The Diehard Holdouts

The new Republican majority in the House of Representatives has arrived in Washington with all its tea party veterans, born again Christians and conservative activists. That’s the way it goes in a democracy and that’s both democracy’s strength as well as its weakness. No one can prevent elected representatives from doing stupid things for a couple of years.

What we know so far about Republican congressional plans is that they’re a long way from being a coherent platform. That’s all right because it’s the opposition’s job to oppose. But there’s a big difference between opposing and obstructing, and it’s blatantly obvious that many Republicans are all too willing to cross that line. Their theory of sharing power is that compromise between the White House and Congress degenerates into political irresponsibility in practice.

It will be Obama’s difficult task to work productively with this legislature. That’s not unimaginable, as his successes in passing important legislation in December have shown. But it isn’t probable, because Republicans want to deny Obama further such achievements in order to prevent his reelection in 2012.

The big question will be whether the Republican House leadership will succeed in keeping its own ranks closed and unified in opposition to Obama as Republicans in the Senate have. If they do, not much will be accomplished in the coming two years. But that’s the point at which U.S. democracy encounters its own self imposed limits: It’s not only the conservative House majority that’s democratically elected. President Obama and his majority in the Senate are as well. The Republicans would do well to keep that in mind.