Winning Ugly
BARNES, FRED
Winning Ugly Republicans are doing better than you think. BY FRED BARNES WHO'S WINNING in Washington right now? Republicans, President Bush included. But they are winning ugly, and just barely....
...This is especially significant with the likelihood of a supreme Court vacancy (or two) this summer...
...I'm going to do better...
...Reid said the nuclear option is "off the table...
...Another would be to give employers access to information about an immigrant's legal status...
...At a White House meeting last week with Republican congressional leaders, the president made a confession...
...Reid is no Tom Daschle, who was an effective obstructionist...
...Interviewed on Meet the Press, he declined even to criticize Dean...
...And only two of them would need to defect from the Gang of 14 deal to pass the nuclear option...
...His top goal is enlarging the Republican coalition...
...Actually, if success on social security reform is the yardstick, Republicans aren't winning at all...
...The answer is Republicans...
...Social Security reform, however, remains a priority, despite the president's inability to stir public support...
...Tax reform passed, cutting the top rate on individual income to 28 percent...
...Rather than make a fool of himself, Dean is supposed to be raising money and expanding the party...
...Such a nomination would not constitute "extraordinary circumstances...
...In any case, the Bush plan is not a top priority in Congress for now...
...And the press has responded accordingly...
...Bush hasn't been able to recruit any and neither have Republican leaders...
...House Republican whip Roy Blunt believes a few legislative steps are needed to pave the way for Bush's plan to let illegals work in the United States...
...Three Republican members of the Gang of 14—Mike DeWine of Ohio, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and John Warner of Virginia—indicated they would vote for the nuclear option if Democrats filibustered a nominee who was a conventional conservative and not an extremist...
...Also, the showdown over filibustering helped place the very idea of filibustering judges in an unfavorable light...
...He makes no wild charges about Democrats...
...He's failing at both...
...The fight over judges showed again the fecklessness of Reid...
...Considerable credit goes to senate Majority Leader Bill Frist...
...In comparison, Ken Mehlman is doing exactly what he's supposed to as Republican national chairman...
...Thanks to the Gang of 14 deal to save the filibuster, a parade of relatively young and attractive conservatives are now being confirmed for the federal appeals courts, putting them in position to be nominated later for vacancies on the supreme Court...
...since the agreement, the three prime targets of Democrats—Priscilla owen, Janice Rogers Brown, Fred Barnes is executive editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...Mehlman spends much of his time proselytizing Hispanics and blacks...
...He couldn't deliver...
...Reid promised Frist he would deliver enough Democrats to prevent a filibuster of John Bolton's nomination as ambassador to the United Nations...
...When the agreement on judicial nominations was struck in May by seven Republican and seven Democratic senators, many conservatives agreed with senate Democratic leader Harry Reid that it was a victory for Democrats...
...What Republicans on Capitol Hill want is for Bush to emphasize border security...
...so while Bush's chances of creating personal investment accounts have faded, his goal of shifting the ideological tilt of the federal judiciary is closer at hand...
...He has stereotyped himself as a trash-talking party chairman...
...Republicans have also been aided by Democratic National Chairman Howard Dean, who has made himself a big issue...
...I have not communicated this issue as well as I should have," he was quoted as saying...
...One would be to tighten restrictions on hiring illegal aliens...
...Without his pressure to enact the so-called nuclear option barring filibusters of judicial nominees, the deal leading to the string of confirmations would not have occurred...
...Reid has scarcely any influence over the Senate Democratic caucus...
...That is shorthand for persuading a few Democrats to break with their party...
...He mischaracterized the upshot of the Gang of 14 deal because he actually believed it was a triumph for Democrats...
...His plan is in the same position tax reform was in 1986...
...They were wrong...
...Bush's hopes for overhauling Social Security now depend not on public enthusiasm but on "legislative maneuver-ings" in Congress, a White House official said...
...It seemed to have no national constituency, but it had the backing of President Reagan and a few Democrats...
...House Majority Leader Tom DeLay favors even tougher legislation...
...William Pryor—have all been confirmed, plus two other less controversial nominees...
...He's been promoting legislation to allow thousands of illegal immigrants to get green cards and work legally for three to six years in the United States...
...What changes the score is success on judges...
...Mehlman proves that a strategist is better suited to be party chairman than a politician who has held elective office...
...Heavyweights like Chris Dodd of Connecticut and Joe Biden of Delaware don't follow his orders...
...But it's not...
...Or they ask him to repudiate the harsh things he's already said...
...And more conservatives are in the confirmation pipeline...
...Reporters now look for him to blast Republicans in over-the-top language...
...Who decides when these circumstances occur...
...Dean lusts after the roar of the crowd and thinks about what office he'll run for next...
...Another result was to declare, as the Gang of 14 senators did, that the filibuster may be used to block a judicial nominee only in "extraordinary circumstances...
...At town hall meetings in the home districts of House Republicans, the problem of illegal immigrant crossings is a hot topic...
...But they faced the same situation earlier, on judicial nominations, and look what happened there...
Vol. 10 • June 2005 • No. 38
