Thank you for looking this up. I have done blogs on this and I am working on other things.

Make it 2%. Hell you gotta pay 6-8% for a frickin car or a bibycle. In Europe it is half a percent I guess.

Add a 50% tax on all corporate bonuses and a lot of this national debt would melt away!!

Again. There's a constitution that addresses the underlying question here - making it kind of moot. In the circumstance where what the majority of the people want to do is constitutional, yes, the will of the people should stand. Even if it pisses some other people off (me included, I'm not a wall flower). If there is a deficiency where the constitution itself is lacking in a needed protection/power, there is a mechanism for society to update the document as a reflection circumstances newly enlightened by progressing knowledge. I believe in American Democracy. Period.

I'm not conversant with Goldwater's stance on States Rights, that was a bit before my time. But as a reasonably strong supporter of states rights generally speaking, I don't necessarily see that as the pejorative you seem to imply it being. I think I've been pretty clear about my position, you just seem to disagree. So beyond specious hypothetical questions and guilt-by-association, what do you see as a specifically articulated case against my point of view, and what to you propose as the alternative approach?

The nature of the founding father's ideology is irrelevant (although, it seems more accurate to say they were much like us - a group of people with very diverse points of view who formed a consensus which attempted to address the major systemic concerns raised by all participants). The structure they put into place has specific definitive properties that simply exist - regardless the frame of mind at the time of that structure's creation. I notice you completely ignore my real point that the nature of this structure provides the leeway for proper representation by the elected officials with the judiciary and constitution providing the protective backstop against excess - do you agree with this, or do you think I'm off base?

I think your trite assessment that 100% of the American population is totally unqualified - or worse - to make decisions for themselves (while properly steeped in jaded hipster-chic) is lazy and inaccurate. But I am kind of curious ... what is an example you are thinking of as a politician having done something back-pat worthy?

You have gone pretty far afield from my own stated opinion on the nature of the proper relationship between elected representative and electors. So, while you have (somewhat) effectively argued against government by referendum, nobody actually proposed such an arrangement as desirable. It kind of feels like you are answering the argument you wish had been made instead of the one presented. What do you think about the representative/elector relationship I actually articulated?

There is some confusion about my position on the relationship of opinion polling to policy. I don't generally think that's a valid way to go at all - unless we're dealing with a totally out of the blue circumstance or something. The electoral process is where the real conversation and will of the people is articulated in it's most detailed form. I disagree comparing what someone fights for with what they promised to do constitutes a "litmus test" ... well, you can call it a "litmus test", but I'd argue that this is the exactly correct litmus test to use for assessment.

You bring up a great nuanced example with offshore drilling. That's one of those areas where, had I been paying more attention, I should have given more credence to those raising questions about Obama's honesty. Obama's most public stance was against offshore - he made an amazingly strong economic and scientific case against the expansion. Then, after having won the primaries, he quietly mentioned that he'd consider compromising on it. But this was *technically* before the election (after the primary), so he kind of loaded the contract on this issue. Having been directly promised that Obama personally held an anti-offshoring stance as a part of the election process, those who protested at the presentation of a policy he himself had articulated as undesirable (yet possible under extreme circumstances) as his opening position were certainly not unreasonable to use Obama's own words in trying to pressure him to stick with the position he had articulated to win their primary votes. If he's got to fail someone's hopes, why not err on the side of better policy and promises to his base? (In retrospect, "liberals" were also 100% right - had Obama taken a strong offshore stance and made it a fight, he would have gone in to the BP disaster on a totally different footing than being stuck swimming in the oily results of shit-policy right along with the corporate executives.)

I think it needs reiteration, my opinion is premised on us discussing the American system of government. Your assumptions on the implications of a Republican house are kind of absurd. I have a single representative. They represent me. I have to work within the reality that the people in my district selected Labrador - and were given a set of expectations for how he would conduct himself as a part of that campaign. This means two things really. One, since I disagree with Labrador on several key issues - I will be opposing him on some stuff. Two, there are some issues on which Idahoans disagree with Bohner; we fully expect Labrador to go against Bohner on those issues. A citizen's political expectations are not bound by an arbitrary delineation of "powers" divvied up by the political duopoly based on majority/minority determinations within the congressional body - that is an artificial construct for bureaucratic purposes and has nothing to do with a democratic majority as far as relationship with electors is concerned. From my perspective the situation in Idaho is somewhat by design - the big challenge for CD-1 Idahoans is now to get a viable Democrat who is better than Minnick in position early while at the same time finding a good Ron Paul faction primary candidate to undercut Labrador's Tea Party bona-fides.

I have a similar view of expectations from Obama. My state delegation and presidential representative are the only federal political actors someone with my position in the electorate has an expectation-based relationship with. Sure, there is political value in pressuring representatives holding leadership roles regarding the conduct of that position with local impact - but mostly expectations there are based on that rep's relationship with their own voters. One thing terribly disingenuous "centrist" pundits have been doing is inventing opinions for folks in places like Montana (from their perches in NYC and DC) that totally don't match reality - and then saying these representatives are just doing what their voters want. That may be true in Nebraska , I don't know, but it sure isn't true in Montana - so IMO it makes every such assertion suspect. (BTW: Schweitzer is term-limited 2012 ... right in time to primary Baucus 2014! Just sayin'.).

And I strongly disagree with your take on the bully pulpit. Elected officials have the capacity to command news coverage. For the Presidency, this is exponentially true. Corporations pay millions and millions of dollars for access to that vehicle when trying to influence opinion in favor of their products - yet when politicians are able to access this vehicle it can be treated as inconsequential? No way. That is a power. The ends to which this power are used should be a significant factor when assessing a politician's leadership. If an electorate is ignorant about the nature of their government and the basic details of policy, certainly some of the blame must lie with government leaders not bothering to invest in any genuine communication or outreach beyond a blizzard of attack ads every-other dozen months. Even the so-called use of the bully pulpit during HCR was largely a campaign style attack-ad festival and deployed pushback in the town-hall format backed by mega-millions in ad dollars - more a large scale coordinated political operation than bully pulpit.

At this point, Democrats must be hoping independents will adopt your fluid interpretation of "success" compared to specific promises made on the exact policy questions addressed. So far, the farther right Democrats run, the more independents appear to hate them. I think that's the biggest problem those taking your view face, it seems to be distinctly non-infectious. Sure, there is always a ready and reasoned explanation why you aren't bugged ... and you have the mildly-annoyed that everyone else doesn't have your depth of perception and even-keel thing down to a T. But easy to dismiss is not the same as insignificant. Democrats dismissing what the voters have to say as "something not worth listening to" is quite likely why Republicans just took control of the House. The centrist Democrats aren't exactly shy in expressing disdain for the debased and ignorant nature of their fellow Americans ... which can't be helping considering centrists are ascendant as the face of the Democratic party (You mean the ones calling everyone ignorant racist moron children didn't win? Surprise!). IMO, addressing Social Security without first getting an electoral mandate by running and winning on a platform that prominently includes "entitlement reform" would be unconscionable. Trying to re-define "protecting Social Security" as meaning "willing to cut Social Security" takes the art of political spin to the point of inoperable. Time will tell. But damn, it will sure be a pity if the most prominent Democratic legacy post-2008 ends up being they were turned out of office in the midst of a depression for letting Social Security get all screwed up.

"I seem to recall that the Iraq War was very popular once, so popular that many Democratic politicians felt obliged to throw in their lot with George W."

I don't remember it like that at all.  What I remember being popular was a series of well orchestrated lies and fabrications by folks We the People trusted including politicians and their appointees, news organizations, other nations and a chorus of thinkers & talkers.  As the truth slowly untangled, so went the popularity.  I find the choice between doing the right thing and going with popular will unfair to The People.  Given good information, they're always the same.  We are that good.