rkgc
03-31 12:26 PM
Hi,
I got my PERM labor approved yesterday, for applying I-140 were can I find the processing dates for I-140? I mean specific to Country? Because, if I go to https://egov.uscis.gov/cris/jsps/Processtimes.jsp?SeviceCenter=NSC the processing time for "Skilled worker or professional" is April, 1 2008, does this date apply for all? Thanks in advance.
Thanks,
RK
I got my PERM labor approved yesterday, for applying I-140 were can I find the processing dates for I-140? I mean specific to Country? Because, if I go to https://egov.uscis.gov/cris/jsps/Processtimes.jsp?SeviceCenter=NSC the processing time for "Skilled worker or professional" is April, 1 2008, does this date apply for all? Thanks in advance.
Thanks,
RK
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jaisri03
03-25 09:43 PM
Hi
I work for NewJersey based consultant and my current project location is Los-Angeles CA and I also reside in Los-Angeles CA.
Which state tax my employer has to deduct and does LCA has to be registered for LA county California.
Thanks
jaisri
I work for NewJersey based consultant and my current project location is Los-Angeles CA and I also reside in Los-Angeles CA.
Which state tax my employer has to deduct and does LCA has to be registered for LA county California.
Thanks
jaisri
Solutionwanted
06-11 02:22 PM
An employer did H1 processing for Ms.A on US Masters degree quota in 2007, but she decided to go back to school before the H1 kicked in (communicated the same with H1 sponsor/Employer) and is getting the degree (PhD Engg) in Aug 2010. Ms. A never worked on H1 and continued to be a full time student(made the mistake of telling the university about H1).
FYI: Ms. A traveled to home country and got back on F1 visa in Aug 2007
What solutions does she have now?
1. Get a job, continue on H1 and extend it?
2. Get back to F1 ( graduate in December instead of Aug. Really difficult to find other schools giving I 20 now!)
(Ms.A may have to visit home country this year for personal reasons and visa stamping is required to get back to US!!!)
Is there any other solution?
Do you think consulting two different lawyers is helpful in this situation?
How much may be the Attorney fee ?
Deeply appreciate your input.
FYI: Ms. A traveled to home country and got back on F1 visa in Aug 2007
What solutions does she have now?
1. Get a job, continue on H1 and extend it?
2. Get back to F1 ( graduate in December instead of Aug. Really difficult to find other schools giving I 20 now!)
(Ms.A may have to visit home country this year for personal reasons and visa stamping is required to get back to US!!!)
Is there any other solution?
Do you think consulting two different lawyers is helpful in this situation?
How much may be the Attorney fee ?
Deeply appreciate your input.
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belmontboy
04-24 07:53 PM
Hi guys,
I know lobbying takes money, but i am not sure how much we need.
I see lots of emails about funding going around, but i am not getting any idea of how much exactly is needed.
Can the admins post a funding drive! and set some target - say, "100000$ funding drive". If we have a target, we can pitch in money and try to meet that. If we fall short, we know how much we need more, so that people can make extra contributions.
Once again, this is just my random thoughts.
I know lobbying takes money, but i am not sure how much we need.
I see lots of emails about funding going around, but i am not getting any idea of how much exactly is needed.
Can the admins post a funding drive! and set some target - say, "100000$ funding drive". If we have a target, we can pitch in money and try to meet that. If we fall short, we know how much we need more, so that people can make extra contributions.
Once again, this is just my random thoughts.
more...
jcgamboa
04-30 11:32 AM
Hi guys,
I got as well the unlucky audit like almost 80% of the people filing for a PERM.
My L1 visa is expiring on May 14th and the PERM audit reply was on Jan 28th and based on the current cases pending, I will hearing back from Atlanta sometimes between July-August.
I also applied for the H1-B and get approved but it is starting on Oct-1st,2008
1.- Can I stay "out-of-status" based on the INA 245 that "allow us to stay up to 180 days because change of status in process"?
2.- This changes of status process is valid only when you file the I-485 or for anyone already starting GC process like PERM in process?
3.- If I need to come back to my country and get the H1-B stamped, Do I loose the current PERM even if it get aproved or can I use the same PERM once aproved and apply for I-140/I-1485 concurrently (because EB-2 category) no matter I 'll have a different Visa H1-B instead of L1-B stated in the PERM?
Thanks for your soon reply.
I got as well the unlucky audit like almost 80% of the people filing for a PERM.
My L1 visa is expiring on May 14th and the PERM audit reply was on Jan 28th and based on the current cases pending, I will hearing back from Atlanta sometimes between July-August.
I also applied for the H1-B and get approved but it is starting on Oct-1st,2008
1.- Can I stay "out-of-status" based on the INA 245 that "allow us to stay up to 180 days because change of status in process"?
2.- This changes of status process is valid only when you file the I-485 or for anyone already starting GC process like PERM in process?
3.- If I need to come back to my country and get the H1-B stamped, Do I loose the current PERM even if it get aproved or can I use the same PERM once aproved and apply for I-140/I-1485 concurrently (because EB-2 category) no matter I 'll have a different Visa H1-B instead of L1-B stated in the PERM?
Thanks for your soon reply.
ItIsNotFunny
04-27 09:46 AM
Will post something 3.
Great Job !!!
Great Job !!!
more...
black_logs
02-02 09:26 AM
Reminder for residents of TX/TN
2010 makeup Free clip art from the
krishna_brc
06-25 12:44 PM
Can some one file for H1 transfer when his/her H1 extension is pending?
Also there is a RFE on H1 extension which the company is responding.
Original H1 expired 2 months back but have a valid I-94 till december.
Used AP to re-enter so I-94 has Parolee status.
please advise.
Also there is a RFE on H1 extension which the company is responding.
Original H1 expired 2 months back but have a valid I-94 till december.
Used AP to re-enter so I-94 has Parolee status.
please advise.
more...
kalinga_sena
08-20 07:34 PM
If your parents never overstayed beyond their I-94 date then I do not think there is any issue at all. POE off. can ask why you are coming again in 3 months then they can tell that they want to be here in new year time etc.
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newxyz100
07-19 03:47 PM
Can someone reply to this issue?
more...
JunRN
05-14 08:00 PM
It depends. It may become 'U" but if your application is already 'pre-allocated a visa' during June, then you may still get some news in July.
But I do believe it will not become 'U' in July. Maybe in August and September it will become 'U'.
But I do believe it will not become 'U' in July. Maybe in August and September it will become 'U'.
hot W_042_ Wolf
ho_gaya_kaya_?
11-28 08:41 PM
congratulations.
when did you file your 485?
also - did you have second FP call etc?
could you list all that has happened ever since
when did you file your 485?
also - did you have second FP call etc?
could you list all that has happened ever since
more...
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dealguy007
09-28 06:46 PM
Call your Local DMV office.
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chanduv23
11-17 10:12 PM
If you live in Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Albany, and anywhere else in the Upstate NY region, please post here.
more...
pictures lion-attacking-wolf. Previous:
cled
October 28th, 2004, 09:13 PM
Second try.
Comments ?
Thanks.
Comments ?
Thanks.
dresses Child And Wolf Outline
Blog Feeds
04-01 10:40 AM
Bolivian immigrant Jaime Escalante, the inspiration for the calculus teacher portrayed by Edward James Olmos in the film Stand and Deliver passed away yesterday at the age of 79. Escalante taught disadvantaged inner city Latino high school students in Los Angeles and was known for his innovative teaching techniques. And he produced some highly impressive results. According to the NY Times: Mr. Escalante, a Bolivian immigrant, used unconventional techniques to explain mathematical problems and to convince his students at James A. Garfield High School, known for its dismal test scores and high drop-out rate, that they could compete with students...
More... (http://blogs.ilw.com/gregsiskind/2010/04/jaime-escalante-dies.html)
More... (http://blogs.ilw.com/gregsiskind/2010/04/jaime-escalante-dies.html)
more...
makeup Hyena, Cape Wolf clipart
neel_gump
07-07 11:11 AM
Form AR-11 asks for the date my stay in the United States will expire. What date should I use? Currently, I am on working on EAD (I-485 pending) and last entered US on AP.
girlfriend Royalty Free Wolf Clipart
jonty_11
07-19 02:43 PM
has been discussed b4. This can be doneonline...but not w/o recipt for 485
here is link
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=f3fe194d3e88d010VgnVCM10000048f3d6a1RCR D&vgnextchannel=9059d9808bcbd010VgnVCM100000d1f1d6a1 RCRD
here is link
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=f3fe194d3e88d010VgnVCM10000048f3d6a1RCR D&vgnextchannel=9059d9808bcbd010VgnVCM100000d1f1d6a1 RCRD
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valuablehurdle
01-19 12:53 PM
Hello Friends,
I recently got laid off. Our state is Ok for me to draw unemployment insurance under EAD. Can anyone give me an idea how much I can expect as monthly payment if I draw $7000 per month? Your feedback are greatly appreciated.
I recently got laid off. Our state is Ok for me to draw unemployment insurance under EAD. Can anyone give me an idea how much I can expect as monthly payment if I draw $7000 per month? Your feedback are greatly appreciated.
Macaca
07-07 08:36 AM
Bush Struggles With Pelosi and Reid (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BUSH_PELOSI_REID?SITE=AZTUC&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT) By BEN FELLER Associated Press Writer, Jul 7
Ben Feller covers the White House for The Associated Press.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- When President Bush invited lawmakers for a picnic, an approaching storm threatened to derail the event. His spokesman, Tony Snow, suggested that Democratic leaders in Congress secretly wanted it that way.
"They've been seeding the clouds," he said.
A little joke, a little suspicion. It seemed appropriate for Bush's relationship with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
In public, there are promises to work together, then unmistakable acrimony. Private dealings are respectful, but not fully trustful.
Where ill will seeps out between Bush and the two Democratic leaders, it is not based on personal animus, those close to them say. Rather, it is rooted in vastly different views of how to run the country, and how much say each side has in running it.
Pelosi and Reid say Bush blithely dismisses their roles as leaders of a coequal branch of government; Bush says they overreach and meddle, never more so than in the case of the war in Iraq.
How well they get along, a fascination in Washington, is important in a much broader sense: It affects what they get done for the country.
On that front, progress has been slow during the first half-year of this divided government.
Bush and Democratic leaders agreed on new trade-policy guidelines, but Congress later refused to renew his fast-track trade power. Bush vetoed the Democrats' bid to expand stem cell research, a move that Reid and Pelosi called deplorable.
The president's immigration overhaul is dead. A potential energy agreement looks shaky at best. Bush is also in a worsening standoff with Congress over the firing of U.S. attorneys, and a huge fight is brewing over the main spending bills that keep the government in operation.
And, of course, there's the war.
"It's hard to know how they would get along without Iraq," said Charles Jones, who studies relations between Congress and the president as a nonresident senior fellow for The Brookings Institution.
"There are some issues on which they would probably work pretty effectively together, but the overlay of Iraq and the intense conflicts spills over," Jones said. "It makes it difficult for them just to say, 'Well, let's forget Iraq and work nicely on other issues.'"
The White House disputes that spillover, citing quiet negotiations taking place to renew Bush's education law and work with Democrats on the immigration legislation. The immigration bill died when conservatives in Bush's own party rebelled against it.
Iraq may be the better test case of Bush's relationship with Reid and Pelosi.
It took more than three months for Bush and Congress to agree on a war funding bill, gobbling up valuable and finite legislative time.
Bush vetoed the Democrats' first try because it included a timeline for U.S. troop withdrawal. Then came a grim meeting in which Bush, Pelosi and Reid chose negotiators but got little else done.
In the days that followed, Pelosi miffed the White House by holding a vote to pay for the war in stages, drawing another veto threat. Another negotiation session broke down.
Ultimately, hemmed in by time, both sides had to give or risk the political catastrophe of leaving combat troops unfunded.
So Democrats gave up the timeline for withdrawal. Bush agreed to add domestic spending to the bill and establish benchmarks for measuring progress in Iraq.
"The vote showed what's possible when we work together," the president said.
The reality is that the compromise was forced upon them all, because no one wanted to cut off money for the troops.
Still, quietly, some trust built through the experience. Bush's chief of staff, Josh Bolten, appreciated that Reid kept his word during negotiations; Reid respected that no details leaked from those private talks. He now says that Bush is listening more, but only compared with zero cooperation in prior years.
Bush's tendency has never been to engage Congress, said James Thurber, director of the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies at American University.
"He doesn't have a close relationship with either one of them," Thurber said, referring to Pelosi and Reid. "I think that makes a difference. I don't see any evidence that he has come around to engaging the opposition party the way (Bill) Clinton did."
Bush, Reid and Pelosi all dismiss the idea that they don't like one another despite the constant public harping.
When the cameras are off, the tone is different, said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky, who has sat with Reid and Pelosi in private sessions with Bush.
"It's not an acrimonious kind of thing," McConnell said. "In all the meetings I've been in, there's never been a lack of courtesy. I don't think there's anything personal. We are just in different places. Everybody fully understands that we have different agendas."
Ben Feller covers the White House for The Associated Press.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- When President Bush invited lawmakers for a picnic, an approaching storm threatened to derail the event. His spokesman, Tony Snow, suggested that Democratic leaders in Congress secretly wanted it that way.
"They've been seeding the clouds," he said.
A little joke, a little suspicion. It seemed appropriate for Bush's relationship with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
In public, there are promises to work together, then unmistakable acrimony. Private dealings are respectful, but not fully trustful.
Where ill will seeps out between Bush and the two Democratic leaders, it is not based on personal animus, those close to them say. Rather, it is rooted in vastly different views of how to run the country, and how much say each side has in running it.
Pelosi and Reid say Bush blithely dismisses their roles as leaders of a coequal branch of government; Bush says they overreach and meddle, never more so than in the case of the war in Iraq.
How well they get along, a fascination in Washington, is important in a much broader sense: It affects what they get done for the country.
On that front, progress has been slow during the first half-year of this divided government.
Bush and Democratic leaders agreed on new trade-policy guidelines, but Congress later refused to renew his fast-track trade power. Bush vetoed the Democrats' bid to expand stem cell research, a move that Reid and Pelosi called deplorable.
The president's immigration overhaul is dead. A potential energy agreement looks shaky at best. Bush is also in a worsening standoff with Congress over the firing of U.S. attorneys, and a huge fight is brewing over the main spending bills that keep the government in operation.
And, of course, there's the war.
"It's hard to know how they would get along without Iraq," said Charles Jones, who studies relations between Congress and the president as a nonresident senior fellow for The Brookings Institution.
"There are some issues on which they would probably work pretty effectively together, but the overlay of Iraq and the intense conflicts spills over," Jones said. "It makes it difficult for them just to say, 'Well, let's forget Iraq and work nicely on other issues.'"
The White House disputes that spillover, citing quiet negotiations taking place to renew Bush's education law and work with Democrats on the immigration legislation. The immigration bill died when conservatives in Bush's own party rebelled against it.
Iraq may be the better test case of Bush's relationship with Reid and Pelosi.
It took more than three months for Bush and Congress to agree on a war funding bill, gobbling up valuable and finite legislative time.
Bush vetoed the Democrats' first try because it included a timeline for U.S. troop withdrawal. Then came a grim meeting in which Bush, Pelosi and Reid chose negotiators but got little else done.
In the days that followed, Pelosi miffed the White House by holding a vote to pay for the war in stages, drawing another veto threat. Another negotiation session broke down.
Ultimately, hemmed in by time, both sides had to give or risk the political catastrophe of leaving combat troops unfunded.
So Democrats gave up the timeline for withdrawal. Bush agreed to add domestic spending to the bill and establish benchmarks for measuring progress in Iraq.
"The vote showed what's possible when we work together," the president said.
The reality is that the compromise was forced upon them all, because no one wanted to cut off money for the troops.
Still, quietly, some trust built through the experience. Bush's chief of staff, Josh Bolten, appreciated that Reid kept his word during negotiations; Reid respected that no details leaked from those private talks. He now says that Bush is listening more, but only compared with zero cooperation in prior years.
Bush's tendency has never been to engage Congress, said James Thurber, director of the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies at American University.
"He doesn't have a close relationship with either one of them," Thurber said, referring to Pelosi and Reid. "I think that makes a difference. I don't see any evidence that he has come around to engaging the opposition party the way (Bill) Clinton did."
Bush, Reid and Pelosi all dismiss the idea that they don't like one another despite the constant public harping.
When the cameras are off, the tone is different, said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky, who has sat with Reid and Pelosi in private sessions with Bush.
"It's not an acrimonious kind of thing," McConnell said. "In all the meetings I've been in, there's never been a lack of courtesy. I don't think there's anything personal. We are just in different places. Everybody fully understands that we have different agendas."
Macaca
11-11 08:15 AM
Extreme Politics (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/11/books/review/Brinkley-t.html) By ALAN BRINKLEY | New York Times, November 11, 2007
Alan Brinkley is the Allan Nevins professor of history and the provost at Columbia University.
Few people would dispute that the politics of Washington are as polarized today as they have been in decades. The question Ronald Brownstein poses in this provocative book is whether what he calls “extreme partisanship” is simply a result of the tactics of recent party leaders, or whether it is an enduring product of a systemic change in the structure and behavior of the political world. Brownstein, formerly the chief political correspondent for The Los Angeles Times and now the political director of the Atlantic Media Company, gives considerable credence to both explanations. But the most important part of “The Second Civil War” — and the most debatable — is his claim that the current political climate is the logical, perhaps even inevitable, result of a structural change that stretched over a generation.
A half-century ago, Brownstein says, the two parties looked very different from how they appear today. The Democratic Party was a motley combination of the conservative white South; workers in the industrial North as well as African-Americans and other minorities; and cosmopolitan liberals in the major cities of the East and West Coasts. Republicans dominated the suburbs, the business world, the farm belt and traditional elites. But the constituencies of both parties were sufficiently diverse, both demographically and ideologically, to mute the differences between them. There were enough liberals in the Republican Party, and enough conservatives among the Democrats, to require continual negotiation and compromise and to permit either party to help shape policy and to be competitive in most elections. Brownstein calls this “the Age of Bargaining,” and while he concedes that this era helped prevent bold decisions (like confronting racial discrimination), he clearly prefers it to the fractious world that followed.
The turbulent politics of the 1960s and ’70s introduced newly ideological perspectives to the two major parties and inaugurated what Brownstein calls “the great sorting out” — a movement of politicians and voters into two ideological camps, one dominated by an intensified conservatism and the other by an aggressive liberalism. By the end of the 1970s, he argues, the Republican Party was no longer a broad coalition but a party dominated by its most conservative voices; the Democratic Party had become a more consistently liberal force, and had similarly banished many of its dissenting voices. Some scholars and critics of American politics in the 1950s had called for exactly such a change, insisting that clear ideological differences would give voters a real choice and thus a greater role in the democratic process. But to Brownstein, the “sorting out” was a catastrophe that led directly to the meanspirited, take-no-prisoners partisanship of today.
There is considerable truth in this story. But the transformation of American politics that he describes was the product of more extensive forces than he allows and has been, at least so far, less profound than he claims. Brownstein correctly cites the Democrats’ embrace of the civil rights movement as a catalyst for partisan change — moving the white South solidly into the Republican Party and shifting it farther to the right, while pushing the Democrats farther to the left. But he offers few other explanations for “the great sorting out” beyond the preferences and behavior of party leaders. A more persuasive explanation would have to include other large social changes: the enormous shift of population into the Sun Belt over the last several decades; the new immigration and the dramatic increase it created in ethnic minorities within the electorate; the escalation of economic inequality, beginning in the 1970s, which raised the expectations of the wealthy and the anxiety of lower-middle-class and working-class people (an anxiety conservatives used to gain support for lowering taxes and attacking government); the end of the cold war and the emergence of a much less stable international system; and perhaps most of all, the movement of much of the political center out of the party system altogether and into the largest single category of voters — independents. Voters may not have changed their ideology very much. Most evidence suggests that a majority of Americans remain relatively moderate and pragmatic. But many have lost interest, and confidence, in the political system and the government, leaving the most fervent party loyalists with greatly increased influence on the choice of candidates and policies.
Brownstein skillfully and convincingly recounts the process by which the conservative movement gained control of the Republican Party and its Congressional delegation. He is especially deft at identifying the institutional and procedural tools that the most conservative wing of the party used after 2000 both to vanquish Republican moderates and to limit the ability of the Democratic minority to participate meaningfully in the legislative process. He is less successful (and somewhat halfhearted) in making the case for a comparable ideological homogeneity among the Democrats, as becomes clear in the book’s opening passage. Brownstein appropriately cites the former House Republican leader Tom DeLay’s farewell speech in 2006 as a sign of his party’s recent strategy. DeLay ridiculed those who complained about “bitter, divisive partisan rancor.” Partisanship, he stated, “is not a symptom of democracy’s weakness but of its health and its strength.”
But making the same argument about a similar dogmatism and zealotry among Democrats is a considerable stretch. To make this case, Brownstein cites not an elected official (let alone a Congressional leader), but the readers of the Daily Kos, a popular left-wing/libertarian Web site that promotes what Brownstein calls “a scorched-earth opposition to the G.O.P.” According to him, “DeLay and the Democratic Internet activists ... each sought to reconfigure their political party to the same specifications — as a warrior party that would commit to opposing the other side with every conceivable means at its disposal.” The Kos is a significant force, and some leading Democrats have attended its yearly conventions. But few party leaders share the most extreme views of Kos supporters, and even fewer embrace their “passionate partisanship.” Many Democrats might wish that their party leaders would emulate the aggressively partisan style of the Republican right. But it would be hard to argue that they have come even remotely close to the ideological purity of their conservative counterparts. More often, they have seemed cowed and timorous in the face of Republican discipline, and have over time themselves moved increasingly rightward; their recapture of Congress has so far appeared to have emboldened them only modestly.
There is no definitive answer to the question of whether the current level of polarization is the inevitable result of long-term systemic changes, or whether it is a transitory product of a particular political moment. But much of this so-called age of extreme partisanship has looked very much like Brownstein’s “Age of Bargaining.” Ronald Reagan, the great hero of the right and a much more effective spokesman for its views than President Bush, certainly oversaw a significant shift in the ideology and policy of the Republican Party. But through much of his presidency, both he and the Congressional Republicans displayed considerable pragmatism, engaged in negotiation with their opponents and accepted many compromises. Bill Clinton, bedeviled though he was by partisan fury, was a master of compromise and negotiation — and of co-opting and transforming the views of his adversaries. Only under George W. Bush — through a combination of his control of both houses of Congress, his own inflexibility and the post-9/11 climate — did extreme partisanship manage to dominate the agenda. Given the apparent failure of this project, it seems unlikely that a new president, whether Democrat or Republican, will be able to recreate the dispiriting political world of the last seven years.
Division of the U.S. Didn’t Occur Overnight (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/13/books/13kaku.html) By MICHIKO KAKUTANI | New York Times, November 13, 2007
THE SECOND CIVIL WAR How Extreme Partisanship Has Paralyzed Washington and Polarized America By Ronald Brownstein, The Penguin Press. $27.95
Alan Brinkley is the Allan Nevins professor of history and the provost at Columbia University.
Few people would dispute that the politics of Washington are as polarized today as they have been in decades. The question Ronald Brownstein poses in this provocative book is whether what he calls “extreme partisanship” is simply a result of the tactics of recent party leaders, or whether it is an enduring product of a systemic change in the structure and behavior of the political world. Brownstein, formerly the chief political correspondent for The Los Angeles Times and now the political director of the Atlantic Media Company, gives considerable credence to both explanations. But the most important part of “The Second Civil War” — and the most debatable — is his claim that the current political climate is the logical, perhaps even inevitable, result of a structural change that stretched over a generation.
A half-century ago, Brownstein says, the two parties looked very different from how they appear today. The Democratic Party was a motley combination of the conservative white South; workers in the industrial North as well as African-Americans and other minorities; and cosmopolitan liberals in the major cities of the East and West Coasts. Republicans dominated the suburbs, the business world, the farm belt and traditional elites. But the constituencies of both parties were sufficiently diverse, both demographically and ideologically, to mute the differences between them. There were enough liberals in the Republican Party, and enough conservatives among the Democrats, to require continual negotiation and compromise and to permit either party to help shape policy and to be competitive in most elections. Brownstein calls this “the Age of Bargaining,” and while he concedes that this era helped prevent bold decisions (like confronting racial discrimination), he clearly prefers it to the fractious world that followed.
The turbulent politics of the 1960s and ’70s introduced newly ideological perspectives to the two major parties and inaugurated what Brownstein calls “the great sorting out” — a movement of politicians and voters into two ideological camps, one dominated by an intensified conservatism and the other by an aggressive liberalism. By the end of the 1970s, he argues, the Republican Party was no longer a broad coalition but a party dominated by its most conservative voices; the Democratic Party had become a more consistently liberal force, and had similarly banished many of its dissenting voices. Some scholars and critics of American politics in the 1950s had called for exactly such a change, insisting that clear ideological differences would give voters a real choice and thus a greater role in the democratic process. But to Brownstein, the “sorting out” was a catastrophe that led directly to the meanspirited, take-no-prisoners partisanship of today.
There is considerable truth in this story. But the transformation of American politics that he describes was the product of more extensive forces than he allows and has been, at least so far, less profound than he claims. Brownstein correctly cites the Democrats’ embrace of the civil rights movement as a catalyst for partisan change — moving the white South solidly into the Republican Party and shifting it farther to the right, while pushing the Democrats farther to the left. But he offers few other explanations for “the great sorting out” beyond the preferences and behavior of party leaders. A more persuasive explanation would have to include other large social changes: the enormous shift of population into the Sun Belt over the last several decades; the new immigration and the dramatic increase it created in ethnic minorities within the electorate; the escalation of economic inequality, beginning in the 1970s, which raised the expectations of the wealthy and the anxiety of lower-middle-class and working-class people (an anxiety conservatives used to gain support for lowering taxes and attacking government); the end of the cold war and the emergence of a much less stable international system; and perhaps most of all, the movement of much of the political center out of the party system altogether and into the largest single category of voters — independents. Voters may not have changed their ideology very much. Most evidence suggests that a majority of Americans remain relatively moderate and pragmatic. But many have lost interest, and confidence, in the political system and the government, leaving the most fervent party loyalists with greatly increased influence on the choice of candidates and policies.
Brownstein skillfully and convincingly recounts the process by which the conservative movement gained control of the Republican Party and its Congressional delegation. He is especially deft at identifying the institutional and procedural tools that the most conservative wing of the party used after 2000 both to vanquish Republican moderates and to limit the ability of the Democratic minority to participate meaningfully in the legislative process. He is less successful (and somewhat halfhearted) in making the case for a comparable ideological homogeneity among the Democrats, as becomes clear in the book’s opening passage. Brownstein appropriately cites the former House Republican leader Tom DeLay’s farewell speech in 2006 as a sign of his party’s recent strategy. DeLay ridiculed those who complained about “bitter, divisive partisan rancor.” Partisanship, he stated, “is not a symptom of democracy’s weakness but of its health and its strength.”
But making the same argument about a similar dogmatism and zealotry among Democrats is a considerable stretch. To make this case, Brownstein cites not an elected official (let alone a Congressional leader), but the readers of the Daily Kos, a popular left-wing/libertarian Web site that promotes what Brownstein calls “a scorched-earth opposition to the G.O.P.” According to him, “DeLay and the Democratic Internet activists ... each sought to reconfigure their political party to the same specifications — as a warrior party that would commit to opposing the other side with every conceivable means at its disposal.” The Kos is a significant force, and some leading Democrats have attended its yearly conventions. But few party leaders share the most extreme views of Kos supporters, and even fewer embrace their “passionate partisanship.” Many Democrats might wish that their party leaders would emulate the aggressively partisan style of the Republican right. But it would be hard to argue that they have come even remotely close to the ideological purity of their conservative counterparts. More often, they have seemed cowed and timorous in the face of Republican discipline, and have over time themselves moved increasingly rightward; their recapture of Congress has so far appeared to have emboldened them only modestly.
There is no definitive answer to the question of whether the current level of polarization is the inevitable result of long-term systemic changes, or whether it is a transitory product of a particular political moment. But much of this so-called age of extreme partisanship has looked very much like Brownstein’s “Age of Bargaining.” Ronald Reagan, the great hero of the right and a much more effective spokesman for its views than President Bush, certainly oversaw a significant shift in the ideology and policy of the Republican Party. But through much of his presidency, both he and the Congressional Republicans displayed considerable pragmatism, engaged in negotiation with their opponents and accepted many compromises. Bill Clinton, bedeviled though he was by partisan fury, was a master of compromise and negotiation — and of co-opting and transforming the views of his adversaries. Only under George W. Bush — through a combination of his control of both houses of Congress, his own inflexibility and the post-9/11 climate — did extreme partisanship manage to dominate the agenda. Given the apparent failure of this project, it seems unlikely that a new president, whether Democrat or Republican, will be able to recreate the dispiriting political world of the last seven years.
Division of the U.S. Didn’t Occur Overnight (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/13/books/13kaku.html) By MICHIKO KAKUTANI | New York Times, November 13, 2007
THE SECOND CIVIL WAR How Extreme Partisanship Has Paralyzed Washington and Polarized America By Ronald Brownstein, The Penguin Press. $27.95
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