An unhappy 50th birthday for the congressional budget process

And an interesting debate between election reform wonks

President Biden’s White House recently delivered to Congress its “Mid-Session Review” of the federal budget. The bottom line was bad: the deficit for 2024 is projected to be $1.87 trillion and the nation likely will be $37 trillion in debt by the end of the year.

This news arrived just one week after the 50th birthday of the law that created the congressional budget process. President Richard M. Nixon hailed the Control Budget and Impoundment Act’s (CBA’s) passage in his July 12, 1974 signing statement. “I commend the Congress for this landmark legislation…. [T]his bill will allow the Congress to step up to full and equal responsibility for controlling Federal expenditures”…. (Read more)

And an interesting and important debate between election reform wonks

Welcome to the main event!

In this corner wearing the tortoise shell glasses and hailing from the New America Foundation — he is a tireless advocate of fusion voting and multi-member congressional districts. He is the reigning liberal thinktank wonk—Lee “Doom Loop” Drutman!

And in this corner towering at more than 6 feet tall and anchoring the elections intelligentsia at Moritz Law at THE Ohio Sate University—he is an advocate for convergence voting. He is the the author of Ballot Battles: The History of Disputed Elections in the United States — Ned “Buckeye Brawler” Foley!

But seriously, folks. Please do take a look at Lee and Ned’s takes on these alternatives to the first-past-the-post voting systems. How elections are structured creates incentives for candidates, voters, parties, and financial donors. For example, anyone who wants to run for Congress feels a strong incentive to pander to the voters who vote in parimaries and the special interests who pour money into them. This often leaevs we voters with elected officials who disappoint us.

So read up and enjoy!

• Fusion voting

• Convergence voting

ICYMI: Some Very Good Reads

• Daniel Schuman, “The Balance of Powers Demands a Strong Congressional Research Service,” Washington Monthly.

“[I]nterim [CRS] director Robert Newlen described encountering a staffer balancing her cell phone on a door jamb in the repurposed Washington, D.C. book depository that houses CRS. When asked why, she explained that it was the only place she could get cell service and be responsive to calls from congressional offices. When called, she would answer, hang up, and call back from outside the building….”

• Jonathan Rauch, “Why You Should Feel Good About Liberalism,” Persuasion.

“[N]o viable system has emerged that can come close to replicating liberalism’s capacity to produce knowledge, prosperity, freedom, and peace. In fact, both on its own terms and compared with all the historic alternatives, liberalism has delivered spectacular results. It is the greatest social technology ever invented, and well ahead of whatever comes second.

• Phlip Joyce, “The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act at 50: Goals, Effects, and Possible Reforms,” Brookings Institution.

“Is the Budget Act asking the Congress to do something—set overall budget priorities, rather than focus on narrow political or parochial interests—that it is just not well suited to do? Almost 35 years ago, political scientist Louis Fisher answered that question affirmatively. It might be that in our current hyper-polarized environment, it is even less likely that congressional budgeting—in a macro sense—can be successful.”

RIP

Dick Best, longtime Congressional Research Service expert in foreign affairs, has died. He was a good guy and a dedicated servant of Congress. He was very active in his church and community, and his interests ranged from country music to world travel. (Full obituary.)