Democrats and Republicans make nice in new political whirl
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Top congressional leaders offered olive branches to one another as the new political math claimed its first victim.
In the wake of the GOP’s surprising capture of a Senate seat in Massachusetts, the political calculus has been reconfigured, as both Democrats and Republicans try to find a way to work together on issues including healthcare, which was at the heart of the electoral upset.
“There is a way for us to work together,” House Minority Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia said this morning in a televised news conference. “Republicans have proffered solutions. I am hopeful these elections have sent the message.”
Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada was equally generous in opening the Senate session this morning after a holiday break. The Senate’s last official full business was passing its version of healthcare in a painful holiday-week push that fostered bitterness rather than bipartisanship.
“As we do all these things,” Reid said of the coming agenda, including dealing with healthcare and jobs, “we will continue to leave a seat at the table for our Republican colleagues. Whether their caucus comprises 40 or 41 members, each composes this body of 100. We should all be united within the walls of this esteemed chamber, not defined by the aisle that divides its desks.”
Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), the unsuccessful GOP presidential candidate, urged a return to the bargaining table and what he called “honest negotiations.”
“We know healthcare costs are out of control,” McCain said. “We want to be part of that process so I urge the president and my colleagues – now 59 of them -- to say stop, and start from the beginning.”
While the Democrats struggled to figure out their strategy for healthcare reform, the administration lost its nominee to head the Transportation Security Administration. Weeks ago, Reid had promised a cloture vote on the nomination, but now lacking 60 votes, the nomination of Erroll Southers fell apart.
Southers announced this morning that he was withdrawing because his nomination had become a “lightning rod” for those with a political agenda. Obama had tapped Southers, a Los Angeles airport official and former FBI agent, to lead the TSA, but the nomination was blocked by Republican Sen. Jim DeMint, of South Carolina.
Obama has walked away from other nominees and officials who have had political problems, but the fall of Southers was different. He already had gone through the committee process, had confessed past transgressions and had some GOP support. With DeMint’s opposition, Reid simply didn’t have the votes.
-- Michael Muskal
