Bill Frist's Persistent Legislative State

I can't get out of my head the fact that the leader of the Republican majority in the Congress proposed a $100 bribe to get his party on the side of Americans feeling the gas crunch. We hear a lot about tipping points, the moment when the country collectively wakes up from their stupor and realizes that the folks running the show are the most incompetent boobs ever the hold the office. But this may really be that tipping point.

If you polled Americans about their thoughts on this rebate, I'd guess you'd get about 95% opposition. Real Republicans would hate it because it's a government handout; Democrats hate it because it's naked political pandering; and everybody agrees that $100 is a pitiful sum that maybe would fill up your SUV for a week. It's also clear that giving taxpayers $100 dollars so they can give it over to the oil companies is kind of corporate welfare by proxy, and in a time when people are starting to get educated about global warming and America's addiction to oil, it's the polar opposite of encouraging conservation.

The New York Times has an analysis of the short and painful life of this proposal, and it reads like an Adam Nagourney hit piece on Democrats, only with a different target. Frist is portrayed in the piece as hastily agreeing to the idea without telling his colleagues, forcing them to defend something they didn't particularly like:

That night, Mr. Frist's chief of staff, Eric Ueland, and a handful of other Senate staff members — the worker bees who drive the machinery of Congress while their bosses take either the credit or the heat — came up with their own version of an idea that had been circulating among Democrats (I'd like to see any Democratic attribution for that- ed.): a rebate to taxpayers, in this case for $100. Mr. Frist signed off and made plans to introduce it at a news conference the next day.

But the idea, part of a larger eight-point plan, fell flat. It was ridiculed by consumers and scorned by fellow Republicans in and out of Congress, including some of the seven senators who, like Mr. Thune, had stood beside Mr. Frist to announce it.

"I never was in favor of that," Mr. Thune said Thursday. "We all got out there and tried to put our best face on it."

[...]

Mr. Frist failed to air the plan with all of his Republican colleagues, a serious oversight in the eyes of lawmakers who were caught off guard when they heard about it. One Republican, Senator John E. Sununu of New Hampshire, said that after he caught wind of it he quietly tried to steer leadership aides away. "I made it clear in no uncertain terms to some of the staff that this was bad politics and bad policy," Mr. Sununu said.

Without feeling invested in the rebate, senators felt free to criticize it publicly. One of the first to do so, Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, acknowledged that Mr. Frist had been hurt by the episode. But he said there were other victims as well.

"I think it hurt all of us," Mr. Cornyn said, referring to his Republican colleagues. "It appeared to be a nonserious response to a serious problem."

[...]

In one sign of how haphazardly the plan had been thrown together, lobbyists for businesses — an important element of the Republican base — quickly mobilized against a provision that would have generated billions of dollars by changing the way businesses treat inventories for tax purposes The business lobby complained that it had not been consulted, and by Monday Mr. Frist had scuttled the provision.

The coup de grâce for the rebate came on Tuesday afternoon, when the House Republican leader, John A. Boehner of Ohio, called the plan insulting.

Later, at a White House meeting, Mr. Boehner told Mr. Frist he had not realized it was Mr. Frist's plan. But the political damage was done: the story of the House leader lambasting an idea from his Senate counterpart was impossible for the news media to resist.

Those stumbling, bumbling Republicans.

That this proposal came from the Majority Leader gave it the imprimatur of a Republican proposal. Debbie Stabenow was apparently out there pushing a $500 rebate, but she was marginalized as just a voice in the wind. This was one instance where the "top-down" structure of the GOP ended up hurting them in the minds of the electorate. Republicans then had to scramble to disassociate from the idea, which meant they had to publicly fight about it, also hurting their image.

This passage shows exactly how things have changed during the Bush Presidency, and could be the most hopeful sign for Democratic resurgence in a long while.

Mr. Ueland turned to a senior aide on the Senate Finance Committee, Mark Prater, for guidance. The committee staff had calculated the cost of the federal gasoline tax at $11 a month for the average consumer, roughly $100 over nine months.

Mr. Prater reminded Mr. Ueland that the Bush administration in 2001 sent rebate checks to taxpayers . Mr. Ueland ran the idea past his boss.

"It seemed reasonable to him," Mr. Ueland said, describing Mr. Frist's reaction.

But the reaction of conservative talk-show hosts was hostile. Though the rebate was couched in a broader plan that included provisions to allow drilling in the Arctic refuge, protect against price gouging and repeal tax incentives that benefit energy companies, the proposed $100 rebate provided a neat sound bite. Callers denounced it as pandering, and Rush Limbaugh said senators were "treating us like we're a bunch of whores."

I remember when everybody got their $300 in 2001. Most people I knew were kind of OK with it, happily musing about where to spend it. Something has changed in the American character. Obviously we were in a time of surplus then, and deficit now. But maybe it's something deeper. Maybe it's that it happened in an election year, and it looked too much like buying our vote on the cheap. Or maybe we see the disaster of Iraq, Katrina, and Medicare Part D and wonder why we're being bought off when that money could go where it's needed. Maybe, as Michael Tomasky noted, Americans want to contribute to the common good, to something greater than themselves, and getting one C-note just doesn't seem kosher.

Or maybe the Eureka moment has occurred. Maybe everyone looked at their morning paper and said, "My God, these guys have no idea what they're doing. Giving away a hundred dollars?" (Or, as we've all put it in the Dr. Evil voice, ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS!!!) The bankruptcy of the supposed "party of ideas" was on full display. People are done with such an unserious approach to governing. That's what the low Presidential approval ratings are all about. He doesn't take his job seriously. He talks down to the American people. He treats us like children. And now we see that the Republican Congress is the same thing.

I think this could be an important moment for the Democrats if they take the reins. I want to see DNC ads highlighting this ridiculous rebate. The Republicans will whine that they pulled the proposal and the Dems don't have any ideas of their own, but the people will get the point. These guys don't know what they're doing. They'll say anything to get your vote. They'll even pay you off. I envision a humorous ad where a bagman hands a voter a package, reminding the voter to "vote for us in November" or something. The voter hurriedly opens it to find it's mostly bubblewrap and straw, with a single hundred-dollar bill inside. "A hundred dollars? What a ripoff!" Then the factual information. "The Democrats don't think you can be bought and paid for. These are serious times. They call for real solutions. The Republicans don't have them."