What If They Held an Election, and Reasonable People Came?

This has been a pretty contentious session of the Indiana legislature, and one of the most divisive proposals has been the renewed effort to include a ban on same-sex marriage in the Indiana Constitution.

The amendment is really just a gratuitous effort to marginalize gay citizens, since we don’t have same-sex marriages in Indiana. Proponents want a vote on the issue, not because it is appropriate in our system to vote on other citizens’ fundamental rights–it isn’t–but in order to make clear that the majority of citizens in Indiana don’t like gay people.

They may be too late.

Indiana Equality Action recently commissioned a poll of Indiana citizens on attitudes toward the proposed amendment. The results were shocking–in a good way. Forty-seven percent of Indiana residents oppose the amendment, while 43% favor it. Even more surprising, 65% of self-described Republicans and conservatives opposed it, and 41% of seniors. More predictably, 67% of young voters opposed it.

I want to be clear: opposition to the amendment should not be equated with support for same-sex marriage. (The numbers show progress, but not that much progress!) However, there are plenty of compelling reasons to oppose constitutionalizing discrimination, even when you don’t particularly like the folks who are being singled out, and obviously those reasons have convinced a lot of people that this amendment is a bad idea. The poll also confirmed that Indiana citizens have much higher priorities than bashing gay people: the economy and jobs, education, the state budget, health care, crime and drugs, and taxes all came in well ahead of gay marriage.

Particularly interesting is how quickly attitudes on this issue have changed, even in staid, conservative Indiana.  Clearly that’s one of the reasons the usual suspects have been so desperate to get this amendment on the ballot–every year it is delayed, its prospects for passage dim further.

If the proposal passes this year, as expected, and if a separately elected legislature passes the identical language, it will go before the Indiana electorate for a vote. That means that voters first chance to weigh in on the issue will be nearly four years from now.

I wouldn’t want to bet on the outcome.

Checks, Balances and Legislative Absences

Yesterday, my sister asked me when I was going to blog about the Democratic “departure” from Indiana’s legislative session. She was the fourth person to ask me that.

I haven’t addressed our legislative impasse, largely because I am conflicted about it.

The walkout as a tactic has much in common with the U.S. Senate filibuster; both are intended to provide a check on the power of majorities to ride roughshod over the interests of a legislative minority. Both are legitimate IF–and it’s a big if–they are properly and judiciously employed. In the case of the filibuster, I support the “old-time” version (the Jimmy Stewart version, if you will), where Senators actually stood up on the chamber’s floor and talked–and talked. Filibustered. I do not support the current version, where the minority party simply says “If you do that, we’ll filibuster,” and the majority caves if it can’t count on sixty votes to override.

This iteration, it seems to me, is worse than lazy–it gives positive encouragement to those whose sole purpose is to deny the majority an opportunity to accomplish anything.

In the state legislature, my calculus is much the same. If negotiation fails, if the majority is being dictatorial and unreasonable, if it is attempting to take actions that the minority is convinced would cause significant damage, the minority may legitimately withdraw in order to bring the chamber to a halt and focus public attention on the arguments involved. The use of such a “nuclear option” should be rare, however, and judiciously employed.

A couple of additional observations: these “rules” should apply no matter who is in the majority or minority. And as Doug Masson observed in his blog post yesterday, legislative absence does not necessarily equate to “not working.” Most of the work of legislative bodies occurs outside the chamber even when everyone is present, for one thing, and keeping bad laws from being enacted is also “doing legislative work.”

There are certainly arguments to be made about the propriety of any particular use of drastic tactics, but the tactics themselves serve a purpose when appropriately used. When I look at the current assault on working people, teachers and women, and the potential consequences of the measures the Democrats are trying to block, I think this is an appropriate response.

If the use of such tactics at the state level becomes a routine part of our toxic and gridlocked political environment, as the abuse and misuse of the filibuster has, I might change my mind.

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Cultural Whiplash

Who are we supposed to believe, our lying eyes or the polls?

On the one hand, efforts to marginalize gays—to label them as permanently “other,” as second or third-class citizens—have heated up since the advent of the Tea Party and the 2010 elections. Here in Indiana, we have seen the resurrection of efforts to constitutionalize a ban against same-sex marriage, an effort that has been dutifully endorsed by the majority party, and seems likely to pass during this legislative session.

Fortunately, the Indiana Constitution requires that proposed amendments be passed—in identical form—by two separately elected legislatures, so there’s hope it can still be defeated.  There is no similar roadblock to an equally hateful anti-immigration provision, modeled upon Arizona’s law, or to measures aimed at rolling back women’s right to control their own reproduction.

Other states seem fixated on efforts to exclude and demonize Muslims. The most ludicrous are measures passed by several states that outlaw the imposition of Sharia law—thus “solving” an absolutely non-existent problem.

In the U.S. Congress, a number of anti-woman measures are part of what appears to be a full-court press to repeal the 21st—and maybe the 20th—century. Newly elected ideologues are voting against science (the 31 Republican members of the House Energy Committee voted that global climate change doesn’t exist and besides, it isn’t caused by human activity) and economic reality (trying to reduce the deficit by refusing to raise taxes on even our richest citizens, and passing cuts likely to reduce revenues further by throwing the economy back into recession).

Looking at the news these days is a prescription for depression. Who are these people we’ve elected, and why are they actively trying to repeal the Enlightenment and destroy everything that makes America great? Are they insane, or just really, really ignorant?  What does it say about us that we elected these buffoons?

And yet.

Several recent surveys from respected pollsters have shown a slight majority of Americans in favor of same-sex marriage. An overwhelming majority favors legislation that would forbid employers from firing people simply because they are gay. The same Congress that seems to be trying to put women back in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, did repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. The Department of Justice has confirmed what seemed pretty obvious to many of us—that the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional—and consequently, announced that DOJ won’t defend it in court. Even Arizona appears to be backing off its hateful anti-immigration campaign—not because Arizona legislators have suddenly come to their senses, but because their bigotry has cost the state millions in lost business and tourism. Nice people decided to spend their money elsewhere—and it turned out there are a lot of nice people.

In short, the politics of equality is decidedly mixed. If we look for evidence of progress, there’s plenty to see. If we look for evidence that we are regressing, we’ll see that too. If we look at the whole picture, we get whiplash.

I cling to one amply documented bit of evidence: every poll, every survey, shows that the younger generation—those under 35 or so—are more tolerant, more accepting of difference, more at ease in a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural world.

So when my generation is gone, things will improve. Unfortunately, a lot of people will be hurt while we’re waiting.

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Burning Down the Village to Roast a Pig

One of my favorite lines from a Supreme Court decision was delivered in the opinion striking down the mis-named “Internet Decency Act.” The Court compared the measure to burning down a village to roast a pig.

The “pig” this time is the budget deficit, which is unquestionably a very significant problem. Unfortunately, Congress is attacking America, not the problem.

Any credible economist will confirm that even if we zeroed out all discretionary spending–that is, if we spent only on the military and entitlements, and absolutely nothing else–we would not erase the deficit for twenty-plus years. (Actually, we would never erase it, because that would destroy the economy and lose billions in tax revenues.) If we are to get the budget balanced, we must couple responsible, judicious spending cuts (including military cuts) with measures to grow the economy and increase tax revenues. We might begin with rolling back the Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest 2% of Americans.

Instead, Congress is merrily proceeding to destroy civil society.

There has been a lot written about the effect of defunding Planned Parenthood on the health of poor women, and about the effort to kill public broadcasting. Those proposals are in the news. But another proposed cut that has been less discussed would defund the single most successful civic education program we have. The “savings” wouldn’t pay for a single fighter jet, but the cost would be incalculable.

The program is “We the People.” In a 2010 study conducted for the Center for Civic Education, students who completed We the People were far and away more knowledgeable about the country’s democratic principles and institutions compared to their peers.

We the People national finalists also were:

* More likely to register to vote, write to a public official, investigate compelling political issues, participate in lawful demonstrations, and boycott certain products or stores.

* More likely to agree that keeping up with political affairs, influencing the political structure, developing a meaningful philosophy of life, becoming a community leader, and helping others in need are of strong to absolute importance.

* More likely to agree that people should be able to express unpopular opinions and that newspapers should be able to publish freely, without government interaction.

As a graduate student who has worked with the program put it in an email to me:

“It’s mind boggling to me that right now, when we need it most, the best program in the country on educating citizens would be eliminated. This is very real, as the Center for Civic Education had to cancel the We the People – Frontiers partnership. Frontiers is a 70+ year old organization providing civic engagement opportunities to the African American community. Four years ago, we teamed up with them to provide We The People to their inner-city and urban club students on nights and weekends, since their schools are no longer teaching civics. These kids traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, competed in We the People competition and experienced the civil rights movement first-hand, learning from Foot Soldiers who marched when they were their age. That event was scheduled to take place in July and has been cut. 600+ inner-city and urban youth from around the country have already been hurt by this, not to mention the millions more in the future who may never know We the People.”

I wonder what those who are stoking the fire will do when our civic village is gone.

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Self-Awareness Was Never Goldsmith’s Strong Suit

Former Indianapolis Mayor and current New York Deputy Mayor Stephen Goldsmith has a letter in the Wall Street Journal, in which he explains why “progressive government” is obsolete. The letter is vintage Goldsmith.

The letter is a far more intellectual and polished version of the complaints we’ve heard from Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels: government is broken because of the special interests. Those special interests–unions and civil service employees–have “stifled the creativity of public-sector workers and reduced the ability of public investments to create opportunities for citizens.”

Now, I’ll be the first to concede that many of the work rules that have resulted from collective bargaining agreements are unwieldy, and should be and could be revised and streamlined. But what are we to make of statements like this one: “State law mandates that over 1500 job titles must be filled through competitive written exams, specifically ignoring an employee’s actual performance or qualifications.”? If I were a suspicious sort, I might think that a public manager’s subjective evaluation of an employee’s performance (perhaps the willingness of that employee to support certain policies or even candidates for office) would be less reliable than an employee’s ability to demonstrate knowledge on an objective examination.

And in fact, it was for precisely that reason that the examination requirement was imposed. So it is ironic–and telling–that Goldsmith then says “We are even required to administer a civil service test for the head of our Police Department’s counter-terrorism unit! (We found a way around it.)”

Those of us who lived in Indianapolis during the Goldsmith Administration will recall that he “found a way around” a number of rules he didn’t like. (We might also find the letter’s emphasis on transparency somewhat ironic, since transparency was hardly the hallmark of that administration.)

The letter also reinforces the complaints of Governors like Walker and Daniels about worker pensions; Goldsmith complains that New York City will have to pay 8.4 Billion to “fill a hole in its unfunded pension obligations.” Those “greedy” public workers, who chose to take some of their pay in the form of deferred compensation (i.e., pensions) were not the people who decided to divert those funds to other uses, rather than funding their pension obligations at the time. New York, like Indianapolis and many other cities, willfully ignored their pension obligations for years. Why should workers who relied upon those pensions be the ones who take the hit?

What is most striking about the letter is also what is most reminiscent of Goldsmith’s tenure in City Hall: his either-or approach.

Goldsmith is not a stupid man, and the problems he identifies are not all imaginary. But there is no nuance in his worldview. These problems are the result of rules, he tells us, and the rules are not working optimally, so they must go. He doesn’t tell us what, if anything, he would do to insure that public employees would not be subject to arbitrary dismissals, that political insiders wouldn’t be hired in lieu of nonpolitical professionals for jobs requiring expertise, or how he would handle the other evils these rules were intended to address.

Blowing things up was always Goldsmith’s style. But America’s cities need people who can fine-tune systems and fix problems–not bomb throwers.

We need snow removal–not snow jobs.

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