Ornstein on Self-Executing Rules
Republicans whining about self-executing rules are being hypocritical.
Any veteran observer of Congress is used to the rampant hypocrisy over the use of parliamentary procedures that shifts totally from one side to the other as a majority moves to minority status, and vice versa. But I can’t recall a level of feigned indignation nearly as great as what we are seeing now from congressional Republicans and their acolytes at the Wall Street Journal, and on blogs, talk radio, and cable news. It reached a ridiculous level of misinformation and disinformation over the use of reconciliation, and now threatens to top that level over the projected use of a self-executing rule by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. In the last Congress that Republicans controlled, from 2005 to 2006, Rules Committee Chairman David Dreier used the self-executing rule more than 35 times, and was no stranger to the concept of “deem and pass.” That strategy, then decried by the House Democrats who are now using it, and now being called unconstitutional by WSJ editorialists, was defended by House Republicans in court (and upheld). Dreier used it for a $40 billion deficit reduction package so that his fellow GOPers could avoid an embarrassing vote on immigration. I don’t like self-executing rules by either party—I prefer the “regular order”—so I am not going to say this is a great idea by the Democrats. But even so—is there no shame anymore?
It’s not quite as dumb as trying to equate reconciliation with the nuclear option that was promoted by Bill Frist to make appointments not subject to the filibuster. The Democrats aren’t doing anything atypical in this process. They are using tools that Republicans used when they were in power. The problem is that Washington is full of fools who aren’t smart enough to call Norm Ornstein or Sarah Binder or other expert when they don’t understand a procedural argument.
While most are bemoaning the loss of comity, there is another outcome for parties becoming ideologically consistent–party government with the party in power being held accountable. Everyone can whine and carry on and try to worry about equivalency of different acts or we can move on to dealing with different parties being in power having policy consequences that they are held to account. It will be nasty and mean from time to time, but it will also produce results instead of only gridlock.
That said, some rules have to change under these conditions and the first one is the filibuster needs to go all together.
March 17th, 2010 at
While attention is always given to the “birthers, ” the people who contend that Obama was not born in this country there is a far more dangerous group of birthers in the land. They are the people who act is if this country was born on January 21, 2009, the day Obama became President.
Why are they more dangerous? Because many of them are mainstream reporters and commentators. Their failure to explain with precision what is happening and to treat clearly false statements as if they were true leaves many people ignorant of what is actually happening. The present House vote is a perfect example. The House will vote to pass health care but will do so at the same time they pass their reconciliation package. I don’t think this is a hard concept. Why can’t members of the media seem to comprehend what is happening and explain that it has been a fairly regular practice in Washington?
The only explanation is that new rules for a new nation took effect January 21, 2009.
March 17th, 2010 at
Call me Pollyanna, but if the Democrats stick to their guns and do what they need to do to pass health care, the Republicans in the end will be seen for what they are: whining losers.
I agree with Stuart above, although I have to add that the Tribune has been surprisingly scrupulous about pointing out in its news coverage how Republicans used the same tactics when they were in power.