Paul Ryan’s Worst Ally
“He has actually proposed three — total, three — bills that have become law in his entire career dating back to 1999,” said David T. Canon, chairman of the political science department at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. One named a post office in Wisconsin, a second changed taxes on arrows used by deer hunters, and the third, this year, established a $3 million presidential commission on “evidence-based policy making.”
.. “Paul Ryan is not a detail kind of legislator in terms of putting bills together to pass, and he never has been,” Professor Canon said. “He is an ideas guy. He’s not Lyndon Johnson — ‘let’s crack heads and get stuff done and actually pass some laws.’ ”
.. “If Trump wins, it will be because he will have found a way to campaign by marginalizing the core party and its leaders. Trump will conclude he doesn’t need Ryan’s ideas.”
.. “If Clinton wins,” Mr. Kettl continued, “it will be because Trump has made a shambles of the party and Ryan will have had to spend months diminishing himself by distancing himself from Trump. Either way, Ryan will face a massive rebuilding job. It’s conceivable that his wonky agenda will provide an ideological keel on which to rebuild the party. But that’s not likely.”
.. And as Mr. Ryan’s troublesome first year as speaker has shown, his challenges in passing legislation stem as much from Republicans’ divisions as from who is president. Congressional Republicans failed to agree on a budget resolution, which does not require a president’s signature.