The Blue Dogs bark

By: Glenn Thrush and Patrick O'Connor
February 5, 2009 04:29 AM EST

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has never enjoyed a firmer hold on the leash of her 255-member caucus — but the Blue Dogs are starting to strain against the chain.

Many of the 49 members of the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition are going public with deep misgivings about the goodie-packed $819 billion stimulus package the House passed last week.

That’s hardly surprising, considering it’s a deficit-spending behemoth that inherently offends their balanced-budget sensibilities. But the Dogs are really growling about the way in which the bill passed the House — how Pelosi shepherded it through, and how she suspended “regular order” during the passage of the $700 billion financial markets bailout late last year.

“A lot of the Blue Dogs were unhappy with the [stimulus] bill and even angrier because they felt they had zero input — like their caucus doesn’t matter anymore because of the padded majority,” said a staffer for a prominent caucus member.

“I got in terrible trouble with our leadership because they don’t care what’s in the bill; they just want it to pass and they want it to be unanimous,” Tennessee Rep. Jim Cooper, the member deepest in Pelosi’s doghouse, told a Nashville radio program over the weekend.

“We’re just told how to vote. We’re treated like mushrooms most of the time.”

None of this is lost on Pelosi, a microscopic observer of intra-caucus politics — although it’s not clear if she’ll do anything to appease the group.

Pelosi confidant George Miller (D-Calif.) said Democratic leaders are “definitely paying attention” to the Blue Dogs’ concerns. But at her weekly press conference Wednesday, Pelosi made light of a reporter who tried to ask her about the topic.

“Speaking of the Blue Dogs,” the reporter began.

“Were we speaking about them?” Pelosi asked, before asserting that “a bill … will pass the House” no matter who opposed it.

In the past, the Dogs have barked more than bitten. But they could gain major leverage if Republicans continue to unanimously oppose the stimulus — and Pelosi needs every Democratic vote to pass the House-Senate compromise bill.

Members of the group are slated to meet with President Barack Obama next week and are expected to try to secure a commitment that Obama will tackle the deficit when the crisis passes, said Louisiana Rep. Charlie Melancon, a co-chairman of the Blue Dogs.

More significantly, Melancon will press the case to adopt new rules requiring both chambers to offset any new spending or tax cuts with program cuts or tax increases.

To that end, Blue Dogs are targeting a procedural vote prior to the reconsideration of the stimulus. If Republicans remain opposed to this legislation, the Blue Dogs would have more than enough votes to bring down the procedural measure, suspending consideration of the recovery package and embarrassing party leaders and the new president.

But, as usual, there’s a way out: Melancon hinted that his fellow Blue Dogs would be content with a vote and not passage of the so-called pay-go rules.

The Blue Dogs backed down from a confrontation last week, with an overwhelming majority of their members holding their noses to vote with Pelosi and the White House.

“We didn’t want to embarrass the president,” Melancon said.

But another possible area of friction looms: the inclusion of a new $70 billion alternative minimum tax extension — which most of the Dogs view as fiscal apostasy — as part of the rewritten stimulus expected to emerge from the Senate within the next week or so.

A top House aide said it’s unlikely the group will vote against the package based on the AMT.

Former House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), a close observer of the Democratic caucus, sees a rising tide of frustration, but one that poses little threat to the imperial speakership anytime soon.

“They genuinely mean what they say, it plays well in their home districts — and it doesn’t make any difference around here,” he said. “To be honest with you, I think their power has diminished, not increased, since last year. They are divided, and they won’t buck this president, and he is going to back their leaders.”

To some extent, these larger fiscal and ideological issues are likely to be less fruitful for the group than a procedural matter — the restoration of regular order, which Pelosi has suspended to fast-track massive bills.

That issue, several leadership aides conceded, is more dangerous to Pelosi in the near term because it addresses basic issues of fairness within the larger Democratic caucus beyond the Blue Dogs.

A group of about 55 Democrats, many of them Blue Dogs, have been working with Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), a Blue Dog sympathizer, to prod Pelosi into restoring full committee and subcommittee legislative review.

“We strongly share the view that regular order is important to both the House institutionally and to moving the strongest possible agenda for the American people,” said a person close to Hoyer.

Pelosi is considering loosening her grip, aides say, but hasn’t decided when.

“Both speaker and leadership agree that it is preferable to use regular order, especially in non-emergency cases, and that has always been the intent,” said Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami. “But the fact is, we have lost months in addressing the crisis because of the refusal of the previous administration to acknowledge the rapidly deteriorating conditions — now at a pace of about a half-million jobs lost each month.”