You won’t find a better explanation for why the GOP in Congress still doesn’t understand why they lost their majority than this column by John Fund in today’s edition of The Wall Street Journal. John has long been among the essential reads among the nation’s top newspaper columnists and this column illustrates why.
I don’t want to give away the whole column but this passage focuses on the essential point:
“If 34 Senate Republicans had united and voted against the bill, Democrats would have been forced to draw up more meaningful reforms. They might even have forced Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to accept the very “sunshine” provisions the Senate unanimously adopted in January–so at least the public would know who is doling out pork. But when it came down to it, only 17 voted for prolonging debate on the bill.
“The bill the rest voted for had been gutted: Disclosing an earmark is now voluntary (not mandatory), protecting an earmark requires only 41 votes (instead of 67), and the power to determine whether a spending provision inserted by a senator is officially considered an earmark will now be up to . . . Mr. Reid.
“The latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds Democrats lead Republicans by 16 points on controlling government spending and by nine points on taxes. The Republicans have their work cut out for them if they want to win back public confidence; but their behavior on the ethics bill shows they still don’t get it.”
But don’t just settle for these three graphs. The rest of the column focuses on the Alaska congressional delegation, particularly Sen. Ted “Bridge to Nowhere” Stevens, the Senate’s longest-serving Republican, and Rep. Don “Pork is my reason for living” Young.
BTW, if you haven’t already, you should get your hands on John’s superb book on voting fraud, “Stealing Elections: How voter fraud threatens our democracy.” John literally has written the book on this issue that too often gets taken for granted as something that can’t be changed.
