Has Congress finally come to its senses?

Only 10 percent of voters approve of the job it is doing, according to
one new national poll.  And another survey reports only 26 percent have
a positive view of Republicans, who control the U.S. House of
Representatives and can block votes in the Senate.

More than half of American voters think this is one of the worst
Congresses ever, the polls say.

Congress seems paralyzed. Unable to agree on a budget, it has allowed
automatic, across-the-board spending cuts to click into effect.

The leading groups favoring those cuts are some conservative
organizations that want so badly to cut government spending they hardly
care how it will be done.  They even agree to slash military spending,
which they usually support.

With more automatic budget cuts looming, Congress gave itself one more
chance.  It appointed a huge, unwieldy committee to come up with a
solution. Fortunately, the two committee heads, GOP Rep. Paul Ryan and
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, decided to do all the work, and they came
up with a compromise.

It was pretty simple.  The House Republican budget proposal was $967
billion. Senate Democrats came in with $1.058 trillion.  The average of
the two is about $1.012 trillion.

The Ryan-Murray bipartisan deal is for $1.012 trillion.  Brilliant.

Amazingly, the House and Senate had earlier agreed on the military
portion of the budget, larger than all the rest combined. But the
compromise result was less for the military. Nonmilitary spending was
closer to the Democratic level.

The good news is that there is a two-year deal, and Congress can get on
with other major issues such as farm policy and immigration, both of
which need immediate attention.

Not everybody liked the outcome. Liberal Democrats, including Maine’s
Chellie Pingree, had wanted additional unemployment insurance to be
included in the deal, but it wasn’t. 

Even before the deal was complete, conservative groups blasted it. 
Following their lead, faithful tea partiers opposed the budget, voting
with the liberals.

In the end, a moderate majority, including Maine’s Mike Michaud,
dominated the House.  It was composed of an almost equal number of
members of both parties.

Certainly, some Republicans decided a compromise was worth the risk of
facing tea party challengers next year.

Conservative groups attacked those favoring compromise over drastic
automatic cuts.  They preferred deadlock.

It matters that the people believe their government is capable of
functioning, whether it cuts taxes and spending, raises them or
compromises.  Prolonged deadlock is dangerous to the political system.

Coming after years of stalemate, the federal budget compromise was more
important for the simple fact of its existence than the details of the
deal.

But what happened after the deal was announced was perhaps even more
surprising than the compromise.

House Speaker John Boehner, a conservative Republican, blasted the
conservative organizations that had opposed the deal.  He said they were
using his members for their own fund-raising purposes.

The Republican Party has come to rely heavily on these groups, which
have produced massive support for the tea party candidates that gave the
GOP its House majority.

But they have also used the GOP to block any action they did not like. 
Boehner, clinging to his speakership, has been reluctant to move unless
his party could pass a bill without Democratic support. 

This time, he stood up to the tea party and its conservative backers by
allowing a bipartisan vote to pass the budget.  It looked like he was
taking back the Republican Party, still conservative, but willing to
compromise.

The Republican House majority has the right to influence the policies
adopted by Congress and the president.  But it may be backing off from
causing stalemate by preventing anything it dislikes from passing.  

The renewal of a healthy political system seems to depend heavily on the
GOP shifting from a “my way or the highway” approach to hammering out
compromises with the Democrats.

That’s why Boehner’s move, almost a declaration of independence from
outside conservative groups, may be the most important thing that
happened last week.

The U.S. Senate went along with the House.  The key vote was to end
debate on the budget, and 67 senators, including 12 Republicans, voted
in favoring of blocking a filibuster.

Among the Republicans, in addition to GOP moderates like Maine’s Susan
Collins, were several true conservatives, though not tea partiers. 
Angus King voted with the Democrats who all voted to end debate.

This congressional course correction offers some hope that the American
political system can get back on the track.