The democratic constitution: why Europeans should avoid American style constitutional judicial review

Understanding of the relationship between constitutionalism and democracy among legal and political philosophers reflects an idealised account of the US constitution and the nature of judicial review. This view is normatively and empirically flawed. The US constitution is built on pre-democratic assumptions and its counter-majoritarian checks and balances are largely regressive, benefitting privileged minorities over the underprivileged. By contrast, ‘actually existing democracy’, involving competing parties and majority rule, is constitutional in its process and effects, treating all with equal concern and respect, upholding rights and maintaining the rule of law. Judicial review undermines these beneficial qualities

The PlcR Virulence Regulon of Bacillus cereus

PlcR is a Bacillus cereus transcriptional regulator, which activates gene expression by binding to a nucleotidic sequence called the ‘PlcR box’. To build a list of all genes included in the PlcR regulon, a consensus sequence was identified by directed mutagenesis. The reference strain ATCC14579 sequenced genome was searched for occurrences of this consensus sequence to produce a virtual regulon. PlcR control of these genes was confirmed by comparing gene expression in the reference strain and its isogenic Δ-plcR strain using DNA microarrays, lacZ fusions and proteomics methods. The resulting list included 45 genes controlled by 28 PlcR boxes. Forty of the PlcR controlled proteins were exported, of which 22 were secreted in the extracellular medium and 18 were bound or attached to cell wall structures (membrane or peptidoglycan layer). The functions of these proteins were related to food supply (phospholipases, proteases, toxins), cell protection (bacteriocins, toxins, transporters, cell wall biogenesis) and environment-sensing (two-component sensors, chemotaxis proteins, GGDEF family regulators). Four genes coded for cytoplasmic regulators. The PlcR regulon appears to integrate a large range of environmental signals, including food deprivation and self cell-density, and regulate the transcription of genes designed to overcome obstacles that hinder B. cereus growth within the host: food supply, host barriers, host immune defenses, and competition with other bacterial species. PlcR appears to be a key component in the efficient adaptation of B. cereus to its host environment

Recruitment of the Major Vault Protein by InlK: A Listeria monocytogenes Strategy to Avoid Autophagy

L. monocytogenes is a facultative intracellular bacterium responsible for listeriosis. It is able to invade, survive and replicate in phagocytic and non-phagocytic cells. The infectious process at the cellular level has been extensively studied and many virulence factors have been identified. Yet, the role of InlK, a member of the internalin family specific to L. monocytogenes, remains unknown. Here, we first show using deletion analysis and in vivo infection, that InlK is a bona fide virulence factor, poorly expressed in vitro and well expressed in vivo, and that it is anchored to the bacterial surface by sortase A. We then demonstrate by a yeast two hybrid screen using InlK as a bait, validated by pulldown experiments and immunofluorescence analysis that intracytosolic bacteria via an interaction with the protein InlK interact with the Major Vault Protein (MVP), the main component of cytoplasmic ribonucleoproteic particules named vaults. Although vaults have been implicated in several cellular processes, their role has remained elusive. Our analysis demonstrates that MVP recruitment disguises intracytosolic bacteria from autophagic recognition, leading to an increased survival rate of InlK over-expressing bacteria compared to InlK− bacteria. Together these results reveal that MVP is hijacked by L. monocytogenes in order to counteract the autophagy process, a finding that could have major implications in deciphering the cellular role of vault particles

MR fluoroscopy in vascular and cardiac interventions (review)

Vascular and cardiac disease remains a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in developed and emerging countries. Vascular and cardiac interventions require extensive fluoroscopic guidance to navigate endovascular catheters. X-ray fluoroscopy is considered the current modality for real time imaging. It provides excellent spatial and temporal resolution, but is limited by exposure of patients and staff to ionizing radiation, poor soft tissue characterization and lack of quantitative physiologic information. MR fluoroscopy has been introduced with substantial progress during the last decade. Clinical and experimental studies performed under MR fluoroscopy have indicated the suitability of this modality for: delivery of ASD closure, aortic valves, and endovascular stents (aortic, carotid, iliac, renal arteries, inferior vena cava). It aids in performing ablation, creation of hepatic shunts and local delivery of therapies. Development of more MR compatible equipment and devices will widen the applications of MR-guided procedures. At post-intervention, MR imaging aids in assessing the efficacy of therapies, success of interventions. It also provides information on vascular flow and cardiac morphology, function, perfusion and viability. MR fluoroscopy has the potential to form the basis for minimally invasive image–guided surgeries that offer improved patient management and cost effectiveness

The tyranny of the supermajority - how majority rule protects minorities

This article demonstrates that majority rule offers more-protection to the worst-off minority than any other system in that it maximizes the ability to overturn an unfavorable outcome. It is known (May, 1952; Dahl, 1956) that majority rule is the only decision rule that completely respects political equality. However, it is frequently argued that other decision rules (such as a system of checks and balances, which are implicitly supermajoritarian) better serve the goals of protecting minorities' rights and preserving stability. This article argues that this trade-off is illusory and that majority rule actually provides most protection to minorities. Furthermore, it does so precisely because of the instability inherent in majority rule, which overcomes the problem of majority tyranny

The advantages of ideological cohesion : a model of constituency representation and electoral competition in multi-party democracies

This article develops a model of parties in multi-party systems. Instead of treating parties as vote-maximizing candidates able to take any position, parties are assumed to be controlled or at least constrained by their supporters. The model relies on a process whereby supporters sort themselves between parties, as in Aldrich (1983) and the economics literature starting with Tiebout (1956). The results of the model are sensitive to the shape of the preference distribution, particularly its skewness. This can be used to explain how a cohesive minority may have more influence than a more dispersed majority, and why certain parties are systematically advantaged over others

Why party leaders are more extreme than their members : modeling sequential elimination elections in the US house of representatives

Grofman et al. (forthcoming) find that party leaders in the U. S. House of Representatives tend to be more extreme than the median member of their party, and that they tend to come from the party's ideological "heartland" between the median and the mode. This paper shows that if the distribution of preferences is skewed (as is the case with both parties in the House), then we should expect sequential elimination elections to choose on average leaders between the median and modal positions. We show that this is the case whether or not the party is factionalized

How an ideologically concentrated minority can trump a dispersed majority : Nonmedian voter results for plurality, run-off, and sequential elimination elections

In contrast to Downs' (1957) median voter result for two-candidate elections, we should not expect multicandidate elections to produce outcomes around the median, even on average. Rather the winning candidate will tend to be between the median voter and the mode. This is true whether we consider plurality, run-off, or sequential elimination elections, and whether or not the electorate is divided into factions that control the nomination of candidates. For an unfactionalized electorate, computer simulation with randomly positioned candidates is used to model various electoral systems. This is because no equilibrium solution exists for this case. For a factionalized electorate, a game-theoretic model of faction formation is used. The results suggest that an ideologically cohesive minority around the mode of the population distribution may have a disproportionate influence on the outcome. These results can be applied to party leadership in the U.S. House, following Grofman, Koetzle, and McGann (forthcoming)