This is focused on ideological gridlock & governance. You are less concerned because the current version of the GOP is more ideologically heterodox. That's one set of issues, but it mostly elides an orthogonal set of issues.
The founding fathers didn't foresee political parties or ideological polarization. They were worried about the rise of a non-ideological, power-hungry, authoritarian (King George) becomming a tyrant who undoes all of the hard-won good they had achieved. The constitution's system of checks and ballances was intended to serve as a bullwark in that case.
It barely held. Under 4 years of Trump, the Republican party progressively bent to Trump's will. It isn't at all clear to me that if there were fewer checks and balances, and Trump and the Republicans had greater control over everything, that we'd be better off now.
What happens if Donald Trump or Ron Desantis wins a leadership election to be Prime Minister and is swept into office with a huge Parliamentary majority, with potentially only a judicial check on acts that could be enacted?
First past the post parliaments can just steamroll legislation through without having to moderate if they have a large enough majority.
Well, Trump won both houses in 2016 (I love the number of Democrats who won't admit that Republicans won the raw majority of votes cast for the House that year. No gerrymandering involved!)
To a degree my answer is bicameralism (a Senate that's elected on a staggered cycle, different from the House/PM, so that they can't be overwhelmed by Latest Populist Fad). And, strong political parties with long-standing, staggered Steering Committees who appoint candidates, to keep demagogues out (i.e. not US-style open primaries where anyone can run). And most importantly, a strong American or German-style judiciary that can strike down unconstitutional laws, nominated on a nonpartisan basis as the Germans do (and we don't).
But ultimately, yeah that's a question of democracy. If the demagogues get enough votes, there's nothing you can really do about that
The issue is in a Parliamentary system, particularly a first past the post system, the demagogue would by definition wield all the power, because for him to come to power, his party has to have the majority/coalition in Parliament. As you point out, in a bicameral style system there are further choke points possible that serve as a check.
The boring answer is that Prime Ministers are not dictators, and have to deal with the society as it exists in their country. It's certainly true that if you have a solid enough majority, you will never or very rarely lose the final vote on a bill passing, but bills go through revisions, committee stages, have to appeal to the PM's cabinet, are subject to protest and criticism in the media, etc etc.
I can promise you, as a resident of a constitutional monarchy with a PM (the UK) it is not and never has been as simple as 'the PM wants it so it will become law exactly how he imagines'.
I think you might be underselling the degree to which a Trump figure exacerbates some aspects of your original doomerism essay. One striking line in that essay is where you point out that under the Constitution, a president could have his political opponents murdered in DC and then pardon the perpetrators. Trump did not come especially close to that particular bit of outrageousness, but his constant probing of how the pardon and firing powers (as well as other bits of intimidation like taking away Andrew McCabe's pension) could be used to encourage loyalty was in the same very large ballpark of actions that are allowed under the Constitution but destructive of actual public order and political functioning.
Excellent again. You make us think in new ways. It seems to me that for our Government we need to address what we say we believe and what we actually do. If each person’s vote actually counts the same, we need to revise the Electoral Count System and elect a President from the total vote count. The limits of Presidential Power should be clearly defined. On the smallest scale is the town. Our town is governed by a Town Council. Interested people can attend meetings and for big financial decisions we have large open town meetings with clearly defined pro-con views on each issue published & circulated ahead. No mayor. It works quite well for most people living here.
What appears to make things work is an acceptance of old time decorum. Strong feelings about tough issues are still expressed without personally injuring another person.
To me, this acceptance of norms of expression is integral to Democracy working. Countries with people who act in agreed upon ways have a reasonable chance to live together peacefully. Our USA is so very big and diverse it is more difficult to manage. Covid isolation increased individuals beliefs each’s personal desires and culture was most important. We have become the “Me Me” culture. If we have a chance to continue some form of Democracy, we might find ways to help each other find the good in our opposites’ ideas.
One thing that has always bothered me about our political system is that there exists no truly neutral party to arbitrate election-related disputes, whether constitutionality of gerrymandering or voting restrictions, or the actual counting of votes.
In theory, the courts are supposed to serve this function. In practice, the courts are run by judges appointed by politicians for the express purpose of getting rulings in favor of their side whenever there is contention. The baseball analogy would be allowing whichever team wins the world series to appoint umpire vacancies for the following season, so whoever happens to win in the year right before a bunch of umpires die or retire gets to have all of the borderline plays called in their favor for the next several decades.
That is exactly what's happening with today's politics, where the Trump presidency has left the Republican party firmly in control of the umpires. And, it's actually worse than just the truly borderline calls. Just like a good baseball picture, faced with a ball that is called a strike, will try to push the envelope, and throw the next pitch just a little bit further off the plate, to see what the biased umpire will let him get away with, good politicians will do the same thing. Which is exactly what Republican politicians are doing with respect to election administration. While allowing a gerrymandered legislature to simply appoint electors is a bit of a bridge too far today, that doesn't mean it will stay that way forever. If every GOP-controlled state did that, every presidential election would simply be over before it even begins.
Would love to hear more about Branko Milanovic's ideas in Capitalism, Alone in these conversations. It describes the Chinese system ("political capitalism") as an alternative to the Western system ("liberal capitalism") and sounds something closer to what the reactionary right might have in mind. The key difference isn't delineated so much in formal governance structures (parliamentary versus monarchy etc) but in who retains political power and how the resulting (normalized) corruption manifests itself.
In political capitalism, the ruling political party is insulated from rule of law and also institutionally and socially separated from capital. No revolving door between political power and the corporate world that is so familiar here; no place like Martha's Vineyard where the business and political elites mix and hang out. There is in fact an adversarial relationship between the two that necessitates occasional "displays of force" from the government against business people, companies, or whole sectors that are seen as wielding too much power or influence. Hence the cadence of capricious whack-a-mole smack downs like the ousting of Alibaba superstar Jack Ma or the harsh crackdown on the thriving Chinese video game industry, or the nationalization of this or that firm.
In liberal capitalism on the other hand there is rule of law, individual freedom, and democracy but the political power is overwhelmingly controlled by capital through what is essentially bribery in various guises (although sometimes becomes totally explicit, as when a billionaire CEO runs for office).
The Chinese system, political capitalism, doesn't suffer from a lot of the chronic governance issues found in the West--maybe you could say it's an "illiberalism that builds". It seems that it's this attribute that the reactionaries are after, the ability of a clique of technocrats to exercise power without hinderance. And they are apparently willing to abandon democracy in order to make it happen.
But in my view, a big contradiction in their vision for themselves is that the creation of an unaccountable ruling class will almost certainly--and very swiftly--separate capital from its hold on political power in order to consolidate its position, and ipso facto it is unlikely that the Thiel's of the world who bring this transition about would see their values or interests preserved for very long. Capital has always been tempted by the reactionary right as an alternative to collectivism, not understanding that by doing so they're riding the tiger.
I think we'll find out how obstructionist the GOP will be in the 2nd half of Biden's first term (I am hoping not his only term). If McConnell leads the GOP to allowing Biden to keep relatively sane picks: then I am less concerned. If, on the other hand, Biden needs to literally negotiate every level of his cabinet: then I'm quite concerned.
I think the odds of the US getting a parliamentary system is basically zero. However, I think it is possible we can reform the House of Representatives act more like a parliament by either radically reforming redistricting, or by moving to some form of proportional voting (either multiple member districts or straight proportional voting). I also think House members should be elected to more than a 2 year term, but that's likely beyond our capabilities.
The Senate is the Senate, there's lots of reforms I'd like, but I would settle for killing the filibuster.
>>The elected president could try to just run roughshod over FDA decision-making, but that’s considered inappropriate. . . . So the agencies just kind of sit there, occasionally meddled with and occasionally ignored, but never really governed in a coherent way.<<
On mundane, day to day issues, sure. And no one would want the President or Congress intervening on those. But on larger issues? I'm not so sure the President doesn't have power to change what agencies are doing if he/she thinks they're heading in the wrong direction. An obvious step is to replace the political appointees, which sends a very clear message. But the other is just to express Presidential concern and opposition. Most of the civil servants I've known show a default deference to the democratically-elected leader and great respect for the office of the presidency. (As long as it's not Trump, whose utter contempt for agencies sparked an equal reaction.) If the President uses that august power of political legitimacy to call them out, I think they tend to be inclined to take that criticism very seriously and reconsider their course of action.
Isn't there a distinction to be made between the executive branch (essentially the departments headed by cabinet secretaries) and independent agencies, which are a creation of Congress? Though the President has a bully pulpit and often the right to appoint the commissioners who head the independent agencies for set terms, and often with requirements for bi-partisan membership, he doesn't have the power to fire those he disagrees with.
"Obama ... represented a high water mark in terms of rigid ideologues"
Lolwut? Where in the heck did this come from, MattY? Obama ran as a liberal Democrat, and then got criticized *constantly* by the left wing of his party for not being liberal/lefty enough! (He bailed out Wall Street but not Main Street! He capitulated to the Republicans by watering down Obamacare! He continued Bush-era drone strikes!) Clearly, you mean something very, very different than I do by "rigid ideologue."
As for Donald Trump being non-ideological - well, duh. Trump was never about ideology; he was all about getting wealth and power for himself, damn the consequences. Might as well expect my neighbor's pet cat to have an ideology.
My main concern is that Republicans in charge of elections are getting replaced with people that are angry that legitimate results in favor of Democrats were upheld in 2020. In Michigan you saw many election officials that upheld Biden's win and rejected their crazy conspiracy theories get drummed out of office.
At least "no, I will not find you more votes" Raffensberger won his primary handily.
“The skein of local democracy turns out to mostly be a series of low-turnout, low-salience elections that mask an underlying reality of governance by opaque coalitions of insider stakeholders — contractors, cops, bureaucrats, and psychos who have the time to show up to community meetings.”
The low turnout, low salience part is true. But local governments - cities and counties - are radically impact by their elected leader(s), and new at-will appointed bureaucrats can and do make major changes in new administrations.
The stuff that is very hard to change - and there is a lot of it - would not be impacted by electing fewer officials, or some different model. It would be most impacted by the quality of the leader and the higher level appointees.
Some streamlining of the multiple bureaucracies described would probably make sense. But the toughest inertia and challenges can only really be impacted by strong and effective leaders, regardless of structure.
One reason I keep subscribing despite not liking Matt’s politics is that he is honest and seems to really love the USA.
Most left-leaning politicos have adopted the inane habit of referring to “our democracy” when they really mean the American Left. This seems to especially be true of establishment outlets’ staff writers who have to put out lazy pieces several times a week and never get much pushback from editors.
It’s refreshing that MY actually addresses democratic structures in a thoughtful way that meaningfully explores current events in an historical context. He’s right to question if our democracy is doomed because elected leaders rarely do any meaningful work. I was particularly interested in his analysis of the deep state and how it has persisted through lack of congressional review.
This is focused on ideological gridlock & governance. You are less concerned because the current version of the GOP is more ideologically heterodox. That's one set of issues, but it mostly elides an orthogonal set of issues.
The founding fathers didn't foresee political parties or ideological polarization. They were worried about the rise of a non-ideological, power-hungry, authoritarian (King George) becomming a tyrant who undoes all of the hard-won good they had achieved. The constitution's system of checks and ballances was intended to serve as a bullwark in that case.
It barely held. Under 4 years of Trump, the Republican party progressively bent to Trump's will. It isn't at all clear to me that if there were fewer checks and balances, and Trump and the Republicans had greater control over everything, that we'd be better off now.
I feel bad for whatever happened that made you feel compelled to write about neoreactionaries
Why do so many journalists and intellectuals slap “neo” on the front of every term? “Neo-reactionary political thought”?
Middle school social studies teacher here. Kids seem to love the Horrible History series in my classroom.
What happens if Donald Trump or Ron Desantis wins a leadership election to be Prime Minister and is swept into office with a huge Parliamentary majority, with potentially only a judicial check on acts that could be enacted?
First past the post parliaments can just steamroll legislation through without having to moderate if they have a large enough majority.
Well, Trump won both houses in 2016 (I love the number of Democrats who won't admit that Republicans won the raw majority of votes cast for the House that year. No gerrymandering involved!)
To a degree my answer is bicameralism (a Senate that's elected on a staggered cycle, different from the House/PM, so that they can't be overwhelmed by Latest Populist Fad). And, strong political parties with long-standing, staggered Steering Committees who appoint candidates, to keep demagogues out (i.e. not US-style open primaries where anyone can run). And most importantly, a strong American or German-style judiciary that can strike down unconstitutional laws, nominated on a nonpartisan basis as the Germans do (and we don't).
But ultimately, yeah that's a question of democracy. If the demagogues get enough votes, there's nothing you can really do about that
The issue is in a Parliamentary system, particularly a first past the post system, the demagogue would by definition wield all the power, because for him to come to power, his party has to have the majority/coalition in Parliament. As you point out, in a bicameral style system there are further choke points possible that serve as a check.
The boring answer is that Prime Ministers are not dictators, and have to deal with the society as it exists in their country. It's certainly true that if you have a solid enough majority, you will never or very rarely lose the final vote on a bill passing, but bills go through revisions, committee stages, have to appeal to the PM's cabinet, are subject to protest and criticism in the media, etc etc.
I can promise you, as a resident of a constitutional monarchy with a PM (the UK) it is not and never has been as simple as 'the PM wants it so it will become law exactly how he imagines'.
I think you might be underselling the degree to which a Trump figure exacerbates some aspects of your original doomerism essay. One striking line in that essay is where you point out that under the Constitution, a president could have his political opponents murdered in DC and then pardon the perpetrators. Trump did not come especially close to that particular bit of outrageousness, but his constant probing of how the pardon and firing powers (as well as other bits of intimidation like taking away Andrew McCabe's pension) could be used to encourage loyalty was in the same very large ballpark of actions that are allowed under the Constitution but destructive of actual public order and political functioning.
Excellent again. You make us think in new ways. It seems to me that for our Government we need to address what we say we believe and what we actually do. If each person’s vote actually counts the same, we need to revise the Electoral Count System and elect a President from the total vote count. The limits of Presidential Power should be clearly defined. On the smallest scale is the town. Our town is governed by a Town Council. Interested people can attend meetings and for big financial decisions we have large open town meetings with clearly defined pro-con views on each issue published & circulated ahead. No mayor. It works quite well for most people living here.
What appears to make things work is an acceptance of old time decorum. Strong feelings about tough issues are still expressed without personally injuring another person.
To me, this acceptance of norms of expression is integral to Democracy working. Countries with people who act in agreed upon ways have a reasonable chance to live together peacefully. Our USA is so very big and diverse it is more difficult to manage. Covid isolation increased individuals beliefs each’s personal desires and culture was most important. We have become the “Me Me” culture. If we have a chance to continue some form of Democracy, we might find ways to help each other find the good in our opposites’ ideas.
SallyJones
One thing that has always bothered me about our political system is that there exists no truly neutral party to arbitrate election-related disputes, whether constitutionality of gerrymandering or voting restrictions, or the actual counting of votes.
In theory, the courts are supposed to serve this function. In practice, the courts are run by judges appointed by politicians for the express purpose of getting rulings in favor of their side whenever there is contention. The baseball analogy would be allowing whichever team wins the world series to appoint umpire vacancies for the following season, so whoever happens to win in the year right before a bunch of umpires die or retire gets to have all of the borderline plays called in their favor for the next several decades.
That is exactly what's happening with today's politics, where the Trump presidency has left the Republican party firmly in control of the umpires. And, it's actually worse than just the truly borderline calls. Just like a good baseball picture, faced with a ball that is called a strike, will try to push the envelope, and throw the next pitch just a little bit further off the plate, to see what the biased umpire will let him get away with, good politicians will do the same thing. Which is exactly what Republican politicians are doing with respect to election administration. While allowing a gerrymandered legislature to simply appoint electors is a bit of a bridge too far today, that doesn't mean it will stay that way forever. If every GOP-controlled state did that, every presidential election would simply be over before it even begins.
Would love to hear more about Branko Milanovic's ideas in Capitalism, Alone in these conversations. It describes the Chinese system ("political capitalism") as an alternative to the Western system ("liberal capitalism") and sounds something closer to what the reactionary right might have in mind. The key difference isn't delineated so much in formal governance structures (parliamentary versus monarchy etc) but in who retains political power and how the resulting (normalized) corruption manifests itself.
In political capitalism, the ruling political party is insulated from rule of law and also institutionally and socially separated from capital. No revolving door between political power and the corporate world that is so familiar here; no place like Martha's Vineyard where the business and political elites mix and hang out. There is in fact an adversarial relationship between the two that necessitates occasional "displays of force" from the government against business people, companies, or whole sectors that are seen as wielding too much power or influence. Hence the cadence of capricious whack-a-mole smack downs like the ousting of Alibaba superstar Jack Ma or the harsh crackdown on the thriving Chinese video game industry, or the nationalization of this or that firm.
In liberal capitalism on the other hand there is rule of law, individual freedom, and democracy but the political power is overwhelmingly controlled by capital through what is essentially bribery in various guises (although sometimes becomes totally explicit, as when a billionaire CEO runs for office).
The Chinese system, political capitalism, doesn't suffer from a lot of the chronic governance issues found in the West--maybe you could say it's an "illiberalism that builds". It seems that it's this attribute that the reactionaries are after, the ability of a clique of technocrats to exercise power without hinderance. And they are apparently willing to abandon democracy in order to make it happen.
But in my view, a big contradiction in their vision for themselves is that the creation of an unaccountable ruling class will almost certainly--and very swiftly--separate capital from its hold on political power in order to consolidate its position, and ipso facto it is unlikely that the Thiel's of the world who bring this transition about would see their values or interests preserved for very long. Capital has always been tempted by the reactionary right as an alternative to collectivism, not understanding that by doing so they're riding the tiger.
Desmond Shum's Red Roulette is an interesting (and chilling) first-hand description of how this works in China.
I think we'll find out how obstructionist the GOP will be in the 2nd half of Biden's first term (I am hoping not his only term). If McConnell leads the GOP to allowing Biden to keep relatively sane picks: then I am less concerned. If, on the other hand, Biden needs to literally negotiate every level of his cabinet: then I'm quite concerned.
I think the odds of the US getting a parliamentary system is basically zero. However, I think it is possible we can reform the House of Representatives act more like a parliament by either radically reforming redistricting, or by moving to some form of proportional voting (either multiple member districts or straight proportional voting). I also think House members should be elected to more than a 2 year term, but that's likely beyond our capabilities.
The Senate is the Senate, there's lots of reforms I'd like, but I would settle for killing the filibuster.
Just my 2 cents.
>>The elected president could try to just run roughshod over FDA decision-making, but that’s considered inappropriate. . . . So the agencies just kind of sit there, occasionally meddled with and occasionally ignored, but never really governed in a coherent way.<<
On mundane, day to day issues, sure. And no one would want the President or Congress intervening on those. But on larger issues? I'm not so sure the President doesn't have power to change what agencies are doing if he/she thinks they're heading in the wrong direction. An obvious step is to replace the political appointees, which sends a very clear message. But the other is just to express Presidential concern and opposition. Most of the civil servants I've known show a default deference to the democratically-elected leader and great respect for the office of the presidency. (As long as it's not Trump, whose utter contempt for agencies sparked an equal reaction.) If the President uses that august power of political legitimacy to call them out, I think they tend to be inclined to take that criticism very seriously and reconsider their course of action.
Isn't there a distinction to be made between the executive branch (essentially the departments headed by cabinet secretaries) and independent agencies, which are a creation of Congress? Though the President has a bully pulpit and often the right to appoint the commissioners who head the independent agencies for set terms, and often with requirements for bi-partisan membership, he doesn't have the power to fire those he disagrees with.
"Obama ... represented a high water mark in terms of rigid ideologues"
Lolwut? Where in the heck did this come from, MattY? Obama ran as a liberal Democrat, and then got criticized *constantly* by the left wing of his party for not being liberal/lefty enough! (He bailed out Wall Street but not Main Street! He capitulated to the Republicans by watering down Obamacare! He continued Bush-era drone strikes!) Clearly, you mean something very, very different than I do by "rigid ideologue."
As for Donald Trump being non-ideological - well, duh. Trump was never about ideology; he was all about getting wealth and power for himself, damn the consequences. Might as well expect my neighbor's pet cat to have an ideology.
You're not wrong about Obama, but compare him to other Democratic presidents and I see where Matt is coming from.
Please stop saying the Capitol riot was an insurrection. It's a laughable claim
Oh, I get it. If there's bear spray and blunt trauma, it's an insurrection. Didn't learn that part in history or law classes
My main concern is that Republicans in charge of elections are getting replaced with people that are angry that legitimate results in favor of Democrats were upheld in 2020. In Michigan you saw many election officials that upheld Biden's win and rejected their crazy conspiracy theories get drummed out of office.
At least "no, I will not find you more votes" Raffensberger won his primary handily.
About local government, this is not really true:
“The skein of local democracy turns out to mostly be a series of low-turnout, low-salience elections that mask an underlying reality of governance by opaque coalitions of insider stakeholders — contractors, cops, bureaucrats, and psychos who have the time to show up to community meetings.”
The low turnout, low salience part is true. But local governments - cities and counties - are radically impact by their elected leader(s), and new at-will appointed bureaucrats can and do make major changes in new administrations.
The stuff that is very hard to change - and there is a lot of it - would not be impacted by electing fewer officials, or some different model. It would be most impacted by the quality of the leader and the higher level appointees.
Some streamlining of the multiple bureaucracies described would probably make sense. But the toughest inertia and challenges can only really be impacted by strong and effective leaders, regardless of structure.
One reason I keep subscribing despite not liking Matt’s politics is that he is honest and seems to really love the USA.
Most left-leaning politicos have adopted the inane habit of referring to “our democracy” when they really mean the American Left. This seems to especially be true of establishment outlets’ staff writers who have to put out lazy pieces several times a week and never get much pushback from editors.
It’s refreshing that MY actually addresses democratic structures in a thoughtful way that meaningfully explores current events in an historical context. He’s right to question if our democracy is doomed because elected leaders rarely do any meaningful work. I was particularly interested in his analysis of the deep state and how it has persisted through lack of congressional review.