Debate between Victor Obasohan and Dennis Falcon about Congressional Partisanship

OBASOHAN: The Congress of the United States, the most powerful legislative institution in the world today. My name is Victor Obasohan and this is Professor Falcon. Is the Congress too partisan today?  FALCON: I would basically argue that Congress has been hijacked by two major political parties and that party loyalty now substitutes for the will of the people, yes.  OBASOHAN: This is not a partisan institution. What are you talking about Professor Falcon? This was supposed to be combat spots. We have a bicameral legislature. It is supposed to disagree. People come from different parts of the county, from different districts and states, and you expect them --  FALCON: And you just made my argument for me. I don't know who coined the term, but Congress has, basically, has been referred to as the "people's house," the House of Representatives, specifically. All politics is local. The people who are elected to the House represent districts that have 700, 000 people in them, give or take, and you know what, they're sent to Congress to meet the needs of the people in their districts. Their local constituents, businesses, and families.  OBASOHAN: But the needs are different from state to state from district to district. I mean --  FALCON: But what happens is once they get to Washington D.C., the district that sent them, whether it's a suburban, a rural, a big state, small, the district that sent them is forgotten and they start taking marching orders from their national political parties.  OBASOHAN: You have forgotten the old adage that "all politics is local."  FALCON: Until they get to Washington D.C. Right now we can't get legislation accomplished, we can't get judges passed, we can't get Congress to agree on anything, because the Democrats and Republicans are so busy trying to win points against the other. They are not thinking about the interest of the American people.  OBASOHAN: This is very healthy for America, Professor Falcon. I mean, Congress is not a place where you come there and be drinking or sipping tea.  FALCON: No, it's a place where people are supposed to go and argue about ideas –  OBASOHAN: They argue about ideas.  FALCON: -- and to read solutions and find compromises and find ways to work together.  OBASOHAN: But I'm not going to compromise if it's not in my own interest or my district interest or my state interest. You want me to compromise?  FALCON: Well, that's what I'm arguing. What I'm arguing is that once they get to Washington D.C. and Sacramento and other places around the United States, we're finding that political parties are issuing marching orders directed to their members and basically using money, and power ,and the media, and national political party organizations to railroad them into certain kinds of legislation.  OBASOHAN: The mistake we make or we assume is that this is supposed to be a national legislature. That members of Congress are supposed to do the American people's wishes. No, they represent individual constituencies.  FALCON: I know, and that's what I'm saying.  OBASOHAN: I know, so I don't think this is too partisan as far as I'm concerned, because they are like you said --  FALCON: Then why during, let's say, the Clinton presidency, and the impeachment scandal, and the whole time period, most of the American people were saying that they didn't think Congress should be wasting time on the impeachment? But what Congress did was get into that trap of partisanship so that Democrats were so worried to defend Bill Clinton. The Republicans were attacking Bill Clinton. They stopped doing the people's business and the American people were saying, "Stop this nonsense."  OBASOHAN: You are going to defend --  FALCON: Stop this nonsense, and they didn't stop it, because the political parties were walking to it.  OBASOHAN: You are going to defend a president who lied under oath that the Congress had the backbone to impeach. You are going to call that partisan. I don't think --  FALCON: It was partisan.  OBASOHAN: There's a president who lied under oath. I don't care what he lied – and so the chief enforcer who lied under oath.  FALCON: And we're also witnessing in our time period right now, we’ll see how long this lasts over the next couple of years, but we have a Congress that is terribly divided down party lines, and when we look at almost any legislation, the percentage of members who vote according to their party and down party line; it's reached historic proportions.  OBASOHAN: This is representative of our own society. We are a diverse society. You cannot be surprised by this.  FALCON: Well, for being such a diverse society why --  OBASOHAN: I don't think we are partisan.  FALCON: -- do two political parties with two national organizations with a lot of money and clout; why are they so successful at bottling up the people's business in the House of Representatives?  OBASOHAN: It is called politics.  FALCON: United States Senate.  OBASOHAN: It is -- this is good.  FALCON: No, it's called partisan politics.  OBASOHAN: No, it is called -- politics is a beautiful concept to acquire political power. This is called politics for those of us --  FALCON: I'm not arguing against politics, but I am arguing against Congress that turns its back against its constituents and no longer votes in the interest of their constituents and their voters and the people who live in their districts and they start voting for the national parties in Washington D.C. and in New York.  OBASOHAN: People of the same view as you have become offended when members of Congress downplay to your own wishes. They are responsible for the needs of their own constituency. And if you call that partisanship, that is the politics.  FALCON: No, that's not what I'm calling partisanship. What I'm calling partisanship is that when you get the two political parties, when their leaderships and their whips start pulling out their, like I said, their marching orders, because that's what they are; they actively punish members from their own parties who don't vote according to their line.  OBASOHAN: It is called --  FALCON: That is not what people send people to Congress for.  OBASOHAN: It is called politics. Those of us -- I mean, how many Independent members of Congress -- you know one; Jim Jeffords, from Vermont, who may be retiring shortly. So --  FALCON: And he is a respected member of Congress, because he is an Independent, and because he represents the people of his --  OBASOHAN: I don't care -- I don't know how much respect you give. He's only one person who looks like a Democrat, smells like a Democrat, acts like a Democrat; he might as well be a Democrat.  FALCON: Goes to Washington, the power of one. That's what Congress is about. That's what the House of Representatives is built for; the people's house. I want to know that my representative, whether you see him as a trustee or a delegate, it's my trustee and my delegate, my district in California, whatever it is.  OBASOHAN: If you're a member of Congress that does not bring home the bacon, is he likely to be reelected?  FALCON: That's another argument for local politics. All politics --  OBASOHAN: So if you're a member --  FALCON: Yeah, I want them to bring home the bacon. I'm all for pork barrel politics, but not based on party line arguments. Not based on them following orders and doing what they're told -- and then it's me that's telling them as their voter.  OBASOHAN: But they are members of the political party. I don't think the institution, these two houses, are partisan. They are simply responding to the needs of their own people.  FALCON: Like you just said. We live in a candidate-centered time period now. Political parties used to be much more powerful. I'll agree with you on that one, but the fact that we've gone to a candidate-centered election system where candidates can be more independent, that's what I'm trying to protect. And what I'm saying is that over the last 15, 20 years, that we have started to sink back into a period where the political parties are stepping on the independence and on the real decision making of individual members. I want to protect individual members from politics.  OBASOHAN: I think we are going back to the good old days. The days of Richard Daley, when the partisans were in control.  FALCON: And that's why we had a reform movement spread across the United States in the early part of the 1900s. The reform system, the primary election system was all designed to take power away from political parties and back to the people.  OBASOHAN: And how many Americans actually vote in the primaries and the caucuses? Very little Americans. So I don't think the institution --  FALCON: And that's why we need to have open primaries. So that people can go back --  OBASOHAN: We have open primaries. We have open primaries. Most of the states employ open primaries.  FALCON: No, no, no. The Supreme Court has said that political parties are private organizations. They can determine who votes in their primaries.  OBASOHAN: And there's nothing. That is correct.  FALCON: That argument is still being debated right now. I'm for open primaries, because it's going to weaken political parties and give voters more choices.  OBASOHAN: You want the parties to be weakened and, therefore, be partisan or nonpartisan.  FALCON: I want parties to be weakened.  OBASOHAN: So that --  FALCON: Congress is too partisan. Political parties are dominating the political process. Anything that weakens political parties is good for me.  OBASOHAN: What is going to replace Congress in your own point of view? If you say they are partisan right now, what is going to replace them?  FALCON: Based on my reading of the Constitution.  OBASOHAN: What institution --  FALCON: Based on my reading of the Constitution, even going back to the framers' intent and the Colonial period, the Revolution, I don't live in a national government. I don't want to be treated by a national government. I want my member from the House of Representatives to know my name, go to Congress and fight for me. I want the Senator from my state to go to Washington D.C.  OBASOHAN: How many Americans --  FALCON: -- and represent my interest.  OBASOHAN: -- know the names of their members of Congress?  FALCON: That's not my problem.  OBASOHAN: See, but you are talking as an educated person, which you are, but most Americans are not like that. You're going to blame the institution for the ignorance of Americans.  FALCON: No, I'm not talking institution, but you're making it sound like political parties are making up for that problem. That somehow political parties are helping solve the issue of people not being informed.  OBASOHAN: Yes, they are helping solve the situation. The fact that most Americans are not participating is not their fault.  FALCON: Usually people pick sides, and usually by twisting arguments and twisting issues in some simple little box.  OBASOHAN: You're supposed to twist arguments. This is called politics.  FALCON: Look, we even have a country that's talking about people living in red states and blue states. I don't live in a blue state. I live in the State of California. And I might live in another state someday, but I don't live in a red state or a blue state. The political parties' partisanship, they try to put us all into these little boxes and make us think in terms of small little boxes, small little canned solutions to problems.  OBASOHAN: You know, Professor Falcon, this is a slogan. Red or blue or green, they're all Americans. So, I mean, I don't think the institution is to blame for all these kinds of acronyms.  FALCON: No, but you are defending the institution. You're defending political parties. And I'm sorry, but most Americans will tell you they can't even tell the difference between the two political parties.  OBASOHAN: The institution is not a partisan institution. To accuse them of such does not take into account the responsibilities of members of both houses. Their job is to go to Washington and bring home the bacon. If they don't bring home the bacon, they will not be reelected. And if you accuse them that they are --  FALCON: So you're basically making it sound like for them to be successful at doing -- that they have to sell out.  OBASOHAN: That is the reality. That is the reality.  FALCON: They have to sell out to whatever party is in the majority.  OBASOHAN: That is the reality -- or sell out to a PAC.  FALCON: But that's not what we're saying.  OBASOHAN: You are part of the saying  FALCON: What we're saying is that members of Congress are going and basically not being able to accomplish anything. They're not getting anything done. We have gridlock. We can't get people to get bills out of committee. We can't get people to get votes up or down on whether they should be federal judges. It has nothing to do with the merit of the candidates or the nominees. It's all based on the political parties.  OBASOHAN: Do you know in poll after poll where most Americans are asked, "Should Congress turn out lots of new laws?" Most Americans said, "No, we have enough." So then these people go there and simply bring home the bacon. If you say that is partisan, I say that is politics. You and I will not settle this here, of course. As we continue to discuss this, and you continue to discuss this among yourselves as students along with your professors; the Congress is a viable breathing institution in this country and you can take whichever side you prefer, but it remains a livable kind of institution --  FALCON: Hijacked by political parties.  OBASOHAN: -- that most of us will continue to employ. Thank you.