So says none other than Stuart Rothenberg guesting at Taegan Goddard's Political Wire in discussing the first harsh loss by Nancy Pelosi. It is a pretty devastating assessment by someone who knows a bit about politics.
Yes, I know. Leadership fights on Capitol Hill are the ultimate political insider contests. Voters don’t care about them, and once they are over, they are quickly forgotten.
Having said that, Nancy Pelosi’s decision to pick a public fight with her second in command, Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer, is so incomprehensible, so politically stupid that it has raised eyebrows among political journalists and insiders of all type.
For weeks, I have been suggesting that Pelosi will be a lot smarter and more subtle that her conservative critics warned, and that she won’t drive the Democratic bus off the cliff. But now I’m not so sure.
Pelosi’s political antennae appear much less sensitive than I assumed, and if you are a Republican looking for a quick reason to think that you may be able to take back the House in 2008, the incoming Speaker’s intervention in the majority leader race – a race that her candidate lost rather decisively – has to give you some reason for optimism.
Instead of generating front page stories about the Democrats’ agenda, Pelosi has made herself and divisions within her party the story du jour.
Here's the problem as I see it. Pelosi simply did not have to pick this fight but she did, then she lost it. On top of that, what is normally an insider's fight has become national news and turned the unnecessary loss into a public debacle. I really think she lost control of her troops over this for no good reason whatsoever. This was not the move of a really sharp politician and she has made it look that way to the public. (The media is doing its bit to spread this perception, too).
All the different explanations I’ve seen given for her stance, things like “loyalty to a friend” or “throwing a bone to the nutroots” pales when put against the plain fact she wrote a letter to the caucus urging them to vote for her annointed candidate, when she could have just said she personally backed Murtha but it was up to the members to decide. Instead, she campaigned for Murtha.
Right now, Steny Hoyer has shown he has more juice in the Dem caucus than Nancy Pelosi… and he knows it. She’s going to have to run any decision through HIS filter if she hopes to get anything she wants done. It’s supposed to be the other way around.
What’s going to happen with Hastings? Will she still try to put him up for the intelligence chair to spite her California foe Harman and kiss up to the Congressional Black Caucus?
Would she even dare? She’d need Steny’s blessing to attempt it.
Now let’s stop picking on San Fran Nan, she _is_ a grandmother after all. So I’m sure she cares deeply…and that’s all that really matters isn’t it?
Hoyer is like Fitz.
He is a federal employee union type backer
and is always for hiring more, which is why you have to be a dem to work for the federal government. This is dem tradition and Pelosi also looks stupid because all she had to do was study Newt and let them vote for whoever they wanted.
What’s funny is the CIA analysts are moving to DIA and this is probably Hoyer’s biggest concern-Plame.
“Some days you’re the windshield and some days you’re the bug.” Today was bug day for nutty Nancy. You have to scratch your head and wonder how in the world a professional politician could be so tone deaf and plain wrongheaded. Arrogance has to be a big part of the answer.
Especially because it was all so totally unnecessary, Pelosi didn’t have to break tradition, openly take sides, and expose herself to a humiliating public smack down. She put herself in a no-win situation, and stayed there when alarm bells were ringing all over town. Not smart.
Now, if she’s foolish enough to appoint Alcee Hastings chairman of the Intelligence committee, it could signal the end of her time as someone who could be taken seriously.
PS: HT to Dire Straits
The Democrats are in great shape compared to the Republicans. How do they pull out of the hole they’ve been digging themselves into the last, oh, almost 20 years. I guess you could date it from Pat Robertson coming in 2nd in the 1988 Iowa caucus. What kind of Republican can win a primary, any kind of primary, except one that kowtows to whatever this religious tumor is thats attached to the Republican Party.
Arlo has never heard of Rudy Guilianni, for one.
Rudy Giuliani is one candidate who would lose to Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama (even with that stinky RE deal I posted here about the other day) or John Edwards, who I think is a complete phony.
Wow, Arlo is resorting to “My daddy can whip your daddy” logic!