A plea for more federalism. David French writes:
It is absolutely clear from recent American history that the public likes a divided federal government. One party is able to enjoy dominance only for brief periods of time. But it’s also clear that the public is choosing unified state government, and that those unified states are not scattered willy-nilly across the nation. Instead, they tend to be geographically contiguous with like-minded states and culturally distinct from competing regions. […]
[W]e are moving to a new reality for modern America. Geographically contiguous, culturally similar, and economically potent American regions are now also increasingly politically uniform.
It is imperative that the national government adapt to this reality. One party or the other will of course control the White House and may (briefly) control both houses of the legislature, but if either party overreaches in its short period of total control, it will trigger a furious response. And the greater the attempted power grab (say, ending the legislative filibuster, followed by court-packing or single-payer), the greater the response.
Politically unified states can be bold. A federal government presiding over perilously divided American regions should be cautious. Any other approach will only increase the bitterness and rancor of American political life, and we cannot presume our nation will always survive its widespread rage.
[David French, “The Dangerously Unified States of America,” National Review, November 9]
I’m not clear what, if any, obscure point, this academic Ivy tower fellow is trying to make.
Note that he makes no reference, whatever, to immigration-induced demographic changes are making electorally – Notably in California and Illinois.
Both went for Ronald Reagan in the elections of 1980 – and both “sanctuary states” for illegal aliens have not gone conservative since.
French makes no reference to the race-baiting and socially divisive agenda of the American Left today.
This fellow seems to be writing as if he is back in the America of 1980 or, perhaps, 1950.
Why is an ostensibly conservative website publishing the confused (and financially interested collegiate professor) nonsense of an irrelevant fellow like this?
Let’s get serious.
Demographics are political destiny – but, of course, David French cannot say that, or he’d lose his campus professorial job – for not embracing ” Diversity” and “multiculturalism.”
WELL SAID, Clint.