Politics: January 2015 Archives

James Madison, writing to George Turberville, 2 November 1788, about the prospect of another Constitutional Convention before the ink was dry on the 1787 Constitution:

"You wish to know my sentiments on the project of another general Convention as suggested by New York. I shall give them to you with great frankness . . .

3. If a General Convention were to take place for the avowed and sole purpose of revising the Constitution, it would naturally consider itself as having a greater latitude than the Congress appointed to administer and support as well as to amend the system; it would consequently give greater agitation to the public mind; an election into it would be courted by the most violent partizans on both sides; it wd. probably consist of the most heterogeneous characters; would be the very focus of that flame which has already too much heated men of all parties; would no doubt contain individuals of insidious views, who under the mask of seeking alterations popular in some parts but inadmissible in other parts of the Union might have a dangerous opportunity of sapping the very foundations of the fabric. Under all these circumstances it seems scarcely to be presumeable that the deliberations of the body could be conducted in harmony, or terminate in the general good. Having witnessed the difficulties and dangers experienced by the first Convention which assembled under every propitious circumstance, I should tremble for the result of a Second, meeting in the present temper of America, and under all the disadvantages I have mentioned. . . .

Retired Chief Justice Warren Burger, writing in 1988, during his service as chairman of the Commission of the Bicentennial of the U. S. Constitution:

I have repeatedly given my opinion that there is no effective way to limit or muzzle the actions of a Constitutional Convention. The Convention could make its own rules and set its own agenda. Congress might try to limit the Convention to one amendment or to one issue, but there is no way to assure that the Convention would obey. After a Convention is convened, it would be too late to stop the Convention if we don't like its agenda...Our 1787 Constitution was referred by several of its authors as a 'miracle.' Whatever gain might be hoped for from a new Constitutional Convention could not be worth the risks involved....

Eagle Forum has a section of its website devoted to the problems with a proposed Article V Convention (sometimes called a "Convention of the States").

Our 1787 Convention was developed by men who were classically educated and immersed in a culture suffused with the teaching of Scripture. The Great Awakening had produced a revival of religion and a reformation of manners throughout the American States. The Framers of the Constitution understood the innate dignity of man and his innate depravity. They read the ancient historians on the strengths and weaknesses of Athenian democracy. They read histories and contemporaneous accounts of the rise of the Roman Republic and its decline into dictatorship and empire. The evolution of Britain's constitutional monarchy and her brief experiment with republicanism was in the not-too-distant past.

Anyone seriously believe that a new Constitutional convention would be populated by delegates with the same depth of education and capacity for complex thought?

We have judges who are quite happy to twist constitutional language to suit the social and political aims of the Cultural Revolution. How will more words stop them? We have senators who won't block judges of the aforementioned type, out of fear of being thought judgmental and obstructionist. We have citizens who twice elected a President who had described his purpose as "fundamentally transforming the United States of America." What kind of men and women will they elect to a Constitutional Convention?

Tulsa Community College has for several years offered a program to Tulsa County high school graduates called Tulsa Achieves: Free tuition and fees for up to 63 credit hours or three years, which ever comes first. To qualify, you have to have a C average or better in high school and enroll in TCC for the fall after you graduate.

These scholarships are primarily funded by the property taxpayers of Tulsa County and the sales and income taxpayers of Oklahoma out of the TCC budget:

The FY 14 budget includes the following components: approximately 34.4 percent from local appropriations; 32 percent from state appropriations; 31.6 percent from tuition and fees; and 2 percent from grants and other sources.

So the same families that send their young adults to TCC on a Tulsa Achieves scholarship are paying the property taxes (either directly as owners or indirectly as renters) and sales taxes to fund the scholarship. The same board of directors that pays for the scholarships are also in control of institutional costs. If the board were to allow spending to spiral out of control, the same people would have to decide whether to make up the difference by cutting the number or scope of Tulsa Achieves scholarships, raising tuition, or seeking outside funding. Raise tuition or cut scholarships too much, and students drop out. There's no disconnect between funding and spending, and that creates an incentive to keep costs under control.

President Obama has proposed federal funding to cover all community college tuition. I haven't seen a description of the funding formula, but the effect is almost certain to be the same as any situation in which a third party is paying the bill.

Right now TCC tuition plus fees is about $130 per credit hour, not counting flat fees on top of that. 30 credit hours per year is roughly what you'd need to take in order to graduate in two years with an associate's degree. So for the sake of example let's round it off to an even $4000 per academic year in tuition and fees.

So the federal government comes along and says we'll cover community college tuition and fees for qualified high school graduates. TCC would realize that they could phase out the Tulsa Achieves program or end it altogether. They wouldn't lose any students because the net cost to the student will remain the same, but now TCC would have an extra $4000 a year per student to play with. They could raise salaries, increase administrative perks, pay for more conference travel, build fancier facilities.

Then, suppose TCC should raise tuition and fees from $4000 to $5000 -- a 20% jump and far faster than the rate of inflation. A few adult learners may yelp, but not much, since they're only taking a course or two, not a full load. The students who qualify for free tuition from the federal government won't feel it at all. And now TCC would have even more money to spend on salaries, perks, travel, and facilities. They would regard it as "other people's money," even though it's really money ultimately but indirectly coming from Tulsa taxpayers and from the grandchildren who will have to repay the money the feds borrowed to fund "free" community college.

With a federal guarantee of free community college, would there be any pressure on TCC to control costs? No. If the federal government tried to limit reimbursement under the program to the original tuition baseline, there would be protests that the government is going back on its promise of free tuition.

I don't know how many Tulsa Achieves students have attained two-year degrees or gone on to four-year degrees. I don't know how many of those students would not have received a degree without the help of Tulsa Achieves. But I do know that Tulsa County residents are getting more educational opportunity for their tax dollars because the same board that determines the scope and size of the grants also has to account for the cost that those grants have to cover.

MORE: The New York Times' David Brooks points out that retention is a much bigger problem than tuition cost for underprivileged students trying to get an education:

The problem is that getting students to enroll is neither hard nor important. The important task is to help students graduate. Community college drop out rates now hover somewhere between 66 percent and 80 percent.

Spending $60 billion over 10 years to make community college free will do little to reduce that. In the first place, community college is already free for most poor and working-class students who qualify for Pell grants and other aid. In 2012, 38 percent of community-college students had their tuition covered entirely by grant aid and an additional 33 percent had fees of less than $1,000.

The Obama plan would largely be a subsidy for the middle- and upper-middle-class students who are now paying tuition and who could afford to pay it in the years ahead....

In short, you wouldn't write government checks for tuition. You'd strengthen structures around the schools. You'd focus on the lived environment of actual students and create relationships and cushions to help them thrive.

We've had two generations of human capital policies. Human Capital 1.0 was designed to give people access to schools and other facilities. It was based on the 1970s liberal orthodoxy that poor people just need more money, that the government could write checks and mobility will improve.

Human Capital 2.0 is designed to help people not just enroll but to complete school and thrive. Its based on a much more sophisticated understanding of how people actually live, on the importance of social capital, on the difficulty of living in disorganized circumstances. The new research emphasizes noncognitive skills -- motivation, grit and attachment -- and how to use policy levers to boost these things.

The tuition piece of the Obama proposal is Human Capital 1.0. It is locked in 1970s liberal orthodoxy. Congress should take the proposal, scrap it and rededicate the money toward programs that will actually boost completion, that will surround colleges, students and their families with supporting structures. We don't need another program that will lure students into colleges only to have them struggle and drop out.

Brooks mentions several specific challenges:

Community colleges are not sticky places. Many students don't have intimate relationships with anyone who can guide them through the maze of registration, who might help bond them to campus....

A quarter of college students nationwide have dependent children. Even more students at community colleges do. Less than half of community colleges now have any day-care facilities. Many students drop out because something happens at home and there's no one to take care of the kids.

My late mother-in-law, Marjorie Marugg-Wolfe, saw this need many years ago when she began working with "displaced homemakers" -- women who found themselves suddenly widowed or divorced and in need of a job. She founded the Benton County, Arkansas, Single Parent Scholarship Fund and helped begin similar funds statewide and nationwide. The fund helps with costs beyond tuition -- it may be books, childcare, or car repairs -- anything that might otherwise force a student to drop out. The aid is provided in the context of relationships with mentors and peers. Because the funds are raised and distributed by a private organization, funds are distributed according to compassionate judgment rather than rigid rules. Thousands of students in Benton County have been helped since the program's inception.

Rather than spend money our federal government would have to borrow and establish another federal bureaucracy, it would be better for state and local higher education officials to encourage more of these private scholarship funds to be established.

From the Wall Street Journal's Washington Wire blog:

Senate Environment and Public Works Chairman James Inhofe (R., Okla.), who just took the reins of the panel, said he is open to considering raising the gas tax as a way to help pay for the dwindling Highway Trust Fund that keeps up the nation's roads and other transportation infrastructure.

"Everything is on the table," Mr. Inhofe said in a Wednesday briefing with reporters to preview his committee agenda. He said his top priority is passing a long-term transportation bill, whose spending runs out at the end of May.

With gasoline prices at lows not seen since 2009, some political observers and business executives say now is the ideal time to raise the 18.4 cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline and the 24.4 cent-a-gallon tax on diesel fuel, which haven't increased since 1993. The taxes are the main source of revenue for the highway trust fund.

Mr. Inhofe didn't say he supports raising the gas tax, and he refutes referring to it as such. "It's not a tax," Mr. Inhofe said. "It's a user fee."

He also said this period of cheap gas isn't really a window of opportunity given it could close sooner than Congress is going to act. "You don't know what's going to happen to the price of gas," Mr. Inhofe said.

It doesn't sound like Sen. Inhofe is gung-ho for boosting the Federal gas tax, but he's more open to the idea than he should be. If the gas tax is collected as a "user fee" for those who travel our interstate highway system, then the money collected should be spent only on the interstate highway system. If lower gas prices create an opportunity to raise gas taxes, leave that to state and local governments, who can then prioritize spending among local needs -- widening local highways, rebuilding bridges, installing sidewalks, building bike lanes, funding mass transit.

Sending locally-collected money to Washington just so congressmen and senators can send it back home is a ridiculous game. The money comes back with strings attached, is often politically directed, and often gets spent on wasteful projects that are only pursued because the money is "federal" and treated like a windfall. (I-40 relocation in Oklahoma City is a prime example.)

I'd love to see our new Republican majorities reduce the federal gas tax and federal diesel tax to what is required to fund upkeep on the two-digit interstates -- the trunk roads that are the backbone for shipment of goods around the US. Then states can choose -- or not -- to raise local fuel taxes to match the cut in federal taxes.

Oklahoma 1st District Congressman Jim Bridenstine has reversed himself and announced his opposition to John Boehner's re-election as Speaker. But other Republicans are sticking with Bridenstine's earlier analysis that Boehner cannot be beat.

But critics of the anti-Boehner rebellion who say the announced challengers -- Louis Gohmert of Texas and Ted Yoho of Florida -- cannot win the speakership themselves are missing some historical perspective. Gohmert, Yoho and company can get what they seek -- someone besides Boehner as speaker -- without becoming speaker themselves. They don't have to be viable alternatives. They are stalking horses.

The most famous example in recent history of this scenario was in the 1990 ouster of UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Despite leading the Conservatives to a landslide third general election victory in 1987, she was losing popularity over the "community charge" (the so-called "poll tax"), and pro-European-integration Tories saw an opportunity to take her down. Thatcher had handily defeated a challenge the previous year by a back-bench MP, but enough votes were cast against her to reveal some weakness.

In 1990, former cabinet member and rabid Europhile Michael Heseltine had no chance of being elected party leader, but he challenged Thatcher for the leadership as a stalking horse. Thatcher won a majority on the first round of balloting, but missed outright election under the rules by four votes, forcing a second round. Wounded by the sizeable minority opposed to her continuing as leader, Thatcher was persuaded by allies to withdraw, which opened the door for John Major to enter the race and win. Heseltine finished a distant second behind Major. Although Major was an ally of Thatcher, he was considered more conciliatory and more open to bringing Britain (disastrously) into the European exchange-rate mechanism. Thatcher's enemies got their way, even though their initial challenger did not become prime minister.

The same scenario would likely play out if Boehner failed to get the majority on the first ballot. Unable to win a majority of the vote, he would have to withdraw, and the Republican caucus would have to find a candidate that everyone, especially the anti-Boehner rebels, would be willing to support. The resulting compromise candidate would likely be someone who supported Boehner in the first round but is seen by his colleagues as a stronger leader and negotiator.

BACKGROUND:

The Washington Post is keeping a whip count.

The Daily Signal reports on the last time a Speaker election went beyond the first round and lists other notable challenges to official party nominees for Speaker:

The last time Congress failed to immediately elect a speaker of the House was 1923. Still chafing from the heavy-handed speakership of Joe Cannon, the progressive wing of the Republican Party forced nine ballots before allowing Frederick Gillet to become speaker in exchange for policy compromises.

Freedom Works explains why House Republicans should replace Boehner and lists Boehner's 10 worst votes as speaker.

Challenger Louis Gohmert gives Breitbart Texas a list of John Boehner's broken promises to conservative congressmen.

Erick Erickson says Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan is the man who could rally opposition and block Boehner. Will he be Horatius at the bridge? And Erickson calls out Republican freshmen who are backing away from their campaign pledges to oppose Boehner:

First, in the whirlwind of Washington you will often be pressured to just do something. That something is always constructed in a way to act as opposed to refrain from acting. Sometimes, however, not acting is a more powerful thing to do.

Second, remember that you are accountable to your constituents. You work for them, not the other way around. You are their employee and your job review comes up on a two year schedule in the House and a six year schedule in the Senate.

Third, and above all else, remember that there is a God and one day you will stand before Him. Long after the voters ceased assesses you, you will stand in judgment. This world will pass away, but what you do here will be measured on that last day. Eternal things matter most and selling your soul to Washington at the expense of God or your family will eventually catch up to you.

Pollster Pat Caddell says that his polling shows 60% of Republicans want a new Speaker and a third of Republicans are ready to bolt from the party, believing that the party leadership does not share their views and values.

Matt K. Lewis says you have to trade favors and build loyalty over a long period of time to be successful as an "insurgent." He points to the groundwork that Newt Gingrich laid for his rise to Minority Whip and then Speaker.

What is more, Gingrich began working with the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) in 1979 as part of an effort to take the majority, and later took over GOPAC. Both organizations were focused on helping elect new Members to Congress. This means that newly-elected Republicans would be indebted (and thus loyal) to Gingrich. Aside from his brilliance as a visionary thinker, Gingrich spent years assiduously cultivating support and planning for a majority.

Now ask yourself this: Is there a serious conservative House Member today who does so many favors for Republican candidates that they will be loyal to him when they are elected? By definition, the people interested in accumulating power -- and capable of pulling off this sort of logistical feat -- tend to be establishment types. It's tempting to say this is a Catch-22, but it doesn't have to be this way. As Morton Blackwell says, "You owe it to your philosophy to study how to win."

Nevertheless, there seems to be an inverse relationship between the ability to win a leadership position -- and one's commitment to ideological purity. Some of this is probably structural and self selecting, but I can't help lamenting the fact that the most charismatic and inspirational conservatives also tend to be among the least organized.

As a newly-sworn-in freshman in 2013, Bridenstine voted against Boehner and for then-Majority Leader, now ex-Congressman, Eric Cantor instead, one of 12 Republicans to vote for another candidate. Had four more Republicans joined them, Boehner would have been denied re-election on the first ballot.

But as recently as November 15, 2014, Bridenstine, who won re-election without any opposition from either party, announced in an op-ed that he would support Boehner for a third term as Speaker, seeing no practical way to stop his re-election after the caucus renominated him:

An effort to replace Speaker Boehner would require several steps, each offering very little chance of success. The first step would be to rally enough Republican dissenting votes to block a 50-percent-plus-l vote on the floor. The Republicans have a historically high 60-seat majority in the newly elected 114th Congress, possibly higher as midterm election vote counts continue. With this large of a majority, the probability of securing enough dissenting votes is remote, especially after a private nomination meeting.

If 30 or more Republicans voted for someone else and Speaker Boehner did not get a 50-percent-plus-l vote, a second private meeting of the Republican Conference would occur. At that meeting the dissenting members would have to withstand pressure from the balance of the Republican conference. The minority of Republicans would have to offer an alternative candidate who the majority of Republicans would accept. The probability that there would be 30 or more dissenters is virtually zero, and likewise the chance that the majority of Republicans would capitulate to the minority is near zero.

If the minority of the conference somehow prevailed, there would be another vote on the floor, again requiring a 50-percent-plus-1 majority. This time, members of the original majority would vote against the new Republican nominee to block the minority. The process would be in shambles, the public would be outraged, and Democrats would be strengthened. If this impossible scenario happened, it would be the worst outcome for those of us who have been fighting for the conservative movement.

My goal has always been to do what is right for our country, regardless of the political consequences. In my first term, with a smaller Republican majority, I voted against Speaker Boehner on the floor believing that we could deny him a 50-percent-plus-l majority. However, Rep. Boehner was elected as several potential dissenters succumbed to pressure. While that effort may have been the right move under a smaller Republican majority, it is not the right move under a larger majority.

In his January 2, 2015, press release, Bridenstine explains that Boehner's support for the CR/Omnibus cost him Bridenstine's vote:

Like President Obama, Speaker Boehner must have heard voices that didn't vote. Together they crafted the CR/Omnibus, a $1.1 trillion spending bill which funded the government for 10 months and blocked our newest elected Republicans from advancing conservative policy and delivering on campaign promises. With this vote, Republicans gave away the best tool available to rein in our liberal activist President: the power of the purse. The power of the purse is Congress' Constitutional strength.

For the next 10 months, the CR/Omnibus will fulfill Obama's ambition of creating an even larger constituency of dependency on Obamacare. The President's goal has always been to create as much dependency as possible before enforcing the destructive employer mandate. The CR/Omnibus hands the liberals that victory. This is unconscionable after watching the campaign rhetoric that won such decisive victories for the GOP....

The Constitution requires the President to faithfully execute the laws of the United States. He has refused to enforce the laws on border security, Obamacare, illicit drugs, and the release of detained terrorists. His activism in his last two years has accelerated to include executive amnesty, initiating international climate deals without a treaty, and establishing an embassy in Cuba without consulting Congress. When our Constitution is under assault and House Republicans give away our Constitutional power of the purse, they share the guilt of abandoning our founding principles.

(Bridenstine actually could have stopped the CR/Omnibus by voting against the rule to bring it to the floor, but rejected that tactic, thinking it unlikely to succeed. As it happened, one more vote against would have been sufficient to stop the bill.)

THE AFTERMATH:

Louis Gohmert's statement:

This was always about one thing -trying to have a Speaker who was sensitive to the will of the American voters. As I repeatedly made clear, this was never about one person.

We knew that if everyone were present, we needed 29 votes for anyone other than the current Speaker. If we achieved that, then either after the first ballot or second, we would have a conference of only Republican members of Congress to likely agree on a compromise candidate. The goal was to have a new Speaker with wisdom and honesty to lead the Congress. The fight does not end today. ...

After being told that we should now all come together and work together, we have been told late today that two of our Congressmen are being taken off of the committee they were on, simply for voting like their voters wanted. So, it appears before we can work together, we are now going to have another fight. It would be a shame if the Speaker of the House who has so much power is a sore winner."

Erick Erickson, a leading voice calling for Boehner's ouster urges grace toward those who voted for Boehner's re-election.

Leon H. Wolf urges conservatives to take heart:

The simple fact is that what happened today in the Speaker election is unprecedented in modern politics. Speakers of the House who gain seats do not face defections on this order, or anything even remotely like it. The fact that Boehner had 25 (at least) defections despite the absence of a credible challenger speaks volumes about the fact that the culture in the GOP Caucus is changing - even if it is changing slower than some would like to see it change.

I got some flak for pointing out that Bridenstine could have blocked the CR/Omnibus by voting against the rule to bring it to the floor -- he would have been the one-more-vote the opposition needed. It was suggested that noticing this is nitpicking his tactics when I should be applauding without reservation. But at the time, Erick Erickson and others believed the key vote was the vote against the rule. If the CR/Omnibus reached the floor it would pass, because it would receive enough Democrat votes to make up for any Republican defections. A Politico article about the revenge planned by Boehner and his lieutenants against GOP dissidents appears to confirm the substantive importance of the vote on the rule:

The House Republican leadership is carefully reviewing the list of members who voted against the speaker and those who opposed a procedural motion in December on the so-called "crominibus," the $1.1 trillion spending package to keep the government open through to September. Top Republican sources suggested that the process could take months to unfold.

While I applaud Bridenstine's leadership in the attempt to defeat Boehner, his decision not to use the power in his hand to block CR/Omnibus was a surprising move toward pragmatism over principle, as was his decision back in November to support Boehner as the GOP caucus's nominee for speaker. When a planet wobbles, astronomers look for an object exerting gravitational pull. Whose pull made Jim Bridenstine wobble?