Tag Archives: politics

Party Influence

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There is growing concern among some, particularly among the elites and party elders, that our political parties are losing too much power and authority over candidate selection.

[The ascents of Progressive-Democratic Party Presidential candidate and Senator Bernie Sanders (I, VT) and President Donald Trump (R)] are the latest sign that the nation’s political parties have lost influence in choosing their own presidential nominees….

Tom Rath, ex-Republican National Committee delegate, worried about this:

We’re organized around individual candidates and individual concerns. No one wants to be bothered with the party.

Joe Trippi, ex-Progressive-Democrat strategist and current CNN pundit, also expressed angst:

The parties are powerless right now and have been for a while. With both parties it’s personality- and candidate-driven, not party-driven.

And this:

Several current and former members of the Democratic National Committee said a party that once elevated Governors Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton to the White House should have found a way to place governors, who have proven electoral records, on the debate stage more often.

Because Party Know Betters should determine voter choices, not the voters. (I’ll elide questions about why a party that once elevated Senators to the White House switched to governors. I’ll also leave aside the Know Betters’ wisdom in choosing Carter.)

And this, from Elaine Kamarck, herself a long-time Democratic National Committee Know Better (as paraphrased by the WSJ):

DNC Chairman Tom Perez should have acted “by decree” to give more visibility to elected leaders such as Mr Bullock or former Governor John Hickenlooper of Colorado…. At the same time…Mr Perez had little choice but to adopt neutral qualifying criteria, because “party leaders are no longer expected to have a role in choosing the nominee.”

Wow. Just—wow. The party that claims to be all about democracy and “what people want” should act from diktat.

We can debate the wisdom of personality-driven. However, it’s clear that in order to be personality-driven, or candidate-driven, the process also has to be voter-driven. The nominees, after all, are ours, not the parties’.

And that’s all to the good. Our Constitution, after all, opens with We the People, not Our Parties.

The noise of freedom is growing louder and democracy is growing stronger for it—especially republican democracy.

Somewhat of an aside:

Self-described democratic socialist Senator Bernie Sanders and President Trump rose in politics by developing strong personal brands, while keeping only tenuous ties to—and frequently criticizing the leaders of—the parties they later sought to lead.

I’m not sure of the inconsistency here. What would we expect them to do—say, “These guys are doing a terrific job. Put me in charge instead.”

The Equal Rights Amendment

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The Wall Street Journal‘s Editorial Board noted in their Valentine’s Day editorial that the time limit for ratifying the ERA has long passed its expiration date and that Virginia’s lately “ratification” of the Amendment, which might have put the thing over the top for national ratification, came much too late to have effect.

On the whole, I agree with the Editors.

However, on this, I strongly disagree:

The ERA also isn’t necessary today. America in 2020 is a very different place for women than it was when the ERA was written. Laws bar discrimination against women in all walks of life, and women are CEOs, Senators, and the Speaker of the House.

Laws are nearly as easily undone or allowed to go fallow as they are enacted. Our Constitution is much harder to ignore or change–as it must be. Principles that are enacted as statute aren’t, at bottom, principles; they’re merely today’s view of things. On the other hand, principles need to be written into the Constitution if they’re to have lasting effect.

Back to the ERA: it was unnecessary when it was proposed in 1972; that it’s unnecessary today is irrelevant. Article I of the 14th Amendment does the job just fine, especially in the hands of textualist judges and Justices.

Happy Valentine’s Day, a few days after the fact.

Stakeholder Capitalism

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Vivek Ramaswamy, writing in Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal, offered a brief definition:

“Stakeholder capitalism” is…the fashionable notion that companies should serve not only their shareholders, but also other interests and society at large.

Ramaswamy is right. What the virtue-signaling social justice warriorlettes (of which Ramaswamy is not one) miss, though, is that companies serve “other interests” and society at large by doing well, making money for their owners, and creating jobs for “other interests” and members of society at large—us citizens.

It ripples. Business owners, whether direct owners or shareholder owners, whose businesses prosper have more money with which to start new businesses; or invest in new, or existing businesses; or grow existing businesses; or expand R&D spending; or…pursue their own other interests and their own views of what society at large needs rather than those things the VSSJws demand they pursue.

Employees of those prospering businesses, new employees of those new and expanded businesses, all have more money with which to pursue their own other interests and their own views of what society at large needs, even start their own new businesses or invest in new or existing businesses, rather than doing what the VSSJws demand they pursue.

Telecommunications and Backdoors

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It turns out that Huawei has been able to use legislatively mandated backdoors into telecommunications software—backdoors ostensibly for the sole benefit of law enforcement, and then only usable within judicially allowed limits, search warrants duly sworn, in the US, for instance—for years.

But we would never do that, says Huawei in its wide-eyed innocence.

“The use of the lawful interception interface is strictly regulated and can only be accessed by certified personnel of the network operators. No Huawei employee is allowed to access the network without an explicit approval from the network operator,” the [senior Huawei] official said.

The existence of the interface is the access pathway. The bar to its use is wholly a matter of the integrity of the humans involved. This is not a hard concept to understand; Huawei’s management is being disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

Further, PRC law requires PRC companies to cooperate with the government on the government’s demand.

Huawei “has never and will never do anything that would compromise or endanger the security of networks and data of its clients,” the company said.

Huawei’s CEO Ren has also made that preposterous claim. He and his management team insult our intelligence, assuming as they do that we would believe that Huawei would actually defy the PRC government.

Progressive-Democrats and Litmus Tests

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The Progressive-Democratic Party and its Presidential candidates continue to be…upset…over judicial confirmations that are going on with the Trump administration and the McConnell Senate. And they have issue-based litmus tests for what they consider acceptable (progressively so) judges and Justices. The test is in addition to their wish to change the structure of the Supreme Court to favor their ideology.

Their tests are these: the nominees must overtly favor abortion, be activists regarding the environment, and positively consider labor union matters.

Never mind that judges cannot legitimately consider these things except from within the confines of the text of our Constitution and the statute before them in any particular case. Otherwise, those matters are political items that must be determined by the political branches of our government and by Government’s employer and boss, We the People.

More: the candidates refuse to provide the lists from which they’d nominate their favored judges and Justices. They seem to lack the integrity and moral courage to do so.

In contrast, then-Presidential candidate Donald Trump published his list of judges and lawyers from which he’d draw his Justice nominees, and President Trump has drawn his Justice—and appellate court—nominees from that list.

Just to saucer and blow the matter, here’s my litmus test for judge and Justice nominees; it’s both simple and general:

  • Will you rule strictly on the basis of the text of our Constitution and of the statute before you, or will you rule on your current interpretation of what it should say?
  • Do you believe our Constitution lives through judicial rulings or that it lives through Article V and We the People?

It’s clear that Progressive-Democrats’ nominees—named or secret—would fail that litmus test.