Whooping It Up with the Budget Hawks
Also: Some fine reads on Congress including the tale of the overly agressive campaign tracker and a side of Rep. Don Bacon
This week, I had the pleasure of popping into Charlie Palmer’s Steakhouse for the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget’s Fix the Debt Awards 2024 Fiscal Heroes. Trophies went to Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN), Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), Rep. William Timmons (R-SC), and many other legislators. It was quite the crowd: budget wonks like Eugene Steurle, legislators, Hill staff, and the occasional randos who winkle into such events for the free hors d'oeuvres and drinks.
It was a great party—not least because it provided a chance for me to chat with lots of sharp people who really are trying to get our federal finances in better shape. But I couldn’t help feeling a little dour: for all the educating and advising we’ve done the budget is in terrible shape. Facts and reason have not been able to overcome the various factors (interest group pressure, demographic shifts, etc.) that have driven our annual deficits to $1 trillion a year and our national debt to more than $34 trillion. Is it going to take an international economic crisis to spark reform? I hope not, but some days I wonder.
Philip Wallach and Priscilla Goh published a fine explainer on the House Discharge Petition on UnderstandingCongress.org. What’s it about? Well…
“This memorandum first explicates the precise mechanics of how this type of discharge petition operates and explains three prominent attempts at discharge petitions made in the 118th Congress. It then considers the last two petitions to reach 218 signatures, in 2002 and 2015; offers a historical account of how the discharge petition has changed over more than a century in the House; and finishes with a brief inventory of ways that the discharge petition could be reformed.”
Check it out!
ICYMI: Interesting Reads on Congress
Igor Khrestin, “Can Congress Prevent Trump From Exiting NATO?” American Purpose, May 1, 2024.
“[I]f a president’s intention to leave NATO is indeed serious, as former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton believes is the case with Donald Trump, the commander-in-chief would have many perfectly legal ways to limit U.S. participation in the alliance without formal withdrawal. A U.S. exit in any informal or formal way would most likely spell an end to NATO itself.”
Rep. Jeff Jackson, “Saving the Speaker,” Quick Update, May 3, 2024.
“The next day, the folks who filed the motion to fire the Speaker announced that they would force a vote on it, to occur next week - knowing it would fail. Why? Two reasons: One, the right-flank had to escalate. That’s core to their brand…. Second, the minority party’s announcement effectively shielded the right-flank from the consequences of their actions. The reason they hadn’t called the vote wasn’t just because they were afraid of losing - it was also because they were afraid of winning.”
Bonus: Jackson also reports on an aggressive tracker stalking a Congresswoman. This exhibits one of the sick incentives in politics now. This tracker was hoping to get a big pay out for a video from some group working with her opponent’s campaign. One wonders: where to drawn the line between free speech towards a public official and harassment/menacing?
Adam White, “Constitutional Government After Chevron,” Law & Liberty, May 1, 2024.
“Just as returning law-interpreting responsibility to courts would put courts to a test, returning law-making responsibility to Congress would put it to a test, too. Ending Chevron could help return Congress to its proper constitutional role: our government’s center of policymaking gravity. But could Congress actually re-learn how to legislate? [….] Chevron proved to be part of a much broader decades-long decline in the other direction. Congress’s broad grants of discretionary power to agencies, through poorly written statutes, made both the executive’s and judiciary’s jobs harder. Indeed, those delegations of power deformed the other branches.”
Craig Volden and Alan Wiseman, “Rep Don Bacon discusses legislative effectiveness,” Center for Legislative Effectiveness blog, April 2024.
“Representative Don Bacon has served as the U.S. Representative for Nebraska’s 2nd congressional district since 2017. He has been identified by the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) as being the most effective Republican lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives in the 117th Congress (2021-2023) and the fourth-most effective lawmaker, overall, in the House during the 117th Congress, despite being a member of the minority party at the time.”
Mark Strand, “Twelve Lessons Learned From the Military Aid Bill,” Politics and Sausage Making, April 29, 2024.
“Gary Marx, President of Defenders of Faith and Religious Freedom in Ukraine, detailed Russian abuses of Christians and the efforts of American Christians to support their brothers and sisters in faith in Ukraine. Said Marx, ‘The persecution of Christians in Ukraine, and the specter of broader religious oppression across Eastern Europe galvanized Evangelicals into action. Their collective voice helped to persuade Speaker Mike Johnson to change course and advance Ukraine funding in the U.S. House.’”
Ethan Bauer, “Detour from Democracy,” Deseret News, April 24, 2024.
“And even if Congress did, somehow, recognize the disastrous potential of a contingent [presidential] election and work to address it before it happens, it’s probably too late for such action in 2024. Paranoia, Kosar says, would pervade negotiations, with both sides worried that their political opponents would be working to game the reform to their benefit. ‘So yeah,’ he adds, ‘it’s a problem.’”
Thanks for reading. Enjoy your weekend!