Senate Democrats choose losers to lead
[Updated to correct date of Daschle defeat.] For the second time in less than a decade, the Senate Democrats are finding themselves with a leader facing political extinction. Tom Daschle, Harry Reid’s predecessor as the leader of the Senate Democrats, lost his own reelection race in 2002 in 2004, having become minority leader after the 2002 elections. For Democrats, this is not an unprecedented experience. In the 1950s, back-to-back Democratic leaders also lost their seats.
Checking out the relatively short history of the Senate Leader position shows that the Democrats have been more willing to choose vulnerable members. There have been only 11 Senate Democratic leaders (the position officially came into existence in 1920), and four have lost reelection campaigns.
Republicans have, in some ways, a happier success rate. The first Republican leader, though unofficial, was Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who died in office in 1924. Including both of those men, of the Republicans’ 17 leaders (one was only acting), only one lost his reelection campaign, James Watson of Indiana in the FDR tidal wave of 1932. In other ways, not so happy. Five of their leaders have died in office (as opposed to only one for the Democrats).
There is no real explanation for the Democrats’ willingness to choose among the electorally vulnerable—each leadership election is unique and involves personality issues that have nothing to do with the history of the office. But, there are advantages to having a majority leader from a swing state. Just by dint of being elected in a state that could go either way, these Senators may be more attuned to the nation as a whole, and better able to pull the party from extreme positions. But the downside is that it may make them more vulnerable to losing—Reid became the face of the Democrats in the Senate, and as such is blamed by conservatives.
The Democrats can take comfort in the knowledge that it’s hard to believe Reid’s leadership position will be what cost him his seat—he would have been targeted anyway. He was vulnerable incumbent, and there is no reason to think he would have received any easier treatment from Republicans or conservative groups than Blanche Lincoln or Russ Feingold.
If Reid is out, the Democrats will not be trying for a three-peat. His most likely successors, Chuck Schumer or Dick Durbin, both reside in much safer seats.
Joshua Spivak is a PR executive and senior fellow at the Hugh L. Carey Institute for Government Reform at Wagner College.
Two Independents could be the key to the next Congress
The following is a guest post by Joshua Spivak, a lawyer and a research fellow at the Hugh L. Carey Center for Government Reform at Wagner College.
With Republicans making a serious push to take over the Senate in November, a rare but important development may prove to be the key to the post-2010 Congressional landscape: the Senate may feature two elected members not beholden to the major parties — Independent s Joseph Lieberman and Charlie Crist.
In a closely divided Senate, having two Independents could play an outsized role as powerbrokers and creators of a moderate bloc. It would also be only the second time since World War II that two Independents occupied the Senate.
Successful Independents are very rare in high-level American legislative politics. Instead, they have been much more successful in winning gubernatorial races despite the fact that the Senate has twice as many seats available. In the last two decades alone, Minnesota, Maine, Alaska and Connecticut have all elected Independents. In the 2010 elections, there are at least three serious Independent gubernatorial contenders.
While there have been a number of Independent Senators in recent years, only Vermont’s James Jeffords was able to have any real impact, thanks to switching control of the chamber when he moved from the Republican side of the aisle. Nearly all of these Independent s have been men who left their previous party during midterms in a huff, either for personal pique or for political purposes. These senators then either quickly align with the opposition party.
Most importantly, though, none succeeded in winning re-election as an Independent. One of them, Robert Smith of New Hampshire, quickly went back to the Republican Party after being defeated in a primary election for his apostasy. The only other time that two non-major party candidates were elected was in 1970. Harry Byrd Jr., formerly a Democrat, was elected as a senator of Virginia and conservative James Buckley became a New York senator. But both wound up closely aligned with one party or the other, and neither were important figures in the Senate.
both will be footnotes in history;we are tired of fence sitters
Senate vote exposes Wall Street impotence
Wall Street’s diminished influence in Washington was made plain yesterday when the Senate voted to approve financial reform legislation by 59 votes to 39.
Industry lobbyists will point out the bill only just managed to scrape the required votes needed to end debate and forestall a filibuster. It fell far short of a lopsided bipartisan majority.
But the formal tally on HR 4173 (Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act 2009) as amended by S 3217 (Restoring American Financial Stability Act 2010) conceals a much wider bigger majority of 63-37 for enacting far-reaching reforms.
In the final vote on passage, the bill was backed by 53 Democrats, 2 Independents and 4 Republicans (Maine’s Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, Iowa’s Charles Grassley and Massachusetts’ Scott Brown).
It was opposed by 37 Republicans and 2 Democrats (Maria Cantwell of Washington and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin). Two senators were not present (Democrats Robert Byrd of West Virginia and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania).
But the two Democrats who voted “No” did so because they thought it did not go far enough and were registering a protest in a bid to get it toughened further. The two absent members were Democrats who had voted in favor of the legislation before.
All four votes should really be added to the “Yes” column to give an effective underlying majority of 63. By any measure that is a very high tally or a major piece of legislation.
“adverse” struck me,too. populist = equalitarian, not stupid masses. so many terms get rendered toxic in the “spin,” what’s needed is a reassertion of the “all [persons] are created equal . . . endowed with . . . rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” understanding of what it means to be a citizen. it isn’t “adverse” to reduce the size and impact of an exploitive paracitic oligarcy, is it?
Industry defeated on U.S. derivatives reform
Senate Democrats have beaten back an ambitious, industry-supported amendment to the derivatives portion of financial reform legislation.
If passed it would have significantly weakened the administration’s efforts to tighten regulation of over the counter derivatives markets.
Yesterday’s vote went largely along party the lines (39-59). But Senate Democrats attracted support from moderate Republicans Olympia Snowe (Maine) and Charles Grassley (Iowa), making that part of the bill effectively filibuster proof.
So far lobbyists have largely failed to change the direction of the bill despite heavy pressure on members of the chamber to make it more industry-friendly.
It now looks like the final derivatives reform will be largely along the lines advocated by the White House and the U.S. Treasury Department, and that industry lobbying will not materially affect the outcome.
CHAMBLISS AMENDMENT Yesterday’s crucial amendment offered by Senator Saxby Chambliss (R, Georgia) (Amdt 3816) was a second-degree amendment to the main one (Amdt 3739) already offered by Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd and Agriculture Committee Chairman Blanche Lincoln, which is the chamber’s working text on financial reform.
Senate Rules permit amendments of amendments (“amendments in the second-degree”) but not amendments of amendments of amendments (third or higher degrees) except by unanimous consent.
After clash, Senate filibuster ends in whimper
Just a few minutes after the Senate failed for a third time in as many days to reach the 60-votes needed to approve a cloture motion on the financial reform bill (failing 56-42), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid rose to his feet and asked the chamber’s presiding officer:
“Mr President, I now ask unanimous consent the motion to proceed to S 3217 be agreed to.”
After the president officer asked for objections, and heard none, he replied “Without objection, it is so ordered,” according to the Congressional Record.
And with that the Senate decided to commence debate on the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010. No roll call, no vote on the record, no 60th vote to cut off debate, just an absence of naysayers.
In effect, the bill moves forward by a lopsided margin of 98-0 as dissent melted away, for the moment.
Reid’s unanimous consent agreement provides both parties with a neat way out of an embarrassing impasse while preserving maximum flexibility for further negotiations.
For Senate Democrats it gets the bill onto the floor in exchange for a token concession (dropping the pre-funded $50 billion bank rescue levy most had not wanted in the first place).
Quote: “No roll call, no vote on the record, no 60th vote to cut off debate, just an absence of naysayers”
We should ask … is this democracy???
Now we will have Tea Party idiots who do not even know the Constitution. I just shows the dirty negative ads many of which are not true or distort the facts work well for the GOP. Now they had better do some good work or they will really be on the hot seat for being so vocal about the opposition. God help this country; we need it with the GOP in charge of anything.