Stanley W. Samarasinghe

Bipartisan governance is routinely dished out during US presidential elections to attract the crucial independent vote and the so called moderates who may not mind crossing the party line. Exit poll data show that Barack Obama was more successful that John McCain in convincing such voters. We won’t go into the reasons for Obama’s success and McCain’s failure. But it is useful to examine the practical implications of this proposition for the Obama administration.

First, there are basic philosophical differences between the two parties. In the Obama presidency this is sure to be on full display in respect of the role of the government in the current economic crisis and on other key issues such as healthcare. The Bush administration that believes in free markets very reluctantly initiated the $700 billion rescue package for financial institutions. It was done only because there was no option. Once out of office the Republicans will have no direct responsibility for the economy. Already the Bush White House and the Republicans in Congress have signaled that they would not support a second stimulus package that the Democrats are proposing. Republicans want to revert to their lower taxes and smaller government policy as soon as possible. This basic difference regarding the role of the government in the economy is not a basis for bipartisan policy making.

Second, the composition of the newly elected House and Senate have in some ways diminished the prospects for bipartisan governance, especially on the Republican side because several of the more moderate members of the party – Chris Shays in the House and Gordon Smith and John Sununu in the Senate are examples – lost their seats last Tuesday. On the House side the Democratic leadership has enough votes to carry legislation without having to rely too much on the so called blue dogs from the red states.

Third, if power is divided with one of the three, the White House, Senate or the House in the hands of one party and the other two in the hands of the other, bipartisan governance can win brownie points with voters for both parties. However, in the present case all three are in the hands of the Democrats. Then there is no serious political incentive for the Republicans to help the Democrats to pass legislation because kudos will anyway go mainly to the ruling party and president. But there is much to gain for the Republicans if something goes wrong because it would be easy to blame the Democrats who rule. Conversely, the Democrats also have no significant incentive to cooperate with the Republicans if the job could be done alone so that they could claim all credit. Moreover, Democrats in Congress (especially the House) may prefer to have legislation that accords with their own more left-of-center ideology that Republicans won’t support anyway.

All of the above does not mean that bipartisan governance in Washington is a totally lost cause. As long as the economy remains in crisis the Republicans will be forced to extend some cooperation to the Obama administration to avoid being accused of being unpatriotic.

Second, Obama’s presidential campaign appeared to be more centrist that what one would expect from a senator with a strong liberal record. It was a good strategy to win over the independents. He may continue along the same pat in the White House. For example, if Obama’s appointments of Republicans to senior positions in his administration go beyond tokenism it may help promote an atmosphere of bipartisanship.

Third, the economy and tax cuts for the middle class apart Obama has identified energy, healthcare and education as his top priorities. These will consume a great deal of his presidency. All of these have ideological underpinnings but they are not as divisive as the so called value issues. The latter is most likely to come up if and when a vacancy occurs in the Supreme Court.

Democrats will not get the filibuster-proof 60 seats majority on the Senate. The filibuster is a built-in structural incentive for the two parties to cooperate in the Senate and that probably will be the strongest reason to see some trace of bipartisan governance in the next two years. The situation can change in the 2010 mid-term elections.

By Stanley W. Samarasinghe

In American electoral politics there are two fixed traits that have got recycled in every recent election. One is to proclaim that Washington is broken and condemn those who run Washington. The other is the promise given to the electorate to reach out across the aisle and usher in bipartisan governance. In this essay I will argue that a “broken” Washington is what you get in the democracy that we have and that we need to learn to live with it. Then we can focus on the more real issues such as the economy. I will take up the bipartisan issue in a later essay.

Undoubtedly there is some scope to improve the quality and speed of governance in Washington. But that does not mean that it is easy to do as the critics generally imply. There are several reasons for it.

First, consider who is available to fix the broken system. It is more or less the very same people who have been running the system for many years and presumably should be held accountable for breaking it. Consider the election cycle just concluded. McCain and Biden are vintage Washington products. If Washington is so broken, they were very much a part of it. Obama has much less experience in Washington but much of his professional life has been in politics in Chicago. It is hard to argue that Chicago politics is any less broken than that of Washington. Ironically Sarah Palin is the only one among the four on the two tickets who has had relatively less experience in that kind of politics. However, from what we have learned in the last two months about her skills and knowledge she is the least qualified of the four to hold presidential office. In fact her very selection as the Republican VP nominee by a Washington veteran who rails against Washington is another indication of how broken Washington really is.

Then consider the Congress. The vast majority of the Senators and Congressmen who will come back next January are incumbents. They usually win comfortable majorities that suggest that the voters also do not really mean when they proclaim that Washington is broken and that they want to “throw the rascals out.” It is worse. The Senator from Alaska Ted Stevens who is a convicted felon is set to return to the Senate. A convicted felon cannot vote in Alaska or anywhere in else the US but can stand for election to the Senate and the very same voters who condemn the broken system happily vote for him.

This brings us to the so called “pork” issue that refers to earmarks that the legislators get for their own constituencies. This is cited ad nauseam as an example of how broken Washington is. The $700b rescue package for financial institutions also contained earmarks. Senator McCain who is the most outspoken warrior against earmarks supported the bill because this is what practical politics is all about. The public may condemn earmarks in general but not the specifics for their own states or congressional districts. That is why those who bring more pork to their respective states and districts continue to win easy reelection. Senator Stevens is a supreme example.

Actually the fuss about pork, rather than the pork itself, can be considered more of a sign of broken Washington. The total amount in earmarks in the 2008 budget was about $20b accounting for 0.7% of total federal spending. First, this amount is relatively very small. Second, while Alaska’s bridge to nowhere gives a bad rap for every earmark, there is no logical reason to assert that every dollar that is earmarked is wasted. The Senators and the House Members often respond to community needs and that is not a bad thing in a democracy. Arguably it is a better way to use tax dollars than have a faceless bureaucrat decide what to do with the money. Sometimes one feels that Parkinson’s Law is in play here where a big fuss is made about some small item of spending when real waste is allowed to go unchecked. It is well known that some departments, most notably Defense, waste enormous sums on failed projects, badly written contracts, and over-payments.

Finally consider the filibuster and the idea of divided government which is also cited as an example of broken Washington. When the Republicans realized that they were facing a massive electoral defeat they argued that divided government where one party does not control the Senate, House and the White House is good for governance. The Democrats took the opposite view and wanted a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate to fix what is broken in Washington. If the party electoral fortunes were the reverse the arguments also would have been the reverse. It is basically a lot of hypocrisy.

“Broken” Washington comes with the separation of powers that we have in our Constitution that we cherish. It may have a cost but we have to be prepared to pay it if we want to keep the system that we are so proud of.

By Stanley W. Samarasinghe

Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign, towards its tail end, relied heavily on calling Barack Obama a liberal, a socialist and a redistributionist. These are over-lapping concepts but were believed to be dirty words in US politics. Then there was also the criticism from the beginning of the campaign, sometimes implicit and sometimes more explicit, that Obama was an “intellectual.” Also implied in this criticism was that having had a sound education in some of America’s best schools was a disqualification for the presidency. As strange as it may sound, these were considered “elite” traits unworthy of a prospective president. Add to that the denigration of his apparent popularity abroad and his lack of “experience” and he was considered totally disqualified to be president. Of course the idea was to create a classic class division to win the election

Millions of Americans probably were convinced by these arguments. But many more millions rejected this line of thinking last Tuesday and elected Obama as the next president. In particular the younger voters and the more educated voters appeared to have seen Obama’s liberal leanings, redistributionist tax policy, his first class education, sharp intellect and popularity abroad as qualifications for the presidency. This verdict has significant long-term implications for US politics and governance.

First, all Americans can’t be millionaires, no matter how level the playing field of opportunity may be. Thus it is only fair that the richer in society bear a somewhat higher burden in paying for those services that are for the common good. In addition, and this is important, Americans always open their pocketbooks to help the less fortunate not only in their own communities and country but also abroad. McCain’s “Redistributionist-in-Chief” taunt of Obama challenged this most basic of American traits. Obama, instead of retreating in the face of this attack, counter-punched with conviction that there was nothing wrong in some redistribution through a progressive tax system. After all one of the basic tenets of Christianity as well as every other great religion in the world is that we should share what we have by helping the less fortunate among us.

This leads me to my second point. If “socialism” and “liberalism” in the American context mean a more humane society, many voters did not see any reason to reject these ideas. In the past when Republicans used these terms Democrats ran away in fear. This only reconfirmed the suspicion in the minds of many voters that being liberal must be something really bad for the country. The Obama victory has disabused many of this false notion. America is a liberal democracy that is based on the ideal of freedom. But we now recognize that it is a freedom for all and not for one privileged section of that society. Obama had the intellectual strength and the communication skill to convey this basic truth to a sufficiently large number of voters at this election.

Finally, the outcome of this election creates a great opportunity for America to redefine its liberal ideal. President-elect Obama’s policies from giving a tax break to the middle class, and universal healthcare to tuition assistance for every young person who wants to go to college would help create a new “Humane Liberalism” that all liberals could be proud of. But it also has a big electoral dividend. The numbers suggest that the combination of a higher the level of education with higher income is the best way to strengthen the Democratic brand. This is pure win-win.