Senate Dysfunction v 39827

Sums up the Senate nicely.

The GOP has spent the last three years turning the Senate into an abattoir of reform.  They made 60 the new 51 and basically turned unbelievable power over to noted asshats Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson the Lesser.

Since the GOP won the House, there has been less need for them to obstruct needed legislation, like energy or fiscal policy, since what the House produces is so nuts (how many ways can you restrict abortion?) that it's been the Senate Democrats who have stopped legislation.

But one area that has become increasingly contentious has been the confirming of presidential appointments.  It used to be that the minority party would pick a few high profile examples of ideological driven nominees and make them the rally point of holding up the process.  The Party of No has simply stopped almost all nominees.  While the derailing of Godwin Liu's nomination got a lot of headlines, I can understand a certain reticence towards judicial nominations.  Those are permanent like herpes.

But it has been executive branch appointments that have really begun to slow down.  Elizabeth Warren is the poster child of this.  The President should have the right to staff his administration with people he wants, provided they are not corrupt, bonkers or nepotistic.  The minority party should be able to use the hearings to score whatever political points they want to create future fundraising letters, but ultimately, let these people serve.  Elizabeth Warren is manifestly not corrupt, bonkers or a product of nepotism.  She is a nationally renowned expert on banking abuses, and is THE perfect choice to run the Consumer Financial Protection Board.  In fact, quite a few bankers have even been won over by her, knowing that she will be impartial and rigorous.

There was growing hope that Obama would give her a recess appointment, but now that isn't going to happen.  The GOP has refused - for the first time in anyone's memory - to agree to the unanimous consent motion to adjourn the Senate.  They say it's turnabout for when the Democrats refused to adjourn the Senate from 2006-2008 to prevent Bush from making recess appointments.

Two differences.  First, Bush was a lame duck, and they worried about packing the Courts with a bunch of Liberty University Law School graduates.  Second, and more importantly, THE DEMOCRATS WERE IN THE MAJORITY.  The majority should be able to control the institution that they, you know, control.  That's what elections are for.

It is obviously a long time before 11/2012, but from this vantage point I will make a safe and a wild prediction.  Obama will win re-election and Democrats will regain the House.

But the Senate will remain tight, though I think the Democrats retain "control" of it.

If the GOP continues to prove that the Senate has reached a level of dysfunction that cannot be dealt with through usual political channels, we could finally see the needed reform that people were talking about in 2010.  The GOP takeover of the House made reform irrelevant, but if the Democrats control the White House AND the House and have a 3-5 vote majority in the Senate, maybe we will see some needed reform on issues of executive appointments and the "painless filibuster" that allows a minority of Senators who represent a small minority of the population make the US government non-functional.

And then it's ponies for everyone.