When a party is willing to hamstring the country’s overall prospects, as “collateral damage” in its effort to weaken the other party, the results are bad for everybody. To choose one example, about which I have more to say in an upcoming magazine article: Everybody knows that “green tech” / “clean tech” businesses of many descriptions are going to be a future source of jobs, wealth, influence, and growth. The Chinese government, as we’ve read so often, is putting a lot of money behind them — and will keep doing so over the next decade. The U.S. government has started making such investments in the past couple of years — but these will surely become hostage to “divided government,” since stopping them will be a way of “stopping Obama.” And what will really be stopped is America’s future share of such jobs, wealth, influence, and growth, since you can’t develop these projects through short-term, stop-start spending. Sigh. Rather, Grrrrrr.

Paul Krugman:

[A] recent interview by National Journal, this one with Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, has received a lot of attention thanks to a headline-grabbing quote: “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

If you read the full interview, what Mr. McConnell was saying was that, in 1995, Republicans erred by focusing too much on their policy agenda and not enough on destroying the president: “We suffered from some degree of hubris and acted as if the president was irrelevant and we would roll over him. By the summer of 1995, he was already on the way to being re-elected, and we were hanging on for our lives.” So this time around, he implied, they’ll stay focused on bringing down Mr. Obama. . .

But we won’t get th[e]policies [that worked in the '90s] if Republicans control the House. In fact, if they get their way, we’ll get the worst of both worlds: They’ll refuse to do anything to boost the economy now, claiming to be worried about the deficit, while simultaneously increasing long-run deficits with irresponsible tax cuts — cuts they have already announced won’t have to be offset with spending cuts.

So if the elections go as expected next week, here’s my advice: Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Jamelle Bouie:

If we’re looking at the parties in the last three decades, then it’s unambiguously the case that Democrats care about reducing deficits and will work toward the goal. Republicans, on the other hand, care about cutting taxes for rich people, and insofar that they have any concern about the deficit, it’s as a prop in that general direction.

But don’t take the liberal media’s word for it:  listen to Republicans admit in their own words (or lack thereof) that they have no idea what they’re doing.

-AR

“The oil spill in the Gulf is this nation’s largest natural disaster and stopping the leak and cleaning up the region is our top priority.  Congressman Barton’s statements this morning were wrong.  BP itself has acknowledged that responsibility for the economic damages lies with them and has offered an initial pledge of $20 billion dollars for that purpose.

“The families and businesspeople in the Gulf region want leadership, accountability and action from BP and the Administration.  It is unacceptable that, 59  days after this crisis began, no solution is forthcoming.  Simply put, the American people want all of our resources, time and focus to be directed toward stopping the spill and cleaning up the mess.”

As much as Republicans may want to believe that desecrating the environment in the name of commerce is God’s work, the explosion of a man made oil rig is not a “natural” disaster.

-AR

Barton’s apology to BP CEO Tony Hayward at this morning’s Congressional hearing  for the Obama administration’s “shakedown” of BP lacked many of the flaws one usually sees in a public apology.  It sounded sincere and unequivocal, did not make any excuses and did not blame BP for it’s own role in the underlying matter.  The problem, however, is that the “shakedown” for which Barton was apologizing was actually a perfectly reasonable demand that BP pay its share for causing one of the worst environmental disasters in history.

In a rare moment of good taste and political sense, the Republican leadership demanded Barton retract his apology, and issue a new apology for the apology.  (Finally answering the question of how outrageous a Republican member of Congress‘s statement must be before Republican leadership will consider it to be out of line.)  Barton’s apology for the apology provides an interesting combination of what are perhaps the two most common and obnoxious species of bad public apologies:  “I’m sorry if anyone was offended” and “My comments were misinterpreted.”  Barton indeed claims his words were misconstrued (how could anyone belief that apologizing to BP meant he was sympathetic to BP?), and then goes on to conclude “I want to apologize for that misconstruction.”  The “I want to apologize for that misconstruction,” phrasing, like “I’m sorry if anyone was offended,”  is interesting because the speaker is essentially apologizing to the listener on the listener’s own behalf.  Even if the problem really were with how Barton’s comments were construed by others, and not that they were out of line with reality and indicative of political corruption, then he should at least be apologizing for his own poor word choice.  Or, of course, he could have avoided this all entirely by not siding with the oil company in an oil spill.

-AR

As has been discussed previously on this blog, no one can really can say what gives rise to a reasonable suspicion that a person is undocumented.  This lack of a non-racial basis for determining what raises reasonable suspicion renders the ban on racial profiling dead letter.  Without articulable standards, an officer has broad leeway to invent whatever reasons he chooses for finding a particular person suspicious, and as long as he avoids saying, “Well, doesn’t she Mexican to you?” it will be nearly impossible to prove that the ban on racial profiling has been violated.  The lack of articulable standards also means that enforcement of the law will be imprecise, and many people will be asked for papers who are American citizens or legal residents.  Because being Latino is a baseline requirement for suspicion of being undocumented in Arizona, whether we admit it or not and regardless of whatever other factors may or may not exist, this burden will be borne solely by the Latino community even if police officers act in good faith and do not target anyone solely for being Latino.

The “the bill doesn’t allow racial profiling because we say it doesn’t allow racial profiling” argument follows similar logic to the infamous John Yoo “what we’re doing isn’t torture because I’m telling you it isn’t torture, and in any case the United States doesn’t torture anyone ’cause that would be illegal” memos.  Given the racial dynamic to this issues, perhaps a better analogy would be the “separate but equal” fiction that American law recognized in the nine decades between the adoption of the 14th Amendment and Brown v. Board of Education.  Much like the Arizona bill’s “no racial profiling, honest” provision, the separate but equal doctrine lent segregation a sheen of neutrality that was completely detached from the reality of what motivated Jim Crow laws and how they were actually experienced.   Sure, blacks can’t go to white schools, but whites can’t go to black schools either, so who really gets to complain?  Fortunately, the Warren Court intervened in Brown, saying, in essence, “Jesus Christ, you fucking assholes!”

In full disclosure, I myself have not read the entirety of the Arizona’s immigration law.  Nor have I read the actual text of, for example, Mississippi’s pre-Brown school segregation laws.  I have no hesitation about condemning either.

-AR

What George Will is interested in is eliminating birthright citizenship, so that Congress could have the power to say that no matter where they were born, Mexicans are Mexicans.  (I’m paraphrasing.)  This, Will says, serves to accomplish 3 goals: 1) bringing the interpretation of the 14th Amendment “into conformity with what the authors of its text intended”; 2) bringing that same interpretation in line with common sense; and 3) removing an incentive to illegal immigration.

Let’s start with that first goal, what the authors of the text intended.  The 14th Amendment was added to the U.S. Constitution following the Civil War.  That war was famously preceded by a Supreme Court case, Dred Scott v. Sanford, which held that people of African descent were not citizens.  So the post-war amendments were enacted specifically to correct the wrong of saying that citizenship could be determined by ancestry or race rather than by birth.  And yet Will thinks the authors of that text intended, in fact, to say the opposite – because if citizenship were based on that of parents, the children of African slaves, born in the United States, would not be citizens.  I don’t think it’s going out on a limb to say that was NOT the intent of the 14th Amendment’s authors.

As for the issue of common sense, Will argues that interpreting the language of the 14th Amendment to require birthright citizenship strains reason.  The text says, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”  Seems pretty clear to me.  I don’t see a part that says “other than persons born of persons not of the United States.”  In order to make this simple, straightforward sentence confusing, Will gives a strained reading to the “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” language, following an argument that was first made in the 19th century to try to exclude native-born Americans of Chinese ancestry from citizenship.

Will’s argument is even less coherent than the racist anti-Chinese arguments, though – he says that because “in 1868 there were and never had been any illegal immigrants,” since immigration had not yet been restricted, the authors and ratifiers could not have intended birthright citizenship for “illegal immigrants.”  This, to me, is an amazing rationalization.  The argument is factually untrue, since many states regulated immigration both before and after the Civil War.  But it is also incredibly disingenuous, because it acts as though the invention of a phrase is the same thing as the start of a concept.  Does Will honestly think that because this country did not criminalize the act of living in the United States without federal authorization until after 1868 (aka “illegal immigration”) mean that the people who wrote the 14th Amendment – a mere 7 years before enacting a federal immigration statute, in fact – thought that everyone living in the U.S. had and always would have federal authorization to do so?  Again, not plausible.

Will’s final argument gets the most popular play – the idea that birthright citizenship creates a powerful incentive for pregnant women to come to the U.S. in order to access our most valuable asset: citizenship.  “On our dime,” the argument usually continues, implying further disgust at the hospital bills and other costs that then American taxpayers have to pay for this jet-setting mother.  Even though this is Will’s least legal argument, he puts it in the mouth of a law professor (does he realize its racist undertones, or is that assuming too much?):

A parent from a poor country, writes professor Lino Graglia of the University of Texas law school, ‘can hardly do more for a child than make him or her an American citizen, entitled to all the advantages of the American welfare state.’

Yes, right.  As though Americans on welfare are living lives of great advantageousness.  As though a woman suffering in abject poverty would choose to have a child in order to better her circumstances.  And as though poor pregnant women, in droves, are making the unfathomably dangerous and difficult decision to immigrate to the U.S. unlawfully, just to get their children rubber-stamped as citizens.  After all, having a citizen child does not protect a mother from deportation.  It does not protect her other children from deportation either.  It gives only the barest protections to the citizen child, who will still face racism, discrimination, and criminal suspicion.

Will ends by making the same argument that has been made elsewhere (by Peter Schuck, for example), that U.S. citizenship is a consensual relationship, requiring the consent of the nation.  Will might prefer that people (specifically, white people) get to decide who gets the citizenship title and who does not (and in this regard he shares much in common with the tea party types denying Obama’s citizenship).  Thankfully, since the 14th Amendment, citizenship has almost nothing to do with consent.  Whether Will likes it or not, the descendants of African slaves are citizens automatically, as are the descendants of Chinese immigrants in California, as are the “children born to Indian parents,” who Will wrongly suggests are not citizens.

It’s actually the one immigration rule that functions pretty equitably.  So it is no surprise that in spite of the fact that it has been clear, unquestioned, and fully established constitutional law for well over a hundred years, the calls to change the rule keep on coming.

-AS

The first part of this argument ignores decades of Supreme Court precedent giving an expansive interpretation to the Commerce Clause.  The second part is only a concern if you accept the Glenn Beck view that our elected representatives are pawns of an insidious progressive movement hell bent on taking over every aspect of our lives, rather than sensible, self-interested people trying to balance doing the right thing for the country with the desire to get re-elected.  Worrying about extreme implications of allowing the individual mandate to stand misses that Congress could pass all kinds of ridiculous legislation under its clearly enumerated powers.  For instance, Congress has the power to levy income taxes, and could pass a nationwide income tax of 90% on all brackets.  Combining the fears of health care opponents cited above, under the power to regulate interstate commerce, Congress could pass a law that no one call sell an automobile to a person not wearing a hat.  We’re fine with Congress having those powers in theory, because we have enough faith in republican democracy that we don’t expect our leaders to take actions that both don’t serve the public good and will harm their prospects of being re-elected.

The slippery slope argument ignores two checks that will remain against Congress passing ridiculous laws even if the individual mandate is found to be constitutional.  One is other constitutional doctrines, such as substantive due process, which the Supreme Court could use to strike down any law that was truly irrational or invidious.  The other is the democratic process.  Opponents of health care reform are outraged that Congress passed the bill even though polls showed a majority of the country opposed to it.  The worry is that we are now in a “tyranny of the majority,” where whoever controls Congress runs roughshod over the public will.  Slippery slope fears would be more justified if that characterization were accurate, but it ignores that Democrats won the last two election cycles campaigning largely on a promise to reform our health care system, and polls have continued to show that the public trusts Democrats more on the issue of health care than Republicans even as it started turning against the President’s plan.  While part of Congressional Democrats’ motivation was to do the right thing whatever the cost, the party was also partly motivated by the knowledge that opposition to the health care bill has been based largely on misinformation and a belief that between now and November Democratic candidates will be able to explain the new law to the public and turn it from an electoral liability to a benefit.  Whether they are right or wrong in that calculation, that is exactly what republican democracy is all about.

-AR

But last week was a good week for ACORN.  First, the results of an independent investigation, commissioned by ACORN and conducted by a former Attorney General of Massachusetts and the esteemed law firm Proskauer Rose, revealed no pattern of illegal activity by ACORN and cast doubt on the most damning piece of evidence touted by the Right.  Then, on Thursday, a federal judge ruled that the bill passed by Congress to strip ACORN of any federal funding it receives is unconstitutional.

What the investigation revealed is what anyone who has actually dealt ACORN already knew:  that the problem with the organization isn’t corruption but rather disorganization and lack of oversight.  And rather than serving some great liberal conspiracy to steal elections and install communist dictators, ACORN’s flaws undermine, rather than further, its true and noble mission of organizing low-income people, providing them services and getting them to be more active in their communities.

With the prostitution video discredited, the only evidence ACORN’s critics really have is stories of organizers turning in fraudulent voter registration cards.  But like ACORN’s disorganization more generally, this specific charge doesn’t indicate some great conspiracy to steal elections, but rather reveals a waste of resources that undermines ACORN’s true mission of empowering low-income communities.  It doesn’t help low-income communities or ACORN-backed candidates if some unscrupulous canvasser registers Mickey Mouse to vote; he ain’t showing up on Election Day.  As someone who has worked in community organizing, I can say from experience that there’s nothing more frustrating than realizing that you’ve wasted your organization’s resources to pay someone to go sit in a park and write made-up names on a piece of paper.

The best news for ACORN is that neither the Right’s crackerjack gumshoes nor their own investigators have yet uncovered ACORN’s true scheme:  to buy up cheap property in the California desert, then have their crony Barack Obama detonate a nuclear weapon in the San Andreas fault so that Southern California crumbles into the ocean and ACORNburg becomes expensive beachfront property.

-AR

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-AR