Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? - Grasping Reality with Both Hands
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Grasping Reality with Both Hands The Semi-Daily Journal of Economist J. Bradford DeLong: Fair, Balanced, RealityBased, and Even-Handed Department of Economics, U.C. Berkeley #3880, Berkeley, CA 94720-3880; 925 708 0467; delong@econ.berkeley.edu.
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Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? That was the question asked by Denver University Professor Alan Gilbert during the morning panel. Here is the answer I gave, as best as I can reconstruct it: The question is: "Is there hope for the rule of law in America?" My answer is: No. Begin with the assassination of George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham and Prime Minister to King Charles I Stuart, on 23 August 1628. Nobody at the time doubted the king's power to torture the confessed assassin, John Felton, on the rack--the king's father James I Stuart had tortured Guy Fawkes and the other Gunpowder Plot suspects. But the king's power to torture was part of his prerogative powers of state, and Charles I Stuart sought to reserve his prerogative powers for use in more important arenas--that is, to raise money with them. Thus Charles I asked his judges to authorize the torture of John Felton not as an act of state under the royal prerogative but as part of the process of the criminal law. And let's let William Blackstone pick up the story at IV, 25, 326 of his Commentaries on the Laws of England: [T]rial by rack is utterly unknown to the law of England; though once... [the] ministers of Henry IV [Lancaster]... laid a design to introduce the civil law into the kingdom as a rule of government... erected a rack for torture, which was called in derision the Duke of Exeter's daughter, and still remains in the Tower of London; where it was occasionally used as an engine of state, not of law, more than once in the reign of queen Elizabeth. But when, upon the assassination of Villiers, duke of Buckingham, by Felton, it http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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was proposed in the privy council to put the assassin to the rack in order to discover his accomplices, the judges, being consulted, declared unanimously, to their own honour and the honour of English law, that no such proceeding was allowable by the laws of England... With the Great Revolution of the 1640s the prerogative powers of the monarch of the United Kingdom shrank. And with the Glorious Revolution they shrank again. And with the accession of the German-speaking Hanover dynasty they shrank yet again. And by 1789, when James Madison and company moved the then-powers of the monarch of the United Kingdom to make them the powers of the President of the United States, there were no prerogative powers left: the President was 100% Chief Magistrate with the power and the duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, and 0% princeps legibus solutus. So things stood for 200 years--save for Abraham Lincoln's arrogation of Congress's Art.I ยง9 power to suspend the "privilege of the writ of habeas corpus in "cases of rebellion or invasion" but only when such suspension was "required" for the public safety. So things stood until John Yoo. Now John Yoo is an interesting case. In 2000 he was arguing at the Cato Institute that the President's powers as commander-in-chief were extremely crabbed and narrow-and that President Clinton had, in fact, exceeded his c-in-c powers and undermined the rule of law by ordering American soldiers to obey the orders of a British NATO general. That the president--or, indeed, that any commander--does not have the power to place American soldiers under allied command would have been a great shock to Dwight D. Eisenhower, or Harry S Truman, or Franklin D. Roosevelt, or Woodrow Wilson, or William McKinley, or indeed George Washington himself. Yoo's claim in 2000 had absolutely no warrant in the constitution, in the law, in precedent, or in history. But that is how it is with Yoo. Sources who should know and whom I believe to be reliable tell me that when histenure case moved through the University of California at Berkeley, historians objected to his use of history in his published articles: "What the frackity-frack is this?" they asked. "This isn't history. This isn't how it happened. This isn't wie es eigentlich gewesen." The response of then then-Dean of Berkeley Law School, a response that was convincing to the then-Chancellor of the University of California is said to have been that history plays a special role in legal academia and argument. In legal academia, one's claims about history do not have to be true, the argument went. Indeed, a major mode of legal argumentation and academic debate is to make false claims about what the law has been in past in the hope that those claims will then shape what the law will be in the future. By 2001 with a Republican as president John Yoo had reversed field 180 degrees. He was making a very different set of false claims about what the law of America had been. He was then claiming that the president's commander-in-chief powers contained within them prerogative powers to torture and kill outside of legal procedure that would have astonished George III Hanover, and even exceeded those of William I Conqueror. When William I Conqueror tortured or killed, he agreed owed his barons at least an after-the-fact accounting of why if not any before-the-fact procedural checks. Backed by John Yoo and company, George W. Bush claimed that he did not owe even
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an after-the-fact accounting. And Barack Obama holds to the same line. So I see no hope. Brad DeLong on September 26, 2010 at 04:46 PM in Moral Responsibility, Obama Administration, Politics: Civil Liberties, Strategy: Grand Strategy, Utter Stupidity | Permalink Favorite
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Comments Wexit said... Berkeley City Council Declares “NO To Torture” Week Oct. 10-16 In a move welcomed by civil liberties and human rights groups nationally, last week the Berkeley City Council unanimously approved a resolution declaring “Berkeley Says No to Torture” Week (October 10-16). The resolution emerged from a grassroots campaign supported by many local organizations and leaders. The campaign will present a week of public educational events, many featuring prominent writers, attorneys, protest leaders, artists and religious leaders. These panels, debates, bookstore and museum events will take place throughout Berkeley. Anti-torture protest demonstrations are also scheduled. A personal statement supporting “Berkeley Says No to Torture” Week from Fernando Botero, the internationally acclaimed artist whose “The Abu Ghraib Series” paintings are now in the permanent collection of the UC Berkeley Art Museum, can be found along with more event details at http://www.WeSayNoToTorture.net. On their website the organizers say: “[We] are condemning the American torture program made infamous to the world through the leaked photographs from Abu Ghraib and a wealth of damning evidence marshaled in recent years through the work of journalists, legal and civil rights forces, and filmmakers. Under the regime of Bush/Cheney, their program of nightmarish war crimes was committed in our names then – but illegal torture and abuse, and the shredding of basic legal and human rights for whole “enemy” populations, is continuing now, long past Bush and under the new Democratic administration.” The theatrical reading “Reckoning with Torture,” originated by the ACLU and the American Pen Center, will take the stage at UC Berkeley Law’s Booth Auditorium on October 15. This West Coast premiere production of “Reckoning” will feature nationally known civil liberties leaders, poets and actors, and the voices of torture survivors http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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themselves. For a full calendar go to http://www.WeSayNoToTorture.net. For more information or interviews with representatives of participating organizations go to that website’s ABOUT page. For interviews with World Can’t Wait, contact Linda Jacobs. The “Berkeley Says No to Torture” Week is a collaborative project of these organizations and individuals: World Can’t Wait, National Lawyers Guild (San Francisco), Progressive Democrats of America, Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, National Accountability Action Network, Code Pink, FireJohnYoo.org, Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Social Justice Committee, Rev. Kurt Kuhwald, Bill of Rights Defense Committee, East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, Flashpoints Radio (KPFA), Haiti Action Committee, La Raza Centro Legal, Moe’s Bookstore, Revolution Books, School of the Americas Watch(SOAW) East Bay and SF chapters, Fr. Louis Vitale, OFM, WarCriminalsWatch.org, and Al Young (California Poet Laureate Emeritus) Reply September 26, 2010 at 05:14 PM latinist said... "By 2001 with a Republican as president John Yoo had reversed field 180%." Are you sure you don't mean he had made a 100-degree turn? Reply September 26, 2010 at 05:25 PM Mark Field said... If you really want to be depressed, read the discussion at Volokh: http://volokh.com/2010/09/25/administration-invokes-state-secrets-in-targetedkilling-case/comment-page-5/#comment-968448 Reply September 26, 2010 at 05:35 PM Trainwreck said... "Indeed, a major mode of legal argumentation and academic debate is to make false claims about what the law has been in past in the hope that those claims will then shape what the law will be in the future." That, thank god was not what I was taught in law school. And in fact one gets dangerously close to violating the rules of professional conduct when one resorts to making up facts or by claiming the law to be what one knows clearly it is not. As stated in the ABA's Model Rules of Professional Conduct: Advocate Rule 3.3 Candor Toward The Tribunal (a) A lawyer shall not knowingly: (1) make a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal or fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer; (2) fail to disclose to the tribunal legal authority in the controlling jurisdiction known to the lawyer to be directly adverse to the position of the client and not disclosed by opposing counsel; or (3) offer evidence that the lawyer knows to be false. If a lawyer, the lawyer’s client, or a witness called by the lawyer, has offered material evidence and the lawyer comes to know of its falsity, the lawyer shall take reasonable remedial measures, including, if necessary, disclosure to the tribunal. A lawyer may refuse to offer evidence, other than the testimony of a defendant in a criminal matter, that the lawyer reasonably believes is false. http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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http://www.abanet.org/cpr/mrpc/rule_3_3.html Reply September 26, 2010 at 06:51 PM David Cay Johnston said... Brad, That is a shocking assertion about made up facts by Prof. John Yoo. If provable, it ought to be a major concern to the entire faculty. Forget what you or I think of Yoo's legal reasoning, making up facts is lying. In my old line of work it was an automatic firing offense on the first occasion if someone made a solid case. Among my colleagues in my new profession lecturing at Syracuse Law and grad biz schools I cannot imagine anyone tolerating manufacturing facts in a published paper. Mistakes? Sure. We all make them. Bizarre interpretations. Sure. But making stuff up is lying. Period. And it ought to get one fired. Period. So has anyone investigated this, as we have seen other universities do with medical, physics and other hard science professors? Reply September 26, 2010 at 06:55 PM save_the_rustbelt said... If we disbarred every lawyer who bent or stretched the truth there wouldn't be many lawyers. If we denied tenure to every economist who makes a very bad argument (say, NAFTA will be good for US workers) there would be few economists. Or maybe we should consider the innocent women and children who died at the orders of Janet Reno. It is a very complicated world. The list of perfect public officials is very short. Reply September 26, 2010 at 07:05 PM dilbert dogbert said... Rusty, The discussion is about the bush administration and the torture memos. Specifically Yoo and the rule of law. Reply September 26, 2010 at 07:32 PM Brad DeLong said in reply to David Cay Johnston... The then-Berkeley Dean is correct, however, in that this is how much legal argument has worked. Vide William Best in 1824 on seventeenth century judge Edward Coke: The fact is, Lord Coke had no authority for what he states, but I am afraid we should get rid of a great deal of what is considered law... if what Lord Coke says without authority is not law... Yours, Brad DeLong Reply September 26, 2010 at 07:38 PM Trainwreck said in reply to save_the_rustbelt... As an attorney I am not afraid to say that no other profession should be held to a
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higher level of ethical conduct then those that practice the field of law. Many attorneys lose their law licence or get seriously sactioned by forgetting their ethical responsibilities. Essentially, we can live by the rule of law and hold those that practice it to a high standard of ethics or we can live by the rule of power, and cave to the practice of bribery, thuggery and outright persecution. Banana republics, totalitarian states and oligarchies govern by the later, I would rather be governed by the former. Reply September 26, 2010 at 08:09 PM Bob Athay said... "... is said to have been that history plays a special role in legal academia and argument. In legal academia, one's claims about history do not have to be true..." WTF?!? I hope the dean didn't actually say that asserting as historical fact something that is provably false is allowable in legal academia. Asserting as true something that is _not provably false_ is one thing: even in the hard sciences experimental results are often ambiguous. But asserting as fact something that is _known_ to be false is another matter entirely. Reply September 26, 2010 at 08:22 PM DrDick said in reply to Trainwreck... I hope you have a valid passport and can get a visa. I share Brad's pessimistic outlook and fear that the Republicans and our economic elites are determined to transform this country into a third world banana republic. Reply September 26, 2010 at 08:45 PM Trainwreck said... I never said we as a nation were not on the path toward banana republic, I am simply saying if you desire a true democratic republic, then you should always defend to your death the rule of law. Those that oppose the rule of law have earned the right to hang by the rule of might. Rule of law or rule of power, make your choice. Reply September 26, 2010 at 09:12 PM RW said in reply to save_the_rustbelt... Pathetic and oddly convenient: Your world has suddenly become too complex for ethical revulsion? Either the projected Republican electoral victory has emboldened you or you're slipping but, regardless, neither your moral equivocation nor interjection of non sequitur* is edifying. *Although your comment WRT Reno is utterly irrelevant to the current discussion Woo's memos guided national policy and constitutional interpretation whereas the deaths at Waco were an operational administrative decision -- one can grant that the (allegedly abused) children who died at Koresh's funeral pyre were innocent; but no one else was, no one. Reply September 26, 2010 at 09:54 PM AlanDownunder said... While Presidents tell Attorneys General who and who not to prosecute, the rule of law is suspended. Since Obama has told Holder not to prosecute even the crimes of the prior administration for which there are public confessions ("looking forward" is, I gather, the euphemism), there is now very little hope. Holder could also prosecute Obama for authorising targeted assassinations. Reply September 26, 2010 at 11:10 PM http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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joe said... As the quip goes: When the facts are on your side, argue the facts. When the law is on your side, argue the law. When neither is on your side, just argue! Of course that doesn't excuse Yoo in the least. The real tragedy is that there is so little public outrage. Reply September 26, 2010 at 11:39 PM r.d. said... To those who are in favor of the rule of law? What do you think about the "living Constitution" view, that the SCOTUS can essentially bend the meaning of the Constitution as far as it wants in order to effect good outcomes? Reply September 27, 2010 at 02:16 AM save_the_rustbelt said... NYT: U.S. seeking to expand wiretaps on the internet Washington -- Federal law enforcement and national security officials are preparing to seek sweeping new regulations of the Internet, arguing that their ability to wiretap criminal and terrorism suspects is "going dark" as people increasingly communicate online instead of by telephone. - 8:44 am So much for obama the liberal. Reply September 27, 2010 at 05:57 AM DrDick said in reply to r.d.... I know that the blatant politicization and activism of the Roberts' Court is a major problem, but the Constitution is not and never was intended to be a static document. The Supreme Court was already reshaping and extending provisions within a decade of ratification. Reply September 27, 2010 at 07:17 AM Mark Field said in reply to r.d.... Since that's a caricature of living constitutionalism, I don't spend any time thinking about it at all. Reply September 27, 2010 at 07:51 AM howard said in reply to r.d.... r.d.: i think what you've said is a complete myth, so i don't have to worry about it and i do continue to believe in the rule of law. if you want to say something reasonable, like "there are times when the supreme court finds an argument that i can't agree with," i agree completely, but that's an entirely different matter. words are interpreted: anyone who thinks otherwise doesn't belong in the discussion at all. Reply September 27, 2010 at 07:55 AM howard said in reply to save_the_rustbelt... because of course, save_the_rustbelt, there are lots of us who think that obama is a liberal. whatever are you carrying on about? the man voted for FISA immunity in 2008: that was the moment that made it clear that he was no liberal and he was, in terms of state power, not hugely dissimilar to john yoo.
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who among us can you point to in september, 2010 that thinks obama is a "liberal?" (and no, right-wingers saying he's a socialist don't count). Reply September 27, 2010 at 07:57 AM aimai said... I think a more adqueate response to r.d., though I appreciate Mark Field's "No more interesting in arguing with you than with a dining room table..." approach, is to point out that when law makers make law that is, definitionally, following the rule of law. A one off "this is not a precedent" ruling, such as Bush v. Gore, would, of course, not be lawful in any meaningful sense. But the problem isn't that it bends or perverts founding documents but that it refuses to admit that it carves out a special case which can not serve as precedent and thus breaks the chain of reasoning and lawful acts that makes things lawful or not lawful. Actuall, Mark Field's was in the right of it. I'll go with what he said. aimai Reply September 27, 2010 at 07:59 AM Manta1976 said... Dear Brad, if your account of what happened at Yoo's tenure is accurate, the Dean and the Chancellor should be fired, the whole Berkeley law school should be scrapped and redone from scratch, and if Yoo is still tenured, it's because he is in good company in the faculty. Therefore, I urge you to investigate more in deep these claims. Reply September 27, 2010 at 08:00 AM Adams said... This post earns you back some of the cred you lost with last week's fawning adulatory apologia of Larry Summers "tenure" at the W. H. You might have totally redeemed yourself if you had mentioned the extent to which the Orahma administration has broadened and deepened the executive assault on the rule of law. Or at least linked to Glennzilla: http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/09/25/secrecy/index.html Reply September 27, 2010 at 08:42 AM Brad DeLong said in reply to Adams... Take the link to Glennzilla as made... Reply September 27, 2010 at 08:46 AM nilso said in reply to Manta1976... You took the words right out of my mouth. At what point does "academic freedom" become academic malfeasance, and thus no longer defensible? If *anything* can be excused under the aegis of "academic freedom", then you have a loophole in the law, allowing a breakdown in our system of laws. Oh, that's what Prof. DeLong was saying! So when do the dean and the chancellor get called to account for this continuing coverup of malfeasance? Reply September 27, 2010 at 08:54 AM Adams said... Please consider yourself redeemed. In the political sense only, of course. Reply September 27, 2010 at 08:58 AM Patrick (G) said... http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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Obama's position RE: Torture can be considered in this way: We know that the U.S. Military forces(and unnamed national security agencies) have committed egregious war crimes such as systematic torture of prisoners in violation of U.S. Laws and treaties. If they were honestly investigated, tried, and punished according to the established legal precedents, the end result would be a whole bunch of U.S. generals summarily executed by firing squad. Ain't gonna happen. Hell, Obama's administration couldn't conduct Bank stress tests without pulling their punches, what makes you think they'd do better facing down military officers currently engaged in two wars instead of fat cat bankers with insolvent banks? Reply September 27, 2010 at 09:51 AM Manta1976 said in reply to nilso... Truth to be told, I think Brad's account is exaggerated (being hearsay, and so on). However, the reputation of a department (and of a whole discipline) rest heavily on the assumption that the kind of things Brad claimed do NOT happen, and when they are discovered, tehy are punished. Knowlingly making false claims to advance one's argument is the highest form of academic malfeasance I could conceive (much worse, for instance, than plagiarism), because much of the academic discourse is based on assuming good faith in your interlocutor. On the other hand, it could become a neat slogan for Berkeley's law school: "Making up facts, since 1894". Reply September 27, 2010 at 10:22 AM Indigenous Centurion said... " tortured Guy Fawkes and the other Gunpowder Plot " ~~Brad DeLong~ A penny for the Guy? Reply September 27, 2010 at 11:31 AM Brad DeLong said in reply to Manta1976... RE: Truth to be told, I think Brads account is exaggerated (being hearsay, and so on). Perhaps. It would be nice to know... Yours, Brad DeLong Reply September 27, 2010 at 11:42 AM Confabulator said... My terse summary: Bush/Yoo usher in a new era sans rule of law. Barack Change-YouCan-Believe-In Obama gives them a pass and picks up where they left off. Both parties are now complicit leaving the electorate with no place to go. We have the added bonus
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of cover being provided by a top university so the intellectuals are in on it too. And, as an aside, thanks to our Supremes we now have large (multi-national) corporations exercising their free speech rights to elect those politicians that will serve them best and jettison those who won't throw the voters under the bus. So who cares about us?!? No one. We're f*cked. Reply September 27, 2010 at 01:11 PM Maynard Handley said... It seems to me that the large scale history of these things has always been that law and custom are written up, followed, and twisted and bent, to protect some at the top from the rest at the top. Whether it's Roman law or Magna Carta or the US "3/5ths" Constitution --- to the extent that anyone else gets protection, that's unexpected fallout from what happens at the top. Occasionally we get Gracchi brothers who figure they can derive power (and, who knows, maybe they actually care about improving the world along the way?), from harnessing the masses, but that's a problematic route because, sad to say, the masses are generally short-sighted idiots with poor impulse control, no ability to plan, and remarkably susceptible to believing whatever nonsense they are told. THUS to our current situation. I don't believe hope for the future will come from the law --- that magnificent profession that gave us (and happily continues to coddle) John Yoo, not to mention Scalia, Alito et al and their "Bush gets the presidency, but this decision is a one-off that never gets to be used for any other purpose again". And I don't believe hope for the future from the masses, no more impressive than their Roman contemporaries. The US aristocracy can keep them in control for as long as necessary by distracting them with nonsense about gay marriage or wars on christmas on similar nonsense and, when things get really tough, will bring out the big guns in distracting them --- "maybe, just maybe, if you're all good little citizens, we might federally legalize marijuana". Whether by design or accident, the US has constructed a system that manages to allow many of the brightest to escape from the masses. They don't get to the upper echelons, for the most part, but they do get a mortgage and a job --- enough that it doesn't make sense to risk it all on violence and political extremism. (Unlike South Africa and unlike Israel, where there were and are large populations with little to lose.) So the only real hope would be if the upper class felt that they might be hurt by law. Of course they might by criminal law, hence, truth is, they have no REAL complaints about Miranda and insanely complicated laws of procedure, evidence, jury selection, etc. The more such complications there are, the better for allowing a $5000/an hour lawyer to get young Biff III off the hook for drunk driving or raping his girlfriend or whatever it was. (cf any celebrity trial of the past 50 years). On the other hand, any sort of REAL attempt to crackdown on white collar crime or tax evasion or insurance fraud, we can't have that. So we get punishment for those who were simply too stupid or too greedy to hide what they were doing, but life goes on as before for everyone else. Which all means that as long as torture, rendition, targeted assassination etc are deployed against what "we" all *agree* are enemies of the state, they'll continue without much pushback. So what will happen? Possibility 1 is over-reach by some future president. Rather than sticking to wiping out http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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foreigners with funny names that no-one has ever heard of, he'll conclude that life would be much simpler if he had someone wipe out Tom Becks, the uppity preacher of Canterbury Road Church in San Marino. Or some nosy journalist. Or a judge who won't do what he's told. Possibility 2 would be a disagreement about who counts as an enemy of the state. There are few Muslims and Arabs among those in power in the US, but the US didn't have much problem with *Irish* terrorists, and, well, there's *no such thing* as Israeli terrorism is there? It's hard (at least for me) to see any obvious path from the current targets of the three-minute hate to more popular groups; but I could see it happening. Perhaps China comes down unequivocally on the side of Iran, followed by most of the rest of Asia? Which will happen first? (1) is easier to understand, but would take a remarkably stupid and tone-deaf president+support staff. (On the other hand, could I see someone like Palin or O'Donnell ordering it in a fit of pique? I guess so. On the third hand, I do not think Palin or O'Donnell could win the presidency --- they are too loathed. On the fourth hand, Palin was supposed to be VP to a guy that could have a heart attack tomorrow! On the fifth hand, he lost, and Palin was at least part of the reason for that lost.) (2) relies on the behavior of the outside world, and that's even more difficult to predict than what happens in the US. Resource shortages are going to lead to an angrier, less pleasant world, with rather more US "you're with us or against us" screaming at the top of the lungs, and one after another, China, then India, then Europe, are going to lose patience, very publicly and obviously, with this. SO: If I had to bet, my be would be that - US torture et al will be with us for quite some time (the rest of my lifetime) - the president will be smart enough NOT to use them against domestic opponents (and mission creep, like using the patriot act against copyright infringement will be kept at a low-enough level to generate little serious pushback) - the consensus will *eventually* collapse through taking things too widely in the "war against everyone outside the US who thinks THEY have the right to OUR oil (and copper and uranium and transition metals and ...)" But, to return to my point --- the way this will play out is how it threatens those with power in the US, not based on claims of law, history, christian decency et al. Reply September 27, 2010 at 02:18 PM Will said... Whom do we have to blame for this? Who was the chancellor at the time? Was it fricking Berdahl? I always knew there was something that was not right about that guy. Reply September 27, 2010 at 05:21 PM Graydon said... Rule of law only works when people believe in it enough to find their kith and kin guilty when they are. Once you get people believing in their wealth, and not the system of public good, well. The system crashes, because any political system means giving up direct benefit for indirect benefit. During that crash, people stop believing in the various core axioms of the system, because either what they are doing is very bad, or the axiom can't be right. The US hegemony is busy collapsing; it is going unusually fast because the US has spend a hundred years or so making a preponderance of terrible policy decisions based http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2010/09/social-studies-50th-anniversary-symposium-is-there-hope-for-the-rule-of-law-in-america.html
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Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? - Grasping Reality with Both Hands
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on preferring capitalism to democracy. It's likely going unusually hard because there's a terrible global crisis involved. Anyone in power with the intellectual attainments plausibly exceeding those of cabbage knows these things, if they can stand to be honest about the subject. That the ability -- in skill, treasure, and (still) time -- to fix the mess exists is obvious. That the requirement -- driven by technology as much as circumstances -- is to give up on having an upper class, to give up on the organizational and social legitimacy of the _idea_ of an upper class, is also pretty obvious. (Said upper class keeps making these horrible, horrible decisions, and they're not even _effective_ horrible decisions. The less said about the decisions of those wanting into that upper class the better.) Which puts me right solidly with Brad in "no hope"; I can't think of a single example of an upper class deciding to stop being an upper class for the common good in the entire history of the world. Reply September 27, 2010 at 06:03 PM Lex said... Unfortunately, I'm with Prof. DeLong on this. This made me an unpopular Republican during the Bush regime and it has made me unpopular with Obama supporters given HIS recent excesses (for which I called a while back for his impeachment and removal from office just as I did with Bush). But, no, I think we've started down the road from which there is no returning. The U.S. It was a really good idea. Reply September 28, 2010 at 10:34 AM Anon. said in reply to Maynard Handley... Manynard Handley wrote: "Whether by design or accident, the US has constructed a system that manages to allow many of the brightest to escape from the masses. They don't get to the upper echelons, for the most part, but they do get a mortgage and a job --- enough that it doesn't make sense to risk it all on violence and political extremism." Um, have you been paying attention to the economic malpractice of the elites? Social mobility is hitting new lows and the scenario you describe is becoming quite close to impossible. Therefore, don't count the oppressed out. As for your other two options, the Don Siegelman case shows that trumped-up charges are now routinely used to suppress political opposition; I see no reason why any Republican would avoid adding assassinations to their arsenal. You're right that option (2) seems more likely to cause the outright collapse. Reply September 30, 2010 at 02:08 AM Comment below or sign in with TypePad
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Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? - Grasping Reality with Both Hands
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Procrustean Economics (Wonkish)
economics DeLong
Me:
New York Times (blog) - Sep 30, 2010 Brad DeLong manfully takes on the efforts of various commentators to define away the paradox of thrift and redefine our current problems as somehow wholly ... Related Articles » « Previous Next »
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Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? - Grasping Reality with Both Hands
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Social Studies 50th Anniversary Symposium: Is There Hope for the Rule of Law in America? - Grasping Reality with Both Hands
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