I was in Paris last week, reporting on the Task Force for Financial Integrity and Economic Development’s annual conference. After a fascinating day hearing how illicit financial flows and tax avoidance are destroying the developing world, American economist Jeffrey Sachs gave an excellent keynote speech over the video link. Particularly interesting were his points on the impact of corporate lobbying and financing on US democracy.

“Our democracies are getting eaten alive by lobbying,” Sachs said.

Sachs argued against companies being allowed to give unlimited resources to parties, and the particular problem of anonymous donations.

“The Supreme Court said corporate money given anonymously should be equated to free Speech,” Sachs said.

He pointed to Obama’s attempts to raise $1 billion for next year’s election campaign and the $35,000 per head dinners he has hosted to help him reach that target.

“What’s the point of that?” Sachs asked. “Maybe a few hundred of it is to get your picture taken with Obama, but most of it is to get access to the President. It’s an issue of financial integrity. It cuts to the heart of our democracies.”

Sachs called for regulation to prevent the growth of companies so large they threaten democracy.

“Corporate money equals free speech? No. It may not be the opposite, but it’s close to the opposite,” Sachs said.

Sachs sees that the role of companies in society should be to make money within an effective regulatory framework, not to try to change that framework for their own ends.

He believes that the reason nothing is getting done on climate change is corporate lobbying.

And he’s right. American democracy relies more on cents than sense. Its fundamental pillars are not built on votes, but dollars. When two billion dollar parties can be bought and sold by the same group of business interests holding both their purse strings, where do the people fit in? Does it even matter whether the Republicans or Democrats are in power if corporate money can throw the clog in the machine of any genuine attempts for change?

Last night, the American House of Representatives passed legislation to raise the debt ceiling and heavily cut public spending – a historic move if you take into account the first has never been conditional on the latter. Today, the Senate unsurprisingly passed it.

This trimming of the budget was inevitable considering the normalisation of neoliberal policies. Horrendous facts and figures regarding the extent of the cuts aside, the focus is on negotiations which took place and the ideological victory won by the Republicans and their Tea Party offshoot who succeeded in their desire to see no tax increases. The Democrats were evenly split in House votes (95 for and 95 against), whereas the Republicans were heavily in favour of the bill (174 for and 66 against).

Talk of a compromise being made flatters to deceive, with even staunch Obama supporters disillusioned by this legislation. Obama’s posturing has been to attract support from the centre of his party and the independents who are worrying about the deficit and its relationship between Wall Street investment for Main Street businesses and services. However, this will not wash when imagining the destruction of public services, social security and education. If people don’t have these things, they can’t get to work, won’t be qualified to work, and won’t be able to afford the rising costs of living in urban towns and cities.

Its easy to say Obama isn’t to blame; that he’s held in thrall to corporate interests and a Republican majority in Congress. However, it is easy to say he is to blame too. It is foolish for anyone to think he has failed because no one person should ever have that much responsibility or power anyway. The criticism will always be easy if it is about him. I am not taking anything away from his agency as president here, but we must not forget the words being whispered into Reagan’s ear to “hurry up” by Don Regan , his policy man, during a speech, or Clinton and the continuation of the Washington Consensus, or Bush Jr. and both the recent invasions. These men, while being the public faces of the problem, deflect away from a festering undergrowth of corruption, corporate collusion, nepotism and class warfare perpetrated by those who wish to maintain the status quo, their own corporate welfare, and social immobility.

Commentators have suggested this outcome is a severe weakening of Obama’s already lacklustre authority and maybe even his re-election chances, but this is all too simplistic and linear. Americans love a narrative, preferably with a soundtrack, of individuals with ideals battling their nemeses and prevailing for the ambiguously greater good.

It is popcorn politics the American mainstream media try and peddle, and it is the American public who start feeling powerless and apathetic because of it.

While austerity will be pushed onto us here and we will fight it tooth and nail, it is the Americans I wish to see rally and fight this new bill once it is enforced. If a large scale movement can be built with the support and enthusiasm the “Save Our Schools” campaign has recently generated there, there will be huge protests in all the major cities in the U.S, which will in turn reverberate around the developed world.

It has been said capitalism would destroy itself for a profit. We may be witnessing the beginnings of America’s implosion. After all, as we’ve seen with Spain’s “Indignados”, a movement which has been virtually ignored as of late despite daily protests and demonstrations held by thousands, “No es la crisis, es el sistema” (its not the crisis, its the system) must come to mind.

I think, or rather hope, more Americans act on the realisation that it is not Obama who they are now feeling increasingly alienated from, but the sacred system which both major parties defend and maintain with very little deviation.

A version of this article was first published in International Tax Review

Bongo players, Robin Hood, men dressed as drag dinner ladies and Mrs Doyle from Father Ted proclaiming the only tea she does not like is poverty greeted activists as they filed into Westminster Central Hall to lobby their MPs. But behind the fun and frolics of Tea Time for Change, organised by seven of the UK’s leading development agencies, was a serious message. The government must act to shore up aid, crack down on tax avoidance and push for a Robin Hood tax on financial transactions to help the world’s poorest people.

Tax justice

“It’s a scandal every day that 850 million people are going hungry,” said Chris Bain, director of CAFOD, which helped organise the event. “But aid alone won’t enable us to end global poverty. Developing countries need sustainability.”

It is for this reason that tax was such a central focus of the event, which attracted 131 MPs, and activists welcomed International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell’s positive words on the subject.

“Everyone should pay their taxes due,” said Mitchell. “We champion transparency.”

Mitchell told the audience that the government is working in Rwanda and the occupied Palestinian territories to help them build the capacity necessary to ensure companies are not avoiding taxes.

Mitchell’s opposition counterpart, Harriet Harman, was even more forceful in talking about the role of multinational companies in development, pointing out that developing countries lose more through tax avoidance than they receive in aid.

“Many developing countries are rich in natural resources – in oil, diamonds, and precious metals – but their people go hungry,” Harman said. “Businesses can play a major part in helping development. But they can also be an ugly force for exploitation – the unacceptable face of global capitalism.”

Harman urged the government to act to ensure companies play their part in development and backed the Publish what you Pay campaign.

“We want the government to require companies to show what they pay in the developing world – country by country,” said Harman. “So that the world can see whether the relationship between a multibillion dollar multinational and a poor country is fair. And so that the people in that country can see that too – and hold their leaders to account.”

Chris Jordan, an economic justice campaigner at ActionAid, one of the charities behind the event, welcomed the government accepting the principle of transparency in the extractive sector, but argued that it should be wider.

“The government needs to take tangible steps before the G20, there’s no reason why transparency shouldn’t apply to all sectors,” Jordan told International Tax Review.

Financial transactions tax

Mitchell was positive on the possibility of a FTT and he stressed that using revenue from a new tax to finance development goals would not replace Britain’s commitment to spending 0.7% of its national income on aid.

“The Treasury is warm to this approach and it is looking at means to raise additional income,” Mitchell said, pointing to the report Bill Gates is preparing for French President Nicolas Sarkozy on financing for development. “We are looking at all the ways.”

Harman also supported taxing the financial sector to fund development.

“We back the demand that within Europe, in the G8 and in the G20, the Prime Minister leads on how we make the financial sector play its part in extra finance for development to tackle global poverty and climate change,” said Harman.

Campaigners were encouraged by the arguments heard from the government and the opposition.

“We welcome that the government is warming to a Robin Hood tax,” said Jordan. “We want to see those warm words turned into a commitment. Lots of the technical work has already been done, there’s no reason to delay.”

The benefits of a FTT for development, given its ability to raise large amounts of revenue with a tiny rate because of the breadth of the tax base, are obvious. So too are the difficulties. The European Commission, while giving its support to the FTT, said that it is something that needs to be implemented on a global level.

“It’s going to be most effective if it’s international, but there’s no reason why countries can’t go it alone,” said Jordan. “The concept is feasible, we already have a share transactions tax in the UK.”

The mood on the day was upbeat, with more than 1000 activists clearly excited to be drinking tea with their MPs and talking to them about tax and development. And despite the levity of the event, personified by Spitting Image comedian Jan Ravens impersonations of Sarah Palin – “When I heard there was a tea party I just had to come” – no one was in any doubt as to the gravity of the issues as the charities prepare to step up their campaign ahead of the G20 meeting in November.

“I want to share an African proverb because to me it sums up why you are here,” said Adwoa Kwateng-Kluvitse, country director for ActionAid Ghana. “When spiders webs unite they can tie up a lion.”

Following Obama’s 45 minute speech about the Middle East and North Africa, I am left predictably bored by it all. We were told the U.S. would be “turning a new page” regarding its relationship with these states which are experiencing great upheaval right now.

Hillary Clinton took the stage first and said “new” about 38 times and left. President Obama then stepped on and began an emotional narrative regarding the rightful internal overthrow of (previously supported) dictators (who he didn’t apologise for supporting). “It should come as no surprise”, he gushed. It didn’t.

Obama then explained that America’s interests are not contrary to the peoples hopes and ambitions in these troubled countries, but are intrinsically tied to them, even inferring that they depend on them, as we will see later. Iraq was mentioned as if were a previous drunken adventure they have now learnt from. Still, he insisted that Iraq projected a “promise of democracy […] a multi-ethnic, a multi-sectarian democracy”. Still only a promise? This after 8 years and hundreds of thousands dead. I think the invasion was based on a promise too.

He woke from the malaise and was sterner when mentioning Syria. He declared that Assad and his regime must either “lead the transition [to reform and democracy], or get out of the way”. What is mystifying is how there is even an option here as Assad has already killed hundreds of protestors, much like Gaddafi, who is now branded an illegitimate tyrant. A bit of convenient inconsistency then. Moreover, “get out of the way” was not his most detailed and explanatory comment regarding Syria since the uprising. Softening again, he spoke of Bahrain as a “long standing partner” who had a legitimate right to exact the rule of law and maintain its sovereignty and integrity. He blamed a lot of the strife on Iranian influence, but did say the Bahraini regime must conduct a dialogue with the protestors, and can’t if they keep throwing them in prison. It seems the Saudi tanks were incredibly well disguised.

Moving on to Egypt and economic policy, he said that America were prepared to “relieve up to $1bn in debt” Egypt owed, and “ensure $1bn was made available for borrowing” for various infrastructure projects. This was seemingly part of an economic plan which involved, as quoted, “trade, not just aid” to the countries in the region. His idea was that “protectionism [would give] way to openness”. Convenient if you’re America, I’d say. You know, after you are done with being protectionists over your own economy in the past in order for it to develop so it doesn’t become destabilised by flaky and unreliable foreign investment. But nevermind that.

After all of these periphery, drawn out comments, Obama came to the meat of the speech everyone was waiting for – Israeli/Palestinian relations and America’s role in and around them. As both peoples become more shrill in their indignation, the U.S. has not provided anything resembling an assertive turning point in the mediation of the affair:

But what America and the international community can do is state frankly what everyone knows: a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples. Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people; each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

So while the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, and a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.

The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

Now, this prelude to anything meaningful already positions the Israeli argument as the driving one. Obviously, Israel will be controlling the conversation because it is already a state and any negotiations are negotiations regarding Israeli concessions. However, calling for a “viable Palestine” shelves any notion that one has been dreamt of yet by the Palestinians, and damages their bargaining power when the U.N. General Assembly convene later this year in what could be a historic moment in this war of attrition.

The lacklustre speech slowly unravelled its deceptive purpose:

These principles provide a foundation for negotiations. Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basic security concerns will be met. I know that these steps alone will not resolve this conflict.

Two wrenching and emotional issues remain: the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees. But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians.

This is important on two counts. Firstly, Obama positions the issues of territory and security before the issues of Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugees right of return. What remains to be seen is if these issues do in fact come before the more sensitive ones he has placed afterwards. Is there even a solution to security and borders without addressing the massive hurdles of Jerusalem and the right of return for Palestinian refugees? It is almost a non sequitur. This subtle infraction will have neo-cons and the American Israeli lobby sit back contented with the speech. By way of this deft positioning, Obama has reiterated U.S. hostility towards Palestinian aspirations by delegitimising the seemingly inevitable declaration of Palestinian statehood in September, and harming the on-going reconciliation of Fatah and Hamas, which is key to it and proves quite a problem to an Israeli dominated discourse.

Secondly, Obama has solidified the role of the U.S. in these negotiations. By identifying the conditions of peace and stability as such, he is putting a deflated ball back in the court of the Palestinians, while “unshakably” supporting Israel as it “must defend itself” and its borders. All of this can only be said and done from a position of leadership and demonstrative power. The U.S. has strategically reasserted this. As we have seen with the recent and isolated veto in the Security Council relating to Israeli settlements, the American administration is not changing its policy or its position in this conflict and will remain a staunch defender of Israeli interests.

Hearing “new this” and “new that” repeatedly at the beginning by a hype-woman does nothing to frame the speech as something it isn’t. It was anything but new. What it was was another dressing down of Palestinian aspirations with eyes firmly fixed on September.

With recent news of the U.S. deploying predator drones in Libya to “degrade Gaddafi’s forces”, and Europe’s involvement teetering on the brink of all out invasion, we have to think carefully about what kind of message this sends out to the various protest movements which are on-going in the region. This is important not only because there is a certain arbitrary factor attached to Europe’s involvement specifically in Libya considering the widespread violence enveloping most of the region, but the self-interested attitude which Western states are projecting yet again to the people of these countries in turmoil.

Much care has been taken by Western governments to sidestep this potential accusation with their obvious hesitation to deploy any meaningful force – ground, air or naval – to properly and quickly depose Gaddafi. However, whatever involvement Britain plays will be under the microscope. A war of attrition, akin to the economic warfare exemplified by the “Oil for Food” sanctions imposed on Iraq in the 90’s, looks likely. Yet, overt action in Libya with inaction everywhere else will again smear British foreign policy. Precedents may be irrelevant in the dark, cloak and dagger corridors of Westminster, but the public, here and elsewhere, will always remember and vote/act accordingly. We are still keen to lead on a global stage, but where do we find this authority? Simply put, emanating from the mouths of our political establishment and ultimately for economic reasons.

The ruling Ba’ath party in Syria routinely suppresses any dissidence in the country with military force. Assad and his Ba’ath party have the support of the current Iraqi regime too in what represents a worrying hypocrisy. Despite this foreign policy, the Iraqi state has banned the remnants of its own Ba’ath party from public office and outlawed any Ba’ath sympathisers from assuming public service positions. The awful situation in Baghdad’s politics extends to the Kurdish north of the country. Billed as the freest, most stable, democratic and prosperous part of Iraq, there have nevertheless been daily protests since February, at first modestly calling for better services and democratic freedoms, but are now demanding the resignation of President of the Kurdish region, Massoud Barzani, and the President of Iraq, Jalal Talabani – the two dynastic rulers who head the two fractious ruling Kurdish parties; the KDP and the PUK respectively.

This is important because Britain has forged strong ties with the leadership of the Kurdish region. As relationships like this are fostered between our political elites, it becomes incredibly difficult to approach the inevitable outrage of oppressed populations with any thoughtful and principled response to their concerns. It has become something of a last resort to abandon our tyrannical puppets, and this is shameful for all of us because its often too late.

Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice once said in a speech in Cairo in 2005:

"For 60 years, my country, the United States, pursued stability at the expense of democracy in this region, here in the Middle East, and we achieved neither,"

"Throughout the Middle East the fear of free choices can no longer justify the denial of liberty,"

"It is time to abandon the excuses that are made to avoid the hard work of democracy."

This policy has most definitely not been abandoned. In fact, it has become popularised. The ousting of Mubarak was a prolonged and embarrassing sham for the U.S. and the U.K. It is only when the will of the people was demonstrated in impressive and immovable fashion, our governments conceded to inevitable democratic reform. Its almost as if they sighed afterwards at the inconvenience. The Egyptian army, the biggest recipient of U.S. aid ($1.5bn a year) is still very much in charge to preserve stability in the region. The Kurdish leadership is praised to preserve stability and contribute to the “Iraqi experiment” as a success, despite growing evidence of the opposite. And of course, Saudi involvement in Bahrain’s protests is largely ignored for political and economic reasons.

It is one thing to put the new (old) Libyan flag as an avatar on Facebook and Twitter to show your support, but spare a thought for all the movements in the region. In fact, spare more than a thought. They are certainly not helped by the succession of unprincipled and snivelling leadership figures we have now in this country and other Western states who depend on autocracies to preserve favourable and convenient trade and political arrangements. A democracy which is reliant on autocratic rulers and despots is a crumbling democracy. This is an emerging truth in our globalised economy and political landscape. Irresponsibility here means peoples lives. The civil war in Libya would be fought regardless of what we think or believe as British citizens, and any action or inaction by Britain will result in our embarrassment. Lets at least stop laying the foundations for these future crises by properly and seriously addressing our involvement and relationships elsewhere.

“There’s always a bigger fish.” – Qui-Gon Jinn

Paul Krugman on his New York Times blog notes a symptom of just how far the West has regressed in the distribution of income: so much of America’s wealth is concentrated in the top 1% of the income scale that those only just below actually feel insecure about their standing. The differences in income among the rich are now so dramatic that Americans in something like the top 10% of earners confidently call themselves ‘middle’ or ‘upper middle’ class. (Read it here: http://nyti.ms/iiA7cV.)

As Catherine Rampell (also of the NYT) explains: ”those who aspire to hop from the 30th percentile to the 35th percentile would need to increase their cash income by $4,000 annually (or by about 17 percent); those who aspire to hop from the 94th percentile to the 99th percentile would require an increase of $324,900 (or 171 percent)…In other words, at least in dollar terms, there is much greater inequality at the very top of the income scale than at the bottom or in the middle.” Put another way, the differences in income between neighbours in a ‘gated community’ are greater than those between people in an actual community. A businessman on several hundred thousand a year can pull back the curtains, scowl at the couple across the street and quite sincerely mutter, “This is bullshit, why don’t I have a jet?”

All this shows that ‘wealth’ is, indeed, relative and psychological. The Thatcherite justification for greater inequality was that the working class was better off in absolute terms. This is barely a sufficient excuse once we realise that people judge their social standing next to their neighbour’s.

The same can only hold true in Britain, a country that has followed America’s example in inequality (we’re now on the way to regaining the distribution of income of c. 1920). Is it any wonder our ‘Business Leaders’ desperately set up ficticious establishments in Monaco and threaten to jump ship if the top rate of tax is increased 1%? (The poor devils, I know…)

So, ever-increasing inequality – the objective of politics in the West for 30 years now – doesn’t even make the rich happy. All this social dislocation, insecurity and resentment is for the benefit only of the super-super rich, who have no social betters (all of whom could probably fit in a medium-sized school assembly hall). Is that what a democracy looks like?

The rise of the Tea Party in America has presented lefties and liberals with more than two brain cells to rub together on both sides of the Atlantic with a problem.  Picking a facepalm of the week just got a whole lot harder.

Following the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona, Republican senator Jon Kyl attempted to argue that her assailant was too mentally unstable for it to be a politically motivated attack, despite all of Sarah Palin’s crosshairs.

“It’s probably giving him too much credit to ascribe a coherent political philosophy to him,” Kyl said.

A bit like the rest of the Tea Party then?

“We just have to acknowledge that there are mentally unstable people in this country,” Kyl added.

Glenn Beck, check.

Bill O’Reilley, check.

Sarah Palin

What’s that, you daft accidental anti-semite? Your liberal enemies have accused you of drinking the blood of Christian children? I think we have a winner.

TTE readers will probably be aware of the ‘It Gets Better’ internet campaign against homophobic bullying. This was started by the brilliant American sex advice columnist Dan Savage, reacting to the suicide of Billy Lucas, a fifteen-year old gay teenager who hanged himself after suffering intense homophobic abuse from his peers. His mission statement: “I wish I could have talked to this kid for five minutes…I wish I could have told him that, however bad things were, however isolated and alone he was, it gets better.” He posted this video on Youtube with his partner and since then the thing has, rather wonderfully, caught on.

The campaign gained real notoriety when Barack Obama submitted his own ‘It Gets Better’ video and David Cameron has followed his example (watch it here.)

Dan Savage, though grateful, offered the following criticism:

David Cameron isn’t the first straight politician who has told bullied LGBT kids to go to their parents for support. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Nancy Pelosi—practically every straight politician who’s made an IGBP [It Gets Better Project] video has said the same thing: go and ask mom and dad for help.

Between twenty and forty percent of homeless teenagers are LGBT kids and most of these homeless LGBT kids were thrown out of their homes when they came out or were outed to their families…Bullied LGBT kids should be encouraged to reach out, to find help, to seek support. But that support, sadly, can’t always be found at home.

I have my own reservations. Firstly, the video very quickly turns into a rather soppy promotional video for modern, tolerant Britain (with opportunities for British viewers to wince when Cameron reminds viewers of his commitment to ‘fairness’). The ‘It Gets Better’ campaign was intended to be of comfort to any gay teenager suffering from abuse - there have been IGBP videos from lots of countries and in several languages; thus a gay fifteen-year old from some American backwater won’t get much from this. Cameron also refers to civil partnerships and recent Equality legislation as examples of how we’ve moved forward – forgetting to mention that these are Labour policies, opposed by his Conservative Party.

And the criticism of Obama’s IGBP message also applies to Cameron – politicians have the power to actually make things better. Just as Obama has yet to fulfill his promises on gay equality (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, DOMA, gay marriage etc) Cameron hasn’t actually proposed any measures to combat homophobia in schools, something well within his power.

But this is still bloody significant, and Cameron should be commended. As Dan Savage pointed out, “this is the leader of the Conservative Party in the UK. Try to picture a Republican politician making an IGBP video—not one that I’m aware of has—much less the leader of the GOP.”

Image: flickr/Torley

I’m a massive fan of the Daily Show. In the dark days of Dubya, it was a welcome – and all-too-rare – voice of sanity from the other side of the Atlantic, and since Obama took power it’s never been anything but on-target in its skewering of the hysterical reporting of Fox News and the rest of the batshit-crazy American right.

One of the best things about the programme is that it’s non-partisan, but rarely strives for ‘balance’ for its own sake; Jon Stewart is perfectly willing to attack Democrats and liberal commentators on MSNBC, and his arguments with senior Republicans who appear on his show as guests probably constitute some of the most constructive political dialogue currently on TV in the US, but this hasn’t compromised either Stewart’s or the programme’s liberal-left slant.

But when it comes to Stewart’s upcoming Rally to Restore Sanity (now merged with Stephen Colbert’s March to Keep Fear Alive to form the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear), I can’t bring myself to feel the same enthusiasm, and not just because it’s happening several thousand miles away. ‘We’re looking for the people who think shouting is annoying, counterproductive, and terrible for your throat’, the rally’s website states. So the march is aimed at opposing both the Tea Partiers and their cheerleaders on the right, who are convinced Obama is a Kenyan-born communist Muslim Nazi and are all but calling for armed revolt on one side, and those on the left who…think the Iraq War was illegal, that the 2000 election was at best dodgy, and that the Tea Party movement is at least partly motivated by racism?

The simple fact is that there is no leftwing or liberal counterpart to the Tea Party in the US of anything like the same size, and it’s disingenuous to suggest there is. There are certainly cranks and conspiracy theorists, as there are among people of practically any political persuasion, but they’re a fairly insignificant minority. Suggesting otherwise is to fall into the false equivalence trap. It’s the same mistake the BBC makes when it feels the need to invite a climate change denier on the air whenever there’s a story about global warming. Combined with the fact that the event is billed as a rally ‘against extremism’, this implies that the most vocal political voices are also the most extreme (when American political discourse is skewed so far to the right that ‘liberal’ and ‘socialist’ have become synonymous), and that the most sensible place to be politically is somewhere between the two.

Jon Stewart isn’t a ‘moderate’; by American standards he’s definitely a man of the left (he’s even on record as describing himself as a socialist), but by painting the Rally as the quiet, sensible compromise between two insane extremes, he’s taking a position only slightly less facile than the crap the Tea Partiers come out with. Restoring civility to American politics isn’t a bad aim by any means, but suggesting that the problem is simply one of ‘extremism’ is deeply problematic.

This has been a goodish week  for liberal America. A judge has halted the enforcement of the  ”Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” laws, under which thousands of soldiers have been discharged after the military discovered they were gay. I have always been a little queasy about fighting for people to have the right to join one of the most murderous organisations of the past 100 years, but that is a dilemma for another day. What interests me here is the way in which this reform, like a number of other liberal reforms, was not pushed through congress, but instead the courts.

This is by no means the first time  liberal outcomes have come about like this. On The Third Estate, Owen recently defended the decision of the Californian Judiciary to overturn Proposition 8 – thereby subverting the outcome of a referendum. Compared with Owen, I would say that I hold democracy to be a little more sacrosanct, and treat the power of the judiciary with a little more suspicion. Gay equality is a political issue, which – in the interests of genuine and sustained progress – should  be fought over by a country’s elected representatives. However, in the case of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,  America’s parliamentary machine proved simply incapable of facilitating such a battle.

In Britain the government of the day is largely decides upon the business of parliament. In America, where powers are separated, this is not so. Several weeks back 56 out of 100 senators voted for the senate to hold a debate on repealing “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”. Yet the Republicans, despite being in the minority, were able to prevent the debate from going ahead. Under Senate rules, 60 out of 100 senators are needed to force a debate. And so despite the Democrats winning the elections, and despite 60% of the American people favouring a repeal of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” – something that ought to lighten some people’s paranoia about the threat of mass rule to minority rights – America’s democratic institutions could not move forward on the issue. Under such circumstances, it is hard to blame progressive Americans for looking to judicial solutions.

The right to filibuster is jealously guarded in America – regarded by many as an important check on the power of the party with the most seats, and a guarantor of minority rights. Traditionally filibustering involved a parliamentarian speaking for so long that the debate could not be drawn to a close and voted upon. Today, the filibusterer can cease speaking and simply wait for the debate to run out of time. And unless the other side can produce a 60%  ”supermajority”, there is nothing that they can do about it. The 60 votes  that the Democrats needed to push through health reform undoubtedly affected the watered down final act.

The opinions of minorities are important. Yet with  too many checks and balances, it can become effectively impossible for the people to vote for a change of government, or for a government that can change society. The separation of powers – between President, Congress and Senate – means that, for better or worse, President Obama cannot corall Democratic politicians into a particular course of action in the way that, say, David Cameron can. Most substantially, he lacks the power of patronage – since cabinet jobs are not given out to congressmen. When this is combined with the need for super-majorities, and with incredibly loose and diverse party structures – as exhibited by the Blue Dogs and, to a lesser extent,  the RINOs – it becomes very difficult to really alter government and society through the ballot. Hence the Democrats have relatively little to show from a series of great electoral victories between 2006 and 2008.

Now, this might seem like a smug appraisal of America’s constitutional weaknesses. Yet the origins of these problems really lie in England. It is well known that the American revolution – far more than the French – drew heavily upon 17th century English radicalism. The politics world of tyranny and liberty, of Locke and Leviathan, and 1600s Whiggery all shaped the rebellion. And the polity emerged in a world in which government was perceived as almost the only potential source of oppression. Henry David Thoreau’s famous statement that “the government that governs least governs best” sums up a perpetual strand of American thought.

The result, today,  is a constitutional machine  which is designed not to enable elected representatives to wield power, but to prevent them from doing so. While this may keep people safe from tyranny, it also keeps those who benefit most from the current order of things safe from democracy.