Who's Gridlock in the congress - (NOT Republicans)

Whose Gridlock Is It?

Posted 01/16/2014 06:39 PM ET

Politics: If there's one truism in the world today, it's that Republicans are the cause of all the partisan gridlock in Washington. It must be true, since everyone constantly says so. Turns out, however, it's just a big fat lie.

A few months ago, Quinnipiac University asked voters to choose between Republicans "determined to block any President Obama initiative" or Obama's lack of negotiating skills for gridlock in Washington.

More than half (55%) blamed Republicans. Makes sense, since every Democrat, every liberal pundit, and almost every reporter has repeated the claim ad nauseam since the GOP took control of the House in 2011.
Obama routinely blames "hyperpartisanship" by "a faction of Republicans in the House" for failure to make progress.

CNN ran a story earlier in the year — headlined "Gridlock in Congress? Blame the GOP" — which quoted a Washington Post op-ed claiming Republicans are now "an insurgent outlier in American politics."

Even some Republicans point the finger of blame at their own party, as did California Rep. Buck McKeon when he announced his retirement this week.

But what the good folks at Quinnipiac — as well as most of the public — seemed to have overlooked is that there's another possible cause of gridlock.

It's called the Senate. You know, the other house of Congress. The one run by Democrats.

When the liberal Brookings Institution decided to look at the facts, they came to the stunning conclusion that it was the Democratic-run Senate, not the Republican House, that's largely to blame.

The Brookings scholars note that the 113th Congress passed just 56 bills out of the 5,700 introduced, making it the least productive of any since 1947.

What they found, however, was that the Republican-run House actually passed bills at nearly twice the rate as the Senate under Harry Reid's leadership.

"The Senate," the authors wrote, "is not serving its intended function." And that's not because Senate Republicans keep filibustering bills.

The authors found that the vast majority of Senate bills — 87% to be exact — were killed in committees that are — you guessed it — chaired by Democrats.

"While the filibuster may grab all the headlines," the authors note, "committees are a far deadlier weapon."

So if you want to grouse about Washington gridlock, direct your post cards, letters, emails or phone calls to the real cause: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Or try reid.senate.gov/contact.