George,

Isn't it time to re-examine what we mean by "democracy"? Everybody else in the world has done so. The Bush-Cheney administration has certainly done so, and concluded -- as the old Soviets knew well -- that "democracy" as they speak it is the same as "free-market capitalism" to benefit the wealthy. These autocrats want their kind (not anybody else's kind) of democracy, not only at home but also to remake the Middle East. Let us for the moment ignore Iraq and their egregious violations of international law in the name of democracy, and consider a slightly more distant example. The Hamas government was elected democratically, even by our own standards, when the Bush-Cheney government called for free elections in the Palestinian territories. The Bush-Cheney and Olmert governments didn't like the result, so refused to recognize it. Whatever one thinks of Hamas, we can't deny they were elected democratically. They're not free-marketers, though.

Perhaps naively, we believe our form of democracy works because minorities are protected Constitutionally. (We also believe the electoral system still works!) Should we not reexamine that belief, as this current government -- taking to the extreme the continual assault on the Constitution by Republican presidents since Nixon -- has worked deftly to negate the balance of powers enshrined in our basic document?

Or, we might consider our form of democracy from another angle: wasn't Virgil Goode re-elected democratically? Does he represent me (or you) or anyone I know?

The California ballot initiative is dissected ably by the ever-acute Hendrick Herzberg, in this week's New Yorker. He concludes:

If California does what [proposed initiative] No. 07-0032 calls for while everybody else is still going with winner take all by state, the real-world result will be to give Party B (in this case the Republicans) an unearned, Ohio-size gift of electoral votes. In a narrow sense, that's good if you like Party B, but not so good if you like Party A (in this case the Democrats). Or if you think that in a democracy everybody ought to play by roughly the same rules. Nor, by the way, is Party B the only offender. Last week, the Democratic-controlled legislature of North Carolina, a state that has gone Republican in every Presidential election since 1976, enthusiastically took up a bill to do the same mischief as the California initiative. The grab would be smaller - it would appropriate perhaps three or four of North Carolina's fifteen electoral votes for the Democrats - but the hands would be just as dirty.

 

The California initiative flunks even the categorical-imperative test. Imagine, as a thought experiment, that all the states were to adopt this 'reform' at once. Electoral votes would still be winner take all, only by congressional district rather than by state. Instead of ten battleground states and forty spectator states, we'd have thirty-five battleground districts and four hundred spectator districts. The red-blue map would be more mottled, and in some states more people might get to see campaign commercials, because media markets usually take in more than one district. But congressional districts are as gerrymandered as human ingenuity and computer power can make them. The electoral-vote result in ninety per cent of the country would still be a foregone conclusion, no matter how close the race.

 

California Initiative No. 07-0032 is an audacious power play packaged as a step forward for democratic fairness. It's the lotusland equivalent of Tom DeLay's 2003 midterm redistricting in Texas, except with a sweeter smell, a better disguise, and larger stakes. And the only way Californians will reject it is if they have a chance to think about it first.

Katherine McNamara (Electronic mail, August 4, 2007)