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A House Divided
The announcement of Speaker Boehner’s sudden retirement has mostly been met with joy, and I am not sorry to see him go. But we should temper our enthusiasm about how radical a change will come with a new speaker.
The reality of the House, in my opinion, is that it is not made up of two parties. It is made up of three.
Democrats: This is easy. They’re what’s left over after Nancy Pelosi’s Obamacare jihad, which cleansed the House of moderate blue-dog democrats. Their districts are so gerrymandered that there’s little threat of them losing an election, no matter how crazy they are: See Maxine Waters, et al.
Republicans: Nominally the GOP, but in reality the line shifts on every vote. Their districts are not universally conservative, and they tend toward more moderate positions. To retain their seats, they don’t rock the boat.
Freedom Caucus (FC): Formed in January 2015, with Jim Jordan of Ohio as Chairman, these are the GOP’s troublemakers. They come from strong conservative districts, gerrymandered to stay that way. The Freedom Caucus grew out of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), which used to be a conservative voting block. When it became a conservative litmus test, many jumped on board — but they didn’t vote with the RSC, and it became ineffectual.
The total membership of the FC isn’t widely known. I’ve seen figures as low 37 and as high as 40 from credible sources and Wikipedia. For my analysis, I’ll give them 38 reliable members. Your mileage my vary.
The magic number in the House to get anything done is 218, and none of these groups make the hurdle. Republicans are close, and a handful or more defections to the right on certain votes helps to enforce their minority status.
The breakdown is:
This is the landscape Speaker Boehner lived with and the new speaker will inherit.
There’s no majority, and the tendency of the leadership to discount the FC and sometimes berate them makes it hard to create a majority from the right that includes the FC and Republicans.
The FC’s districts are solidly right-wing, and expect their representatives to use every means possible, including the power of the purse and even impeachment, to stop the progressive agenda. FC Representatives who fail to do this may expect a primary threat next cycle.
If the leadership tries to move right, toward the FC, many Republicans will drop off for fear of losing their seats to Democrats in districts they may have won, say, by 50.5%. Left with a minority position, the leadership has to move left — usually pretty far — and pick up Democrat votes to move legislation.
Nancy Pelosi is my pick for most effective legislator of the 21st century to date. She and Steny Hoyer are successful at unifying the Democratic vote on many issues. Thus it becomes a layup for the speaker and his chosen lieutenants and committee chairs to move left, drop the FC and some of the Republicans, and secure a majority sufficient move legislation.
We will have a new speaker soon, but we will not have a new pie chart. The next speaker could be Jim Jordan, but his challenge will no different from Speaker Boehner’s. The reality for a speaker coming from the FC is that in their beliefs about the proper size, scope, and role of the federal government, the Republicans are ideologically closer to Democrats than the FC.
Will things be better in the House? Unlikely, and I personally expect much worse, with the infighting being vicious.
Is there a way forward? The impediment the 114th Congress faces in moving conservative legislation to Obama’s desk, where it may be vetoed, is the Senate. Already, the Washington Times has come out with an article quoting the longest-tenured state Republican chairman calling for McConnell’s resignation.
I love a good revolution and even enjoy a bad one. I am happy to see Boehner go, but he did not go because anyone got a scalp. He got rich and tired, end of story. The landscape for the next speaker doesn’t improve and is precisely why nobody in the House wants the job, and every attempt to overthrow Boehner failed. There was always a group yelling for Boehner’s scalp. But nobody wants to set up shop in the speaker’s teepee.
Published in Elections, General
I’m okay with restricting any revenue from growth to paying down the debt. But entitlements must be reformed to find a way to sustainability. They are on autopilot, and are driving us to federal bankruptcy based on today’s demographics.
The physics of political heat flow ..
Is this related to entropy or something else? Who won the last award for this category?
Nancy Pelosi’s work on Obamacare and retaining her party’s leadership position is the stuff of political legend. Nothing tongue in cheek about it. She is a boss and the quicker we realize it the better we are.
Nobody ever won a battle discounting a worthy opponent.
At this point we could turn the entire federal government into a glorified assisted living facility and still run deficits. The issue is Americans are just unrealistic about what it is possible to afford. We are sliding slowly towards Greece there is literally nothing we can do about it. The lure of free money is too strong.
Yes, and why I adamantly oppose raising the debt ceiling. Our ability to borrow in a reserve currency has pushed the day of reckoning so far into the future as to be nearly invisible.
Exactly. How far are you willing to go on reform though? The only kinds of reform I can imagine being effective towards the goal of sustainability are means testing (and not the kind we’re seeing recommended), and that will out the system as a simple welfare program. No one wants another welfare program (or three) unless they’re on the receiving end.
I don’t discount Pelosi. She is a worthy opponent, although totally without logic, common sense, or any moral compass. Harry Reid did the difficult work on Obamacare, not Pelosi. Her legend is the first female Speaker of the House. That and five bucks gets you a cup of coffee at Starbucks.
The only solutions I can see are fiscal collapse or internal war, which will happen after the collapse. We can imagine and hope that congress led by McCarthy and McConnell and a Republican president will win the argument with the people and enact real reform, but it’s just a dream. If they do it against the will of the people, then they’ll all be thrown out and the dems will put it all right back in place.
Aggressively raise eligibility age.
I’m okay with means testing. I worked for over 40 y ears and paid maximum FICA every year I worked. If I received 3% a year on the money I contributed, my Social Security check would be 10 times larger than it is. Social Security is the easiest entitlement to fix. The most difficult one is Medicare.
I am not sure that is how it goes down. Look at Obamacare.
It blew up dem majorities within a term, turned Congress red in 4 years. If we get a Republican President I am not sure it gets repealed.
No doubt Republicans would risk losing members and majorities, but not a swing to the majorities they had in 2009.
The really frustrating thing about Social Security is that we could eliminate it entirely, and instead for the contributions to simply buy bonds from the Federal Government for each citizen and those citizens would get a better return on their investment.
If we get a Republican president Obamacare will be repealed.
I hate this idea the most. It perpetuates the lie.
Agree, but I think the lie is going to need to be perpetuated a while longer.
We need to decide weather Social Security is a retirement fund or a welfare payment. If it is a retirement fund than the money contributed should be invested either in government bonds or in contributor selected options. It should not be a “pay as you go” system. I think all welfare payments should be consolidated into a single payment to those eligible.
The other major problem here is the growth of Social Security disability payments when they are not warranted or justified.
Care to wager on that? I drink TX or Ferrari Carano and I’m good for it. Sal Padula will attest.
Her legend is that she stripped an appropriations bill into the ACA, passed it last the majority and retains leadership.
I don’t know too many generals that march their troops into a wood chipper and get rewarded.
It’s like changes at church — sometimes you just have to wait for certain people to die.
I don’t think it’s ever been operated as retirement fund. It’s always just been a cash cow for Congressional spending, but now the teat’s empty. I’ll stop myself here before I describe it as an udder disaster.
And I am accused of being overly pessimistic.
Oh Brent, I need to get you some better wine.
The serious thought behind that is that younger generations are way less expectant to receive SS or Medicare. Those 45 and below will hopefully take one for the team when it comes time to reform/eliminate the program as we know it. Or we’ll have rioting like in Greece.
Brent, if I wasn’t retired, I would take you up on it. My reason for thinking this is that the Congress doesn’t set policy, it legislates. That is why the current Congress cannot agree on a single proposal to repeal and replace Obamacare. Any Republican candidate for president will run on a repeal and replace policy. If we retain majorities in the House and the Senate, Congress will be asked to legislate that policy. There will be give and take, but Obamacare will be repealed.
I’ll take door number 2.
Brent, you should be drinking the best wine, grown and bottled in California. I love Texas, but wine is one area where you are not number one.
I accept donations in 1/2 case lots, but you are going to be hard pressed to beat Ferrari.
I think Sonoma County is still in California or did the democrats screw that up also.
Challenge accepted!
Which wines from Carano do you drink?