Republicans in the House seem to think that Beltway spin wars are more important than governing.
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Paul Waldman had a great find about the current state of the House Representatives yesterday in USA Today. Apparently since the Republicans took over in 2011 the House has been slashing policy staff and instead hiring a lot of new press flacks:
Since Republicans took control of the U.S. House in January 2011, Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, has led a cost-cutting effort that has trimmed staff for House committees by nearly 20%, saving taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. But the number of committee staff responsible for press and communications work has increased by nearly 15% over the same period, according to House spending records.
That’s a pretty remarkable fact and it’s good evidence of the GOP’s current trend towards what some have called “post policy” politics.
Look public policy is hard, it’s complicated, convoluted, and highly specialized. A ordinary person who gets elected to the House might be an intelligent and hard working person, they might even know quite a bit about a specific topic like how farms work or about an important issue that affects their home community. But what do they know about all the other aspects of public policy? For example, what do they know about how to address the huge drought in the Southwest right now? Or how to reform the foster-care system? Or how digital technology is changing how hospitals work? Or the political situation in Japan or Nigeria? Indeed these example, which the vast majority of Americans no little to nothing about, is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what Congress deals with all the time.
And that’s why Congress is divided into committees that specialize in certain areas that are in turn staffed by professionals: to help answer these questions and find ways to grapple with them. Would more foreign aid to Nigeria help deal with Boko Haram? Or would it just be siphoned off by corrupt politicians? If you go to an expert on West Africa they might be able to tell you, but some press flack is going to say (if she’s honest) “I have no clue” or these days something along the lines of “I have no clue, let’s scream about fake scandals in the IRS instead.”
It’s fine for liberals to get upset about this, after all it’s not good for the country. But it’s really conservatives that should be mad. A failure to come to grips with public policy was a huge reason why the George W. Bush Administration was such a disaster, if you win in 2016 do you really want another round of Jeff Gannon and no earthly clue about what to do once your invade Iraq? Or do you actually want a Congress that makes policy on the issues you cared about?
John Boehner seems more interested in the former than the latter.
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