In praise of Joe the plumber

America has had 230 years to perfect its electoral system. Israel doesn't have that kind of time.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
obama mccain 3rd debate 224 88 (photo credit: AP)
obama mccain 3rd debate 224 88
(photo credit: AP)
The process of forming a new government in Israel is expected to take several more weeks - though success is hardly guaranteed. The United States, meanwhile, will be electing a new president and congress on November 4. The contrast in how the two political systems choose their leaders underscores the need to reform the way Israel elects its representatives and to change the political culture of our campaigns. In order to win, America's two parties vie for the middle ground because that's where most voters are. Israelis, by comparison, chose from over 30 mostly single-issue ideological parties in the February 2006 Knesset race. No party in history has ever achieved a majority which would enable it to pursue a coherent agenda. Kadima, which "won" the last elections with 29 seats, cobbled together yet another government of strange bedfellows. No one would suggest that the American system is without fault. For one thing, electing a president takes too long and costs too much. Barack Obama declared his candidacy in February 2007; John McCain announced in April 2007. Together the campaigns have raised $1 billion. America's system also has its quirks, as observers around the world discovered eight years ago when Al Gore won more popular votes (50,999,897) than George W. Bush (50,456,002), but lost the election because Bush captured the electoral college (271-266). The more people a state has, the more clout in the electoral college, but the paradoxical result is to dilute majority rule. The US is a representative, not a "pure" democracy. Its constitutional framers created a system in which power was kept diffuse. Fearing tyranny above all else, they designed a system that does not permit power to be concentrated in any single body - not with the president, judiciary or congress (which they split in two). Israel's founders, in contrast, fearing various groups would feel disenfranchised, created an unwieldily hyper-democratic system. DESPITE being a nation of 300 million people, US voters can personally encounter presidential candidates with relative ease. Take Joe "the Plumber" Wurzelbacher from Ohio. He's been thinking about expanding his business, but worries that Obama's tax plan would rob him of incentives to invest in his company. Joe challenged Obama face-to-face on the campaign trail: "Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn't it?" Obama readily acknowledged that he'd be raising Joe's taxes if he earned more than $250,000 a year. It was the equitable thing to do, Obama argued, to help people making less. In Israel, there's little chance "Yossi the instalator" would ever get close enough to a candidate for premier to engage in that kind of back-and-forth. During the US campaign, voters have had ample opportunity to watch McCain and Obama and hear their views. The prospect that one of them would, upon election, pursue a totally unexpected policy on a fundamental issue is remote. For instance, Obama would never appoint a jurist to the Supreme Court pledged to overturning Roe v. Wade and re-criminalizing abortion. In Israel, by contrast, any number of prime ministers have turned their backs on cardinal campaign promises. America's two candidates have debated face-to-face. They met for a third and final time Wednesday and argued about the economy, negative campaign ads, judicial appointments character, abortion and taxes. In fact, Joe the Plumber's name came up - 26 times. "It's pretty surreal, man, my name being mentioned in a presidential campaign," Wurzelbacher told the AP. In contrast, during Israel's last Knesset campaign, Kadima's Ehud Olmert simply refused to debate the Likud's Binyamin Netanyahu and Labor's Amir Peretz. WE CAN only look on, dejectedly, as Tzipi Livni now tries to build a coalition. So far she's had to promise Labor's Ehud Barak that he will be "senior deputy prime minister, second only to the prime minister." She's made an opening offer to the Shas Party of NIS 1 billion (for child allowances). She needs to woo the collection of bickering curmudgeons known as the Gil Pensioners Party. And she needs to mollify the 98 year-old godfather of the United Torah Judaism Party who doesn't want his followers serving in a government led by a woman. America has had 230 years to perfect its electoral system. Israel doesn't have that kind of time.