Foreign Policy asks the question: “Who Killed Copenhagen?” FP does list hapless Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev), but the real culprit is the institution itself: the United States Senate.
Indeed, the Senate is where bills go to die. American healthcare reform has been slowed and stalled throughout the year in the upper house. But the progress on a cap-and-trade bill makes the healthcare reform process look swimmingly. Climate change legislation hasn’t even gotten through committee, and won’t until next year, at the earliest.
Matters are not helped that the opposition party has no interest in governance—only power for power’s sake. Nearly two-fifths of the body would reject any bill—on any topic—out of hand, simply because they fear any legislative accomplishments will make Democrat Senators, and President Barack Obama, more popular and politically secure. The interests of the country are of little import to them. Moderate Democratic Senators (Evan Bayh and Joe Lieberman—an independent who caucuses with the majority—chief among them) are little better, obstructing and obfuscating necessary policy.
As it currently operates, the Senate is an impediment to democratic governance, unresponsive to the vast majority of American public opinion, and harmful to the future of the United States. Institutional reform is desperately needed in American government—we are governed by institutions largely unchanged since the late 18th century. This will simply not work in a hyper-globalized world. If Washington wants to maintain its global preeminence in the twenty-first century, it needs to dramatically reform the procedures of the Senate—and barring that, disband the undemocratic body.
