[Newsbot]

Filibuster Cartoons
Title: Snowballing chaos (click to view)
Date: August 22, 2010
Australia became the latest Anglosphere nation to be plunged into political uncertainty this week, after their latest federal election yielded the most uncertain results in nearly six decades. The Labour Party of Prime Minister Julia Gillard lost its majority in the House, which would normally ensure her swift removal from office, but the conservative opposition party also failed to win an outright majority. Some sort of novel arrangement will thus have to be cobbled together; possibilities include a British-style coalition government between one of the two big parties and some of the smaller ones, or a Canadian-style "minority government" where a PM rules despite only controlling a narrow plurality of legislators, ensuing that very little ever gets passed.

America has its own little constitutional crisis looming, too, of course. Assuming this Novembeer's midterm election pans out the way everyone expects it to, the US could be looking at a split-party Congress for the first time since the 1980s, with the GOP gaining control of the House, while the Democrats retain the Senate. Coupled with Obama in the White House, the whole situation will likely ensure one big ol' jamboree of obstructionism and deadlock for years to come.

The fact that every major English-speaking democracy is presently embroiled in some form of political turmoil (often quite unprecedented) should raise more than a few serious questions about the functionality of our existing political institutions. Across the world, it seems that Anglo politics are getting more bitter, more partisan, and more nakedly ideological, thus limiting the effectiveness of a constitutional order based on compromise and concession. Even when parties are forced to share power, through minority governments and the like, things rarely get much better; indeed, tensions may actually be exacerbated by the sheer indignity of it all.

It seems like precisely the wrong sort of thing to advocate in such a climate, but sometimes it appears that the only real solution to our present woes would be to institute an even more rigid "winner-takes-all" approach to elections. Like, the winning party takes literally all, and has unquestioned, total power until the next election. That way everyone can safely restrict their endless partisan bitching and grandstanding to campaign time, and let government get on with its merry business of actually running the country during the brief interludes in-between.

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[Kjorteo]

The question--and by extension, the problem with your proposal--is whether letting government get on with its merry business is better than deadlock. In theory, when you put it like that, then yes, obviously... but "in theory, when you put it like that" is also where you find people saying that smaller government and decreased spending are good even though that means absolutely nothing until you go into the details.

Personally, I can't speak for the other countries, but I believe the American system of checks and balances was put into the Constitution the way it was specifically so that if a tyrannical government ever came into power, they would have a harder time actually doing anything. (I'm not saying the current government is tyrannical, by the way, just speaking hypothetically.) I think there are actually quite a few people on both sides who would find no movement at all preferable to the "wrong" party easily, efficiently, and rapidly moving the country into a ditch.

(Even though I'm speaking about a general attitude that applies to both sides, almost like political Mad Libs, I'm sure that won't stop the incoming firestorm of comments from angry conservatives who took the liberty of filling in the blanks with how the Democrats are, indeed, driving the country into a ditch.)

[JJ]

Yeah, I was obviously being a bit glib, and I don't really like the idea of unchecked government. But at the same time, I find it hard to escape the impression that something has gone quite wrong with our various systems of government at the moment, though it's hard to articulate precisely what. Some lesson has to be learned from the fact that the four countries with the most closely-resembling political cultures are all experiencing strange aberrations in their political processes.

[Kjorteo]

I think something has gone wrong with the voters more than the system of government, which is why it's so hard to put a finger on and explain even harder to figure out how to fix. We're just... not even trying to cooperate anymore. The right has, as Jon Stewart frequently put it, confused tyranny with losing, and it hasn't been long enough since the Bush administration for me to pretend that the left is somehow above that. Even me, knowing this and having the hindsight and perspective to articulate it like this... even I would be seriously uncomfortable with the thought of going back to that, either. I feel like we barely survived the last time, which is undoubtedly how the right will feel a couple years after Obama is gone. No one is immune.

A few people (or at least primary candidates) from places like Texas and Tennessee have floated the idea of secession as a natural reaction to this unprecedented Governmental overreach (and by that I mean life in a Democratic administration.) Even if it's just something to get the more hardcore members of their base excited and not something they'd actually do, it really says something about our entire culture at this point that at least a couple people feel that "voters who want to secede from the Union" is a legitimate demographic worth reaching out to.

[thealmightynarf]

The real problem I think, at least in the US, is that the country is becoming much more politically polar than it's ever actually been before. I mean, I've always been under the understanding the the vast majority of Americans were slightly leaning moderates and that strong followers in either direction were actually quite rare. That really doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I would like to think it's all just hype created by politicians and pundits to fluff their importance, but watching the "Tea Party" rise to it's bizarre amount of influence seems to contradict that.

I don't think the system is a problem, though. I like government more when opposing ideologies are forced to compromise with each other to get anything done, and that's the case in the US more often than not. Letting government push legislation through regardless of whether it's good or bad just for the sake of looking like something is getting done would be far worse in my opinion.

[Teikiatsu]

I'm all for gridlock. The less new rules the government can do, the better off the people are. I just wish they got paid less. This is assuming the people are self-starters and not welfare/entitlement/handout drones, of course.

I'm not for secession either. What really needs to happen is for America (sorry, other countries) to remember that we were set up as a federalist republic and that the federal government is not supposed to be involved in central planning of society.

The Democrats's problem is they want to promote social programs and 'punish the wealthy' to harness lower class votes. Sure it may get them votes but it hurts the nation.

The Republican's problem is they can't decide between conservatism, becoming Democt-lite, or corporatism to harness a majority of the votes. Only one of those is a winner for the country.

[Reconnaissant]

I agree with Teikiatsu, and to a lesser extent with JJ and thealmightynarf. Unchecked government is a really terrible idea. The former Soviet Union and today's China are examples of that. You probably are familiar with some of the brutal tactics that both of these governments have used to put down anyone in opposition to them (Tiananmen Square and tanks rolling over Czechoslovakia). It appears to me to be far better to "get nothing done" than to put into effect changes that many would consider tyrannical. Government has legitimate purposes, but none of them include social legislation. Note the recent uproar in California as one single judge overruled some 78% of voters on the "one man-one woman" marriage issue. Marriage was not instituted by government in the first place, and it is not, in fact, in its actual purview. However, government has been growing by leaps and bounds, usurping powers to itself that will, in the end, lead to something far worse that "Big Brother." I can only pray and hope that reason will prevail, but I have to admit to being rather fearful that it will not.

[Thanos]

I'm not sure anymore that minor 'crises' warrant any major changes in Western electoral systems. Seems to be much more of a bother than it's worth to have to go through more interminable debates over major constitutional changes. I really can't see any changes doing anything but weaken the larger, more representative parties whilst simultaneously giving smaller, more ideological one-issue parties more influence than they deserve.

I've yet to be convinced that a divided congress or minority parliament is such a bad thing to begin with. If it creates more restraint by default and forces compromise onto hardcore ideological-driven agendas, how is it not good? I don't want to see a Liberal super-majority in the Canadian Parliament ever again anymore than I want to see Republicans in control of both the White House and Congress ever again. If it keeps the crazies from doing too much damage then leave things exactly as they are. It's safer that way for all the normal people out there.

[Marcus_Ozius]

One problem, in America anyway, is that the government takeover of formerly private institutions is a legitimate (if unfortunate) attempt to address a legitimate problem. In the past, there was a notion of society, a group of people bound by cultural and geographic ties. You had to stay within certain bounds, not because of what the law said, but because everybody had to get along and people would remember just what it is that you had done. Now, we've gained a lot of freedom from society. People don't know their neighbors anymore, let alone anything about them, and we've the right to yell at anybody who tells out children to stop being idiots. Civil society broke down and nobody feels like they have a stake in working together anymore, after all, if you're nice to somebody it gives them fire for the next lawsuit. However, we have a need for rules and regulations to keep people from going axe crazy. Solution? Government! It can tell us what to do. Now, we struggle because the government is terrible at telling people what to do, nobody wants to shut up and get along, and nobody wants gridlock/chaos.

[Thanos]

Exactly what private institutions have been taken over by the federal government over the last few decades anyway? This is a point often repeated with few, if any, legitimate examples ever provided.

[Quantum_Wizard]

Thanos wrote:

Exactly what private institutions have been taken over by the federal government over the last few decades anyway? This is a point often repeated with few, if any, legitimate examples ever provided.

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, General Motors etc.

[Thanos]

Fannie/Freedie are government sponsored enterprises, privately owned but publically chartered, and subject for decades to governmental guidance and regulation that privately chartered institutions weren't. As such they could hardly be counted as fully 'private' businesses. And GM's been touting for months that it's been making profit and will be ready ahead of schedule to pay back any bail-out money it received. The government control over GM is at such a far arms-length that it might as well be non-existant.

I can't see the example of these three companies/institutions coming anywhere close to meeting the criteria of 'government undermining/permanently taking over' private businesses.

[BartSimpson]

Kjorteo wrote:

I believe the American system of checks and balances was put into the Constitution the way it was specifically so that if a tyrannical government ever came into power, they would have a harder time actually doing anything.

Probably one of the best summaries of the US system I've ever seen.

[Quantum_Wizard]

Thanos wrote:

I can't see the example of these three companies/institutions coming anywhere close to meeting the criteria of 'government undermining/permanently taking over' private businesses.

Just for record, I also believe this kind of arrangements will be only temporary.

[hoshie]

JJ,

This is great toon, as usual. In the blurb, there's something to add. You write:

...the US could be looking at a split-party Congress for the first time since the 1980s, with the GOP gaining control of the House, while the Democrats retain the Senate.

While a split-party Congress happened in the 80's (the GOP held the Senate from 1981-1987 and the House was Democratic during this time), a split-party Congress has happened more recently in 2001. The November 2000 elections produced a split 50-50 Senate. From the beginning of January 2001 until George W. Bush took office, the Democrats controlled the Senate due to Vice President Gore's tie-breaking vote. This happened again in May 2001 when Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords left the GOP and became an independent. He decided to sit with the Democrats, which gave them the majority. This continued until January 2003. For more see:

CNN: Lawmakers convene divided 107th Congress with pledges of cooperation
CNN: Jeffords leaves GOP, throwing Senate control to Democrats
CNN: Democrats take control of Senate

Keep up the good work.