As lawmakers return home for the August recess, they’ll be reminding voters of their accomplishments. With the entire House of Representatives and a third of the Senate facing re-election, does this Congress deserve high marks?
In the number of bills passed and signed into law, they compiled an impressive record: a major tax cut, an education bill that allied Bush with liberal icon Ted Kennedy, campaign-finance reform, corporate reform and the trade authority that President Clinton had been denied for eight years. And before members of Congress go home to campaign in the fall, they will send Bush legislation to create a Department of Homeland Security, the most far-reaching reorganization of government in 50 years.
When it comes to passing bills, Congress gets an A. But that misses the point because the better measurement is whether these bills were wise, with the tax cut a prime example of legislation gone awry. Congress was complicit with the Bush White House in a fraudulent effort to pump up an estimated budget surplus, and then to use accounting gimmicks to make the tax cut appear affordable. What Congress did resembles how corporations fraudulently inflated their stock value without having the earnings to back up their heady claims. “When it comes to fiscal matters, Congress gets a D at best,” says Tom Mann, a congressional scholar at the Brookings Institution. Democrats in Congress didn’t dare stand up to a popular president, and Republicans were so eager to get on the Bush bandwagon they forgot they were once the party of fiscal prudence.
What we learned about Bush is that he knows how to jump on a train that’s leaving the station. He resisted federalizing airport security workers until it became obvious travelers wanted it, and Democrats were going to win the issue; he reversed field on campaign-finance reform, and he championed the Homeland Security Department and a crackdown on corporate fraud after it became obvious those bills would sail through Congress. Bush gets a B for his overall handling of Congress, but he gets a D for failing to put together a government of national unity on domestic issues the way he did on fighting terrorism. Bush’s inability to confront the error of his tax cut, and his refusal to demand more of citizens than to go shopping, were missed opportunities.
The leaders on Capitol Hill fared little better. Democrat Tom Daschle has struggled to run the Senate with a one-vote margin. He managed to keep his even temper and Tom Sawyer image intact for the television viewing audience. But behind the scenes, colleagues say he is frustrated and ruminating about whether he even wants to continue serving in the Senate let alone mount a presidential bid. Polls show that the Republicans have succeeded in bashing him personally; he has high negatives for the first time in his political career. The outcome of this year’s race in South Dakota will be viewed as a referendum on Daschle, given how much time he has invested in his colleague Tim Johnson’s race. Republican leader Trent Lott is still not over his funk at being deposed after the GOP lost control of the Senate last year, and he faces challenges from within his own party. He mainly just strikes out at Daschle and the Democrats, and he has faded as a rallying force for the GOP.
And then there was the prescription drug debacle. Both parties will justifiably catch hell over the August break for not not coming up with a bill to aid the elderly-and depending on how much hell, they may try again in September to cobble together something. At least one would hope. Democrats have had more credibility on the issue, but the GOP can claim they passed something in the House (although it’s totally fraudulent).
On the House side, credit the iron fists of Republican leaders Dick Armey and Tom DeLay for keeping the GOP’s slender majority together and giving Bush virtually everything he wants. Democrats have been unable to demonize the duo the way they did Newt Gingrich, and that’s because of Speaker Denny Hastert, who is soft and gentle and provides cover for his acerbic colleagues. Republican moderates are the big losers as their numbers dwindle and their influence wanes. Maryland Rep. Connie Morella, whose district is home to many federal workers, sponsored the amendment to extend civil-service protections to workers at the new Homeland Security Department. Her amendment lost. If Democrats had been in charge of the House, it would have passed-an argument Morella’s opponent will make in the fall. The extraordinary success of the Republican House leadership has frustrated Democrat Dick Gephardt, who has found it almost impossible to do anything legislatively. Gephardt’s failure to lead his party back to the majority in three successive elections has been deeply disappointing, and even if the Democrats gain control this time, he’s leaving to run for president.
More than any other single figure in Congress, the one to set and drive the agenda on a range of issues has been Arizona Sen. John McCain. “He is the protean force in the Senate,” says Mann. For someone who once had a reputation as a loner who couldn’t pass legislation, McCain has been able to forge coalitions across party lines on everything from campaign-finance reform to gun control. He did it again just recently, siding with the Democrats on a more expansive prescription-drug benefit to the dismay of GOP leaders. McCain’s call for the expensing of stock options rattled Democrats as well as Republicans because of its implications for the high-tech industry, major campaign contributors.
If McCain’s reformist instincts represent the better angels of politics, New Jersey Sen. Robert Torricelli’s gift grubbing reminds us of the darker side. Yet the man known as “the Torch” should never be discounted. He came through both a federal investigation and an ethics investigation without either indictment or censure and expulsion. He headed immediately to the Senate floor and before a deserted chamber accepted responsibility for his egregiously poor judgment and apologized-a smart tactical move and maybe even heartfelt. Once he was no longer vulnerable to anything but further press coverage, the man who never yields ground could finally afford to confess wrongdoing.
