JONATHAN CHAIT JULY 19, 2011
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Despite months of media hype, I've expressed long-standing, deep skepticism that the Senate "Gang of Six" would ever succeed in getting a deficit agreement passed into law. The final stages of the group are just plain sad:
In a last-ditch effort to make their deficit-cutting ideas relevant to the debt ceiling debate, the remnants of the Gang of Six will give a presentation on their plan to a bipartisan group of about 50 senators on Tuesday morning, according to several congressional sources.
Sens. Mark Warner (D-Va.), Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) and Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) plan to go over the broad outlines of a finished proposal that would cut roughly $3.6 trillion in spending over 10 years from the federal budget.
The Gang of Six — now actually just five senators — has held a series of small-group discussions in recent weeks to try to build new support for their approach. But Republicans Chambliss and Crapo have withheld their public support for the deal because fellow Republican Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) walked away from the deal in May over a failure to cut discretionary spending and Medicare as deeply as he would like.
How predictable was this failure? The exact same thing happened in health care. Six Senators, evenly divided between the parties, started negotiating on a bipartisan plan. They called themselves the "Gang of Six." Then the most conservative Republican bolted. Then the other republicans started backing away from the deal, ultimately indicating they wouldn't support it even if it reflected their own proposal.
Senators remain strongly attached to the folklore of bipartisanship. But no amount of meetings, charm, pleas, and dealing can get Republicans to break loose from their party's caucus discipline. The modern Republican Party is a parliamentary party. Maybe you can still forge bipartisan deals on minor issues. But on major policy questions in which party activists and pressure groups take an interest, forget about bipartisan wise man deals. If you think that can still work, you're living in the past.
4 comments
"Senators remain strongly attached to the folklore of bipartisanship" -- there you go again. No, Republicans remain strongly attached to accusing the OTHER side of lacking bipartisanship, even as they themselves are walking away from the table. The Democrats ARE attached to being bipartisan, which is why they keep making compromises that are then ignored by the Republicans because they've redefined "compromise". So saying all Senators are attached is simply not true, the Republicans give it lip-service but are hypocrits. Still, your conclusion is absolutely correct -- until some future time, "forget about bipartisan wise-man deals". If only Obama, and the voters, understood this.
- AllanL5
July 19, 2011 at 10:11am
I believe that Obama fully understands the strategy of the Republicans, and the divisive nature of their political tactics. He further understands that perpetuation of this strategy and the failure to move our government towards a consensus will cripple our ability to deal with future problems. Obama believes that his fundamental role in American political development is not to enact specific policies, but to attempt to breach the divide that presently exists in American politics. Our system is structurally incapable of operating on a strictly parliamentary basis. A certain degree of compromise on both sides is necessary to address the problems facing our nation. Unfortunately, the Republicans have adopted parliamentary-style discipline and ruthless tactics that are crippling our government. I believe that the media has failed to expose the one-sided nature of the failure to reach compromise solutions. Granted, I would prefer her that Obama more aggressively expose this failure on the part of the Republicans; however, I submit that he is gradually exposing the Republicans for what they are, and that this will be his ultimate legacy as President. If you view Obama's actions through the prism of his overriding goal of being a unifying president, his actions are justified and necessary.
- spd1955
July 19, 2011 at 11:03am
- Didn't any deals become minor compared to a greater goal, all tactics had to fit the strategy to unseat President Obama? I think the GOP concluded in early '09 that the waves of '06 and '08 could only be stemmed if they denied the president victories. Even when interests would have preferred compromise they had less clout after Republicans became convinced dealing would lead to their demise.
- michaelg
July 19, 2011 at 11:09am
Bipartisanship went out the window with the advent of the Party of Epistemic Closure. Not that you would know, A., but there still remains a mythology of bipartisanship in the clubby senate. It is not shared by all senators, but this tradition dies hard, and that is what Jonathan was writing about. Welcome back, Jonathan. I hope you had a good mini-vacation.
- liberalref
July 19, 2011 at 12:42pm