Carnival of Divided Government - Duo et Trîcênsimus -Special "No Special Day" Edition

Welcome to the 32nd edition of the Carnival of Divided Government- The duo et trîcênsimus June 15 Edition. DWSUWF has posted many special editions of this carnival over the last few years, including the recent Special St. Patrick's Day edition, Special Chinese New Year Editon, Special Bad Attitude Election edition, Special Halloween edition, etc. Today we post the "No Special Day" edition , as we are more than a bit late for the originally planned "Special Memorial Day" edition. This is best. Our carnival is a bit too cynical and flippant for as somber a holiday as Memorial Day. Of course, as this is the first "No Special Day" edition in over two years, this edition is more special than all the others.

As explained in those earlier editions, we have adopted Latin ordinal numeration to impart a patina of gravitas reflecting the historical importance of the series. In this the Carnival of Divided Government duo et trîcênsimus (XXXII), as in all of the CODGOV series, we select volunteers and draftees from the blogosphere and main stream media writing on the single topic of government divided between the major parties (leaving it to the reader to sort out volunteers from draftees). Consistent with this topic, the primary criteria for acceptance in the carnival is to explicitly use the words and/or concept of "divided government" in submitted posts. A criteria that, to our endless befuddlement, is ignored by many of the bloggers submitting posts, which sadly results in DWSUWF reluctantly ignoring their fine submissions.

Carnival

We begin with Michael Kinsley and an op-ed in the Washington Post - "Change - You asked for it":

"High-church moderates like to claim that a government with the power split between the two parties is desirable. They even claim sometimes that the voters consciously choose divided government, or that they are sending a message that they want sensible compromise and are tired of partisan bickering, etc., etc. Moderistos do not explain how a particular voter would go about doing these things. (How would you even know which way to split your ticket to make sure that you're not just canceling out the votes of a fellow divided-government enthusiast?)"

Interesting. Apparently DWSUWF is a "high-church moderate." I don't even know what that means. More to the point Michael - while I have no idea whether many (or any) voters "consciously choose" divided government, I know they should. And it is just not that hard to figure out how to vote for divided government.

This particular "moderisto" divided government advocate has been explaining how to vote for divided federal government for a number of years now. It is really quite easy. In 2004, the divided government vote was obvious. It was a vote for John Kerry and failed. In 2006, the divided government vote was obvious. It was a straight vote for Democratic party legislators and succeeded. In 2008, the divided government vote was obvious. It was a vote for John McCain and failed. In 2010 the divided government vote will be a straight vote for Republican legislators and will likely fail to achieve that goal, but will hopefully close the gap in preparation for 2012. In 2012, the divided government vote will be for Republican Senators, and/or the Republican nominee for President. It very well may succeed, with Republicans retaking either the White House, or (more likely) the Senate, with the Dems retaining control of the House of Representatives (and maybe the presidency).

None of this is meant to imply that the divided government vote will always be obvious. Indeed, in 2007 DWSUWF addressed exactly this question - What if there is no obvious "divided government" vote? The updated answer:

If the "divided government vote" is not obvious, if reasonable people can argue about what the correct "divided government" vote should be, then there simply is no "divided government" vote for that election. In that circumstance, the moderate/libertarian divided government voting block would go "free agent." There are several easily identifiable situations where it will be completely obvious that there is absolutely no divided government vote. As a hypothetical example: Although the Democrats structural advantage in the Senate race in 2010 make it extremely unlikely that the Republicans can take either house, if the GOP were by some miracle able to retake the Senate, and the Democrats hold the House of Representatives, we would go into 2012 with a divided Congress that is likely to stay that way. This means the presidential vote in 2012 would have no divided government preference (assuming that historical incumbent advantages hold.) It simply does not matter which party the president belongs to, as the congress and the government would still be divided. In that case, the moderate/libertarian/dividist vote becomes "free agent" with a counter-intuitive preference for incumbents.

Whether we can succeed in restoring the greater fiscal responsibility and better governance that comes with divided government will depend on many factors. A critical factor will be whether "moderistos" of good conscience understand why it is important, and vote to make it happen. At least this blogger will continue to do what he can to promote the divided government voting heuristic. Hope this clears it up for you Michael.

Some Republicans have already picked up the gauntlet, recognizing and promoting what will likely be the best argument to vote Republican in 2010 and 2012. Pat Toomey is a Republican running for teh Senate in Pennsylvania. I have no idea whether he has any real prospect of succeeding, but I sure like what he is saying in this Harvard Crimson guest editorial, picked up by the Morning Call and linked by The Centrist - "History tells us one party rule often leads to excesses.":

"In the present age, we have experienced again the consequences of unchecked, one-party dominance. From 2001-2007, Republicans controlled both houses of Congress and the White House. At the height of its power, following the 2004 elections, Republicans had a 55-seat Senate majority and a 232-seat House majority. Some party leaders got carried away and pursued policies that grew their own power at the expense of American taxpayers. Their unlimited power led to runaway spending, an explosion in obscenely wasteful and parochial earmarks, a lack of transparency, and once again corruption that sent several Congress members to court and some to prison... Over the past five months, the Democratic monopoly has expanded the federal government by historic proportions. It began with further taxpayer-funded bailouts of Wall Street and the auto companies, then extended the bailout fever to the housing industry. After campaigning on a promise to end the Republicans' tenure of irresponsibility, full Democratic control in Washington has produced policies that reward rampant irresponsible behavior and penalize innocent and responsible taxpayers who are forced to foot the bill. Still, there's more. A unified Democratic government passed a partisan $787 billion stimulus bill and another $410 billion spending bill. After promising to end the Republican tenure of pork-barrel spending, these massive bills included titanic lists of pork projects. The projected budget deficit for the fiscal year 2009 grew to $1.8 trillion, or a shocking and nearly unprecedented 12.3 percent of our gross domestic product. They then proceeded to pass a new record-breaking $3.6 trillion budget for the upcoming year. Unchecked power pushes parties to excess regardless of which party is in power."

Too true. But unless a meaningful percentage of the voters ( 5-10%) start voting based on what politicians do as opposed to what they say (even if said politician is really really good at crafting and delivering what they say), we are still going to suffer the abuses, fiscal irresponsibility, bad governance and excesses endemic to single party rule.

The view from the Ivory Tower

Academics across the political spectrum have taken note of the apparent lack of any constitutional or legislative constraint on Obama's exercise of executive power under single party Democratic rule. Unsurprisingly, the left-leaning are much more sanguine about the Obama unitary executive, despite it being identical in overreach and carrying the same constitutional risk as the Bush unitary executive. Case in point, Sandy Levinson, who is beating the drum for fundamental constitutional changes to constrain the executive branch (among other perceived deficiencies) and blogs about his choice for president at Balkinization with the hand wringing post "Further notes on a constitutional dictatorship":

"..when presidents are not faced with "hostile majorities" in Congress, they can increasingly count--especially if Republican--on the lemming-like loyalty of congressional majorities who are especially delighted to provide not an ounce of the oversight that the naive might believe attach to a separation-of-powers system. And, of course, even when George W. Bush was faced with divided government in 2007-2009, he was still able to exercise quasi-dictatorial powers with regard to military and foreign policy. But enough of Bush bashing. After all, the President who seems determined not to hold any high-ranking member of that Administration accountable for disgracing the country and making us less safe to boot by adopting torture as a national policy is Barack Obama, to whose campaign I contributed and for whom I happily voted (and whose presidency, overall, still leaves me delighted). But surely we should recognize that the American version of "constitutional dictatorship" is built into our system and not simply a function of character. "

It strikes me as odd that Professor Levinson still manages only the most perfunctory expressions of concern at the identical exercise of quasi-dictatorial powers when it is this administration issuing edicts as opposed to the last. And as far as the "lemming-like" congress, I am failing to see the distinction that Levinson discerns between the "lemming-like" current congress and the "lemming-like" Republican congress under GWB. I can only surmise the good professor feels it is reasonable to be "delighted" with a "constitutional dictator", as long as he is in the right party.

Professor John Buck, blogging at Economic Perspectives, displays some frightening graphics on our collective accelerating debt, but offers some mushy thinking when he questions "The virtues of politcal dissension?":

"A glance at the annual change in the U.S. public debt since 1940 suggests the abandonment of fiscal responsibility can more easily be blamed on the ascension of supply-side economic doctrines with the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and the popularity of tax cuts, rather than the lack of divided government from 2001-2006. Using the Welches´ questionable logic, one could just as easily have argued the opposite point - that divided government is detrimental to the economy. In the recessions of the early 1980s, the White House and Congress were controlled by different parties. The same can be said for the 1990-1991 recession. The 1992 elections when Bill Clinton won the presidency and Democrats gained control of the House and Senate initiated a decade of prosperity and economic growth. So which is it? I think the answer is there is no correlation between economic prosperity and whether the U.S federal government is divided."

Like any good partisan, the professor does not permit facts to get in the way of a grand sweeping conclusion that confirms his partisan bias. There is a clear correlation between divided government and reduced rate of spending increases and growth of federal government. This has been documented by economists like Niskanen and Slivinski among others. I actually thought the correlation might have been broken when Obama took office, and indeed it would have if Obama had lived up to his moderate campaign rhetoric. While the rate of federal spending increases under the last two years of divided government in the Bush administration were less than the previous six years of profligate spending by the single party Republican government, it certainly was still an easy target to beat if Obama chose to demonstrate any inkling of fiscal responsibility. He did not. Instead he chose to steamroll the Democratic House of Representatives stimulus pork barrel spending plan through Congress and the wildly irresponsible massive deficit increases of the Democratic budget, saddling the country with back breaking debt that cannot be repaid without devaluing the currency. His disingenuous rhetoric about halving the deficit and advocating "paygo" is laughable after forcing through a budget that quadruples the budget under a suspension of "paygo". But he gets a free pass from the professor. After all, as the professor concludes in his post, it is really not about facts or policy, but "What matters is the INDIVIDUALS in positions of power...". In other words, everything is ok, as long as Obama does it. Even if it is the exact same or worse policy as George W Bush.

At the Library of Economics and Liberty, Professor Arnold Kling reaches a depressing conclusion in his post "Why I fear a one party state.":

"I am not upset with political trends because I want Republicans to win. I am upset because I foresee a one-party state. Even if neither party is particularly libertarian, gridlock and competitive checks and balances are better for libertarians... as hard as it is for many people to admit it, the political equilibrium of competitive balance is gone for the next decade. For now, the only two elements of the political system are Progressive Corporatism and The Resistance. And the latter does not amount to much yet."

FWIW professor, you can count DWSUWF in The Resistance. It still does not amount to much. Yet.

Professor Kling's co-blogger at Econlog - Professor Bryan Caplan - is willing to put money on his somewhat less pessimistic prognosis in his post "One Party Democaracy is not coming.":

"There is also some evidence that unified government is less libertarian than divided government (see here and here for starters). I should add, though, that the effect is not huge, and Singapore is a striking counter-example. Nevertheless, I disagree with Arnold's claim that one-party democracy is likely to happen in the U.S. He assures us that, "it is quite easy for a one-party government to emerge when there are ethnic blocs and a large public sector relative to the private sector."

Small comfort, but a comfort nevertheless.

For additional comfort we might look to Jennifer Rubin writing at Commentary who looks at a Gallup poll and infers that "Independents Seem to Like the “No” Crowd":

"It might be that independent voters think back fondly on the days of divided government, when gridlock protected them from political extremism and the passage of every bad idea that popped onto the majority party’s agenda. It may be that all that spending and debt really has rubbed them the wrong way. Or maybe all that “We won, lock out the Republicans” stuff isn’t what they had in mind."

Flap at FolloseusFlaps Dental Blog looks at a more recent Gallup poll and comes to a similar conclusion in his post "Political Party Affiliation Now Tied – 11 Point Swing Towards GOP":

"Quite an interesting trend if this poll is not an outlier. Interestingly, the same thing happened after Bill Clinton was elected President. In 1994, the first election after Clinton’s 1992 election, the GOP captured the House majority for the first time in over 40 years. Is the reason that American voters prefer divided government with no one party in complete control or has there been a Democrat, Obama overload?"

The Republicans likely are too deep in a hole to climb out in the mid-terms, but if they can narrow the gap it will bring us closer to a divided government in 2012. However, it would be very helpful for the GOP to follow the first rule of holes - stop digging.

Here comes the Judge

Divided government occurs when one party does not exercise control of both the executive and legislative branches. As observed by Professor Levinson, constitutional separation of powers break down when "lemming-like" majority Congressional Democrats abrogate their constitutional oversight responsibility over a Democratic President, as is happening now, just as when "lemming-like" majority Congressional Republicans abrogated their oversight responsibilities under President Bush. Without divided government, only the Judicial branch offers any hope of imposing constitutional constraints on the the power of the presidency.

After eight years of Bush judicial nominations, the silver lining under the dark cloud of our current single party government was the prospect of balancing appointments to the judiciary in general and the Supreme Court in particular. As I've said before, my fervent hope is that Obama will appoint judges who will declare many of his administration's actions on civil liberties unconstitutional - particularly in the area of habeus corpus, search and seizure, surveillance, and detentions without trial. To that end, based on what I have seen thus far in the MSM, DWSUWF supports the Sonia Sotomayor nomination to the Supreme Court.

The nomination has prompted some disparate divided government musing across the sphere.

According to David Stras writing in SCOTUS Blog, absent moderating influences like divided government, Obama has a virtually free hand in this selection. Such are "The politics of the Sotomayor nomination":

"As I have outlined in my essay in the Northwestern University Law Review, the traditional indicators of political constraint in this process–such as the presence of divided government, a short time until the end of a President’s Term, the preferences of the median and filibuster pivots of the Senate, the approval ratings of the President, and the criticality of a particular nomination to the composition of a court–all pointed in favor of a relatively unconstrained choice for President Obama... it is extraordinarily likely that Judge Sotomayor will be confirmed in time for the first Monday in October."

The man that Judge Sotomayor is likely to replace on the court, Justice David Souter, had some cautionary comments worth considering in a recent speech. I found his comments particularly resonant when considering the young Obamites delighted with the unconstrained power being wielded so freely by their favorite "constitutional dictator". As reported by the Washington Times:

"Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter on Wednesday warned that America's civic core is floundering in an address to the nation's judicial leaders, including two women considered potential successors for the retiring justice. Mr. Souter said the nation's troubles in educating citizens about the importance of democratic principles and the philosophy of divided government are a threat to democracy. "It is being lost," he said Wednesday afternoon at Georgetown Law School. "It is lost if it is not understood."

Finally, frequent carnival contributor, humorist and limericist Madeleine Begun Kane also weighs in on the nomination with "Karl's Roving Standards" posted at Mad Kane's Political Madness, saying, "While this doesn't use the phrase "divided government" it's very much about its effect on U.S. Supreme Court nominations." Hmmm.... Ok Mad... Lets see:

Karl’s Roving Standards
By Madeleine Begun

Kane Rove’s memory’s certainly short.
Back when dealing with names for the Court,
He said Dems must not nix
Any Bush judgeship picks
Based on views that they failed to support.

But now that the tables are turned,
He says Dem nominees must be spurned
If Republicans think
That their politics stink.
Consistency? Karl? Unconcerned!

Madeleine is a wonderful political humorist and I love her work, even when I disagree with her politics. However, whenever a partisan accuses another partisan of hypocrisy, as the talented Ms. Kane does here, the riposte is always absurdly easy to craft - just flip-flop the argument or in this case - the verse:

Citizen Kane's Court
by mw

Kane’s memory is equally short.
Back when dealing with names for the Court,
She demanded Dems nix
Any Bush judgeship picks
Based on views that she failed to support.

But now that the tables are turned,
She feels no nominee should be spurned
as long as Madeleine is feeling
their politics are appealing.
Consistency? Mads? Unconcerned!

Finally, Bobo at The Bobo Files had some nice things to say about our efforts here and some thoughtful comments on the problems with our two party system in his post "Not all great minds should think alike.":

"I’ve been following Divided We Stand, United We Fall for quite some time now - he contributes to The BoBo Carnival of Politics frequently. The premise of his blog is that we should keep the Federal government divided. We should in no way ever allow a supermajority in the government as it will cause this great nation to fall, and fail. No time like now has this ever been proven to be more correct... If you are either a Republican or a Democrat and you have found that your party no longer represents your values - the best solution now is to become an independent... The solution is to shed the parties and vote as an Independent or find one of the “third-parties” out their that is actually closer to your own values. The Democrats and the Republicans are both taking America down the same path of destruction and none of them have a backbone any longer. The two-party system is corrupt... It’s time for we regular everyday Joe Schmoe Americans to rise up and let D.C., local, and state politicians know that we want our country back. If our votes don’t matter to them any longer they will no longer have our financial support either. We will show them with our votes at the ballot box and we’ll reject everything they stand for. We need to make them fear us."

Agreed. An interesting element here, is that in our partisan polarized political environment it will only take a relatively small percentage of true independents voting consciously and consistently for divided government to make a big difference. Something for disillusioned Republicans and Democrats alike to consider.

Miscellany

Traditionally, we conclude this Carnival by including one "off-topic" submission, as a grudging acknowledgment and proxy for the many off-topic submissions received. Off-topic in this context meaning - no mentions of "divided government" or gridlock. For this issue we offer Allison Bricker reading the MIAC report and asking "Does Supporting the Constitution Make Me a Terrorist?" posted at The Smoking Argus, saying:

"During the course of the previous administration, both officials and their old-media shills demonized individuals who dared speak out against the Bush Doctrine as unPatriotic, unAmerican, and/or traitors. Now we are told by socialist scribes⁶ that dissenting against the “economic terrorism” id est the central bank manipulated credit crisis, is also unpatriotic. If we are no longer allowed to question or criticize the government’s domestic or foreign policies without being painted as homegrown radicals, is there any semblance left at all of our republic? Should I instead just pledge blind allegiance to President Obama and be content with my “right” to criticize a group of B-list celebrities or no talent wannabee singers on “Dancing with the Stars” or “American Idol” respectively?"

Not going to happen. Not for Allison. Not for me.

And with that we conclude this edition. Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for all of the submissions (on-topic or not).

As previously announced - since this carnival is focused on the topic of Divided Government, and seeing how voters spectacularly rejected the idea in the last election, and with no real prospect of restoring divided government before 2012, we have put this carnival on a reduced publication schedule over the next year. Instead of monthly, we'll go quarterly or - you know - whenever I feel like it.

Look for the next edition of The Carnival of Divided Government XXXIII - Special "Be Late for Something Day" Edition on September 5th. Which I anticipate being late and actually publishing on Labor Day - September 7. As we head in to the end of year, and in anticipation of the 2010 mid-terms, I expect to restore the monthly CODGOV publication schedule. In the meantime, submit your blog article at carnival of divided government using our carnival submission form.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: divided government, CODGOV, blog carnival, Sonia Sotomayor, libertarian, economics, Barack Obama

Friday Flotsam - The "Please listen to what Obama says and pay no attention to what he does" edition.

Wherein we take a stroll down the metaphorical beach of the DWSUWF blog and note the detritus that has washed ashore and cluttered our little island of rationality in the great big blogospheric ocean. The beach is particularly messy now as we have neglected it for a few months. Your loyal blogger was distracted, spending time touring foreign lands and working on other projects.

While not a comprehensive cleanup, permit me to point out a few of the shiny items washed up on the beach.

ITEM - You should still buy a Ford
Last December, DWSUWF outlined why Ford was the only Detroit based automobile manufacturer that should be considered by Americans buying an American manufactured car. Since then, Ford has continued to reject government bailout money, managed to show some financial improvement, has rasied money from the private sector to improve their balance sheet, and their stock has more the tripled. This is a well managed American car company, surviving in tough times without government handouts. They deserve our support. Particularly since Ford will need to compete against the walking dead automotive monsters reanimated in the grotesque, experimental economic laboratory of Dr. Frankenobama.

Yes, back at the lab, GM and Chrysler continue to be fed intravenously at the Obama intensive care unit. They will continue to live for exactly as long as they stay on taxpayer life support and not one minute after (if?) the plug gets pulled. To the surprise of no one, it is now certain that the taxpayer "loans" to GM and Chrysler (as they were characterized by the President) will never be repaid.

The now familiar Obama administration communication philosophy of "Say anything they want to hear, but do whatever we want" is on full display. Obama actually said the government does not want to run the car companies, but the Obama administration and their proxy, the automotive task force, are hiring and firing CEO's, negotiating the bankruptcy terms with lenders, forcing mergers with a foreign buyer, deciding whether, when, and how to restructure GM and Chrysler, setting advertising policy, and deciding which dealers will remain open. Not surprisingly, Obama even wants to tell them what kind of cars to build, among other things.

But it is a relief to know that they don't want to run the car companies.

ITEM - Guantanamo in da moonlight.
I'll be heading to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan next week for an annual fishing holiday at our family camp. An ex-governor recently suggested that the U.P. would be a good home for any remaining detainees when Guantanamo is finally closed. Michigan headline writers are having a field day with this idea. [NOTE: It occurs to me that in order to appreciate this headline, one must be familiar with the straight-to-video, widely ignored Jeff Daniels cult comedy classic "Escanaba in da moonlight"]

Guantanamo in da moonlight?

Detroit Free Press
"How about Michigan, for a change, solving a problem for the U.S. government, instead of the other way around?That's one way to look at an idea floated recently by former Gov. John Engler to offer the Upper Peninsula, already home to a dozen state prisons, as a place to move the 200 or so enemy combatants and terror suspects now housed in a camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. President Barack Obama intends to close Guantanamo, just as soon as the administration figures out what to do with the prisoners there, a knotty problem considering they may include some of the most dangerous people on the planet..."

Move Gitmo to da UP, eh
By Ed Brayton
"Former Michigan Gov. John Engler has an interesting idea to bring some revenue into Michigan: Turn the UP into Guantanamo Bay North... Not an idea that Michigan political leaders are likely to get behind."

Al Qaeda, eh?
"Former Michigan Governor John Engler suggested last week that the more than 200 prisoners currently housed at the soon-to-be-closed Guantánamo Bay, Cuba prison be relocated to to the Upper Peninsula. We certainly could use the money and people actually moving into Michigan to live would be big news.

Which would be fine until winter arrived, when a UP prison would run afoul of the Obama Administration's prohibition against torture"

Hey - If it moves some money and jobs to the UP... why not, eh?

ITEM - Obama is committed to fiscal restraint - BWAHAHAHA.
Honest to God - I mean how f***ing stupid does the administration think the American people are? Obama actually had the unmitigated gall to call a press conference and say this with a straight face:

"We can no longer afford to spend as if deficits do not matter and waste is not our problem," he said in his formal remarks. "We can no longer afford to leave the hard choices for the next budget, the next administration or the next generation."

WTF? This is the same guy that only weeks before proposed a $3.7 triillion dollar budget, quadrupling the deficit, and forced through a monstrous "emergency" trillion dollar "stimulus spending plan" that does not actually - you know - stimulate.

Even the liberal San Francisco Chronicle didn't buy it:

"To date, the president's rhetoric exceeds his results. He has long said he would require his team to scrub the budget "line by line" for savings. Thursday's release is the product of that review, though an administration official was careful to call it "only a step in the process" of dealing with the deficit problem.. In reality, in the short term, deficits do not matter much to the administration. His aides would say that's justifiable given the scale of the economic recession that greeted them in January. They have decided to spend freely to jump-start the economy and to reduce the resulting deficits later. An attack on government waste, as necessary as that may be, cannot solve the problems he is helping to create."

Did you get that? "The president's rhetoric exceeds his results." That's like reporting "The Titanic received a complete and thorough cleaning in the North Atlantic". I just don't know what to say.

Maybe you can fool most of the people all of the time.

This video from Stop Spending Our Future presents the reality of our current situation with a great deal more clarity than our president would like you to understand. Keep away from open windows and hide sharp objects before viewing:



We are doomed.

ITEM: Happy belated birthday to me!
While we were away, the third anniversary of the DWSUWF blog passed without fanfare. DWSUWF was born on April 23, 2006 in the service of promoting a voting heuristic of divided government in order to secure better governance and more fiscal responsibility out of our leaders in Washington.

Our first anniversary was noted here as we celebrated the reestablishment of divided government in 2007, which began paying dividends immediately. In our second anniversary [linked here] we were looking forward - hoping against hope that the benefits of divided government could be maintained across the November election. Alas, our third anniversary was ignored, as I was instead golfing in a faraway land, and enjoying exotic food and drink. While I played, our country continued its headlong plunge into mind-numbing, ruinous levels of debt that can never be serviced, never be repayed, and with terrifying consequences we have yet to experience. The deadly effects of single party rule has once again taken its toll.

We are not really getting older, we are just getting more cynical, more pessimistic and borderline catatonic in the face of this economic horror.

"Eat drink and be merry my friends, for tomorrow we die".

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: libertarian , Barack Obama, Bailout nation, Insanity, Stimulus, Democratic, Ford, Divided Government.

The Arrogance of "Hope"

Image ripped from Barbeefish

Much has been written about what to expect from the Obama administration. Past presidents are often invoked as models for comparison. Will Obama be like FDR - leading the country out of the depression? Or is the big spending, big government, big deficit liberal icon LBJ a more apropos comparison? Or should we simply accept the comparison to the vision, vigor and youth of JFK as Obama has consciously and carefully cultivated throughout his campaign and early presidency?

DWSUWF has also indulged in this game, comparing candidate Obama to the ivory tower academic Jimmy Carter and also noting President Obama's embrace and defense of the Bush/Cheney expansive redefinition of unitary executive. Perhaps all of these comparisons are wrong, and the comparison that is most apt, is a comparison to Richard Nixon, as exemplified by the money quote in the Frost/Nixon interview -"When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal."

That seems to be the conclusion of Tom Laruia in this disturbing CNBC Maria Bartiroma interview aired yesterday. Lauria is a White & Case Financial Restructuring Attorney who represented the first lien Chrysler bond holders in the bankruptcy proceedings. He outlines how this administration abused their power to strong arm legitimate creditors into giving up their legal contract rights in order to hand a sweetheart deal to the Obama union contributors and constituents:

[CNBC Video No Longer Available]

Now Tom Lauria is not a dispassionate observer. He is an advocate and has an axe to grind. But what he says in this interview rings true, and is completely consistent with other reports of what this administration is really all about. The money quote:

"We all have the sense that what is on the table here is all about America and saving the concept of free enterprise in this country. Things that are baked into the Constitution, the founding fathers put the right of contract in the Constitution and there is a reason for that... You know what's interesting? The company (Chrysler) had no involvement in that negotiation whatsoever, which is another kind of shocking thing. We should ask ourselves under what Federal law is the US Government running Chrysler? TARP does not provide for the US government to run an auto company. We have not been able to find any other statuatory scheme. So if there is no legal authorization, is this kind of a separation of powers issue under the Constitution where the executive, a la President Nixon, is now doing what he thinks he should do, what he thinks is right, but is nevertheless not permitted under the law." - Tom Lauria

Obama is like Nixon? Lets see, abusing executive power in the service of political goals was the defining characteristic of the Nixon administration. Yup. Sounds about right for our current administration.

The defining characteristics of the Obama administration are just now coming into clear focus. This is what it looks like to DWSUWF:

1. Ruthlessly wield executive power to push political objectives - The willingness - no - eagerness of the Obama administration to aggressively use the power of the presidency to meet political goals regardless of whether there is any legal basis for that exercise of power is right there in plain sight for any who care to see. The strongarmed Chrysler bondholders are the most recent example.
2. What Obama says is wildly at variance with what he does - The gulf between what this President says and what this president actually does grows wider with every passing day. The more the MSM lets him get away with it, the bigger the gulf seems to get. Talk government transparency - do the opposite. Talk fiscal responsibility - spend recklessly. Talk gay rights, do nothing. Talk protection of civil liberties, defend the Bush/Cheney unitary executive. If he keeps this up, his credibility gap will look like the Grand Canyon.
3. Script the talking points, enforce message discipline, reward loyalty - The message discipline and efficiency of the Obama/Axelrod White House makes the Bush/Rove politburo look like rank amateurs. Even more astonishing - The ability for the Obama hard core faithful to put on the blinders, drink the kool-aid, and parrot whatever talking points are being pushed out of the oval office. DWSUWF has seen nothing like it - well - except for the hardcore faithful on the right during the GWB administration. The mindset is absolutely identical. Obama/Axelrod are just better than Bush/Rove at leading the acolytes around by the nose.
4. Drive an arrogant ideological agenda - The core conceit of this administration is the radical ideological view that a few really smart academics can manage the economy. Regardless of the lip service paid to the principles of free enterprise (see point number 2) this administration's core belief in central planning is clear. The administration intends to manage everything from executive pay to credit card interest rates and, as noted above, they have no problem ripping up contract law to steamroll bondholders and stamp their ideological vision on a bailed out and restructured automobile industry. This kind of central economic planning and top down industrial policy has never worked. But - since these guys are smarter than everyone else, no worries. I'm sure it'll all turn out fine this time.

Bringing this back to Chrysler and the auto industry - I'll wrap this up with the same conclusion I reached in an earlier post. Although I am a satisfied owner of a Jeep Grand Cherokee bought new 10 years ago - you could not give me a Chrysler or Fiat product today. I'll never own a Chrysler product again. The truly dangerous and flat out wrong behavior on the part of this administration should not be supported, and I won't support it with my discretionary dollars. Boycott Chrysler. If the same thing happens to GM, boycott GM.

In any case, it looks like we'll have some rich fodder for future posts as we slowly ramp this blog back up after our little hiatus.

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Carnival of Divided Government - ûnus et trîcênsimus - Special St. Patrick's Day Edition

UPDATED: 03-21
Welcome to the 31st edition of the Carnival of Divided Government - The ûnus et trîcênsimus - Special St. Patrick's Day Edition. DWSUWF passionately supports all drinking holidays and in particular St. Patrick's Day. As motivation to get this Carnival completed ASAP, DWSUWF will forgo his first Guinness until such time that this Carnival is posted.

Alright. Lets crank this baby out. I'm thirsty.

Saint Patrick - The Patron Saint of Drunks.

I am not Catholic, or even Christian. I grew up in a mixed Jewish/Presbyterian household, ultimately identifying more strongly with the Jewish tradition. But I do like to drink and find myself drawn to this holiday. Perhaps it can be explained by the fact that there is Irish blood in my lineage. Growing up, my grandmother used to tell me we were Orangemen and insisted we wear orange not green on St. Patrick's day. Never really understood what she was talking about, but this 1880 New York Times article helped clear it up:

Those were the days when partisan polarization actually meant something. I don't know what my grandmother was thinking. I guess she expected me to take on the entire green-attired grade school and instigate a brawl on the playground during recess. Thanks Grandma.

But here at DWSUWF we are more concerned with the implications of Red vs. Blue government than Orange vs. Green religious squabbles. As explained in earlier editions, we have adopted Latin ordinal numeration to impart a patina of gravitas reflecting the historical importance of the series. In this the Carnival of Divided Government ûnus et trîcênsimus (XXXI), as in all of the CODGOV series, we select volunteers and draftees from the blogosphere and main stream media writing on the single topic of government divided between the Red and Blue parties (leaving it to the reader to sort out volunteers from draftees). Consistent with this topic, the primary criteria for acceptance in the carnival is to explicitly use the words and/or concept of "divided government" in submitted posts. A criteria that, to our endless befuddlement, is ignored by many of the bloggers submitting posts, which sadly results in DWSUWF reluctantly ignoring their fine submissions.

Today, two months into a great big blue legislative tsunami, we are beginning to see yet again the consequences of granting unfettered power to a single party. Awash in a sea of new spending programs, our children Grandchildren will soon be drowning in oceans of debt. DWSUWF can only offer a this selection of red, blue, and purple divided government posts as a life preserver to cling to during the spending flood. Just hold on and dream of that first Guinness of the night.

Carnival

In honor of the day, we will begin with a blog and a book from the Old Country. Last summer, Darnoc - a UF student left these shores for Dublin University, kicked off a blog entitled True Divided Government, wrote five posts, and has not been heard of in the blogosphere since. How often do you get the opportunity to read the contents of an entire blog in one sitting? I was intrigued by the title, found some nice pictures, but not much political content. As he is an Obama supporter, I can only assume that, like Obama and most Progressives, he defines bipartisanship as compromises between the left and the far left while disparaging the right and offering sonly eyewash and soothing words to the independent centrists. Presumably Darnoc is in Ireland to study under the tutelage of Robert Elgie, the Paddy Moriarty Professor of Government and International Studies at Dublin City University and Editor of Divided Government in Comparative Perspective:

"Divided government occurs when the executive fails to enjoy majority support in at least one working house of the legislature. To date, the study of divided government has focused almost exclusively on the United States. However, divided government occurs much more widely. It occurs in other presidential systems. Moreover, it is also the equivalent of minority government in parliamentary regimes and cohabitation in French-style semi-presidential systems. This book examines the frequency, causes and management of divided government in comparative context, identifying the similarities and differences between the various experiences of this increasingly frequent form of government. The countries studied include Denmark, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Norway, Poland, and the US. "

Sound interesting. I'll read it as soon as the price drops by about 90% or so. $160 for a 256 page book? Really Robert? Really?

Lets bring this international Divided Government excursion back home by way of SJS and Team blogging at The Mighty Pen. This is an eclectic, oddly interesting anonymous political blog that claims to be a team of international writers, but is singularly focused on helping the rural poor of Malaysia. SJS had a very different take on Rush Limbaugh's recent infamous comments about supporting Presidents, divided government:

"The issue of separation of Powers does not seem to be confined to Perak these days. The following excerpt is from a transcript of a monologue from prominent American radio personality - Rush Limbaugh - who examines the concept of the Separation of Powers from a historical and current perspective for the United States (which could be also applicable for Malaysia..."

SJS reminds us, that unrestrained political power is a primary concern for most of world, and they do not think sacrificing checks, balances, and opposition to power on the alter of "getting things done" is a particularly good idea. The specific Rush Limbaugh quote that SJS references and finds relevant to Malaysia:

"The whole theory of the separation of powers, meaning legislative branch, judicial branch, executive branch, was ingeniously based on human nature. Our Founding Fathers had studied history, and they knew that absolute power corrupts absolutely. So we divide power. We divide power between the states and the federal government. We divide power within the federal government. And we further divide power among three separate branches of government. We give each branch a different set of powers and incentives to protect their own prerogatives so they can keep an eye on each other. These are called checks and balances. The underlying assumption of this whole system is that the country functions better if everyone is of a skeptical bent of mind. That’s what keeps the next guy honest. The whole reason that we have divided government instead of a king is that the issue is not about one government official succeeding. This country was not founded on the principle that the president is a king and above all the king must succeed. In fact, the system is designed to ensure that the president fails when he is wrong. That’s the whole purpose of checks and balances."

There are few things I find as distasteful as quoting or defending the statements of a hypocritical partisan windbag like Rush Limbaugh, except maybe quoting or defending the statement of his hypocritical partisan wind bag doppelganger on the left - Michael Moore. Impossible to say which would be more likely to drive me to rip out my eyes and ears and run screaming into the night. That said, Limbaugh's statement, divorced from the man who said it, stands on it's own and is perfectly correct and absolutely true. James Madison was a bit more eloquent making the exact same argument when he wrote this in the Federalist Paper #51:

"Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself."

I can't let Rush off the hook though. Regarding that hypocrisy bit, I recall that Rush Limbaugh responded on his radio show to a caller asking about divided government on the eve of the 2006 mid-term Congressional elections thusly:

"The media has put that notion out there, and they've done it for a number years. They tried it in 2002 and 2004 in the sense it would be good. "We have one-party rule. Why, that leads to corruption and leads to people becoming out of touch in Washington." They love one-party rule when it's them. The only reason they're against one-party rule is because they're not the party, and so they're trying to say it leads to all kinds of bad things. But that means they don't trust the democratic process. The democratic process delivers what it delivers, and if it delivers a Republican dominated House and Senate and a Republican president, then that's representative democracy at work. That is what you get in a representative republic, and to sit there and complain about it is to complain about the system itself."

At the time I called this an example of the "intellectual bankruptcy of the right". Nothing has happened since to change my mind about that characterization. However, that does not obviate the fact that we may still need the "intellectually bankrupt right" if only to counteract the "intellectually banrkrupt left", who incidentally currently hold all the power. I call this phenomena the DWSUWF Corrolary to Madison's Maxim:

"Assholes must be made to counteract assholes."

Ron Chisud of Liberal Values also had some thoughts about Rush Limbaugh, and responds to a commenter responding to his thoughts by explaining "Why I Blog About the Direction Conservatives Are Going":

"I have written of the dangers of one party, regardless of which party, having total control, and expressed a preference that the Democrats remain shy of sixty Senate votes. Ideally I would prefer that we do not even have one party control both houses of Congress as well as the White House. There is a problem with a preference for divided government when one party has ceased to be able to respond meaningfully to current problems. There is a reason why independents have been moving towards the Democratic Party in recent years. Rush Limbaugh is a showman. He has no coherent political views beyond a set of simplistic talking points. People like Limbaugh, Coulter, and Hannity appeal to the worst parts of human nature and ignorance and do attract an audience. This does not mean that their views should become the guiding principles of a political party. Hoping to see the restoration of a viable two party system, I am interested when some conservatives support rejecting the anti-intellectual, authoritarian, no-nothing mindset which has taken control of the conservative movement."

I am in general agreement with Ron's post and thesis, but ... methinks he doth protest too much about the insufficiently intellectual nature of GOP opposition. In our system of government, it is important that a minority opposition party actually oppose the party in power. It is less important whether the opposition comes up to snuff on Ron's criteria of being a sufficiently intellectual opponent. If the Democrats had done their job as a minority opposition party in 2002, perhaps we would not be saddled with the crushing human and financial burden of the Iraq war. If the Republicans do their job as a minority opposition party in 2009, perhaps future generations will be able to avoid being saddled with the crushing debt and government entitlements being promoted and expanded by Obama and the Democrats.

If Ron Chisud can respond to commenters in a post, I guess I can too. Liz had some nice things to say about DWSUWF in comments to a recent post, but she took exception to our last:

"While I definitely agree that president Obama should not overstep his bounds as president, there is something to be said about a strongly democratic president and congress. Perhaps there will be less bickering, and more positive action (health care reform, ending of “torture”, etc…)! While no branch should be given the opportunity to rule completely without anyone to check them, the people did vote for a democratic congress majority and president. I don’t think it is fair to equate the idiocy of the bush administration to the progressive Obama administration. Let’s give the democrats a chance and perhaps we will have something to HOPE™ for!"

Here is the problem Liz - This is not about whether Obama takes advantage of and abuses the near monarchical powers claimed by the Bush/Cheney administration. He said during the campaign he would move to help restore the balance with Congress and the Judiciary. He isn't. He is doing the exact opposite by actively defending, continuing, and extending the power of the Bush/Cheney definition of the unitary executive. Even if you believe that Obama is a kind and good benevolent king, he won't be king forever. I hope you are as sanguine about the expanded power of the presidency when a Romney, or Palin, or - God forbid - if circumstances dictate that Biden has to take the reigns.

People were not voting for Single Party Progressive Democratic Ruleso much as they were voting against what Liz calls the "idiocy of the Bush administration".

Unfortunately, but predictably - Obama and Progressives now operate as if they have a mandate for radical progressive change, while the Independents and Centrists that voted for Obama are getting buyer's remorse. Too late. The left has the votes, the right is emasculated, and there is no telling how much damage will be done over the next four years to the budget, our economic liberties and our already broken economy. The least Obama could do is use his extraordinary executive power to restore the civil liberties lost under the Bush administration, but even that is not happening.

The way to achieve centrist government is not by electing politicians who will whisper sweet centrist nothings in your ear. The way to achieve centrist government is to never ever ever give either party all the power.

In a related post, Steven Germain asks a relevant question about how all this spending is going to be managed and postulates the probable answer in "There Is No Such Thing As Raw, Analloyed, Agendaless Kindness" - David Foster Wallace posted at Rough Fractals. Jim DeSantis has another answer in his post "You Are A Banker And A U.S. Automaker" posted at On Line Tribune | Front Page Blog, saying,

"What are we to do? We can do nothing except remember, at the next election, just who voted to put us and our heredity into hock and who voted against it. "

In other words, some of us will be voting for those who just said "No". Contrary to what President Obama asserted in his speech defending the budget today, "Just say no" is the exact right thing to say to this insane spending.

Break

I can't wait. I'm going out for that Guinness right now.

[TIME PASSES]

Carnival (continued)

Now I've done it. I am not sure that I will get this special St. Patrick's Day post actually posted on St. Patrick's Day. Let's just soldier on and see what happens.

Eric Michael Johnson takes issues with Yuval Levin's Newsweek article "Partisanship is Good" presents The Nature of Partisan Politics-Part I and The Nature of Partisan Politics-Part II posted at The Primate Diaries. His conclusion that Yuval is being hypocritical is not without merit:

"The day after the 2008 election, on November 5, when it was disclosed that Rahm Emmanuel would be the top pick for President Obama's Chief of Staff, Levin lambasted his choice as someone who was "a vicious graceless partisan: narrow, hectic, unremittingly aggressive, vulgar, and impatient." This, for Levin, was a bad sign and he criticized the new President because it "suggests both that he wants to be ruthless and partisan and that he does not have a clear sense of how the White House works." Perhaps his essay should have been titled "Partisanship is Good (But Only If My Side Wins)". With such a statement it would seem that Levin’s view of human nature has no concept of hypocrisy. Such outright duplicity not only illuminates his approach as an advocate of Ethics and Public Policy, it is the very nature of partisan politics that we should all seek to avoid."

I would encourage you to read both of Eric's posts in totality, but I would distill his argument to this - "Conservatives are bad and wrong. Liberals are good and right. Therefore Conservative partisan opposition to Liberal proposals are bad and wrong. QED. " Perhaps Eric Johnson's essay should have been titled "Partisanship is Bad (But Only If My Side Loses)." DWSUWF has opined before on this topic, most notably in this historical meditation and the post Polarized Partisan Politics Promotes Popular Participation.

Hendrik Hertzberg of the New Yorker takes a second look at the election returns in "Election Returns Redux" and concludes (among other things) that...

"Americans do not prefer divided government. They are not Broderists. Americans who are Democrats prefer Democratic rule; Americans who are Republicans prefer Republican rule."

Problem being, there is a glaring logical flaw in this statement. In order to conclude that Americans do not prefer divided government as Hendrik does here, one must conclude that all Americans are either partisan Democrats or partisan Republicans. Actual poll data does not support this premise. Depending on how you want to slice and dice the data, the general conclusion is that about 1/3 of the electorate identify Democrat, 1/3 identify Republican, and 1/3 identify as some version of Independent, Non-Affiliated, Libertarianish (Fiscal Conservative / Social Liberal), or Centrist. This center may register Democrat or Republican but will shift their vote from election to election, which means you cannot identify the electoral preference by looking at one election tally as Hendrik does here.

The simple fact is that voters who are philosophically aligned with fiscal conservatism, liberal social tolerance, live and let live diversity and limited government do not have much of a choice between big spending, big deficit, big government Republicans and bigger spending, bigger deficit, bigger government Democrats. They very well may decide that the real choice is between the unrestrained growth of government size and power under single party rule, or the relatively constrained growth that is only found under divided government.

I can't take this anymore. It is almost midnight. I am going to post this thing now, warts and all, just so I can say I got it posted on St. Patrick's Day, even if it is only St Patrick's Day somewhere the Hawaiian time zone.

I'll clean up the typos and graphics tomorrow, and there are a few more posts I'd like to add. Why don't we just call this the St. Patty's Season, and I'll just keep drinking Guinness and polishing this turd until I feel like moving on to another post.

Miscellany

Traditionally, we conclude this Carnival by including one "off-topic" submission, as a grudging acknowledgment and proxy for the many off-topic submissions received. Off-topic in this context meaning - no mentions of "divided government" or gridlock. For this issue we offer Angry Max presenting The Quests for Truth and Blood posted at Pterodactyl Puke, saying, "Concerning who, in both parties, is responsible for the economic meltdown, and what to do with them." The post could be considered thematically on topic, but that is not why I am including it. I am including it because it is funny, informative, deadly accurate, and borderline genius. Read it and enjoy it.

And on that happy note we conclude this edition. Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for all of the submissions (on-topic or not).

As previously announced - Since this carnival is focused on the topic of Divided Government, and seeing how voters spectacularly rejected the idea in the last election, and with no real prospect of restoring divided government before 2012, we have put this carnival on a reduced publication schedule over the next year. Instead of monthly, we'll go quarterly or - you know - whenever I feel like it.

Look for the next edition of The Carnival of Divided GovernmentXXXII - Special Memorial Day Edition sometime around - oh.. lets say May 25. Submit your blog article at carnival of divided government using our carnival submission form.

Carnivalingus

Some Carnivals and links of interest:

• Bobo presents "The Bobo Carnival of Politics" at The Bobo Files.
• Quisani presents the "Carnival of Conservatism" at The Quisani League.
• Stefanie presents "All Things Eco" at Focus Organic.
• U.S Common Sense presents Political Blog Weekly.
• Jonathon present the "Seventh Carnival of Modern Liberty" at Liberal England.
• Mark Raynar presents the "Carnival of Satire" at The Skwib.
  
• Danny Jack presents the "Carnival of Ohio Politics - St Patricks Edition" at Ohio Politics
  

UPDATED: 03-21-09
Added unacceptably delayed and unfairly overlooked carnivals and links.
Fixed even more typos (Where do they come from??)

Divided and Balanced.™
Now that is fair.

Technorati tags: divided government, CODGOV, blog carnival, rush Limbaugh, libertarian, partisan