In a long but effectively argued piece about the challenges facing the nation and how our Congress has failed us, Lawrence Lessig writes:
What would the reform the Congress needs be? At its core, a change that restores institutional integrity. A change that rekindles a reason for America to believe in the central institution of its democracy by removing the dependency that now defines the Fundraising Congress. Two changes would make that removal complete. Achieving just one would have made Obama the most important president in a hundred years.
That one–and first–would be to enact an idea proposed by a Republican (Teddy Roosevelt) a century ago: citizen-funded elections. America won’t believe in Congress, and Congress won’t deliver on reform, whether from the right or the left, until Congress is no longer dependent upon conservative-with-a-small-c interests–meaning those in the hire of the status quo, keen to protect the status quo against change. So long as the norms support a system in which members sell out for the purpose of raising funds to get re-elected, citizens will continue to believe that money buys results in Congress. So long as citizens believe that, it will.
Watch the video to get the main point of his argument: Fix Congress First. The linked website is full of information about why and how Congress must be fixed. Until we citizen-funded election, and we amend the Constitution to ensure the Roberts Court won’t throw out those citizen-funded elections, we have little hope of a broken Congress ever getting the country back on track.
According to the report, Shelby is holding Obama’s nominees hostage until a pair of lucrative programs that would send billions in taxpayer dollars to his home state get back on track.
Of course, this is Senator Shelby being responsible and bringing “jobs” into his state. It couldn’t possibly be … PORK, could it? Or an earmark? Because he won’t be having none of that. Watch this video and see what Shelby has to say about earmarks.
Balloon Juice new front pager DennisG (aka dengre of GOS) is already producing some excellent reading material for those of us who are interested in government and want to clean up the systemic corruption. He’s been actively researching the corruption of one time lobbyist and now Federal prisoner Jack Abramoff for more than ten years. But this shot at FDL’s Jane Hamsher got a laugh out of me.
ps to Jane: did you see that part in the review, “with the money often hidden behind fake nonpartisan organizations”, that’s about your pal Grover. Hear that slurping sound? That’s Grover drinking your milkshake. Good luck with that in November.
Pivoting off of my previous post I want to take you in another direction. While Congressional Democrats take time to do a gut check, a self-proclaimed political independent is not happy with President Obama. What I find most interesting about the “jumping off the Obama bandwagon” complaint is just how unrealistic this otherwise rational business owner sounds in this epic whinefest. It’s got a lot of butt hurt in it:
I am a registered Independent. I voted for Barack Obama. And for that, I am sorry.
I’m not sorry for you. I’m sorry for me. Because I voted for Obama for me, not for you. I voted for hope and change and all the intangibles that Obama was peddling in the wake of the financial crisis, Sarah Palin, Sept. 11 and all the other ills that shook our country in the last decade. I wanted something new. Something different. What I got was, I suppose, exactly what I voted for – a spin doctor. And not a very good one at that.
Boo fucking hoo. I wasn’t particularly thrilled with the bailouts either, but what was the alternative? Let them fail and watch the entire economy go into the toilet? You can argue that the banksters should have been put on a shorter leash, but to whine because your business failed and you didn’t get a bailout is just childish. Boo fucking hoo.
Andrew Sullivan has more:
What you have here is big babyism. After the worst downturn in memory, bequeathed a massive and growing debt, two failing wars, a financial sector threatening to bring down the entire economy, Obama has betrayed this person by preventing a Second Great Depression.
– No bed-wetting. This will be a tough election for our party and for many Republican incumbents as well. Instead of fearing what may happen, let’s prove that we have more than just the brains to govern — that we have the guts to govern. Let’s fight like hell, not because we want to preserve our status, but because we sincerely believe too many everyday Americans will continue to lose if Republicans and special interests win.
Are you listening Democrats? If politics were baseball:
Would the excise tax on high-dollar plans actually help to keep costs down? Maybe:
But Dr. Rubin said UnitedHealthcare’s approach is particularly aggressive and might be part of a wave of pressure insurance companies feel from employers to cut costs and to keep premiums lower to avoid penalties, like the “Cadillac tax” on expensive insurance plans
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So we don’t know for a fact that the excise tax would work, but it does appear that it could have the desired effect of driving costs down.
One of the arguments on left leaning blogs about whether the House should pass the Senate bill intact, is that the Senate version might increase insurance premiums on union and other high-dollar health insurance plans. In the House version an additional marginal rate tax is levied on those with incomes over $500K and in the Senate a marginal rate tax of 40% is levied against any insurance company that sells a policy that cost more than $8500 for individuals and $23000 for a family of four. I have a couple of problems with the argument that the House version is superior and the main thrust of my problem is that the House mechanism for funding expanded insurance accessibility does nothing to restrain rapidly rising health care cost. We seem to have some evidence that the Senate approach will in fact hold down costs while still providing coverage to millions more Americans. The House version may be more convenient when trying to court and retain support from unions but in the end don’t we all want the same thing? More affordable access to the system for all Americans?
Q: Why not use both funding mechanisms?
A: The Senate.
“Engineers don’t usually put things dramatically, but the alarm about infrastructure is real. Our forebears invested billions in these systems when they were relatively much poorer than we are. We won’t even pay to maintain them for our own use, let alone have anything to pass to our grandchildren.” — Stephen Flynn, Center for National Policy
