DeLay's legacy: a damaged House, where democracy must be restored

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: A Partisan Leaves; Will an Era Follow Suit?
By ROBIN TONER
Published: April 5, 2006


(NYT)

....For 11 tumultuous years, Mr. DeLay proved remarkably effective in pushing the Republican agenda through the House — tax cuts, budget cuts, an overhaul of Medicare and energy bills — pulling the necessary 218 votes together from often narrow and fractious Republican majorities.

But he was also a man who, perhaps more than any other, embodied the fierce partisanship of his era — a prime mover behind the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, a practitioner of take-no-prisoners electoral politics and a legislative strategist who many Democrats asserted saw no real role for the minority in the legislative process....

***

Mr. DeLay tested the limits — of ideological change, of partisan politics and of the use of money and interest groups in the service of maintaining power. He departs as his party scrambles to find a new formula for an increasingly dissatisfied electorate that gives low marks in the polls to Congress and to President Bush....

***

Many Democrats said Mr. DeLay left...a House whose rules and civilities will need to be painfully restored. They cited the roll-call votes held open way beyond the normal time limits and quickly closed when Republicans formed majorities, and the conference committees where Democratic participation was in name only.

Martin Frost, a longtime Democratic member who lost his seat after his district was dismantled in the Texas redistricting that Mr. DeLay pushed through, said: "The means he used damaged the House as an institution. And it will take some time to restore democracy to the House."...

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/05/us/05assess.html?hp&ex=1144209600&en=392ceda16c5e03dd&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[spag68]

1. Delay

has damaged both partys, you can believe that. We as dems. lost a lot of talent in the rethugs. onslaught of Mr Delay and his cronies. There has to be a non political solution to redistricting at the very least. If you watch some of these hearings in the house, you get the feeling that there are even good people over there on the darkside, waiting to come into the light.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. A hopeful, and perceptive, post, spag68. Thank you.

Out of darkness, into light.

[spag68]

3. thank you

I rarely get anyone to notice me, as I think most of this site, i think are young, and god bless them. Years do count for something.

[ShockediSay]

4. What chance? So long as lobbyist "reform"

is in name only. Trips and meals? What about the money bags?

Lobbyists and their money are the ones who run this so-called democracy.