February 6th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
“I actually think it did have an effect on Bush’s perceived legitimacy among his opponents. People opposed Reagan or Bush Senior; with W., from the first moment, there was enormous ill-will that wasn’t just focused on his policies but also on whether or not he had a right to be President at all. ”

His opponents? This wouldn’t include the Democratic leadership in Congress; it wouldn’t include such alleged bastions of liberality such as the NYT.

The people who are pissed were the rank-and-file; the elites told them to shut up, and got eagerly down to doing business.

The end lesson of the Bush administration is just how far a GOP president can push it, with no fear of serious consequences.

I’m very unwilling to sit out elections based on the candidates’ engagement in pretty normal political stupidity. Mostly this is because I spend a lot of time dealing with the practical effects of government policy (school funding and quality, youth incarceration, abortion/birth control/childcare access for teenagers, what happens when kids don’t have dental care, public transit). The Clinton-McCain choice is absolutely meaningful at that level, and not worth sitting out over one unfair maneuver in a generally unfair process. It’s not like the Democratic nomination process is a model of voter enfrachisement and representation aside from this one issue.

When the DNC rules committee met (I watched it on C-SPAN) to consider Florida, the expectation was that the DNC would impose the maximum sanction (half the delegates). Instead, the DNC shocked Florida by throwing out the DNC’s rulebook and inventing a new rule (loss of all delegates). This action took place well after the polls made it clear Clinton would dominate in Florida. The DNC rules committee was stacked with Obama and Edwards supporters and the most vocal ringleader was Obama supporter Donna Brazile.

That DNC rules meeting was a kangaroo court, stacked and loaded to dilute Clinton’s strength in Florida. So don’t talk about “fairness”.

As a practical matter, the Democratic Party has to be brain-dead to disenfranchise one of the most critical large swing states. Florida has the fourth largest number of electoral college votes. It is this kind of political tone-deafness that explains why the Democratic Party has only mananged one President in the last 28 years.

Prof. Burke and I will offset our votes. I view the disenfranchisement of Florida and Michigan in the same vein as the controlling Shia disenfranchising the Sunni in Iraq. I will absolutely not support a Democratic Party that turns its back on democracy.

It’s worth pointing out that the Republicans managed this situation better. They don’t have a small army of superdelegates either.

As it happens, I have no preference between Obama and Clinton. On Tuesday I intend to vote for Edwards. Just because he’s suspended his campaign doesn’t mean I don’t still consider him the best choice. But having no preference leaves me in the situation where I feel like the designated driver at a New Year’s Eve party, astonished at the vehemence surrounding me.

So I take it you think that the two-party system is capable of producing this person so you can vote him into office.

Do you think that over time it will happen 40% of the time? How often has the present system produced this person since 1800? Since 1900? Since 1952?

I think that the system is decaying. Things will not get better. The R’s have held the WH in 28 of the last 40 years, counting this one. Our nation has taken 28 steps backward and only 12 steps forward, if that many. Since 1980 the backward steps have been really big ones, don’t you think?

In 2006 Ornstein and Mann wrote “Broken Branch.” In 2007 Dean wrote “Broken Government.” They seem to think that things are pretty bad. So who is to blame? The People or the System?