As someone who has built a reputation on exposing the sheer absurdity that defines political discourse at our university, I can tell you that we are truly the punch line of our own jokes. For every drastic action, there is an equally ridiculous reaction. It is a spiral that works as a centrifuge to force students to extremes of an artificially contentious spectrum, where the most dedicated stake out diametrically opposed positions and the rest feel alienated by a system that over-politicizes the day to day business of their undergraduate education. With such a toxic environment pervading  student government, a structure meant to represent the entirety of the student body, decisions are left to those with the fortitude to withstand the nauseating process of democracy. In short, our university government is dictated not by ideology, but attendance.

Given such a grossly unrepresentative and exclusive arrangement, you can imagine my indignation when I received the latest email from Elections AUS. What was billed as a routine and benign Fall Referendum turned out to be little more than a slate of questions designed to radically alter the governing structure of McGill’s largest faculty. Among the proposed changes being considered in this referendum (read: impromptu constitutional convention) would allow the AUS President to circumvent a by-election and appoint an interim replacement without the consent of the Arts Faculty electorate, and would make it easier for politically savvy and motivated students to amend the constitution by abandoning the traditional two-thirds majority in favour of a 50 per cent plus one model, depleting the democratic legitimacy of a super majority.

Now here’s the kicker: in an election dominated by amendments designed to fundamentally curtail the power of elected senators and representatives in favour of the executive, the inherent apathy and disengagement which characterize the voting public at McGill means that AUS President Devon LaBuik’s power play went almost entirely unnoticed. A man who was elected on a Warren G. Harding-esque platform emphasizing moderation and centrist competence, LaBuik knows that student indifference is an enormous asset when making contentious decisions (see: Jobbook). Having moved all of the proposed amendments to the AUS Constitution from which he stands to benefit, President LaBuik is undoubtedly banking on low turnout and a highly mobilized contingent of ideologically sympathetic cohorts to expand his political power and create a more exclusive and, in his view, streamlined environment in which he can unilaterally dictate policy.

I fully appreciate the irony of someone who mocks student government taking such a hardline stance on a political issue which would normally serve as little more than comedic fodder. But in an age of dire call and response politics, such political maneuvering has led to a situation where small but committed factions create increasingly extreme policies that guide a largely centrist majority. While universities must never cease to be fora for political discussion, if we wish to move forward with a sense of not only legitimacy but efficiency, we must abandon dirty politics and create a system that seeks not to inspire the far ends of the spectrum, but which aims to engage the students it left behind.

Daniel Braden is a Michelle Obama devotee and sometimes comedian through his blog McGill Memes. He can be reached at danielmbraden@gmail.com.

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In many ways, the canonization of Olympia Snowe as a moderate reads like an epitaph of the Republican Party. Many older Republicans who remember the days of Eisenhower and the even more politically conservative Nixon (who proposed universal healthcare through private employers and government subsidies) feel that today’s GOP has left them behind. The rise of social conservatism that began with the 1964 Republican presidential candidacy of Barry Goldwater and took off with Ronald Reagan has overshadowed the traditional Republican focus on jobs and the economy, and the belief that a rising tide lifts all ships and that bringing about such prosperity necessitates minimal government interference. This naturally begs the question: how does a woman like Snowe, heralded for her prowess at negotiation and level-headed thinking, incur the moniker of right-wing policy maker? The answer lies in her voting record.

Those who bemoan the retirement of Senator Snowe as marking an end to compromise in America’s upper chamber and Congress as a whole would do well to remember that since the inauguration of Barack Obama in January of 2009, Snowe has voted in lockstep with her much more conservative-minded colleagues. While having stated that she looked forward to working with President Obama on healthcare policy, her vote against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), which allows children to stay on their parents’ healthcare plans until the age of 26 and bans insurance companies from denying health care to anyone based on a preexisting condition, was a reflection of her values and those of the Republican Party as a whole. When faced with the easiest of political wins, she and every other Senate Republican voted against giving health care to 9/11 first responders, instead choosing to prioritize tax breaks for wealthy Americans. Following in the same vein, she joined her GOP colleagues in voting against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, designed to ensure equal pay for equal work and initially opposed the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” which prevented LGBTQ Americans from serving openly in the military, changing her vote only when public opinion and a lame duck Congress gave her the opportunity to escape political scrutiny. She also contributed to the first credit downgrade in American history by originally voting against raising the debt ceiling, causing a furor that highlighted the destructiveness of political brinksmanship.

In an age where compromise is seen as a dirty word, where ideology is valued above efficiency, and where partisan loyalties count for more than civility, it’s easy to become nostalgic at the mention of anyone who appears to retain some shred of level-headed decency and objective analytical thought. For many Americans, Snowe represented the hope of a more cultured and sophisticated discourse. But before we sanctify the last of perceived Republican moderation, it is essential that we understand that today’s GOP is no longer the party of Eisenhower, Rockefeller, and Specter, but a politically-charged, divisive faction that seeks to take America back to a time of institutionalized discrimination, to a condition in which government provided no protection from the destructive populism of organized bigotry.

Daniel Braden is a U3 Political Science student and member of Democrats Abroad. He also dabbles in satire through his blog McGill Memes. You can reach him at danielmbraden@gmail.com.

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