Category Archives: Politics

Judges: a dying breed?

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According to the reporters over at CNBC, judges are “disappearing” from the workforce:

It seems counterintuitive that we’re increasingly becoming a lawsuit-happy nation and yet, the need for judges is shrinking. The reason is simple: Budget. From the federal government on down to states, cities and towns, cash-strapped governments are slashing their budgets.

This trend is having and will have profound effects on the U.S. legal environmental.  It is true that today most cases settle (civil) or plea bargain (criminal) long before they reach trial, but they do so under the so-called “shadow of the law.”  In other words, litigants choose not to waste time and money fully arguing their cases when the payoff (winning or losing) is not worth the transaction costs of trial (years of litigation, lawyer fees, etc.).

These settlements and plea bargainings are attractive alternatives to full trials, however, only if trials (1) are an actual possibility and (2) it is reasonably certain who will win.  If there are fewer judges, (1) is undermined.  Moreover, if there are fewer trials–resulting in fewer judicial opinions–(2) is undermined insofar as there are precedents to indicate how current controversies will resolve.  In a world with few judges, potential litigants are thus left with a less-attractive reason to settle/bargain:  uncertainty.

A potentially huge penalty for losing, combined with the cost of not knowing, results in a rational decision to resolve the problem quickly.  This is fine to the extent that it lessens legal combativeness.  It is problematic to the degree that it encourages wasteful payments of “go away money” (civil) or guilty pleas to lesser crimes by the innocent (criminal).

Michael Gerson: Obama’s faith-based campaigning has lost steam

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Michael Gerson, President Bush’s head speechwriter for most of his time in office, argues that while President Obama successfully courted religious voters during his campaign, those same voters have now turned against him. Here are Gerson’s reasons for why this has happened:

There are a number of reasons for the believers’ remorse. Social issues blurred during a campaign naturally become more vivid and divisive in the process of governing. Obama’s campaign appeal to reconciliation — which impressed many religious voters — has dissolved into prickly partisanship.

But the failure of Obama’s religious appeal is also ideological. It is true that evangelicals are generally not libertarian. They admit a place for government in encouraging values and caring for the needy. Yet they do not believe that governmental elites share their values or have their best interests at heart. Among conservative Christians, government is often viewed as a force of secularization — a source of both bureaucratic regulation and moral deregulation. By identifying with expanded government, Obama fed long-standing evangelical fears of the aggressive, secular state.

It sounds then like the issue may be that while voters liked what they were hearing, they don’t particularly like the way this was to be carried out through an increased role for government. Putting these values from the campaign into practice has proven to be a difficult task.

But it is interesting to note that Gerson concludes that religious voters, a good number of whom are conservative, cannot break from their views on the size of government to support Obama’s faith plans. Gerson suggests that many of these voters have been pushed by Obama into an ideological choice: big government or faith concerns. Why do these two concerns have to be so linked? This is a bigger issue that Gerson touches on by suggesting that “There are a range of options between government as the first resort and government as the enemy — options that few in our political debate seem willing to offer.”

World War I reparation payments from Germany to end soon

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From the dustbins of history, CNN reports that Germany will on Sunday (October 3) make its last reparations payment from World War I. Here is a brief history of the payments:

The initial tally in 1919, according to the German magazine Der Spiegel, was 96,000 tons of gold but was slashed by 40 to 60 percent (sources vary) a few years later. The debt was crippling, just as French Premier Georges Clemenceau intended.

Germany went bankrupt in the 1920s, Der Spiegel explained, and issued bonds between 1924 and 1930 to pay off the towering debt laid on it by the Allied powers in 1919’s Treaty of Versailles…

Germany discontinued reparations in 1931 because of the global financial crisis, and Hitler declined to resume them when he took the nation’s helm in 1933, Der Spiegel reported.

After reaching an accord in London in 1953, West Germany paid off the principal on its bonds but was allowed to wait until Germany unified to pay about 125 million euros ($171 million) in interest it accrued on its foreign debt between 1945 and 1952, the magazine said.

In 1990, Germany began paying off that interest in annual installments, the last of which will be distributed Sunday.

I had no idea that these payments were still being made. I don’t know the answer to this: are reparation payments between nations still a common method for helping to rectifying the wrongs of war?

It is also a reminder of the major consequences of World War I, a war that gets a lot less attention in the United States due to a smaller US role and a majority of the fighting taking place away from American shores.

Two strange examples of “rights”

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As I was driving to work the other day, I had a thought about two “rights” that I had recently heard people defend. The first came in a radio discussion about sexist comments made regarding a female sports reporter from Mexico by New York Jets. In the defense of this female reporter, another female reporter said on the air that fans had a “right” to hear comments from players right after the game rather than having to wait for post-game comments in some media area.

The second example comes from the yearly discussions about whether burning leaves is appropriate and the “right” of an individual homeowner. As far as I understand, our community has decided that burning leaves can be done as long as certain guidelines are followed.

Thinking quickly about these two examples, they both strike me as quite American: the right to sports news and the right to remove leaves by burning. But perhaps using the language of “rights” in instances like these makes the conversation about real rights we value in America, typically considered the ones written in the Bill of Rights (and its subsequent amendments), more difficult.

Kennedy/Nixon debate fanfare overblown?

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Fifty years ago yesterday, John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon faced off in the first televised presidential debate. The debate supposedly “changed the world” and the narrative of the Kennedy win has long been part of history:

It’s now common knowledge that without the nation’s first televised debate – fifty years ago Sunday – Kennedy would never have been president. But beyond securing his presidential career, the 60-minute duel between the handsome Irish-American senator and Vice President Richard Nixon fundamentally altered political campaigns, television media and America’s political history. “It’s one of those unusual points on the timeline of history where you can say things changed very dramatically – in this case, in a single night,” says Alan Schroeder, a media historian and associate professor at Northeastern University, who authored the book, Presidential Debates: Forty Years of High-Risk TV.

But after reading and reviewing the book Getting It Wrong, I’m a little more skeptical of these claims. So let me be the contrarian for a moment and suggest why this media moment from 1960 is overhyped:

1. It is part of the lore of JFK. It was in this moment that the country saw his youthful charm and in contrast, Nixon’s shadiness. JFK’s image fit television perfectly and the media has since played up the Kennedy family as American political royalty. Of course, JFK’s charm was likely evident elsewhere and Nixon was still elected president twice (after having served as vice-president under Eisenhower).

2. It suggests televised debates, in general, are critically important for elections. I’m not sure about this – I think the media thinks they are more important than they are. By always looking for a “winner” and “loser,” candidates are set up to succeed or fail. Television doesn’t lend itself to nuanced debates about critical issues; it is perfect for sound-bites and unflappable dispositions. If the voters care about debates, it is because they have been told that such debates matter.

3. Overall, it suggests TV can be an important contributor to democracy rather than just the source of junk television shows. This is debatable.

Gender bias in the application of the death penalty?

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The Atlantic provides a round-up of opinions about gender bias and the death penalty. The collection of stories is prompted by recent events in Virginia:

On Thursday night, Virginia executed 41-year-old Teresa Lewis. It was the first time a woman was executed in the state since 1912 and the first time any woman was executed in the U.S. in five years.

Overall, the death penalty issue seems to be low on the list of priorities these days. How many politicians this election season will be running on platforms based on crime and law and order issues?

Both parties disliked by a majority

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Coming up to the fall elections, a poll from AP-GfK finds that both parties are disliked:

Yet Democrats trying to exploit the GOP’s unpopularity in hopes of hanging onto control of Congress face a problem: People who dislike Democrats seem ready to vote in greater numbers than those with little use for Republicans.

In an Associated Press-GfK Poll this month, 60 percent disapprove of the job congressional Democrats are doing — yet 68 percent frown on how Republicans are performing. While 59 percent are unhappy with how Democrats are handling the economy, 64 percent are upset by the GOP’s work on the country’s top issue. Just over half have unfavorable views of each party.

If this thinking holds up until November, then a majority of individual Americans will be choosing between two parties that they dislike. Perhaps a common response will be to simply not vote – which seems to be what many Americans have done in recent years.

The poll also found that more of the people who disapprove of the Democratic party are likely to vote.

I wonder if this could become a common election cycle: every two years, the current party in power faces a crisis because they tend to get blamed for the issues in the country. Unfortunately for both parties, the issues aren’t going away and many will only get more difficult to deal with as time passes.

How to measure “success” of movements like the Tea Party

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In the midst of an opinion piece about the Tea Party, E.J. Dionne Jr. of the Washington Post touches on an interesting social movements question: what makes a social movement successful?

Before you dismiss the question, note that word “successful.” Judge the Tea Party purely on the grounds of effectiveness and you have to admire how a very small group has shaken American political life and seized the microphone offered by the media, including the so-called liberal media.

But it’s equally important to recognize that the Tea Party constitutes a sliver of opinion on the extreme end of politics receiving attention out of all proportion with its numbers.

In this excerpt (and by the end of the article), Dionne suggests two markers of success for the Tea Party:

1. Getting the attention of the media and political leaders. (Dionne says this has been a success.)

2. Having a majority (or perhaps just a large enough critical mass?) of Americans on its side or as constituents. (Dionne suggests this is not the case.)

There also could be other measuring sticks for success:

1. How many Tea Party candidates reach political office. This could be for the 2010 election cycle or for elections beyond that.

2. How long the movement lasts. Is it here just for this election cycle or longer? Is it going to be a permanent party or will it fade away?

3. How much money can be raised in support.

I’m not sure I’ve read that the Tea Party itself has defined what “success” looks like.

Collecting online sales taxes

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With so many governments struggling to make ends meet, more states are looking at how to collect more sales tax revenue from online purchases. While Internet users may not like this, it seems like this is primarily being held up by complications about how to collect the money:

Under a 1992 Supreme Court ruling, businesses are responsible for collecting sales taxes on every sale they make in a state where they have a “physical nexus.” In other words, if the business has a store, an office or even a single sales rep in your state, it’s supposed to tack the state’s sales tax onto your bill.

Online retailers like Amazon.com typically don’t add the tax, except in the states where they’re based or where they have physical facilities like warehouses or distribution centers. Amazon, for example, collects sales taxes only in Washington (its home state), Kansas, Kentucky, North Dakota and New York.

The tax is still supposed to be paid, however. And if the seller’s not responsible, then you, the buyer, are. In general, you’re supposed to voluntarily file your own report and pay the standard tax on your out-of-state online purchases. (The appropriate forms are available on state tax agency websites, revenue officials are happy to remind you.)

But it turns out that the vast majority of Americans are completely unaware of those rules, so the forms don’t get filed and the taxes don’t get paid — to the tune of $8.6 billion in 2010 alone, the National Conference of State Legislatures estimates.

Two quick thoughts:

1. Why have states waited so long to get on this? Perhaps they didn’t want to look like the bad guys while things were relatively good.

2. If more of these taxes are paid, what effects would this have on Internet commerce? There would still be benefits to Internet purchases: no need to go out to a store, often a lot more options, delivery to your doorstep. At the same time, would this help traditional retailers?