THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

But IIRC, the freshman Rep. Mrs. Margolies-Mezvinsky was dragged into the House chamber by her elbow in order to cast that vote she now is defending.

Yeah, it’s great if someone really believes that, but not so great if they just pull this one out of their political toolbox when they think they can use it to defend their usual logrolling, or this week’s episode of Spy vs. Spy, like it was a 3/4” socket wrench or a pair of needle-nose pleiers…

I don’t know which category this instance falls in…

Why is it that only in politics do we take something that is correct, ignore it, and then bring up something else that is unrelated to the statement?

You see this with Israeli-Arab conflict ALL THE TIME.  The Israelis will do something completely wrong and indefensible, and then take the “best defense is a good offense” approach, and blame the Arabs on something.  And the Arabs will do the exact same thing back at the Israelis.

Republicans and Democrats do the exact same thing, and Brian did his part here. 

The quoted passage here is perfectly well-said.  If Jonathan Papelbon had said this, would we then say “yeah, but, did you hear about the stupid things he’s said the other 364 days?” Does his stupidity the rest of the year invalidate the great thought he would have had the one other day?

It’s fighting for fighting’s sake, where you look for a fight no matter where.

The ONLY reason to have a dialogue is to find some common ground.  The ONLY reason to have a monologue is to get your point across.

If you are going to talk WITH someone, make it a dialogue.

When a representative votes against their consituents wishes, how often are they doing so because they know the facts better and are exercising good judgement, and how often are they doing it because of pressure from lobbyists/donors/leaders in their party?

I suspect we’d be better off overall with a referendum.  It’s harder to buy off the whole country than a few politicians.

Yes, but then how do we decide what we take a referendum on? There’s a reason why we elect people - namely, studying and voting on everything that goes through the system should be a full-time job for multiple people (it’s not like every congressperson/senator doesn’t have a ton of staffers).

A referendum?  That’s as good an idea in theory as communism.

Practically speaking, of referendum’s I’ve been involved in (Quebec separatists lost 50.6% to 49.4%, with a 92% turnout) and I’ve seen (denying full civil union rights to two committed adults), they leave MUCH to be desired.

Majority rule on every issue is not the right thing to do.  It simply exacerbates the bias on individual issues.  Quebec has more french-speakers than english-speakers, and voting fell HEAVILY on those lines.  California gay people presumably voted HEAVILY on that line as well.

Referendums on one general thing (your leader) is one thing.  After that, no.  It becomes majority rule on each and every issue, and that’s not good.

We’d never get immigration reform, we’d never get black rights, especially if they couldn’t vote to begin with!

Referendums (California Prop 8) could’ve been turned over and found unconstitutional by the courts.  It wasn’t.  So there is atleast some checks and balances.  Not ideal, but thought it should be atleast mentioned
vr, Xei

Rally - I would not recommend vote by referendum.  California has it on virtually every issue and I can’t imagine that it’s any less influenced by lobbyists. 

And the voters really are stupider than the politicians - Californians have passed laws that require a mandatory level of spending on schools and libraries; then when the revenue isn’t there, they vote to issue bonds and borrow money to cover the gap.  A politician might actually have the vision to be concerned about long-term finance, but you can’t expect the voters to have a long-term coherent plan.  This is but one example where your constituents - who never want services cut and never want to raise taxes - are wrong.

I’m sure this happens in many cities in California, but in San Francisco, we had three different referenda on the same ballot in the mid-1990s to decide where to build a small stretch of freeway.  So the voters decided which neighborhoods would get demolished and have an overhead freeway and which ones wouldn’t.  The referendum process makes politicians so weak and scared that they can’t even make basic decisions.

This is but one example where your constituents - who never want services cut and never want to raise taxes - are wrong.

Reminds me of some old people:
“I want the government out of my healthcare.  And I don’t want them touching my Medicare!”

"This is but one example where your constituents - who never want services cut and never want to raise taxes - are wrong.”

There are no referendums at the federal level, yet we’ve gotten to the point of multi-trillion dollar deficits.  For the same reasons - nobody who suggest a tax hike or spending cut lasts 5 minutes. And there is no letup in sight.  The citizens might not do any better, but it’s hard to imagine doing much worse.

What is the deficit on a per person basis.  And what is it inflation-adjusted historically speaking?

While I agree that people should be judged on the merits of their present actions or what have you, I view the Margolies statement as a noisy measure of her principals. If I could, I would FIP (or xFIP) it. But I’m a cynic when it comes to politics.

I agree with the principal though, and it’s in line with all our founding documents. We have our bloodless coups each year in the election booth, and that’s good enough for me.

Tango, in mgl’s quote she was speaking of her vote for the Clinton budget, which was in fact the deciding vote as it passed by one.

My comment was specifically directed at that one politician and that one vote. It was well known that she was pressured by party leadership to cast that particular vote, and now she says she did it bravely of her own convictions. I don’t believe her.

My comment had nothing to do with anything else she or any other politician has done.

Brian, thanks.  I didn’t get that kind of context from the original quote or your reply. 

It may be “well known” to an American, but not to me.

I wouldn’t say Margolies’ story is well-known, and it’s a bit more nuanced than Brian describes.  Margolies and Pat Williams cast the two deciding votes, since it passed 218-216:

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/07/us/the-budget-struggle-the-house-whips-use-soft-touch-to-succeed.html

How can we possibly know what was in her head in 1993?  It seems like she intended to vote how her constituents wanted, didn’t, and didn’t get re-elected.

Margolies was the only one mentioned in the article who lost her seat in the 1994 mid-terms.

Here is the article that I got the quote from:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/17/AR2010031701496.html

"What is the deficit on a per person basis.  And what is it inflation-adjusted historically speaking?”

Last year (source CBO.gov): 1.55 trillion.

Compare to highest $amount from the Reagan years, 238 billion in 1986.  This is 466 billion in 2009 dollars (source: BLS inflation calculator).

Population: 239 million in 1986, 307 million in 2009.

Per person, inflation adjusted:
2009 $1950
1986 $5049

You have the two years reversed…

More importantly what is the federal deficit per gdp.

Answer:
Year - GDP - Def/GDP
1998 8793.5 -0.79
1999 9201.14 -1.37
2000 9951.5 -2.37
2001 10058.2 -1.27
2002 10398.4 1.52
2003 10886.2 3.47
2004 11867.8 3.48
2005 12339 2.58
2006 13090.8 1.90
2007 13715.7 1.17
2008 14165.6 3.24
2009 14237.2 9.92
2010 14623.9 10.64

2009 seems to be the year when things got out of control.  What (financial crisis, stimulus, bail outs, obama) happened that year?  Really up until 2009 the deficit was manageable.
vr, Xei

My post on referenda got lost somehow.  Rally - the people of California imposed a 2/3 supermajority requirement on passing the state budget.  No state with a large economy does anything like this. 

California’s schools went from top 10 in the country in 1975 to 49th today.  California’s decline exceeded that of any other state - including all those that are run directly by politicians. 

Whatever the numerous failings of politicians, they are better at governing than the man on the street.

Conflating the cause for the decline in performance in CA schools with the budget and tax supermajority rule is misleading. There has not been a clearly demonstrated link between spending and student performance, to my satisfaction, at at the levels of spending that dominate in the US (i.e. already high, marginal dollars don’t do much etc.).

For some things it is debatable whether a referendum is proper.  For other things it is not.  Not having a referenda-based decision-making process in government, along with the checks and balances associated with our trifurcated system, prevents the tyranny of the majority.

To me, the ease with which a state constitution can be amended by a referendum (in some states more than others) is deplorable.

Josh - the link between small class size and student achievement is hardly in dispute.  Californians refuse to put out the money to hire enough teachers and so we have the largest class sizes in the country. 

California’s property tax system is one of the worst ideas conceived in post-WWII America.  It’s a giveaway to corporations, the wealthy and the elderly.  If that’s what you support, you are entitled to your opinion.  But I pay ten times the property tax that my neighbor does for an identical home, and a 1/3 minority of voters can keep this inequity from ever changing.  That is not a legislative achievement the voters should be proud of.

I tutor kids in math.  I do it voluntarily.  I do it in the classrooms.  Sometimes it’s one-on-one, most of the time I wander the room helping whoever I see needs it.  I tutor 12-18 yr olds.  I’ve been doing it a while.  I’m convinced that class size has VERY little to do with understanding.  The second most important reason for improvement is the teacher, but by FAR the most important is the parents.  If the parents are involved in the student’s learning and progress on a daily basis, kids can learn at a surprising rate.  If left to themselves, they rarely will take the initiative to truly do the hard work at home.

Hawer,

Class size is a different issue from spending, though they are related. However studies on the effectiveness of smaller class are mixed. Here is a Rand study showing limited improvement after billions in investment, for instance : http://www.rand.org/pubs/reprints/RP1030/

I think class size is likely a factor but, like clutch hitting, it is so small it doesn’t really matter compared to things like quality of the teacher, parental involvement and student motivation. Where class size creates a synergy between these factors it is valuable. But it will take much more than simply throwing money at the problem to address the issues with CA education.

As to pride, there is very little in CA politics that I take pride in.

I agree with you: a lack of quality teachers is a huge problem.  California’s school districts pay poorly relative to the cost of living in the state, and underfunding the system means the teacher’s unions can favor older, incompetent teachers and force newer, better teachers to be laid off every year.

“Starving the beast” has a very negative effect on the state’s school system.