From The Washington Post
By E.J. Dionne Jr.

The most important tension within the new Democratic majority in the House of Representatives is not between liberals and conservatives or free traders and fair traders. It is between older members who once enjoyed the power and perks of majority status, and their younger colleagues who will experience real power for the first time.

The older members — many of whom will be taking over committee chairmanships — came to political maturity in the pre-Clinton, pre-Gingrich era, before the full flowering of the permanent campaign. They governed from a House in which committee leaders typically had more power than the House speaker in shaping legislation.

But nearly two-thirds of the Democrats in the new House have been elected since 1994, meaning they have only known life in the opposition during a time when Republicans radically centralized control in their leadership. In their hunger to overturn the Republican majority, these younger Democrats honed their strategic shrewdness by taking the lesson from Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich that politics and policy are inevitably linked.

The key to Nancy Pelosi’s success as speaker will be to find a way to bring the old bulls and the Young Turks together.

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