One of the most shrill, chattering voices in the House of Representatives belongs to Lauren Boebert, who represents Colorado's sprawling 3rd district, a gerrymandered mish-mash of mostly rural counties in the western part of the state, swinging around to the central and southern parts of the state to avoid larger population centers where the population is heavily Democratic. She originally won election to Congress by a six percentage point margin, gathering just over 51% of the vote in the Presidential election year 2020. But re-election turned out to be a much tougher proposition for Boebert, in spite of the fact that her Democratic opponent, Adam Frisch, a former Aspen city council member, was underfunded, winning by just over 500 votes.
Boebert, more than any other Republican member of the house, characterizes her party's ineffectiveness and failure to govern, leading to the erosion of voter support among independents and centrist, moderate Republicans. Polling data, which turned out to be inaccurate and skewed, prevented Democrats from investing the kind of money into the campaign Frisch needed to win and they likely regret not doing so now, since it looks like the cost to win would not have been much more than what he already spent. The count was so close, depending on virtually every vote, that the race was one of the last to be called.
What Boebert does to characterize the current GOP is demonstrate an almost total and complete ignorance of American history, civics and leadership ability. Her public statements have been so poorly constructed, and represent such an incredible level of her complete lack of understanding of how a democratically-elected government is supposed to operate that her communications director resigned in the wake of the mess made by her public comments following the January 6th Trump Insurrection. Boebert's shrill insistence in equating the insurrection with "people petitioning their government" drew a barrage of criticism, forcing her to backtrack on the remarks, something she finds herself doing frequently.
When she told those gathered at a campaign event that, "The church is supposed to direct the government. The government is not supposed to direct the church. That is not how our Founding Fathers intended it. And I am tired of this separation of church and state junk. It's not in the Constitution," she characterized her ignorance of American history as well as the position of the far right branch of the Republican party's position on the pseudo-Christian perspective of Christian Nationalism. There, in a nutshell, is exactly the kind of attitude which prevents the Republicans from succeeding when they are in charge of governing.
There is a lot to be said for having an education, something that Boebert never got.
Instant Chaos, and Instant Contrast to one of the Most Effective Speakers in History
I had the privilege of meeting Nancy Pelosi several years ago while attending a legislative advocacy meeting in Washington. We had just gotten our lunch in the cafeteria in the Rayburn building when one of the colleagues I was with said, "Don't look now, but if you want to see Nancy Pelosi, she just sat down at the table right behind you." I resisted the temptation to stand up, go over and shake hands, interrupting her lunch, which looked more casual than business. However, as we were getting up to leave, so was the party at her table, so I walked over, not thinking that she might have a security detail who did take notice, put out my hand, introduced myself and asked her if I could take care of her tray, saying that it was my privilege to serve someone who had served me, as a citizen of the United States, so well.
Speaker Pelosi made government work. She brought together quarreling branches of the party, resolved difficulties, was sensitive to perceptions and feelings, understood the constitution, respected her colleagues and her political opposition and she knew when she didn't have the votes to sustain passage of a bill. She rarely had to walk-back things she said, because she knew when to speak and when to maintain silence. She knew how to govern, because she respected the institutions of government and understood that compromise was not a dirty word, and that taking a hard line and insisting that her way was the only way prevented government from serving the people who empower it.
You'd never catch her standing up in the chamber, disrespectfully shrieking like a magpie, jabbing her finger in the air and behaving like a spoiled child, a common observation of Boebert's behavior, like an uneducated rube. She had ways of passive resistance, and of making her point, like being captured on camera ripping up her copy of Trump's State of the Union speech. But she recognized that the government was everyone's government and that the best way for it to succeed, and serve the needs of its people, is for everyone to have a voice. Joe Biden will go down in history as one of the most accomplished Presidents in modern history because he and his party's Speaker of the House both had the kind of experience learned through years of experience of how to make government work, coupled with a desire to serve the people.
Lauren Boebert, and Kevin McCarthy, are both more interested in their agenda than in serving the people and McCarthy is caught up in personal ambition. Follow the money trail there. It would be difficult for Boebert, a high school dropout who has lost the ability to provide any reasonable level of leadership, especially in Congress, because of her outlandish rhetoric in a place where fellow Republicans are far more educated. But she's helping hold the GOP's first business item hostage. McCarthy has been such a self-promoter that he's only the front runner for the speaker's job because of party loyalty. Few are supporting him because they actually like him.
This isn't How Democracy Works, But it is How Republicans Govern
The first Republican majority in the House in four years, in its opening exercises conducting what has been a routine and relatively peaceful transfer of power for most of the nation's history, is showing us that it is no longer capable of governing. Extremists, while not making up nearly as large a majority as their leader wants us to think, have still paralyzed the party, mainly because the rest of it has still decided it is too weak and conciliatory to stand up to the orange menace and take it back. So, while the extremists aren't participating in the negotiating and deal-making that is an essential part of a representative democracy, they are also helping to make their party's chances of holding this majority and winning the White House in 2024 slimmer every day.
This is a prelude to the next two years of Republican house leadership. Even with the gerrymandering that is essentially the only reason they actually got their thinnest of majorities this mid-term, this is going to turn into an electoral disaster. And in all honesty, I don't think the party can survive this in one piece. It is in "disarray" (I love to use that term!) and the tendency of Republican extremists to avoid any kind of deal making or compromise and stick to their "my way or the highway" way of doing things is causing a fracture in the GOP that can't be repaired.
This is how the Republicans govern! A small oligarchy of individuals get themselves into a position of power, and then they use it to bring everyone else into submission. Because there is really no one among the Republican members of the house who has an ounce of integrity, who is willing to stand up to the bullies, and who wants to work within the parameters of a democratic structure where old fashioned give-and-take compromise gets things done and everyone is an American on the same side working for the good of the same people, they become an oligarchy of a single issue, single minded special interest. The small minority is infected by extremism, characterized by the influence of fascist media bigots who are Rush Limbaugh wannabees, outside money from the corporate elite and Vladimir Putin's government.
They are working to defeat true democracy, while trying to make it look like they are loyal to the constitution. Most of those who are playing the game with the vote on the Speaker participated or supported the January 6th Trump Insurrection. Their ideological group failed to get anywhere close to the number of members of the house that was their goal, but the narrow Republican majority has opened up an opportunity for them to manipulate the majority of their own party, mostly spineless cowards who care little about the country but a lot about their own power and wallet. They're going to make a mess of things in the house for as long as they can. But in political terms, this will be very short lived.
I believe the damage they are doing to their party is irreparable. The extremist faction of the GOP is mired in lies and conspiracy theories and they've lost enough credibility to be at the point where they are no longer trusted by the majority of voters. This confusion around electing a speaker, which involves deliberate humiliation of one of their own party leaders, only confirms the party's slide into fascism and sets up the Biden administration and the Democrats for victory in 2024. We aren't likely to see the kind of landslides that characterized past partisan shifts, but this will be a sizeable win.
The house Democrats have demonstrated a spirit of unity and solidarity that developed under Nancy Pelosi's leadership. I have to smile every time I see Hakeem Jeffries come out on top of vote after vote after vote. That's a reminder to every Republican that the power they hold is limited, that their opponents are united and they're not going to be able to achieve much, if any, of their extremist agenda.
I doubt there are any Republicans in the house willing to step up on their own, show some integrity and help make the house more effective than it's going to be these next two years. So what that does is make the contrast between the unity of the Democrats and their commitment to the American people and the disarray (I love to use that word) of Republicans and their commitment to the destruction of the republic. I hope they enjoy it while it lasts, because it's not going to last for long.
No comments:
Post a Comment