On Wednesday, the House steering committee will vote to decide whether to oust Rep. John Dingell from the post of chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, where he's been a thorn in the green-besotted side of environmental and clean energy advocates. Rep. Henry Waxman wants to take his job.
The timing is propitious, given the subject matter of the main Congressional debate -- whether to transfer government cash to the auto industry, which has been Dingell's main patron and concern for decades. Detroit wants Dingell to win; Waxman has fought for more clean air regulation for 30 years. There's already talk of behind-the-scenes negotiations: maybe Dingell will stay put for another year and then step down. Waxman, and many Democratic colleagues, won't have that.
Waxman wants the job for obvious reasons: the committee will be the most powerful in the new Congress, one that'll deal with health care and energy legislation. (Ways and Means? Pleghghgh.) A lot of impatient liberal Democrats want to see Dingell go; he is too old, too blinkered in his thinking and too at odds with the party on energy, they say; just as many, it seems, want him to say, including some influential members of the leadership, even if for reasons of preserving the integrity of the seniority system.
Senior Democratic aides expect that the vote will go to the full caucus; all the loser of the steering committee vote has to do is present a letter with 35 House members. The full vote would be Thursday via secret ballot.
Dingell will need a way to save face if he loses. Perhaps he'd take a lead role in a government-ordered restructuring of the auto industry, or maybe he'd serve on a commission appointed to do the same thing.
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