The following is a letter to the editor I sent to our local newspaper.
Scott Brown characterizes himself as a nice, bipartisan fellow. But despite this bipartisan image, Scott Brown has done a lot of damage.
Brown often uses the Dodd-Frank bill to re-regulate the banks as an example of his bipartisanship. Brown did work with Democrats on this bill, and it did pass. However, he played a very destructive role. In return for his needed vote, Brown demanded, and got, $19 billion in concessions to the banks. After the bill passed, Brown worked vigorously behind the scenes to weaken the enforcement regulations.
After the massive banking collapse at the end of the Bush administration, it was clear that some kind of banking regulation was necessary. The Dodd-Frank bill was the response to this need. Dodd-Frank is a weak bill, unlike the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act that prevented a major banking collapse for over 70 years. However, it was the best that the Democrats could do in the present political environment. Even so, rather than trying to strengthen this bill, as a strong Democratic senator from Massachusetts should have done, Scott Brown did everything he could to water it down, protecting his banker friends and donors.
Sending Elizabeth Warren to the Senate will ensure that attempts to effectively regulate the banks will have a strong advocate and not someone who, under the guise of bipartisanship, will sabotage these efforts.
Massachusetts loves fiscally conservative, socially moderate, independently minded Republicans like Edward Brooke or William Weld.
I knew Bill Weld, Bill Weld was a Governor of mine, Mr. Brown is no Bill Weld.
When the Democrats had almost enough votes to break filibusters, Brown could vote against his party provided there were enough conservative Democratic votes to make up for his defection. In other words, it becomes possible, on occasion, to be “bipartisan” in a legislatively ineffective manner. This is bipartisanship for show and McConnell, no doubt encourages it because he knows it helps Brown get re-elected
With the Democrats having a much smaller majority, Senator Brown can be bipartisan-for-show quite a bit. His vote is unnecessary for maintaining filibusters.
If the Democrats lose their majority this cycle, Mr Brown will have no incentive at all to be bipartisan. He’s not going to vote against cloture on Republican bills.
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That’s the arithmetic for Republican Senators from more moderate states. I don’t know exactly how one communicates all that to voters. The point though is that a lot of bipartisanship these days is only for election campaigns and has no effect on legislative outcomes.
…is too complicated as kbusch sort of implies. Senator Brown needs to be taken to task on specific votes and actions, such as sponsoring the Blunt Amendment or weakening Dodd-Frank.
as an example of his bipartisanship, and this can be refuted, as I did here. People need to see the damage he is causing, even when laws like Dodd-Frank pass with his “bipartisan” support. He is not some nice guy who goes to Washington and votes his conscience. He is a tool of the banks and the far-right Republicans.
Warren needs to point out the substance of his “bipartisan” work. He says, “hey, look how bipartisan I am” She replies. “It is not bipartisan when you hold the bill hostage to put in sweetheart deals to the banking industry.”
That is just untrustworthy.
Harry Reid hates this guy.
when she pointed out that he tells people in Massachusetts that he will be bipartisan, but when he goes to his out-of-state fundraisers, he asks for money so that the Republicans can control the Senate.
Republican donors, after all, care about the effect of his votes. Campaign sloganeering doesn’t have to.
… what it was to have Romney badmouthing Massachusetts while traveling.
Is that centrism and bipartisanship are not always virtues. Even if liberal attempts to get Dubya to go to the UN worked and Kofi signed off on it it’d still have been a terrible war. The fact that attempts at bipartisanship resulted in a blank check is even worse. Medicare Part D was also bipartisan, as were the Bush tax cuts and No Child Left Behind. Bipartisanship is a means to an end, not an end in itself, and the end should be government that works better for all of us.