Madfloridian gave me the idea for this post by noting in several recent posts her concern over the pressure being put on President-elect Obama and other Democrats to be “bi-partisan”, or “post-partisan”. I share that concern (and used some of her links for this post). In fact, that may be the biggest concern I have about our next President. Of course, we do not yet know to what extent he will go to be “post-partisan”. I’m hoping it will be a lot less than some people think.
But wait! Isn’t bi-partisanship a good thing and partisanship bad? To hear a lot of people talk, you’d think that the answer to that question is a resounding and unequivocal “yes”, and that it’s not even open to question. But the fact of the matter is that discussion of this issue can be very confusing because there are two distinct and even somewhat opposite meanings of “partisanship”.
What does partisanship mean?By one definition – the definition used by all these people who are urging Obama to be “post-partisan” – partisanship is unequivocally bad. In that definition, partisan means putting party ahead of country – and more specifically it means putting party ahead of country for selfish political purposes or for some other nefarious purpose, such as revenge.
I think that most all of us could agree that, by that definition, partisanship is bad. Our elected officials are not elected to serve their party – they’re elected to serve our country. Therefore, any of them who put their party ahead of their country, especially if they do so for selfish political reasons, do not deserve to hold the office they were elected to.
But having said that, there is also another, very different way of viewing partisanship. According to that definition, a partisan person is one who has very strong beliefs about certain political issues and who works hard to achieve goals consistent with those beliefs. People such as that join political parties largely because they believe in the principles espoused by their political party. They do NOT put their political party above their country. But in many respects they might feel that what is good for their political party is good for their country. How could they feel otherwise? If they strongly believe that the goals supported by their political party are vital to the well being of their country and its people, then obviously they will feel that there is quite a bit of overlap between what is good for their party and what is good for their country.
In the same way that partisanship can have either of two very different meanings, so can bi-partisanship. Its positive meaning is where a person overcomes her dislike for or discomfort with members of another party, to work with them to produce legislation of benefit to her community or her country. Its negative meaning is where a person moves towards the center, not out of some noble motivation, but solely to position himself to win the next election.
So we have two very different definitions of partisanship, one basically bad and the other basically good. Unfortunately, we use the same word to describe those two very different things. That creates a lot of confusion
The phony use of the partisan label to promote one’s own agendaIn an effort to persuade Obama to move to the center, Al From wrote an
article titled “Keeping the promise of post-partisanship”:
Obama… will come into office with substantial Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress. That’s good. But ironically, it could make it more difficult for him to keep the central promise that propelled him to the White House. That promise is to change Washington… and forge a post-partisan political era. He pledged to tackle the country’s most pressing economic, domestic and security challenges by delivering a new kind of politics.
In other words, don’t use the substantial Democratic majorities in Congress to enact programs favored by the voters who elected a substantial Democratic majority to do just that. That wouldn’t be “post-partisan”.
Well Al, maybe Obama feels that his best chance to “tackle the country’s most pressing challenges” will be to use his Congressional Democratic majorities to enact programs favored by the Democratic Party and the voters who elected them. From continues:
With the superpartisan Bush White House finally history and swelled majorities in both Houses, Democratic constituencies will have plenty of pent-up demands, and some Democrats in Congress may be tempted to engage in political payback.
No, Al. The “pent-up demands” of the Democratic Party do not represent “political payback”. More accurately, those demands are aimed at getting our country back on the right track, which just prior to Election Day
less than 30% of voters believed we were on.
Bob Kerry takes the same tack in an
article titled “How Obama Can Walk the Post-partisan Talk”:
The primary threat to the success of a President Obama will come from some Democrats who, emboldened by the size of their congressional majority, may try to kill trade agreements, raise taxes in ways that will destroy jobs, repeal the Patriot Act and spend and regulate to high heaven.
This is where Obama's persona is invaluable. He can withstand the arguments and pressure of the liberal wing in the Democratic caucus if, once elected, he is guided by the best instincts he has displayed on the campaign trail.
In other words, Kerry is equating the liberal wing of the Democratic Party with “partisanship” in the bad sense of the word and moving to the center as “post-partisanship” in the good sense of the word.
In my opinion, articles like those noted above by From and Kerry are pure hypocrisy. They disparage “partisanship” as something that is purely bad, for the sole purpose of advancing their own agendas. They don’t cite
reasons for why they believe Democratic or liberal ideas are bad. They simply define them as “partisan” – end of argument.
The avoidance of the partisan label to promote partisanship: Taking impeachment “off the table”Another example of how the meaning of “partisanship” has been twisted around to cow our elected representatives away from doing things that they ought to do is Nancy Pelosi’s taking impeachment “off the table”. Presumably, impeachment was taken off the table because the Democratic leadership in the House believed that the American people would see impeachment as too “partisan”.
Forget the fact that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney
committed numerous criminal offenses for which a decent respect for our Constitution and the rule of law in our country demanded impeachment and removal from office. Forget the fact that no president in the history of our country was (and is) more deserving of impeachment. And forget the fact that our Founding Fathers included an impeachment clause in our Constitution precisely so that we would have a means of checking the power of presidents who abuse their powers repeatedly, as George W. Bush has done.
None of that seemed to matter compared to the fear that an attempt to impeach a power-mad criminal might be seen as “partisan”, and that that could hurt Democrats’ chances of increasing their majorities in Congress.
But in reality, it was the act of taking impeachment off the table, rather than proceeding with it, that was partisan in the bad sense of the word. This was an example, in my opinion, of putting party above country. A terrible precedent was set – a precedent that will make it much easier for future presidents to abuse their powers with impunity. There are few things that could be worse for our country. Yet, largely in order to avoid the partisan label, our House of Representatives allowed that terrible precedent to be set.
Examples of why our country needs partisanship – in pursuit of good causes Thus it is that the “partisan” label is often misused and thereby presents an obstacle to doing what is right. For the fact of the matter is that partisanship can be a tremendously constructive force, and necessary for the well-being of the American people. Here are some examples:
Health carePaul Krugman wrote a book titled “
Conscience of a Liberal”, in which he extensively discussed why we need to resurrect and expand FDR’s New Deal. He singled out universal health care as a goal that especially needs to be pursued.
Since few if any Congressional Republicans have been in favor of universal health care, one would have to define it as a “partisan” issue. But why should that mean that we shouldn’t pursue it?
In explaining the importance of pursuing a universal health care system in our country, Krugman attacks the idea of “bi-partisanship” and explains why partisanship can be necessary in the pursuance of a better society. He explains that concept as well as I’ve ever seen it explained:
The central fact of modern American political life is the control of the Republican Party by movement conservatives, whose vision of what America should be is completely antithetical to that of the progressive movement. Because of that control, the notion, beloved by political pundits, that we can make progress through bipartisan consensus is simply foolish. On health care reform, which is the first domestic priority for progressives, there’s no way to achieve a bipartisan compromise between Republicans who want to strangle Medicare and Democrats who want guaranteed health insurance for all. When a health care reform plan is actually presented to Congress, the leaders of movement conservatism will do what they did in 1993 – urge Republicans to oppose the plan in any form, lest successful health reform undermine the movement conservative agenda…
To be a progressive, then, means being partisan – at least for now. The only way a progressive agenda can be enacted is if Democrats have both the presidency and a large enough majority in Congress to overcome Republican opposition. And achieving that kind of political preponderance will require leadership that makes opponents of the progressive agenda pay a political price for their obstructionism – leadership that, like FDR, welcomes the hatred of the interest groups trying to prevent us from making our society better.
Howard Dean and the Iraq WarIn a recent
article in
Politico, titled “Dean out as Health Sec, Sources Say”, anonymous sources are quoted as saying that Howard Dean will not and should not be considered for Secretary of Health:
But the chief attributes President-elect Barack Obama is seeking in his HHS secretary will be an ability to work with members of Congress and shepherd reform legislation through the House and Senate.
That job description has turned out to be a particularly ill-suited one for Dean, given his partisan background and lack of congressional experience, sources inside and outside the transition offices say.
Dean never served in Congress and spent his Washington career trying to thin the ranks of congressional Republicans that the Obama White House will need to court during the expected debate on health care reform.
In other words, these sources are saying that Howard Dean is not qualified to be Secretary of Health, mainly because of his partisan background. And what does that consist of? For one thing, it consists of his “trying to thin the ranks of Congressional Republicans”. So, what do these people think the duties of a DNC Chairman should consist of, if not electing Democrats to Congress?
Dean is also perceived as partisan for the way he ran for the Presidency in 2004. The primary aspect of his “partisanship”, which was also the primary reason that he was the Democratic frontrunner for many months in 2003 and 2004, was his
position on the Iraq War.
The Iraq War is bankrupting our country. It has resulted in the
deaths of more than four thousand American soldiers and
hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians. It has incited the hatred of the Muslim world, thereby serving as a magnet for
recruitment of more anti-American terrorists, consequently imperiling the lives of Americans everywhere. The Iraqi people
do not want us occupying their country in order to spread “freedom” and “democracy” to them,
as George Bush says, by replacing the tyranny of Saddam Hussein with Bush’s own brand of tyranny.
So, was Howard Dean’s repeated denouncing of the Iraq War during his presidential run a sign of partisanship? Yes it was, in the good sense of the term. But why on earth should Obama use that against him in deciding his qualifications for high office? Obama’s own views on the Iraq War – as he was one of the few Presidential candidates to come out against that war from the very beginning – are far more in tune with Dean’s views than they are with the good majority of other Democrats. How can those principled views conceivably be held against Dean in consideration of his qualifications for a cabinet post? Only a very twisted definition of “partisanship” can lead to that kind of thinking.
Gay rightsKeith Olbermann, in one of his recent “
Special Comments”, commented on the banning of gay marriage in California, with the passage of Proposition 8. That Special Comment was one of the greatest and most heartfelt speeches I’ve ever heard. Olbermann appeared to me to be on the verge of tears at times, as he expressed his dismay over the efforts to ban gay marriage:
This vote is horrible. Horrible. Because this isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics. This is about the human heart, and if that sounds corny, so be it.
If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want – a chance to be a little less alone in the world…
Excellent questions. But there is one part of this speech where I somewhat disagree with Keith – the part where he says “This isn’t about politics”. It
is about politics because the right wing ideologues have made it about politics. I think that what Keith meant to say was that it
shouldn’t be about politics or that to
him it’s not about politics.
To him, as it is to all liberals, and as it should be to everyone, it’s about showing people enough respect and consideration to refrain from trying to screw up their lives for no good reason.
This is a political issue because Republicans repeatedly use it as a wedge issue to try to defeat Democrats for elective offices. And it is a
partisan political issue because the Republican Party is solidly behind this effort to divide Americans against each other and stir up our hatreds in order to win elections.
Therefore, to fight against this, as Keith Olbermann did with his “Special Comment”, is a partisan action. The alternative is to sit passively by and accept right wing tyranny.
Some concluding words on the need for partisanship in today’s United States Few would disagree that George W. Bush has been one of the most partisan presidents our country has ever known. So, why would I advocate in favor of the characteristics of a man who has treated the American people with nothing but contempt for eight long years? Well, as I said, partisanship has two very distinct and different meanings. If you believe that Bush’s partisanship emanates from a sincere desire to do what is best for his country, then you would probably admire his partisanship, even if you disagreed with his policies. But if you believe, as I do, that his partisanship is rooted primarily in a single minded quest for power and not the slightest bit in a concern for the American people, then you probably don’t admire it at all.
Because of the inordinate influence of money in U.S. politics today, and especially the inordinate influence exerted by our corporate-run national news media, our elected representatives tend to develop policies and enact statutes that are far to the right of the views of the American people in general. Congress did not fail to give us universal health care during Bill Clinton’s presidency because the American people didn’t want it. Proposition 8 didn’t pass in California recently because Californians were intent on preventing gay marriage. Rather, in both cases, and so many others, those right wing results were realized because tons of money was spent on a massive disinformation campaign. If you believe that the American insurance industry fought tooth and nail against universal health care because of their concern for the well-being of the American people, then you’re living in a fantasy world.
Partisanship has been given a very bad reputation in our country in recent years, not least because of how it has been practiced by our current Republican administration. Some people are now using that fact to pretend that partisanship is almost the equivalent of corruption. By so doing, they thereby cynically attempt to persuade Democrats to move to the right, to support policies more in tune with corporate interests than with the interests of the American people.
Fighting against the agenda of the radical right in our country, and
for programs and policies that will benefit the American people is not wrong. You can call it “partisan” if you want. But as Paul Krugman explained, it has to be done if we want to make a better society for ourselves.
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