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OpEdNews Op Eds    H2'ed 9/6/11

The Broken Government

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But why is our government so dysfunctional? One reason may be that every year billions of dollars are spent by thousands of corporate lobbyists. Not to mention, the legalized bribery of campaign contributions. As Aaron Scherb of Public Campaign wrote, "Recent estimates reveal that many members spend anywhere from 25 percent up to 50 percent (and sometimes more) of their time fundraising, especially as an election approaches." As Thomas Ferguson, Professor of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, has written, "In dividing so sharply and refusing compromises, Congress is listening primarily to those who contribute political money, not the public." Little wonder than that, as Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has pointed out, we are now a government "of the [richest] 1%, by the [richest] 1%, and for the [richest] 1%."

So things look pretty gloomy, but can't we some how hope for public financing of campaigns to end this scourge of corporate governance? Like we can hope for Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, more hair, and a twenty-pound weight loss.

After the right-wing activist Roberts court Citizens United ruling, we can forget about any legislative body trying to even the playing field for the vast majority of us. It will not happen. And if you cannot get big money out of the electoral system, the average person has no real power. As Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs has pointed out, "In America today, only the rich have political power."

For proof, look no further than at what went on in Washington this past summer. Most Americans understand that our greatest problem is unemployment. A June CBS poll had 53% saying jobs was the most important issue facing the country, while only 7% picked the budget deficit, not surprising considering that effectively we now have double-digit unemployment in this country.

And the obvious solution to that problem is for the government to prime the pump, to spend money to increase employment, yet you wouldn't know it by our government's actions of late. They had conniption fits about -- not unemployment, but the debt. So the government will cut spending, which will only mean less employment. Duh! There is now an almost total disconnect from what most people want and what our government does.

But can't we still hope for some Superman or Superwoman to come and save us? In 2012 another presidential election is coming up, and the chattering class will urge us with all their wiles to catch that quadrennial fever that is so contagious within the Beltway. To fall for some new face, who, despite being well-connected to the halls of power, invariably will pose as an "outsider" running against the mess in Washington. And we will be sold a bill of goods that this man or woman will somehow cut through this Gordian knot of a government.

But as a recovering political junkie, who has been multiple times through this waiting for Superman bit, let me tell you that you are living in a fantasy if you believe one man or woman, can fix this system. Just ask Barack Obama or his supporters and ex-supporters.

In fact, I can predict with 100% accuracy that there will be no Supermen (or Superwomen) in our future. And yes, I know, a third party is such a seductive and beguiling mirage, but, in the end, it is a rabbit hole. Our winner-take-all system effectively keeps third party aspirants permanently on the fringe.

So is there any hope? Well, I suppose, the eternally optimistic among us can hope for constitutional changes that will reinvigorate our democracy, but the very Constitution that governs us makes any change more than difficult.

The mere attempt to amend our 18th century Constitution is a challenge so daunting as to make it nearly impossible. The two-thirds rule means the opposition of one-third plus one of either chamber or one-third plus one state legislature can doom any amendment that the vast majority would like to pass. And this one-third plus one in the state legislatures or Congress might only represent a miniscule percentage of the electorate. As Yale professor emeritus Robert A. Dahl has pointed out in his How Democratic Is the American Constitution?, changes "that would be desirable from a democratic point of view . . . have very little chance of coming about in the indefinite future."

One question we should ask but won't is why do we continue to allow ourselves to be governed by an 18th century relic? No one still wears white wigs and satin breeches, at least not in public. Our culture, literature, modes of transportation, social mores, and even the total area of our nation have changed drastically. Yet collectively we have bought into the myth that Jay, Madison, and Hamilton are some sort of holy trinity that delivered the Constitution to us after a weekend mountain retreat with God. Ignoring the simple fact that the Constitution was debated by real live 18th century human beings with all kinds of failings and prejudices in a very muggy Philadelphia 224 years ago.

The Constitution of 1787 is first and foremost a political document written by and for a certain time. Many of the issues it addressed, slavery and the amount of power Virginia had compared to other states, are no longer on the front burner because that time has passed. And the time has long passed when we should write fawning, obsequious lines treating this 18th century relic as if it were a sacred text.

One simple way of demythologizing the Constitution is to ask, "What kind of government do we want?" While we might differ on particulars, at a bare minimum, most people would want a government that is representative, is responsive to the public's needs, and can be held accountable come Election Day. Everything our present government is not. It is unrepresentative, unresponsive to the general public, and because of divided government cannot be held accountable.

Our government's balance of powers among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches was imposed so that, as Madison explained in Federalist No. 10, the majority could not rule. It was Madison's belief that "an interested and overbearing majority" should be checked. Or as Governor Edmund Randolph of Virginia stated baldly at the Constitutional Convention, "Our chief danger arises from the democratic parts of our constitutions." In short, the balance of powers scheme was designed to provide a "check against . . . democracy."

Yet the balance of powers idea not only curbs democracy, in the end it is responsible for our irresponsible government. As Glenn Beck's improbable bà ªte noire, Woodrow Wilson wrote in Congressional Government before he was President, "Power and strict accountability for its use are the essential constituents of good government . . . It is, therefore, manifestly a radical defect in our federal system that it parcels out power and confuses responsibility as it does." Or, a bit snappier in the same tome, "[T]he more power is divided, the more irresponsible it becomes."

A relevant example occurred during Ronald Reagan's tenure when deficits exploded. Reagan supporters to this day defend their man by pointing out that it is Congress, not the President, that produces the budget, and they have a point, even if you acknowledge the fact that Reagan never submitted a balanced budget.

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Ken Wheatcroft-Pardue Social Media Pages: Facebook page url on login Profile not filled in       Twitter page url on login Profile not filled in       Linkedin page url on login Profile not filled in       Instagram page url on login Profile not filled in

I blog at "Left-Wing Tex" from beautiful Fort Worth, Texas. Here I am a retired English-as-a-Second Language teacher. I have had poems published in a number of venues, including California Quarterly, Borderlands, The Texas (more...)
 

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