Rock On, Obstructionists!
Daily life in Washington offers another one of those peculiar contradictions that intrigue the planet. The bush administration complains bitterly and daily because the Democrats are exercising democracy and (perhaps to their own surprise) are doing their job.
Eh?
The function of an opposition party is to, well, oppose. To resist, cavil, object, and pose awkward and difficult questions. I suspect this point is lost on many Republicans because, despite their many years without ownership of most of the engines of government, they never quite figured out how to do it. There have been individual exceptions, but on the whole principled opposition seems alien to the Republican mind. They favour hegemony. When they can't have that, they'd rather whine.
Recently, there has been some interesting scholarship on a place and time that shed light on this problem. The place was Britain and the time was 1765-1783, the era of the American War for Independence. One has to begin by appreciating that America didn't so much win that war as that Lord North's ministry lost it. Britain occupied a world position very much analogous to that of the contemporary U.S. The government were a conservative oligarchy that paid very superficial lip service to ideas of "the rights of Englishmen." North's government was supported at every turn by a monarch who could, and did, yield real executive power. Neither monarch nor ministry ever considered the possibility that they could lose the American colonies not by catastrophe, but by incremental setbacks. Piled one on another, the increments became the catastrophe. The opposition were there to pile up the increments (and sometimes, the excrement).
This divided and uncertain opposition had watched this drama unfold for a decade before there was any actual fighting. They knew two things clearly: that the Tory ministries would need to defeat themselves, for they didn't have the power, and that the adventure was unsustainable. As things stood in the late 18th century, colonies 3,000 miles away could not be compelled to stay loyal to a mother country, without applying ruinously expensive measures to keep them.
The opposition were subjected to political pressure and verbal abuse that makes eeriely familiar reading. The pressure came not only from the ministry, but from a press that was either cowed and captive to the Tories, or bought. What the opposition contributed in this unfavourable climate was opposition: sometimes principled, sometimes not, but annoyingly intelligent and — as it turned out — right. To some observers, it appears that modern democracy owes a great deal to the success of these stubborn obstructionists who were not cowed by conventional wisdom, appeals to patriotism or verbal abuse. They were there, in the end, to pick up the place when the Tory house of cards collapsed.
Eh?
The function of an opposition party is to, well, oppose. To resist, cavil, object, and pose awkward and difficult questions. I suspect this point is lost on many Republicans because, despite their many years without ownership of most of the engines of government, they never quite figured out how to do it. There have been individual exceptions, but on the whole principled opposition seems alien to the Republican mind. They favour hegemony. When they can't have that, they'd rather whine.
Recently, there has been some interesting scholarship on a place and time that shed light on this problem. The place was Britain and the time was 1765-1783, the era of the American War for Independence. One has to begin by appreciating that America didn't so much win that war as that Lord North's ministry lost it. Britain occupied a world position very much analogous to that of the contemporary U.S. The government were a conservative oligarchy that paid very superficial lip service to ideas of "the rights of Englishmen." North's government was supported at every turn by a monarch who could, and did, yield real executive power. Neither monarch nor ministry ever considered the possibility that they could lose the American colonies not by catastrophe, but by incremental setbacks. Piled one on another, the increments became the catastrophe. The opposition were there to pile up the increments (and sometimes, the excrement).
This divided and uncertain opposition had watched this drama unfold for a decade before there was any actual fighting. They knew two things clearly: that the Tory ministries would need to defeat themselves, for they didn't have the power, and that the adventure was unsustainable. As things stood in the late 18th century, colonies 3,000 miles away could not be compelled to stay loyal to a mother country, without applying ruinously expensive measures to keep them.
The opposition were subjected to political pressure and verbal abuse that makes eeriely familiar reading. The pressure came not only from the ministry, but from a press that was either cowed and captive to the Tories, or bought. What the opposition contributed in this unfavourable climate was opposition: sometimes principled, sometimes not, but annoyingly intelligent and — as it turned out — right. To some observers, it appears that modern democracy owes a great deal to the success of these stubborn obstructionists who were not cowed by conventional wisdom, appeals to patriotism or verbal abuse. They were there, in the end, to pick up the place when the Tory house of cards collapsed.
posted by Uncle | 23:58
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