Action Item

So. The Washington Post is having a contest to search for "America's Next Great Pundit." And it's down to the final three, one of whom is my friend (and former colleague) Nancy Goldstein.

You can read all three of the finalists' sample op-eds here, and I can say in all honesty that Nancy was absolutely the most deserving of my vote. I believe you'll find she's most deserving of your vote, too.

Tough times and election cycles intensify the desire for heroes and villains, good and evil - for simple story lines, quick resolutions and vengeance. And actors all along the political spectrum have eagerly fed that desire, at a price that once looked reasonable but is turning out to be too high. Nothing good can come to a democracy whose alleged defenders are seeing democracy's founding concepts as nuisances - mere obstacles to be overcome or sidestepped. Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell ferociously defends her electorate from "government interference," which she has famously located in the First Amendment. She thinks it stinks that church-state separation forbids public school boards from giving the green light to teaching creationism: Why can't majority rule be the law of the land? For Paul's minions, free speech is the right of the mob to silence dissent by force.

Clearly what the Tea Party really wants to "Take America Back" from is silly concepts such as equal protection, or the minority's right to be free from the will of the majority.

It is no less frightening or dangerous that President Obama is undermining the balance between democracy and presidential power in the name of national security. As a constitutional law professor, he ran against his predecessor's record of preventive detention, military commissions and extraordinary rendition. As president, he has held tight to every scrap of executive power the Cheney gang claimed for President George W. Bush.

People do strange things when they are scared, want to win elections or are desperate for results. Shove past the minority. Revert to force. Set the Constitution aside - just this one time - in the name of the greater good. But when political figures, whether by exhortation or example, encourage a frightened, frustrated public to think of fundamental constitutional or governmental principles as impediments rather than the foundation of our democracy, their victories are built on earth that they have dug out from beneath our feet.

Go, Nancy!

Vote here.