Make It Work

by digby

d-day wrote an interesting post last night about the Bush Justice Department’s legal opinion outlining what kind of power the legislative branch has to stop an out of control Executive without resorting to the courts. He concluded:

Here’s the thing. These may be Bush Administration lawyers doing the talking here, but they’re absolutely right. The Congress has all sorts of tools in their arsenal to force compliance from the executive branch. They can shut down the nomination process. They can eliminate any and all expenditures for the President and staff or executive agencies. They can refuse to enact spending bills for programs and policies prized by the executive. They can constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court that may investigate the executive. They can use the power of inherent contempt to try those neglecting a Congressional subpoena, and imprison them. And they can, you know, vote to remove the President from office, or all civil officers of the United States, for that matter.

There are dozens of ways for this Congress to get the attention of the President, as the Justice Department’s own lawyers recognize. But of course, they won’t do that. They worry about their image, their perception by the voters, what the Republican noise machine would say about them, and all the rest.

I agree. But that’s politics. All politicians worry about their image, their perception by the voters, what the opposition will say about them and all the rest. They always have and they always will. Profiles in courage in politics are as rare as someone who is seven feet tall. If doing the right thing depends upon that, then doing the right thing never gets done.

Why do politicians worry about their image, their perception by the voters and what the opposition will do? Because their main purpose in life (aside from those who are just plain corrupt and want to steal taxpayers money) is keeping their seats. That means they have to always ensure that their constituents are happy with them. It’s human nature. It’s democracy.

So why is it then so difficult for them to do the right thing? The voters must want them to and will reward them for it, right?

That’s the rub. Showdowns between the legislative and executive branch are unpredictable. And politicians are always fighting the last war:

November 15, 1995
Web posted at: 11:10 a.m. EST

While Americans have shifted toward the Republicans in the question of who has the best approach toward dealing with the budget deficit, more blame the GOP than Democrats for the bringing about the partial government shutdown this week, according to a new CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll. The poll sampled the opinions of 652 adult Americans on Tuesday. Sampling error is plus or minus four percentage points.

When it comes to dealing with the tough choices involved in cutting programs to reduce the federal budget deficit while maintaining needed federal programs, poll respondents chose the Democrats over the Republicans, the opposite results from a poll in July.

Best Approach to Budget
Now July
Democrats 49% 43%
Republicans 36% 44%

When asked if they personally view the government shutdown as a crisis, as a major problem, as a minor problem, or not a problem at all, a majority of respondents said it was a major or minor problem.

Government Shutdown
Crisis 11%
Major problem 40%
Minor problem 33%
Not a problem 14%

Overall, Americans blame the Republican leaders in Congress more for the recent shutdown of the federal government, not President Clinton.

Blame for Shutdown
GOP leaders 49%
President Clinton 26%
Both 19%

Here’s a fairly typical news report of the time:

Monday morning, just before driving back to Washington for another plunge into the meat grinder once known as the U.S. House of Representatives, Rep. Owen B. Pickett was asked the question on the lips of a lot of angry citizens.

“Just what in the name of God are you guys doing up there?”

Pickett, along with every other elected federal official, has heard the question in one form or another for weeks.

With the government in a nominal shutdown – one that inconveniences only the governed, not those who govern – and political leaders calling one another names in public that one should not call a rodent in private, Pickett could only shake his head and concede, “The exercise we’re going through right now is totally uncalled for.”

“Shutting down the government,” he said, “isn’t any way to do business. It’s a bad reflection on everybody. It’s inexcusable and simply should not be permitted.”

Pickett, a Democrat who for nine years has represented most of Norfolk and Virginia Beach in Congress, said in a lengthy interview that he’s hearing no small amount of anger from people in the district.

“They are cynical and upset,” he said, “and very severe in their criticism. They say things like, `What’s wrong up there?’ and `Why can’t you settle your differences? Who’s in charge?’ ”

Granted, that is ancient history to most people. But it isn’t ancient history to the congress, which remembers very well that in a head on collision with the executive, they can pay a steep price with the public.

Newt Gingrich lost his revolution over that one. The press turned on him and dealt him the worst humiliation possible:

Congresscritters and Senators care about perception and image and what the opposition (and the media, by the way) will do because their careers depend on it.

This is why it’s important to have a strong and thriving *independent* progressive movement, to push from outside the political process to build public support for specific issues. During the Martin Luther King day flap in the primary earlier this year, Robert Borosage wrote a piece to which I’ve referred before:

The lesson of the King years isn’t a choice between rhetoric and reality, or between experience and change. The lesson of the King years is the vital necessity of an independent progressive movement to demand change against the resistance of both entrenched interests and cautious reformers.

King understood that electing good liberal leaders – whether the young and fresh like Kennedy or the experienced and wily like Johnson — was necessary but not sufficient. “Freedom,” he taught, is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” King called each of us to vote but also to act. “Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”

Obama is right that there is power in the word, that hope has a true force in the world. Hillary is right that Johnson’s experience and forcefulness were vital to passing the civil rights laws. But King’s example and lesson is that neither of these is sufficient. It takes a movement to force even a sympathetic president to act.

You cannot depend upon politicians alone — any politicians — to defeat the status quo, no matter how much they may promise. The forces of aristocratic privilege are very, very strong. They must believe that it is in their political interests to do so. And in the case of things like civil liberties or social justice or any other issue for which there is no moneyed interest to promote it, it must come from a mass of average citizens demanding change from the outside.

Political machines can gain power and sometimes keep it. Only an independent political movement can make them use it for the greater good.

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