“Committed To Decline And Despair”: It’s Time For The GOP To Grow Up
The United States needs two responsible governing parties if it’s ever going to address its most pressing problems.
I’ve grown so used to dismissing Tom Friedman’s work for The New York Times that when he writes something genuinely good, it comes as a surprise. To wit, in his column for the Sunday paper, he aruges that our political system has devolved into a “vetocracy”—a system where “no one can aggregate enough power to make any important decisions at all.”
The culprits, according to Friedman, are polarization, broken institutional norms—in particular, filibuster abuse—the massive proliferation of special interests, and the growing importance of money in politics. The ultimate outcome of this, says Friedman, is governmental paralysis:
America’s collection of minority special-interest groups is now bigger, more mobilized and richer than ever, while all the mechanisms to enforce the will of the majority are weaker than ever. The effect of this is either legislative paralysis or suboptimal, Rube Goldberg-esque, patched-together-compromises, often made in response to crises with no due diligence. That is our vetocracy.
This dovetails with a problem that Friedman only alludes to:
[I]f you believe the fantasy that America’s economic success derives from having had a government that stayed out of the way, then gridlock and vetocracy are just fine with you. But if you have a proper understanding of American history — so you know that government played a vital role in generating growth by maintaining the rule of law, promulgating regulations that incentivize risk-taking and prevent recklessness, educating the work force, building infrastructure and funding scientific research — then a vetocracy becomes a very dangerous thing.
If there’s anything that defines the current political moment, it’s the fact that—of the two major parties—one has completely abandoned the American consensus that Friedman describes. In the mythology of the Republican Party, government has never played a part in the country’s growth or prosperity—the “free market” alone is responsible for the nation’s current prosperity. Not only does this run counter to the historical record—to say nothing of observable reality—but it has resulted in a world where one party refuses to accept a role for government in anything.
As Friedman (obliquely) points out, this is a recipe for disaster. The institutions of the United States aren’t built for one-party rule, and we can’t make progress on pressing issues—climate change, health care, aging infrastructure—without a mutual understanding between the two parties. Republicans don’t have to abandon their preference for small government or their skepticism for federal programs, but effective action requires the GOP to back away from its opposition to the public sector, and reconsider the role of government in solving the nation’s problems.
Between Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, the Republican Party is committed to a radical attack on the size and role of government. The Romney economic plan, which draws its ideas from Paul Ryan’s budget, would eliminate most non-defense discretionary spending, and funnel the savings to tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. Vital government functions like environmental regulation, scientific research, and poverty reduction would be sacrificed on the altar of small government. This isn’t a sustainable state of affairs. A world where government completely withdraws from the lives of ordinary Americans is one where we all but commit to a path of decline and disrepair.
If there’s anything that this country needs right now, it’s a responsible and functional Republican Party. I won’t hold my breath.
BY: Jamelle Bouie, The American Prospect, April23, 2012
“Content Free Propaganda”: “We The People” And Other Things That Aren’t True
According to a recent study by the University of California, 93% of income growth since the economic collapse of 2008 has gone to the wealthiest 1% of American households. Just 20 years ago, the amount of national income growth earned by the top 1% was less than half that.
So, if you are a right wing movement and not even you can justify concentrated economic and political power like that, what do you do? Well, you produce a video that celebrates “freedom” and shakes its fists at “tyranny” and you hope that the gullible will think the plutocratic takeover of our country is as American as apple pie.
The video is called “We the People” and it looks like it’s gone viral on the Right, collecting more than six million hits. I saw it because a friend of my wife’s thought it was just great and was sure we would too. Guess she didn’t get the memo!
The video is organized like an open letter to President Obama and its tone is a perfect replication of the gauzy, abstract vernacular of Fox News.
As the narrator informs President Obama, We The People “have stated resolutely we reject your vision for our country.” We The People “have assembled across America resisting your efforts to subvert our constitution and undermine our liberty.”
The video is filled with the sort of Americana that appeals to Sarah Palin’s right wing “real Americans.” As the Battle Hymn of the Republic plays in the background, scenes of Mount Rushmore, the Lincoln Memorial, a saluting Marine, an Apache attack helicopter, the Preamble to the Constitution, American flags, American flags, American flags and more American flags fill the screen. Even a Bald Eagle makes a guest appearance.
The video claims to speak for We the People but its voice is boilerplate Tea Party Republican: “Our greatest treasure is freedom;” “We believe in the power of the individual;” “Freedom is the capacity of self-determination.”
There are also the Thomas Jefferson-like “long train of abuses” hurled at the President: “you have expanded government, violated our Constitution, confounded laws, seized private industry, destroyed jobs, perverted our economy, curtailed free speech, corrupted our currency, weakened our national security, and endangered our sovereignty.”
And this is why, the video’s producers say, “we” are assembling all across this land, so that “we” can deliver “our” message that: “We will not accept tyranny under any guise;” that the redistribution of “the fruits of our labor is Statism and will not be tolerated;” that “We The People will defend our liberty;” and that “we will protect our beloved country and America’s exceptionalism will prevail.”
At first I thought “We the People” was the kind of parody Saturday Night Live might do as a spoof of right wing propaganda. Even its title was laughhable – “We the People” – as if the 70% of We the People don’t exist who think Democrats are right and Republicans are wrong when it comes to such key questions as whether to tax the rich more, to eliminate subsidies for oil companies or to preserve America’s endangered safety net.
But, at the end of the day, it is also disheartening to see how easy it is for the hard work of raising the level of understanding and debate in this country to all go to waste as vacuous, dishonest, manipulative and utterly content-free propaganda like this is produced to bamboozle even very smart people like those who sent us this insulting piece of reactionary performance art.
Then again, given recent experience, why should we be surprised that so many seem impervious to facts and reason or who now see politics as nothing more than brute force and war — a take-no-prisoners, law of the jungle scramble for survival of the fittest?
But I did like the Bald Eagles.
By: Ted Frier, Open Salon, March 31, 2012
“Block The Vote”: The Republican War On Voter Registration
Republican state legislatures aren’t only trying to prevent voting at the polling place, they are also stopping people from becoming registered voters in the first place. These same laws that require voters to present state issued photo identification at the polling both—nominally aimed at preventing voter fraud—also sometimes contain provisions that are placing onerous requirements and stringent limitations on third party voter registration efforts.
The targets are national and statewide organizations that use volunteers or paid staffers to canvass underrepresented communities to register new voters. Often these voters are young, poor or non-white and thus lean Democratic. A study by the Brennan Center for Justice found, “54 million eligible Americans are not registered to vote. More than 25% of the voting-age citizen population is not registered to vote. Among minority groups, this percentage is even higher— more than 30% for African Americans and more than 40% for Hispanics.” Registration drives typically focuse their efforts on these historically disenfranchised populations, as well as elderly and disabled voters who may have trouble reaching a government office to register. Perversely, as the Brennan Center notes, “Instead of praising civic groups who register voters for their contribution to democracy, many states have cracked down on those groups.”
The excuse is that they wish to prevent fraudulent voter registrations from being submitted. But the result, if these rules are enforced, is that far fewer voters are registered.
In Florida, the New York Times reported on Tuesday, the law has been quite successful:
Florida, which is expected to be a vital swing state once again in this year’s presidential election, is enrolling fewer new voters than it did four years ago as prominent civic organizations have suspended registration drives because of what they describe as onerous restrictions imposed last year by Republican state officials.
The state’s new elections law—which requires groups that register voters to turn in completed forms within 48 hours or risk fines, among other things—has led the state’s League of Women Voters to halt its efforts this year. Rock the Vote, a national organization that encourages young people to vote, began an effort last week to register high school students around the nation—but not in Florida, over fears that teachers could face fines. And on college campuses, the once-ubiquitous folding tables piled high with voter registration forms are now a rarer sight.
The election of 2000 demonstrated how just a few hundred votes in Florida could determine who wins the presidency. Florida’s voter registration law is, of course, facing legal challenges. If the law remains in place, though, it could depress turnout by far more than a few hundred votes.
By: Ben Adler, The Nation, March 29, 2012
“The Fundamental Right To Vote”: Second Judge Strikes Down Wisconsin’s ALEC-Inspired Voter ID Law
A Dane County judge has declared Wisconsin’s American Legislative Exchange Council-inspired voter ID law unconstitutional, making him the second judge in one week to block the law’s unnecessary burdens on the right to vote.
“The people’s fundamental right of suffrage preceded and gave birth to our Constitution,” wrote Dane County District Judge Richard Niess, “not the other way around.”
The judge rebuffed assertions by Governor Scott Walker and legislative Republicans that they possessed the authority to impose new burdens on voting. “[D]efendants’ argument that the fundamental right to vote must yield to legislative fiat turns our constitutional scheme of democratic government squarely on its head,” he wrote.
“A government that undermines the very foundation of its existence – the people’s inherent, pre-constitutional right to vote – imperils its legitimacy as a government by the people, for the people, and especially of the people. It sows the seeds for its own demise as a democratic institution.”
The case was brought by the League of Women Voters and tried by the law firm Cullen, Weston, Pines & Bach.
Judge Niess’ decision comes less than a week after a Wisconsin State Court judge temporarily enjoined the same voter ID law — Act 23 — on grounds it likely violated the state constitution, but only until that court could hear a full trial. Niess’ decision, also decided under the Wisconsin Constitution, permanently invalidates the law. Governor Walker’s Department of Justice says they will quickly appeal the decision.
Voting Protected by Wisconsin Constitution
Article III, Section 1 of the Wisconsin Constitution provides that all state residents who are U.S. citizens and over age 18 may vote, and Section 2, according to the decision, “authorizes the government to exclude from voting those otherwise-eligible electors (1) who have been convicted of a felony and whose civil rights have not been restored, or (2) those adjudged by a court to be incompetent or partially incompetent, unless the judgment contains certain specifications.”
According to Judge Niess, Section 1 and 2 provide the exclusive basis for creating laws that implement the constitutional requirements for voting. “The government may not disqualify an elector who possesses those qualifications on the grounds that the voter does not satisfy additional statutorily created qualifications not contained in Article III, such as a photo ID,” he wrote.
“By enacting Act 23’s photo ID requirements as a precondition to voting, the legislature and governor have exceeded their constitutional authority.”
Wisconsin passed Act 23 in May on a contentious, party-line vote. Four lawsuits challenging the law have since been filed. Wisconsin Republicans assert that the law should be upheld because the U.S. Supreme Court decided in 2008 that Indiana’s relatively similar voter ID law did not violate the U.S. Constitution. However, two of the four lawsuits are challenging Act 23 under the Wisconsin Constitution, which unlike the U.S. Constitution expressly protects the right to vote. Wisconsin’s voter ID law is also more strict than Indiana’s, and evidence indicates it will place more burdens on a greater number of people.
Voter ID’s ALEC Roots
Wisconsin’s voter ID law bears many elements of the ALEC model Voter ID Act. ALEC began to focus on voter ID shortly after the highest general election turnout in nearly 60 years swept America’s first black president into office with strong support from college students and African-Americans. Soon after the 2008 elections, “Preventing Election Fraud” was the cover story on the Inside ALEC magazine, and ALEC corporations and politicians voted in 2009 for “model” voter ID legislation.
Around 34 voter ID bills modeled after the ALEC template were introduced in 2011. Those bills have been coming under increasing scrutiny in recent months.
Judge Niess’ decision came on the same day that the U.S. Department of Justice blocked Texas’ ALEC-inspired voter ID law on grounds it would suppress the Latino vote. Last December, the D.O.J. blocked South Carolina’s voter ID bill as discriminatory against people of color. Texas and South Carolina are two of several states with a history of discrimination requiring federal pre-clearance for changes to voting laws or procedures under the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Wisconsin is not subject to pre-clearance.
“The right to vote belongs to all Wisconsin citizens”
While last week’s state court decision by Judge David Flanagan focused on how the voter ID law “is addressed to a problem which is very limited” and “fails to account for the difficulty its demands impose upon indigent, elderly and disabled citizens,” Judge Niess issued his decision based solely on the legislature’s constitutional authority to regulate voting. “It is not necessary to consider the human cost of photo ID requirements in order to expose their constitutional deficiencies,” he wrote. “They are unconstitutional on their face.
But, Judge Niess wrote, “there is no harm in pausing to reflect on the insurmountable burdens facing many of our fellow constitutionally qualified electors should Act 23 hold sway.”
“Mostly they would consist of those struggling souls who, unlike the vast majority of Wisconsin voters, for whatever reason will lack the financial, physical, mental, or emotional resources to comply with Act 23, but are otherwise constitutionally entitled to vote.”
While noting that “where it exists, voter fraud corrupts elections and undermines our form of government,” Niess stated that “voter fraud is no more poisonous to our democracy than voter suppression. Indeed, they are two heads on the same monster.”
Niess wrote:
“Where does the Wisconsin Constitution say that the government we, the people, created can simply cast aside the inherent suffrage rights of any qualified elector on the wish and promise – even the guarantee – that doing so serves to prevent some unqualified individuals from voting?
It doesn’t. In fact, it unequivocally says the opposite. The right to vote belongs to all Wisconsin citizens who are qualified electors, not just the fortunate majority for whom Act 23 poses little obstacle at the polls.”
By: Brendan Fischer, Center for Media and Democracy, March 13, 2012
Share This Blog
Unknown Feed- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
mykeystrokes.com 