One of my predictions for 2009 was the breakdown of the left-right paradigm. In retrospect, I think it only became evident in the minds of the many people joining the liberty movement. This is certainly significant. Perhaps these headlines are evidence of the breakdown finally spreading to the media.
www.antiwar.com/blog/2011/02/08/rachel-maddow-in-shock-tea-partiers-defeat-patriot-act/
Rachel Maddow is using her “report” on the Republican tea caucus blocking the extension of the PATRIOT Act to replay her “interview” with Rand Paul, and rail about abortion. Rant all you want, Rachel, but people are noticing that you haven’t even mentioned the Act several minutes into your tirade.
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UPDATE: Oh, and by the way, hours after the PATRIOT Act went down to defeat, Matt Drudge has yet to report it. Instead, we have the red-hot news that a Texas school district is having second thoughts about making the study of Arabic mandatory.
UPDATE 2: On the other side of the divide, the newly-AOL-ized Huffington Post headlines: “Beyond Left and Right: House Defeats Patriot Act Extension,” but the story doesn’t live up to its billing. Rep. Dennis Kucinich is quoted, but not a single Republican who voted “nay,” and the phrase “tea party” is nowhere to be found. Beyond left and right? Not quite.
UPDATE 3: The Washington Post got it right, for once:
“House Republicans suffered an embarrassing setback Tuesday when they fell seven votes short of extending provisions of the Patriot Act, a vote that served as the first small uprising of the party’s tea-party bloc.”
(Read more from antiwar.com)
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The Tea Party and civil liberties
It’s long been clear that the best (and perhaps only) political hope for civil liberties in the U.S. is an alliance that transcends the standard Democrat v. GOP or left v. right dichotomies. Last night’s surprising (and temporary) failure of the House to extend some of the most controversial powers of the Patriot Act — an extension jointly championed by the House GOP leadership and the Obama White House — perfectly illustrates why this is true.
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But what happened last night highlights the potential to subvert the two-party stranglehold on these issues — through a left-right alliance that opposes the Washington insiders who rule both parties. So confident was the House GOP leadership in commanding bipartisan support that they put the Patriot Act extension up for a vote using a fast-track procedure that prohibits debate and amendments and, in return, requires 2/3 approval. But 26 of the most conservative Republicans — including several of the newly elected “Tea Party” members — joined the majority of Democratic House members in voting against the extension, and it thus fell 7 votes short. These conservative members opposed extension on the ground that more time was needed to understand whether added safeguards and oversight are needed.
The significance of this event shouldn’t be overstated. The proposed Patriot Act extension still commanded support from a significant majority of the House (277-148), and will easily pass once the GOP leadership brings up the bill for a vote again in a few weeks using the standard procedure that requires only majority approval. The vast majority of GOP members, including the leading Tea Party representatives, voted for it. The Senate will easily pass it. And the scope of the disagreement even among the Democrats opposing it is very narrow; even most of the “no” votes favor extending these provisions, albeit with the types of tepid safeguards proposed by Leahy. So in one sense, what happened last night — as is true for most political “victories” — was purely symbolic. The White House will get what it wants. (Read more from salon.com)
