A ‘Do-Nothing’ Congress — by design

May 10, 2006

[tag]Congress[/tag] may have a 23% approval rating in an election year, but that’s apparently not incentive enough for the [tag]House[/tag] and [tag]Senate[/tag] to even try to [tag]govern[/tag]. In fact, the opposite seems to be true.

Republican leaders in Congress have all but abandoned efforts to pass major [tag]policy[/tag] initiatives this year, and are instead focusing their energies on a series of conservative favorites that they hope will rally loyal voters in November’s congressional elections.

The House and Senate agendas are packed with bills that, even supporters concede, have no chance of passing but that social and fiscal conservatives clamor for, like constitutional amendments banning flag-burning and gay marriage. By bringing them up, [tag]Republicans[/tag] hope to inspire a constituency that has fractured in its support for President [tag]Bush[/tag] and the party. They also hope to cast [tag]Democrats[/tag] as obstructionists by drawing their plentiful “no” votes.

I realize it’s been painfully obvious for a while now, but it’s almost comical how unserious congressional Republicans are about matters of state. They have not only decided to give up on actually governing, they’re shirking their duties intentionally as part of an electoral strategy.

There are still six months left on Congress’ calendar, and what should we look forward to? Votes on bills that are designed to fail, so Republicans will have something to whine about to their base before November.

House majority leader John A. [tag]Boehner[/tag] said Republicans don’t need sweeping policy achievements to convince voters that the GOP should stay in control.

“What we need to do every day is the simple blocking and tackling that any team goes through if they’re going to win,” the Ohio Republican said.

More specifically, this means “blocking” substantive legislation that might pass, and “tackling” Dems when they vote against the measures they’re expected to oppose.

During a debate on a medical malpractice bill that was going to lose anyway, Sen. [tag]Trent Lott[/tag] (R-Miss.) told CQ, “We haven’t done anything worth a toot in three months.” Expect six more months of the exact same thing.

For the “party of [tag]ideas[/tag],” it’s a sad spectacle, isn’t it?

Six more months of lack of governance in favor of useless wedge issues? Congress abdicated its responsibilities years ago and gave them to the President and industry represenatives, didn’t you know.

In other words, this news changes things exactly…how?

  • Between Lott’s wonderful comment and The Boner’s boner to the American people, this might seem like an ideal time for Democrats. But they don’t appear to want to seize the moment, do they? At this point Harry Truman would be repeating, ad (effective) nauseum, reference to the “do nothing Congress”.

  • Immigration?

    Intelligence Reform Oversight?

    Oversight of the War in Iraq and Afghanistan?

    Internet Neutrality?

    Actually passing the Appropriation bills on time?

    Lobbying Reform?

    These guys don’t have time to goof off.

    But watch them do it anyway.

  • Doesn’t the Democrat’s ability to prevent all these things from becoming law undermine the media narrative that Dems are disorganized and uneffective?

  • Who is this “Trent Lott” guy? He has the same name as this other crazy righty “Trent Lott” but this new one has recently been saying things I agree with. How odd to have two guys with exactly the same name. Crazy world.

  • Frankly, with this bunch of chuckleheads, I would rather them be doing nothing. Their harm is then limited for at least 6 months.

  • Sad to say but considering the horrendous job Republicans has done managing Congress and the country – I don’t know if I have much of a problem with them not passing any major policy initiatives. Of course I could do without the slight of hand legislation designed to rev the core and draw attention away from their sucky job performance – but since they have little hope of passing (I hope) and are so good for mocking well………

  • Go nuclear!

    I can’t wait until Frist tries to go nuclear on some idiot wingnut judge. Then Reid can simply detonate his nuclear bomb: stop giving the Repugs the privilege of controlling which bills get introduced. Then he can start introducing his own bills and forcing the Repugs to block them and/or vote against them!

    Oooh I hope it comes to this. I really do. I can’t wait to see Democrats running a government in exile…. to show the rest of the country how it’s done. Why let these Repug clowns manipulate and maneuver us any longer? Just go around the assholes.

  • “Frankly, with this bunch of chuckleheads, I would rather them be doing nothing. Their harm is then limited for at least 6 months.” – bubba

    I concur. With this Congress and President, a lack of action is preferrable over any action they would choose.

  • My pet theory: The more time that Congress spends on the “social issues,” the less time that Congress can spend on other legislation—particularly appropriation bills. Ever since the Republican took-over the House in 1994, it seems that four out of five years that the Congress would have to come back to Washington after the November election to finish their business and fund the government. If time is wasted on social issues—for the purpose of “ginning-up the base”—it will obviously take time from the real business and, in turn, the real business will take from time that could be spent campaigning in their home states. It is a two-fold opportunity for the Democrats: 1) less time for incumbent Republicans on the campaign trail, 2) the label “The Do-Nothin’ Congress” can be hung on the Republican if they waste time on tertiary issues, preventing them from finishing the appropriation bills before November. I think that this is an opportunity for the Democrats to put the Republicans “between a rock and a hard place.”

    Related article from 2004 here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A453-2004Oct26.html

  • This:

    Dobbs to President: Do you take us for fools?
    By Lou Dobbs

    http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/05/10/dobbs.enforcement/index.html

    ….is what Democrats need to sound like. This is not a work of genius or some obscure philosophical rant. This is common sense and informed opinion based on obvious and provable truths. Why is this perspective so difficult to put forth?

    The only reason I can come up with as to why Democratic politicians can’t say these words with this force and clarity is because they know they can’t walk the walk if they talk the talk. That sucks.

  • I’m sure all of you have heard the statement:

    The best government is the
    least government.

  • Dobbs to President: Do you take us for fools?

    No sir, Mr. Doobs, not at all.

    By da way… hows ’bout vot’in fer me brother in 2008?

  • burro (#11) – excellent data in that link. Thanks. I don’t like the “walls around Amerka” and “beat back the immigrant approach”, nor do I like the “y’all come” approach. Enforcing the law and making the exploiters (those who do the hiring) pay is the only way to solve the “problem”. Neither Republicans nor Democrats get it though because, as Dobbs said, they’ve both sold out to the corporations.

    BTW, did you know “burro” is Italian for “butter” (not the goat, the stuff I love on bread no matter what the health nags say).

  • The congress are merely one of the enabling institutions that are engaged in the wholesale rape and theft of our nation.

    The repubs know they just have to stay the course because their corporate media cronies will provide cover.

    The dems know that if they keep their mouth shut unless they are needed to support some inane policy (think bankrupcy ‘reform’) they will get their piece of the pie.

    They are mostly criminals and deserve to be dealt with as such.

    As an aside, maybe it’s me but CB seems remarkably troll-free these days…..

  • I thought burro was just donkey. And not a Dem donkey but just a pokey, grey not overly excitable sort of donkey. Why…? I don’t remember.

    Butter is fine in moderation. It tastes so much better than any fake alternatives that it’s not usually necessary to use as much. I’ve been appreciating the switch to good olive oils in some restaurants for bread dipping. It’s not as lux as butter but it’s almost as satisfying in a different way and I think it’s considered to be kind of healthy. But a crisp english muffin is made for real butter.

    I agree with Mr. Dobb’ take on the immigration picture but what I really find refreshing is his confident delivery and confrontational, aggressive posture. RepubCo is just standing there waiting to be tarred and feathered but Dems can’t seem to find the bucket and brush. And they don’t seem to be very concerned about it. Lou Dobbs is no wild eyed bomb thrower. If he’s this clear and emphatic in his thoughts and speech, it’s time for Dems in power to become just as clear and emphatic. If they can’t or won’t, they should just get the hell out of the way.

  • Somewhat OT, but other folks are raising the issue…

    Ed, I’m going to have to disagree with you on the pitfalls of the “y’all come” approach. In the globalized economy, two legs of free trade have (in descending order) freedom to go elsewhere in order to maximize inflows and minimize outflows: businesses and consumers. Businesses can outsource or move manufacturing jobs out of country. Consumers can generally buy products imported from elsewhere if those goods made domestically are unsatisfactory (excepting government-subsidized cartels). The final leg, workers, are constrained by national borders–in effect, they are a trapped group and trapped groups can be exploited mercilessly. The threat that productive workers can easily go elsewhere is a check on exploitation. After all, isn’t that how universities work? (Where disloyalty is damn near the only way to get a decent raise?)

    In short, if we’re going to have global free trade–then every part of the system should be allowed to move at will to where the best deal is to be had. Borders work to the advantage of government and business. I can think of no advantage to having borders, unless one wants to increase the general level of misery.

  • Wait… FISCAL conservatives are clamoring for constitutional amendments banning flag-burning and gay marriage? Somehow I doubt it.

    I’m all for calling out the stupidity of the religious right, but if you’re going to go so far as to mention social and fiscal conservatives, don’t assign them both the same ideology.

  • Mr Flibble, that’s an interesting argument but I think you have it wrong. I agree that workers are relatively trapped by their geographic location, and so easily exploited by this new global labor market, but eliminating or opening borders won’t be an equalizer as you claim.

    People have social, cultural and economic ties that limit geographic mobility. It’s not the borders that keep them from moving freely from place to place to work, it’s that it’s too expensive and socially disruptive for all but the most desperate to do so. If what you say were true, then there would be no regional differences in wages within our own American borders, since workers would just migrate en masse to wherever the pay was best at any given time. That’s just not the pace that populations redistribute. And that is why multinational corporations, an employer who has the ability to exist in many places around the world simultaneously and move operations to wherever labor is cheapest virtually overnight, have such an outrageously unfair advantage.

    Globalization as a multinational free-for-all need not be an inevitability. If we want to preserve our standard of living, we need to be a closed system, or one that trades but demands that what we import be made with the same quality, health, product safety and human rights standards as our own (which of course will add to the cost thus reducing their unfair price advantage). The only alternative is a race to the bottom and we will never hear the end of “we just can’t compete” until we have given up all worker protections and are willing to work for $.50 an hour.

  • This Congress blocks and tackles about as well as the Houston Texans.

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