With Town of Greece v. Galloway still to be decided by the Supremes, and while we are doing whatever we do on our "Winter Holiday," a few items to show that truth is sometimes stranger (funnier?) than fiction. Who knew (I didn't) that the headquarters for the group that got the Florida Capital "reclaimed" by a Nativity Scene only to be countered by a Festivus Pole, is one of Chicago's Very Own.
The case of Nativity scenes being "secular" and not to be off-limits to government display was established in the 1983 Establishment Clause case, Lynch v. Donnelly.
On Dec. 1, Amazon launched (see how I did that) this video to show off a "30 minutes or less" delivery system they are working on in their next generation R&D lab. From their YouTube post, "Putting Prime Air into commercial use will take some number of years as we advance technology and wait for the necessary FAA rules and regulations."
An extra Popp Point available if you can name another bureaucratic agency might have a say in in Amazon's new idea and why. BTW, this was released Dec. 1 -- not April 1. No foolin.' And also, does this idea look better in light of the gifts that didn't get delivered in time for Christmas by UPS and FedEx?
Elections
in Action, part of the Mikva Challenge, is a nonpartisan organization that
believes that 'Democracy is a VERB'. Elections in Action challenges high
school students around Illinois to be active participants in the political
process through elections, activism, and policy-making programs. Elections in Action wants young adults
to learn civics by being actively engaged in democratic activities inside and
outside the classroom, and believes that schools, neighborhoods, and cities can
be transformed by the insight and expertise of young civic leaders.
If you successfully complete three different, approved
activities through Mikva Challenge, you will earn extra credit onto your 2nd
semester final grade.
Approved
activities include:
ðMonday, Jan. 20: Republican debate at WTTW studios
**WVHS can only send FOUR students!You will be asking questions to the
candidates LIVE.What an incredible
opportunity.
**Interested students must formulate questions to ask the
candidates. Questions must be posted on Political
Warrior in the comment mode of this post by 1/7/14.If more than four students wish to attend,
they will be selected based on the quality of their questions.
**Question Guidelines / five questions per student, one per
category below:
1.Questions for a specific candidate 2.Questions about a youth-related issue 3.Current events related questions 4.Character/human interest questions 5.MLK-related questions (since it will be MLK Day,
after all)
ðTuesday, Feb. 25: Student-moderated/student-audience Republican lieutenant
governor debate at **Community High
School, West Chicago from 7- 8pm.
ðSaturday,
March 1: Mikva Challenge Campaign Field Day in DuPage County.
**Tentatively scheduled
at Waubonsie Valley High School from 10-2 pm.
ðTuesday,
March 18: Becoming successfully trained as an election judge in
DuPage County’s First Judge Program. Wolak has applications that will be
available after break. [BTW, you get paid.]
ðOngoing: volunteering
for a state or local campaign.
** You may
do this more than once if your activities are on different dates
You need to do a 1-page, typed reflection for each activity OR
fill out the attached “On the Campaign Trail” form that follows.All of your reflections and forms are due
before Spring Break! More information will be available after break. But especially for the questions and the interest in being part of the student auidence for the WTTW Channel 11 GOP Gov. Debate, you at least think, and maybe post, while on break.
U2's Ordinary Love written for the new Nelson Mandela film (Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom) could be an Oscar nominee for best song. Great to have a new track from my guys!
Mark Rubinstein@mrubinsteinCT #Mandela After 27 years in prison was asked how he could forgive & seek reconciliation. "If I didn't, I would still be in that prison."
Moderate minimum wages do more good than harm. They should be set by technocrats not politicians
(From The Economist)
ON BOTH sides of the Atlantic politicians are warming to the idea that the lowest-paid can be helped by mandating higher wages. Barack Obama wants to raise America’s federal minimum wage by 40% from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, and more than three-quarters of Americans support the idea (see article). In Germany, one of the few big rich-world countries still without a national wage floor, the incoming coalition government has just agreed on an across-the-board hourly minimum of €8.50 ($11.50) from 2015. In Britain, which has had a minimum wage since 1999, the opposition Labour Party is keen to cajole firms into “voluntarily” paying higher “living wages”.
For free-market types, including The Economist, fiddling with wages by fiat sets off alarm bells. In a competitive market anything that artificially raises the price of labour will curb demand for it, and the first to lose their jobs will be the least skilled—the people intervention is supposed to help. That is why Milton Friedman called minimum wages a form of discrimination against the low-skilled; and it is why he saw topping up the incomes of the working poor with public subsidies as a far more sensible means of alleviating poverty. More
The last several decades have been especially hard on American workers in jobs that pay the minimum wage. Adjusted for inflation, the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour today is 23 percent lower than it was in 1968. If it had kept up with inflation and with the growth of average labor productivity, it would be $25 an hour.
Congressional Democrats have proposed legislation to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour and index it to inflation, and President Obama signaled support in a recent speech highlighting the economic and political dangers of growing income inequality. Predictably, opponents of an increase in the minimum wage are once again invoking the hackneyed warning that it will lead to higher unemployment, especially among low-skilled, low-wage workers who are the intended beneficiaries.
I heard the same refrain in 1996 when I served as chairwoman of President Bill Clinton’s National Economic Council, and he worked with congressional Democrats to raise the minimum wage to $5.15 an hour at a time when it had fallen in real terms to a 40-year low. To hear Republican opponents and lobbyists for retailers and fast-food companies, we were about to inflict a cold-hearted fate on young people and minority workers. The same chorus is voicing the same dire predictions today....
...
Contrary to the warnings of its opponents, a higher minimum wage would, under current economic circumstances, mean more employment, not less.
An increase in the minimum wage would also increase the effectiveness of the earned-income tax credit to reduce poverty and increase demand among low-income households with high propensities to consume. As David Neumark asserts in his recent Economix post, since the mid-1990s, when President Clinton championed a sizable increase in the earned-income tax credit, it has provided much greater income support to low-income families than the minimum wage. But as Professor Neumark acknowledges, the earned-income tax credit and the minimum wage are not substitutes for each another. They work together and can lead to better outcomes than either policy alone. Full Article
I love when you Political Warriors contribute material to keep talking about in the Youdia. Here are three current events that show mixed Establishment Clause, and Free Exercise policy being played out around the country.
(From TeenTribune)
Should schools be made safe for Christmas?
Just in
time for the holidays, Texas is making sure everyone remembers that wishing
someone "Merry Christmas" is now protected by law in its public schools.
Conservatives are hoping similar measures will gain momentum across America.
Bill French, dressed as Santa, helped raise awareness for Texas' new Merry
Christmas law. More
LOS ANGELES — A federal judge ruled Thursday that a cross on federal land in San Diego violated the First Amendment ban on a government endorsement of religion and ordered it removed within 90 days.
But the quarter-century fight over the 29-foot cross atop Mount Soledad may not be over. The judge said he would stay the order if there was an appeal. The case has wound through the courts since the 1980s, while the cross has become emblematic of the national debate over the place of religion in public life. More
A New Mexico wedding photographer who was found to have violated an anti-discrimination law by refusing to photograph the “commitment ceremony” of a lesbian couple is attempting to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that the government cannot compel her to create expressive images that conflict with her religious beliefs.
Elaine Huguenin is appealing a New Mexico Supreme Court decision that said “a commercial photography business that offers its services to the public, thereby increasing its visibility to potential clients, is subject to the anti-discrimination provisions” of the New Mexico Human Rights Act.
The court in August rejected Huguenin’s argument that serving same-sex couples would unconstitutionally compel her “to engage in unwanted expression” because she has a deeply-held religious belief that marriage is the union of a man and a woman. The case began in September 2006 after she turned down the request of Vanessa Willock to photograph her commitment ceremony, saying she only photographed “traditional weddings.” More
Breaking News, or Same Old Story? Another ex-Illinois governor was appealing a conviction at the Dirksen Federal Building. What constitutional arguments are Blago's attorneys going to make to try to get the three-judge panel to reverse his conviction?
As a teacher of sociology, this linguistic map that popped up a couple of years ago in the NY Times, which tracked where in the country do people call their fizzy drinks, "Soda," "Pop" or "Coke," was of interest to me: http://ideas.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/11/the-soda-vs-pop-map/
Why am I posting this now? Well, later in the second semester we will examine the difficult concept of governing in a country with over 500 languages (Nigeria), but for the here and now it gives a visual that helps me give credit to the Blogging Points leaders as we wind down the first semester.
I call these Popp Points in honor of the student that helped me create the first AP Government Blog (in 2006), WV grad Alex Popp. So here they are the extra credit Popp Point leaders for blogging this first semester (10 pts EC max., "Major Award" for total points winner):
Others receiving one point: Ester F.; Gloria G.; Bailey Y.; Aamna G.; Remi Y.; James O.; Caitlin F.; Hot Pocket; Scott C.; Brianne S.; Sami B.; Nathan W.; Mahum Z.
EC point opportunity runs out on 1/6/14. This year we have had more postings than last year, when for the first time nobody qualified for maximum Popp Points. So far this year nobody has shown max effort either. So this weekend, make a resolution to pop the lid on your ideas and share them here for points.
Call this post a full-court press on Supreme Court news and
views (article on Stevens "The Dissenter," and "The Incredible
Shrinking Court," need to be read by Monday):
1) From the 2005 Senate comfirmation hearings of Samuel
Alito, political cartoonist Mike Lane illustrated the constitutional conundrum
facing the newest justice and the term stare decisis -- lettting the precedent
stand unless there are compelling reasons not to -- and a woman's right to
choose an abortion.
Alito's mother said, "Of course he's against
abortion,'' in a classic sound-byte before during the confirmation hearings.
The question is not really what the Alito believes personally, but as NPR
reported in 2005 if that Roe v. Wade was settled law.
2) U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas made news by speaking his mind, something he's not prone to do while on the job.
As the above data shows, Thomas' silence during Supreme
Court oral arguments is legendary. While his colleagues pepper lawyers with
questions, Thomas listens. While the other 8 justices force legal teams to
perform verbal and logical gymnastics 30 minutes at a time, Thomas often leans
back in his large chair and stares at the ceiling.
When he does speak during oral arguments, it's almost always in private
conversation with Justice Breyer. (And from the looks at the menus that they
swap, those conversations are often about what to get for lunch.)In the past,
Justice Thomas has said the oral argument time is not meant for Justices to show
off but for the lawyers to make their legal arguments before the Court. But
Thomas has recently
said--in jest-- that “My colleagues should shut up!”
________________________
3) In the Ny Times article, "The Disenter," gives insight into how the High Court
has moved right and now the self-proclaimed conservative, and eldest
(and now retired) member of the Supremes, may have been be The
Nine's most liberal justice:
"Justice Stevens, the oldest and arguably most liberal justice, now finds
himself the leader of the opposition. Vigorous and sharp at 87, he has served on
the court for 32 years, approaching the record set by his predecessor, William
O. Douglas, who served for 36. In criminal-law and death-penalty cases, Stevens
has voted against the government and in favor of the individual more frequently
than any other sitting justice. He files more dissents and separate opinions
than any of his colleagues. He is the court’s most outspoken defender of the
need for judicial oversight of executive power. And in recent years, he has
written majority opinions in two of the most important cases ruling against the
Bush administration’s treatment of suspected enemy combatants in the war on
terror — an issue the court will revisit this term, which begins Oct. 1, when it
hears appeals by Guantánamo detainees challenging their lack of access to
federal courts.
"Stevens, however, is an improbable liberal icon. “I
don’t think of myself as a liberal at all,” he told me during a recent interview
in his chambers, laughing and shaking his head. “I think as part of my general
politics, I’m pretty darn conservative.”
This
is one of the two linked articles you need to read and comment on by Monday.
4) The second article you need to have read by Tuesday is Time's cover story
from October, 2007:
The Incredible Shrinking
Court
"The irony is that the Court's ideology is playing a dwindling role in the lives
of Americans. The familiar hot-button controversies--abortion, affirmative
action, the death penalty, police powers and so on--have been around so long,
sifted and resifted so many times, that they now arrive at the court in highly
specific cases affecting few, if any, real people. And it's not clear that
Roberts wants to alter that trend. His speeches on the judicial role suggest a
man more interested in the steady retreat of the court from public policy than
in a right-wing revolution. Unless the Roberts court umpires another disputed
presidential election (à la Bush v. Gore in 2000--a long shot, to say the
least), the left-right division will matter mainly in the realm of theories and
rhetoric, dear to the hearts of law professors and political activists but
remote from day-to-day existence. What once was salient is now mostly
symbolic."
Probably way more statistics on The Supremes, but if you are doing this assingment option, filter through the Stat Pack and share the three (3) biggest takeaways that you get from the numbers about our current Supreme Court. Why are these stats interesting to you?
6) Finally, a re-run post from 2009's 'Global Warming' SC
decision:
The world saw former Vice-President being called a “rock
star” and getting an Oscar from movie stars for his documentary on the “climate
crisis,” and later a Nobel Peace Prize. But with far less glitz and fanfare, the
legal definition of whether global warming is damaging US and the world was
being argued in the U.S. Supreme Court a few months ago.
The new “swing
vote” on the high Court is Justice Anthony Kennedy and his questions during the
oral arguments in Massachusetts, et al. v. EPA (05-1120) seemed to indicate that
justices may be ready to decide more than the case at bar.
At issue is
the states’ (MA. and 12 others, including Illinois) lawsuit challenging the
federal bureaucracy’s (EPA) lack of enforcement of an act of Congress (1990
Clean Air Act). The questions the Court is considering are:1) May the EPA
decline to issue emission standards for motor vehicles based on policy
considerations not enumerated in the Clean Air Act?2) Does the Clean Air Act
give the EPA authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse
gases?Breaking down the oral argument, Justice Kennedy seemed to be saying the
Court has a bigger, global, question to answer. But not all on the bench seemed
to think it was in the Court’s jurisdiction.
From the transcript of the
oral argument, Justice Kennedy is questioning counsel for the petitioners, the
Massachusetts states attorney:
JUSTICE KENNEDY: At the
outset, you made this, some of this perhaps reassuring statement that we need
not decide about global warming in this case. But don't we have to do that in
order to decide the standing argument, because there's no injury if there's not
global warming? Or, can you show standing simply because there is a likelihood
that the perceived would show that there's an injury?
MR.
MILKEY: Your Honor, especially in this case where none of our
affidavits were challenged, I don't think the Court needs to go there ultimately
on the merits because we showed through our uncontested affidavits that these
harms will occur. There was no evidence put in to the contrary, and I would add
that the reports on which EPA itself relies conclude that climate change is
occurring.
JUSTICE KENNEDY (later): What is the
scientific answer to if global warming exists? I think this Court might have to
press for an answer to this question.
(Justice Antonin Scalia’s prides
himself as a strict constructionalist, and a Constitutional scholar. He never
claimed to have aced Mr. Rosiano’s “Cosmic Journey” class, he chimes
in):
JUSTICE SCALIA: Mr. Milkey, I always thought an air
pollutant was something different from a stratospheric pollutant, and your claim
here is not that the pollution of what we normally call "air" is endangering
health. That isn't, that isn't -- your assertion is that after the pollutant
leaves the air and goes up into the stratosphere it is contributing to global
warming.
MR. MILKEY: Respectfully, Your Honor, it is not
the stratosphere. It's the troposphere.
JUSTICE SCALIA:
Troposphere, whatever. I told you before I'm not a scientist.
(Laughter.)
JUSTICE SCALIA: That's why I don't want to
have to deal with global warming, to tell you the truth.The decision in
Massachusetts, et al. v. EPA (05-1120), given last June ruled in favor of
Massachusetts.
(From PBS.org)
He united a nation and inspired the world.
In the wake of Nelson
Mandela's passing, we've made FRONTLINE's The Long Walk of Nelson Mandela available to watch
online for the very first time.
In The Long Walk of Nelson Mandela, FRONTLINE tells the intimate and
surprising story of the Nelson Mandela few people know: a bomb-throwing
revolutionary who became a skilled politician in prison, and a passionate man
who sacrificed the love of his life for a country that needed him more.
Watch and blog, what YOU and YOUR GOVERNMENT LEADERS can learn from Nelson Mandela.
Check out this awesome article that reveals the tension between the WH Staff and the Cabinet. (Thanks Politico Magazine @ APGov.org blog). I'm thankful I found this article, albeit a unit late. You can be thankful (and free read) that there is NO graded assignment here. Remember though comment for a EC blog points.
Above, Senator John F. Kennedy as he was running for president spoke to Texas ministers on our tradition of a "Wall of Separation" between Church and State. It's a theme we revisit again this week, as the Supremes announced they have issued a Writ of Certiori to hear another judicial challenge to the Affordable Health Care Act on the grounds it violates the religious freedoms of for-profit secular companies that don't want to cover birth control in their health insurance offerings.
From the NY Times:
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a pair of cases on whether corporations may refuse to provide insurance coverage for contraception to their workers based on the religious beliefs of the corporations’ owners.
The cases present a new challenge to President Obama’s health care law. The Supreme Court in 2012 upheld another part of the law, one that requires most Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty.
The Obama administration has exempted many religious groups from the law’s requirements for contraception coverage. But it said that commercial corporations could not rely on religious objections to opt out of compliance with the law.
“Our policy is designed to ensure that health care decisions are made between a woman and her doctor,” Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, said in a statement. “The president believes that no one, including the government or for-profit corporations, should be able to dictate those decisions to women.”
Blog here, your thoughts on the "Wall of Separation" in American Society. BTW, I am thankful when students post on Political Warrior. You will be thankful, too with 10 points of EC at the end of the semester.
(From White House.gov)
We've come a long way since 11-year-old Tad Lincoln convinced his father to "adopt" a turkey named Jack in 1863.
Today, President Obama pardoned two 20-week-old, 38-pound turkeys named Popcorn and Caramel -- and announced Popcorn as the official "National Thanksgiving Turkey," after the American public weighed in on their favorites via Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
The President noted:
The competition was stiff, but we can officially declare that Popcorn is the winner -- proving that even a turkey with a funny name can find a place in politics. As for Caramel, he’s sticking around, and he’s already busy raising money for his next campaign.
And so, all "Hunger Games" references aside, both turkeys will live. Popcorn and Caramel will spend the rest of their natural days in the historic rolling pastures of Morven Park's Turkey Hill -- located at the home of former Virginia governor Westmoreland Davis in Leesburg, Virginia.
Depending on whom you ask, President Abraham Lincoln was the first to spare a turkey, when his son Tad "adopted" the bird intended for Christmas dinner and named it Jack. As President Clinton noted in a speech in 1997, "President Lincoln had no choice but to give Jack the full run of the White House."
The official annual presentation of a Thanksgiving turkey began under President Harry Truman, but there wouldn't be any official "pardoning" for several decades. According to his presidential library's documents, President Eisenhower, too, appears to have eaten the birds presented to him over the course of his two terms in office.
President Kennedy sent a particularly scrawny turkey back to the farm in 1963, saying "we'll let this one grow." (Not quite the stuff of empathetic pardons.)
It was President Ronald Reagan that issued the first "pardon" on record, when he was presented with a turkey named Charlie in 1987 -- Charlie was thereby sent to a petting zoo -- and President George H.W. Bush made the turkey pardon a permanent fixture in the American presidency.
Since then, pardoned turkeys have been sent to a variety of pastoral American venues -- from Frying Pan Park in Fairfax, Virginia, to the Disneyland Resort in California to Mount Vernon -- the home and estate of President George Washington.
As the President said today, "The Office of the Presidency -- the most powerful position in the world -- brings with it many awesome and solemn responsibilities. This is not one of them."
Popcorn and Caramel might disagree.
____________________
And maybe further evidence of the complexities of criticism of a modern president, Obama's pardon was met by a special interest protest posted on YouTube by PETA:
(Thanks, US Gov Teacher's Blog)
Keith "Hip" Hughes is a one man flipping factory for US history and government.
Above is one he just wrote on "The Nuclear Option."
Executive Branch & the
Bureaucracy -- Patterson, Chapters 12/13
Roles of the president --
Chief Diplomat, Chief Legislator, Commander-in-Chief, etc.
Presidential
Leadership Style -- pyramid, circular, ad hoc
Presidential Veto Power -- Line
Item Veto
Stewardship Theory, Whig (or Strict Constructionalist)
Theory
President's role in foreign policy v. domestic policy
Two
presidencies thesis
Bully Pulpit
Coattails
War Powers Act
Executive
Agreements
President's power to influence legislation
Impeachment
procedures
Executive power in a presidential system vs. a parlimentary
system
Executive office of the President "umbrella-like"
Imperial
Presidency
Constitutional (Formal) Requirements
Informal
Requirements
Formal (Expressed) Powers of the Presidency
Informal powers
of the Presidency
Power of Prez. in times of crisis
Presidential electoral
systems -- primaries, electoral college
Cabinet -- selection process and
roles
presidential approval ratings -- first term vs. second term
Lame
Duck
prez. powers granted without consent of Congress
Executive
Privilege
Signing Statements
Bureaucracy -- cabinet departments,
regulatory agencies, independent agencies
Managing the bureaucracy
--patronage, executive leadership, merit
Bureaucratic
accountability
Public opinion on bureaucracy
ID -- president's current:
Chief of Staff, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Attorney
General
FRQ -- Public Approval of President's over time
Mike Adams,the creator of the above cartoon, thinks things
are bad at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA):"Of all the cartoons
we've ever done on the FDA, this is the one that people seem to like the
best."
It addresses the issue of FDA conflicts of interest. The
Food and Drug Administration, an agency that suffers under the hallucination
that it protects the public from dangerous foods and drugs, has actually become
the marketing department of Big Pharma. It actually takes money from drug
companies in exchange for evaluating and approving their drugs, and the
decisions concerning which drugs to approve almost always come down to a panel
of "experts" who have strong financial ties to the very companies
impacted by their decisions.'' Well, if it's "Broken Government" then it's your
job to fix it. Before you start with your poster/policy pitch assignment
due Tuesday, consider this article from US History.org
(take note or the merit
system and bureaucratic accountability).
EPA Chief (from last year): Enviroment should be above
partisanship. Do you agree? Also, would Richard Nixon (before Watergate) make
it in the current GOP. Afterall, it was his administration that created the EPA
in 1970.
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed legislation Wednesday allowing same-sex weddings starting this summer, making President Barack Obama's home state the 16th overall - and largest in the nation's heartland - to legalize gay marriage.
The festivities at the University of Illinois at Chicago featured a family-friendly crowd, musical performances and a stage lined with American, Illinois and rainbow flags.
"We understand in our state that part of our unfinished business is to help other states in the United States of America achieve marriage equality," Quinn said before he signed the bill on a desk once used by President Abraham Lincoln. He said part of that mission was to ensure that "love is not relegated to a second class status to any citizen in our country."
Your Thoughts? Blog here. By the way, Chief Executives of States and the United States sign bills many times with many pens, as Quinn did Wednesday. Do you know why?
Don't know if we can say he had much of Bully Pulpit, but when President Obama held a press conference on Thursday he had the nation listenning to his mea culpa as well as his "fix" for the "fumbled" play in the Obamacare unveiling.
From the pulpit, the President said it is still early and there are positive signs. But his announcement to extend a "grandfather clause" for workers for one year to avoid losing insurance they currently had was not in the original Affordable Health Care Act. Linked is an article from Forbes on Obama's "announce (ing) new plans to implement the law ."
Using your Patterson text, your flipped assignment to be posted by classtime on Monday. Define the presidential action and with supporting evidence to back your claim, was Obama's announced fumble recovery an:
A -- Executive Order (pg. 340) "Executive power.....also check out the White House.gov site for a listing of President Obama's previous Executive Orders. B -- Use of the "Executive Leadership System" in the Bureaucracy (pg. 383). "-- as a means of coordinating the bureaucracy's activities to increase efficency and responsiveness."
or,
C -- An overreach of Presidential Power, infringing on Congress' Lawmaking Function (pg. 324).
BTW, please table any political statements in your post behind what your claim and support that analyzes what the President did.
(At the end of this week, we will be done with the study of congress and Lawmaking. To give you a sweet taste of an instituion that we know has all-time sour public
approval ratings, here are a couple of interesting posts from the Political Warrior's archives. First, the Tribune
reports on the important desk Illinois Sen. Mark Kirk is manning. Second, a
look in on the influence candy makers had on the treat ofmoving the end of Daylight Savings until
after Halloween six years ago.)
WASHINGTON — Here's a sweet story from the nation's capital, a tale devoid,
mostly, of its political knife fights and grenades.
Sen. Mark Kirk, a
Republican from Illinois, maintains a Senate tradition dating to 1965, back when
he was in kindergarten at Fairmount School in Downers Grove.
He is
assigned to Desk No. 95, which is near the Senate's most heavily used entrance,
making it perfect to serve as the chamber's "candy desk." Kirk, his aides and
Illinois candy manufacturers keep it stocked with treats for senators and staff.
It's loaded with confections such as Jelly Bellys, bite-size Snickers bars and
Ferrara Pan chocolates.
"Senators, being older, can get kind of grumpy in
the afternoon, and have this tradition of being able to reach into this desk to
get a treat," Kirk, 52, said.
Chocoholics in the chamber need not worry
because Kirk won't name names. It's partly discretion, partly the nature of his
calorie-laden cache. Rather than staying at his desk and minding the store, Kirk
is often buttonholing colleagues on the Senate floor.
"I'm deep in
the well (of the Senate) talking to 15 members about 14 things," he said. "The
desk kind of runs itself. I can't tell you individual (candy) preferences. It's
a 'drive-by' pickup they do … a pretty stealth swoop."
His own weakness?
When sugar-free Orbit gum won't suffice during a "hypoglycemic dip," Kirk
chooses chocolate.
For more on how the Illinois Republican handles this
informal leadership spot:
The Senate, more than the House of Represenatives, is
associated with evolving traditions of (worthy?) of the Upper House. Here's the
skinny (really?) on the history of the candy desk.
(Was it a Trick, or a Treat? This was big news at Halloween and the
influences on lawmaking on Capitol Hill six years ago. This post origninally
posted on Political Warrior in Nov. 2007)
For the last six years, Trick-or-Treating has been different. Because Congress in 2007 moved
Daylight Savings time back to the first Saturday in Novemeber, my son (in 2007) went to a
record number of doors in the Sunlight.
"I got lots of candy more than ever before,'' said then
nine-year-old Patrick. "It should have been night, because night is cooler going
trick-or-treating, and the houses are more lit up . But I probably wouldn't have
got as much candy."
Hmm. Despite the fact that Patrick did get tooth
paste at one house, the load of his loot may have been due to influences on
Capitol Hill. The New York Times City Room Blog says the candy lobby gave an
influential push for a rider to the 2005 Engergy Policy Act.
NYT story on the influences on federal lawmakers to shed more light on
Halloween night (child safety was also a legitimate concern) is linked here:
This video is more to the subject area of my sociology class, but when we think about shaping domestic and international public policy, Professor Richard Wilkinson offers much lawmakers and their consitutents should think about.
Many of you missed the extra-credit opportunity today on which function was illustrated in this House Judiciary Committee investigative hearing of the National Football League and traumatic brain injuries. While the NFL is not part of the executive branch of government, this was oversight function of Congress. At the end of these investigative hearings, the committee could recomend, for example, that the NFL loses its federal anti-trust protection if it did not become more transparent on the dangers of its game. It also could have advised the executive branch justice department to take legal action against the NFL.
At the end of the 2009 hearings, the NFL did become more transparent about football's head injuries. So one might say that this oversight function was successful.
However, as we ready ourselves for our lawmaking function , yet another knowlege drop that might keep you feeling frustrated with our Congress linked here. Read Matt Taibbi's Four Weddings and a Funeral (2005) and comment your thoughts here for a 3-point assignment. Also make sure you come in Monday with an idea for a bill and a co-sponsor to work with.
Terms to know for tomorrow's MC portion of the test: Traditional
Roles of the Media Voter Turnout in
U.S. Significance of 2000 presidential
election Campaign finance reform (Bipartisan Campaing
Finance Reform Act of 2002, Soft Money, Hard Money, FEC, PACs, Super
PACS) Incumency Advantage Primaries,
Caucuses National Conventions Public
opinion polling Politcal
Socialization Political Efficacy Where
do liberal Democrats live? Where do conservative Republicans
live? Conservative ideology Liberal
ideology Third parties
in America Institutional challenges to third parties in
America Purposes of Politcal
Parties Valance issues vs. Positional
Issues Expanding electorate Proportional
representational voting systems First-past-the post voting
systems Iron Triangle Republican Party
founding linkage institutions Special
Interest groups Growth of lobbyists in
Washington How many PACs in
US? Importance of Iowa and New Hampshire in
campaigns FEC FCC Ralph
Nader John McCain/Russ Feingold Jon
Stewart Tea Party Occupy Wall
St.
Also, watch these short videos on political
movements, on the fringes of our political parties:
Since the days of Andrew Jackson, campaign financing in America has been a controversial, confusing and important issue effecting elections in our republic. All you will need to know and more on Thursday's Test (Patterson, Ch. 7-9) is here. This "flipped" lesson will need to be completed in the comment section here by Thursday, 10/10.
Jack Abramoff was the King of K Street (the HQ of lobbyists in Washington)
until he went to prison on 2006. (Thanks, APGov.org)
4) MCQ: Which of Jack Abramoff's activities listed below is the closest to bribery - one of his crimes for which he spent 4 years in federal prison. A. Giving $2,000 to a Congressperson's re-election fund B. Taking members of Congress golfing in Scotland C. Holding a fundraiser for a member of Congress D. Promising to hire a member of a Congressperson's staff in the future E. Suggesting obscure additions to legislation that would help his clients
Casino Jack, with Kevin Spacey....about Jack Abramoff.
5) FRQ: Although all lobbyists attempt to influence the governmental policymaking process, not all groups employ the same methods.
A) Identify and explain two (legal) methods lobbyists use to influence public policy makers.
B) Identify and explain the best methods lobbyists would use for two of the following groups: MADD, NAACP, NRA or AARP.
By a historical comparison of good, divided government, Chris Matthews suggests the need for Pols in Washington to listen and work with each other for the good of the country. Here's an excerpt that is timely today and may be a preview of next summer's read:
Visitors to Washington are taken with its quiet grandeur. Just like they saw in the postcards, they witness the beauty of the Mall stretching from one horizon to the other. They see the Capitol itself up there on its hill, pay respects to the beloved Lincoln sitting high in his memorial, and gaze like children at the tall, clean obelisk honoring the city’s namesake. The truth is, no loud commerce or clanking industry disturbs the peace; no smokestacks darken the skies even in the distance. Tourists, generally speaking, are respectful rather than boisterous. Even the bureaucracy, busy along its daytime corridors, fails to shatter the stillness. Yet for all the statues and monuments loyally attesting to what’s gone before, Washington is very much a living city. And what makes it so is its jamboree of human voices engaged in discourse, debates, discussion, argument, compromise, leaks, gossip, criticism,and commentary, not to mention speechmaking. Undeniably the city’s signature output, it’s been this way since General Washington and Pierre L’Enfant together on horseback envisioned our new nation’s capital in the late eighteenth century. It’s a place where talking matters, and even more important, who’s talking to whom. Since the moment of its creation the city has been marked in every era by voices. Year in and year out, the questions they hurl into the air lie at the center of the American conversation, and this ritual of the voices is what animates our government. And always there come the responding questions from the country: Shall the people hold sway? Will the winning faction deliver on its promises? Will the losing faction give way? Will a divided electorate see a spirit of compromise? These are the recurring quandaries that separate action from stalemate, a working democracy from one seized by dysfunction.
The framers of the American Constitution, who also made Washington the capital, established two great offices. One is the president of the United States; the other, the Speaker of the House of Representatives. The role of the first is to lead the country; the province of the Speaker, through custom and his prerogative to set the House agenda, is to control the government’s purse strings. Not a dollar can be allocated that the Congress hasn’t guaranteed by law or specifically appropriated. This historic arrangement makes simple human bargaining a central task for the two leaders. The check-and-balance relationship between president and Speaker can either propel the government forward or not. Put plainly, they either talk, or they don’t. When they join in alliance, the government rumbles ahead. When their interests collide, something’s got to give. Either one side prevails, or a compromise is struck. Otherwise,the republic stalls. This means that, for the Constitution to work, the two must be open to the larger picture, to resist base obstructionism, to accommodate differences for the common good. Historically, this coupling of president and Speaker has been a tricky one that encourages a choreography both quickfooted and wary.
I was witness, with eye and heart, to one of the most celebrated of these pairings. The time was the 1980s, the president was Ronald Reagan, and the Speaker was Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr. Both were Irish-Americans. Both men were larger than life. The former was a California conservative Republican, elected in a landslide. He arrived in Washington to his very first job there, walking into the White House on Inauguration Day 1981.The latter was a New England liberal Democrat, a hardened, blooded Washington veteran who’d entered the House of Representatives in 1953 and had spent the twenty-eight years since finessing and cajoling his way to the top of the Hill. The outsider and the insider: these two moved together in a remarkable, if sometimes rough, tandem. They argued mightily, each man belting out his separate, deeply cherished political philosophy—but then they would, both together, bow to the country’s judgment. Decisions were made, action taken, outcomes achieved. They honored the voters, respected the other’s role. Each liked to beat the other guy, not sabotage him. During this period, government met its deadlines. Members of Congress listened and acted. Debates led to solutions. Shutdowns were averted. What needed to proceed did, and America’s citizens were the beneficiaries. Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill were definite political rivals. Just not always. People in politics, like everyone else, like to talk about how different things were in the old days. They point to the relationship between President Reagan and Tip O’Neill—old-school guys, only two years apart in age, who were so different yet not, on some level, that different—whose commitment to comity came out of their shared integrity. They disagreed on the role of government, knew it, admitted it face-to-face. But they put concentrated effort into trying to get along even as they challenged each other. Why, we wonder, can’t it be that way again? Why won’t our leaders work to accommodate each other, employing civility as they cooperate to accomplish goals in the country’s best interests? Why must we continue to suffer their relentless gumming up of the works? What in our national character, in the ways we choose to deal with one another and respect different viewpoints, has changed so since the days of Reagan and O’Neill? How can we win back the faith that our republic is working? Today we have government by tantrum. Rather than true debate, we get the daily threat of filibuster. Shutdowns are engineered as standard procedure. In place of hard-earned statecraft we witness new tricks of the trade. Presidents make “recess” appointments to end-run Senate consent. Tea Partyers in the House of Representatives act as if voting “Nay” constitutes twenty-first-century governance. Democrats in the Senate, for a while, refused to approve the annual budget—withholding consent to skip the embarrassment of admitting dire fiscal reality. Brinkmanship grabs today’s headlines even as public faith dies a little with each disappointing eleventh-hour deal. What’s to be done? I truly believe it doesn’t have to be this way. And the story I’m about to tell of these two extraordinary figures will show you why. My goal is to bring you the true account of what took place. Our country is less in need of a myth than a real-life account of one imperfect leader dealing with another. It serves no purpose in this time of habitual conflict to spin a tale of happy harmony; far better to illustrate how two very different figures managed to make politics work.
Ronald Reagan was dismissed by his enemies as a Hollywood lightweight, Tip O’Neill as a Tammany-style ward heeler. I refuse to add a third cartoon to those two. The credit for their civility goes not to their off-duty socializing and shared Irish stories: it was their joint loyalty to American self-government. Tip’s oldest son, an elected politician himself, put it best in a 2012 New York Times column: “What both men deplored more than each other’s political philosophy was stalemate, and a country that was so polarized by ideology and party politics that it could not move forward. There were tough words and important disagreements. . . yet a stronger commitment to getting things done.” They respected elections, accepted who had won, knew that duty came with office. It’s all true. I was there.
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