Ellen Weintraub, a member of the Federal Election Commission, has something she wants to say:
The FEC has six members: three Democrats and three Republicans. Enforcement actions require a majority vote. Since all three Republicans refuse on principle to investigate violations by Donald Trump, it means he's effectively immune from all federal campaign laws.
No conservative person is fit to hold public office.
Their nature precludes responsibility or engagement with society in any serious way.
Come now. We need conservatives - they serve an important role in a pluralistic society, as annoying as they sometimes can be.
That's a big part of the problem - we don't have a conservative party. Republicans are reactionary-authoritarian with an ethno-fascist wing that overlaps with a theocratic-fascist wing.
I've often heard that from people, but I would say the evidence is wanting.
Yes, I agree with paragraph one. Human beings are constitutionally optimistic or pessimistic, "go getters" or subdued, bright and not so bright, passionate or cerebral, chance takers and preservationists.
The list of course goes on from there; these are only examples. The important thing is that both sides of every continuum need representation in a democracy.
Notice that I didn't say anything about policy, because I believe that our "policy preferences" are much more guided by our temperaments than our cognitive assessments. So, yes, we need a "conservative" party.
I also agree with the second paragraph. Since the Republicans absorbed the Dixiecrats in the 1970's they have been infected by the vile methods of the Confederate followers who have ruled the South since Reconstruction was ended
The term "conservative" is by now far too often confused with "Republican" to be useful on its own.
It really should always be used in pharses like "actual conservative", which obviously doesn't apply to Trump and most of the current Republican party.
On the contrary, we *do* have a conservative party--the Democratic Party. What we don't have is a significant liberal party.
Yes. This.
With respect, this misses the point of how US political parties are structured. Because, primarily, of the electoral college, there are powerful structural incentives for two majoritarian parties, i.e., coalitions that can get to 51% of the vote.
Almost by definition, that won't be "liberal" or "conservative" parties (except in relation to each other). They will often be "center-left" and "center-right" parties.
In parliamentary systems, it's more common to find "liberal" and "conservative" (and other) parties because 1) a party can get meaningful representation by 2) forming a coalition government with other minority parties.
The Democratic party is the only real national political party in the US and have to find some way to accommodate everyone, where the Republican party has, for most of its history, been a tool for keeping corruption legal by pandering to the baboon colony while keeping them at arm's length it's now entirely baboon.
Since DT isn't a conservative, that's a misguided prohibition. Conservatives would be fine, if we still had any. (Gerald Ford, for instance, was a conservative.)
The founders were deeply afraid of faction, the spirit of party. But it seems now they should have feared the spirit of servility more.
Thank you, Commissioner Weintraub, for your service, which I imagine must be very like banging your head against a wall all day long.
If there were prosecutable crimes, I assume the FEC OGC would simply forward their findings to the DoJ, no?
Not without a majority vote to do so. The Federal Election Commission was deliberately created to respond only after the Judicial system has already acted.
I think the Commission on Presidential Debates was rendered irrelevant for much the same reason. An even number of votes leads to paralysis. Also, the presidential candidates didn't want to obey any rules. (See "League of Women Voters")/
Clearly it's pointless to have an even number of votes.
Here's what I don't understand: why doesn't Biden appoint Adam Kinzinger or Liz Chaney or any number of other pro-democracy Republicans? Anyone know?