I had originally considered entitling this piece "Why 'Bipartisanship'?" The more I thought about it, however, the more that I realized that the quota angle was the one to use.
There is already considerable discussion about Obama potentially naming Colin Powell to his cabinet. There is also discussion that Robert Gates might be retained as SecDef "to demonstrate bipartisanship." There is also speculation about Chuck Hagel or Richard Lugar for State, although Lugar has publicly disclaimed interest in a cabinet position.
While none of us really know how grounded in fact most of these rumors are, a Gooper being named to head either State of Defense appears to be a very real prospect. Even worse, the idea seems to be to name a Gooper or 2 to key cabinet positions b/c they are Goopers. It is hard to understand why such a thought process would be taking place.
This thought process, sadly, is not a new concept. It was openly discussed by Obama back in March. Back then, the following quote was offered:
Larry Korb, a defence official under President Ronald Reagan who is backing Obama, said: "By putting a Republican in the Pentagon and the State Department you send a signal to Congress and the American people that issues of national security are above politics."
With all due respect to Mr. Korb, exactly when did "national security" issues become "above politics?" Was it when Saxby Chambliss ran ads in 2002 equating Max Cleland w/ OBL? How about during the Swiftboat campaign in 2004? The GOP won the 2002 off-year elections and the 2004 presidential election by beating Dems over the head w/ the "national security" club. Now that the club hasn't been so effective for them in the past 2 cycles, we're supposed to go back to square one w/ them?
Paul Krugman, as he so often does, put this topic into perspective yesterday in his blog post "The Monster Years":
What I mean by that is that for the past 14 years America’s political life has been largely dominated by, well, monsters. Monsters like Tom DeLay, who suggested that the shootings at Columbine happened because schools teach students the theory of evolution. Monsters like Karl Rove, who declared that liberals wanted to offer "therapy and understanding" to terrorists. Monsters like Dick Cheney, who saw 9/11 as an opportunity to start torturing people.
And in our national discourse, we pretended that these monsters were reasonable, respectable people. To point out that the monsters were, in fact, monsters, was "shrill."
Four years ago it seemed as if the monsters would dominate American politics for a long time to come. But for now, at least, they’ve been banished to the wilderness.
Why would any Dem seek out the party of Gingrich, of Rove, of Cheney, of DeLay, and of Abramoff for advice? Why would our first A-A president seek advice from a party that spent the past 40 years consciously using race as a wedge issue? Why would he want to make common cause w/ the party that used Willie Horton to keep the WH in 1988? Why would a constitutional law instructor want to make nice w/ a party that put a patently unqualified and patently dishonest sexual harrasser on the SCOTUS in a patently cynical exercise in racial politics?
Forget about the past 4 decades. Let's look at this year. Obama was repeatedly blasted as a "socialist" b/c he wants to raise the top marginal rate to a fraction of what it was under Ike, Nixon, and Ford. He was villified for "palling around w/ terrorists" b/c of his tangential associations w/ William Ayers. Locally, a GOP ad ran in the days before the election tying Obama to Rev. Wright, too.
Why, furthermore, should we seek to make common cause w/ our opponents when they're feuding amongst themselves? Our opponents are drowning right now--why should we be throwing them life preservers? As the NYT piece notes, the GOP has (successfully) followed a very different path in the past:
This highlights a profound temperamental difference between the parties. The Democrats, more inclined in recent decades to pragmatism, have tended to bow to popular will even in close elections. President Bush, though he lost the popular vote in 2000 and though many believed that the Florida recount was unjustly halted by the Supreme Court, nonetheless had little trouble pushing his first initiatives through Congress, including one of the largest tax cuts in history.
When Mr. Reagan was elected in 1980, he probably stood farther to the right of the public of his time than Mr. Obama stands to its left today. Only two years before, in the Congressional election of 1978, Democrats held on to substantial majorities in both houses of Congress, despite the troubled leadership of President Jimmy Carter. And there was little tangible evidence that voters had embraced the supply-side economics that became a cornerstone of Reaganism.
But when Republicans achieved a slight majority in the Senate to go along with the Reagan landslide, Democrats, still in the majority in the House, accepted much of his agenda, in deference to the public’s will and also in recognition that a new era in politics had arrived.
Compromise is, obviously, an essential part of politics. While a part of me would love to see Cheney, Gonzo, et al lead a long perp walk of Bush WH officials, I know that such indictments will never issue from an Obama DOJ. I assume, in fact, that a stream of increasingly nauseating WH pardons will issue in the coming weeks.
I'm willing to accept the fact that, while Haldeman, Erlichman, Mitchell, Dean, et al all served time, the far greater crimes of the W/Cheney regime will go unpunished. I'm willing to accept the fact that our party will have to deal w/ what may be the worst combined domestic and FP mess ever left behind by any departing president. I'm willing to accept that there are Republicans (e.g. Lincoln Chaffee) who are worthy of consideration for key positions in the Obama WH on their merits.
I'm not, however, willing to accept the idea that a key cabinet post or 2 should be set aside for a Gooper as a form of symbolism. Isn't that very concept something that they have railed against for decades? I'm even less willing to accept the idea that Colin Powell should get a post.
Let's assume that Powell now regrets being a front man for W/Cheney during both the 2000 campaign and the ensuing theft of the WH. Let's assume that he regrets being a front man for them in his 2003 UN speech. WTF was he doing testifying as a character witness for Ted Stevens? By whoring himself for a greedy dishonest hack who was convicted of 7 felonies, Powell showed that he learned nothing from his experiences in the Bush years. He clearly does not represent change, and he is even more clearly not someone whom we can (or should) believe in.
As is exemplified by this op-ed piece by my namesake in the WSJ, while our opponents may be down for the moment, they clearly do not consider themselves to be "out" by any means. As Rachel Maddow mentioned last night, noted statesmen Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, and Roy Blunt will constitute the GOP "leadership" in the coming Congress. While their positions will have to be respected and while proper formalities will have to be observed, they are not the kind of people w/ whom coalitions will be built.
By all means, work w/ the likes of Snowe and Collins on legislative matters of common interest. While JoeMentum badly needs to lose his chairmanship, some accomodations will likely have to be made w/ him. There is no need for or reason to, however, consciously seek out Goopers to serve in high-profile positions in the Obama WH.
While the outgoing regime started a disastrous war of choice, gutted the Bill of Rights, packed the judicial branch, allowed a great American city to drown, looted the treasury, and consciously chose to use torture, few, if any, dissenting voices were heard from w/i its party. Now that a solid majority of the American public has finally awakened to this reality, there is no reason to reward members of the party that enbabled and even encouraged this parade of horribles. Elections have consequences, and it's time to let our opponents experience such consequences and maybe learn something from that experience.