December 10, 2008
Defending Democracy
Somebody has to do it. I will tentatively defend the institution of little-d democracy, clear my throat and call for keeping the 12th and 17th Amendments. Pull up a chair.
First, I have a suggestion for James Taranto's "Great Orators of the Democratic Party" feature:
Blagojevich was reportedly caught on a wiretap explaining that a Senate seat "is a f***ing valuable thing, you just don't give it away for nothing."
I understand the tyranny of the majority, friends. Hot off of Gene Healy's "Cult of the Presidency," I must admit that most of our problems seem baked into the cake. Blog brother AlexC asks why we can't all agree that employer-provided health care is the problem? But the article he links to mentions "A Kaiser Health Tracking Poll this summer, for example, found that only 17% of Americans said they would prefer to buy insurance on their own." Not very electorally enticing, izzit? Aggravating 83% is not healthy to incumbency.
Reading Healy and some eloquent antagonists of the plebiscite at ThreeSources, I was thinking that the 12th and 17th Amendments were wrong. I don't know how to fix it (repeal the 24th and bring back poll taxes?), but a listen to the vulgar Governor from Illinois doesn't make me want to devolve the power from an uninformed electorate back to corrupt local power bosses.
At least the plebiscary might be rallied to throw the bums out on occasion. Not in Illinois, of course, but some places.