The House Republican leadership's ability to exercise its will over its members is diminishing. I guess that one's obvious.
The Republican "nay"s were not simply a collection of moderates; this is a right-left coalition of no votes, with people like Jim Gibbons (R-NV), Cliff Stearns (R-FL), and Butch Otter (R-ID) voting no because it doesn't reduce revenue far enough or otherwise damage spending, while Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons voting no because they need to keep their jobs.
We've been here before; usually, these problems were usually swept under the rug in conference committee. But the budget is out of conference now, so the House would have to send it back in order to mollify the few needed nay votes.
This is, I think, a strong argument against turning American government into a more parliamentary style democracy. When the wheels come off, they really come off, and it becomes difficult to get anything done. The only way Clinton got anything done in 1994 was by negotiating with Republicans, and at some point Bush will need to negotiate with Democrats in order to get anything done. After 1994, though, the Clinton administration operated in a very haphazard fashion, and learned to form "creative" coalitions on any given issue (such as joining with Tom DeLay on special needs adoption or Roscoe Bartlett on climate change). If you constantly operate in a parliamentary style, it's too difficult to change course and find roving coalitions that are willing to negotiate with you.
Pre-publishing update:Looks like we spoke too soon. "Narrow win for bill that cuts $50B for poor, students and farmers". (Roll Call). It looks like House leadership simple scaled back the cuts to food stamps, free school lunches, welfare benefits and other programs, but those programs will still be cut. As Warren Buffet says, if there's a class war going on, his class is winning.
An interesting note: all of the "nay" votes from the right came back into the fold.
Dear press corps: It is not a deficit control bill. The Republican budget cuts spending by $50B, but also reduces revenue by $70B. By the Fundamental Theorem of Elementary School Arithmetic, the new budget will increase the deficit. Good work, folks.
