In 2006, there was a push for Democrats to gain the majority in the House and Senate of the US Congress. At the time, I wondered exactly what those majorities would bring us. After all, it wasn’t as if we were electing left-wing idealogues. Since that time, we’ve added to the majority in the House, the most recent addition being Travis Childress from Mississippi, who is described in this article as a “pro-gun, pro-life, anti-tax Democrat.”
But have we really added to the majority? Sure, we have the committee chairmanships but legislatively, do we have an agenda consistent with the party’s platform (pdf)? More importantly, are we making strides towards making the platform a reality, as opposed to a wish list? From the same article referenced above:
But the strain of balancing the political imperatives of a right-of-center to pretty far left-of-center caucus has already strained the Democratic majority in the House. In the most recent example, the party’s intricate scheme for passing a war spending bill collapsed Thursday when most Republicans sat out the war money vote and most Democrats, who oppose spending any more money on combat in Iraq, voted against it.
That left the Democratic majority without the votes to pass a spending bill that, in the leadership’s calculation, is essential to protecting the party’s image on national security as well as members from conservative districts who cannot afford to be seen as failing to support troops in the field. Most of those lawmakers, including many freshmen, backed the war funds.
That the Democrats with the majority can’t get stuff done is a problem. I understand that universal health care has been in the party platform for decades but does anyone think that such legislation could pass our current Congress?
So my question is this: can the tent be too big?
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
Can it get too big? Possibly. I would imagine that there’s an ideal size where the legislature has enough votes that it can pass what it wants that adding more people to compromise with would just be at least theoretically superfluous, but the only thing I’m absolutely positive about is that the tent can be too small.
This was one of my arguments about the bragging goin gon about the likes of Webb et al. Cokcy Dems would talk of the majority but in reality they sold their soluls and ideals to get it in name only. Now since no one toes the party liner, as it were, nothing gets done and you havea Congress with worse polling rating than Bush. Let me say that again… Worse than Bush.
Truly, what was won.
Now Vivian, you were NOT one of those arrogant Dems, seriously. Actually you are one of the (Few) thoughtful ones whom, as I recall, voiced concerns of straying from the ideals in the name of winning. That and this post prove once again that you have this rare liberal skill: Thinking 🙂
This is a problem with both of the major parties. If there were ever an advantage to political parties at all, it would have been that less political, less informed voters would have been able to have at least a general idea of the principles of a given candidate, based upon the party’s platform. I cannot, for the life of me, find enough similarities between Evan Bayh and Ted Kennedy to place them as political allies. I can’t figure how GWB and John McCain claim any similarity to Ronald Reagan. This is a problem which has even begun to creep into the Libertarian Party. The very notion that Bob Barr and Mike Gravel share a political philosophy with one another, let alone with me, is ludicrous!
I recently had a back and forth with MB, in the comments section of one of your other posts, where he took me to task for using the term “liberal card”. I’m certain that the issue you bring up here is the source of where he misunderstood my point. I said liberal, he heard Democrat. What he called a liberal “caricature” was not consistent with his experience with Virginia Democrats. My experience with being ostracized for violating liberal orthodoxy was with Democrats in Massachusetts. Believe me, this is not a difference between a mastiff and a chihuahua. It’s more like the difference between a mastiff and a ferret. Massachusetts Republicans would be very liberal Democrats in Virginia.
How these people fall into political alliances with others of such vastly different ideologies really exposes the bankruptcy of political parties, as far as I’m concerned.
It’s wrong to say Democrats “can’t get stuff done”. The GOP is taking advantage of Senate rules to block the Democratic agenda. In the Senate, a majority no longer has any meaning because the GOP filibusters everything. Democrats would need 60 votes to be able to push their agenda through (such as universal health care) without needing 10 GOP votes. Get the Dems 60 votes in the Senate (hey, Mark Warner!) and then judge their effectiveness.
I don’t think it’s wrong. In fact, the article provides a really good example of legislation not being able to get out of the House, where our majority is much, much larger. We can’t blame the lack of a veto-proof majority in the Senate on the failure of the House to get legislation passed.
Well, it seems like there is a cornucopia of issues in the platform. So many that it would be hard for anyone to feel left out. It does seem easier to peg a Republican than a Democrat. At least in appearance, Republicans now center around a movement (conservatism in the Goldwater, Friedman sense) or movements (Christian conservatism). Democrats don’t represent the exact antithesis of these movements. There is not some unifying ideal like the DOD being the only branch of government left. Not that this is a bad thing; in fact, it can be a good thing in that it does not constrain our ability to develop good, better, or the best solutions.
Also, politicians are an abstraction of their parties. There are always the powers in Washington that intervene to separate politicians from the ideals of their party. When all your new friends are lobbyists, wining and dining you at the Capital Grille, it is easy to forget your ideals, especially when an industry trade group explains what deleterious effects your ideals will have on their fiscal health. But I digress.
Back to your question, sure the tent can be too big. If there are people inside the party that don’t feel on balance that their ideas are getting any play, then that will leave them to look elsewhere. And if their ideas fall under the individualism banner, then they will probably find a home in the Republican Party.
As far as purity, and getting a legislative majority to effect that purity. It depends on what purity is. Republicans are never going to get that for say Ron Paul’s, Jeff Flake’s, or Tom Coburn’s ideal. As Bush and Rove so eloquently demonstrate, there will always be powerful party members on each side that are not interested in ideals, just power. I don’t think Democrats will ever have the votes or the interest to give us a healthcare system like Japan, Taiwan or Germany (all spend less than we do as a percentage of GDP on healthcare and all have universal coverage). In order to achieve the spectacular, you either need a mass movement of the people or you need a crisis.
Too right, Vivian! Those who control the Rules Committee are close to all powerful in the House. Then it is all down to controlling your caucus. If you can’t control your caucus on key votes, it certainly begs the question you asked.
Rick, you’re (again) mischaracterizing what I said, but I only care enough to note that, not rehash it.
~
Yes, I think that a party can risk more than it’s worth to get someone elected under its banner, when that person doesn’t share its core values. (I’ll point out that I don’t think fiscal/tax policy is necessarily a core value, unless one adheres to a fiscal/tax policy as a value in itself, superior to all others).
But whether the tent is too big already or not, can we all agree that Lieberman needs to be thrown out the back door?
Of course your tent is too big, but so is the Republican tent.
Much has been made of the election of three Democrats in special elections to formerly GOP seats in the House of Representatives, but in at least two cases, the successful Democrat is actually more conservative than the average Republican Congressman. The major parties have become more like competing leagues, like the AFL & NFL, than real political parties advancing a coherent political philosophy.
In theory, Republicans should advocate a republic as our form of government, with the government having only those powers specifically granted by the people through ratification of the Constitution.
Democrats should promote the unfettered rule of the majority.
Neither name is really descriptive any more, with Republicans just as ready to ignore the limits of the Constitution today when it interferes with their agenda as the Democrats have been since FDR.
The only parties remaining which have coherent political philosophies to which they consistently adhere are the Communists and the Libertarians.
How do you figure that?
Personally I like that both political parties have to try and represent a majority rather than settling for an ideologically pure minority or plurality. It means that the governing party has to remember that government is supposed to represent all Americans, not just the constituents who voted for the majority coalition, and it pushes our political leaders to acknowledge, respect and build concensus around a broader diversity of opinions than any one individual is capable of holding–indeed, that’s why I prefer the Democrats to the bottom-rung parties like the libertarians and the greens. Even if I sometimes I agree with libertarians or greens about an issue, the fact is they don’t give a damn what I think about anything, my opinion will not impact them in the slightest (and it’s no wonder they never win anything as a consequence, since they apparently want neither my opinion nor my vote).
Congress may not be that great at representing the Democratic Party as envisioned by the liberal puritans at Daily Kos, but I think they’re actually doing a reasonable job representing the diverse and at times divergent opinions and ideas that characterize America today. Which isn’t to say that the Democratic Party should feel compelled to try to please all people at all times or that they ought to try and win 100% of all districts, it only means that I’m glad Nancy Pelosi at least has to listen to a few different opinions on any given issue during House caucus sessions before the majority attempts to craft and pass legislation.
Vivian,
Well, the tent can’t be stretched any further than their are poles to prop it up. Let’s say the poles can be personalities or issues.
Still, while tents work well enough in brief showers, or steady drizzles, they don’t hold up too well in storms.
To me the people’s business was better served when coalitions formed over each important issue that reached across the aisle. So, maybe the big tent is a metaphor that can only be stretched but so far.
The strictly party line voting pattern of the last 25 years makes us think there is an on-going need for yet another big tent. Moreover, it has created the poisonously partisan atmosphere that keeps our legislators from getting much done.
Empires are out style. Maybe big tents are, too.
Well, they don’t really have to, though. Certainly the we’ve seen the Republicans achieve great (electoral) success substantively representing a rather small minority, and paying superficial attention to a bare majority (if that). [insert parliamentary system macro, delete for pointlessness]
I think the Dems have the near mirror problem – they’re crippled by fear of displeasing a small (but effective) minority.
The problem with having two parties which are only slightly different flavors of the same theory of government is that we don’t get to try one way, and then switch if it doesn’t work. All we get to choose is which pretty face to entrust with the same basic programs.
If Republicans really want a republic and Democrats really wanted no limits to majority rule, we could try one iway or the other, and abandon bad ideas in favor of others that seem better.
As it stands, until it really hits bottom, and the country either goes Libertarian or Commie in desperation, there is no fine tuning to be done, we just slowly slide toward catastrophe. The most common result of letting things get that bad is fascism.
All we are doing now is playing two teams striving for the highest number of seats in order to get committee spots and pork, by appealing to the lowest common denominator of our fears and prejudices. So what we get is corruption, demagoguery and pandering instead of wisdom and leadership.
I get nervous with “Blue dogs” like Childress. It makes me think – is he really a Democrat??? Or will he pull a Virgil Goode? If it walks like an elephant, talks like an elephant can it be a donkey?
But then again, I do not want a lithmus test for Democrats.