The folks at First Read are gobsmacked:
Out of touch? By now, you’ve probably heard about the GOP push — embraced by Mitch McConnell, Jon Kyl, and even John McCain and Lindsey Graham — to hold Senate hearings into whether the 14th Amendment should be amended. At issue: the 14th Amendment granting automatic citizenship rights to anyone born in the United States, even the offspring of illegal immigrants.
Just askin, but do these Republicans want to be tied to wanting to change this historic, post-Civil War amendment, which made former slaves and their children full citizens in this country? At a time of 10% unemployment and two wars, do politicians really want to debate a Constitutional Amendment from the 19th century? For the GOP, does this help them with their problem at wooing non-white votes? This seems a tad tone deaf; it may be popular with folks who listen to talk radio or watch evening infotainment debate shows but really?
As a friend says, “Yes, Really.” But look: there’s no mystery here. Republicans know perfectly well this isn’t going anywhere, but they also know that symbolic issues like this are great for firing up their base. People like me scratch our chins and wonder why their base falls for this schtick so regularly when Republicans never follow up on this stuff, but that’s not the point. The point is….to make a point. They’re just signalling to their base that their hearts are in the same place and their values are aligned. And that’s good politics.
Democrats, as critics like Drew Westen routinely point out, aren’t as good at this. This might have something to do with the liberal temperament, but I sort of doubt it. More likely, it’s just that the liberal base is smaller. When Republicans pander to conservative hot buttons, they’re pandering to something like two-thirds of the party. When Democrats do it they’re pandering to about a third of the party. So the arithmetic is simple: for Republicans this kind of pandering is a winner, probably producing more votes than it loses. Among Democrats it’s just the opposite, so they don’t do it as much. There’s too much risk of offending large numbers of independents, as well as the (still) fairly significant number of conservative Democrats.
As for why the press continues to treat this stuff seriously, I think this is the reason: they know perfectly well that this is just political puffery, but they figure that all’s fair in love and politics. Who are they to tell the parties how to pander to their own base? Quite the vicious circle, no?
