In the wake of "Kevin McCarthy's drawn-out humiliation at the hands of far-right tormenters as he sought to become House speaker," and attention on the GOP's "destructionists," Joshua Green finds a "hopeful sign," aptly described in the headline, "Republicans Are Finally Breaking Out of the Fox News Bubble."
More than 50 current and former Republican members of the House appeared on CNN during the final week of the speaker vote-a-thon. (It would be interesting to compare the current and former counts.) And while I'm skeptical that this is a done deal, representing a corner turned for House Republicans, rather than an anomalous blip during one week in the life of the 118th Congress -- Remember Trump's first year when analysts kept finding supposed pivots when the former guy was about to take the presidency seriously? -- Green finds reasons to account for a recent willingness of some GOP legislators to reach out beyond the safe confines of Fox News Channel and the lesser lights of conservative media.
Let's zoom in on one of the reasons that Green suggests might have moved a handful of House Republicans:
many of their own voters profess to desire something beyond endless partisan warfare. In a recent CBS News poll, 48% of Republican voters say they want the new Republican House majority to prioritize “working with Biden and Democrats.”
That's one poll [CBS News/YouGov, January 4-6, 2023]. Polling is complicated. Meaningful results can be illusive. (Both pro-choice and pro-life advocates, for instance, can cite survey responses that prove the majority of Americans side with them on the issue.) And, when push comes to shove, when there's a specific battle being waged and Fox News has weighed in, many of those Republicans in the 48% might scurry back into alignment with their party's partisan warriors and reject any actual accommodation of Democratic views.
Grant all that. Still, it's hard as a Democrat not to find in that 48% a sign of hope.
Democrats represent a diverse coalition united in a number of policy goals. When in power, Democrats try to enact legislation to implement those goals. These elected officials are pragmatic, willing to compromise and to accept half a loaf when political constraints dictate that. They will, when they share power with Republicans, seek to find a middle ground to make incremental progress possible.
Republican luminaries, increasingly committed to waging a culture war, have dismissed Democrats and Democratic constituencies as illegitimate participants in the political process and ruled out compromise with opponents that they regard as enemies. A substantial number of Congressional Republicans are (as Green notes) "destructionists," who would rather sow dysfunction and wreak havoc with what was accepted a generation or two ago as the normal, unexceptional give-and-take of politics.
While the stars of conservative media and the Republican personalities making money off of division won't countenance respectful discourse with Democrats, a huge chunk of GOP voters have a different view. In an era when one political party has embraced grievance and animosity, and lost interest in offering legislative solutions to public problems, it is heartening to find that nearly half of its voters express the desire that Americans on both sides of the divide work together.
Working together requires communicating across the aisle, recognizing that our opponents have standing to voice their views, and trusting that representative government may be a force for good. It is undoubtedly a hopeful sign when a healthy number of Republican voters wish for constructive engagement with their opponents.