5 ms·

Political labels are almost meaningless; always judge politics by actions, not words. The Democrat Party today is as far from Andrew Jackson (it's first Preside

Political labels are almost meaningless; always judge politics by actions, not words. The Democrat Party today is as far from Andrew Jackson (it's first President) than North Korea (the Democratic People's Republic of Korea) is from being a democracy, or a republic.

pdonis 6y ago
You called yourself a "Democrat". Even if you want to disclaim association with the political party that calls itself that, you still have the same problem I attributed to them.
- erichocean 6y ago
  Judges are nominated and confirmed by elected officials, which are determined by the voters. Which part of that is "undemocratic"?
  - pdonis 6y ago
    > Which part of that is "undemocratic"? The part where judges make political decisions that are supposed to be made by voters and their elected representatives. The fact that some busybody believes that voters "can't be relied on" to enact particular policies that the busybody favors does not justify getting those policies enacted by judges instead. Judges are not supposed to enact policies. They are supposed to say what the law is, not what someone believes it ought to be.
    - erichocean 6y ago
      > Judges are not supposed to enact policies. They are supposed to say what the law is, not what someone believes it ought to be. I think that was true at the country's founding, but is no longer true today. The entire purpose of Civil Rights legislation was to enable the courts to "enact policies", which they have done continuously since. They are literally doing what Congress asked them to do. If you don't like Civil Rights legislation, fine. But don't blame the courts for using it as the basis to do what Congress has clearly empowered them to do.
      - pdonis 6y ago
        > The entire purpose of Civil Rights legislation was to enable the courts to "enact policies" Congress cannot change the structure of the government by passing a law. The Constitution makes enacting policies the job of Congress (and the President, for either signing or vetoing bills passed by Congress), not the Supreme Court. If we want the Supreme Court to be able to enact policies, we would need to amend the Constitution. As I said in another comment upthread, I think you have a highly idiosyncratic (and wrong) view of how law in the US works.
    - scarface74 6y ago
      Would you have preferred that judges didn’t rule the way they did in the case of Brown vs Board of Education? The “busy bodies” are the people who want to deny employment to people just because who they share a bed with.
      - pdonis 6y ago
        > Would you have preferred that judges didn’t rule the way they did in the case of Brown vs Board of Education? As a matter of law I would have preferred that political decisions about public schools were made by legislatures, not judges, as they are supposed to be. The idea that the purpose of government is to get our favored policies in place, by hook or by crook, is going to be the death of our republic sooner or later. The government is supposed to uphold the rule of law, and the law of the land in the US, the Constitution, does not give judges the power to make political decisions. As a matter of policy, I would have preferred that the whole public school system in the US have either not been developed at all, or developed along very different lines. The people who put the US public school system in place were quite explicit that their purpose was to indoctrinate children. I think the government has no business indoctrinating children. But that policy question is way past any hope of repair.
        scarface74 6y ago
        As a matter of law I would have preferred that political decisions about public schools were made by legislatures, not judges, as they are supposed to be. I wonder if you would have had the same preference if you had had to send your kids to separate schools, drink from separate water fountains, give up your seat on a bus for someone who was the right color or be forbidden to marry the person you love because they were a different color? Would you also be in favor of a national religion if the majority passed such a law? A republic that legalizes discrimination deserves to die.
        pdonis 6y ago
        > I wonder if you would have had the same preference if you had had to send your kids to separate schools, drink from separate water fountains, give up your seat on a bus for someone who was the right color or be forbidden to marry the person you love because they were a different color? Regarding having to send kids to separate schools, I've already given my opinion on the US public school system in general. Given how messed up I think that whole system is, having to send kids to segregated schools instead of integrated ones would rank pretty low on my list of things to complain about. I'd be far more worried about how the school was trying to indoctrinate kids than what the demographics of the student body were. I can see the obvious equal protection argument for requiring public schools not to be segregated, which of course was basically the argument the Court used when it said "separate is inherently unequal". (Similar arguments could of course be made, and were made, for the other cases you describe.) However, if we are going to talk about equal protection, I would think having equal quality of schools available to all would be the chief requirement to impose on the government if the government is going to provide public schools at all. And even if we grant that having the demographics of the student body be representative of the community is one aspect of school quality, it certainly is not the only one or even the primary one; surely what the students are actually being taught in the classroom should count, and count for more. If all the inner city integrated schools are bad and all the suburban integrated schools are good, that's not equal protection even if the demographics of the student bodies in both cases are the same. Once we get into considerations like that, it should be obvious that we are talking about political policy decisions that have to be made legislatively, since they involve public funds, and are fraught with difficulty even then. Nobody knows how to ensure good quality schools everywhere, or even what "good quality" really amounts to or how to judge it. Having courts try to dictate policy in this area is not likely to be helpful. And in fact, the Supreme Court in Missouri v. Jenkins explicitly ruled that courts cannot dictate policy in this area; Brown vs. Board of Education only outlaws de jure segregation, not de facto inequalities in school funding and quality that impact different races differently. In other words, the only thing the Court found itself able to enforce was the thing that, judging by how our public schools have fared since Brown was decided, has by far the least impact on the actual quality of education that public school students receive. This is what happens when courts try to make policy: you get a symbolic victory without the substance. I think most people, if they thought about it, would prefer the substance; but the only way to get that in a democracy is by doing the hard work of changing how citizens are willing to vote.
redler 6y ago
The term "Democrat Party" (and, more generally, "Democrat" as an adjective) is both a shibboleth signaling opposing tribal membership, and an epithet signaling contempt for the Democratic Party — the actual name of the organization. It's adult name-calling. The usage is widely understood to be an intentional discourtesy.

pdonis 6y ago

You called yourself a "Democrat". Even if you want to disclaim association with the political party that calls itself that, you still have the same problem I attributed to them.

erichocean 6y ago
Judges are nominated and confirmed by elected officials, which are determined by the voters. Which part of that is "undemocratic"?
- pdonis 6y ago
  > Which part of that is "undemocratic"? The part where judges make political decisions that are supposed to be made by voters and their elected representatives. The fact that some busybody believes that voters "can't be relied on" to enact particular policies that the busybody favors does not justify getting those policies enacted by judges instead. Judges are not supposed to enact policies. They are supposed to say what the law is, not what someone believes it ought to be.
  - erichocean 6y ago
    > Judges are not supposed to enact policies. They are supposed to say what the law is, not what someone believes it ought to be. I think that was true at the country's founding, but is no longer true today. The entire purpose of Civil Rights legislation was to enable the courts to "enact policies", which they have done continuously since. They are literally doing what Congress asked them to do. If you don't like Civil Rights legislation, fine. But don't blame the courts for using it as the basis to do what Congress has clearly empowered them to do.
    - pdonis 6y ago
      > The entire purpose of Civil Rights legislation was to enable the courts to "enact policies" Congress cannot change the structure of the government by passing a law. The Constitution makes enacting policies the job of Congress (and the President, for either signing or vetoing bills passed by Congress), not the Supreme Court. If we want the Supreme Court to be able to enact policies, we would need to amend the Constitution. As I said in another comment upthread, I think you have a highly idiosyncratic (and wrong) view of how law in the US works.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    Would you have preferred that judges didn’t rule the way they did in the case of Brown vs Board of Education? The “busy bodies” are the people who want to deny employment to people just because who they share a bed with.
    - pdonis 6y ago
      > Would you have preferred that judges didn’t rule the way they did in the case of Brown vs Board of Education? As a matter of law I would have preferred that political decisions about public schools were made by legislatures, not judges, as they are supposed to be. The idea that the purpose of government is to get our favored policies in place, by hook or by crook, is going to be the death of our republic sooner or later. The government is supposed to uphold the rule of law, and the law of the land in the US, the Constitution, does not give judges the power to make political decisions. As a matter of policy, I would have preferred that the whole public school system in the US have either not been developed at all, or developed along very different lines. The people who put the US public school system in place were quite explicit that their purpose was to indoctrinate children. I think the government has no business indoctrinating children. But that policy question is way past any hope of repair.
      - scarface74 6y ago
        As a matter of law I would have preferred that political decisions about public schools were made by legislatures, not judges, as they are supposed to be. I wonder if you would have had the same preference if you had had to send your kids to separate schools, drink from separate water fountains, give up your seat on a bus for someone who was the right color or be forbidden to marry the person you love because they were a different color? Would you also be in favor of a national religion if the majority passed such a law? A republic that legalizes discrimination deserves to die.
        pdonis 6y ago
        > I wonder if you would have had the same preference if you had had to send your kids to separate schools, drink from separate water fountains, give up your seat on a bus for someone who was the right color or be forbidden to marry the person you love because they were a different color? Regarding having to send kids to separate schools, I've already given my opinion on the US public school system in general. Given how messed up I think that whole system is, having to send kids to segregated schools instead of integrated ones would rank pretty low on my list of things to complain about. I'd be far more worried about how the school was trying to indoctrinate kids than what the demographics of the student body were. I can see the obvious equal protection argument for requiring public schools not to be segregated, which of course was basically the argument the Court used when it said "separate is inherently unequal". (Similar arguments could of course be made, and were made, for the other cases you describe.) However, if we are going to talk about equal protection, I would think having equal quality of schools available to all would be the chief requirement to impose on the government if the government is going to provide public schools at all. And even if we grant that having the demographics of the student body be representative of the community is one aspect of school quality, it certainly is not the only one or even the primary one; surely what the students are actually being taught in the classroom should count, and count for more. If all the inner city integrated schools are bad and all the suburban integrated schools are good, that's not equal protection even if the demographics of the student bodies in both cases are the same. Once we get into considerations like that, it should be obvious that we are talking about political policy decisions that have to be made legislatively, since they involve public funds, and are fraught with difficulty even then. Nobody knows how to ensure good quality schools everywhere, or even what "good quality" really amounts to or how to judge it. Having courts try to dictate policy in this area is not likely to be helpful. And in fact, the Supreme Court in Missouri v. Jenkins explicitly ruled that courts cannot dictate policy in this area; Brown vs. Board of Education only outlaws de jure segregation, not de facto inequalities in school funding and quality that impact different races differently. In other words, the only thing the Court found itself able to enforce was the thing that, judging by how our public schools have fared since Brown was decided, has by far the least impact on the actual quality of education that public school students receive. This is what happens when courts try to make policy: you get a symbolic victory without the substance. I think most people, if they thought about it, would prefer the substance; but the only way to get that in a democracy is by doing the hard work of changing how citizens are willing to vote.

redler 6y ago

The term "Democrat Party" (and, more generally, "Democrat" as an adjective) is both a shibboleth signaling opposing tribal membership, and an epithet signaling contempt for the Democratic Party — the actual name of the organization. It's adult name-calling. The usage is widely understood to be an intentional discourtesy.