Representative John A. Boehner beat back an embarrassing challenge to his speakership from aggrieved conservatives on Tuesday as Republicans assumed control of both houses of Congress, pledging to restore function and civility to a body that has become a symbol of disorder for most Americans.There's a lot of crap in those two paragraphs, of course -- what, specifically, makes the House a "symbol of disorder," one might ask, especially "for most Americans." Still, the problem with Congress in the last session wasn't necessarily John Boehner. The larger problem was across the building, in the form of this guy:
Two dozen Republicans voted against Mr. Boehner, and one withheld his support, clouding what should have been a day of euphoria for the party after its definitive midterm election victory. It was the largest number of votes against a speaker from members of his or her own party in at least two decades.
 |
| What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas |
 |
| An obvious grasp of the situation |
Yet the problem is in the Republican leadership, or so we are told.
Let's be honest -- John Boehner is hardly the optimal leader, but in order to topple him, you need someone else who can credibly lead. And as a one-time rebel points out, that individual doesn't yet exist:
Representative Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina, a Republican who did not vote for Mr. Boehner in 2013 but did so this year, said the attempted ouster of the speaker was “poorly considered and poorly executed.” He added, “This was an effort driven as much by talk radio as by a thoughtful and principled effort to make a change.”I'm not sure how a Senator can be Speaker of the House, but we'll leave that aside. Mulvaney's point about talk radio is spot on. It's great that Mark Levin and his pals are howling about Boehner, but howling isn't how you change the world. Getting in the arena and getting your people elected is how you change the world. Boehner has been at that business of getting elected for his entire career. He's quite good at it. I'm not aware that Levin has elected anyone. The world of practical politics requires a lot of hard work and sustained effort. And, unfortunately, it requires making compromises with people you find unsavory or unsatisfying. It's great to be a true believer, but true believers rarely grasp the levers, especially if they spend the majority of their time howling and preening.
The random nature of some of the protest votes reflected how disorganized the opposition to Mr. Boehner was. One congressman voted for Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, for speaker; another voted for Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama; two voted for Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio. Mr. Gohmert received three votes; Mr. Yoho, two. Each man voted for himself.
4 comments:
Getting in the arena and getting your people elected is how you change the world.
So the argument goes. It's a useful argument. It seems reasonable. And it's pretty nearly unfalsifiable. If nothing changes in the right direction, it just means that we didn't elect enough of the right people and we need to do better next time. The fault always remains ours.
Is there ever a point at which we can say that the system itself is flawed?
Is there ever a point at which we can say that the system itself is flawed?
Yes, but have we reached that point? Think about it. Who were Boehner's challengers? Gohmert? Yoho? Webster? Did any of them make a sustained challenge to Boehner or even do any of the spade work involved in mounting a challenge? Based on what I can see, it didn't happen. Gohmert and Yoho mentioned that they would be interested in being Speaker this week, and Webster made his candidacy known on the same day as the election. It's a variation on what Fred Thompson did when he ran for president; he didn't campaign because he assumed he would get the casting call. It doesn't work that way.
As far as I can tell, the Boehners and Klines of the world succeed within the system because they believe in the system and work at it. Think about what happened with Kurt Bills in 2012 — he had a bunch of people, mainly Ron Paul acolytes, who pushed him over the top in the nominating process, but once he won the nomination, there wasn't much outreach to the party regulars who do the tough day to day work of door knocking and phone calling. It felt like a hostile takeover and these folks stayed home. Not surprisingly, Bills got crushed.
Is that a flaw in the system? Yes, but it doesn't change the reality that winning hearts and minds is job one. It doesn't matter how attractive or sensible your ideas are if you're not willing to spend the time to make a sustained argument and then stay at it through all the steps of the process, including the ones that they find distasteful. Conservatives and liberty-minded people can't just make their argument and then drop the mic.
Is that a flaw in the system? Yes, but it doesn't change the reality that winning hearts and minds is job one. It doesn't matter how attractive or sensible your ideas are if you're not willing to spend the time to make a sustained argument and then stay at it through all the steps of the process...
Well stated, D.
I don't think the system is flawed as much as the people we count on to run the system are flawed. And more to the point, I didn't really hear any reasonable arguments about what Boehner was suppose to have accomplished in the last two years without the Senate and Obama in the White House. A lot of it (not all of it) seemed to be that Boehner wasn't willing to engage in more political theatrics, despite the fact that there was a government shutdown for 15 days in 2013.
I would assume that over the next two years, all that will happen is that a boatload of bills will be vetoed - and that almost none of those vetoes will be overridden. And that may be the best case scenario.
You win hearts and minds, you start moving the ball. Now the two party system is bad, a parliamentary system worse, but all in all, you move hearts and minds, you move juries, you move city councils, you move the ball.
Post a Comment