Did Newt Gingrich break American politics?

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Did Newt Gingrich break American politics?

Postby cmsellers » Sat Nov 03, 2018 12:57 am

I've been meaning to start a thread on this article since it came out. Tess brought it up today, and Crimson started a somewhat related thread, so I feel like the time is ripe.

I have been saying for some time that the decline of modern political discourse dates back to Gingrich and nearly every escalation has been the GOP's fault, outlining the following examples:

  1. Gingrich pioneered the "Hastert rule" or "majority of the majority rule," under which the speaker will block a vote on any legislation not supported by most of the GOP caucus.
  2. Gingrich led the circus over Monica Lewinsky.
  3. The GOP Senate blocked a bunch of Clinton judicial nominees to "hold" them for W.
  4. When the Democrats tried to reciprocate under W, Bill Frist threatened to eliminate the filibuster, leading to an up-or-down vote on all of them (all but two were approved).
  5. McConnell vowed to make Obama a one-term president.
  6. The GOP refused to cooperate with Obama on a Heritage Foundation proposal because Obama did it.
  7. McConnell's stunt with Garland.
  8. Republicans under Trump have refused to allow most or all Democratic amendments to some key bills.
  9. The whole Kavanaugh fiasco.
Since this is not a "both sides" position, it has tended to result in disapproving reactions from Republicans, independents, and even a few liberals who want to play Devil's advocate. Republicans will bring up Bork and everyone will bring up Schumer eliminating the filibuster for lower court and Executive branch nominees. But Bork was rejecting a controversial nominee, as had been done multiple times before, and Schumer was making good on Frist's threat.

I forget exactly when I started blaming Gingrich, I know that initially I dated the decline in political norms in the US only back to 2008, but I've been tracing it back to Gingrich at least since 2016. This article suggests that not only was I right to blame Gingrich, but Gingrich's influence is more corrosive and goes back even further than I realized.
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Re: Did Newt Gingrich break American politics?

Postby Crimson847 » Sat Nov 03, 2018 3:27 am

cmsellers wrote:Republicans will bring up Bork and everyone will bring up Schumer eliminating the filibuster for lower court and Executive branch nominees. But Bork was rejecting a controversial nominee, as had been done multiple times before, and Schumer was making good on Frist's threat.


Other things that get brought up include accusations of "legislating from the bench" emblemized by Roe v. Wade, the way Democrats handled the credible allegations of rape and sexual abuse against Clinton and his efforts to obstruct and tarnish the investigation, endless hyperbolic accusations of bigotry aimed at any Republican who runs for office (Biden's claim that Romney would "put y'all back in chains" to a crowd of black people gets brought up a lot, for instance), and an alleged bait-and-switch in the 1986 immigration reform that seems to be a central cause of our immigration debate clusterfucking itself. And if all else fails, there's always abortion and the impenetrable bunker it provides conservatives against claims of left-wing moral superiority. You can excuse a near-endless amount of procedural and rhetorical hardball if you argue that you're fighting against the genocide of millions by tyrants who won't even let the people vote on the matter.

Another point is that midcentury bipartisan comity in Congress existed in a context of overwhelming Democratic supremacy. During the 62 years between 1932 and 1994, Republicans had a (small) majority in the House for a total of 4 years, and a majority in the Senate for a total of 10. Under those circumstances, Republicans had to work with Democrats if they ever wanted to get anything done, just as blue-state Republicans still do today. After 1980 and particularly after 1994, though, the possibility of winning a real victory rather than table scraps was in the air. So it's not clear whether Republicans became more combative as they gained power in the 80s and 90s because of Gingrich, or because they finally stood a real chance of winning political fights and so had more incentive to pick them.

Because of all this and more, I can't say I've ever succeeded in convincing any Republican or right-leaning independent that the right is primarily to blame for the political system's woes. I've gotten to "equal", or "we certainly both do bad things and I guess there's really no way of knowing who's worst", but never all the way to "you're right, we're moral degenerates and you're better than we are". Regardless of who has done the most to make the parties hate each other and refuse to work together, it's clear that both sides have stockpiled enough ammunition to keep that debate going for a very, very long time.
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