7.05.2006
The news, such as it is
From the local family daily: Republicans will lose credibility if they don't find a solution for immigration! (That's giving Joe Public a lot of credit - will enough people remember the immigration straw man when we're imbroiled in the next hot non-issue?)
Is Nebraska's initiative process broken? Promising headline, too bold for anyone but a weekend headline-writer. Too bad the article is waffle. Yes the initiative process is broken. In theory it allows the people to make a case for the issues that mean a lot to them and are ignored by the representatives. In practice, it's a back door for anyone in the world to walk into Nebraska and hire signature-takers to get their pet policy onto the ballot. Since our state constitution is easily altered, many initiatives are constitutional amendments. Since we passed ballot initiative 418 in 2004 (no one noticed - the ballot also held a presidential contest and an initiative to legalize gambling) it takes a two-thirds supermajority of the legislature to overturn a law created by the initiative process.
Initiatives scare the shit out of me. I am in the political minority most of the time, and I need all the protection from tyranny of the majority that I can get. I need to march myself to the library and see if I can increase my ability to verbalize this gut-level response. If there's a headline like that, it's a great time for a letter to the editor.
Is Nebraska's initiative process broken? Promising headline, too bold for anyone but a weekend headline-writer. Too bad the article is waffle. Yes the initiative process is broken. In theory it allows the people to make a case for the issues that mean a lot to them and are ignored by the representatives. In practice, it's a back door for anyone in the world to walk into Nebraska and hire signature-takers to get their pet policy onto the ballot. Since our state constitution is easily altered, many initiatives are constitutional amendments. Since we passed ballot initiative 418 in 2004 (no one noticed - the ballot also held a presidential contest and an initiative to legalize gambling) it takes a two-thirds supermajority of the legislature to overturn a law created by the initiative process.
Initiatives scare the shit out of me. I am in the political minority most of the time, and I need all the protection from tyranny of the majority that I can get. I need to march myself to the library and see if I can increase my ability to verbalize this gut-level response. If there's a headline like that, it's a great time for a letter to the editor.
