A few stories regarding last weeks' roll out of the federal health care exchange

The Economist: Will it get better?
Wonkblog: A design critique of HealthCare.gov.
Wonkblog: A techie walks us through . . .
Wonkblog: The individual mandate's penalty costs more than you think.

From The Hill: ‘Citizens United II’ could open floodgates

The Hill points attention to another Supreme Court case which promises to allow for more money from wealthy donors into the political system.

The case is McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission.
Here's detail:

At issue in the case are aggregate contribution limits – the maximum amount that a donor can give to federal candidates and political party committees throughout the course of a two-year election cycle.

Dubbed “Citizens United II” by watchdogs, they worry without the limits, donors’ influence will only grow.

“If the court strikes down these limits they will leave the nation unable to protect itself from the wholesale corruption of our officeholders and of government decisions,” said Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, which lobbies for stronger campaign finance laws.

Now set at just over $123,200, the limits were enacted by Congress in the early 1970s and upheld by the court’s 1976 decision in a case dubbed Buckley v. Valeo.

“Congress was surely entitled to conclude… that contribution ceilings were a necessary legislative concomitant to deal with the reality or appearance of corruption inherent in a system permitting unlimited financial contributions,” the court found.

The Supreme Court has taken up numerous campaign finance cases since then, but has declined until now to revisit the Buckley finding.

The justices will consider the case of Shaun McCutcheon, an Alabama businessman and GOP backer who is challenging the limits as unconstitutional. His central argument is simple: limiting donations hampers contributors’ free speech and their participation in the political system.

“Contributing to candidates is protected by the First Amendment,” said the Bopp Law Firm’s James Bopp, lead counsel for the Republican National Committee, which has partnered with McCutcheon on the case to oppose the aggregate limit.

“When you have a law that prevents you from contributing to candidates that you want to, which this law does, it is prohibiting speech, which is what a contribution is,” he said.

Some of the major cases before the SC

A quick look at the principle questions to be raised this term - drawn from the USA Today's preview.

Affirmative Action
- Schuette v Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action
- Question: Does a state constitutional amendment barring racial preferences in public university admissions violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution.

Legislative Prayer
- Town of Greece v Galloway
- Question: Does a town;s policy of having local clergy recite prayers at government meetings violate the First Amendment's establishment clause when nearly all prayers are Christian?

Housing Discrimination
- Mount Holly v Mt. Holly Gardens Citizens in Action
- Question: Is a government policy, such as redeveloping a blighted neighborhood, permitted under the Fair Housing Act of 1968 if it has a disparate impact on racial minorities?

EPA
- EPA v EME Homer City Generation
- Can the federal government supersede states' authority by setting emissions reduction plans for power plants, based in part on pollution that travels to downwind states?

Recess Appointments
- NLRB v Noel Canning
- Can the president use his recess appointment power to sidestep Senate confirmation during intra-session recesses, or when the vacancy predates the recess, or when the Senate is Meeting every three days in pro-forma sessions?

Abortion Buffer Zones
- McCullen v Coakley
- Can a state set up a buffer zone around reproductive health care facilities that perform abortions, on order to separate patients from protesters?

Medical Abortion
- Cline v Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice
- Can the state limit the administration of abortion-inducing drugs to the protocols specified on their labels, thereby restricting so-call;ed medical abortions?

Health Care Contraception
- Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores
- Can a family owned corporation whose owners oppose abortion refuse to offer health insurance policies that include coverage of contraceptives, as required by President Obama's health care law?

Cell Phones
- Riley v. California
- Can police search the data in a suspect's cellphone during a routine search incident to arrest, without first getting  warrant?

The Supreme Court reconvenes

The US Supreme Court reconvenes the first Monday of each October.

Which is tomorrow.

Here's are a few stories detailing what lies ahead:
- NYT: The Supreme Court Returns.
- CSM: Campaign finance and public prayer top new term agenda.
- LAT: In new term, Supreme Court may steer to right on key social issues.
- USA Today: Supreme Court poised to tilt further to the right.

For 2305 tomorrow

A look through the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

This will be in addition to glancing through Rivals for Powers.

Written Assignment #9

This is the last of the core assessments.

Critical Thinking

Operational Definition: Upon completion of a degree plan at Alvin Community College, students will demonstrate the successful application of higher order analyses, innovative interpretation of evidence, and creative cognitive processes.

Enhancing the Right to Vote: Voter Suppression vs. Voter Fraud

At the heart of the debate over voter the requirement that photo identification be presented in order to vote is whether the move is a legitimate means to curtail voter fraud, or an illegitimate means to suppress the vote on the part of the population that may find it difficult to obtain adequate ID.

In a critical essay I want you to determine how best to promote the right to vote while ensuring that votes are legitimate. How much effort should be made by the government (be it local, state, or nation) in enhancing access to the polls all the while ensuring that the votes cast are in fact legitimate.

While you do so, also evaluate the claims on the one side that voter ID measures are intended to suppress the votes of certain populations – thus biasing election results – and on the other that voter fraud is rampant.

Speculate also on the political feasibility of passing legislation that enhances access to the polls.

150 words at a minimum

Due October 28

Written Assignment #8

This is the next core assessment required by the state of Texas.

Social Responsibility

Operational Definition: Student will understand the importance of making a personal investment in the well-being of others, the community and/or the planet while showing respect for the ideas and beliefs of others.

What is Your Responsibility to Keeping the Republic

One of the themes of this class – at least one that was introduced early in the semester – was that you are a citizen (or at least a resident) in a democratic republic, and one of your responsibilities is to sustain it. Remember Franklin’s alleged response to the woman who asked him what they had produced in the constitutional convention.

Based on what we have covered this semester so far, what does this mean?

Keep in mind that while you have certain rights and liberties, so do others. What do you have to do to comply with your responsibility to help keep the republic? What are your responsibilities? You might want to take on Franklin however. Perhaps you don’t think this is your responsibility. If so, make a persuasive case.

Again - write at least 150 words.

Due October 21

Written Assignment #7

This question is directed at one of the core assessment items established by the state of Texas.

Personal Responsibility

Operational Definitions: Students will demonstrate the ability to connect choices, actions and consequences to ethical decision making.

The Ethics of Voting

Despite your young age (at least at heart), you have already been bombarded with messages about the importance of voting and participating in the politics, including in this class. But both voting and participation carry with it the responsibility that you stay informed in order to make sensible, justifiable – ethical - decisions. As you also know, in the complex political world American live in, this takes time. We also have lives to live and other responsibilities that require out attention.

I want you to address this issue in the following question(s): How much time and effort should reasonable, ethical citizens spend educating themselves prior to deciding how to position themselves on public policy issues and how to vote? What types of shortcuts are and are not acceptable? Is there a responsibility for citizens with low information to not vote in an election?

You can take this in as many directions you choose, but your answer should focus on what it takes to be a responsible citizen and the degree to which this involves informed voting.

Write at least 150 words, turn it in by October 14

Is the US now ungovernable?

The Economist worries that it is:

. . . Republicans are setting a precedent which, if followed, would make America ungovernable. Voters have seen fit to give their party control of one arm of government—the House of Representatives—while handing the Democrats the White House and the Senate. If a party with such a modest electoral mandate threatens to shut down government unless the other side repeals a law it does not like, apparently settled legislation will always be vulnerable to repeal by the minority. Washington will be permanently paralysed and America condemned to chronic uncertainty.

It gets worse. Later this month the federal government will reach its legal borrowing limit, known as the “debt ceiling”. Unless Congress raises that ceiling, Uncle Sam will soon be unable to pay all his bills. In other words, unless the two parties can work together, America will have to choose which of its obligations not to honour. It could slash spending so deeply that it causes a recession. Or it could default on its debts, which would be even worse, and unimaginably more harmful than a mere government shutdown. No one in Washington is that crazy, surely?

Like other commentators, they argue the fault lies in the polarization facilitated by gerrymandered districts.

The solution is to reform the electoral process by establishing independent commissions to draw electoral districts instead of parties in state legislatures:

What can be done? In the short term, House Republicans need to get their priorities straight. They should pass a clean budget resolution without trying to refight old battles over Obamacare. They should also vote to raise the debt ceiling (or better yet, abolish it). If Obamacare really does turn out to be a flop and Republicans win the presidency and the Senate in 2016, they can repeal it through the normal legislative process.
In the longer term, America needs to tackle polarisation. The problem is especially acute in the House, because many states let politicians draw their own electoral maps.

Unsurprisingly, they tend to draw ultra-safe districts for themselves. This means that a typical congressman has no fear of losing a general election but is terrified of a primary challenge. Many therefore pander to extremists on their own side rather than forging sensible centrist deals with the other. This is no way to run a country. Electoral reforms, such as letting independent commissions draw district boundaries, would not suddenly make America governable, but they would help. It is time for less cliff-hanging, and more common sense.

Good luck with that. California is using one, but I doubt it would have much of a chance in Texas.

Medicaid Expansion in the 83rd Session

For both 2305 and 2306: One of the major questions facing the 83rd Texas legislative session was whether Texas should participate in the expansion of Medicaid encouraged by the ACA.

Texas ultimately opted to not do so. Opposition was driven by top statewide elected officials and Republican Party. Local government however were much more supportive of the expansion, as were health care providers.

- Here's a Texas Tribune story from January 26, 2013 which claimed the state would benefit from the expansion:

Expanding Medicaid is a "smart, affordable and fair" decision for Texas, according to a report issued by Billy Hamilton, a nonpartisan consultant commissioned by Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas and Texas Impact, a statewide interfaith network.

“If politics are set aside, the right decision is obvious,” wrote Hamilton, a former deputy comptroller of public accounts who was once the state’s chief revenue estimator. He argued that for an investment of $15 billion, Texas could draw down $100 billion in federal funds and expand health care coverage to 2 million low-income Texans over 10 years.

. . . In contrast to arguments that the Medicaid expansion would cost Texas too much money, Hamilton finds state spending on the Medicaid expansion could be met “many times over” with existing funds that the state, local jurisdictions and hospitals already spend on unreimbursed charity care for low-income adults. An estimated $1.8 billion in new state revenue generated by the expansion could offset the state’s match for the Medicaid expansion from 2014 to 2017, Hamilton says, adding that an estimated 231,000 jobs, $2.5 billion in local revenue and $67.9 billion in total economic output could be generated by 2016.

Here are a few other random stories related to the proposed expansion:

- Texas Hospital Association argues in favor of expansion.
- Texas Public Policy Foundation argues against it.
- The Legislative Reference Library lists the bills filed in the 83rd session concerning expansion.
- Texas Matters: The Cost of Not Expanding Medicaid.
- Texas Legislature Passes Measure To Prevent Medicaid Expansion.

How many are uninsured in Texas?

Some links:

- Texas Medical Association: The Uninsured in Texas.

Texas is the uninsured capital of the United States. More than 6.3 million Texans - including 1.2 million children - lack health insurance. Texas' uninsurance rates, 1.5 to 2 times the national average, create significant problems in the financing and delivery of health care to all Texans. Those who lack insurance coverage typically enjoy far-worse health status than their insured counterparts.

- Wonkblog: Why Texas has the highest percentage of uninsured people in the U.S.

They cite four reasons. Many Texas jobs don;t offer health insurance. The Medicaid program is relatively limited, generally only the federally mandated minimum coverage is provided. The insurance market is unregulated, which can make it expensive and unobtainable for many potential customers. And many of the uninsured are immigrants, a group which tends to not be insured.

- Gallup Poll: Texas Uninsured Rate Drifts Further From Other States.

From the NYT: Millions of Poor Are Left Uncovered by Health Law

One part of the ACA encourages states to provide access to health care to the poor by expanding Medicaid. As opposed to Medicare - which is a fully federally run program that provides medical assistance for the elderly - Medicaid is funded by the national government but run largely by the states. This allows the states some control over who gets funding and who does not.

Originally the ACA required states to expand coverage to people with incomes up to 133% of the federal poverty level or risk losing all Medicaid funding. This was the only major part of the ACA that was found unconstitutional. States were allowed to be able to opt out of the expansion while still retaining existing benefits.

Many states, including Texas, have done so.

The NYT discusses the consequence of this decision, which had created a group of 8 million or so people a bit too wealthy to qualify for Medicaid, but not wealthy enough to qualify for subsidies for health insurance.

Click here for a map showing where the poor and uninsured live.

The Dish flags this chart showing Medicaid eligibility levels in different states and whether that state has accepted Medicaid expansion.



 

Are government shutdowns the new normal?

This author thinks so, and does not see this as a good thing.

He also suggests that threats of shutdowns will join other procedural changes to make governing more and more difficult:

Just take a look at what’s happened to the Senate in recent years. Once, filibusters were rare exceptions. Now, they are constant. Nearly every bill, no matter how trivial, requires 60 votes for passage in a body that historically required a mere majority.

Similarly, presidential nominations are now routinely blocked for reasons only occasionally having to do with the qualifications of the nominee. Lawmakers have learned that they can take a nominee hostage in order to send an ideological message or convince an administration to change a regulation.

As a result, behavior that was once rare has become as routine as the Senate’s daily prayer.

The same thing has happened with the budget process. Over the past four decades, various efforts to manage the deficit eventually failed in the same way: Each included special rules aimed at waiving their spending limits in the event of an emergency. But lawmakers soon learned they could use these exceptions whenever they wanted. They got addicted, the waivers became the legislative norm, and efforts to control spending withered.

I fear the same is about to happen with government shutdowns. Once those who would use the shutdown as a useful legislative lever succeed, it will become a tool of choice. True, it couldn’t be used in every circumstance, but there would be enough opportunities to make it the next filibuster.

Have Republicans hit a sweet spot in their gerrymandering strategy?

The Economist suggest that they have.

In the redistricting that happened after the 2010 census - and the 2010 election where Republicans did very very well which allowed them to control a large number of state legislatures - a large districts were drawn where Republicans dominated, but not too much. Republican votes were spread enough to guarantee majorities in a large enough number of districts to ensure control of legislature despite having fewer overall votes than Democrats.

They guaranteed themselves a majority, with a maximum number of safe seats. This makes them immune to negative opinion about things like shutting government down.

It was a neat trick:

Republicans have managed to both make their seats safer, and ensure there are more of them, despite the fact that they lost the overall popular congressional vote. How did they do that?

By finding the golden mean. The ideal strategy for elections is to make sure your districts have just enough of a partisan tilt to ensure you'll almost certainly win them, but not so much that you win them overwhelmingly and waste your votes. Meanwhile, you want to cram the opposition's voters into districts which they win by overwhelming margins and thus waste their votes. Republicans can make sure their seats are both safer and more numerous by achieving lots of districts where they're likely to win by a safe but not extravagant margin, say 15-30%. If they pursue this strategy, they should wind up with relatively fewer seats that tilt overwhelmingly Republican. Meanwhile for Democrats, whose votes have been "cracked" or "packed" such that they lose more districts, the districts that they do hold would be more likely to be overwhelmingly Democratic than is the case for Republicans.

And this is what the Republicans' redistricting appear to have achieved. Of members of congress who won their districts with a margin of 60% or more in 2012, 18 were Republicans, while 29 were Democrats. In the crucial safe-but-not-overwhelming zone, with victory margins between 15% and 30%, Republicans won 92 seats while Democrats won 42. The average margin of victory for Republicans was 28.6%; for Democrats, it was 35.7%.

So there you go. This is one big reason why Republicans in the House are likely to react to widespread anger over the shutdown by becoming more, rather than less, confrontational. The vote distributions in their districts would have to swing by 10% or more for any sizable number of them to lose their seats, and that's not very likely to happen.

From Slate: Conscience Creep: What’s so wrong with conscience clauses?

A Slate writer discusses one of the newer - relatively - areas of religious freedom: the conscience clause.

These are designed to allow for people to opt out of following certain laws because doing so violates their conscience. It's not entirely new - a conscience clause was originally proposed to be part of the Bill of Rights, and conscientious objectors have been able to resist the draft - but it has become more and more common for religious groups to use these to try to avoid following laws they find objectionable.

Not surprisingly, many involved sexual morays - specifically birth control and homosexuality.

The author argues that the impact of these laws are spreading more and more into vast areas of public policy. She calls this conscience creep:

. . . what’s really wrong with conscience clauses? We all have consciences and laws that exist to protect us from being forced to violate our religious and ethical principles should be welcome on the left and right. The problem isn’t conscience clause legislation so much as what we might call conscience creep: a slow but systematic effort to use religious conscience claims to sidestep laws that should apply to everyone. Recalibrating who can express a right of conscience (i.e do corporations have a conscience?) and what the limits of that conscience might be, may well be the next front in the religious liberty wars being waged in courts around the country.

In the current craze to deploy conscience arguments to scuttle unpopular provisions of the Affordable Care Act, birth control is just the tip if the iceberg.

The explosion in conscience claims was kicked off by the decision in Roe v. Wade, which led to a national wave of legislation protecting those with religious objections from participating in abortions. States and the federal government rushed to promulgate conscience clauses for health care workers seeking to be exempt from providing or assisting in abortions. Passed in 1973, the Church Amendment provided that “receipt of federal funds did not require an individual or institution to perform sterilizations or abortions if it would be contrary to ... religious beliefs or moral convictions.” Since then, most states and the federal government have passed laws allowing health care providers to opt out of procedures that offend their religious convictions.

But it hasn’t stopped at health care providers, and the list of objectors now encompasses pharmacists and ambulance drivers, cashiers in supermarkets and business owners who object to same-sex marriage. Last year, for instance, a prison guard withheld an abortion pill from a prisoner who’d been raped on the grounds that it violated her personal religious beliefs. And it hasn’t stopped at abortion, birth control, or sterilization, but may include activities like counseling rape victims or teaching AIDS patients about clean needles.

From the Atlantic: If Congress Won't Raise the Debt Ceiling, Obama Will Be Forced to Break the Law

A look ahead at the looming fight over raising the debt ceiling.

Regardless of how the current shutdown crisis ends, it seems there will be a second debt-ceiling crisis two weeks from now. And the questions are flying again: Is the debt-ceiling statute unconstitutional? Can Obama “invoke” Section Four of the Fourteenth Amendment and assert authority to breach the debt ceiling to pay “the public debt of the United States, authorized by law”? Or can one party, decisively defeated in a nationwide election and controlling only the lower house of the legislature, threaten the full faith and credit of the United states — and the health of the world economy — in pursuit of its short-term partisan advantage?

30 Republicans are forcing the shutdown

2305 students should remember Madison's comment in Fed 10 that minority factions can clog the administration and convulse the society - here's your proof.

- How 30 House Republicans are forcing the Obamacare fight.
- 8 million to 1 ratio.

Can a discharge petition be used to end the shutdown?

Some commentators argue that there are enough moderate Republicans willing to vote with Democrats on a clean continuing resolution - one that does not contain language denying funding for the ACA - to pass it, even over the objections of the House Speaker.

It involves the use of a discharge petition - which we discussed a bit in 2305 when we walked through the bill-making process. Not everyone agrees that this is likely to happen.

For detail:

- Wikipedia: Discharge Petitions.
- Democrats can use this one weird trick . . .
- CRS: The discharge rule in historical context.
- Why the discharge rule wont help Democrats . . .

From the Fiscal Times: GOP Moderates Rally to Stop the Government Shutdown

Some see evidence that moderates within the Republican Conference might be willing to split with the Tea Party Caucus and possibly join with Democrats to end the shut down - no guarantee of that though.

Several GOP congressmen are openly rebelling against their hardline colleagues—whose insistence on gutting Obamacare has led to the first government shutdown in 17 years.

Going into the third day of the shutdown, the criticisms of this tactic by this group of GOP pragmatists has become louder, offering the first sign of hope that the government might reopen.

The fissure inside the Republican Party has become undeniable, even as House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) continues to side with the Tea Partiers who have demanded that the 2010 Affordable Care Act be derailed. Moderates including Rep. Peter King (R-NY) and Rep. Charlie Dent (R-PA) are pressuring Boehner to ditch the dozens of Tea Party types who have controlled the caucus in recent weeks – but for now that seems unlikely given Boehner’s unyielding statement after leaving a meeting with Obama and Democratic congressional leaders at the White House late Wednesday.

The House and Senate Rules for the 113th Congress

We mentioned these in class, so I though direct links here would be helpful:

- The House Rules
- The Senate Rules

Remember that the Constitution allows each chamber to set their own procedural rules. Here they are.

Prop 1 - Texas Constitutional Amendment - 2013

Click here for detail.

Allows the surviving spouse of a member of the United States military that was killed in action a complete property tax exemption on their residential homestead until the surviving spouse remarries.  The amount of the property tax exemption can be transferred from the home the serviceman and spouse owned at the time of death to another property. 

Sample Ballot for the November 5, 2013 Brazoria County Election

Click here for Brazoria County's elections page.

ACC is in precinct 41, so here's the actual ballot voters registered here will be presented.

It contains the nine Texas constitutional amendments and an up or down vote on a proposed $212 million bond for AISD.

Analyses of the proposed amendments to the Texas Constitution

A look at all nine from the Texas Legislative Council.

Time for a new state constitution?

The Dallas Morning News editorializes that we do.

Our state has many things going for it, but our constitution probably isn’t one. Mostly, it’s a relic of a bitter, bygone era after the Civil War and Reconstruction left Texans in ill humor when it came to trusting state leaders.

The solution was a constitution that takes power from the elected and gives it to the electorate. That may sound well and good, but in Texas, voters must return to the polls every two years, usually the November after a Legislature, to ratify or reject many issues that barely register on statewide public radar.

Turnout is typically less than 10 percent — often far less. Does an entire state need to weigh in on whether El Paso County can tax itself to create a parks district (2011)? Important, perhaps, in El Paso County, but the other 253 have their own situations.

This year, every Texas voter can help decide whether to repeal a constitutional provision on creating a hospital district in Hidalgo County. Again, no small issue there, but elsewhere? Still, it’s on the list as Proposition 8 among nine amendments on the Nov. 5 ballot.

Unlike the U.S. Constitution — which has been amended 27 times — the Texas Constitution functions as a limiting document. With no equivalent of the “necessary and proper clause,” our state’s document has grown like kudzu. It may not be the longest in America, but it’s a contender (Alabama and California are even worse).

After Nov. 5, Texas voters will have weighed in on more than 660 amendments, many of the intensely local or fabulously obscure variety. To date, about 73 percent have been approved.

This editorial board will research and dutifully recommend outcomes on the nine amendments this year and publish them in the coming days. It’s the least we can do.

The least our leaders could do is give some serious thought to whether this is any way to run a state. If nothing else, asking each of Texas’ 254 counties to hold these elections every two years costs money that could better go elsewhere.

More on the weakness of parties in Congress

At least that of the current Republican Party. The Democratic Party organization is quite string in comparison. It's getting to be quite the meme. Outside pressure groups have more influence on individual members than either the party, or their members. This author suggests that more partisanship would actually be beneficial. This suggests that Boehner's perceived weakness as Speaker is really the result of the influence of outside groups that are more influential to members of Congress - and have a greater ability to benefit their careers - than the traditional party leadership structure.

From the New Republic:

The current Democratic Party, which trims and disciplines the aspirations of its core progressive activists, is a good example of a fairly strong party, which is why it’s consistently frustrating to the left.

But the modern Republican Party is not strong. It’s something more like a loose association of independent forces, including Tea Party–backed members, those with their own sources of campaign money from ideological backers, many with seats so safe that they can happily ignore all their non-conservative constituents, and outside agents like Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint, who Businessweek recently described as the de facto Speaker of the House. Many of its politicians have deliberately cut themselves off from all the incentives that traditionally moderate and stabilize politics—earmarks, constituent service (many offices say they won’t help constituents maneuver the ACA), and infrastructure spending. With safe seats, and hearing little dissent at home, they are able to do so. Cutting themselves off from the incentive to build and maintain a strong and viable party is part of the same story.

Consider the difference between House Speaker John Boehner and his shutdown forerunner, Newt Gingrich. Gingrich was a partisan in the original sense, and the first truly partisan Speaker. Although a conservative, he always had strong support from moderate Republicans because he cared about their party’s strength above all else. Many House Republicans felt they owed him their political careers, thanks to early support from his GOPAC. Following his own shutdown debacle, he was able to lead his party into a period of effective bargaining with the Clinton White House that included the budget deal of 1997. Boehner has no such capacity to manage or discipline his caucus, and that’s not mainly a reflection of his personal failings. No one owes him or the party anything. Paul Ryan or Eric Cantor could do no better.

The role of Senator Ted Cruz, who prodded the embers of the House shutdown gang even while he couldn’t do anything meaningful in his own chamber, exemplifies the undisciplined, loose association that the Republican Party has become. Backed by ideological donors including the Koch brothers, he has no need for the National Republican Senatorial Committee and his presidential aspirations are better off without the support of the party establishment. Like his almost-colleague DeMint, Cruz will likely endorse primary challengers to incumbents of his own party, something that was once almost unheard of in either party. That’s the opposite of putting party first.

The way money works in politics certainly has something, though not everything, to do with this splintering. SuperPACs, political non-profits, and other outside spenders do more than just bring the corrupting influence of corporations and wealthy individuals into the process. They also destabilize and decenter the process, replacing the long-term interests of the party with those of individual donors. The Campaign Finance Institute reported yesterday that outside groups outspent political action committees for the first time in 2012. We’ve seen a massive shift in electoral politics away from parties, candidates and formal groups like PACs, and toward outside groups; it should be no surprise that we are now seeing a similar shift in the base of power in legislative politics.

From Bloomberg: Jim DeMint, Congressional Republicans' Shadow Speaker

Bloomberg Businessweek argues that recently resigned Senator Jim DeMint - who now heads the Heritage Foundation - is the de facto Speaker of the House - or at least the guy who helps determine its agenda far more than John Boehner.

They describe how he developed the idea of using the continuing resolution process to defund Obamacare and has been pitching the idea for months. Many Republicans in Congress have been opposed to doing so, but DeMint appears ready to play hardball:

Many Republicans looked on in horror as the defund movement gained steam. If the government shuts down, polls suggest blame will fall most heavily on the GOP. North Carolina Senator Richard Burr calls DeMint’s plan “the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard.” Representative Tom Cole, a veteran Oklahoma Republican, has likened the shutdown threat to “putting the gun to your own head. You’re basically saying, do what I want or I’ll shoot.” DeMint doesn’t see why his ploy should hurt Republicans. “Democrats will be shutting down the government to protect Obamacare,” he insists. As DeMint sees it, if Republicans would just toughen up and start singing from the same hymnal, public opinion might swing to their side. And if they won’t, he plans to turn his legions of supporters inside and outside of government against them.

The story highlights a growing division within the Republican Party, a fight over how to regain power, and suggests that the current level of dysfunction in Congress is due to this internal conflict:

When most Americans look at Washington, they see a broken Congress, riven by partisanship and lurching from crisis to crisis. While the hostility between Republicans and Democrats is indeed severe, it isn’t the real reason the engine of government keeps seizing up. What’s causing the malfunction is a battle within the GOP over how to return the party to its former glory after two consecutive losses to Obama and setbacks in the House and Senate. It’s a fight that pits uncompromising, Heritage-style conservatives against more cautious Republican elders. What makes it so contentious is that both sides have radically different—and mutually exclusive—ideas about how to move forward.

Boehner and his allies want to avoid direct confrontation. DeMint and company do not. DeMint also seems to be building one of the external organizations that may have more influence on the positions taken by Republican members of Congress than their elected leaders.

Are Republicans winning the battle over spending?

Looks like it.

People like the Affordable Care Act more than they like Obamacare

Words matter.

There's nothing new here.

From Wonkblog: Why Boehner doesn’t just ditch the hard right?

Here's a good insiders look at the difficulty the Speaker is facing managing the Republican Caucus.

Party leaders don't have the tools they once had to build cohesion in their parties. External forces are gaining strength, which tempers the argument that parties are the dominant institution within Congress.

Key bit from the interview in the story I linked to above:

What we're seeing is the collapse of institutional Republican power. It’s not so much about Boehner. It’s things like the end of earmarks. They move away from Tom DeLay and they think they're improving the House, but now they have nothing to offer their members. The outside groups don't always move votes directly but they create an atmosphere of fear among the members. And so many of these members now live in the conservative world of talk radio and tea party conventions and Fox News invitations. And so the conservative strategy of the moment, no matter how unrealistic it might be, catches fire. The members begin to believe they can achieve things in divided government that most objective observers would believe is impossible. Leaders are dealing with these expectations that wouldn't exist in a normal environment.

Happy Fiscal New Year!

Though the players may not be willing to compromise, the governing system may be forcing it to anyway.

A lengthy but worthwhile read from Jonathan Rauch:

A funny thing happened on the way to legislative gridlock and fiscal meltdown in the past few years. In paralyzed, polarized Washington, where Democrats refuse to reduce spending without revenue increases that Republicans peremptorily reject, Democrats have accepted spending cuts, Republicans have accepted tax increases, and deficits have come down.

It is true that all of that happened in an ugly, piecemeal fashion, with the two parties lurching from one self-created crisis to another. At one stage, Republicans seemed willing to default on the national debt rather than compromise; at another, an automatic "sequestration" cut spending in what everyone agreed was a nonsensical fashion.

Instead of joining hands in the grand bargain so ardently desired by pundits and much of the public, Congress and President Obama fought their way through a series of stopgaps, each of them greeted as disappointing if not appalling.

Yet the results bear pondering. The cumulative effect of Washington's serial muddling has been to stabilize the national debt as a share of gross domestic product over the coming decade, according to Congressional Budget Office projections. The resulting level, by many accounts, is still too high, and more remains to be done about long-term increases in health-care spending and other entitlement costs. But the near-term debt emergency is over.

To get here, Congress cut spending by about $2.6 trillion over ten years, and raised taxes by about $700 billion (according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities). After adjusting for padding and assorted gimmicks on the spending side, that ratio of spending cuts to tax increases looks remarkably close to the ratio of between 2-to-1 and 3-to-1 recommended by many of the mainstream economists and pundits who called for a grand bargain.

And at least as important, all of that fiscal tightening happened at a pace that slowed but did not abort a delicate economic recovery. Too much deficit reduction would have caused a recession, aggravating the debt problem; too little would have left the underlying crisis untended. Unlike Europe, America seemed to have gotten both the pace and the magnitude of the fiscal adjustment about right.

In short, the system acquitted itself quite well, and better than any of the individual actors within it — steering a course between hostile political factions and dangerous economic outcomes. Somewhere, James Madison is smiling.

From the Texas Tribune: State Gets Waiver From No Child Left Behind

From 2306's look at both federalism and education policy:

After nearly a year of negotiations, the state has finally secured a waiver from No Child Left Behind, the Texas Education Agency announced Monday.
 
With the reprieve, only the lowest-performing 15 percent of schools will be subject to a series of federally prescribed interventions, instead of what would have been nearly all of the state's school districts next year because of a failure to meet the law's requirement that 100 percent of their students pass reading and math exams by 2014. Struggling school districts will also no longer be required to set aside 20 percent of their funding for remedial tutoring services.

“The underlying message throughout our negotiations with the federal government has been Texans know what’s best for Texas schools,” TEA commissioner Michael L. Williams said in a statement. “I believe our school districts will appreciate the additional flexibility this waiver provides while also adhering to our strong principles on effective public education.”

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said in a letter to the agency that he had granted the waiver for the 2013-14 school year with the condition that Texas continue development of a new teacher evaluation system. The Obama administration has pushed for student achievement on standardized tests to be included as a review of teacher performance, while the agency has said it does not have the authority to require districts to use a specific evaluation measure.

From the Texas Tribune: Federal Government Shutdown to Keep Texas Workers Home

How will the federal shutdown affect the state? Many federal workers live in Texas. That's lots of lost revenue.

Thousands of “nonessential” Texas federal employees will be off the job until Congress passes legislation to turn the government’s lights back on.

Texas has the nation's third-highest concentration of federal employees, according to the University of Texas at Austin's Texas Politics Project, and many of those 140,000 workers will go without a paycheck.

. . . NASA, headquartered in Houston, is slated to close, with 97 percent of its employees at home. The Department of Homeland Security will temporarily halt its E-Verify program, preventing business owners from checking the immigration status of prospective employees. Border Patrol agents will remain on the job, but their paychecks will most likely be delayed. The Department of Energy will run on a third of its staff, with employees working on nuclear materials and power grids still on the clock.

Military personnel would have been paid by IOUs following a shutdown, but a last-minute bill signed by the president two hours before the deadline Monday night extended military salaries into fiscal year 2014.

While federal employees will feel the initial pinch, state agencies reliant on federal funding are scrambling to cover budget holes to carry them through the shutdown. The stalemate will be “catastrophic” if it lasts longer than a few weeks, said Tory Gunsolley, president of the Houston Housing Authority, which distributes housing vouchers to low-income families. October payments for the Housing Choice Voucher Program are already promised by Washington, but November’s are not.

“There simply isn’t enough money to be able to make good on our obligations without the federal government because there is not another source of money,” Gunsolley said. The Houston Housing Authority provides rental assistance for 60,000 people, costing about $10 million per month.

From the Texas Tribune: Dallas Hair Braider to Sue Over Regulations

One of the reserved powers of the state is the ability to set regulations for occupations.

These are contained in the Texas Occupations Code and overseen by the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation.

A Dallas hair braider thinks the state's requirement that she have 2,250 hours of training and have a 2,000 square foot facility in order to teach hair braiding is not just excessive, but unconstitutional.

On Tuesday, she will file a lawsuit against the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, alleging in federal court that the state’s rules violate her constitutional right to equal protection under the 14th Amendment. Brantley will ask the court to exempt her from the regulations and grant an injunction preventing the state from applying the rules to other hair braiders.

“This lawsuit means economic liberty for my community,” Brantley said in a statement. “Economic liberty is especially important for black women. This is our new civil rights movement.”

An official at the state regulating agency acknowledged that the rules for barber schools could be difficult for hair braiders to comply with.

Since its a 14th Amendment issue - this would proceed through the federal courts. Should be fun.

From the Washington Post: Everything you need to know about life under Obamacare

We'll walk through the bill in some classes soon enough, but here's a primer before we do.

Here's why House Republicans will not face backlash against government shutdown

Because they - like Democrats as well - represent safe gerrymandered districts. Which might distort the original intent of the design of the House.

From Slate: 

When optimists try to predict the end of the government shutdown/debt limit wars, they suggest that Republicans will, eventually, have to buckle. Polls showthat most voters blame them, not the president, for the quagmire—hey, who can argue with polls? History shows that Republicans were blamed for the winter shutdown of 1995–1996—who can argue with history?

Republicans can, and they do. The gerrymanders of 2011 added to their natural geographic advantage over urban/suburban Democrats and gave them a House they simply don’t think they can lose. In 2012 they proved it, winning 1.36 million fewer votes than Democratic candidates but keeping a 33-seat majority.According to the Cook Political Report, 205 of 435 House districts are solidly Republican, basically impossible to lose without an unexpected bribery or sexting scandal. Only 163 districts are solidly Democratic. If Democrats swept the table and won all the districts currently rated as tossups or “leaning” Republican, they’d win 213 seats, five short of a majority.

That was always the long-term Republican plan. In 2010, when voter anger was already guaranteeing a fantastic party comeback, groups like the Redistricting Majority Project (nicknamed REDMAP) told donors that “the party controlling that effort controls the drawing of the maps—shaping the political landscape for the next 10 years.”

Some random items on the roll out of the health insurance exchanges.

The insurance exchanges roll out today though coverage won't take effect until January 1.

For class discussion:

- Insurance Exchange 101: Here's What you Need to Know.
- Timeline: Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
- Some Fear Impact of State Rules in Health Navigators.
- Quiz: What are my insurance options under Obamacare?
- Obamacare to open amid shutdown drama.
- Wikipedia: Health Insurance Marketplace.

From The Hill: 25 Regulations to Watch

After out look at Congress in 2305 we will look at the executive branch and discuss the rulemaking power in the bureaucracy. We mentioned it already when we outlined the iron triangle, so its not an entirely new thing.

To prep us, here's an article in The Hill about 25 noteworthy proposed rules that being debated in DC.

From the NYT: Senate Action on Health Law Moves to Brink of Shutdown

Keeping up with the excitement on Capitol Hill:

Plus: Who works and who stays home in a shut down?

The Hastert Rule

Here is one of the factors driving dysfunction in Congress.

Despite the fact that we assume we are a majoritarian democracy there are many places were the will of the majority - which tends to be understood as the will of the people is thwarted. One of the many areas this happens is in the US House of Representatives where the majority of House members do not determine what comes to the floor of the chamber - rather it is a majority of the majority party that matters.

Theoretically this means that 117 members can prevent the preferences of the remaining 318.

The Republican Conference tends to use this rule when in charge. It has been called the Hastert Rule after Speaker Dennis Hastert who was speaker from 1999 - 2007, and also the majority of the majority rule. Other Speakers have also adhered to the rule.

- Hastert was quoted as saying that his job as Speaker was to please the majority of the majority.

There is nothing set in stone about the rule, but it argued to be an effective way to keep House Republicans cohesive, though it does not encourage bi-partisanship.

Related stories:

- Hastert rule not working.
- The absurdity of the Hastert Rule.
- What the rule tells us about House Republicans.

The Tea Party Caucus

Most commentators argue that the current stand off over the government funding - the debt ceiling - and the ACA - etc..., all stem from the demands imposed by a very disciplined and cohesive Tea Party Caucus within Congress. It contains 50 or so members - but has been able to drive its agenda forcefully.

For more info

- Wikipedia - Tea Party Caucus.
- Politico - The Tea Party Returns.
- Who is the Tea Party in the House?
- NYT- The Tea Party Caucus

The Hill argues that the caucus has gained control over Speaker Boehner - which allows it to control the House to a great degree.

By the way, what is a congressional caucus?
Here is a comprehensive list of caucuses in Congress.

WonkBlog explains Obama Care in Two Minutes

One of a series if videos apparently.

Written Assignment #6

By now - hopefully - you've submitted your proposal and you should have received feedback from me on it.

Take that feedback into consideration and revise and resubmit your proposal - if necessary - or build it further if you've been given the green light to go ahead.

Give at least 150 words.
Be sure to give me your answer in the submissions box in Blackboard.
If you send me a file - use Microsoft Word.

From NPR: How Two Brothers Waged A 'Secret World War' In The 1950s

NPR has an interview with the author of a book I'm tempted to order for a future class.

It's called The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War.

Its about two brothers - the Dulles' - who seem to have dominated the nature of American foreign policy for the couple decades following WWII. Their activities seem to have been allowed to go forward by the presidents of that era.

They had this tendency to overthrown democratically elected governments in places like Iran. The author suggests that many of the problems we face internationally are the result of an ongoing backlash against their actions.

Its an interesting inside look at how foreign policy was actually made during a 20-30 years period of American history.

380 agreements

The article linked to in the previous post mentions 380 agreements. Here's my best at describing what these are and what they tell us about state and local policy making. I've added the appropriate links so you can find out where they are described more fully and what the issues surrounding them tend to be.

The simple description is that they are allowances for Texas cities to enter into agreements with private entities in order to provide assistance for economic development.

The are named after Chapter 380 of the Texas Local Government Code.

- Click here for a presentation by the Texas City Attorney Association about the agreements.
- Click here for the actual code.

Here's a description from the Comptroller's Office:

Chapter 380 of the Local Government Code authorizes municipalities to offer incentives designed to promote economic development such as commercial and retail projects. Specifically, it provides for offering loans and grants of city funds or services at little or no cost to promote state and local economic development and to stimulate business and commercial activity.

In order to provide a grant or loan, a city must establish a program to implement the incentives. Before proceeding, cities must review their city charters or local policies that may restrict a city's ability provide a load or grant.

There is a comparable agreement - 381 - that allows counties to offer similar incentives.

You can also find a good run description by clicking on the website of the International Business District. From what I can see the district appears to be promoting 380's to individuals and business who seek to work with them.

The City of Houston has entered into over a dozen 380 agreements since they were established - no more than six can be funded at one time.

- Click here for a list of them.

The Parker Administration has entered into a great number of these - we had a question in class about her tenure in office and what she has accomplished. She makes the argument that these agreements have increased the economic vitality of certain areas of town and the quality of life there as well.

That doesn't mean they have not been controversial. One of the agreements was with the developer who helped build a Walmart in the Heights. Critics argued that the largest corporation in the US did not need a local tax abatement, but it got one anyway.

Here are a few related links that ought to help fill in gaps. One of the areas where I am deficient is in discussing land use policy on the state and local level. Hopefully this helps fill in some of that gap.

- Residents don't like details of 380 agreement.
- Mayor Parker defends incentives to lure development.
- Comment of the day.
- That mysterious 380 agreement.

Houston tries to make itself attractive to the Millenials

This Houston Chronicle story is behind a pay-wall, but it fits our general discussion of cities as networks of economic interests. It also tells us something about how the more vibrant cities do what they can to continually re-position themselves so that they remain vibrant.

Often this means ensuring that the city is appealing to the young since they are the engines that drive future growth.

The story - Mid Main project will ride with the millennials - details a development in the midtown area, on the light rail line between downtown and the Museum District, which is geared to wards the 18-32 year old demographic. Developers hope it will be the first of money other such projects, and it comes after other efforts to make the area hip.

Much of this effort requires partnerships between the public and private sector in order to make it happen. I'll post a few separate items about the institutions and rules that try to make that a reality. Remember that Houston still suffers from a general sense that it is looked down upon nationally, so it has to try hard to overcome that reputation.

What is the 113th Congress anyway?

For 2305's to chew on this week as we look through the legislative branch.

It's the 113th meeting of the Congress since they first met in 1789 following the first election held under the current Constitution.We will discuss the achievements of the first Congress periodically - they established the original agencies, passed the Bill of Rights and put in place early legislative processes.

We'll talk loosely about factors related to it, but the Wikipedia on it is worth a quick look.

It contains a list of party leaders and the standing committees and subcommittees.The principle feature of the current Congress is its split control - one party controls the House - the other the Senate. Another - as mentioned below - is the polarization between the parties. The ideological distance between the two parties is only increasing. The current impasse over the continuing resolution and the debt ceiling is argued to be a direct consequence of it.

External forces which have spurred this division between the parties punishes members who might seek to compromise.

We'll go it this week.

What exactly does a Speaker do anyway?

I though this list from a helpful stranger named Jack on Yahoo answers was worth sharing:

There was a time when Speakers of the House were all powerful. Those days are long gone. Nevertheless, Speakers still possess a few formidable powers worth noting:

1. The Speaker is the chair of the steering committee that chooses all committee chairs.

2. The Speaker directs all bills to their respective committees. (This is a HUGE power -- as if the Speaker hates the bill he can send it to a committee he knows will kill it -- or vice versa).

3. The Speaker is personally responsible for elevating members to the all powerful (and never to be messed with) "Rules Committee". 

4. The Speaker is responsible for organizing floor debates, ruling on the acceptability of floor motions, and recognizing members who wish to address the House. 

5. In any dealings with the Senate, the Speaker appoints all members of conference committees. 

6. Because of all of these things, the Speaker is the agenda setter of the House. What bills are heard? What bills simply get thrown away? What policies do we wish to impact, and how? These are all questions that only the Speaker gets to answer.

I'll keep posting criticisms of the Speaker Boehner's job performance, but this gives us a guideline for evaluating him.

Its important to keep in mind that while the Speaker is meant to preside over the entire House - and is elected by the entire House - each party nominates its leader for the position. Obviously the party which holds the majority will win, so the Speaker is less a neutral presiding officer than an advocate for the interests of the majority party.

The 113th Congress is the most divisive one yet - at least going back to 1879

VoteView measures polarization in Congress, and though the 113th has a long way to go, its shaping up to be the most polarized yet. Click on the link to see how they measure polarization. Their assessment is that the Republican Conference is being pulled increasingly to the right - Democrats are holding steady.



The Washington Post comments.

Is Boehner to blame for the House's dysfunction?

An ex-Republican member of the House lays blame with House Democrats - who refuse to vote for anything Republicans propose - and "No On Everything Caucus" within the Republican Party.

The focus on Boehner has been more intense because House Democrats have abdicated any meaningful role in passing legislation. Few bills are able to garner Democratic support, often not because of policy differences but because House Democratic leaders have decided they would rather wash their hands of responsibility for governing and, instead, focus on winning back the majority.

The role of the minority party is to be the “loyal opposition,” and Democrats have gotten it half right — they are opposed to everything House Republicans do, but there is not much loyal about it.

. . . Boehner is a skilled politician who is more than able to lead his caucus — well, at least the 180 or so members interested in actively participating in the legislative process. Unfortunately for Boehner, for the House as an institution and for the country in general, these 180 public servants are not the problem.

Thirty to 40 other members of the House, however, believe their only responsibility as a member of Congress is to show up and vote “no.” Frankly, they take such a dim view of their job that a trained monkey could do what they do. And, sadly, the situation is becoming one in which the monkeys are running the zoo.

It is these members who are largely responsible for the dysfunction in Washington and the failure of the legislative process. They have gleefully ground to a halt the work of the people. Because of them, agreement cannot be reached on legislation once deemed too important not to pass, such as the farm bill or the transportation bill.

These members are cheered on by interest groups such as the Club for Growthand FreedomWorks, organizations that have made a lucrative business out of Washington’s dysfunction.

If Boehner is ousted he won't be the first Republican Speaker to suffer that fate

The Week tells us its actually common, Democrats have been less likely to do so - surprising since Democrats have traditionally been argued to be less cohesive than Republicans (though this seems less the case now).

House Republicans have had a propensity, throughout the 20th century, for periodically getting rid of their leaders. 

Tossing out a speaker is in many ways a drastic measure because, unlike other congressional leaders, the Speaker of the House has demonstrable power over the institution. In one of the many ironies of American politics, the House of Representatives, which was intended to channel voters' opinions, has been a top-down, leadership driven branch of government, in contrast to the historical every-Senator-for-himself model on the other side of the Capitol. Due to this top-down structure, the speaker, unlike the majority leader of the Senate (frequently referred to derisively as the majority pleader), can bend the chamber to his or her will. 

Nevertheless, speakers occasionally have had to ward off intra-party threats to their power. These attacks are unusual — in The Ambition and the Power, John Barry compares overthrowing a speaker or minority leader to regicide. And, perhaps surprisingly, all of the successful overthrows have been on the Republican side of the aisle.

The most notable of which was Newt Gingrich, who was originally revered for leading the party back to the promised land of the majority after 40 years in the minority, but then had a very rocky tenure. Gingrich was forced out right after the party's unexpectedly poor showing in 1998.

High hopes for Boehner in 2010

I ran across this hopeful profile of a then potential Speaker Boehner written just before Republicans took over the House in 2010. It contains this insight into the internal power struggles within the party and the job a Speaker is supposed to do:

It’s an open secret that Boehner’s Republican lieutenants—Eric Cantor, Kevin McCarthy, and Paul Ryan, who spent last week promoting a new, coauthored book (Young Guns) about how they’re more in tune with the times than their slick establishment predecessors—harbor leadership ambitions of their own. So when they instantly distanced themselves from the boss’s remarks, no one was surprised. As one GOP staffer puts it, “Those guys are pushing themselves forward, with the implication that they’re leaving the rest of the leadership behind. That includes John Boehner.”

The funny thing about all the anti-Boehner ferment, however, is that the Ohioan’s critics may soon come to consider him irreplaceable. In truth, Boehner is one of the few players in American politics with the potential to give both Republicans and Democrats what they need in the wake of November’s anticipated GOP landslide. For the left, that means an experienced legislative negotiator on the opposite side of the aisle. For the right, it means a leader who can rack up tangible accomplishments for the party to run on in 2012—while also keeping the new, red-meat caucus from eating him alive.

Assessing Speaker Boehner

Speaker of the House John Boehner has not had an easy go of it recently. For some time he has been accused of being unable to adequately manage the House Republican Conference (the Tea Party faction does not trust him), much less the chamber as a whole.

Here's a roundup of the latest evaluations of him:

No following this leader:

Boehner’s collapse as speaker has been sad to watch. Unable to control his own caucus, negotiate effectively with the president or pass legislation, he flounders in office — a likable man who is utterly ineffective. He is the prisoner of the extreme wing of his party, and of his supposed lieutenants, such as Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who spend their time pandering to the extremists rather than helping Boehner lead.

Boehner’s problem is that he is unable to deliver the 218 House Republicans for any pragmatic piece of legislation. He survives from crisis to crisis, thanks to Democratic votes that salvage last-minute compromises. But on major issues that Boehner personally supports, such asimmigration reform, he has been powerless.

The author argues Majority leader Cantor is the real seat of power in the Conference:

House Republican sources tell me that Cantor has cunningly worked to undermine his nominal boss. By often allying himself with the roughly 40 tea party extremists who refuse any compromise with Obama, Cantor gives them political oxygen. He encourages their showboating, as on the bill he championed this month to slash the food-stamp program. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee, described this bill as “a monumental waste of time.” House committee chairmen ignore Boehner; they know Cantor is the guy with the knife.

John Boehner, Eric Cantor struggle to lead House:

The skirmish is yet another example of how few Republicans are willing to follow Boehner and Cantor’s lead during tough legislative fights. And in practical terms, the rejection of what became known as the Cantor Plan — a continuing resolution, with an unattached provision to defund Obamacare — makes it more likely that the House and Senate will be at loggerheads with a government shutdown looming on Sept. 30.

A clearly frustrated Boehner seemed to realize that he leads a conference where no plan is quite good enough. There are frequently about 30 Republicans who oppose leadership’s carefully crafted plans — just enough to mess things up. A reporter asked him whether he has a new idea to resolve the government funding fight. He laughed and said, “No.”

“Do you have an idea?” he asked the reporters. “They’ll just shoot it down anyway.”

A small handful of House Republican have floated the idea of replacing Speaker Boehner with Senator Cruz - there is no requirement in the Constitution that the speaker be a member of the House.

Are we really naturally violent?

The Dish flags a story that challenges a self evident truth contained in the Declaration of Independence, one based on an assumption enlightenment philosophers made about the state of nature.

It was generally assumed that it was violent, and that this was why people in the state of nature decided to form government - to secure the unalienable rights. Thomas Hobbes argued that the state of nature was a perpetual state of war of all against all.

But other philosophers during the enlightenment period scoffed at that idea - they saw little evidence that a state of nature every really existed.

An evolutionary biologist challenges the idea that there was ever any proof that ancient people were actually that violent. The assumption that they were has clouded how evidence has been evaluated. Yes we can be violent, but we can be compassionate as well.

When it comes to human aggression, violence and war, there simply is no unitary direction impelled by evolution. On the one hand, we are capable of despicable acts of horrific violence; on the other, we evince remarkable compassion and self-abnegation. Our selfish genes can generate a wide array of nasty, destructive and unpleasant actions; and yet, these same selfish genes can incline us toward altruistic acts of extraordinary selflessness. It is at least possible that our remarkably rapid brain evolution has been driven by the pay-off derived by successful warlike competition with other primitive human and humanoid groups. But it is equally possible that it was driven by the pay-off associated with co-operation, co‑ordination and mutual care-taking.

Perhaps we need to rethink why government evolve and what purposes they serve.

Wrapping up week 5 - 2306

This week was meant to be a bridge to a discussion of the three branches of government outlined in Articles 3, 4, and 5 of the Texas Constitution.

Before digging into it, I though it was necessary to make sure we were clear on the purpose of and problems presented by the separated powers. The simple purpose of it was to ensure that the three principle powers of government would not be concentrated in the hands of one person, group, or institution.But it comes at a cost because it makes the governing system inefficient.

Texas' mechanism for separating power is different from that you see on the national level, an an open question in any state - especially Texas - is whether the powers are in fact adequately separated.

After doing so we ran through basic features of each of the three branches and tried to understand how Texas is different from each of the states. We hit the following point repeatedly, but the amateur legislature, plural executive and elected judiciary - together - are meant to minimize the power of the state government. Whether that makes Texas government more susceptible to private interests is a topic we pick up later.

Next up: a look at the constitutional design of the legislature.

Then we will hit the pause button and spend a week walking through the book you are assigned to read.

Wrapping up week 5 - 2305

We covered two subjects this week and ignored - maybe just postponed - a third.

The first looked at public policy and included an observation of the public policy process and - in my view more importantly - the concept of a sub-government, or issue network, or advocacy coalition. These are terms that refer to the networks of interested parties - stakeholders - that develop around a specific policy impacted by government.

I suggested that despite the constitutional arrangements we discussed in previous lectures, these might best describe the actual workings of government, and its relationship with private organizations which benefit from those policies. We discussed the iron triangle since that provides the clearest picture of what these networks might actually look like. I mentioned that this is a simplistic picture - and other institutions can play a role in preserving certain policies - but the relationship between legislative committees, bureaucratic agencies and interest groups might be the best way to visualize these networks.

I also mentioned that a revolving door exists between these institutions, and it describes the tendency of people to move from a job in one institution to another. Each step of the way the knowledge and connections built up in one institution tie into those in another. The interests of the committee and the agency become intertwined. Interest groups - the strong ones especially - can drive the connection between them. Members of Congress can often cash in when they retire by joining one of the interest groups focusing on the policy the member focused on when in office.

The major point I tried to drive home was that network matter, and we can best understand what governments actually do less in terms of the constitutional principles we discussed in the two previous weeks - though they still matters - but in terms of these networks. Critics argue they compromise democracy and ought to enter into our assessment of whether the people either rule, or our understanding of consent.

We then looked at civil rights and the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. I encouraged you to consider it as being a fifth principle - equality before the law - added to the Constitution following the Civil War. It - along with the 13th and 15th Amendment.

A couple points to keep in mind as we go further:

- A lot of the ongoing conflict between the state and national governments - especially states like Texas - are based on the equal protection clause. Definitions of what it takes to be equally protected by the law can vary, and have varied over history.

- Its up to the Supreme Court to define which groups are covered under the equal protection clause and how much protection they are provided. Legislatures - local, state, national - pass laws related to these groups, which are generally challenged by opponents, which begins a process which can lead to the case being heard in the Supreme Court.

Finally a word about the section we did not cover: Ideology - What is Government for anyway?

I'm still developing this section and its not quite ready to go live. It'll provide a little more in-depth analysis of the history of ideological movement in American history and how they tie into broader movements throughout western political history. This should help us know how different political movements rose and fell over American history, and how we got to where we are now ideologically. There's an outside possibility it will be included later in the year. I'll let you know if that happens.

Keep reading - and I hope this review helps.

Next week we begin looking at the US legislature.

I mentioned in class that the week after that will be devoted to the assigned book in order to help you more clearly build on your proposed topic for the 1000 word essay.

I hope the class is going well so far - let me know otherwise.

From The Texas Tribune: Bag Bans May Sweep Through Texas Again

More from the Trib.

In 2306 we discuss areas of conflict between the state and local governments. One area ripe for conflict is between the conservative state legislature and liberal city council of Austin.

Austin passed an ordinance banning plastic and paper bags. The argument is that quickly become trash and undermine the city's quality of life. In response, a member of the legislature introduced HB 2416, the Shopping Bag Freedom Act.

It didn't pass, but a lawsuit was issued against the city by the Texas Retailers Association. It has since been dropped leading to the speculation that cities might renew these bans.

From The Texas Tribune: Judge Ken Anderson Resigns Amid Ethics Lawsuit

This picks up a story we highlighted in the spring.

The state district judge was found to have withheld evidence in a murder case while he was a prosecutor in 1986. He is now facing civil and criminal proceedings, but has already been accused by the State Bar's Commission for Lawyer Discipline of violating several of its rules of disciplinary conduct.

From the Texas Tribune: Education Could Test Both Parties

The Texas Tribune reports that its polling indicates the education will be a major issue in next year's election - especially for each party's gubernatorial nominee. End each party has challenges to face.

For Republicans it's the lackluster quality of the educational system and the degree that can be blamed on current Republican policies:

Both supporters and opponents of the current educational regime have lamented Texas’ lackluster numbers when it comes to per pupil spending and graduation rates. While Perry has worked hard to focus his and others’ attention on Texas’ economy and the so-called “Texas Miracle,” the public education system is an unhealed sore spot for the party in power. The numbers used to judge the state of the public education system can be complex and seem to point in contradictory directions, but after a decade of Republican hegemony, the public education funding system is once again under review by the courts. In the absence of an easy solution to the funding model, the public discussion on education defaulted to a set of important but unclear side issues in the most recent legislative session — charter schools, testing and testing companies, graduation requirements.

For Democrats its the different opinions its supporters have on key issues regarding education:

In the February 2013 UT/TT Poll, we found Texans to be supportive of school choice by a margin of 63 percent to 36 percent. Unlike the graduation requirement question, blacks and Hispanics were equally supportive of school choice, and not surprisingly, Republicans overwhelmingly support the idea. For Davis and the Democrats, the trouble is that 68 percent of liberals expressed opposition to school choice. Liberals have long opposed school choice reflexively; it is a kind of litmus test among the white liberals that Davis will count on as the core of her coalition.

So the major issues appear to be:

- per pupil spending
- graduation rates
- charter schools
- testing - the STARR test
- school choice - vouchers

Inequality in funding per district has been a traditional issue, but it does not appear to register at the moment.

From The Dish: The Disagreement Gap

The Dish flags a story that attempts to measure which pieces of major legislation over the past 100 years have been most controversial. The author looks at the difference between the Republican and Democratic vote in both the House and Senate and calls this the disagreement gap.

Here's is how it looks graphically - you can see the stimulus bill and the Affordable Care Act have been the most divisive in the past century.



And a chart with greater detail.

A campaign speech, not a filibuster

Our Senator's 21 hour speech was technically not a filibuster since there were already enough votes collected to ensure cloture - meaning that a vote on the continuing resolution was guaranteed to occur.

The National Journal explains here.

Rand Paul's speech which held up the nomination of a CIA director and Wendy Davis' which forced the end of a special session of the Texas Legislature both qualified. But it was similar to a speech given by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in 2010 - which was also not a filibuster.

A filibuster - according to Wikipedia - is:

a type of parliamentary procedure where debate is extended, allowing one or more members to delay or entirely prevent a vote on a given proposal. It is sometimes referred to as talking out a bill, and characterized as a form of obstruction in a legislature or other decision-making body.

The consensus seems to be that the speech had little to do with defunding Obamacare, and more to do with raising Cruz's viability as a 2016 presidential candidate and gathering campaign contributions.

This might have been the first big speech of the 2016 presidential race.

Scary thought.