A good argument can be made that democracy would be enhanced by decentralizing political power. There are problems with this, such as the fact that people tend to be much less attentive to state and local politics than they are to national politics. Also, world wide, we're seeing more centralization and less democratic decision making--look at the Euro Union.

The problem is that for the last 15 years at least, the two parties have acted like they were operating in a parliamentary system. If we had votes of confidence and snap elections, that would represent an apparently necessary check on bad ideas and incompetence.

(But would it be good TV? Ah, there's the question.)

Mussolini

gr wrote:

All Hail Freedonia!

Now we're talking.

FlightRisk wrote:

gr wrote:

All Hail Freedonia!

Now we're talking.

Marxist!

http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/0908/Congress_to_celebrate_legal_booze_seriously.html?showall

If this isn't a reason to have a beer during the Eagles game, I don't know what is.

jerseyhoya wrote:http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/0908/Congress_to_celebrate_legal_booze_seriously.html?showall

If this isn't a reason to have a beer during the Eagles game, I don't know what is.

Best part:

The resolution notes that "prior to the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, which established Prohibition in the United States, abuses and insufficient regulation resulted in irresponsible overconsumption of alcohol."

...Whereas now we all just love to party, and can quit any time.

Well of course. I for one am glad that they're focusing on the important stuff today.

VoxOrion wrote:This country is too large for a parliamentary system. This is elementary.

Your one-line quips aren't adding a lot. What do you mean and why are you so resigned to limited thinking? The whole point is to give a more accurate representation of that large diverse group of people that make up the nation. If what unifies us is our shared passports, language, culture (work in progress), and a desire to see the nation as a whole propser, be safe, and grow -- how bout we get a better sense of the diversity and let it impact the discussion and decision making. Small minorities can't win a lot of votes, but it can help shape discussion.

What does "too large" mean? I don't get it?

dajafi wrote:The problem is that for the last 15 years at least, the two parties have acted like they were operating in a parliamentary system. If we had votes of confidence and snap elections, that would represent an apparently necessary check on bad ideas and incompetence.

(But would it be good TV? Ah, there's the question.)

Do you see Cheney-Bush 8 years and a duly elected White House, that is merely incompetent and filled with bad ideas?

I see them as idealogs, corrupt at their very corp, and completely out of step with mainstream views, or any values that would represent a vast majority of the people. They are racist, xenaphobic, and evil. Hypocrites and liars, and having committed crimes on the nation and humanity.

The 2 halves of the same party, known as the "corporate rule party" -- how do you mean that, as faux-parliamentarianism?? Tell me why a few more voices in congress and a proportional representation system would be ineffective and less fair? How it wouldn't induce more dialog and putting different things in the news headlines?

Philly the Kid wrote:

dajafi wrote:The problem is that for the last 15 years at least, the two parties have acted like they were operating in a parliamentary system. If we had votes of confidence and snap elections, that would represent an apparently necessary check on bad ideas and incompetence.

(But would it be good TV? Ah, there's the question.)

Do you see Cheney-Bush 8 years and a duly elected White House, that is merely incompetent and filled with bad ideas?

I see them as idealogs, corrupt at their very corp, and completely out of step with mainstream views, or any values that would represent a vast majority of the people. They are racist, xenaphobic, and evil. Hypocrites and liars, and having committed crimes on the nation and humanity.

The 2 halves of the same party, known as the "corporate rule party" -- how do you mean that, as faux-parliamentarianism?? Tell me why a few more voices in congress and a proportional representation system would be ineffective and less fair? How it wouldn't induce more dialog and putting different things in the news headlines?

Read it again, Jokey: I happen to agree with you on this one (even if I had to read it through a few times to get past the spelling errors). The problem of Bush-Cheney is exactly that, one, the Congressional Republicans voluntarily handed over their testicles in '01 to become a parliamentary-type force--putting partisan imperatives over institutional ones, making George Washington spin fast in his grave--and two, there was and is no way to get rid of them despite conspicuous failure until next January.

(Okay, there's impeachment. But the Democrats didn't go that way, stupidly taking it off the table at the jump in hopes of getting a pat on the head from David Broder, and thus killing any leverage they might have had in the subsequent wranglings with the Loyal Bushies.)

I'm just not sure how we get from "A" (current system with its flaws) to "B" (more parliamentary system, different flaws but probably addressing some of the current ones). Living in the real world as I do, I tend to worry about these things, as well as the question of whether the costs incurred by pursuing a path of radical reform outweigh the benefits of what it might accomplish IF it works. (Think for example of how much time would need to be expended on this.)

That said, the way the two-party system generally has worked in American politics is by what we might call the Blob Theory: one or both of the parties absorbs any politically powerful issue or cause or mindset arises as a third force. Both parties took bits of the Progressive/Populist tradition in the early 1900s. The Republicans eventually absorbed the Strom Thurmond/George Wallace strain of racial grievance in the '70s and later. The Democrats accommodated a chunk of the New Left at the same time (to their great electoral misfortune). Both parties tried to present themselves as champions of the '92 Perot voters, and arguably still do.

Politically powerful ideas win out eventually, however the system is set up. They just might not do so in the way and form that you know, in your wonderful and untestable arrogance, is best for all of us.

dajafi wrote:

Philly the Kid wrote:

dajafi wrote:The problem is that for the last 15 years at least, the two parties have acted like they were operating in a parliamentary system. If we had votes of confidence and snap elections, that would represent an apparently necessary check on bad ideas and incompetence.

(But would it be good TV? Ah, there's the question.)

Do you see Cheney-Bush 8 years and a duly elected White House, that is merely incompetent and filled with bad ideas?

I see them as idealogs, corrupt at their very corp, and completely out of step with mainstream views, or any values that would represent a vast majority of the people. They are racist, xenaphobic, and evil. Hypocrites and liars, and having committed crimes on the nation and humanity.

The 2 halves of the same party, known as the "corporate rule party" -- how do you mean that, as faux-parliamentarianism?? Tell me why a few more voices in congress and a proportional representation system would be ineffective and less fair? How it wouldn't induce more dialog and putting different things in the news headlines?

Read it again, Jokey: I happen to agree with you on this one (even if I had to read it through a few times to get past the spelling errors). The problem of Bush-Cheney is exactly that, one, the Congressional Republicans voluntarily handed over their testicles in '01 to become a parliamentary-type force--putting partisan imperatives over institutional ones, making George Washington spin fast in his grave--and two, there was and is no way to get rid of them despite conspicuous failure until next January.

(Okay, there's impeachment. But the Democrats didn't go that way, stupidly taking it off the table at the jump in hopes of getting a pat on the head from David Broder, and thus killing any leverage they might have had in the subsequent wranglings with the Loyal Bushies.)

I'm just not sure how we get from "A" (current system with its flaws) to "B" (more parliamentary system, different flaws but probably addressing some of the current ones). Living in the real world as I do, I tend to worry about these things, as well as the question of whether the costs incurred by pursuing a path of radical reform outweigh the benefits of what it might accomplish IF it works. (Think for example of how much time would need to be expended on this.)

That said, the way the two-party system generally has worked in American politics is by what we might call the Blob Theory: one or both of the parties absorbs any politically powerful issue or cause or mindset arises as a third force. Both parties took bits of the Progressive/Populist tradition in the early 1900s. The Republicans eventually absorbed the Strom Thurmond/George Wallace strain of racial grievance in the '70s and later. The Democrats accommodated a chunk of the New Left at the same time (to their great electoral misfortune). Both parties tried to present themselves as champions of the '92 Perot voters, and arguably still do.

Politically powerful ideas win out eventually, however the system is set up. They just might not do so in the way and form that you know, in your wonderful and untestable arrogance, is best for all of us.

Insults aside...

Tell me, since you seem to be a pragmatist, and prefer discussion that in your opinion actually speaks to something that is possible given where we are now. Given all that -- (and excuse me if you feel I haven't quite re-capped you properly) -- and this is a sincere question ...

Do you think that it's possible to bring about any systemic change in our lifetime? To where the assumptions you are operating off of, whereby someone like me seems to have wildly idealistic ideas that have no chance of coming about. Are we doomed to just keep moving to the right, I know you aren't going to contend that Bill C was a move to the left -- I don't see it the way you do nor do I think past history is always useful, or beyond a point since the world has changed so fast in such a short time.

See, I think things are so broken, we have no choice. And that's why debating the nuances of the Obama campaign or him as a person, is really not very interesting to me because I know even if he somehow gets in there and doesn't get assasinated -- he isn't going to change anything, he won't even roll us back to pre-Bush (Patriot Act, variety of executive orders, congress giving big telecomm a free pass, bail outs of investors with our dough, repeal of NAFTA or GATT)

What's the best case in your practical worldview? Or do you accept a certain amount of hypocrisy, corruption and the ongoing forwards march to a more crowded and unequal planet?

Ross Douthat channels Vox:

Amid the mounting liberal hysteria about how John McCain is running the most despicable campaign ever etc. etc., Ezra Klein deserves credit for this (relatively) cool-headed observation:

The McCain campaign's decision to lie about, well, everything, really needs to be understood as more than the outcome of John McCain's consuming ambition. It is a rational and obvious response to the rules laid down by the media. Indeed, McCain's spokesperson Brian Rogers says this directly to The Politico's Jonathan Martin. "We ran a different kind of campaign and nobody cared about us. They didn't cover John McCain. So now you've got to be forward-leaning in everything."

And it's true. Earlier this year McCain made poverty tours and offered policy speeches. No one cared, Obama retained his lead. It was only when he began offering vicious attacks and daily controversies that he began setting the pace of the coverage. The McCain campaign learned something important about the media: It's an institution that covers conflict. If you want to direct its coverage, give it more conflict than your opponent. And so they have.

In broad outline, I agree with this point. (It's also worth noting that McCain wanted to do a long and unprecedented series of town-hall meetings with Obama, which would have given the campaign a very different feel - and Obama, seeing no upside at a time when it looked like he might coast to landslide, said no.) But I also think Ezra is a little too hard on the media here. Yes, the press feeds on conflict and flees from policy substance, but to a large extent that's because the public feeds on conflict and flees from policy substance, however much wonks and watchdogs would like to think otherwise.

He makes another good point a little later in the same entry:

And then let me say something else in the press's defense, which is that John McCain's attempt to run a "different kind of campaign" earlier in the year was largely a matter of symbolism and procedure rather than substance, and to a certain extent the media gave it the treatment it deserved. McCain went to places Republicans don't usually go, and proposed a series of informal debates that represented a departure from what presidential candidates usually do ... but when it came to those policy speeches, he didn't seem interested in taking big risks or making hard choices, and this no doubt affected how (and how often) the press covered his campaign. In their first races for the presidency, both George W. Bush and Bill Clinton promised to take their parties in new directions, and both offered substance to back these promises up; the press treated them like new-model candidates because there was actually good reason to think that they were. McCain, by contrast, has promised to take his party in a new direction, but the centerpiece of his reform agenda is ... cutting earmarks. Maybe that's a laudable goal, but "compassionate conservatism" or "ending welfare as we know it" it sure isn't, and you can't fool reporters into thinking that it is. The press is allergic to policy detail, but they do respond, at least to some extent, to innovation and unconventional proposals - and if McCain's agenda had been bolder, his attempt to run a more high-minded campaign in the early going might have earned him more press coverage than he ended up receiving. Any politician can claim to be running as a new kind of a candidate - but unless you're Barack Obama, who wears his newness in his name and on his skin, you need to prove it, and then prove it again, before the media will take you seriously.

I'm just enough of a sucker to want to hear more from McCain--hell, just for someone to ask him--what he's going to do differently from Bush. And just enough of a non-sucker to grant that Obama could be a lot clearer on how he differs from "traditional Democratic policies" too... though I think the difference is that the failures of Bush governance are a lot fresher in voters' minds, and thus more immediately relevant.

So will the debates be meaningful?

How much control do the campaigns have over format, pre-knowing the questions. Will there be any chance for them to have to respond on the fly?

And how will they each respond to directly being called-out and probably on point? Since neither of them is as 'original' as they'd like us all to think.

Philly the Kid wrote:Insults aside...

Tell me, since you seem to be a pragmatist, and prefer discussion that in your opinion actually speaks to something that is possible given where we are now. Given all that -- (and excuse me if you feel I haven't quite re-capped you properly) -- and this is a sincere question ...

Do you think that it's possible to bring about any systemic change in our lifetime? To where the assumptions you are operating off of, whereby someone like me seems to have wildly idealistic ideas that have no chance of coming about. Are we doomed to just keep moving to the right, I know you aren't going to contend that Bill C was a move to the left -- I don't see it the way you do nor do I think past history is always useful, or beyond a point since the world has changed so fast in such a short time.

See, I think things are so broken, we have no choice. And that's why debating the nuances of the Obama campaign or him as a person, is really not very interesting to me because I know even if he somehow gets in there and doesn't get assasinated -- he isn't going to change anything, he won't even roll us back to pre-Bush (Patriot Act, variety of executive orders, congress giving big telecomm a free pass, bail outs of investors with our dough, repeal of NAFTA or GATT)

What's the best case in your practical worldview? Or do you accept a certain amount of hypocrisy, corruption and the ongoing forwards march to a more crowded and unequal planet?

We probably have very different ideas of what constitutes "systemic change."

I do think history is useful. And short of an incredibly violent disruption like the Civil War--where the violence was probably necessary to accomplish a change as momentous as ending slavery--the biggest shifts we've seen are the New Deal and the Great Society.

Granting that our friends on the right have quibbles with both in terms of whether they were good or bad, I think you and I basically feel like they were worthwhile and accomplished more good than bad. That's what the system can accommodate without enormous upheaval, and that's what I'd like to see happen not just "in our lifetimes," which hopefully will go on for awhile, but in the next 10-20 years.

Briefly, what I'd like to see in that sort of shift includes a new commitment to responsible regulation of markets--because the original regime (to your point about the corpocracy) was undermined by both parties in the '80s and '90s, leading to the mess we're seeing today--a redefinition and updating of the social safety net to address health care, retirement savings, mid-career retraining and other issues previously worked out piecemeal, a series of shifts in education policy (some of which was discussed in this thread and others), and a reasserted commitment to the Constitutional principles that have come under such strain in recent years (Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments, and checks and balances, I'm looking in your general direction).

I believe all this could be sold to the public, and could be done without wrecking the economy or causing other major disruptions. But maybe I'm wrong.

I'm less sure that Obama has the chops to pull this off. But I was certain Hillary didn't, and I'm even more sure McCain, at least 2008, Just-Win-Baby McCain, does not.

Where I think you err is that you seem to believe perfection is possible. The societies predicated on that idea not only failed, but did unimaginable damage to the world in their efforts to make it happen. Yes, hypocrisy and corruption are in some respects inevitable--as is, much as I hate to write it, some degree of poverty. But we can make it better. We've done it before.

Typically, what you call "systemic change" leads a lot of people to the guillotine and the gulag.

Why did Rove say those things about McCain's campaign? Big payoff, sour grapes, what?

The McCain campaign thought they could win the game on an even footing. Obama did agree to the town hall debates.

Oh, we're definitely going to be doing some town hall debates... "I look forward to, you know, having more than just the three traditional debates that we've seen in recent presidential contests.

That was the last we heard about it for two months when Obama said they weren't going to have town hall debates because the campaigns couldn't agree on them. Even dajafi suggests the real reason was because it was a format that McCain would likely do better. Obama was way ahead. Why even recognize there was an opponent?

Then Obama reversed himself on public financing. Again he blamed the McCain campaign for not agreeing and insisted it was necessary because the Republican 527s would outspend him. And really his donors were just like public financing. Granted, 60% of his money comes from large donors, but the media is enamored with his long list of small donors. No candidate had ever opted out of public financing.

Then the Obama campaign announced there would only be three debates, not the five Barack had mentioned. There just wouldn't be time.

Again Obama saw an advantage and took it. McCain was left with a campaign that was behind. He couldn't use town halls to catch up. And they were going to be outspent. Apparently if the other guy is duplicitous anything goes. Barack Obama promised a new kind of politics. John McCain promised a respectful campaign. I think both men were genuine at the time. They both broke their word.

please stop

Philly the Kid wrote:So will the debates be meaningful?

How much control do the campaigns have over format, pre-knowing the questions. Will there be any chance for them to have to respond on the fly?

And how will they each respond to directly being called-out and probably on point? Since neither of them is as 'original' as they'd like us all to think.

I'm looking forward to the Vice-Presidential debate because Biden should school Hockey Mom