DSA: Working-Class Democracy

In addition to changing both domestic and foreign policy, the DSA has idea on reforming how the government governs.  Let's go back to the DSA website.

Working-Class Democracy

Democracy for All: Extend full voting rights to all permanent U.S. residents and restore the right to vote for incarcerated people and people with criminal convictions. Establish statehood for Washington D.C. and recognize the right to self-determination for all U.S. territories and colonies. Expand and protect voting rights and end voter suppression.

Death row inmates get to vote.  Criminals are a reliable voting block for Democrats because Democrats are the soft-on-crime party.  Of course, the DSA would seek to benefit its voters.  Beyond criminals, what sort of expansion of voting rights are being considered?  Recognizing a right to self-determination is just an invitation for secession and disintegration of the country.  When combined with the instant amnesty proposed in the abolition of ICE, a lot of newly-minted permanent residents will join the voter rolls and they will mostly vote for the party offering the most freebies (psst, that would be the DSA).

A Real Democracy: For the working class to govern, we need a new political system. End political corruption and legalized bribery: get rid of lobbyists, dark money, and Citizens United, and publicly finance all elections. Abolish the Electoral College. Replace the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress.

Repeal the Constitution.  This requires a constitutional convention or several new amendments to the Constitution.  By eliminating the president, the Congress would become more like the British Parliament where the Prime Minister is just one of the members of parliament who happens to exercise the executive.  If we have eliminated the presidency, the Electoral College is irrelevant.  However, if the Electoral College was eliminated before the presidency was folded into the Congress, it would greatly diminish the representation of smaller states.  This is a call for the destruction of the US Republic.

A Democratic Congress: Replace the two-party system with a multi-party democracy. Expand the House of Representatives, implement proportional representation and ranked choice voting in all elections, and abolish the Senate.

By abolishing the Senate, the DSA would abolish the states.  Wyoming would have one representative in the new unicameral legislature and would be pillaged by neighboring states with more say.  Proportional representation means that parties have slates of candidates who are elected based on the proportion of the vote that the party gets.  You aren't voting for your congressman but merely a party who will get so many seats in government.  Furthermore, a multiparty system can lead to empowering minority parties, such as the DSA.  A coalition party is likely to be both less stable and more extreme, allowing for wide swings in governing.  Again, this is a repeal of the Constitution and a destruction of the Republic.

Economic Democracy: Establish public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries to ensure democratic control and accountability to the people. Enact aggressive wealth taxes on the richest individuals and corporations to spend on public goods and infrastructure.

Communism.  Yeah, we finally got there.  There is public ownership of the means of production.  There is from each according to his means (i.e., the rich) to each according to his needs (i.e., the public).  The DSA has adopted communist policies, but made them sound like democracy and fairness.  How long will the rich remain rich under such a system?  This will lead to an equality of poverty though the governing elites will be a bit more equal than everyone else.  Sounds familiar.

Democracy at Work: Empower workers to come together and fight the boss. Protect, expand, and enforce the rights of all workers to form, join, and strike with their unions, regardless of industry. Support union members who organize reform caucuses, democratize their unions, and take political action.

For those industries that have not been nationalized, the workers are to view the boss as an adversary.  Rather than being unified in providing a good or service to the public, the boss-employee dynamic should be one of constant contention where the workers chip away at the boss and inevitably make the business less productive and profitable.  This is sure to encourage more entrepreneurship and expand the economy, right?  No, quite the opposite.  There is a reason that Detroit has fallen so far as car manufacturing fled to less hostile locations.

It should be noted that the DSA does not need to achieve all of its policies to crash the US.  Just defunding the military could end the US.  Opening the borders like the Biden Administration for a more extended period with the amnesty policy could destroy the US.  The only reason Europe has been able to enact so many of these policies is because the US has footed the bill for defense.  The US has no one to cover that bill.

Vote against the communists in November!

Qualifications Don't Matter

Darlene Graham, sister of the recently deceased Lindsey Graham, debated Ralph Norman.  During the debate, she was asked a question about Taiwan and the South China Sea.  She was clueless and had no idea how to answer the question.  Most embarrassing.  The pundits had a field day.  Clay Travis and Buck Sexton declared her answer to make her unqualified to be a senator.  Of course, she is the sitting senator, having been appointed in her brother's place.  Moreover, she has been endorsed by President Trump.  Sean Hannity defended her, saying her brother just died.  Oh, so that excuses it?

If I were a South Carolina voter, I would probably switch to Ralph Norman; this is a primary election, so he is a Republican too.  However, if she secures the nomination, I can guarantee that Clay and Buck will change their tune on her qualifications.  An 'unqualified' Republican will suddenly be vastly preferable to a highly-qualified Democrat.  Do you want a reliable Republican vote or a reliable Democrat vote in the Senate?  That is all this is about.  If the general election were between a candidate with Henry Kissinger level knowledge of world affairs and a chihuahua, you vote for the one who will reliably toe the party line.  That goes for both parties.  Recall that Pennsylvania Democrats selected a recovering stroke victim over a medical doctor.  Tragically, that is where we are.

Prior to the 17th Amendment, it is unlikely that a sibling would be chosen to fill a vacant senate seat.  Name recognition is important for popular elections, but no so much in being selected by the state legislature.  The legislature would seek someone who could effectively argue on the state's behalf, not someone who was broadly known and could get votes.  Repeal the 17th and the qualifications of senators will rise.

Filibuster

Traditionally, the filibuster was used to prevent legislation from proceeding to a vote in the Senate.  Strom Thurmond famously spoke for more than 24 hours in an effort to prevent passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957.  The point is that the Senate allows debate to continue until everyone has had their say, even if it happens to be reading the phone directory into the Senate record.  In order to end debate, the Senate must assemble 60 votes.  What we have today is autopilot filibusters.  No one debates the bill.  No one puts in the time to speak ad nauseum to prevent a vote.  Nope, the minority party just says filibuster and voila, no vote without 60 votes.

The filibuster is a rule the Senate adopted that has no basis in the Constitution.  It could be eliminated, if the majority party so chose.  It has seen a lot of modification over the years, being nixed for judicial nominations, including Supreme Court nominees.  If no one is willing to carry on the debate, then it should just be a matter of calling for the vote.  The filibustering party should be required to talk the issue to death, which takes really commitment.

Debate or vote.

From the Senate to the Presidency

Though 17 presidents have served in the Senate, only three successfully moved directly from Senate to the White House.

1. Warren G. Harding (1921-1923) was a senator from Ohio (1915-1921) when he ran for president in 1920.  Interestingly enough, the Democratic nominee was James Cox, the sitting governor of Ohio!  There was going to be an Ohioan in the White House either way.  The Democratic nominee for vice-president was none other than Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Assistant Secretary of the Navy.

2. John F. Kennedy (1961-1963) was a senator from Massachusetts (1953-1960) when he defeated Richard Nixon in 1960.  He was, and remains, the youngest man to be elected president.  He was the first Catholic.  His vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson, was also a senator.  In fact, LBJ went from outranking JFK in the Senate (LBJ was the Majority Leader while JFK was the junior senator from Massachusetts) to being his inferior as VP.  Not unlike what happened for...

3. Barack Obama (2009-2017) was the junior senator from Illinois (2005-2008) and still in his first term when he ran for president.  His VP candidate was the senior senator from Delaware, Joe Biden.  Of course, if the Republican candidate had won, he was also a senator: John McCain of Arizona.  Barack Obama is the only senator to president who didn't die in his first term, making him the most successful of the bunch by default.

What about those other 14 presidents who served in the Senate but ran for the presidency from a different post.  Who are they?

1. James Monroe (1817-1825) had served as a Virginia senator (1790-1794) but went on to many other offices before his terms as president.  After the Senate, he served as Minister to France, Minister to England, Governor of Virginia, Secretary of State, and Secretary of War before winning the presidency.  Few men had so much training for the office.

2. John Quincy Adams (1825-1829) had been in the Senate (1803-1808), but that is little more than a footnote for him.  Like the three presidents before him, he served as Secretary of State before winning the presidency.  Unlike most former presidents, Adams was elected to the House of Representatives (1831-1848) where he served until his death.  He was played by Anthony Hopkins in Amistad (1997).

3. Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) had been a senator from Tennessee (1823-1825) during his first run at the presidency in 1824.  Jackson had only run for the Senate to aid his planned presidential run in 1824.  Though he was the candidate with the most electoral votes and the plurality of the popular votes, he lost the contingent election in the House of Representatives.

4. Martin Van Buren (1837-1841) had been a senator from New York (1821-1828).  From there, he ran for governor of New York, which he won, only to resign 6 weeks later for an opportunity to be President Jackson's Secretary of State.

5. William Henry Harrison (1841) had been a senator from Ohio (1825-1828) before being appointed Minister to Columbia (1829) by President John Quincy Adams.  He had been out of government for more than 10 years when he finally won the presidency.  He had run as one of 4 Whig candidates in 1836.  Though the Whigs lost, Harrison was by far the strongest Whig candidate, which is why he was nominated for the 1840 election despite his age.

6. John Tyler (1841-1845) had been a senator from Virginia (1827-1836).  Oddly, he represented 3 different parties during his Senate career: Democratic Republican, Democratic, and Whig.  His Whig bona fides proved weak when, after ascending to the presidency, he found much of the Whig legislation unconstitutional and vetoed it.  Also, unlike the Whigs, he was in favor of Texas Annexation.  From a party point of view, Tyler was the worst vice-presidential selection ever.

7. Franklin Pierce (1853-1857) had served as a senator from New Hampshire (1837-1842) and was an important figure in New Hampshire's Democratic Party operations.  Like Polk in 1844, Pierce was a dark horse candidate in 1852.  The slogan was "The Whigs we Polked in forty-four, We'll Pierce in fifty-two."

8. James Buchanan (1857-1861) had been a senator from Pennsylvania (1834-1845) before President Polk selected him to be Secretary of State.  Like many Secretaries of State before him, he ran for president.  He lost the nomination in 1848 to Lewis Cass and fell short again in 1852 to Franklin Pierce.  His turn finally came in 1856, which he unfortunately won.

9. Andrew Johnson (1865-1869) served in the Senate both before (1857-1862) and after (1875) his term as president.  Though a Southern slave owner, he was strongly against secession.  As such, Lincoln plucked him from the Senate and made him military governor of Tennessee.  Later, Lincoln called upon him to be his 2nd vice president.  After the House impeached him, the Senate failed to convict by a vote of 35 to 19; a switch of one vote would have met the 2/3 requirement for conviction.  Therefore, it was somewhat awkward when Johnson returned to the Senate in 1875.  He died of a stroke only 5 months after assuming office.

10. Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893) served as a senator from Indiana (1881-1887) but was defeated for re-election on account of gerrymandering.  It must be remembered that senators were selected by the state government, not through popular vote, thus a state with a Democratic legislature was unlikely to choose a Republican.  The 17th Amendment changed senators to a state-wide elective office.  He was the grandson of President William Henry Harrison.

11. Harry Truman (1945-1953) had been a senator from Missouri (1935-1945) until he was chosen to be President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's running mate for the 1944 election.  FDR won an unprecedented 4th term and then promptly died.  The gap between being a senator and becoming president was the three months he spent as vice president.

12. Lyndon Banes Johnson (1963-1969) was elected to the Senate from Texas (1949-1961) and very soon became the chief arm-twister (Whip) and then Majority Leader (1955-1861).  LBJ was a powerhouse in the Senate.  He had competed with Senator Kennedy for the 1960 nomination but fell short.  For the general election, Kennedy needed more Southern support, which Johnson had.

13. Richard Nixon (1969-1974) served as a senator from California (1950-1953) before becoming Eisenhower's vice-president (1953-1961).  Interestingly, this made him President of the Senate, where his 1960 electoral rivals - Senator Kennedy & Senator Johnson - served.  Nixon had long been out of public office when he secured another nomination for the presidency (1968). 

14. Joseph Biden (2021-present) was a senator from Delaware (1973-2009).  He had made two presidential runs as a senator.  In 1988, he was accused of plagiarizing speeches.  He also had a habit of exaggerating his resume.  He made another run in 2008, but quickly dropped out as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton dominated the primaries.  He had been 12 years out of the Senate and 4 years out of office when he ran a successful presidential campaign in 2020.  Third time was the charm.

Though a stint in the Senate appears to be a positive for presidential contenders, sitting senators only rarely rise to the presidency: Harding in 1920, JFK in 1960, and Obama in 2008.  It takes a lot of charisma - which each of these Senators had - to overcome a lack of executive experience.

Learning from Ginsburg

In the last year of President Obama's tenure, there was much pressure on Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to retire.  She had had several bouts of cancer, starting in 1999.  There was concern that, if the worst happened and a Republican was elected in 2016, she would not survive to 2021.  Though she nearly made it, Trump was able to replace her in the days before the election.    Where Bill Clinton and Barack Obama had only seated two justices each in there two-term presidencies, Trump sat 3 in his single term.

With a Republican wave predicted in November, Justice Stephen Breyer has elected to retire from the Supreme Court.  Though President Biden will still be in office for another 3 years, his margin in the Senate is at stake.  Trump was able to get conservative justices by the barest of margins thanks to the change in filibuster rules for judicial nominees and having a majority in the Senate.  Gorsuch (54-45), Kavanaugh (50-48), and Coney Barrett (52-48) would not have been seated if the Republicans didn't hold the Senate.  Trump would have had to nominate more moderate justices.  By that same token, Biden has a shrinking window in which he can place a liberal justice.  Come next year, Biden's nominees will have to satisfy a Republican majority in the Senate, led by Mitch McConnell.  By leaving now, Breyer's replacement is more likely to share his views, rather than have a watered-down version of his views.

Acquitted Again

As should be a surprise to no one at all, Trump has again been acquitted.  It was a foregone conclusion.  At least the Senate only wasted a week on this folly.  The evidence did not matter.  The Constitution did not matter.  If these people really believe that Trump incited an insurrection, they should report him to the DC District Attorney to bring charges.  You know, just like with the people who broke into the Capitol.  He broke a law, right?  He's out of office and can be prosecuted, right?  Do it.  If the evidence was enough for impeachment, surely it must be enough for law enforcement.  Right?

<sound of crickets>

Yeah, that's what I thought.  Just another show trial.

Rush to Impeachment

Do the Democrats know how this works?  The House plays prosecutor and the Senate plays judge and jury.  The prosecutor is supposed to investigate all the fact before the case is ever brought to court.  What prosecutor would schedule a court date and arrived to announce that the case needed more evidence?  The vote to impeach in the House was supposed to be the completion of the investigation.  By voting to impeach, the House declared that sufficient evidence and testimony had been uncovered to merit the removal of the president.  However, now in the Senate, there are calls to examine witnesses who did not appear in the House.  That would be a continuation of the investigation rather than a trying of the case.  Why didn't the House simply investigate longer?  The entire foundation of the obstruction of Congress charge is based on the House not pursuing remedies in the courts.  The President can't have executive privilege during impeachment hearings?  If so, executive privilege would always be nixed by the House declaring all hearings to be for impeachment.

 

The House had hearings and heard testimony.  That is what should be presented and nothing else.  That is the case they voted out of the House.  If it isn't enough, tough.  Be more thorough next time, which may very well happen before the election.  Trump may be the first president with multiple impeachments.

Bad Night for Al Franken

Doug Jones has won the Alabama Senatorial race and Roy Moore will ride off into the sunset to trouble the Republican Party no more.  Al Franken had intentionally offered that vague non-resignation with the expectation that he could revoke it when Moore won the race.  Or maybe he would make his resignation contingent on Moore's not being seated in the Senate.  Whatever the case, Franken's last, best hope for remaining in the Senate just went down the drain.  What will the Senate Ethics Committee do now?

To the Ethics Committee!

"As with all credible allegations of sexual harassment or assault, I believe the Ethics Committee should review the matter."

Mitch McConnell, Senate Majority Leader

 

In that case, let's elect Judge Roy Moore and send him directly to the Ethics Committee!  That will teach him!

Failing McConnell

President Trump has unleashed his ire on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and McConnell has responded by explaining how the president doesn't understand the legislative process.  Mitch is full of crap.  With virtually the same batch of senators, he managed to get a repeal of Obamacare onto President Obama's desk in January of 2016.  In that instance, the President was hostile to the legislative process and yet McConnell and Ryan overcame.  This time, with a president who is cheerleading the effort, they fell short.  The only problem that Trump brings to the process is that he will sign the legislation.  In 2016, the Republicans could send the legislation with supreme confidence that it wouldn't be signed but they would be able to go back to their districts and say "See, I passed it and the President vetoed it."  It was the best of both worlds, a way to convince the rubes back home that Republicans were opposed to Obamacare while still retaining all the money and power that the Affordable Care Act provided.  This time around, they couldn't even repeal just the mandates.

 

McConnell is offering empty excuses that are clearly false.  You passed it last year when Obama was there but can't pass it now that the Republicans have an even stronger hold on government?  Nah.  You don't want to pass it.  You want to keep all that power in Washington, where you are top dog in the Senate.  You don't really believe in limited government or, at the very least, too many of your Republican colleagues in the Senate don't believe in it.

Never Gonna Let You Go

Calexit is again in the news as signatures are gathered.  The politics of Trump aside, California has an excellent case - purely on size - for becoming an independent country.   In 1870, the United States had a population of 38.8 million people who were represented in Congress by 241 Representatives and 72 Senators.  Today, California has a population of 39.3 million who are represented in Congress by 53 Representatives and 2 Senators.  The federal aristocracy put a cap on the number of people who could be in the ruling class and this gets worse every year.  A mere 535 people in Washington cannot possible represent the disparate interests of 320,000,000 citizens.  If the central government kept to its Constitutional role, perhaps it could but it has breached those bounds.  One cannot reconcile the sharply contrasting views of New York and Texas or California and Oklahoma.  Federalism or secession.

 

Though the state is dominated by Democrats, the Democratic Party cannot allow California to secede.  20% of all the Democratic Congressmen are from California.  Right now, the Republicans hold the House by a 240 to 194 margin.  Take out California and that becomes 226 to 155.  Without California, Trump won the popular vote by 1.4 million rather than losing it by 2.9 million.  The Democrats cannot afford to lose the state and will necessarily take action to prevent Calexit.  As such, the Republicans should grease the skids for Calexit and enjoy the ensuing civil war between California Secessionist Democrats vs. National Unionist Democrats.

Now Everyone is Qualified

Thanks to Trump's election, everyone thinks they are qualified to get elected to high office.  Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is pondering a political career.  Oprah suddenly views herself as qualified for political office.  Kid Rock is floating the idea of running for Senate.  Caitlyn Jenner has even hinted at running for office.  When one considers the $20 trillion debt, the eternally collapsing infrastructure that somehow has no 'shovel-ready' jobs, the selective law enforcement, and myriad failures of government, it is clear that these highbrow educations aren't all they are cracked up to be.  As I noted in an earlier posting, we have a lot of Ivy Leaguers for Presidents and Senators.  We are closer to Buckley's less desirable composition:

I would rather be governed by the first two thousand people in the Boston telephone directory than by the two thousand people on the faculty of Harvard University.

William F. Buckley

 

Of course, Buckley was a Yale man so perhaps he was exposing a bias.  Still, the results of the Washington elites speak for themselves.  If there was a 100% sweep, it would do the government good, especially if the new Senators and Representatives were people who would have been unthinkable before Trump.  It is time to usurp the new aristocracy that has presumed the right to rule and return to government of the people, by the people, for the people.

 

Good luck storming the castle!

Filibuster Folly

On Thursday, Majority Leader McConnell invoked the 'nuclear option' - also called the Reid Rule - to rewrite senate rules to overcome the filibuster of Judge Neil Gorsuch.  When put to a vote, he won confirmation by 54-45.  The Republicans have a 52-48 majority in the Senate.  This incident is supposedly evidence that Republicans are wrecking the traditions of the Senate.  Hmm.

 

In 1991, the Democrats held a majority of 55 to 45 seats in the Senate.  In that same year, Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court by a vote of 52-48.  By current standards, Thomas was far outside the 'mainstream' of judicial thought.  How did he get confirmed?

For the entire history of the Senate, judicial nominations were not considered to be subject to the filibuster with the possible exception of Abe Fortas who had some ethics issues that sank his elevation from a Supreme Court Justice to Chief Justice.  However, in 2003, the Democrats decided to filibuster judicial nominees.  They used the filibuster to defeat about ten of George W. Bush's judicial nominees.  This was payback for when the Republican-controlled Senate had bottled several times that many Clinton nominees in committee, never even allowing them to come to a floor vote.  But then the Republicans were getting payback for the smear job against Thomas and the 'borking' of Robert Bork.

 

This growing tit for tat exercise first saw some rollback when the Democrats again took control of the Senate and got sick of Republicans using the filibuster against Obama's nominees.  Though the Republicans had flirted with the idea of a nuclear option when they controlled the Senate, the Democrats used it.  The rules were rewritten so that only Supreme Court nominees could be filibustered.  Now the Republicans have completed the process by removing that last case and returning the Advice & Consent function back to where it was prior to 2003.  Oh the humanity!

 

The filibuster should be returned to its pre-1970 status where a senator had to speak for hours on end to hold up legislation.  Why have a cloture vote to end debate when no one is debating?  It is amazing how much use the filibuster has seen in the wake of that rule.

The Easy Button

Effective as of Dec. 31, 2017, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is repealed, and the provisions of law amended or repealed by such Act are restored or revived as if such Act had not been enacted.

Affordable Care Repeal Act as written by Congressman Mo Brooks

That was easy.  Let's clear the wreckage that is Obamacare and rebuild rather than trying to refurbish the ruins that will still be a rickety structure prone to failure and requiring constant maintenance.  Tear it down and start clean.  Better still, tear it down and see what the private sector builds in its place, especially after some additional regulations are repealed.

 

The complicated and ambiguous nature of legislation provides plenty of work for lawyers, bureaucrats, and judges while burdening the producers of society.  As noted in a previous blog, a majority of US Senators are Doctors of Law but only 4 are Medical Doctors.  Are these lawyers particularly suited to designing a health care system?  I doubt the House has much better qualifications.  Would we entrust the Congress to design a system for computers and software and expect the costs to go down?

Elites of the Senate

The United States Senate, which was initially formed to represent the interests of the States, was undermined by the 17th Amendment.  Rather than being selected by the state assembly and/or the governor, the senators would be popularly elected.  This effectively ended the ability of state governments to directly influence the federal government.  Whereas the state legislature could have recalled a senator who voted in favor of a law that would impose costs on the state government (e.g. Medicaid, Americans with Disabilities Act, No Child Left Behind, etc.), the 17th Amendment removed that check from the state.  Unfunded mandates have proliferated, allowing the federal government to determine how the states must spend their tax revenues.

 

The reasoning behind the amendment was that too many millionaires were 'buying' senate seats.  There was also an issue with legislatures selecting senators in a timely fashion since it wasn't an election with a given day for all legislators to vote.  Popular vote certainly resolved the second of those issues but senators are still among the wealthy elite.

 

Members of the 115th Senate are, on average, 61.9 years old and have been in the Senate for 10 years.  26 Senators graduated from Ivy League colleges (20 of them attended Harvard, Yale, or both) and 55 Senators have a Juris Doctor degree.  By contrast, only 4 senators earned an MD and 6 have an MBA.  Two have achieved PhDs.  Impressive credentials when one considers the mediocre to bad quality of their work.

 

Splitting by party is illuminating.  There are 46 Democrats, 17 of whom are Ivy League graduates (37%) and 32 of whom have a JD (70%).  By contrast, of the 52 Republicans, only 8 are Ivy League grads (15%) and 22 have a JD (42%).  All 4 MDs are Republicans.  The MBAs are split 4 Republicans to 2 Democrats.  Each party has a PhD senator.  50% of the Democrats have worked as lawyers while only 35% of the Republicans have.

 

Considering the low regard in which lawyers are held, it is no surprise that an institution that is dominated by lawyers and Ivy League elites would find itself with similar approval ratings.

Too Much News

So much is happening in so short a period of time that I would have to be a fulltime blogger to get even close to commenting on all of it.  However, here are some thoughts on recent developments:

1. Senate Committee rule change: It has long been practice that members of both party need to be present for a vote on a nominee.  The Democrats have used this rule to prevent votes by not being present.  This was used to the extreme by Wisconsin Democrats trying to thwart Governor Walker's reforms, which included them fleeing the state!  Committee Chairman Hatch altered the rules to allow for a vote with those present.  I suspect the purpose of the rule was to prevent the majority from meeting secretly to move nominees and bills out of committee and intentional absence was not an expected tactic.  Such childish antics explain the low approval ratings of Congress and government.

 

2. Neil Gorsuch nomination: It is always best to have justices who understand that it is up to the legislature to write law, not the courts.  Far too many subjects are decided by courts writing laws and framing it as existing rights.  That he was unanimously approved for his current position in 2006 is good maneuvering by the Trump Administration.  It used to be that nominations were not so contentious, because the court wasn't nearly as important as it has become.  Antonin Scalia was approved 98 to 0 and Ruth Bader Ginsberg won with 96 to 3.  Gorsuch will be lucky if he gets 60 in favor.  If courts would refrain from legislating, we could return to the ho-hum confirmation process.  Yeah, that's not going to happen.

 

3. Betsy DeVos for Education Secretary: Though she is out of committee, two Republican Senators have stated their intention to vote against.  A party line vote would give her a 50-50 split which VP Pence would presumably decide in DeVos's favor.  As someone who would like to abolish the Department of Education, I am mostly indifferent to who is in charge.  When did the Constitution get amended to expand federal authority to education?  In any case, US education has been static - at best - since the creation of the department, demonstrating how useless it is.

 

4. Barack Obama speaks: Not even two weeks and Obama feels the need to offer his opinion.  I'm not sure George W Bush ever said anything in opposition to Obama though Obama spent most of his first term blaming Bush for the state of everything.  Even so, Bush remained silent and allowed the new president to take the world stage.  Some ex-presidents have class.

 

5. Military Action against Mexico: Apparently Trump had a phone conversation with Pena Nieto and suggested that he deal with the cartels or perhaps the US military might.  Wow, that escalated fast.  The US has intervened militarily in Mexico in the past.  When Pancho Villa raided into the US, President Wilson dispatched a Punitive Expedition led by General Pershing.  Wilson also occupied Vera Cruz.  It is extremely unlikely that US forces actually march into Mexico but hinting at the possibility could certainly prompt Mexico to crackdown.  Bullying or smart diplomacy?

 

6. Frenetic Trump: That may not be the right adjective but it certainly seems appropriate to an outside observer.  There is something new always happening.  No one would accuse Trump of being 'low energy.'  In a way, his tactics so far remind me of a military campaign.  Shock and awe is surely what Washington is feeling.  This high-speed activity is not how things are normally done.  However, that may be the point.  The opposition is off-balance.  Heck, even the allies are off-balance.  It remains to be seen how successful this strategy will be.  Did he use this technique in the many deals he has struck over the years?

 

7. Berkeley Riot: The self-described 'Dangerous Faggot' was scheduled to speak at Berkeley but protests turned to a riot.  Do these students not realize that this sort of 'tolerance' of opposing views is part of the reason Trump was elected?  Each time one of these protests make the news, more people wonder what Milo is saying to incite it.  Curious, they look on YouTube.  This is how I became aware of Milo and now he is a rising star with a huge book deal and multiplying appearances.  It reminds me of how every time Obama would call for reasonable gun legislation, gun sales would sky rocket.  Counter-productive.

 

I wonder how much has happened while I've been blogging.

Consent

He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate... shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court,...

US Constitution, Article 2, Section 2

 

This details the president's authority to appoint justices to the Supreme Court.  Note that it is limited by the Advice and Consent of the Senate.  The Senate is not required to act expeditiously, schedule hearings, or play nice.  The Senate can refuse to confirm every single appointment from day one; their consent is not mandatory or it wouldn't be consent.  This is one of those checks we hear about in our checks & balances government.  The Senate is well within its authority.  As for the Democrats, they have no cause for complaint.  When the shoe was on the other foot, they imposed the nuclear option to bypass the minority party entirely on judicial nominations.  They rammed through, on a party line vote, the House version of the Affordable Care Act in the days before Scott Brown became the 41st Republican vote in the Senate, thus allowing zero input from the minority.  You reap what you sow.

 

There is currently an argument that Republicans want the people to decide the next Supreme Court Justice via their vote in November.  Democrats have countered that the people made that decision in 2012 when they reelected President Obama.  Of course, the people elected a Republican Senate in 2014.  Wouldn't that mean the people voted to obstruct the president more recently than they voted to support him?  In any case, the President is entirely within his rights to nominate a judge for the Supreme Court and the Senate is entirely within its rights to refuse consent.  Checks & Balances.

 

Of course, the Republicans are spineless and will likely collapse before the month is out.  That spinelessness, that lack of principals is why the Republican base is willing to roll the dice on Trump.  There will probably be hearings but will enough linguini-spined Republicans vote in favor of Obama's nominee to get 50 votes?  How many Jim Jeffords and Arlen Specters are still hiding in the Senate?  Considering the track record, I would give Obama even odds that his nominee is confirmed.

The Nuclear Option

Back when the Republicans threatened the Nuclear Option of changing Senate rules so that a simple majority could confirm nominees, Senators Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and Harry Reid were all in strenuous opposition.  Of course, they were the minority then.  The nuclear option was not exercised and the filibuster remained.  Today, the filibuster has been tossed aside.  Sure, they said it only applies to judicial (except for the Supreme Court) and executive nominations but the precedent is now set.  If the majority wants to change the rules to get its way, the majority shall change the rules.  In other words, there are no rules.

The Senate is meant to put the brakes on the more volatile House.  It is supposed to preserve the rights of the minority, which is a large part of why the supermajority filibuster exists.  The Senate has made a huge leap to being just another House of Representatives.  As I've said before, we need to repeal the 17th Amendment so that Senators are chosen by the state legislatures rather than the citizens.  Then they would protect the independence of the state rather than weakening it.  However, that is a tough sell.

As for the effects, I am ambivalent.  I think a president should get the nominees of his choice in most cases, especially those that expire with his term.  Nominations that outlive his presidency (such as judges) deserve greater scrutiny.  However, since this simple majority will apply to Republican nominees in the future, it comes out even.  Likely to get more extreme nominees this way.  Democrats will rue the day when they are no longer the majority.

Why No Budget?

Today, the Senate voted down 5 budgets.  President Obama's proposed budget went down to a 0-99 defeat.  The other four budgets, proposed by various Republican senators, were also defeated but none so badly as this.  Only Rand Paul's budget came close to matching Obama's crushing defeat though his got 16 votes in favor.

The Constitution requires Congress to pass a budget.  The House passed a budget last year and passed one this year.  The Senate has gone more than 1000 days without passing a budget.  The House is controlled by Republicans and the Senate by Democrats.  Of note, it only takes 51 votes to pass a budget, so the Democrats could pass a budget without a single Republican vote.  Moreover, as it is a budget, it is not subject to filibuster.  Reconciliation is how the Bush Tax Cuts were passed even though the Republicans didn't have a supermajority.

One wonders why the Democrats have failed to pass a budget.  The Republicans can't stop them from passing a budget.  Once a budget is passed, the House and Senate would reconcile their differing budgets through horse trading, which is how it has happened for more than 2 centuries.  Why not now?  We've had divided government before.  This should be nothing new.  And yet we are moving into 3 years without a budget.  There must be a reason.

Failure to pass a budget means that the only options on the table are to continue current spending levels via a continuing resolution or a government shutdown.  Republicans were burned badly the last time they tried the government shutdown (1995) and won't dare to do it again.  That leaves the continuing resolution.  What budget is thus extended?  The 2009 budget, which dramatically expanded government spending through the stimulus package.  Thus we have our answer.

If the Senate passes a budget and then goes into conference committee with the House, it is a certainty that budget priorities will change.  The Democrats will not get a budget as much to their liking as the 2009 budget that was passed by a Democratic House, Senate, and President.  Better to forever extend a budget they like than to pass a new budget that they dislike.  All the complaints that the Republicans are intransigent is nonsense but it plays well in the media.

Senator for Life

Richard Lugar, Senator from Indiana, lost in the primary tonight.  Though I know little of his opponent, I am pleased by this.  I distrust career politicians; it is my big beef with my governor.  Lugar was first elected to the Senate when I was 9 years old.  If his successor were to last as long, I'd be in my 80s.  As it happens, Lugar is 80 and wanted to serve until he was 86.  Must everyone try to be a Strom Thurmond (47 years), Ted Kennedy (46 years), Robert Byrd (51 years), or Daniel Inouye (49 years and counting)?

Too many of these politicians, be they Republican or Democrat, treat their offices as a title of nobility.  Though they may say they are our representatives, they soon come to view themselves as our rulers.  Few people choose to become servants if there are other options.  However, public servant attracts a lot of "selfless" people.  It is amazing how wealthy these folks get by lowering themselves to be our servants.  This is just another word game.  Few of them serve us, and those who do are generally freshmen who have yet to be corrupted.  It is funny how President for Life is correctly viewed as undemocratic and bad but Senator for Life or Representative for Life is considered normal and even good (seniority, don't you know).

My first option to fix this problem in the Senate would be to repeal the 17th Amendment.  My second option, which could fix things in the house as well, would be to propose a 12 year limit in elective office in the Federal Government.  Doesn't matter the combination of posts but a limit of 12.  Of course, that would require an amendment to the Constitution.  Or, perhaps we could find a judge who would simply rule such; that's how we amend the Living Document these days.