Update: Dems, the Bailout and Joe Lieberman
A brief time out for a news break to see where the hell we are today. One could say Joe Lieberman won after the Dems took away a subcommittee chairmanship but left him as Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. Conventional wisdom says Obama pressured Dems including Harry Reid to do what it takes to keep Joe Lieberman in the Dems caucus for his vote. Rush Limbaugh just stated his opinion that Lieberman will grovel to stay in the Dems good graces. This blog has a different take. The Dems as well as the GOP do not know for sure how the undecided Senate races will play out. While there may be other Senators who could consider switching sides in the aftermath to adjust the majority, Lieberman remains a wild card. To defect from the Dems to the GOP now would be premature as the Senate majority may not reach supermajority after the remaining races are decided. Don’t be surprised if Lieberman becomes a Republican if a supermajority results from the outcome of the other Senate races.
The 42/13 vote favoring keeping Lieberman in his Senate chairmanship raises a question. 42 Dems were either going to vote to keep Joe or were feeling pressure from the President-elect or some combination of those two scenarios. The question is how the 13 who voted against him will vote on subsequent issues in the Senate? Depending on what Senate Dems view as necessity between loyalty to their base or brokering deals with the President-elect it is reasonable to expect the performance of Congress and their approval rating from this point forward will mirror that of the 110th Congress or dismal.
Another good point expressed by Limbaugh today was Congressional posturing with the bailout scams. They gave carte blanche to Hank Paulson in hopes of looking good regarding the economy and other financial matters. Now that their bills including oversight have come under fire along with Paulson the ’spectator’ Congress is scrambling for cover and likely searching for scapegoats to take the heat.
This blog has long held Presidents have little effect on the markets or the economy with few exceptions. Granted, a President can effect a day or week’s trading by statements or actions originating from the White House but they usually have about the same effect as published earnings reports for bellwether stocks reported on a quarterly basis. That could be extended to economic reports such as the PPI, CPI, jobs, etc. But one still has to wonder what the impact was over the 2008 campaign reality that the next President would be either Obama or McCain with a marginally different layout in Congress after the dismal performance between the 110th and the Bush Administration beyond the success of the troop surge in Iraq?
As there always is, there will be winners and losers in the public and private sector including ‘main street’ and the public at large while the major issues play out over the next year or two. Besides obsessing over possible extreme and lasting outcomes of the current economic climate in this country it is likely the nation will survive this latest test. The question is will we learn anything from it and act differently in the future? As an addendum to this post, few seem to be analyzing the actions of other countries to the current global economic ‘meltdown’ in terms of the US response thus far. All seem to be injecting cash into the situation or in other words throwing good money after bad just like the US. What does this say about the allegation we are becoming more socialist in our approach to solving problems? Or is it just that Hank Paulson was in a position to assist those he knows on Wall Street and took it? Not like Congress would mind sharing in that effort. After all, how many of them were in part responsible for the subprime mess that started it all?
Stanford Matthews
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Trackposted to Rosemary’s News and Ideas, The Pink Flamingo, Leaning Straight Up, Rosemary’s Thoughts, Faultline USA, third world county, and Dumb Ox Daily News, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe
November 18th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
We can only hope! The less Congress actually does, the happier I am, and I don’t care which party is in power. That attitude will change when Congress decides to start repealing the acts of prior Congresses on a wholesale basis.
November 18th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
Hi Perri,
Thanks for ‘chiming’ in. Some of my remarks in this post were intended to point to what seems a historical tendency over at least the years I’ve been on the planet that all the wailing and gnashing of teeth over any situations described by the term ‘crisis’ are typically followed by some sort of conclusion with little or no improvement on the way we conduct ourselves as a nation.
The current situation will probably be no different. And so it goes.