[Cross-posted from OC Blog]
Sen. Abel Maldonado, basking in the adoration of the California Left — not to mention that of Governor Hollow Man — declared this weekend that "We need a change."
By "we," Maldonado means Republicans, and he uttered that profound insight in response to my f friend Jon Fleischman calling him on his role as the enabler of the largest state tax increase in American history. Kudos to Jon, by the way — wish I could have been there.
By the way, if you haven’t joined my FaceBook group — "Never Elect Abel Maldonado To Anything, Ever Again" — please do so. It figured in a San Francisco Chronicle story on Friday, and in the Los Angeles Times on Saturday. We’re up to 520 members. Join now – e-mail it to your friends who are wondering who to thank for the privilege of forking over more than a $1,000 more dollars to the black hole in Sacramento.
But I digress.
Maldo’s Change: Where’s the Beef?
So does Sen. Maldonado have some long simmering vision for the Republican Party’s future that he’s heretofore kept to himself? Or was "We need a change" just an empty, reflexive, Obama-esque phrase he blurted out because he couldn’t think of anything else to say?
Let’s suppose that Sen. Maldonado was speaking purposefully, and the $13.5 billion tax hike he mid-wifed is part of the change he says the GOP needs.
Rather than castigates conservatives — at least we can articulate a coherent political philosophy — isn’t it incumbent upon Sen. Maldonado to spell out in some detail the nature of this change the GOP must undergo?
After all, massive transfers of wealth from the people to the government isn’t exactly new. It’s as old as government itself, and is standard operating procedure for the Democratic Party.
Historical Amnesia
Republican have tried this kind of change before, and it hasn’t exactly been a winner for us.
In 1990, President George H.W. Bush worked with the Democratic Congress and a minority of Republicans to pass a massive tax increase as a deficit reduction measure, in the midst of weakening economy.
Result?: The recession deepened, Republicans lost seats in Congress and the deficit remained.
In 1994, Gov. Pete Wilson made a deal with the Democratic Legislature to eliminate the historic $14 billion deficit with $7 bill in tax hikes and $7 billion in spending cuts.
The result: the recession deepened, deficit re-appeared within months, and Republicans lost seats in the Legislature — despite the fairest reapportionment in decades.
This isn’t lost knowledge locked away in one of the Dead Sea scrolls — it’s recent history. Yet, amazingly, it is lost on the Maldos of the California GOP — and has been for as long as I’ve been in politics.
So tell me: what change does Sen. Maldonado offer Republicans that is any different from the aforementioned examples?
Oh yes: the vaunted blanket primary.
Less Choice, More Echo
Now, let’s be clear as to what we are discussing. The media has been erroneously calling the price of Maldonado tax-hike vote an "open primary."
In an open primary, voters cast ballots in whichever party’s primary they choose, regardless of their own partisan affiliation. Even in an open primary, each party will have a candidate in the general election.
In a blanket primary, however, all candidates — Republican, Democratic, Libertarian, Green, etc. — are listed on one ballot. Only the top two vote getters advance to the general election.
That is a very, very different thing from the open primary.
In California’s few competitive districts, there will likely be a Democrat and a Republican on the general election ballot. In most of the gerrymandered districts, it will more likely between Democrats or two Republicans — providing voters with less choice, and more echo.
A blanket primary de facto eliminates third parties. It entirely abolishes the ability of party members to determine their own nominee. The decision whether to open their nomination processes should be left to the political parties — not the general electorate. Maybe someone should remind Sen. Maldonado of our constitutional right to free association.
Thus far, the extent of the "change" Sen. Maldonado claims we need is to blur the distinctions between the two parties: make the GOP more like the Democratic Party by embracing tax increases is the sine qua non of fiscal responsibility, and elect more Republicans who are more like Democrats and accept the philosophical underpinnings of the Democratic nanny state.
Which precisely what blanket primary true-believers want: more moderates in the Legislature, in the belief that more "will get done" — because, as we all know, action for its own sake is held to be a modern political virtue.
I, for one, have no doubt a blanket primary-shaped Legislature — more susceptible to the blandishments of editorial pages and special interest — would have dealt with the $42-billion deficit weeks ago, by enacting an even bigger tax hike with less internal squabbling.
And so what will we get for the change Sen. Maldonado is pushing? More of the same.
February 24th, 2009 at 12:00 am
I will leave most of the comments on the Open Primary alone, because I recognize we disagree on the issue. But do you really think it’s a wonderful idea for third party candidates to divide the vote and help a candidate sneak in that isn’t supported by a majority of the voters?
I know many Republicans who believe that without Ross Perot, Bill Clinton would never have been elected and Democrats who believe that without Ralph Nader we would never have had George W. Bush and I think what happened in both of those cases was bad for the country whether the reasoning was faulty or not because it took legitimacy away from the candidates who were elected.
But worst of all I know of cases on both sides of the aisle where legislative races were decided by third party candidates who were talked into running specifically to split the vote. It’s a bad thing for Democracy if the way you win is not by convincing voters, but by trickery and I hope however the election on the Open Primary goes we will not see some type of romanticizing of fringe candidates who serve no purpose except to muddle election results.
February 24th, 2009 at 12:00 am
Maldobama. Say it, memorize it, use it.