March 14: Democrats Really Were in Disarray Over Spending Bill
Having spent much of the week watching the runup to a crucial Senate vote on appropriations, I had to express at New York some serious misgivings about Chuck Schumer’s strategy and what it did to his party’s messaging:
For the record, I’m usually disinclined to promote the hoary “Democrats in Disarray” narrative whereby the Democratic Party is to blame for whatever nightmarish actions Republicans generally, or Donald Trump specifically, choose to pursue. That’s particularly true right now when Democrats have so little actual power and Republicans have so little interest in following laws and the Constitution, much less precedents for fair play and bipartisanship. So it really makes no sense to accuse the powerless minority party of “allowing” the assault on the federal government and the separation of powers being undertaken by the president, his OMB director Russ Vought, and his tech-bro sidekick Elon Musk. If congressional Republicans had even a shred of integrity or courage, Senate Democrats would not have been placed in the position this week of deciding whether it’s better to let the government shut down than to let it be gutted by Trump, Vought, and Musk.
Having said all that, Senate Democrats did have a strategic choice to make this week, and based on Chuck Schumer’s op-ed in the New York Times explaining his decision to get out of the way and let the House-passed spending bill come to the floor, he made it some time ago. Nothing in his series of rationalizations was new. If, indeed, “a shutdown would be the best distraction Donald Trump could ask for from his awful agenda,” while enabling the administration to exert even more unbridled power over federal programs and personnel, that was true a week ago or a month ago as well. So Schumer’s big mistake was leading Senate Democrats right up to the brink of a collision with the administration and the GOP, and then surrendering after drawing enormous attention to his party’s fecklessness.
This doesn’t just look bad and feel bad for Democrats demanding that their leaders do something to stop the Trump locomotive: It also gives the supreme bully in the White House incentive to keep bullying them, as Josh Marshall points out in his postmortem on the debacle:
“[P]eople who get hit and abused and take it tend to get hit and abused again and again. That’s all the more true with Donald Trump, a man who can only see the world through the prism of the dominating and the dominated. It is a great folly to imagine that such an abject acquiescence won’t drive him to up the ante.”
The reality is that this spending measure was the only leverage point congressional Democrats had this year (unless Republicans are stupid enough not to wrap the debt-limit increase the government must soon have in a budget reconciliation bill that cannot be filibustered). Everyone has known that since the new administration and the new Congress took office in January. If a government shutdown was intolerable, then Democrats should have taken it off the table long before the House voted on a CR. Punchbowl News got it right:
“Let’s be blunt here: Democrats picked a fight they couldn’t win and caved without getting anything in return. …
“Here’s the lesson from this episode: When you have no cards, fold them early.”
Instead, Democrats have taken a defeat and turned it into a debacle. House and Senate Democrats are divided from each other, and a majority of Senate Democrats are all but shaking their fists at their own leader, who did in fact lead them down a blind alley. While perhaps the federal courts will rein in the reign of terror presently underway in Washington (or perhaps they won’t), congressional Democrats must now become resigned to laying the groundwork for a midterm election that seems a long time away and hoping something is left of the edifice of a beneficent federal government built by their predecessors from the New Deal to the Great Society to Obamacare. There’s a good chance a decisive majority of the general public will eventually recoil from the misrule of the Trump administration and its supine allies in Congress and across the country. But at this point, elected Democrats are going to have to prove they should be trusted to lead the opposition.
muckdog,
Afraid to dive deep into what?
I don’t think anyone is arguing that the country is not still fairly evenly divided. But Kerry is now ahead in almost every single national poll. That can’t be good news for Bush, especially when conventional wisdom says that the undecideds will break for the challenger as election day looms near.
I’m not sure how you can say his message isn’t ‘selling well’ when he’s ahead in the polls, and when we’re still in the middle of summer with a lot of people still not paying much attention. I think a lot of people haven’t taken the opportunity to hear John Kerry’s message yet.
These “message readjustments” in the Bush campaign, to me, are reassuring signs that they know they’re in big trouble. They are trying to bend their tin ear to what the bulk of the electorate are telling them, but: “many call you the elite – I call you my base”.
The “base” – big business owners – was distressed during the boom because high employment led to what Greenspan called “wage pressure”. Wage presssure!?!?! I nearly fell over laughing! Those darn employees gettin’ uppity agin! Askin’ fer more money, th’ greedy bastards! W can only satisfy them by keeping unemployment high. This strategy, if he was able to do anything about it at all, seems to have worked too well! Since the economy failed to rebound “because” of tax cuts for the wealthy (I’m in the top 7% income bracket and they didn’t cut MY taxes that much), what then is the republican message? I don’t think more of the same is gonna cut it…
That WSJ journal article is in conflict with a piece in Barrons this weekend, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics regarding who is participating in the recovery. Most of the jobs are higher-wage jobs, according to the BLS.
Because Bush’s economic medicine did turn around the economy. The economy is surging ahead at the fastest rate in over 20 years.
What’s different now is global competition and the emergence of biotechnology and health care as the booming domestic industry, and the increasing supply of lower-wage technology workers overseas.
Bush should be talking about the expanding economy, AND the need to continue to improve.
I don’t think the Kerry misery message is selling well. Despite all the bad news for Bush, movies and op-ed spinning, the polls are even. And Kerry didn’t get much of a bounce from picking Edwards. Which is very strange indeed. Usually the challenger has a pretty big bump. Not Kerry.
Afraid to dive deep into that one?
Great article but… WHY ISN’T KERRY DOING ANYTHING?!
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040802&s=phillips
Kevin Phillips has written a very good article about how Kerry can beat Bush. It is refreshing, and backed up by historical precedent. Well worth the read.
That’s fast. AP today:
“”You’re probably here thinking I’m going to spend most of the time attacking my opponent,” Bush told the crowd. “I’ve got too much good to talk about.”
The president hardly mentioned Democratic rival John Kerry while contending that a second Bush term in the White House would extend the programs of tax relief and education reform enacted in the past four years. ”
This is off topic but I wanted to get your comments since you guys are so insightful. I live in one of the battleground states, SouthWest FL. Lately we are being bombarded by negative ads from the Bush campaign blasting Kerry. These ads are numerous not only on TV but on local radio as well. I’ve noticed that the new ads don’t feature a male narrator with a sarcastic tone but a female narrator who sounds sincere yet concerned. It is weird to hear a Bush ad on our local “oldies” radio station placed between Buffalo Springfield’s “There’s Something Happening Here” and The Beatles’ “Revolution”. These ads WILL have an effect on some people and the Kerry campaign needs to do something. I have a suggestion. Let me know if you think its a good one. If its not; let me know this too. After all, this is how we learn.
Kerry/Edwards should combat these ads by running their own ad (particularly on Radio) decrying the general negative nature of the Bush ads and the distortions and lies contained in them. I know it would be impossible to run an ad addressing all of these distortions but they should run a general ad urging the public to be wary of what they hear in these negative Bush ads. They should also direct the public to an easy source where they can read the truth about Bush’s allegations and see the explanations for certain allegations: such as why Kerry voted against the so-called Laci Peterson bill.
Perhaps the public could be directed to johnkerry.com where a PROMINENT link could be placed on the homepage addressing the lies and distortions of the Bush ads. Or better yet…Perhaps they could be directed to a new website: adlies.com or something. I hope you understand what I am suggesting. Kerry needs a way to fight this negative advertising beyond just a 10 second sound bite on MSNBC. Most people probably wouldn’t even visit the website BUT, Producing just one major ad that attacks the Bush campaign for going way overboard with the negative attack ads will accomplish at least 3 objectives:
1) It will instill in the public consciousness a doubt when they hear the myriad negative Bush ads.
2) It will demonstrate that Kerry is not just going to sit down and take it but he is FIGHTING BACK! He can even stay on the “high road” and keep running positive ads. His only negative ad will be an ANTI-negative ads ad!
3)It will offer the people a source to find the truth if they desire.
I can hear the end of the ad in my head right now:
(A sincere but concerned female voice)” Please visit JohnKerry.com now and click on the link, “AdLies” to see just how untrue and distorted the Bush Campaign’s negative ads have become. You will be glad you did.”
It would also be nice if we could make it clear that Bush has not lowered taxes at all. He has lowered tax rates. We are taking less taxes right now, but only because we are running unprecedneted deficits (not really, but nominally, and with the demographic sistuations they really are unprecedented).
However, in order to reduce taxes we need to reduce the amount of money that the government requires to run. On that count, Bush has masively raised taxes, and offers only empty rhetoric to do anything other than that.
We really should be pointing out that Bush has not lowered the tax burden, simply shifted it.
Sounds like someone with no real solutions telling his client — “hey, this message is doing great numbers for them, let’s co-opt it and use it ourselves”. Imitation = sincerest form of flattery, and all that. Or, more accurately, “watch what they do, then steal what works and make it your own!”
Yes, there are always going to be those drawn to the Republicans’ message about taxes. There are many people who are Republicans based almost solely on the tax issue, so I don’t see why they would ever stop harping about cutting taxes.
That said, the last polls I’ve seen on this issue stated a majority of people would rather do things such as have universal health insurance, pay down the debt, and fix social security even if it meant not getting tax cuts.
So while this strategy gives the Republicans a definite advantage among a certain segment of the population, I agree with Ruy in that I don’t think it’s something that would miraculously bring a bunch of undecideds into the fold.
I would be hesitant to imply that the Republican strategy of offering more tax cuts as a panacea for our economic concerns will not work, especially because it is “more of the same.”
Anecdotally, I know many moderates/independents who are swayed by the “tax cut” message every election year — that is, until you explain what goes with tax cuts, namely cuts in social spending and ballooning deficits.
Only if Kerry-Edwards can respond quickly to any discussion of further tax cuts by pointing out Bush’s promise to halve the deficit in five years, and pointing out the dissonance between the two proposals, can they effectively counter this very popular message.
That said, there is polling evidence that when you ask Americans about upper-Income taxes specifically, they tend to think that the rates are probably too low versus too high by 63% to 9%.
http://www.pollingreport.com/budget.htm
(Scroll down on the April 2004 Gallup poll)
Today’s Wall Street Journal has this article you may want to check out. Headlined:
“Affluent Advantage: So Far, Economic Recovery Tilts To Highest-Income Americans — They Gain More, Spend More; With Job Market Rising, Will Others Feel Rebound?”