6-28-07, 1:27 pm

The Bush administration and its appointees and Congress are in conflict, in a struggle for power. Although personality and partisanship are important elements of this power struggle, viewing this situation as an internal conflict in the US ruling class is also helpful in clearing up some of the muddiness. The ruling class is in crisis because it appears unable to agree on its own ground rules for how to run the country.

The Constitution was more or less authored by the capitalist class. It designated a division of power and representative institutions to ensure shared power and to prevent a single person or clique from assuming total power.

But now Bush appears to be on the verge of doing the latter and ignoring the Constitutional authority of Congress, the most representative institution in the government. Bush has joked about dictatorship, has written an emergency order that would declare himself the sole leader in the event of a 'catastrophic event,' and has openly stated that he is uninterested in public opinion.

Bush's concept of crony capitalism favors his capitalist supporters, providing them with lucrative no-bid government contracts, provides them billions in federal subsidies, and mobilizes the political, economic, and military power of the US government to their causes, while ignoring other capitalists.

Along the way, Bush has harmed the democratic rights of all the people (with the US PATRIOT Act, wiretapping and spying on US citizens, undermining civil rights) and pushed economic and tax policies that have harmed working families. Driving jobs out of the country, shifting the tax burden to working families, and implementing trade and economic policies that enrich multinational corporations at the expense of working people here.

To secure the votes it needs to accomplish this agenda, Bush and the ultra right in Congress cynically aligned itself with the religious right. It used its control over huge campaign coffers to sledgehammer the votes of moderate Republicans in Congress (a la Tom DeLay and the K Street project) and even resorted to vote theft to win the presidency and congressional majorities. So confident was Karl Rove in his system of ,' or eliminating about 3 million votes in the 2006 election (now being exposed as a result of the US attorneys scandal), that when pollsters said the GOP would lose 40 or 50 seats in the House, he smugly retorted that, according to his own polls, the GOP would actually win.

Despite 'caging' and vote theft, the Republicans lost control of Congress. How did that happen? We could argue that the sections of the capitalist class which found themselves punished or marginalized by Bush and his clique got fed up. (As did the mass of voters of non-elite origins.) Both democratic-minded capitalists and the working class and its allies in the peace movement, the civil rights movement, the environmental movement, the women's equality movement entered a tenuous alliance in the 2006 campaign to defeat the Bush and ultra right Republican dominance of the political process.

And this alliance succeeded, with these latter activist sections of the population proving crucial and decisive in that victory. The alliance, not a formal one by any means, was based on a lot of legislative goals: oversight and reigning in the excesses of the Bush administration, ending the war, extension of union rights for workers, civil rights legislation ranging from equal pay to anti-hate crimes legislation, and environmental legislation addressing the climate crisis.

What are the accomplishments of this alliance? So far the worst excesses of the Bush administration have been exposed, halted, and even in some cases reversed (e.g. refusal to address ongoing Hurricane Katrina disaster, some PATRIOT provisions have been eliminated, congressional oversight has exposed several Bush administration power grabs). The alliance has also successfully shifted debates on the war and climate change. The debate now is over when and how the war should end, not over whether or not we should be there. On climate change, the public and most politicians are talking about how much can we do to turn the tide against global warming, and the deniers are raving lunatics.

But little new policy has emerged. And the new legislation that has emerged, such as on addressing the climate crisis, has been weak and oriented toward addressing the perceived needs of capitalists (e.g. in the case of recent climate change legislation, for those who own the auto industry and various energy sectors). The minimum wage was raised slightly, but with billions in new tax breaks for employers. In the case of antiwar legislation, no timetables, but rather 'benchmarks' that punish Iraq and ensure oil resources are open to foreign control. Of course, with slim majorities in Congress (especially the debilitating filibuster rules in the Senate) and an ideologically driven and besieged executive, who wields veto power, what else could we expect?

But the executive's veto power and the Senate's filibuster rules (requiring 60 votes to get anything passed) were carefully designed ruling class mechanism's to guarantee compromise across different sections of the capitalist class. Both of those institutions check the power of the House of Representatives, which is the institution that is the most open to influence by ordinary folk. For the most part, this balance of power ensures the stability of the ruling class and prevents other elements (e.g. representatives of the working class) from attaining too much influence.

But with these recent scandals – the US attorneys scandal, revelations about vote 'caging,' Cheney's declaration of himself above the law – it appears that the Bush administration is flouting the agreed-upon rules of the balance of power.

Should ordinary people sit back and let the conflict run its course? What do we have to gain from this situation?

Some might say that because the political system is so dominated by big money and by people who ultimately agree with each other on the basic issues (that the needs of big business trump all others or that real change is too scary), that working people and other advocates of social justice should rely only on other avenues of influence and change. Some argue that being involved in electoral politics, especially on the level of attempting to influence and campaign with political parties that actually wield power (e.g. Democrats) isn't worth the effort and affects no change. Democrats and Republicans are all the same, some insist.

But, we should agree that things like Supreme Court appointments, shifts in political debate, and the actual legislation produced have a real impact on the lives of ordinary people whether they are part of the process or not. So sitting out the turmoil makes no sense. And pretending that third party politics is the best electoral strategy is the same as sitting out at best, and, at worst, gives the ultra right-wing electoral victories.

What do we gain from being involved, besides heartburn and frustration? Bush's power has been checked. Anti-democratic trends are being reversed. The war will end. New civil and workers rights measures will pass. Extremist judicial appointments have been blocked. Voter protections will pass. Stem cell and other disease-fighting measures will be adopted. Better climate crisis legislation will also make its way through this grindingly slow process. More resources will be made available to fight AIDS and poverty. Some sort of health care reform that will give more people some or additional access to health care will be adopted, as well.

Should we settle for half measures? No. Justice requires more.

Will the Constitutional crisis being precipitated by the the Bush administration lead to the collapse of the political system? I doubt, and frankly I am not rooting for that option. The alternative would not be a good thing. 'Decider' Bush, 'commander guy' for life? No thanks.

So congressional Dems are going to have to make this a real fight and defend the Constitution. Bush's record shows that the world, not just our country, is depending on them.

--Joel Wendland is managing editor of Political Affairs and can be reached at