(Finally, some good news. Thanks, Eric - promoted by The Big E)
There are many people on the left feeling like every thing has gone to crap since we celebrated Obama's inauguration. The approval ratings of Obama and Congress are lousy, in no small part because of disgruntled Democrats who feel Obama has followed Bush's policies on the wars and civil liberties. Allegedly Democratic senators are on the point of killing health care reform, conservatives are resurgent and feeling quite cocky about their prospects for next year. At the state level, Pawlenty is so far getting away with unallotment and somehow still has about half on Minnesotans liking him.
However, some things have gone well over the last year, and even some disappointments have their mitigations. Suspect if you want that I'm keeping the glass half full by pouring a bucket into a bottomless glass, but consider a few things. All right, a bunch of things, which is why this is just part 1 instead of the whole thing. It was getting rather long for a blog, but let's get started: |
| Pawlenty's use of unallotment is a forced error, assuming he loses legally and suffers politically, which he still might. He had to resort to it because the DFL legislators have stuck together. The Republicans can uphold a veto by all of two representatives, which wouldn't be an issue if some DFLers would get Lieberman-like on their caucus. But they haven't, and they therefore forced Pawlenty to act illegally to avoid a compromise.
As long as I've started with the state, we've discovered this year that the DFL bench is much deeper than the GOP's. Almost every one of that gaggle of DFL gubernatorial candidates look like reasonably strong candidates, while the leading Republican is a tenther. Their field is so weak the Norm Coleman, as washed up as he looks after dragging out the recount, looks like he would blow away the field if he ran.
And has anyone noticed what they've been coming up with for congressional races? Take out Pawlenty, and there isn't much left of the Republicans.
Now the most recent piece of good news: a good financial reform bill just passed the House. It includes the Consumer Financial Products Commission conservatives have keyed in on as the part they hate. Yes, I know it's just the House and the Senate will be a problem (more on that in a moment). There are holes to be sure. Nonetheless, some very good stuff got in there and regulation will be strengthened, and this will be the first attempt to address corporations that get "too big to fail".
Moreover, there were individual reforms passed outside this bill and already in law, like our own Keith Ellison's bill to protect renters of foreclosed housing. Renters were evicted literally --- and I do mean literally --- with no more notice than the deputies showing up to put their belongings outside. Now they get 90 days or the end of the lease, whichever is longer. Republicans did nothing about this, which makes this one of my favorite retorts to "there's no difference between the parties".
Health care reform has never come so close to passing. Think about it: literally for a century, liberals/progressives have been trying to reform our health care system and other than some programs for the poor and Medicare, which is big but covers just the disabled and elderly, we have failed to even get passage in one house, but this year we did it. We might still get something through the Senate.
Also on health care, we now know how dysfunctional the Senate has become. The difficulty getting anything done in the Senate has come as a surprise to many, but it was this bad before. We just didn't all know it. Now maybe enough of us know that we can do something about it. The big problem of course is the filibuster, since even when we agree with the minority, there seems something wrong with not even allowing a vote. At least I felt that way when Democrats used it, and I'm not the only one. Surely there is some way to prolong debate long enough to let the minority generate public support if they can, but not outright prevent a vote.
Update: I have posted part 2. |
