Soccer Dad

What's wrong with the 17th amendment?

Charles Krauthammer sees the positive in Gov. Blagojevich's behavior (or here):

In light of the pending dynastic disposition of the New York and Delaware Senate seats, the Illinois way is almost refreshing. At least Gov. Rod Blagojevich (allegedly) made Barack Obama's seat democratically open to all. Just register the highest bid, eBay-style.

This wasn't an unqualified success for the American way, though:

Sadly, however, even this auction was not free of aristo-creep. On the evidence of the U.S. attorney's criminal complaint, a full one-third of those under consideration were pedigreed: Candidate No. 2 turns out to be the daughter of the speaker of the Illinois House; Candidate No. 5, the first-born son of the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Krauthammer's main point, though, is this:

It's not the end of the world, but it is an accelerating trend that need not be encouraged. After all, we have already created another huge distortion in our politics: a plethora of plutocrats in the U.S. Senate, courtesy of our crazed campaign finance laws. If you're very very rich, you can buy your Senate seat by spending as much of your money as you want. Meanwhile, your poor plebeian opponent is running around groveling for the small contributions allowed by law. Hence the Corzines and the Kohls, who parachute into Congress seemingly out of nowhere.

Having given this additional leg up to the rich, we should resist packing our legislatures with yet more privileged parachutists, the well-born.

Kathleen Parker who is so infected by Palin Derangement Syndrome that she is quickly becoming the essential must-miss "conservative" columnist, tells us that Caroline Kennedy is no Sarah Palin. Caroline Kennedy, to Parker, doesn't need to be qualified for the Senate because she'd only be one of 100. But that wasn't the issue, the issue is entitlement as Krauthammer noted. Lack of qualifications is secondary.
Still it's amusing, I suppose, to have Parker harp on Gov. Palin's inexperience. What about the guy who won the election? Right now President-elect Obama is learning that it's easy to run against an unpopular president, but that it might not be so easy to govern much differently from the way the incumbent does.

After the interventions of the trigger-happy Reagan and Bush Sr., feel-your-pain Bill Clinton was convinced that his charisma could achieve through diplomacy what his predecessors had failed at through their clumsy use of force. But after 1993, President Clinton ended up bombing or shooting Afghans, Iraqis, Serbians, Somalis and Sudanese -- without consulting either Congress or the United Nations.

Realist George W. Bush ran on ending Bill Clinton's nation-building -- and ended up spending hundreds of billions of dollars on war and fostering democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Parker also harps on Gov. Palin's like of Washington savvy. Given the way the government's been pushing for bigger and bigger bailout packages for more and more industries, is it possible that what we really need is an outsider? At first I believed that the financial industry needed a bailout, but then when that didn't work the administration and Congress wanted an even bigger package. And then the auto makers asked for their cut. Maybe too much familiarity with the ways of Washington causes one to overestimate what can do. It's a problem with political incestuousness.

Which brings us back to the idea of appointing political relatives to senate seats. Krauthammer argues against it. So what to do? Jennifer Rubin says, pay attention to the 17th amendment!

So what to do? All the open seats should be filled by special election. And if the money is tight in states, that's one bailout of federal money I'd favor. Spending money on democratic elections seems about the best use of the taxpayers money one can imagine. As we see, the alternative is an embarrassment.

Joshua Spivak thinks it's good to have governors appoint senators, or at least that special elections aren't that great.

The main alternative under consideration is the special election, because it passes two basic tests -- the fairness test (by including any candidate who can get on the ballot) and the democracy test (by letting voters do the selecting). But dig a little deeper, and it becomes apparent that special elections have problems of their own.

Two of these are procedural. The first is that, done right, a special election would take months to carry out, leaving the state without a key legislative representative. By contrast, a governor can fill a Senate seat in almost no time. The second problem is the expense. Statewide special elections cost tens of millions of dollars, a considerable concern at times -- such as now -- when state budgets are under strain.

But there are hidden, and more fundamental, problems, too. Turnout for special elections is dramatically lower than it is for general elections. This shouldn't be a surprise -- voters have to care enough to come out for just one race, while on Election Day the presidency or a governorship may also be on the line.

While I understand the procedural problems, the idea that fewer people vote in special elections doesn't work against special elections. There were still be many more than one person determining who will represent. And even if an appointed senator usually loses, why should this decision be decided by fiat?

Betsy's Page concludes:

Whatever the drawbacks of a special election, it's better to let the people vote than to have the smarmy sort of politics that we witness now.

In short, our political system would benefit from some new blood. Sarah Palin, to Kathleen Parker's chagrin, represented a fresh approach to politics. Overall the best way to encourage diversity and new ways of thinking into the political system is with more elections, not less.

Related thoughts:

Deja Vu links to a great letter (last one) in the New York Times:

It is amusing that Andrew M. Cuomo, who owes his whole career to his dad, may not get the Senate seat of Hillary Rodham Clinton (who owes her whole career to her husband) because David A. Paterson (who owes his whole career to his dad) may give it to Caroline Kennedy (who owes her whole career to her dad).

Carl Cannon thinks that Caroline Kennedy can fly an X-wing fighter.

Fausta rebuts Kathleen Parker's cattiness.