IN WASHINGTON, POLITICAL TYPES speak of good weeks and bad weeks, the good weeks being those in which your side comes out ahead. Then there are weeks–this is rare–when confusion reigns, because no one is quite sure who has won and who has lost.
Such was apparently the case last week, when a bipartisan group of 14 senators–7 Republicans, 7 Democrats–led by Arizona Republican John McCain, announced at the last second that they had struck a deal on President Bush’s judicial nominees, thus avoiding a showdown on the Senate floor. The war over judges continues, but the announcement of this deal, and the reaction to it, say something about today’s politics, and something about the politics of the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.
The deal was simple, if vague. It had two parts. The first–“Commitments on Pending Judicial Nominations”–announced that the signatories would “invoke cloture”–that is, vote to end debate–on the nominations of Priscilla Owen, Janice Rogers Brown, and William Pryor, while making “no commitment” to “vote for or against cloture” on the nominations of William Myers and Henry Saad. In the second part–“Commitments for Future Nominations”–Republicans promised not to vote for the “nuclear option”–the arcane Senate rules change that would eliminate the filibuster of judicial nominees–in exchange for the Democrats’ promise not to filibuster Bush’s nominees except in “extraordinary” circumstances. The meaning of “extraordinary” was left to each senator’s “own discretion and judgment.”
In other words: Three of Bush’s nominees would receive up-or-down votes on the Senate floor–which is to say, since the Republicans control the Senate 55-44 (with one independent), three of Bush’s nominees probably would be confirmed. Sure enough, the Senate confirmed Priscilla Owen last Wednesday, 55-43, and is likely to confirm Brown and Pryor in the coming weeks. Also as a result of the deal, however, the fates of nominees Myers and Saad were left undecided, perhaps indefinitely.
Things remained as they were . . . except that three more conservative judges were headed for the federal bench. And a rules change had been averted, for now. But it was not entirely clear whether GOP Senate leader Bill Frist actually would have had the votes to prevail on the change. And it was even less clear what the political consequences of a very close vote on the nuclear option would have been for the political prospects of either party, or for the president’s legislative agenda.
In a way, then, the Senate dealmakers–“the Gang of 14,” they’re being called–had presented Republicans and Democrats with a classic “Is the glass half empty or half full?” problem. Judging by their reactions, the problem was a little too complicated for Republicans and Democrats.
There was no bipartisan consensus on what the deal meant; there was no partisan consensus, either. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and executive director of MoveOn.org Eli Pariser both praised the deal. “This is a significant victory for our country, for democracy, and for every American,” said Reid; “Our members fought hard to preserve the filibusters, which will now live to see another day,” said Pariser.
Nan Aron, however, who as head of the liberal Alliance for Justice had spent months working with Reid and Pariser to prevent confirmation of Bush’s judges, was “very disappointed with the decision to move these extremist nominees one step closer to confirmation.” And liberal activist Ralph Neas, the president of People for the American Way, said the deal “could lead to confirmation of appeals court judges who would undermine Americans’ rights and freedoms.”
As for the Republicans, President Bush and Senate majority leader Frist offered tepid support for the deal–“I’m pleased the Senate is moving forward on my judicial nominees who were previously being blocked,” said Bush; “The agreement, if followed in good faith, will make filibusters of judicial nominees in the future, including Supreme Court nominees, almost impossible,” said Frist.
Meanwhile, social conservative James Dobson, president of Focus on the Family, called the deal a “complete bailout,” a “betrayal.” And a Wall Street Journal editorial said, “All in all, we can’t recall a more cynical Senate performance since the phony impeachment trial of Bill Clinton.” Phyllis Schlafly was outraged. So was radio host Rush Limbaugh: “We had McCain-Feingold. This is McCain-the middle finger!”
What consensus there was, actually, was on the part of the press, which decided, not without reason, that the deal was a victory for John McCain and a blow to Bill Frist. “McCain eclipses Frist . . . ” read the headline on the front page of the Hill newspaper on May 25. McCain is “The Senate’s Real Leader,” pronounced David Broder. The New York Times‘s Adam Nagourney quoted GOP strategist Scott Reed, who told him, “McCain has a new title as superleader of the Senate.” Nagourney’s article was headlined “A Compromise with Overtones for 2008.”
And yet, when the press looked into the future–specifically, the 2008 Republican presidential fight–they saw, startlingly, a picture that looked a lot like the past. In one corner was John McCain: independent, straight-talking, alienating himself from social conservatives; in another corner was Bill Frist: southern, patrician, taking pains not to offend any part of the Republican coalition. It was a faint echo of the dimly remembered primary battles of election year 2000, when McCain’s insurgent campaign against George W. Bush collapsed in South Carolina. Unlike Bush and McCain, however, Frist and McCain have–or, at least, had–a good personal rapport. “I thought they personally got along pretty well,” Marshall Whittmann, who worked for McCain before joining the Democratic Leadership Council last year, told me. Another former staff member recalls Frist occasionally stopping by McCain’s office to chat.
Officially, McCain hasn’t decided whether he’ll run for president in 2008. If he does, the backlash against his deal on judges suggests that it’s likely he’ll face challenges similar to those he faced in 2000. The irony here–McCain only stepped in to head the negotiations after Mississippi Republican Trent Lott pulled out–apparently is lost on his opponents. As one Republican strategist with ties to several potential ’08 candidates told me, “McCain has a constituency that can make you president of the United States in a general election–but won’t necessarily get you nominated in the Republican party.”
“A lot of the griping in the Republican party” about McCain’s compromise “is silly,” the strategist went on. “It’s like walking out of a bank with $1 million, and then complaining about the splinter you got in your thumb.” Fact is, “John McCain has just delivered more conservative judges than George W. Bush, the Christian right, and Tom DeLay. So let’s have that debate.”
For his part, McCain has reacted coolly to the firestorm he’s caused. After announcing the deal on the evening of May 23, he dove into a car that sped him to the premiere of a movie based on his memoir, Faith of My Fathers. The next morning, asked on NBC’s Today show what “extraordinary circumstances” means, he replied, “It means just like child pornography, you’ll know it when you see it.” The day after that, he stopped by The Late Show with Conan O’Brien, and told the audience what had happened to him a few weeks before when a small plane flew into restricted airspace over Washington, D.C., and the Capitol was evacuated.
“I’m curious,” asked Conan, “how did you react when the plane gets close and they say, ‘You’ve got to get out of here, run! Run!’ Do you run?”
“Well,” McCain replied, “everybody said, ‘Run, run!’ And I thought, ‘Huh, they want me to be president.'”
The audience broke out into laughter, applause, and cheers. McCain tilted his head back and laughed too. He smiled. He had had a good week. He thought.
Matthew Continetti is a staff writer at The Weekly Standard.
