Who is Really Running Congress - Vince McMahon?

Telecom immunity. A rollover on Iraq funding. George Bush’s continued petulance. Political gamesmanship. It’s enough to make an ordinary citizen give up on the political process in America. The thing is, none of this is really new — in fact, Vince McMahon perfected the “art of the show” in professional wrestling a long time ago. The political theater in Washington isn’t so very much different…

Richard Blair, AllSpinZone.com: In November, 2006, the GOP was overcome by a wave of anti-Iraq and anti-Bush sentiment, and a not-ready-for-prime-time Democratic Party was given majority control of both houses of congress. Thinking back to 2006, the Dem leadership was fairly confident all year that the GOP was extremely vulnerable in many House races, and it turned out that they were right, particularly after the Mark Foley scandal blossomed in the latter stages of the 2006 campaign. What was surprising, though, was that everything broke in the right direction (Foley, the Macaca moment, Conrad Burns connections to Abramoff, etc.), and Dems also took control of the U.S. Senate.

Happy days were here again, right? The Dems would listen to the electorate, and force the Bush regime to accept changes to policies in Iraq, un-stonewall criminal investigations that had been bottled up in limbo, and generally start America back on the right path.

A funny thing happened on the way to FantasyLand™. George Bush not only didn’t back down America’s commitment to Iraq, he escalated our involvement. And instead of challenging the least popular President in U.S. history, again and again the leadership of the Democratic Party did not listen to the electorate, but rather, turned completely tone deaf to the constituency that put them in control of the legislative branch of the government.

When illegal act after illegal act came to light, Chairmen of respective House and Senate committees made a lot of noise, heat, and light. And then did nothing. One of the more disheartening spectacles I witnessed during the course of the past year was watching John Conyers, heretofore a hero of progressives, sleepwalk through one hearing after another. I thought that, of all the Dem Committee Chairs, Rep. Conyers was the pit bull that was needed to get to the bottom of 7 years of Executive Office malfeasance. Damn, was I wrong. But it wasn’t just Conyers. It was Waxman. Rangel. Skelton. Reyes. The list seems endless.

It became a game. They issued subpoenas. The GOP promptly ignored the subpoenas (or flat out lied, and demonstrably lied through their teeth in testimony). There have been exactly zero “contempt of Congress” citations. No one is behind bars. Rove is still pulling strings in the White House. White House counsel Fred Fielding continues to ignore requests and strongly worded letters from the Democratic Party leadership who are demanding records, witnesses, and other evidentiary matter.

The Plame investigation went nowhere. The U.S. Attorney investigation went nowhere. Torture investigations went nowhere. Illegal wiretapping investigations went nowhere - in fact, these investigations went so far nowhere that the Dem leadership was (and still is) willing to offer retroactive immunity to the willing participants (telecom companies) in this illegal activity in order to pass a FISA bill after the first of the year. One after another, the scandals that surfaced flared briefly, inspiring momentary outrage, but then flamed out just as quickly.

It has been like the Democratic Party revolution of 2006 didn’t even happen.

Bush has only become more petulant. The Republicans continue to paint the Democratic Party as anti-American, terrorist supporting, politically motivated, partisan wieners. And even in the minority, the GOP continues to control the media bully pulpit.

Never, ever, have I witnessed such a weak-kneed bunch of lilly livered “leaders” trying to run the country. Sure, a few things have been accomplished, but in reality, Nancy Pelosi’s much ballyhoo’d “first one hundred hours” was little more than a publicity stunt. Her most memorable act has been taking impeachment off of the table.

Harry Reid has got to go. There are times that I’ve been supportive of his actions in the Senate, but most of those came during his tenure as Minority Leader, not when he was elevated to the majority. The final straw came earlier this week when he actually allowed the FISA bill, with telecom immunity intact, come up on the floor of the Senate. Thank the gods for Chris Dodd’s tenacity in ensuring that this travesty of a bill was shelved until at least the first of the year.

And today? The U.S. House of Representatives passed the latest Iraq funding bill, $70 billion worth, without so much as a peep, an attempt to attach conditions, a timetable for withdrawl, nothing. They again gave the least popular President in U.S. history everything he wanted.

I used to think that the answer was to elect a Dem to the office of President next year, but the more that I watch the crop of the current candidates, only two even begin to stand out as the type of person who will really shake things up. One of them is John Edwards, and I like his positions almost across the board. The other is Ron Paul - who I could support simply from the standpoint of his desire to shake things up, regardless of many of his positions that I detest. Unfortunately, both are so far outside of the Beltway Class that it’s doubtful if either could have a lasting impact.

A Democratic Party President, though, isn’t going to cause his or her colleagues in the legislative branch to suddenly grow a set of cast iron cajones. Let’s be clear about something. There is no way that the current administration should be allowed to walk away free from their involvement in the high crimes and misdemeanors that have been perpetrated against the American public (and indeed, humanity) over the past seven years. But I fear that’s exactly what’s going to happen, regardless of who’s running the show after 2008 because of the Washington insider culture of quid pro quo.

When Bush leaves office in January, 2009, his list of pardons is, by default, going to smash the records of his predecessors. But is it really going to make any difference what he does on the way out the door? No.

Hell, maybe that’s the super-double-secret Democratic Party strategy. Don’t seek indictments against anyone in the current administration, because if any one of the current suspects are convicted between now and the end of the Bush regime, they’re just going to be Libbyed as Bush takes his last ride on Air Force One. Wait until the new President is sworn in, and then go after the crooks.

I know, I know. I’m dreaming.

Which brings me full circle back to the original question in the title of this article — Who is really running congress right now? I ask, because it sure doesn’t appear to be the scared rabbits in the Dem leadership. But, then, maybe it wasn’t the GOP leadership running the show in the previous years, either.

It all comes back to an old axiom, that Dems and the GOP are two sides of the very same coin. A new Senator or Congresscritter may first step into office with the best of intentions, but are then quickly assimilated into the congressional collective. A newly elected representative operating under the Capitol dome for the first time is understandably quite intimidated, and doesn’t get the choice committee assignments (or future party backing) by rocking the establishment boat too vigorously.

The new representative sees visions of Mr. Smith going to Washington vanish pretty rapidly, and a degree of pragmatism settles in — if the pork isn’t brought home to the state by the representative, chances are that a second term isn’t very likely. Pork isn’t going to flow without cooperation, quid pro quo, and coloring within the lines of acceptable congressional wisdom (which is largely bi-partisan). Party insiders won’t work to reelect the non-conformist, in fact, to the degree that they’re willing to see an opposition candidate elected who might play “inside baseball”. That’s just the way things work in the Beltway.

So, we can rant and rave about Reid and Pelosi and Boehner and Hoyer and McConnell all day long, and it isn’t going to make much difference. At the end of the day, they’re all basically playing for the same team, and their primary job is to push the agendas that are given to them by the real controllers. The foot soldiers in the House and the Senate are there to play along, for the most part, and collect a paycheck - and fatten their resumes for the big lobby payday in advance of the time when either they tire of the game or get forced out the door.

It’s kind of like professional wrestling, in that regard. Most of what we see and hear from Washington is well scripted, with the outcome all but assured. Every now and then, a Christopher Dodd will step out of the shadows and challenge the status quo - but you can bet, for the most part, that Dodd’s outspoken response to the FISA outrage was (again) an expected part of an ongoing, orchestrated production.

There was no time for such orchestration today. The House members want to get out of town, and they had to do something with the Iraq funding bill. Rather than squawk, or put on a staged fight for timeline and withdrawal amendments that had no chance of going anywhere, they just voted “yes”.

Because it’s what they were told had to be done if they wanted to make that 5:30 flight.