Warning: Politics

I very rarely blog about politics, except in the economic sense, because I have no wish to know what the political persuasions of my clients are. There are times, however, because I am a very politically active individual, that I don't have much choice. This is one of those times. If you don't want to hear it, just move along and I promise tomorrow I'll be back to bashing the BCS or waxing philosophical about the meaning of life. Not that you'll necessarily like that better, but hey, you're here, so there must be something appealing to you about all this.

As the returns from around the nation began to come in yesterday, I was sitting in HQ here at the Group and talking with a neighbor who is not a political person. He asked me what the difference was between Democrats and Republicans, a question I get a lot these days. I gave him the usual answer, which is that Republicans stand for lower taxes, smaller government, and the traditional Judeo-Christian ethic of respect for innocent life and punishment for the guilty, respect for traditional morality, and a powerful, active military. Democrats stand for a government whose job it is to solve social problems, protection of the weak (especially domestically), and a permissive social policy, a strong emphasis on diplomacy instead of arms, and a bureaucracy whose purpose is to keep people from hurting themselves. On social policy, Democrats generally favor leaving you alone, where Republicans generally meddle. On economic policy, Republicans generally favor leaving you alone, while Democrats generally meddle. All this is, of course, drifting quite fast to the "meddling everywhere" side of things, because the actual meddling is done neither by Republicans or by Democrats, but by bureaucrats, whose jobs depend on increasing the number of problems there are to solve. Thus government increases in scope and power by itself.

But as I was giving this civics lecture, it occurred to me that this explanation did not do a good job of boxing up the current situation. In all reality, the difficulties Republicans were having last night were not difficulties of economic policy or social policy (though there was a huge backlash at the spendthrift GOP), but of ethics. So I restarted the lecture thus:

Democrats play politics like rugby, or football. There are rules, but the game is so fast that the rules are subject to an incredible array of interpretations, and the referees cannot see everything. Therefore if you have perfected a method of holding as an offensive lineman, and your opponent never makes any tackles, you're going to be an all-star, never mind that what you're doing is against the rules. Steroids? Fine, as long as you win, and don't get caught. For the Democrats, the purpose of the game is to win, winning being defined as "being effective" in office, mostly by expanding the size of the bureaucracy so as to increase the ability of the government to solve problems. For the Democrats, what you do outside the office is irrelevant. What you do inside the office is also irrelevant, as long as it does not diminish your ability to bring home the bacon.

Republicans, however, are playing golf. They police themselves. When they contravene the rules, they call penalties on themselves. Golf is not a contact sport, and it does not move at all quickly, and there are no referees. Things are pretty black and white. No one can possibly perfect an illegal move that makes him more effective a golfer; either he can put the ball in the cup or he can't. Either he grounded the club in a hazard (one-stroke penalty) or he didn't. If he signs an incorrect scorecard, he is disqualified, even if the mistake is not discovered until days later (as opposed to football, where there are several notable examples of teams getting away with clearly illegal behavior that led to points being scored, but no team has EVER given those points back). For Republicans, holding office is a trust of honor, and that honor is expected to be upheld in and out of the office. Dishonorable conduct outside the office is as great a sin as such conduct in the office, and most such conduct is grounds for dismissal.

This goes a long way toward explaining the political divide of the last fifteen years. Bill Clinton did what the Democrats wanted him to do, thus an affair that would have been grounds for a harrassment suit, perjury, and other personal misconduct was perceived by Democrats as being no big deal ("it's just about sex"), while for Republicans it was grounds for impeachment. At the same time the impeachment was going on, Rep. Henry Hyde was about to be elected Speaker of the House when it was discovered that he had an affair. Not an affair with an employee, or an affair that happened in the workplace itself, or one that led to perjured testimony, but a simple affair where the Congressman slept with a woman that wasn't his wife. Hyde admitted the affair (not attempting to redefine "sex" to mean, apparently, fully-naked coital relations and nothing else, as Clinton did), and not only was he not elected Speaker, he resigned from the House altogether and has disappeared from politics. Quick, for ten points, what party was Henry Hyde a member of?

There are many, many recent examples as well. Here's one: Rep. Duke Cunningham, Republican from California, was convicted of accepting bribes, resigned his seat and went to jail this year. Rep. Alcee Hastings, Democrat from Florida, was a U.S. District Court judge until 1989, when he was impeached and convicted of corruption (taking bribes) and perjury. He was elected to Congress in 1992 and sometime in January will become the Chairman of the House Foreign Intelligence Committee.

Here's another: Rep. Tom DeLay (R) was indicted (though not convicted) for several violations of election law regarding money used to buy advertising. Most of the charges were dismissed as being utterly without foundation. DeLay, however, resigned as Speaker of the House and later resigned his seat altogether, a seat which yesterday was won by the Democrats. Rep. Alan Mollohan, ranking Democrat on the HOUSE ETHICS COMMITTEE, funneled over $150 million of federal money through five nonprofit corporations in his home district, and saw his personal wealth through "investing" with "business associates" (the same ones running the nonprofits) rise over the same period from $500,000 to $6.5 million, though he has not been convicted of anything. Yesterday he was re-elected to Congress.

The best example I know of is the very recent scandal involving Rep. Mark Foley (R) of Florida, who was exposed as having sent explicit sexual instant messages to a House page, who may or may not have been underage at that time. He has not been charged with anything, as no crime has been proved to have been committed. Nevertheless, he resigned in disgrace from the House and his seat, too, was won yesterday by the Democrats. Rep. Gerry Studds, Democrat from Massachusetts, was censured by the House in 1983 for actually having sex with a male page, whom he transported to North Africa for the purpose, thus evading state statutory-rape law. He refused to apologize, turned his back on the House during the reading of the censure, continued to caucus with the Democrats thereafter, received a standing ovation in his first public appearance in his home district after the censure, and was re-elected to the House six more times.

[An aside - Republican Dan Crane was also censured at that time for having consensual sex with a female page. He apologized, left the House after his censure, and was defeated for re-election.]

There are more, but you get the point. Republicans cannot abide hypocrisy. If you promise "No New Taxes", then sign some into law, you will lose your bid for re-election. This doesn't always happen, but it does happen often. Democrats never lose over things like that.

So yesterday, a large number of Republicans lost. Some of them were good men and women that didn't deserve to be defeated, and who would have made (and have made previously) good congresspeople. The Republicans can complain about being held to a higher standard, and they are, and it's nothing to complain about. They're playing golf. Golf is a gentleman's game. It is possible that politics cannot be played this way with any success anymore, but more likely, the Republican Party forgot what game they were supposed to be playing. I still think the majority of Americans think the way Republicans are supposed to, and cannot abide Republicans who play football when they're supposed to be playing golf. If the GOP returns to the links, I believe it will return to power.

In the meantime, though, if anyone thinks that the Democratic Party will clean up the corruption in D.C., they are too stupid to be allowed out alone. The Democrats invented corruption. They aren't shocked by it and don't think there's anything particularly wrong with it, unless Republicans do it, and then they only pretend to be angry about it long enough to get rid of the fellow that got caught. Heck, the one Democrat that was willing to say that he didn't think it was appropriate for Clinton to be having sex in the Oval Office was defeated in the Democratic primary, and only won yesterday, running as an independent, because the Bush White House told Republicans to vote for him instead of the Republican candidate. Can you imagine such behavior from the Clinton White House in favor of a former Republican Vice-Presidential candidate?

We will assuredly get higher taxes, and indictments (or at least investigations) of a parade of public figures, most of them Republicans, a few of whom will deserve it. We will get almost nothing else. And that's about what we deserve.