Partisan politics
 

According to the U.S. Constitution members of Congress cannot be sued for libel for anything they say on the floor (or committee rooms) of the houses of Congress.

Does this immunity contribute to the poisonous partisan atmosphere of American politics? Is there anything we can do reduce the partisan nature of politics?

Sure, remove them from office. Start over. Prevent lobbyist's on Federal property. Remove all external forms of campaign finance other than government funding. Term limits. Allow more than 2 parties to dominate the political arena.

Would you give taxpayer money to any of these organizations:

American Nazi Party: http://www.americannaziparty.com/

Christian Falangist Party of America: http://www.falange1.com/

Communist Party USA: http://www.cpusa.org/

Democratic Socialists of America: http://www.dsausa.org/

Family Values Party: http://members.aol.com/fvparty/fvparty1/ ?


If you are going to use taxpayer money to facilitate political campaigns, could you legally or morally exclude any party or candidate from getting taxpayer money? And if you give taxpayer money equally to all parties and all candidates, can you legally or morally compel any tax payer to give financial support to a party or candidate that is anathema to the taxpayer?

And just how does money contribute to the partisan nature of American politics? How does money enable a Democrat to call conservatives/Republicans Nazis or allow a Republican to call liberals/Democrats un-American?

No, I would discriminate against them and they would not get squat. :D

We already give taxpayer money to political parties and canidates. It is not a question of morality. If you do not understand how money contributes to the partisan nature of American politics I would suggest some basic civics and political science lessons at your local college.

How so? If you are referring to the federal money that presidential candidates get, it is money that comes from voluntary contributions that federal income tax payers make to a special fund. Money that is paid into this fund is not tax money. As far as I know giving money to this fund does not alter what you otherwise have to pay in taxes.

You condescending attitude is uncalled for considering that 1. I have been studying history and politics for over 30 years; 2. I have 40 credit hours in college history courses (to go with my bachelor’s degree in biology) and 3. I have actually been a candidate for public office.

Furthermore, you are the one making the claim that money causes partisan politics, so it is incumbent upon you to explain how. Expecting me to do the research to back up your claim tells me that your claim is bogus.

Expecting me to defend your petty positions is just as stupid. You present me with parties as indicated in your links and then turn right around and state, "Democrat to call conservatives/Republicans Nazis or allow a Republican to call liberals/Democrats un-American". When and where did I state such a thing. You expect some kind of high respect because you have a biology degree? and because you ran for some petty office on the left coast?

I believe Radar has been reborn.

Ignored.

I think i actually agree with all of that, merc, except government funding.

on one hand, it would level the playing field

on the other, it prevents private non-lobbyist small-cash donations that, for example, Obama has built his campaign on.

those small, personal donations, i think, are a good thing
massive corporate/lobbyist/special interest kinds of donations are a bad thing.

I see my responses and blanks. Amazing this thing works!

I reject the premise. I don't think "partisan politics" is a bad thing.

Take the issue of taxation. I vote for representatives who share my view on taxation. I think it is in the best interest of everyone to have a minimally intrusive government in the economic workings of society.

There are other people who believe that it is in the best interest of everyone to have a government that actively redistributes the wealth of its citizens.

I want my representative to be partisan on this issue. I expect it of them. I consider the good faith of my vote for them to have been violated if they choose the false value of "reaching across the aisle" over honoring the integrity of my vote for them.

I expect my representative to be an advocate for the principles that I value. I expect them to be contentious for those issues. If politics are not partisan, then we have either ceased to be people who rationally disagree on critical issues, or our representatives have ceased to represent.

I haven’t said that you’ve personally called anyone a Nazi or un-American. But such tactics are part and parcel American politics.

So not only are you obtuse, but you apparently cannot read either.

I wouldn’t necessarily support limits on the amount of money that can be donated to a campaign, but I would support limiting campaign contributions to individual voters who can vote for a candidate. But either way this would have to be done with a constitutional amendment, since any law to limit campaign funding would violate the 1st Amendment.

Would you like to return to the days of snake oil salesmen and rats being ground up along with hamburger to be sold as food?

I am not in favor of government re-distribution of wealth. But as a conservative I am opposed to the mass concentration of wealth and poverty since either one can threaten societal cohesion.

What happens if partisanship leads to things like gerrymandering and you end up living in a district where people with your political views are in the minority?

What happens if partisanship prevents the government from dealing with problems that individuals and private enterprise cannot or will not deal with?

Rather than limit the amount that can be donated, perhaps it would be useful to limit what can be spent on an election campaign. If a sensible spending limit is set, then it removes much of the impetus for political parties to rely so heavily on large-scale donations.

In terms of the partisan nature of politics: I want my politicians to be partisan. I am partisan. I don't know that much about the American political system, but the rules on what can be said on the floor of the house and the immunity from libel suits are very similar to the British system. I think it's a necessary evil. It would, in my opinion, damage debate if politicians were having to second guess themselves and watch out for whatever makes them vulnerable to litigation during those debates. I also think that removing that immunity, far from reducing the partisan elements of politics would actually make it more partisan. The potential for libel suits to become a common weapon in politics is something to be wary of.

Well, I live in California. My vote has never counted for anything, ever. I'm always in the political minority.

If the majority agrees on the nature of the problem and the solution, then government will move forward. If a majority does not agree, then partisan politics should prevent government action. Like "partisan politics", I reject the notion that government inaction is always a bad thing. Sometimes the best thing a representative can do is allow their contentiousness to prevent the government from "getting things done."

What would the limit be? How would it be set? What would you do about the relative costs of running for the same office in different places? It doesn’t cost as much to air a TV ad where I live as it would in places like New York City. Would candidates in both places be limited to spending the same amount?

And again, how does money lead to the partisan nature of American politics? Ron Paul didn’t have nearly as much money to spend as John McCain or Barak Obama, but is Ron Paul any less partisan as a consequence?

But isn’t there a time when debate has to give way to either compromise or civil war?

But wouldn’t libel judgments make politicians think twice before they toss out any rhetorical bombs? If politicians knew that they could be sued into bankruptcy for telling lies and half-truths about their opponents, wouldn’t they go out of their way to avoid telling lies and half-truths?

BTW: I was once told on another board that British politicians in Parliament don’t libel one another because dueling is essentially still legal for politicians.

I turned 18 and registered to vote in 1986. I have always lived in a gerrymandered CD and there have only been only 2 elections in which my district was gerrymandered to support the party that I was a member of.

My mother moved here in the early 1960s. From that time until 1992 her CD was represented by the same man.

And in the meantime the problem is allowed to fester and get worse. If your town needs a flood levee and partisan politics prevents that levee from ever being built, what do you when the flood comes?

Post WWI American politics has never been so partisan as it is today. Take Vietnam as a perfect example. The minority calling for a Vietnam solution were from both parties. During both a Democratic and a Republican administration, support for that war was never by party lines.

Gerrymandering is a new phenomena (a refined tool) resulting in a Congress of party extremists rather than two parties with numerous moderates. Better government means constantly crossing the aisle to create legislation. Take Hilary as an example. Her first legislation was a cooperative effort with John McCain - both moderates. But moderates have become rare in Washington which also explains the recent contentious atmosphere in Washington.

Gerrymandering has created a Congress so entrenched that the conservatives Bob Dole, Brent Scowcroft, Alan Simpson, or Pat Buchanan are now considered so moderate.

I expect my representatives to work first for America - not for the party. That is the difference between a good politician and a bad one. The bad politician simply totes the party line. You cannot work both for America and the party simultaneously. When the choice arises - as it often does - I expect my representatives to buck party politics and work for the nation. Otherwise he has been corrupted. Obviously, that means working across the aisle often is necessary when Congressmen work for America.

Yeh - lemme know when thats gonna start.:eyebrow:

I suspect that you and I would have vastly different ideas of what that phrase "Working for America" means, and when a particular politician is stepping outside of their party to do so.

I should say that I'm referring to partisan politics as something separate than party politics. Many of the politicians in my party are not nearly partisan enough when it comes to principles; if the party decides to slip loose from its philosophical moorings and drift about, these politicians go right with them, in the interest of party unity.

Maybe we're actually talking about party politics?

True, perhaps, but American politics today are likely not as hostile as in the past. Abraham Lincoln was called an ape and the original gorilla and this was by members of his own party. But this hostility didn’t prevent Lincoln from putting his most bitter rivals in his cabinet, and for the most part his rivals served him well for the good of the country. The good of the country is most often lost in today’s politics.

Gerrymandering goes back to the early 19th century when Elbridge Gerry, as governor of Massachusetts(?), had a legislative district drawn to help elect someone from his party. But with today’s computer technology gerrymandering has essentially become an effortless task.

I don’t consider either Hilary or McCain to be moderates. Hilary is pro-abortion and wants socialized medicine; McCain supports high taxes and he went out of his way to keep many of GWB’s judicial appointees (at least some of whom may have been conservatives) off the federal bench.

I am not saying that only moderates should be elected to public office. Neither am I saying that politicians should not be partisan. What I am saying is that I am sick and tired of the constant bickering between the left and the right. I am sick and tired of politicians that won’t work together because they know that if they find a political solution to a political problem they will forfeit a campaign issue for the next election.

I think the best way to end the bickering is to implement term limits, give equal and un-hindered ballot access to all candidates and all parties and chose representatives by some form of proportional representation.

I would also support something comparable to what is used in the U.K. where the executive (prime minister) and the legislature (parliament) can force each other to stand for re-election when they are unable to get along with each other.

Is that so? *chuckles* It's entirely possible that the origin of the rule lay in the right to duel and that has somehow survived on the statute books. I don't know though. The two sides of the house are separated by a gap of two sword lengths :P

Forgive me for not having a detailed plan worked out in advance and ready to implement. I don't know how you'd set the limits. I only know how the limits are set in my country. I barely understand how your political system works. I do consider that lobby funding may feed into partisan politics as it has the potential to harden up party differences in line with lobbies.

There is a fairly tight spending limit on election expenditure over here. But, that only applies for the official election period. The rest of the year the parties can spend money upping their profile. I don't know what the exact amount allowed on spending is but there's a limit that each parliamentary candidate can spend or incur (including the market value of donations in kind). The same applies at a local level in council elections.

The limit in council elections is £600 + 0.05p per registered elector for the ward (approx. 8400 electors in my ward). That worked out at around £1020. For everything, printing, postage, telephone bills, admin, ink, paper, rosettes, posters, etc. etc.

How you'd set it over there I don't know, but over here we have something called 'london waiting' on wages, expenses and what have you and that applies to elections too. In london where the prices are so different from the rest of the country the amount allowed is higher.

I have no idea. I do not have an intimate enough understanding of your political scene to make any such judgement about the individual politicians.

I see no reason why that must be the case. There comes a time when the debate must be brought to a close and a vote entered into.

Yes, they would. And they would also go out of their way to take fewer risks in debate. I would not want my elected representatives to be hamstrung in such a way. Inside that chamber they should be able to say anything they wish. If one lies, another may stand and set him right.

Please tell me, what is the moderate view on abortion in your mind, and how does it differ from the conservative view?

And are you suggesting that McCain is a liberal?

My understanding is that if an MP says something that another MP finds personally insulting the offended can invite the offender to repeat what was said someplace outside of the Parliament building.

Congress doesn’t have anything comparable to floor plan of the House of Commons so no sword rule is applicable. Personal insults and fisticuffs were quite common in the Houses of Congress in the years leading up to the Civil War and a Representatives from South Carolina once nearly beat the Senator from Massachusetts to death with a walking cane in retaliation for something the Senator had said about one of the Representative’s relatives.

Parental consent for minors, just like you have to get for every other medical procedure.

Prohibit late-term partial birth abortions

Require pre-abortion counseling to inform the patient of all available options.

All of this things stop well short of the conservative position on abortion, but are more restrictive than the position held by Clinton and others in her party. I think you can consider that to be somewhere in the "moderate" zone.

Abortion is kind of like the death-penalty - nobody on either side of the issue will acknowledge that a moderate position is actually a moderate position. They will attack it as surrendering to the other side on cherished principles.

I don't think it's insults that are frowned upon, so much as impugning honour; more specifically, a member of parliament cannot accuse a fellow member of lying whilst on the floor.

There are other medical procedures and treatments for which minors do not need parental consent... VD treatments, blood donations, drug/alcohol rehab etc...

Not that I think minors should be running around getting abortions willy-nilly, just that I don't think legislating morality is a good idea for anyone, even if you can get away with it with minors under the guise of protecting them.

The U.S. has something like 300,000,000 people while the U.K. has around 60,000,000 the last time I checked. Furthermore, elections in the U.S. can cover wide areas whereas the whole of the U.K. would only take up a few U.S. states.

And lobbyists are not the cause of partisan bickering in the U.S. since lobbyists for business and industry tend to give to both parties so they will have something to hold over the head of whichever party wins the next election. Expanding ballot access to include 3rd party and no-party candidates would help stop this.

We often have that here as office holders are perpetually running for re-election.

Do incumbents in the U.K. have the franking privilege whereby they have free postage for anything they want to mail to their constituents? Members of Congress have this power (but I don’t think the President does), so incumbents could easily outspend any limit imposed by law.

Consider yourself lucky. I know quite a bit about U.S. politics and find most of it nauseating.

What do you do about political issues that no office holder wants to make an issue of? Inaction can come from a failed vote whereby something that is needed is not done, but it can also come from failure to debate to begin with. Prior to the U.S. Civil War the House of Representatives had a gag rule, whereby any resolution or bill regarding slavery was automatically tabled. For years the issue of slavery couldn’t even be discussed according to the rules of the House of Representatives. As it stands now, anything that any member of either House of Congress wants to introduce can be tabled by a majority vote of his respective House. Ignoring controversial issues can be just as bad as debating them endlessly.

What risks can there be in debating an important public issue with a civil tongue and mutual respect between political opponents?

There is no moderate, liberal or conservative view on abortion- only a morally right one and a morally wrong one. Human life begins at conception and any abortion that is performed when the mother’s life is not endangered by continuing the pregnancy, is murder. The view that any and all abortion is OK is the liberal view only to the extent that this is the view that people who are liberal on other issues tend to support.

Yes and I think I am far from alone in this.

You can find people on this forum who will fill that gap with everything from taxation to universal health-care to the war in Iraq. And, SHAZZAM! we have instant partisan politics.

At a local level, I am allowed something in the region of 50 1st class and 100 2nd class stamps for use in my work (cannot be used for electioneering, paid for by the public purse). During the election period all expense incurred contacting the electorate must be within the spending limit, including postage. Anything that has the party ID on it, or any statements designed to promote myself electorally must be included. If a supporter lets me use their office space ( I cannot use my townhall office) I must include a calculation of how much that office space would theoretically have cost me were I to rent it. Any cost above £25 must carry a receipt and any donation above £50 must include full donator details.

The parliamentary levels are much bigger, but MPs operate within tight spending limits on postage and communications as well. Throughout their MPs are allowed to spend a certain amount, claimable as an expense from the public purse, on communications as long as they are not overtly campaign orientated: news letters and the like. During the election period, similar rules apply as to local campaigns though I am unsure of the amount allowed.


There are no risks in debating in such a manner. However, you are dealing with a political system and tools designed to promote calm can just as easily be abused as respected.

Mmm. This is probably a topic you and I should avoid discussing Flaja :P

And if the parent consents, an unborn human being still ends up being murdered.

Why? If an unborn human is not a living being after 1 day or 3 months or 6 months in the womb, is he or she any more a living human being after being in the womb for 1 day less than 9 months? Why give the unborn the benefit of the doubt after 1 day less than 9 months when you won’t give the same benefit of the doubt after 1 second in the womb?

And if the “patient” refuses all other options, an unborn human being still ends up being murdered.

Accusations of lying are issued on a pretty regular basis in American politics.

I am not saying that things like war and the availability of health care are not moral issues, but only fools would equate things like taxation with life and death moral issues like abortion.

That would make it a pretty useless example of how Hillary is "not a moderate" then, don't you think?

How could tools designed to promote calm be abused? Can you give some specific examples?

And surely a politician who is concerned more about political issues than political advancement could engage in passionate debate about critical issues without telling lies or hurling offense insults at their political opponents. The trouble is that very few politicians care more about political issues than they do advancing their political careers.

She is a liberal on this issue because she holds the position that is generally associated with liberals. She associates with liberals on this issue, thus she is not a moderate.

flaja, I'm not interesting in defending those positions on abortion, I'm just presenting the possibility of a moderate position. Thank you, however, for so aptly demonstrating my second point.

Ah, of course. You can't be a moderate unless you agree with the conservative position. You are obviously very well-versed on the concept of spectrums.

As indeed they are here.....just not on the floor of the House :P

No, I cannot give specific examples; however, I can point to a number of areas in which the potential for litigation can have a negative effect. In the medical world, for example, many doctors are unwilling to take risks on behalf of their patients, for fear of litigation. I can think of several politicians, off the top of my head, who would become overly careful in the Commons' debates if the risk of litigation were there.

As a local politician I sometimes have to deal with planning matters. If I am to sit on a planning committee, I am legally obliged to enter that committee with an open mind. Because it is a quasi-judicial process, if I have at any time expressed an opinion on the application being heard, i must declare an interest and leave the room. If I have allowed myself to be lobbied by either party, I must declare an interest and leave the room. This is designed to protect the system from lobbying. The penalties are potentially very damaging: I could be removed from office and barred from standing for a number of years, I could also face a nasty fine. Simple enough right? Except it isn't. It isn't just based on what you say and do, it's based on what you are perceived to have said or done. If there is a potential for the general public to perceive that I have already made up my mind, then I am out of the process. Because of the 'reasonable perception' rule, I, and most councillors I know, are overly careful. This sets us at a distance from our constituents in a very important area. Our planning system is so tied up in such concerns it occasionally grinds to a halt. or produces rogue results.

No, I cannot predict the specifics, but I can tell you the effect on the individual of a fear of litigation: it makes one cautious. It can, if the risk of litigation is high, make one overly-cautious. I do not want my politicians to be overly cautious.

If you want politicians to treat each other with respect.....don't vote for thugs and morons.

How many politicians do you know? The field is huge. In my country, and I suspect this applies to yours as well, the vast majority of politicians are not known beyond the borders of the area they represent. The number of politicians who make it into the public eye in any meaningful way is small compared to the number who do not. There are 646 Members of Parliament in Britain. Out of those there may be 150-200 who are well known to the general public (with most people able to name a handful of those).

The ones who make it into the public eye are the ones who play the political game, succeed in progressing to the top, or vocally rebel. On the basis of their performance, people judge the integrity of the remaining several hundred who do not play the political game, succeed in progressing to the top, or vocally rebel. Some of those will be just as ruthless as the front benchers....but many won't. There are plenty of MPs who do what they do with a public service ethos and no grand ambitions beyond representing their constituents. There are plenty who treat it like an ordinary job: doing what they can to help individuals and groups, attending the debates and voting on important issues, contributing in a meaningful way to society as a part of their work. There are also those who resent the fact they haven't progressed further, treat their job as a vehicle and enjoy the status.

They're just people. If you want to be represented by civil and pleasant people.....then vote for civil and pleasant people. Don't vote for the man you'd feel most comfortable sharing a pint with and then be horrified when he turns the floor into a pub brawl.

So you don’t think abortion is a moral issue rather than just a political one?

You think we can murder people in moderation?

When it comes to life and death, no.

BTW: What is the conservative position on abortion? What do you use as your guide for determining what this conservative position is?

Your use of the term 'murder' in this context is, in itself, profoundly political.

But Dana, she's made up her mind, don't confuse her with facts.:rolleyes:

Medical malpractice is not the same thing as political debate on political issues. Furthermore, in the U.S. whenever a doctor wants to prescribe, or even just give the patient the option of having, a treatment that is not 100% foolproof, the patient must sign a waiver whereby the doctor cannot be held liable in a malpractice suite.

Which means that they now go out of their way to be insulting to their opponents rather than trying to find solutions to the political issues that they should be dealing with?

It sounds like a computer could be programmed to do your job. If you cannot venture an opinion based on your judgment, what purpose do you serve?

I don’t want my politicians to spend their time throwing bombs at each other either when the public interest is at stake. If they have to have the fear of litigation to make them stop with the bombs, so be it. I don’t have anything to fear from a cautious politician as long as he is a conscientious politician who puts the public interest ahead of his personal or political interests.

I don’t. But since it is one voter, one vote, one office holder with one seat in America, there is no way for me to prevent others from voting for thugs and morons. And in America as long as a politician can send government pork back home, most voters are content with their elected thugs and morons.

If you mean personally, I know no politician. But because the news media is so vast in this country and politicians tend to spend entire lifetimes in office, it is easy to know many American politicians by reputation.

Also remember that constituencies on a national level in the U.S. are much more vast here than in the U.K. A presidential election can easily have 100,000,000 votes and a member of the House of Representatives, on average, has about 600,000 people living in his district.

Can someone who never makes it to elected or appointed office be called a politician? And considering how restricted ballot access is for candidates that are neither Democrat, nor Republican, a large number of people who seek election to public office do get elected. The number of people who get elected to Congress is seldom much greater than the number of people who seek election to Congress. In most elections something like 98% of the incumbents in the House of Representatives get re-elected and many do so without any challenger in either the general or the primary election.

Something like half of the voting age population in the U.S. is not registered to vote and a good turnout for an election is 50% of the people that are registered. Most Americans don’t care about politics, so most don’t know anything about any politicians. But most Americans that do make a point of voting on a regular basis would likely at least know the name of the President, Vice-President, a few cabinet members and Supreme Court judges as well as the name of their Senators and Representative along with the party leaders in Congress.

Since America doesn’t have a parliamentary system and our party structure isn’t comparable to Britain’s, the politicians that most often get noticed are the mavericks that go out of their way to oppose their own party. Seldom does a member of Congress who votes against his party’s leader get punished in any way. There is no rule or regulation that says you must do X to be a member of a particular party. The current Republican presidential nominee has made a career of opposing the Republican Party leadership on many issues. There are no back benchers in America. You need not toe a party’s line to be a successful politician over here.

We do not readily have this option in America since it is so hard for 3rd party and no-party candidates to get their name on the ballot. In the state of Florida you cannot even cast a write-in vote for someone that the state (controlled by the Democrats and Republicans) doesn’t recognize as a candidate.

I can and do venture opinions in my job. I was referring purely to occasions when I have to sit on a quasi-judicial planning committee. Once inside that meeting any member can express an opinion. Prior to the meeting, a member must not reach a conclusion nor be seen to do so. This kind of committee is a very small part of my job.

And if the patient is unconscious? If the next of kin cannot be located? If a decision has to be made fast, if the risk has to be weighed up and a decision reached in time to stand a chance of saving the patient? Are you saying you can see no hypothetical situation that might lead a doctor to make his decision based on the risk litigation?

Well, okay, so you successfully legislate to ensure that your politicans can be sued for libel if they are personally insulted. Have you considered the various possible ramifications of that legislation? Have you considered the opportunities to take the political fight and have it out in lengthy court cases with frivolous actions brought at sensitive times (such as six months before an election)? Yes, it may make people more cautious about insulting someone, but it also may make people less willing to take a risk in attempting to expose someone. It won't only be those you seek to curb who feel themselves curtailed.

Except, as you have already pointed out you believe most of your politicans do not put the public good ahead of their personal or political differences. Do you think a rule that allows litigation for libel is going to transform your politicians? Return to them, somehow, their moral compass?

If you want to think up legislation, you need to take account of where people are. If you base it on where you would prefer people to be, you may find it has some unintended consequences.

Democracy is a blunt instrument. See what happens when you trust the proles to vote?

Many. I suspect not most. Manyh of our politicians also have lifelong careers. We also have our elder statesmen and our revered and famed rebels. The point remains, you are basing your judgement of a very large number of people on the media coverage of a minority of them.

I don't see how that in any way counters the point I was making. In fact it seems to have little relevance to what we were discussing.

I guess that would depend on your definition of politician. I was using the term to mean those who have been elected to serve in public office. The vast majority of elected politicians in my country are not well known. Those that are in the public eye, are the ones who have either succeeded to the front benches or are well-known rebels.

I think you just made my point for me.

Here also, the most admired and well-known politicians are often those who have rebelled against their party or crossed the floor.

That's unfortunate; however, the republican and democratic parties encompass a hell of a lot of people there is no reason to say their representatives cannot be pleasant and polite. There is equally no reason to think that members of smaller parties will not be bullish and unpleasant.

It wouldn't stop the bombs it would merely change the nature of the munitions. Politicians would still throw bombs but they would consist of libel cases.

I was going to participate in this thread.
But having taken both the contraceptive pill and the morning-after pill it is statistically likely that I am a murderer. I'm therefore ineligible to vote.

Oh hey yeah....that makes me a murderer too !

Fear of litigation does not impose positive social forces upon politicians. Far more important and effective is peer pressure. Peer pressure in the Senate is more restrictive which is why Senators are traditionally more civil as compared to the House. But this system breaks down, becomes contentious, is undermined, when political agendas will subvert what makes a Congressional body work.

The more extremist that body becomes, then less civil and less productive that body becomes. What happens when a politician is more moderate; works more for America rather than for their party? We all saw Arlene Spectre lead a charge against the president (his own party) to subvert American protections of privacy and civil rights. Why? Arlene Spectre demonstrated why a political body needs more moderates and fewer extremists. When extremists use insults, phony accusations, and a political agenda to subvert that body, the majority - the moderates from both parties - will apply peer pressure to protect that body and its function (to serve the nation). After all, the difference between an extremist and a moderate: an extremist works for a self serving political agenda. A moderate works first and foremost for the nation. Why was Nixon served up for impeachment? Because Congress back then contained many more moderates. Because those moderates from both parties saw a man trying to pervert this nation's government for his own self serving agenda.

Peer pressure makes a political body work productively and makes litigation (most often) unnecessary. Does your politican work for the party or work for America. He cannot do both. When it comes to peer pressure, will he do what is best for the nation or do what is in the interest of his party? A question that better defines an extremists verses a moderate. A question says, in summary, whether peer pressure works within that body so that the body can argue the issues; not conduct personal attacks.

This doesn’t sound like anything that I am familiar with in the U.S. It sounds like you are given a narrow time frame in which to form an opinion on something. I don’t know of any comparable situation in the U.S. Even courtroom judges are expected to have opinions about things that they must consider in their courtrooms even before the things come up in a courtroom setting. And the only way a ventured opinion can hurt a judge is when it keeps them from being appointed to a higher court.

But at any rate, a judicial setting isn’t necessarily a political setting. Legislators and executives have to consider issues that a judge may never have to consider.

Getting the consent of the patient or the next-of-kind is always the first choice. But when consent cannot be obtained, doctors in the U.S. still have a legal obligation to use their best judgment to give treatment. As litigious as American society is, failing to treat a patient will just as likely get a doctor sued as giving the wrong treatment or botching the right treatment will. And remember that a malpractice suit between patient and doctor is not the same as a libel/slander suit between politicians. So you still haven’t explained how a politician would be overly cautious in debate due to a fear of lawsuits.

I don’t expect there to be many court fights because the fear of being sued would insure that politicians keep a civil tongue in their mouths.

People that don’t sit in Congress aren’t protected against slander and libel suits under federal law- and people that do sit in Congress can be sued if they libel or slander someone when they are not in the Capitol building in D.C.

My U.S. Representative can stand in the House of Representatives and call her election opponent a crook without being sued. If she does it on the Capitol steps she can be sued. But if the constitutional immunity were removed no member of Congress would risk slandering someone without having supporting evidence. Being in the habit of not being sued because they can lash out at their opponent from the halls of Congress with immunity encourages members of Congress to lash out everywhere else. Since political challengers seldom have enough money to wage even a halfway effective campaign against incumbents they certainly cannot afford to launch a libel suit. But if members of Congress were to start suing each other, them maybe they’d learn to fear lawsuits from the rest of us.

What else would you propose? Litigation would be a start, but I think you would also need things like term limits and unhindered ballot access.

The U.S. is not a democracy, but rather a republic. The Constitution was intentionally designed to temper the majority lest it make rash decisions at the ballot box or demand that politicians make decisions that are detrimental to the public good. Sadly some of these constitutional provisions have been unwisely altered while the quality of the people who are willing to be politicians has greatly deteriorated.

It is true that America’s news media does not (and physically cannot) give an equal amount of coverage to every U.S. politician. But from the extensive coverage that the most prominent politicians share, you can easily get a good understanding of the character of our prominent politicians. And birds of a feather acting the way they do, you can easily (and likely accurately) extrapolate the character of politicians in general.

I was pointing out how much easier it is for Britons to interact with their politicians. A single voter in Britain carries far more weight than a single American voter does in national elections.

Can you give me some idea about how many people seek election to any single seat in the Commons in an election? In the U.S. most 3rd parties don’t make it to the ballot and seldom does an incumbent face a challenger for re-nomination and if the other party does manage to nominate a challenger for the general election that challenger is often nominated without opposition from within his party. You seldom have more than 2 people seeking the same seat in Congress. The power of incumbency in the U.S. (at virtually every level of government and every office) is so strong that few other people ever bother to run for office. In comparison to the number of elected offices that exist in this country, the number of politicians this country has is very small. The odds of defeating an incumbent are so great and politicking is so contentious that few decent people are willing to be candidates.

Which begs the question: If so many voters admire people who are not party politicians, why do so many voters return party politicians to office?

Likely true, but as long as American voters don’t have a 3rd party option, we will never know for certain.

I don’t think so. It would cost too much to wage, let alone lose, a lawsuit for politicians to risk having very many of them.

He should particularly avoid this if the other fellow has just tripped and measured his length upon the carpet.:yeldead:

Arlene Spectre for Arlen Specter is one hell of a brick.

Extremist Whacking, anyone?
 

Partisan politics has occasionally turned physical with us too. The most celebrated incident was the Brooks-Sumner affair, where one Senator beat another into brain damage with a heavy cane. Interestingly, the victim, an abolitionist, won his next reelection, and his chair stood there, empty, while the Senate debated slavery and the causes of the impending American Civil War, 1861-65.

Nowadays this seems more the arena of State Legislatures, though even the pugnacious and pugilistic Texas Legislature doesn't throw punches as often as the Taiwanese.

And yet if that were as true as you so loudly attest that it is, there would be some kind of way you can back that up besides simply declaring it to be so.
you can't, so it isnt. end of story.

There is a very long discussion on the moral issue of abortion in the philosophy thread. Perhaps you should address that there rather than in the politics forum.

How do you know that what I say is not true? How many people who are liberal on other issues are against abortion?

How many people who are conservative on other issues are for abortion?

I am not for abortion. I am for a womans right to choose to have complete and utter control over her own body, including her right to terminate a pregnacy if she so chooses. Not my business.

I am conservative on many issues.

I am liberal on many issues.

Most people are not this or that, based upon what some dumb ass thinks about you because of what they have seen you post on a frigging fourm, good fucking God.

So you are for abortion. Meaning that if someone said to you, do you agree that women should be allowed to have one, you'd say yes. For and against. Yes or no. The aye's have it. ;)