Tag Archives: Harry Reid

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How to get a functioning government

Winning Progressive had a very interesting and thoughtful post this morning by NChrissie B.

We need political fringes because that’s where most new ideas begin. Many will be bad ideas, like the House Republican Budget’s plan to turn Medicare into a voucher program. Others will be good ideas, like the financial transactions tax in the Congressional Progressive Caucus “Back to Work” Budget. As the Economic Policy Institute report noted, that tax would “raise significant revenue while dampening speculative trading and encouraging more productive investment.” It would also discourage individual investors from day-trading and other mistakes that churn their savings into brokers’ profits.

New ideas tend to start on the fringes – right and left – because the fringes don’t have to govern. Think tanks, academics, pundits, and bloggers can kick around ideas without worrying about whether the ideas are politically viable. We did that at BPI when we discussed a Guaranteed Basic Income, an idea from and still on the political fringe. We didn’t talk about whether it could pass in the House or Senate. It couldn’t, at least not soon. But it might gain traction in some form, at some point, and such discussions open our eyes to other perspectives on work, wages, and the social safety net.

I wrote in my unpublished dissertation that social movements need racial fringes to make the movement look mainstream.  NChrissie B.  is arguing that the same is true of  legislating.  The danger, however, is that the Democrats ignore their progressive or left wing while the Republicans are ruled by their right or Tea Party wing.  This is where we seem to be right now and nothing is functioning.  We need to get back to a place where there is a middle ground.  NChrissie B. uses the Overton Window as an illustration.

overton window

I’d like to see the window moved a little more to the left and I think that could happen if Harry Reid would just fix the damn filibuster rules.  I also think the Democrats (and President Obama) need to take the Progressive Caucus budget a little more seriously than they do.  It would also help if Mitch McConnell grew a backbone.

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What does Chuck Hagel have to do with Benghazi?

I wish someone would explain to me what someone who was not even a government official at the time has to do with Benghazi?  Is Chuck Hagel just leverage?  Believe me, the Obama Administration could show live action footage of the event as it unfolded and the Republicans still wouldn’t be happy.

According to Politico

One Armed Services Committee member, South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey  Graham, has made clear that he considers Benghazi and Hagel to be one issue —“no confirmation without information,” he said Sunday, threatening to block both  Hagel and CIA nominee John Brennan. Graham is demanding more details from the  administration about its response to the Benghazi attacks, particularly the  direct involvement of President Barack Obama.

And then you have James Inhofe.  Again from Politico

A spokeswoman for Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) confirmed to POLITICO that he wanted  to drag out the confirmation process for the former Republican senator from  Nebraska.

Inhofe’s threat continued GOP brinksmanship that got under way on Sunday when  Republican aides first said that some senators might walk out of a meeting that  included a vote on Hagel. Inhofe and another top Republican on the committee,  Sen. John McCain of Arizona, both said Monday they would not walk out, but  Inhofe repeated his vow to press the battle against Hagel.

It appears very much as if the Republicans have forgotten that they are a minority in the Senate.  If Chair Senator Carl Levin calls for a committee vote, it will be along party lines which he didn’t want.  But I don’t think there will be any bipartisan agreement there.  According to the New York Times, Levin

…called Monday for a committee vote on Tuesday afternoon on the nomination of former Senator Chuck Hagel to be the next secretary of defense.

The committee action has been postponed for the past week over evolving demands from Republicans for new documentation on Mr. Hagel’s past statements, personal financial records and even a sexual harassment allegation involving two former staff members, but not Mr. Hagel himself. As action has drawn closer, Republican opponents to a former Senate Republican colleague have threatened filibusters and even a walkout from the committee.

Once Hagel’s nomination reaches the floor, vote counters believe that there will be 60 votes to break any attempt at a filibuster.  Maybe Majority Leader Reid need to reconsider his agreement with Senator McConnell since I don’t think it is going to work.

But Mr. Levin’s decision to call for a public discussion and vote, starting at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday ahead of President Obama‘s State of the Union address, indicated that the chairman still believes that Mr. Hagel has enough support to be confirmed. Committee aides say they have no indication that any Democrats or Senate independents will oppose him, putting him at 55 votes to start. Two Republican senators, Thad Cochran of Mississippi and Mike Johanns from Mr. Hagel’s home state, Nebraska, have pledged their support, and at least four Republicans have said they will oppose a filibuster.

And I still want to know what Chuck Hagel has to do with Benghazi, Senator Graham.  I think we all know that this really has to do with the fact that Hagel is not a war hawk and will figure out a way to cut the defense budget.

Photograph Brendan Hoffman for The New York Times

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Hopes for Obama 2.0

I thought this was a good summary of President Obama’s first term and what we hope can be avoided.

And they are still working on it.  Just look at Mike Luckovich

The more things change the more they stay the same.  John McCain is mischaracterizing Hillary Clinton’s testimony and it looks, right now like Harry Reid is going to cave on filibuster reform after all but it is an evolving situation.

And if you want another sign that nothing has changed, John Boehner is accusing Obama of destroying the Republican party.  I think they are doing a pretty good job without the President’s help.

Collage of pictures of John Boehner crying.

Boehner Collage – Jed Lewison

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About the Republican request for a balanced approach

Ezra Klein posted this today

This is a very sharp point by Josh Barro:

The Republicans’ main problem in this negotiation is that they know President Barack Obama will not agree to cut in the area they want to cut: aid to the poor. The signal Obama has sent is that he is willing to make a deal that cuts old-age entitlements, meaning Medicare and Social Security, and Republicans are internally conflicted over those programs.

He’s right. Think back to Mitt Romney’s proposed budget. Medicare and Social Security were held harmless for at least 10 years. Defense spending got a lift. PBS and the National Endowment for the Arts were on the table, but they cost so little it hardly mattered.

And there is the Ryan budget problem which remains the basic Republican budget outline.  It is what they ran on.

These are, however, classes of cuts the White House won’t even consider. A year ago, they were open to modest cuts in Medicaid, but after the Supreme Court’s health-care decision, even that door has shut. As for discretionary spending cuts, so many of those were made in 2011, there’s just not much left to do.

That leaves Medicare and Social Security. It’s possible that the negotiators will enact a backdoor, but significant, cut to Social Security by changing the government’s measure of inflation. But they’re not going to come at Social Security from the front. It’s too politically potent. Even Ryan’s budget left Social Security alone.

As for Medicare, as Barro says, if “Republicans ask for near-term Medicare cuts, that will mean reversing a position that is popular with a core constituency (old white people) and giving up a cudgel that they feel they have used effectively to beat up the president since 2009.” It’s a pickle.

In addition, as Steve Benen on the Rachel Maddow blog reminds us, the President has already offered spending cuts, of about 1.7 trillion over 10 years.

The White House keeps saying it wants a ‘balanced approach’ but this offer is completely unbalanced and unrealistic,” a Capitol Hill Republican said yesterday. “It calls for $1.6 trillion in tax hikes — all of that upfront — in exchange for only $400 billion in spending cuts that come later.”

Let’s put aside, for now, the irony of hearing Republicans talking about “balanced” debt-reduction plans. Instead, the importance of complaints like these is that they overlook everything that happened a year ago. Jonathan Cohn had a good piece on this.

…As part of the 2011 Budget Control Act, Obama agreed to spending  reductions of about $1.5 trillion over the next ten years. If you count  the interest, the savings is actually $1.7 trillion. Boehner should have  no problem remembering the details of that deal: As Greg Sargent points out, Boehner at the time actually gloated about the fact that the deal was “all spending cuts.”

And now, with this latest offer, Obama is proposing yet more spending  reductions, to the tune of several hundred billion dollars. Add it up  and it’s more than $2 trillion in spending cuts Obama has either signed  into law or is endorsing now. That’s obviously greater than the $1.6 trillion in new tax revenue he’s seeking. (And that doesn’t even take into account automatic cuts  from the 2011 budget sequester, which Obama has proposed to defer, or  savings from ending the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.)

I can understand the temptation to block 2011 from memory, but what transpired is clearly relevant to the current debate. Obama wanted a “balanced” approach last year — some cuts, some new revenue — but didn’t get it. Instead, faced with the prospect of Republicans crashing the economy on purpose, the president accepted a deal with a whole lot of spending cuts.

How much new tax revenue came as the result of last year’s deal? Zero. The entire package came in the form of spending reductions and savings.

So with the new tax revenues and the already proposed budget cuts, President Obama is offering exactly what the Republicans keep asking for:  a balanced approach.  I’m not sure what they are waiting for.  Senator Harry Reid is mystified and so am I.

We need a comprehensive solution that lasts for a couple of years at a minimum because this non-economist doesn’t think the economy will improve as long as we seem to be in a continuous a budget or debt ceiling crisis.

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How to filibuster your own bill

I think that Mitch McConnell has just helped out the Senators who are looking to reform the Senate rules.

This is from the Washington Post

In a bit of parliamentary squabbling common only to the United States Senate, the chamber will not be voting Thursday on President Obama’s proposal to largely shift responsibility for raising the debt ceiling from Congress to the White House.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) proposed an immediate vote on the idea Thursday morning, as a way to highlight potential Democratic unease with the idea.

This afternoon, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) called that bluff, asking to proceed to immediate vote on the measure. But he asked for an up-or-down vote, allowing the Senate to skip to a final vote by which the measure could be approved on a simple 51-vote majority.

McConnell countered the measure should require a 60-vote majority, as most votes do in the Senate.

“What we’re talking about here is a perpetual debt ceiling grant, in effect, to the president. Matters of this level of controversy always require 60 votes,” McConnell said.

Reid objected to the 60-vote threshold. “What we have here is a case of Republicans here in the Senate once again not taking yes for an answer,” Reid said. “Now the Republican leader objects to his own idea. So I guess we have a filibuster of his own bill.”

Go, Mitch!

It really is time to go back to majority votes except on treaties.

Photograph:  AP

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Elizabeth Warren meets some Republicans (with update)

Here is cartoonist Dan Wasserman’s take on Senator Elect Elizbeth Warren and her potential assignment to the Senate Banking Committee.  Of course, some of us think this is exactly why she needs to be appointed.  Are you listening Harry Reid?  (update: Looks like he listened!)

banking and warren

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Talking in the Senate

Back in 2010, I wrote about the filibuster in a post called “Puppies, Cats and Filibusters“.  In it I argued for the talking filibuster.  It didn’t seem at the time that there was any real move to do away with it totally, but making someone actually show up and explain why while holding the floor and appearing on C-SPAN seemed reasonable.  It has only taken a few years, but it looks like Harry Reid and a number of Senate democrats are moving toward a similar solution.  I am still waiting, however, for a clear explanation of how exactly the change could be accomplished.

Here is what I understand so far.  It usually takes 67 votes to change Senate rules, but there is a mysterious thing called the “nuclear option” where the rules could be changed with only 51 votes.  We know there are 53 Democratic senators and 2 who will caucus with them at least one of whom (Saunders, VT) should be voting with Reid on this.) So there are probably enough votes if there is some party solidarity.  But how does that “nuclear option” work?  That is the question.

The New York Times had this

Senate Republicans have refused to let scores of bills go forward in recent years, often because Mr. Reid will not allow the party to put amendments on those bills. This practice is deplored by the minority in both chambers, but only in the Senate can bills be stopped through the minority protest. Mr. Reid would like to limit what procedural motions are subject to filibusters, and to force senators to return to the practice of standing around forever, reading the phone book or what have you, if they choose to filibuster a bill before its final passage.

“If a bare majority can proceed to any bill it chooses,” said Mr. McConnell, deeply angry, “and once on that bill the majority leader all by himself can shut out all the amendments that aren’t to his liking, then those who elected us to advocate for their views will have lost their voices in this legislative process.”

Mr. Reid countered that the filibuster was “not part of the Constitution.”

“It’s something we developed here to help get legislation passed,” he said. “Now it’s being used to stop legislation from passing.”

And Ezra Klein explained McConnell’s objections this way

McConnell is referring to the Democrats’ proposal to change Senate rules with 51 votes rather than 67. But his outrage isn’t particularly convincing. As Senate whip, McConnell was a key player in the GOP’s 2005 effort to change the filibuster rules using — you guessed it — 51 votes. As he said at the time, “This is not the first time a minority of Senators has upset a Senate tradition or practice, and the current Senate majority intends to do what the majority in the Senate has often done–use its constitutional authority under article I, section 5, to reform Senate procedure by a simple majority vote.”

Now, Reid, at the time, was steadfastly opposed to changing the rules with 51 votes. He condemned the idea as “breaking the rules to change the rules.” So McConnell isn’t the Senate’s only inconsistent member on this point. But the fact is that McConnell was right the first time: The reason that Republicans believed they could change the rules with 51 votes in 2005 and Democrats believe they can do the same today is that they can.

So I guess it really is a constitutional not nuclear option to change the rules by a simple majority.  And the changes being proposed are pretty modest.  Basically you could only filibuster final passage of a bill, not bringing it to the floor at all.  The Republicans seem to want to amend bills and I think this is OK, but there has to be acaveat that any amendment must be related to the actual substance of the bill.  Room for some compromise here?

But if you want to know what this is important at all think about all the judges being held up, all the bills that don’t come to the floor of the Senate because someone (and we currently don’t have to know who) decides they want something to come to a vote.

This is from the Washington Post.

In order to overcome a filibuster — when a political party attempts to block or
delay action on a bill — the Senate can invoke a procedure called cloture. Sixty
votes, or three-fifths of the Senate, is required for cloture regardless of
whether all senators are present and voting. If cloture is passed, a time limit
is placed on the debate, ultimately ending the filibuster. Read related article

*The minority party of the 107th Congress changed multiple times. Source: United States Senate. The Washington Post. Published on November 27, 2012, 8:35 p.m.
So we do have a problem here.  The question is whether it can be fixed or if the Senate will continue to be dysfunctional.  I would actually look forward to seeing John McCain or Tom Coburn or some other Republican Senator on C-SPAN holding forth at length explaining opposition to a measure.  Then we could all call our own Senators in either support or opposition.  Could be fun.
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Accept the tax increase and defeat the Republicans

I was eating my lunch at my desk today as I often do (I know a bad habit) and the Republicans were voting down the Senate bill in several complicated procedural moves I don’t pretend to understand.  I do know the bottom line:  Increase in payroll taxes, no unemployment extension, and funny things happen to reimbursements to doctors for Medicare.  Anyway, I posted on the New York Times comment section on the story of the Republican vote, that maybe we should accept the tax increase as a way of contributing to the Republican’s defeat in 2012.  Last time I check it had over 300 recommendations!  Maybe I’m on to something here.  But I have to give credit to my husband at FortRight who said at breakfast, ”it might be worth $1000 to see the Republicans go down.”

Stand firm, Harry Reid.  Stand firm, Mitch McConnell.  You made your compromise as the House asked and just because John Boehner can’t herd his cats or maybe squirrels (Ana Marie Cox on her Guardian blog quoted a friend who called them squirrels because “[they] are panicky and prone to irrational running into traffic.”) doesn’t mean you have to save him.  Here is John with his squirrels.

Now they want the President to order the Senate back.  Stand firm, Mr. President.  Yes, not passing the bill will hurt briefly, but the Republicans will get the blame and will be forced to come back in January and be serious about a real bill, with real funding to pay for it.  As Ana Marie Cox said, “Congressional Republicans are roadkill.”

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Harry Reid, Race, and the GOP

The new book “Game Change” by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann about the 2008 Presidential is already upsetting a lot of people.  I’m certain that Sarah Palin will not be happy with Steve Schmidt’s comments about her for one.  But right now that is being overshadowed by a remark that Harry Reid made to them during an interview.

Harry Reid stands in the Capitol.

Reid told them that Barack Obama could be elected president because he is “light skinned” and lacks “Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.”   According to Politico

Embarrassed by the remarks and already facing a tough climb to reelection in the fall, Reid has reached out to the African American community, apologizing for his comments and highlighting his legislative record of backing civil rights issues important to the black community. He immediately won a showing of support from prominent Democratic black leaders, including the president, who accepted his apology and said he’s seen the “passionate leadership he’s shown on issues of social justice and I know what’s in his heart. As far as I’m concerned, the book is closed.”

Harry Reid might be ignorant and inarticulate but the Republicans are hypocrites. 

I think Ruth Marcus writing in the Washington Post today has it about right.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid acted like an idiot.

Also, he was right.

It’s a measure of the suffocating culture of political correctness that it feels risky to say that. It’s a measure of the insulting how-dumb-do-they-think-we-are culture of incessant partisanship that Republicans leapt on Reid’s remarks as racist.

…

For anyone in public life to use the word “Negro” in 2008 is beyond stupid. What was once polite has become demeaning. (Although, interestingly enough, the U.S. Census chose to retain the word on the 2010 census form because so many respondents wrote it in 10 years ago.)

The lame explanation offered by an aide — that the remarks were not intended for use in the book — is about as convincing as Jesse Jackson’s assertion that he did not consider his “Hymietown” comments to the Washington Post’s Milton Coleman on the record. (“Let’s talk black talk,” Jackson had said to Coleman.)

But there’s a big difference between Reid 2008 and Jackson 1984 — or, more to the point, Lott 2002. When the then-soon-to-be-former Majority Leader Trent Lott said that the United States could have avoided “all these problems” if Strom Thurmond’s 1948 segregationist campaign for president had succeeded, there was an unmistakable — if unintended — whiff of racism. As much as Republican critics would like to use the incident for partisan purposes, Reid’s blundering comments were made in the context of supporting an African American candidate, not praising a segregationist one.

Walter Russell Mead posted this on Politico’s Arena

Majority Leader Reid’s cretinous private remarks are creepy and disturbing. The GOP outrage is as phony as a three dollar bill and the ‘double standard’ charges don’t hold up. The difference is that Lott was praising the political wisdom and importance of Thurmond’s Dixiecrat campaign and that Lott gave a strong appearance of wishing that the segregationists had somehow won. Reid’s remarks reveal a man who is embarassingly and pathetically awkward and out of touch, but there’s nothing there that would give aid and comfort to organized racism in American life. The remarks give credence to the view that the time has come when Senator Reid should think about spending more time with his family; the voters of Nevada look like they are planning to help him achieve this next fall. Until then, the rest of us might do well by thinking about Senator Reid as little as humanly possible.

And Michael Steele of the Republican National Committee who called on Reid to resign said this is if he didn’t it showed a double standard from what happened to Trent Lott.

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele called Sunday for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to resign because of racial remarks, but Steele took the opposite view when a Republican Senate leader was facing similar calls.

 The Washington Post reported on Dec. 14, 2002: “Lt. Gov.-elect Michael S. Steele said last night that he was personally upset by U.S. Sen. Trent Lott’s praise for Sen. Strom Thurmond and his segregationist past, but said Lott should not be forced to relinquish his leadership position in the Senate. ‘Trent Lott apologized, but he needs to keep apologizing because this is a very sensitive issue to the black community,’ Steele (R) said at an event celebrating his election as Maryland’s first black lieutenant governor. ‘I know Trent Lott personally, and I know that this is not his intent. But it’s still unfortunate. And I think he needs to apologize a little bit more.’”

Steele was joined in his call for Reid to resign and in saying there was a “double standard” because Lott lost his leadership post by Senators Kyl and McConnell.  But isn’t an apology enough, Mr. Steele?

On the Democratic side, Doug Wilder (former Governor of Virginia) thinks Reid ought to apologize to the country while Eleanor Holmes Norton, Jim Clyburn and Al Sharpton are defending Reid.  I have no idea if Nevada has another Democrat who could run for Reid’s Senate seat this fall and win, but I think maybe they should look for someone quickly.

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First Look at the House Health Care Vote

A few days after the one year anniversary of Barack Obama’s election, the House of Representatives has succeeded in passing what pundits of many stripes are calling  “sweeping reform.”  I’m one of those sick political junkies who stayed up to watch the vote.  220 to 215.  39 Democrats voted against final passage while one Republican voted for.  The magic number was 218.

Speaker Pelosi and the House Leadership.  Photo from the New York Times.

I’ve been looking at the voting pattern posted on the New York Times “Inside Congress” webpage.  There were four votes taken last night.  Looking at Democrat Rick Boucher, an old friend from the mountains of Virginia in a district that voted for McCain and two Republicans, An Cao from New Orleans and Timothy Johnson from Illinois, is quite interesting.

On the Stupak Amendment that added language relating to abortion beyond that of the horrible Hyde Amendment, all three men voted party line and the amendment passed 240 to 194.   The next vote was on the Republican substitute bill.  Rick Boucher and Timothy Johnson voted against the Republican bill while An Cao voted for it.   The substitute was defeated 258 to 176.  (Speaker Pelosi didn’t vote.)

The third vote was to recommit the Democratic Bill.  This was defeated 247 to 187 with Boucher and Johnson (joined by Republican John Duncan from Tennessee) voted against and An Cao voting for recommitment.On the vote for final passage, Boucher and Johnson voted against the Democratic bill while An Cao voted for it.  The Senate Democrats should take a lesson from Rick and vote to end the Republican filibuster even if they vote against the final bill.  And An Cao stood with his leadership on everything but final passage.  (Snowe and Collins take note. )  Harry Reid needs only 50 Democratic votes for passage and Joe Biden can break the tie. 

Chris Cillizaa makes an interesting observation in the Washington Post this morning. 

8

That’s the number of House Democrats voting against tonight’s health care bill who represent districts carried by President Barack Obama during the 2008 election.

Of the eight, Obama’s highest percentage came in Rep. Artur Davis‘ 7th district where he won 74 percent of the vote. Davis’ vote is rightly understood through a political lens as, despite the overwhelming support for Obama in his district, he is running for governor of a conservative-leaning state next November and wants to safeguard against attacks from Republicans.

Six of the remaining seven members — Reps. John Adler (N.J.), Brian Baird (Wash.), John Barrow (Ga.), Larry Kissell (N.C.), Scott Murphy (N.Y.) and Glenn Nye (Va.) — represent districts where the President took 55 percent or less in 2008, making their decision to vote “no” strategically defensible

(The last Democratic member holding an Obama district to vote against the bill was Rep. Dennis Kucinich who, as we all know, is tough to predict.)

That means — for you non-math majors out there — that 31 of the 39 Democrats who voted against the bill represent seats won by Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) last fall.

Hats off to Speaker Nancy Pelosi for getting the bill passed.  Ball is now passed to Harry Reid.