I know that we here, since the very beginning of the site it seems, have been making the point that the fetish of bipartisanship is perhaps one of the worst possible habits of our political elites. Mainly because only Democrats want to be bipartisan while Republicans have no interest in it at all. But also because, more often than not, if there is any thing in which the Washington establishment is in bipartisan agreement on, that thing is either awful or inconsequential. We've made the case on more than one occasion that while the country wants to have a fight over big things, Washington keeps idealizing a world where the parties stop fighting over the things their voters want them to fight over. President Obama very much represented this view of governance. That there are no red states and no blue states. That "politics" and "game-playing" was what kept people from reaching the heavenly shores of bipartisan compromise. Of course, the compromising was almost always done by the Democrats.
So it comes at a shock to our Borderian Beltway elite that we actually do have a divided country. That people actually do disagree about the role of government. And that elections should sort these questions out and that, upon election, the majority should rule. If people don't like it, they can fix it. Then the other side gets to rule. The Washington establishment finds this sort of...democracy..."unseemly."
Well, the news Daily Kos has understood for years has finally reached Politico. And it notes that even President Obama gets it after the debt ceiling fiasco he had with Boehner. (Remember when Obama said "There's no way Boehner will just sit on the sidelines and throw bombs for political advantage...he will have to govern once he's Speaker!...jokes on you Sir.)
Some excerpts from Death of Bipartisanship:
Every time there is divided government in Washington, there is a revival — among elite journalists, think tank commentators and respectable politicians of all stripes — of a cherished idea about how business should get done in the nation’s capital:
Get the most responsible adults of both parties in one room, shoo away the cameras and microphones, and don’t let the two sides come out until they have cut a deal on the most pressing problem of the day.
The striking fact about Washington at the start of 2012 is how many people, in public and private, say they have concluded that the capital is no longer a city of splittable differences.
This sullen judgment is by all evidence driving the political strategy of President Barack Obama, formerly an apostle of a grand bargain to solve the country’s fiscal problems.
He’s being joined by a critical mass of Washington influentials — witnessing the inability of the two parties to find common ground on the budget in 2011 — who are ready to discard the old ideal: Politicians huddling behind closed doors to cut deals is no longer viewed as necessarily even a desirable scenario, much less a plausible one.
I have a proposal that Washington might find shocking: Have the politicians run on what they believe in out in the open in an election type thing. Then when they get into office, have them do what they said in the campaign right out in the open on the floor of the legislative body in question. (thinking of Sir Humphrey Appleby recoiling in horror)
Neera Tanden, an influential Democrat who heads the liberal Center for American Progress, echoed McCarthy. “Two different elections point in two different ways, and both sides are arguing over fundamental principles,” she said.
Tanden argues that much of the commentary about Washington incorrectly supposes that it is petty obstacles — political posturing or the tactics of special interest groups — that prevent a return to grand bargains of the Andrews Air Force Base variety. “The debate has become so shrill and partisan people just assume it’s ridiculous,” she said, when the argument is actually over basic questions that may get resolved only when the electorate decides in an emphatic way which side is right.
Exactly. Elections are what should matter, not the search for some elusive ideological middle ground. Whoever wins, gets to rule. When they screw up, they get pushed back. Cue Wisconsin.
If the Split the Difference Scenario has been exposed as a myth, perhaps no person has been more shaken by the discovery than Obama. He now believes, according to advisers and others familiar with his thinking, that there is scant opportunity for any kind of Washington grand bargain until 2013 — and perhaps not then, unless the results of the November election leave one party clearly empowered and the other so chastened it is ready to deal.
This conclusion represents a painful falling to earth. Obama’s 2008 message was built on the idea that Washington governance had become irrational — distorted by the mad dash of politicians for publicity and momentary tactical advantage — and that his brand of cool rationality could bridge divides and restore order.
The blame over why this didn’t happen seemingly began within hours of his inauguration — Republicans spurned his overtures, or his own agenda was called too radical and divisive. But it wasn’t until 2011 that the basic premise of Obama’s vision of Washington compromise collapsed.
Well, we tried to tell ya Sir. Right from the beginning when we were saying go ahead and rewrite the Senate rules in late 2008 so you could take truly decisive action on the economy. Right when we were saying just ram healthcare reform down their throats with reconciliation instead of leaving it up to a bipartisan gang. Right when we were saying the grand bargain was pointless. Right when we were saying the supercommittee would fail. You cant negotiate in good faith with a raving lunatic. That is what the Republican Party is...a raving band of rich, insane, nutcases.
“Steadily the moderates have all disappeared,” Poole said. “The moderate Southern Democrats were replaced by Republicans and then, one by one, the moderate Republicans were replaced either by Democrats or conservative Republicans.”
LBJ was right.
Poole and research partner Howard Rosenthal of New York University have written that Republicans have become more conservative faster than Democrats have become more liberal.
“The Republican Party has been steadily moving to the right since the 1970s,” Poole said. “The Republicans have moved about three times the speed to the right as the Democrats have moved to the left.”