karen tumulty: democrats know what it will take to win
Karen Tumulty: Republicans win could plow do-little Congress into exercise-nothing Congress
The best-case scenario for the U.Southward. is that the Republicans experience compelled to stop blockading Congress, to testify they tin can govern in accelerate of the 2016 presidential vote
WASHINGTON — Now that power has changed easily in the Senate, at that place are two scenarios for what is likely to get done in Washington over the next couple of years: non much, and nothing at all.
The new Republican majority was elected with near no agenda beyond stopping President Barack Obama'southward — something they were already pretty successful at doing as the minority.
[np_storybar title="Conrad Black: The Republicans accept given the Obama Democrats a well deserved thrashing" link="http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/11/04/conrad-black-the-republicans-accept-given-the-obama-democrats-a-well-deserved-thrashing/"]
Equally all just rabid Democratic partisans suspected, the organizational talents of that political party in getting its core supporters to the polls did not significantly diminish the severe and well-deserved electoral thrashing that has awaited the Obama administration nearly since its re-election (in the beginning entrada since Martin Van Buren's in 1840 when the incumbent did not stand up on his record, and Obama was immune to distract the voters with red herrings nearly a Republican "state of war on women").[/np_storybar]
Their leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, preoccupied with his own re-election, has clearly avoided setting out whatsoever grand ambitions — such as putting entitlement programs on sound fiscal footing, or overhauling the immigration organisation, or rewriting the tax code.
"There are some obvious things. Nosotros'd be voting on the Keystone pipeline" as well as several modifications to the Affordable Care Act, McConnell said at a campaign stop final Fri. "A number of things that, I think, there's a majority in the Senate for."
But "voting on" legislation is non the aforementioned affair as enacting information technology. Republicans will be short of the 60 votes needed to overcome filibusters by a Democratic minority that is expected to experience picayune incentive to compromise. The Republicans would have to take even more — 67 — to override a presidential veto.
Thus far, Obama has used the veto only twice during his presidency, on bills that had technical flaws, but aides say he is ready to assert that power as frequently as information technology takes to protect the things he cares most.
That is why the goal virtually often mentioned past this year's Republican candidates — repealing the Affordable Care Act — remains out of attain.
"Practically speaking, with President Obama in the White House, that's probably non gonna happen," McConnell said.
"But we'll certainly be voting on information technology," he added.
McConnell and Obama each offered a gesture of cooperation Tuesday.
As results began to show the early on signs of a strong Republican night, the White House let it be known that Obama had invited the bipartisan congressional leadership for a meeting on Friday. And McConnell, in his victory speech, pointed to an "obligation to piece of work together on issues where nosotros can agree."
"Just considering we take a two-party arrangement doesn't mean we have to be in perpetual conflict," he said.
Meanwhile, Business firm Republicans, who on Tuesday were expected to aggrandize their majority, say they will recycle a raft of bills, most of them relatively narrow in scope, that they've passed before, simply never gotten through the Senate. Amidst other things, those measures would open up more oil and gas drilling, require government agencies to disembalm more than well-nigh their process of writing regulations, and encourage employers to hire more veterans.
[np_storybar title="Keystone 40 seen equally big winner as pipeline-supporting Republicans accept command of Senate" link="http://financialpost.com/2014/eleven/05/keystone-xl-seen-as-big-winner-every bit-pipeline-supporting-republicans-take-control-of-senate/?__lsa=74ec-f4aa"]
A top priority for a Republican-led Senate will exist to send President Barack Obama a bill to qualify the Keystone XL pipeline and cartel him to veto it.
While near senators support TransCanada Corp.'s proposed $5.4 billion Canada-to-U.S. oil pipeline, the Senate under a Democratic majority hasn't held a bounden vote on information technology since 2012. The Republican-controlled House has repeatedly voted to allow the pipeline's construction.
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On the other stop of Pennsylvania Avenue, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough has been holding regular meetings with Obama'due south top aides in recent weeks to map out their strategy for the last two years of his presidency, factoring in the new alignment of ability on Capitol Colina.
At that place is a sort of fatalism in their calculations. "We will be open up to opportunities where we tin piece of work together, only realistic about the larger political dynamics that have stymied progress so far," said presidential senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer.
Barring an unlikely outbreak of bipartisanship, Obama plans to focus on things that remain largely within his control: foreign policy, as well every bit the ongoing implementation of the health-care law, financial market regulation and other laws passed early in his presidency.
Obama also plans to use his executive authorization, aides said.
One much-predictable guild would let some-howeverhoped-for-adamant number of illegal immigrants to remain in the U.Due south., a move that would likely inflame the event but as both parties endeavour to regroup earlier the 2016 elections and court crucial Hispanic voters.
Other executive orders could come up on climate modify, White House press secretary Joshua Earnest said Tuesday, calculation a less-than-subtle suggestion that Democrats see political upsides in drawing the GOP into a more than robust debate on that front.
"In that location are still, yous know, too many Republicans in Congress who even deny the basic scientific fact that climate change is occurring and something that policymakers should be concerned nigh," Hostage said "So the president volition use his executive action to take some additional steps, but he is as well going to continue to talk about this issue in a way that lays the background for activeness past future presidents and future congresses."
Obama too has an eye on his legacy, and on softening the turf for presidents that follow him to act on issues that matter to him.
Even after an election in which largely unregulated outside groups spent an unprecedented $500 one thousand thousand on congressional races, the chance of passing campaign finance reform legislation "is rather remote," Earnest said. "But the president is going to continue to talk near that issue, and he'southward going to continue to try to push that issue."
Earlier the new Congress is sworn in, there will be a closely watched lame-duck session in which Democratic and Republican lawmakers volition be able to test their realigned relationship.
Senior aides in both parties say that, at a minimum, the Senate will have to hold upon a bill to fund the government, to reauthorize operations in Syria, foreclose a tax increase on the Internet and pass a defence policy beak.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is also expected to use his final days in accuse of the chamber to button through as many Obama nominees as he can — possibly including the president's all the same-to-exist-announced pick to supplant Attorney General Eric Holder Jr.
Then Republicans will get the reins.
There is a instance to be made that the new bulk will feel compelled to rack upwardly some achievements, if for no other reason than to show that the Republican Party that was blamed for a sixteen-day federal shutdown last year knows how to govern.
The electoral map in 2016 will exist a hostile one for the GOP — most an exact inverse of this year'south — with 23 Republican-held seats on the ballot, many of them in states carried twice by Obama. Those facing reelection may feel intense pressure level to move toward the eye.
Simply it is just as easy to argue that partisan lines will exist hardened. Nearly a half-dozen Senate Republicans are seriously considering running for president, which means they will exist playing to the party's conservative base. One of them, Ted Cruz of Texas, told The Washington Post last weekend: "I think we have seen election after election that when Republicans neglect to draw a clear stardom with the Democrats, when we run to the mushy center, we lose."
Senate Democrats, meanwhile, are expected to hunker down. It will be in their political interest to resist giving the GOP any legislative victories to claim, and to go along the distinctions betwixt the two parties equally sharp as possible in the runup to 2016.
The concluding two men who plant themselves in McConnell'due south state of affairs say he volition soon larn how much more difficult it is to be the leader of a fractious majority than the organizer of a block party.
"Minority leader is a lot easier. It's much more defense, trying to stop things you don't similar," said one-time Sen. Trent Lott.
Sometime Sen. Thomas Daschle, noted that as majority leader, "you must piece of work with the minority leader, the speaker, the president and your caucus. The latter is sometimes hardest of all, because there are some who believe they tin can to the chore better than yous tin. And almost immediately, at that place is the side by side election."
McConnell is an institutionalist who got his start on Capitol Hill as an intern and Senate adjutant in the 1960s. His get-go goal, those around him say, is to restore a semblance of "regular order" to the Senate: hashing out bills in committee; getting appropriations bills passed on schedule; allowing more than amendments on the flooring; making certain the Senate passes a budget — something that has happened only in one case since 2009.
And there are a few pieces of legislation in which signficant agreement already exists between the two parties. Some that might actually go to Obama's desk and be signed into police: new spending on infrastructure; merchandise bills; changes in the corporate tax code. And, yes, the Keystone oil pipeline that has been a point of tension between the parties and within the Obama administration.
Those may sound similar minor things, compared with the grand bargains that once seemed possible. But who knows, Lott said. "Do some of those things, and show you can become things done, and information technology becomes contagious."
The Washington Postal service.
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Source: https://nationalpost.com/opinion/karen-tumulty-republicans-win-could-turn-do-little-congress-into-do-nothing-congress
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