Are Democrats Willing to Play the Long Game?

Here we are in the middle of 2020 and the prospects for Democratic control of the Presidency and both houses of congress are at least slightly better than a delusional fantasy. Our nation is in the midst of a pandemic which has already killed over 90,000 lives and is likely to claim that many again. Unemployment is now at levels not seen since the great depression. We are in 4th year of the worst president our nation has ever known. Growing income inequality will soon bring us our first trillionaire and racism is at levels not seen since the early sixties. The very concept of America is descendant.

Should Joe Biden be elected with control of the congress he will have his hands full fixing the utter economic and health disaster that Trump has left him. He will have his hands full for his entire first term but it’s going to take a lot longer than 4 years to drag the American ship off the reef on which it has grounded itself. With a narrowly divided electorate and the anchor of the electoral college, democrats cannot count on keeping the presidency and both houses of congress for very long. They have to find a way to give themselves more time and that requires thinking about how to alter the long term balance of power in this country. We can all rail about the electoral college but good luck getting 2/3rds of the states to ratify an amendment that diminishes their influence on the presidential race. We have to work within the existing constitution.

As we have learned from the past 2 years, the combination of a GOP president, a GOP senate, and a 5–4 conservative supreme court can effectively outflank a democratic congress. Combined control of the senate and the presidency means the president cannot be checked or balanced except by SCOTUS but the senate plus the presidency control the composition of SCOTUS over time.

If the democrats are willing to play the long game they will need to take the following actions before the 2022 midterms:

1. Admit DC and Puerto Rico as states. This would create 4 new senate and 5 new congressional seats (1 for DC, 4 for PR) which would likely be democratic for many years. Maybe that helps in eventually getting to a 3/5ths senate majority but it seems unlikely we’ll see another 2/3rds majority (required for conviction at impeachment) for either party for many years. The key is controlling SCOTUS appointments along with any potential future impeachment proceedings.
2. Add two supreme court justices and name a new chief justice. This will be distasteful to may but it’s essential to realigning SCOTUS to the needs of a majority of the US population.
3. Restore effective voting rights act enforcement. This function of the DoJ has been chemically castrated. This is important to help overcome the critical GOP weapons of voter suppression and gerrymandering. More people voting with fewer wasted votes will make it harder for the GOP to regain control.
4. Instill outright fear in those who may be tempted in the future to abuse the trust of the people. The DoJ has got to be relentless in their investigation and, if the evidence supports it, prosecution of those cabinet members and white house advisors who have lined their pockets with impunity for the past four years. Assuming that another GOP president is elected sometime in the future any member of that incoming administration needs to have their memory irrevocably imprinted with the fair but harsh justice that was inflicted on their kleptocratic ancestors. Furthermore the entire country needs to regain confidence that the rule of law applies equally to those in power. If it becomes clear that political service is no longer a path to personal enrichment future grifters of any party will become much less enthusiastic about running for office or vying for government positions. I’m in fantasy land here anyway so how about wishing for a return to a more idealistic GOP?
5. Congress needs to ban lobbyists from ever holding a government position (at least 20 years) and to ban former members from lobbying congress for the same period. The revolving door between K street and the hill or any position of federal power needs to be welded shut.
6. Restore the spirit of the Sherman anti-trust act. Elizabeth Warren is right about breaking up the big tech monopolies, not only because of their influence on economic inequality but because they have already reached reached the scale where they can control who sits in government, what laws are passed, and how they are enforced. But even in non-tech sectors the FTC and the anti-trust division of the DoJ have been far too lax for long (across both democratic and republican administrations) in approving mergers that have negatively impacted American consumers. We beat the robber barons once before, we can do it again.

Note that very little of the above has anything to do with progressive policies which one might like to see enacted. A more progressive tax structure, the green new deal, medicare for all (or some kind of single payer, universal insurance), gun control, reduction in fossil fuel and farm subsidies, improvements in infrastructure, immigration reform, criminal reform, etc… Most of those initiatives are going to take longer than two years to get enacted which means the democrats need to hold the house and senate for a long time, as well as of course the presidency. Even after progressive policies are enacted, a later GOP president can do serious damage through executive actions and the courts; we’re all witnessing the ACA hanging on by a thread.

I’m not sanguine about the democratic party, Joe Biden, or Nancy Pelosi to be this bold. Democrats have a habit of seizing defeat from the jaws of victory. If Pelosi isn’t even willing to enforce house subpoenas will she be willing to lead the charge to admit DC and Puerto Rico? She and Biden may argue that helping the US recover from the pandemic and the economic is more important in the short term which it absolutely will be but protecting whatever they do for more than two years is really just as important.

States can be admitted by the house and senate alone. SCOTUS, POTUS, and the existing 50 states have no say. It’s not even clear that a 2/3rd majority is needed in the senate since its rules can be changed by a simple majority.