Historic Quote: “Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.” Mark Twain.
What is there to say about the shutdown that hasn’t already been said? Disgusting. Disingenuous. Heinous. Inexcusable.
The dysfunction of Washington is falling on the backs of the poor and the vulnerable. It’s heinous enough that much of Washington is furloughed. But when cancer care, veterans benefits and screening for salmonella outbreaks have been stalled, that ought be a loud and clear breaking point for the American people. Indeed, polls show it is. And yet it continues.
Let’s look at how we got to this point. It may be tempting to say the Tea-Partiers got control of Speaker Boehner’s head and agenda, and that much is true. The Speaker’s refusal to not only reign in the most vocal conservative wing but bend and allow a clean vote to reopen the government in light of the fact that there are clearly votes to end the shutdown (while insisting otherwise) is a sign of a major misread that will forever define his legacy. And it may be tempting to blame Ted Cruz but he had little to do with it as well. He can rant and rave on the Senate floor all he wants but, in the end, the Senate did it’s job.
The shutdown actually goes beyond both men. It’s the rhetoric, a win at all costs mentality, and ego. And yes, a lack of accountability.
Changing it requires a number of things.
One is redistricting reform. Nate Cohn had a piece in the New Republic entitled, “Gerrymandering Isn’t To Blame,” for the Tea-Party dominance in this debate. By itself, that much is true. Let’s examine it.
The overwhelming majority of Tea-Party guys and gals hail from the south and west, where many primary voters have, in the last two cycles, advanced the most conservative candidates to the general election. Because those districts are so Republican, winning the primary essentially means they’ll be elected.
But while the Tea-Party is growing more dominant, it by no means applies to the district of every House incumbent in the Republican Conference. That’s where hyper-partisan redistrictings come in.
The one party, mainly Republican domination of many Governorships and State Legislatures allows the party to consolidate their more marginal seats. That gave all but a handful of Representatives in those states districts where, barring a wave election, members can generally count on coasting to new terms.
Prior to 2012, President Obama carried many districts held by Republican incumbents handsomely. These included Republicans such as Pat Tiberi and Steve Stivers of Ohio, and Lou Barletta of Pennsylvania, the latter whom was for a “clean” resolution before he became against it, presumably under pressure from his very conservative brethren. Post redraw, their districts saw a nearly 10% jump in Republican performance.
Stivers went from a competitive district to one that is relatively safe
These folks may not hew to the Tea-Party philosophy, but, they don’t have to. For not being constrained by election worries leaves them freer to conspire with their party leadership, rather than carefully treading middle ground had their districts been more evenly divided. And because one party rule has increased over the last two decades, so have the number of “off-the-table seats. In other words, instead of negotiating policy with the center, they can negotiate with the hard and harder right. That’s what the rank’n’file House Republicans are doing, and that’s what Speaker Boehner, against his better judgement, is doing.
Therein lies another problem. Wonder why the number of House Republicans on record for baking a “clean” CR has stalled in the past week? Dana Bash of CNN interviewed a number of House Republicans who told her off the record that while they’d be willing to back a “clean” CR, they don’t want to publicly state that for fear of needlessly stirring up the Tea-Party.
Some of these members are already held in deep suspicion by the group. But many members might have Kenny Rogers in their car CD players, because they’re a “Gambler” and don’t “know when to hold ‘em,” and “don’t know when to fold ‘em.” While a GOP Congressman once told me polling is difficult because the Tea Party is all over the place, the full effects. What they do know – or at the very least ought to, is that the backlash in a general will be far worse.
Minnesota’s John Kline is emblematic of that. He represents a district that twice voted for President Obama, the second time by the narrowest of margins.
But while never having a Tea-Party bent, Kline is a conservative at heart. And he chairs a committee, which would make going against his leadership troubling. Kline could probably survive a Tea-Party challenge. But the more he relents, it’s likely that the moderate voters in his district will And that should be far more worrisome. Ditto for scores of other GOP incumbents.
Conversely, a quartet of Pennsylvania Republicans, Jim Gerlach, Pat Meehan, Mike Fitzpatrick, and Charlie Dent, have seen the Republican base in their districts grow, but not nearly enough to have safe seats. Thus, they came out for a “clean” CR early.
Which brings me to the next factor in how we got into this mess; the demise of the centrists. Both parties have seen a purge of all but a handful of what I refer to as quintessential moderates. You know, the true deal makers.
These individuals have either been taken out by their own parties for not being ideologically pure enough or by the general electorate in districts where the other party has an edge. GOP centrists retired or were defeated in large numbers in the Democratic waves of 2006 and 2008. Democratic “Blue Dogs” were eviscerated in 2010, as literally half the 50 or so member caucus left office. 2012 continued the pattern. And centrists, or knee-jerk moderates, or members of the “Squish Caucus” are such because they are the ones who are accountable back home. And because elections are decided by the middle, lacking centrists will lack choices. Voters will have to choose between one extreme or the other. And that adds to the paralysis.
What I fear is that the impact that this stalemate on this will have is driving the few remaining genuine moderates to express further disgust and leave. We’ve seen that cycle after cycle. Now, I can picture junior incumbents such as Republican Richard Hanna of New York and Democrat Raul Ruiz of California, who were anything but traditional politicians upon coming to Congress, deciding that they can’t make a difference on the inside and return to their chosen fields (developer and physician respectively), where they can make a tangible difference, not to mention far more money.
It’s not just the shutdown. It’s everything from immigration reform to fiscal policy, to just about everything. But obviously, the shutdown is the most consequential.
And what of the “No-Labels” citizen movement organization, founded with the prime goal of foster understanding regardless of personal views and party lines? At the very least, the intention was to stop hyper-partisanship, particularly situations such as this. To date, 86 members of Congress have joined the “Problem-Solvers Caucus,” and, “have agreed to meet regularly to build trust across the aisle.” Some of the members encompass both sides of the ideological spectrum. But with most members sticking with their parties, one has to wonder how many memberships are for boasting rights.
Other negatives. Talking points is among the worst. Both parties use them, and in many cases they strain credulity, but it’s a “Beltway” mentality where they assume folks outside won’t be able to see through the logic. Sadly, they’re right. My most vivid recollection on this was a Senate debate over the stalling of judicial nominations. Mitch McConnell rebutted Harry Reid’s call for swifter confirmations by saying Democrats are “worried about 17 people who already have jobs (the Senate has a Constitutional responsibility to confirm vacancies). And we’ve seen Boehner do the same by pounding the “he’s refusing to negotiate” line, which in and of itself is misleading (the administration has already agreed to GOP requests of pre-sequestration funding levels).
Now having staff compose talking points will not change. But in a perfect world, not having them would require members to be on their feet. And in crisis’ like these, that would be refreshing.
I can’t close this column without proposing at least one more solution. It may seem simplistic but bear with me. Sending more women to Congress.
We’ve heard that women are consensus builders and that is true. But more importantly, they lack the testosterone and ego that, by nature, many men don’t. Now that’s not to say women can’t give as good as they get. An episode of Piers Morgan where Debbie Wasserman-Shultz and Marsha Blackburn debated it could easily disabuse that. And just imagine Hillary Clinton and Sara Palin as Presidential opponents. The campaign slogans of either could easily be, “Weakness Not Permitted.”
But the civility and mutual respect for one another was there. Those are two things Congress lacks. And there’s a third. Courage.
I won’t put the lack of it solely at the hands of the GOP. It’s universal. And it’s beyond problematic.
Martin Luther King Jr once said, “Courage breeds creativity; Cowardice represses fear and is mastered by it.Cowardice asks the question, is it safe? Expediency ask the question, is it politic?
Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience ask the question, is it right? And there comes a time when we must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.”
So in light of King’s words, how should the tired and the frustrated proceed? Either our elected officials start heeding those words or we get new elected officials.
In closing. Kenny Rogers closed the “Gambler” with the words, “When you’re sittin’ at the table, there’ll be time enough for countin’
When the dealin’s done.”
So let’s get a deal and count the chips.