Politics, Government & Public Policy: June 2005 Archives

"I apologized for accusing you of stealing me bike, so now you should apologize for accusing me of stealing your ball."

"But you did steal it!"

The "controversy" over Karl Rove's recent comments about Democrats not appreciating the full importance of the War on Terror is pretty amusing. They're pointing to Senator Durbin's weasel non-apology for calling American soldiers Nazis and claiming that Mr. Rove should now likewise apologize for his critical remarks. I guess the main difference is that Senator Durbin the Turban was wrong, whereas Karl Rove is right.

Rove, the architect behind President Bush's election victories, on Wednesday night told a gathering of the New York Conservative Party that "Liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." Conservatives, he said, "saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war."

He added that groups linked to the Democratic Party made the mistake of calling for "moderation and restraint" after the terrorist attacks.

I can't even count how many times I had to listen to whiny pleas to "try to understand why they hate us". Ironically, I'd like to understand that, and fix it, but priority number one has always been to make sure that if more dying is necessary it's them that's doing it, not us. Can't we all just get along? Yes, we can, as soon as they stop blowing stuff up; and since we have no reason to trust them, we'll have to eliminate their capacity for violence.

Anyway, the left has been wobbly on terror since 9/11. That's no secret. Sometimes some hesitation was worthwhile, but most of the time their complaints are designed to hamstring America and protect our enemies out of misplaced (or entirely disingenuous) "compassion".

Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, in a letter to Rove co-signed by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Democratic senators from Connecticut and New Jersey, called the presidential adviser's speech "a slap in the face to the unity that America achieved after Sept. 11, 2001."

There are more important things than unity for a country. What's more, the idea that unity is "achieved" and must then be preserved is nonsense. There's unity when people agree about important issues, but unity is the result of that agreement, not the cause of it. In that way, unity is like peace.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Thursday there was no reason for Rove to apologize because he was "simply pointing out the different philosophies when it comes to winning the war on terrorism."

"Of course not," McClellan said when asked by reporters whether Bush would ask Rove to apologize.

Ace points to The Therapist's main complaint:

Rove's recent comments, in which he said that liberals sought "therapy and understanding" in the wake of the attacks on September 11th, 2001, is being touted as "the most" incendiary of comments yet delivered in the rapier-thrust arena of politics--primarily in how Democrats charge that Rove "deliberately and maliciously" plotted to not slam American fighting forces. ...

Illinois Senator, Dick Durbin said he "knows first hand" how to go about dispensing incendiary remarks, and that Rove's non-comparing of the troops to Nazis was "part and parcel of the nefarious GOP strategy to unite Americans behind America."

Meanwhile, James MacDuff bemoans the connotations of "liberal".

But read Rove's comments again. Remember the Presidential election? How many times did you hear the Democratic ticket described as the 4th and 2nd "most liberal" Senators as if it were a disease? It is truly fascinating how pejorative the term "liberal" has become to our Southern neighbours - if you are a liberal, you are a waffling wimp with no moral compass. A "liberal" voting record is a bad one in middle America, case closed. Conservatives in Canada likely have the same grudge at Liberals for successfully linking the extremist elements to the core of the party, hence its "scary" nature.

I generally use "leftist" rather than "liberal", because to me a real liberal is someone who favors, you know, liberty, which most American leftists abhor. Anyway, if people associate "liberals" with waffling America-haters, whose fault is that?

There was some discussion on my earlier thread about Arnold's propositions about rules for drawing district lines that would eliminate the problem of gerrymandering. Wacky Hermit proposed a rule limiting the ratio between the perimeter and area of a district, and Ben Bateman proposed creating a computer model to optimize over a wider range of constraints.

My own thought is that attempts to group people that "fit" together into a district based on demographics is inherently anti-democratic. I think districts should be based on city and county lines, and I would propose two simple rules for two types of districts.

1. Type A districts can contain multiple cities. Any city in a Type A district must be contained entirely within that one district. More than one city can be in a Type A district, but none of those cities can cross the district line.

2. Type B districts can contain part of only a single city. Any city too large to fit in a Type A district can be broken into multiple Type B districts, but no two cities can share a Type B district.

These two rules would ensure that district lines are drawn that represent the local government structure. State and federal representatives should work with the same lines as local representatives; it'll make everyone more accountable, and reduce confusion and waste.

Update:
And then there's bioregional democracy:

Bioregional democracy (or the Bioregional State) is a set of electoral reforms designed to force the political process in a democracy to better represent concerns about the economy, the body, and environmental concerns (e.g., water quality), toward developmental paths that are locally prioritized and tailored to different areas for their own specific interests of sustainability and durability.

Interesting concept, and the article has some examples of how it's put into practice. I'm not an environmental fanatic by any means, but I like the idea of political structures built with environmental interest geographical boundaries in mind -- that way, people in a given environment can treat it as well or as poorly as they want, with minimal effect on other groups.

Update 2:
Richard Tallent emailed with an algorithm he devised to allow voters to draw district lines (with some pixelization).

There is only one fair method to creating districts: as much as possible, let the voters choose for themselves with whom they want to vote. Create a number of similarly-populated geographic "blocks" using a semi-random computer algorithm that is simply taught to avoid splitting up cites or counties where possible. Let each voter pick up to "X" other blocks along with his own, where "X" is the size of the represented region divided by the average number of people in each block. Require that voters can only choose regions either neighboring their own block or sharing some border with at least two other blocks they have also selected. Aggregate these to determine the wishes of each block, and use these numbers to shape the borders with a deterministic best-fit algorithm.

Interesting and possibly effective, but voters won't trust a system that's too complicated for them to understand -- just remember the recent EU Constitution debacle. Why not just take the next step and untie representation from geography entirely?

The biggest story of the day has got to the the 5-4 ruling by the Supreme Court in Kelo v. City of New London that basically says there are no limits to eminent domain.

The Supreme Court today effectively expanded the right of local governments to seize private property under eminent domain, ruling that people's homes and businesses -- even those not considered blighted -- can be taken against their will for private development if the seizure serves a broadly defined "public use."

In a 5-4 decision, the court upheld the ability of New London, Conn., to seize people's homes to make way for an office, residential and retail complex supporting a new $300 million research facility of the Pfizer pharmaceutical company. The city had argued that the project served a public use within the meaning of the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution because it would increase tax revenues, create jobs and improve the local economy.

There is no more private property in America. Whatever you own can now be taken and given to someone else for them to profit off of at the whim of the government. If you don't like it you'll have to sue to keep your stuff, and even if you fight it all the way to the Supreme Court, apparently they'll spit in your face.

A group of homeowners in New London's Fort Trumbull area had fought the city's attempt to impose eminent domain, arguing that their property could be seized only to serve a clear public use such as building roads or schools or to eliminate blight. The homeowners, some of whom had lived in their house for decades, also argued that the public would benefit from the proposed project only if it turned out to be successful, making the "public use" requirement subject to the eventual performance of the private business venture.

This isn't even for the "public" good -- which would be bad enough -- it's for the good of Pfizer and Pfizer's shareholders. They're the ones who will be making a profit off the theft of these homes. If they want the land so bad, they should just buy it. That's how a free market works.

I think it's time for some impeachments. If not the five who joined this majority decision -- Justices John Paul Stevens, Anthony Kennedy, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer -- then let's just throw the whole bunch of them out and start over. It's time for limited terms for federal justices.

I know some leftists wouldn't be happy to have President Bush appoint nine new justices, but how about if we start them on eighteen-year terms staggered every two years? So Bush would get to appoint all nine now, but by the time the next president comes around in 2008 he'll get to appoint two of his own, and so will the next president, and so on forever. Eh, there's flaws I'm sure, but it would be better than the system we've got now.

Another possible solution is proposed by Abu Gingy who wants to develop over some Justices' homes.

If there are any well connected real estate developers in the DC area reading this, please drop me a line. If we can come up with some project that would kick these schmucks out of their own homes, I doubt the irony would be lost on the learned justices.

Michelle Malkin links to Brash Limburg who points out that property rights are more important than library records.

While You Were Busy Protesting The Patriot Act... ...the government took your house. I'm sure the residents of New London, Connecticut will be happy to know that while their houses are being demolished, their library records will be safely locked away.

I wish the left would use its protest energy for something useful like this... or am I mistaken in thinking that leftist Americans would be opposed to the elimination of private property?

Update:
Eugene Volokh has a more balanced look at Kelo v. City of New London and examines the effects of the ruling, setting aside (apparently) any moral objections to government takings.

But I think Clayton Cramer's analogy is better, because I don't think the moral aspects can be ignored.

If you aren't a property owner, consider this analogy: you believe that you labor is worth $10 per hour. You aren't prepared to work for less. A corporation decides that your labor is essential to what they are doing, but they aren't prepared to pay you $10 per hour--so they have the government draft you, and pay you a private's wages--and assign you to work for that corporation, arguing that the corporation's products would enhance the overall economy. You would properly recognize that you had been enslaved.

Senator Dick Durbin has made yet another "apology" for his remarks equating American soldiers with Nazis.

"Some may believe that my remarks crossed the line," the Illinois Democrat said. "To them I extend my heartfelt apologies."

Some may believe? What do you believe, Senator? Do you believe that your comments crossed the line? I've had to make plenty of apologies in my life, and "I'm sorry you were offended" is much different from acknowledging, "what I said was wrong, and I shouldn't have said it".

DeoDuce takes a look at the strange and disturbing world of abortion-themed merchandise. I guess the point of the products is to desensitize people to abortion (an implicit admission that abortion is revolting and sick?) but I predict that any girl who wears a t-shirt that says "Kiss me, I'm pro-choice" is not going to end well.

Republicans should take heart, because from Senator Hillary Clinton's own mouth we learn that Republicans are hard to stop!

"I know it's frustrating for many of you, it's frustrating for me. Why can't the Democrats do more to stop them?" she continued to growing applause. "I can tell you this: It's very hard to stop people who have no shame about what they're doing. It is very hard to tell people that they are making decisions that will undermine our checks and balances and constitutional system of government who don't care. It is very hard to stop people who have never been acquainted with the truth."

Also hard to stop: people who keep winning elections. Yeah, democracy sucks, but what can you do?

In some of her sharpest language, Mrs. Clinton said that abetting Republicans was a Washington press corps that has become a pale imitation of the Watergate-era reporters who are being celebrated amid the identification of the Washington Post source Deep Throat.

"It's shocking when you see how easily they fold in the media today," Mrs. Clinton said, again to strong applause. "They don't stand their ground. If they're criticized by the White House, they just fall apart.

"I mean, c'mon, toughen up, guys, it's only our Constitution and country at stake."

Last time I checked, only our elected/appointed government officials take oaths to protect the Constitution, so why is Hillary trying to fob her job off on the press? They only use the protections of the Constitution to make money -- which isn't bad, but certainly isn't noble either.

(HT: GayPatriot and PoliPundit, who have worse things to say about her.)

In a comment to the earlier post on freedom from taxes, Ben Bateman made a good point:

The real problem this state compact is addressing is neither a spending problem nor a revenue problem. It's a tax administration problem.

It's tempting to think of tax law in political terms; I did it, too, until my first tax class in law school. But my tax prof patiently explained that tax law says very little about how much tax is collected overall. It is instead concerned with who pays how much. A bad tax system warps taxpayer behavior, and makes the economy less efficient overall.

The sales tax situation is a great example: In-state vendors are required to collect sales tax, while out-of-state vendors are not. Technically, the purchaser is required to pay a tax on out-of-state purchases equal to what he would have paid in local sales tax. But that tax is impossible to collect as a practical matter.

This differential treatment pushes people to prefer out-of-state purchases over in-state purchases to some extent, solely because of the tax system. That's inefficient in many cases. Many types of products can be sold more efficiently through brick-and-mortar stores, but the tax system pushes people away from those and towards less efficient purchases by mail. That tax-based distortion generates pure economic waste.

Very true. The best way to pay less taxes is to lower the tax rate, not to have all sorts of special cases that end up distorting the market. However, seeing as how it's rather difficult to elect politicians that will actually cut taxes, I'll take what I can get.

As for the rest of Ben's comment, I disagree.

It's usually a mistake to think about tax law in ideological terms. As my tax prof liked to say: "We've got to pay the Marines." We're going to give the government some amount of our money. The total amount that the government takes is a political question. But once politics has set that amount, the next question is not political: How much should you pay? How much should I pay? And how much should the guy down the street pay? Or, more globally: How do we determine who pays how much?

The question of who pays what seems entirely political to me. Should everyone pay the same amount? The same percentage? Percentage of income, spending, wealth, or what? Those are all political questions.

Not much to write about this, but I love how our politicians -- looking to enrich their own bureaucratic fiefdoms -- can call the lack of a tax a "loss".

DENVER - 9News has learned that 43 states have joined together in a coalition to collect sales tax on all Internet purchases.

You already pay sales tax when you go online to buy from an established business like Eddie Bauer or Wal-Mart. But a lot of small Internet businesses and individual transactions float under the radar. ...

The states say they've been losing as much as $16 billion annually to the Internet. They say that new software will make collecting the money almost automatic and that they can have a system in place by Oct. 1.

Now, obviously states don't "lose" money by not taxing it -- by that logic, the federal government "loses" 50% of my income by letting me keep it. Our state and federal governments have a spending problem, not a revenue problem.