Comments on: Senate obstructionism

By: tadhgin

tadhgin — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 23:02:26 +0000

Limberwulf what you actually said was:”Any method that works is fine with me” Dude that’s your opinion IN context. If negotiating (or killing) doesn’t work why should you impose deficits on future generations? Now the question originally was about the efficacy of senate obstructionism. The argument against it is that if you lose an election you should just accept that, and the argument for it is that the rules allow you to do it (protection of minorities etc.). Neither involve inflicting what you believe to be bad policy on the people to force them to come around to your POV. Starve the beast deficit spending does, even if used as last resort-unless you believe running a deficit is in and of itself good policy! (can only apply if the social return exceeds interest rate or for counter-cyclical spending )

By: Bernard Yomtov

Bernard Yomtov — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 21:26:38 +0000

Overrepresentation of small states is what the senate was designed for. Yes. But remember the context. It was part of an effort to get thirteen quasi-independent entities to form a union. The largest of these, Virginia, had a population about ten times the smallest. Today California has a population seventy times that of Wyoming and ten times that of Oregon, the 27th largest state. And, with some exceptions, the states later added to the union were simply not the same sort of political entities as tghe original thirteen prior to joining. There’s not much to be done, I suppose, but I find summoning up the wisdom of the Founders in defense of the logic of current arrangements unpersuasive.

By: limberwulf

limberwulf — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 16:14:11 +0000

Overrepresentation of small states is what the senate was designed for. The House is the part of congress designed to represent based on population. The reasoning was that certain powers reside with state governments, and those governments should not have all of their power based on population. As for electoral overrepresentation I think you may be right. I would prefer to see the number of electoral votes doubled or tripled to permit more accurate differentiation. I would also consider weighted electoral votes, where more states could allow a split vote in a state. Again, however, this removes poer from the state. If too much is removed from the state, then the state becomes pointless to have. This would be a bad move, because the consolidation of power at the federal level would be even more scary, no matter who the leader was. I dont understand those who support bigger, stronger, better funded federal governments and then whine about power consolidation. The power is there because people kept passing the buck to the fed level and saying “something should be done, as long as I dont have to actually do the work”.

By: Katherine

Katherine — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 07:21:47 +0000

“The candidate I supported for President in 2000 won despite losing the popular vote” I think it’s pretty clear from the rest of the post, but: this is a typo. I supported Gore, not Bush.

By: Katherine

Katherine — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 07:18:31 +0000

Well, I’m not sure why the popular vote totals run up in states that weren’t close give a “mandate” to the president but not to the incoming Senate class. They’re relevant or their not. You guys are really lucking out right now due to some undemocratic features of our government: the overrepresentation of small states in the Senate. The slight overrepresentation of small states in the electoral college. The electoral college first got Bush into power. The increasing phenomenon of House reps choosing their voters instead of voters choosing their House reps. The overrepresentation of small states in the constitutional amendment process. I live in Boston, am originally from the NYC area. My states are not contested in presidential elections, ever, as long as I can remember. Both, and especially NY, are underrepresented in the Senate. They are represented in the House, but the GOP has used questionable redistricting tactics to get a majority we can’t challenge, and has used that majority to entirely cut my legislators out of the legislative process. They also cut my Senators out of the legislative process. The candidate I supported for President in 2000 won despite losing the popular vote, partly because he got lucky as hell in Florida and the Supreme Court—the kinds of people that get referred to as “unelected judges” in other contexts—sealed it. Now, he won both the popular vote and the electoral vote this time, but if he loses in 2000 Gore’s in office on 9/11 and our history looks very different. This president and Congress are trying to pass a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage in my state and in the country. This will do material harm to a lot of good friends of mine, and to the Constitution itself in my view. I don’t think it will pass Congress, but I can’t dismiss the possibility. If it passes Congress, it will probably go into the Constitution, because every state has an equal voice in whether gay marriage is allowed. The states I am most confident will vote down such an amendment—California, New York, Illinois, Massachusetts—have SO MANY more people than most of the states I am most confident will support it—Wyoming, the Dakotas. But that doesn’t matter. 53 million Californians, 28 million New Yorkers, and 8-9 million people in Massachusetts—including those whose marriage licenses may be torn up—have exactly as much say as 500,000-odd people from Wyoming and North Dakota, and 700,000-odd people from South Dakota. 9/11 was an attack on the city where I was born. The city where I was born & my whole family lives, and the city where I live now, are some of the most likely targets of a new attack. (We think, by overwhelming majorities, that this President puts us in greater danger of attack. That’s irrelevant as far as the democratic issues, it just increases the big states’ emotional sense of grievance and fear at being systematically underrepresented in the electoral process.) Despite all this, New York gets the second least per capita homeland security spending in the country. Wyoming gets the most. It is pretty clear that this is because of the way small states are overrepresented in Congress, and to a lesser extent because the states with the more likely targets are generally represented by Democrats. The only voice, the only chance, the only people in the government whom I trust even a tiny, tiny amount to represent my interests are the 45 Democratic Senators—who once again, represent more people than the 55 Senate Republicans—who might be able to muster a fillibuster or two against some truly disastrous party. And now the Republicans are trying to take that away. Well, they can do it, legally, but don’t fucking pretend they’re doing it in the name of “democracy” so that they can carry out “the will of the people.” It’s a naked, ugly, power grab, and nothing more. This is getting pretty far afield from the original post, but the worst part of it is, if my nightmares come true, and there is another severe attack on Boston or New York—the administration I’m convinced is failing to protect me will get huge political benefits from this, and consolidate their hold on power further, and pursue more stupid policies that makes more attacks on us likelier still. (I hope I don’t need to say this, but just in case: I am not, of course, suggesting that they’re failing to protect us for that reason, even in a tiny or subconscious way. That’s insane. I assume it’s the usual combination of incompetence and belief in their own infallibility that is leading them to ignore various obvious, sensible steps to prevent Al Qaeda from getting nuclear weapons.)

By: limberwulf

limberwulf — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 04:17:25 +0000

tadhgin, I placed that statement in a specific context, which you removed it from. I mentioned that draining the lifeblood was as good a method as any to weaken the beast, but I also mentioned that deficit spending is not the way to drain the lifeblood, because revenue is the true lifeblood, not credit. The intent of the statement is to starve the beast, because negotiating with it or killing it has not worked. Its placement as evidence of purposed deficit spending was dubious at best, taking my statement out of context was even more so.

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 03:11:08 +0000

So what is needed is an effective opposition. – Works hard to be involved in the issues, with the stakeholders; – contributes contstructively when possible – doesn’t generate wasted effort on points that don’t make a difference in value – builds influence through constituents and stakeholder organisations, delivering well-argued contributions, and selling them to stakeholders and Government agencies. – gains points toward election by becoming credible as an alternative government.

By: tadhgin

tadhgin — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 02:30:54 +0000

Limberwulf said “…as a libertarian…I see absolutely no problem with “…reducing the size and scope of government by draining its lifeblood.” Any method that works is fine with me.” Which is a very unprincipled (and unlibertarian) attitude. Remember the money that is wasted draining the lifeblood of government belongs to taxpayers. You cannot justify squandering (the) people’s money because of your personal preferences!

By: Bernard Yomtov

Bernard Yomtov — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 02:17:31 +0000

That’s interesting stuff, Katherine, but as you say, trivia. An accidental result of which states had Senate races. OK. But we might note that the population of states with two Democratic senators is greater than that of states with two Republicans.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 01:47:19 +0000

One other thing to keep in mind is that the trend toward concentration of power in the executive has been happening both throughout U.S. history (as others have already pointed out) and in most Western democracies. For example, it used to be that European legislatures could negotiate the terms of treaties; now most of them can only vote up-or-down on a treaty delivered to them by the executive. As my politics TA once pointed out, one of the factors which has made the EU possible is the increasing concentration of power in the hands of the executive (ie, the person who negotiates the treaty with the other countries), thus making it easier for all countries to agree on a treaty because the executive of each country “rams it through.” So obviously this is still a disturbing development, even if it is quite common. But perhaps it’s one of those “inevitable” trends in the political development of modern states, such as increasing intensity and scope of governance (ie bigger government), or in the U.S., increasing strength of the federal government.

By: George

George — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 01:02:51 +0000

That’s interesting stuff, Katherine, but as you say, trivia. An accidental result of which states had Senate races. For instance, more than half that margin of 3.7 million mentioned by Hertzberg was run up in the wildly uncompetitive race in California.

By: Brett Bellmore

Brett Bellmore — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 00:17:23 +0000

Ah, but only a third of the Senate comes up for reelection every two years, so there were states where no votes for Senator were cast. And how would THEY have gone? We can guess, but we don’t know. We merely know that the votes for Senators were not a representative sample of the whole country. Now, the votes for the House, the story there is different.

By: Katherine

Katherine — Tue, 09 Nov 2004 23:37:48 +0000

“A notable (tho not massive) majority of all persons who cared enough/were ellegible to vote chose the republicrats.” Again, this is false as far as the Senate goes. Here is the cite: “In Thursday’s Times, a front-page news analysis argued that “it is impossible to read President Bush’s reëlection with larger Republican majorities in both houses of Congress as anything other than the clearest confirmation yet that this is a center-right country—divided yes, but with an undisputed majority united behind his leadership.” That is certainly true in institutional terms. But it is not true in terms of people, of actual human beings. Though the Republicans won nineteen of the thirty-four Senate seats that were up for grabs last Tuesday, for a gain of four, the number of voters who cast their ballots for Republican Senate candidates was 37.9 million, while 41.3 million voted for Democrats—almost exactly Bush’s popular-vote margin over Kerry.”—Hendrik Hertzberg

By: limberwulf

limberwulf — Tue, 09 Nov 2004 23:25:17 +0000

It has always been the way in politics for the group who is losing to cry foul and point out examples of abuses or perceived ones. It has also always been the way for those same groups to keep silent or even defend the very same techniques when the agenda matches their own. As such I think the whole thing may be a bit overstated. That said, I do not like consolidation of power in any form, and actions taken by either party to do so warrant close investigation and action if necessary. OTOH, as a libertarian who considers himself “worth his salt”, I see absolutely no problem with: “The goal is reducing the size and scope of government by draining its lifeblood.” Any method that works is fine with me. I do not, however, think that deficit spending is the answer. A balanced budget combined with tax cuts would be more effective. Borrowing merely delays the inevitable, by burdening the taxpayer with inflation and interest payments to the lenders. Tax cuts are only tax cuts if there are correspnding spending cuts. Those cuts need to occur in nearly every branch of government. The lifeblood is not the credit of the government, but the actual revenue. As for the Founding Father’s intent, I agree with James. There was no place for filibuster in the constitution, it is simply a way for the minority to slow the progress of the majority. I am not entirely opposed to this, and I do not think that the president is the one who should be trying to stop it, but I do think that it is a precedent that is easily abused. A notable (tho not massive) majority of all persons who cared enough/were ellegible to vote chose the republicrats. The Demicans will just have to suck it up.

By: Nicholas Weininger

Nicholas Weininger — Tue, 09 Nov 2004 22:51:53 +0000

In the middle of jet’s invective, he has a good point. Presidents of both parties have been making power grabs, usually in times of crisis, for practically the entire history of the republic. FDR’s court-packing scheme is hardly the only egregious example; Adams, Lincoln, Wilson, Johnson, Nixon are all guilty. On the one hand, this is some cause for optimism, since we’re still around despite all that those guys could do. On the other hand, the power of the executive never seems to diminish again when the crisis is over. So we have by degrees gotten an executive with a level of power the Founders would certainly have abhorred as dictatorial, and that ain’t good at all. Furthermore, there is no organized constituency for reducing the power of the Presidency as such, and we have a congressional opposition that was unusually stupid and spineless even when it controlled the Senate. It’s worth remembering that FDR’s scheme finally failed when enough members of his own party called bullshit on him. If and when six Republican senators (Chafee, Snowe, Collins, Specter, Hagel, Lugar, are you listening?) can be found to call bullshit on Bush, his drive for power will be halted. We shall have to see how long that takes.