Sean Wilson
Fri, 29 Jan 2010 15:47:13 -0800
... fwiw, I'm not an advocate of this "ideal point science," because it seems only to paint its portraits after history is over. If it were given to us as sculpting, however, one would be in inclined to allow it such a luxury. It seems to me that "older political science" is much more helpful here. You don't like executive power? Now look at what you have. The old party regimes of the 1900s would have had the executive writing the legislation and being the focal point of the governmental power -- the way it is supposed to be. (As in, the way it WORKS). But this anti-Bush thing that came about largely from foreign policy issues (torture, spying and the like) and public symbolism (signing statements, unitary executive rhetoric) was confused by the Left as a call for being against executive power. This is by far the most confusing thing the Democrats have done in quite some time (which is saying a good deal). Why on earth anyone would gain power and then try to wield it without the executive front-and-center, writing and steering the legislation, I have no idea. I say again: what did this arrangement accomplish? Getting Democrats to lead in Congress is like trying to herd cats. It reminds me a lot of kids who organize finger-painting.
So if you want the Nobel-winning weak executive model, you got it. Note also something else that is peculiar. So much of the debate about health care has majorities close in mind. Wasn't it Sandy who was saying that the Senate was thwarting democracy? You know, you can make an argument that the actual policy position that emerged from the Senate on health care was perfectly aligned with public mood. This country is far from liberal. Go out in any area of the heartland and see what noise people make when they talk about issue politics. So if you want majority-sentiment to rule, you've got that too. Regards. Dr. Sean Wilson, Esq. Assistant Professor Wright State University Personal Website: http://seanwilson.org SSRN papers: http://ssrn.com/author=596860 Discussion Group: http://seanwilson.org/wittgenstein.discussion.html _______________________________________________ To post, send message to Conlawprof@lists.ucla.edu To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/conlawprof Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or wrongly) forward the messages to others.