Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

Brad writes: Is the leadership as bad as those Republican senate leaders who let Joe McCarthy off his leash?

Joe McCarty was a reaction of the country betrayed. Better rude than Red.

Concerning the specific example of Rick Santorum, I think I could argue that you should be more afraid of him and his type than a loose cannon like Joe McCarthy. Santorum is seen as a completely mainstream Republican, and his most important work is his behind-the-scenes efforts to guaranatee that in the future, all the lobbyists on K Street deal with and contribute to only the Grand Old Party. Surprisingly effective, and therefore pretty scary in my book.

We can look at this another way-- the organizational and ideological alignment Brad speaks of has happened for a couple of big reasons. One, the white South is no longer in the Democratic camp. Nixon and his people (and Kevin Phillips) were accurate in the long run that the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act gave Republicans an opening for the ideological crowbar.

Two, and perhaps more important, is what's happened with campaign finance law and the primary election system. The finance changes, together with vastly more expensive campaigns, have almost completely undermined the ability of parties to control or influence office-holders; party money and electoral apparatus are almost insignificant now. The choosing of candidates by primaries instead of party bosses has tremendously strengthened this trend by making the apparatus insignificant in an area where it used to be central.

When bosses ran parties, the parties did have to stay in touch with what people wanted and deliver some of it in order to keep their hold on office.

That deeply pragmatic function of the parties was an important influence in keeping American politics close to the center. But it's pretty well gone because the material conditions that enforced it aren't there much anymore. And of course the shift from retail- and group-based politics to mass communications has helped accelerate this trend.

The ideological frenzy we're seeing is in part a substitute glue for this old pragmatic party interchange with constituents. It's a really dangerous substitute, too, IMHO.

Joe McCarthy never conspired to commit aggressive war on a country that did not attack or threaten us.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=commit+aggressive+war

I would add another factor: gerrymandered districts. Now that statistical mapping software has transformed gerrymandering from an uncertain art into a reliable science, very few districts are competitive in general elections. What matters more than ever now is local, state or national party, or wealthy interest group, support in the primaries. So we have more polarized House Reps on the left and right. Well, maybe the left is drifting right. But even so, the incentives for compromise are less than ever before. Many congressman have a highly polarized majority in their districts that will not punish them for lack of compromise. As the Economist magazine pointed out some months ago, the result is a move towards a modern US version of rotten boroughs. I agree with the Economist that there is a danger to representative democracy when the legislators choose their electors just as much as the electors choose their legislators. This doesn't explain the Senate, but I think that the Senate is less polarized than the House (certain Z. Millers are exceptions, though).

In California, highly gerrymandered districts plus term limits have made it even worse. Everyone knows that they will have to run for something else after two terms. So there is a very short time horizon over which legislators have to worry about working with some one they trashed/betrayed/doublecrossed/stonewalled/punked.And also a very short time horizon over which they have to impress interest groups and party organizations that will support them for their next elective career move. So in CA, we have Republican legislators whose first and only concern is to move back to the late Roman Empire in terms of political and economic organization (but probably without the corn dole and no new colonies for the poor rabble), and Democrats whose first and last impulse is to ask what Sweden would do. Personally, I have no problem with what Sweden would do. But I do like to be on the winning side once in awhile, so I prefer to face the fact that this isn't Sweden and have no trouble with reasonable compromise.

In CA, with a supermajority needed to pass a budget, this is leading to financial crisis. A deadlock in the legislator plus a less than honest movie star governor has resulted in a new budget proposal that is warmed over Davis (try to borrow your way out) and warmed over Wilson (steal more property tax from the counties). It is interesting that recent polls indicate that the majority of the CA population thinks new taxes are necessary, and disapprove of the new borrowing A.S. has proposed, and that will be up for a vote in less than two months. And if the new CA bond borrowing is not passed there wil be a fiscal meltdown, or a very hard sell for much more expensive borrowing on Wall Street.

I wonder how long it will be until the polarization leads to a similar mess in Wash DC?

Please note that the gerrymandering problem is not relevant to the Senate - those 'districts' have been fixed for quite a while :)

Also, that one of the classical reasons for Senate courtesy was the fillibuster. Seriously piss off too many members of the minority party, and they might fillibuster one's bills. And this has gotten easier in the past few decades: from my (casual and amateur) understanding of the Senate rules, a fillibuster used to involve Senators being present and talking, each and every hour of the fillibuster. Now, any one Senator can refuse cloture (sp?), and a 60% majority is required to actively vote for cloture. Therefore, 41 Senators can stage a fillibuster by having one member taking action for a few minutes, and the other 40 refusing to vote in a certain way (they can vote against cloture or abstain).

It is more than just a north-south realignment. Urban blacks in the South have more in common with urban blacks in the North than with the Southern Whites that represent their state in the Senate. Blacks flocked to the Democratic Party for the policies of FDR and then for the LBJ civil rights policies of the 60s. The southern alignment is between blacks and progressive whites in the Democratic Party and Fundamentalist, and social conservative whites in the GOP. The Democrats attracted blacks in the south by embracing civil rights. The GOP has attracted whites in the south by embracing fundamentalist religious values such as prayer in schools, antiabortion, antisexEd and merged with the antiUnion buisness leaders and prosubsidy rural Ag industry.

The social values realignment of the Southern dominated GOP is driving a wedge into the moderate wing of the GOP that are fiscal conservative and socially liberal. The next realignment is a mass exodus of moderates from the GOP, or their elimination from the party by right wing primary challenges followed by Democratic victories. These dynamics are in place for the 04 PA Senate race. The pressures will increase on those few GOP moderate holds in the North such as Maine and RI.

Big tensions will continue to exist between urban and rural such as Democratic Chicago and GOP downstate IL.

In my mind the big change in civility comes from an increasingly ideological approach to politics that eschews compromise and "politics". The GOP has lost senators like Bob Dole who knew how to cut deals and replaced him with the Lotts and Frists who prefer to run roughshod over the opposition whenever possible. It is not about respect for numerous POV and working compromises that do the most good for the most people. It is about being right and defeating the infidels.

bakho wrote, "The social values realignment of the Southern dominated GOP is driving a wedge into the moderate wing of the GOP that are fiscal conservative and socially liberal. The next realignment is a mass exodus of moderates from the GOP, or their elimination from the party by right wing primary challenges followed by Democratic victories."

Would that it were so. So-called moderate Republicans have shown almost no inclination to abandon the Party. As long as they're getting some of the tax-cut gravy, what do they care?

Heh-heh... That's what I get for going into rant mode too quickly. My post is still valid in general, and I explicitly exempted the Senate from my discussion. But the topic seems to be the Senate, doesn't it? OK, I'll take my medicine... I don't have a theory for the US Senate.

No one comments on the irony of Rick Santorum calling ANYONE in the Senate "an empty suit"?

This is a man who claimed during his first Senate run that it was virtually impossible for a raped woman to get pregnant.

So-called moderate Republicans have shown almost no inclination to abandon the Party.

Jim Jeffords- Others have used his message as leverage. What about Whitmans OpEd pleading for space for GOP moderates?

The Democrats will continue to loose fundamentalist Christians over social issues.

bakho wrote, "Jim Jeffords- Others have used his message as leverage. What about Whitmans OpEd pleading for space for GOP moderates?"

Jeffords is a valid counterexample to my point. But I'd say that's a special case, where one Senator defected because it would make a difference to control of the Senate. But in more general terms, I just don't see it happening.

Whitman's op-ed---yeah, I saw that, though didn't read it. I think it's just lip service. She can plead all she wants, but she has the option of switching parties *today*. Has she chosen to exercise that option? No.

My opinion is based on the existence of e.g. homosexual Republicans. That someone could be a member of a political party which believes in criminalizing an essential aspect of one's person is stupifying and leads me to conclude that these folks just want their tax cuts. Ditto for women who have the foresight to realize that they (or their daughters, cousins, etc) may someday want to have an abortion for whatever reason.

So I'd say it's the usual combination of stupidity and greed, and that furthermore these all-to-human factors will prevent the exodus you hope for.

This might be called "Lost great moments on the floor of the Senate."

March 9, 1954
Senator Ralph Flanders, (R-VT) rises to speak, pointing out he is sorry the Senator from Wisconsin is not present to hear what he has to say about him. Nine Senators are around the floor, the gallery is empty. Unpaid student intern at the time was Jeffords.

After a fairly long introduction about the fundamentals of housecleaning with images of housewives dusting and mopping, Flanders turned to the issue of the day.

"Whole Countries are being taken over by Communists, others are undergoing relentless infiltration...The World seems to be mobilizing for the great battle of Armageddon. Now is the Crisis in the agelong battle between God and the Devil for the soul of man."

And what had McCarthy Done, Flanders asked.

"He dons his warpaint, He goes into his War-dance. He emits War woops. He goes forth into battle and proudly returns with the scalp of a pink dentist."

Within hours, Flanders received a hand written note from Ike, congratulating him on his speech, and suggesting Americans needed to hear more Republical voices such as Flanders.

That evening -- Edward R. Murrow and Fred Friendly presented their first "See It Now" McCarthy program. The one that became a classic.

But I still think Ralph Flanders little speech earlier that day to 9 Senators around the chamber was equally classic. One has to be prepared to forgive and contextualize the non-pc references to housewives and the idiom of the Indian Warrior, but this March 9th it will be the 50th anniversary of Flanders speech -- and I suggest a huge public movement to celebrate it. The least that could happen would be for Jeffords and Leahy to read it on the Senate Floor. But perhaps we could have a real do -- a National Ralph Flanders Day.