Dr. K. points out what several people have already mentioned – a Democratic congress (assuming that the stupid Republicans can pull themselves together and take control in November ) will have three months to create more mischief and push through even more liberal legislation, and then wait for the 2012 elections where they can hope for a comeback. Krauthammer rightfully reminds us never to underestimate “The Stupid Party” aka the G.O.P. and their capacity for putting their foot in their mouth with congressmen doing things like apologizing to B.P.(which was a public relations disaster no matter how many GOP drones and apparatchiks tried to spin it otherwise).
by Charles Krauthammer
Barack Obama’s considerable political capital, earned on Election Day 2008, is spent. Well spent, mind you, on the enactment of a highly ideological agenda of Obamacare, financial reform and a near-trillion-dollar stimulus that will significantly transform the country. But spent nonetheless. There’s nothing left with which to complete his social-democratic ambitions. This would have to await the renewed mandate that would come with a second inaugural.
That’s why, as I suggested last week, nothing of major legislative consequence is likely to occur for the next 2 1/2 years. Except, as columnist Irwin Stelzer points out, for one constitutional loophole: a lame-duck Congress called back into session between the elections this November and the swearing-in of the 112th Congress next January.
Leading Democrats are already considering this as a way to achieve even more liberal measures that many of their members dare not even talk about, let alone enact, on the eve of an election in which they face a widespread popular backlash to the already enacted elements of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda.
That backlash will express itself on Election Day and result, as most Democrats and Republicans currently expect, in major Democratic losses. It is still possible for the gaffe-happy Republicans to blow it. When the ranking GOP member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee publicly apologizes to the corporation that unleashed the worst oil spill in American history, you know the Republicans are capable of just about anything.
[…]
It’s a target-rich environment. The only thing holding the Democrats back would be shame, a Washington commodity in chronically short supply. To pass in a lame-duck session major legislation so unpopular that Democrats had no chance of passing it in regular session — after major Democratic losses signifying a withdrawal of the mandate implicitly granted in 2008 — would be an egregious violation of elementary democratic norms.
Read the rest here: Beware the lame duck
Tags: Charles Krauthammer
