The Folly of Bipartisanship

[sirs]

Let me preface this by indicating I'm all for efforts to find reasonable compromise.  The point of this thread was more so to deal with the current definition of "bipartisanship" by Obama & company.  Let me paste this blog note, then add my additional 2 cents
-------------------------------- 
Mark Knoller acknowledges the obvious: "Obama Says Bipartisanship, But What He Wants is GOP Surrender."

Even so, Knoller goes on to insist that this characteristic isn't exclusive to Obama, but rather, is something every President manifests.

Perhaps there's a similarity in kind, but Obama's insistence on "his way" is unparallelled among modern presidents (perhaps in part due to his party having enjoyed a larger congressional majority than other recent presidents).  After all, among the examples Knoller offers are President Bush I's disastrous tax-raising in 1990 (done against the wishes of Newt Gingrich and all Republican conservatives), and Bill Clinton's 1993 appeals.  He could have included President Bush II's willingness to work with Ted Kennedy on No Child Left Behind and the prescription drug benefit -- neither of which won him any plaudits among his party's base.

There's a world of difference between those kinds of substantive compromises and the "bipartisanship in talk only" that President Obama has so far offered.

As I've noted before, part of the problem for President Obama is that he has no experience with confronting the need to make substantive compromises with anyone to his right.  Before, words alone were enough to create a reputation for bipartisanship.  Now, things are different for him, and so far, he shows few signs of being able to adapt.  In fact, he's even lost the verbal civility that won him his reputation for "bipartisanship" in the far-left precincts he frequented in the past.
 
For Obama, "Bipartisanship" = "My Way"

So Obama can try an end around rhetorical game by "seeking bipartisan compromise", delegate some "bipartisan comittee", and have townhall-like meetings with both Republicans & Democrats, but at the same time, demonstrates a transparent plan that his version of compromise is that the GOP agree with his plans.  Simple as that

[Kramer]

this is a no win for Repubs to meet with Barry. The only way they should meet is if the HC Bill is scraped and the entire process begins anew. otherwise Obama can go pound sand.

[sirs]

Later this month, President Obama?s health care summit will aim to highlight input from both Democrats and Republicans.  This last ditch effort for bipartisanship appears encouraging on the surface, but many predict it will mean little more than theatrics and sound bites, rather than actual inclusion for the minority in the legislative process.

If the President were serious about moving forward on health care with bipartisan support, he would conduct this meeting in a more serious manner.  Rather than create a public illusion of ?reaching out?, the President would engage in serious discussions with not only Republicans, but with state and local legislators who also will play a role in enacting reform.  Most importantly, the President would ask legislators to start afresh by abandoning current legislation and creating an improved bill from scratch.  By bringing both parties to the table to draft the legislation in the first place, lawmakers are more likely to find common ground on how best to proceed.  And, as Heritage?s Stuart Butler pointed out in a recent article in the National Journal, there is plenty of common ground to be found.  Butler highlights the following areas as those which would address serious problems in our health care system with bipartisan support:

- A firm Republican commitment to achieving affordable coverage for all Americans in annual stages, starting now, in return for a WH agreement to scale the current bills way back.
- A package of insurance reforms, such as extending HIPAA, designed to deal with pre-existing conditions.
- An agreement to provide states funding to address high-risk and chronically ill Americans through high-risk pools. In addition, giving states legislative waivers for left or right ideas to expand coverage ? eg through the bipartisan Baldwin-Price House bill.
- An overhaul of the tax treatment of private health coverage to make it efficient and to provide cost-reducing incentives ? limiting the tax exclusion by income to finance better tax relief for those who need it to afford coverage.

An effective and bipartisan health care bill is obtainable, but to achieve this, Congress and the President must seek it in a more sincere and productive manner.  The President?s summit on health care is the wrong approach.


Symbolism vs Substance
 

[sirs]

The president has invited congressional Republicans to sit down and talk through health care at a big "bipartisan summit" on Feb. 25. Some think it's a little late for such a conversation. After all, the Democrats have built their health care palace from the ground up, using only Democratic labor and Democratic input; they just can't get it to pass inspection. So general contractor Obama invites Republicans to debate the blueprints, and just the blueprints. Oh, and he wants to debate them, not change them. Not really.

"The president doesn't think we should start over," White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer explained. Obama himself has said he's committed to the existing bill(s) in the House and Senate. He just wants to hash out ideas with Republicans, in front of TV cameras, at a much-hyped summit because he thinks it would be good for America, or something. The Republicans can get whatever fixtures they want in the guest bathroom. Beyond that, they should just co-sign ObamaCare and shut up.

The best you can say about the effort is that it fits into the White House's universal answer to all of its problems: "We just need to explain to these confused Americans how we've been right about everything." To that end, the White House wants to use Republicans as a skeptical prop-audience in one last infomercial for the ShamWow of ObamaCare.

The worst you can say is that it's a cynical trap, designed to make the GOP look out of touch, ill-informed and ideological. Indeed, there's a bipartisan consensus growing in Washington that the whole thing is a setup. Obama is going to say "nice doggie" to Republicans right up until the moment he smashes them with a rolled-up 2,000-page health care bill.

Liberals like the idea because they want the Republicans to get brained. They believe the GOP either doesn't have real ideas on health care, or that conservative ideas won't go over well with voters. They hope that Obama the law professor and community organizer will expose all of this, forcing the American people to come to their senses and support legislation they've been hearing about nonstop for a year. Again, liberalism is never wrong, it just has a problem explaining to the mule-headed electorate it's right about everything. Liberalism is always one more tutorial away from sunshine and lollipops for everyone.

Even so, the GOP should go.

Boycotting the event, as some have recommended, would rightly be seen as a sign of cowardice. Although there's no reason why the GOP has to play to the White House's script.

Republicans should be respectful and serious, but they should also designate one or two representatives to speak for them. That's what Democrats did when they designated then-Senator Obama as their sole voice in the White House meeting on the financial crisis in September 2008. Sen. John McCain had conceived that meeting as a grand showcase for his statesmanlike leadership. That didn't work out too well for McCain, and there's no reason to expect that Obama's plan is any more foolproof.

That's the great irony in this whole stunt. Since he took office, Obama has been trying to use Republicans as one kind of foil or another. He started by castigating them as mindless drones of Rush Limbaugh. When Republican leaders opposed Obama's hyper-partisan stimulus, the president chastised them. "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," he told them.

Then the White House and its supporters started casting the GOP -- and the burgeoning tea party movement -- as a Hieronymus Bosch scene of racists and gun nuts. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid compared opponents of ObamaCare to opponents of civil rights legislation. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi flatly questioned the patriotism of anyone who objected to Obama's policies. And so on.

At every turn, Obama's agenda became less popular,
- his support among independents cratered,
- his promises to change the tone in Washington looked ever more transparent,
- and his magic spell over the press weakened.
- Gallup now has Obama in a statistical dead heat against a generic Republican opponent,
- and the Democratic party is in near total freefall, despite the fact it still has almost total dominion over Washington.

Now the president has another brilliant plan. Once again he has Republicans exactly where he wants them. Only someone who thinks Obama is one explanation away from total victory should think the GOP has reason to worry.


The "Bipartisan" Infomercial