- On Tuesday, when this page runs the list of people it
has endorsed for election, we will include no Republican Congressional
candidates for the first time in our memory. Although Times editorials
tend to agree with Democrats on national policy, we have proudly and consistently
endorsed a long line of moderate Republicans, particularly for the House.
Our only political loyalty is to making the two-party system as vital and
responsible as possible.
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- That is why things are different this year.
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- To begin with, the Republican majority that has run the
House - and for the most part, the Senate - during President Bush's tenure
has done a terrible job on the basics. Its tax-cutting-above-all-else has
wrecked the budget, hobbled the middle class and endangered the long-term
economy. It has refused to face up to global warming and done pathetically
little about the country's dependence on foreign oil.
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- Republican leaders, particularly in the House, have developed
toxic symptoms of an overconfident majority that has been too long in power.
They methodically shut the opposition - and even the more moderate members
of their own party - out of any role in the legislative process. Their
only mission seems to be self-perpetuation.
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- The current Republican majority managed to achieve that
burned-out, brain-dead status in record time, and with a shocking disregard
for the most minimal ethical standards. It was bad enough that a party
that used to believe in fiscal austerity blew billions on pork-barrel projects.
It is worse that many of the most expensive boondoggles were not even directed
at their constituents, but at lobbyists who financed their campaigns and
high-end lifestyles.
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- That was already the situation in 2004, and even then
this page endorsed Republicans who had shown a high commitment to ethics
reform and a willingness to buck their party on important issues like the
environment, civil liberties and women's rights.
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- For us, the breaking point came over the Republicans'
attempt to undermine the fundamental checks and balances that have safeguarded
American democracy since its inception. The fact that the White House,
House and Senate are all controlled by one party is not a threat to the
balance of powers, as long as everyone understands the roles assigned to
each by the Constitution. But over the past two years, the White House
has made it clear that it claims sweeping powers that go well beyond any
acceptable limits. Rather than doing their duty to curb these excesses,
the Congressional Republicans have dedicated themselves to removing restraints
on the president's ability to do whatever he wants. To paraphrase Tom DeLay,
the Republicans feel you don't need to have oversight hearings if your
party is in control of everything.
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- An administration convinced of its own perpetual rightness
and a partisan Congress determined to deflect all criticism of the chief
executive has been the recipe for what we live with today.
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- Congress, in particular the House, has failed to ask
probing questions about the war in Iraq or hold the president accountable
for his catastrophic bungling of the occupation. It also has allowed Mr.
Bush to avoid answering any questions about whether his administration
cooked the intelligence on weapons of mass destruction. Then, it quietly
agreed to close down the one agency that has been riding herd on crooked
and inept American contractors who have botched everything from construction
work to the security of weapons.
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- After the revelations about the abuse, torture and illegal
detentions in Abu Ghraib, Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay, Congress
shielded the Pentagon from any responsibility for the atrocities its policies
allowed to happen. On the eve of the election, and without even a pretense
at debate in the House, Congress granted the White House permission to
hold hundreds of noncitizens in jail forever, without due process, even
though many of them were clearly sent there in error.
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- In the Senate, the path for this bill was cleared by
a handful of Republicans who used their personal prestige and reputation
for moderation to paper over the fact that the bill violates the Constitution
in fundamental ways. Having acquiesced in the president's campaign to dilute
their own authority, lawmakers used this bill to further Mr. Bush's goal
of stripping the powers of the only remaining independent branch, the judiciary.
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- This election is indeed about George W. Bush - and the
Congressional majority's insistence on protecting him from the consequences
of his mistakes and misdeeds. Mr. Bush lost the popular vote in 2000 and
proceeded to govern as if he had an enormous mandate. After he actually
beat his opponent in 2004, he announced he now had real political capital
and intended to spend it. We have seen the results. It is frightening to
contemplate the new excesses he could concoct if he woke up next Wednesday
and found that his party had maintained its hold on the House and Senate.
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