The media have made much of the reputed progressive/moderate split in the Democratic Party. The split is real of course, though it must be acknowledged that the entire party has moved left in recent years, so even “moderate” means left-of-center.
After leaving the race for her party’s presidential nomination, Elizabeth Warren said she had been told there were two “lanes” to the nomination: a left-leaning lane occupied by Bernie Sanders and a moderate lane occupied by Joe Biden. Those two lanes have been cleared of all but their original occupants, so it now appears that the Democratic presidential nominee will be either Biden or, less likely, Sanders.
Under Donald Trump, the country has moved toward anti-intellectual (and -scientific) authoritarian cronyism. When the president took office, it was hard to imagine how far from the prevailing political norms the country could be taken in three short years. The United States of 2020 is almost unrecognizable from a vantage point of only a few years ago. Those who did not embrace Trumpism—and the majority of citizens never has—have experienced a kind of political whiplash, a perpetual disorientation from which they seek relief.
The promise of a Joe Biden is a return to a pre-Trump status quo ante, followed by modest movement left. That movement, however, irrespective of which Democrat is in the White House, will be either difficult or impossible if the party cannot retake the Senate or, at the very least, defeat Senator Mitch McConnell. The fear that a Sanders candidacy will create difficulties for down-ticket Democrats is palpable and realistic. It could sabotage the very Democratic Congress needed to support the program of any Democratic president.
Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, seeks immediate and radical change. This presents two problems. First, even with a Democratic Congress, it is unlikely that lawmakers will approve Sanders’ radical agenda. Congress will be reluctant because citizens, having experienced the Trump whiplash, are not ready for being yanked in the opposite direction. For this reason, Sanders is much less likely to become a successful president than Joe Biden. Also, because of his radical agenda, he is less likely than Biden to be elected.
Democrats seem to understand this, and they will likely choose the former vice president as their standard-bearer. He is perhaps not the ideal candidate; he is likely not the candidate that would have been chosen through a better-designed primary process. But, under the present circumstances, Biden is what you get. He’s probably good enough.
March 6, 2020
March 5, 2020
Lizzy’s Choice
The political landscape has changed rapidly during the past week. The departure of Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Steyer, and then Bloomberg from the Democratic presidential race has left us with only two viable candidates, Sanders and Biden. (As best as I can tell, Tulsi Gabbard is still running, though God only knows why.)
Even though their prospects were bleak, I had expected Buttigieg and Klobuchar to stay in at least through Super Tuesday. Biden’s huge victory in South Carolina apparently changed their plans. Seeing no likely way forward, Buttigieg and Klobuchar bowed out and endorsed Biden, the only person in a position to derail the candidacy of crazy non-Democrat Bernie Sanders. Rather more surprisingly, Bloomberg did the same.
Warren, we are told, is rethinking her strategy, given that her showing in primaries and caucuses has been abysmal. She clearly is not getting the Democratic Party nod. She has not dropped out, but we know she has had at least one post-Super-Tuesday conversation with Sanders. What is Elizabeth going to do?
Warren has, I think, four choices.
First, she could stay in the race for now in the hope of who knows what. She might gain a few delegates to have a bit of leverage at a broked convention, an unlikely but conceivable outcome. Staying in at this point, however, seems merely self-indulgent and would provide proof that she is incapable of reading the handwriting on the wall.
Second, Warren could simply drop out, endorsing no one. This would show that she can read the handwriting on the wall. It would also show her to lack courage, and it would be disappointing to her supporters, who might reasonably look to her for guidance.
Warren could, of course, leave the race and endorse Sanders, who has been seen all along as a kind of philosophical kissing cousin. She has, after all, assiduously avoided attacking him. But Warren has positioned herself as a more thoughtful, systematic, and realistic candidate than Sanders, and many—perhaps even most—of her supporters could not follow her embrace of democratic socialism. Warren would lose the respect of many Democrats with this move.
Finally, Warren could leave the race and, following Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and Bloomberg, endorse Biden. Some would see this as a sellout, but it would represent a certainly personal sacrifice for the sake of her party. It has become clear, after all, that, for most Democrats, Biden is the one. Her endorsement of Biden would be a severe blow to the Sanders campaign and would make a clean Biden victory more likely.
What will be Lizzy’s choice?
Update: About the time I wrote this, NBC News announced that Warren was getting out of the race. That eliminates Option 1. The story indicated that she has not endorsed anyone else yet. The New York Times has reported that Warren has also spoken to Biden. Stay tuned.
Even though their prospects were bleak, I had expected Buttigieg and Klobuchar to stay in at least through Super Tuesday. Biden’s huge victory in South Carolina apparently changed their plans. Seeing no likely way forward, Buttigieg and Klobuchar bowed out and endorsed Biden, the only person in a position to derail the candidacy of crazy non-Democrat Bernie Sanders. Rather more surprisingly, Bloomberg did the same.
Warren, we are told, is rethinking her strategy, given that her showing in primaries and caucuses has been abysmal. She clearly is not getting the Democratic Party nod. She has not dropped out, but we know she has had at least one post-Super-Tuesday conversation with Sanders. What is Elizabeth going to do?
Warren has, I think, four choices.
First, she could stay in the race for now in the hope of who knows what. She might gain a few delegates to have a bit of leverage at a broked convention, an unlikely but conceivable outcome. Staying in at this point, however, seems merely self-indulgent and would provide proof that she is incapable of reading the handwriting on the wall.
Second, Warren could simply drop out, endorsing no one. This would show that she can read the handwriting on the wall. It would also show her to lack courage, and it would be disappointing to her supporters, who might reasonably look to her for guidance.
Warren could, of course, leave the race and endorse Sanders, who has been seen all along as a kind of philosophical kissing cousin. She has, after all, assiduously avoided attacking him. But Warren has positioned herself as a more thoughtful, systematic, and realistic candidate than Sanders, and many—perhaps even most—of her supporters could not follow her embrace of democratic socialism. Warren would lose the respect of many Democrats with this move.
Finally, Warren could leave the race and, following Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and Bloomberg, endorse Biden. Some would see this as a sellout, but it would represent a certainly personal sacrifice for the sake of her party. It has become clear, after all, that, for most Democrats, Biden is the one. Her endorsement of Biden would be a severe blow to the Sanders campaign and would make a clean Biden victory more likely.
What will be Lizzy’s choice?
Update: About the time I wrote this, NBC News announced that Warren was getting out of the race. That eliminates Option 1. The story indicated that she has not endorsed anyone else yet. The New York Times has reported that Warren has also spoken to Biden. Stay tuned.
February 27, 2020
Collect for a Time of Contagion
Americans are increasingly anxious about coronavirus and its potential to cause a pandemic. Public statements from the governments of both China and the United States are rightly viewed as untrustworthy and, therefore, not comforting.
I searched the Episcopal Church’s Book of Common Prayer and found no prayer that seemed apropos of the threat posed by coronavirus. Therefore, I decided to write one. The result is the collect below.
I searched the Episcopal Church’s Book of Common Prayer and found no prayer that seemed apropos of the threat posed by coronavirus. Therefore, I decided to write one. The result is the collect below.
For a Time of Contagion
Most merciful God, whose Son manifested your love by healing the sick, protect us from advancing contagion and the fear thereof, and grant wisdom to those who, by virtue of training or election, are guardians of public health, so that we may cast aside our fears and continue to advance the Kingdom of Heaven proclaimed by Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
February 8, 2020
“O God of All the Nations”
Carolyn Winfrey Gillette is a Presbyterian minister who is also a hymn writer. America’s recent political upheavals have inspired her to compose a new hymn, “O God of All the Nations,” which she has set to one of my favorite hymn tunes, Llangloffan (see information about this tune on Hymnary.org). Although Gillette hasn’t said so on her Web site, I suspect that her text was in part inspired by “O God of Every Nation,” which is also set to Llangloffan. (One of my own hymns can also be sung to this tune, although, for historical reasons, Munich was my first choice.)
Some have criticized this hymn as too “political.” I have two responses to this criticism. First, Gillette has offered a number of biblical citations to justify her text; it is surely scripturally based. At least as important, however, is the fact that much of the Old Testament can be viewed as political commentary. Separating God from politics separates God from considerations of good and evil. If our worship is oblivious of the world around us, including the political world, it is simply solipsistic.
I am perhaps not a disinterested observer respecting the Gillette hymn, as I myself have recently written two collects in reaction to the behavior of our current president (“For a Troubled Nation” and “For an Impeachment Trial of the President”). I don’t consider my collects to be different in kind from those in the Book of Common Prayer.
I have reproduced “O God of All the Nations” below. You can also find it on Gillette’s own Web site here, on a page that carries the following notice:
Some have criticized this hymn as too “political.” I have two responses to this criticism. First, Gillette has offered a number of biblical citations to justify her text; it is surely scripturally based. At least as important, however, is the fact that much of the Old Testament can be viewed as political commentary. Separating God from politics separates God from considerations of good and evil. If our worship is oblivious of the world around us, including the political world, it is simply solipsistic.
I am perhaps not a disinterested observer respecting the Gillette hymn, as I myself have recently written two collects in reaction to the behavior of our current president (“For a Troubled Nation” and “For an Impeachment Trial of the President”). I don’t consider my collects to be different in kind from those in the Book of Common Prayer.
I have reproduced “O God of All the Nations” below. You can also find it on Gillette’s own Web site here, on a page that carries the following notice:
Copyright © December 19, 2019 by Carolyn Winfrey Gillette. All rights reserved.
Permission is given for free use of this hymn.
O God of All the Nations
Tune: Llangloffan 76. 76. D
O God of all the nations, your ancient prophets saw
That kings and institutions are not above the law.
Integrity is precious, and truth will one day stand;
Your way is peace and justice, and love is your command.
O God, when times are troubled, when lies are seen as truth,
When power-hungry people draw praise and not reproof,
When greed is seen as greatness, when justice is abused,
We pray that those who lead us will know what they must choose.
We pray they’ll gather wisdom and lift up high ideals,
To guide our struggling nation along a path that heals.
We pray they’ll have the vision to value each good law,
To put aside ambition, to seek the best for all.
O God of all the nations, may those who lead us see
That justice is your blessing, that truth will set us free.
Give all of us the courage to seek the nobler way,
So in this land we cherish, the good will win the day.
February 2, 2020
The Iowa Caucus Poll
The final and much-anticipated poll results from the Des Moines Register were not released yesterday. Questions about the validity of the polling caused the newspaper to withhold publishing what were seen as questionable results. (See, for example, the New York Times story here.) Apparently, the Iowa caucuses will have to go forward tomorrow without the poll results.
The polling snafu may be a blessing. Who knows what the ultimate result of such a poll might be? If candidate A is leading in the poll, does that encourage supporters to participate in a caucus or to confidently stay home? If candidate B is behind, does the candidate’s supporters, discouraged, stay home and drink hot chocolate, or do they trudge through the snow in the hope of showing the pollsters wrong?
We’ll likely never really know the effect of the absence of a last-minute poll. We will, however, know the result of the caucuses tomorrow.
The polling snafu may be a blessing. Who knows what the ultimate result of such a poll might be? If candidate A is leading in the poll, does that encourage supporters to participate in a caucus or to confidently stay home? If candidate B is behind, does the candidate’s supporters, discouraged, stay home and drink hot chocolate, or do they trudge through the snow in the hope of showing the pollsters wrong?
We’ll likely never really know the effect of the absence of a last-minute poll. We will, however, know the result of the caucuses tomorrow.
January 30, 2020
A Policy Declaration All Democrats Should Love
From the competition between Democratic presidential candidates so far, one might be led to think that policy positions are the most important criteria on which we should judge presidential hopefuls. In fact, many experts point out that voters tend to select the person, rather than the person’s policies. Certainly, expectation of what a particular candidate might actually do in office is important, but it can be difficult to rank candidates on policy alone if one considers objectives, the mix of objectives, and the likelihood of accomplishing what is being promised.
There is one pledge I would like to hear Democratic presidential candidates make, and it is a one that would be widely applauded by Democratic voters. In fact, it would be great if all Democratic candidates made this pledge. (That wouldn’t help differentiate the candidates, but it would increase peace-of-mind among Democratic voters.) The promise would go something like this:
There is one pledge I would like to hear Democratic presidential candidates make, and it is a one that would be widely applauded by Democratic voters. In fact, it would be great if all Democratic candidates made this pledge. (That wouldn’t help differentiate the candidates, but it would increase peace-of-mind among Democratic voters.) The promise would go something like this:
I will appoint cabinet members and advisors who are experts in their field, rather than self-aggrandising grifters and political hacks. Furthermore, I will always give serious consideration to recommendations made by those I appoint and by career professionals within the government. I will listen to voices outside the government as well, but always with a healthy wariness of the self-interest of those offering advice.In most years, this would seem an odd pledge. After all, isn’t that what a president should do? This year, however, the declaration is a promise to undo much of the damage wrought by Trump and his minions—well, to begin to undo that damage anyway and to foster an environment that can advance the general welfare of the American people.
January 20, 2020
Collect for an Impeachment Trial of the President
I have written a number of collects, either for general use or for use in particular circumstances. As the Senate prepares to try the President of the United States, a special prayer seems to be in order, particularly since the outcome appears likely to be an unfortunate one. I hope that this collect is seldom appropriate. Before the trial of President Donald John Trump begins in earnest, however, I offer the following prayer:
For an Impeachment Trial of the President
Almighty God, whose precepts direct us into all righteousness, inspire those who sit in judgment of our president to pursue justice with wisdom, courage, and integrity, so that this nation may again display the love and compassion of your Son, our Savior, who, with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
January 15, 2020
McConnell’s Kangaroo Court
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wants a Senate “trial” of President Trump without the introduction of any documents or witnesses.
A court proceeding without documents and witnesses is simply a kangaroo court. Without documents and witnesses, the trial is a he-said-she-said affair. The prosecution and the defense can assert anything at all, and there will be no evidence to support or refute it.
Is this really happening in America?
A court proceeding without documents and witnesses is simply a kangaroo court. Without documents and witnesses, the trial is a he-said-she-said affair. The prosecution and the defense can assert anything at all, and there will be no evidence to support or refute it.
Is this really happening in America?
January 11, 2020
Gilmore Girls
A few days ago, I received a Blu-ray disk of Bad Santa from Netflix. For some reason, I had put this movie in my queue some time ago, and I ended up with it because the disc at the top of my queue was not immediately available. Having forgotten why I wanted to see Bad Santa in the first place, I expected a movie that was rather stupid. It wasn’t that, but it was quite transgressive and generally in bad taste.
The bad Santa of the title is played by Billy Bob Thornton, and his love interest, such as she is, is played by Lauren Graham. If I never see another Billy Bob Thornton movie, it will be too soon, but I was smitten by Lauren Graham’s smile. I knew her from Gilmore Girls, of course, and always thought her an attractive and talented actress. (Are we still allowed to use the word “actress”?)
Anyway, watching Bad Santa reminded me how much I liked Gilmore Girls, the entire series of which I have seen at least twice. So, last night on Netflix, I watched the pilot of the series, largely to see Graham again and to remind myself how all the important relationships in the series were set up in the first hour. It is an impressive hour of television. Today, I watched the second episode of season 1.
Re-watching this series is a real joy. I don’t have to pay much attention to plot, as I am quite familiar with that aspect of the show. This allows me to concentrate on the fast-paced and clever dialogue. I found myself laughing a lot, probably more than I had on previous viewings. I’ll likely watch more episodes whenever I need to relax and recharge.
If you aren’t familiar with Gilmore Girls, I recommend your watching it streaming on Netflix. Loren Graham plays single-mom Lorelai Gilmore, and Alexis Bledel, who has gone on to appear in many roles, including in The Handmaid’s Tale, plays her teenage daughter Rori (also Lorelai Gilmore). You won’t be disappointed.
The bad Santa of the title is played by Billy Bob Thornton, and his love interest, such as she is, is played by Lauren Graham. If I never see another Billy Bob Thornton movie, it will be too soon, but I was smitten by Lauren Graham’s smile. I knew her from Gilmore Girls, of course, and always thought her an attractive and talented actress. (Are we still allowed to use the word “actress”?)
Anyway, watching Bad Santa reminded me how much I liked Gilmore Girls, the entire series of which I have seen at least twice. So, last night on Netflix, I watched the pilot of the series, largely to see Graham again and to remind myself how all the important relationships in the series were set up in the first hour. It is an impressive hour of television. Today, I watched the second episode of season 1.
If you aren’t familiar with Gilmore Girls, I recommend your watching it streaming on Netflix. Loren Graham plays single-mom Lorelai Gilmore, and Alexis Bledel, who has gone on to appear in many roles, including in The Handmaid’s Tale, plays her teenage daughter Rori (also Lorelai Gilmore). You won’t be disappointed.
January 5, 2020
A Litany for the Democratic Presidential Candidate
In September 2012, I was thinking about the upcoming election in which President Obama was seeking a second term. As a way of assuaging feelings of guilt I might experience should I fail to write myriad essays on things political, I wrote a longish post I called “A Preëmptive Political Post.” It was something of a list of principles I hoped would guide the incoming administration.
In this political season, I have been listening to the many people vying for the Democratic Party nomination. The political game demands that candidates try to stand out from the crowd with policy proposals that often seem impractical or barely indistinguishable from those of other candidates. In fact, one suspects that, in less competitive circumstances, many candidates could agree about most important issues.
This year, rather than enunciating political principles, I thought I would list desirable outcomes or initiatives. I suspect that nearly all the Democratic candidates could, in conscience, subscribe to a majority of the items on the list, even if no two candidates would approve of the same exact group. I acknowledge that many of my own ideas cannot be implemented, at least in the near term.
My original thought was to call my list a litany, and I had hoped that the language I used would be, in some sense, not only practical but also poetic. The poetry was largely lost in rhetorical abundance, but I have retained the term “litany” anyway. What follows is a compendium of the hopes and dreams for my ideal Democratic candidate for president.
I will likely edit or extend this list as I think of things. I welcome suggestions for modifications, additions, or deletions. Read the list carefully, however, for implications that may not be immediately obvious.
In this political season, I have been listening to the many people vying for the Democratic Party nomination. The political game demands that candidates try to stand out from the crowd with policy proposals that often seem impractical or barely indistinguishable from those of other candidates. In fact, one suspects that, in less competitive circumstances, many candidates could agree about most important issues.
This year, rather than enunciating political principles, I thought I would list desirable outcomes or initiatives. I suspect that nearly all the Democratic candidates could, in conscience, subscribe to a majority of the items on the list, even if no two candidates would approve of the same exact group. I acknowledge that many of my own ideas cannot be implemented, at least in the near term.
My original thought was to call my list a litany, and I had hoped that the language I used would be, in some sense, not only practical but also poetic. The poetry was largely lost in rhetorical abundance, but I have retained the term “litany” anyway. What follows is a compendium of the hopes and dreams for my ideal Democratic candidate for president.
I will likely edit or extend this list as I think of things. I welcome suggestions for modifications, additions, or deletions. Read the list carefully, however, for implications that may not be immediately obvious.
A Litany for the Democratic Presidential Candidate
We shall protect the birds of the air, the creatures that roam the land, and the fish of the seas, including sharks and the great whales.
The waters shall be clean, and the air shall be fresh and healthy to breathe.
We shall join with the nations of the world to reduce climate-altering gases in our air, and shall help our people adjust to changes resulting both from our collective action and inaction.
Likewise, shall we join with others to remove plastics from our oceans and waterways and prevent new plastics from entering the planet’s waters.
Our national parks and national museums shall receive adequate funding to protect our natural, artistic, and historic legacy, making them available to all people.
Public lands shall remain public for the benefit of all, and any fees due for their use shall be collected without fail.
Although we cannot compensate native Americans adequately for what we have taken from them, we shall endeavor to uphold treaties conscientiously and to improve life on Indian lands.
We shall undertake the development of energy-efficient public conveyances to facilitate both modest and long-distance travel.
We shall repair public works whose maintenance we have deferred: highways, bridges, tunnels, dams, and other systems essential to modern life.
We shall undertake the repair or construction of public works only if adequately funded endowment is established for their perpetual maintenance.
More shall be required of the rich and less of the poor, as we seek to reduce the disparity of wealth between them.
All personal income deemed taxable, irrespective of its source, shall be taxed at the same rate.
Inheritance taxes on large estates shall be substantially increased.
The size of salaries and severance payments of high-ranking executives shall be limited by law.
Military spending shall be carefully reviewed with the intent to implement severe cuts.
The state shall regulate commerce for the general good, and individual enterprises shall not be allowed to interfere with regulation.
Antitrust legislation shall be strengthened and enforced aggressively.
Corporate crime, when adjudicated, shall result in punishment of the offending enterprise and its responsible managers.
Corporations shall not be allowed to make profits in America and avoid or reduce taxes by recording those profits overseas.
Senators and representatives shall be prevented from sitting on the boards of corporations and from trading securities of any kind except through a blind trust.
Subsidies for particular industries shall be eliminated unless they are needed for the purpose of national defense.
Senators and representatives shall be required to disclose, on a quarterly basis, all gifts or contributions from lobbyists or those entities represented by lobbyists whose value exceeds $100.
Senators and representatives shall be required to disclose any text from lobbyists or those entities represented by lobbyists that have been incorporated into legislation either directly or with minimal modification.
The president shall not be allowed to declare a national emergency without prior approval from the congress.
Government programs such as crop and flood insurance shall be made self-supporting or nearly so.
Interest rates and fees charged for consumer lending shall be limited.
Union creation and maintenance shall be encouraged, and anti-union activities by enterprises shall be curtailed and punished.
States and municipalities shall be discouraged from using tax incentives to attract corporations, sports teams, or other institutions to locate in their area.
The federal minimum wage shall be increased to be a living wage, indexed to inflation, and adjusted by region.
Private prisons and detention centers shall be outlawed.
We shall eliminate hunger and homelessness in our land, being generous with food assistance and committed to providing sufficient shelter for everyone
Public education shall rear competent, ethical adults appreciative of the arts, aware of our history, and imbued with civic virtue, irrespective of their natural talents or handicaps.
Public colleges and universities, as well as public radio and television stations, shall receive increased funding.
The government will encourage the institution of public school kindergarten and pre-K programs in localities where they do not now exist.
We shall respect the dignity and liberties of all human beings; corporations shall enjoy similar but limited rights appropriate to non-human entities.
Specifically, civil rights shall not be denied because of sex, sexual preference, or sexual presentation.
Anti-discrimination laws shall be aggressively enforced.
The prohibition against engaging in political activity by tax-exempt organizations such as churches shall be strictly enforced; tax-exempt status shall be revoked for repeated or egregious offenses.
Adequate health care shall be available to all, and no person shall be forced into bankruptcy because of medical expenses.
Health care shall not be dependent upon employment.
No law shall be allowed to interfere in medical decisions made between a patient and a duly qualified physician.
Drugs, whether purchased by the government or by individuals, shall not be sold for a price above the average price charged in other parts of the world.
The government shall set maximum prices for life-saving drugs sufficient to make their development profitable.
The category of Schedule 1 drugs shall be eliminated, and the government shall fund adequate drug cessation programs.
Persons imprisoned for crimes involving small amounts of illegal drugs shall be released from prison.
Psychological maladies shall be treated the same as “physical” maladies, and the government shall develop adequate programs to treat them.
Basic science and medical research, as well as a space program, shall be funded on a long-term basis to encourage sustained investigation.
Profits accruing from research supported by the government shall be shared with the government.
All citizens shall be deemed voters and expected to exercise the franchise.
All federal elections shall be at least partially publicly financed.
We shall encourage the use of ranked preference voting in all elections, including party primaries.
Gerrymandering of districts shall be discouraged through articulating appropriate characteristics for drawing districts and by encouraging the drawing of districts by nonpartisan bodies.
Laws shall be passed requiring presidential candidates to make public ten years of federal and state personal and relevant corporate tax returns; comprehensive health information shall also be required to be released.
Members of Congress shall not be allowed to vote on a bill unless they certify that they or an employee under their direct supervision have read every word of the bill.
Legislation shall clarify that no person, including the president of the United States, is immune to indictment, trial, and sentencing.
By being afforded competent advocates, the poor shall enjoy the same justice before the law as the well-to-do.
The death penalty shall be abolished throughout these United States and its military; persons who shall have been convicted of capital offenses shall have their punishment changed to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
No prisoners shall be held in any jail under the jurisdiction of this nation, wherever located, without being afforded adequate counsel and a speedy trial.
Cash bail shall be eliminated except in cases of infamous crimes or the likelihood that the accused will flee to avoid trial.
The United States Postal Service shall be maintained even if it incurs financial losses.
The integrity of person shall be guaranteed in all jails and prisons; physical, emotional, and educational programs shall be available to all prisoners.
Men and women of virtue and skill shall guide the departments of the state and labor for the good of all.
The president and secretary of state shall be required to hold public press conferences at least once a quarter.
Weapons of war shall not be owned except by the military; such devices in private hands shall be subject to a compulsory buy-back program.
In theaters of war or in areas of significant danger, the American military shall be discouraged from hiring consultants to perform duties that can be performed by military personnel.
We shall reduce our inventory of nuclear weapons and urge others to do the same or to not build any such weapons in the first place.
The word of our nation shall be our bond, and we will seek to restore the trust of the world in our wisdom and our faithfulness.
We shall seek peace among nations, strengthening those assemblies that foster concord and regular commerce.
We shall facilitate free trade in goods and services among nations, even where “free” trade seems less than perfectly “fair.”
We shall demand that all nations respect the freedom of the seas.
We shall support democracies throughout the world and shall encourage the replacement of autocracies and theocracies with democracy wherever they are to be found.
We shall restore full diplomatic relations with the Republic of Cuba and encourage cultural and commercial ties with this nearby nation.
We shall promote human rights at home and throughout the world wherever they are not upheld or are endangered.
We shall welcome peoples fleeing war, natural disasters, and civil or domestic discord, and we shall help to integrate them into our national life.
Immigration to our shores shall be available to people of all nations, subject only to an overall annual allocation and a prohibition against serious criminals; the decision to admit an immigrant shall be made with reasonable alacrity.
Persons bought to the United States illegally as children and who have committed no serious legal infractions shall be allowed to become citizens subject to the usual requirements for naturalization.
Persons who entered the United States illegally as adults, who have committed no serious legal infractions, and have been in the country for at least five years shall be allowed to become citizens upon paying a civil penalty and subject to the usual requirements for naturalization.
No one shall be deported from this country soley on the basis of having entered it illegally.
American sales of military equipment shall be guided by military needs, rather than by commercial interests.
We shall continue to maintain American troops where they constitute a bulwark against probable aggression, but we shall remove troops from places where no credible threat exists or where no prospect of lasting peace is foreseeable.
Israelis and Palestinians shall be given the choice of creating two separate states or a single, democratic, secular state; continued American aid shall be contingent on their making a choice and implementing it in short order.
Restrictions on the funding of family planning services by foreign aid shall be removed.
December 30, 2019
Isn’t She Still Dead?
Terry Gross’s Fresh Air has been broadcasting reruns of notable interviews during the holidays. At the end of today’s program, Gross announced a forthcoming interview “with the late Joan Rivers.”
Really? I doubt the late Joan Rivers is giving many interviews these days, having died in 2014.
Gross’s intent was to inform listeners of the upcoming interview and to indicate, for anyone who may not know or remember, that Joan Rivers is no longer with us. It turns out to be difficult to concisely communicate these two ideas clearly and precisely.
Some would be inclined to speak of an interview “with Joan Rivers before she died.” But surely—assuming you know something about Rivers—the interview was not done after she died.
I think the only simple way of saying what needed to be said without insulting anyone’s intelligence would require a bit more information and would be something like “an interview with Joan Rivers conducted two years [or whatever time period is appropriate] before her death.
How about it, Terry?
Really? I doubt the late Joan Rivers is giving many interviews these days, having died in 2014.
Gross’s intent was to inform listeners of the upcoming interview and to indicate, for anyone who may not know or remember, that Joan Rivers is no longer with us. It turns out to be difficult to concisely communicate these two ideas clearly and precisely.
Some would be inclined to speak of an interview “with Joan Rivers before she died.” But surely—assuming you know something about Rivers—the interview was not done after she died.
I think the only simple way of saying what needed to be said without insulting anyone’s intelligence would require a bit more information and would be something like “an interview with Joan Rivers conducted two years [or whatever time period is appropriate] before her death.
How about it, Terry?
December 17, 2019
Thoughts on the Coming Impeachment
Tomorrow, the House of Representatives will almost certainly approve two articles of impeachment against President Donald J. Trump. Now is a good time to update my thoughts about this development. (See my earlier essays “Don’t Impeach Trump,” 7/25/2019; “Slow Order for the Impeachment Train,” 9/27/2019; and “Further Thoughts on Impeachment,” 10/9/2019.)
It is highly unlikely that the Senate will convict the president. Indeed, the Senate appears as though it will be a kangaroo court. (We tend to think of a kangaroo court as a court that unfairly convicts, but the term applies to any purported judicial body that deliberately perverts justice. No one seems to know where the term came from.)
The jurors in any fair court are expected to be impartial, but the Senate Republican majority is clearly not that. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has declared that he will act as chief defense attorney for the accused. He also pretty much gets to make the rules of the court, a power any defense attorney would covet.
Nearly all GOP senators have supported President Trump through thick and thin and without reservation. We can hardly expect much impartiality from that crew. Senator Lindsey Graham, for example, has made it quite clear that his mind is made up, and he will not vote for conviction however the trial goes. It is unclear whether Chief Justice John Roberts, whom the Constitution specifies should preside over the trial, will have any real ability (or inclination, for that matter) to promote justice.
It is to be hoped that whatever happens in the Senate causes public opinion to move away from support of the president. But Trump’s approval rating during his entire presidency has been around 40% and has varied little around that figure. I have been tracking his approval on FiveThirtyEight and am distressed that the figure has recently been increasing. As I write this, his approval rating stands at 42.5%. (FiveThirtyEight aggregates poll results weighted for poll quality, recency, sample size, and so forth, updating results frequently.)
I fear that Democrats have miscalculated. They have sought impeachment on narrow grounds rather than charging Trump with a multitude of constitutional infractions, beginning with violation of the Emoluments Clause. Although Democrats see the president’s attempt to enlist the help of Ukraine in his re-election campaign as a smoking gun, the act appears less clear to low-information voters who are the core of Trump’s supporters and who are likely not paying close attention. Such citizens may not understand a quality allegation when they see one but might be more moved by the quantity of charges.
House Democrats chose not to pursue testimony from clearly relevant witnesses such as National Security Adviser John Bolton, witnesses Trump would surely have encouraged to testify before House committees had he thought their evidence would be exculpatory. Did Democratic leaders really think that Mitch McConnell would force these folks to testify at a Senate trial?
I can only assume Democrats believe that the charges against Trump plus a conspicuously unfair Senate trial will move public opinion. I hope they are right. I doubt that they are.
Today’s letter from President Trump to speaker Pelosi should convince any rational, educated person that (1) Trump knows nothing about the Constitution, and (2) the president is losing all semblance of composure. (Of course, Trump probably didn’t write the letter, though he surely influenced its tone. The letter contains too many long words to have been crafted by Trump all by himself.)
Doubtless, the Trump letter will mean nothing to his cultist supporters. Historians will make much of it.
It is highly unlikely that the Senate will convict the president. Indeed, the Senate appears as though it will be a kangaroo court. (We tend to think of a kangaroo court as a court that unfairly convicts, but the term applies to any purported judicial body that deliberately perverts justice. No one seems to know where the term came from.)
The jurors in any fair court are expected to be impartial, but the Senate Republican majority is clearly not that. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has declared that he will act as chief defense attorney for the accused. He also pretty much gets to make the rules of the court, a power any defense attorney would covet.
Nearly all GOP senators have supported President Trump through thick and thin and without reservation. We can hardly expect much impartiality from that crew. Senator Lindsey Graham, for example, has made it quite clear that his mind is made up, and he will not vote for conviction however the trial goes. It is unclear whether Chief Justice John Roberts, whom the Constitution specifies should preside over the trial, will have any real ability (or inclination, for that matter) to promote justice.
It is to be hoped that whatever happens in the Senate causes public opinion to move away from support of the president. But Trump’s approval rating during his entire presidency has been around 40% and has varied little around that figure. I have been tracking his approval on FiveThirtyEight and am distressed that the figure has recently been increasing. As I write this, his approval rating stands at 42.5%. (FiveThirtyEight aggregates poll results weighted for poll quality, recency, sample size, and so forth, updating results frequently.)
I fear that Democrats have miscalculated. They have sought impeachment on narrow grounds rather than charging Trump with a multitude of constitutional infractions, beginning with violation of the Emoluments Clause. Although Democrats see the president’s attempt to enlist the help of Ukraine in his re-election campaign as a smoking gun, the act appears less clear to low-information voters who are the core of Trump’s supporters and who are likely not paying close attention. Such citizens may not understand a quality allegation when they see one but might be more moved by the quantity of charges.
House Democrats chose not to pursue testimony from clearly relevant witnesses such as National Security Adviser John Bolton, witnesses Trump would surely have encouraged to testify before House committees had he thought their evidence would be exculpatory. Did Democratic leaders really think that Mitch McConnell would force these folks to testify at a Senate trial?
I can only assume Democrats believe that the charges against Trump plus a conspicuously unfair Senate trial will move public opinion. I hope they are right. I doubt that they are.
Today’s letter from President Trump to speaker Pelosi should convince any rational, educated person that (1) Trump knows nothing about the Constitution, and (2) the president is losing all semblance of composure. (Of course, Trump probably didn’t write the letter, though he surely influenced its tone. The letter contains too many long words to have been crafted by Trump all by himself.)
Doubtless, the Trump letter will mean nothing to his cultist supporters. Historians will make much of it.
Freedom Around the World
If you have never done so, you should take a look at the Freedom House Web site. It rates countries (and some territories) on how free they are. Rankings run from 0 (not at all free) to 100 (completely free). One can quibble about Freedom House’s methodology, including the meaning of the ends of its scale, but rankings seem intuitively realistic.
The Freedom House site contains a page that lets the visitor explore freedom ratings via an interactive map. More information is available in a country-by-country list. Current information is for 2019, and, presumably, it will be updated to keep the information timely.
Some observations: Only Syria achieves a rating of 0, an evaluation I can understand having just watched the documentation For Sama. Other notable low ratings include South Sudan (2), North Korea (3), and Saudi Arabia (7). China rates only slightly higher (11). Canada achieves a 99, but the United States only gets an 86. (That sounds about right, though the U.S. perhaps deserves an even lower rating as we complete the third year of the Trump administration.) The only countries to achieve perfect 100 scores are Norway, Sweden, and Finland. (Denmark only rates a 97.) The United Kingdom rates a 93. (Will this decrease under Prime Minister Bris Johnson.) The Republic of Ireland, on the other hand, shows up at 97.
Sadly, Freedom House’s 2019 report is titled “Democracy in Retreat.”
The Freedom House site contains a page that lets the visitor explore freedom ratings via an interactive map. More information is available in a country-by-country list. Current information is for 2019, and, presumably, it will be updated to keep the information timely.
Some observations: Only Syria achieves a rating of 0, an evaluation I can understand having just watched the documentation For Sama. Other notable low ratings include South Sudan (2), North Korea (3), and Saudi Arabia (7). China rates only slightly higher (11). Canada achieves a 99, but the United States only gets an 86. (That sounds about right, though the U.S. perhaps deserves an even lower rating as we complete the third year of the Trump administration.) The only countries to achieve perfect 100 scores are Norway, Sweden, and Finland. (Denmark only rates a 97.) The United Kingdom rates a 93. (Will this decrease under Prime Minister Bris Johnson.) The Republic of Ireland, on the other hand, shows up at 97.
Sadly, Freedom House’s 2019 report is titled “Democracy in Retreat.”
December 12, 2019
Why General Convention Resolution A063 is Problematic
At the recent annual convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, I noticed that, although proposed amendments to the Episcopal Church constitution were distributed to deputies, no time was allotted by the agenda to discuss them. Their distribution to the convention arose as a result of Article XII of the Episcopal Church constitution, which reads in part:
The constitution is silent on why proposed amendments are to be sent to dioceses, but, presumably, this is to inform the wider church of significant impending actions by the General Convention and to provide an opportunity for individual dioceses to offer opinions concerning the same. There is no special mechanism to take notice of such opinions, but local conventions may try, through resolutions, to influence their own General Convention deputies or General Convention deputies broadly. Without discussion, of course, diocesan conventions can neither elicit concerns nor articulate them.
As I was a deputy from my parish to the 154th convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh this year, I was able to raise my concern about the lack of opportunity to discuss the proposed constitutional amendments. I did so because of concerns for one particular proposal. Although I was ready to discuss the matter, it was apparent that, through no fault of their own, no one else was. Moreover, since the next meeting of the General Convention occurs in 2021, discussion at our 155th convention could still be timely. Realizing this, I was able to extract a commitment from Bishop Dorsey McConnell that the agenda for our next convention would indeed include consideration of the resolutions sent to the diocese from the General Convention.
My concern was for Resolution A063, which would amend Article X: The Book of Common Prayer. Changes to our fundamental liturgical resource are handled in a manner similar to constitutional amendments, in that they must be passed by successive General Conventions and be sent to dioceses after being first proposed. In practice, revising the BCP is considerably more complicated and time-consuming. (The most recent Book of Common Prayer (BCP) was approved 51 years after the previous version.)
Article X allows some liturgically-related innovations to be approved by a single General Convention and without special notice to the dioceses:
My problem with Resolution A063 involves the inclusion of the words “alternative and.” The phrase “additional liturgies” adequately provides legitimacy for the likes of The Book of Occasional Services, which contain liturgies lacking a counterpart in the BCP. The looser requirements for establishing such liturgies arguably signifies their subordinate status relative to the prayer book. One may quibble about whether allowing the looser approval process is a good idea, but Resolution A063 at least makes what the General Convention has been doing completely above board.
The business of “alternative” liturgies is different. Alternatives to what are already “additional liturgies” are, of course, simply additional liturgies. But “alternative liturgies” can mean—and the phrase is certainly intended to include—alternatives to liturgies already included in the BCP. This presents a problem. If the amended Article X is used to authorize an alternative to a liturgy already in the BCP, one has to ask why it is not being proposed for trial use as potential replacement text in a revised prayer book, an option afforded by the existing item b in Article X. (See text above.) The reason a provision for alternative liturgies is being added is almost certainly to allow approval of liturgies having a counterpart in the prayer book for which there is insufficient support for its superseding existing prayer book text. In other words, the matter of alternative liturgies is a backdoor scheme to avoid the laborious prayer book revision mechanism. Moreover, whereas item b of Article X implicitly suggests an end process for a proposed liturgy—it is decided to replace prayer book text or not—the proffered item c implies no such sunset provision.
The proposed addition to Article X raises the prospect of supplanting the prayer book with more easily established (and revised) liturgies. As the Church of England has done with its prayer book of 1662, the Episcopal Church could freeze its 1979 book and widely ignore it in favor of newer liturgies approved without the cumbersome mechanisms attendant to actual prayer book revision. Individual parishes could pick and choose which liturgy to use. The ultimate result could be the effective destruction of common prayer as a unifying aspect of Episcopal Church worship.
It would be easy for an Episcopalian to assume that liturgical collections such as The Book of Occasional Services are a kind of appendix to The Book of Common Prayer, but this is not currently the case. (We could adopt such a view, of course, but our “appendices” would presumably need to be subjected to the same rigorous procedures used in prayer book revision. This does not seem to be direction in which the church wants to go.) As long as additional liturgies are primarily intended for occasional use in special circumstances, they pose no serious threat to the church’s commitment to common prayer. Adoption of resolution A063 with its changes to Article X that would allow alternatives to existing prayer book liturgies, however, do indeed challenge our tradition of common prayer.
Finally, I need to mention one other issue. Suppose the General Convention wants to propose a liturgy intended to be part of a revised prayer book but which is not designed to replace an existing liturgy prayer book liturgy. For example, a gender-neutral marriage ceremony could be proposed as an addition to the prayer book without eliminating the existing Celebration and Blessing of a Marriage (p. 423). Curiously, at least as I read item b of Article X, such a liturgy could not be proposed for trial use. This problem could be resolved by modifying item b, For example, after “or of any portion thereof,” could be added “or any proposed addition.” This would result in item b reading
No alteration or amendment of this Constitution shall be made unless the same shall be first proposed at one regular meeting of the General Convention and be sent to the Secretary of the Convention of every Diocese, to be made known to the Diocesan Convention at its next meeting, and be adopted by the General Convention at its next succeeding regular meeting by a majority of all Bishops, excluding retired Bishops not present, of the whole number of Bishops entitled to vote in the House of Bishops, and by an affirmative vote by orders in the House of Deputies in accordance with Article I, Section 5, except that concurrence by the orders shall require the affirmative vote in each order by a majority of the Dioceses entitled to representation in the House of Deputies.(Sorry for this outrageously long citation; I did not want to quote only part of a sentence.)
The constitution is silent on why proposed amendments are to be sent to dioceses, but, presumably, this is to inform the wider church of significant impending actions by the General Convention and to provide an opportunity for individual dioceses to offer opinions concerning the same. There is no special mechanism to take notice of such opinions, but local conventions may try, through resolutions, to influence their own General Convention deputies or General Convention deputies broadly. Without discussion, of course, diocesan conventions can neither elicit concerns nor articulate them.
As I was a deputy from my parish to the 154th convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh this year, I was able to raise my concern about the lack of opportunity to discuss the proposed constitutional amendments. I did so because of concerns for one particular proposal. Although I was ready to discuss the matter, it was apparent that, through no fault of their own, no one else was. Moreover, since the next meeting of the General Convention occurs in 2021, discussion at our 155th convention could still be timely. Realizing this, I was able to extract a commitment from Bishop Dorsey McConnell that the agenda for our next convention would indeed include consideration of the resolutions sent to the diocese from the General Convention.
My concern was for Resolution A063, which would amend Article X: The Book of Common Prayer. Changes to our fundamental liturgical resource are handled in a manner similar to constitutional amendments, in that they must be passed by successive General Conventions and be sent to dioceses after being first proposed. In practice, revising the BCP is considerably more complicated and time-consuming. (The most recent Book of Common Prayer (BCP) was approved 51 years after the previous version.)
Article X allows some liturgically-related innovations to be approved by a single General Convention and without special notice to the dioceses:
But notwithstanding anything herein above contained, the General Convention may at any one meeting, by a majority of the whole number of the Bishops entitled to vote in the House of Bishops, and by a majority of the Clerical and Lay Deputies of all the Dioceses entitled to representation in the House of Deputies, voting by orders as previously set forth in this Article:Resolution A063 proposes to add an item c to this list:
- Amend the Table of Lessons and all Tables and Rubrics relating to the Psalms.
- Authorize for trial use throughout this Church, as an alternative at any time or times to the established Book of Common Prayer or to any section or Office thereof, a proposed revision of the whole Book or of any portion thereof, duly undertaken by the General Convention.
Ostensibly, Resolution A063 is about the legitimacy of collections such as Lesser Feasts and Fasts and The Book of Occasional Services. General Convention has been creating such material without unambiguous authority to do so. Presumably, such material is of lesser authority (or of no authority at all) with respect to establishing church doctrine, though this is perhaps unclear as well. (The official rationale for Resolution A063 can be read here. This explanation was not distributed to Pittsburgh convention deputies.)
- Authorize for use throughout this Church, as provided by Canon, alternative and additional liturgies to supplement those provided in the Book of Common Prayer.
My problem with Resolution A063 involves the inclusion of the words “alternative and.” The phrase “additional liturgies” adequately provides legitimacy for the likes of The Book of Occasional Services, which contain liturgies lacking a counterpart in the BCP. The looser requirements for establishing such liturgies arguably signifies their subordinate status relative to the prayer book. One may quibble about whether allowing the looser approval process is a good idea, but Resolution A063 at least makes what the General Convention has been doing completely above board.
The business of “alternative” liturgies is different. Alternatives to what are already “additional liturgies” are, of course, simply additional liturgies. But “alternative liturgies” can mean—and the phrase is certainly intended to include—alternatives to liturgies already included in the BCP. This presents a problem. If the amended Article X is used to authorize an alternative to a liturgy already in the BCP, one has to ask why it is not being proposed for trial use as potential replacement text in a revised prayer book, an option afforded by the existing item b in Article X. (See text above.) The reason a provision for alternative liturgies is being added is almost certainly to allow approval of liturgies having a counterpart in the prayer book for which there is insufficient support for its superseding existing prayer book text. In other words, the matter of alternative liturgies is a backdoor scheme to avoid the laborious prayer book revision mechanism. Moreover, whereas item b of Article X implicitly suggests an end process for a proposed liturgy—it is decided to replace prayer book text or not—the proffered item c implies no such sunset provision.
The proposed addition to Article X raises the prospect of supplanting the prayer book with more easily established (and revised) liturgies. As the Church of England has done with its prayer book of 1662, the Episcopal Church could freeze its 1979 book and widely ignore it in favor of newer liturgies approved without the cumbersome mechanisms attendant to actual prayer book revision. Individual parishes could pick and choose which liturgy to use. The ultimate result could be the effective destruction of common prayer as a unifying aspect of Episcopal Church worship.
It would be easy for an Episcopalian to assume that liturgical collections such as The Book of Occasional Services are a kind of appendix to The Book of Common Prayer, but this is not currently the case. (We could adopt such a view, of course, but our “appendices” would presumably need to be subjected to the same rigorous procedures used in prayer book revision. This does not seem to be direction in which the church wants to go.) As long as additional liturgies are primarily intended for occasional use in special circumstances, they pose no serious threat to the church’s commitment to common prayer. Adoption of resolution A063 with its changes to Article X that would allow alternatives to existing prayer book liturgies, however, do indeed challenge our tradition of common prayer.
Finally, I need to mention one other issue. Suppose the General Convention wants to propose a liturgy intended to be part of a revised prayer book but which is not designed to replace an existing liturgy prayer book liturgy. For example, a gender-neutral marriage ceremony could be proposed as an addition to the prayer book without eliminating the existing Celebration and Blessing of a Marriage (p. 423). Curiously, at least as I read item b of Article X, such a liturgy could not be proposed for trial use. This problem could be resolved by modifying item b, For example, after “or of any portion thereof,” could be added “or any proposed addition.” This would result in item b reading
- Authorize for trial use throughout this Church, as an alternative at any time or times to the established Book of Common Prayer or to any section or Office thereof, a proposed revision of the whole Book or of any portion thereof or any proposed addition, duly undertaken by the General Convention.
November 23, 2019
Job Protection
NPR ran a story this morning about both liberal and conservative groups urging President Trump to ban flavored e-cigarettes. Apparently, the president had agreed to do this but is now vacillating because such a ban could result in lost jobs.
I am tired of hearing arguments that one policy or another cannot be implemented because jobs will be affected. There are few policy decisions of any consequence that will not result in reduced employment in some field. If we embark on a crackdown on murder-for-hire, for example, there will surely be assassins who will lose their current livelihood. This is too bad. The good entailed by this endeavor would surely outweigh the inconvenience—even pain—of a small number of people who earn their living as hit men.
Surely, the number of people likely to become unemployed because of a ban on e-cigarettes is vanishingly small, perhaps even zero. A ban on all e-cigarettes has not been proposed, and it is likely that affected manufacturers and their suppliers, in response to the proposed ban, would, at least to some degree, reassign workers within their respective companies. If some people lose their jobs, so be it; the job market is strong, and workers in many occupations are in short supply. The effect on unemployment will be unnoticeable.
Of course, the jobs argument for an e-cigarette ban is a trivial instance of the argument. Conservatives regularly argue against measures to protect the environment or pursue other regulatory measures because the rules are “job killers.” Well, sometimes they are, and sometimes they increase the cost of doing business. People may need to seek employment in a different field. Few policies are equally favorable to every person in the country. In every case, advantages and disadvantages of a policy must be weighed against one another. That some people will lose jobs is not an argument that should automatically trump every other consideration.
Happily, the assassin lobby is weak, but it takes little publicity to frighten this president out of a policy because of potential job losses. In fact, reduced employment in one sector of the economy and increased employment in another is commonplace and, often, necessary. (Livery stables have given way to car rental counters, for example.) President Trump is counting on a robust economy to power his re-election, and his personal ability to evaluate tradeoffs in any rational way is, to put it gently, limited. We have a president incapable of seeing consequences beyond the most immediate ones. He is, in any case, reluctant to rock the economic boat if the economy seems to be performing well, at least from his point of view.
Like all other policy considerations in this administration, the effect on Donald J. Trump is what is given most weight in the decision-making process. The distribution of labor across occupations is not and cannot be immutable.
I am tired of hearing arguments that one policy or another cannot be implemented because jobs will be affected. There are few policy decisions of any consequence that will not result in reduced employment in some field. If we embark on a crackdown on murder-for-hire, for example, there will surely be assassins who will lose their current livelihood. This is too bad. The good entailed by this endeavor would surely outweigh the inconvenience—even pain—of a small number of people who earn their living as hit men.
Surely, the number of people likely to become unemployed because of a ban on e-cigarettes is vanishingly small, perhaps even zero. A ban on all e-cigarettes has not been proposed, and it is likely that affected manufacturers and their suppliers, in response to the proposed ban, would, at least to some degree, reassign workers within their respective companies. If some people lose their jobs, so be it; the job market is strong, and workers in many occupations are in short supply. The effect on unemployment will be unnoticeable.
Of course, the jobs argument for an e-cigarette ban is a trivial instance of the argument. Conservatives regularly argue against measures to protect the environment or pursue other regulatory measures because the rules are “job killers.” Well, sometimes they are, and sometimes they increase the cost of doing business. People may need to seek employment in a different field. Few policies are equally favorable to every person in the country. In every case, advantages and disadvantages of a policy must be weighed against one another. That some people will lose jobs is not an argument that should automatically trump every other consideration.
Happily, the assassin lobby is weak, but it takes little publicity to frighten this president out of a policy because of potential job losses. In fact, reduced employment in one sector of the economy and increased employment in another is commonplace and, often, necessary. (Livery stables have given way to car rental counters, for example.) President Trump is counting on a robust economy to power his re-election, and his personal ability to evaluate tradeoffs in any rational way is, to put it gently, limited. We have a president incapable of seeing consequences beyond the most immediate ones. He is, in any case, reluctant to rock the economic boat if the economy seems to be performing well, at least from his point of view.
Like all other policy considerations in this administration, the effect on Donald J. Trump is what is given most weight in the decision-making process. The distribution of labor across occupations is not and cannot be immutable.
November 19, 2019
November 12, 2019
Quick Evaluation of Democratic Presidential Candidates
As of this writing, ten Democratic contenders for the presidential nomination have qualified for the November 20 debate being held in Georgia. Below, I offer quick evaluations of those candidates. Take this for what it’s worth. Keep in mind that I am a liberal Democrat. I list the candidates in alphabetical order.
It was difficult to characterize some of these candidates. This was especially true of Booker, whom I considered labeling too urban, though it’s unclear just what that means. On the other hand, Biden, Sanders, and Warren could each be characterized as too old. Sanders might also be tagged as too grumpy. Buttigieg could also be considered too smart, which might or might not be a problem. We are unlikely to see Williamson on the November debate panel, but it is too tempting not to note that she is too weird, another ambiguous characterization.
Thinking about (and researching) these people has clarified my thinking somewhat. I will, of course, vote for the Democratic candidate, irrespective of who that may be. That said, I hope that person is not Biden, Gabbard, Sanders, Steyer, or Yang. I find myself being more kindly disposed toward Booker, Harris, and Klobuchar. At this juncture, however, I doubt that Booker will win the Democratic nod.
Perhaps the November debate will narrow the field.
| Biden | Too tired |
| Booker | Too conciliatory |
| Buttigieg | Too green |
| Gabbard | Too Republican |
| Harris | Too aggressive |
| Klobuchar | Too nice |
| Sanders | Too socialist |
| Steyer | Too fickle |
| Warren | Too leftist |
| Yang | Too monomaniacal |
Thinking about (and researching) these people has clarified my thinking somewhat. I will, of course, vote for the Democratic candidate, irrespective of who that may be. That said, I hope that person is not Biden, Gabbard, Sanders, Steyer, or Yang. I find myself being more kindly disposed toward Booker, Harris, and Klobuchar. At this juncture, however, I doubt that Booker will win the Democratic nod.
Perhaps the November debate will narrow the field.
November 6, 2019
One Flaw in the Warren Medicare-for-All Plan
At long last, Elizabeth Warren has revealed how she plans to pay for her plan for universal health care. Her plan is expensive and complex, but it is not the usual smoke-and-mirrors proposal we are used to seeing in political campaigns. Her plan might actually work (or not). Of course, even if Warren is elected president, her plan will be passed by Congress only when hell freezes over. One has to wonder why Warren even bothered.
I won’t evaluate the plan here, which has been much criticized in the press. (See, for example, this analysis by The Washington Post, which is more positive than most evaluations.) I only want to comment on one aspect of Warren’s scheme.
The plan finds $8.8 trillion—for effect, we should write that as $8,800,000,000,000.00—by requiring employees currently paying for medical insurance to pay nearly all of that money to the government instead. (It isn’t clear whether employers who do not provide a health insurance benefit are let off the hook.) I object to this on philosophical grounds.
That employer-provided health insurance is widespread, though hardly universal, in this country is something of a historical accident. During World War II, employers found it hard to attract workers. Many men were fighting the war, and wage-and-price controls didn’t allow employers to compete for labor by raising salaries. The federal government, however, ruled that offering health insurance as a fringe benefit did not constitute raising wages. (Wikipedia offers an explanation here.) Thus, a new incentive for potential workers was born.
Those wartime wage-and-price controls are long gone, of course, but the offering of fringe benefits continues to be a mechanism by which employers compete for labor. Although one could make a case for increasing salaries and eliminating fringe benefits completely, I only want to address health insurance here.
In the abstract, it has never made sense to associate health insurance with employment. Yes, workers need health insurance. But the need for insurance does not vanish if a person is not employed. In recent times, obtaining health insurance as an unemployed individual or as an employee without benefits has been difficult (or impossible) and expensive. This situation has been improved by the Affordable Care Act, but it is hardly ideal. Hence, the allurement of Medicare-for-all or something like it.
The Warren scheme of extracting trillions of dollars from employers may seem attractive, but it maintains a nexus between employment and health coverage that does not and never made sense. The plan raises other questions. What about employees who never paid for health insurance? Have they no obligation under this plan? Employees now can change their health coverage of employees or even eliminate it completely. What happens to this option under the Warren plan?
Of course, these questions are irrelevant, as the Warren plan will never be implemented. As a practical matter and as a campaign promise, only restoring Obamacare to its original form, undamaged by Trump administration depredations and enhanced to include a public option makes sense in the near term. Democratic presidential candidates need to point this out.
I won’t evaluate the plan here, which has been much criticized in the press. (See, for example, this analysis by The Washington Post, which is more positive than most evaluations.) I only want to comment on one aspect of Warren’s scheme.
The plan finds $8.8 trillion—for effect, we should write that as $8,800,000,000,000.00—by requiring employees currently paying for medical insurance to pay nearly all of that money to the government instead. (It isn’t clear whether employers who do not provide a health insurance benefit are let off the hook.) I object to this on philosophical grounds.
That employer-provided health insurance is widespread, though hardly universal, in this country is something of a historical accident. During World War II, employers found it hard to attract workers. Many men were fighting the war, and wage-and-price controls didn’t allow employers to compete for labor by raising salaries. The federal government, however, ruled that offering health insurance as a fringe benefit did not constitute raising wages. (Wikipedia offers an explanation here.) Thus, a new incentive for potential workers was born.
Those wartime wage-and-price controls are long gone, of course, but the offering of fringe benefits continues to be a mechanism by which employers compete for labor. Although one could make a case for increasing salaries and eliminating fringe benefits completely, I only want to address health insurance here.
In the abstract, it has never made sense to associate health insurance with employment. Yes, workers need health insurance. But the need for insurance does not vanish if a person is not employed. In recent times, obtaining health insurance as an unemployed individual or as an employee without benefits has been difficult (or impossible) and expensive. This situation has been improved by the Affordable Care Act, but it is hardly ideal. Hence, the allurement of Medicare-for-all or something like it.
The Warren scheme of extracting trillions of dollars from employers may seem attractive, but it maintains a nexus between employment and health coverage that does not and never made sense. The plan raises other questions. What about employees who never paid for health insurance? Have they no obligation under this plan? Employees now can change their health coverage of employees or even eliminate it completely. What happens to this option under the Warren plan?
Of course, these questions are irrelevant, as the Warren plan will never be implemented. As a practical matter and as a campaign promise, only restoring Obamacare to its original form, undamaged by Trump administration depredations and enhanced to include a public option makes sense in the near term. Democratic presidential candidates need to point this out.
November 5, 2019
Let’s Kill Daylight Saving Time
“It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” That was the famous line from a series of commercials for Chiffon margarine, a product manufactured from cottonseed oil and first marketed in the early 1950s. (For those too young to have seen one of these commercials, you can view a sample here.) When it comes to local time, however, fooling Mother Nature is almost a necessity. The question is how much fooling is appropriate.
It is relatively easy to determine noon at any point on the earth. It is the time at which the sun is highest in the sky. Of course, this means that noon occurs at different times at different longitudes. Roughly speaking—we needn’t concern ourselves with the “roughly” business here—we can divide the period between two successive noons in the same place into 24 intervals, each of which represents an hour of the day. This is all well and good, but this system of timekeeping has the consequence that even places that are close to one another have clocks that do not agree.
In the nineteenth century, the variability in local time was giving railroads fits. Individual railroads “solved” the problem by using the time in one location as the time for all stations on its line. I need hardly explain how this could be confusing, particularly when a given town was served by two or more railroads.
In 1883, U.S. and Canadian railroads agreed to create standard time zones. The standard time in any zone would be the same throughout the zone, and the time in adjacent zones would be exactly one hour earlier or one hour later. This system was codified in law by Congress in 1918. Only at the (longitudinally approximate) center of a time zone would solar noon and standard noon correspond. We were fooling with Mother Nature a bit, but it was for a good cause. Commerce and life generally were much simplified by the adoption of standard time.
Then there is the matter of daylight saving time. It, too, was enacted by Congress in 1918. It has become nearly universal in the U.S., though there are notable exceptions, such as the state of Hawaii. The times that we “spring forward” and “fall back” have changed from time to time, but now, most of the country is on daylight saving time for longer than it is on standard time.
Various rationales have been advanced in favor of daylight saving time, most of them questionable. The ecological argument that the procedure saves energy seems either wrong or insignificant. I have heard that farmers favor changing our clocks, but this, too, is bogus. (Try explaining daylight saving time to a cow.) The main lobby for continuing to observe daylight saving time is commercial interests, particularly the recreation industry. (A golf club or amusement park gains little from an earlier sunrise but may benefit greatly from an extra hour of daylight in the evening.)
I have always been skeptical as to the benefits of daylight saving time. In my post “More Haiku” I wrote, in 2001,
The relevant question is really where goes the sleep we lose. It is well-documented that the spring time change results in more accidents and more heart attacks than usual. Invariably, people walk into church late after the spring change, and, no doubt, confusion occurs elsewhere. Most people hate the time transitions daylight saving time requires. This dissatisfaction has lead to a widespread movement to eliminate the biannual time changes, a reform that would have to come from Congress.
Unfortunately, most of the agitation for a change in daylight saving time is for making it apply throughout the entire year! Doing this would be surrendering to the commercial interests that want us to spend more time and money during summer evenings, even if it means that children will be waiting for school buses or walking to school in the dark.
Well, it’s not nice to fool Mother Nature, and the benefits of daylight saving time are questionable, at best. We should return to year-round standard time. It isn’t quite what Mother Nature intended, but it’s close enough.
It is relatively easy to determine noon at any point on the earth. It is the time at which the sun is highest in the sky. Of course, this means that noon occurs at different times at different longitudes. Roughly speaking—we needn’t concern ourselves with the “roughly” business here—we can divide the period between two successive noons in the same place into 24 intervals, each of which represents an hour of the day. This is all well and good, but this system of timekeeping has the consequence that even places that are close to one another have clocks that do not agree.
In the nineteenth century, the variability in local time was giving railroads fits. Individual railroads “solved” the problem by using the time in one location as the time for all stations on its line. I need hardly explain how this could be confusing, particularly when a given town was served by two or more railroads.
In 1883, U.S. and Canadian railroads agreed to create standard time zones. The standard time in any zone would be the same throughout the zone, and the time in adjacent zones would be exactly one hour earlier or one hour later. This system was codified in law by Congress in 1918. Only at the (longitudinally approximate) center of a time zone would solar noon and standard noon correspond. We were fooling with Mother Nature a bit, but it was for a good cause. Commerce and life generally were much simplified by the adoption of standard time.
Then there is the matter of daylight saving time. It, too, was enacted by Congress in 1918. It has become nearly universal in the U.S., though there are notable exceptions, such as the state of Hawaii. The times that we “spring forward” and “fall back” have changed from time to time, but now, most of the country is on daylight saving time for longer than it is on standard time.
Various rationales have been advanced in favor of daylight saving time, most of them questionable. The ecological argument that the procedure saves energy seems either wrong or insignificant. I have heard that farmers favor changing our clocks, but this, too, is bogus. (Try explaining daylight saving time to a cow.) The main lobby for continuing to observe daylight saving time is commercial interests, particularly the recreation industry. (A golf club or amusement park gains little from an earlier sunrise but may benefit greatly from an extra hour of daylight in the evening.)
I have always been skeptical as to the benefits of daylight saving time. In my post “More Haiku” I wrote, in 2001,
|
DSTThe relevant question is really where goes the sleep we lose. It is well-documented that the spring time change results in more accidents and more heart attacks than usual. Invariably, people walk into church late after the spring change, and, no doubt, confusion occurs elsewhere. Most people hate the time transitions daylight saving time requires. This dissatisfaction has lead to a widespread movement to eliminate the biannual time changes, a reform that would have to come from Congress.
Unfortunately, most of the agitation for a change in daylight saving time is for making it apply throughout the entire year! Doing this would be surrendering to the commercial interests that want us to spend more time and money during summer evenings, even if it means that children will be waiting for school buses or walking to school in the dark.
Well, it’s not nice to fool Mother Nature, and the benefits of daylight saving time are questionable, at best. We should return to year-round standard time. It isn’t quite what Mother Nature intended, but it’s close enough.
October 24, 2019
A Proposed Constitutional Amendment
President Trump’s attorneys have argued that the president, while in office, is not only immune to indictment, but also is immune even to investigation for crimes, including, incredibly, shooting someone on Fifth Avenue. (His attorneys actually have argued this in court!) Moreover, the Trump legal team has asserted that this immunity extends even to the president’s commercial enterprises. To any rational and intelligent person, these arguments are, to put it in technical terms, totally bonkers. Apparently, however, we must wait until the courts officially declare these assertions of immunity invalid before, for example, Mr. Trump’s tax returns can be turned over to authorities investigating possible misdeeds by him.
Before now, one would not have assumed that the president is, for all practical purposes, completely above the law. The courts may make this clear, but it is perhaps time for the matter to be resolved once and for all by constitutional amendment.
In order to clarify that the United States of America has a president and not a king, I propose the following as the 28th amendment to the Constitution:
Passing such an amendment to the Constitution should be straightforward, but, in the present environment, passage may be opposed aggressively by Republicans. Amending the Constitution to assure uniform administration of justice may have to await the reform or destruction of the Republican Party. Let us not forget the matter once that occurs.
Before now, one would not have assumed that the president is, for all practical purposes, completely above the law. The courts may make this clear, but it is perhaps time for the matter to be resolved once and for all by constitutional amendment.
In order to clarify that the United States of America has a president and not a king, I propose the following as the 28th amendment to the Constitution:
Universal Administration of Justice
Neither the President, nor the Vice President, nor any other person subject to the jurisdiction of the United States is immune to Investigation, Indictment, or Arrest for just cause except as provided in Article I, Section 6.Article I, Section 6, Clause 1 says, in part:
[Senators and Representatives] shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.One may quibble about my title, capitalization, and whether the president and vice president deserve any immunity at all. My wording is not cast in stone; I’m sure it can be improved by constitutional scholars.
Passing such an amendment to the Constitution should be straightforward, but, in the present environment, passage may be opposed aggressively by Republicans. Amending the Constitution to assure uniform administration of justice may have to await the reform or destruction of the Republican Party. Let us not forget the matter once that occurs.
October 16, 2019
Let’s Add a Different Presidential Primary Debate to the Schedule
When two additional Democratic presidential candidates who were not invited to the September debate qualified for the October event, I had hoped that the debate would be conducted on two nights, with six candidates participating in each debate. Clearly, having 10 candidates was too many, and the 12 crowded onto the stage last night were many too many. As usual, the top candidates got most of the air time. As is becoming common, no one scored big, and no one committed fatal mistakes.
We know that Biden, Sanders, and Warren are the current leaders of the pack, but it is also true that there is significant talent in the pool consisting of the nine other Democrats who sparred last night. Each of those other candidates, however, had limited time to talk.
The reality is that early Democratic front-runners for their party’s nomination often do not become the party’s standard-bearer. Think Carter, Clinton, or Obama. (Even Trump himself was an early long-shot.) Unless the seeming also-rans have significant opportunities to be seen in action by the public, the choice of candidates in 2020 will be drawn from among contenders who are too old, too depleted, and too radical.
Of course, as long as less popular candidates can accumulate funds from their most ardent fans, they can continue to toil on the campaign trail in hopes of sparking interest among the rest of the electorate. But continuing to sponsor debates that favor the already popular candidates makes it hard for anyone in the rest of the pack to gain traction.
So, here is my idea to level the presidential-primary playing field a bit. Let’s sponsor a debate—it can even use the standard format, even though that could be greatly improved (see “A Different Kind of Presidential Candidate Debate”)—that includes all the major candidates except the top three. In the current instance, that would leave 9 participants, a group that would not include Sanders, Biden, or Warren.
My second-tier debate would allow participants more time to speak and to make their case to the public for their candidacy. Of course, the debaters could simply take the opportunity to trash the front-runners, but I think that either would not happen or would not dominate the conversation. The debate would help Democrats decide which candidates are promising, perhaps surprisingly so, and which should go back to whatever they had been doing. It might even help to winnow the field faster.
What do we have to lose? What about it, DNC?
We know that Biden, Sanders, and Warren are the current leaders of the pack, but it is also true that there is significant talent in the pool consisting of the nine other Democrats who sparred last night. Each of those other candidates, however, had limited time to talk.
The reality is that early Democratic front-runners for their party’s nomination often do not become the party’s standard-bearer. Think Carter, Clinton, or Obama. (Even Trump himself was an early long-shot.) Unless the seeming also-rans have significant opportunities to be seen in action by the public, the choice of candidates in 2020 will be drawn from among contenders who are too old, too depleted, and too radical.
Of course, as long as less popular candidates can accumulate funds from their most ardent fans, they can continue to toil on the campaign trail in hopes of sparking interest among the rest of the electorate. But continuing to sponsor debates that favor the already popular candidates makes it hard for anyone in the rest of the pack to gain traction.
So, here is my idea to level the presidential-primary playing field a bit. Let’s sponsor a debate—it can even use the standard format, even though that could be greatly improved (see “A Different Kind of Presidential Candidate Debate”)—that includes all the major candidates except the top three. In the current instance, that would leave 9 participants, a group that would not include Sanders, Biden, or Warren.
My second-tier debate would allow participants more time to speak and to make their case to the public for their candidacy. Of course, the debaters could simply take the opportunity to trash the front-runners, but I think that either would not happen or would not dominate the conversation. The debate would help Democrats decide which candidates are promising, perhaps surprisingly so, and which should go back to whatever they had been doing. It might even help to winnow the field faster.
What do we have to lose? What about it, DNC?
October 9, 2019
Further Thoughts on Impeachment
I have already written two posts concerning the possible impeachment of President Donald Trump (see “Don’t Impeach Trump” and “Slow Order for the Impeachment Train”). Here, I want to comment on the Trump administration’s reaction to the official beginning of an impeachment inquiry and to add to what I have already said about a possible impeachment.
Most readers no doubt recognize that President Trump’s attack on the impeachment inquiry by the House of Representatives recently announced by Speaker Nancy Pelosi is diversionary and without merit. As a help to anyone who might have to argue the validity of what the House is undertaking with a member of the Trump cult, I will set forth the case for what is taking place.
Mr. Trump has argued that the pursuit of articles of impeachment by House Democrats is merely an attempt to nullify the 2016 election. On the contrary, his disparagement of the House action and his categorical refusal to allow co-operation with the inquiry by the executive branch is an attempt to nullify the Constitution itself.
Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 of the Constitution reads
If the president is impeached by the House of Representatives, the Senate is empowered to conduct a trial of the president according to Article I, Section 3, Clause 6:
Counsel for the president has called the House action “unconstitutional,” but, as illustrated above, this is not the case.
Mr. Trump has also asserted that no impeachment investigation can go forward without a vote to do so by the entire House. The Constitution is silent on such a reputed requirement and no House rule demands it.
Article I, Section 3, Clause 7, enumerates the consequences of impeachment and conviction:
In the current circumstances, it appears that President Trump will, at a minimum, be charged with soliciting something of value for his re-election campaign from a foreign party, which is an actual crime. If convicted by the Senate, Mr. Trump could be therefore be prosecuted after leaving office for it, for misrepresenting payment to Ms. Stormy Daniels, and for other offenses.
The removal of the president from office would, of course, elevate Vice President Mike Pence to the presidency. As noted in my earlier essays, this raises the question of whether President Pence would immediately pardon the ex-president for past and future crimes, as President Gerald Ford did for Mr. Richard Nixon after he resigned from office in the face of certain impeachment and conviction.
As it happens, President Pence would not find himself in quite the same position as Mr. Ford. This is by virtue of Article II, Section 2, Clause 1:
First, President Trump can maintain his ability to be pardoned by a President Pence by resigning before he can be impeached and convicted. This is the Nixon strategy. As I noted previously, however, he can only be pardoned for offenses against the United States and could still be prosecuted for violating state (e.g., New York) laws. Trump’s self-importance makes resignation unlikely unless the march to conviction in the Senate seems inevitable.
Perhaps more significantly, the nature of the articles of impeachment drawn up by the House and the handling of those articles by the Senate make a difference. If the president is charged and convicted of only one offense, he could be prosecuted for that offense after leaving office, but he could be pardoned for all other crimes he may have committed. Even if the House impeaches the president for many offenses, the Senate could remove him from office by voting to endorse only one. This could allow Mr. Pence to offer his former boss at least a partial get-out-of-jail-free card.
If Trump leaves office before the end of his term, I hope that he can be indicted, convicted, and imprisoned. In reality, he is most likely to serve jail time by being beaten in the November 2020 election and prosecuted under a Democratic president. In normal times, this would seem the actions of a banana republic, but Mr. Trump’s outrageous behavior might convince citizens that he is simply receiving his just rewards.
Can Trump leave office early and not be pardoned by Mr. Pence? Probably not. Although Mr. Pence’s pardon power is somewhat limited, Trump’s pardonable offenses are legion. Congress could pass a bill—one unlikely to become law—to the effect that a president cannot pardon a convicted or resigned president. The Supreme Could would likely find such a law unconstitutional. Alternatively, though equally unlikely, Congress could make it clear that it would consider President Pence’s pardoning Trump an impeachable offense. This would be kosher, but, removing Pence from office would install Pelosi, a Democrat, so that circumstance seems very farfetched indeed.
I continue to think that investigating Trump, even impeaching him without conviction is the best plan. Democrats in the house can build a strong case against the president. Senate Democrats are numerous enough to keep Trump from being convicted and therefore subject to later prosecution.
NOTE: All references to impeachment in the United States Constitution are discussed in the above essay.
_________
1The constitutional quotations are from the National Archives.
The Trump Attack on Impeachment
Most readers no doubt recognize that President Trump’s attack on the impeachment inquiry by the House of Representatives recently announced by Speaker Nancy Pelosi is diversionary and without merit. As a help to anyone who might have to argue the validity of what the House is undertaking with a member of the Trump cult, I will set forth the case for what is taking place.
Mr. Trump has argued that the pursuit of articles of impeachment by House Democrats is merely an attempt to nullify the 2016 election. On the contrary, his disparagement of the House action and his categorical refusal to allow co-operation with the inquiry by the executive branch is an attempt to nullify the Constitution itself.
Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 of the Constitution reads
The House of Representatives shall chuse [sic] their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.1Reasons for impeachment are set forth in Article II, Section 4:
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.Not only members of the House but, judging by recent polls, a majority of voters believe that there is a reasonable case to be made that President Trump is guilty of infractions of the sort listed in Article II.
If the president is impeached by the House of Representatives, the Senate is empowered to conduct a trial of the president according to Article I, Section 3, Clause 6:
The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds [sic] of the Members present.Article III, Section 2, Clause 3 further clarifies the special status of an impeachment trial:
The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed.Mr. Trump has referred to the action of the House as a “coup,” by which, presumably, he means a coup d'état, which dictionary.com defines as
a sudden and decisive action in politics, especially one resulting in a change of government illegally or by force.What is happening in the House is, of course, not illegal, not being effected by force, and is certainly neither sudden nor decisive. (Only the Senate has the power to make impeachment decisive.)
Counsel for the president has called the House action “unconstitutional,” but, as illustrated above, this is not the case.
Mr. Trump has also asserted that no impeachment investigation can go forward without a vote to do so by the entire House. The Constitution is silent on such a reputed requirement and no House rule demands it.
Impeachment Consequences
Article I, Section 3, Clause 7, enumerates the consequences of impeachment and conviction:
Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.This provision makes clear that, if a president is convicted by the Senate, acting on a bill of impeachment passed by the House of Representatives, he or she is to be removed from office and may be subject to prosecution for any crimes committed in office. Because the Senate trial need not involve actual statutory crimes, a cashiered president may or may not face legal jeopardy for actions taken while in office.
In the current circumstances, it appears that President Trump will, at a minimum, be charged with soliciting something of value for his re-election campaign from a foreign party, which is an actual crime. If convicted by the Senate, Mr. Trump could be therefore be prosecuted after leaving office for it, for misrepresenting payment to Ms. Stormy Daniels, and for other offenses.
The removal of the president from office would, of course, elevate Vice President Mike Pence to the presidency. As noted in my earlier essays, this raises the question of whether President Pence would immediately pardon the ex-president for past and future crimes, as President Gerald Ford did for Mr. Richard Nixon after he resigned from office in the face of certain impeachment and conviction.
As it happens, President Pence would not find himself in quite the same position as Mr. Ford. This is by virtue of Article II, Section 2, Clause 1:
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment [emphasis added].Mr. Ford could pardon Mr. Nixon because his predecessor resigned. Had the Senate convicted President Nixon and removed him from office, he could have been indicted and tried for obstruction of justice, etc. I see two lessons to be learned here.
First, President Trump can maintain his ability to be pardoned by a President Pence by resigning before he can be impeached and convicted. This is the Nixon strategy. As I noted previously, however, he can only be pardoned for offenses against the United States and could still be prosecuted for violating state (e.g., New York) laws. Trump’s self-importance makes resignation unlikely unless the march to conviction in the Senate seems inevitable.
Perhaps more significantly, the nature of the articles of impeachment drawn up by the House and the handling of those articles by the Senate make a difference. If the president is charged and convicted of only one offense, he could be prosecuted for that offense after leaving office, but he could be pardoned for all other crimes he may have committed. Even if the House impeaches the president for many offenses, the Senate could remove him from office by voting to endorse only one. This could allow Mr. Pence to offer his former boss at least a partial get-out-of-jail-free card.
If Trump leaves office before the end of his term, I hope that he can be indicted, convicted, and imprisoned. In reality, he is most likely to serve jail time by being beaten in the November 2020 election and prosecuted under a Democratic president. In normal times, this would seem the actions of a banana republic, but Mr. Trump’s outrageous behavior might convince citizens that he is simply receiving his just rewards.
Can Trump leave office early and not be pardoned by Mr. Pence? Probably not. Although Mr. Pence’s pardon power is somewhat limited, Trump’s pardonable offenses are legion. Congress could pass a bill—one unlikely to become law—to the effect that a president cannot pardon a convicted or resigned president. The Supreme Could would likely find such a law unconstitutional. Alternatively, though equally unlikely, Congress could make it clear that it would consider President Pence’s pardoning Trump an impeachable offense. This would be kosher, but, removing Pence from office would install Pelosi, a Democrat, so that circumstance seems very farfetched indeed.
I continue to think that investigating Trump, even impeaching him without conviction is the best plan. Democrats in the house can build a strong case against the president. Senate Democrats are numerous enough to keep Trump from being convicted and therefore subject to later prosecution.
NOTE: All references to impeachment in the United States Constitution are discussed in the above essay.
_________
1The constitutional quotations are from the National Archives.
September 27, 2019
Slow Order for the Impeachment Train
Now that the House of Representatives is onboard the impeachment train, everyone is asking just where that train is going. Because Nancy Pelosi indicated that six existing committees, rather than a special impeachment committee, would be responsible for dealing with impeachment of the president, I initially assumed that the case to be made against President Donald Trump would be comprehensive. It seemed reasonable that the Ukraine affair (Ukrainegate?) was, to the Speaker of the House, the last straw, rather than the first incontrovertible high crime committed by the incumbent president. It will make a difference, however, whether the impeachment train leaves the station with a full complement of coaches or departs carrying a single railcar.
Democrats believe that Mr. Trump’s attempt to induce Ukraine to assist in his re-election campaign is egregious and unmistakably so. That this is not so clear to Republican politicians, however, suggests that the outrage felt by Democrats might not be universally appreciated by the electorate. If the House votes impeachment on the basis of Ukrainegate only—some have suggested this should be the case, and Ms. Pelosi has not been entirely clear about how the House should proceed—the case for removing the president may be unconvincing to the American people and to the Senate. The effort, in that case, would be a disaster and might well improve the chances of having to endure a second Trump term.
Since Mr. Trump seems to engage in treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors during most of his waking hours, it seems prudent to draw up articles of impeachment that convincingly portray a president out of control and more concerned with his own welfare than that of the nation. Such a comprehensive indictment is more likely to sway public opinion in its favor. Conviction by the Senate needs only a single infraction found to be a constitutional violation, so the House can improve the odds of conviction by giving the Senate more options to choose from. Besides, to limit impeachment to Ukrainegate might suggest that all the other insults to the Constitution committed by the president are unimportant. That would allow Republicans to suggest that Ukrainegate was merely an aberration, inconsistent with the president’s overall performance.
As much as my sense of justice is bouyed by Nancy Pelosi’s decision to set the impeachment train in motion, I find the development worrisome. I expressed my greatest fear in an earlier essay (Don’t Impeach Trump, July 25, 2019). Were Mr. Trump actually removed from office, Mike Pence would become president and, undoubtedly, would pardon Donald Trump for all past and future offenses, thereby depriving the Republic of the opportunity to indict the ex-president, convict him, and send him to prison.
There is another contingency that could prevent Mr. Trump from getting his just rewards, namely, resignation from office. The House of Representatives might build such a strong case for impeachment that Donald Trump, like Richard Nixon before him, might resign rather than face likely conviction by the Senate. (Admittedly, this would take much change-of-heart among GOP Senators.) Again, in this scenario, President Pence could pardon Mr. Trump and preserve his undeserved freedom.
Ukrainegate revelations are coming out uncomfortably fast. Some people believe this will allow a single-issue bill of impeachment to be drawn up rather quickly and approved by the House of Representatives. Either conviction or exoneration on such a bill would have a bad outcome. It will, in fact, take some time to fully investigate Ukrainegate, though it won’t take forever. It would be better for the house patiently to develop articles of impeachment involving all the incumbent's misdeeds without actually completing the process in time to send the impeachment train to the Senate before, one hopes, a new Democratic president is inaugurated. Slowly building the case against Donald Trump may strengthen public opinion against his presidency without either calling upon the Senate to act or alarming the president so much that he takes the Richard Nixon option.
Democrats believe that Mr. Trump’s attempt to induce Ukraine to assist in his re-election campaign is egregious and unmistakably so. That this is not so clear to Republican politicians, however, suggests that the outrage felt by Democrats might not be universally appreciated by the electorate. If the House votes impeachment on the basis of Ukrainegate only—some have suggested this should be the case, and Ms. Pelosi has not been entirely clear about how the House should proceed—the case for removing the president may be unconvincing to the American people and to the Senate. The effort, in that case, would be a disaster and might well improve the chances of having to endure a second Trump term.
Since Mr. Trump seems to engage in treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors during most of his waking hours, it seems prudent to draw up articles of impeachment that convincingly portray a president out of control and more concerned with his own welfare than that of the nation. Such a comprehensive indictment is more likely to sway public opinion in its favor. Conviction by the Senate needs only a single infraction found to be a constitutional violation, so the House can improve the odds of conviction by giving the Senate more options to choose from. Besides, to limit impeachment to Ukrainegate might suggest that all the other insults to the Constitution committed by the president are unimportant. That would allow Republicans to suggest that Ukrainegate was merely an aberration, inconsistent with the president’s overall performance.
As much as my sense of justice is bouyed by Nancy Pelosi’s decision to set the impeachment train in motion, I find the development worrisome. I expressed my greatest fear in an earlier essay (Don’t Impeach Trump, July 25, 2019). Were Mr. Trump actually removed from office, Mike Pence would become president and, undoubtedly, would pardon Donald Trump for all past and future offenses, thereby depriving the Republic of the opportunity to indict the ex-president, convict him, and send him to prison.
There is another contingency that could prevent Mr. Trump from getting his just rewards, namely, resignation from office. The House of Representatives might build such a strong case for impeachment that Donald Trump, like Richard Nixon before him, might resign rather than face likely conviction by the Senate. (Admittedly, this would take much change-of-heart among GOP Senators.) Again, in this scenario, President Pence could pardon Mr. Trump and preserve his undeserved freedom.
Ukrainegate revelations are coming out uncomfortably fast. Some people believe this will allow a single-issue bill of impeachment to be drawn up rather quickly and approved by the House of Representatives. Either conviction or exoneration on such a bill would have a bad outcome. It will, in fact, take some time to fully investigate Ukrainegate, though it won’t take forever. It would be better for the house patiently to develop articles of impeachment involving all the incumbent's misdeeds without actually completing the process in time to send the impeachment train to the Senate before, one hopes, a new Democratic president is inaugurated. Slowly building the case against Donald Trump may strengthen public opinion against his presidency without either calling upon the Senate to act or alarming the president so much that he takes the Richard Nixon option.
September 11, 2019
A Different Kind of Presidential Candidate Debate
With yet another debate among Democratic presidential candidates nearly upon us, now is a good time to consider the value of these events and whether the present format is serving us well.
Aside from anything that happens on camera, a candidate benefits from simply being in a debate, particularly in the early stages of the campaign. Whereas a candidate like Joe Biden is well-known, a candidate such as Julián Castro is less familiar to the electorate and benefits substantially from the exposure afforded by a spot on the stage. Candidates, such as Tulsi Gabbard, who were cut from the pack this time, miss an opportunity to re-introduce themselves and put their policies before the public. Of course, participation in a debate is not a guaranteed benefit. Who can forget Rick Perry’s failure to remember the three cabinet departments he wanted to get rid of? (Ironically, of course, he now heads one of those.)
What we have come to call a debate is really not a debate in the formal sense, and the more people there are on the stage the less debate-like it becomes. With ten “debaters,” there is little opportunity for sustained disputation, and, unless moderators aggressively enforce rules of who can speak when, the event can quickly become a verbal free-for-all. Candidates trailing in the polls have every incentive to speak out-of-turn knowing, realistically, that they will be called on by the moderators less frequently than the more popular participants.
Moderators have conflicting objectives. They want to be (or at least seem to be) fair to everyone; they want to explore issues that have been raised in the campaign; and they want to produce engaging television. Should they try to give everyone equal time, knowing full well that some of the hopefuls have no chance of becoming their party’s nominee? And who wants to hear from the least popular candidate as much as from the front-runner anyway? Both to explore issues and to generate lively discussion, moderators have a tendency to play let’s-you-and-him (or her)-fight by asking participants to critique the policies of a particular rival. This can make for exciting television, but it often exaggerates the differences between candidates and leaves some participants out of the discussion.
Particularly at this point in the campaign, the usual debate format encourages fights over minutiae among people who largely agree with one another, and it rewards clever bons mots created in advance specially for the occasion. Debates (and the primary campaign generally) artificially encourage articulation of policies that are markedly different from (and, implicitly, better than) those of other candidates. Politicians generally, not only Donald Trump, are loath to admit to either having made a mistake or to having found another’s idea to be an improvement on the politician’s own.
Debates can be enhanced in small ways. Four years ago, I offered some possible improvements. (See “Suggestions for Presidential Debates.”) But perhaps what we need is something quite different, at least during the early presidential primary season. I offer a debate-alternative below and suggest why I think it would be a helpful addition to our political toolbox. Others may have even better ideas. I do think we need better ideas!
Let’s face it; debating skills (or whatever skills are needed for what we call debates) are not an important skill required of the chief executive. In fact, skills needed to become president, particularly those observable to voters, are not necessarily the most important skills needed to be president. Candidates can exhibit more important presidential skills and give voters a better sense of just who they are by radically changing the nature of intra-party debates.
Here is my suggested format: Seat (not stand) the candidates in a semi-circle faced by the moderator. There should be no studio audience. Candidates are not allowed to have notes. The moderator will have chosen in advance a set of problems (not solutions) to discuss and an amount of time to be devoted to each problem. Although candidates could be given a problem list ahead of time, this is likely unnecessary, as the important issues facing the nation should be obvious. A surprise topic or two might usefully contribute to the program, however. Candidates are expected to discuss—this could mean arguing about—the nature and causes of the problem, as well as possible approaches to ameliorating it. Other duties of the moderator are the following:
This format has a number of advantages over the conventional one:
Debates later in the campaign season should probably be some variation of the conventional events.
Evidence suggests that, for many people, policy positions are less important than character, the 2016 election notwithstanding. My modified debate scheme may be more helpful to voters for whom that is true.
Aside from anything that happens on camera, a candidate benefits from simply being in a debate, particularly in the early stages of the campaign. Whereas a candidate like Joe Biden is well-known, a candidate such as Julián Castro is less familiar to the electorate and benefits substantially from the exposure afforded by a spot on the stage. Candidates, such as Tulsi Gabbard, who were cut from the pack this time, miss an opportunity to re-introduce themselves and put their policies before the public. Of course, participation in a debate is not a guaranteed benefit. Who can forget Rick Perry’s failure to remember the three cabinet departments he wanted to get rid of? (Ironically, of course, he now heads one of those.)
What we have come to call a debate is really not a debate in the formal sense, and the more people there are on the stage the less debate-like it becomes. With ten “debaters,” there is little opportunity for sustained disputation, and, unless moderators aggressively enforce rules of who can speak when, the event can quickly become a verbal free-for-all. Candidates trailing in the polls have every incentive to speak out-of-turn knowing, realistically, that they will be called on by the moderators less frequently than the more popular participants.
Moderators have conflicting objectives. They want to be (or at least seem to be) fair to everyone; they want to explore issues that have been raised in the campaign; and they want to produce engaging television. Should they try to give everyone equal time, knowing full well that some of the hopefuls have no chance of becoming their party’s nominee? And who wants to hear from the least popular candidate as much as from the front-runner anyway? Both to explore issues and to generate lively discussion, moderators have a tendency to play let’s-you-and-him (or her)-fight by asking participants to critique the policies of a particular rival. This can make for exciting television, but it often exaggerates the differences between candidates and leaves some participants out of the discussion.
Particularly at this point in the campaign, the usual debate format encourages fights over minutiae among people who largely agree with one another, and it rewards clever bons mots created in advance specially for the occasion. Debates (and the primary campaign generally) artificially encourage articulation of policies that are markedly different from (and, implicitly, better than) those of other candidates. Politicians generally, not only Donald Trump, are loath to admit to either having made a mistake or to having found another’s idea to be an improvement on the politician’s own.
Debates can be enhanced in small ways. Four years ago, I offered some possible improvements. (See “Suggestions for Presidential Debates.”) But perhaps what we need is something quite different, at least during the early presidential primary season. I offer a debate-alternative below and suggest why I think it would be a helpful addition to our political toolbox. Others may have even better ideas. I do think we need better ideas!
Let’s face it; debating skills (or whatever skills are needed for what we call debates) are not an important skill required of the chief executive. In fact, skills needed to become president, particularly those observable to voters, are not necessarily the most important skills needed to be president. Candidates can exhibit more important presidential skills and give voters a better sense of just who they are by radically changing the nature of intra-party debates.
Here is my suggested format: Seat (not stand) the candidates in a semi-circle faced by the moderator. There should be no studio audience. Candidates are not allowed to have notes. The moderator will have chosen in advance a set of problems (not solutions) to discuss and an amount of time to be devoted to each problem. Although candidates could be given a problem list ahead of time, this is likely unnecessary, as the important issues facing the nation should be obvious. A surprise topic or two might usefully contribute to the program, however. Candidates are expected to discuss—this could mean arguing about—the nature and causes of the problem, as well as possible approaches to ameliorating it. Other duties of the moderator are the following:
- Call on participants based on raised hands.
- Without imposing a fixed time limit on contributions, ensure that no one dominates the discussion.
- Keep the discussion on topic.
- Do not allow discussion of measures to deal with the problem until a substantial consensus is reached about the nature and causes of the problem.
- Insofar as it’s possible, give everyone who wants to speak an equal opportunity to do so.
- Move on to the next topic when the time for the current one expires, irrespective of the state of the discussion. (The moderator should avoid interrupting a speaker if possible.)
This format has a number of advantages over the conventional one:
- It provides a sense of how candidates approach problems and make decisions, important presidential skills.
- It is likely to provide a better sense of candidates’ temperaments than does the usual high-pressure debate, with its need to upstage particular rivals.
- It provides a better sense of candidates’ philosophical orientation.
- It educates the audience about the issues of the day, something that provides insight into proposed policies.
- To the degree that candidates put forth a plan devised in advance, they are forced to “show their work,” i.e., explain explicitly how their “solution” relates to their understanding of the problem.
- It provides a sense of where the party itself stands and of the distribution of views within the party. The format encourages consensus, rather than uniqueness of ideas, offering a strong sense of the party. (Commentators have complained that people no longer know what the Democratic Party stands for.)
- Ultimately, it should help candidates hone their proposals, based on ideas from other candidates.
Debates later in the campaign season should probably be some variation of the conventional events.
Evidence suggests that, for many people, policy positions are less important than character, the 2016 election notwithstanding. My modified debate scheme may be more helpful to voters for whom that is true.
September 6, 2019
Arguing Against an Anti-abortion Argument
In a story titled “Plan C,” by Nona Liss-Schultz, in the current issue of Mother Jones, Alabama State Senator Clyde Chambliss is quoted as saying, “When God creates the miracle of life inside a woman’s womb, it is not our place as human beings to extinguish that life.” That being a religious argument, of course, it is hardly a legitimate basis for legislation. There is nothing wrong with legislators taking religious concerns into account, however. But this argument is crazy even as a religious argument.
Chambliss’s reasoning can easily lead to a sense of powerlessness and a willingness to accept whatever fortune or tragedy comes our way. But fatalism is not a particularly useful philosophy, and a Christianity that rejects free will must necessarily reject salvation as well. I don’t think I exaggerate by paraphrasing Chambliss’s statement as don’t fuck with God’s plan.
If we are to accept a pregnancy as a God-given event not properly subject to human intervention, what other “gifts” of God should receive similar consideration? How about breast cancer? Muscular dystrophy? Polio? Swine flu? Are we to eschew medicine entirely? Why stop at medicine. Aren’t floods “acts of God?” Is it moral to try to avoid them, say, by building levies? You get my point.
But, back to the pregnancy thing. You may choose to think of pregnancy as an act of God, but, let’s face it, two people are directly responsible for it. Parents—willing or not—need to take responsibility for a largely avoidable event, not blame it on God. If the pregnancy was a human “mistake,” why should we prohibit a human correction?
On the other hand, contracting breast cancer or muscular dystrophy is, as far as we know, a circumstance over which we have no control. Surely, such medical tragedies are more easily seen as God’s work than pregnancy. Is it “not our place as human beings” to intervene? Why is the case for non-intervention regarding pregnancy stronger than that for breast cancer?
Let’s face it, Chambliss, like so many “pro-life” partisans, abhor abortions for their own reasons, and they are willing to advance any argument, however illogical or inconsistent, to try to make abortions illegal. Their arguments, however crazy, must always be countered.
Chambliss’s reasoning can easily lead to a sense of powerlessness and a willingness to accept whatever fortune or tragedy comes our way. But fatalism is not a particularly useful philosophy, and a Christianity that rejects free will must necessarily reject salvation as well. I don’t think I exaggerate by paraphrasing Chambliss’s statement as don’t fuck with God’s plan.
If we are to accept a pregnancy as a God-given event not properly subject to human intervention, what other “gifts” of God should receive similar consideration? How about breast cancer? Muscular dystrophy? Polio? Swine flu? Are we to eschew medicine entirely? Why stop at medicine. Aren’t floods “acts of God?” Is it moral to try to avoid them, say, by building levies? You get my point.
But, back to the pregnancy thing. You may choose to think of pregnancy as an act of God, but, let’s face it, two people are directly responsible for it. Parents—willing or not—need to take responsibility for a largely avoidable event, not blame it on God. If the pregnancy was a human “mistake,” why should we prohibit a human correction?
On the other hand, contracting breast cancer or muscular dystrophy is, as far as we know, a circumstance over which we have no control. Surely, such medical tragedies are more easily seen as God’s work than pregnancy. Is it “not our place as human beings” to intervene? Why is the case for non-intervention regarding pregnancy stronger than that for breast cancer?
Let’s face it, Chambliss, like so many “pro-life” partisans, abhor abortions for their own reasons, and they are willing to advance any argument, however illogical or inconsistent, to try to make abortions illegal. Their arguments, however crazy, must always be countered.
September 4, 2019
Happy Summer Day
Happy Summer Day
by Lionel Deimel
An ordinary drive across town
Past the usual scenery with its familiar flagpoles
Fronting fire station, bank, courthouse, high school
Flying red, white, and blue banners
Emblazoned against a cloudless azure sky
Below their bold silver finials
Evincing pride in a great nation
And announcing a happy day across the land:
There were no mass shootings yesterday.
The above poem is a second draft. I’m not sure if I will revise it further.
It seems that flags fly at half-staff frequently these days. As I drive past them, I sometimes have to ask why they are not flying high that particular day. Often, however, I know the flags are at half-staff in acknowledgment of a mass shooting somewhere in the country. These were not always so common.
by Lionel Deimel
An ordinary drive across town
Past the usual scenery with its familiar flagpoles
Fronting fire station, bank, courthouse, high school
Flying red, white, and blue banners
Emblazoned against a cloudless azure sky
Below their bold silver finials
Evincing pride in a great nation
And announcing a happy day across the land:
There were no mass shootings yesterday.
The above poem is a second draft. I’m not sure if I will revise it further.
It seems that flags fly at half-staff frequently these days. As I drive past them, I sometimes have to ask why they are not flying high that particular day. Often, however, I know the flags are at half-staff in acknowledgment of a mass shooting somewhere in the country. These were not always so common.
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