Sorry for the DeLay -- 4/6/06
I apologize to all for my recent absence from this site. As the editorial note posted tells you, I have been on the road a bit (I am on leave this semester to do some research for a book), but we have also been dealing with the loss of one beloved pet and the critical illness of another. Sometimes life just trips you up.
There are a couple of issues I’d like to discuss here, but I am going to divide them up over the next couple of days. Look for upcoming posts on immigration and the Massachusetts health care bill. Today we’ll talk about the announcement on Tuesday that Tom DeLay, the former House Majority Leader who resigned that post when he was indicted last year, will resign from Congress and not seek reelection in November.
The news about DeLay came in a Time Magazine exclusive interview with Mike Allen, quickly followed by an announcement by the man himself and nonstop interviews and media coverage everywhere. DeLay says he is quitting to spare the Republican Party the possible loss of his seat and because the upcoming campaign would be incredibly nasty. But DeLay has survived and even flourished in nasty campaigns before. What else is going on here?
The crash in DeLay’s career has been sudden. Just last year he was universally hailed or hated as the most powerful man in the U.S. House, a person who had almost single-handedly changed the way Congress does business (see the discussion of the K Street project below, for example) and who was largely instrumental in fostering the strong partisanship that has characterized American legislative politics since the Clinton years (DeLay was a powerful force behind the Clinton impeachment, for instance). But his tribulations quickly piled up. First he himself was indicted on money laundering charges, for which he still faces a trial. Then two close friends and former staffers have been indicted as part of the investigation into Jack Abramoff, and some believe that investigators are closing in on DeLay as well. (Jonathan Weisman and Chris Cillizza, DeLay to Resign from Congress, WaPo, 4/4/06.) With polls showing him running 50/50 in his district, the possibility that the once invincible “Hammer,” as he was called, could lose the election became very real, prompting his decision to quit (though he says he still believes he could have won).
He says his future plans are still uncertain, though he speaks of becoming a national leader of the conservative movement. The future of the Republicans he leaves behind in Congress is unclear as well. With Bush’s approval ratings too low to provide cohesion, and the man who kept them in line for so long on his way out, Republicans are beginning to show divisions in what once seemed like an unshakable party bloc (Carl Hulse, Republicans Are Finding Their House Now Divided, NYT, 4/6/06) and Democrats are delighted to see their once formidable foes on the ropes. (Howard Kurtz, Three Cheers for DeLay, WaPo, 4/5/06.)
During the DeLay years, the Republicans were remarkably successful at changing the rules of American politics to advantage their party – from the K Street Project to the Texas redistricting that bolstered their majority in the 2004 elections. The Democrats are now starting to think that they may have a chance to take back the majority (though it is a long shot still - see for example this map), at which time, of course, they would try to change the rules back to benefit their party. If you remember the theme of KTR, that politics is about who gets what and how they get it, and that controlling the rules of the game helps you determine who will win and who will lose, much of this battle for control of Congress makes sense. If you remember the old adage that power corrupts, then the fate of Tom Delay begins to make some sense too. The Democrats, who faced corruption in their own ranks during their majority, would do well to remember it too.
More to come in a day or so on immigration and health care.