Expaticats

People unfamiliar with the inner workings of the Senate are probably wondering what is happening in the Senate with regard to healthcare reform, and why it is taking so long. I’ve noticed that newspapers outside the US will report that something has passed the House, with an expectant tone that this clears the way for a swift passage through the Senate, straight to the president’s desk. Well, no.

The Senate rules are rather complicated and arcane. The main problem is that there are votes to both start and end discussion on a proposed bill. They are called “cloture votes”, and require 60 out of 100 votes to pass. The final vote on a bill is what you’d expect: 51 out of 100 votes is enough (or, 50 plus the tie-breaking vote of the vice-president). There are more rules, and I’m not familiar with all of them, but those are the important ones.

As long as the opposition party is at least somewhat interested in getting things done, these cloture votes aren’t a big problem. However, when the opposition really wants to block things, they can delay a bill indefinitely by continually voting against cloture. That is called “filibustering”. In the past, this has been done by both parties, but it was generally an exception. But now, Republican senators have made it their goal to block the Democrats at every turn. They will always vote against cloture, effectively making the required majority not 51 votes, but 60 votes.

This is a problem. If the opposition party were to always adopt this tactic, nothing would ever get done anymore. In the current US political climate, it is unlikely that one party can get together 60 votes. The Democrats right now have them, but only in theory. The Democratic caucus isn’t all Democrats (it has 3 independents), and there are a few conservative Democrats who are out of the mainstream of the Democratic party, and who seem to be willing to milk their position of power (that they get from being the last remaining votes needed for cloture) for all that it’s worth.

The current result is that it seems nearly impossible to pass anything in the Senate, unless its watered down to the extent of being almost meaningless. And this is with one caucus having 60 members. In the 2010 election, the Democrats will likely lose seats. They may retain the majority, but it will be well below 60 votes. So if they can’t get anything meaningful passed now, imagine what will happen then. Nothing will get done anymore.

So what if the Republicans eventually regain power? Will the Democrats follow suit and block everything in cloture votes? Probably not. The Democrats seem to be playing by the old rule book: if you’re in the minority, you take what you can get. You try to get the concessions that you can, but at the end of the day, the majority party can pass its legislation. Filibustering is only for extreme cases. The Republicans are playing from a different set of rules: you block the majority party at every turn.

This leads to an ironic state: the party that is most willing to obstruct, the Republicans, will get the reputation of the party that gets things done. Most voters aren’t aware of the details of the Senate rules, so they will wonder why the Democrats aren’t getting anything done. Then, when the Republicans get back in power, they will get things done, because the Democrats won’t obstruct as much.

A few years ago, the Republicans threatened to blow up the filibuster/cloture rules, via procedural manoeuvering, if the Democrats would filibuster certain Bush nominees. They should have done it. Effectively requiring 60 votes to pass normal legislation, via procedural trickery, is ridiculous, and unworthy of a Democracy. Of course, there was much complaining by the Democrats when this threat was made, and if the Democrats were to talk about doing the same thing now, there would be much complaining by the Republicans. But it would be the right thing to do. Legislation should be passed by a normal majority. Which I won’t like if the Republicans regain the majority, but fair is fair.

Ending the filibuster rule isn’t likely to happen. What can be done? It seems that currently, things are stuck. The only way for the Democrats to get Republicans to go along with their legislation is to either water it down to the point where it’s toothless, or to somehow convince a few moderate Republicans (of which there are very few left) that voting for a bill is in their best interest. “Best interest” for a politician means “making it more likely to get re-elected”. But getting re-elected for Republicans right now means getting past a primary where you face a purist “tea party” candidate, with a motivated set of voters behind them. Who won’t like it if you strike a deal with the Democrats.

In other words: the Senate rewards obstructionism, and this is unlikely to change. It’s depressing isn’t it? Merry Christmas.