“The Battle For The Republican Party”: Just Another GOP Pity Party, Looking For Sympathy In All The Wrong Places
Imagine what would happen if:
• The budget deal passes the Senate with a handful of Republicans;
• Immigration reform passes the House and something is agreed upon by the Senate;
• In 2014 the House lead expands;
• All Senate incumbents defeat their right-wing challengers and the GOP takes the Senate;
• If not a grand bargain, then a modest bargain with some entitlement reform is passed; and
• One or more tea party favorites run in 2016 and lose decisively to a mainstream GOP nominee who wins the presidency.
Well, that would be a triumph of the center-right and the demise of the tea party, at least from an electoral and governance standpoint. It would reaffirm the GOP as a national, if not dominate, party. And it would move the national agenda significantly to the right since the GOP would hold both houses of Congress and the White House.
One can see, then, that what is of tremendous benefit to mainstream Republicans (and to the agenda of conservative reform) puts the tea party professionals — those inside the Beltway right wingers who gain glory and make money by attacking Republicans and blocking legislative compromise — largely out of business. Sure, they remain active participants in electoral politics, even more active critics and occasional contributors to national policy debates, but they no longer have the influence to either elect or primary candidates. They become merely gadflies and kibitzers.
That is one possible scenario that plays out over the next few years. One can see how the interests of mainstream and tea party conservatives collide and why, for example, the recent budget deal was a threat to the latter. The enemy (not of conservatism) but of the right wingers who depend on controversy, resentment and defeat is center-right governance. Functional government of the center-right saps the interest in throwing the “traitors” out. It discourages primaries from the right. It dulls the interest of donors.
It is important to distinguish here between conservatives who largely embrace the modern Reagan and post-Reagan agenda (best exemplified these days by GOP governors) and right wingers, those whose volume is always turned to high, see politics as all-or-nothing, want to take the country back to the pre-New Deal or even pre-Progressive era, and aim to freeze the United States demographically by keeping immigrants out and socially by refusing to accept changed beliefs on topics like gay marriage. The entities and politicians (the Heritage Action, angry talk radio, Sen. Ted Cruz crowd) that populate the second group flourish when the GOP is in the minority, so defeat is their ally.
The contrast between the two groups is evident in the trajectory of Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), pre- and post-shutdown. His ideology didn’t change, but his tone, outlook and purpose sure did after he saw the destruction wrought by the shutdown. He moved from the group that relishes defeat and delights in spreading resentment to the group that wants to govern. I’d suggest in the wake of the shutdown, and now the budget deal, we will see more conservatives follow Lee’s lead.
Now, there is another scenario, maybe less likely but certainly possible over the next few years:
• The budget deal passes the Senate with no Republicans;
• Immigration reform never passes the House and nothing is agreed upon with the Senate;
• In 2014 the House GOP lead stays the same or shrinks;
• Some Senate incumbents defeat their right-wing challengers, but others do not and the GOP doesn’t take the Senate;
• No bargains are struck for the remainder of the Obama term; and
• One or more tea party favorites runs in 2016, one wins the nomination and loses decisively to Hillary Clinton while the GOP House majority is lost as well.
In that case we return to an era of Democratic rule and the GOP becomes a marginal player on the national scene. It is impossible, I would suggest, for the country to be governed mostly, let alone entirely, by the GOP if the tea party contingent triumphs within the GOP. The people who brought us the shutdown do not reflect the desires, outlook and views of a majority of the country. When presented with that alternative, the lion share of the country will choose the Democrats time and time again.
Which one will it be? It’s up to GOP office holders, candidates and voters.
By: Jennifer Rubin, Opinion Blogger, Right Turn; The Washington Post, December 16, 2013
“A Very Low Bar”: How A Crazy Senator Became A Sudden Darling Of The So-Called Respectable Right
Fanfare! Trumpets! There has been a Big Important Speech on the Future of Conservatism. Let’s take it Really Seriously. Sen. Mike Lee, Republican of Utah, went to the Heritage Foundation Tuesday and spoke. Milton Friedman and Irving Kristol were namechecked! Russell Kirk was quoted! The gas tax was proposed to be slashed 80 percent! Oh wait, I am supposed to still be mentioning the Serious parts.
I shouldn’t make fun, maybe. There are serious parts. Lee’s concern for “immobility among the poor,” the middle-class squeeze, and “cronyist privilege at the top,” and his desire to fashion a conservative response to them, is the right note for a Republican senator to strike. Amen to calls for “a new conservatism of the working and middle class,” because either we will get one or the failed attempt to give us one will prove it to be a contradiction in terms. Conservative intellectuals of a reformist bent welcomed the speech—Ross Douthat, Reihan Salam (they co-wrote a book on these themes), Rich Lowry, Jennifer Rubin. BuzzFeed political editor McKay Coppins called it a “lofty, agenda-setting speech” for its ringing declaration, “frustration is not a platform. Anger is not an agenda. And outrage, as a habit, is not even conservative” and for its forceful denunciation of the House Republicans’ sociopathic shutdown tactic, which futilely damaged the U.S. economy and very nearly caused the federal government to default—a narrowly evaded catastrophe.
Except, of course, Lee didn’t do that last thing. Lee was pro-shutdown! Other than Ted Cruz, he was probably the House Republicans’ most important ally in the Senate. And he did not denounce—or, in his case, repudiate—the shutdown tactics. So now you see why I couldn’t help but make fun.
I suppose if we set the bar low enough that insects can do the limbo with it, you could read his speech as endorsing a less insane way forward. But here is what happened Tuesday: One of Washington’s most staunchly pro-shutdown politicians, appearing at maybe Washington’s most important pro-shutdown organization, pointedly refused to condemn the shutdown or suggest he would not support a future shutdown if it meant trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare.
On the contrary, Lee said, “I am proud of my friend Ted Cruz and the dozens of others—including Speaker John Boehner and the House Republicans—who fought Obamacare, continue to fight it, and will not stop fighting it.” At the outset, he narrated, “It began with our effort to stop Obamacare—a goal that all Republicans share even if we have not always agreed about just how to pursue it.” Absent a declaration that he no longer agrees with how he pursued it, one is forced to conclude that he feels the same way now. Douthat, Salam, and Lowry do not mention this.
There is a broader point here. If I ever found the bulk of my political views articulated by somebody whose most prominent action ever—undertaken in the past month and unrepudiated—was as grotesquely irresponsible as what Cruz, Lee, and the House Republicans put us through, it would cause me to question my views. I would reflect upon the fact that Lee and I share these beliefs, and that he logically extends them toward something totally self-destructive and crazy. I would have to conclude either that he is correct to do this, and therefore that my views must be wrong and that I must change them, or that he is not worth listening to, because he takes perfectly good ideas and warps them into something powerfully hazardous. There is apparently no such reckoning among the right’s respectable intellectuals—most of whom did oppose the shutdown itself, and not only for pragmatic reasons.
But in the meantime, let’s stick to the matter at hand. Can’t all reasonable people agree to ignore Mike Lee completely until he says he was wrong about the shutdown? Should this be a controversial suggestion? Given the gravity of the threat of a future shutdown, isn’t that the only responsible response?
Salam highlights several promising policy sketches that Lee offered; and truly, it is hard not to appreciate a Republican concerned with work-life balance issues. But Salam and the others misrepresent Lee—who, Salam notes, holds a relatively safe seat, and so presumably may speak his mind. Giving parents greater flexibility isn’t Lee’s foremost priority. According to Lee, “The first and most important policy goal Republicans must adopt to improve the lives of middle-class families is, and will remain, the full repeal of Obamacare.” How? Again, we have no choice but to presume that Lee believes that a legitimate tactic for repealing Obamacare is, and will remain, shutting down the government and threatening its default. How about we hear Lee out, and maybe even talk to him, sometime after he puts his gun away.
By: Marc Tracy, The New Republic, October 30, 2013
“More Problems Than Just The Tea Party”: Too Much Attention Being Paid To The Gladiator TV Hard Core “Stars” Of The Republican Party
I am not talking about poll numbers. I am not talking about the Republicans’ record unpopularity. I am not talking about declining support for the tea party. I am not even talking about election results.
I am focusing on the following numbers: 85, 49, 87 and 87 again.
Those are not Powerball numbers … well, in a sense maybe they are!
What are they? These are the “YES” votes from Republican members of the House of Representatives on four pieces of legislation that Speaker John Boehner brought to the floor of the House, ignoring the Hastert rule. That, of course, is the rather absurd self-imposed rule that says you shouldn’t bring up a bill if it does not have majority support from your caucus.
Here are the bills:
- 85 Republican votes to approve the fiscal cliff deal at the end of 2012.
- 49 Republican votes to approve emergency funding for hurricane Sandy.
- 87 Republican votes to approve extending the Violence Against Women Act.
- 87 Republican votes to approve opening the government this week.
Combined with nearly unanimous support from Democrats, all these bills passed.
Now, that meant that 151 votes, 179 votes, 138 votes and 144 votes were cast against these four bills, respectively, by Republican House members.
The point here is that the problem with Republicans is not just several dozen Tea Party activists – it is a caucus that won’t truly stand up to those extreme elements of the party. Too much attention is being paid to the gladiator TV hard core “stars” of the Republican Party such as Sens. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee and Reps. Raul Labrador, Michele Bachmann, Steve King and a handful of others.
They have somehow convinced the House Republican caucus that the best way to take on Obama and the Democrats is scorched earth.
The real question now is whether the pragmatic, reasoned, responsible gene present in many Republican House members will assert itself. Will they negotiate bills on fiscal matters, immigration reform, entitlements and taxes that lead to progress? Or will they let the tea party members role them over and over again?
The hope for many is that this horrendous shutdown and brinkmanship may have taken many members to the edge – they see the absurdity and suicidal nature of the action – and they are ready to stand up to the extremists within their own party. When we start seeing the numbers switch and more than 100 Republican members begin to accept reasonable legislation then we will know that they are no longer going to kow-tow to the Tea Party. We can all hope for that day.
By: Peter Fenn, U. S. News and World Report, October 18, 2013
“As Usual, The Public Be Damned”: House Republicans Should Come To Their Senses And Just Knock It Off
The health care obsessives in the Senate, led by Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, have spent days trying to portray Democrats as out of touch with the public. “The Senate Democrats are not listening to the millions of Americans who are being hurt by Obamacare,” Mr. Cruz said this morning in his last stand in this particular round of the budget battle.
Moments later, however, the vote took place and Mr. Cruz lost badly. It was clear that all Democrats and a majority of Senate Republicans had in fact listened quite closely to the public — which demanded that Congress not shut down the government, whatever the fate of President Obama’s health law.
On the crucial vote to cut off debate over a temporary spending bill to keep the government open, 79 senators, including 25 Republicans, opposed Mr. Cruz’s plea for a filibuster. (All of those Republicans also opposed the final bill, which removed the provision defunding the health law and sent the stopgap bill back to the House, but by then Democrats only needed a simple majority for passage.)
The Republican split in the Senate — 25 against shutdown tactics, 19 in favor — was a pretty clear signal to the House about the political limits of opposition to the health law. Mainstream Republicans will continue to oppose the law, exaggerating every minor glitch and failure, and running against it in next year’s election, but most are not willing to shut down the government to stop it.
They know what will happen if a shutdown occurs at midnight on Tuesday, or even worse, if a default occurs two or three weeks later: television news clips of phones going unanswered at Social Security offices, shuttered national parks, and veterans protesting reduced services. And a plunge in the market in event of a default. What was a political standoff would turn into a picture of dysfunction. Voters would get angry, and Republicans would inevitably (and accurately) get the blame.
The question now is whether a majority of House Republicans will feel the same way as their colleagues in the upper chamber. Answering only to rigidly gerrymandered districts, House members have shown themselves far less interested in the general welfare than senators, and may not react to the same pressures.
The bill now heads back to the House, and if Republicans attach another health care demand to it, that’s it, game over, the government shuts down on Tuesday. The Senate will have to strip it out again, and there won’t be enough time for reconciliation. Speaker John Boehner could agree to a one- or two-week extension, if he can get the votes for a kick-the-can bill, or he could punt, approve the Senate bill, and make his stand on the debt limit increase in the following few days.
But he’ll eventually have to punt on that, too, or risk triggering an economic catastrophe. The only realistic path is a sensible variant on what Mr. Cruz said this morning: Listen to the public and stop governing by crisis. Or as President Obama put it this afternoon: “Knock it off.”
By: David Firestone, The Opinion Pages, The New York Times, September 27, 2013
“The Obamacare Swindle”: Republican Grifters Using Defunding To Raise Money From Gullible Tea Partiers
House Republican leadership does not want a government shutdown over Obamacare, but the agitation of conservative activists might make one inevitable.
That’s not good news for Republicans. After the debt ceiling crisis in 2011, congressional approval ratings dipped to their lowest ever, with Republicans taking a huge hit; in one survey, 71 percent of respondents disapproved with the GOP’s handling of the debt limit. In another, 68 percent said the same (PDF).
Conservatives must know they have nothing to gain politically from taking this stance, which raises the question: why do it? One answer, as suggested by the National Review’s Robert Costa in August, is money. Tea party organizations, he writes, “aren’t worried about the establishment’s ire. In fact, they welcome it. Business has boomed since the push to defund Obamacare caught on. Conservative activists are lighting up social media, donations are pouring in, and e-mail lists are growing.” [Emphasis mine]
To illustrate the point, Heritage Action for America—the political arm of the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank—has a standing website devoted to collecting donations. “Conservatives in Congress have proposed using the fight over a key budget bill, called the continuing resolution, to strip funding from this law. But Establishment Republicans and special interests in Washington are resisting this plan,” it explains. But there’s no reason to panic: “You can ensure Obamacare is defunded,” it asserts. All it takes is a small donation to Heritage. “Time is of the essence. Please donate now to ensure we have the resources to fight and win.”
As of Tuesday afternoon, this particular push had raised over $327,000, and it’s no stretch to assume that other, similar efforts have raised as much if not more cash. To wit, the Senate Conservatives Fund—a political action committee devoted to electing “true conservatives to the United States Senate”—also has a specific website that collects donations for Obamacare repeal. It asks supporters to “Join Mike Lee and Ted Cruz in the fight to stop Obamacare” with a small contribution. The same goes for the National Liberty Federation, a Tea Party group that wants to know if you have a few dollars to spare in the fight against Obamacare.
Of course, no matter how much money these groups collect, the Affordable Care Act is here to stay. And they know it. “Even they admit privately that they won’t succeed in defunding Obamacare,” notes The Wall Street Journal in a recent editorial urging “kamikaze” Republicans to give up their self-defeating crusade against the law. As President Obama said in a speech on Monday, “the Affordable Care Act has been the law for three-and-a-half years now. It passed both houses of Congress. The Supreme Court ruled it constitutional. It was an issue in last year’s election, and the candidate who called for repeal lost.” Simply put, there is no conceivable scenario that ends with Obama dismantling his signature legislative achievement.
It should be said that the most fervent opponents of the Affordable Care Act are Republican base voters. Of those who “always” vote in GOP primaries, notes the Pew Research Center, 53 percent oppose the law and want lawmakers to make it fail. When they demand action—as they have for the last four years—Republican politicians and conservative activists have a choice. They can try to channel this anger into something constructive, or they can cynically use it to boost their own prospects. For lawmakers like Ted Cruz and organizations like Heritage Action, the choice was simple: Give them what they want, even if it’s doomed to fail.
If there were no money involved, I’d call this a misguided bid for relevance. As it stands, the effort to defund Obamacare is a lucrative business. Which is why it continues to go forward, even as the odds for success dip to the quantum level. For the lawmakers and groups spearheading this movement, Tea Party voters aren’t dedicated citizens as much as they are gullible customers; ripe targets for their brand’s commercialized outrage.
Ted Cruz may style himself as a leader, but the reality is that he and his fellow travelers are just the latest in a long line of shameless grifters. And like the presidential campaigns of Newt Gingrich and Herman Cain, this grift will continue for as long as there is money to earn, and Republican voters to con.
By: Jamelle Bouie, The Daily Beast, September 18, 2013
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