Megan McArdle points out House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s culpability in the failure of the modified version of the Paulson-Bernanke rescue plan for the financial sector to pass the House yesterday:
Being in power means that you get to give your party special favors on many occasions–but it also means that you, yes you, have the ultimate responsibility for getting things done. She didn’t particularly try to bring her party in line, and so of course as soon as a few Republicans defected, hers stampeded. The ultimate blame for this failure has to be laid at her feet.
That doesn’t excuse the Republicans; I’ve already expressed my opinion of their conduct. If they do not understand that there are some things more important than reelection, they do not deserve to be in Congress. I’m not sure they deserve to be let loose in society. But Pelosi is the one who was vested with the ultimate responsibility for shaping the legislative process in the House. She not only dropped the ball; she picked it up and drop kicked it through her own goal.
If things were fair, Megan would be right. But it’s not fair it’s politics and, unless the economy brightens enormously between now and the first Tuesday in November, the House Republicans will get the blame, it will further sour the “Republican brand”, and at the margins it will tip the election more to the Democrats.
I disagree I don’t think Megan’s right at all. Yes she gave a partisan speech, bit deal. The speakers always give partisan speeches. She convinced 60+ percent of her party to vote for a massively unpopular bill. The republicans completely failed to do so, getting something like a third to vote for a the bill. A republican bill no less, sure the dems got some concessions but that makes it no less a republican bill. Blame for it’s failure is pretty straight forward as I see it. Republicans voted against the bill not for ideological reasons but so they could get reelected with out this monkey on their back.
Not to say that Pelosi’s couldn’t have gone farther or asked for fewer concessions, still I don’t see the failure as her fault…much as it pains me to say it.
Perhaps it was a very calculated move on Pelosi’s part..in less then five weeks, there could very well be a different view on Capital Hill…When was the last time the Democrats had all three houses at the same time?
I’m hoping for a complete overhaul in Washington…one that will clean out many GOP members as possible for a long time to come…
To answer your question, Larry, Democrats controlled the Senate, the House, and the Presidency until the 1994 midterm elections.
The main accomplishments of that period were the passage of NAFTA and the adoption of the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy in the military.
I have to say, I don’t see it. This began as a White House Bill. The Dems brought 60% of their people to support it. The Republicans brought a third of theirs. How exactly is that a Democrat failure?
Democrats asked for 100 GOP votes to ensure that the GOP wouldn’t turn this into a partisan issue. Boehner failed. The failure is his, and the GOP’s.
If you believe that the problems with the financial sector are real and need to be addressed urgently and you believe that the bill presented would address the problems in some way, shape, or form, and you’re the Speaker of the House you bear some responsibility in its failure. There are all sorts of discipline you can bring to bear to ensure that reluctant members of your own party toe the line. There was no attempt to do that. Indeed there are reports that the Democrats that voted against were explicitly released to do so.
If you believe the first and don’t believe the second, the bill should never have been brought to the floor. If you don’t believe either of the propositions, it’s all kabuki.
Assuming as I am that it’s not kabuki, then you’ve got a choice between the bill should never have brought to the floor or that the Speaker is at least partly at fault for the failure of the bill to pass. My assessment is it’s the latter.
Note that I think that the Republicans certainly share the blame, the Republican leadership has been inept, and Republicans will get all or most of the blame.
Pelosi could have gotten the votes. Could GOP leaders then have stopped their own members dishonestly running against the bill? No. So the Democrats — batrayed by their erstwhile GOP allies — refused to shoot themelves in the foot.
It’s hardly a profile in courage, but at best they score an assist. This was a GOP meltdown.
It still never ceases to amaze me how voting the overwhelming will of the people is such a bad thing, even a significant number of Dems got it. I must have missed it when the definition of represent was changed to include the word convenient.
Or perhaps it is more important to “do the right thing” because those that elected you are not smart enough to know what is good for them.
Failure is failure, but the important part of a bipartisan failure is being able to blame someone else?