Being on the receiving end of rolled eyes, arguments and dirty looks when you make your teen finish his homework before going to visit a friend.............frustrating.
Being on the receiving end of a big hug and the words "Thank you for making me do my homework" when your son gets invited to go see his favorite basketball team (the one for which tickets are almost impossible to get) and realizes he can go because he has his homework done --- unforgettable!
Monday, January 4, 2010
Friday, January 1, 2010
So it is January 1, 2010 and 2.5 years since I last updated this blog. This year I will try to update more often (I'd say its a New Year's resolution but I don't believe in those).
I just checked on the status of National Popular Vote. It looks like it is making progress and is now law in 5 states -- NJ, Maryland, Hawaii, Washington and Illinois. This is one of those very dangerous things. Noone talks about it much and it gets passed under the radar in state after state. And then all of a sudden one day the last state needed will pass it and chances are the representatives in these first states will have forgotten they ever passed it. As previously mentioned -- I'm not necessarily against the concept. I just think that if the folks in favor of a popular vote election want to make it happen, then they need to work on the constitutional amendment and avoid this end run! Let's have the debate openly and on a national basis because we are changing something very fundamental to our nation. There is no way such a change should be made as an end run.
Of course our legislators don't see this. For too many them, everything is an end run. What little provision should be but in a piece of legislation today? Heck if Ben Nelson had made his deal early on, that exemption for Nebraska would have been included in the healthcare bill and noone would have ever noticed -- not in 2000 pages of legalese. That is why I think Congress should pass a law limiting legislation to 100 pages. And as far as spending -- if a bill contains more than $250 million in total spending then it can't have more than 3 major spending items in it. No more $787 billion stimulus bills! Some of you would claim that Congress would never get anything done -- I'm not sure that would be such a bad thing. The reality is that the bargaining would still occur -- but it would be easier to see. It would make it harder to earmark and make semi-secret deals.
Oh well, time to go cook dinner. More later......this week, I hope!
I just checked on the status of National Popular Vote. It looks like it is making progress and is now law in 5 states -- NJ, Maryland, Hawaii, Washington and Illinois. This is one of those very dangerous things. Noone talks about it much and it gets passed under the radar in state after state. And then all of a sudden one day the last state needed will pass it and chances are the representatives in these first states will have forgotten they ever passed it. As previously mentioned -- I'm not necessarily against the concept. I just think that if the folks in favor of a popular vote election want to make it happen, then they need to work on the constitutional amendment and avoid this end run! Let's have the debate openly and on a national basis because we are changing something very fundamental to our nation. There is no way such a change should be made as an end run.
Of course our legislators don't see this. For too many them, everything is an end run. What little provision should be but in a piece of legislation today? Heck if Ben Nelson had made his deal early on, that exemption for Nebraska would have been included in the healthcare bill and noone would have ever noticed -- not in 2000 pages of legalese. That is why I think Congress should pass a law limiting legislation to 100 pages. And as far as spending -- if a bill contains more than $250 million in total spending then it can't have more than 3 major spending items in it. No more $787 billion stimulus bills! Some of you would claim that Congress would never get anything done -- I'm not sure that would be such a bad thing. The reality is that the bargaining would still occur -- but it would be easier to see. It would make it harder to earmark and make semi-secret deals.
Oh well, time to go cook dinner. More later......this week, I hope!
Monday, June 11, 2007
National Popular Vote
Has anyone else been following this slick project? I find it scary that, if successful, this project will in practice change the way we elect a president without amending the constitution. Yet it is receiving very little attention in the press or elsewhere. Whether or not, you support the goals of this project, it concerns me that it is making its way through the country with so little publicity and fanfare.
For those of you unfamiliar with this project -- its goal is to force the winner of the national popular vote to also always be the winner of the electoral vote thus ensuring that our president is elected by the popular vote. While I'm somewhat ambivalent in my feelings about that goal (my instinct is to preserve the proportional system designed by the framers but I might be convinced otherwise), I am absolutely livid at the method being used to achieve the goal.
Instead of approaching this goal as a constitutional amendment, with the attendant national debate that such a historic change should engender, this project proposes to simply have individual state legislatures pass legislation that says that a state's electoral votes would all be given to the winner of the national popular vote and not be reflective of the state vote as it is today. In other words even if a state voted 100% for candidate A, if candidate B won the national popular vote, then the electoral votes of the state would go to candidate B. The kicker is that this legislation would not become effective until enough states to represent the majority of the electoral college votes pass it. According to the website this is all perfectly legal because the constitution does allow states to determine how their electors will vote.
And don't think this legislation doesn't have a chance -- it has already been passed and signed into law by the governor of Maryland. In two other states -- Hawaii and California -- it passed the state legislatures but was vetoed by the governors. It has already been passed by both houses of the legislature in Illinois and by one house in 4 other states. And there are bills drafted or proposed in all but 4 states. And yet -- no national debate.
So why does this bother me so much? After all -- didn't 2000 prove that we need to elect a president by the popular vote? Maybe, maybe not. But it is fair game to have the debate.
But have it by proposing an amendment to the Constitution -- not by keeping to the letter of the law while trampling all over the Constitution. Proponents of this "elegant", as its supporters say, solution say that a Constitutional amendment can not be passed because the small states would never pass such as amendment. Yet protecting the small states is one of the reasons that the electors were divied up the way they were -- to protect smaller states from larger states. Passing an amendment is tough -- tougher than electing a president It requires Congress and 3/4's of the states. That's as it should be. Something as momentous as changing the way we elect a president requires that type of scrutiny. Yet this change to the way we elect a president can be made to happen if less than half the states pass this legislation
From a more practical standpoint -- the problem in 2000 was as much about the vote counts in Florida (which multiple outside sources have proven was won by Bush, like it or not) as it was the fact that Bush didn't win the popular vote. But at least the problem was limited to Florida. There were reports of voter fraud in St. Louis, Minnesota and elsewhere. Think of how close that election was on a national basis -- what if every vote in every state needed to be recounted! And partisans in every state would continue to find alleged new incidents of voter fraud. And for every one that was legitimate -- there will be others ready to claim fraud on false or flimsy pretenses. (Think I'm exagerrating -- talk to someone who works in customer relations and you'll understand how many fraudulent complaints there are and how much they hurt the customers with real complaints. The same principle applies.)
Further with a constitutional amendment the change would be permanent. With this legislation the change could be revoked at any time. So when the wind blows east we have an election that is done under one set of rules and when it blows west then the rules change. Do we really want that?
So if you want to elect our president by the popular vote -- then go and propose the amendment. Lobby for it, fight for it. But do it that way. Drop this slick end-run now!
For those of you unfamiliar with this project -- its goal is to force the winner of the national popular vote to also always be the winner of the electoral vote thus ensuring that our president is elected by the popular vote. While I'm somewhat ambivalent in my feelings about that goal (my instinct is to preserve the proportional system designed by the framers but I might be convinced otherwise), I am absolutely livid at the method being used to achieve the goal.
Instead of approaching this goal as a constitutional amendment, with the attendant national debate that such a historic change should engender, this project proposes to simply have individual state legislatures pass legislation that says that a state's electoral votes would all be given to the winner of the national popular vote and not be reflective of the state vote as it is today. In other words even if a state voted 100% for candidate A, if candidate B won the national popular vote, then the electoral votes of the state would go to candidate B. The kicker is that this legislation would not become effective until enough states to represent the majority of the electoral college votes pass it. According to the website this is all perfectly legal because the constitution does allow states to determine how their electors will vote.
And don't think this legislation doesn't have a chance -- it has already been passed and signed into law by the governor of Maryland. In two other states -- Hawaii and California -- it passed the state legislatures but was vetoed by the governors. It has already been passed by both houses of the legislature in Illinois and by one house in 4 other states. And there are bills drafted or proposed in all but 4 states. And yet -- no national debate.
So why does this bother me so much? After all -- didn't 2000 prove that we need to elect a president by the popular vote? Maybe, maybe not. But it is fair game to have the debate.
But have it by proposing an amendment to the Constitution -- not by keeping to the letter of the law while trampling all over the Constitution. Proponents of this "elegant", as its supporters say, solution say that a Constitutional amendment can not be passed because the small states would never pass such as amendment. Yet protecting the small states is one of the reasons that the electors were divied up the way they were -- to protect smaller states from larger states. Passing an amendment is tough -- tougher than electing a president It requires Congress and 3/4's of the states. That's as it should be. Something as momentous as changing the way we elect a president requires that type of scrutiny. Yet this change to the way we elect a president can be made to happen if less than half the states pass this legislation
From a more practical standpoint -- the problem in 2000 was as much about the vote counts in Florida (which multiple outside sources have proven was won by Bush, like it or not) as it was the fact that Bush didn't win the popular vote. But at least the problem was limited to Florida. There were reports of voter fraud in St. Louis, Minnesota and elsewhere. Think of how close that election was on a national basis -- what if every vote in every state needed to be recounted! And partisans in every state would continue to find alleged new incidents of voter fraud. And for every one that was legitimate -- there will be others ready to claim fraud on false or flimsy pretenses. (Think I'm exagerrating -- talk to someone who works in customer relations and you'll understand how many fraudulent complaints there are and how much they hurt the customers with real complaints. The same principle applies.)
Further with a constitutional amendment the change would be permanent. With this legislation the change could be revoked at any time. So when the wind blows east we have an election that is done under one set of rules and when it blows west then the rules change. Do we really want that?
So if you want to elect our president by the popular vote -- then go and propose the amendment. Lobby for it, fight for it. But do it that way. Drop this slick end-run now!
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
I've Done It!
I've Done It!
I've created my own blog! I've been thinking about doing this to months and tonight I've done it.
What will I write about?
Politics, soccer, motherhood, educational choice and whatever else I feel like kicking or cheering about.
Welcome.
I've created my own blog! I've been thinking about doing this to months and tonight I've done it.
What will I write about?
Politics, soccer, motherhood, educational choice and whatever else I feel like kicking or cheering about.
Welcome.
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