“Beyond Polarization To Warfare”: It’s The Broader Acceptance Of Political Warfare In The Conservative Movement That’s Most Alarming
At WaPo’s Monkey Cage subsite today, there’s an important piece by University of Texas political scientist Sean Theriault that gets to a distinction in political attitudes that some of us have been trying to articulate ever since the radicalization of one of our two major parties occurred:
I have been studying party polarization in Congress for more than a decade. The more I study it, the more I question that it is the root cause of what it is that Americans hate about Congress. Pundits and political scientists alike point to party polarization as the culprit for all sorts of congressional ills. I, too, have contributed to this chorus bemoaning party polarization. But increasingly, I’ve come to think that our problem today isn’t just polarization in Congress; it’s the related but more serious problem of political warfare….
Perhaps my home state of Texas unnecessarily reinforces the distinction I want to make between these two dimensions. Little separates my two senators’ voting records – of the 279 votes that senators took in 2013, Ted Cruz and John Cornyn disagreed less than 9 percent of the time (the largest category of their disagreement, incidentally, was on confirmation votes). In terms of ideology, they are both very conservative. Cruz, to no one’s surprise, is the most conservative. Cornyn is the 13th most conservative, which is actually further down the list than he was in 2012, when he ranked second. Cornyn’s voting record is more conservative than conservative stalwarts Tom Coburn and Richard Shelby. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz disagreed on twice as many votes as John Cornyn and Ted Cruz.
The difference between my senators is that when John Cornyn shows up for a meeting with fellow senators, he brings a pad of paper and pencil and tries to figure out how to solve problems. Ted Cruz, on the other hand, brings a battle plan.
That’s probably why Cornyn has attracted a right-wing primary challenge from Rep. Steve Stockman.
The rise of “politics as warfare” on the Right, accompanied with militarist rhetoric, is one that my Democratic Strategist colleagues James Vega and J.P. Green and I discussed in a Strategy Memo last year. We discerned this tendency in the willingness of conservatives to paralyze government instead of redirecting its policies, and in the recent efforts to strike at democracy itself via large-scale voter disenfranchisement initiatives. And while we noted the genesis of extremist politics in radical ideology, we also warned that “Establishment” Republicans aiming at electoral victories at all costs were funding and leading the scorched-earth permanent campaign.
All I’d add at this point is that it’s not terribly surprising that people who think of much of the policy legacy of the twentieth century as a betrayal of the very purpose of America–and even as defiance of the Divine Will–would view liberals in the dehumanizing way that participants in an actual shooting war so often exhibit. But it’s the broader acceptance of political warfare in the conservative movement and the GOP–typified by the perpetual rage against the Obama administration–that’s most alarming.
By: Ed Kilgore, Contributing Writer, Washington Monthly Political Animal, January 10, 2014
“Bad News For The Jobless And America”: How Our Economy Lost $400 Million In One Week Alone
Long-term unemployment benefits expired on December 28, meaning an absence of checks this week for more than 1 million jobless Americans. That’s bad news for them, of course—but also the rest of us. According to a new analysis from the minority staff of the House Ways and Means Committee released Friday, $400 million was drained from state economies this week alone thanks to the lapse.
Unemployment benefits are one of the more effective forms of stimulus because the money is badly needed and thus spent right away. The Congressional Budget Office says 200,000 jobs will be lost this year if the benefits are not restored, and this week the damage began.
Big states were obviously the hardest hit, naturally: nearly $65 million came out of the California economy in one week alone, according to the analysis. And of course, states represented by Republicans who oppose the extension each suffered some economic harm. Senator John Cornyn twice blocked a vote on an unemployment insurance extension before the holiday recess, and his home state of Texas lost $21.8 million this week.
Yet Republicans, so far, have not expressed any desire to extend the benefits. “Every week that Republicans fail to act tens of thousands of additional long-term unemployed Americans lose this vital lifeline as they look to get back on their feet after the worst recession in generations, and the economy in each state is taking a hit,” said Representative Sander Levin, the ranking member on Ways and Means.
Senator Harry Reid has promised a vote early next week on a bill by Senators Jack Reed and Dean Heller to extend the benefits for three months, with no offsetting spending cut, so that a longer-term bill can be worked out. But Heller is the only known Senate GOP sponsor to date, and House Speaker John Boehner has said he doesn’t want any bill without a pay-for attached.
If that bill fails, Democrats have a couple options this month: an extension of benefits could perhaps be folded into either the farm bill, which is in conference negotiations, or into the several omnibus spending bills that need to be finalized soon. In those latter two cases, Republicans would no doubt extract some sort of price from Democrats for extended benefits, but perhaps a solution is still possible.
But, again, Republicans seem to have other plans. House majority leader Eric Cantor announced Thursday his plans for the new year: yet another vote to modify Obamacare, this time adding new security requirements to the health insurance exchanges. The White House has said there is no danger of breaches, and some observers, like Steve Benen, think Cantor’s bill is simply a ploy to scare people away from the exchanges.
In any case, while Cantor fiddles around with his messaging bill on Obamacare (which will never be signed into law), his home state of Virginia lost $2.8 million in economic activity this week, as 9,700 people lost benefits. That’s going to be hard to justify as time goes on, both for Cantor and his colleagues.
By: George Zornick, The Nation, January 3, 2014
“A New Level Of Immaturity”: Ted Cruz Manages To Get Even More Repulsive
OK, Sen. Ted Cruz showed me: I accused him of hypocrisy for his Nelson Mandela praise last week – praise that horrified his racist wingnut Facebook fans – and he followed up by attending Mandela’s memorial service this week.
That’s nice. But far from getting into the “What Would Mandela Do?” spirit of the day, he made headlines by walking out on the speech by Cuban President Raúl Castro. President Obama, meanwhile, is being torched by the right for shaking Castro’s hand, and even seeming to “bow” to the Communist leader; can’t some tall conservatives, at least, explain that what we saw was a tall man greeting someone shorter? Nah.
Of course, Cruz couldn’t pull off his walkout with quiet dignity. ABC News broke the story, and its headline reads “Cruz says he walked out of Mandela service when Raul Castro spoke.” Get that? It appears Cruz wasn’t spotted walking out, he announced it, with a hectoring statement from his spokeswoman to ABC: “Sen. Cruz very much hopes that Castro learns the lessons of Nelson Mandela. For decades, Castro has wrongly imprisoned and tortured countless innocents. Just as Mandela was released after 27 years in prison, Castro should finally release his political prisoners. He should hold free elections, and once and for all, set the Cuban people free.”
I can very much promise you that Ted Cruz has not learned the lessons of Nelson Mandela.
Communist Cuba did indeed help the African National Congress and Mandela always expressed his gratitude. Castro had as much right as Obama to speak at the service. In fact, one lesson of Mandela applies to Cuba today: We should stop seeing the world in Cold War terms – which is what led the U.S., particularly Ronald Reagan and the American right, to support Mandela’s jailers and their apartheid rule — and realize that we can do more to support democracy in Cuba by engaging with Castro than by walking out on him.
Also: Are we supposed to think it’s a big deal that Cruz won’t endorse Steve Stockman against “liberal” Texas Sen. John Cornyn (he of the second most conservative voting record in the U.S. Senate, which is saying something). Because it’s not. “As the senator has said many times, he will likely not get involved in any incumbent primaries,” Cruz’s communications director told Jonathan Martin. (That’s a promise he made to mend fences with his GOP colleagues after his government shutdown fiasco.)
Of course, anyone who cared about either the state of Texas or the state of the Republican Party would “get involved” in that race. They’d stand up and say Steve Stockman isn’t fit to be a rodeo clown, let alone a U.S. senator, and endorse Cornyn. If Cruz’s staying neutral is supposed to represent a new maturity, I’d hate to see what’s considered his juvenile behavior.
Well, we’ve already seen it. But still, what a low bar for Ted Cruz’s “maturity.” Even Rand Paul is backing his Kentucky colleague Mitch McConnell over his 2014 Tea Party challenger – and Matt Bevin, said challenger, isn’t a racist nutjob. If Cruz won’t support Cornyn, that’s because he’s hoping he can get an edge on Paul with the racist nutjob vote in 2016. Good luck with that, Sen. Cruz.
By: Joan Walsh, Editor at Large, Salon, December 11, 2013
“There’s Only So Far You Can Follow Your Extremists”: Conservative Anger Over Budget Deal Now Purely To Save Face
Have we finally reached a point where the perpetual anger of Washington conservatives is no longer a threat to the republic? The budget deal announced yesterday suggests that it may well be, at least for the moment. It isn’t that conservatives aren’t raising a stink about it—they’re displeased that it doesn’t repeal the Affordable Care Act, slash Social Security and Medicare, and do more to punish food-stamp recipients, among other things—because they certainly are. Indeed, they were decrying it even before it was announced, which tells you how concerned they are about the details. But they seem to be just going through the motions. Send the press releases, say you’ll vote against it, tell Fox News why it doesn’t get to the real problems … and then we’ll all move on. The budget will pass, mostly because it averts the possibility of a government shutdown (at least over the budget, though not over the debt ceiling) for two more years. And even the most conservative Republican knows that’s a good thing for their party.
Just look at how John Boehner is acting. Boehner, who spent the entire period of the shutdown (and the weeks leading up to it) stepping gingerly around his party’s right wing as though it were a Bengal tiger that could rip his throat out with a single swipe if angered, now feels free to attack the likes of Heritage Action, obviously without concern that they can make him pay for his insolence:
At a press conference Wednesday, a visibly angry Boehner said conservative groups who oppose the two-year budget deal struck by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) are “using our members and they’re using the American people for their own goals. This is ridiculous.” Moments earlier, during a closed-door meeting, Boehner told House Republicans that the well-funded and influential organizations “aren’t acting out of principle, and they’re not trying to enact conservative policies. They’re using you to raise money and expand their own organization,” he said, according to a source in the room.
Those are some pretty strong words. Meanwhile, primary challenges to Republicans who have sinned against purity aren’t exactly looking formidable at the moment. Steve Stockman, who could well be the single nuttiest Republican in the House (and that’s saying something), is mounting a challenge to already extremely conservative Texas senator John Cornyn, one that will produce some moments of comedy but is almost certainly doomed. There are other primary challenges in progress to high-profile Republicans like Lindsey Graham, but most of those will probably fail as well.
That doesn’t mean that the Tea Party is irrelevant, or that events couldn’t conspire to renew their power and influence over the Republican party. For the moment, however, it does appear that the shutdown provided everyone in the GOP a valuable lesson: there’s only so far you can follow your extremists before they lead you off the cliff, and once you’ve plunged to the bottom, you don’t much want to climb back up and hurl yourself off again.
By: Paul Waldman, Contributing Editor, The American Prospect, December 11, 2013
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