RE DK'S RECENT POSTS

This is an interesting passage:

'My old friend Stanley Hoffmann, in his review of Thomas Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum's new book This Used to Be Us, suggested that European parliamentary systems are simply more effective than our own separation of powers, but I think this was an oversimplification. Presidents such as Truman and Eisenhower have accomplished great things with the help of Congresses at least partially controlled by the opposition party. We are in trouble now not because of our constitution, but because of our almost complete lack of any common civic spirit.'


They, European parliamentary systems, are more effective for a variety of reasons, both there and here. 


We here are, after all, partly in trouble precisely because of our constitution, as amended,.............. pace DK. 


It, ours, lends itself, after all, sadly enough, to a lack of a common civic spirit, and always, since its inception, has. 


It, our constitution, is not of course a necessary condition for a lack of common civic spirit, but it seems instrumental, at a fundamental, historical, structural, level, in a failure to integrate politically and culturally, over here, over centuries.


Many European parliamentary regimes are more nationalistic, and more politically integrated, in spite of the EU, 


and less susceptible than ours, perhaps, to political drift, or separation of powers paralysis.


So.