Tag: change congress

Legislator as Campaign Strategist

Post author By David
Post date September 28, 2009
No Comments on Legislator as Campaign Strategist

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I had thought to cover the ideal candidacy of a good legislator in a single post but it has become obvious to me that there is just too much to cover in one sitting. On top of that, the campaign is arguably the aspect of being a good legislator where candidates – whether they end up winning or losing – stray from what a good legislator should do.

From a campaign strategy perspective the most important thing that a good legislator should do is understand the system that they are to be working in. I saw what I thought was a good example of this in the Jason Chaffetz campaign for Utah’s 3rd District congressional seat in 2008. For the sake of clarity I would like to say that I was not part of the campaign nor do I live in the 3rd district – I am simply an outside observer who happens to share the same party affiliation.

My observations were of a campaign where they understood the Utah Republican Party rules to receive the nomination and they focused their efforts on getting that nomination. As far as I could see goals of fund-raising were completely secondary to goals or raising support among those who would actually be casting the votes for the Republican nominee in the district – first the state delegates, and then the members of the Republican party when he fell just shy of averting the need for a primary race against Rep. Cannon. Again from my outsider perspective it appears that all other goals were designed and pursued only as a means of reaching and persuading those who would actually be casting the votes. Contrary to what seems to be the conventional wisdom, there is more to it than raising large amounts of money and buying up as much advertising as possible – as proven by the fact that Chaffetz was significantly outspent by Cannon.

The reason that a legislator needs to be a good strategist with a solid understanding of the system is not simply so that they can get elected, but also because those skills are important in working within the legislative body to which they are seeking membership. Again from my outsiders perspective Rep. Chaffetz appears to demonstrate this by the fact that he has been able to garner more attention and influence than I would have expected to see in a freshman congressman in the minority party of the House.

Tags campaigns, change congress, ideal, thoughts

General

An Ideal Legislator

I seem to have caught the interest of some people when I offered to describe the job of a being a legislator. I said that it would take multiple posts (and it will), but I thought I should start out by explaining the scope of what I would be describing.

My view is that being a legislator involves being a person and thus the job of a legislator demands some qualifications within the life of the person filling the role. I believe there is a lot of room for variation, but there are some things that really are necessary in the life of someone who would be a good legislator. (If I still have any atheists among my readers let me just offer that having any religious belief or affiliation is not among the qualifications.)

Being a legislator also involves being a candidate in the vast majority of cases (there are obviously exceptions where someone is appointed to fill a vacancy in a legislative body) thus there are ways that an ideal legislator would approach the campaign process differently than a less-than-ideal legislator. Watching campaigns today is a good way to observe how far our current political environment is from the ideal. (I know that when I talk about this there will be people who argue that what I say is impractical – in fact I would not be surprised if some of what I say gets labeled “political suicide.”)

Finally, being a legislator obviously involves participating in the process of crafting legislation. This is the most important aspect of what makes an ideal legislator and in some ways the least well understood. I would argue that a legislator who truly does their job in this area should not have to actively campaign for re-election other than to defend themselves against any unfair attacks from challengers. (I do make some exception in this for those who have not served a full term because of being appointed, and possibly also for first term representatives because they have served less than two years before voters are asked to vote again on filling their seat.)

Tags change congress, ideal, legislation, legislature, thoughts

National State

What is the Job of a Representative?

Post author By David
Post date September 22, 2009
3 Comments on What is the Job of a Representative?

One of my favorite questions to ask candidates in the past has been “in your own words, what is the job description for the office you are seeking?” That continues to be one of my candidate questions because observing the representatives I have had (as well as members of Congress in general) convinces me that most of them do not understand what their job is. I have described many of them as representing the party or the government to their constituents rather than the other way around.

How would I answer that question? First let me say that my answer is generalized to apply to either Representatives or Senators. For one thing I would say that once elected they will be required to take an oath to support and defend the Constitution. As keeping their oath is a mark of the integrity that is central to any position of trust, I would say that keeping their oath of office should be first and foremost in any description of the job of their office. I would also say that the exact opposite of what so many seem to do (representing party and government to constituents) is another primary task of the office that they are seeking. In other words they should be representing the interests of their constituents (that’s different than representing the interests of their campaign donors) to the legislative body they are elected to be a part of. I do admit however that representing the government and the wider perspective on the issues of the day to their constituents does have a place in their role. One of the advantages of a representative form of government is that those chosen to represent each group of people have the opportunity to help the people they represent to gain a greater understanding of issues than their local perspective would otherwise afford them.

A more complete description of what a legislator should do would take much more than one post. I hope to expound upon what a legislator is and should be in a series of posts in order to demonstrate how our current system has gone astray from the system that was designed and bequeathed to us by the founders of our nation.

Tags candidate questions, change congress, Oath of Office, thoughts

National State

How and Why to Expand the House

Post author By David
Post date September 17, 2009
21 Comments on How and Why to Expand the House

I find it appropriate that on Constitution Day (“happy” 222nd) there is a story about a lawsuit seeking to expand the House in the name of fairness for voters across the nation. Of course, I am in favor of expanding the House but let’s look at this lawsuit summed up in two paragraphs:

The most populous district in America right now, according to the latest Census data, is Nevada’s 3rd District, where 960,000 people are represented in the House by just one member. All of Montana’s 958,000 people likewise have just one vote in the House. By contrast, 523,000 in Wyoming get the same voting power, as do the 527,000 in one of Rhode Island’s two districts and the 531,000 in the other.

That 400,000-person disparity between top and bottom has generated a federal court challenge that is set to be filed Thursday in Mississippi, charging that the system effectively disenfranchises people in certain states. The lawsuit asks the courts to order the House to fix the problem by increasing its size from 435 seats to at least 932, or perhaps as many as 1,761.

Tags change congress, Delaware, Elevated, fourth seat, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming

General

Predictable

As a political junkie you would expect that I would be endlessly fascinated by all things political and that I would be very excited to listen to a speech by the President (even if only to find things to contradict when I disagree with him). Once upon a time that would have been true, but not anymore. While I am still anxious to be engaged in politics and the political dialog I find that too much of politics is very formulaic and predictable. I can easily say what the speech by the President will be like without even listening to or reading the transcript or any report about it.

In his speech tonight the president will talk about the importance and of Health Care reform. He will take time to rebut some of the more ridiculous rumors that have been circulated by his opponents and he will make his approach to health care seem perfectly reasonable – in fact he will be trying to strike a balance of being bold while not rocking to boat too much. The overall effect of the speech will be to make many people more comfortable with the approach he is taking while conveniently masking the fact that nothing in the current Health Care reform proposals actually addresses the real issues that plague our system of health care.

The only thing I can’t predict is whether enough people will be assuaged (or lulled into a false sense of security) to get a health care bill passed as the President hopes. While I will always hope for every president the best of success for the nation, this effort by the President shows no indication of promoting what is best for the nation (except in his words) and so I continue to hope that this effort flounders until the leaders of the country are ready to look at the actual problem and craft a solution to that problem within the limits of their authority rather than looking at their political goals and trying to convince the rest of us that their goals will solve real problems.

Tags change congress, current events, health care, legislation, Obama

National

Big Government = Big Solutions

Post author By David
Post date August 25, 2009
11 Comments on Big Government = Big Solutions

photo credit: angel_shark

If you want to walk a thousand miles you do it one step at a time. If you want to eat an elephant you do it one bite at a time. The genius of big government is that Congress believes that since there are more than 500 of them they can swallow any elephant-sized problem in one bite time after time. They forget that putting two geniuses to work on one problem does not double their IQ nor guarantee that their solution will be twice as good. Not only do they forget that but they go further and assume that 100 Senators must produce legislation that is 100 times as good as what any one of them would propose, that 400 Representatives will produce a law 400 times as good as what one of them would come up with, and that the combined efforts of the House and the Senate will generate results better than what either chamber had passed in isolation.

Tags change congress, Elevated, government, legislation, money

National

An Effective Response on Health Care

Post author By David
Post date August 18, 2009
13 Comments on An Effective Response on Health Care

Those who wish to oppose the current health reform plan wending its way through Congress will not succeed simply by opposing the current bill, nor by offering an equally complex alternative bill. This is a major mistake being made by those in Congress who are not ready to back the overhaul currently being proposed (mostly Republicans). The only hope is to offer a simple bill that can gain wide support and propose to pass it as a first step to real health care (or health insurance) reform.

A simple bill allowing the purchase of health insurance from other states could be just exactly the medicine this health care reform fiasco needs to turn it from the current monstrosity to a real, effective push for sustainable reform. This could not be a full solution to our health care problems but it could be an easily understandable bill that could gain wide support and show clearly that those opposing the bill being thrust upon us now are serious about reform and offering clear alternatives. In fact, such a bill plays directly to the president’s latest soundbite that the important thing to satisfy the President is that there be “choice and competition in the health insurance market.” (See remarks by Robert Gibbs among others.)

Perhaps passing such a bill would be just the thing to get the White House and Congressional leaders to come back to the bargaining table and work with the rest of Congress on this issue to get bipartisan reform (and preferably to approach reform as a series of small, easily understood bills passed in succession) instead of trying to craft their preferred bill (hiding who knows what in a massive reform bill that few people have read and nobody truly understands) and then trying to convince some Republicans to support it so that they can call it bipartisan.

I wrote to my congressional representatives to say as much. I told them:

Republicans in the House and the Senate should be able to put together such a bill (likely only one or two pages) and a coalition of support and be ready to present it in both houses of Congress as soon as the August recess is over. I’d like to see all my representatives sponsoring or cosponsoring such a bill within the first week after the Congressional session resumes.

For anyone who would like to send a similar message to their representatives (anywhere in the nation) they can do so by going to the Make Health Insurance More Affordable campaign from Downsize D.C.

Tags change congress, civic participation, Downsize DC, health care, issues

General

Constitutional Amendment 18

Post author By David
Post date August 7, 2009
18 Comments on Constitutional Amendment 18

The Eighteenth Amendment is a great example of constitutional law.

After one year from the ratification of this article, the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.

I know that many people will argue that it is a bad amendment (generally citing the fact that it was later repealed as evidence of their claim) but I would like to explain why I argue that it is such a good example.

Congress (and the majority of states at the time) wanted to restrict the use of alcohol for recreational purposes. They had no constitutional authority to do anything like that. The proper fix for this is to pass a Constitutional amendment rather than trying to ignore or get around the Constitution and use some easier means of doing what Congress wants to do. In this case, Congress followed the correct path – perhaps they had too many senators and representatives still in Congress since the 17th amendment was passed who remembered how the government was supposed to be limited according to the Constitution.

The question of whether this was a good law is a separate matter. Should Congress decide whether people should ever be allowed to consume alcohol? No. But at least in making this bad law they followed the proper procedure to give themselves the authority to take the action they wanted to take – and to successfully pass a Constitutional amendment requires a very broad base of support. If the people choose to prohibit consumption of alcohol that’s much better than having Congress prohibit its consumption because of the influence of a vocal lobbying group.

Tags amendments, change congress, documents, history, liberty

National

The Cost Issue is MIA

Matthew Piccolo has a good summary of some of the major issues that are attached to the current health care proposal. That seemed like a good complementary article to what I wanted to point out about the Health Care Reform Freight Train™ speeding through the halls of Congress – there is a major issue that has failed to be attached to the current discussion – cost reduction.

Back in ancient history (2007 through mid 2008), while the presidential election was in full swing but before the economy and the urgent need to bail out anyone with pockets deep enough to hold quantities of money starting with “$” and ending in “Billion”, health care was seen as the most important domestic issue on the campaign trail – does anyone remember that time? If you do you should remember that one of the few points of consensus on the issue between all parties was that health care was too expensive and that any attempt at a solution would have to include measures to cut the overall amount that we spend on health care. Here is a clip from Obama’s campaign website on the issue of healthcare:

we want to make health insurance work for people and businesses, not just insurance and drug companies.

Reform the health care system:
We will take steps to reform our system by expanding coverage, improving quality, lowering costs, honoring patient choice and holding insurance companies accountable.

Improve preventative care:
In order to keep our people healthy and provide more efficient treatment we need to promote smart preventative care, like cancer screenings and better nutrition, and make critical investments in electronic health records, technology that can reduce errors while ensuring privacy and saving lives.

(emphasis added)

Tags change congress, Elevated, health care, issues, liberty, money, Obama

National

The Opposite of Progress

I was just thinking today that there are two bills currently introduced in the House that clearly demonstrate how Congress acts in opposition to real progress. One is H.R. 1207 (text) and the other is H.R. 3200 (Table of Contents). Let’s have a look at some facts related to these two bills and what those facts illustrate.

H.R. 1207 was introduced just under 5 months ago. The full text of the bill easily fits on one page so every member of Congress could read the bill anytime they have two minuets to spare (admittedly members of Congress are not long on spare time). The bill currently has well over half of all members of the House listed as co-sponsors and yet there is no indication of when it will be voted on in the House Committee on Financial Services (more than half the committee members are co-sponsors but the committee chair is not among them). The Senate version of the bill now has co-sponsors and might well exceed 50 co-sponsors before it comes up for a vote.

H.R. 3200 was introduced two days ago. The table of contents for this bill is longer than the text of H.R. 1207. The bill is more than 1000 pages long (does anyone have that kind of spare time?) and there is every indication that the bill will come to a vote within the three weeks before the August recess (possibly within one week) – well before the vast majority of the members of Congress will have been able to do more than scan it briefly.

If history is any guide (which it generally is) this massive bill being rushed through Congress without adequate deliberation (just like the Patriot Act and TARP) will very soon be the cause of new government intervention (by 2016 at the latest) as we try to clean up the mess that it will leave in its wake.

Tags change congress, Elevated, legislation