Pelosi Retires: A Legacy That Defines an Era

Pelosi's retirement and record power isn't a speech, it's a vote count. Nancy Pelosi says she'll retire at the end of her term, closing nearly four decades in Congress and two history making turns as speaker of the House. She announced the decision by video, thanking San Francisco and promising a final year of service. Her legacy is turning razor thin margins into landmark law across health care, finance, infrastructure, climate and civil rights. Even rivals took notice. As former Speaker Republican Newt Gingrich put it, you could argue she's been the strongest speaker in U.S. history. Gingrich himself praising her ability to move big bills with tiny margins from the Affordable Care act to the inflation Reduction act, from Wall street reform to veterans care. Pelosi didn't just preside, she deuced. Whether you love her politics or not, the map of modern American policy bears her fingerprints. Okay, what's the real message here? Whether you love Pelosi or not, she will go down in history as one of the most powerful speakers in the history of the country, if not the most powerful. She knew how to count votes. She knew how to get legislation over the line, turning it into law. Let's dig a little bit deeper here. Now, to most Republicans, conservatives, MAGA members in the United States, the mere mention of the word Pelosi is as if you said the devil. It's if you've said the boogeyman is here because she became a favorite target in TV commercials for Republican candidate direct mail campaigns. You just talk about the San Francisco Democrats and how awful they are, how they're going to destroy the country. And you put a picture of Nancy Pelosi and the money would flow in. Now let's go behind the theatrics and look at what's really happening here. Both political parties have to raise money. They're always looking for symbols of someone from the other party that can scare, induce fear in their followers. And Nancy Pelosi did that among Republicans. Now a case can be made. The reason she was vilified so much was not because of awful things she did. Although a conservative could certainly disagree with any one policy she advocated, she became feared, hated, low because she was so extraordinarily what leaders of any one party hope that the leader does in another party is give a bunch of speeches, say crazy things, be ineffective and get nothing done. That's not Nancy Pelosi's track record. She, in fact wasn't really known for being fantastic in the media and for really giving riveting speeches. Highly persuasive. She was known as the person who could put together coalitions, who could lobby her own members, who could gently twist arms, find compromises, figure out ways of getting legislation actually passed and turned into law. So if you do believe government can work and you want it to work, Pelosi is someone near and dear to your heart. Let's look at some of her biggest accomplishments. The Affordable Affordable Care act, also known as Obamacare, just barely squeaked by the House and the Senate. She made it possible. Dodd Frank Financial reform this is the post crisis Wall Street Rules created. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau wouldn't have happened without her. Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay act back in 2009. Now you might not care about that, but it made it easier for people to file suits against pay discrimination. The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Hate Crimes Act. She helps repeal the don't ask, don't tell law, which opened up the military service to gay people. So she had a tremendous amount of legislative accomplishment. Covid Relief if all of a sudden you were out of a job during COVID and you needed some money to just pay your bills or eat, you could thank Nancy Pelosi again. I understand. Certainly if you are a conservative and you want the leanest possible government and you want the number one action to be cutting taxes, you're no fan of Nancy Pelosi and you're not disappointed at all that she's retiring. Now, we should point out she did step down from the Speaker's role last year. So she has been more or less a regular member of Congress for this term and she's announced she's not going to be running for reelection. So she does have one more term. She also was running things with the two Trump impeachments and the January 6th select committee. So she is. She has been involved in every major legislative decision and effort to advance a Democratic agenda for pretty much the last 40 years. Certainly when she was speaker. She will be missed. Now, having said that, there are a lot of Democrats saying, oh, thank goodness you're finally stepping down. We love you, Nancy, but come on, you're just too old. I mean, Joe Biden could be her little brother. She's that old. She is literally closer to the age of 90 than she is at the age of 80. She's in her mid-80s, but closer to 90. So there are a lot of Democrats saying, look, it's just not a good look for the party when after the Joe Biden fiasco of being in debates looking like this, not seemingly knowing where he is and excuse my, excuse me, my friends on the audio podcast, but I just made a face like a dithering old man who doesn't know where he is. Now, Nancy Pelosi always seemed with it. She does not seem like she's lost any of her mental capacity. But at some point, you're close, closer to 90 than you are to 60, 70 or even 80. There are a lot of young voters who think we just want fresh blood, we just want new people. And in fact, the Democrats still have dozens of more members of Congress over 70 than the Republicans do. They are more geriatric, no doubt about it. Having said all that, the current President of the United States will be the oldest person to ever that office if he does serve through the rest of this term. And he'll be even older if he stays longer than that. But we'll leave that debate for another day. So many in the Democratic Party are saying not necessarily or demanding that you leave Congress right now because she wasn't Speaker. But they are breathing a sigh of relief, saying, okay, you did a great job, we appreciate you. But it is time to let in some new blood, some younger blood, and bring people in. Because let's face it, the Democrats are looking a little long in the tooth. Chuck Schumer is nobody's idea of a spring chicken. One of the most famous prominent Democratic senators, Bernie Sanders, who is about the same age, he's 84. He's going to be 90 before you can blink your eye. It is time to get some new blood into the Congress, arguably on both sides. The Democrats going to have at least one more newcomer in the House at the beginning of 2027. That is when former Speaker Pelosi's term will expire. So I happen to think Speaker Pelosi will go down in history with extreme praise from historians as really one of the ablest politicians in the history of this country.