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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.
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- 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.
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- 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)
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