Dude, when you think your team is going to end up in the Motor City Bowl, you don't bitch because they go to the Rose Bowl and not the national championship game.
So you don't like it that 7 moderate Republicans are going to have a role in brokering nominee decisions? Who do you prefer -- them, or Bill Frist? In an ideal world, every nominee would be in the mold of Stephen Reinhardt, but that's not going to happen, just like the Democrats' aren't going to be able to continue their filibuster tactic for the indefinite future. Either cast your lot with Republicans like Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins (who are essentially conservative Democrats), Lindsay Graham (who once described himself as a closet Democrat, or something to that effect), Lincoln Chafee (the archetypical RINO), John McCain (who needs no introduction) and John Warner (who is too serious a person to fuck up the Senate for Bill Frist's presidential ambitions), or go for broke, hope that your bridge-burning tactics don't alienate these people, and risk losing all of your ideal platonic outcomes, as well as the Senate and the courts in the process.
But Flop and other absolutists on the left-wing blogs want to burn the village in order to save it. Apparently, they'd prefer an outcome where the Senate rules are changed, the fiibuster is eliminated, and every one of Bush's nominees passes the Senate with 50 votes. Why? Because some of these Republicans may be susceptible to pressure and can't be trusted. Bullshit. They're all susceptible to pressure on every issue -- welcome to Poli Sci 140. If any of these seven Republicans flip that easily, they lose face and credibility with their colleagues, the press, and the small percentage of their constituents who gives a shit about this issue. It's basic game theory. If they opt not to cooperate and it works out, they may be rewarded; but if they opt not to cooperate and fuck up, they face retribution. Plus, they didn't broker this deal out of charity. There was something known as "self interest" involved.
To the absolutists, though, there's no such thing as a partial win. They'd rather lose everything than cede a few inches. Sure, you've screwed yourself, the Senate, and the courts, but what's that matter when you've taken a "position of principle"? That might be cool when it's 3 a.m. and time for a lively session of Policy Roundtable at Dempsey's Pub, but it's no way to run a fuckin' country.
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6 comments:
"But Flop and other absolutists on the left-wing blogs want to burn the village in order to save it. Apparently, they'd prefer an outcome where the Senate rules are changed, the fiibuster is eliminated, and every one of Bush's nominees passes the Senate with 50 votes."
Yeah! Also, Flop and the Absolutists opposed the Iraq War because they'd prefer to have Saddam still be in power (they LOVE mass graves and rape rooms!)
And Flop and the Doctrinaires oppose eliminating the Estate Tax because they'd prefer that poor farm widows have to go to the poorhouse...
And Flop and the Dead-Enders opposed President Bush's reelection because, well, let's face it, they hate America...
That's question-begging. If you think that the Democrats had enough votes to prevent the rules change, you wouldn't get any disagreement from me. If you think that the number of votes was in question, or that the Democrats didn't have 51 votes, then the anti-compromise Democrats are the ones thinking like the Republican extremists and taking the "my way or the high way" approach. I don't know what anyone on the left thought they were going to gain from the nuclear option, except political castration to go with a right-wing judiciary.
Flop and the Doctrinaires, huh? I'm trying to decide if we're more like Jem and the Holograms (please note: this would make us truly outrageous in a way that is utterly undeniable) or Josie and the Pussycats.
I think we traded possible castration today for more likely castration tomorrow. The problem with the deal is that the Democrats are the only ones who can break it (since Frist can't exactly schedule a nuke vote without a filibuster).
Once that happens, the right will scream as only they can about how those crass, partisan Democrats broke their word...since these aren't "extreme circumstances" (note: they will do this even if the nominee is Mussolini himself).
Anyway, the debate becomes whether or not the Democrats broke their word (those dishonest Democrats, they don't stand for anything and you can't trust them!), NOT whether the Republicans are making an unprecedented power grab (which is what the debate was just a few days ago).
And as this is going on, Frist gets his nuke on (as it were). And what will happen then?
I think if the nuke vote had been Tuesday, we would have either won 51-49 or lost on a Cheney tiebreaker (McCain, Warner, Collins, Snowe, Chaffee would have voted no, leaving it up to Graham and DeWine). So we would have either won, or lost while standing up and fighting and making sure that everyone sees that it was DICK CHENEY'S tiebreaking vote that completed this unprecedented power grab. We could have won a huge victory. Huge. And even if we didn't, the image would have been of Bill Frist and GOP as out-of-control extremists.
On the next one, though? The Fox screaming about those dishonest Democrats breaking their word will give Collins, Snowe, Graham, DeWine the cover they need to vote yes. And then we definitely lose...only now we're also dishonest, partisan hacks who can't be trusted.
We could have won on Tuesday, but even if we didn't, losing then would have been much better than losing later...when we'll not only be the losers, but the bad guys, too.
Here's where I disagree: with the exception of Janice Rogers Brown, I don't think any of the nominees are unfit to be Article III judges. I considered the Democrats' filibusters a useful tactic in terms of drawing lines on what would happen to Supreme Court nominees, but for all but one current nominee, this is a matter of maneuvering and not substance.
My end-game plays out as follows: maintenance of the current status quo until a Supreme Court nomination. When that nomination comes up, the Democrats can then go for broke. If Bush misfires and appoints a nominee in the Bork tradition, the Democrats have license to filibuster away. But with the seven Republicans (most of whom I find generally respectable) acting as power brokers, the odds go up that Bush names someone less extreme on the right -- a Rehnquist heir, not a Richard Epstein disciple. If Bush names an extreme appointee in the Harvey Wilkinson mode, I'm hopeful that some of the same seven Republicans plus Arlen Specter will stick with the compromise. And if they don't, and, in fact, the rules change occurs in the middle of a Supreme Court fight, that's a better political result for the Democrats. There will be a Supreme Court justice who came to the bench in unprecedented, rulebreaking fashion, the way Bush came to power in 2000. S/he will be an illegitimate justice, and if the Democrats play their cards as well as they did with Bork, they'll have public sentiment behind them. The Republicans will be forced to stand behind an unpopular nominee and the rules change will happen in a higher-stakes, higher-profile context. Also, if it's a divisive nominee (again, like Bork) it seems to me that some of the seven (eight counting Specter) won't want to stick out their necks on his/her behalf, thus making it more likely that the rule won't change.
But under the compromise it may not come to that. There may be adequate realpolitik pressure from the Senate that Bush will name a traditional conservative, not a radical conservative, and if it's someone that Democrats don't like, it will be someone they can at least live with, preserving the Court's current balance and the current filibuster rule.
My whole scenario goes to shit, though, if something happens to Stevens and Bush nominates a Wilkinson, Luttig, etc.
I almost made a very similar point in my last comment. I was tentatively approving of the deal because it allowed us to fight this fight during a Supreme Court nomination, when more people would be watching.
I changed my mind, though, because the more I thought about it, the more I don't think we can win this fight then (not after this). Like I said, I think that when that time comes, the debate will not be over the nominee at all, but over the Democrats' "dishonesty". And, particularly, when at least a couple of the Dems vote yes on the cloture vote (I'm looking at you, Joe Lieberman), that'll give Snowe, Collins, Graham, and DeWine all the bipartisan cover they need. We lose AND we're dishonest.
Of course, all this could be avoided if, when the time comes, Bush nominates a reasonable nominee instead of some ultra-radical.
But then again, if you're counting on George W. Bush to embrace moderation, I've got a nice bridge I'd like to sell you. Nice views, and lots of trucker hats at the end of it...
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