Legal Commentary

How To Regain Trust In Government: By Governing

By Big Tent Democrat

So many want to focus on GOP obstruction as the problem regarding health care reform. This is a dodge. The Democrats control the Presidency and both houses of Congress. If there is a failure of governance, particularly on health care reform, the fault will be placed, properly, on Democrats. Ezra Klein writes:

What Republicans -- and, when they're out of power, Democrats -- are doing is essentially discrediting the political process. . . . Republicans may think they've found a clever strategy in making it hard for Democrats to govern, but what they're really doing is making it nearly impossible for anyone to govern. American politics is trapped in a cycle of minority obstruction, and though that's good for whomever the minority is at the moment, it's not particularly good for making progress on pressing issues.

This is simply false. Republicans governed during the Bush Administration. They governed very badly. But they governed. I can only speculate why Ezra insists on emulating David Broder (personal ambitions?), but it is demonstrably false.

If Democrats want to be successful, they need to understand that it is their turn to govern, not the Republicans. And if they fail to govern well, they will rightly be held to account. That is how politics works. And that is how it should work. Elections are supposed to be about choices. Republicans do not agree with Democrats. If the electorate chooses Republicans, then Republicans should enact Republican policies. If they fail (as they did), they get voted out. Same for Dems. It's called accountability.

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 23, 2009 (boomark / email).