Setting Goals for Political Reform
Joe Nocera has put out a call for reform and opens the discussion with a few that he favors. Tying his list together is his hope to "invigorate the electorate" and encourage "more responsive, and less extreme, political candidates.” These different goals can pull in different directions. An electorate is often invigorated by negative campaigns—which is not to say that candidates have to be extreme in order to be negative, or that only negative campaigns are invigorating, but the connection is not unknown, either. And there is also nothing to suggest that extreme candidates, however Nocera defines “extreme,” are unresponsive. Many are responsive to constituents that reward them for this type of behavior.
Of the different reforms Nocera lists, two illustrate the reasons why some reform programs open with hope and end in frustration, and others might stand a chance.
Arizona and Its Conflicts Over Public Financing
What to Do About the Court: Two Views
A scan of recent days’ writing reveals two lines of argument about the Supreme Court’s failings in campaign finance. One holds that the Court’s understanding of politics is weak and leaves it helpless to grasp, in practical terms, the issues presented. It is suggested that Congress knows best; its members, also political candidates, are experts in the electoral process. Others argue that there is hope for the Court but it would require an improvement in the arguments it hears, and Professor Lessig and his allies continue to urge that the Justices be pressed on his “originalist” argument for an expansive view of the corruption—“dependence corruption”—that Congress should be empowered to control.
There is more to add in each instance to round out what the proponents of these points of view have chosen to offer.