No wonder Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) is thinking about quitting politics in two years; he’s just not very good at it.
When Republicans needed to replace Trent Lott two years ago, they turned to Frist, a senator who seemed likable and had a compelling personal narrative. The White House, which helped orchestrate the selection, considered the political ramifications first and merit second. It was a mistake.
From the outside, being a senator doesn’t seem like a tough job. You give a bunch of speeches, raise money, and vote on issues. What’s not to like? But being the majority leader, it turns out, is really difficult. Coordinating the floor schedule and orchestrating the legislative process takes knowledge, experience, and a steady hand. As has become readily apparent, Frist isn’t quite up to the job.
Conservative columnist Bob Novak, for example, lambasted his ideological ally this week, describing him as an incompetent leader, who has orchestrated “multiple parliamentary blunders,” and who has set the Senate GOP on a “catastrophic course.”
Novak even placed the blame for partisan rancor at Frist’s feet.
The added factor is the worst hostility between Republican and Democratic leaders since I began Senate-watching in 1957. Frist broke precedent by traveling to South Dakota to campaign against Democratic leader Tom Daschle’s re-election. Republicans who must deal with Daschle regard him as one of the coldest men they have met in politics, who truly subscribes to the Kennedy clan’s axiom of ”Don’t get mad, get even.” Daschle could not conceal his glee two weeks ago in humiliating Frist on the class-action bill.
Frist has a “plan” to get things back on track, for himself and the chamber he leads. Unfortunately for him, it doesn’t make any sense.
In a recent speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Frist said the key to getting the Senate machine working again is a minimum of 55 Republican members, as opposed to the 52 there now (51 plus Zell Miller).
“If we picked up one seat, it would be helpful. If we picked up two seats, it would be very helpful. If we picked up three, the filibusters would go away.”
“We don’t need 60 votes,” he added. “We need 55, really. The momentum would be with us.”
This guy really doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
As recent Senate business as demonstrated, the number of Republicans is important but not indicative of success. As Novak noted:
Republicans pulled defeat from the jaws of victory when Democrats killed a bill to curb trial lawyers. That was followed by last week’s fiasco, when Republicans could not even win a simple majority to ban homosexual marriages. The 49-member Democratic minority was running the Senate.
There are other examples. The Senate GOP caucus, despite 52 members, can’t even agree on a budget blueprint. The Senate passed a tobacco buyout, but only because Ted Kennedy approved the deal. The Senate had the votes for a tort-reform boondoggle, but Frist pulled the bill to work on the gay marriage debacle.
Frist already has a majority but doesn’t know what to do with it. He doesn’t need three more allies; he needs a clue.
Matthew Yglesias was right this morning: Frist and the GOP are “out of touch with reality.”
The issue, in short, isn’t Democratic obstructionism, but a Republican failure to cope with reality by forging compromises or trying to put forward some kind of legislation around which a consensus can be built. They prefer at every turn to cling dogmatically to some narrow principles, engage in electoral positioning, and keep dreaming of the day when they can legislate without regard to the existence of an opposition party or public opinion.
Hey, that’s a good idea for a new GOP motto: We win, when everyone gets out of our way.