Timothy Egan on American politics and life, as seen from the West.

After the last insult had been spat from the Senate floor, after final passage of a legislative attempt to do something significant in this messy democracy, a leading voice of the opposition made a public prediction:

“People will be hunting Democrats with dogs,” said Senator Phil Gramm of Texas.

This was 1993, in the fragile first year of Bill Clinton’s presidency, on a vote to raise taxes for the wealthiest 1.2 percent and cut them for the poor and small businesses. That budget bill passed without a single Republican vote.

What followed was the greatest period of peacetime prosperity in modern times, a budget surplus of $559 billion and a president who left office with an approval rating of 66 percent — the highest of any since World War II. But first, some Democrats were indeed hunted, particularly in the South, which has been cleansing itself of the party since the Civil Rights era.

Gramm went on to deregulate the banking industry, setting the stage for a binge of economic nihilism that nearly brought down the world economy.



That fight in 1993 is worth recalling this Christmas Eve, as the voices of the apocalypse rain down on Democrats who dare try to expand health care for their fellow Americans.

In many ways, the budget vote 16 years ago ushered in the modern era of hyper-partisanship. Right-wing talk radio hosts were just entering their steroid phase, threatening any Republican who voted for a bill that ultimately led to budget surpluses.

From then on, nobody could “respectfully disagree.” Moderates were called wussies, traitors and socialists. When Republicans gained control of everything, the fringe Democratic left took their rhetorical cues from their angry counterparts on the right. This year, things became coarser still with the “tea party” extremists, who taught Republicans in Congress how to shout “You lie!” to the president and cast aspersions on something so innocuous as a pep talk to school children.

What the Senate has done this week will not break the economy or cure all that ails a profoundly imperfect health care system. “What we are building here is not a mansion,” said Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa. “It’s a starter home. But it’s got a great foundation.”

For that, it deserved at least a handful of Republican votes. Can the bill, without its public option, making reforms that many in the G.O.P. advocated in last year’s election, really be so one-sided that not one lone Republican could support it?

I was hoping for a profile in courage, just to signal a truce of sorts during this awful epoch of toxic nastiness. Instead, we got cowardice. But by the rules of political combat dating to 1993, the opposing party can take no other stance.

So, there was Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, all but calling for the Almighty to strike down an aging Democratic legislator, when he urged people to pray that at least one senator would not make it to the chambers during a snowstorm. His colleagues took it as a clear reference to the ailing, wheelchair-bound, 92-year-old Robert Byrd.

And there was Mike Huckabee, showing once again his Gomer Pyle piety without Gomer’s sincerity, comparing the vote of Senator Ben Nelson, the last Democratic holdout to join his party, to Judas Iscariot, who sold out Christ.

Topping them all was Michael Steele, the Republican National Committee chair, saying Congress was “flipping the bird” to the American people with the vote to expand health care. Daniel Webster he ain’t. But let’s put that quote up on the board for posterity.

The other side was not much better, with Democratic majority leader Harry Reid comparing opponents to slave holders.

For now, Americans are against “the bill,” whatever they think it is. But strong majorities favor a public option, and reining in insurance companies, and overhauling the medical industrial complex. They want reform. They just don’t want the fight.

As people get a chance to see what’s actually in the bill, sentiment will shift. Over time, it closes the dreaded doughnut hole, which makes cash-strapped seniors pay for their meds at the point when they are most in hock to Big Pharma. It forces insurance companies to cover people with pre-existing conditions. By creating an exchange where people can shop for coverage, the bill seeks to bring care to 31 million additional Americans. And it does all this, according to the independent Congressional Budget Office, by reducing the deficit $132 billion over 10 years.

There are new taxes on tanning salons — already dubbed the Boehner tax, for the preternaturally bronzed Republican House leader from Ohio — and those at the highest end.

Will Democrats run on it, or run from it? That depends on whether they take a long view, and fight, or a short view and cower. There are plenty of people in the latter camp. The former can look to the lonely legislators who stood with Bill Clinton in 1993 and say “told you so,” while grandchildren listen at Christmas.