From immigration reform, to marriage equality to voting rights, it has been quite a roller coaster week. First up, immigration reform. Yesterday, the Senate voted 68-32 to pass an overhaul of America's immigration system.
The New York Times welcomes this major steps and sees trouble ahead in the House:
[T]he Republican majority in the House has its hands over its ears and is going la-la-la-la-la. It does not care about the Senate’s preoccupations, and it is unimpressed with the months of debate and arduous deal-making that led to the historic vote. As John Boehner, the House speaker, has said more than once, the House majority will do what the majority wants, in its own way and on its own time.
And what that majority wants, apparently, is not a big, bipartisan immigration solution, at least not one that turns millions of undocumented immigrants into citizens. Mr. Boehner insists that he won’t even bring a bill up for a vote unless a majority of Republicans support it.
To say immigration reform has uncertain prospects going forward puts it mildly.
Conor Friedersdorf at
The Atlantic analyzes the GOP's major disconnect on immigration:
A chief speechwriter for George W. Bush, Michael Gerson, offered his most blunt remarks during a "Future of the Republican Party" panel on the subject of immigration. The problem isn't that the GOP has done insufficient outreach to the Hispanic community, he wrote -- it's that "an element of the party has set out to positively alienate the Hispanic community." He cited Proposition 187, a California ballot initiative backed by Republican Governor Pete Wilson that sought to deny public services to illegal immigrants; the controversial immigration enforcement law passed by Arizona voters; the defeat of President Bush's efforts at immigration reform; and Mitt Romney's talk of "self-deportation."
The problem requires "shock therapy," he said -- he spoke of a need to signal, "we understand that this has been on the wrong track," and argued that passing immigration reform is a vital symbolic act. [...] As America has become much more sensitive about the way it speaks about racially charged subjects, the language used by Republican standard bearers on illegal immigration has grown much less sensitive -- and that's happened as the clout of Hispanic voters has risen significantly.
That's a huge problem for Republicans.
Jonathan Bernstein examines why the Senate bill had to be more conservatives than what many on the left wanted:
Normally, it would make sense for the Democratic Senate to pass a more liberal bill, the Republican House to pass a more conservative bill, and then the two chambers to cut a deal somewhere in the middle. But that probably won’t happen here, since the dysfunctional House Republicans probably aren’t capable of getting a bill to conference — and, after all, quite a few of them don’t want a bill at all. So the real bargaining has to happen in the Senate, as it did on the fiscal cliff and, well, any other substantive bill during this Congress.
What we don’t know going forward is whether there are enough House Republicans who want a bill to pass (even if they would vote against it) to get John Boehner to pass a bill with mostly Democratic votes. What is very likely, however, is that the 68-vote version of the Senate bill is likely to satisfy the House Republicans who were open to a bill in the first place. And that’s all that the Senate can do. Now, we’ll wait to see if it’s enough.
More analysis of the day's top stories below the fold.
George Takei sums up the Court's marriage equality ruling:
Reflecting this slim majority, Wednesday’s 5 to 4 ruling made clear that “ick” is not a proper basis for constitutional jurisprudence.
The editorial board at
The Los Angeles Times says "good riddance" to Prop 8:
Even if California is late to the party, even if the weddings go forward without high court affirmation of the wrongness of Proposition 8, the pending demise of the gay marriage ban is a history-making event for both the state and the nation. An era of emotional political division is churning to an end, and when it does, it will add the nation's most populous state to the growing roster of places where gay and lesbian couples and their families enjoy equal footing in society and before the law. [...]
The foes of same-sex marriage might eke out a few more legal objections, but the fate of Proposition 8 appears sealed. And once weddings of gays and lesbians have taken place in large numbers, Californians will see the truth that emerged in the federal trial: These marriages pose no threat to traditional heterosexual marriage or to family life. In fact, they will only strengthen and stabilize families in the state. Some people may never accept that view, but their numbers are dwindling and their arguments are losing. California will soon be rid of Proposition 8, and most of the state's residents will never miss it.
Constitutional scholar
Erwin Chemerinsky, who supports marriage equality, writes a thought-provoking piece providing a bird's eye view of how the whole legal battle went down. He argues that states should at least provide a mechanism to have state ballot initiatives defended in court, even if the state itself chooses not to defend them:
Although the state officials shouldn't be required to defend a law that they find indefensible, it also should not be possible for a few government officials to negate ballot measures they disagree with simply by refusing to defend them.[...] The state was certainly within its rights to refuse to defend a law that officials believed to be unconstitutional. Indeed, that is the duty of public officials who have taken an oath to uphold the Constitution. But Proposition 8's supporters were left understandably upset. A majority of Californians had voted to ban gay marriage in the state, and now the state would no longer defend the law.
The supporters tried to step into the void, defending the law themselves, but the U.S. Supreme Court held that they had not been injured in the kind of tangible, direct way that allows them to pursue a legal remedy. They had no standing.
I think this was clearly right as a matter of constitutional law, and I am tremendously pleased that the result will be that same-sex couples will soon be able to marry in California. But the long-term implications of the ruling are disturbing. The state should not be able to nullify an initiative passed by millions of voters simply by choosing not to defend it in court. [...] Here's how a solution could work...
The Miami Herald laments the Court's weakening of voting rights:
Of this there should be no doubt: The impact of the ruling will be to weaken the rights of voters at a time when politically driven efforts to suppress voter registration and turnout have increased in GOP-leaning states all across the country.
Voter ID laws, restrictions on early voting (which led to embarrassingly long lines in Florida last year), extreme gerrymandering of congressional districts — all these tactics and more have become more evident in recent elections. The court’s ruling means there’s no cop on the beat to prevent these malicious actions, encouraging those intent on curtailing voting rights to do as they please.
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/...
Nan Hunter at
The Nation on this week's developments:
It was the best of weeks and the worst of weeks at the Supreme Court. [...] Is this some new game of equality whiplash? Not really. For eight Justices, their views are consistent across the board. For the four most conservative Justices, the government is best that equalizes least. In fact, they see any affirmative attempt to dismantle hierarchy as presumptively unconstitutional and, even if adopted by a recent legislative majority, it will be tossed out as reflecting the attitudes of civil rights old-fogeyism. For the four progressive Justices, the current retrogression is horrifying. And then there’s that man in the middle.
On the topic of leadership,
Timothy Egan at
The New York Times argues that the President hasn't been doing enough of it, especially when faced with obstructionist Republicans and a court that sides with big business over workers:
Obama’s policies — on immigration, marriage equality, tax fairness, guns — are sound and have majority support. His opponents are holding back history, and the will of the people. If Obama gets immigration reform (doubtful, with House intransigence), he will have a terrific legacy, along with health care and saving the American economy from a recession that still cuts deep in Europe.
It’s the way he runs the executive branch, his fear of taking the fight to Republicans, that is so maddening. Several governors now are trying to withhold expanded federal health care for the poor, just to spite Obama. He ought to be in those states, calling out the governors who are actively trying to hurt the governed.
Instead, he’s defensive, forced to defend his presidency as still being alive and well. Obama doesn’t have to be Lyndon B. Johnson, twisting elbows to shape history. But maybe he can hire an L.B.J. Leaders find a way.
Meanwhile, on the international front,
Ian Bremmer over at
Reuters writes a very insightful piece about how protests in Turkey and Brazil are in part a class uprising against growing inequality:
The protests in countries like Brazil and Turkey are not Arab Spring-style uprisings: they’re the anger and frustration of newly empowered middle and lower-middle classes, the same consumers who were the catalysts and beneficiaries of this growth in the first place. In emerging markets, politics have at least as big an impact on market outcomes as the underlying economics — that’s why these kinds of protests can strike seemingly out of the blue, and bring business-as-usual to a halt. Compare the impact of protests (and leaders’ responses) in Brazil and Turkey to the Occupy Wall Street movement. In a developed country like the United States, the political system is consolidated in a manner that forces fringe movements to choose one of two paths: go mainstream or lose steam. In emerging markets that have experienced dramatic and rapid changes, governments can’t keep up with citizens’ evolving demands. Protests are far more likely to swell, with severe economic ramifications.
