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Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch on the Archaic Two-Party System. "Nothing in American life today seems as archaic, ubiquitous and immovable as the Republican and Democratic parties," write Gillespie and Welch, citing the fact that our "two 19th-century political groupings divide up the spoils of a combined $6.4 trillion." While "rhetorically and theoretically," the two parties are at odds with each other," they have "managed to create a mostly unbroken set of policies and governance structures that benefit well-connected groups at the expense of the individual." Gillespie and Welch go further to say that Americans have a growing sense of "alarm and alienation" while witnessing the decisions made by the dual party system, noting the fact that "the only real growth market in politics is voters who decline affiliation, with independents increasing from 20% of respondents to 28%." While they concede that it "is generally taken for granted that the Democrats and Republicans will always be around," they in part attribute this to what cognitive scientists call "existence bias," or "the pervasive idea that the status quo is stable and ongoing." In truth, they argue, "there is nothing inherently stable about two organizations dominating a particular market." For example, the authors look at the demise of the market duopolies, such as Kodak and Fujifilm. In government now, there are citizen groups creating "angry and effective coalitions to confront the status quo," such as the Tea Party. "Such new configurations do not mean that the Democrats and Republicans will disappear anytime soon... But the demonstrated ability of disgruntled voters to create whole new ways of doing things has made our political duopolists less secure and complacent."
Glenn Greenwald on Obama's "Illegal" War in Libya. The New York Times reported that top administration lawyers, Attorney General Eric Holder, OLC Chief Caroline Krass, and DOD General Counsel Jeh Johnson, all told Obama that his waging war on Libya without congressional approval was invalid. Glenn Greenwald explains why this is such a singular event. "In 2007, former Bush Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified...[that] he reviewed the NSA eavesdropping program Bush had ordered back in 2001 and concluded it was illegal...Bush decided to reject the legal conclusions of his top lawyers and ordered the NSA eavesdropping program to continue anyway, even though he had been told it was illegal." This was "of course, a major controversy, at least in many progressive circles." According to Greenwald, "now we have Barack Obama not merely eavesdropping in a way that his own top lawyers are telling him is illegal, but waging war in that manner." Moreover, "what is undeniable is that Obama could have easily obtained Congressional approval for this war -- just as Bush could have for his warrantless eavesdropping program -- but consciously chose not to... Other than the same hubris -- and a desire to establish his power to act without constraints -- it's very hard to see what motivated this behavior."