Scanning the Headlines: Part I

THE TWEEDLES


The two big political stories today (August 11) are final congressional approval of a $26 billion aid package to the states and the primary elections in four states. Since brevity is the soul of more than wit, today's comments will just focus on the aid package and a brief look at times gone by.

Final approval of the money served as a reminder of the old adage about choosing between Democrats and Republicans. The adage says it was a choice between "tweedledum" and "tweedledee". One dictionary defines the two tweedles as, "Two people or two groups resembling each other so closely that they are practically indistinguishable." Obviously that is not true in our current political world, but it has never really been true. There has always been different centers of gravity, ideologically and in policy choices. But what is so alarming today is the height and thickness of the partisan wall that separates the two parties, whether in Washington or Peoria. (The latter referring to an old vaudeville adage, "Will it play in Peoria", meaning will it be a winner or a flop.)

Passage of the aid bill in both the House and Senate was basically along party lines, squeaking through the Senate with the help of just two Republicans. That extreme partisanship has also been evident in passage of other major legislation such as health care reform and greater regulation of Wall Street. We also see it in legislative proposals that won't get passed such as immigration reform.

As said at the outset, it has never been a tweedledum-tweedledee conundrum in reality. Republicans have always had a clear bias against expansion of federal involvement in economic and social issues, whether it involves health care reform, regulation of business, taxing and spending, and a bias for constitutional amendments such as requiring a balanced budget, prohibiting flag burning, and repealing part of the 14th amendment to stop granting automatic citizenship to the children of illegals born in this country. They are social and economic pacifists (better yet, regressionists) and constitutional activists.

In l965, when the medicare/medicaid legislation was enacted, Republicans, while not reform enthusiasts, had more bipartisan leanings. In both the House and Senate, GOP lawmakers were almost evenly split between the "yeas" and "nays", while the Democrats were overwhelmingly for the legislation. In 2010, health care reform got just enough Republican votes, after a lot of Democratic compromising, to meet the 60-vote Senate test, and didn't do much better in the House. In the l965 major immigration reform legislation ending more than 40 years of ethnic bias embedded in the national origins quota system (biased toward northern and western European immigrants), Senate passage received support from 14 Republican crossovers (nearly half of the Republicans in the Senate). But today, immigration reform, which has passed the House, can't attract enough Republican support to even make it to the Senate floor for debate. In fact, some former Republican supporters of reform (Lindsey Graham and John McCain come to mind) have now become outspoken opponents and both are helping to boost the case for repeal of part of the 14th amendment.

What has changed is our political atmosphere. It has become far more toxic than it was 50 years ago, or even two years ago thanks to the most recent push from the far right by the Tea Party movement, its supporters among talk show hosts, and traditional conservative office holders and office seekers who are afraid of being outflanked at election time by the extreme right. Add to this those who want to see the first black President become a one-term President. As said in my first blog on July 13, over the past 50 years "our politics has morphed from a system of low decibel, pluralistic politics characterized by civility in discussing opposing views, to one of high decibel "to the barricades' confrontation."

In the mid-l960s liberal sentiment held the high ground and made possible the enactment of two historic pieces of civil rights legislation as well as a host of laws included within President Johnson's so-called Great Society program. That brief window of liberal opportunity ended with the l966 mid-term elections and a big Democratic loss of seats, stemming from an emerging discontent with the Vietnam war and a white, anti-black backlash brought on by the urban riots of l964-68.

Today, the liberal sentiments and support of the l960s is a distant memory replaced by a conservatism which gained a new voice with Ronald Reagan and has now been pushed farther to the right by more extremist views, including some would-be GOP presidential hopefuls who should know better. And what makes this even sadder is that while the far right is gaining momentum, a voice comes from the White House attacking the party's left wing.

Stay tuned for Part II in a few days, taking a look at the primary elections and the anti-incumbency and "experienced help not wanted" moods that the media say explains how the voters are making their choices.