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Glenn Greenwald has an interesting article as Salon about what bipartisanship actually means.
Greenwald then lists through a bunch of votes that nearly all of the Republicans voted for it and the Democrats are split.But more importantly, "bipartisanship" is already rampant in Washington, not rare. And, in almost every significant case, what "bipartisanship" means in Washington is that enough Democrats join with all of the Republicans to endorse and enact into law Republican policies, with which most Democratic voters disagree. That's how so-called "bipartisanship" manifests in almost every case.
Many people, especially partisans, always believe that their own side is compromising too much and that the other side is always winning, so it's best to consult objective facts in order to know how "bipartisanship" works. Here are the vote breakdowns by party over the last couple years on the most significant and contentious pieces of legislation, particularly (though not only) in the area of national security.
In almost every case, the proposals that are enacted are ones favored by the White House and supported by all GOP lawmakers, and then Democrats split and enough of them join with Republicans to ensure that the GOP gets what it wants.
One reason for this is the demise of the moderate Republicans in congress.
Republicans have long been purging their party of moderates, even encouraging primary opponents to run against moderate incumbents. However, Democrats are often very happy to continue to send incumbents back to Congress that continually vote against the interest of the Democratic party and against the interests of the people they represent.Today, however, the animal on the brink of extinction comes from Congress’ own ranks: moderate House Republicans.
Their numbers have long been in decline, they were nearly wiped out in the midterm elections, and 2008 looks to be another bad year for this proud creature.
2 comments:
Noneed4thneed, this is EXACTLY why I find Obama's post-partisan, both-sides-are-equally-to-blame rhetoric so galling.
The last thing we need is "bipartisan" leadership in Washington. That's the Lieberman road. We need someone to have backbone and stand up for Democratic values.
I liked Richardson's approach. He wanted to start the next session of Congress with items that could have bipartisan support. Two examples from 2007 were SCHIP and the Water Resources Development Act.
Richardson acknowledged that there are plenty of divisive issues--imagine the debate when he would have moved to have the U.S. join the International Criminal Court!--but starting with some issues of common interest might help dial down the rancor for more contentious issues.
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