What is Defense Policy?
A couple definitions:
1 - One of the primary responsibilities of governments is to provide for the defense of their citizens and territories against threats from other state and non-state actors. Defense policy makers must make decisions on how best to deploy the military and civilian resources at their disposal to ensure the protection of their nations and their allies. - The Atlantic Council.
2 - Military policy (also called defence policy or defense policy) is public policy dealing with multinational security and the military. It comprises the measures and initiatives that governments do or do not take in relation to decision-making and strategic goals, such as when and how to commit national armed forces.
Military policy is used to ensures the retention of independence in national development and the alleviation of hardships imposed from hostile and aggressive external actors. The Defence Ministry (or a synonymous organisation) minister is the primary decision-maker for the national military policy.- Wikipedia.
- Constitutional Powers
- Military history of the United States.
Saturday, November 19, 2022
From the Council on Foreign Relations: U.S. Foreign Policy Powers: Congress and the President
- Click here for the article.
The U.S. Constitution parcels out foreign relations powers to both the executive and legislative branches. It grants some powers, like command of the military, exclusively to the president and others, like the regulation of foreign commerce, to Congress, while still others it divides among the two or simply does not assign.
Foreign policy experts say that presidents have accumulated power at the expense of Congress in recent years as part of a pattern in which, during times of war or national emergency, the executive branch tends to eclipse the legislature.
The periodic tug-of-war between the president and Congress over foreign policy is not a by-product of the Constitution, but rather, one of its core aims. The drafters distributed political power and imposed checks and balances to ward off monarchical tyranny embodied by Britain’s King George III. They also sought to remedy the failings of the Articles of Confederation, the national charter adopted in 1777, which many regarded as a form of legislative tyranny. “If there is a principle in our Constitution, indeed in any free Constitution, more sacred than any other, it is that which separates the legislative, executive, and judicial powers,” wrote James Madison, U.S. representative from Virginia, in the Federalist papers.
A speech by Anthony Blinken: A Foreign Policy for the American People
Our current secretary of state.
- Click here for it.
Friday, November 18, 2022
Diplomatic Policy / The State Department
What is Diplomacy?
From Britannica:
. . . the established method of influencing the decisions and behaviour of foreign governments and peoples through dialogue, negotiation, and other measures short of war or violence. Modern diplomatic practices are a product of the post-Renaissance European state system. Historically, diplomacy meant the conduct of official (usually bilateral) relations between sovereign states.
By the 20th century, however, the diplomatic practices pioneered in Europe had been adopted throughout the world, and diplomacy had expanded to cover summit meetings and other international conferences, parliamentary diplomacy, the international activities of supranational and subnational entities, unofficial diplomacy by nongovernmental elements, and the work of international civil servants.
Who is in charge of diplomatic policy?
1 - The national government
2 - The president
3 - The senate
- Official Website: United States Department of State.
- USA GOV: U.S. Department of State.
- Wikipedia: United States Department of State.
- Wikipedia: List of United States treaties.
- Wikipedia: History of United States foreign policy.
_____
- Neutrality Act of 1794.
- Jay Treaty.
- Treaty of Ghent.
- Monroe Doctrine.
- Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.
- Clayton–Bulwer Treaty.
- Treaty of Tientsin.
- Hay–Pauncefote Treaty.
- Open Door Policy.
- Roosevelt Corollary.
- Big Stick Diplomacy.
- Neutrality Acts of the 1930s.
- Lend-Lease.
- Marshall Plan.
- Containment.
- Proxy war.
- Détente.
From Britannica:
. . . the established method of influencing the decisions and behaviour of foreign governments and peoples through dialogue, negotiation, and other measures short of war or violence. Modern diplomatic practices are a product of the post-Renaissance European state system. Historically, diplomacy meant the conduct of official (usually bilateral) relations between sovereign states.
By the 20th century, however, the diplomatic practices pioneered in Europe had been adopted throughout the world, and diplomacy had expanded to cover summit meetings and other international conferences, parliamentary diplomacy, the international activities of supranational and subnational entities, unofficial diplomacy by nongovernmental elements, and the work of international civil servants.
Who is in charge of diplomatic policy?
1 - The national government
2 - The president
3 - The senate
- Official Website: United States Department of State.
- USA GOV: U.S. Department of State.
- Wikipedia: United States Department of State.
- Wikipedia: List of United States treaties.
- Wikipedia: History of United States foreign policy.
_____
- Neutrality Act of 1794.
- Jay Treaty.
- Treaty of Ghent.
- Monroe Doctrine.
- Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.
- Clayton–Bulwer Treaty.
- Treaty of Tientsin.
- Hay–Pauncefote Treaty.
- Open Door Policy.
- Roosevelt Corollary.
- Big Stick Diplomacy.
- Neutrality Acts of the 1930s.
- Lend-Lease.
- Marshall Plan.
- Containment.
- Proxy war.
- Détente.
From the New York Times: House Panel Weighs Whether to Seat a Cherokee Delegate in Congress
As required by the
- Click here for the article.
A House committee on Wednesday weighed a proposal to seat a delegate from the Cherokee Nation in Congress, holding a historic hearing that grappled with how to uphold a promise made in a nearly 200-year-old treaty that has yet to be fulfilled.
The effort has prompted members of Congress to publicly confront some of the darkest moments in American history and the string of broken promises to Indigenous people across the nation.
If it granted the position to Ms. Teehee, 54, the House would fulfill a once-overlooked stipulation in the Treaty of New Echota, which forced the nation to relinquish its ancestral lands in the South. The treaty led the U.S. government to force 16,000 members of the Cherokee Nation on the Trail of Tears, a deadly trek to land in what is now Oklahoma. A quarter of those forced to leave — about 4,000 — died before they arrived, as a result of harsh conditions, starvation and disease.
-----
- Click here for the treaty.
- From Britannica: Treaty of New Echota.
- In 1835, the Cherokee were promised a seat in Congress. They're still waiting.
- Wikipedia: Indian Removal Act.
Proposed rule changes, by the House Freedom Caucus, in the House of Representatives
- Click here for a list of the changes.
For commentary, see below:
- From the Hill: House GOP hashes out internal rules with McCarthy Speakership on the line.
House Republicans started consideration of internal conference rules change proposals on Wednesday, a major priority for right-wing members who have withheld support for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) to be Speaker.
- From Fox News: Moderate House GOP ready to push back against Freedom Caucus rule changes.
Moderate Republicans are preparing to flex their political muscles to ensure their newly-won but narrow House majority is not hijacked by conservative hard-liners from the Freedom Caucus who are looking to impose a new set of rules in 2023.
"They make the most noise, but as far as being productive that's not necessarily true," said Joyce, R-Ohio. "It's a lot of smoke and mirrors."
- From the Hill: Freedom Caucus demands rule changes for House and GOP conference.
First, the Freedom Caucus wants a formal “majority of the majority” rule for the conference. Such a rule would ensure that legislation passed in the House is also supported by a majority of House Republicans. The Speaker of the House, regardless of party, generally follows that pattern, dubbed the Hastert Rule, but it has been broken in the past.
. . . A measure to significantly increase the number of members on the GOP Conference Steering Committee by adding more “regional representative” positions. That would have the effect of reducing GOP leadership’s power in major party decisions.
The far-right Freedom Caucus is demanding a suite of changes to the Republican Conference rules and House rules that would reverse a decadelong trend of power consolidating in the speaker’s grip. Done right, such a shift could herald a renaissance of bipartisan legislating, experts say. But done wrong, it will exacerbate partisan tensions and empower extremists, all but ensuring legislative deadlock that could force federal government shutdowns and a sovereign debt crisis.
“There’s a real question about whether the Freedom Caucus members want to pursue a positive legislative agenda or whether their goal is to simply be an agent of chaos,” said Daniel Schuman, policy director at Demand Progress.
“Congress has been testing this speaker-dominant model for at least 30 years,” said Kevin Kosar, congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. “Certainly it has some advantages in terms of being able to make commitments to voters and then push legislation through the House on party-line votes. The downside is legislators feel like they’re not legislators.
Democratic Leadership in House resigns
These include the top three positions: Speaker, House Majority Leader, and the House Whip.
From Axios: Pelosi stepping down as House Democratic leader after 20 years.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the iconic San Francisco liberal who has led congressional Democrats for two decades and broke the glass ceiling as the first woman to control the House of Representatives, said on Thursday she'll step aside as leader at the end of the 117th Congress.
. . . Democratic Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), 52, is seen by many colleagues as Pelosi's natural successor, Axios reported Wednesday evening.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), 83, and Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), 82, said in statements they will follow Pelosi's lead and step away from their leadership roles while remaining in Congress.
They are expected to be succeeded by Assistant House Speaker Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), 59, and Caucus Vice Chair Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), 43, respectively.
Thursday, November 17, 2022
Links - 11/17/22
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/14/texas-bill-filing-legislation-session-2023/
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/15/harris-county-election-complaints/
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/16/ted-cruz-john-cornyn-same-sex-marriage-bill/
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/15/chip-roy-speaker-house-republicans/
https://www.txana.org/
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/feckless
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/arbitrary
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capricious
https://www.txwd.uscourts.gov/judges-information/judges-directory-biographies/
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/voter-turnout-rate-by-age-usa
https://azsos.gov/sites/default/files/AZSOS_Signature_Verification_Guide.pdf
Recent activities of federal judges
Federalsism
Checks and Balances
- Federal judge in Texas rules that disarming those under protective orders violates their Second Amendment rights.
A Texas federal judge declared it was unconstitutional to disarm someone who is under a protective order, setting into motion a likely legal fight over who can possess firearms — a move that advocates say could have wide-ranging impacts on gun access across the county.
Judges who deem people a danger to family members or intimate partners can take the extra step to issue a protective order requiring people to relinquish the guns they already have. Federal law currently prohibits domestic abusers who are charged with a felony, misdemeanor or are under a protective order from possessing a gun.
The ruling comes months after a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case on the Second Amendment, the effects of which, legal experts say, are just beginning to be felt.
- U.S. can’t quickly expel migrants under pandemic-era health rule, federal judge says.
A federal judge on Tuesday blocked the federal government from continuing to use an emergency health order known as Title 42 to immediately expel migrants at the southern border after they have entered the United States.
“It is unreasonable for the CDC to assume that it can ignore the consequences of any actions it chooses to take in the pursuit of fulfilling its goals, particularly when those actions included the extraordinary decision to suspend the codified procedural and substantive rights of noncitizens seeking safe harbor,” Sullivan wrote in his opinion.
- In latest challenge to student loan forgiveness program, a Texas judge blocks Biden’s policy.
A federal judge in North Texas ruled on Thursday that President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program is “unlawful,” the latest challenge to the policy that has seen several attacks from conservative groups.
U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman said in court files that he declared the loan forgiveness plan unlawful because Biden did not follow federal procedures to allow for public comment prior to the policy’s announcement.
In October, the Job Creators Network Foundation filed the lawsuit in the North Texas court on behalf of two borrowers who don’t qualify for all of the program’s benefits. Those borrowers disagreed with the program’s eligibility criteria and the lawsuit alleged that they could not voice their disagreement.
Wednesday, November 16, 2022
https://csis.psych.umn.edu/projects/why-do-people-participate-politics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sputnik_1#Legacy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFouFuNgBRw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Caucus
https://www.archives.gov/files/presidential-libraries/events/centennials/nixon/images/exhibit/rn100-6-1-2.pdf
https://www.cherokeedelegate.com/PJc4q8D
Tuesday, November 15, 2022
Regarding Kevin McCarthy's bid to become Speaker in the 118th House.
Representative Kevin McCarthy of California on Tuesday resoundingly won the Republican nomination for speaker, but a challenge from his right flank that drew more than two dozen defectors showed weakness in his hold on his party, indicating a potentially rough fight ahead of him to secure the job at the start of the new Congress.
The vote, which took place as his party was still clawing its way to what appeared likely to be a historically slim majority, was a successful first showing for Mr. McCarthy, the five-term congressman from California, in his quest to win the speaker’s gavel. He only needed to secure support from a majority of his conference — including incumbents, newly elected members and candidates in uncalled races — in a secret-ballot vote held behind closed doors at the Capitol.
In a vote of 188-31, Mr. McCarthy easily defeated a challenge on his right from Representative Andy Biggs of Arizona, a former chairman of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus who ran as a protest candidate.
What was the pitch? "Name your price," Cuellar told ABC News.
He said his response was simple: "No, thank you."
The California Republican is expected to easily surpass the simple majority needed to win the nomination, but members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus are planning to put up a symbolic challenger to make clear that McCarthy can’t reach the magic number needed — 218 votes — in the formal floor vote when the new Congress convenes on Jan. 3.
“Nobody has 218,” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., told reporters before conservatives met to discuss rules changes they want from GOP leadership. “And somebody is going to run tomorrow” against McCarthy, he added.
. . . Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., who is opposing McCarthy for speaker, said once conservatives demonstrate that McCarthy can't secure 218 votes, a number of other Republicans will be interested in jumping into the race for speaker.
While several leading conservatives, including Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, have already endorsed McCarthy, other conservatives are demanding that he agree to a number of proposed rule changes before they get on board with his bid for speaker.
Among the changes they want: Bring back a rule making it easier to force a vote on ousting a speaker. It’s highly unlikely McCarthy would cede that power to the Freedom Caucus, though he could back smaller proposals.
Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry, R-Pa., who has been negotiating with McCarthy, said he spoke to him on Monday and that the “conversation went well.”
The vote, which took place as his party was still clawing its way to what appeared likely to be a historically slim majority, was a successful first showing for Mr. McCarthy, the five-term congressman from California, in his quest to win the speaker’s gavel. He only needed to secure support from a majority of his conference — including incumbents, newly elected members and candidates in uncalled races — in a secret-ballot vote held behind closed doors at the Capitol.
In a vote of 188-31, Mr. McCarthy easily defeated a challenge on his right from Representative Andy Biggs of Arizona, a former chairman of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus who ran as a protest candidate.
- Kevin McCarthy allies privately push moderate Democrat to switch parties in House speaker bid.
In a sign of the challenges House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy faces to secure enough votes to possibly become the next speaker of the House, his allies have tried to persuade one moderate Democrat to switch parties.
What was the pitch? "Name your price," Cuellar told ABC News.
He said his response was simple: "No, thank you."
- Conservatives warn McCarthy: You don't have the votes for speaker.
Conservative lawmakers sent a strong message to House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy on Monday, telling him he doesn't have the votes to be the next speaker.
The California Republican is expected to easily surpass the simple majority needed to win the nomination, but members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus are planning to put up a symbolic challenger to make clear that McCarthy can’t reach the magic number needed — 218 votes — in the formal floor vote when the new Congress convenes on Jan. 3.
“Nobody has 218,” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., told reporters before conservatives met to discuss rules changes they want from GOP leadership. “And somebody is going to run tomorrow” against McCarthy, he added.
. . . Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., who is opposing McCarthy for speaker, said once conservatives demonstrate that McCarthy can't secure 218 votes, a number of other Republicans will be interested in jumping into the race for speaker.
While several leading conservatives, including Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, have already endorsed McCarthy, other conservatives are demanding that he agree to a number of proposed rule changes before they get on board with his bid for speaker.
Among the changes they want: Bring back a rule making it easier to force a vote on ousting a speaker. It’s highly unlikely McCarthy would cede that power to the Freedom Caucus, though he could back smaller proposals.
Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry, R-Pa., who has been negotiating with McCarthy, said he spoke to him on Monday and that the “conversation went well.”
Why does it take so long to count votes?
A few thoughts:
The main difference: Florida doesn’t have an avalanche of mail ballots on Election Day. The state doesn’t allow mail voters to drop off their ballots anywhere but the county elections office on Tuesday.
Arizona does, and Maricopa County voters took advantage of late voting this year more than ever before. The county received 290,000 mail-in ballots on Election Day, according to County Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates, the most ever, and a 70% increase from 2020’s general election. That includes mail-in ballots sent in the mail, or dropped off at a vote center or drop box. The voter signatures on the envelopes of those mail-in ballots take time for county workers to verify. Florida is already done verifying those signatures before Election Day.
- Counting Through Conspiracy Theories in Arizona’s Midterms.
The issues started just a few hours in: voters reported that the tabulators couldn’t read their ballots, first at a handful of polling places around Phoenix, then a few more. Across the country, Election Day tends to involve a certain amount of managed chaos—volunteers don’t show up for their shifts, or can’t figure out how to set up the printers—but these technical issues were cropping up in Maricopa County, which has been the epicenter of election conspiracies for the past two years. The local officials running the election—Bill Gates, the chair of the county board of supervisors, and Stephen Richer, the county recorder—were already under enormous scrutiny. For months, right-wing activists and candidates had been stoking fears that the election might be rigged. The Gateway Pundit predicted “wide-scale, multifaceted voter fraud”; Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, said that “Stephen Richer and the entire Maricopa board of supervisors are a team of crooks and charlatans.” A swarm of national and international media were in town to observe how things unfolded. And now the machines weren’t working. By early afternoon, one in three polling places in Maricopa County were having problems with election equipment. “People of Arizona: Don’t get out of line until you cast your vote,” Donald Trump posted on Truth Social. “They are trying to steal the election with bad Machines and DELAY. Don’t let it happen!”
- Why is the midterm vote count taking so long in some US states?
The big picture here is that counts are taking extra time in races that are very close. News networks are hesitant to project winners because the margins between candidates are narrow and there are many ballots left to count – and so the need for patience may be justified. In this cycle, much of the heat is engulfing just three states: Arizona, Nevada and Georgia.
The number of people who vote early has increased dramatically since the pandemic. This year Maricopa county also saw a surge in the number of early ballots that were dropped off on election day – they are known as “late earlies” – rising to 290,000, the largest number in the state’s history and 100,000 more than in 2020.
Each early ballot has to be verified to check that the voter’s signature matches the signature in the voter rolls, and after that is done it is sent to a bipartisan panel for approval and processing. That all takes time, as we are witnessing.
Many people have drawn a comparison of Arizona’s vote count with that of Florida, which called its results within hours of polls closing on Tuesday. That state’s system allows election officials to begin counting mail-in ballots as soon as they are received; mail-in ballots have to be requested and must be received by an election supervisor no later than 7pm on election day.
But the main reason why Ron DeSantis won his re-election race so quickly on Tuesday was because it was a blowout, with the incumbent Republican governor garnering 59% of the vote while his challenger, Charlie Crist, received only 40%.
- Why Does It Take So Long to Count Mail Ballots in Key States? Blame Legislatures.
Far from being a fraud, a conspiracy, or even an accident, the slow count of mail ballots is a deliberate choice that lawmakers in key battleground states have made — and with disastrous consequences for public trust in elections. By building these delays into the system, lawmakers give oxygen to false claims of “ballot dumps” and other nonsense that has been used to sow distrust and has led to threats and violence against election workers. We will hear the same false claims after the 2022 election — in which mail ballots again appear to be tilting Democratic — and in every subsequent election until state legislatures fix the process.
State law prescribes the timing of the vote-counting process. Most states allow election workers to remove ballots from their envelopes and confirm the voter’s eligibility before Election Day, sometimes weeks in advance as the ballots arrive at processing centers. Nearly half of states — including Florida, Ohio, and Texas — allow election officials to scan ballots into tabulators ahead of Election Day so that these ballots can be counted immediately and included in results on election night.
- When polls close — and how long counting votes might take — in each state.
Poll closing times vary from state to state, from county to county, and, in some parts of the country, from town to town. The earliest results in most states are reported by local voting precincts soon after polls close there. Every state also has different rules for how officials process and count ballots, and these rules determine how quickly results are released.
In 2020, an influx of mail-in and early ballots due to the pandemic caused major slowdowns in vote counting and reporting election results. It took four days for enough votes to be counted for the major decision desks to call the presidency for Joe Biden.
- It Took Two Weeks to Call Every State in 2020. This Is When to Expect Results This Year.
This article reflects expectations for results timing by officials before election night. As of Wednesday at 1:30 p.m. Eastern time, three competitive Senate seats are yet to be called. It’s unclear how long it will take to count remaining mail and provisional ballots in Nevada and Georgia. Georgia seems unlikely to be resolved before a Dec. 6 runoff election.
From the New York Times: Gerrymandering, the Full Story
Now that the election is over. its time to look at the impact gerrymandering.
- Click here for the article.
If you asked Americans to describe the ways that political power has become disconnected from public opinion, many would put the gerrymandering of congressional districts near the top of the list. State lawmakers from both parties have drawn the lines of House districts in ways meant to maximize the number that their own party will win, and Republicans in some states have been especially aggressive, going so far as to ignore court orders.
My colleague Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, explains this situation in the latest version of his newsletter. “In reality, Republicans do have a structural edge in the House, but it isn’t anything near insurmountable for the Democrats,” Nate writes. “By some measures, this is the fairest House map of the last 40 years.”
Of the House’s 435 districts, 220 now appear to have a natural Republican lean, compared with 215 with a Democratic lean. To be clear, that three-seat margin (because Democrats must flip three Republican-leaning seats to win control) is still meaningful, especially in an election shaping up to be as close as this one.
There are two apparent causes. First, Republicans really have been more aggressive than Democrats nationwide. As the political analyst David Wasserman recently wrote for NBC News:
Thanks to reforms passed by voters, many heavily blue states employed bipartisan redistricting commissions that produced neutral or only marginally Democratic-leaning political maps — including in California, Colorado, New Jersey, Virginia and Washington. And state courts in Maryland and New York struck down Democratic legislatures’ attempted gerrymanders.
By contrast, Republicans were able to manipulate congressional maps in their favor in Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Ohio, Tennessee and Texas, among others, and the conservative-dominated U.S. Supreme Court blocked lower court orders to draw new Black majority districts in Alabama and Louisiana. In Florida alone, Gov. Ron DeSantis overpowered his own Legislature to pass a map that adds an additional four G.O.P. seats.
The second cause is one that Jonathan Rodden, a political scientist at Stanford University, has explained in his book, “Why Cities Lose.” Many Democratic voters live packed tightly together in cities. As a result, even Democratic state officials often struggle to avoid drawing districts where Democratic House candidates win landslide victories, effectively wasting votes.
From The Guardian: £7,000 a year – that’s the hit to your salary if you come from a working-class family
A look at one of the sources of unequal treatment before the law. Less wealth translates in to lower education, less political power, and less power before the courts, etc....
It's called the class pay gap.
- Click here for the article.
Those on the receiving end of this class pay gap are being hit by a double whammy as the cost of living crisis also eats into their incomes. Employers and the government need to take urgent action on both to stop hundreds of thousands of workers from being undervalued and underpaid.
The data could not be starker. Research sponsored by the Social Mobility Foundation, which I chair, has revisited the work of academics Sam Friedman and Daniel Laurison to calculate the class pay gap at 13%. In other words, people from underprivileged backgrounds who have made it into professional employment may as well be working 13% of the year for nothing. That is nearly one day for each seven-day week.
Putting it another way, it means that from tomorrow, which is Class Pay Gap Day, professionals from working-class backgrounds effectively stop earning for the rest of the year. The gap is even wider – more than £8,000 – for CEOs, finance managers, management consultants and solicitors.
Depressingly, the research found that when gender and ethnic differences were taken into account those from a working-class background face a “double disadvantage”. Working-class women are paid £9,450 less than their male colleagues, even when they are both working in higher professional-managerial positions. The study also found that people of Bangladeshi and black Caribbean heritage are paid £10,432 and £8,770 less respectively than their white peers in the same jobs.
From Politico: The GOP's under-the-radar leadership race
Electoral votes are still being counted, but competition now shifts to the party caucuses in both chambers of Congress as they figure out who their leaders are going to be.
- Click here for the article.
House Republican leadership elections are scheduled to go ahead tomorrow, but conservatives are pushing for postponement until it is clear which party will control the House. The House Freedom Caucus is mulling a symbolic bid by Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) for House Speaker that could prevent House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) from securing the 2018 GOP votes he would need on Jan. 3 to clinch the gavel in a GOP-controlled House.
The vision is a coalition-style leadership arrangement, where every decision about legislation, governance and House operations must be cleared by the Freedom Caucus in order to come to fruition.
The plan is risky and far from finalized. The entire Freedom Caucus is not involved in the McCarthy-toppling proposal (although HFC chair Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) is involved) and it could flop altogether.
Section Twelve - The Judicial Branch
The Judicial Branch
The last governing institution created in the Texas and U.S. Constitutions is the judiciary, which is designed to resolve disputes. These disputes can involve private parties, private organizations, and governments. These disputes must also involve real cases and controversies regarding laws and behavior, and be brought by people who have been impacted by them.
The courts are unique - on the national level, not the state - because they are appointed by the chief executive, subject to confirmation by a majority of the senate. In Texas, these people are elected as nominees of a political party. Regardless, judges are intended to make decisions dispassionately according to the law, not according to the politics or partisanship. At least that's the intent.
1 - Constitutional Design.
2 - Statutory Design.
3 - U.S. Code: Title 28—Judiciary And Judicial Procedure.
4 - Process.
5 - The Supreme Court.
6 - Judicial Review.
7 - Test Cases.
Terms
- common law
- case law
- judicial procedure
- due process of law
- criminal law
- civil law
- public law
- private law
- precedence
- stare decisis
- trial court
- court of appeals
- supreme court
- jurisdiction
- original jurisdiction
- appellate jurisdiction
- writ of habeas corpus
- landmark Supreme Court cases
- district courts
- U.S. court of appeals
- judicial appointments
- senatorial courtesy
- dispute resolution
- coordination
- rule interpretation
- judicial review
- supremacy clause
- checks and balances
- presidential power
- lawmaking
- cases and controversies
- rules of access
- ripeness
- standing
- class action suits
- mootness
- writ of certiorari
- rule of four
- the flow of cases
- solicitor general
- amicus curiae
- law clerks
- briefs
- oral arguments
- conference
- opinion writing
- majority
- concurrence
- dissenting
- judicial restraint
- judicial activism
- political ideology
- implementation
- strategic behavior
- power
- appellate courts
- appellate jurisdiction
- bench trial
- caseload
- civil cases
- common law
- judge made law
- criminal cases
- disposed
- dual structure
- en banc
- felony
- jurisdiction
- jury trial
- mandatory review
- merit selection
- misdemeanors
- opinion
- original jurisdiction
- probate
Lecture Topics
- The Judicial Power.
- Adjudication.
- Case Law.
- US Courts.
- US Supreme Court.
- The Texas Judiciary - Relevant Links.
- The Texas Judicial Branch.
- Alvin Municipal Court.
- US Constitution: Article 3.
- Article 3: Annotated.
- 1876 Texas Constitution: Article 5.
- Texas Constitution: Article 5.
- Texas Statutes: Government Code.
- Texas Courts.
From the Washington Post: Crime is surging (in Fox News coverage)
Public policy is often driven by media coverage, not facts.
- Click here for the article.
Fox News contributor Gianno Caldwell caught up with Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) outside an elevator in the Capitol. His focus was simple: “We just want to talk about the crime crisis in America.” Nadler, who’d suggested that Caldwell contact his office, didn’t reply.
If so, I’d be interested to know what numbers he’s looking at. Data released by the FBI on Wednesday suggested that violent crime nationally didn’t increase much in 2021 relative to 2020. That comports with recent figures from crime victimization data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), which indicated that reported violent crime was flat in 2021 and down from before the pandemic.
As I noted when those BJS numbers were released, discussion of crime in the United States is hampered by broadly inconsistent and uneven reporting of crime data. Some jurisdictions, like New York or Los Angeles (where violent crime is essentially flat, year-over-year) report data regularly. The national measure compiled by the FBI has seen declining participation (thanks in part to a change in what it collects) even as it operates at a substantial delay.
From Gallup: Most Important Problem
A look at what the percentage of respondents that claimed that the economy wad the important problem of the time, dating back to 2000.
- Click here for the page.
Monday, November 14, 2022
Links 11/14/22
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ike_Dike
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/11/14/americans-support-marijuana-legalization/
https://capitol.texas.gov/Reports/Report.aspx?ID=todayfiled
https://capitol.texas.gov/Reports/General.aspx
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/10/texas-judge-biden-student-loan-forgiveness/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozawa_v._United_States
https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/02/politics/mitch-mcconnell-rick-scott-fight-senate-control
https://rollcall.com/2022/11/10/at-the-races-726-days-til-election-day-2024/
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/11/08/us/elections/results-key-races.html
https://news.gallup.com/poll/388781/political-party-preferences-shifted-greatly-during-2021.aspx
https://prospect.org/politics/house-democratic-leadership-race-hakeem-jeffries/
Friday, November 11, 2022
From Wikipedia: Statute of Labourers 1351
For our look at labor law
- Click here for the entry.
The Statute of Labourers was a law created by the English parliament under King Edward III in 1351 in response to a labour shortage, which aimed at regulating the labour force by prohibiting requesting or offering a wage higher than pre-Plague standards and limiting movement in search of better conditions.[1] The popular narrative about its success and enforcement holds that it was poorly enforced and did not stop the rise in real wages.[2] However, immediately after the Black Death, real wages did not rise, despite the labour shortage.[3]
The statute set a maximum wage for labourers that was commensurate with wages paid before the Black Death, specifically, in the year 1346. It also mandated that able-bodied men and women should work and imposed harsh penalties for those who remained idle.[4]
For more: United States labor law.
United States labor law sets the rights and duties for employees, labor unions, and employers in the United States. Labor law's basic aim is to remedy the "inequality of bargaining power" between employees and employers, especially employers "organized in the corporate or other forms of ownership association".[3] Over the 20th century, federal law created minimum social and economic rights, and encouraged state laws to go beyond the minimum to favor employees.[4]
UH GOVT 2306 Module 4 Terms
Terms for module 4 GOVT 2306 - UH
TX - Chapter 11 - Public Finance
- budget
- biennial budget
- general appropriations bill
- "balanced budget"
- All Funds
- General Revenue Funds
- General Revenue - Dedicated Funds
- Federal Funds
- Other Funds
- Fiscal Size-Up
- Spending
- Revenue
- low service, low tax
- taxes
- income tax
- state sales taxes - general and specific
- local sales taxes
- property taxes
- tax burden
- oil severance tax
- progressive tax
- regressive tax
- matching funds
- permanent school fund
- available school fund
- state highway fund
- economic stabilization fund
- permanent university fund
- higher education fund
- national research university fund
- budget cycle
- pay as you go
- limits on growth of certain appropriations
- welfare spending limit
- limitation on debt payable from the general revenue fund
- budget execution authority
- budgetary process
- dual budget
- governor's office of budget, planning, and policy
- legislative budget board
- comptroller of public accounts
- revenue estimate
- House Appropriations Committee
- Senate Finance Committee
- budget certification
- state auditor's office
TX - Chapter 12 - Public Policy
- public policy
- policy making process
- problem identification
- policy formation
- implementation
- evaluation
- rationality
- education policy
- public education
- Gilmer - Aikin Laws
- Desegregation
- equal protection clause
- equity in funding
- San Antonio v Rodriquez
- Edgewood ISD v Kirby
- vouchers
- charter schools
- increased funding
- welfare policy
- poverty in Texas
- New Deal
- Medicaid
- Supplemental Security Income
- AFDC
- TANF
- dependency
- Health Care Policy
- Medicaid Participation
- Medicaid Administration
- Medicaid Financing
- Abortion Policy in Texas
- Affordable Care Act
- Health Insurance
TX - Chapter 13 - Crime, Correlations, and Public Safety
- crime
- criminal justice
- policing in Texas
- police departments
- Texas Commission on Law Enforcement
- licensing
- use of support
- Sandra Bland Act
- Categorizing Crime in Texas
- felony
- misdemeanors
- punishment
- probation
- parole
- three strikes provision
- arraignment
- bail
- bail reform
- grand jury
- pretrial hearings
- plea bargaining
- trial
- sentencing
- reform
- marijuana laws
- county attorney
- district attorney
- assigned counsel
- public defender
- prisons
- incarceration rate
- death penalty
- self defense
- concealed weapons
- open carry
- fairness
- reforms
TX - Chapter 14 - Building the Future: Public Policies for a Changing Texas
- immigration
- legal
- illegal
- border security
- transportation policy
- roads
- highways
- centerline miles
- lane miles
- vehicle miles traveled
- funding
- toll roads
- bullet train
- public transit
- naturalized citizens
- Texas Dream Act
- sanctuary cities
- Senate Bill 4
- DACA
- Higher Education Policy
- Permanent University Fund
- university systems
- THECB
- finance
- tuition and fees
- special items
- HEF
- 60x30TX
- Water Policy
- surface water
- groundwater
- Water Law
- law of capture
What is authority?
Something essential to establishing hierarchy - without authority there is no hierarchy
Here are few definition from Merriam - Webster:
power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behavior
- the president's authority
- Who gave you the authority to do as you wish?
persons in command
- specifically : GOVERNMENT
- the local authorities of each state
a governmental agency or corporation to administer a revenue-producing public enterprise
- the transit authority
- the city's housing authority
: GROUNDS, WARRANT
had excellent authority for believing the claim
- convincing force
- lent authority to the performance
a citation (as from a book or file) used in defense or support
- the source from which the citation is drawn
- He quoted extensively from the Bible, his sole authority.
a conclusive statement or set of statements (such as an official decision of a court)
- a decision taken as a precedent
TESTIMONY
an individual cited or appealed to as an expert
- The prosecutor called the psychiatrist as an authority.
Colonial America's First Newspaper
It was called Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, it was printed in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1689, and it survived one issue because it wasn't licensed. This means that colonial leadership exercised their authority due to their elite status to limit the nature of the information allowed to flow throughout the colony.
It featured a story of alleged atrocities committed by Indian tribes.
- Click here for it.
The first and only issue, published Thursday September 25, 1690, had an account of a battle waged by General Fitz-John Winthrop during the French and Indian Wars covering the brutal treatment of French prisoners of war. No second edition was ever printed because the account angered the Colonial government, which ordered the immediate suspension of the paper, only four days later on September 29, 1690, and which referred to the paper as a "pamphlet" . All remaining issues of the newspaper were destroyed. The order stated:[7][5][8]
By Order of the Governor and Council,
— Isaac Addington, Secr.,
Sept. 29, 1690,
The colony in question was called the Dominion of New England.
The royal governor of the time was Edmund Andros.
The political forces that have shaped the current Supreme Court
Nominations are not accidental. The links below mention that the group was created largely with anonymous funds. Meaning we have no idea what forces drive the decisions of the court.
- The Federalist Society.
The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies is an American conservative and libertarian legal organization that advocates for a textualist and originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution.[4][5][6] Headquartered in Washington D.C., it has chapters at more than 200 American law schools and features student, lawyer, and faculty divisions. The lawyers division comprises more than 70,000 practicing attorneys in ninety cities.[1] Through speaking events, lectures, and other activities, it provides a forum for legal experts of opposing views to interact with members of the legal profession, the judiciary, and the legal academy.[7] It is one of the most influential legal organizations in the United States.
- Leonard Leo.
Leonard A. Leo (born 1965) is an American lawyer and conservative legal activist. He was the longtime vice president of the Federalist Society and is currently, along with Steven G. Calabresi, the co-chairman of the organization's board of directors.
Leo has been instrumental in building a network of influential conservative groups funded mostly by anonymous donors, including The 85 Fund and Concord Fund which serve as funding hubs for nonprofits in the network.[1] He assisted Clarence Thomas in his Supreme Court confirmation hearings and led campaigns to support the nominations of John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.
- Steve Calabrese.
Steven Gow Calabresi (born 1958) is Clayton J. and Henry R. Barber Professor of Law at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law. He is the co-chairman of the Federalist Society. He is the nephew of Guido Calabresi, a U.S. Appellate judge and former dean of the Yale Law School.[1]
The group claims to base it's goals on the principles outlined in Federalist 78. So here it is if you'd like a peek:
- Federalist 78.
Thursday, November 10, 2022
Largest Armies in the World 1820-2022 WW1, WW2
I cant vouch for the accuracy of these numbers, and I'm not sure if they mean only the army or the entire military, but notice how the size of the US army fluctuates over history - depending on whether there is a war going on - until 1947 when it stabilizes at around 1.5 million.
Historical looks at public opinion on race
- From the Roper Center: Historical Data on Public Opinion and Black Americans 1930s-2010s.
- From Pew Research: Deep Divisions in Americans’ Views of Nation’s Racial History.
- From Gallup: Race Relations.
- From Brookings: When it comes to public opinion on race, it’s not 1968 anymore.
Key Terms - Week 12
Terms
WTP: Chapter 6 - Public Opinion and Political Participation
- public opinion
- political participation
- political socialization
- agents of socialization
- - parents
- - peers
- - education
- - race
- - religion
- - wealth
- - life events
- - generational effects
- party identification
- political elites
- - agenda setting
- - framing
- focusing events
- polling
- non-attitudes
- information shortcuts
- group think
- traditional participation
- voting
- electoral activities
- voice
- civic voluntarism
- direct action
- civil disobedience
- political voice
- social capital
- political mobilization
- issue advocacy
- voter turnout
- paradox of voting
- institutional barriers
- complacency
- clicktivism
- din
From Ballotpedia: Statewide 2022 ballot measures
Statewide initiatives were on the ballot across the nation. These are not authorized on the state level in Texas, though they are allowed on the local level.
- Click here for the page.
On November 8, voters in 37 states decided on 132 statewide ballot measures. You can view ballot measure election results here.
- On December 10, voters in one state, Louisiana, will decide on three ballot measures.
- Earlier in 2022, voters in four states decided on five ballot measures. Voters approved three and rejected two of these measures.
From 2010 to 2020, the average number of statewide ballot measures in an even-numbered year was 164.
For more:
- 2022 local ballot measure elections.
From the Washington Post: When polls close — and how long counting votes might take — in each state
- Click here for the article.
State officials in Indiana and Kentucky are likely to report some of the first results of the 2022 midterm elections on Tuesday soon after polls close in parts of those states at 6 p.m. Eastern time. Within a few hours, results from most areas should be flooding in, but expect some states to count a lot faster than others.
In 2020, an influx of mail-in and early ballots due to the pandemic caused major slowdowns in vote counting and reporting election results. It took four days for enough votes to be counted for the major decision desks to call the presidency for Joe Biden. Vote counting isn’t expected to be nearly as slow as it was last time around, but there’s a chance we won’t know the outcomes of some key races — and possibly even control of Congress — on election night.
Texas
Polls close: 8 p.m./9 p.m. Eastern (7 p.m. local time). Two Texas counties are in Mountain time.
How long does counting usually take? Most of the votes are typically counted within 4-5 hours of polls closing statewide, with remaining votes verified over the following days. Unless a race is too close to call, most winners are determined by 2 a.m. Eastern. In fact, in the 2020 general election, more than half of all votes counted were released within 75 minutes of polls closing statewide. Texas can count quickly because so much of the state votes early, and counties with 100,000 people or more are allowed to start tallying early votes once the early voting period ends — this year that’s Nov. 4 — which gives them a head start. Counties with less than 100,000 can start counting when polls open on Election Day, but with the smaller populations, many still manage to count all early votes by the time polls close. (More from the AP)
From the Washington Post: Where voter turnout exceeded 2018 highs
A look at how turnout in 2022 differed from the last midterm election in 2018, in addition to the presidential election of 2020.
- Click here for it.
A smaller share of Americans appear to have voted in these midterm elections than the last one, but in some states, voter enthusiasm exceeded the high mark set in 2018, according to a Washington Post analysis of Associated Press and U.S. Elections Project data.
Votes are still being counted, and in some states, it may take weeks to know the exact number of Americans who voted. But votes counted so far and expected vote totals show divergent turnout rates across states.
Turnout was especially high for a midterm in several battleground states, where expectations of a close contest appeared to boost voter participation. Voter turnout in Pennsylvania is on track to exceed 2018 by four percentage points. Nearly 6 in 10 eligible voters in Wisconsin and Michigan cast a ballot.
But in a handful of states, voter enthusiasm fell far below 2018 levels and was more on par with the record lows seen in 2014. In Mississippi and West Virginia, less than 35 percent of eligible voters participated. In New Jersey and Maryland, turnout is anticipated to be 10 percentage points lower than 2018.
From Kurt Eichenwald: Cash to Politicians is Free Speech. A Vote Isn't?
An opinion piece - so it is biased, but it raises an important question. If funding a campaign in order to influence people's votes is free speech, why isn't voting? Should those who promote voting frame it as a free speech issue?
- Click here for the article.
If I send an envelope stuffed with cash to support a politician, that’s free speech. If I send an envelope stuffed with my ballot to support a politician, it’s not. That is the twisted world created by our current Supreme Court
. . . The Founders did know of many types of political speech - with voting being the most obvious. But not to a court that believes money supporting a candidate is free speech, while supporting that candidate with a vote is not.
The entire approach is absurd. “It seems like an obvious proposition that a citizen registering to vote or casting a ballot is engaging in free speech,” Armand Derfner and J. Gerald Hebert, two experts on law and voting wrote in Yale Law and Policy Review. “This simple proposition is especially fitting in light of the broad First Amendment protection extended to the dollars spent in political campaigns to influence votes. But the current Supreme Court rarely scrutinizes voting regulations as it does other speech regulations.”
Besides, if the Supreme Court ever declared that casting a ballot is political speech, their endless effort to gut the Voting Rights Act in cases like Shelby v. Holder would end. That would mean that the electorate would be allowed to vote without improper interference by states desperately working to throw up barriers to the ballot box.
For more on the question of whether voting is speech - which would make great weekly written assignment - click on these:
- Voting Is Speech.
- Protect Voting Like We Protect Free Speech.
- THE FIRST AMENDMENT PROTECTS ACTIVITIES ADJACENT TO VOTING, BUT STOPS SHORT OF VOTING ITSELF.
- WHY DON'T WE DEFEND VOTING ON THE GROUNDS OF FREE SPEECH?
- Legislators’ votes are not protected speech, Supreme Court rules.
- - Nevada Commission on Ethics v. Carrigan.
Links - 11/9/22
- https://organizetexas.org/
- https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/08/texas-harris-county-polls-close-8-pm/
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_midterm_election
- https://apps.texastribune.org/features/2022/texas-2022-election-results/?_ga=2.127000974.2029690159.1668000084-1085566851.1661785763
https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/voter/important-election-dates.shtml#2023
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/09/harris-county-judge-lina-hidalgo-alexandra-mealer/
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/analyses/the-2022-midterm-elections-what-the-historical-data-suggest
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/11/09/texas-cities-marijuana-decriminalization-election/
From the New Republic: The Case for Tribal Statehood
I have never heard of such a thing, but now that I have it seems perfectly logical.
- Click here for the article.
American democracy is in distress, its future uncertain. No single solution will fix all its problems, but one popular idea of the past few years—on the left, anyway—is to grant statehood to Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. Doing so would first and foremost grant the people of the Caribbean territory and federal district, respectively, the representation in Congress and governmental autonomy that they deserve. It would also shake up the pro-rural—and thus pro-conservative—bias of the Electoral College and Senate. But a similar, complementary solution has been overlooked: tribal statehood.
In 1898, the Five Civilized Tribes of Oklahoma (so named because of their willingness to adopt Western forms of economic and social ties) were facing a crisis. It had become clear the U.S. government was once again reneging on its promises by planning to abolish their tribal governments and force them to cede most of their land to white settlers. In response, the Five Tribes held a convention to form an Indian state. They drafted a constitution and proposed a state government for the potential Native American–controlled state of Sequoyah. The referendum was approved by a majority of Native American and white voters, but Congress never considered their request.
Instead, Oklahoma was admitted as a state in 1907, following President Theodore Roosevelt’s proposal to combine Oklahoma Territory with Indian Territory. Despite becoming part of the new state of Oklahoma, the people—and their lands—who would have formed the state of Sequoyah retained their separate legal status, as the Supreme Court in McGirt v. Oklahoma recently reaffirmed. Because tribal lands remain sovereign territories, tribes possess a constitutional pathway to an alternative form of self-governance. Tribes can seek statehood.
From the Texas Tribune: Five Texas cities vote to decriminalize having small amounts of marijuana
It is still illegal statewide, so I imagine there will be pushback at the state level. It does indicate a further trend towards legalization in the state - one day.
- Click here for the story.
By the end of Election Day, five Texas cities have voted to decriminalize low-level marijuana possession.
Voters in these cities have now shown strong support for the proposals at the polls.
The campaign saw the highest level of support in San Marcos — home to Texas State University — with nearly 82% of the votes. Denton, which has several university campuses, saw more than 70% of the votes backing the proposition.
In Killeen, known for its proximity to military base Fort Hood, close to 70% of voters approved the proposition. Elgin, just outside of Austin, saw almost 75% of votes in support of the reform. And on the low end, more than 60% of voters in Harker Heights in Bell County casted ballots in favor of decriminalizing marijuana.
Wednesday, November 9, 2022
From ScotusBlog: 2020 Election Litigation Tracker
To help understand the role the judiciary can play in adjudicating lectison disputes.
- Click here for it.
Which makes more sense?
Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more:
By Sinel's death I know I am thane of Glamis;
But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,
A prosperous gentleman; and to be king
Stands not within the prospect of belief,
No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
You owe this strange intelligence? or why
Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you.
The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted.
By Sinel's death I know I am thane of Glamis;
But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,
A prosperous gentleman; and to be king
Stands not within the prospect of belief,
No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
You owe this strange intelligence? or why
Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you.
The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted.
Monday, November 7, 2022
From Wikipedia: The Talented Tenth
- Click here for the entry.
The phrase "talented tenth" originated in 1896 among White Northern liberals, specifically the American Baptist Home Mission Society, a Christian missionary society strongly supported by John D. Rockefeller. They had the goal of establishing Black colleges in the South to train Black teachers and elites. In 1903, W.E.B. Du Bois wrote The Talented Tenth; Theodore Roosevelt was president of the United States and industrialization was skyrocketing. Du Bois thought it a good time for African Americans to advance their positions in society.
He strongly believed that the Black community needed a classical education to reach their full potential, rather than the industrial education promoted by the Atlanta Compromise, endorsed by Booker T. Washington and some White philanthropists. He saw classical education as the pathway to bettering the Black community and as a basis for what, in the 20th century, would be known as public intellectuals
From Britannica: Elite Theory and the Iron Law of Oligarchy
- Click here for Elite Theory.
. . . in political science, theoretical perspective according to which (1) a community’s affairs are best handled by a small subset of its members and (2) in modern societies such an arrangement is in fact inevitable. These two tenets are ideologically allied but logically separable.
The basic normative question underlying elite theory is whether the relative power of any group ought to exceed its relative size. The affirmative answer goes back to ancient Greece, where the disproportionate influence of distinguished minorities was defended by reference to their superior wisdom or virtue, as in Plato’s “guardian” class of rulers. The Greek precursor to the English aristocracy (aristokratia) referred to rule by “the best men” (the aristoi). The empirical assumption behind the defense of elite rule at the time was the unequal distribution of the finest human traits.
The inevitability of elite rule could not be taken for granted, however, as attested by the fact that ancient, medieval, and early modern political writers undertook a constant struggle against rule by ordinary people, or democracy, which was often equated with the absence of order, or anarchy. That explicitly antidemocratic posture was characteristic of Christian writers such as Thomas Aquinas, the 13th-century theologian. The French word élite, from which the modern English is taken, means simply “the elect” or “the chosen” and thus accommodates the notion that people of outstanding ability hold their power and privileges by divine sanction.
- Click here for the Iron Law of Oligarchy.
A sociological thesis according to which all organizations, including those committed to democratic ideals and practices, will inevitably succumb to rule by an elite few (an oligarchy). The iron law of oligarchy contends that organizational democracy is an oxymoron. Although elite control makes internal democracy unsustainable, it is also said to shape the long-term development of all organizations—including the rhetorically most radical—in a conservative direction.
Robert Michels spelled out the iron law of oligarchy in the first decade of the 20th century in Political Parties, a brilliant comparative study of European socialist parties that drew extensively on his own experiences in the German Socialist Party. Influenced by Max Weber’s analysis of bureaucracy as well as by Vilfredo Pareto’s and Gaetano Mosca’s theories of elite rule, Michels argued that organizational oligarchy resulted, most fundamentally, from the imperatives of modern organization: competent leadership, centralized authority, and the division of tasks within a professional bureaucracy. These organizational imperatives necessarily gave rise to a caste of leaders whose superior knowledge, skills, and status, when combined with their hierarchical control of key organizational resources such as internal communication and training, would allow them to dominate the broader membership and to domesticate dissenting groups. Michels supplemented this institutional analysis of internal power consolidation with psychological arguments drawn from Gustave Le Bon’s crowd theory. From this perspective, Michels particularly emphasized the idea that elite domination also flowed from the way rank-and-file members craved guidance by and worshipped their leaders. Michels insisted that the chasm separating elite leaders from rank-and-file members would also steer organizations toward strategic moderation, as key organizational decisions would ultimately be taken more in accordance with leaders’ self-serving priorities of organizational survival and stability than with members’ preferences and demands.
The iron law became a central theme in the study of organized labour, political parties, and pluralist democracy in the postwar era.
Related: - Extrapolating Insufferability from Fandom Affiliation: The Case of Elon Musk Fanboys.
. . . in political science, theoretical perspective according to which (1) a community’s affairs are best handled by a small subset of its members and (2) in modern societies such an arrangement is in fact inevitable. These two tenets are ideologically allied but logically separable.
The basic normative question underlying elite theory is whether the relative power of any group ought to exceed its relative size. The affirmative answer goes back to ancient Greece, where the disproportionate influence of distinguished minorities was defended by reference to their superior wisdom or virtue, as in Plato’s “guardian” class of rulers. The Greek precursor to the English aristocracy (aristokratia) referred to rule by “the best men” (the aristoi). The empirical assumption behind the defense of elite rule at the time was the unequal distribution of the finest human traits.
The inevitability of elite rule could not be taken for granted, however, as attested by the fact that ancient, medieval, and early modern political writers undertook a constant struggle against rule by ordinary people, or democracy, which was often equated with the absence of order, or anarchy. That explicitly antidemocratic posture was characteristic of Christian writers such as Thomas Aquinas, the 13th-century theologian. The French word élite, from which the modern English is taken, means simply “the elect” or “the chosen” and thus accommodates the notion that people of outstanding ability hold their power and privileges by divine sanction.
- Click here for the Iron Law of Oligarchy.
A sociological thesis according to which all organizations, including those committed to democratic ideals and practices, will inevitably succumb to rule by an elite few (an oligarchy). The iron law of oligarchy contends that organizational democracy is an oxymoron. Although elite control makes internal democracy unsustainable, it is also said to shape the long-term development of all organizations—including the rhetorically most radical—in a conservative direction.
Robert Michels spelled out the iron law of oligarchy in the first decade of the 20th century in Political Parties, a brilliant comparative study of European socialist parties that drew extensively on his own experiences in the German Socialist Party. Influenced by Max Weber’s analysis of bureaucracy as well as by Vilfredo Pareto’s and Gaetano Mosca’s theories of elite rule, Michels argued that organizational oligarchy resulted, most fundamentally, from the imperatives of modern organization: competent leadership, centralized authority, and the division of tasks within a professional bureaucracy. These organizational imperatives necessarily gave rise to a caste of leaders whose superior knowledge, skills, and status, when combined with their hierarchical control of key organizational resources such as internal communication and training, would allow them to dominate the broader membership and to domesticate dissenting groups. Michels supplemented this institutional analysis of internal power consolidation with psychological arguments drawn from Gustave Le Bon’s crowd theory. From this perspective, Michels particularly emphasized the idea that elite domination also flowed from the way rank-and-file members craved guidance by and worshipped their leaders. Michels insisted that the chasm separating elite leaders from rank-and-file members would also steer organizations toward strategic moderation, as key organizational decisions would ultimately be taken more in accordance with leaders’ self-serving priorities of organizational survival and stability than with members’ preferences and demands.
The iron law became a central theme in the study of organized labour, political parties, and pluralist democracy in the postwar era.
Related: - Extrapolating Insufferability from Fandom Affiliation: The Case of Elon Musk Fanboys.
From Wikipedia: The Noble Lie
A justification for hierarchy.
- Click here for it.
In politics, a noble lie is a myth or a lie typically of religious nature, knowingly propagated by an elite to maintain social harmony or advance an agenda. The noble lie is a concept originated by Plato as described in The Republic.
. . . Plato presented the noble lie (γενναῖον ψεῦδος, gennaion pseudos)[3] in the fictional tale known as the myth or parable of the metals in Book III. In it, Socrates provides the origin of the three social classes who compose the republic proposed by Plato. Socrates speaks of a socially stratified society as a metaphor for the soul,[citation needed] wherein the populace are told "a sort of Phoenician tale":
...the earth, as being their mother, delivered them, and now, as if their land were their mother and their nurse, they ought to take thought for her and defend her against any attack and regard the other citizens as their brothers and children of the self-same earth...While all of you, in the city, are brothers, we will say in our tale, yet god, in fashioning those of you who are fitted to hold rule, mingled gold in their generation, for which reason they are the most precious—but in the helpers, silver, and iron and brass in the farmers and other craftsmen. And, as you are all akin, though, for the most part, you will breed after your kinds, it may sometimes happen that a golden father would beget a silver son, and that a golden offspring would come from a silver sire, and that the rest would, in like manner, be born of one another. So that the first and chief injunction that the god lays upon the rulers is that of nothing else are they to be such careful guardians, and so intently observant as of the intermixture of these metals in the souls of their offspring, and if sons are born to them with an infusion of brass or iron they shall by no means give way to pity in their treatment of them, but shall assign to each the status due to his nature and thrust them out among the artisans or the farmers. And again, if from these there is born a son with unexpected gold or silver in his composition they shall honor such and bid them go up higher, some to the office of guardian, some to the assistanceship, alleging that there is an oracle that the city shall then be overthrown when the man of iron or brass is its guardian.[4]
Socrates proposes and claims that if the people believed "this myth...[it] would have a good effect, making them more inclined to care for the state and one another."[5] This is his noble lie: "a contrivance for one of those falsehoods that come into being in case of need, of which we were just now talking, some noble one..."
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