Congress Matters
It seems a bit unseemly to criticize an article that quotes me as an expert but I thought this one element of a basically good article is a little bit off base:
Then there’s the question of how hard Democrats will push their activist philosophy, particularly in a period when the budget deficit is at record levels and resources are scarce. The answer hinges greatly on the enigmatic figure of Barack Obama, who variously displays leftist and centrist sides. [...]
“We will find out if he is a new Franklin Roosevelt or a new Bill Clinton,” [David] Boaz said.
Roosevelt of course presided over the greatest expansion of government economic power in U.S. history. Clinton adapted to conservative dominance by declaring in 1996 that the era of big government was over.
For starters, I think this is a misinterpretation of the Clinton administration. If the health care bill that the Clinton administration authored, pushed for, and staked its presidency on had passed you would say that FDR, LBJ, and Bill Clinton were the three main architects of the modern welfare state. Because the bill didn’t pass, the institutional legacy of the Clinton years is considerably more moderate than that and the Clinton administration is instead remembered for its responsible stewardship of national affairs. But that’s because congress blocked the bill not because of Clinton’s moderation.
In general, it’s important to understand the way the American institutional framework works. Clinton was, throughout his presidency, more liberal than the median member of congress and substantially more liberal than the 41st most conservative Senator. Under the circumstances, even if Clinton had been more left-wing than he was, it’s not clear how much of a difference this would have made on domestic issue. Similarly, whatever you make of Obama’s place on the centrist-liberal spectrum, he’s clearly going to be to the left of the 41st Senator no matter what happens in November, and, indeed, he’ll very likely be to the left of the median member of the House (currently Tim Mahoney).
Take a look at this chart that I found in Andrew Gellman’s book and on his blog:
By all indications, the safe thing to assume about Obama is that he’s a pretty typical Democratic legislator. Maybe he’s more like the typical Democratic Senator, or maybe he’s somewhat more liberal like the typical Democratic House member. But either way, a typical Democratic legislator is going to be more liberal than the median voter, more liberal than the median member of congress, and, indeed, more liberal than the median Democratic Party voter. And all the same is true of a Republican president, as it would be very difficult for an ideological outlier to secure his or her party’s nomination. The result of this, though, is that domestic policy outcomes are unlikely to hinge crucially on the relatively subtle differences between mainstream Democratic Party politicians. Rather, the views of relatively conservative congressional Democrats are likely to be decisive. There’s a tendency to attribute FDR’s and LBJ’s achievements to something inherent to their character or their approach to governing, but the truth is simply that in 1933-34 and 1965-66 you had a lot of liberals in congress so a lot of liberal legislation passed.
Presidential leadership matters, of course, but it can’t manufacture voters out of thin air. If Senators from “right-to-work” states decide they don’t want to vote for EFCA or Senators from oil, coal, and automobile producing states decide they don’t want a serious climate change policy, there’s no way for the White House to somehow pull the wool over their eyes and trick them into doing so.
35 Responses to “Congress Matters”
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October 20th, 2008 at 10:52 am
Clinton may not have been able to pass more liberal legislation if he had tried, but he didn’t have to demagogue so much really awful reactionary stuff like Welfare Reform, the Omnibus Crime Bill (federal death penalty), Federal Defense of Marriage Act, Communications Decency Act, DMCA, Desert Fox and extraordinary renditions.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:04 am
Clinton’s political hermaphroditism was the <em<fons et origo for the monster George W. Bush. The country was flush and the scandals were salacious and riveting during the Clinton years, so it’s as if the country quit caring for distinctions. It would have been gauche and played into Republican hands to have insisted on political discernment, and it wouldn’t have paid. So, c’est la vie. There’s a cruelty in Clinton’s political caprices that became more pronounced with Bush, but Bush’s version would have been stillborn without the blurring that began with Clinton.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:04 am
I guess the devil is in the details of how Gellman defines “liberal?” I have not read his book, but to say this is counterintuitive given some of the horrible legislation passed this decade with the help of Democrats, is an understatement.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Matt,
I love the plot, even if its made up.
One of the things that bugs me is for commentators to say things like “americans want divided government”.
You cannot take a mean to represent the opinion of any individual or a great number of individuals. In a bimodal distribution, the mean may not represent anyone. There are lots of examples of this. While it may be true, Americans may want “divided government”, that question is rarely, if ever, asked.
When you have bimodal distributions, of the sort illustrated, the issue is how best to govern. If you govern according to the ideology of the larger mode, what will be the result? I’d guess it would depend on the outcome. If decisions ‘work’ then the dominant mode will grow, getting some converts from the smaller mode. If it doesn’t, the reverse will occur. Governing via the dominant mode is guaranteed to outrage many or most people in the lesser mode, who will scream that governance is out of whack with the will of the people (the mean).
If, on the other hand, you go the Clinton, triangulation route, you may split the difference between the modes. Can this work? Maybe, maybe not.
In the final analysis, I think governing decisions depend on three things:
1. what really will work.
2. what the true shape of the underlying distribution is.
3. whether the underlying distribution can be changed to permit implementation of things that will work.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:25 am
Basically the Republicans have been holding our government hostage since 1994. Under Clinton, Newt shut down the government until the political heat got too much. Since 2006, Republicans have filibustered EVERYTHING including getting out of Iraq.
No matter how much the above commenters want to make it about Clinton or say that the current Congress is ‘do nothing’, the bottom line is that a group of committed extremists that don’t care about governing can use the rules to hold the will of the people hostage to their whims and special interests.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:38 am
From the conclusion of Gellman’s blog post:
That said, the success of an administrative policy depends on more than where it stands on a left-right scale. For example, when it came to implementing conservative policies, Reagan had more success with tax cuts than with budget cuts.
This points out something that bugs me about a lot of political science. In fact, another example of it is on the back of In Search of Progressive America, a recent book Yglesias contributed an article to: “Nearly every recent poll finds that most voters agree with views historically labeled as liberal: a hike in the minimum wage, government mandated health insurance…” etc. But then why do liberals not win races more? At a signing event for that book, Ezra Klein suggested that it’s just because Republicans have been better campaigners. Well, maybe, but for so long, in so many places? But here’s an alternate explanation, which also neatly explains the contradiction Gellman points out: people are stupid.
Or, to be more scientific about it, irrational, inconsistent and selfish, not that those are always and completely bad, or else maybe polls are very bad at capturing the way people think in real life. Everyone wants lower taxes and higher government spending, safer streets and more privacy and personal liberty. Congress has low approval ratings, but most individual Congressmen don’t.
Realizing this makes it very easy to take the wrong kind of information about the public with a grain of salt, keep a calming sense of perspective about the state of your country and political party, and figure out what really motivates our allies and opponents. Unfortunately, it also makes the study of political science very difficult.
October 20th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Unfortunately, my congressman is a Bush Dog, nominally a Democrat but functionally right-wing Republican.
October 20th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
I know people do this for lack of other information, but please stop assuming that presidents govern along the ideological lines of their campaigns or prior elected service. Every one since Truman to Clinton gravitated or was pushed to the center from previously liberal or conservative leanings. The single exception is George W. Bush, who campaigned in 2000 as a center-rightist and governed as a hard-rightist, more or less as he had as governor of Texas.
Obama would not to be as liberal, or McCain as conservative, a president as their voting records and campaign platforms lead us to believe. Circumstances beyond its control, starting with the economy, will moderate the next administration.
October 20th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Sorry, that should be, “Every [president] from Truman to Clinton…”
October 20th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
“Expert” is a little strong. I think he just quoted you.
October 20th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
“there’s no way for the White House to somehow pull the wool over their eyes and trick them into doing so”
Haven’t we just seen an 8-year demonstration of just how a
committed White House can indeed “pull the wool over (Congress’)
eyes” and thus get their way on a whole host of issues ? Most infamously, the Iraq war; but also the huge tax cuts, the torture policy, the politicization of DoJ.
Now I’m hoping that Obama wouldn’t be quite that dishonest: but with about 3M grassroots donors, he’s got an unprecedented ability to mobilize mass public opinion against anyone who obstructs his agenda. And I hardly see a hairsbreadth of disagreement between Obama, Pelosi, and Reid, so the
leadership is going to be remarkably united. And then there’s the raw power of someone who can raise $150M in a month: the Blue Dogs might not be all that keen on Obama’s policies, but that fundraising prowess is a heck of a bargaining chip.
The constitution is pretty well set up to make it damn hard to get anything done. But there are some very unusual factors at work right now. I don’t think it’s going to be business as usual.
October 20th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Cyrus, another explanation might lie in asking how much people care about these issues. If 55% of Americans want to raise the minimum wage in a kind of, “Uhh, yeah, okay, that sounds like a pretty good idea” way, while 45% of Americans oppose it in a kin of, “WHAT’S THE MATTER WITH YOU YOU STINKIN’ COMMIE? YOU’LL RAISE THE MINIMUM WAGE OVER MY DEAD BODY!!” way, then the minimum wage isn’t being raised.
And even then, the rubber doesn’t hit the road until you find out what people are willing to do about those preferences.
October 20th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
“But then why do liberals not win races more? At a signing event for that book, Ezra Klein suggested that it’s just because Republicans have been better campaigners. Well, maybe, but for so long, in so many places? But here’s an alternate explanation, which also neatly explains the contradiction Gellman points out: people are stupid.”
These are some pretty lame explanations! The fact is that policy proposals are pretty low on the list of determinants of voting behavior, alas. And when voters judge government performance, they aren’t primarily judging how liberal or conservative it was. And stupidity seems pretty random to me, so I’d like to hear an argument as to how stupidity systematically favors the GOP.
Ethnic identity, cultural factors, and economic self-interest
are bigger determinants of voting behavior than policy liberalism. That’s a pretty simple, well-confirmed explanation that explains why more voters are closer to liberals but that liberal politicians don’t do better than they do. It also explains why liberals can’t simply change strategy and get the same white conservative votes by campaigning differently. In many ways liberal policies and party labels are probably cultural indicators for right-wing voters, as are the minority groups that support the Democratic party.
“Cyrus, another explanation might lie in asking how much people care about these issues…And even then, the rubber doesn’t hit the road until you find out what people are willing to do about those preferences.”
Yes. Republicans vote at a higher rate than Democrats do, just like the majority that wants a more liberal foreign policy generally doesn’t translate that preference into votes like foreign policy hawks do.
October 20th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Your premise is false. The Congress did not kill the Mitchell. Indeed, it had the votes to pass the House and possibly to survive Senate filibuster. Keep in mind, the Dems still controlled both houses. Gingrich told Clinton that if the Mitchell bill came to the floor, he would kill GATT, which was opposed by many Democrats and needed Republican support. Clinton decided to sacrifice health care for the sake of free trade. Here is the obligatory cite:
September 20, 1994 – Newt Gingrich privately warns Bill Clinton in the White House that if he continues to push for health reform in the closing days of the session, he will lose the Republican support needed to pass GATT, which the President believes is critical to the U.S. economic position as the leader of the Western alliance. George Mitchell, repeating this Gingrich threat to colleagues privately immediately after, describes it as “an atomic bomb blast.”
September 26, 1994 – At a news conference in the Capitol, George Mitchell pulls the plug on health care reform.
source:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/forum/may96/background/health_debate_page3.html
October 20th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Martin, you’re assuming that health care was still in a position to pass in September 1994. While the Democrats still controlled Congress, the source you linked to plainly shows that rank-and-file Congressmen were distancing themselves from the White House by that time. Had Clinton stuck to his guns, he very well might have gotten neither health care nor GATT.
Obviously, that’s just fine if you don’t think GATT was a good idea in the first place. But Clinton did.
October 20th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
What Clinton could have done is actually force the Republicans to vote against health care reform in the House – and probably lose – and filibuster it in the Senate – and probably win. Then run for election on that basis. Everyone knew that for the health care plan to go down without Republican fingerprints would help them enormously in the midterms.
What Matt said is that on the basis of the Health reform that Clinton was more liberal than commonly supposed. But if Clinton had not blinked over GATT, he could have had one of two things: 1) health care reform if the Republicans blinked or 2) continued Democratic control of the Congress if they did not. He chose GATT over either. As you say, that is a position one can agree or disagree with, but it is not the *liberal* position – the progressive caucus and the unions were strongly against GATT. You may disagree, but if so, you, like Clinton, are siding with the conservatives and the pro-business center against the Left, and your politics should be understood in this light.
November 29th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
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