Same Song - Different Dance

Commentary By Ron Beasley

Joe Gandelman reports on the latest Republican obstructionist strategy.

File this in your Here We Go Again file. On April 22 a top
Republican strategist urged GOPers to delay a vote on the Obama
administration�s Supreme Court nomination no matter who he or she would
be for pure political reasons.

.......

If this is what occurs for the reasons outlined above, then the
ostensible goal of governance � governing efficiently and seriously
evaluating policies � is (clearly) going to take back-seat to a
loooooooong delaying tactic, backed up by talking points that will be
repeated on cable shows and the Internet.

Meanwhile, there is a sense of deja vu here. Some weeks ago the
Internet was abuzz after GOP pollster Frank Luntz gave specific words
that Republicans should use to try and oppose financial reform. And � lo
and behold � some Republicans were repeating them.

They didn�t need the dreaded cue cards or notes on their hands, but
it was clear what was happening.

The system is broken.  A few days ago Ezra Klein had this to say:

Secret holds are not the problem (but the Democrats would like to make them the problem)

I've never been able to get a straight answer on why, exactly,
senators should be able to place anonymous holds on nominees. I can see
the arguments for holds themselves: They allow senators to express
strong opposition and, from a bargaining standpoint, they give senators
leverage to use on other priorities. But making a hold anonymous
undermines both arguments: It means no one knows why there's opposition
and no senator can bargain on the issue.

That said, if the problem is that Republicans have bottled up more
than 90 nominees, the answer isn't to get rid of secret holds. The
answer is, on the one hand, to make fewer positions Senate confirmable
(there's no reason the Senate needs to vote on the assistant secretary
of state for educational and cultural affairs), and on the other, to
make it harder to obstruct nominations. In reality, holds work because
breaking a filibuster takes about a week even if you have the votes. The
Senate has more pressing things to do than spend a week voting on the
deputy director of the Peace Corps, so the Peace Corps ends up going
without a deputy director.

To think about this differently, imagine how much hiring would get
done at IBM if their board of directors had to spend a week considering
each and every potential employee.

I agree that the Senate is required/allowed to approve far too many positions.  But that doesn't address the real problem.  Cable "News" and talk radio have so polarized the country that the Congress has become dysfunctional.  Given it's power and arcane rules the Senate is seriously impacted.  Can the Senate be fixed?  I don't know.  Cable and talk radio are here to stay and have power they don't deserve.  The reality is a very small percentage of the population watch cable news or listen to talk radio.  But the ones who do are the activists - the ones that let their representatives know how they feel.  This is not Democracy but small mob rule.