A Weak Reid, Two-Faced Except In His Partisanship

From Roll Call, Saturday, 6:40 p.m.

A grim faced Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid returned to the Senate from a meeting with President Barack Obama Saturday with a deal to raise the nation’s debt ceiling nowhere in sight….

“The question is are we closer to agreement? The answer is no,” the Nevada Democrat told reporters following his meeting with Obama and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

From the Washington Post, Saturday, 10:13 p.m.

Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid announced late Saturday that negotiations with Minroity Leader Mitch McConnell and the White House had made enough progress that he would delay consideration of his own legislation to avert the debt crisis.

And then there’s what might called the straight-face issue: on numerous occasions, with an apparently straight fact, Reid has accused Republicans of playing partisan politics with the debt ceiling. But as Byron York, after quoting Reid’s accusations, has just pointed out,

A look at Reid’s record, however, shows that in the last decade his own voting on the issue of the debt ceiling is not only partisan but perfectly partisan. According to “The Debt Limit: History and Recent Increases,” a January 2010 report by the Congressional Research Service, the Senate has passed ten increases to the debt limit since 2000. Reid never voted to increase the debt ceiling when Republicans were in control of the Senate, and he always voted to increase the debt ceiling when Democrats were in control.

Reid, alas, was not alone.

“It’s time for bipartisan leadership, not partisan gamesmanship,” said the number-two Democrat in the Senate, Richard Durbin, after Republicans pulled out of budget talks with President Obama. And Obama himself described the debt debate as a “partisan three-ring circus” — leaving no doubt that it is Republicans who are practicing partisanship.

At look at Durbin’s record shows that he, too, has voted along absolutely partisan lines. In the last decade, Durbin never voted to increase the debt ceiling when Republicans were in control and always voted to increase the debt ceiling when Democrats were in control. As for Obama, there were four votes to raise the debt ceiling when he was in the Senate. He missed two of them, voted no once when Republicans were in charge, and voted yes once when Democrats were in charge.

I can see how it would be difficult to negotiate with Sen. Reid, since Sen. Reid often doesn’t seem to remain in agreement with what Sen. Reid has said. But those at the top of the Democratic Party in Washington can be counted on always to remain steadfast on one bedrock principle: they never let anything compromise their partisanship.