The Can Win Elections, But They Can't Govern

You can try and hide from the truth, but in the end, the ugly just comes through.

Said before, I'll say it again.

The GOP is not fit to govern the country.  The reason they are not fit is because in order to win elections, they have to advocate for pony-based policies that are impossible to implement.

Take the debt ceiling debate.  Usually, the debt ceiling is passed fairly easily and uncontroversially.  The GOP,  beholden to its Tea Party members and rhetoric, decided to use the debt ceiling to double down on the politically disastrous Ryan plan to attack entitlements.  This, despite the fact that most Americans would rather see revenues increased than benefits cut.

Obama then doubles down and decides to try and create a plan that will extend the life of entitlements out to the budgetary horizon, rein in spending and raise revenues.  The GOP walks away.  Because their rhetoric - or if you're being charitable: beliefs - precludes them from... well, making hard choices and compromising.

The result is the McConnell plan -  a capitulation disguised as a 30 second attack ad.  The McConnell plan would avert the policy disaster of default, thus making happy the Wall Street wing of the party.  It would also create attack ads about how many times the Democrats raised the debt ceiling - and since most Americans are too fascinated by whether Casey Anthony will date OJ Simpson - it might work.

It's terrible governing, but it might help them win an election.  Classic.

And then we also have this.  Click through and read the damn thing.

Mandating more efficient light bulbs is an easy way to save energy and save money in the long and short run.  Opposing that is Level 68 stupid.  In fact, it would seem to be a completely necessary action to insure uniform application across the country under the commerce clause.

But, no.  If you're a GOP politician, then by definition nothing the government does - besides killing dusky hued foreigner - is legitimate ipso facto.

In other words, the "modern" GOP simply does not believe in the act of governing.

The House of Representatives has been taken over by anarchists and no one has noticed.

GOP=Accountability Free Zone

Boehner and McConnell plan their escape.

First, we had Orrin Hatch, now we have the Escape Hatch.

Yesterday, Orrin Hatch made some predictably asinine statement about taxing Gilligan's Island or something.  I was too bored to click through the link.

Today, Sherwood Schwartz, the man who created Gilligan's Island, died.  Coincidence?  I think not.

Now we have Mitch "The Human Banana Slug" McConnell coming up with a ridiculous plan to raise the debt ceiling without restrictions.

Basically, it creates a series of three debt increases that can be voted on by Democrats alone.  It goes something like this: They vote for a series of three debt increases that come up for votes at various times over the next year and a half.  But these increases in the debt ceiling are effectively pre-approved and can only be defeated by a two-thirds majority AGAINST.  So the GOP can - their thinking must go - label the Democrats as Big Spenders every time they vote to keep the government solvent.

First, it's stunningly cynical.  In fact, it's so transparently cynical, I bet even the DC press corps can see it.

Second, it's capitulation.  It's capitulation to the Teatards (though they won't be fooled).  And it's capitulation of their responsibility to govern responsibly.  The GOP is effectively ceding the debt ceiling argument to the executive branch.  They are effectively walking away from their duties to be a partner in governing the country.  And don't think for a moment all those glibertarians and Teatards will consider this a victory for "small government" conservatism.

On a policy level, this would be pretty good.  Debt ceiling gets raised, no dramatic cuts in spending.  Politically, I think this makes the GOP look like chumps, and it would certainly vindicate O'Donnell's Rope-A-Dope thinking.

It still has to happen, but for the moment, I think the GOP just blinked.

UPDATE: This is a good take: http://www.balloon-juice.com/2011/07/12/all-over-the-map/

Debt Ceiling Part 7.0

Don't drink slaughter the Kool Aid.

The political debate is starting to heat up over the debt ceiling.  Despite that, the majority - or at least a plurality - of Americans still don't seem to understand what the debt ceiling is or why it's absolutely essential that it be raised.  You have idiots like Paul Broun (R-GA Moronia) actually talking about lowering the debt ceiling.  While he's at it, maybe he should repeal the law of gravity.

Anyway, as the debate increases in intensity, it seems obvious to most sentient people that Obama has been much more flexible than the GOP in considering a deal for raising the debt ceiling, including embracing some ideas that are frankly stupid, counterproductive and a betrayal of his constituents, such as raising Medicare eligibility to 67.  

As any economist who isn't employed by some think tank subsidized  by the Koch Brothers will tell you: You don't cut spending in a recession.  We have a demand problem that is keeping unemployment untenably high.  When Obama agreed to cuts in the last negotiations with the GOP, they were mostly bookkeeping changes and phased in cuts over time.  Some of the cuts proposed right now would likely lead to a true double dip recession.

Lawrence O'Donnell seems to think that Obama has played a brilliant Rope-A-Dope on the GOP.  He's publicly accommodated a ton of their insane suggestions, knowing that in the end they would walk away from the table when he laid his marker - revenue increases on the richest Americans.  Sure enough, Cantor walked away and now any increase in the debt ceiling is likely going to require House Democratic votes and will not, therefore, include major cuts to entitlements.

I have no idea what will happen or whether O'Donnell is right.  But it does seem to me as if we could wind up with a clean debt ceiling increase, or at least it seems more likely than it has at any time up until now.  

I've always felt that Boehner was a shallow pol but not a stupid one.  He understands - as he has said - that the debt ceiling must be raised.  He is also trying to accommodate his batshit insane Teatard members.  Obama has cemented his position as the reasonable one, and Boehner knows this.

I have no idea what happens as the endgame here.  Perhaps they introduce another "clean" debt ceiling bill and enough Democrats and enough Republicans pass it.  

But in my recent readings of the Great Depression, it occurred to me that intelligent, well-meaning men made disastrous choices for all the "right" reasons.  Their folly was to be captured by outmoded ideas about monetary policy and macroeconomics.

What worries me is that we have a momentous decision ahead for the world economy. and we don't even have intelligent or well-meaning men and women who ultimately hold the power to make this crucial decision.

And that scares the poop out of me.

Summer Day

Safety first... think of the children.

It was hot and humid here in ol' Connecticut.  So naturally I spent the day mowing the lawn and gutting the downstairs half-bath.  Because really what could be better on a hot day than dealing with the smell of sewer gasses and the disgustingness of the wax ring that seals the toilet to the sewer pipe.

But at the end of the day, tired and drenched in sweat, the boys playing soccer (nicely, amazingly) having come home from a good day of scout camp.  The smell of mown grass and a cold beer in hand... not a bad day.

The Beautiful Game

I watched the US-Brazil WWC match today.

It is impossible for me to believe that if Americans watched that game they wouldn't be drawn to soccer.  But I went to ESPN and a few commenters were issuing the usual predictable "even the highlights are boring"... "too much drama"... "too much diving".

Isn't that what makes sports great?  Isn't the narrative as important as the outcome?

Eleven Dimensional Chess

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2011/07/my_way_or_the_highway.php#more?ref=fpblg

Boehner pulls out of the $4 trillion deal that would include entitlement cuts and revenue increases.

One of the options all along was that this was Kabuki by the White House to make the GOP look like nothing was good enough for them, and thus blame the economic collapse on them.

That option is looking frighteningly real right now.

The View From The Plantation Porch

The family and I have been on Nantucket this past week and a half.  It is an important place for the Wonderful Wife and me.  We were married here, our kids were baptized here, we spend as much of each summer here as we can.

But it is a place swarming with the rich and kinda famous.  At the Fourth of July festivities, we walked by Joe Scarborough and David Gregory.  For some reason, if you work at NBC, you have to have a place here.  We see multitudes of people who are obviously doing great economically right now, whether they be the factotums from NBC or the myrmidons of Wall Street.  From the intricately carved and sculpted faces of aging matrons to people plopping down $32 for kids boxer shorts from Vineyard Vines, this is one of the seats of the new Gilded Age.

When the jobs report came out Friday, it should have scared the crap out of everyone in the country.  It should have stampeded a deal to get the debt ceiling raised - cleanly - so that we can remove this great cloud of uncertainty from the world economic stage.  It should have created a clarion call for a legitimate jobs bill.

Obama said the right things in his Twitter conference and his presser Friday.

But he should have been saying them for the past year.

I'm not an FDL nutjob, who thinks Obama's awful.  But I worry about the capture of his vision by the Washington Bubble.  I think he tries to remain connected to average American concerns, and he certainly comes from a perspective of middle class Americans more than most of our Presidents.  And maybe he's obsessed by the debt because he really thinks it's more important long term.

He admitted in his Twitter conference that he underestimated the depth of the recession, especially in the job market.  The stimulus bill did a good job of saving the auto industry, creating a bump in demand to halt the tumble and bridging state government budgets until 2011.  In other words, it would have been fine if this was 1991.

But it's not, and it wasn't enough.  And he's not going to get a job's bill through the Congress.

But he has to appear to be fighting for one.

The people out here in Nantucket don't give a damn about 9.2% unemployment.  All it means to them is they can pay their landscaper less.  These powerful and wealthy people don't need to worry about 2012, because no matter who gets elected, they will still be rich.

But at some point, there will be a breaking point.  At some point those 9.2% and the 16% underemployed are going to find a leader who will speak for them.

By temperament and inclination, Obama should be that guy.

I've been saying ever since I started this blog that Obama needs to find his inner populist.  The new media are going to keep searching for new Casey Anthony, the new Chandra Levy, the new Natalie Hollowell.  He has to change the conversation.

Obama has to pierce the disregard we have for the New Serfdom.  He has to lead the middle class to a new economy.

It will require him to get out of his comfort zone.

Which is as it should be, for millions of Americans haven't been comfortable for years now.

The World According To Bleh

I'm not coming out of this box until the world is sane again...

So it does look like Obama is endorsing a change in COLA to reduce Social Security payments over the long run.  In return he wants revenue increases.  So to recap: Obama wants to piss off older voters so he can raise taxes on the rich - who also vote.  He will reap political rewards by.... Hell if I know.

And then we have today's job report.  It is beyond sucky and is likely partially tied to uncertainty surrounding the debt ceiling.  If you were hiring would you take on the training of new workers when we are staring at a new Dark Ages?

Obama was largely right in saying that the collapse in hiring can be attributed to four things:

1) Uncertainty surrounding the immediate economic conditions, especially the possibility of default.

2) Persistent unemployment in the construction sector.

3) State lay-offs as the "Fifty Little Hoovers"* reduce state payrolls to balance their budgets.

4) Natural disasters like the Japanese earthquake that have disrupted global supply chains.

What's amazing is that looking at those top three causes, it would seem that the last thing we should be doing is cutting spending at the federal level.  I can't imagine someone is deciding not to open a small business because of the federal deficit.  But they might be because they don't know if America will be solvent in three weeks.

Similarly, Obama has  - rightly - proposed infrastructure spending to get people working in the construction trades.  All the while buying in to the BS fallacy that federal debt is somehow inhibiting job growth.

At the state level, one of the benefits of the stimulus bill was that it kept states solvent and allowed them to avoid laying people off.  That money is gone.  There is no way in hell the Tea Party controlled House (and it does seem to be controlled by the Tea Party) will appropriate money to states to keep state employees on the job.

Krugman, Stiglitz and others noted in 2009 that the stimulus was too small and too short in duration.  Obama admitted that he underestimated the power of this recession.  And yet he seems to be following the advice of the same people who advised him poorly in 2009.

I also understand that Obama likely couldn't have gotten a bigger stimulus through Ben Nelson's Senate in 2009.  I understand he will not get more spending from Louis Gohmert and Michelle Bachmann's House in 2011.

But the White House political team should have looked at William Howard Taft's disastrous endorsement of the Payne-Aldrich tariff.  Taft ran for office on lowering the tariff, but reactionaries in the Senate and House leadership took a tariff reduction and turned it into a tariff increase.  Then - and here was Taft's mistake - he called it "the best bill the Republican Party has ever passed".  This set up the Progressive flight from the GOP party to the Bull Moose party and eventually to the Democrats under FDR. It also insured Taft's defeat in 1912. (I am not prepared to offer an exegesis on early 20th century tariff policy right now.  I haven't slept well in about five nights.)

Sometimes circumstances serve you up a big old steaming Poo Sandwich.  And while you may have to eat it, don't pretend it's delicious.

* The appellation "Fifty Little Hoovers" isn't really fair to Hoover.  He did embrace modest deficit spending, albeit primarily in a "trickle down" effect through the RFC.  Sorry, Herbert.

Required Reading

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/07/plus-a-change-twitter-town-hall-dept/241542/

My dear mother was appalled at President Obama taking questions via Twitter.

But as Fallows points out above, average people tend to ask better questions than our professional journalist caste.

Shocker.

The Latest Word

There goes Pelosi... Biden... Reid... And there's Obama last out of the clown car.

Now we hear that Obama has offered Le Grande Bargain.  They're talking $4 trillion in deficit reduction that includes cuts to entitlements, discretionary spending and increased revenues.  The devil is obviously in the details - my guess is the Social Security cuts are means tested - but this is especially true of the revenue portion.

Having proposed this, we shall see if there is anything the GOP will do with it.

On the one hand, Obama has called the GOP bluff on deficits and simultaneously endeared himself to the Very Serious People of Washington who LOVE Le Grande Bargain.  For them, Tip O'Neill and St. Ronald of Reagan sitting down together and saving Social Security is the awesomest thing ever in the history of forever and ever amen.

If the cuts are bad, I have to wonder WTF Obama is doing.  Defending Medicare and Social Security is the route back to a Democratic majority in the House.  Unless maybe he's offering an unbelievable package to the GOP, knowing they will vote against it, cementing for even the most serious of Very Serious People the idea that the GOP is f-ing nuts.

It's the old Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times.

UPDATE: I think John Cole is right on target here.

Tick Tock

We get closer and closer to Default Day.  Even David Brooks has come out and said the GOP has gone crazy.

Thanks, Bobo, where have you been for the past two four six eight thirty years.

We will increasingly see the so-called mainstream Republicans and the Wall Street GOP start to push the Congressional GOP to get this done.  Hoyer just said that any Democratic votes in the House would require revenue increases.  Oddly, this might make it easier for the "sane" Republicans to cave on taxes.

More interestingly, Kent Conrad has introduced a bill that closes the deficit with 50% spending cuts and 50% revenue increases.

In other words, a responsible bill.

Hope it gets a vote in the Senate.

It will be a nice change of pace for decent legislation to die in the House for a change.

"If I've Lost Cronkite, I've Lost America"

And if you've lost David Brooks and Roger Cohen, you've lost the Conventional Wisdom Brigade.

http://www.balloon-juice.com/2011/07/05/tuesday-morning-open-thread-5/

Brooks and Cohen both come to the conclusion that many sane people reached in 2009 and 2010.  The GOP has gone insane.  Cohen calls it a "cult".  They have abandoned reason for Norquist's "pledge".  They have decided that forcing a Second Great Depression on us is a political win.  They think - as John McCain said - that "Americans don't want compromise".

In a just world, we could find a way to punish the GOP for their idolatry before the altar of Fake Reagan without cratering the global economy.

We do not live in a just world.

Happy Independence Weekend

This guy has a clear understanding of the principles of self-government.

So, yesterday was the anniversary of the Continental Congress voting to declare their independence from Great Britain.  Tomorrow we will celebrate the publication of that vote by exploding Chinese fireworks and drinking German beer.

We seem to feel a need to commemorate things.  We latch on to dates like limpets on the hull of a ship.  We are about to enter 9/11 Tenth Anniversary Rememberathon that will induce a combination of tears and nausea alternately depending on what's happening at any given moment.  Roger Cohen starts it of here.  It's a fine essay, but somewhat navel gazing.  Eloquent but somehow adding up to less than the sum of it's fine writing.

Anyway, back to 1776.

As I wrote the other day, it is saddening to be a history teacher in an era of rampant historical illiteracy.  Of course, this era began with Herodotus and has continued unabated ever since.  We have never really known or understood our past, which is why everyone knows the Santayana quote.  We continue to repeat the errors of our grandparents.

Instead we focus on superficialities like dates and anniversaries.  What's more important?  Your wedding anniversary or your marriage?

Take the Declaration itself.  The Unitarian church - full of jihadists, no doubt - has a reading of the Declaration, and it's a great reminder of how boring the document is once you get past the stirring preamble.  It's mostly a whiny list of things George III did that we find mean.

He didst come over for a barbeque and not bringest his own beer or even potato salad.
He didst expel flatus in a closed room and not say, Sorry, that was mine.
He didst finish the milk and putteth the empty carton back in the fridge.

But we forget all that and focus on the "all men are created equal" without really dwelling on what that means. We forget that the most important documents in our history are all aspirational.  The Declaration's radical assertions of human liberty and self-governance were unique in the world at that time.  Today, those ideas rule the world.  The Constitution proffered the dream of a "more perfect union" and Madison hoped the document would last 50 years, but he was not hopeful.  Over 200 years later, we still abide by its structures.  The Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave in actuality but created an expectation that one day all Americans would be free.  The Gettysburg Address, the Four Freedoms speech and MLK's Dream speech are all about a world that might be, not one that is.

If you don't understand that these documents are about creating a better world, then you cannot understand the basic idea of citizenship.  You cannot understand the promise of America.  For centuries, people understood that the circumstances of their birth would be the circumstances of their life.  America - a product of the Enlightenment - was about perfecting the world.  That has been the foundation of the American Dream.

So, in between beers and barbeque, in between hot dogs and hot asphalt, take a moment to dedicating yourself to improving this country, this world.  Look beyond the calender.  Look beyond the surface.

We're kind of screwed up right now.

We could use all the help we could get.

Everything Old Is New Again

"No one ever listens..."

I'm still slogging through Lords of Finance.  I just got to the part - in 1931 - where all the European countries decided they should force austerity measures on the struggling economies of Germany, Austria and England.

Can I just say that being a history teacher is a despair inducing job, since no one seems to learn anything from us?

Not Much To Say

Don't really have much to say today, unless you want to watch the PowerPoint I'm making on the causes of the Great Depression.

So - unlike Thing Two - not having anything to say, I won't say anything.

Damn, that kid can talk.

But he hates Bieber, so I give this pic...