Matt Stoller caused a bit of a stir over the weekend with a provocative post about Senate Dems and opposition to the war in Iraq. After the latest GOP obstructionism blocked consideration of an anti-escalation resolution on Saturday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid allowed the chamber to go into recess, which it had been scheduled to do the day before. Stoller argued that this was a mistake.
Wow, so after the failed Iraq surge vote, Harry Reid lets the Senate vote to go on recess. That’s the key, not the nonsensical anti-surge resolution which was always going to fail. You see, recess is something the Senators want for themselves. This is how they suffer from the Iraq war, by having to give up a weekend. Keeping them in session, and I know it sounds lame, is one of the only ways that a Senate majority leader can create leverage on the opposition to vote. The fact that Reid wasn’t even willing to force the Senate to give up recess time to debate the war is pathetic.
Politics is about priorities, not just theater. Reid just doesn’t think the war in Iraq is an important priority at this moment. It’s not that he thinks the war is a good thing, it’s just that he would prefer to delegate authority to Joe Biden, keep caucus cohesion, and stomp on any real action than try to take ownership of the war and stop it. And so the war rages on. And don’t worry, the Republicans will take some blame, but now, so will we.
This came a day after Stoller identified Harry Reid as being one of several who are “blocking real progress on Iraq.” The Senate Majority Leader, Stoller said, is “giving the impression of action, but not the teeth.”
I’m not entirely unsympathetic to Stoller’s argument. When Dems took control of both chambers of Congress, expectations were raised. Many Dems thought, if not expected, Dems would wrestle control of the policy agenda away from the White House, by virtue of a popular mandate. This included, of course, the direction of the war, and helping bring it to a close.
That said, I’m not nearly as disappointed with congressional Dems as Stoller is. It’s not that I’m satisfied with the status quo, it’s just that I’m accepting of the difficult circumstances congressional Dems find themselves in.
Matthew Yglesias, responding to Stoller’s argument, explained the limits on Reid’s position.
Look, Matt Yglesias leading a caucus of 51 Democratic Senators that includes Joe Lieberman, Bill Nelson, and Tim Johnson couldn’t get much done in these circumstances either. Nor could Matt Stoller. It’s not Reid’s fault that there aren’t 60 votes for a non-binding resolution on Iraq in the Senate (except in the sense that the “nuclear option” fight was mishandled way back in the day, and Democrats should have tried to abolish filibusters altogether). Blame Lieberman. Blame Jeff Sessions. And, again, ask yourself: If Reid’s resolution is so useless, why is the GOP so determined to defeat it? And if it’s so difficult to get 60 votes for this measure, what would the point be in proposing something more far-reaching that would only fail by a larger margin?
The sad reality is that what Matt and I would like to see the Democrats accomplish is, under the circumstances, very difficult to achieve. Progressives should keep the pressure on for action, but we need to understand that objective circumstances matter. This is a slow boring of hard boards kind of situation, and it’s extremely frustrating, but it’s also George W. Bush’s fault, not Reid’s.
I think that’s exactly right. We can have a debate about whether Reid would pursue a sufficiently vigorous progressive agenda with a 60-vote majority and with a Democratic president at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, but those aren’t the circumstances we find ourselves in today.
Reid has a 51-seat majority, one of whom is in the hospital, and another of whom is Joe Lieberman. As a practical matter, that means the Senate Majority Leader is trying to exercise power with 49 votes, which is an inherently difficult task.
It’s not that I disagree with Stoller’s goals — I think he and I are very much on the same policy page — I just have lower expectations about what’s possible in this environment, and am far more willing to cut Reid, Durbin, & Co. some slack because of it. How can Senate Dems excel in the face of filibusters they can’t break and vetoes they can’t override?
Yglesias summarized the three things we should expect from the new Dem majorities on the Hill: ending Bush’s domestic agenda, holding extensive oversight hearings, and using the legislative agenda to “frame issues in ways favorable to the Democrats for 2008.” That sounds about right. Of course I’d like more — I suspect all Dems do — but realistically, those are the limits of divided government and a razor-thin Senate majority.
Publius summarized the goals nicely.
The way around these obstacles is to gain bigger majorities. And you do that (as the 2006 election illustrated) by politicizing these issues and offering the public a clear choice about them. Dems don’t need a Pickett’s Charge, they need to position their pawns and view things from a longer-term perspective. The Democrats need to make Iraq a Republican vs. Democrat issue. They need to tie Iraq around the GOP’s neck in the court of public opinion. Make them defend Bush. Make them defend surges. Challenge them on their failures to demand accountability until it became clear in the late months of 2006 that blind support would be a political liability.
Of course, as a general matter, war should be above politics. And I’m certainly not crazy about politicizing issues where human life is at stake. But I’m not advocating politicization simply as a means to put the Dems in power. In fact, it’s exactly the reverse — I want the Dems in power so people will stop getting killed. Political control is not an end, it’s a means to the greater end of bringing this tragedy to a close. And if the two parties disagree on the most important issue of our day, well, that’s what political fights are for. (That’s why I think this view is different from Rove’s 2002 Iraq strategy — Iraq was a means to political power for him, not vice-versa).
We want Reid to do more. I suspect Reid wants Reid to do more. So, let’s get him a bigger majority and a Democratic president, and I suspect we’ll see more.