One-Way Bipartisanship

I agree with David Broder on one thing. The lack of bipartisanship in Washington really is a big problem.

That's not to say that all of our problems can be solved by a split-the-difference bipartisan approach. Many can't. Immigration, for example, strikes me as an issue where a split-the-difference approach tends to produce legislation that incorporates the worst of what each side has to offer. Similarly, I tend to agree with Stephen Biddle that a partial withdrawal from Iraq is probably the worst possible policy option, a reality that makes any sort of bipartisan compromise on Iraq difficult.

That said, there are a number of policies that, but for partisan entrenchment, would long ago have become law. Things like an increase in the minimum wage, funding for stem cell research, implementation of the 9/11 Commission recommendations, incentives for research into renewable energy, ethics reform, etc.

The David Broders of the world react to this gridlock by reflexively blaming both parties ("a pox on both your houses!"). Among our elite cadre of Sensible Pundits, those who write opinion columns and populate the Sunday news shows, there is a deep-seated need to believe (or at least pretend) that our political system is perfectly symmetrical, that what happens on the Right happens in equal measure on the Left. It is completely taboo to point out the one thing that would be immediately obvious to any Martian who happened to visit Washington D.C., namely, that Republicans are WAY MORE partisan than Democrats.

As I've noted before, this asymmetry is The Great Unmentionable in American politics, the structural reality that no one will acknowledge. Since at least the beginning of the Clinton administration, the defining feature of our political system has been an intense Republican partisanship.

No Republicans were willing to sign on to Clinton's major policy initiatives. His tax bill passed only when Al Gore cast the deciding vote; every Republican opposed it. And his health care bill was defeated when Democrats joined every Republican in opposing it.

When the Republicans took over in 1994, they began changing rules and procedures in an effort to shut Democrats out of the legislating process. They initiated the K-Street Project, which was an effort to systematically purge all Democratic lobbyists from Washington. They implemented a majority-of-the-majority policy so as to ensure that only bills that a majority of Republicans supported would even be considered. They shut down the government in a budgetary squabble. They investigated everything and subpoenaed everyone imaginable, including the Socks the Cat. And they made a mockery of our constitutional system and paralyzed our country for over a year by insisting on impeaching and trying a popular Democratic president over matters related to a sexual indiscretion.

When President Bush took over, the Republican-controlled Congress grew even more aggressively partisan. Under Karl Rove's direction, Republicans in Congress actually pursued a policy of attempting to minimize bipartisan support for legislation (and thereby keep Democrats from taking any credit). They would tinker with bills that had bipartisan support by adding provocative amendments and provisions until no self-respecting Democrat could support the final product. In the Senate, Republicans went as far as attempting to eliminate the filibuster.

They solidified their majority in the Fall of 2002 by shamelessly politicizing the issue of terrorism just a year after the 9/11 attacks. The goal was to turn terrorism into a Republican (as opposed to bipartisan) issue. And, of course, unlike the previous six years, in the first six years of President Bush's term, the Republican-controlled Congress conducted no oversight at all and issued no subpoenas.

And now that the Republicans are a minority again, they have resorted to partisan obstructionism of an unprecedented scale. As Hilzoy points out in an excellent post, Republicans in the Senate are now using procedural tactics to block just about everything, including bills that have already been passed by overwhelming margins:

Remember the Congressional Ethics Reform package, for instance? It passed both houses of Congress by substantial majorities: 96-2 in the Senate, and 396-22 in the House. And yet, strange to say, the Republicans are refusing to let it go to conference, where both houses agree on a uniform final version of the bill to enact.

And the filibuster has gone from being a tool of last resort to a daily occurrence:

Normally, filibusters are used only when one side feels that some bill is exceptionally important. They have always been for special circumstances, not for everyday use. But the Senate Republicans have, essentially, decided that they are going to require not a majority vote, but 60 votes, for everything more important than naming post offices. And that is unprecedented.

Unprecedented but, sadly, not unexpected.

If you're still not convinced, consider all the major pieces of legislation that have been enacted in the last two decades. What do they all have in common? Virtually all of them were Republican initiatives that important Democrats agreed to support: welfare reform, the Bush tax cuts, No Child Left Behind, the Medicare prescription drug bill, the Iraq War authorization, the Military Commissions Act, etc. The only real exception was the Clinton tax bill, but that's the exception that proves the rule; that bill passed without a single Republican vote (at least in the Senate).

In other words, for a long time now, bipartisanship has been a one-way street. It only happens when Democrats are willing to go along with an idea that most Republicans support. It almost never happens in reverse. In the Senate right now, Republicans are even blocking the bills that many Republicans themselves support. The goal is to make Congress look as ineffectual as possible. And to accomplish that goal, Republican leaders are blocking everything, for no other reason than to stop anything constructive from occurring.

The Democrats have been known to block things in the past as well, but only when they all agree that it's a really bad idea, as was the case with Social Security privatization. When there is support within the Democratic ranks for a Republican initiative, Democrats routinely cross the line and vote in favor of it.

This asymmetry is present in all aspects of American politics, and it is the primary obstacle to meaningful bipartisan compromise. If the David Broders of the world really want to do something about this problem, they need to stop pretending that both sides are equally to blame and start holding the GOP accountable for its obstructionism.