When Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) walked past me the other day, he stopped to say: “You haven’t written anything trashing me lately.”
Well, here goes.
The attempt to pass a Defense appropriations bill recently foundered amid a complex Senate dispute. McConnell first attached a fast-track cybersecurity measure to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The cybersecurity measure was thwarted by a Democratic filibuster but the underlying legislation passed easily.
{mosads}But Democrats then went on to block a Defense appropriations bill, arguing that the GOP was making use of a budgetary gimmick in the measure.
In a memorable floor speech, Reid said McConnell should “walk into his office, his little bathroom there, look in the mirror [and]…over that mirror he should be able to see the words ‘hypocrisy’ and ‘cynicism’…”
Reid said the Democrats have “tried very, very hard since the first of the year to cooperate with Republicans.” Democrats, Reid said, tried to be fair-handed on the defense authorization bill by not filibustering a bill the president had promised to veto because it relied on budget trickery. The decision to not filibuster and to allow amendments, Reid noted, is “something Republicans wouldn’t let us do when this bill came up the last two years.”
As Reid saw it, McConnell’s response to the Democrats’ goodwill was to poke them in the eye by adding on the cybersecurity bill.
McConnell is stuck with a bad political hand because he previously used his considerable political and strategic cunning to turn the screws on the Democrats just a bit too tightly.
When the GOP was in the Senate minority for the six years up until January, McConnell employed any and every parliamentary technique to stop the Democratic majority and President Obama from advancing their legislative agenda.
Now the Democratic minority is following the path blazed by McConnell.
Likewise, McConnell once cheered on Republican senators who used egotistical, grandstanding tactics to stall Democratic efforts to get anything done.
McConnell is now pulling his hair out in frustration over the same tactics. Sen. Rand Paul (R) gave no deference to McConnell, the senior senator from his home state of Kentucky, when he filibustered the majority leader’s attempt to renew the Patriot Act.
McConnell was forced to wait on Paul, drag the Senate back from the Memorial Day break and hold a Sunday session. All that trouble only concluded with McConnell folding under pressure from fellow Republicans on Capitol Hill. He got nothing for all his effort to block the new law.
And then there is McConnell’s continuing bad faith on judicial nominations. Since taking control of the Senate in January, he has allowed only four district court nominees to be confirmed. Not one circuit court judge has been able to win GOP Senate approval.
A quick check of history by Jennifer Bendery of The Huffington Post showed that, at this point in President George W. Bush’s second term, the Democratic Senate majority had confirmed 15 of the Republican’s district court nominees and three for the circuit court.
Congressional scholar Norman Ornstein said McConnell’s recent failure on the Patriot Act made him look “impotent” as a leader.
But McConnell has friends offering some defense. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) recently wrote that the majority leader has opened the door to more votes on amendments.
Under Reid’s leadership, the Democrats had closed the door on amendments in an effort to prevent the GOP from staging politically-charged votes intended to delay and derail legislation.
The bottom line is that, despite all the spin from McConnell and his supporters, the Senate under Republican leadership remains dysfunctional and unable to work with a Republican House to solve big national problems such as immigration, climate change and authorizing military force against ISIS.
Next year, Senate Republicans will be defending 24 seats, many of them in states carried by President Obama. The Democrats have only ten to defend.
It is obviously in McConnell’s interest to get the Senate to work. That means demonstrating the ability to work with Democrats.
Continuing to delight in trying to snooker the Democrats is not a winning strategy to help Republicans retain power. It invites derision from people who continue to give the entire Republican Congress dreadfully low ratings.
It is not trashing McConnell to tell him to stop digging if he wants to get out of this hole.