Gastonia, NC The easiest constitutional principle in America is the one that binds the other side. The useful test is whether the sentence survives a change in the proper noun. Before running the test, I want to correct the tense in the question, because it is doing a great deal of work and it is … Continue reading If a future administration opened parallel state and federal files against a departing opposite-party president, would the defenders of the current docket still call that “the rule of law,” or would they rediscover process, venue, and timing as constitutional values?
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Does a campaign conducted while one candidate is a convicted felon under state law create a legitimacy problem for whoever wins, or is that a category the Constitution already answered?
Myrtle Beach, SC Correspondent — The Constitution answered the category. It lists age, residency, natural-born citizenship, and a small number of disqualifications that Congress and the Fourteenth Amendment actually wrote. A state conviction isn't on the list, and the historical precedent is direct. Eugene Debs ran for president from a federal penitentiary in 1920 and … Continue reading Does a campaign conducted while one candidate is a convicted felon under state law create a legitimacy problem for whoever wins, or is that a category the Constitution already answered?
After the first presidential debate, should party mechanisms have a formal capacity test for nominees, or would that process be captured by the same insiders the primaries were meant to discipline?
Gastonia, NC Correspondent — The country watched a fitness question answered on live television. That doesn't mean I want a committee with a stethoscope and a donor list. Primaries were supposed to be the capacity test voters run. What we saw last week was a party that spent a year insisting the question was a … Continue reading After the first presidential debate, should party mechanisms have a formal capacity test for nominees, or would that process be captured by the same insiders the primaries were meant to discipline?
How can the United States address the long-term fiscal burden of entitlement programs without undermining the social contract with current retirees?
Owatonna, MN Correspondent — Current retirees planned around existing promises and abrupt cuts would break expectations built over decades. The arithmetic is published and nobody disputes it. The trustees put old-age insurance depletion at 2033, after which the payroll tax covers something like three-quarters of scheduled benefits. Medicare's hospital fund runs out sooner. Depletion isn't … Continue reading How can the United States address the long-term fiscal burden of entitlement programs without undermining the social contract with current retirees?
Was the Fulton County racketeering indictment a conventional use of a state RICO statute against an alleged effort to overturn a certified result, or a county prosecutor’s attempt to nationalize a political dispute the voters were already going to retry?
Gastonia, NC The word doing the work in this indictment is "enterprise," and I want to start there because I spent two days last week finding out that the word does not mean what I assumed it meant. My assumption, and I suspect most people's, was that a racketeering statute reaches organizations whose business is … Continue reading Was the Fulton County racketeering indictment a conventional use of a state RICO statute against an alleged effort to overturn a certified result, or a county prosecutor’s attempt to nationalize a political dispute the voters were already going to retry?
Are midsummer state referenda and ballot-qualification fights over abortion a better test of post-Dobbs democracy than a federal statute neither chamber can pass?
Myrtle Beach, SC Correspondent — Democracy that can actually close a question beats a national bill that exists as a fundraising header. The decision didn't create a consensus. It created a venue, and venues that can vote are the test of whether a country can live with disagreement. Ballot-qualification fights are ugly — signature vendors, … Continue reading Are midsummer state referenda and ballot-qualification fights over abortion a better test of post-Dobbs democracy than a federal statute neither chamber can pass?
Do gasoline prices at midsummer levels require a temporary federal tax holiday and drawdown of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, or would those steps worsen the longer shortage?
Myrtle Beach, SC Correspondent — A holiday on a federal tax of eighteen cents against a five-dollar sticker is a rounding error with a ribbon. A reserve drawdown is a one-time sale from a tank built for a blockade, not for a midsummer poll. Neither drills a hole or finishes a pipe. Midsummer prices hurt … Continue reading Do gasoline prices at midsummer levels require a temporary federal tax holiday and drawdown of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, or would those steps worsen the longer shortage?
How should regulators respond to the spread of monkeypox without repeating the early-COVID pattern of mixed messages and uneven access to vaccine?
Gastonia, NC Correspondent — Say who is actually at risk, say it on Monday, and say the same sentence on Friday. That's the whole rule. The current outbreak is concentrated in a defined sexual network — overwhelmingly men who have sex with men — and it's spreading through close, sustained skin contact rather than through … Continue reading How should regulators respond to the spread of monkeypox without repeating the early-COVID pattern of mixed messages and uneven access to vaccine?
Should Congress reassert clearer limits on the use of emergency and national-security authorities by the executive branch?
Wheeling, West Virginia Correspondent — These authorities expanded through repeated use and broad interpretation, and Congress has the constitutional position to redraw them. Tighter definitions, shorter time limits, faster review. Leaving them vague invites continued expansion and reduces the legislature to a commentator. I'd say the obvious thing about why it doesn't happen. A member … Continue reading Should Congress reassert clearer limits on the use of emergency and national-security authorities by the executive branch?
After the first hundred days and the January 6 prosecutions, is “domestic violent extremism” now a coherent federal priority, or a label that will be applied to whichever street the current majority dislikes?
Gastonia, NC Correspondent — January 6 was ugly, illegal, and a gift to every camera in the country. Whether it was domestic terrorism depends on whether the noun means anything or just means a crowd we dislike on a day we can use. A coherent priority would have found the word in 2020. A police … Continue reading After the first hundred days and the January 6 prosecutions, is “domestic violent extremism” now a coherent federal priority, or a label that will be applied to whichever street the current majority dislikes?
