Behaviorism and Elections
I've been reading a lot about animal training since we got a new puppy. He's incredibly smart, energetic, and food-motivated. Thus, when untrained he was destroying the house. Indeed, I tried to get a discount on the lost- book fee at the public library for "irony" when he ate a dog training book. (They didn't go for it.)
Anyway, one of the key messages from animal behavior research is that the first couple of times a dog tries something are key, because if he's strongly rewarded for the behavior it will be a process of months or years to get rid of the behavior. All the literature says that the same rules apply to humans, albeit more subtly.
I would submit that what just happened was millions of conservatives being strongly reinforced against any sort of bipartisan cooperation on health care, if not more broadly. Not one House Republican voted for the current bill, not because they opposed the final product, but because they made a strategic decision not to even start a dialogue in the beginning. It was a strategy designed to break this administration out of the gate, and it has proven quite effective. The flat "no" to negotiating was just strongly reinforced, and thus will remain in place as a strategy, is my prediction. Whether that's good or bad remains to be seen. Getting back to my analogy, the British Army's canine corps has an expression: "you get the dog you deserve." Methinks the same applies to governments.
posted by QueensGuy @ 8:29 PM
8 Comments:
As long as liberals keep lying to themselves this way, they'll keep failing.
Which way, anon?
Democrats had at least the minimal grace when they were ashamed of Jimmy Carter's performance as president to be abashed enough to give Reagan a chance to play things out. Yes, some people said some mean things, but overall, they acted like: "Our guy didn't do so great -- give this guy a chance." Certainly no organized effort to filibuster everything in every sense of the word. When will the Republicans realize -- their guy screwed up seriously (while they were still backing him to the max) and maybe they don't know everything?
We'd be in the 2nd Great Depression right now if Obama hadn't saved their asses having to take extreme measures that no one wants to do. Where's the gratitude?
First anon here. I'll keep it short. Both the Democrats and the Republicans played hardball to get what they want. There's mostly a straight party line vote, but that cuts both ways. The only reason the Democrats are faithful is not because they all truly support the bill, but because they their party will kill them if they don't. The Democrats may seem more open but that's because they won so many seats they have quite a few who had to run as conservatives in conservative districts, but they were still willing to screw over their constituents for their part. If the Republicans had won more seats in liberal districs, then you'd see more breakaways.
More important, the Democrats didn't give an inch. If you recall, Nancy Pelosi devised the health care plan in secret meetings which Republicans were not even allowed to attend. The bill is filled with giveaways to Democrat lobbyists and Democrat districts. Republccan amendments, if they were even considered, were voted down immediately. To use your dog metaphor, do you honestly expect the Republicans to lie down and play dead for this?
If the Democrats want this, go ahead, fight for it. Just don't lie to yourself that somehow you're doing it for noble reasons and your opponents don't care about the public.
Well, maybe we've got a chicken and egg problem, anon., but the history I'm working from (as told to me by the NYTimes and confirmed by a friend of a friend who works on the Hill) is that before Pelosi's secret meetings, there were overtures to the House Republican leadership that were flatly rejected. No meetings, no nothing. The House Republican caucus decided to sit this one out before anything was proposed or even considered. I obviously could be wrong about that timeline, but I'd appreciate a source if you think so. Whether they were thinking "what's the point, they won't listen" is another matter. Kind of reminds me of the traditional Israeli/Palestinian conundrum: "when I am weak, how can I compromise; when I am strong why should I compromise?"
I think the tone of this administration's dealings with the Republicans was set on the day after Obama's inauguration. In his first meeting with Congressional leaders of both parties, he responded to a Republican challeneg to the proposed economic stimulus plan outline "I won." http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/01/23/obama-to-gop-i-won/
That certainly put the Republican (John Kyl) in his place. This lead was followed by similar statements of political power by Nancy Pelosi. Now, I don't blame Democrats especially for adopting this approach. With their majorities in both houses, they might have been able to run roughshod over the Republicans, if they could have decided amongst themselves what they wanted to accomplish. I believe their failure to prevail on any number of legislative priorities is wholly their own fault (prompted by the fact that the US public does not support the more leftist planks Democrats wish to pursue, leading to dissension in the ranks).
I will say, the lack of civility did not start with this adminsitration. It has been growing since the Republicans took control in the 80s. Personally, I mark the start with the attrotious treatment of Bork in his S.Ct nomination hearings. Things have escalated since then. The treatment of Clarence Thomas, the treatment of the Lewinsky affair, the hounding out of office of Senator Delay (never found guilty of anything), the multiple, repeated challenges to recounts in Florida in 2000, followed by the multiple challenges to recounts in Minn. in 2008. What goes around comes around with a vengence.
To Anon.
Democrats may have been ashamed of Carter, but Republicans are not ashamed of George W. Bush. We are more disappointed in his father, George HW. This is because we don't buy the spin cast against his administration. And already the verdict of history is beginning to settle back toward a more centrist view of his two terms. See John Yoo making the circuit of talk shows with his new book, quite successfully defending his part in the adminsitration's activities.
Despite 9/11 and Katrina, the Bush years were mostly years of economic prosperity. Even toward the end (and I for one do not blame economic cycles on Presidents), the Bush administration worked very cooperatively with the incoming Democrats to craft TARP (this was the last example of Bipartisanship I can recall). Prevously, the Democrats completely stimied efforts at Social Security reform which will still bedevil this administration if they don't come up wit a solution soon.
As long as conservatives keep lying to themselves that way, they'll keep America failing.
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