Republicans Too Eager To Compromise
November 13, 2002
It was George Santayana, the American poet and philosopher, who said, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ As the Republicans prepare to take back the Senate, they appear to be dismissing the words of Santayana. Sometimes I think the Republicans are nothing like their emblem, the elephant. Their memories are shorter than Bill Clinton’s fidelity.
It turns out that before the election, Trent Lott, current Republican minority leader, made a deal with Tom Daschle, current Democrat majority leader, that no matter what happened in the November 5 th election, the Democrats would be allowed to hold on to their chairmanships of the senate committees until January. Why would Lott agree to something like that? What would he possibly have to lose by saying no? When questioned, neither side denied it.
It seems the Republicans can’t remember how Daschle treated them while they were in the minority. There was no sharing of committee chairmanships. There was no compromise. There was no bipartisanship. It was Daschle and his agenda.
Well, now the tables have turned. Later this month, Jim Talent from Missouri will take over Democrat Jean Carnahan’s seat, thus giving the Republicans the majority once again. Trent Lott is moving quickly to make sure he’s back in the driver’s seat. Not so fast, Trent. Why should the Republicans automatically reinstall a man to a position he was so willing to compromise?
And not just in the last session in which he served as majority leader. Remember the Clinton impeachment trial? Who was it that cut the House Managers off at the knees just as they were going in for the kill? You guessed it. Trent Lott. They had the president dead to rights. His conduct had, indeed, risen to the level of an impeachable offense. That was proven so vividly after the trial when the judge in the Paula Jones case fined him for perjury, a clearly impeachable offense. In famous Trent Lott fashion, he walked into a meeting of the managers and announced that no further evidence would be permitted. The senate would vote immediately. One can only be left to wonder what god-awful dirt Larry Flint and company had dug up on Lott. Whatever it was, it was enough to nudge Lott into the spirit of compromise, a trait that carried forth from that moment.
The days of compromising with the extremists in the Democrat party should be over. There should be no compromise on banning partial-birth abortions. There should be no compromise on much-needed tax cuts to stimulate the economy. There should be no compromise on confirming qualified judges who have languished in political purgatory for months, at least one for over a year. There should be no shackles placed on the feet of our soldiers fighting to defeat a dangerous dictator with no compunction to use weapons of mass destruction on his own people, much less his enemies.