How Do Mere Mortals React To "Politics as Soap Opera"

I mean, when it's not quite as literally soap opera as it was during the Ken Starr / Monical Lewinski era.

In terms of those who aren't addicted to politics.... Do they particularly care if Obama gets his stimulus package passed within 2-1/2 weeks of taking office instead of 1-1/2? Is anybody appalled that he included provisions demanded by Republicans? Or is this drama that political junkies dream up and project upon the rest of America?

It amazes me that people who should know better seem to think Obama was going to walk into Congress with his own pure-as-snow stimulus bill, be received like Moses coming down Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments, and somehow avoid the whole ugly mess that is Congress. The factory that actually produces legislation. Sure, it would have been nice had members his own party not tucked in their bibs as soon as they heard the numbers involved, but it's the nature of the beast.

The Games Politicians Play

I don't know if Obama should scold the person who stuck the birth control provision into the stimulus bill, or thank them. The scolding should follow from the fact that this was supposed to be a pork-free, non-political bill that could pass with broad bipartisan approval. The birth control provision gave right-wing Republicans a talking point - they could point to it and say "What does birth control have to do with stimulation."

And that brings us to the possible "Thank you." Other than being fodder for an easy one-liner, Republican opposition has been unprincipled and dishonest. The fact is, the provision is good public policy and is consistent with the Medicare policies of a number of Republican governors. It would have saved those governors a ton of money and unnecessary hassle in obtaining waivers so that they could offer birth control benefits through Medicaid. And when the provision was dropped, the Republican answer was still "no" - giving Obama the opportunity to... do this:

“We’re not going to get 100 percent agreement, and we might not even get 50 percent agreement, but I do think people appreciate me walking them through my thought process,” the president said, as he left a meeting with GOP senators just off the Senate floor.

“I hope I communicated a sincere desire to get good ideas from everybody,” he added. “My attitude is this the first major piece of legislation we’ve worked on, and that, over time, some of these habits of consultation and mutual respect will take over, but old habits die hard.”

The shoe is on the other foot. The Republicans were ignoring public policy in favor of a talking point, leaving Democrats to explain why the birth control provision belongs in a stimulus package and makes good sense. Now the talking point is gone and the Republicans are left to sputter things like "We need more tax cuts" or "It's unfocused... not that we have any better ideas".

Obama was placed in an awkward position by the legislators who stuck the birth control provision into the stimulus bill. That measure was inconsistent with his stated goals for the bill. But to ask for its removal opened him up to attacks from the left, accusations that he's selling out women's health. While it's standard Washington fare to stick appropriations like this into "must pass" legislation, this really wasn't the time. I hope that Democratic party leaders have a bit of a sit-down after this, to discuss how they might avoid shooting the President and themselves in the foot over the next two years. Meanwhile, they should work to get a similar appropriation passed through, perhaps, a bill directing some aid or assistance to the states or updating Medicaid rules.

On Looking Forward

Dahlia Lithwick doesn't seem to have much patience for the argument that we should look forward as the Bush Administration is replaced by Obama's:

Those who say that there should be no investigation or prosecution of senior officials who authorized torture and warrant-less surveillance rarely even bother offering legal justifications. They argue that the Obama administration has more urgent problems to contend with. They insist that any such process would devolve into partisan backbiting from which this country could never recover. And they insist, as did Attorney General Michael Mukasey in early December, that there is no basis on which to prosecute the architects of torture and wiretapping policies because each was acting to “protect the security in the country and in the belief that he or she was doing something lawful.”

I personally wouldn't say "there should be no investigation or prosecution of senior officials who authorized torture and warrant-less surveillance"; I would say "If Justice Department officials are aware of crimes, they can consider whether or not to prosecute them". (And here I mean "consider" in the sense that any prosecutor evaluates a case, and choose to prosecute some while passing over others.) I take issue with bringing out the muckrakes and trying to dredge new indictable offenses out of the Bush Administration's... I suppose there's no real need to continue that metaphor; you get the point. There's lots of muck to rake, but there's a real cost and risk in choosing that path.

Of all of the reasons not to prosecute that Lithwick attributes to opponents of (large-scale investigation and) prosecution, the only one I agree with is this: "the Obama administration has more urgent problems to contend with". Sure, the cost of any distraction that resulted from a full-scale investigation of "the crimes of the Bush Administration" would have to be weighed against the benefits of finding and prosecuting crime. Would the benefits, either in the long- or short-term, outweigh the costs? Lithwick apparently believes they will; I suspect otherwise. Lithwick implies that the decision should be made on legal grounds, not practical or political grounds, but even if that's technically possible the nation will nonetheless interpret the choice to prosecute through a political filter.

Others — including unnamed officials on the Obama transition team — have already claimed that there is simply no political will for criminal prosecutions, or even a truth commission.

Is that untrue? I personally haven't sensed a strong public sentiment toward either an independent counsel or a truth commission. If Lithwick is seeing a strong grassroots movement, or is aware of opinion polling suggesting otherwise, I would welcome more information.

We are telling ourselves that bad people did bad things under bad circumstances, but that it’s better to forgive and forget, that we are really truly sorry and it won’t happen again. We sound like a nation of drunks after a bender. We are full of good intentions, but unwilling to hold ourselves to account.

Actually, I have very little sense that a large number of people on either side hold that mindset. I sense that there are people, including myself, who are very worried that the Bush Administration's bad policies will happen again, and that some will be carried forward into the Obama Administration. I've even heard some Bush critics cynically suggest that Obama doesn't want to take action because he doesn't want to tie his own hands. On the other side, there are partisans who would not admit (and perhaps can't contemplate) that any act contemplated by the Bush Administration was wrong, or that any action nominally taken "in the interest of national security" should ever be second-guessed. The number who argue, "We meant well but we were wrong, so let's let bygones be bygones?" They're probably out there, somewhere; I'm just not running across them.

Lithwick argues,

Nobody is looking for a series of public floggings. The blueprints for government accountability look nothing like witch hunts. They look like legal processes that have served us for centuries.

and

Some commentators have suggested that any such truth commission should promise immunity or a pardon in exchange for truthful testimony, but I believe that if it becomes clear that laws were broken, or that war crimes were committed, a special prosecutor should be appointed to investigate further.

Although Lithwick correctly states, "It’s not a witch hunt simply because political actors are under investigation", I disagree with her suggestion that nobody wants the witch hunt / public flogging of former members of the Bush Administration. I believe that some people very much want that, and that they will overshadow the motives of those who want an investigation focused upon determining facts and preventing the recurrence of bad acts. Frankly, as long as you leave the threat of special prosecutors and indictment hanging over the witnesses, all you're going to get at your hearings is a long succession of people who either refuse to testify or, after being subpoenaed, recite, "On advice of counsel, I hereby respectfully exercise my Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination...."

If our world were more ideal, Lithwick's view would prevail - and an efficient, entirely non-political investigation would quickly reveal important truths, help ensure that crimes were punished, help prevent similar crimes in the future, etc. Nobody would have to worry that the prosecution would be perceived as politically motivated, because that would be unthinkable. (But in a world that ideal, we wouldn't be in this position in the first place, would we?) I hate to drag practical concerns and politics into this, but in our often dystopian world and under our imperfect political system that's an unfortunate necessity.

Didn't Ken Starr initially have a very high approval rating, and broad popular support for his Whitewater investigation, before it went metastatic in its "leave no stone unturned" quest to get Clinton? "Oh no", his defenders protest, "he only investigated possible criminal acts he found during his other investigations". "Even if Starr ran amok, this time will be different", proponents of a sweeping investigation of the Bush Administration contend. Yeah, right.

Governing Like Bush?

Michael Gerson's the latest to pen an "OMG! He's Just Like Bush!" column about Barack Obama - the type of column that suggests that his only sources of information about Obama are party memos and McCain's campaign ads.

Conservatives have generally feared that Obama is a closet radical. He has uniformly voted with liberal interests and done nothing to justify a reputation for centrism.

Until now.

Because there is no evidence that Obama is a cautious politician with a history of working from consensus and not making waves. Oh, wait. I guess there is plenty of evidence if you base your analysis of Obama's record on, you know, his record. I believe Larison overstates his case in respect to the implications of this:

Most people in the broad “middle” seem to be relieved by Obama’s moves in the last few weeks, so I have to conclude that they don’t have much of a problem with conventional Washington thinking, either. The majority is not just getting the government they deserve, but apparently it is also the government they want. When it fails them, as it is going to do, I don’t want to hear them complaining about the problems of the status quo.

Our system is constructed to impede radical change. If you want disappointment, elect your ideological hero in the form of a Dennis Kucinich or a Ron Paul, and see how his agenda for reform never even gets out of the starting blocks. But that aside, it's always been readily apparent that Obama's far from being the socialist revolutionary the McCain campaign, and portions of the right-wing punditocracy, attempted to argue. But back to Gerson:

Obama's appointments reveal not just moderation but maturity - magnanimity to past opponents, a concern for continuity in a time of war and economic crisis, a self-confidence that allows him to fill gaps in his own experience with outsize personalities, and a serious commitment to incarnate his rhetoric of unity.

Again, which part of this wasn't apparent from Obama's record?

Obama is benefiting from being the only player on the stage - all his pretensions of moderation could be quickly undermined by a liberal Congress, unhinged by its expanded majority. And Obama's social liberalism could still turn Washington into a culture-war battlefield.

I suspect that Gerson means this as a caution, or as a distinction from G.W. - But if you look at the history of G.W.'s administration, perhaps instead he's warning us that Obama's first term could look like G.W.'s administration, during his first eight months and starting again with his reelection, where his popularity plummeted and he ran both his administration and (with their active complicity) his party into the ground.

Though Obama's campaign savaged the administration as incompetent and radical, Obama's personnel decisions have effectively ratified Bush's defense and economic approaches during the past few years. At the Pentagon, Obama rehired the architects of President Bush's current military strategy - Gates, Gen. David Petraeus and Gen. Raymond Odierno. At the Treasury Department, Obama has hired one of the main architects of Bush's current economic approach.

This continuity does not make Obama an ideological traitor. It indicates that Bush has been pursuing centrist, bipartisan policies - without getting much bipartisan support.

Good grief, does Gerson pay attention to anything? When Obama launched his campaign, we were told of the superiority of Bush's war policy, and that Obama's call for ending the war and fixing a date for withdrawal of the troops was defeatism that would reward terrorists. Around that same time, Bush brought in Gates to replace the disastrous leadership of Donald Rumsfeld and within months "every single one of the top commanders running the war ha[d] been replaced." Bush has since negotiated a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. That is, in the face of significant public opposition to his war and his policies, Bush shifted his position from his prior (failed) partisan policies to something to what he would formerly have described as letting the terrorists win.

Gates was appointed by the Senate in a 95-2 vote. When Bush started moving from partisanship toward the positions shared by the majority of Congress and the majority of the American people, he got plenty of support. It isn't Obama who has shifted on these issues - it's Bush.

In terms of treasury, Gerson is apparently talking about Timothy Geithner. There's good reason to believe that Geithner has worked with Henry Paulson to fashion the response to the present crisis in the financial industry, but... you know, funny thing, you would expect the president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to be involved in this sort of crisis. Although I am not at all impressed with Paulson's inconsistent approach to this crisis, or his tendency to indiscriminately and unconditionally throw money at banks while refusing to hold bank executives responsible for their incompetence, he's clearly been given a lot of discretion to respond to this crisis. To some degree you have to credit Bush with giving him that discretion, but Bush's desperation is hardly reflective of centrist policy. In normal times, the political center would be horrified by what Paulson has been doing - actually, it's hard to imagine any segment of the political spectrum that wouldn't be horrified. So again, this is a horrible example of Bush's supposed centrism.

Particularly on the economy, Bush has never been a libertarian; he has always matched a commitment to free markets with a willingness to intervene when markets stumble.

I'm not sure what Bush has been "on the economy", other than a failure by the measure of the political left, political right, job market, stock market, housing market.... But I'll grant, he's no libertarian.

Third, Obama is finding the limits of leading a "movement" that never had much ideological content.

This notion of a "movement" seems to emerge from two separate phenomena - the fact that some individuals and loose-knit groups projected their own political goals onto Obama (as, frankly, happens with pretty much any new, charismatic political leader who builds a coalition sufficient to win a national election), and the caricature advanced by people like Gerson. But you know, there's one person whom I've not once heard speak of Obama as a leader of a cohesive "movement" - Barack Obama. And there's a guy who has been willing to disappoint large groups of his supporters on issues such as Iraq policy and FISA, even before he was elected. (Can Gerson guess his name?) But then, Gerson was apparently taken surprise that Obama reappointed Gates, despite, you know, Obama promising to reach across the aisle when composing his cabinet.

Reappointing Gates is also politically savvy, as it makes it harder for Republicans to blame Obama if the Iraq phase-down goes poorly. But whatever Obama's motivations, take a step back and think about what it means for Gates to be accepting this reappointment. He had the alternative of cashing in, big time with a book deal, private sector jobs... think Cheney at Halliburton. It's a testament to his character that he's continuing in the job, and a testament to Obama that he's again willing to disappoint supporters who wanted a clean break from past war policy in order to retain somebody who may in fact be the best available choice for the job. So with regard to Gates, although my reasoning is different, I'll accede to Gerson's conclusion - That's centrism we can believe in.

As for Gerson's having his hopes raised by Obama's "disappointing the ideologues", he may be onto something. After all, had Bush been more willing to stand up to factions exemplified by PNAC, the Club for Growth, the domestic energy industry, etc., his administration might not have been such a miserable failure.

You Play The Hand You're Dealt

This comment, from a venture capitalist, is pretty typical following... well, pretty much any election:

I think Obama has the election pretty wrapped up absent a major external event. I think my parents might vote for him. They are army people, lifelong republicans, who are in their late 70s/early 80s. But if they vote for Obama, they are not really voting for him, they are voting against the GOP and what is has become and what it has done to this country. Obama's mandate, if he wins, will be thin and he should not overplay it. He must win these skeptics who held their nose and voted for him if he wants to govern with a real mandate. And that won't be easy and he must govern from the far center which is where our country really is right now. And I think he can and will do that.

If you recall how G.W. overplayed his hand following the 2004 election ("I earned capital in this campaign, political capital, and now I intend to spend it.") this might appear to be common sense. G.W. was narrowly elected, didn't have great public support for the changes he wished to press, and his initiatives failed. Something similar might be said about Bill Clinton's first couple of years, where he was stymied by his own party.

But in both cases, was the problem that they didn't have a strong enough mandate? Or that they overplayed their hands? Bill Clinton probably anticipated greater support from his own party - in retrospect he should have worked to build that consensus, or in its absence to at least build a popular consensus for his initiatives, before he tried to push them through. G.W. wanted to reinvent Social Security, proposing "reforms" that were supported more in theory than in practice within his party and which were viewed skeptically by the public. Like Clinton, and in contrast to the party unity of his first four years in office, he suffered a breakdown in party discipline that made it impossible for him to advance his proposals. After that, his continuing efforts to advance his "reform" agenda eroded his public support.

Don't underestimate G.W.'s tactics merely because they failed. He managed to cram through a great many controversial initiatives during his first two years in office, most of which were treated as minor issues or non-issues by the time the 2004 election rolled around. Saving "Social Security reform" for his second term reflects the greater political risk involved. But the Republicans had the sense to know that initiatives that pass more than two years before an election generally won't be big issues when the election finally comes. News coverage will dwindle, pundits will move on to other issues, voter anger will subside, and in all likelihood the election will turn on other issues.

To advance his agenda, the new President, Obama or McCain, should evaluate his position: What initiatives are likely to be well-received in Congress, by the public, or both? What important initiatives might pass with some finessing of Congress, the public, or both? What initiatives are likely to fail? He can build a first term agenda based upon that analysis.

But what he shouldn't do is worry about whether three or four years later a particular set of swing voters will be offended that he carried out his promises, when they had secretly hoped he would not. Really, what's the advice here? "Wait four years to see if you get a bigger mandate"? Absent catastrophe a President probably has only one chance to be transformative - and that chance most likely comes (and goes) in the first half of the first term. No, certainly, the newly elected President won't want to overplay his hand - but if he wants to change the country in any meaningful way he needs to play his hand for all it's worth.

Whining About Bloggers

Is it just me, or are the pundits, media figures and politicians who spend the most time whining about bloggers - and here I mean bloggers generally, not specific bloggers or blog posts, or blog coverage of a particular story or event - typically... Not very bright, not very careful with the facts, not very honest, or some combination thereof?

The Latest Silliness from David Brooks

David Brooks takes us on a tour of his own psyche today:

Obama speeches almost always have the same narrative arc. Some problem threatens. The odds are against the forces of righteousness. But then people of good faith unite and walls come tumbling down. Obama used the word “walls” 16 times in the Berlin speech, and in 11 of those cases, he was talking about walls coming down.

* * *

When I first heard this sort of radically optimistic speech in Iowa, I have to confess my American soul was stirred. It seemed like the overture for a new yet quintessentially American campaign.

I have acknowledged that it's easy to get stirred by some of Obama's rhetoric, but that it's obvious that they're political speeches and that his rhetoric can be obviously inflated, and that inspires me to interpret Brooks' "confession" in one of two ways:

1. His early praise-verging-on-adulation of Obama, which ended the moment it became obvious that Obama was going to be the Democratic candidate, representing the height of disingenuousness; or

2. Brooks routinely lets his emotional responses overwhelm his ability to be rational or objectively analyze political speeches and commentary.

Either way, he claims to now be over his early infatuation:

But now it is more than half a year on, and the post-partisanship of Iowa has given way to the post-nationalism of Berlin, and it turns out that the vague overture is the entire symphony. The golden rhetoric impresses less, the evasion of hard choices strikes one more.

So how does Brooks respond? By comparing the speeches of Presidents who are already in office with those of a candidate.

Much of the rest of the speech fed the illusion that we could solve our problems if only people mystically come together. We should help Israelis and Palestinians unite. We should unite to prevent genocide in Darfur. We should unite so the Iranians won’t develop nukes.

And the difference between this and the past eight years of Bush would be... that Obama thinks people must come together to effect change, while the Bush Administration expects it to happen by magic? The difference between this and the McCain campaign is that McCain wants us to accept a dismal status quo?

Since [the 1990s], autocracies have arisen, the competition for resources has grown fiercer, Russia has clamped down, Iran is on the march. It will take politics and power to address these challenges, the two factors that dare not speak their name in Obama’s lofty peroration.

Now you'll excuse me for observing this, but nothing in Obama's speech is inconsistent with a recognition of the need for "politics and power" to address the problems in the world. Perhaps Brooks slept through Obama's call for a stepped up military action in Afghanistan? He caught the part where "called on Germans to send more troops to Afghanistan" - but apparently was unable to process the implication. (Hint: He doesn't expect them to go to Afghanistan to teach children to hold hands and sing Kumbaya.) But get this:

The odd thing is that Obama doesn’t really think this way. When he gets down to specific cases, he can be hard-headed. Last year, he spoke about his affinity for Reinhold Niebuhr, and their shared awareness that history is tragic and ironic and every political choice is tainted in some way.

So Obama is capable of thinking like a President, being tough, and making tough choices. Then what's Brooks' problem?

But he has grown accustomed to putting on this sort of saccharine show for the rock concert masses, and in Berlin his act jumped the shark.

Oh how horrible - you mean Obama is running for political office? Thank goodness Brooks alerted us to this alarming reality.

You want to talk about "jumping the shark"....

Enough Of The Earth-Shattering Observations

You know, I don't mind that you disagree with some of Obama's positions, but I don't need to be told that Barak Obama is a politician who is "doing what he needs to do to get elected." That's a given.

You know what would be more helpful, at least from my perspective? Commentary about when Obama is not "doing what he needs to do to get elected." Because, you know, he's gearing up for an election. And it's safe to say that he's trying to win it.

_______
Update:

Some examples from both sides of the political spectrum:

Charles Krauthammer demonstrates amazing insight by telling us, "The truth about Obama is uncomplicated. He is just a politician (though of unusual skill and ambition)."

Over at TalkLeft, champion of Hillary Clinton, we get the astonishing commentary, "Barack Obama is a conventional politician who will run a conventional general election campaign.... Pols are pols and do what they do".

Thanks for, um, sharing.

How Dare He Say Such A Thing...

Michael Gerson is appalled:

But the vulgarity of "The Jerry Springer Show" or misogynous rap music -- the cultural equivalents of Franken's political "satire" -- generally expresses contempt and cruelty. Franken is not content to disagree with Karl Rove; he calls him "human filth."

How could Franken say such a mean thing about Turd Blossom? It's time to raise the level of political discourse!

I liked this as well:

So what is Franken's "provocative, touching and funny" contribution to the genre? Consider his article in Playboy magazine titled "Porn-O-Rama!" in which he enthuses that it is an "exciting time for pornographers and for us, the consumers of pornography."

In Playboy? It's hard to imagine that they would publish adolescent sexually oriented humor pieces in Playboy.

"Porn-O-Rama!" is a modern campaign document every voter should read -- the Federalist Papers of lifestyle liberalism. It has the literary sensibilities and moral seriousness of an awkward adolescent nerd publishing an underground newspaper to shock his way into campus popularity

Again, this is Playboy we're talking about? Adolescent humor? I thought all they did was publish interviews with Jimmy Carter. (Let it never be said that Gerson isn't happy to regurgitate GOP talking points - but could he truly see an eight-year-old Playboy article as a "campaign document"?)

At an event hosted by the Feminist Majority Foundation in 1999, Franken offered this thigh-slapper: "Why don't we focus on what Afghan women can do? They can cook, bear children and pray. As I recall, that was fine for our grandmothers."

If only Gerson had gotten there on time, he could have explained to Franken that feminists don't have a sense of humor, and had no chance of figuring out that Franken was making fun of conservatives and not them. And, having read Gerson's column, we all now know that jokes about conservatives are not funny.

You know, as satire goes, at least to me Franken's not particularly compelling. He's far too obvious. I see him as much more a comedian who happens to address political subjects. But unlike Gerson, when I see somebody acting on a stage or performing on TV, I don't assume, "The person must be just like that in real life." Nor do I see the pulling of "shocking" punch lines from jokes told over a period of ten or twenty years, and presenting them as representative of a person, as particularly honest. (But if Gerson intends his own piece as satire of the "emptiness and viciousness of our political discourse", with his usual emphasis on "emptiness", maybe he's on the right track.)

More Truth Than You Can Handle

In case you haven't yet had enough of pundits wishing that politicians would tell the truth as they see it, Thomas Friedman offers us some more truthiness. Friedman opens:

Imagine for a minute, just a minute, that someone running for president was able to actually tell the truth, the real truth, to the American people about what would be the best — I mean really the best — energy policy for the long-term economic health and security of our country. I realize this is a fantasy, but play along with me for a minute. What would this mythical, totally imaginary, truth-telling candidate say?

At this point you're probably already thinking, "I don't know, but I suspect it's something different than what you're about to say." Perhaps you're expecting that it will be yet another call by Friedman for an increased gas tax.

No, our mythical candidate would say the long-term answer is to go exactly the other way: guarantee people a high price of gasoline — forever.

This candidate would note that $4-a-gallon gasoline is really starting to impact driving behavior and buying behavior in way that $3-a-gallon gas did not. The first time we got such a strong price signal, after the 1973 oil shock, we responded as a country by demanding and producing more fuel-efficient cars. But as soon as oil prices started falling in the late 1980s and early 1990s, we let Detroit get us readdicted to gas guzzlers, and the price steadily crept back up to where it is today.

We must not make that mistake again. Therefore, what our mythical candidate would be proposing, argues the energy economist Philip Verleger Jr., is a “price floor” for gasoline: $4 a gallon for regular unleaded, which is still half the going rate in Europe today.

Price controls? Friedman is literally suggesting that having "had the courage to tell voters that the McCain-Clinton summer gas-giveaway plan was a fraud", Barack Obama should guarantee windfall oil company profits by preventing the free market from ever leading to a gas price below $4/gallon?

Wouldn’t it be amazing if he took the next step and put the right plan before the American people? Wouldn’t that just be amazing?

It sure would, Mr. Friedman, but (so sorry) your plan isn't the right one.

Robert Samuelson On Truth Serum

Oh boy.... Robert Samuelson imagines a world where we put politicians on "truth serum" and suddenly everything the have to say coincides 100% with (you probably guessed it) Samuelson's personal political agenda. Let's supplement some of these remarks, such that they're actually truthful.

"What we can do is preserve an economic climate that favors long-term growth. That means holding down the tax burden to maintain incentives for work and investments. We're already running a $400 billion or so deficit; some broad-based tax increases may be needed. This will disappoint conservatives, who think no one should pay taxes, and liberals, who think only the rich should pay them. But we must also cut spending, because, unless we do, the future tax increases will be crushing.

"Taxes may need to be raised, but only broad-based taxes. Should we need to raise taxes, we need not concern ourselves with progressive taxation or the impact of higher taxes on working families. We should caricature both conservatives (in a somewhat flattering way) and liberals (in a somewhat nonsensical way).

"To cut to the chase - while taxes may need to be raised that's something to be avoided. What we must do is cut spending. And by cutting spending, of course, I mean programs that help the poor and (primarily) the middle class. I have no interest in examining other major expenses, such as the cost of the Iraq War, so don't even go there.

"Of necessity, spending cuts should focus on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. These programs are projected to grow from about 45 percent of the present budget to 70 percent over a couple of decades. Paying for that exclusively with taxes would be devastating for the economy and our children. Paying exclusively by cutting other programs would gut vital government services. I admit that raising eligibility ages for baby boomers and cutting some benefits are unfair. People should have received more warning. But our politicians have so dawdled that there's no warning time left.

"Yes, I'm one of those politicians who happily advances the right-wing canard that because we "spent" the money we borrowed from Social Security, even though Social Security owns treasury notes that if repaid would carry it for decades, those taxes you paid to support your retirement are gone and now we need to cut your benefits. We won't pause to reflect on what this means for the oft-heard line, 'the poor and lower middle class don't pay income taxes,' as if we divert your Social Security taxes into the general fund what are they other than just another income tax.

"And no, don't ask me the financial specifics of the Social Security crisis, because the facts hurt my argument. I want you scared that if you don't give up some benefits now, even though we can afford them, the entire system will soon collapse. The truth about Social Security? Not so scary. We have some work to do, sure, but it's dishonest of me to suggest that the sky is falling.

"Now Medicare and Medicaid are a different story, and we do need to find a way to reign in costs. I'm going to start by ignoring how implementation of universal health care could affect this financial picture, because I'm busy pretending that nobody is addressing these issues. While universality of health insurance doesn't directly address the problems of Medicare and Medicaid, it could keep people off the Medicaid rolls who currently intentionally reduce their earnings and assets in order to qualify for benefits.

"My opponent sees a future where the working poor can hold jobs despite having chronic, costly illnesses and still have good health coverage. My vision involves keeping them poor and dependent - then cutting their Medicaid benefits. Let's face it - that's better for wealthy taxpayers like me. We can pay for our own health care - although our ability really isn't the issue, as most of us also have really good insurance and we don't need to worry about the consequences of Medicare and Medicaid cuts.

"Take for example candidate John McCain. His wife could open him his own private medical clinic, staffed with personal physicians and nurses to cater to his every need. She could afford this without even having to sell her private jet or mortgage one of her vacation homes - they have so much money, it wouldn't affect their lifestyle at all. But he and I still want to cut your medical benefits and your medical safety net, because let's face it. We're more important than you.

"And because we're more important to you, when I talk about cutting Social Security and the medical care safety net, I'm not talking about cutting retirement benefits for members of the Senate, or eliminating the generous health insurance packages available to Senators at taxpayer expense. You may notice that while I'm talking about surprising you with less income and more medical expenses in your retirement, I have no interest in sharing your pain. I would prefer it if you didn't notice that, but no matter how hard I wish it weren't the case, not all of you are stupid.

"We've also dawdled on energy. No one likes $125-a-barrel oil. Last year, we paid an average price of $64 a barrel for imports. Some blame the oil companies, but the truth is that we're all to blame. Americans like cheap gasoline and big vehicles. Nothing was done to dampen consumption. Meanwhile, Congress restricted new oil and gas exploration on environmental grounds. So, demand rose and supply fell. In 1985, we imported 4 million barrels of oil a day; now that's 12 million

"Now when I say 'nothing was done', I don't really mean that. I mean that once Ronald Reagan was elected President and energy self-sufficiency and conservation no longer seemed like pressing concerns, those quaint notions were quickly relegated to the status of exhibits at the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library. I'm also going to pretend that the only issue causing a rise in oil prices is our domestic inability to get more oil out of the ground right now. That it has nothing to do with increased demand for oil around the world, and perhaps especially in China and India.

"I'm also going to pretend that other oil-producing nations would not step down their production in response to any domestic increase, so as to maximize their own profits. I will happily ignore the fact that if we drained ANWR dry, odds are we will get at most a four year domestic supply of oil - then it's gone and we're back where we started. And I'll ignore the very concept of the word "reserves" - because I think it's better that we completely tap out domestic sources of oil sooner rather than later, so we can become even more dependent on foreign oil.

"As I said, I don't want you blaming the oil companies for any of this. It's not like they have intentionally limited refinery capacity so as to maximize gasoline prices in the summer. Well, actually it is like that, but I don't want you to remember that fact. Don't blame the auto industry either, because they made a lot of money off of selling SUV's, even as they ceded the technological advantage in fuel efficient technologies to the Japanese auto manufacturers. And I don't want you to bring up the environmental records of 'big oil' either, because, well, I don't think the environment is very important. And just so you know, if you disagree with me you're stupid.

" 'Energy independence' is a fraud. We simply use too much foreign oil. All we can do is limit our dependence by shifting to more-efficient vehicles and increasing domestic production. But these measures will take years and have only modest effects. The same is true of global warming. Without major technological breakthroughs, making big cuts in greenhouse gases will be impossible.

"And when I say 'Energy independence is a fraud', I mean I don't want to pay the political price of achieving it. I don't want to have to sell you on nuclear power, mass transportation, more energy-efficient living, and massive infrastructure investment - I don't even want to mention those things. I'm happy to pretend that if we get the average vehicle up to 30 or so MPG, everything will come up roses - and that we have no other ways to conserve energy. I'm going to pretend that only gasoline is made from a barrel of crude, and am not going to mention other gases or heating oil. I certainly don't want to ask businesses to ante up, and as you know I'm not going to raise taxes on the rich to pay for any of this.

"Similarly, when I say 'The same is true of global warming,' I'm again passing the buck. Obviously there are things we can do to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. I'm not willing to increase taxes to pay for those things, and again I'm not interested in asking industry to bear the expense, so forget it. It's just not a priority to me. As far as I'm concerned, the whole "global warming" thing is overblown.

"By the way, did you notice that I didn't mention nuclear energy? It would take a courageous politician to bring up nuclear energy as a possible solution to some of our energy needs. Did you see the way I avoided mentioning coal, the environmental impact of coal mining and coal-burning power plants, and the greenhouse gases and environmental damage resulting from coal-burning plants? Because it would take a courageous politician to tackle those issues, and if you noticed that you're probably also noticing that I'm anything but courageous. You did notice? Drat.

"Finally, let's discuss poverty. Everyone's against it, but hardly anyone admits that most of the increase in the past 15 years reflects immigration -- new immigrants or children of recent immigrants. Unless we stop poor people from coming across our Southern border, legally and illegally, we won't reduce poverty. Period. That doesn't mean we should try to expel the 12 million illegal immigrants already here -- an impossible and morally dubious task. Many families have been here for years; many have American children. We need a pragmatic accommodation: assimilate most people now here; shift future immigration to the highly skilled.

"And here you'll note that I'm painting a picture of immigration and poverty that is so misleading that anybody who is conversant with the issues will think I'm lying. But I'm telling the truth, in a relative sort of way, by describing the world in a way that reflects my politics and personal prejudices.

"Now you're of course asking me, 'How are you going to keep those 'south of the border types' out'? I'm not. Oh, I might promise stepped up border patrols, fencing the entire U.S.-Mexican border, or other expensive forms of window-dressing, but at the end of the day I'm simply not the type of politician who is going to ask the agriculture industry to pay the type of wages that will draw citizens to pick our nation's fruits and vegetables, the hospitality or retail industry to pay that type of wage for maids and janitors, or the construction industry to pay that type of wage for workers.

"Heck - since I'm being honest, I'm not willing to pay that type of wage for the guy who mows my lawn and cleans my pool, or the woman who clean my house. So at most I'm talking about trying to shift them into a 'guest worker'-type system that maintains them as a steady supply of cheap labor. If I were to be honest about my hope, it would be that they come here to work they leave their children at home, and by 'home' I mean 'south of the border'.

"By pretending the poverty problem is driven by immigration, I also get to avoid addressing the more difficult aspects of poverty. If I admitted that immigrant populations assimilate, their children mostly speak English and hold jobs, and that their poverty is relatively transitory, you might turn around and ask me, 'What about those populations where poverty isn't a transitional stage? Where people or families are in poverty for years, or even generations? What can we do for them?' You might even argue, 'Can't we learn something from the successful assimilation of immigrants, even those with little or no education, that might help us learn how to move other populations out of poverty?' Truth be told, I don't care about people in poverty. My only solution for them is to cut their entitlements.

"Vote for me. I'll tell the truth."

"That is, the truth as I see it. Which may not be the truth. But that technicality aside, it's the truth."

Samuelson adds,

Of course, our hapless candidate would be dismissed as misinformed, offensive, possibly racist and, of course, unelectable.

No. A fair assessment would be that the hapless candidate is ill-informed, intentionally or unintentionally oversimplifies serious issues, responds to serious problems at best with clichéd non-solutions, and mostly offers no solution whatsoever to anything else he defines as a "critical" issue for the nation.

That isn't a good way to differentiate himself from the rest of the field.

David Brooks? He's No Fool

When reading David Brooks, The American Conservative reminds us that the operative word isn't tool fool:

I’ve been pondering for months whether David Brooks is far and away McCain’s most sophisticated operative. He writes a deft put-down of Obama today, commenting en passant about “the cultural issues” and Jeremiah Wright, and noting that “voters want a president who basically shares their values and life experiences.” “How Obama Fell to Earth” is the title of the column.

How amazing that Brooks could restrain himself from writing this stuff until Obama was 80 percent assured of securing the Democratic nomination. It’s not as if Jeremiah Wright appeared on the scene yesterday.

While I disagree with the author of that post in relation to his praise of Steve Sailer, whose online activities tend in my view to be about a millimeter short of "white supremacism", the gist is correct - for months, despite the fact that any sensate reader knows he's going to vote for the Republican candidate, Brooks has come close to swooning over Obama. His sudden shift to attack mode isn't inspired by new facts or evidence, but by timing. This approach is not only politically helpful to his party, but makes the job of writing columns about Obama pretty easy - take all the nice things you said about him last month, and explain how disappointed you have become. By things you knew all along, or are making up.

Brooks is in full "no mendacity barred" mode in taking on Obama. He exaggerates Obama's statement on not raising taxes, but more strikingly in whining, " That will make it impossible to address entitlement reform," completely omits the fact that his candidate, McCain, promises further massive tax cuts. Further, it's an outright lie that the most fiscally troubling entitlements, Medicare and Social Security, are significantly affected by a promise not to raise income taxes. There, as I noted yesterday, Obama has proposed lifting the cap on payroll taxes. Check the transcript of the debate. Brooks surely remembers this,

Well, Charlie, I just have to respond real quickly to Senator Clinton's last comment. What I have proposed is that we raise the cap on the payroll tax, because right now millionaires and billionaires don't have to pay beyond $97,000 a year.

Brooks gave an "A" grade to the imbecilic questions raised in the debate, including this whopper from Charlie Gibson:

And in each instance, when the [capital gains] rate dropped, revenues from the tax increased. The government took in more money.

Well, gee... why don't we cut the capital gains rate to 0% and use the massively increased tax revenues to make up for any shortfalls in other areas. (That was sarcasm, of course - but here's a more realistic picture of how capital gains taxes line up with tax revenues.)

Further, half or more of all income taxes are paid by people earning above the range Obama described, so how is it that we could not see significant increases in tax revenues without touching taxes below that threshold? For that matter, when did we enter an era where the only way to increase spending is to raise income taxes?

I recognize that Brooks comes from the school of pseudo-conservatism where deficits matter... but only if there's a Democrat in the White House. But who seriously tries to argue in this era that a balanced budget must take priority over all else, even in the face of a recession? Further, if in fact Obama winds down the war in Iraq, that should free up a lot of money that is presently being spent on the war - although I'm sure Brooks sees it as entirely justifiable deficit spend hundreds of billions on a war he supports, as opposed to spending similar amounts of money repairing this nation's crumbling infrastructure or implementing health care reform.

Which brings us to Brooks' next deception, "Then [Obama] made an iron vow to get American troops out of Iraq within 16 months." Well, no. He didn't. If you actually look at what Obama said, he was very careful to avoid committing to a specific timeframe. He instead indicated that the direction of the war would be his decision to make, with due consideration of the advice of the military. Brooks didn't just fall off the turnip truck - he could have legitimately criticized Obama for evading the question, something that would have fit in just fine with this "He's just another, ordinary politician"-type column. But apparently honesty doesn't serve his purposes.

Then we get into standard Brooks-style elitism, and sneering at working class voters:

Then there are the cultural issues. Charles Gibson and George Stephanopoulos of ABC News are taking a lot of heat for spending so much time asking about Jeremiah Wright and the “bitter” comments. But the fact is that voters want a president who basically shares their values and life experiences. Fairly or not, they look at symbols like Michael Dukakis in a tank, John Kerry’s windsurfing or John Edwards’s haircut as clues about shared values.

And how do we know voters do this? Because Brooks says they do. And what voters is he describing with this insulting stereotype? You got it.

If it really is "all about image", why has Brooks never sneered at our "cowboy" President for apparently being afraid of horses? Why not a column sniggering, "He's such a wimp, he can't even eat a pretzel without ending up in the hospital"? Because I'm pretty sure he would give us that type of "analysis" of similar "news" about Obama or Clinton.

Do you think there's one chance in a billion that Brooks would say, "This, after all, is how I choose my candidate"? Do you think he would attribute that type of shallow thinking to any other member of the Republican elite? If he did, how fast and furious would be the repudiation? This is mainstream Republican elitism on full display, folks. It's somehow not "elitist" to tell the working class, "You make your voting decisions based upon how a candidate bowls, looks in a tank, or how much he pays for a haircut." Do the voters themselves agree with Brooks? No, it appears that they do not.

I think it is fair to say that voters want a President who will project American values to the world. Image is part of that, and it is thus an important part of a campaign. But it is just plain insulting to picture working class voters as beer-guzzling yokels who choose a candidate based on such conceits as "Who would I rather have a beer with." Whatever the image a candidate cultivates, there are darn few voters who don't recognize that they will never be invited to have a beer with the President - they know that honor is primarily reserved for elites like, well, David Brooks. McCain's not inviting us to his back yard BBQ's. Bush doesn't have us over to watch football, or even to help him clear brush on his faux ranch. We even know that Clinton's shot and a beer was a photo op, not a reflection of her lifestyle, without your telling us. That is to say, Mr. Brooks, contrary to your elitist beliefs, voters aren't half as stupid as you think they are.

Elitism, Kang and Kodos Style

Elitist: You're wrong to be concerned about issues I don't care about. You should vote for me so I can work on the issues I see as important to this country.

Non-Elitist: You're right to be concerned about issues I don't care about. You should vote for me so I can work on the issues I see as important to this country.

Big Mistakes By Politicians

When politicians talk about things they supposedly know about, and make colossal mistakes, what are we supposed to think? I will grant that some politicians are pretty dense, but most are above average in intelligence. So they're capable of grasping basic facts. So I'm left thinking that the primary problem is one of two forms of disinterest:

1. They don't actually care about the subject that they are discussing, or
2. They are unable to break out of their pre-existing constructs about the subject.

Perhaps both.

If we take the Lieberman/McCain Iraq War tag team, first we have Lieberman correcting McCain, that the Iranians are not training al-Qaeda. Now we have Lieberman making a similar gaffe,

If we did what Sen. Obama wanted us to do last year, Al-Qaeda in Iran would be in control of Iraq today.

My impression of McCain is that he just doesn't care about the subtleties. Arab, Persian, Sunni, Shiite, whatever. An insurgent is an insurgent is a terrorist, and to support one is to support them all.

Lieberman, on the other hand, has never failed to surprise me with how little he knows about the Middle East, or pretty much anything else he chooses to discuss, sometimes to the point of being a buffoon. He seems to have tried to brush up on his foreign policy credentials when he thought he could be President, but to demonstrate the acumen of a bored college freshman. Iran? Iraq? We know from his correction of McCain that he knows the difference between Sunni and Shiite, but we can't really expect him to stay on top of the terminology for stuff that was on "last month's test", can we?

But answer this: How ignorant do you have to be of Iraq and its various factions to believe that "Al Qaeda in Iraq" would find a welcome home if we pulled out, rather than being extirpated at the hands of the Shiite majority? "Al Qaeda in Iraq" isn't even popular with Iraqi Sunnis.

Lieberman leaves me wondering if he cares about anything other than reelection, or perhaps scoring a Cabinet post in a McCain Administration.
___________________
Update: On a similar note:

[General Odom] blasted the hawks who want to expand the war to Iran, noting that such people are actually seeking to fulfill a key Al Qaeda strategic aim. “One need only take note of the al Qaeda public diplomacy campaign... they implore the United States to bomb and invade Iran and destroy the apostate Shiite regime. As an aside, it gives me pause to learn that our vice president and some members of the Senate are aligned with al Qaeda on spreading the war to Iran.”

Pretty good stuff. Over to you, Dick Cheney, Senator Lieberman, Senator McCain: why are you aligned with al Qaeda on spreading the war to Iran?

You can have valid reasons for not liking the Iranian government, or wanting to replace it, but... pause for a moment and think?