A Congress in trouble

The political tiff between Rep. Olympia Snowe and Sen. George Mitchell over the collapse of the federal budget summit can be written off as a politically necessary if unusually nasty exchange between two normally restrained members of the Maine congressional delegation. But there is a feeling back home that the motives and provocations run deeper than partisan politics.

What the state may be watching is the beginning of the end of the old order in American politics. Congress has been running from the truth for a long time. The truth — the reality of huge overspending, pandering to special interests and basing major national decisions on immediate personal political self-interest — is overtaking and is about to run over all 535 senators and House members.

Rep. Snowe and Sen. Mitchell are hearing footsteps behind them. They, and their colleagues, had better listen closely.

The public is fed up.

The $500 billion (at last count) savings-and-loan scandal is the responsibility of every member of Congress who was on watch while this economic disaster was allowed to happen. The public is coming to understand that the S&L crisis did not occur spontaneously. Lightning did not strike these banks. The scandal was the end product of decisions made by members of Congress who deliberately loosened their grip on an economic institution that proved incapable of regulating itself. Meanwhile, they increased taxpayer exposure to the folly of S&L executives, then took money from the S&Ls in the form of political campaign contributions.

Fed up? You bet.

Now, the same people who allowed the S&L crisis to happen are demonstrating that they are incapable of doing the primary job for which they were sent to Washington: Make responsible policy and spend the public’s money wisely.

Facing a $168 billion, one-year budget deficit, these elected representatives are unwilling to make tough decisions on spending priorities. They are afraid of the reaction of constituents who will be angry when the federal gravy train doesn’t stop for them anymore. Too many members of the House and Senate have a priority of their own: maintaining a base of special-interest support and money for their continuing cycle of re-elections. This, unfortunately, is what the American congressional experience has come down to after 200 years.

Like sleepers trapped in a nightmare, unable to run away, the people that America sent to Washington have incapacitated themselves. They can hear the outrage of the American taxpayer and voter. The truth is hard on their heels and now they are fighting among themselves.

Is the public surprised? No. Just fed up.