Democrats: The Fighting 110th

People have such short memories, particularly Washington pundits.

Take the Pelosi-Murtha-Hoyer pillow fight. For the few days it raged, cable TV news made it almost as big a story as OJ’s “what if I did it?” murder book or the TomKat wedding.

What they forget is that fighting among themselves for power, perks or what they believe in is what Democrats do best. Naturally it comes as somewhat of a shock after six boring years of the Republican Congress’ lip-lock with the White House.

Dick Morris, often wrong but having a particularly bad year, opined in the New York Post that “the Democratic Party is celebrating its return to power by loudly and publicly tearing itself to pieces.”

In all the hooting and hollering over the Murtha-Hoyer battle for majority leader, there was speculation the 110th was falling apart before it ever convened. Was Nancy Pelosi out of her mind, taking sides? With the underdog! When Murtha lost, could Polosi recover? Could the Democrats?

These political arbiters forget that Democrats won the midterm because of voter anger over Iraq. Nancy Pelosi didn’t forget. On that single issue, voters booted out even the most moderate Republican incumbents on election day. Pelosi’s first act of leadership was to acknowledge that debt. For House majority leader, she announced her support of decorated Marine John Murtha, the first Vietnam veteran to serve in the House and point man for Democrats in Congress to “bring the troops home”.

Regardless how the vote for majority leader turned out, it was a “win-win” position for Pelosi and for Democrats. At a time when the leading Republican candidate for President in 2008 was calling for more troops in Iraq, she was telling voters that ending the war would be the top priority of this Congress.

It didn’t matter that Murtha was unlikely to be elected majority leader. Actually, the undisciplined and erratic Murtha would have been a disaster. Steny Hoyer is a much better choice and Pelosi undoubtedly knew that. Steny is organized and knows where the bodies are buried. He and Pelosi will make a good team. Democratic moderates are comfortable with Steny and even the Blue Dogs trust him. That gives Pelosi and her subpoena-throwers some wiggle room to lead this country in a direction the electorate was begging for on November 7.

We can expect more infighting as accountability issues are raised and subpoenas start to fly. This is what Democrats do: they fight. They argue. Admittedly, ADD may run rampant throughout the party but five minutes after the dust settles, they’re all sidled up to the bar drinking toasts to each other and laying plans to render speechless the GOP opposition that kept them locked in their rooms the past five years. The do-nothing, rubberstamp Hastert-yawn-Frist Republicans don’t have such unsightly wrangles, though I’m sure they’re envious.

Voters Unafraid of `Speaker Pelosi’

Perhaps I’m missing something here, but should the Republican Party have been in such a tizzy about “saving” the country from Democratic minority leader Nancy Pelosi?

Nancy, after all, is a very attractive, polite (even former House majority leader Dick Armey says so), and politically-savvy 66-year old grandmother who for ten terms has represented a San Francisco Congressional district where they consider her a national treasure, though too conservative.

How could any change not be an improvement for this “do nothing” GOP-controlled Congress that entered the midterm elections with an embarrassing 13% approval rating?

Now in the death throes of lame-duckism, this is an institution that was on cruise control for rehab or Leavenworth.

This was the Congress that debated gay marriage and flag burning at a time when American families were losing their jobs, pensions and health benefits.

This was the Congress of Duke Cunningham and Bob Ney, one in jail and one packing to go there. This was the House where former majority leader Tom DeLay and four of this top aides were indicted for money-laundering.

This was the House where Pelosi’s predecessor was under attack by his own party for covering up a sex scandal.

Majority Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri called the prospect of Pelosi becoming Speaker “just plain scary” and, horror or horrors, warned that with Nancy in charge Democrats just might establish a “Department of Peace.” Apparently, the very thought of peace breaking out would be enough to galvanize the GOP base.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist claimed Pelosi would “compromise 100% of our National Security.” Accustomed to such GOP taunts, Pelosi responds that a woman would be tougher on defense than her male colleagues. “Think of a lioness. You come anywhere near our cubs, you’re dead.”

At a time when a “culture of corruption” had engulfed the GOP-controlled Congress, their party leaders tried in vain to demonize the squeaky-clean Pelosi who has zero-tolerance for payoffs or shady deals regardless of party. Republicans were stunned at her quick action removing Rep. William Jefferson from the Ways and Means Committee for allegedly taking bribes.

To the political paranoid, her San Francisco base is enough to disqualify her from any office higher than school crossing guard. But San Francisco’s only crime is tolerance, and her East Coast upbringing is the stuff of novels, hailing from a strong family tradition of public service. Her father, Thomas D’Alesandro Jr., is her role model and local legend , serving as Mayor of Baltimore for 12 years after five terms in Congress.

This election was an historic one, with a result long overdue: As Speaker, she will have reached the highest position of power ever achieved by a woman, third in line of Presidential succession. Whether you’re a Democrat, a Republican or an Independent, if you yearn for a return to good, honest government and have a genuine concern for America’s future, what is there not to like about Nancy Pelosi?

FDR had his “first 100 days” that changed America, but everything moves at a faster pace today so Nancy Pelosi has her “first 100 hours”. On that lightning pace and with her swinging the gavel, Democrats will “drain the swamp of corruption,” roll back the subsidies to Big Oil, increase the minimum wage, adopt the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and broaden stem cell research.

Bill Buckley’s National Review has no doubt she will be true to her promise. In a recent cover story, the magazine horrified its conservative readers with this brief summary of “Madame Speaker’s” agenda: “The minimum wage would be increased. The re-importation of drugs at discounted prices would be allowed. The government would use its purchasing power to impose de facto price controls on the drug industry. Congress might enact some restrictions on wiretapping in the pursuit of terrorists.”

That may be scary to the GOP base, but election results showed it was a welcome change of direction for most Americans.

President Bush campaigned as “a uniter, not a divider” and proceeded to become the most polarizing American politician in modern times. Under Pelosi’s leadership in the House, Democrats have their most unified voting record in half a century. If she can bring fractious Democrats together, think what she can do for the country.

Not Again, Charlie Brown

With new exposés almost every day from Bob Woodward’s book and the Foley fallout, things never looked so good for Howard Dean and Company this close to a critical election. So why can’t I shake this feeling that the Democrats are Charlie Brown and Karl Rove is Lucy holding the football? Somehow, at the very last minute, you just know that Lucy (Rove) is going to pull the ball away and Charlie Brown (the Dems) once again will wind up sprawled in the dust muttering “drat!”

As with the Abramoff scandal, I’m sure if investigators dig through enough smarmy Congressional e-mails to teenage pages they’ll eventually find one from a Democrat, but it’s unlikely they’ll find one who chaired the Caucus on Abused and Exploited Children as Foley did or one who has made “values” a crusade.

Ever since the Religious Right took control of the Republican party, it has won the White House, both houses of Congress and packed the courts with Bible-quoting judges who love guns and hate abortion. Meanwhile, a cottage industry of academics and political consultants has sprung up holding post-election seminars for Democrats on how to nurture their softer, “values” side and win elections.

The Republican base and its “values” voters are almost catatonic. Richard Viguerie, one of the founders of the modern conservative movement, tells anyone who will listen that a Democratic win in the midterm elections might be a good thing — that the Bush White House is corrupt and immoral. He says the Bushes “have busted the federal budget for generations to come.”

The fact that Republicans are the “values” party is why a sex scandal traumatizes them so. Democrats barely flinched in 1974 when Wilbur Mills, chairman of the powerful Ways and Means committee, hit the front pages cavorting in the Tidal Basin with stripper Fanne Foxe, “the Argentine Firecracker.” And when Wilbur went into rehab to cure his drinking, you never suspected this was a dodge to get him out of media sight (as is the suspicion about Foley). Everyone knew Wilbur was a drunk. Gary Hart had a 20-point lead in the campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1988 when he was photographed with Donna Rice on his lap aboard the yacht Monkey Business sailing for the Bahamas. That ended his Presidential ambitions but he remains one of the party’s most respected political observers.

In my judgment, the Woodward book documenting how Rummy, Condi and Cheney ignored the pleas of our military commanders in the field, making an unnecessary war a disastrous one, should be far more damaging to the Bush White House than Foleygate.

But the e-mail flap has created such panic in Republican ranks that even Sen. John McCain, he of the “Straight Talk Express”, is speaking with forked tongue in his run for cover. McCain was scheduled to lead a rally in Buffalo for embattled Rep.Tom Reynolds who is knee-deep in Foley fallout. At the last minute, McCain cancelled. Craig Goldman, spokesman for Straight Talk America, McCain’s PAC, said the Senator had a “schedule conflict.” Reporter Doug Turner asked where McCain planned to be instead of Reynolds’ $250-a-plate dinner. Goldman responded: “We haven’t figured that out yet.”

Charlie Brown just might get a kick out of this yet.