With the GOP-led House and the Democratic Senate and White House far apart on a measure to pay the federal government’s bills past March 4, Washington is rumbling toward a repeat of the 1995 government-shutdown fight (actually two shutdown fights, one in mid-November of that year and the other in mid-December).
This makes some Republicans nervous. They think Bill Clinton “won” the blame game that year, and they’re afraid they will get the short end of the stick if there is a 1995-type impasse this year.
Advertisement
A timid approach, though, is a recipe for failure. It means that President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid can sit on their hands, make zero concessions, and wait for the GOP to surrender any time a deadline approaches.
In other words, budget hawks in the House have no choice. They have to fight.
But they can take comfort in the fact that this is not a suicide mission. The conventional wisdom about what happened in November of 1995 is very misleading.
Republicans certainly did not suffer at the polls. They lost only nine House seats, a relatively trivial number after a net gain of 54 in 1994. They actually added to their majority in the Senate, picking up two seats in the 1996 cycle.
More important, they succeeded in dramatically reducing the growth of federal spending. They did not get everything they wanted, to be sure, but government spending grew by just 2.9 percent during the first four years of GOP control, helping to turn a $164 billion deficit in 1995 into a $126 billion surplus in 1999. And they enacted a big tax cut in 1997.
If that’s what happens when Republicans are defeated, I hope the GOP loses again this year.
So what actually happened in 1995, and why do Republicans have such unpleasant memories?
The debate that year hinged on some issues that favored the GOP, such as whether the budget should be balanced within seven years, and whether to use scoring from the Congressional Budget Office instead of the executive branch’s Office of Management and Budget. But there were also some issues that favored the Clinton administration, such as whether the elderly should pay higher Medicare premiums.
And it’s worth pointing out that 1995 was a perfect storm of fiscal-policy conflicts, featuring fights over appropriations (annual spending), reconciliation (taxes and entitlements), and the debt limit. This year’s fight — at least at this early stage — is only about appropriations for the rest of 2011.
Also key is that 1995 was a fight between an unstoppable force and an immovable object. Republicans sent legislation to the White House; Bill Clinton used his veto pen. Republicans said Bill Clinton was shutting down the government by vetoing legislation; Bill Clinton said Republicans were shutting down the government by sending him unacceptable proposals.
They eventually struck a deal, of course, with Republicans winning on their issues (balanced budget in seven years with CBO scoring) and Bill Clinton winning on his issues (such as Medicare premiums). But since the polling data favored the White House, Bill Clinton was declared the victor.
McConnell and Boehner "Budget Hawks?" I wish it were so. I hope that it's so but I have seen nothing to indicate that they are. My political X-Ray shows no spine in either of them. Boehner seems to have tear ducts where his spine should be. I guess that's kind of interesting from a clinical standpoint.
Interesting article, I like the historical view and I wish more authors on this forum would do things like this.
But I find your statement: "...true that CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, the New York Times, and the Washington Post will regurgitate Democratic talking points..." absurd. Being to the left of you doesn't mean they are far-leftists. CBS/NBC/ABC/CNN are all very near the center of Washington.
I also find it humorous that you are putting Fox news and Rush Limbaugh on the same page.
Johntmcdonald: I'm curious if you can name any real budget hawks in congress/senate? I think they are extinct outside of the general populace.
If nobody showed up for work from the dept of education or commerce or transportation... it would be wonderful. All these people do is hassle those of us with real jobs.
J.D.: I suppose the confusion is that liberal and conservative are relative terms. The center of Washington being to the left of you does not make it liberal.
Most liberals hate the mainstream media because they see it as conservative leaning and most conservatives hate it because they see it as left-leaning. I see the mainstream media not as left/right, but as bowing to the power elite...meaning those in positions of power and respected by the general populace. They cannot ask hard questions of people that are powerful and respected because then those types of people wouldn't come on their shows and thus their ratings would drop.
They also tend to call everything down the middle because they are afraid to voice an opinion. That fake neutrality also annoys me.
Fox News and Rush do not report the "truth". They both espouse their opinions and there's nothing wrong with it, but calling it "truth" is incorrect even if you agree with them. What is humorous is that Fox news claims to be objective unlike Rush, but the author lumped them together because as everyone knows they are similar opinion outlets (although admittedly not the same degree).
As I recall, the federal govt paid every govt worker full pay for the work they were deprived of doing during the shutdown. It amounted to nothing more than a few vacation days for them and saved the country nothing. Both parties approved this , as I recall.
Fact: govt is a joke
In 1995, federal spending was 18.7% of GDP. Today, it's 26.5.
Since FDR, the left has called for an ever-expanding government. In 1925, federal spending was just 4.4% of GDP and America was clearly a super power.
What's saved us for so long is the enormous benefits of technology. That technology has made possible more and more resources wasted on government spending.
No conservative, sadly, even dreams of federal spending going down to 10% of GDP. That would be "extreme." However, liberals would love to see spending rise to 30% and then 40% of GDP. And if our country had not collapsed from the weight of all that spending, the liberals would call for 50% and then 60%.
Not until the government eradicated evil corporations and we all worked for the government would liberals be happy.
Of course, the liberals have a legacy of accomplishments on their side. Herion addiction is now common among middle class white kids. 76 percent of black children are born out of wedlock since Lyndon Johnson launched his great society welfare programs, when only 23% of balcks were born out of wedlock.
Divorce rates have skyrocked. Our schools teach foolishness. Our churches have been weakend.
