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| "Romney unites Republicans and Democrats." - Jon Stewart |
Welcome to the 55th edition of the Carnival of Divided Government - the Special "Paul Ryan's Express" Edition. This was intended to be the special "Dog Days of Summer" Edition, but the presumptive Republican nominee for President chose this week to make an early announcement of his selection for Vice President. Apropos to our dividist theme, conservatives and liberals embraced the selection of Congressman Paul Ryan for diametrically opposed rationales. Jon Stewart and the Daily Show nail it:
As explained in earlier editions, we have adopted Latin ordinal numeration to impart a patina of gravitas reflecting the historical importance of the series. In this the Carnival of Divided Government LV (Quînque et Quînquâgintâ), as in all of the CODGOV editions, we select volunteers and draftees from the blogosphere and main stream media writing on the single topic of government divided between the major parties (leaving it to the reader to sort out volunteers from draftees).
Consistent with this topic, the primary criteria for acceptance in the carnival is to explicitly use the words and/or concept of "divided government" in submitted posts. A criteria that, to our endless befuddlement, is ignored by many of the bloggers submitting posts, which sadly results in The Dividist reluctantly ignoring their fine submissions. Among the on-topic posts, essays and articles we choose our favorites for commentary and consideration. The Dividist hopes you enjoy these selections. A reminder - Extremism in defense of Divided Government is no Vice-President:
Michael Moran blogging at Slate takes note of the Vice Presidential hopeful wrapping himself in the Reagan legacy and shares his thoughts in "Reagan's Mantle, Ryan's Hope":
Moran despairs of either party adopting the practical pragmatic governing style that was the hallmark of the Reagan presidency. But he glosses over the very reason why pragmatism was a characteristic of that administration - to whit: "Faced with a difficult economy and divided government... Reagan actually worked quite deftly with a Congress in which Democrats held power in both chambers."
The appetite for practical, pragmatic, compromise will be directly proportional to the degree the government remains divided in 2013. There is no chance that the GOP will lose control of the House this cycle, so there is no possibility of the Democrats restoring One Party Democratic Rule. However, the GOP will certainly close the gap in the Senate and have a real possibility of taking control of that chamber. This raises the specter of One Party Republican Rule restored with a Romney / Ryan victory. In that eventuality Moran's fears of an uncompromising intransigent GOP administration will be realized.
However, if any of the three other possible variations of divided government that will likely result from this election prevail, a pragmatic solutions along the lines of the "Grand Bargain" is a virtual certainly. This is where the comparison to the Reagan administration is apt. One difference - This time it is likely to be the Democrat Obama who will need to learn to work deftly with a Congress in which Republicans hold power.
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Michael Moran blogging at Slate takes note of the Vice Presidential hopeful wrapping himself in the Reagan legacy and shares his thoughts in "Reagan's Mantle, Ryan's Hope":"Set aside the question of whether the 1981/2013 comparison is valid or not (the case is dubious at best) and let’s look at what Reagan actually did when he took office.... Faced with a difficult economy and divided government, Reagan chose to mix tax cuts with stimulus spending and, yes, tax increases, too. Bruce Bartlett, an economic advisor to Reagan and a Treasury official under George H. W. Bush, professes amazement at the twisting of the historical record by those too young to remember the factual Reagan...
Bartlett reminds us, “The cumulative legislated tax increase during his administration came to $132.7 billion as of 1988 [$367 billion today]. This compared to a gross tax cut of $275.1 billion. Thus Reagan took back about half the 1981 tax cut with subsequent tax increases... Imagine that! The alleged God of Tax Cuts actually raised taxes when he thought progress, political, economic or otherwise, required him to do so.”
The appetite for practical, pragmatic, compromise will be directly proportional to the degree the government remains divided in 2013. There is no chance that the GOP will lose control of the House this cycle, so there is no possibility of the Democrats restoring One Party Democratic Rule. However, the GOP will certainly close the gap in the Senate and have a real possibility of taking control of that chamber. This raises the specter of One Party Republican Rule restored with a Romney / Ryan victory. In that eventuality Moran's fears of an uncompromising intransigent GOP administration will be realized.
However, if any of the three other possible variations of divided government that will likely result from this election prevail, a pragmatic solutions along the lines of the "Grand Bargain" is a virtual certainly. This is where the comparison to the Reagan administration is apt. One difference - This time it is likely to be the Democrat Obama who will need to learn to work deftly with a Congress in which Republicans hold power.
