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Accountability collapses when systems protect positions instead of performance.
State and local governments increasingly model the kind of practical problem-solving Washington avoids.
A governing revival will require rediscovering human judgment as a public value, not a liability.
Edwin Eisendrath, host of Lincoln Square’s It’s the Democracy, Stupid, and author and attorney Philip K. Howard meet at a hard truth: a government obsessed with process loses the ability to act, and a government that fears discretion loses the ability to trust itself. Their examples — from Chicago’s permit politics to America’s 4,000-rule nursing homes — point toward a system that confuses compliance with competence, creating a culture where inertia masquerades as fairness.
In Philip’s new book, Saving Can-Do: [ [link removed] ] [ [link removed] ]How to Revive the Spirit of America [ [link removed] ], Philip pushes that critique further, arguing that the “legal operating structure” has calcified so thoroughly that authority itself has been buried under decades of risk-aversion, leaving states and cities to model the kind of decisiveness the federal system now resists. And while he and Edwin differ on how prepared the public is for a reform movement, they share a conviction that getting things done — not litigating every inch of civic life — is the only way to restore democratic legitimacy.
Tune in to the full conversation with Edwin and Philip Howard, now!

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