On Thursday, the House approved a controversial bill that would extend President Bush's tax cuts. The bill is now headed to President Obama's desk. It would be difficult for the timing to be any better. The bill extends the tax cuts for two years. That means the next debate over the cuts will be in 2012. 2012 is an election year. It is a big election year. Obama will be running for reelection in 2012. I have never been good at predicting the future but I will hazard a guess that taxes and the economy will still be issues of concern to voters in 2012. I will also guess that the prospect of ending or continuing Bush's tax cuts will be an issue as well. Short of a war or a catastrophe, the economy should be the major issue in 2012. If it improves significantly, President Obama will point that out every at every opportunity. If it does not improve, republicans will point that out at every opportunity.
If the economy is improving in 2012 many will credit the tax cuts. It will be said that lower taxes spurred the recovery and raising them will only harm it. If the economy is still foundering, it will be difficult to make an argument for letting the cuts expire. Whether or not the higher taxes that will result if the policy is allowed to expire will help or hinder the economy, they will not be popular: higher taxes never are. Election years are the years when politicians want most to be popular. The only circumstance under which letting the cuts expire will not cause a lot of controversy is if the economy is thriving. If the economy is thriving many would not complain, at least not complain loudly, if some taxes were raised. People could afford it. Not only that, people could afford principal and fairness as well. Election years are the best years to grant tax cuts. They are the worst years to raise taxes. 2012 is an election year.
Tax cuts and economic policy are complicated issues except at election time. At election time they are simple: do you want to pay higher taxes or not? Obama hailed the tax cuts. He pretty much had to.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Monday, December 13, 2010
Can We Rely on Voters?
Some legislators in Texas are growing leery of allowing voters the option of straight party voting on election ballots. They are considering a bill to ban it. "Straight ticket voting is detrimental to our system" asserted State Senator Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio. He and others feel it undermines democracy by making voters lazy. Wentworth wants to go so far to make straight ticket voting illegal. It is viewed as a "luxury" that is making voters complacent. That may be so but complacence is a prerogative that belongs to the voters.
American citizens have the right to vote. They are free to exercise that right in the manner they see fit. Voters do not have to be intelligent, coherent, or informed. They do not even have to be able to read. They just have to be registered. There was a time when voters were required to pass a literacy test. The assumption was that voters needed to be able to read if they were to be at all informed. They had to be informed if they were to be able to make an intelligent decision. That the rule was abused to keep segments of the population from voting changes nothing. The rule was sound in its merits. People no longer have to read to be informed. We have long had television and radio to serve that purpose. The Internet has become important but it still requires at least a modicum of literacy. For better or worse (more often worse), we also have interest groups to keep the public informed. Perhaps worst of all, people do not have to know the Constitution. They needn't even be familiar with it. There is no civics test. They do not need to know how the government works or what its responsibilities are. They do not need to know how many branches of government there are. They just need to know where the voting station is. All this makes them potential dupes and easy prey for political opportunists.
In a typical Texas election there are a great number of names on the ballot. Once one moves past the top of the ticket there is a plethora of choices for state representatives, judges, commissioners, constables, justices of the peace, and more. One has to be a political junkie to keep track of all the races and candidates. The easiest way to sort it out is through voting a straight ticket. If you are inclined to believe Republicans would do a better job managing state affairs you can pull the lever. If you believe the Democrats would be better, you can pull the other lever. That is why we have political parties in the first place. Political parties are ways to organize politics and make it coherent for voters. At least they used to be.
Straight ticket voting saves voters time and energy. They do not have to educate themselves on all the issues or candidates. They cannot educate themselves on all the issues and candidates. People have traditionally relied on parties to sort out issues for them. If Wentworth is uncomfortable with that he is in the wrong business. He hopes that by banning straight ticket voting he will be able to force voters to be more attentive. He wants to make them think in the voting booth. It is a commendable effort. But even if Wentworth succeeds he will have done nothing to make voters more educated or responsible. He will likely only irritate and confuse them.
There are very few, if any, voters in Texas that are informed on all the issues in the state, let alone candidates and policy positions. To force them into choosing candidates office by office will do nothing to preserve the integrity of the system. It will do nothing to make voters more informed or responsible. If anything, it will do little more than reduce the number of votes cast as voters begin to lose interest the further down the ballot they go. Some results at the bottom of the ballot would likely resemble football scores.
Wentworth does not trust the voters. He believes many are uninformed and therefore led astray by straight ticket voting. He may be right. Voters have jobs and families. They have bills to pay. They have lives to live. They do not have the luxury of analyzing policy, assessing candidates, and examining issues in every race. They rely on political parties to keep things sorted out. If the system is not working, it is not the fault of the public. They do not have, and they never will have, the time to examine politics issue by issue and office by office. The public relies on political parties to patch everything together. That is what parties are supposed to be for. A better way would be to strengthen parties at all levels, local to national. That would not make voters any more responsible either but it would help make the political system more coherent. But parties are increasingly under fire, both in Texas and across the nation. Some legislators in Texas think that a political free for all would benefit the state. I doubt that they have thought the issue through.
Eliminating straight ticket voting would not fix any of the short comings of popular elections in Texas. It would not make voters any more informed or responsible. It would just make elections more tumultuous and voting more random. It is difficult to see how Texas would be better off for that.
American citizens have the right to vote. They are free to exercise that right in the manner they see fit. Voters do not have to be intelligent, coherent, or informed. They do not even have to be able to read. They just have to be registered. There was a time when voters were required to pass a literacy test. The assumption was that voters needed to be able to read if they were to be at all informed. They had to be informed if they were to be able to make an intelligent decision. That the rule was abused to keep segments of the population from voting changes nothing. The rule was sound in its merits. People no longer have to read to be informed. We have long had television and radio to serve that purpose. The Internet has become important but it still requires at least a modicum of literacy. For better or worse (more often worse), we also have interest groups to keep the public informed. Perhaps worst of all, people do not have to know the Constitution. They needn't even be familiar with it. There is no civics test. They do not need to know how the government works or what its responsibilities are. They do not need to know how many branches of government there are. They just need to know where the voting station is. All this makes them potential dupes and easy prey for political opportunists.
In a typical Texas election there are a great number of names on the ballot. Once one moves past the top of the ticket there is a plethora of choices for state representatives, judges, commissioners, constables, justices of the peace, and more. One has to be a political junkie to keep track of all the races and candidates. The easiest way to sort it out is through voting a straight ticket. If you are inclined to believe Republicans would do a better job managing state affairs you can pull the lever. If you believe the Democrats would be better, you can pull the other lever. That is why we have political parties in the first place. Political parties are ways to organize politics and make it coherent for voters. At least they used to be.
Straight ticket voting saves voters time and energy. They do not have to educate themselves on all the issues or candidates. They cannot educate themselves on all the issues and candidates. People have traditionally relied on parties to sort out issues for them. If Wentworth is uncomfortable with that he is in the wrong business. He hopes that by banning straight ticket voting he will be able to force voters to be more attentive. He wants to make them think in the voting booth. It is a commendable effort. But even if Wentworth succeeds he will have done nothing to make voters more educated or responsible. He will likely only irritate and confuse them.
There are very few, if any, voters in Texas that are informed on all the issues in the state, let alone candidates and policy positions. To force them into choosing candidates office by office will do nothing to preserve the integrity of the system. It will do nothing to make voters more informed or responsible. If anything, it will do little more than reduce the number of votes cast as voters begin to lose interest the further down the ballot they go. Some results at the bottom of the ballot would likely resemble football scores.
Wentworth does not trust the voters. He believes many are uninformed and therefore led astray by straight ticket voting. He may be right. Voters have jobs and families. They have bills to pay. They have lives to live. They do not have the luxury of analyzing policy, assessing candidates, and examining issues in every race. They rely on political parties to keep things sorted out. If the system is not working, it is not the fault of the public. They do not have, and they never will have, the time to examine politics issue by issue and office by office. The public relies on political parties to patch everything together. That is what parties are supposed to be for. A better way would be to strengthen parties at all levels, local to national. That would not make voters any more responsible either but it would help make the political system more coherent. But parties are increasingly under fire, both in Texas and across the nation. Some legislators in Texas think that a political free for all would benefit the state. I doubt that they have thought the issue through.
Eliminating straight ticket voting would not fix any of the short comings of popular elections in Texas. It would not make voters any more informed or responsible. It would just make elections more tumultuous and voting more random. It is difficult to see how Texas would be better off for that.
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