No Idea What They Are Talking About

When i read most articles about voters, their motivations, rationales, etc i want to smash my head against a brick wall. Today featured a string of blog posts by respected bloggers steve benen, digby, matt yglesias about exactly who and what independent voters are. These bloggers have gotten where they are today because they tend to write intelligently about things that they know and what they say is accurate. This is in stark contrast to the "reporters" and other media professionals who profess to cover politics.

Digby wrote a reflection that nicely illustrates the ignorance at work

I was listening to all the gasbags drone on all day yesterday about how the "independents" are all unhappy with Obama and are probably going to vote for the Republicans again when just a couple of years ago they were all unhappy with Bush and voted with the Democrats. This was interpreted as a signal that Obama needs to tack right immediately to recapture them.

Does that make sense? Isn't the answer more logically that independents just habitually dislike whoever is in power and think that both parties are incompetent? Why else would they identify as independents in the first place?

I realize that the villagers think there is some sort of "median" moderate voter who believes that the answer to all of our problems lies somewhere between the positions of the two parties. But that's not necessarily the independent's position. They don't like either party true, but it doesn't necessarily follow that they yearn to split the difference. In fact, I suspect that a large number of them are apolitical people who don't really understand politics at all and simply reject whoever is in power when things aren't going well, without regard to party. (In fact, there is great social utility in rejecting party politics and proclaiming yourself unhappy with the whole set-up. Who can't relate to that on some level?) Many independents ideologically fall far enough outside the two parties that they can't consider themselves members of either --- libertarians, greens etc.

The number of independents out there is quite large and all national politicians need to reach them in elections in order to win. But the knee jerk assumption that they are always more moderate than everyone else is probably wrong. They might just be more cranky, more cynical, more uninformed, more skeptical or more impatient. There are a lot of reasons why someone might be an independent in American politics but I suspect that ideology is at the bottom of the list.

It is embarrassing that the media in this country who cover politics daily have such little understanding about voters and their behavior. There is such a lack of sophistication in the coverage. There is a long history of voter theory in political science dedicated to figuring out why people vote the way that they do, how they form their opinions, etc. Yet discussions meant to inform the public and help them gain a better understanding of politics and how things are likely to work takes advantage of non of it.

When was the last time you saw V.O. Key referenced? Or Morris Fiorina? Its not like the basic texts are hard to find. Head over to this site for some summaries of the seminal theories of voting behavior. I would love to see direct references to these works in the predictions made by the pundits and other blatherers on tv. I would tolerate the taking of positions that showed even a minimal familiarity or understanding of the work. The deepest that any of the experts who routinely tell us why one thing is good for obama or this thing is bad is thomas franks' whats the matter with kansas. Though i doubt they have read bartels reply.

Is it too much to ask that the people who are paid to analyze voting and what is likely to affect it to exhibit a basic understanding of it? Digby's comments on independents are not surprising. The media describes things in terms of left and right. short hand for conservative and liberal, democrat and republican. The truth is that things are more complicated and messy than simple two dimensional axis. most people do not have developed coherent ideologies. they are all over the map.

About half said a major reason for their independence is that they agree with Democrats on some issues and Republicans on others, and that they are not comfortable with either party. Four in 10 said not wanting to put a label on their political views is a principal reason for calling themselves independents. Fifteen percent said they are independent because they are simply not very interested in politics.

As benen, yglesias, atrios, digby, all point out, describing independently registered voters or people without a party as being moderate centrists is lazy and its wrong. Being wrong on the scale that the village is damages political discourse, policy making, and society itself. Politicians change their behavior based on the incorrect assumptions of the media. With the failure of the village to provide even basically correct interpretation of voter behavior i am not surprised that papers are going under.

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Why Grayson's Use of Legislative History is Brilliant

Dday has a post up about the rising liberal lion Alan Grayson and his myriad efforts to protect the American people. As Grayson rockets to legislative stardom i wanted to take a minute to explore just how good he is at his job. The technical thing i have been most impressed with is his use of legislative history and understanding of the legal system in fighting fraud and abuse by government contractors. His use of legislative history is brilliant.

For a a quick refresher,,

When the House of Representatives went after federal funding for the community-organizing group ACORN last week, the bill as written also affected "any organization" that had been involved in a wide range of fraudulent activity and other bad behavior.

On Friday, Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) inserted into the "legislative history" language spelling out that including all fraudulent organizations was, in fact, the intent of the Congress.

Meanwhile, he has been asking citizens to suggest specific companies which would be targeted by the anti-fraud language and provide evidence for the claim. The list has grown several pages long. The names of those organizations will be submitted into the congressional record next week.

"The purpose of this bill is to cleanse federal contracting and grant-making, completely and permanently. The purpose is to put an end to the invidious practice of rewarding those who steal taxpayer money by giving them more taxpayer money," writes Grayson. "The bill imposes, and is intended to impose, a corporate death penalty on contractors who fall within the scope of its prohibitions."

Careful readers may note that Grayson didnt actually change the text of the bill. Thats the first clever move. If he had actually suggested that it be explicitly spelled out that Boeing etc were part of the bill it would most likely have hindered the bills passage. Republicans would not stand for regulating actual fraud in the military industrial complex. Actually most Democrats would run away from that too. The point is that he left the broad text alone. He simply bolstered the broad "any" language by making it clear for the courts who have to enforce the law that congress really meant any. Why does this matter? Grayson's language prevents courts from reading out Acorn, Boeng, Xe, or anybody else who commits fraud which they might have done without the language.

An example,

The primary intention is not merely to penalize such organization, since other laws perform that function. Rather, the intention is to protect the Government and the taxpayers from losses in the future, and to deter misconduct on the part of federal fund recipients. The intention of deterrence, in particular, requires that these prohibitions be construed broadly, and enforced strictly.

When a judge considers the statute they may take several different approaches. One of these is a textualist approach where upon reading the statute they would find that it does target "any organization." If they strictly adhere to textualist approach they really shouldnt get beyond that. A court giving that a plain meaning could not reasonably find that Boeing is differentiated from Acorn. However, many judges may be tempted to say that congress could not have meant "any" organization and that this would be an absurd result and that the statute should be read to have exceptions. One tool used to determine whether congress really meant "any" is--legislative history.

When a judge looks for the intent of congress to determine whether they really meant "any" organization they will find Grayson's language that is very strong and very clear that they did mean any to include every one perpetrating fraud. I mean his language makes it clear that if you file false reports you get the world dropped on you.

Regarding such prohibitions, Congress intends to substitute a "per se" rule in place of any rule requiring a balancing of factors, or exercise of discretion or judgment, to the full extent permitted for Congress by the U.S. Constitution. "Permanent" means lasting for the entire time that the organization remains in existence. If a principal, or principals, of a covered organization form(s) or attempt(s) to form a new organization, then that new organization may be deemed, through administrative action, to be a covered organization. "Principal" means an officer, a director, or an owner of at least five percent of the shares of a covered organization.

This really cuts out any chance a judge would have to exercise discretion. Grayson wrote it out. No discretion, no balance of factors like courts love to do. One strike and your out.

The other ting that is rather clever about this is that it should alleviate any issues with the bill being a bill of attainder. Bills of attainder are those passed to target specific people or organizations and are unconstitutional. By making it clear that congress meant to get everybody Grayson cleans that up and uses the canon against constitutional conflict to his benefit. Courts are supposed to believe that congress does not intend to pass unconstitutional legislation so if there is a constitutional interpretation it should be used. Grayson provides one. No chance of getting the bill thrown out.

I cant say whether Grayson himself wrote this, he does have a J.D. from Harvard. He is certainly capable. Whether he wrote it or not i have to applaud just how strong he made the legislative history and how smart he was in deploying this tactic. Some judges may blow it all off entirely but if they want to be honest they need to pay attention to it.

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Everything is socialists now

I am some what fascinated by the right wings ability to kill words. The cottage industry they built up to manipulate the electorate through dog whistle and fear is as impressive at is scary. The relentless message discipline combined with an utter carelessness for the actual meaning of words has allowed them to turn what used to be words of art, words with actual definitions, into meaningless terms. The quintessential term that the right has flogged to death is liberal but i have a feeling that socialism is right behind it.

I chalk it all up to a combination of laziness, greed/entitlement, and an utter conviction that the are never wrong and no one else has good points. Laziness prevents the right from creating legitimate policy points open for debate. Greed/Entitlement tells them that they deserve to be on top, that they deserve to be rewarded regardless of merit. The utter conviction lets them rationalize everything they do to achieve their entitlement. The end result is a use of words like "socialism" as a scare tactic devoid of any real meaning.

Lets take the case of Rep. Steve King (r IA).

So in the end this is something that has to come with a, if there’s a push for a socialist society, a society where the foundations of individual rights and liberties are undermined and everybody is thrown together, living collectively off of one pot of resources earned by everyone. That is, this is one of the goals they have to go to is same-sex marriage because it has to plow through marriage in order to get to their goal. They want public affirmation. They want access to public funds and resources. Eventually all those resources will be pooled because that’s the direction we’re going. And not only is it a radical social idea, it is a purely socialist concept in the final analysis.

the first thing that pops to mind is that what he is describing sounds an awful lot like, communism and not socialism. Or maybe the first question is what does marriage have to do with owning the means of production? what does gay marriage have to do with economic theory? You might also ask whether or not we currently live in a closed interconnected system where everyone relies on the work of others. Finally you could ask yourself if representative king is in need of psychiatric help.

The result of rants like king's that just throw in the term socialism for no reason other to say BOO! is that the word becomes devoid of all meaning and is useless in actual debates. Think about how judicial activism is utterly useless in a debate about the role of the judiciary in our society. It has no meaning either proscriptive or descriptive. I feel like thats the point we are at with socialism. Sure it still has a general technical definition but the plain meaning of the word is totally worthless and vague. try and talk to a right winger about the details of what is and is not socailism and in all likelihood you will probably just hear about how crappy liberals and democrats are and how conservative women are hotter than liberal women.

The right thrives on shutting down intelligent conversation, thought and debate. Killing the meaning of words that are useful as part of debate fits perfectly with their mo. Reckless disregard for the truth or for any accuracy in what they are describing kills political discourse. Socialism has come to mean everything short of libertarian paradise of private firefighting and road making. why? why must they kill words?

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Is Obama paying back David Paterson?

There has been a minor dust up regarding President Obama urging Gov Paterson of NY not to seek reelection. We saw Michael Steele make the assertion that it was "curious" on why the White House would ask New York Gov. David Paterson (D) not to run for reelection in 2010.

"I found that to be stunning, that the White House would send word to one of only two black governors in the country not to run for reelection,"
...
"It raises a curious point for me. I think Gov. Paterson's numbers are about the same as [New Jersey] Gov. [Jon] Corzine's. The president is with Gov. Corzine."

The implication here is that Obama is paying back Gov Paterson for not choosing Caroline Kennedy to replace Sen Hillary Clinton. This is the argument made forcefully by Professor Darren Hutchinson at Dissenting Justice here and here. I disagree with Professor Hutchinsons analysis on several points. He makes the link between Corzine just as Steele does but this is a bad comparison as steve benen points out.

First, Corzine and Paterson are not exactly in the same boat, and the comparison is silly. Corzine is running this year; polls show him trailing but closing the gap; and there wasn't a stronger candidate last year, waiting in the wings. Paterson is up next year; polls show him with almost comically low approval ratings; and state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo (D) is strongly favored by voters, both among Democrats and among voters in general.

Professor Hutchinson makes several other points involving the role that race plays here. I am not going to deny that patterson's opponents may be racially motivated. i dont have evidence either way. What i could say is that it places the president in an awkward position when Gov Paterson runs and gets trounced by Cuomo. He has to either support one of the only black governors in the country in a losing bid risking charges of racial bias or he has to back cuomo instigating charges such as the ones that prof. hutchinson makes, favoritism for elites, pay for play etc. It is better for Obama to try and head off this type of choice.

Developing a deeper bench of african american candidates is an important goal. backing a losing candidate because he is black is not. paterson running creates a mess and its not something obama will want to deal with. obama has shown himself to be adverse to these types of complications. he wants the safe noncontroversial candidate ala joe lieberman over lamont.

The point is that i think there are very compelling reasons for Obama to urge Paterson not to run that have nothing to do with the Kennedy appointment fiasco. the world wont end if paterson runs but it will make obama's life more difficult.

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Race and Colorblindness

I have been extremely busy but David has a link and post up on racial views of children that have implications for the way we treat race in society and i wanted to discuss it.

It is a very good piece, particularly because it explodes a lot of myths. One is that diverse schools are not a panacea that will lead to cross-racial friendship and understanding. Apparently not: students in integrated schools still tend to self-segregate dramatically. Of course, they do that in segregated schools too -- the article claims that only 8% of White kids and 15% of Black kids have a "best friend" of the opposite race -- but integrated schools don't seem to help.

Second, the article takes aim at what I have elsewhere called colorphobia: the fear of race as a conceptual category. The article opens by noting the failure of a study which sought to measure the effect of multicultural and egalitarian messaging by parents to young children. The problem was that the parents resisted engaging in specific race-talk as required by the study parameters. Some dropped out entirely, others just didn't say anything beyond extremely vague bromides like "everyone is equal". And, unsurprisingly, this had very little effect on the attitudes of young children.

The first step in treating a problem is admitting that you have a problem. This post goes directly to the heart of a major problem in contemporary politics and American Society--the failure to acknowledge race as a legitimate factor in decisions. The recent trend among conservatives and the public at large seems to be in favor of a colorblind system akin to that exacted in france where race and ethnicity data wasnt even collected until recently.

We see strains of this thought most often in reverse discrimination cases where the majority is discriminated against. Personally im not really in favor of protecting the majority with the 14th Amendment in the way that prevents all considerations of race. reading the 14th Amendment to prevent racial considerations is a way to prevent direct action aimed at eliminating systematic discrimination. While it makes sense in theory to treat equally qualified people with no regard for skin color in truth there is no complete equality in two candidates. Each will be better than the other at certain things and racial diversity itself has value.

The study David cites shows that children who are not given serious information on race pick up the generally negative and seperational tendencies of our society at large. By not recognizing that the differences need to be addressed and not papered over we are locking in the traditional systematic views that regard racial differences as being important. It typifies the problems of the colorblind system. Existing problems cannot be ignored and they dont work themselves out.

Im sure there is a ton of literature on this out there but i just wanted to make the colorblind legal connection explicit

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