Monthly Archives: January 2009

Patronage versus Progress

Whoever said “The more things change, the more they stay the same,” was probably thinking of Indiana.

Governor Mitch Daniels recently held a press conference at which he addressed the critical challenges now facing our state. He was flanked by former Governor Joe Kernan, a Democrat, and Indiana Chief Justice Randall Shepard, a Republican. The message was simple and direct: Indiana’s looming fiscal crisis makes adoption of the Kernan-Shepard Commission recommendations especially urgent.

The response of Indiana elected officials was dispiriting, to put it mildly. According to the Indianapolis Star, “ County officials said they don’t want to give up their elected positions. School boards stressed that they oppose forced consolidation. And House Speaker B. Patrick Bauer said the General Assembly has more pressing matters to consider next year than ‘an academic’s view of how government should operate, without any consideration given to whether such ideas are practical, or even feasible, in the real world.’”

Bauer’s comment, in particular, reminded me why the late Harrison Ullmann used to call the Indiana General Assembly “The World’s Worst Legislature.” It also reminded me of a lengthy conversation I had some years ago with George Geib, Indiana’s pre-eminent political historian. As he told me then, what really drives Indiana’s political culture is not ideology, but patronage.

Patronage and political self-interest have kept Indiana’s government bloated, costly and inefficient. In fact, the only good thing you can say about our resistance to modernization is that the effort to keep state government mired in the late 1800s has been entirely bipartisan—a lonely example of co-operation in our otherwise polarized politics.

It is understandable that people whose jobs are on the line would resist efforts to bring Indiana into the 21st century. But it was Pat Bauer’s snide dismissal of the Kernan-Shepard recommendations as “academic” that provided us with a perfect example of what is wrong with the Indiana General Assembly.

Leaving aside the use of the word “academic” to mean nonsensical (okay, I’m a bit sensitive there!), how many overlapping units of government does Bauer’s “real world” need? Indiana has 3100 units of government, run by 10,300 people paid for with our tax dollars. We have more counties than California. The reforms recommended by the Commission have long characterized government in most other states.

Maybe this slicing and dicing of jurisdictions into so many small units made sense when it took half a day (by horse) to reach the county seat. But in the “real world” I live in, it takes half an hour or less. Increasingly, I don’t need to travel at all; I can renew many permits and obtain needed information online.

The Kernan-Shepard Commission studied Indiana’s multiple levels of government, held hearings around the state, reviewed reforms instituted elsewhere in “the real world” and issued recommendations of 27 ways to cut waste, become more efficient, increase accountability and save tax dollars.

Government officials are supposed to work for us. Thanks to Indiana’s entrenched patronage, we seem to be working for them. 

 

 

 

Comments

Get a Grip

I know that the Rick Warren prayer controversy has been the subject of way too much discussion, outrage and analysis, but I’m going to beat this not-dead-enough horse one more time, because there was a lesson here, and I’m not so sure that it’s the lesson many activists learned.

 

In the days following the announcement that Warren—along with the (pro-gay-rights) Reverend Joseph Lowery—would be delivering an inaugural prayer, I got multiple emails bemoaning Obama’s “treachery.” Several were really over the top; one in particular was an “open letter” to Obama, and said something along the lines of "I supported you but now I wish I’d voted for Hillary Clinton and I’ll never give you any more money, and I won’t help you get national health insurance either."

 

To which I wanted to say: Grow up, get a grip and give it a rest.

 

Do I understand where these partisans are coming from? Of course. But I found it difficult to get worked up—let alone as hysterical as many of the people blogging or emailing about it. Obama will be the president of the whole country, after all—including the fools and bigots and other people I don’t like and don’t agree with—and it is naïve to expect him to surround himself with only people approved of by gays and progressives. To me, what is much more important—and telling—is the caliber and political orientation of Obama’s appointments, and in my opinion, at least, those have been excellent.

 

So Rick Warren was invited to say a prayer at the Inauguration. That will make religious right people feel included. It won’t change public policy. What it may (or may not) change is the difficulty of making policy in our polarized country—making it marginally easier to achieve Obama’s (progressive) policy goals. Gestures of respect for other people’s right to hold opinions with which we disagree—which is not the same thing as respecting or agreeing with the opinions themselves—can only advance policy in those areas where we do agree. And despite most descriptions of Warren on gay and gay-friendly blogs, those areas exist.

 

Warren is probably the least objectionable of the right-wing nut clergy. He focuses primarily on ameliorating poverty and (ironically) curing AIDS, and conducts comparatively few campaigns to demonize “abortionists” and those of us working to advance the “gay agenda.” I certainly don’t agree with him, but I think reaction to the invitation was overwrought and ultimately unhelpful to the cause of gay rights. As I noted in a post on my American Values Alliance blog, politics isn’t softball, and politicians who actually want to get stuff done don’t do it by avoiding people deemed insufficiently pure.

 

Obama has reiterated his commitment to choice and gay rights. He has broken ground by appointing an out lesbian to a high-ranking White House energy post. It isn’t like he’s backing off these issues, or softening his positions. But critics insist that the symbolism is powerful–that by including Warren in this ceremony, he is "legitimizing" everything Warren stands for. Folks on the other side, however, are saying the same thing about Warren’s acceptance. As the Washington Monthly reported, “In an interesting twist, plenty of conservatives are mad, not at Obama for inviting Warren, but at Warren for accepting the invitation.”

 

David Brody, a correspondent for TV preacher Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network, reported being flooded with emails. “Most of them absolutely rip Pastor Warren for doing this."

 

Brody published a couple of them, and they sounded a lot like the ones I got—only with a different villain.

 

"Unless Rick Warren has changed, he is very disappointing in the pro-life cause. Just ask pro-life leaders their opinion. He doesn’t like to deal with it at his church. It just seems funny that he is known as ‘pro-life’ when he largely ignores the subject and teaches others to do the same. I fear God for these ‘men of God’ "

 

And this one:

 

"I have had about all I can stand of Rick Warren’s double standards. WHOSE side is he really on anyway? … This is a complete mockery of all things sacred."

 

Meanwhile, back in Bush country, the U.S. was the only major western nation to refuse to sign a UN declaration calling for worldwide decriminalization of homosexuality. Sixty-six of the U.N.’s 192 member countries signed the nonbinding declaration in an effort to push the General Assembly to deal with anti-gay discrimination. More than 70 U.N. members outlaw homosexuality, and in several of them homosexual acts can be punished by execution.

 

Delivery of a prayer—however “symbolic”—pales in comparison to the persistent, insistent and fully intentional homophobia of the late, unlamented Bush Administration.

 

Comments