Running Against Congress
National Review editorial offers what I think is some strange advice to the McCain campaign:
Fourth, McCain must tie Obama to the liberals in Congress. Congress is as unpopular, if not more so, than President Bush. It had a huge hand in stoking the mortgage mess (see again: Fannie and Freddie). With Democrats sure to get larger majorities in the House and the Senate, they will be emboldened to push Obama’s already liberal agenda leftward off a cliff. And Obama has shown no willingness over the years to stand up to his own party.
This strikes me as more truthy than true. It’s true that “congress” is an unpopular institution. And it’s also true that Democrats are sure to get larger majorities in the House and the Senate. But Democrats are going to get those larger majorities because the public has a clear preference for electing more Democrats to congress:
Under the circumstances, it’s by no means clear that linking Obama with a bunch of people who the public intends to vote for would do anything other than compel more people to vote for Obama. Nevertheless, it would sort of be interesting for McCain to raise this line of argument more explicitly if only because it would put on the table the under-discussed question of what, really, McCain plans to do if he becomes President. Will we have a government shutdown if congressional Democrats don’t agree to cuts in literally every domestic program? That doesn’t sound likely to me, but McCain hasn’t really fielded any practical questions about dealing with an opposition congress.
25 Responses to “Running Against Congress”
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October 7th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Video: Palin’s phony accent.
.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:41 pm
What is up with McCain’s meme that Obama must vote against his party? I know that McCain uses his handful of votes against Bush to prove that he is a maverick, but so what? Do people buy into this argument? If voting against Republicans is used as proof that you are a maverick, then Obama is more mavericky than McCain, right?
October 7th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Yeah, but McCain is willing to go for a government shutdown over even a single earmark appearing in a piece of legislation. He’ll shut down the government for just about any reason. Its what a maverick would do.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
People tend to get upset with Congress for two reasons — because “CONgress is the opposite of PROgress” and because of pork (except hometown pork … if Congress is full of pigs, people will be unhappy with Congress but still re-elect incumbents and the party in charge).
If the Dem majority is seen as “doing nothing except feeding at the trough” people will be unhappy with the Dem majority (even if, vide supra, they will vote for Dems in Congress to bring home the bacon) to the benefit of McCain. If it is the GOP that is seen as being obstructionist and filling up bills with bacon, then people will be unhappy with the GOP to the further benefit of Obama.
Back in 2007, Congress kept sending bills to GWB that he could vilify as “not being clean bills” and the spin was that the Dem Congress was doing all the things people hate about Congress (obstructing the Pres, even an unpopular one, is not well liked … and people hate bills with lots of riders, etc.). The GOP, in fact, could block bills and fill them with pork, but then it would get blamed on the Dems. for doing nothing but bloating bills with pork. In this environment, anger at the Dems in Congress no doubt would hurt the Dem pres. candidate even if everyone was happy with their Dem representative (and just mad at “all those other Dems”).
Now Reid and Pelosi have hit their stride in terms of managing spin, and the blame for Congress’s continued ill performance is being laid on the GOP (although people will discount that spin as they hear it on the media which people still presume to be liberally biased). In this environment, hatred of Congress will certainly hurt a long-term Senator like McCain.
But it all depends on the spin who is helped by dislike of Congress. And there is an independence allowing the same person to think “I hate those pigs in Congress” and “I like my Rep. as s/he brings home the bacon”.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
I have always thought that Congress’s unpopularity with the voters is a weak reed for the Republicans to cling to. Sure, some people have a negative view of Congress because it has a Democratic majority with a (presumed) liberal agenda; but others look on it unfavorably because they don’t think it has succeeded in advancing a liberal agenda.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
“Dissatisfaction with Congress” is the silliest poll topic ever, since it is aggregating totally disparate forms of voter unrest. To the extent that it has an ideological component at all, it is probably in favor of pro-active government: of late, one more often hears complaints about ‘gridlock’ (i.e., failure to pass legislation) than against the Congress messing up our lives with bad laws.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
The Right has been pushing this “people hate Congress more than they hate the President” BS since the day Pelosi took the gavel, failing to mention (of course) that a great deal of that dissatisfaction is the direct result of the new Democratic Congress not pushing back hard enough against Bush and the rest is lingering resentment at the Republicans for fu**ing things up so badly since they took over (not counting the 50-odd percent who will always hate Congress no matter what).
Less Republicans + More Progressive Democrats = Increased Congressional Approval. QED.
October 7th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
“With Democrats sure to get larger majorities in the House and the Senate, they will be emboldened to push Obama’s already liberal agenda leftward off a cliff. And Obama has shown no willingness over the years to stand up to his own party.”
They seem to be oblivious to the fact that after Bush, much of the nation has very little problem with this scenario. It’s as though they think taking random contrarian stances against your own party just for the sake of being contrarian is a virtue, since, well, that’s what McCain does.
October 7th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Video: Palin’s phony accent.
There’s a Hitchens essay about religion in politics in which he accuses McCain and Obama of being phony about their stated religious beliefs, but that Palin was sincere. Since nothing else about Palin is sincere, that’s a pretty daring suggestion by Hitchens. I suppose he thinks that because of her abortion position and the 5 kids, but the ever-promised-never-delivered-overturn-of-Roe-V-Wade has been the Republican come-on to the religious Right since 1973. GOP politicians get that with their mother’s milk. And there are lots of Democrats with large families. Some people just like kids.
Palin’s a phony. And worse. She’s been gunning for higher office for a long long time.
October 7th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
This “divided government” argument is making the rounds, I think because George Will argued it in a column this week. Its ridiculous though. If people really wanted divided government, they wouldn’t be supporting and electing so many Democrats to office.
I guess those Washington conservatives have the pulse on the American people though!
October 7th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
CRA did not work except with the wingnuts so now try the GSEs.
Sebastian Mallaby the new poster boy for the blame GSE movement does not even mention CDS in his article. Well it is only a 54.6 trillion dollar (according to FORBES) market that McCain’s good buddy Phil Gramm was involved with creating and making sure it is deregulated.
October 7th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
It’s really funny that these pundits feel McCain should use congressional liberals as his target to win the election… and that congressional liberals will dramatically increase their gains in Congress. That doesn’t compute.
October 7th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
this advice only works with people who think that it’s only the “liberals” in congress who are unpopular…. the “conservatives” aren’t any MORE popular, i’ll bet they’re even less popular than the libs….
this whole thing is wack…what kind of “liberal” legislation have the “liberals” actually passed in the last session and a half to make them so unpopular? something? anything? i must a missed it…
i thought folks were more upset about what congress hasn’t passed… and that would be the gop’s fault….
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