that Lieberman had refused to be a rabid fan of the President-Elect’s.

Say goodbye to the wind in the proverbial sails: Lieberman stays in the Democratic Caucus, loses a minor subcommittee chairmanship, but remains in the captain’s chair of the powerful Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

Now, here’s the kicker — a point I did not understand until I read this article in the Hartford Courant, the predominant newspaper in Lieberman’s home state. Per that article, Lieberman’s committee “not only oversees domestic security but will also have investigative power over the incoming Obama administration.”

Did you get that? By allowing bygones to be bygones, Obama effectively positions his non-fan Lieberman to stay in charge of a committee with investigative power over Obama’s administration. Our President elect impresses me as far too smart not to have known that was a consequence of his forgiveness.

Of course, some will take the cynical view, arguing that Obama hopes his charity toward Lieberman now will earn him a free pass later, when and if Lieberman is compelled to exercise his committee’s investigative function. But there’s a glaring logic-flaw in that cynicism: Obama could have stayed silent and let the Senate Democrats strip Lieberman of his oversight power all together, which they would have surely done if not for Obama’s expressed refusal to hold grudges.

Net: The tale of Joe’s survival may not guarantee Obama will break the pattern of Congressional defiance seen repeatedly during the Bush years. But it’s a damn good sign if there ever was one.