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Politics used to be known as the art of compromise, now a days it appears to be; the art of deception. Even the idea encompassed by the word “compromise” has been transformed from a positive one. Compromise once meant and arrangement where both parties put forward plans and some part of each side’s plan was included and some excluded from the final deal. The result was that each side got something, but not everything they wanted; and the on the whole the deal was looked at as being fair (if not always equal) for both parties.
Compromise is not looked at as fair, or even positive; not anymore. Compromise is now defined in some political circles as giving in, a loss, a big negative. Politics has become a game of winner take all; or nothing. Some may argue that this has always been the case; but most observers of the political scene, both inside and outside the beltway in Washington, say that not that long ago; despite the fighting and posturing there was a reasonable amount of give and take in national politics.
Opinions vary as to when the good old days of compromise started to go sideways, but the general consensus puts the time when it obviously was going awry about 1994. This was when the Democrats had a popular President in Bill Clinton and the Republicans were worried if they would ever get back into the White House. Then Republican’s achieved a majority in the House of Representatives. The Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich then stepped up as antagonist in chief and fought a series of losing battles against the Democrats and President Clinton which ultimately resulted in the shutting down of the Federal government due to the purposeful unwillingness of the Republicans to reach a compromise with the White House. The impasse was fortunately temporary and the Republicans capitulated, compromised but took the blame for the government shutdown. The Reps may have lost most of the battles, but it established the “take no prisoners” style of doing business which eventually won them the war. Extreme partisanship, with no allowance for compromise, became the Standard Operating Procedure in American politics.
Two years of unrelenting partisan beating up on Clinton following the uncovering of his relationship with Monica Lewinski; undercut the eight years of peace and prosperity the Clinton administration had given America and cost the generally popular Vice-President of a still generally popular administration the 2000 election; and ushered in the George W. Bush years. Those 8 extremely partisan years were so contentious, unpleasant and damaging to America in extremely severe ways; that a young African-American one term Senator Barack Obama became President over a well known, popular, moderate turned neo-conservative, war hero, John McCain.
Then the winner take all, no holds barred, my way or the highway partisanship had taken almost complete control of the style of politics in both houses of Congress turned compromise into a very dirty word. While both national political parties are to some degree responsible for the current situation; the Republicans in Congress have raised the art of not compromising to the highest or lowest level ever. The goodness or badness of this turn of events differs depending on one’s goal. If the primary goal (as articulated by Republican Leader Senator Mitch McConnell, right after Obama’s election) is to make Obama a one term President and recapture the White House; then fighting to the near-death on each and every thing that might provide the President with a bit of credit, is the tactic of choice and thus a good thing. If actually providing the kind of governance that will truly get this country moving in the right direction again is a goal; then blocking each and every Democratic proposal with burning barricades is a bad thing.
The way the current Payroll Tax Cut plan has been handled, particularly in the wake of the Debt Ceiling debacle of a just a few months ago, is an example of highly partisan, pre-election politics at its modern all time worst. Both the Dems and the Reps say they want to maintain the Payroll Tax Cut, which affects 160 million Americans; so what’s the problem? Any kind of compromise on funding, eliminating add on legislation, or any other positive handling of the bill which would make it look like President Obama got Congress to help him do a good thing, is a bad thing in Republican eyes with the 2012 election coming up.
So the Reps came up with a series of tricks, maneuvers, ploys and scams to make the President look bad and at the same time serve their real constituency; the very wealthy and connected. First they balked at the funding the administration had come up with; a small increase in tax on people making over a million dollars a year. The Reps didn’t even think about paying for the trillions of dollars in deficit spending during the Bush 8 years of wars and tax cuts. But when Obama wanted to continue helping American workers take home a little more dough; the Reps kept rediscovering that Obama and the Dems, were doing too much spending. On top of that the Reps wanted the Canada to New Orleans pipeline that the State Department said needed more study to be acted on (and almost certainly approved) by the President before the EPA could find any serious problems the pipeline might cause. Serving Big O & G is job one with Reps in that the petrochemical industry is one of their major money providers and has almost a never ending series of problems, and needs help, with things like the Gulf oil spill and Fracking all over the country.
So the White House compromised on the funding; no tax increase for the wealthy. And on the pipeline; the Pres. also compromised giving in to the Republican request that he decide within 2 months to go forward with it or not, despite the agencies involved saying that will not give them enough time to do complete studies. But those shell games of trading something for nothing weren’t enough for the Reps. It looks like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House John Boehner came up with a ridiculously clever plan to jam-up Obama and the Dems. McConnell convinced the White House to kick the can down the road and pass a 2 month extension of the Payroll Tax Cut, implying it had been cleared with Boehner and thus assuring everyone that the House would go along. The Senate passes the bill and then left for their X-Mass vacation. Then Boehner and House Rep majority pulled a fast one; saying they will only accept and are holding out for a full year extension or nothing. The House reps reject the Senate and White House approved quick-fix. And put together their own 1 year extension plan and while they’re at it try to slip in a few additional unrelated items. One of which that helps the health care industry stay economically healthy is the Doc-Fix bill which ups the money Medicare pays for certain payments that have been reduced (like the Reps also say they want). Another little bit of add on is yet another gift for the hydrocarbon burning industry; killing few EPA regulations that Congress’ Big O & G bosses find impede their profits, or as they call them “job killers” (they are actually bonus killers).
The net result the Republicans hope for in this double-crossing of the Obama administration on the Payroll Tax Cut is yet another “failure” of Obama to get something he wants done. And thus the Republicans can claim another “lack of leadership” instance on the President’s record. Trying to make each and every piece of legislation, plan, policy proposal or any other appropriate government business that should be occurring in Washington into an opportunity to embarrass the President appears to be sum total of the Republican’s 2012 election strategy. Even they seem to be aware that a call for reduced taxes for the supposed “job creators” is turning into the same sad kind of joke that “trickle down” economics has become. And since this has been their one and only economic policy for the past 10 years and it has failed utterly and done great damage to this nation’s economy, leaving them nothing to be in favor of; they have adopted the mess with Obama strategy as the one to go with.
Unfortunately the Democrats by virtue of their economic obligation to some of the same big money special interest that the Republicans have, are cooperating (even if publically saying they’re not) with the Reps service to the wealthy. All the dog and pony shows concerning the budget and taxation and regulation have done little if anything to alleviate the real economic problems this country faces. The strong economic hand of the giant multinational and domestic corporations and industries is tightening into a death grip on the economic opportunities of the vast majority of American workers. Too many Washington politicians are counting on the money that will be thrown their way as a result of the Supreme’s Citizens United decision allowing corporations, now defined as “people” (a true oxymoron), to spend uncountable dollars to elect, and most dangerously re-elect (at a rate of 90+% for incumbents), a Congress that is under their thumb. They refuse to serve the best interests of the real citizens to whom they swear an oath to represent. And will continue to do so, unless and until they are voted them out of office and power and replaced by some of our honest fellow citizens and neighbors.
And so opportunities are lost, like the current one of extending a tax break for working Americans and paying for it by an unneeded or deserved tax break for the wealthiest Americans, who can most afford it. That would stop the pendulum from swing way too far toward the few and start to back towards helping the many and thus restoring some balance in this nation’s economic life. But instead of exhibiting politics as the legitimate art of compromise, where the richest still have plenty and the workers get a little something too; politics has become the art of deception, where the smoke and mirrors of phony deals and the old Three Card Monte switch-a-roo has replaced common sense solutions and honesty.
