Here at the League, Mark Thompson has written a great post detailing both a serious problem with our institutional arrangement and its potential solution.  I’m not going to do much block-quoting (though I recommend reading the whole thing), but it suffices to say that Mark wants to make the presidency and Congress more accountable for their failures.  That is, as it stands, even though legislation originates in and is written by Congress, the outsized role of the presidency means that in the public eye, it’s the president who is to blame for failed or ineffective legislation, even if the prerogative lies with the legislature.  Mark’s solution then, is to nationalize elections for the Speaker of the House, in hopes that having a nationally recognized leader of the House would focus criticism where it rightly belongs.  Here’s Mark in his own words:

The most obvious reason why this proposal would greatly reduce regulatory capture and the growth of Executive Power is that it would give voters someone to hold accountable specifically for the passage of legislation. Under our current system, narrow local interests are able to turn national legislation into little more than a giant rent-seeking operation, while the scope of the legislation becomes severely watered down. There is no one to hold accountable for this – if your district gets none of the rent-seeking, you have to be content with “well, it’s better than nothing,” or “well, at least my Congresslizard voted against it.”

Mark’s diagnosis focuses on the problem of accountability and I understand why: as long as its virtually impossible to hold Congress responsible for its failures, we will continue to play this silly game where we pretend that electing a new president will have some measurable effect on Congress’ ability to pass actual legislation, rather than the thinly veiled-giveaways to corporate or parochial interests that passes for legislation.  That said, I’m not sure if increased accountability – through Mark’s solution or any other – should be our first concern.  Before we try to steer Congress towards greater accountability, I think we should first attempt to steer Congress towards greater responsiveness.  That potentially far-reaching legislation is nearly always tamed and de-fanged is partially (or even mostly) a product of the huge number of veto points that exist within our system, including extra-constitutional requirements like the filibuster.

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The point of redistributive taxation isn’t to soak the rich – raising taxes, after all, imposes economic penalties. The larger goal is to improve the lot of poor and middle class citizens through redistributive programs. If the effectiveness of those programs is compromised by the Democratic Party’s core constituencies – teacher unions, the pro-immigration lobby – then perhaps it’s time to reconsider the scope of the Left’s political ambitions.

I agree that the point of redistributive taxation is to improve the lot of poor and middle class citizens and not, as I sometimes suggest, to soak the rich (though to be honest, I would really enjoy to see the rich soaked, if only to satisfy my class resentment*).  Insofar that I disagree with Will’s post – and Douthat’s column more generally – it’s in the idea that “the effectiveness of those problems is compromised by the Democratic Party’s core constituencies.”  That is, I’m not convinced that core constituencies qua core constituencies have that much influence over the policy-making process.

Or in other words, insofar that constituent groups or interest groups can compromise the passage of legislation – and particularly very big legislation – it’s because they can take advantage of the various veto points in the legislative process.  The stimulus, to use one of Will’s examples, was so incredibly pork laden in part because – in the absence of overwhelming legislative support – the only way to get the bill through was to fatten it up with goodies and sweeteners.  The same will be true of the final health care bill: it’s not so much that any one group can exert so much influence that they override the preferences of the legislators and water down the bill considerably, as it is that legislators have to essentially buy votes by paying off whichever parochial interests happens to want something because there isn’t enough consensus to override said interests (Kevin Drum made this point really well not too long ago).

As it stands, our institutions give interest groups the room to have a ton of influence, and give legislators plenty of incentive to give into that influence.  So, to get back to Will’s post, the Left (and the Right for that matter) does need to reconsider the scope of its political ambitions.  I happen to think that both sides need to widen that scope, and aim not just for passing good policy, but for reforming the institutions of governance**.

*Most of which is a product of my time at UVA.

**It’s worth adding that I might be completely wrong about this entire post.