The Dismal Record
A couple of interesting analyses to look at today. First EJ Dionne explains that the Democrats are really feeling the heat, having failed, repeatedly, to accomplish much.
WASHINGTON — Democrats in Congress are discovering what it's like to live in the worst of all possible worlds. They are condemned for selling out to President Bush, and for failing to make compromises aimed at getting things done.
Democrats complain that this is unfair and, in some sense, it is. But who said that politics was fair?
Over the short run, Democratic congressional leaders can count on little support from their party's presidential candidates, particularly Barack Obama and John Edwards. Both have decided their best way of going after front-runner Hillary Clinton — who has been in Washington since her husband's election as president in 1992 — is to criticize politics-as-usual.
At this weekend's Democratic fundraising dinner in Des Moines, Obama and Edwards not only attacked Bush fiercely but issued broadsides against the larger status quo.
When Obama assailed "the same old Washington textbook campaigns" and declared that he was "sick and tired of Democrats thinking that the only way to look tough on national security is by talking and acting and voting like George Bush Republicans," he was aiming at Clinton. But Obama was echoing what many in his party have been saying about their congressional leadership.
And when Edwards said that "Washington is awash with corporate money, with lobbyists who pass it out, with politicians who ask for it," he was criticizing a system in which his own party is implicated.
It makes sense for Democratic presidential candidates to distance themselves from the party's Washington wing. A poll released last week by the Pew Research Center found that 54 percent of Americans disapprove of the performance of Democratic congressional leaders, an increase in dissatisfaction of 18 points since February. Among Democrats, disapproval of their own leaders rose from 16 percent in February to 35 percent now; in the same period, disapproval among independents rose from 41 percent to 56 percent.
Democrats, who relentlessly played obstructionist games when they were in the minority are now complaining that Republicans are using the same tactics. Well, it isn't good for either party to fail to compromise on some things, but the Democrat's ham handed "leadership" is not exactly conducive to getting things done. And how bad is it going right now? How about zero for forty?
As the congressional session lurches toward a close, Democrats are confronting some demoralizing arithmetic on Iraq.
The numbers tell a story of political and substantive paralysis more starkly than most members are willing to acknowledge publicly, or perhaps even to themselves.
Since taking the majority, they have forced 40 votes on bills limiting President Bush’s war policy.
Not a single one has passed both chambers, even though both are run by Democrats.
Indeed, the only war legislation passed during this Congress has been to give the president exactly what he wants, and exactly what he has had for the past five years: more money, with no limitations.
Disapproval of the Democratic majority in Congress has risen steadily, albeit with no corresponding increase in enthusiasm for Republicans.
Even more notably, public opinion about the war — while still dominated by opposition to a military adventure most people think was a mistake — has risen modestly in recent weeks, according to several nonpartisan polls.
The Democrats backed a losing strategy in two different senses. They invested heavily in an American defeat, insisting the war was lost and insisting troops had to come home, then were unable to change direction. Then a funny thing happened. American troops did begin turning things around in Iraq with General Petraeus' new strategies. Add to that an inability to really make the changes they promised in the last elections and a simple fact emerges:
Democrats are looking increasingly like losers to the voters.
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Sister Toldjah — Tuesday, 13 November , 2007 @ 8:33 am
By FedUp, Tuesday, 13 November , 2007 @ 8:59 am
This merely points out how totally ineffective Congress is! They should be rising above all the politics (yes, I said that with a straight face) and work together for the country. Having said that and knowing that that will be as likely to happen as me winning the Nobel Peace Prize… we should throw the bums out… starting with the dinosaurs… Reid.. Pelosi… Kennedy… Byrd… Murtha… And the list goes on!
By mockinbird, Tuesday, 13 November , 2007 @ 4:56 pm
The liberal Democrats just don’t have that “vision” thing that GHW Bush talked about in a speech. The lack of it is starting to bite them in the …next to their tails.