It

appears that John Podesta will lead a new American Majority Institute designed

to develop and popularize "progressive" ideas. (The

New York Times story is here.) I think this is great news, even from

a non-partisan and non-ideological perspective, because the

intellectual collapse of the American Left is reducing competition and debate

in US politics.

There are some good idea for broad political movements

that could be adopted by the Left. Here’s one (more will follow in future postings):

Idea

# 1: A strong "good government" program. To attract the Perot-McCain-Bradley

vote in addition to its usual base, either party could propose the following policies:

• Public financing (or at least free broadcast time) for political candidates

  and parties. Politicians always circumvent limits on campaign spending, but direct

  subsidies can make politics accessible to newcomers and increase competition.

  Public financing is available now in several states and major cities.

• Radical

  tax simplification. On a revenue-neutral basis, taxes could be dramatically simplified

  so that the tax form became a single page for everyone. The fairness of the system

  would improve dramatically if this were done right.

• Alternatives to standard

  methods of federal regulation. Administrative agencies generate malleable, complex,

  and inconsistent bodies of law that are always full of loopholes and inefficiencies

  and impossible to understand. Agencies always get "captured" by special

  interests. In each field, there are alternatives to rule-making by administrative

  agencies. Sometimes, Congress can replace an elaborate system of rules with vouchers

  or other simple payments to consumers. Sometimes, Congress can codify the important

  parts of a body of existing regulations into a sweeping new statute. And sometimes,

  administrative agencies can use new methods of rule-making, such as citizen juries

  or Deliberative Polls.

  The overall theme would be a criticism of both regulation and unregulated

  corporate behavior.

• Aggressive efforts to promote diversity, competition,

  and localism in the news media, including support for low-powered radio; aggressive

  antitrust enforcement in the media industry; higher subsides for public television

  and radio; and laws requiring providers of Internet connections to offer neutral

  services so that their customers may freely explore the World Wide Web and easily

  post their own material.

• More federal support for civic

  education and voluntary service, to increase the capacity of the next generation

  to play an active role in politics and community life.