Maybe They're Not So Dumb After All
Reading the tea leaves on the state of filibuster reform and the McConnellization of the Republican Party.
On Tuesday night, Joe Biden sat down for an interview with ABC News George Stephanopolous. For the first time in his presidency, he, announced support for changing the Senate’s filibuster rules.
Biden endorsed the idea of forcing senators to talk on the Senate floor if they want to block a piece of legislation. This is the so-called “talking filibuster” - an idea floated earlier this month by West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin. This was a major change from the position recently put forward by White House press secretary Jen Psaki, in which she said Biden would “prefer” not to see the filibuster altered.
Filibuster reformists were ecstatic … for about 12 hours until Wednesday when Manchin appeared to throw cold water on the idea. He told CNN’s Manu Raju that he “rejects calls for lowering [the] 60-vote threshold” on the filibuster, “ rejects calls for requiring 41 [senators] to sustain [the] filibuster” and “rejects calls for specific carveouts on legislation, like on voting.”
According to Manching, "I'm still at 60 … I haven't changed."
This runs counter to what Manchin said on Fox News last week, namely that he thinks it’s time to make the filibuster “more painful, maybe you have to make them stand there.” Those words are in line with what Biden endorsed on Tuesday night. In fact, one might think that the president was offering support to Manchin’s idea.
So what the hell is going on here?
Truth be told, it feels like Kabuki dance. The key members of the Democratic Party are suggesting fealty to the filibuster - as a precursor for getting rid of the filibuster.
First of all, I seriously doubt that Biden pulled this idea of a talking filibuster out of thin air or that he was musing aloud when he mentioned it to Stephanopolous. Rather, Biden was quite purposely pushing the ball forward on reform. I have to believe that he was doing so with the knowledge that his proposal would receive a positive reception among the Senate Democratic caucus, including Manchin.
Biden’s comments were no more accidental than Manchin’s declaration earlier this month on multiple Sunday news programs that he was open to the possibility of filibuster reform. As I noted here recently, saying it one time might be a slip of the tongue; saying it twice is not.
So why Manchin’s reticence now? I’ve long been of the view that Democrats will never get rid of the filibuster until it appears that they have no choice - in other words: if met by unwavering Republican obstructionism. Manchin, I believe, is committed to supporting the filibuster in its current form until he is forced to give it up. And the more resistant Manchin appears to be to filibuster reform now, the more legitimate it will seem if he changes his position later.
I think Democrats are wasting their time playing this game. If they are going to get rid of the filibuster, they should just go ahead and do it. But clearly, top Democrats read the politics of this differently and believe that filibuster reform can only succeed if it looks they were dragged to the position (kicking and screaming, of course) by Republican obstinancy.
Here’s the point in this post when clear-eyed readers might suggest that I am engaging in some seriously motivated reasoning. I think Democrats should get rid of the filibuster, and I’m trying to interpret these recent events in any way I can to bolster that prior position.
That’s certainly possible. It’s happened before! But there is another factor that needs to be considered: neither Joe Biden nor Joe Manchin are idiots.
Biden is likely not floating the idea of a talking filibuster a week after his press secretary rejected the idea of filibuster reform unless he has a pretty good sense that Manchin is on board. It’s possible that this was a ham-handed effort to pressure the West Virginia senator, but I seriously doubt Biden is that dumb. And considering that several weeks ago, Manchin expressed annoyance about Vice President Kamala Harris doing local media in his home state in support of the COVID-relief bill - in what he viewed as an effort to pressure him - I consider that possibility even more unlikely.
As for Manchin, when you listen to his comments on the filibuster, they are so broadly incoherent, contradictory, and divorced from the partisan politics that define the US Senate today. It’s tough to imagine they reflect his true feelings. Rather they sound like the words of a man who is putting out public statements intended to obfuscate his views on potentially scrapping the filibuster. Just two weeks ago, Manchin said that he wanted an infrastructure bill to pass the US Senate that was both bipartisan and included tax increases on the wealthiest Americans. Manchin, who is far as I’m aware, did not recently fall off the back of a turnip truck, surely knows that one is as likely to find ten Republicans willing to support tax increases to pay for infrastructure spending as they are to find ten prominent Republicans who will say Barack Obama is the greatest US president who has ever lived. Politicians often exaggerate, mislead, and even contradict themselves, fully aware of what they are doing. Manchin is not unique in this regard.
Of course, Manchin may be dumber than a box of rocks. I doubt it.
Do you know who appears to agree with me? Mitch McConnell.
Earlier this week, he delivered a speech on the Senate floor, pledging a “scorched earth” response if Democrats try to eliminate the filibuster. “Everything that Democratic Senates did to Presidents Bush and Trump, everything the Republican Senate did to President Obama, would be child’s play compared to the disaster that Democrats would create for their own priorities if — if — they break the Senate,” McConnell. He also warned that Republicans would turn the tables on Democrats if they got back in the majority. "This pendulum would swing both ways — hard," McConnell said.
Let’s be very clear on the latter point: McConnell is bluffing. Putting aside the fact that Republicans have no discernible governing agenda, it seems increasingly apparent that they don’t actually want to get rid of the filibuster, even when they are in charge of the Senate. How do I know? Because when they had the chance to do away with it in 2017 after Trump took office, they chose not to. Some might argue that it’s because they were afraid Democrats would use it to pass progressive legislation if they regained the majority. Perhaps. But there’s a simpler explanation: if all it took were a simple majority to pass laws in the Senate, then McConnell would have been under inordinate pressure to push forward every hare-brained bill passed by GOP extremists in the House. Republican senators, who couldn’t even assemble a majority to repeal Obamacare, would be forced to take tough votes on controversial, unpopular legislation. That’s the last thing McConnell would have wanted. Keeping the filibuster 60 votes didn’t just protect the country from bad laws; they protected McConnell’s GOP caucus from bad votes.
McConnell’s recent filibuster speech had the distinctive odor of desperation. They were not the words of a senator who feels confident that Joe Manchin will hold the line on the filibuster.
Maybe I have this all wrong, and maybe Manchin will hold the line on the filibuster and block most of the Democrat’s legislative agenda. Maybe that’s true. Or maybe Washington’s filibuster drama is only just beginning.
The McConnellization of the Republican Party
A couple of years ago, I wrote a long essay for the New York Review of Books on Mitch McConnell, and one of the questions I tried to answer was whether he believed in anything. My conclusion was that he did not. As I wrote then:
If there is one defining characteristic of McConnell’s more than three decades in national politics, it is the prizing of political expediency over integrity, ideology, and any other impulse that should define public service in a representative democracy. For McConnell, as for the president whom he has repeatedly enabled, winning is the only thing that matters. All other considerations are secondary to that goal.
Even McConnell’s obsessive focus on nominating and confirming judges has little to do with ideology but everything to do with throwing red meat to a Republican electorate that highly prizes conservative control of the federal courts.
Increasingly, McConnell’s nihilistic approach to American politics is being replicated across the Republican Party.
Last summer, the GOP failed to write a party platform for the 2020 Republican National Convention. They repurposed the platform used for the 2016 convention. It was emblematic of the policy-free campaign on which Donald Trump ran for reelection. But now, two months since he left office, it’s difficult to understand what, if anything, the GOP stands for.
Over the past several months, both House and Senate Republicans voted en masse to oppose COVID relief. In the House, they’ve opposed police reform, voting reform, expanding legal protections to the LGBTQ community, and background checks for gun purchases. This week 172 House Republicans voted against the Violence Against Women Act. All of this legislation is extremely popular and, in fairness, quite progressive. It’s not necessarily surprising that Republicans would oppose it. But what does the party actually support? What legislation would they seek to enact if they return to power?
It’s not easy to tell because, Republicans have repeatedly reversed themselves on a host of policy issues over the past four years, from trade and immigration to the budget deficit and foreign policy. Even on one of the few issues that Republicans agreed on when they controlled Congress - repealing and replacing Obamacare - they could not coalesce around a single plan. The only major policy issue that Republicans were able to act on during the Trump years was tax cuts - which amounted to a political payoff to their biggest financial donors.
Some congressional Republicans talk about repealing Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which grants immunity to tech companies for materials posted on the Internet because they argue it is biased against conservatives. Republicans are pushing new voting restrictions and other limitations on free speech and peaceful protest on the state level. All these have to do with politics and the perpetuation of Republican political power - the same issues that animate their nihilistic leader, McConnell.
Don’t get me wrong; I understand full well that it’s impossible to disentangle politics from public policy. But the point of gaining and holding political office is to govern. That didn’t happen during the Trump years, and it’s increasingly difficult to find any evidence that the post-Trump GOP intends to be any different. For the modern GOP achieving political power is an end in itself.
Writing
This week I wrote about Cornel West getting a pass for anti-Semitism and America’s exceptional status when it comes to gun violence. Finally, thanks for Joe Biden truth is making a comeback.
Reading
From a few weeks back, I love this story about a guy who spent two years living in Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium. When it comes to basic public services, America is increasingly a Third World country. I’ve long wondered how Brett Kavanaugh was relieved of his large outstanding debts, and I’m glad to hear that Senator Sheldon Whitehouse is taking a closer look. Ryan Grim has a smart explanation of the “talking filibuster.” Jesse Singal is a friend, and the avalanche of lies being spread against him by trans activists is gross. This is a fascinating interview with Howard University scholar Daryl Michael Scott on how bad history is being used to justify social change.
Watching/Listening
It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted about a Grateful Dead show (a recurring habit I had on the old newsletter), so it’s time to end that slump.
About once a year, I post this video from the Dead’s July 4 show at Buffalo’s Rich Stadium. This is the show closer, “Not Fade Away,” and while it’s a rocking version of the song the best part is the sheer happiness on the face of Jerry Garcia as he jams with keyboardist Brent Mydland. This clip always put a smile on my face.