With the big gains nationally for Republicans, after a four year hiatus, voters have returned a Republican majority to the United States House of Representatives.  Back in 2006 Republicans lost the majority, in part, because the GOP had lost touch with voters, and embraced federal spending.   Peggy Noonan, a former speechwriter for President Ronald Reagan, did a great job in describing this in a September column in the Wall Street Journal…

For conservatives on the ground, it has often felt as if Democrats (and moderate Republicans) were always saying, "We should spend a trillion dollars," and the Republican Party would respond, "No, too costly. How about $700 billion?" Conservatives on the ground are thinking, "How about nothing? How about we don’t spend more money but finally start cutting."
When House Republicans lost their majority, they did not change their leadership.  In retaining his leadership post, Rep. John Boehner however made it very clear to all who would listen that “he got it” and that, if granted a majority, things would be different.

Well, with a healthy majority of Republicans being sworn into the Congress this January, it will be time to see whether Boehner’s actions are in line with his rhetoric.  We will also see if Boehner is heading up a team of House Republicans who “get it” and are onboard with substantially changing the way things are done – whether an agenda of really reducing the size and scope of the federal government behemoth is going to be front and center.

When one looks back to the “GOP Largese” of the first half of this decade, a central figure to the big-spending, earmarking, pork-obsessed culture of bloat that helped sink the GOP’s prior majority was Representative Jerry Lewis (pictured, left) from here in California.  First elected in 1978, Lewis has spent most of my life on the House Appropriations Committee, and was the Chairman of this key Committee when we lost our majority in 2006.  Lewis has a famous reputation for pushing to create a terrible culture on Capitol Hill, pushing the notion that “The Appropriators” were a class of legislators unto themselves, beholding to no-one, superior in their attitude, and in their Neitzsche “we are above everyone else” complex.  This would manifest itself in the bullying of non-Appropriators into supporting egregious spending or risk losing spending items important to their districts, and opposing across-the-board cuts that did not originate from the Appropriations Committee. 

Frankly, thinks had and have devolved into a federal spending food-fest with lobbyists for special interests who want to fund projects, egregious or not, lavishing big bucks on the campaign accounts of Appropriations Committee members of both parties, and the results being a flavor/favor factory of unsavory spending.  Perhaps worst off all was the skill in which manipulators like Lewis appended relatively small earmarks but important earmarks for members’ districts into much vastly larger big-spending legislation in order to get votes onboard.  We saw that technique used to get hesitant federal legislators on board with the terrible TARP bills.

To be fair to Jerry Lewis, this terrible Appropriations “culture of spending” started before him.  Invariably some big spenders pulled him in at a young age, much the way the Emperor brought in young Anakin Skywalker to the “dark side” in the Star Wars movies, only to eventually see Skywalker become the dreaded Darth Vader.  Lewis has shown an adroit skill of working to recruit fellow moderate Republicans onto this key committee (aided by the fact that conservatives generally aren’t excited to be a part of the “evil place” that has become the Appropriations Committee) – and has torpedoed the efforts of fiscal hawks and earmark critics, like Jeff Flake, to get onto the committee (the alcoholics do not want someone from the temperance movement in the bar!).  Check out this startling CNN piece on Lewis’ hubris as a porker.  And it is significant to note that Lewis has continued to embrace egregious earmarks since the GOP lost the majority in 2006.

With Republicans losing the majority, Lewis lost his gavel, and has spend the last four years as the Ranking Republican on the committee.  Under House Republican rules, Lewis is facing term-limits as the lead Republican on the Appropriations Committee – three is the max (he had one term as Chairman, two terms as Ranking GOP Member).  That is a reason for not approving his bid for the Chairmanship, but it is certainly not the best reason.

In a stunning move of political gamesmanship, Lewis is actually trying to cloak his bid around fiscally conservative rhetoric.  (One has visions of the alcoholic who says he doesn’t have a problem anymore, as he asks to sit pole position in the bar).  Lewis for years has been the lead Republican in opposing meaningful earmark reform, and has been a steadfast opponent of earmark moratoriums.  Funny, after the November drubbing, he now publicly is supporting the ban, while he tells everyone privately that earmarking isn’t a problem, but it has become a symbolic issue and thus it is good politics for Republicans to ban them.  What Lewis doesn’t understand is that HE represents the egregious earmarking process.  The same “symbolism” of banning earmarks is the same symbolism in denying the “King of Pork” a return trip to the Chairmanship of this key spending committee.

Jerry Lewis should not only be denied another term as Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, frankly he ought to be tossed off the committee all together.  But don’t take my word for it, a large group of conservative leaders, rallied by the American Conservative Union (h/t Jim Lacy) from around the country have all signed a letter to incoming Speaker John Boehner urging the rejection of Lewis (read it here). 

The way things are set up under the Republican rules, an obscure body called the Republican Steering Committee will decide the Chairmanship of this (and other committees).  California has two Congressman on the Steering Committee – House Republican Whip Kevin McCarthy and California’s Representative (the larger states have a vote) Ken Calvert.  It is critical that both McCarthy and Calvert demonstrate their commitment to changing the way things have worked in the past both by privately discouraging Lewis, and publicly opposing his being re-named committee Chairman.  This will be difficult for Calvert, especially, who is close to Lewis.  But this is a cross-roads moment for Calvert, who will have to decide whether Republicans need reform the process, and put an end to the dominance of an old guard, and an old way, that handed a majority to the Democrats in 2006, and could put them back in power in 2012.  McCarthy has skyrocketed to the #3 spot in the House because he is understands politics.  Rejecting Lewis’ bid is smart policy and smart politics.

There are great opportunities for House Republican for this coming session of Congress.  There is a great positive agenda to be pursued, and an important goal ahead of regaining the White House and control of the U.S. Senate in 2012.  Putting the right team in place, especially at the helm of key committees, is critical to our success.  There is a big decision to be made by Republican leadership in the Chairmanship of the Appropriations Committee.  It will tell us a lot about the resolve of Republicans to do things differently, and better, with this majority.

P.S.  John Fund of the Wall Street Journal writes on the battle for the Chairmanship of the House Appropriations Committee today – check it out.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 1st, 2010 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.