For a variety of reasons, it was disappointing to see groups with progressive agendas, such as the [tag]Sierra Club[/tag] and [tag]NARAL[/tag], endorse less-conservative Republicans like Sen. Linc Chafee (R-R.I.). It should be pretty obvious that a Democratic majority is key to the groups’ causes, so endorsing a Dem who shares the groups’ beliefs should be a no-brainer. Unfortuantely, it isn’t.
But, the Sierra Club says, it’s important to support to back Republicans who support the environment. Similarly, NARAL will back pro-choice GOP candidates. It’s not about party; it’s about the person, they say.
[tag]Paul Krugman[/tag], to his enormous credit, helps set the record straight today.
[C]onsider the fact that the National Federation of Independent Business, the small-business lobby, is supporting the bizarre, hybrid wage-and-tax legislation now before the Senate. This legislation would raise the minimum wage while sharply cutting taxes on very large estates.
From a small-business owner’s point of view, this deal makes no sense. Many owners of small businesses believe, rightly or wrongly, that they would be hurt by a rise in the minimum wage. Meanwhile, very few are rich enough to pay estate taxes: the Congressional Budget Office reports that if current law had applied in 2000, only 135 small business estates would have paid any tax at all, which means that small-business owners subject to the estate tax are substantially harder to find than people who have been struck by lightning.
It’s possible that the federation’s leadership has been misled by Heritage Foundation propaganda. But it’s more likely that, like the chamber, the federation believes that its interests are best served by acting as a loyal servant of the Republican electoral effort. And both organizations are probably right.
For the National Federation of Independent Business, it’s about supporting Republicans for partisan sake. Not only is the “person” is irrelevant, the policy specifics are beside the point. The group’s interests coincide with a GOP majority, so the NFIB acts accordingly.
The Sierra Club and NARAL? Not so much.
Now compare this with the behavior of advocacy groups like the Sierra Club, the environmental organization, and NARAL, the abortion-rights group, both of which have endorsed Senator Lincoln Chafee, Republican of Rhode Island, for re-election. The Sierra Club’s executive director defended the Chafee endorsement by saying, “We choose people, not parties.” And it’s true that Mr. Chafee has usually voted with environmental groups.
But while this principle might once have made sense, it’s just naïve today. Given both the radicalism of the majority party’s leadership and the ruthlessness with which it exercises its control of the Senate, Mr. Chafee’s personal environmentalism is nearly irrelevant when it comes to actual policy outcomes; the only thing that really matters for the issues the Sierra Club cares about is the “R” after his name.
Put it this way: If the Democrats gain only five rather than six Senate seats this November, Senator James Inhofe, who says that global warming is “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people,” will remain in his current position as chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. And if that happens, the Sierra Club may well bear some of the responsibility.
That’s unfortunately true. These elections don’t happen in a vacuum — what happens in Rhode Island (and every other race) will help dictate which party is in the majority, which will then dictate how legislation is written, which bills get considered in committee, which bills are brought to the floor, and which bills ultimately pass.
As Krugman concluded, “The point is that those who cling to the belief that politics can be conducted in terms of people rather than parties — a group that also includes would-be centrist Democrats like Joe Lieberman and many members of the punditocracy — are kidding themselves.”