In a recent interview with NPR, GOP Congressman Don Bacon (a Republican from Nebraska) spoke about what legislation an incoming Biden administration might work on to “unit” Congress. I was struck by this moment, when he was commenting on the new Coronavirus relief bill proposed by the incoming Biden administration:
There’s a couple of areas in this bill that will cause heartburn (laughter) on the right. I’ll give you an example. A lot of money is going towards state and local governments. And, you know, the sense on our side of the aisle is it’s helping bail out bad governance. Well, in Nebraska, we have a balanced budget, and there’s a reluctance to have our taxpayer money going to New York and Chicago, Los Angeles, if they’re not being fiscally responsible. So there’s…
There are plenty of reasons why different state and local governments spend different amounts of money and have balanced or unbalanced budgets. I’m less interested in the reasons for those discrepancies than I am in how Bacon views the people and governments of “New York and Chicago, Los Angeles.” They are connected to his Nebraska district because they are in the United States of America, but his statement doesn’t seem to provide any recognition of that. He is a member of the House “problem solvers caucus” so he would presumably be classified as a moderate. This is not an outside the norm view.
What are the limits of a system of government that encourages a congressman from Nebraska to shrug his shoulders at the suffering of residents of Chicago? The “silo” problem is often talked about as a digital problem, but this issue of not having connections between “bubbles” seems much larger. In the U.S., the federal system does not necessarily encourage bubbles or silos, but it does require conversations about how to connect the concerns of different states, municipalities, and cities with one another.
Are we connected? If so, how do we make that connection? Those connections must be maintained and cared for. They can’t be taken for granted or off-loaded to “institutions” that just run on auto pilot.
