Ah, Yes, The Inaugural Ball

[...] most excellent way to carry out this is by putting content-rich useful articles on your website Ah, Yes, The Inaugural Ball – swampland.blogs.time.com 01/04/2009 Once again, we are at the moment where hundreds of thousands [...]

So, are you going to one KT?

Nope. Never have. Not even once. I’ve heard too many morning-after reports.
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My best inauguration moment: Jay Carney and I scored seats (I can tell you how, if you are interested, but it’s not helpful this year) about five rows back right in front of the podium for Bill Clinton’s swearing-in in 1997. Jessye Norman was singing right over my head. I was imagining that this must be what it sounds like when you arrive in heaven. And then, right behind me, this woman whips out her cell phone, and starts calling everyone she knows and telling them at the top of her lungs: “You’ll never GUESS WHERE I AM…”

Jay probably can score us tickets this year. He can just ask his boss for them.
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Jay should raffle off some tickets here on Swampland. Yeah.

Good point.

…and now that the Burris/Blago story is getting really interesting (it turns out that Reid called Blago (http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2009/01/party-of-racism-which-one.html) and told him not to consider black aspirants for the Senate job, and recommended two white ones — including a big loser in a House race in 2006 that Rahm gave millions to (Tammy Duckworth). AND, perhaps more crucially, Reid also recommended Illinois’s attorney general, who has promised to go to court to defend its Secretary of State if he refuses to sign off on the Burris appointment. Can you say “conflict of interest”?

and suddenly KT’s wall-to-wall coverage of the Blago-Burris story stops for some “inaugural ball” fluff!

Reid on MTP has already started back tracking from his firm principled stance. By the time this is done, Norm Coleman should have a bigger office and chairmanship of a committee. Heck of a job Harry.

Pluk: Your timeline is a little screwed up here, isn’t it? Reid’s calls were BEFORE the AG promised to defend the Secretary of State–and in fact, before Blago was even arrested. Your account suggests that he did it afterward. Also, my understanding of yesterday’s reports suggests that Reid didn’t says not to recommend “black aspirants,” but rather, that he suggested not to recommend Jesse Jackson, Emil Jones or Danny Davis. (The way you wrote this suggests that Reid told Blago not to pick anyone who is black.)
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I do not have any confirmation of the reports. However, it did not surprise me to hear that Reid made this call when the seat came open. I also suspect he made similar calls with recommendations for other seats. (And he has publicly supported Caroline Kennedy.)
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Sorry. Preview would be my friend:
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The report is that he recommended–on Dec. 3–that Blago not appoint Davis, Jackson and Jones. And that he did so based on his own view of their electability. The report also suggests that Menendez made a similar call.
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Again, there may be something here. But I don’t have any independent reporting to suggest that there is.

Gunny: I missed it. What did he say?

David asked him if there was room for negotiation. He said he was an old trial lawyer and that there is always room for negotiation.

Ha. Reid suggests Quinn might appoint Burris after impeachment. I think he also brought Blockbuster Video receipts showing what a big Denzel Washington fan he is.

KT -
 
I know what you mean. At the last inaugural ball, I showed up wearing the same dress as my wife. She was livid.
 

Nate Silver has an interesting post up about why the democrats would benefit from seating both.
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One of the quirks of the unresolved senate race in Minnesota and Illinois is that it really does the Democrats no good to have just one of Al Franken and Roland Burris seated — they only gain ground if and when both get sworn in.
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http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/

LBJ must be getting ready to jump out of his grave to throttle Reid. Jawboning, this is not.

gunny
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Don’t leave out that Gregory asked him point blank if there was a chance Burris would be seated after all and Reid effectively said yes. Like I said the other day, much ado about nothing.
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Oh and he denied every saying he opposed seating Triple J and the rest and gave a list of his “fight for black folks” street cred. He says Blago is making it all up. Evidently Politico has an article all about it today that predictably paints him the way we all said people would after that report came out.

I am very uncomfortable with the assumption of guilt at play in the Blagojevich case. A prosecutor points and says “Bad Man!” and without even an indictment we are supposed to be comfortable with the Majority Leader of the Senate unabashedly proclaiming his guilt? There are other prosecutors and other men. I find all of this to scarily undemocratic and wonder when the backlash is coming.

SG: well, presumably, there’s a tape somewhere that is going to settle what really happened…
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Here’s the Politico story:
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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0109/17020.html

Harry Reid will seat Coleman and reject Burris in order to be bipartisan.
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It’s like he can not handle success.

K-Teezie
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Yeah Gregory brought up that point and Harry Reid kinda “humna humna humna your right” in his answer.

hot off the presses
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/28493049#28493049

Wait, for some reason they cut off his final answer about Burris. Curioser and curioser.

“Harry Reid will seat Coleman and reject Burris in order to be bipartisan.”
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Seems like Harry was trying to say it does not matter how many seats the democrats control. Everything has to be bipartisan. Mean while Mitch McConnell has 42 seats and he’s talking about doing what ever the hell he wants.
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It’s all about the optics. Act like a winner and you will win. Act like a loser and you will never win.

FYI: I’m off for the next week, so my posting will be light. JN-S and Scherer are back, though.

found the real deal
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It’s obvious what Reid was doing. I’m sure Reid didn’t “tell him who not to appoint.”

If there is a God then Harry Reid will croak of a heart attack in the next few days giving the job of who to seat to someone else. Of course that is perhaps the God we wished he or she was.

In reality God is just having fun showing how incompetant our Senate leaders can be and will continue to give Harry Reid all the wrong thoughts to insure he continues to make all the wrong decisions.

For some reason the Republicans all think we are God’s devine country. As evidenced by all the stupid actions by the current administration, the Republican leadership and Republican mouthpieces in reality we are just God’s play toy. (See Ann Coulter having her mouth sewn shut because of a broken jaw.) God has a wicked sense of humor!

2009 promises to be an interesting year for our “SPECIAL” country. Hope we survive!

David Gregory didn’t properly follow-up. “Did you at any time discuss the electability of the three African-American candidates with Blagojevich? Did you discuss with Blagojevich the relative electability of the three candidates in comparison to Tammy Duckworth and/or Lisa Madigan? Realizing this was recorded on tape, did you express any opinion on the relative merits of the named candidates?” Instead, Gregory let Reid nominate himself for an NAACP Lifetime Achievement Award. Lame.

Y’know, pourmecoffee, I was going to disagree with your point about assumption of guilt– after all, the level of political support necessary to be an effective governor is, justly, lower than the level of evidence needed to convict a person.
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But I agree with you that it’s a bit discomfiting to see Harry Reid up there calling him “a corrupt governor.”
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Also, is there any such thing in the world as a defender of Harry Reid as majority leader?

the level of political support necessary to be an effective governor is, justly, lower than the level of evidence needed to convict a person.

Agreed. There is a process for reflecting that sentiment: impeachment.

Pourme – I assume one of the reasons Gregory didn’t follow up with Reid is that he’d like the majority leader back, and would like others in the Democratic leadership to be on the show, too. The hosts of all these shows dance a line between eliciting information and making it appealing for guests to come on the show. I’m not sure anything is gained by appearing to be a prosecutor – and if with Reid, why not any other guest?
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KT – do you have any insight into why Reid continues to be majority leader? Nobody seems to defend him, but nobody challenges him for leader, either. Is he somehow effective at procedural issues in a way we haven’t noticed? Are his colleagues waiting for him to get defeated in 2010?

what gunny said: Seems like Harry was trying to say it does not matter how many seats the democrats control. Everything has to be bipartisan. Mean while Mitch McConnell has 42 seats and he’s talking about doing what ever the hell he wants.

K-Tum, before you go, how about initiating a thread on this topic:
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SURVEILLANCE STATE RUN AMOK…. In July, the Washington Post reported on undercover Maryland State Police officers conducting surveillance on war protesters and death penalty opponents. Today, we learn that the monitoring was worse, and more pervasive, than first believed.

Kathy: Reid remains highly regarded by his fellow Democratic Senators, who are the constituency that counts in holding onto the job.

Good point KT. Being held in high esteem by his colleagues is more important to Reid than worrying about the concerns of voters. Perhaps he will not need votes in 2010: just those of his colleagues. Surely they can change the rules and given him his seat by Senate fiat.

I’m not sure anything is gained by appearing to be a prosecutor

Wow. How about finding out the answers to the questions. That would be a gain.

KT – So I assume there’s a good reason for his colleagues’ support. I think sometimes what looks like wimpiness to us is in reality an ability to pick fights carefully.

Bitter: The only thing he needs to fear in 2010 is a Republican challenger. It is hard to imagine a Democrat giving him a serious primary challenge in Nevada. And the only people who get to vote on the majority leader are the Senators of the majority party, who will be judging him, chiefly, by whether their majority has grown under his leadership. I have not heard any serious talk of anyone challenging him for that job. Things could change, though.

pourme- I don’t disagree with you about that. But I think it’s easy to think the Sunday hosts should be aggressive when their guests are there voluntarily, and can voluntarily decide that’s not an experience they want to repeat. The public (including us) are pretty good at figuring out when guests are wriggling out of answers. Eventually the answers come out.

Point taken, KT. I guess my view is that the Senate Democratic Caucus is not all that united, at least not at the level the Republicans achieve. Back in Nevada there is a growing chorus of concern especially at some of the land transfer issues. I guess we will have a better feel for this towards the end of this year. Overall Reid’s pussyfooting about the filibuster is what disappoints. For once I would to see these people earn their pay by taking to the floor and “bustering”. They need to feel discomfort and anxiety: which at the moment is geared towards fund raising and apple polishing.

Also, is there any such thing in the world as a defender of Harry Reid as majority leader?
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Elvis, that would be Mitch McConnell.

KT, have a great week off. We’ll miss you.

Blagojevich for Commerce! The guy can sell anything.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, tapped in December by President-elect Barack Obama to serve as secretary of Commerce, has withdrawn his name for the position, citing a pending investigation into a company that has done business with his state. [Link]

bitter: Good point KT. Being held in high esteem by his colleagues is more important to Reid than worrying about the concerns of voters. Perhaps he will not need votes in 2010: just those of his colleagues. Surely they can change the rules and given him his seat by Senate fiat.
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kathy: KT – So I assume there’s a good reason for his colleagues’ support. I think sometimes what looks like wimpiness to us is in reality an ability to pick fights carefully.
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K-Tum: And the only people who get to vote on the majority leader are the Senators of the majority party, who will be judging him, chiefly, by whether their majority has grown under his leadership. I have not heard any serious talk of anyone challenging him for that job.
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I just thought those three comments needed to be repeated all together. Does anyone, anyone, here actually believe that the Dem gains in the last two cycle’s were because of Reid’s limp leadership? Does anyone here, or in the Senate, actually think that repeated headlines stating that “the Dems caved again” to a weak “president” and bullying, strutting repugs are the reason they gained seats? The dems were only strong in comparison to an epically failed president and epically vile Repug party. And they weren’t very strong, as any look at polling about Congress would demonstrate. Pelosi, who managed to pass the entire 100 days agenda in the House, was tarred with Reid’s failures in the senate and the whole batch was labeled as do-nothings.
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This obviously frustrates me beyond belief. Gunny, sgw, your turns.

wvng – I agree with your assessment of Reid. I’m just thinking it’s barely possible that the people who actually know him and actually work with him have a different point of view about this. I don’t think my judgment is automatically better than theirs. But their assessment baffles me, as I was trying to indicate in comment 30.
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I’m surprised lately by has seemed to have devolved into a frustration with commenters who you think disagree with the three of you, even when we aren’t disagreeing. What gives?

” And the only people who get to vote on the majority leader are the Senators of the majority party, who will be judging him, chiefly, by whether their majority has grown under his leadership.”
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If that’s the criteria shouldn’t Schummer be leader? Reid has become a laughingstock to a lot of Democrats.

kathy, I’m not frustrated with anyone here (well mostly) and usually find great good sense in what you say (I was not disagreeing with your comment above). I am deeply frustrated to have passage of almost everything in the Obama agenda resting in the hands of a man who seems to have far more respect for members of the repug caucus that members from the democratic wing of his own caucus. I was astonished the other week when he hailed as a great idea Sen. Bayh forming a centrist Dem group to rival the Blue Dogs. His “ability to pick fights carefully” is questioned in my mind by the fact that the only fights I have seen him pick were highlighted by ignoring and bypassing principled positions by Feingold and Dodd.

More on Reid. We have a president-elect who is a master of both oratory and optics, and a majority leader who is a master of appearing weak, and demonstrating weakness.
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PNNTO, is Reid a laughingstock to any Dem Senators? It appears they are the only constituency that matters.

wvng, I’m glad you brought up Reid’s hosing of Dodd. That alone should have started a leadership challenge.

wvng – ah, I understand. I’m frustrated by Reid being in charge of the agenda too. So I’m trying to figure out why Democratic senators appear not to be frustrated. For example, could it be because:
1) He takes the heat off other senators because he appears so inept?
2) His milquetoastness helps maintain a level of comity with the R’s?
3) He’s sly like a fox, and his apparent ineptness catches opponents off guard?
4) As in 3, it’s difficult to get anything done just with D’s, so his willingness to work with R’s is a help?
5) Other Dem senators are glad Reid is willing to work with R’s because they’re not willing to themselves? (It’s a dirty job but somebody’s got to do it?)

From Josh-
“Sen. Schumer (D-NY) just released a statement in which he, not surprisingly, said Franken is clearly the winner and that he should be seated — notwithstanding whatever post-recount legal challenges outgoing Sen. Coleman (R-MN) might attempt. That sets up a probable fight with the Republicans since Sen. Cornyn (R-TX) has promised to filibuster any effort to allow Franken to take his seat.”
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How fast does Reid fold? I am establishing the over/under at 45 seconds.

wvng – oh, and I usually find great good sense in what you say, too.

Ya’ll have to excuse us whilst kathy and I share a private moment.
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Back to business. “2) His milquetoastness helps maintain a level of comity with the R’s?” Yes, I also have always found it useful to both appear and consistently behave as a spineless, obsequious lap-dog during negotiations with schoolyard bullies. Makes me wonder if Reid, the one-time boxer, used the classic “fall to the floor and curl up into a tight ball to protect your belly” technique to maintain collegial relationships with his fellow boxers.
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Kathy, I just don’t understand Reid as majority leader at all. And I would really appreciate it if his fellow Dem senators would explain to us why they support him in that position. Specifically, with details demonstrating success beyond maintaining comity.

Pnnto – I’m thrilled Cornyn’s planning to filibuster. Takes a little of the heat off the Burris kerfuffle

“I’m thrilled Cornyn’s planning to filibuster.” I would be thrilled if he did filibuster. But what we will see is another cloture vote that the media reports as “you need 60 votes in the Senate to pass a bill.” And Reid will bemoan “we just didn’t have the votes, gosh darnit.”

” And Reid will bemoan “we just didn’t have the votes, gosh darnit.”
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The shelf-life on that expired last November. The Democrats have used that for two years, not without cause, but when you have the White House and the Senate, and the House the leash is a lot shorter.

wvng-To be fair leading democrats is a lot tougher job than leading republicans. Democrats are all over the place on a whole host of issues and its a tough job getting them all in a herd and heading the same direction.
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However, it can be done, but not by the likes of Harry Reid who is submissive in the face of his republican masters. Reid actually believes this bi-partisan bull crap he spews and his masters know he does, but they don’t. That’s why he gets played every time. Blago did nothing more except play him just like the republicans would have if the shoe had been on the other foot. Harry needs to spend more time attempting to get some progressive legislation passed and less on whom he thinks is electable.
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Kathy you can disagree with me any time.

gunny, on your point about herding cats, the other Klein had a post the other day that seems relevant:
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Democrats are likely to have a larger majority than they did in 1993 (59 rather than 57, assuming Franken wins), but the raw numbers understate the difference. Past Democratic presidents faced Democratic congressional majorities littered with Dixiecrats (and the Dixiecrats tended to be quite senior in the party, chairing committees and so forth). But the Dixiecrats have died out. Obama is entering office with a much more liberal and unified Democratic Party beneath him.
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The question in my mind is, with Reid as the leader, is this functionally true? Thoughts?

wvng
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Yeah its definitely true that he has more Senators under him now that share the same views on major issues. But that just magnifies even more what kind of a sh!tty leader he is. Ya’ll know how I feel about Reid so I won’t add much. But unless he gets voted out of office there isn’t a chance in hell he doesn’t stay majority leader because the rest of the Senate Dems are mostly weak sauce too.

Kathy, Nicolle Belle sees Reid the same way you do: Reid, who is surprisingly milquetoast-y for a former pugilist, has to say no less than three separate times to the unconvinced Gregory that he was merely reiterating, somewhat inartfully, the same things that Gen. Petraeus was saying at the same time.

I’m not familiar with Nicolle Belle – but I see she thinks that Gregory “went after Reid” “…Gregory opts to go after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for daring to suggest that the surge was not the way to win the war in Iraq.”

wvng – What sort of functional majority the Senate has probably depends more on Obama’s popularity than it does on Reid.

The person who keeps Reid in his job is Barack Obama. Lets not forget that Obama backed Reid (and opposed Dodd) when it came to the FISA battle — any chance that Dodd would be in a position to challenge Reid for Senate Majority Leader evaporated when Obama decided that contributions from telecom company executives were more important than justice and an end to domestic spying.

Obama is sponsoring Reid, pure and simple, so don’t go blaming the party, or anyone else for that matter.

Pluk: Your timeline is a little screwed up here, isn’t it?
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KT, there is no timeline. The salient facts is that (according to the highly reputable Sun-Times) the people Reid said “don’t send” were all black, and the people Reid said “send” were both white. And the reason that Reid said “don’t send” about the blacks was because they would not be electable — despite the fact that Illinois is the ONLY state that has ever elected two African Americans to the US Senate — Mosely-Braun and Obama. In other words, there is no reason, other than Reid’s own racist assumptions, to think that three prominent Illinois African Americans would not be electable.

Furthermore, why is Harry Reid trying to influence who gets chosen to represent the people of Illinois other than for the exact same kind of reasons Blago is accused of trying to ‘sell’ the seat for — maintaining/expanding his own power. Its not like Harry Reid is some kind of expert on Illinois politics — he’s completely clueless (and unconcerned about) issues that are important to industrialized states like Illinois. IMHO, Harry Reid doesn’t want black people in the Senate because their agenda is different from Harry Reid’s….

IMHO, Harry Reid doesn’t want black people in the Senate because their agenda is different from Harry Reid’s….
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I’m with pluk here. Not just Harry Reid, but Schumer, Bayh, Rockefeller, Lieberman and that whole bunch who are the center-right of the Senate. The ones who sold your Fourth Amendment rights down the river.
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pluk argues: The person who keeps Reid in his job is Barack Obama.
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Um, Barack Obama lost his vote as to who gets to be Majority Leader when he resigned his seat in the Senate. The President has no say over who gets to be Majority Leader.

K-Tum, since you seem to be checking in, would you be willing to weigh in on one question? Specifically, is Reid a strong or weak Majority Leader?
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You know what a number of us think, as outsiders with a citizen’s perspective. But you have more of an insider look, and your perspective would be appreciated.

wvng: The only truly strong majority leader I think I’ve seen in my time in DC is George Mitchell. Bob Dole might be debatable. The fact is, the job description is a position of weakness, with relatively little leverage.
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Also, a number of commenters have suggested that the Dems are less united than the Republicans. The fact is, it is always easier for the majority party in the Senate to stay united.
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I think I’ve posted this link before, about Daschle:
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http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,984296,00.html

All that said, for the time being, I really hear relatively little grumbling (some, but not much) among Senators regarding Reid and the job that he is doing.

gunny, #6, great point. Reminds me of the expression herding cats. The Repubs fall in lockstep, that is what they are, and why I despise them. Can’t say I completely admire the Dem cats much either. Is there something in between?

Um, that should have been //was// George Mitchell.

KT, you think Obama has no say as to Majority Leader?

Also, that should have been … always easier for the MINORITY party in the Senate to stay united. As I recall, they were pretty united as a minority under Reid as well.
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Gosh, I miss preview.

formerly: Obama has absolutely no say as to who gets to be majority leader, except, perhaps, to lobby individual senators. The job is chosen by a secret vote of the caucus, and there are usually a few (sometimes, more than a few) who lie as to how they are going to vote.

Well, my tickets haven’t arrived, so I will stay home and watch on the teevee in my underwear. I will put on jeans to go ourside to fly the flag in honor. Of Bush leaving town. And Obama spending his first night in the White House.

Huh. Seems like Frist was able to ram through every bill the Republicans wanted to pass, with no trouble at all. Seems like the Dems as Senate minority sucked just as bad as they have since majority. One of Reid’s big problems is that he has a completely, totally incompetent press guy, Jim Manley. That seems to blow your hypothesis out of the water, K-Tum, though I realize that you are trying to be nice.
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Plus, the Republican staffers really like Reid and the job he is doing. What does that tell you?
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I’m looking forward to evaluating the work of Bidens new communications strategist. That should be interesting.
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James: I don’t recall it that way at all. What I remember was a lot of complaining by Republicans about Frist’s ineffectiveness as majority leader.

As for Frist’s success record, here’s one early clip:
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http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-99390333.html
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My recollection, again, is that he was not regarded as a particularly powerful or skillful majority leader. By the time he left, there was a fair amount of speculation that he wouldn’t have been re-elected to the job, and that McConnell was preparing to bump him off.
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K-Tum, thank you for your perspective on the position of majority leader. I also remember Mitchel as being a strong, effective leader. I thought Howard Baker was also, certainly principled. LBJ was certainly strong.
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I never remember seeing Repubs in the modern era appearing weak in that position. For example, I can’t stand Lott, but I don’t remember him ever caving to the opposition. And can’t imagine him capitulating if the Dems tried to pull the same kind of unprincipled stunts that define the modern GOP.
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fj, I also ain’t got no tickets but will be in DC, fully – perhaps heavily – clothed, to celebrate.

Also, here’s a paragraph from Frist’s Wikipedia entry:
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In the 2003 legislative session, Frist enjoyed many successes. He was able to push many initiatives through to fruition, including the Bush administration’s third major tax cut and legislation that was against partial-birth abortion. However, the tactics that he used to achieve those victories alienated many Democrats. In 2004, by comparison, he saw no major legislative successes, with the explanations ranging from delay tactics by Democrats to lack of unity within the Republican Party.

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Well, Frist certainly was an obnoxious guy. But they sure did pass a lot of really damaging stuff during his watch, with the cowardly Dem’s help. They pushed through almost every extremely damaging appointment they wanted, too. Of course, the Repubs have a killer message machine, so they don’t really need the Senate leadership to be that good. That’s where the Dems fall short, IMHO.
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More on Frist, from this article on the Fox News website. Sound like some familiar complaints (and this was even before he disastrously tried to get through the ‘nuclear option’ on judicial nominees)?:
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,98425,00.html
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WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans have failed to play “hardball” with Democrats over the filibuster of President Bush’s judicial nominations and other issues, say critics, some of whom suggest Majority Leader Bill Frist (search) doesn’t have what it takes to get the job done.
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“I think Bill Frist is too weak — it may be that he is a little green as a leader — he’s not a street fighter, and that’s what the Republicans need in regards to the Democratic filibuster, a street fighter,” said Phil Kent, author and former president of the Southeastern Legal Foundation (search).
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“Whatever was done or not done is because the leadership decided not to do it,” said former Georgia Republican Rep. Bob Barr, on the loss of U.S. Circuit Court nominee Miguel Estrada (search), who withdrew Sept. 4 after several months of Democratic filibuster.
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(snip)
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In the case of Estrada, Frist attempted and failed seven times to get the votes necessary for the cloture.
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Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., called the Estrada withdrawal a “wake-up call to the White House” and Democrats were not going to simply “rubber stamp” his nominees.
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The real wake-up call should be to Frist and the GOP, say critics, who believe the Republicans have yet to learn their lesson – that playing “nice” isn’t always going to win the day.

“Democrats have no shame or floor when it comes to tactics, and Republicans have to be willing to pull out the brass knuckles,” charged Republican communications consultant Monty Warner. “Until they are, these things will continue to happen.”

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I don’t remember it that way at all, KT, all due respect to Wikipedia, what they have written there is just an opinion. I think they got two Supreme Court nominees through, the Terry Schaivo bill, and all manner of rightwing lunatics installed as judges. There was of course the MCA that went through during the 109th as well, plus the PAA if I recall. I’m pretty sure, though it would take a little while, that there were any number of other atrocious bills that went through the 109th. So I don’t know what Wikipedia is talking about, unless it is CONSTRUCTIVE legislation. The 108th and 109th Congresses didn’t DO constructive legislation.
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K-Tum, you surely know that Fox news is not taken seriously as a reference link, yes?

Finally, here’s a Business Week article that suggests that Frist was considered a weak (and ineffective) majority leader because he wouldn’t compromise, and therefore, couldn’t get things through:

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/03_17/c3830064_mz013.htm

Unlike his more pragmatic predecessors Lott and ex-Senator Bob Dole, Frist seems to emphasize conviction over compromise. Case in point: Twice he brought Estrada’s nomination to the Senate floor even though he lacked the votes to break a Democratic filibuster. “In his mind, you have to take a principled stand on an issue and not back down in the face of Democratic obstructionism,” says a top Senate Republican aide.
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But such back-to-back defeats make Frist appear more weak than principled. And there have been other setbacks that, while not entirely his fault, happened under his tenure. He failed to prevent the Senate from stripping the President’s faith-based initiative of core provisions that would have made it easier for religious groups to win social-service contracts. Frist was also unable to forge a compromise with key Democrats over limiting payouts in medical-malpractice suits. But the most stinging defeat by far was his inability to persuade four Republican senators to support the President’s $726 billion tax cut. GOP moderates effectively chopped it to $350 billion — at least for now.

J,LA: Fox is credible when it writes about the zeitgeist of conservatives, and in this case, it quotes a number of them on the record. (Ironically enough, saying many of the things about Frist that liberals are saying about Reid now.) And I can tell you, I very clearly remember that many on the right were very unhappy with Frist. See the Business Week article as well.

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Okay, I’ll give you Estrada. But what about my other points?
After Katrina, which happened in the middle of the 109th, Bush lost his luster among the press corp and *some* of those atrocious initiatives didn’t pass. I’ll give you that. But a lot of other stuff did. I’ll accept the Business Week characterization, but that stuff they mention was truly abysmal legislation. We should all be glad it didn’t pass.
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J,LA: I’m just trying to make the point that I think you guys underestimate the degree to which many of your complaints about Reid are things that sort of come with the job. Some of them handle it better than others do, but they all start with a weak hand. Also, I think you are selectively remembering the Republicans (who, by the way, also had a President of their own party) as being more successful than they actually were.

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Wait. I’m not saying that Frist was a good Majority leader, KT. You said that it was easier to be united as the minority. I think if you look at the 108th and 109th, there was an awful lot of lock-step Republican legislation that went through while they were in the majority. Almost everything that passed, and that was a lot of obnoxious stuff, was all united Repub. I thought that’s what we were debating, not that some Repubs didn’t like Frist.
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I remember them as being AS successful as they were. Do I have to put together a list of lock-step Republican votes during 108 and 109? It will take me a while, but I can get back to you tomorrow.
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Reid was weak as a minority leaders, and he is weak as a majority leader. He hasn’t gotten anything through in over a year except a watered down bailout that the Republican President got down and begged on his knees for. You can’t say that about Frist.

I was just taking issue with your contention: Seems like Frist was able to ram through every bill the Republicans wanted to pass, with no trouble at all.
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In the 25 years that I’ve been in Washington, I’ve never seen any majority leader, of either party (again, with Mitchell as a possible exception), who hasn’t come in for a lot of complaining from his own party about how weak he is.

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So you think that Reid is fine? Has done a good job? How do you measure that?
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Whatever mojo Frist might have had, I think he pretty much lost after Senators of his own party (Warner, McCain, Graham, Snowe, Collins, DeWine, Chafee) cut him off at the knees over the “nuclear option” with judicial nominees:
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http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1064469,00.html

I’m not saying he is “fine.” That’s not for me to say. I’m just trying to tell you that this complaint is not a new one about majority leaders. As the articles I’ve cited above show, many of these precise words being hurled at Frist from the right, even though you seemed to recall him as a paragon of ruthless efficiency on the Senate floor. Also, in the view of his colleagues, Reid is not as hapless as some of the commenters here think he is.

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Hmm. I remember that differently. The gang of 14 ensured that there would be no filibusters of Bush’s egregious Supreme Court nominees. That didn’t hurt Frist a bit, though he might have been hoping to deploy the nuclear option. Too bad he didn’t, in retrpspect. But it certainly didn’t hurt the Republicans, indeed it has helped them immensely, with an incompetent like Reid as Majority Leader.
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Actually, no I don’t recall him as a “paragon of ruthless efficiency on the Senate floor.” You shouldn’t make such sweeping statements, Karen. I’m just saying, he was able to push through some pretty egregious stuff through the Senate during his tenure, unlike Reid, who has been profoundly ineffectual.
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Also, I honestly don’t know how to measure a “good” job in the Senate. I’ve covered it long enough to know that success and failure there is a function of the circumstances of each individual vote, and that there are a lot of moving parts. It is very, very unlike the House, where the Speaker has an extraordinary amount of power.

Well, how about Mitchell? What did he do right?

J, LA: I wish I could remember that more clearly. Mitchell had a style that was more inflexible, and he ran over his committee chairmen from time to time, occasionally even taking legislation away from them. (I recall one Senator, after he left, telling me how much of a relief it was that Daschle actually consulted them more. Then again, Daschle took over when they were a shattered minority.) Mitchell was robotically on-message, hardly ever the public face of the party, which of course made it hard for a reporter to cover him, but I now recognize it served the party well.
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Also, for most of the time Mitchell was the leader, he had a guy in the opposition–Dole–who was very pragmatic, and always looking for a deal.

Finally, the Senate was a very different place–far less partisan than it became after the 94 election, when wave after wave of these guys from the House started getting elected and bringing the blood-sport culture of the House with them.

Gotta sign off. Kid demanding the computer.

Well, see. That’s what we’d like to see Reid do. Take control of the Homeland Security committee, for example. Be robotically on message, whip those recalcitrants into shape. But no. His days as a pugilist are gone, gone, gone. Now he’s another Daschle, and sure, the Senators love the comity, but they aren’t supposed to *do* comity, the are supposed to be doing the People’s Work. Seriously, he is as ineffectual a leader as I’ve ever seen. And you know, I really don’t care about how “hard” his job is. He’s not doing it, and needs to be replaced by someone who CAN do the job.
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I appreciate you insight, Karen.

Well, see. That’s what we’d like to see Reid do. Take control of the Homeland Security committee, for example. Be robotically on message, whip those recalcitrants into shape. But no. His days as a pugilist are gone, gone, gone. Now he’s another Daschle, and sure, the Senators love the comity, but they aren’t supposed to *do* comity, the are supposed to be doing the People’s Work. Seriously, he is as ineffectual a leader as I’ve ever seen. And you know, I really don’t care about how “hard” his job is. He’s not doing it, and needs to be replaced by someone who CAN do the job.
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I appreciate your insight, Karen.

ack. Sorry for the double post. G’nite.

This has been a very interesting exchange. Thanks for the interaction, KT. If it’s true that print is dead and it’s all internets from now on, you’re a shining example.
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Comity and working cross the aisle would make sense if the GOP were really interested in running (not just ruling) the nation. But they aren’t, so they need the stick as well as the carrot.
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Mitch McConnel was on ABC today saying that Republican senators represent half of the U.S. population. At 57:41, and the GOP disproportionately representing low-population states, I don’t know how that math work out.

Am on vacation this week, so I will be checking in only sporadically, but J-LA, I couldn’t let your contention about the Gang of 14 stand unchallenged. Conservatives considered this a major defeat, and a betrayal for which they never forgave McCain, Warner et al. The Gang sided with the Senate and its institutional prerogatives over the wishes of the right. (See the earlier article of mine that I linked to. Part of their motivation was that they remembered what it was like to be in the minority.)
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This article from the National Review is a more accurate portrayal of how the deal (and Frist’s leadership) was viewed from the right, at least in my experience of reporting on it and talking to a lot of conservatives:
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http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OTI2NzVjYzY5MGZkMDMzOWVkMjMyNzhlZjQ2Njg0Y2Y=
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I was trying last night to count up all the majority leaders I have covered. (I think it’s eight: Baker, Byrd, Mitchell, Dole, Lott, Daschle, McConnell, Reid.) And while you don’t seem to want to believe this, none of them–not even Mitchell–has ever had a majority that, as you and some other posters here have suggested, marched in lockstep. It’s the Senate, which means it is messy. Some of these leaders have been better than others. (And I think Frist was particularly ineffectual.) But they have all had to contend that theirs is a job which, as I said before, starts you in a position of weakness. Minorities are much, much easier to run.

Argh, preview: Final sentence should begin: But WHAT they have all had to contend WITH IS that theirs …

Um, Barack Obama lost his vote as to who gets to be Majority Leader when he resigned his seat in the Senate. The President has no say over who gets to be Majority Leader.
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That’s right. I keep forgetting that the President of the United States has absolutely no influence on what happens in either House of Congress.

I mean, how naive do you think we are, Karen?

Oops. That was nine. I forgot Frist. Freudian?
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Pluk: Please find me an instance where the President of the United States had any measurable influence over the selection of a Majority Leader. I cannot recall any President influencing it either publicly or privately in the time that I have been in Washington. But perhaps you know differently. I would love to see any evidence to that effect.

K-Tum, thanks for the excellent discussion. I think one of your most critical points was this one:
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Finally, the Senate was a very different place–far less partisan than it became after the 94 election, when wave after wave of these guys from the House started getting elected and bringing the blood-sport culture of the House with them.
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I suspect Reid might have been an effective leader with a Bob Dole as his opposite. But “these guys from the House”, one might call them made men, changed the game utterly. Important to note that “these guys” were repuglican true believers; they were not Democrats.
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The idea of working for the People, instead of working for their own party’s power, went out the door. They behaved like thugs while the Dems clung, one might say bitterly, to comity. But they also are masters of creating and driving the public narrative (with the media’s help) to create their own reality, so that Republican obstructionism and a record number of filibusters in the last session became “you need 60 votes to pass a bill in the Senate” and “Dems cave to minority.” Reid utterly failed to counteract that narrative – which is why he is not the right guy for the job when the opposition consists of thugs like McConnell and Cantor.
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Digby had a fine post on “the narrative” yesterday:
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The right wing understands something that progressives just refuse to engage in and that is that most people, particularly the media, understand their world through stories. And so they consciously craft plots and narratives to explain events that favor their worldview. Right now, after eight years of Bush and a decisive election repudiating Republican rule, it seems impossible to believe that their story makes any sense to people. But they will tell it anyway, full in the knowledge that within a few months any talk of Bush will be as stale as Rickrolling and the focus will be completely on Obama. And they will already be well on their way to setting forth an alternate reality that slides neatly into familiar grooves worn smooth by decades of right wing propaganda.
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I do not believe it is inevitable that they will persuade enough people to buy their narrative that they can turn around their political fortunes. The failures of conservatism are manifest and huge. But beyond some vague idea that politics has been too partisan I don’t believe people have heard a story that really explains it yet and until we see real progress manifested in real life by an Obama administration, I’m not sure that people have anything other than some vague hope that the other guys should be given a chance. It certainly doesn’t mean that a new narrative of progress and competence won’t naturally just emerge, but it’s going to take time. And during that time, the right will be spinning their epic tale of Democratic irresponsibility, fecklessness and elitism, among other things, while Democrats refuse to publicly engage.
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Karen…
here is a little something about the involvement of JFK and LBJ in the selection of Mike Mansfield as Senate Majority leader in 1961.

Thanks for that followup, KT. Enjoy your vacation.
It was never my contention that Frist was a popular ML (majority leader) with the right.
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1) Commenters were complaining about what an ineffectual ML Reid is.
2) You said that they were all like that. You said that it is easier to be united if you are the minority party.
3) I said that the Republicans during 108 and 109 were *quite* united as a majority party.
4) You keep going back to the Republicans didn’t like Frist’s leadership.
5) I keep going back to, regardless of what they thought of Frist, they passed a lot of egregious legislation in lockstep.
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Your contention that the Republicans didn’t march in lockstep is belied by the data. Please see here just as an example Polarized America Page Scroll down to the Senate graphical data and tell me that the Repubs aren’t marching in lock step. See: “Senate: Party Polarization 1879-2008.” Actually look at all those Senate graphs. They are about two-thirds down the page.
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I’ll further say that regardless of the mavericky maverickness of McCain, when push came to shove he voted with the Republicans’ most egregious bills, including voting IN FAVOR OF torture, okay? and domestic spying. He voted to abolish habeas corpus. So, you know, all votes aren’t equal. He didn’t like the tax cuts, yeah, but he loved voting for torture with his fellow Republicans. 100% of Republicans voted in favor of torture, Karen, and 100% in favor of spying on you, me, and our fellow Americans. They voted 100% in favor of two underqualified rightwing lunatics for Supreme Court as well.
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I’m saying that on the biggest, most important votes, and some of those would include cloture votes, the Republicans voted in lockstep. Whether they liked Frist or not, or what they thought of his leadership, is quite beside the point.
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And, you know, Reid can’t get any legislation through, even when the Republican president wants it. That’s pretty ineffectual. I don’t really care if the Senate is messy or Reid’s job is hard. I want deliverables. My job is hard, and I deliver the goods on time. Your job is hard, and you deliver the goods on time. (or Time, heh) So I don’t want to hear sob stories about what they have to contend with. Either Reid delivers the goods, or he ought to step down for someone who can.
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It is perhaps instructive to note that Reid isn’t very popular over at Think Progress either. They ran a clip of him on MTP yesterday, and the comments section there is remarkably like the comments here.
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http://thinkprogress.org/2009/01/04/reid-bush-worst-president/#comments

oops, forgot the link! http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Lyndon_Johnson_Dethroned.htm

Nor should we forget the role played by the White House in the ouster of Trent Lott (and the installation of Bill Frist, who was known as “a White House favorite”)…

J-LA: I believe our debate was about Frist’s effectiveness. You say he was; I think he wasn’t.
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Pluk: Ah, LBJ. Perhaps he got some influence because he had himself been a Majority Leader. But my hunch is that if a President tried to interfere with this selection, the result would be a backlash. Especially with the Old Bulls, who think Presidents come and go.
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And now that you have stirred the trivia in the recesses of my brain — it’s sort of interesting that at least twice in the past couple of decades, the Senate Republicans picked (or stuck with) leaders who had run AGAINST the incumbent President. (Baker v. Reagan; Dole v. Bush I).

Also, Pluk, I will agree that Bush turning against Lott was crucial to his having to resign. But I think Bush was a lagging indicator of public opinion in that whole Strom Thurmond thing, and I think what got Frist the job (despite having less Senate experience than any ML in history) was the assumption on the part of GOP Senators that he would be a fresh face on TV, and a hard-liner in private. Both turned out to be true, but it was a disaster for the party and not so good for the Senate, either.

Looks like Obama is going to capitulate to the GOP before he even takes office, so it appears Reid taught him well:
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Obama strategists say he wants to get 80 or more votes in the 100-member Senate, and the emphasis on tax cuts is a way to defuse conservative criticism and enlist Republican support.
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Way to go, give the repugs what they want and produce a hugely expensive and ineffective stimulus plan. Krugman agrees:
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But the numbers being reported — 40 percent of the whole, two-year plan — sound high. And all the news reports say that the high tax-cut share is intended to assuage Republicans; what this presumably means is that this was the message the off-the-record Obamanauts were told to convey. And that’s bad news. Look, Republicans are not going to come on board. Make 40% of the package tax cuts, they’ll demand 100%. Then they’ll start the thing about how you can’t cut taxes on people who don’t pay taxes (with only income taxes counting, of course) and demand that the plan focus on the affluent. Then they’ll demand cuts in corporate taxes. And Mitch McConnell is already saying that state and local governments should get loans, not aid — which would undermine that part of the plan, too. OK, maybe this is just a head fake from the Obama people — they think they can win the PR battle by making bipartisan noises, then accusing the GOP of being obstructionist. But I’m really worried that they’re sending off signals of weakness right from the beginning, and that they’re just going to embolden the opposition.

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Karen, perhaps we have a different view of “effectiveness.” I say it is getting the legislative agenda passed. Frist certainly did that. Likability doesn’t, IMHO, matter at all. Your mileage may vary. I’ve given examples of legislation that passed under Frist’s watch. You’ve given examples of Republicans complaining about him. I’m all into measuring effectiveness with facts and data. How about you?
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I’m all into measuring effectiveness with facts and data. How about you?
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James, don’t be silly. Karen is a political reporter — which means that she is unconcerned with facts, and concentrates on “what it all means” based on Village conventional wisdom. Thus, regardless of what the “facts” are, Frist was ineffective because that is the conclusion of the Beltway elite.
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Personally, I think that Frist is seen as “ineffective” because he was there only to carry water for the Bush administration — he couldn’t wheel and deal like “effective” majority leaders do, because all the deals were being made by Bush/Cheney, who got Frist the job knowing he could be controlled.

Well, I have no real opinion on whether Frist was effective or ineffective. I just know what the 108th and 109the passed as far as legislation. And they did it pretty easily, with almost 100% Republican participation. I’m jes saying that Reid, by any standard, is incompetent and ineffective. And thus, I’m not interested in a bunch of sob stories about how being Majority Leader is hard work. Why Karen and the Beltway keep making excuses for him is beyond me.
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J,LA: I might be confused or something, but I looked at that chart you posted (Senate votes are the last chart–right?), and it suggests that Republican party unity has dropped sharply in the Reid years, while Democratic unity has risen significantly. Wouldn’t that suggest Reid is an effective leader?
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Here’s the link you posted:
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http://polarizedamerica.com/#POLITICALPOLARIZATION

J,LA (continued): I suspect, though, that this chart is not necessarily a good measure of a leader’s effectiveness. Part of the trend over the last few years would probably be attributable to Republicans peeling off their party and running for shelter in a politically difficult environment. I also think their party unity scores for the GOP will rise in the coming Congress because the moderates have been pretty much wiped out.

Sorry I had to work all day, KT. I don’t know if you’ll come back to this. I can’t believe you are disagreeing with me about Republican lock-step voting. Here’s a page that shows the Republicans with 91.8% voting with party during the 108th. Senate voting with party scores | 108th Congress | Congress votes database | washingtonpost.com. The 109th was 87.2%. But that’s not even what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the key votes, the important votes. Who cares if there was some dissension on the naming of a post office? There was a whopping 98.1% lock-step Republican for the MCA, okay? Only Chaffee voted against. The Dems had 73% against. Okay, that was a significant vote. Same with the PAA. Same with Alito and Roberts. I don’t understand why you argue with this unless you are being willingly obtuse.
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And then you contend that because somehow some of the Repubs peeled off for the bailout that it’s a sign that Reid is effective? C’mon. Weeks before election and the bushies are down on their knees begging for passage? I don’t think it says a thing about *Reid’s* effectiveness.
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My point is that Reid is ineffective because he can’t get anything important passed. He can’t deal with the republicans’ obstruction. Frist got stuff passed, he got a lot of stuff passed. Reid and the Dems were helpless. That’s the Senate’s job, to pass legislation. Ergo, Frist was more effective at his job that Reid. Reid was completely ineffective as minority leader as well.
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Practically the entirety of DC journalism class seems to suffer from short-term amnesia and to have completely forgotten the events of the past eight years. Willingly forgotten, and I don’t blame you guys. If I was such an abysmal failure at my job as DC journalism was during the 8 miserable years of the Bush administration, I wouldn’t want to admit it either. Thus many of you have the habit of drawing examples, no matter what, from the Clinton years, and completely skip over the past eight years, where DC journalism pretty much completely failed to do their job. There is universal consensus on that score, even the honest among you admit it.
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Have you read this, Karen? In the Crisis, the Journal Falls Short : CJR this is one of the finest pieces of media criticism I’ve read. I wish I had the insight and talent to write this kind of criticism, because although Starkman is talking about the financial catastrophe, the same failure applies more broadly to the way DC journalism covered the rogue takeover of our government by the criminals in the Bush Administration. The one shining exception, of course, was the way they covered Katrina for those six days: as a catastrophe. I liked that little metaphor with the hamsters.

J,LA: Your same link has the Dems voting 84.9% with their party. Sounds pretty lockstep to me. The fact is, Congress is a pretty polarized place, and getting more so.

Also, J-LA, did you read those stats that you sent me? Once again, they seem to say the opposite of what you claim:

In the 110th Congress (2007-2008), the Democrats (under the leadership of you-know-who) voted MORE in lockstep than the Rs, 87.5% compared to 80.7%:

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/110/senate/party-voters/

So shall we agree that BOTH parties vote in lockstep in Congress? Because that sure is what these statistics that you quote seem to say.
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Don’t forget, too, that you are judging Reid on his ability to get things passed (I’m assuming you also mean signed into law) with a 51-vote Democratic majority (one of whom is Lieberman) and a Republican President.
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If he can’t get things done with a 59-vote (or however many it is) majority and a Democratic President, that will be another story.

Anyway, I don’t think either of us is convincing the other, J-LA. So perhaps we should declare that we have exhausted this subject.

No, wait.
In the 110th Congress (2007-2008), the Democrats (under the leadership of you-know-who) voted MORE in lockstep than the Rs, 87.5% compared to 80.7%:
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See, Karen, this doesn’t have anything to do with the issue. You had said that it was easier to be united when a party is in the minority, i.e. not in the majority. I responded that I recalled that the repubs pretty much voted lock-step in the 108th and 109th. They were pretty united when they were in the majority. I provided evidence of that. I mean, regardless of how many red herrings you throw out, that’s what the discussion was. And it’s a pretty minor point, too. It goes back to that amnesia, I think, that I referred to among the DC journo elite.
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Now you are bowing out because you know that I’ve made my point and you won’t admit it. You seem to have that flaw that is ubiquitous around DC, that you refuse to concede a point. It affects your credibility, but of course not your likability. What kind of a journalist refuses to concede a point when presented with facts? Well, you aren’t alone in that strange little quirk that you DC journos have. I haven’t met one yet who would. It’s like in your culture, the journo has to be the all-knowing, and it is some kind of disgrace not to already know something. That prevents you from learning new stuff. Think about it.
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I don’t mean to be hurtful.
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So, okay, let’s declare the debate exhausted. (Walking away, polishing my championship gold star.)

J,LA: Ah, my slippery and stubborn friend, I was not the one who brought out that red herring statistic, it was you (#22). As with your previous citation (#11, which I reposted at #20), it showed EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE of what you said it did. When I posted two stories that showed that Bill Frist was NOT the lean, mean bill-passing machine (#27, #31 and #34 of the previous page) that you said he was (#25 of the previous page), you claimed that you had never actually said that (#38 of the previous page). I’m afraid you are the one who is suffering amnesia here.
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Is there a super-duper platinum star for me? I’m afraid you failed this one miserably.
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What kind of commenter refuses to concede a point when presented with the facts? Well, you aren’t alone in that strange little quirk that you have in this comments section. (Fortunately, I’ve met plenty who are capable of engaging in an argument that makes sense.) It’s like in your culture, you have to be the all-knowing and it is some kind of disagrace not to already know something. This prevents you from learning new stuff.
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Think about it.

I will concede that one commenter here has made some good points in contradiction of mine.
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Unlike J-La, whose idea of argument is to just say everything louder and with citations that don’t say what he says they do, Pluk found two instances where the President influenced the selection of a Senate Majority Leader. So he gets the gold star.

Also, J-LA, next time, try presenting some actual facts, instead of “facts.”

Also, you have indeed presented some new information that I was not aware of. I am now very troubled to discover that the Democrats have been marching in mindless, partisan lockstep in the Senate. Thank you, JLA, for calling that to my attention.

Nice cover, Karen. Awarding your old nemesis pluk the Championship Gold Star is a stroke of genius! I’m pretty certain he would treat it with disdain, to make it even better. That’s pretty rich! 91.8% lockstep isn’t a fact? I was just trying to stick to the issue at hand but you bring in irrelevant pieces from FOX, of all “sources”! as proof of something that I wasn’t even arguing about. It started out such a simple thing: the consensus opinion around here that Reid is incompetent, which you have not disproved though you continue to defend him by telling us this big ole sob story about how hard his job is, and then a mild comment by me that Frist as the majority leader was able to get legislation passed. I mean gee, isn’t that obvious? We have the MCA and the PAA under his watch and two rightwing lunatics added to the Supreme Court, there was the Terry Schaivo legislation, the Orwellian “Clear Skies” Initiative. I won’t list them all, you should know better than me. There’s quite a bit of opinion among normal people that the 109th was the. worst. evah.
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Plus, we have retroactive immunity under Reid’s watch, to illustrate how he incompetently got rolled once again by the bushies. Well, I do admit the Dems were a little more united in passing the bailout, but you can hardly call them lockstep, Blue Dogs and all. You know enough about the Congress to know that, at least. I’m pretty sure. though, now you won’t admit it.
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Well, nevertheless, I’m glad to see that you are actually able to concede a point. It’s the first I’ve seen from you! This might signal a new whole era of better journalism! Sure, go ahead and take your platinum star home. But you know, you haven’t shown me where Frist couldn’t get legislation through.
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J,LA:

Ah, my shrewd and diabolical friend, I am finally on to you. It took me a while, but I finally figured out your game.
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While pretending to be disdainful of Reid’s leadership, you threw us statistics that lead us to the inescapable conclusion that he has in fact brought renewed discipline to the Democratic ranks. (#24)
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Indeed, while he has been in charge, according to the statistics you have presented, Republican unity has disintegrated, and Democratic partisanship has risen (#11, final chart).
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Then, to really drive the point home, you point to the feckless leadership of Bill Frist as a comparison. (#25 of the last page). Where is Frist these days, anyway? We haven’t heard much from him since the 2006 election, which didn’t exactly turn out well for his party in the Senate.
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And you even contend that the Gang of 14 debacle actually represented a VICTORY for the Republicans under Frist’s leadership? (#44) Ah, curses! Why didn’t that one tip me off? The only people I can remember trying to make that argument with a straight face were the McCain people. But I fell for it and engaged, not understanding that you were using some kind of weird reverse Socratic method on me.
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James, for all your cunning, you STILL have not convinced me that we should hail Harry Reid as the greatest Majority Leader of modern time, that he should rank some day with Daniel Webster and Henry Clay as the giants of the Senate.
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We will meet again, my friend. But remember: I am on to you.

Well, Karen, certainly in the 110th, the Dems were more unified, since the bills at issue were actually in the interest of the American people: minimum wage, stem cell, bailout. I mean, even the Blue Dogs, in a presidential election cycle, could hardly join the repubs on those issues. And what was left of the moderate (read sane) Repubs DID vote for the bailout, if not minimum wage. Not that the renewed “party discipline” helped, with the thus-far-unheard-of 60-vote requirement (formerly called filibuster).
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Frist, the owner of a hospital chain, ran for Senate with the intention of changing MediCare reimbursement requirements to benefit his hospitals, which he accomplished via bribery-on-the-Senate-floor midnight vote on the Medicare Prescription Drug Law. His job in the Senate done, he retired to his more lucrative hospital ownership.
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I had defined “effectiveness” in a Senate Majority Leader as getting legislation passed, and asked you what your definition was, which you didn’t answer. But now, I see that your definition is “bringing discipline.” Well, I disagree with that definition, and I think that most people outside of Washington don’t really care about party “discipline” except as it relates to doing the people’s business, that is, passing legislation on the people’s behalf. Perhaps the DC culture loses sight of that. Covering that stuff every day is bound to distort the overall picture and consequently the DC culture obsesses about the minutiae of party politics instead of the substantive stuff. In fact, almost every one of my fellow commenters take you all, as political journos, to task for that.
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As to the Gang of 14, well, sure the repubs didn’t like it and viewed it as treason against the party. So did we dems. I think I just made the point that it benefited Frist in the long run by preventing the dems from filibustering Alito and Roberts. It *turned out* to the Repubs advantage, is all I meant.
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As for my diabolical plan, well we’ll see what ole Harry can do. Sigh. I’m not optimistic. His pugilistic days are far behind, methinks. But who knows, maybe he’ll exceed my expectations. It isn’t unheard of. If and when that happens, Karen, you’ll be the first to know. How’s that?
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