Friday, February 19, 2010

DANCING THE TARANTINO



yeah, i know, it's actually the tarantella, the italian folk dance but i heard a good one yesterday about re-naming the filibuster the tarantino because it "kills bills." i think chait is right on the money here. i heard similar ideas in reaction to the supreme court ruling for corporate america, that it would force politicians to "do the right thing" & make real substantive changes to the election finance laws. yeah. right. it's a rare politician whose "better angels" continue to advise a year after their first election.

"The belief that the filibuster is okay, but minority parties should just use it less often and start acting nicer is the equivalent of the belief that the financial system was totally fine, there just needs to be less greed and more caution. Of course, there are people on Wall Street who believe that, too -- you don't need to change the incentive structure that rewards taking on systemic risk, they say, you just need people to listen to their better angels. This sort of misguided notion is probably endemic to people who sit on the inside of any institution and see it in personal rather than systemic terms. The belief among official Washington that moral restraint can persuade politicians from ignoring their political interests is exactly such a fallacy." jonathan chait

here's the link of the whole article.

No comments: