I like this quote from Robert Putnam, the noted political scientist, that I came across in The Daily Dish:
Most men are not political animals. The world of public affairs is not their world. It is alien to them — possibly benevolent, more probably threatening, but nearly always alien.
Whenever I start discussing health care reform with people who don’t closely follow this stuff, they are usually quick to ask why the Democrats don’t simply push health care reform through and be done with it. That question makes a lot of intuitive sense. After all, Democrats hold clear majorities in both the House and Senate while also controlling the White House. What’s the holdup?
In most parliamentary democracies, such large majorities would be more than sufficient to pass most major legislation. Not so in America. As much as our school textbooks like to portray it as the greatest political experiment ever, the U.S. has an extremely risk-averse political culture. The drafters of the Constitution were obsessed, perhaps to the point of paranoia, with placing checks to prevent one state or region from holding too much sway over the nation as a whole. It’s certainly an understandable impulse; nobody wanted to see the rise of an American tyrant after working so hard to throw off the shackles of a king. But that impulse led to the creation of procedures, like the filibuster, that can hardly be considered democratic.
Our system also concentrates a huge amount of power in individual senators, making it possible for a small cadre or even one senator to gum up the works and ensure that nothing gets done. In fact, I think we miss the point when we look at the Senate in terms of majority and minority parties. It’s more accurate to view the Senate as a collection of one hundred egos that are all looking for a bit of stroking.
These dynamics aren’t new, but they don’t get much attention usually because most people find the legislative process boring and removed from the realities of their own lives. The health care reform bill is one of the few times that a substantial number of Americans are watching the policymaking process in action and they are coming away feeling confused and a little repulsed. I don’t blame them.
Politics schmolitics… enough about such boring fare. Let’s move onto important stuff… such as your fabulous hair.
And no, I did not intend that to rhyme.
In my morning paper I found the text of a speech given by Obama in defense of his health care reform policy. Very interesting to read while eating your kiwis or sandwiches as a breakfast, I must say. Obama really has a talent to persuade.