Aside from all the trifling nonsense that drowns us in political banality, there are some substantive differences between the two major parties vying for the White House today. First among them, are the sorts of picks for our federal justices.
Our two major parties do share some structural corruptions, and those, theoretically, could be addressed by constitutional interpretations of the the courts - and yes, they are interpretations, no matter who is, by definition, interpreting.
There's a log jam these days, and though rarely said, it's in the supposedly "conservative," "constructionist," "textualist" (what Scalia says he is) courts.
Take "Citizens United." It has to be among the worst decisions of the SCOTUS, ever.
We now have this complex web of interstate campaigning, something the Founders simply hadn't envisioned at all, running amok, even though billions of dollars of interstate commerce is taking place, while the federal government is essentially forbidden to know what's going on. It's insane, and unconstitutional.
The modern SCOTUS was able to hold up the "Obamacare mandate," while also reading narrowly, "textually," in the Ledbetter decision, while allowing unlimited abuse of tax exempt political organizations to spend unlimited money on interstate campaigning.
How does it do this?
Well, for one, it's also all theoretically constitutional. And of course, to any decent person, it's abhorrent and unnecessary, because it would be just as easily constitutional to have decided the opposite in each of those major cases. It just goes to show how a few well-written words can go a long way, even in the wrong way.
The "Obamacare mandate?"
The court should have thrown it back to the congress to either make constitutional law of direct taxes on non-transactions, or hand it to the states to make an amendment. They decided it was impossible to do so as we have extensive federal taxes on indirect taxes. And in all those taxes, essentially, we all pay taxes for doing nothing.
Roberts made that decision for long-term political considerations. He wants to keep the corporate tax up so as to keep the personal high-income taxes low. All Republicans secretly want that, as they sound the drums ostensibly against it. Democrats are suckered into this as well, because of that structural corruption I mentioned above.
That's part of why Romney won the nomination - he had the most meager cut in the corporate tax.
Unfortunately for we average Americans, this makes us less competitive abroad with our exports, and with our employer-based healthcare system, we are two lengths behind.
I wish "conservatives," who truly love "their country," would think on that.
Ledbetter?
The violations perpetrated on her dated back for years and years before she recognized them. The law certainly allowed for the court to consider her losses over time dating far before they decided. Just read it. It was the most narrow interpretation one could imagine. Read it.
Citizens United...
...has the court throwing up it's hands, and throwing out the 10th Amendment - without even looking at it. This while the way election law was structured then, and all the possible other law that could relate, it was not structured to deal with the influx of powerful private interests that could unbalance the elections, the society, the nation, the U.S. of A - all of us.
The SCOTUS could have thrown it back to the states, given their interpretation, but rather they saw a open, crooked, whore house door, and decided to walk us all through.
The difference between the Democrats and the Republicans?
The Dems are a little better at picking judges, and we need that today to halt the radically conservative, activist courts sitting in America today.
Our laws are useless if our courts intellectually reside in the 18th century.
It is the Supreme Court, and the mostly conservative rest of the Third Estate, I blame for our political log-jam today. A vote for Romney will guarantee such bad decisions. And those decisions are foundations of the structural corruption we have in our politics today.
Please think about that, "conservatives."
JMJ