We’ve all been waiting to see what the GOP will look like after their election defeat—–well we don’t have to wait until January because last night’s showdown over the auto bailout gave us a clue. The “new” GOP will be more conservative and ideologically driven, and for an example look at their behavior in the U.S. Senate last night.
Instead of showing some maturity like President Bush and his administration, Senate Republicans engaged in a union busting campaign driven by ideology as opposed to pragmatism. Last night, the conservative leadership presented a false choice to the UAW, and then turned around and blamed the UAW when the legislation failed.
So what did the Republicans want? Basically, they wanted to rip up the UAW contract that expires in 2011 and slash wages for workers from a contract that had already been implemented. The UAW has made massive concessions to management and now all new hires are paid the same as workers who work for foreign automakers in America. More simply put- unions and management have solved the wage problem as it relates to the future, yet some current workers operate under agreements that were negotiated prior to new concessions. So, these “free market conservatives” wanted to unilaterally alter a contract privately negotiated between two parties—-ironic, right?
In a spirit of further concession the UAW was willing to overhaul worker wages once the existing contract expired in 2011. In 2011, the government “Car Czar” would work to facilitate these negotiations to ensure that a new contract was competitive. Although this idea seems rather reasonable [I mean even Bush was OK with it], the radical cabal in the Senate couldn’t wait to bust the UAW.
Last night’s debate will most likely be a moot point because the Bush Administration appers willing to use TARP funds to keep the industry afloat, yet we’ve seen a preview into how the GOP will operate in the 111th Congress.
Far right ideology will likely govern their approach to healthcare, energy, hate crimes, stem cells and the economy because the members of their caucus are largely more
southern and more conservative than has been the case in previous sessions. Although these GOPers in Congress are true believers in their principles, their chances for electoral success become dimmer as they seem more far right. All of the big action in the next year will take place in Congress so the GOP brand is likely to be shaped by the message that emanates from the Republican caucus. So far, it appears as if this message will be more conservative and this likely does not bode well with an electorate that is increasingly moderate and in favor of more government action.
-Rizzo
December 12, 2008 at 8:23 pm
Excellent analysis! The GOP has placed a high-stakes bet with their rejection of their strident ideological approach. They run the risk of the Democrats using their actions to portray Republicans as not only uncaring toward the plight of workers, ignorant and uncaring of the cascade effect towards suppliers of the Big 3, but of being uncaring about the U.S. economy as a whole. Rather, they would cling to ideological theory than try to help alleviate the very real economic pain the country is experiencing.
Prior to their actions to stop the UAW bailout, I put the GOP’s chances of picking up seats in congress in the 2010 mid-term elections at roughly 60%. Now I give them only about a 30% chance of picking up seats, a 30% chance of maintaining the status-quo, and a 40% of losing additional seats. Unfortunately for them, they have not learned the lesson’s of the 2006 and 2008 elections – one of them was not that the U.S. was embracing liberalism, but rather it was rejecting ideological conservatism, and wanting to move back to the center.