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 Recent commentary from National Journal: Media: From Here to Eternity (July 16, 2001) Coverage of artificial hearts, cell phone dangers, and Lance Armstrong have something in common. By William Powers. On Books: Brace Yourself, World (July 16, 2001) A look at potential wars over natural resources. By K. Daniel Glover. Social Studies: How Not to Hire People for America's Most Vital Department (July 10, 2001) His job was to find candidates for top jobs at the Pentagon. But there was a problem: Congress. By Jonathan Rauch. Political Pulse: New Jersey, the Proving Ground State (July 10, 2001) Bret Schundler's victory in GOP primary energizes both conservatives and Democrats. By William Schneider. On Books: The War on Welfare (July 10, 2001) If you share Michael B. Katz's convictions that social justice and market capitalism are deadly enemies, then you'll have nothing but praise for his new book on the political history of American welfare. By Clive Crook. More from National Journal. |
Political Pulse 
President Lets Democrats Seize the CenterBush's support is slowly drifting down to its base level, just under 50 percent. by William Schneider .... Some people wondered how much difference it would make for Democrats to reclaim control of the Senate. Now we know. The patients' bill of rights had languished in Congress for years, as Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, D-W.Va., noted during the Senate's recent debate: "We have been debating this for 10 years in some form, five years intensely, and the time has long since passed to do it." No sooner did the Democrats take over the Senate than they made patients' rights the top item on their agenda. Senate Democrats passed the bill in a way that puts President Bush on the defensive. They compromised on every issue where the bill might have been vulnerable. They stood their ground where it was politically safe. Nine Senate Republicans ended up voting for it. The Democrats reached for the center at the same time that Bush has been losing it. Take the much-discussed drop in the President's job-approval rating. The news that Bush's job approval is hovering around 50 percent in the polls does not signify a sudden crisis. His ratings have been eroding since March, when he was at 63 percent approval in the Gallup Poll. Bush won the election with just under 50 percent of the popular vote. His support has slowly been drifting back down to its base level. The biggest problem for the White House is that Bush has become an intensely partisan President, one who acts more like Bill Clinton than like Ronald Reagan. Republicans and conservatives are solidly behind Bush. Democrats and liberals are solidly against him. Bush has been losing support among independents and moderates. What Bush desperately needs is a unity initiative—such as, say, the patients' bill of rights. In late May, when Sen. Thomas A. Daschle, D-S.D., found out he would become the new Senate Majority Leader, he promised a spirit of bipartisanship. "We can't dictate to them, nor can they dictate to us," Daschle said. Republicans wondered what had happened to that spirit during the debate over the patients' bill of rights, as Daschle threatened to cancel the Senate's Fourth of July vacation unless the issue was brought to a vote. In the end, Senate Republican leaders did not have the votes to stop the bill. Why not, if the Senate is so closely divided? For one thing, Democrats have public pressure on their side. As more and more Americans are forced into managed care, they want more leverage against insurance companies. It's not like the health care debate of 1993-94. That was about giving new rights to the uninsured. This is about new rights for the insured, a larger and more powerful constituency. So Democrats ended up pushing a bill through the Senate that Bush is threatening to veto. What's the point of that? The point is that the bill the Democrats put together is one the President would find very difficult to veto. Bush did have legitimate complaints about the Democrats' original bill. He protested that it would "run up the cost of health insurance for American workers" and "could conceivably cost millions of people their health insurance." So Senate Democrats accepted many compromises, brokered by moderate Republicans, on issues where the bill might be politically vulnerable. The Democrats compromised on protecting small businesses, deferring to states' rights, and limiting frivolous lawsuits. "We have shared the language with both sides in this debate," Sen. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, one of the brokers, noted. "We have taken their comments into consideration. We literally have built on both bills to come up with this compromise." The key broker, Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, warned, "It would be politically perilous for us to be sending a bill to the President that he has to veto." On big issues, such as giving patients the right to sue their insurance companies, Democrats stood their ground. "The President's going to have to make a decision," Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., said, "whether he wants to stand with the big HMOs or with patients and doctors." The patients' bill of rights is not a partisan issue. Nearly 60 percent of Americans want Congress to pass it, according to Gallup. Only 11 percent are opposed. Bush insists that he, too, favors a patients' bill of rights but wants a version different from the one the Senate passed. When Americans were asked whether they trusted the Democrats or the Republicans more on this issue, the Democrats had an edge, 44 percent to 34 percent. If Congress ends up passing something close to the Senate bill, Bush will be under strong pressure to sign it. A veto would be seen as highly partisan and would be politically damaging. That's why the President must now rely on the House to pass something more to his liking. In the House, the key brokers again will be moderate Republicans. The difference is that they will be making deals with the leadership of their own party. The defection of Sen. James Jeffords, I-Vt., from the Republican Party has had an unanticipated effect. It empowered moderate Republicans, particularly those from northeastern states, who can probably survive outside the GOP. The Republican Party needs them much more than they need the Republican Party.
What do you think? Discuss this article in the Politics & Society conference of Post & Riposte. More from National Journal. More on politics and society in Atlantic Unbound and The Atlantic Monthly. William Schneider is the Cable News Network's senior political analyst. He is also a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., and a contributing editor for the Los Angeles Times, National Journal, and The Atlantic Monthly. His column appears every week in National Journal, a weekly magazine covering politics and government published in Washington, D.C. For information on National Journal Group publications, see NationalJournal.com. Copyright © 2001 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved. |
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