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A year ago, congressional Republicans were an exuberant bunch. Riding high after massive midterm gains, and with President Obama’s approval ratings faltering, GOP leaders and rank-and-file members felt very good about themselves, their standing, their agenda, and their future.
A year later, Republicans aren’t smiling quite as often. Thanks to their style of “leadership,” the GOP-dominated Congress has seen the bottom fall out of its public support, while Obama’s numbers steadily improve. Republicans haven’t gotten anything done, and probably won’t have anything to show for the entire Congress by the end of the year.
This has not gone unnoticed by the GOP lawmakers themselves, and Jake Sherman reported late yesterday that Republicans are now fighting amongst themselves over just about everything.
A year to the day since Ohio’s John Boehner and 87 eager freshmen took Washington by storm, House Republicans are bruised from battle, irritated with each other and have lost trust in their leadership.
The president whose agenda they came to Washington to stop is vowing to spend the year scoring political points against Republicans now, and they don’t have much leverage against him. […]
All told, the House Republicans are going into 2012 weaker and more divided than when they took control of the chamber a year ago. […]
Around the leadership circle — comprising Boehner, Cantor, Whip Kevin McCarthy and their allies — there’s more disunity, grumbling and finger-pointing than there has been all year.
Reading the piece, I’m not at all clear how this gets better. The party doesn’t have a policy agenda, per se, and has no credible shot at completing a legislative wish list. There’s no strategy, no message, and no policies that (a) enjoy broad caucus-wide support; and (b) might stand a chance of passing.
There are disagreements among the rank and file, among the leaders, between the leaders and the rank and file, and between House Republicans and Senate Republicans. Within the caucus, there’s reportedly “a growing deficit of trust.”
Not only is this a recipe for failure, it’s also the kind of dynamic that may ultimately put John Boehner’s job in jeopardy.
For what it’s worth, the piece has a tidbit of good news: apparently House Republicans just want to get the payroll-tax-cut fight out of the way, and don’t intend to re-litigate the fight that proved to be fiasco for the party in December. That suggests the one item on the White House’s 2012 to-do list may come together after all.
Regardless, House Republicans will gather for a Baltimore retreat later this month to ponder a course for the rest of the year. By all accounts, their discussion will be ugly.
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Bruce K on January 06, 2012 2:43 PM:
Idea! How about inviting Obama to speak at their January retreat? I mean, that worked out so well last time they tried it..
golack on January 06, 2012 2:44 PM:
I know, why doesn't President Obama meet with them at their conclave?
just bill on January 06, 2012 2:54 PM:
oh, to be a fly on the wall in baltimore.
bobbo on January 06, 2012 3:00 PM:
Breaks my heart.
schtick on January 06, 2012 3:02 PM:
I love it when they eat each other.
T2 on January 06, 2012 3:03 PM:
When all you got to offer is lies and obstruction, it's tough, huh? I get the feeling that the country is prepared to move on, leaving the Party of Hate behind.
hells littlest angel on January 06, 2012 3:03 PM:
House Republicans will gather for a Baltimore retreat later this month...
Sounds like the perfect time to fill all the vacant judgeships with recess appointments.
citizen_pain on January 06, 2012 3:17 PM:
Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch
Hummm. on January 06, 2012 3:19 PM:
Hummm. It seems to me that about two months ago the prevailing wisdom was much the same but with the opposite polarity: The House GOP was in the cat-bird's seat, and all they had to do was nothing and blame would go to the WH because of their ju-jitsu messaging machine.
That machine is still in place, and stronger than ever. In about 7 month's time, about half of all American's will agree that the bad economy is the result of Obama's massive deficit spending, and only the GOP nominee can be trusted to turn the country around.
They have a lot of gas in their tank, and there's a long way to go...
jim filyaw on January 06, 2012 3:21 PM:
give 'em a break. after all, you've got to break in a taliban like agenda easy lest you start scaring the horses. the average yokel/tea bag dimwit isn't really listening when cantor or ryan holds forth about what a profound philosopher ayn was, or limbaugh rages about that n----g in the white house, but once he figures out that he's gonna be footing the bill for granny's ailments, it starts to add up for him.
jjm on January 06, 2012 3:46 PM:
Today's GOP is probably the stupidest and least politically sophisticated party in recent memory.
How could they not have seen coming what is now taking place? They are either very shortsighted or completely blind. They have had one whole news outlet to broadcast their outrageous lies, and have smugly assumed that would simply carry the day for them.
Their big issue 'the economy' that their last president created but which they tried to palm off on Obama is improving much to their chagrin. Their other big issue, killing women's reproductive rights, couldn't pass the Senate no matter what they did--and they did gin up their anti-abortion, anti-Planned Parenthood bills just to kiss up to their retrograde donors, knowing they wouldn't become law.
They've made crystal clear their support for the rich over everyone else, not very populist of them...and their wild insane claims against Obama has made everyone close their ears to what they say about him.
Obama has cleverly exposed their glaring weakness: their blind, stubborn cockiness about ruling the roost, their hatred of all peoples not rich, white, and Christian, their springing to the defense of fraudsters and con men who want a license to exploit you without constraint, and their total failures in foreign policy.
Anonymous on January 06, 2012 3:49 PM:
House Republicans will gather for a Baltimore retreat later this month.
Anyone see Inglourious Basterds?
square1 on January 06, 2012 3:49 PM:
I get a lot of shit in comments about being negative, but to me it all comes down to expectations.
In 2008, I was one of many who believed that the country could be at the start of a long-term ideological shift back towards liberalism. And the Democrats could regain their status as the dominant political party, much as they enjoyed from 1932-1980.
Bush and Cheney had flushed the GOP brand so far down the toilet that Republicans had to invent a new label "the tea party" just to get grassroots Republicans involved again in politics.
And Republicans had not only destroyed the GOP brand, but they had discredited neoconservative foreign policy and neoliberal economic policy.
In 2008, the Democrats were the Green Bay Packers with Aaron Rodgers leading them and the GOP was the Indianapolis Colts with their star QB on the bench.
Less than 4 years later, the GOP has both moved further to the right AND gained politically. The President is in serious danger of losing re-election. And the Democrats could conceivably lose the Senate.
Even if all the bad news doesn't come true, the fact that we are even discussing it when the GOP should be dead and buried, represents a massive, massive, massive reversal of fortune.
I feel when reading a post like this from Steve Benen, gloating over the GOP being "unhappy campers", like a Packers fan might if they found their team losing 28-27 to the Colts going into the fourth quarter and they just saw their kicker doing a massive dance after kicking a field goal: "Dude, you are losing to a team that sucks balls and you are dancing like you just won the Super Bowl."
People act like I'm pro-Republican because I give the Democrats a hard time all the time. I give the Democrats a hard time because they should be blowing the opposition out of the water and they are choking.
Sgt. Gym Bunny on January 06, 2012 4:07 PM:
The party doesn’t have a policy agenda, per se, and has no credible shot at completing a legislative wish list.
I'm pretty sure there are some legislative accomplishments the GOP in the House can jockey around. I would recommend the HR Bill For Appropriately Buttering Toast Butter-Side Down (Unless, of course, Obama already does that, then it's Butter-Side Up)
I guess those who elected them into power are thoroughly satisfied. All that hard work and posturing to send someone up to the Hill just to stand around and be mad--they could have done that from their own living rooms. Hell, I could have done it for 'em and gotten the same exact results!!! (Actually, I probably couldn't stand aruond being mad for longer than 2 hours; I'm liable to forget why I was mad in the first place.)
Another Steve on January 06, 2012 4:23 PM:
@Square One. The Whigs were electing presidents in 1848. In 1856, they held their last convention, as pathetic little affair that lacked even delegates from every state, where they made a "us-too" nomination of the candidate of the Know Nothings and left for the ash heap.
Politics isn't linear and it doesn't play out in Internet time where every second equals a year.
AK Liberal on January 06, 2012 4:36 PM:
@square1: I think your heart's in the right place, but I don't agree with your theory of politics. You seem to think that if you aren't giving it to the conservatives as hard as they gave it to us that we are losing.
Per jjm @ 3:46 PM, "Obama has cleverly exposed their glaring weakness: their blind, stubborn cockiness about ruling the roost, their hatred of all peoples not rich, white, and Christian, their springing to the defense of fraudsters and con men who want a license to exploit you without constraint, and their total failures in foreign policy."
That's the President's game and has been from the get-go. It's a long game that forces the GOP to either get constructive or get defeated and not for only a single election cycle.
The demographics are breaking our way. Young people overwhelmingly identify with the Democratic Party and the greatest determinant of adult voting history is the first Presidential ballot cast. Hispanics, the fastest growing demographic in the nation, look like a lost cause for the GOP. Of course it might not work, but if it does the GOP will be in the minority for a generation.
Going into 2008, I was a Clinton supporter because I thought she would deliver the kind of smash-mouth politics that I believed would kick movement conservatism to the curb. Then I caught onto the President's political theory and I caucused for Obama. It hasn't been without setbacks, but he is delivering much of what I expected. If the economy doesn't tank again between now and November, we might do very well indeed.
Laz on January 06, 2012 4:39 PM:
You're right, but I don't think it matters. The Republicans will always come together to oppose Obama. They'll continue their concentrated fire on him, regardless of their internal divisions. Obama and the Democrats will continue to be unable to come up with any kind of messaging that would take advantage of the Republicans' behavior and unwilling to say anything stronger than "excuse me please, oh pardon me [boring policy wonk babble...]." The cable TV hate-mouths will continue their streams of bile. And since that's basically the only message many of the American people will hear (since the Dems are so inept at messaging), the Republicans' divisions will play out as a side show jostling of leadership within the palace.
Michael on January 06, 2012 4:44 PM:
I apologize square, I did not mean to insinuate you are a republican, I just meant sucking a rattle the "same", as republicans :)
I see your point, but the reason is because of the bought off media, and the just as badders, (of which you are a major supplier)@:0o, that the low information voters have nowhere to get true information but at a few places.
However, with all of this fodder supplied to candid1te Obama , we are in for a attack on the GOP that will rival any Rovian thought onslaught, and with facts on our side as with video proof that can be verified, I don't see GOP coattails sweeping many GOP along with it. rate ne
square1 on January 06, 2012 4:52 PM:
@Another Steve:
The 19th C. destruction of the Whigs is a poor analogy to the reversal of fortune of the modern Democratic Party.
The Whigs were ripped apart almost entirely by the issue of slavery. As a consequence, Whig politicians simply left the party and joined the other parties. It was a partisan realignment. If there is a modern parallel to the Whigs it is the Democrats' loss of the Dixiecrats during the 60s, 70s, and 80s.
In contrast, the Democrats' recent stumbles are simply the result of a failure to capitalize on political opportunities that were presented.
jonthebru on January 06, 2012 4:53 PM:
I hope that Everybody who thinks Repug thugs are greasy jerks get out and support the Democratic candidates in their states. The President should find his re-election safe, but to keep the Senate and gain the Congress would be frickin' fantastic. That is frankly our only chance to get the Citizens United decision overturned by a constitutional amendment.
barkleyg on January 06, 2012 4:54 PM:
Reading the piece, I’m not at all clear how this gets better
Common, this is easy.
The Elephants REAR END takes control of the Tea Party Hopuse, throw out BONER(sic), and elect a Tea Party Majority Leader, or whatever BS title Boner(sic) holds!
Bob on January 06, 2012 5:06 PM:
When I read pieces like this, makes me think that President Obama is a much better tactician and strategist than we've thought. It seems like he's several steps ahead of the republicans. Makes me feel a little more sanguine about the next election.
barkleyg on January 06, 2012 5:17 PM:
First heard this one during the 2008 primaries where Obama would just "be there", and Hillary( a great sec. of state) and the rest would throw their JUNK at him. Most of the time, Obama looked above the fray, and the strategy was dubbed " ROPE A DOPE" after Ali letting Foreman(?) punch himself out.
Today ROPE A DOPE is against real DOPES: the TEA(Republican)
PARTY of 2012!
Another Steve on January 06, 2012 5:23 PM:
@square1
I was insufficiently clear. I'm saying the GOP is on, and has been on, the same path as the Whigs, not the Democrats. The Whigs didn't collapse because of the unbearable political pressure that resulted from the actions of the Democrats under the leadership of those political masters Pierce and Buchannan, or, for that matter Douglas. They came apart because of internal forces.
The forces that are bidding fair to cause the disintegration of the GOP are profoundly different from those afflicting the Whigs, but, a) as with the Whigs they are internal problems, not because of anything the Democrats (who had their own internal cohesion problems) did b) just as their internal problems didn't keep the Whigs from winning natioal elections, they don't prevent the Republicans from winning htem, and c) the disintegration of the GOP, if it happens, is not going to be a linear process.
And like every analogy, it isn't perfect, just instructive.
I submit that the Whigs were done in by their inability to develop an ideology that actually suggested policy solutions. The reason they could never define an ideology beyond a hazy nationalism was because doing so would have forced them to confront the big issue of the day, slavery, which would have torn them apart instantly.
The GOP's dilemma is different. They don't suffer from too little ideology, or even too much. Instead, they have developed a very strong ideology in order to cement the support of a base that is, unfortunately, based upon the existence of empirically verifiable facts. Their ideology, indeed insists upon, very specific policies that are objectively counterproductive, and they are incapable of recognizing this because to do so would require them to break down the entire alternative entomological construct that is the GOP world view which, in turn, would lead to the party's total collapse.
The sheer ridiculousness of their presidential slate, the cadre of pathetically second and third tier misfits, halfwits and psychotics who are the leading Republican candidates is merely a symptom of the party's onrushing crisis. The fiasco that is the 112th Congress is another symptom.
The point is that like the Whigs, they face a seemingly unsolvable, potentially catastrophic, dilemma but that doesn't mean they can't and won't win elections before the end comes.
Another Steve on January 06, 2012 5:27 PM:
Oops. Correction. The GOP's ideology is based upon the denial of the existence of empirically verifiable facts is what I meant.
chi res on January 06, 2012 5:33 PM:
In 2008, I was one of many who believed that the country could be at the start of a long-term ideological shift back towards liberalism.
You were naive. Given the mood, that could be forgiven.
Problem is, three years later, you still haven't learned a damn thing about politics.
square1 on January 06, 2012 6:00 PM:
@Another Steve: I agree that there are forces pushing the GOP apart. Generally, the GOP is divided into 3 factions: the evangelicals, the corporates, and the libertarians. And if there were viable alternative parties for any of those factions to go to, there would likely be a dissolution of the GOP.
Unfortunately, there is an even stronger political force binding the GOP together: the bipartisan political oligopoly enjoyed by the two parties.
It is virtually inconceivable that more than two main political parties can exist for a prolonged length of time.
Ironically, I think that the Democratic Party is more likely to be replaced, because it is easier for me to imagine a mechanism: Now that the Democratic Party is virtually wiped out in the South, I could imagine a more libertarian party rising in that region to replace it and then spreading across the country.
Even in solidly Blue States, the GOP has not been culturally evicted like the Democrats have been from many parts of the South.
square1 on January 06, 2012 6:23 PM:
Problem is, three years later, you still haven't learned a damn thing about politics.
One thing that I learned is that if you want to suffer one of the worst midterm Congressional defeats in American history then it pays to ignore your activist base and engage in a futile effort to win the votes of mythical "centrist independents" by repeatedly compromising with the very people who the American people resoundingly rejected two years earlier.
But I'm sure that chi res can share with us even greater political lessons that only Kool Kids like him know.
square1 on January 06, 2012 6:41 PM:
In all seriousness, chi res, since you are so much smarter than I am, why don't you just explain (using small words, please), why it was so unreasonable for Obama and the Democrats to capitalize on their momentum from 2008?
After all, FDR was elected in 1932, during a similar financial crisis. Although he didn't solve all the problems overnight, FDR established sufficient credibility with the American public that his party gained seats in 1934, FDR was re-elected 3 times, and the liberal principles that were established during FDR's first term dominated the political ideology for roughly the next half century.
FDR proved that good policy is good politics.
Please explain to us simpletons why it was unreasonable to expect that Obama could lead the party and the country on a similar trajectory. Please explain why those of us who are so deluded are "stupid" and "assholes".
chi res on January 06, 2012 7:26 PM:
73rd Congress, 1933-35
Senate: Dem-59, Rep-36, Oth-1
House: Dem-313, Rep-117, Oth-5
74th Congress, 1935-37
Senate: Dem-69, Rep-25, Oth-2
House: Dem-322, R-103, Oth-10
75th Congress, 1937-39
Senate: Dem-75, Rep-17, Oth-4
House: Dem-333, Rep-89, Oth-13
76th Congress, 1939-41
Senate: Dem-69, Rep-23, Oth-4
House: Dem-262, Rep-169, Oth-4
77th Congress, 1941-43
Senate: Dem-66, Rep-28, Oth-2
House: Dem-267, Rep-162, Oth-6
78th Congress, 1943-45
Senate: Dem-57, Rep-38, Oth-1
House: Dem-222, R-209, Oth-4
Thus endeth the lesson.
chi res on January 06, 2012 7:43 PM:
Senate Action on Cloture Motions
111th Congress, 2009-10
Motions Filed: 137
Votes on Cloture: 91
Cloture Invoked: 63
73rd Congress, 1933-35
Motions Filed: 0
Votes on Cloture: 0
Cloture Invoked: 0
Now it's endeth.
Doug on January 06, 2012 7:58 PM:
I'm always amazed by those who style themselves "progressive" without even a basic understanding of the word "progress"...
square1 on January 06, 2012 8:17 PM:
As usual, you fail to make an argument. The data that you supplied suggests that Democrats during FDR's era did not have to put up with the obstruction of the modern Republicans, so I'll assume that is your point.
That is true to an extent. Although it was also true that it was a much less partisan era: it was much more common during that time to forge cross-party alliances on individual issues than it is today. A Democrat from the Midwest was more likely to find common cause with a Republican from the midwest on, e.g., federal grain policy than he was with a Democrat from Massachusetts.
But leaving that aside, let's assume that Obama faced a more robust partisan opposition. Fine.
Here's the problem with your argument. You can't point to any significant bills that Obama would have passed, but for the GOP filibustering, that would have significantly altered the 2010 elections.
You disagree? Fine. What are they? What are these important bills that Obama proposed between January 2009 and November 2010 that the GOP filibustered that would have kept the House in Democratic hands? What are they?
In fact, when the Democrats went into the 2010 midterms, they didn't claim that, unlike FDR, their agenda had been frustrated. On the contrary, they claimed that they had been extraordinarily successful legislatively. The constant refrain from Democratic supporters such as yourself was that Obama was the TEH MOSTEST LIBERALEST PRESIDENT EVAH, and if we all just went on the websites and read about how much of TEH AWESOME liberal bills that he and Congress passed that we would understand.
Not only didn't Democrats claim that they could have done more without GOP obstruction, they explicitly claimed that Democrats got "virtually everything" they wanted out of major legislation like the stimulus and ACA and any Democrat who said otherwise was just a hater who wanted a pony.
Odd that you don't remember all this. Personally, I recall it quite clearly. I recall warning Democrats that going into 2010 running on a record of accomplishment was probably a mistake and that it would be wiser to blame Republicans for, you know, filibustering good bills rather than watering them down and pretending that they were still good.
I also remember being told by much smarter political Democratic insiders that I should just shut up and leave the politics to the experts.
Go figure.
Dave on January 08, 2012 1:37 AM:
Remember the Whigs? You don't? The Whigs died just before the GOP was born. I don't know what is so GRAND about the GOP because it is the party of Great Depressions and hard times, which started in the 1870s and continued, more or less, through the Great Depression leading to WW2. The GOP is about to go the way of the Whigs. And it won't be missed.
Do not worry about President Obama. He will be re-elected. And, hopefully, he has learned his lesson. DO NOT TRY TO PLAY FOOTSIE WITH THE REPUBLICANS. THEY WILL DOUBLE-CROSS YOU EVERY TIME.
The Republicans are pissed off because there is a Democrat in the W.H. They are doubly pissed off because he is BLACK!! The GOP is now centered in the Old Confederacy, where racism trumps intelligence. Nuff said. Vote for Obama.