Steny Hoyer: Worst Democrat Alive, or Ever?
Thursday, October 1, 2009 at 05:09PM No Associated Press content was harmed in the writing of this post
The headline is hyperbole, of course, and is just a cheap ruse to get you reading (look, it worked!) Any party that Strom Thurmond ever called home has the bar for Worst Ever set higher than Steny Hoyer can dream of clearing. Worst Alive, though - he gets my vote. What qualifies someone for that honor? First, the candidate cannot be a relative unknown plugging away at a fairly low level. There has to be the ability to do something really meaningful along with the production of something abysmal. A midlevel bureaucrat or county commissioner could be thoroughly disreputable and an incorrigible crook, but not the worst Democrat alive. Sheer magnitude of criminality is not enough. Stature is required.
Someone like William Jefferson is closer, but still not within shooting distance. He was not that well known nationally before his arrest, and the details of his crime seem almost like a caricature of Big Easy shenanigans. Moreover, the case didn’t have any legs. It did not bring down any other Democrats, nor was it something like the ruinous catalyst Mark Foley’s case was for the Republicans (which broke in the heat of election season, foreshadowed the Larry Craig/David Vitter scandals and contributed to a crippling perception of GOP hypocrisy). A little closer is John Edwards, who had nationwide recognition and attempted to win the Democratic presidential nomination with a secret nearly guaranteed to be exposed before the election. He did not get the chance to do so, though. Massive damage barely averted is still averted. No harm, no foul (but no second chance either).
Actual damage, prominence, implications for the party as a whole: These seem to be the essential ingredients. Consistent badness matters, too. For instance, Jay Rockefeller is no friend civil liberties. He was a tool of the telecommunication industry when it came to retroactive immunity for illegal surveillance. He wants to give the president outrageously excessive powers to control the internet. And he is not just on the wrong side of these issues, he actively promotes them. But on health care he has redeemed himself so completely that Marcy Wheeler took the extraordinary step of revoking her previously bestowed nickname for him (“Jello Jay”) given in honor of his unwillingness to show some spine when dealing with the Bush administration. Similarly, Michael Moore is pushing for a primary challenge to Chris Dodd because of his compromising ties to the financial industry, but Dodd was a lone and inspiring Senate voice in trying to prevent the Constitutional assault known as the FISA Amendments Act. (I agree he looks very bad on his loans, but he has an awful lot of good will to burn through in my book before I call for his ouster. Insert “LEAVE CHRIS DODD ALONE!” rant here.)
All of that narrows it down to Hoyer and Harry Reid (aka Senator Uriah Heep). Reid is in a position to do more damage to liberal priorities since he is at the top in the Senate and Hoyer is only second in the House. Usually they are neck and neck for the title, and while I do not question the judgment of anyone who gives Reid the nod, I think Hoyer has pulled ahead lately. First, Harry actually did something useful this week by canceling the Senate’s October 12th Columbus Day recess, giving the Senate just a little more time to get health care done via reconciliation before its deadline on the 15th. Hoyer has not skipped a beat, though.
He is in bed with the financial services industry like Dodd appears to be. He tried to sell out the public option, then when he got smacked down by Nancy Pelosi would only say it is “in flux.” He proudly shepherded the loathsome FISA “reforms” through the House. Now that some Senators are trying (maybe foolishly and in vain) to undo some of the damage he announces his opposition. Is there any upside to having this guy in the party? Every time he is in the news it is because he is busy kneecapping progressives. I hope he performs absolutely legendary constituent services because all of his positions seem to come straight from the George W. Bush playbook.
By the way, Rodricks’ column points out Hoyer’s “only opponent in the 2006 election was a Green Party candidate with under $10,000 in contributions.” He clearly has no incentive to act like a Democrat. If party leaders think that does not matter outside Maryland’s 5th Congressional District they should have a look at Germany, where “the big loser of [last] Sunday’s election is still undoubtedly the center-left Social Democrats…The party is only 10 percentage points ahead of its upstart far-left rival, the Left Party.” A base is neglected at a party’s peril.
Reader Comments (11)
Sorry, Dan. As you suggest, Chris Dodd can't be a contender, because he also does a number of good things.
Steny Hoyer is an interesting possibility. but it's mostly because he has no good deeds to balance his bad. The bad things he does are banal, but he can't seem to find a single good thing to do to cover up his opportunism. However, in recent weeks, Hillary Clinton has come from behind to sweep the polls and, although she's not an elected Democrat, she is indelibly a Democrat. The nomination comes from a story by Al Giordano here as Hillary installs a real live death squad supporter to handle negotiations for a country suffering from death squads.
But of course that's only the crowning act so far. If you haven't seen me much at Avedon's, it's because I have been doing the gritty day-to-day journaling of the misdeeds. Clinton has run a brilliantly devious game pretending to support a fairminded solution while repeatedly giving the dictatorship critical support, delaying sanctions, supporting a "settlement" that is an insult to the intelligence... on and on, she is well into George Bush territory, except that she's good at doing evil.
Two years ago, I fully expected to vote for Hillary Clinton for president. I admired her for hanging tough through a vicious Republican assault through the 90s. (Sure, she bungled health care reform, but it was a very tall order and Bill didn't give her much help and her heart seemed to be in the right place). But now I realize that she was just as bad as the Republicans said-- just innocent of the specific things they accused her of.
Thanks for the Giordano link, Charles. I hadn't known that part of the Honduras story (and to be honest I haven't followed it as closely as I should have). Clinton probably wasn't going rogue though - I'm sure she did what she did with the knowledge and support of the State Department, the foreign policy establishment and (ahem) the president.
Hoyer is an admirable choice...but let's not forget Indiana's own shame...Evan (F******) Bayh--perhaps the most Republican of the Blue Dogs. He has constantly pledged to fight a public option, rarely acknowledging an obvious conflict of interest--his wife Susan is on the Wellpoint board of directors. Add this to his continuing resistance to Obama's agenda and insipid defense of same and you have a buffoon to give Steny a real run for his money.
Don't forget Bayh's defense of keeping Lieberman as chair of the Homeland Security Committee, crcombine. He's definitely a strong candidate, though I don't know if he's high enough in the leadership to claim the title (he certainly seems to aspire to, though).
I'm just galumphing in here to state the obvious: we need to make a habit of voting for the person with the smallest campaign chest. Wouldn't that kind of work or at least be a healthy change? At least for Congress?
Much appreciate Charles' words about Hillary. She is a baddy. They're all bad which has to do, I swear, with just how lousy and self-deluding we are as voters. Time to get real.
I nominate Dianne Feinstein as Most Effective Senior Democrat At Quietly Routing Actual Progressive Measures Into A Dark Procedural Cloakroom Wherein They Are Soundlessly Killed.
I'd vote for Obama only because he's the awful Democrat with the most power. Let's see, kept Gates who appointed the awful McChrystal (I guess Obama's childhood in Indonesia was good for something). He's exerted the same executive powers with regard to secrecy as Bush. He's for "preventive" detention. He's kept Bagram up and going. He voted for FISA. He whipped for TARP. He reappointed Bernanke and generally supported shoveling huge amounts of money to the banks. And I'm not even going to get into his education policy and healthcare policy, which are both corporate giveaways.
If all of these things got Bush "worst president ever", then surely Obama, who is continuing most Bush policies albeit with rebranding, is the worst Democrat.
In short, Steny Hoyer wishes he could serve his corporate masses so well.
Read the Honduras piece, what a mess. But I do have one question, why the hell is the Bush-appointed ambassador still there at the OAS? Because as I understand it, that's the guy who is the problem, the Bush holdover. And his job is, if I understand the piece right, the Ambassador to the OAS. So the person Clinton sent to the OAS is the one whose job it is to represent the US at the OAS. She didn't appoint him some sort of special representative or something from what I can tell. Which doesn't make it right to have him represent the US on this issue or at the OAS at all, I'm just trying to figure out what happened. So correct me if I'm wrong. This is a Bush guy who is hanging around.
How is it that this Administration not only can't get appointments made, that's annoying but no big deal, but they've left in the Bush people to continue on in so many places (see, US Attorneys Offices). That, unfortunately, starts at the top but the WH doesn't want to look "partisan" and so these creeps are all over government. This one just happened to get attention because of the events in Honduras.
Okay, I think I answered my own question. Contrary to what the article indicated, Amselem is not a Bush holdover because he appears to be a career person(Dep. Rep. to OAS) acting as the rep. to the OAS while waiting for confirmation of Obama's nominee (Carmen Lomellin). Although he was elevated to the Deputy position at OAS, despite his history, by the Bush Administration.
Thanks for all the comments, BDBlue. It's been a crazy weekend so I haven't been able to stay on top of the site. Just one quick response, Obama certainly seems to be putting his résumé for WDA together. There's a lot of talk in health care about bending the cost curve. With DC wired for Republican control (as JM put it) I don't expect a Democratic president to whipsaw everything to a liberal direction, but things like, say, ramping up Afghanistan don't do much to bend the wingnut curve.
leading U.S. politicians? not believe. better ask the owners of petroleum reckoning