It’s hard not to get discouraged. Our government is so broken and the left is so behind the eight ball that it seems like any progress at all is permanently out of reach. Even the rare glimmer of hope mainly serves to reinforce this sense of powerlessness.
For example, Congress came together last year to use the War Powers Act for the first time since it was enacted in 1973. The goal was to prevent the president from continuing to support Saudi Arabia in the civil war in Yemen. While the resolution passed with bipartisan support, Trump simply vetoed the bill.
This week, Democratic Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia will bring a privileged resolution to the floor of the Senate. The goal is “to limit President Donald Trump’s authority to launch military operations against Iran” by requiring the president to cease “all hostilities targeting Iran within 30 days unless explicitly approved by Congress.” The resolution appears to have the support of all 47 members of the Democratic caucus plus Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Todd Young of Indiana, Mike Lee of Utah, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Jerry Moran of Kansas. That’s more than enough to pass the thing, but far short of the two-thirds majority needed to override Trump’s inevitable veto.
It’s a rare example of congressional Republicans dealing Trump a defeat, as well as a rare instance of Congress trying to exert its powers against the Executive Branch. But it’s not going to have any legal effect.
That doesn’t mean the effort is pointless, of course, but it’s hard to find it as a source of hope.
It’s not surprising that good legislation doesn’t become law in the Trump administration, but not much would be different with a Democratic president. If a bill could actually overcome a Republican filibuster, it would probably not be all that worthwhile. If the bill somehow circumvented the filibuster and it was in any way transformative, it’s likely that the conservative courts would rule it unconstitutional. This problem is so obvious that progressives are already demanding that the next Democratic president increase the size of the Supreme Court and demand that the Senate do away with the legislative filibuster. If either of those things are not done, then there’s little chance that a President Sanders or a President Klobuchar or any Democratic president will be able to fulfill a single major campaign promise.
But it’s hard to see the Democratic Party being unified enough to accomplish this. At least initially, there will be no majority in the Senate for gutting the filibuster, and everyone remembers how badly FDR was hurt when he tried to stack the court. Maybe if the congressional Democrats see enough of their work product help up and stymied, they will come around. But, by that time, the critical first year of a new president’s term will have passed and everyone will be worried about the midterms.
And, note, that I am here assuming that the Democrats will win the presidency in 2020 and take full control of Congress. If they don’t accomplish both of those things, then no legislative progress at all is even conceivable.
There’s really nothing to do but keep fighting, but it’s sometimes hard to see any light at the end of the tunnel.
Time to start impeaching judges. But really it’s just like the old saying goes: headline question the answer is “no.”
Hey, do you remember when Leahy vigorously adhered to the blue slip nonsense? Because I sure do!
That also requires a 2/3 vote in the senate, of course.
It’s much easier to win control of the government and simply add exactly as many judges to every appellate court that Trump polluted with his 40 year old (mostly white) conservative activists. Do away with the filibuster and it’s a majority vote in each chamber.
There’s no light at the end of the tunnel because we are about where Germany was in 1938. It turns out the republic could not survive a single unqualified, mentally unbalanced reactionary demagogue.
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I’ve long said that we get the leadership we deserve. The American public keeps electing Republicans. No matter how bad the last one was, or how much worse the current one is, a whole lot of people still vote red. The culture wars have worked. Democrats do not know how to play the populist game. They would do well to follow Martin’s suggestions regarding corporate consolidation and lack of anti-trust enforcement, but no one seems to be driving in that direction in a concerted way. I don’t know what will break the logjam. Demographics are slowly going our way but will anything be left of our country (or our world) by the time we wake up as a nation?
“Democrats do not know how to play the populist game”
They can not play it, because it would upset the oligarch funders & the owners & funders of the media.
As I often say, Oligarchic suppression of left-populism makes right-populism inevitable.
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Dan Rather has a really good post on his FB page – starts out with “They are counting on despair. That’s how they win.” I think this is absolutely the truth.