Sunday, May 01, 2005
Balancing point
The standard commie talking point this week is to complain that the Republicans own 3 sections of the government; why should they be allowed to have the 4th (courts) as well?
Must admit this sounds like a good argument. I think the govt worked pretty well with R congress and D president; congress was encouraged to pull to the right in order to make partisan points, and congress put more energy into investigating executive excesses.
But the current arrangement has exposed several things that were overshadowed by the Gingrich-Clinton boxing match. On the good side, we can see about 40 nominal Dems in the House who never had a reason to break party discipline in the previous arrangement, but who now migrate to the conservative side on every economic question. So it turns out that for most purposes the House is about 2/3 conservative. On the bad side, we can see far more clearly the unbroken power of imperial judges. When one district judge can write, modify, or repeal any law she wants, and the combined forces of Congress and the Presidency have absolutely no will to overrule her, the situation is still unbalanced. No matter how many R's we put in the right basket, they still won't balance the power of a Phyllis Hamilton ... unless and until they evolve from bottom-dwelling tubeworms into vertebrates.
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Spokesmodel says this 'learning exercise' doesn't help settle the question, but she likes the T-shirt anyway.
¶ 5:17 PM
The standard commie talking point this week is to complain that the Republicans own 3 sections of the government; why should they be allowed to have the 4th (courts) as well?
Must admit this sounds like a good argument. I think the govt worked pretty well with R congress and D president; congress was encouraged to pull to the right in order to make partisan points, and congress put more energy into investigating executive excesses.
But the current arrangement has exposed several things that were overshadowed by the Gingrich-Clinton boxing match. On the good side, we can see about 40 nominal Dems in the House who never had a reason to break party discipline in the previous arrangement, but who now migrate to the conservative side on every economic question. So it turns out that for most purposes the House is about 2/3 conservative. On the bad side, we can see far more clearly the unbroken power of imperial judges. When one district judge can write, modify, or repeal any law she wants, and the combined forces of Congress and the Presidency have absolutely no will to overrule her, the situation is still unbalanced. No matter how many R's we put in the right basket, they still won't balance the power of a Phyllis Hamilton ... unless and until they evolve from bottom-dwelling tubeworms into vertebrates.
-----
Spokesmodel says this 'learning exercise' doesn't help settle the question, but she likes the T-shirt anyway.
¶ 5:17 PM
