Each of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of interest-group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism—offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented.
A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. We report on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues.
*****Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.***** The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.
What a lovely photo. Wonderful way to start the day. Thank you.
Great photo. Early morning light? I like the sharp contrast —shape and color— of angular man-made barrier and rounded natural contours of the land.
david foster,
I like the reference to the ‘Biden’ administration.
Did you or others see or hear about the Jim Sensenbrenner op-ed in the WSJ. I only heard about it, since I let my subscription lapse. Former Rep. JS was one of the authors of the Patriot Act, and he demands that AG Garland withdraw his odious letter of intent to investigate parents as domestic terrorists.
So Colin Powel has passed away at 84. He apparently had bone marrow cancer but the offical press release says he died due to “complications from Covid 19” (evidently a breakthrough case since he was fully vaccinated). I think it’s safe to say that bone marrow cancer qualifies as a “comorbidity”.
Tommyjay: re James Sensenbrenner’s demand. I am sure that Merrick Garland will get right on it.
Thanks David.
Great post.
Saw this on another website. Wow. OSHA exempts vaccine injury from employer reporting requirements
DOL and OSHA, as well as other federal agencies, are working diligently to encourage COVID-19 vaccinations. OSHA does not wish to have any appearance of discouraging workers from receiving COVID-19 vaccination, and also does not wish to disincentivize employers’ vaccination efforts. As a result, OSHA will not enforce 29 CFR 1904’s recording requirements to require any employers to record worker side effects from COVID-19 vaccination at least through May 2022. We will reevaluate the agency’s position at that time to determine the best course of action moving forward. https://www.osha.gov/coronavirus/faqs#vaccine
Looks like part of ‘Christina’s World’ by Andrew Wyeth…
I like the photo above very much for its composition and light. Looks like it could have been the basis of a Diebenkorn painting.
Point Reyes. I was there in my 20’s and for some strange reason have not been back. The land is very sculpted.
So JimNorCal (@ 11:50) what we’re to understand is that OSHA wants to suppress information bearing directly on the safety of a measure they are imposing on every workplace (with >100 employees). And this measure (vaccination) is irrevocable and potentially life-changing (certainly its long-term effects are not, can’t be, known; we are in the midst of a real-life mass experiment).
Well, that certainly seems like a healthy approach for a bureaucracy devoted to worker safety: to hide anything suggesting danger. What’s next: secret man-traps on the factory floor? Undisclosed exposure to lethal radiation?
Eva Marie; Owen:
Thanks.
I can’t remember exactly what time of day I took the photo but I think later in the afternoon. The light was amazing.
david foster —
Thanks, good post. The left just keeps getting more and more hysterical, and I really hope people snap out of it before we hit the urban snipers and mass graves stage.
Nonapod —
A responsible headline would be something like “Colin Powell, 84, fully vaccinated but weakened by cancer, passes away from Covid complications”. The story I read didn’t mention cancer at all and only said he was vaccinated in paragraph 8.
Meanwhile on the occasion of Powell’s death, “National Review” asks the question, “What If Colin Powell Ran for President in 1996?” and concludes that a Powell Republican presidency would have spared the nation Presidents Clinton, W.Bush, Obama and Trump.
Really.
Well, Powell probably would have thrown off that particular sequence of presidents, but I feel no certainty Powell would have led to a better future. The way he threw the Republican Party under the bus to support Obama in 2008 puts a permanent question mark on Powell’s judgment for me.
To push back against government mandates, we need a metric unit to measure the enjoyment of life — and the loss thereof, caused by additional rules and inconveniences.
I propose the Herb (Hb), for the late Southwest Airlines CEO and co-founder. That was a man who knew how to enjoy life.
They’re gonna impoverish you via a very subtle, though tried and true, mechanism they’ll call “transitory inflation” (even if it really means non-transitory hyper-inflation) and then they’ll tell you you won’t suffer from it a bit—followed by…how good it really is for you—followed…by how much you’ll truly enjoy it—a breath of fresh air; a chance to unwind—and thank the guvmint wholeheartedly.
Think of it as government mandated (there’s that word again!) financial punji sticks…for your edification and pleasure…
(Who needs a trap door?)
The photo’s impact is much like Christo’s Running Fence.
Following on from Barry, this Epoch Times headline
Billionaire Supermarket Owner Warns: Food Prices Will Go Up ‘Tremendously’
I’m not a careful shopper but even I am noticing meat and fresh veg prices going up, up, up.
Will our Dem neighbors please wake up?
The media cannot be trusted.
Great photo. I recently spent about 10 days in Wyoming, Montana, and South Dakota. Lots of beauty to see. On the drive through Wyoming to South Dakota I was surprised/interested/amazed at the vast expanses of nothing but brown ground cover, low rolling hills, and cattle. I’ve lived my whole life in New England – eastern MA and now southern ME – so the only time I can see over that great a distance is at the top of a mountain or at the shore.
@ JimNorCal > “Billionaire Supermarket Owner Warns: Food Prices Will Go Up ‘Tremendously’”
The Lesko Brandon Administration* will use the increases in costs to also increase Food Stamps (aka SNAP and other euphemisms), thus increasing the dependency of the poor on government.
All part of the plan?
*Got that from a commenter at Hoyt’s blog yesterday.
The photo is sublime. I thought it was an Edward Hopper landscape. Thank you.
@ Michael Smith > “I propose the Herb (Hb), for the late Southwest Airlines CEO and co-founder.”
That was a nice piece about Kelleher. I’ve always heard legends about him, and the Hb is a great legacy. I’m going to begin evaluating in that metric.
I’d put reading Neo’s blog between “33 mHb: honeysuckle, upwind” and “47 mHb: hitting every green light en route to the airport” — but I think you have undervalued “16 mHb: a report card full of As” (or perhaps overvalued, in today’s educational climate).
You are so right about this one “-230 mHb: TSA.”
We started flying the Peanut Plane in 1978, coming home from Utah to Texas, and have stayed loyal so long as SWA had a flight to where we wanted to go.
“Michael Smith, a freelance book editor, served in the Executive Office of Southwest Airlines from 1995 to 2000.”
Kind of an odd combination of careers!
Do you specialize in any genres or for particular publications?
Glass Half Full: New MacBook Pros out today. Those Cupertino Homos might hate us and want us dead, the guts of it might be made in a TSMC Fab might not be there next week… but it’s a crowning achievement. Zaphod Want! Just a pity it ain’t hypersonic.
@ David Foster > |Cancelled.”
Great post on Freedom of Speech and the other freedoms under attack.
I’ve always thought it interesting that Roosevelt only picked two actual Constitutional freedoms, and then added two progressives ones (which are unattainable by any government anytime anywhere).
Now, even these two DEMOCRAT freedoms are under attack.
Here’s some more information on Rockwell’s paintings illustrating them.
I note that the comments on David’s post have more information about the school board meeting illustrated in the “freedom of speech” painting; even in 1941, the tax-and-spend proposal beat out the “keep within our means” opposition.
Rockwell foundation post: “Rockwell by chance attended a town meeting where a Vermont neighbor was met with respect when he rose among his neighbors to voice an unpopular view.”
Commenter: OldPhil quoting The Switchel Philosopher (George Putnam), so I’ve added the first two paragraphs for context.
In the 1940s Norman Rockwell lived in the small town of Arlington, Vermont. On November 9, 1940 the Arlington school burned. A committee led by Arlington resident John Fisher, husband of the noted author Dorothy Canfield Fisher, proposed building a new school that would cost more than the insurance settlement, and would require the town to borrow money. A special town meeting was held on January 18, 1941 to consider the matter.
Town meetings are a New England tradition, and especially in Vermont. Meetings of the citizens in the town are required to approve municipal borrowings and budgets. Citizens act as the legislative branch of government during town meeting.
Norman Rockwell attended that Arlington town meeting in January 1941. Most citizens present were in favor of John Fisher’s proposal. But Rockwell’s neighbor, a farmer named Jim Edgerton, rose to speak against the proposal. Times were hard on the farm, and he did not want to pay more taxes. He thought that Arlington students could be tuitioned out to neighboring towns. Everyone listened respectfully to what he had to say, and then proceeded to vote 119 to 15 in favor of building a new school as proposed and 114 to 18 in favor of borrowing the money needed to do so.
More information about this painting at Putnam’s blog, plus LINKs to 3 more:
This is one of four posts about the Four Freedoms:
1. Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms
2. Rockwell’s Four Freedoms
3. Freedom of Speech Painting (this post)
4. Legacy of the Four Freedoms
Our youngest plays in a Youth Symphony. The leaders by definition are artsy fartsy and this is, politically, a very Blue area. One guesses they are eager to do their part to advance the Fauci agenda.
Doubtless they will not have noticed that college football fans have attended games (most without masks, in close proximity for several hours) for weeks without spreader events.
I assume they’ll breeze right over natural immunity.
But I wonder if they’ll feel a moment of unease as the need for boosters recurs.
Mostly I wonder if they will feel a pang of regret when one or more kids suffer harm from the vaccine. So far, of course, none of the kids have been harmed by the virus.
From today’s email: “As conditions have changed since the start of our season, we would like to let you know that CYS will be following the lead of the majority of arts organizations in the country and will be requiring our students, faculty, and staff ages 12 and up to be fully vaccinated by Jan 9, 2022, in order to participate in our programs.
As the vaccine becomes available for our students under 12, we will be requiring them to be fully vaccinated 60 days after the vaccine becomes approved by the FDA. For those who choose not to be vaccinated, we will refund your tuition for the spring semester, though we very much hope you will continue to participate in our programs.”
@ JimNorCal > “So far, of course, none of the kids have been harmed by the virus.”
Our community leaders are not a very good advertisement for “follow the science” now that “science” means only “what is politically favorable for one faction.”
If there are enough of you who are hesitant about the vaccine, can you start your own orchestra? All it takes is someone willing to organize and someone who can conduct. Every big organization started small.
Then you would have a good natural scientific experiment with a meaningful number of people and a control group.
Good suggestion but …
Of course all the usual reasons. I don’t know music. There are multiple area Youth Symphonies, not easy to break in. My daughter is on her last year of membership.
So my motivation is low, my skill set is a mismatch and the task is large.
@ JimNorCal > “So my motivation is low, my skill set is a mismatch and the task is large.”
Story of my life as well.
Weigh the pros and cons, and pray.
Best wishes to your daughter.
Leave a Reply
HTML tags allowed in your
comment: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>
My latest post: Cancelled
https://ricochet.com/1074005/cancelled/
Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B
Abstract:
Each of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of interest-group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism—offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented.
A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. We report on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues.
*****Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.***** The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.
Hat Tip: Der Z Man
https://www.takimag.com/article/the-dionysian-theater-of-democracy/
What a lovely photo. Wonderful way to start the day. Thank you.
Great photo. Early morning light? I like the sharp contrast —shape and color— of angular man-made barrier and rounded natural contours of the land.
david foster,
I like the reference to the ‘Biden’ administration.
Did you or others see or hear about the Jim Sensenbrenner op-ed in the WSJ. I only heard about it, since I let my subscription lapse. Former Rep. JS was one of the authors of the Patriot Act, and he demands that AG Garland withdraw his odious letter of intent to investigate parents as domestic terrorists.
So Colin Powel has passed away at 84. He apparently had bone marrow cancer but the offical press release says he died due to “complications from Covid 19” (evidently a breakthrough case since he was fully vaccinated). I think it’s safe to say that bone marrow cancer qualifies as a “comorbidity”.
Tommyjay: re James Sensenbrenner’s demand. I am sure that Merrick Garland will get right on it.
Thanks David.
Great post.
Saw this on another website. Wow. OSHA exempts vaccine injury from employer reporting requirements
DOL and OSHA, as well as other federal agencies, are working diligently to encourage COVID-19 vaccinations. OSHA does not wish to have any appearance of discouraging workers from receiving COVID-19 vaccination, and also does not wish to disincentivize employers’ vaccination efforts. As a result, OSHA will not enforce 29 CFR 1904’s recording requirements to require any employers to record worker side effects from COVID-19 vaccination at least through May 2022. We will reevaluate the agency’s position at that time to determine the best course of action moving forward.
https://www.osha.gov/coronavirus/faqs#vaccine
Double standards alert.
Kamala makes pro-McAuliffe video to be illegally played in over 300 Black churches in Virginia
Looks like part of ‘Christina’s World’ by Andrew Wyeth…
I like the photo above very much for its composition and light. Looks like it could have been the basis of a Diebenkorn painting.
Point Reyes. I was there in my 20’s and for some strange reason have not been back. The land is very sculpted.
So JimNorCal (@ 11:50) what we’re to understand is that OSHA wants to suppress information bearing directly on the safety of a measure they are imposing on every workplace (with >100 employees). And this measure (vaccination) is irrevocable and potentially life-changing (certainly its long-term effects are not, can’t be, known; we are in the midst of a real-life mass experiment).
Well, that certainly seems like a healthy approach for a bureaucracy devoted to worker safety: to hide anything suggesting danger. What’s next: secret man-traps on the factory floor? Undisclosed exposure to lethal radiation?
Eva Marie; Owen:
Thanks.
I can’t remember exactly what time of day I took the photo but I think later in the afternoon. The light was amazing.
david foster —
Thanks, good post. The left just keeps getting more and more hysterical, and I really hope people snap out of it before we hit the urban snipers and mass graves stage.
Nonapod —
A responsible headline would be something like “Colin Powell, 84, fully vaccinated but weakened by cancer, passes away from Covid complications”. The story I read didn’t mention cancer at all and only said he was vaccinated in paragraph 8.
Meanwhile on the occasion of Powell’s death, “National Review” asks the question, “What If Colin Powell Ran for President in 1996?” and concludes that a Powell Republican presidency would have spared the nation Presidents Clinton, W.Bush, Obama and Trump.
Really.
Well, Powell probably would have thrown off that particular sequence of presidents, but I feel no certainty Powell would have led to a better future. The way he threw the Republican Party under the bus to support Obama in 2008 puts a permanent question mark on Powell’s judgment for me.
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/what-if-colin-powell-ran-for-president-in-1996/
To push back against government mandates, we need a metric unit to measure the enjoyment of life — and the loss thereof, caused by additional rules and inconveniences.
I propose the Herb (Hb), for the late Southwest Airlines CEO and co-founder. That was a man who knew how to enjoy life.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/09/misery_indexed.html
“What’s next:”
They’re gonna impoverish you via a very subtle, though tried and true, mechanism they’ll call “transitory inflation” (even if it really means non-transitory hyper-inflation) and then they’ll tell you you won’t suffer from it a bit—followed by…how good it really is for you—followed…by how much you’ll truly enjoy it—a breath of fresh air; a chance to unwind—and thank the guvmint wholeheartedly.
Think of it as government mandated (there’s that word again!) financial punji sticks…for your edification and pleasure…
(Who needs a trap door?)
The photo’s impact is much like Christo’s Running Fence.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=christo+running+fence&t=brave&iax=images&ia=images&iai=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sonomamag.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2016%2F09%2FRunning-Fence-2WVolz.jpg
Following on from Barry, this Epoch Times headline
Billionaire Supermarket Owner Warns: Food Prices Will Go Up ‘Tremendously’
I’m not a careful shopper but even I am noticing meat and fresh veg prices going up, up, up.
Will our Dem neighbors please wake up?
The media cannot be trusted.
Great photo. I recently spent about 10 days in Wyoming, Montana, and South Dakota. Lots of beauty to see. On the drive through Wyoming to South Dakota I was surprised/interested/amazed at the vast expanses of nothing but brown ground cover, low rolling hills, and cattle. I’ve lived my whole life in New England – eastern MA and now southern ME – so the only time I can see over that great a distance is at the top of a mountain or at the shore.
@ JimNorCal > “Billionaire Supermarket Owner Warns: Food Prices Will Go Up ‘Tremendously’”
The Lesko Brandon Administration* will use the increases in costs to also increase Food Stamps (aka SNAP and other euphemisms), thus increasing the dependency of the poor on government.
All part of the plan?
*Got that from a commenter at Hoyt’s blog yesterday.
The photo is sublime. I thought it was an Edward Hopper landscape. Thank you.
@ Michael Smith > “I propose the Herb (Hb), for the late Southwest Airlines CEO and co-founder.”
That was a nice piece about Kelleher. I’ve always heard legends about him, and the Hb is a great legacy. I’m going to begin evaluating in that metric.
I’d put reading Neo’s blog between “33 mHb: honeysuckle, upwind” and “47 mHb: hitting every green light en route to the airport” — but I think you have undervalued “16 mHb: a report card full of As” (or perhaps overvalued, in today’s educational climate).
You are so right about this one “-230 mHb: TSA.”
We started flying the Peanut Plane in 1978, coming home from Utah to Texas, and have stayed loyal so long as SWA had a flight to where we wanted to go.
“Michael Smith, a freelance book editor, served in the Executive Office of Southwest Airlines from 1995 to 2000.”
Kind of an odd combination of careers!
Do you specialize in any genres or for particular publications?
Glass Half Full: New MacBook Pros out today. Those Cupertino Homos might hate us and want us dead, the guts of it might be made in a TSMC Fab might not be there next week… but it’s a crowning achievement. Zaphod Want! Just a pity it ain’t hypersonic.
@ David Foster > |Cancelled.”
Great post on Freedom of Speech and the other freedoms under attack.
I’ve always thought it interesting that Roosevelt only picked two actual Constitutional freedoms, and then added two progressives ones (which are unattainable by any government anytime anywhere).
Now, even these two DEMOCRAT freedoms are under attack.
Here’s some more information on Rockwell’s paintings illustrating them.
https://rockwellfourfreedoms.org/about-the-exhibit/rockwells-four-freedoms/
I note that the comments on David’s post have more information about the school board meeting illustrated in the “freedom of speech” painting; even in 1941, the tax-and-spend proposal beat out the “keep within our means” opposition.
Rockwell foundation post: “Rockwell by chance attended a town meeting where a Vermont neighbor was met with respect when he rose among his neighbors to voice an unpopular view.”
Commenter: OldPhil quoting The Switchel Philosopher (George Putnam), so I’ve added the first two paragraphs for context.
https://switchelphilosopher.blog/2019/01/03/freedom-of-speech-painting/
More information about this painting at Putnam’s blog, plus LINKs to 3 more:
This is one of four posts about the Four Freedoms:
1. Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms
2. Rockwell’s Four Freedoms
3. Freedom of Speech Painting (this post)
4. Legacy of the Four Freedoms
Our youngest plays in a Youth Symphony. The leaders by definition are artsy fartsy and this is, politically, a very Blue area. One guesses they are eager to do their part to advance the Fauci agenda.
Doubtless they will not have noticed that college football fans have attended games (most without masks, in close proximity for several hours) for weeks without spreader events.
I assume they’ll breeze right over natural immunity.
But I wonder if they’ll feel a moment of unease as the need for boosters recurs.
Mostly I wonder if they will feel a pang of regret when one or more kids suffer harm from the vaccine. So far, of course, none of the kids have been harmed by the virus.
From today’s email: “As conditions have changed since the start of our season, we would like to let you know that CYS will be following the lead of the majority of arts organizations in the country and will be requiring our students, faculty, and staff ages 12 and up to be fully vaccinated by Jan 9, 2022, in order to participate in our programs.
As the vaccine becomes available for our students under 12, we will be requiring them to be fully vaccinated 60 days after the vaccine becomes approved by the FDA. For those who choose not to be vaccinated, we will refund your tuition for the spring semester, though we very much hope you will continue to participate in our programs.”
@ JimNorCal > “So far, of course, none of the kids have been harmed by the virus.”
Our community leaders are not a very good advertisement for “follow the science” now that “science” means only “what is politically favorable for one faction.”
If there are enough of you who are hesitant about the vaccine, can you start your own orchestra? All it takes is someone willing to organize and someone who can conduct. Every big organization started small.
Then you would have a good natural scientific experiment with a meaningful number of people and a control group.
Good suggestion but …
Of course all the usual reasons. I don’t know music. There are multiple area Youth Symphonies, not easy to break in. My daughter is on her last year of membership.
So my motivation is low, my skill set is a mismatch and the task is large.
@ JimNorCal > “So my motivation is low, my skill set is a mismatch and the task is large.”
Story of my life as well.
Weigh the pros and cons, and pray.
Best wishes to your daughter.