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Political Crackups
What Happens When Governments Don't Work
By Sebastian Mallaby
Monday, April 10, 2006; Page A17
In the fall of 1992, when a different Bush administration was
unraveling, Shin Kanemaru ran into a little trouble. Kanemaru was the
Tom DeLay of politics in Japan; he was the gruff son of a rural sake
maker who became a political kingmaker, and after he got busted for
taking money from the mob, gold ingots were discovered under his
floorboards. In the ensuing months, two things happened. Japanese
politics underwent convulsive shifts -- the ruling party split, then
lost its grip on power for the first time in four decades. But
Japanese policymaking barely improved. However odious the old crony
boss, the alternative proved nearly as imperfect.
Today the signs of a political crackup are all over Washington. Within
the administration, the White House chief of staff is going, the
Treasury secretary is rumored to be going, and the defense secretary
argues publicly with the secretary of state about whether he made
"tactical errors" in Iraq. The president's domestic policy has
shriveled to pleas for expanded health savings accounts, whose
shockingly muddled design speaks volumes about the administration's
lack of economic talent. In a mark of desperation, Bush has gone off
script to take questions from journalists and citizens. At a forum in
North Carolina on Thursday, he confessed that the torture revelations
from Abu Ghraib had been "disgraceful."
The spectacle in Congress is no prettier. One cannot regret the fall
of Tom DeLay, who combined a mastery of politics with a complete
indifference to its purpose. Really, what did this man seek public
office for? It's said that he was inspired by his conviction that the
Environmental Protection Agency is like the Gestapo, but I suspect
this theory is too kind. Unlike Newt Gingrich, who bristled with
policy ideas, DeLay never seemed to care about anything beyond
counting votes and cultivating links to the moneybags on K Street.
Still, in the absence of a functioning administration and a powerful
House boss, nobody is running the asylum. Senate Majority Leader Bill
Frist, a physician who "diagnosed" Terri Schiavo by watching her on
video, is as charismatic as a stethoscope and as principled as a
cigarette salesman. I doubt many Americans could even recognize
DeLay's successor as House majority leader, John Boehner, let alone
say what he stands for. His most memorable moment came in 1995, when
he chose the House floor as a suitable venue for distributing checks
from tobacco lobbyists.
In theory, this political vacuum presents an opportunity. Liberated
from the DeLay-K Street axis, the GOP could become less of a political
machine and more genuinely interested in governing. But the signs so
far aren't good. Last week House Republicans began debating a budget
framework, then decided the whole thing was awfully hard and shelved
it. The House considered some bad tax legislation, too, but couldn't
get around to making progress.
For a brief moment last week, the Senate seemed poised to produce a
worthwhile immigration bill. But this turned out to be a feint, and in
the end the whole thing fizzled. The fight laid bare the deep splits
among Republicans: on one side, business-backed moderates; on the
other side, spluttering nativists whose contributions to public policy
include proposals to bomb Mecca. A president who wasn't quacking and
limping might perhaps have secured a deal. But in the wake of
Hurricane Katrina, the implosion of the Bush domestic agenda and
unrelentingly awful Iraq news, this proved impossible.
The Republicans' dismal performance could shake their grip on power --
much as the gold-ingot episode upset Japan's politics. But the top
congressional Democrats seem barely more attractive than the
Republicans; they have mastered the art of obstructionism but are
light on policy proposals. In Japan in the 1990s, the collapse of the
cronyistic ruling party was expected to usher in economic change that
would pull the country out of its financial swamp. Instead, reform
proceeded at a glacial pace, and it took a full decade for the economy
to get going again.
The paradox of politics is that government is at once essential and
dysfunctional. Globalization, demographic change, the sheer fact of
economic growth: All these shifts create demands for government to
step in, as a provider of safety nets for workers; retirement security
for seniors; and public goods such as environmental quality and food
safety, which become priorities as societies grow richer. But
governments have a way of screwing up. France can't even take baby
steps toward fixing its labor market without provoking riots; Italy is
led by a high-heeled tycoon who passes laws to protect himself from
prosecutors, though the election yesterday and today may dispatch him.
Despite a world economy that's growing at a record pace, governments
in rich countries can't even pass the basic test of balancing their
budgets. At least the American political system is not alone in its
pathologies.
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