Saturday, December 22, 2018

On the Futility of Divided Government at the Empire Level: The Case of the U.S.A.

Rick Perry, when he was the Republican governor of Texas running for re-election, said his primary opponent, Senator Kay Hutchison, was spending tax dollars too freely in Washington. He meant that she was too Washington. He claimed that she didn't get what he called, “Texas values.” Then, he added something really telling—something that went beyond his electoral contest: “Washington’s one-size-fits-all approaches simply don’t work. They want more control of your dollars and your life, and they want it now. We surrender that to them with peril.” His statement is worthy of our reflection even long after Perry's re-election campaign.

The full essay is at "On Divided Government at the Empire Level."

On European and American federalism compared, see Essays on Two Federal Empires, available at Amazon. See also, "American and European Federalism, a short critique of Perry's book on federalism, Fed Up!