The Senate is currently debating the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2010, which should be self-explanatory. Yesterday, Cheatin’ John Ensign introduced an amendment to recommit the bill back to the committee that produced it. This was an effort to delay the bill. It doesn’t really matter what specific issues Ensign objected to, because the design was purely obstructive. The amendment failed in a 33-64 vote. Looking at the results of this symbolic vote is instructive.
Only 31 Republicans voted to recommit the bill. Nine Republicans voted to proceed to a vote. Who were those nine Republicans? Well, all but one of them are members of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies. The only member of that committee to vote ‘no’ was Kay Bailey Hutichison, who is leaving the Senate to run for governor of Texas. The only Republican who is not a member of that committee to vote ‘aye’ was Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. Murkowski is a member of the full Appropriations Committee, however, and her state is more dependent on federal appropriations than any other in the union.
The two Democrats who voted to recommit the bill, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Evan Bayh of Indiana, are not members of the Appropriations Committee. They serve in very competitive states. Their motivation in voting with the Republicans is no more noble than their desire to pad their statistics as moderate senators. They knew the amendment would fail, so their vote was free.
What’s meaningful in looking at this vote is that it demonstrates how real bipartisanship works, as well as how phony bipartisanship works. So far in this Congress, the Republicans have rarely provided a significant number of votes for anything. But, when it comes time to spend money, the Republican members of the subcommittee in charge of allocating those funds were willing to support the legislation.
The reason for this is that they must support the legislation if they want the Democrats on the subcommittee to continue to involve them in the process of crafting appropriations. Ordinarily, these same dynamics would apply to other legislation like the bills on health care reform, cap and trade, and the Employee Free Choice Act. A loyal minority would still legislate and participate constructively in the mark-up of bills. This is what Max Baucus was attempting to do with the health care bill.
It’s highly unusual for a minority party to choose to obstruct across the board. But that is what the Republicans have chosen to do with the single exception of the appropriations bills. They’re willing to give up their influence in everything except the allocation of federal dollars to their states.
The lesson for Baucus is that he must make the Republicans pay for their bad faith. All future bills in this Congress that pass through his Finance Committee should not seek to include Republican input.
One interesting thing to keep in mind is the career of Teddy Kennedy. Kennedy was in the minority from 1981-1987 and again from 1995-2001 and 2003-2007. Despite that, he left a legacy of accomplishment during those years that exceeds that of anyone who was in the majority. He managed to do that because he understood what the job of a senator is, and that is to legislate, not merely to represent a unified opposition to the majority. There are currently 40 Republican members of the Senate, and no more than one or two of them is worth a damn as a member of the minority because they have no interest in their job.