May 2009 California Proposition Recommendations

Looking for June 2010 proposition recommendations? Click here.


UPDATE: results added below in purple.

After months of legislative stalemate over the budget, they dumped these six hastily drafted, over-complicated initiatives in our laps. Go into the voting booth assured that whatever decisions we collectively make will destroy people’s lives. Can we just go back to voting on gay marriage and whether to ban horse meat?

Prop. 1A. I’m conflicted on the whole concept of a rainy day fund. On the one hand, it’s kind of like a progressive tax system for the economy as a whole, taxing good years to make up for shortfalls when the tax base contracts in bad years. But on the other hand, it seriously weakens the link between taxation and representation. It doesn’t seem entirely democratic to be collecting taxes (12.5% of the budget) for purposes that have yet to be determined. Either way, right now the idea is irrelevant: these are the rainy days, and they’re likely to continue for a while, and when the economy recovers we’ll have to spend a few years attending to all the, um, water damage from our current budget cuts. Maybe the rainy day fund idea should be considered in a decade or so.

Next, taxes. 1A would keep the recent sales and income tax increases until 2012 or 2013 instead of having them expire in 2011. It is definitely necessary to raise some taxes to maintain services, but it is especially vital in bad times that taxes fall most heavily on those who can best afford to pay them – no regressive taxes. California already gets too much of its revenue from a sales tax that is too high. And even the income tax increase in 1A is a flat tax, adding .25% to the existing rates in each tax bracket.

There’s also a lot of stuff in 1A about when money can be transferred from one fund to another, all way too complicated for me to figure out how it would be play out in practice. Which is a good reason not to carve it into stone. And the governor is given way too much discretion over spending, letting him cut, without any reference to the Legislature, all sorts of outlays, including cost-of-living increases for the lame and the halt (but not for state employees, because guess who wrote this thing).

What 1A comes down to is an attempt to create a lot of rules restricting what our elected representatives can do in setting budgets, without addressing the real reason the budgetary process is broken: the ridiculous requirement that 2/3 of the Legislature vote for a budget. I’m just not willing to consider any prop affecting budget-making that leaves intact the ability of a small minority to obstruct the workings of the state. No on 1A.
Result: No, 65.9%.

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Prop. 1B. To pay back – eventually – money the Legislature recently diverted from education (K-12 + community colleges). Yes.
Result: No, 62.6%.

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Prop. 1C. You gotta love the title of this one: “Lottery Modernization Act.” Taking money from the innumerate the modern way, who wouldn’t be in favor of that? Basically, diverting $5 billion in lottery revenue 1) from education into the general fund, and 2) from future years (to be repaid with interest) to the current budget, and making changes to the lottery that would, they hope, bring in lots more revenue in the future (but which would probably fail to bring in enough to repay the $5 billion).

When we first voted to create a lottery, I abstained, figuring that while I had no interest in playing it (and I never have), the people who might want to were adults and could decide for themselves. Then it was implemented, and I saw that with the lottery came advertising, that the state of California was actively enticing credulous people to gamble away their money. To make the Prop 1C Ponzi scheme function, they’d have to work very hard indeed at luring us into throwing away a great deal more than the measly $83 per year that the average Californian evidently currently spends on lottery tickets. I don’t wish to see that happen in my name. No on 1C.
Result: No, 64.6%

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Prop. 1D. would steal money from various early-childhood programs to fund various other early-childhood programs in order to make the budget numbers look better. Short of examining the effectiveness of each one of those programs, there is no way to tell what the impact on children would be, but 1D would move spending decisions from local commissions to the state, and something tells me that the state government is less to be trusted these days. No on 1D.
Result: No, 65.8%

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Prop. 1E would steal money from various mental health programs to fund various other mental health programs to make the budget numbers look better. It could also imperil some federal matching funds. No on 1E.
Result: No, 66.4%. The highest no vote.

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Prop. 1F. No pay increases for elected officials in years when the state is in deficit. Look, the problem with the budget isn’t (just) that legislators are assholes who refuse to do their jobs, it’s that 2/3 requirement, which rewards assholery. The idea behind 1F, that legislators should be prodded into compromise by negative financial incentives is just as unethical and cynical and antithetical to democracy as bribing them would be. Any politician this would work on is not worthy of public office. 1F is populism for infants, and polls say it’s more popular than ice cream and puppy dogs and probably the only one of these that will pass. No on 1F.
Result: Yes, 73.9%. Let it never be said that Californians don't fall for cheap populism. Hey, I've got an idea: let's just elect politicians who don't need salaries that keep up with inflation, rich people, like, I don't know, maybe movie stars. I'm sure nothing could go wrong with that.

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A warning: there are no good choices here. A-E all involve some form of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Someone gets screwed no matter how you vote, and if the majority of Californians follow my recommendations, terrible things will happen, though a different set of terrible things than if they vote the other way. For example, hocking future lottery revenues, taking from future years in order to plug holes in the 2008-9 budget, is short-sightedness of the first order, but if 1C fails, there will be a $5 billion gap that will require some combination of taxes and spending cuts.

And that choice exemplifies how these 6 initiatives have made an already broken budgetary process downright deranged. I mean, we know what we get if 1C passes but not what the Legislature will do if it fails – how can voters make an informed decision? We’re voting on whether there will be a 3rd year of increased sales tax, but not on years 1 and 2. And since the 6 initiatives are meant to be a package, interesting but unpredictable things will happen if some of them pass but not others.

Comments, rebuttals, and the wailing of the damned are welcome in the comments sections.

(Update: see also the SF Bay Guardian's well-explained recommendations (no on everything).

Wherein is revealed the best way to create economic vitality

Friday, Bush was interviewed by Neil Cavuto on the Fox Business Network, mostly about the Colombian free-trade treaty, defeat of which “will embolden those voices of false populism, like I’m not going to say, people who are anti-American.”

IN OTHER WORDS: “If you look at the statistics, 40 percent of the economic growth that occurred over the past year is as a result of exports. In other words, we’ve had problems at home.”

ONE AMAZED AND TWO VERY CONCERNED: “I mean, these leaders that I talk to - and I talk to leaders a lot - are just, one, amazed and, two, very concerned that the United States is turning inward.”

HE HAS AN MBA, YOU KNOW: “You know, people who worry about global poverty, for example -- and I do - must understand that the best way to help people come out of poverty is for there to be economic vitality. And the best way to create economic vitality is for there to be trade of goods and services.” Or capture a leprechaun and get his pot of gold. You know, whichever.

Asked if he might ask for help from Bill Clinton and other pro-trade-treaty D’s, he said that he would indeed reach out to “former Democrat administrative officials.” Democrat. Just can’t help himself (and couldn’t bring himself to utter his predecessor’s name, any more than he could Hugo Chavez’s).

State of the Union Address: Spreading the hope of freedom (in 357 days)

Transcript.

6:08 Bush just waggled his eyebrows


and winked


at Congress. Which I’m sure makes them feel special and tingly all over.

I didn’t catch which members of the Cabinet and Congress are staying away to carry on the work of government should there be a terrorist attack or Cheney get hold of an Uzi. (Update: it was Dirk Kempthorne. Had anything of that nature happened, it would have been President Dirk Kempthorne.) (Let me repeat that: President Dirk Kempthorne.) Also, I believe Atrios is sitting this one out in case every blogger’s head explodes.

Both Bush twins, however, are there for the first time. Should there be a terrorist attack or Cheney get hold of an Uzi, the genetic line would be extinguished.

6:12 Bush says the economy is going through uncertainty, and Cheney’s head suddenly jerks.

6:12 Boehner: this is an intervention: you are spending too much time in the tanning salon.

6:13 He says that some people wouldn’t object to paying higher taxes, and “The IRS accepts checks and money orders.” Also, the blood of the innocent and the howls of the damned.


6:15 “American families have to balance their budgets, so should their government.” Wait, I’m supposed to be balancing my budget? Uh oh.

6:22 He wants to “liberate children trapped in failing schools”. PS 23 and Martin Luther King Jr High School: the new axis of evil.

6:24 If we don’t pass the free trade agreement with Colombia, we will “embolden the purveyors of false populism in our hemisphere.” Meaning Hugo Chavez, of course, although ABC’s cameras went amusingly to John Kerry.

6:27 Greenhouse agreements will only work if every country on the planet signs and none gets a “free ride.” Especially on public transportation, which he mysteriously left out of his half-hearted laundry list of measures to reduce global warming.


6:34 “We’ve seen wedding guests in blood-soaked finery staggering from a hotel in Jordan”. Of course, the US has soaked more than our share of finery, bombing or shooting up weddings on several occasions in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
(Update: Eli at LeftI is all over this one too.)

6:37 We are “spreading the hope of freedom.” Afghanistan is now “a young democracy where boys and girls are going to school.” Um, right.

6:44 Al Qaida is on the run in Iraq. Just like last year and the year before that and the year before that. A lot of running, is what I’m saying.

It’s hard to find anything to say about this, it’s all very stale. “Return on success,” other bits of leftover rhetoric.

6:46 He asks Congress to fully fund the troops. ABC zooms right in on some guy who’s yawning, sitting next to a woman in uniform.

6:49 A failed Iraq would embolden the extremists. That’s the second use of “embolden.”

6:52 Iran (which he’s been accusing in rather vague terms of being behind everything we don’t like throughout the Middle East) should “come clean about your [he refers to it in the second person] nuclear intentions and past actions”.


6:56 “America opposes genocide in Sudan.” In case anyone was, you know, asking.

6:57 The US is leading the fight against “global hunger.” Which I think is when you really want a globe for dinner, with maybe a Triptik for dessert.

He never actually said what the state of the union is, although he did say if we did blah blah blah the state of the union will remain strong.

Well that was an hour well spent.

Eating product

Today Bush held a White House Forum on International Trade and Investment. I won’t leave you in suspense: he’s in favor of it. “We want people eating product grown here in the United States of America. That’s what we want.” I wish he wouldn’t speak so appetizingly; I have to skip product lunch today.

UNDERSTAND? “As I understand it, you understand how trade benefits this nation. ... You understand what I understand: Free and fair trade means higher paying jobs for American workers.”

HE’S THE UNDERSTANDER: “When a job goes overseas, some family hurts in America, and I understand that.”


He pushed for passage of various trade agreements. And remember, Congress, if you’re not with us, you’re with the false populists: “Champions of false populism in the region are watching Congress -- they will use any failure to approve these trade agreements as evidence that America will never treat democracies in the region as full partners.” (If it’s not clear, Hugo Chavez is the “false populist.”)

HE’S GOT AN MBA, YOU KNOW: “And when people compete for the dollar, it means somebody is going to get a better price.”

These agreements will help our friends in neighborhoods and help them lift them out of poverty

Bush gave a speech at the University of Miami Center for Hemispheric Policy today, in which he called on Congress to pass free trade treaties with Peru, Colombia and Panama because “I made my mind about the importance of trade and investment”.

What would those treaties do? “These agreements will help our friends in neighborhoods and help them lift them out of poverty.”


“These agreements will counter the false populism promoted by some nations in the hemisphere.” I’m not sure what false populism might be, but I’m pretty sure Bush doesn’t much care for the real thing either. (In previous posts I’ve written about the use of populism as a scare word against Venez... pardon me, “some nations.”)

Surprisingly, he addressed the use of violence and murder against trade union members in Colombia, although without giving a sense of its scale, which is massive. “President Uribe takes these concerns seriously, and he has responded decisively. He’s established an independent prosecutors unit to investigate and punish homicides against labor unionists.” The conviction rate to date has been about 2%, which isn’t my definition of “decisively.”

“Both houses of the Colombian legislature have expressed overwhelming support for the trade agreement with the United States. And now they’re waiting to see if we will uphold our end of the deal.” No, George, there is no deal until Congress ratifies it.


“And yet, many of our citizens feel uneasy about competition, and they worry that trade will cost jobs. You know, I understand why. I understand that if you’re forced to change a job halfway through a career it can be painful for your family. I know that.” Indeed, George himself left a promising job as town drunk at the age of 40. He thinks everyone who loses a job should go to community college.

And of course because he was in Miami, talk turned to Cuba. When the “long rule of a cruel dictator” ends, “nations throughout the hemisphere and the world must insist on free speech, free assembly; they must insist that the prisoner in Cuba be free.” Just the one, mind you.


In preparation for this speech, he gave an interview to the Wall Street Journal, in which he repeatedly said that the speech would “remind” people of things: “I will remind people the benefits of trade for our economy”; “I just want to keep reminding people of the benefits of trade”; “I will remind people that the country was very isolationist and very protectionist in the 1920s”.

However, that might not be enough: “You know, pointing to the 1920s is a good example of what can happen, but that’s not going to help the fellow who is sitting behind the coffee shop, worrying about whether or not his job is going to go overseas or her job is going to go somewhere else. I understand that.” Er, why is he sitting behind the coffee shop? (And why is the worker always seen as male?)

He is very worried about the return of isolationism and protectionism. “We have lost sight of what it means to be a nation willing to be aggressive in the world and spread freedom or deal with disease.” I don’t know how to even begin to respond to that.

Asked about economic inequality (with new data from 2005 out showing that the top 1% of taxpayers in the US now earn a record 21.2% of all US income, with the bottom 50% getting under 13%), Bush explained that the super-rich deserve every penny: “skills gaps yield income gaps.” Evidently No Child Left Behind will take care of that; “what needs to be done about the inequality of income is to make sure people have got good education.” Also... well, I’ll let him express this in his own words and also IN his OTHER WORDS: “I’ve been told that of the bottom 20 percent of the people, half will move up; and that over the last 10 years, the top 20 percent, one half of them are newcomers -- the top 20 percent -- in other words, there’s mobility.”


He again praised community colleges, which he says helped North Carolina, “where the textiles -- many textiles left the country.”

I hadn’t noticed that he’d stopped using his favorite all-purpose adjective, but here it is again: “one of the interesting benefits of free trade is that our consumers have more choices”. “One of the interesting things about our relationship [between him and Putin] is that we both want Russia to join the WTO.” Why does he want that? “And I think it’s going to be very interesting for there to be -- very important for there to be a dispute -- a resolution mechanism available.”

Bush in Prague: It’s beginning an important trip to Europe

Secretary of War Robert Gates said that if the “surge” is not progressing as fast as was promised, it’s because “al Qaeda and others are trying to make as much difficulty as possible for us and for the Iraqi government.” Isn’t it funny how wars go so much slower when there’s a, you know, enemy?

Irving “Scooter” Libby has been sentenced to 30 months in prison:


Bush is in the Czech Republic, or as he put it, “It’s beginning an important trip to Europe.” Is it? “Obviously, I’m off to the G8 later on this evening. I think it’s important for the people of the Czech Republic to know, however, that my first stop is here.” It’s also important that they know he had eggs for breakfast. And why does he bestow this honor on the Czech people? “People in this country took risk necessary so that the people could actually live in a free society.” “I find it inspiring to be in a country where the leadership and the people are willing to say, we listen carefully for the voices of those who have been imprisoned.” Scooter Libby?


On the stationing of Star Wars systems in the CR, which is deeply unpopular with the general public there, and even more with Vladimir Putin, he said, “Let me first talk about a general principle when it comes to relations with Russia. The Cold War is over. It ended.” See, and you didn’t think there was a general principle when it comes to relations with Russia.

“And so my attitude on missile defense is, is that this is a purely -- it’s not my attitude, it’s the truth -- it’s a purely defensive measure, aimed not at Russia, but at true threats.” You know, if there’s one thing Russia hates more than being thought of as a true threat, it’s not being thought of as a true threat.

“And my message will be, Vladimir -- I call him Vladimir -- that you shouldn’t fear a missile defense system.” Well, if being called by his first name doesn’t win him over, I don’t know what will.

Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek noted that in addition to missile defense and the visa issue that pisses off every country we’re supposed to be friendly with, “We talked about Southern Ossetia, Abkhazia, and Transdnestria conflicts.” I’m sure George had many deep insights to share on those subjects.


Bush also gave a little speech. On freedom. Which is in a war. Like that Cold War thing. The one that’s over, it ended. “Like the Cold War, it’s an ideological struggle between two fundamentally different visions of humanity. On one side are the extremists, who promise paradise, but deliver a life of public beatings and repression of women and suicide bombings.”


“The most powerful weapon in the struggle against extremism is not bullets or bombs -- it is the universal appeal of freedom.” That’s why Bush claims to like freedom so much: he thinks it’s a weapon. Also, if its appeal is universal, who are we using this weapon against?

Speaking of universal appeal, Bush says that “The communists had an imperial ideology that claimed to know the directions of history.” Bush would never be that arrogant: “Freedom is the design of our Maker, and the longing of every soul.”

So freedom is a weapon designed by God. What else is it? “Freedom is the best way to unleash the creativity and economic potential of a nation. Freedom is the only ordering of a society that leads to justice. And human freedom is the only way to achieve human rights.” Just in case you thought that human slavery was a way to achieve human rights.


He says “some” (Natan Sharansky, actually, who was in the room) have said that his goal of “ending tyranny in our world” makes him a “dissident president,” and “If standing for liberty in the world makes me a dissident, I wear that title with pride.” No it doesn’t make you a dissident. Vaclav Havel, also in the room, he was a dissident. Ask him what a real dissident experienced. In fact, you’re actually at a conference that’s lousy with real dissidents.

He has issued an order to all our ambassadors in “unfree” countries to meet with dissidents. I can’t wait to see if this policy of promoting freedom in unfree countries actually extends to issuing a list of countries we consider unfree.

He does name several, including Venezuela, where “elected leaders have resorted to shallow populism to dismantle democratic institutions and tighten their grip on power.” As I’ve mentioned before, the Bushies seem to think “populism” is a word that will make us gasp in horror. I’m not sure if shallow populism is better or worse than regular populism.


He says he will even ask “valued partners” like Egypt and Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to move toward freedom, but then praises them for their “steps to expand liberty and transparency.” He doesn’t say what these steps might be.

He says that Russian reforms have been “derailed.” He doesn’t say by whom.

Accidents do and will happen

I hate the State Department’s crappy website. I’ve been getting Condi’s budget committee testimony in dribs and drabs (by the way, do you know what a drab is? It’s a drib). Here’s another drib: she accused Hugo Chavez of practicing a “Latin brand of populism that has taken countries down the drain.” I’m kind of enjoying thinking about a brand of populism conducted entirely in Latin (“Vox populi, vox Dei,” I always say). Or, if you wanted to be even more populist, Pig Latin. Or did Condi mean something else, with salsa music and the tango and the hot Latin blood and suchlike? Populism is one of the Bushies’ swear words, although it really hasn’t caught on. You were supposed to gasp when she said it: “Populism, oh my word! heavenly mercies! oh the horror!” As I commented in October, “The Bushies don’t seem to be defining what this populism thing they’re castigating actually is, but the label is meant to somehow delegitimize leaders they dislike who nonetheless have the effrontery to win elections.”

Another drib, or possibly a drab, about building the Iraqi military and police: “To be fair, we made a mistake earlier. We relied on number rather than on quality.” I dunno, the death squads operating within the Interior Ministry seem fairly efficient.

The chief Internet guy in the Chinese government, Liu Zhengrong may or may not be horrified by the thought of populism, with or without salsa, but is afeared of “harmful information.” However, he says that Chinese censorship practices are based on those in the West, just like the Washington Post turning off comments. Oh, and the Patriot Act, it’s just like that. “We have noted that the US is doing a good job on this front.” And a Google VP told a House subcommittee, that Google’s censoring of the internet in China “was not something we did enthusiastically, or not something that we’re proud of at all.” So that’s ok, then.

There’s another reward for the death of the Danish cartoonist, this time from a cleric in Pakistan: $1 million (why must they use American currency? why not the Danish herring, or whatever they use over there?) and a car. Doesn’t say what type of car.

Harry Whittington is leaving the hospital. He says he is “deeply sorry” for the trouble he caused Dick Cheney by getting shot by him, adding, “Accidents do and will happen, and that’s what happened last Friday.” The Associated Press put a period after the word happened, covering up the worrying detail that Whittington doesn’t know what day he got shot.

Support democracy or suffer populism

Condi Rice, at Princeton of all places, on Why We Fight: “This is not some grassroots coalition of national resistance, these are barbaric killers who want to provoke nothing less than a full-scale war among Muslims across the entire Middle East.” Bush too has been saying repeatedly that the terrorists have a strategy, that they are acting according to some plan. This is all straight out of the Vietnam War playbook, denying the existence of Iraqi nationalism. And for most Americans, the reason for the continued violence is rather beside the point, the fact of it is sufficient proof that American policy isn’t working. But what’s interesting is watching the Bushies get ever more radical in their rhetoric about their supposed transformational agenda for the Middle East, coupled with a contempt for idealism that is not intertwined with the use of violence. Rice said, contemptuously, “Any champion of democracy who promotes principle without power can make no real difference in the lives of oppressed people.” And the greater the idealism, the more violence is required.

Speaking of idealism, Sen. Mel Martinez gave a speech (pdf) about the threat of a spread of “populist Chavismo” in Latin America. As I noted a few days ago, populism is the new swear word amongst the anti-Chavez crowd. Martinez also refers to “mindless populism,” and warns that one must “support democracy or suffer populism.” Come to think of it, he sounds a little like Vladimir Putin warning that Ukraine-style populist Orange revolutions won’t be tolerated in Russia. The Bushies don’t seem to be defining what this populism thing they’re castigating actually is, but the label is meant to somehow delegitimize leaders they dislike who nonetheless have the effrontery to win elections.

The Miami Herald page reporting that speech contains a Google ad for toilet paper with Fidel Castro’s face.

A new California law requires pharmacists to fill prescriptions they have a moral objection to, or make alternative arrangements that don’t inconvenience the customer.

The number of deaths on the US-Mexico border has set a record, 460 over the last year, the majority dying of heat in the Arizona desert. This is the easily predictable cost of increased border enforcement.

In other words, they have had attacks

Watch this Kinky Friedman commercial.

Thomas Shannon, the nominee to replace Roger Noriega as assistant secretary of state for hemispheric affairs, worries about Chavez-style “populism.” “The United States went through a similar process of populism, and our party structure found a way to contain it,” he said at his confirmation hearing. That’s what these people mean when they pretend to support something they call democracy: doing the minimum necessary to hold off populism. Shannon says he wants to engage Chavez in a “battle of ideas,” which would be a change of pace from his predecessor, unless “You suck” is an idea.

Bush today went further, I believe, than he has before in putting the blame for 9/11 squarely on Bill Clinton (and Reagan too, I guess):

To leave Iraq now would be to repeat the costly mistakes of the past that led to the attacks of September the 11th, 2001. The terrorists saw our response to the hostage crisis in Iran, the bombings in the Marine barracks in Lebanon, the first World Trade Center attack, the killing of American soldiers in Somalia, the destruction of two U.S. embassies in Africa, and the attack on the USS Cole. The terrorists concluded that we lacked the courage and character to defend ourselves, and so they attacked us.

Bush’s language strikes me as getting even odder, more disjointed, with more going back and rephrasing things: “Now, look, they’ve been successful on attacks. They were successful here. They’ve been successful in London and Madrid. In other words, they have had attacks.”

He explains the philosophical underpinnings of his foreign policy: “See, democracy trumps their view of the world. Democracy trumps Taliban-type regimes, because it’s free.”

Not 90 minutes later, displaying no sense that he was aware of any contradiction, he was welcoming the King of Jordan to the White House, telling him, “Your Majesty is a leader and the United States of America respects his leadership a lot.”

The proof is complete, If only I’ve stated it thrice

It’s that time again, another September 11, and doesn’t it seem that the events of 9/11/01 have been transmuted into Republican Party property, so that it becomes increasingly hard for the rest of us to commemorate the loss of life without being in some way on the defensive? (Kerry, with his unerring populism, will be honoring the dead at the... Boston Opera House). Robert Fisk notes that the oddness of the path by which the US is commemorating by bombing Fallujah, a place very few of us had heard of 3 years ago, in what seems to have become the “war on terror,” which used to be the “war on terrorism,” but in a twist Orwell did not predict, we are gradually dropping from political discourse every word, like terrorism, that George Bush cannot pronounce. In a second Bush term (heaven forfend), people who pronounce the word nuclear correctly will be flogged in the town square.

What Fisk ignores is the indubitable fact that Dick Cheney has said that Iraq was a sanctuary for Al Qaida. It is indubitable because Dick Cheney keeps repeating it, which is all the proof needed by the Bushies:

“Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice:
That alone should encourage the crew.
Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice:
What I tell you three times is true.”

(WaPo: “Five times in his speech in West Virginia, Bush spoke of making the country and the world ‘safer.’”)

Unimaginable under Baath Party rule

Shiites at the Iraqi national conference loudly protested the forthcoming Battle of Najaf. The WaPo, oddly, calls it a “scene of political activism that would have been unimaginable under Baath Party rule.” Really? I think Saddam would have allowed protests against an American invasion of Najaf.

The attempt to overthrow Hugo Chavez by referendum has failed, and I am of two or more minds. I don’t especially like Chavez, but he pisses off some of the people I like to see pissed off, is what it amounts to. The US and the National Endowment for Democracy has been going after him using all the techniques familiar from their campaign against Allende in Chile in the early ‘70s, white-skinned Venezuelan capitalists are horrified at having a government that doesn’t reflect their interests. But the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend.

Maybe the best approach is regional rather than national: what’s best for South America as a whole? The transition over the last 20 years from military dictatorships to something resembling representative democracies has been impressive, but the veneer of democratic sensibility may not be very deep. From the perspective of democracy, events in Venezuela are close to a wash. Before winning office, Chavez headed a failed military coup; he should never have been allowed to run, but that was 6 years ago and he’s won several elections since then. His instincts are authoritarian and his followers use intimidatory violence, but he hasn’t moved against the newspapers, radio and tv stations which are almost uniformly hostile to him. He has trashed the institutions of government, courts and so on, but they were controlled by the country-club elite, but Chavez’s so-called populism is not embodied in any institutions--with any leader, you can gauge their relationship to real democracy by asking what would happen if they died suddenly in a plane crash, and Chavez (like Putin, say) does not score well there.

As for the referendum, well, Chavez allowed it to occur, but only after many delays, but I don’t believe that the opposition actually collected the required number of signatures (the US told the election commission it should ignore such “technicalities”). The opposition won’t accept the results, and Chavez probably wouldn’t have if it had gone the other way (assuming that the counting was reasonably fair, of course). Neither side is committed to democracy, both sides have shown a willingness to resort to coups and see the electoral process only as one weapon in their arsenal. Whatever works. Whether the electorate viewed the process so cynically and instrumentally, I’m less sure.

At any rate, the referendum in Venezuela would probably also have been unimaginable under Baath Party rule.