The Economy vs. The Filibuster

I was reading the opinion section of the New York Times today, as I always do, when my smile grew from ear to ear. I had just finished reading Paul Krugman’s piece, "America Is Not Yet Lost", on how and why the United States Senate should change its rules concerning the implementation of the filibuster due to Republican unwillingness to accomplish anything, which had my smile growing, when I began reading a Times Editorial called “The Truth About the Deficit”.

The entire article outlines why the United States has such a large deficit and how it got to this point. By and large it points out that Republicans are the cause.

“What is…breathtaking is the Republicans’ cynical refusal to acknowledge that the country would never have gotten into so deep a hole if President George W. Bush and the Republican-led Congress had not spent years slashing taxes — mainly on the wealthy — and spending with far too little restraint.”

But, of course, the piece also points out that “Far too many Democrats are losing their nerve,” which, unfortunately, is true. It may be hard for Democratic lawmakers to step up in times like this to fight as hard as they can for what they believe will work considering how Republicans and conservative media will harass them, but it is time to see some backbone on the left.

But the editorial also points out that, contrary to popular belief and what Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and other conservative commentators say, it would be moronic to cut spending.

“Americans should be anxious, for reasons including the huge deficit. But the cold economic truth is this: At a time of high unemployment and fragile growth, the last thing the government should do is to slash spending. That will only drive the economy into deeper trouble.”

While the editorial points out why the deficit is so large and why we should not cut spending, it also does offer solutions. In respect to this, it basically backs President Obama for his bailout last year saying that “the stimulus package slowed job losses and helped spur activity — in the third quarter of 2009, the economy grew at an annual rate of 2.2 percent, and the initial fourth-quarter reading was 5.7 percent, a rebound few thought possible a year ago.” Citing evidence the bailout is working and it endorses President Obama’s decision to put a freeze on “some nonsecurity discretionary spending for three years” and to let the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year.

What the piece says about the Senate is an excellent segue into Paul Krugman’s article, that the Senate Republicans are trying to keep Democrats from passing a “$266 billion on tax credits for hiring and new job-creation investments, and on other short-term stimulus including extended unemployment compensation.” This would, in effect, hurt the economy and would curb any increase in production and employment.

The problem is that now, with Sen. Scott Brown seated, Republicans can pretty much filibuster any progressive bill that could help the American (and dare I say world) economy, which is where Krugman’s opinion piece kicks in.

His piece describes the 17th and 18th century Polish Legislation that worked on the idea of unanimity, meaning if anyone opposed a piece of legislation, it would not pass. That made the country hard to govern considering how work could never get done. Krugman parallels the Polish Legislature (called the “Sejm” if anyone was wondering) with the United States Senate because 41 people can stop a 59 person majority from passing legislation and that one senator can stop “70 high-level government positions” from being confirmed because the Senate works on the basis on unanimity to go ahead with Senate confirmation votes.

Krugman’s solution is to change the rules, “including eliminating or at least limiting the filibuster. This is something they could and should do, by majority vote, on the first day of the next Senate session.”

He’s right.

It’s plain and simple.

If the Senate doesn’t change the voting rules on filibustering nothing productive will ever be accomplished and more importantly, the economy won’t improve as quickly as everyone would like. We need to pressure Senators to change these rules so that things can be done in a way that makes sense, so that majority rules.