I've made this argument to a couple of different people in person, but here it goes:
Term limits in this country are backward.
What do I mean?
- The presidency should not be term-limited.
- The Congress (specifically the House) should be term-limited.
I'm making two separate arguments here. I'll take them on individually:
The 22nd amendment was the product of spiteful Republicans of what Harry Truman deemed the "do-nothing 80th Congress." Those Republicans were angered by FDR's successes and the fact that FDR served as president for four terms. They sought to enshrine the precedent established by George Washington in the constitution.
This is all well and good, but I think there are a few points that make this irrelevant. First of all, non-term limited executives (on all political sides) across the world run into a degree of voter fatigue. Tony Blair (UK) and John Howard (Australia) faced this challenge: both were enormously competent, effective leaders of their countries. Both ran into voter fatigue after about 10-12 years at the helm of their nation. In essence, they are organically term-limited by an alert public opinion. The executive is at the very center of government in modern democratic states. Public opinion functions as a check on lifelong terms for executives. There is simply no way George Bush could have won a third term in 2008.
Second, precedent is powerful, and it generally was upheld, pre-FDR. Teddy Roosevelt was the only president to seek the presidency for a third term, and he did this only after stepping down. One could easily argue that TR ran in 1912 out of spite; he thought that Taft betrayed him. (Taft, for his part, was greatly offended by this.) Throughout history, presidents have tended to respect Gen. Washington's judgment.
Moreover, does anyone think the US would have been better off if FDR hadn't sought a third term in 1940? Would Wendell Wilkie, Henry Wallace, or John Nance Gardner have done a better job as president? I doubt it. The public opinion of the US knew that FDR had the right policies and the right experience to deal with the coming international turmoil. And they were certainly right.
Third, being president is tiring, hard work. The modern presidency is a difficult, draining job. I struggle to imagine very many candidates who will be vigorous enough to pursue a fourth term, and popular enough to build the support required for one. If there is such a person out there, I'm not certain that it's a good idea to prevent him from running for a fourth term.
Finally, the "lame-duck issue" is serious. President Bush became a lame duck by late 2005. This was caused, I think, by the comical reaction of Bush and his Congressional allies to the Terri Schiavo situation, and, more critically, by the federal government's stunning display of ineptitude in the face of Hurricane Katrina. If that had been John Kerry's administration with a similar pair of disasters, would he have been marginalized into irrelevancy by the media and voting public. Of course not. Mr. Kerry would only be irrelevant if he had decided not to seek a second term.
Though the powers of the presidency are too extensive, in my opinion, "lame ducks" aren't good for anyone. Undoubtedly, the never-ending campaign of 2008 had something to do with Bush's lame duck status. Presidential candidates were acting the part of president for a full year, even in the incumbent party.
I think that term limiting the president shows a hearty lack of faith in voters, one that I think is not welcome in the case of the presidency.
A lack of faith in voters when it comes to the Congress, however, is quite reasonable, considering their abysmal track record. Since the 1970s, Congressional approval ratings have topped 40% only between 1998 and 2004. Omitting the post-9/11 spike and a less dramatic pre-Iraq War spike, the US Congress never manages to top 50% approval rating.
I strongly believe that these perennially-low approval ratings are more a product of the general public's poor understanding of Congress than anything else--namely, Congress is programmed to fail at most things, most of the time; a desire for slow change was built into the structure, leading to consistent disappointment from voters who do not understand that the system was designed for slow change. Fueled by an under-informed and irresponsible media, this classic misunderstanding leads to consistent disappointment.
But disappointment would be addressed by, you know, voting for new members, you think? At least a little bit?
No. Incumbency protection is as strong as ever, and it has gotten stronger over the past century. Here's a graph to demonstrate this, courtesy of Thirty-Thousand.org:
In 2008, the Congress' approval ratings hovered in the teens. The incumbent protection rate: 95.9%. Undoubtedly, part of this is the product of gerrymandering. But Congress' track record is abysmal, and the Founders never wanted career legislators. I think that states should follow the Iowan model of redistricting (I hate Iowa for its ethanol subsidies, but its sadly idealistic, mushy-middle approach actually makes sense, in this case). I also think that the House should be term-limited.
So, my nascent, idealistic plan: I'd write a constitutional amendment to limit members of Congress to four consecutive terms, with a waiver given to members of the House leadership: the Speaker, the Majority and Minority leaders, and the Majority and Minority Whips. Indeed, the waiver would make those positions both more desirable and more competitive--if someone lost an intra-Congressional election for the leadership position and had passed their term limit, they would have to resign their seat.
I would also run a strong, grassroots, state-by-state campaign to demand a less partisan process for redistricting. I would not pursue this legally; I would pursue this politically.
Simultaneously, I would announce the immediate repeal of the 22nd amendment: a bad idea whose time never was.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
B-Sides: Long Live the Superdelegates
On Edit: I call this a "B-side" b/c it's just a leftover thing I started writing but never got around to solidifying or smoothing out. I have a bunch of these things lying around on my hard drive.
I was digging around my hard drive and noticed a piece I wrote for the campus newspaper that I never actually submitted. It was a response to some claptrap about the Democratic primary campaign.
----------
I often write for the Gettysburgian under the heading “Going Global.” There, I try to take a measured approach to an international issue of some import. Oftentimes, I read my pieces in the paper and wonder if anyone will actually know which side I’m on.
Here though, I was driven to write by a piece in the 2/28 issue of the Gettysburgian. “For Democracy.” The author invited people to write in who know more about it than he does or disagree with him. I do not know more about democracy and the nominating process than he does, but I do disagree with him.
I respect Serfass’ reservations about the delegate selection process and the use of demographic parameters therein. The core of his argument is, as he states it, a candidate should not “be picked in a smoke-filled room by people” who were not elected.
My question is: why not?
I think that there are three essential components to a fair election:
1. A free press: the press should be allowed to report or cover any issues, within the confines of libel law;
2. Electoral safeguards: the government’s sole responsibility in an election is to ensure a fair process where anyone who wants to vote can vote once;
3. Options.
The options in most democracies come from political parties. The primary function of political parties is to win elections.
So, what gives us the right to pick the standard-bearer of a party?
The parties should have the right to determine their nominee in any way they deem suitable. They are better able to determine the direction they want to go than we are. They are also far better able to assess the skills of given candidates than we are. The ability to tolerate the modern campaign process has little relationship to how well suited a candidate is to be president, other than to prove that a candidate has an enormous desire to be president and an enormous ability to tolerate the mundane.
Moreover, the system is designed to create political dishonesty. Campaigns usually consist of running to the wins during the nominating process, and then tacking towards the center in the general election. Is this really an ideal, democratic system?
Think that such a system would lead to ideologues constantly being nominated? Abraham Lincoln was a moderate among the candidates for the Republican nomination in 1860. Wendell Wilkie and Thomas Dewey, Republican nominees in the 1940s, were both to the left of Robert Taft, who, even as “Mr. Republican,” never managed to get on a national ticket.
More empowered, the parties would factor electability into their selection process. Figures like Pat Buchanan and Dennis Kucinich would never win a party nomination, because of their perceived inelectability.
My overall point is, if the Democrats think that balancing their delegates demographically helps them towards their goal of electing candidates, I have no problem with it. The superdelegates, to me, are an excellent safeguard: the party can pick for itself. My problem is that they do not have enough power, and the power they do have is under assault by moralists demanding that the party obey “the will of the people.”
But really, who are the people? It depends on each state. In some states, it’s the number of people who were able to caucus after work, and didn’t have to work the night shift or watch their kids after work. In other states, it’s anyone who wants to vote, Republicans, Democrats, whoever. In other states, it’s a combination of one party and “independent” voters who are allowed to vote on one side. In other states, it’s just the members of the party. Is that really a good measure of “the people” or “the party?” Without a uniform standard to measure "the people", arguing about the "will of the people" lacks force.
I would like to see two things: the parties reassert control over the process, and more people presenting the case against binding primaries and caucuses. Imposing a nominee on a party is a false right, and it is certainly not undemocratic if that “right” were taken away.
A far better way to empower people would be to support measures like instant runoff voting, and proportional representation in Congress, in order to jumpstart third parties. But dictating to the parties is a bad idea, and I support anything the parties do to attempt to regain some control over the process.
So, long live the superdelegates. May they be granted more authority with time.
I was digging around my hard drive and noticed a piece I wrote for the campus newspaper that I never actually submitted. It was a response to some claptrap about the Democratic primary campaign.
----------
I often write for the Gettysburgian under the heading “Going Global.” There, I try to take a measured approach to an international issue of some import. Oftentimes, I read my pieces in the paper and wonder if anyone will actually know which side I’m on.
Here though, I was driven to write by a piece in the 2/28 issue of the Gettysburgian. “For Democracy.” The author invited people to write in who know more about it than he does or disagree with him. I do not know more about democracy and the nominating process than he does, but I do disagree with him.
I respect Serfass’ reservations about the delegate selection process and the use of demographic parameters therein. The core of his argument is, as he states it, a candidate should not “be picked in a smoke-filled room by people” who were not elected.
My question is: why not?
I think that there are three essential components to a fair election:
1. A free press: the press should be allowed to report or cover any issues, within the confines of libel law;
2. Electoral safeguards: the government’s sole responsibility in an election is to ensure a fair process where anyone who wants to vote can vote once;
3. Options.
The options in most democracies come from political parties. The primary function of political parties is to win elections.
So, what gives us the right to pick the standard-bearer of a party?
The parties should have the right to determine their nominee in any way they deem suitable. They are better able to determine the direction they want to go than we are. They are also far better able to assess the skills of given candidates than we are. The ability to tolerate the modern campaign process has little relationship to how well suited a candidate is to be president, other than to prove that a candidate has an enormous desire to be president and an enormous ability to tolerate the mundane.
Moreover, the system is designed to create political dishonesty. Campaigns usually consist of running to the wins during the nominating process, and then tacking towards the center in the general election. Is this really an ideal, democratic system?
Think that such a system would lead to ideologues constantly being nominated? Abraham Lincoln was a moderate among the candidates for the Republican nomination in 1860. Wendell Wilkie and Thomas Dewey, Republican nominees in the 1940s, were both to the left of Robert Taft, who, even as “Mr. Republican,” never managed to get on a national ticket.
More empowered, the parties would factor electability into their selection process. Figures like Pat Buchanan and Dennis Kucinich would never win a party nomination, because of their perceived inelectability.
My overall point is, if the Democrats think that balancing their delegates demographically helps them towards their goal of electing candidates, I have no problem with it. The superdelegates, to me, are an excellent safeguard: the party can pick for itself. My problem is that they do not have enough power, and the power they do have is under assault by moralists demanding that the party obey “the will of the people.”
But really, who are the people? It depends on each state. In some states, it’s the number of people who were able to caucus after work, and didn’t have to work the night shift or watch their kids after work. In other states, it’s anyone who wants to vote, Republicans, Democrats, whoever. In other states, it’s a combination of one party and “independent” voters who are allowed to vote on one side. In other states, it’s just the members of the party. Is that really a good measure of “the people” or “the party?” Without a uniform standard to measure "the people", arguing about the "will of the people" lacks force.
I would like to see two things: the parties reassert control over the process, and more people presenting the case against binding primaries and caucuses. Imposing a nominee on a party is a false right, and it is certainly not undemocratic if that “right” were taken away.
A far better way to empower people would be to support measures like instant runoff voting, and proportional representation in Congress, in order to jumpstart third parties. But dictating to the parties is a bad idea, and I support anything the parties do to attempt to regain some control over the process.
So, long live the superdelegates. May they be granted more authority with time.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Tipping Points
Nate Silver's old definition of the "Tipping Point" state would be: "the state that, when states are ranked by margin of victory, officially tipped the election to the victorious candidate."
Here's the margin of victory ranked list, along with the available electoral votes and the running total...
And the winner is... Colorado! McCain could have won all of Ohio, Virginia, Florida, Indiana, and North Carolina, and Obama still would have won the election. Obama had a comfortable margin of victory, indeed. He won Colorado by 7 points, and he won the general by 6.5 points.
On Edit: Nate Silver just ran this same post with more updated numbers. He technically beat me to the punch.
Here's the margin of victory ranked list, along with the available electoral votes and the running total...
| State | McCain Margin | Electoral Votes | Running Total |
| DC | -86 | 3 | 3 |
| Hawaii | -45 | 4 | 7 |
| Vermont | -35 | 3 | 10 |
| Rhode Island | -29 | 4 | 14 |
| Massachusetts | -26 | 12 | 26 |
| Illinois | -25 | 21 | 47 |
| New York | -25 | 31 | 78 |
| California | -24 | 55 | 133 |
| Delaware | -23 | 3 | 136 |
| Maryland | -23 | 10 | 146 |
| Connecticut | -21 | 7 | 153 |
| Maine | -18 | 4 | 157 |
| Washington | -17 | 11 | 168 |
| Michigan | -16 | 17 | 185 |
| New Jersey | -15 | 15 | 200 |
| New Mexico | -15 | 5 | 205 |
| Wisconsin | -13 | 10 | 215 |
| Nevada | -12 | 5 | 220 |
| Oregon | -12 | 7 | 227 |
| New Hampshire | -11 | 4 | 231 |
| Pennsylvania | -11 | 21 | 252 |
| Minnesota | -10 | 10 | 262 |
| Iowa | -9 | 7 | 269 |
| Colorado | -7 | 9 | 278 |
| Ohio | -5 | 20 | 298 |
| Virginia | -5 | 13 | 311 |
| Florida | -2 | 27 | 338 |
| Indiana | -1 | 11 | 349 |
| North Carolina | -1 | 15 | 364 |
| Missouri | 1 | 11 | 375 |
| Montana | 3 | 3 | 378 |
| Georgia | 5 | 15 | 393 |
| North Dakota | 8 | 3 | 396 |
| Arizona | 9 | 10 | 406 |
| South Carolina | 9 | 8 | 414 |
| Texas | 11 | 34 | 448 |
| South Dakota | 12 | 3 | 451 |
| West Virginia | 13 | 5 | 456 |
| Mississippi | 14 | 6 | 462 |
| Tennessee | 15 | 11 | 473 |
| Kansas | 16 | 6 | 479 |
| Nebraska | 16 | 5 | 484 |
| Kentucky | 17 | 8 | 492 |
| Louisiana | 19 | 9 | 501 |
| Arkansas | 20 | 6 | 507 |
| Alabama | 22 | 9 | 516 |
| Alaska | 26 | 3 | 519 |
| Idaho | 26 | 4 | 523 |
| Utah | 29 | 5 | 528 |
| Oklahoma | 32 | 7 | 535 |
| Wyoming | 32 | 3 | 538 |
And the winner is... Colorado! McCain could have won all of Ohio, Virginia, Florida, Indiana, and North Carolina, and Obama still would have won the election. Obama had a comfortable margin of victory, indeed. He won Colorado by 7 points, and he won the general by 6.5 points.
On Edit: Nate Silver just ran this same post with more updated numbers. He technically beat me to the punch.
House Elections
Here's an interesting chart:
GOP Dem
1990 43.9% 52.0%
1992 44.8% 49.9%
1994 49.9% 44.0%
1996 47.8% 48.1%
1998 48.0% 47.1%
2000 47.3% 47.0%
2002 49.6% 45.0%
2004 49.2% 46.6%
2006 44.0% 52.1%
2008 44.6% 52.6%
These are the percentages of the national popular vote won by the two major parties in elections for the House of Representatives. Just some observations:
- The 1994 "Republican Revolution" did not really signify that great a swing in votes. I have heard theories that redistricting did in the Democratic majority (Democratic minority voters were packed into districts because of a liberal insistence on "majority-minority" districts).
- 2006 and 2008 look awfully similar--except that third parties drew a full percent less in 2008 than they did in 2006. I will attribute that to what was clearly a very polarizing presidential election.
- It's pretty apparent that the Democrats have a stronger national brand than the Republicans--but I don't think that's a particularly new development. Unlike at the presidential level, it has been damn near impossible for the Republicans to break through at 50% of the House vote. What do I mean when I argue that? The Democrats still have a presence in the South--a Southern Democrat like Heath Shuler has little resemblance to a Northern Democrat like Barney Frank, but they caucus in the same party.
- The Democrats managed to pick up 20 seats without significantly upgrading their popular vote total. This is not normal, I think, and signifies to me that the Rahmbo/Dean Democratic approach is strategically more sound than Republican tactics. Why? The more seats you have, the larger a percentage of votes you will need, in the aggregate, to defend them. If the Dems win a 52/44 margin in the House for the next 8 years, the overall seat balance in the House (255/174) will not change much. Hell, there would be years on a 52/44 margin that the Republicans would manage to pick up a few seats. To me, the addition of 20 more seats is a signal that the Dems managed to find strong candidates to run in competitive races. They actually lost a fraction in the overall margin (though I think the decline of third party voters may have helped them a bit as well).
- I don't think that the Dems are fated to lose a handful of House seats in 2010. The economy may show signs of recovery by late 2010, giving Obama a strong case to make in defense of those House seats. The timing of this financial crisis was utterly tragic for Republicans.
- On the Senate: the Dems still have an outside chance at a 60/40 win. Norm Coleman is looking at a recount in Minnesota. There are some abnormalities in Alaska with Mr. Stevens, who may lose anyway. And the Georgia race is going to a run-off, and the Dems will bring their newfound organizational apparatus to the fold.
In either case, the filibuster won't be THAT significant. As a Republican, you can only hope that enough Republicans (and moderate Democrats) can hold up some of Obama's more offensive judicial nominations.
The notion of America as a "center-right" country is about to be tested. We certainly live in interesting times.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Potential GOP 2012
Note: I wrote this back in October.
I'll even handicap them this year. These are arbitrary.
The Front-Runners: these are the candidates that I think have the clearest chance to win the Republican nomination, assuming they throw their hat in the ring.
Fmr. Gov. Mitt Romney (MA)
Gen. David Petraeus (NY)
Gov. Sarah Palin (AK)
Fmr. Gov. Mike Huckabee (AR)
Worth Watching: these are the "second-tier front runners," of sorts; they are worthy of greater notice than being in the general pool, because of national exposure, reputation, perceived political skill, and/or popularity.
Gov. Bobby Jindal (LA)
Gov. Tim Pawlenty (MN)
Gov. Charlie Crist (FL)
Fmr. Gov. Jeb Bush (FL)
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (CA)
Gov. Mark Sanford (SC)
The Eligible Pool: This is the pool where I try to cover everyone I can possibly think of. (I doubt I would have put Obama in a pool like this in '04, but I'll try to learn empirically.) Analytically, my hope is that SOMEWHERE in this blog entry lies the GOP's nominee for president in 2012. There's not much to say about these candidates, other than that they are plausible picks for the 2012 nomination.
Gov. Bob Riley (AL)
Gov. Rick Perry (TX)
Gov. Haley Barbour (LA)
Gov. John Huntsman, Jr. (UT)
Gov. Mitch Daniels (IN)
Sen. John Thune (SD)
Sen. Mitch McConnell (KY)
Fmr. Sen. John Sununu (NH)
Fmr. Sen. Wayne Allard (CO)
Fmr. Sen. Bill Frist (TN)
Fmr. Sen. Rick Santorum (PA)
Fmr. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (GA)
(MORE TO COME)
Congressional Dark Horses: It's VERY rare for a president to come directly from the House (I think only James Garfield did it), but these two are interesting enough that they might be worth watching. Put them on the back-burner.
Rep. Eric Cantor (VA)
Rep. Paul Ryan (WI)
Although his convention speech was an embarrassment, Mitt Romney built up a sizeable base of support during the 2008 nominating cycle, and he has served as a good party soldier for John McCain in this election. Also, assuming that economic growth is stagnant, Romney may be able to win with the "I know how to create jobs" angle. Still, he comes across as a bit of a used car salesman at times, and, for the love of God, no one knows what he really stands for. He also may be passed by the younger generation of conservative Republicans. I find him to be perhaps the least plausible of the Big 4.
Republicans practically begged Dwight Eisenhower to run for office in 1952; they had been out of power for 20 years and thought that they were dying as a party. General David Petraeus may fill that same void. He is well-respected and may be to Obama what Colin Powell could have been to Bill Clinton: the general-turned-politician who ran circles around the sitting president. No one could question his seriousness, his talent, his knowledge, etc. And I get the feeling that some of the younger Republicans might defer to Petraeus' wisdom and simply bow out of the process early (trying to get on that ticket and position themselves for the future). But we don't know his opinions on social issues, and whether or not those views would be palatable to the base. If Petraeus starts angling, believe in it. It's VERY hard to control this process, and randomness plays a large role. But out of all the candidates I will discuss, Petraeus has the highest level of control over his chances.
Since exploding onto the scene a few months ago, Sarah Palin has been a lightning rod. The Left has demonized her. The Right has adored her. The media has scrutinized her as strongly as anyone I've ever seen. A full term as governor of Alaska (and, of course, reelection) would help blunt the experience charges. Palin would also have the benefit of being able to piggyback on any Obama success as proof that she has worthy experience. Palin needs to be a bit more cerebral, and she needs to be more comfortable in a one-on-one interview session. But she can repaint herself in a bunch of ways. Palin's not going away anytime soon, though I could see her skipping 2012. She may be the main reason why Romney's stock is far lower than it was in April. Palin already has name recoginition, and the Rush Limbaugh "Babies, guns, Jesus" endorsement. It's tough to imagine the conservative base picking Romney when Palin is an option.
Mike Huckabee started with absolutely no name recognition at all in 2007. One year later, he won big in Iowa and, with a bit of luck, may have battled for the nomination far more strongly than he did (try to counterfactually picture things if McCain hadn't won New Hampshire). The key for Huckabee is to expand past his Evangelical base. Huckabee can spend time consorting with the Club for Growth Republicans, saying he's found religion on low taxes, and he can preach the virtues of small government (which he did to great effect in his convention speech). Sheer "force of personality," as someone put it, would make him competitive in an election. And he's got a head-start this time. He could win Iowa much more solidly in 2012. He's strongly positioned.
If Palin does flame out, Bobby Jindal will be well-positioned to take the baton. He's proven himself to be a strong governor, attacking corruption in Louisiana's government, while doing an excellent job with hurricane preparedness. He's as conservative as can be, and he's smart as anyone--he's a Rhodes scholar. He'll be 41 in 2012... with a full term as a state governor under his belt. He's also an Indian-American Catholic, which I think actually helps him against Obama. He wouldn't lose the minority of racist Republicans to a white Democrat; he leaves them no other option. Jindal seems like the PERFECT VP for just about any Republican in 2012. But if you asked me about Obama at this time in 2004, I would have said that exact same sentence. Jindal may run to get on the ticket, or he may run to win the nomination. And he may win.
A commenter on a website said that "Tim Pawlenty's only chance to be president is if he gets to be VP first," and I sympathize with that. His "Sam's Club Republican" brand isn't particularly contagious or strong. He's an effective governor, but he comes across as bland or boring whenever I see him on TV. We're in an age of political rock stars, it seems, and the GOP has a slew to choose from: Crist, Jindal, Palin, among others. Pawlenty makes sense on a ticket if the Inland North keeps trending right, but it's just hard to imagine Pawlenty winning in a field with Jindal or Palin or Petraeus. He may be in 2012 what he was in 2008--a very safe VP choice. Safe might make more sense in 2012.
The "gay" rumors aside, Charlie Crist is an effective governor from an important state. I'm having trouble picturing his personality winning in Iowa, but he may be able to take New Hampshire and build momentum from there. Or hell, the whole nominating system might be different by then. He also looks presidential.
Jeb Bush and Condoleezza Rice face the same problem: Bush. Both are quite competent in their own fields; Jeb was one of the country's best governors is his time, and Condi is a brilliant foreign policy thinker and very capable leader in her own right. But the Democrats campaigned against Herbert Hoover for decades, and if GWB is remembered that way, the GOP will have to work to distance themselves from Bush as much as they can.
A Mark Sanford makes sense because of geography--Sanford would be well-positioned to win in Iowa, and South Carolina. He's also a very capable governor and a strong conservative on things like government spending. This may be a big issue in 2012.
We really won't have to pay too much attention to this until 2011, but I wanted to get a preliminary list out there.
I'll even handicap them this year. These are arbitrary.
The Front-Runners: these are the candidates that I think have the clearest chance to win the Republican nomination, assuming they throw their hat in the ring.
Fmr. Gov. Mitt Romney (MA)
Gen. David Petraeus (NY)
Gov. Sarah Palin (AK)
Fmr. Gov. Mike Huckabee (AR)
Worth Watching: these are the "second-tier front runners," of sorts; they are worthy of greater notice than being in the general pool, because of national exposure, reputation, perceived political skill, and/or popularity.
Gov. Bobby Jindal (LA)
Gov. Tim Pawlenty (MN)
Gov. Charlie Crist (FL)
Fmr. Gov. Jeb Bush (FL)
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (CA)
Gov. Mark Sanford (SC)
The Eligible Pool: This is the pool where I try to cover everyone I can possibly think of. (I doubt I would have put Obama in a pool like this in '04, but I'll try to learn empirically.) Analytically, my hope is that SOMEWHERE in this blog entry lies the GOP's nominee for president in 2012. There's not much to say about these candidates, other than that they are plausible picks for the 2012 nomination.
Gov. Bob Riley (AL)
Gov. Rick Perry (TX)
Gov. Haley Barbour (LA)
Gov. John Huntsman, Jr. (UT)
Gov. Mitch Daniels (IN)
Sen. John Thune (SD)
Sen. Mitch McConnell (KY)
Fmr. Sen. John Sununu (NH)
Fmr. Sen. Wayne Allard (CO)
Fmr. Sen. Bill Frist (TN)
Fmr. Sen. Rick Santorum (PA)
Fmr. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (GA)
(MORE TO COME)
Congressional Dark Horses: It's VERY rare for a president to come directly from the House (I think only James Garfield did it), but these two are interesting enough that they might be worth watching. Put them on the back-burner.
Rep. Eric Cantor (VA)
Rep. Paul Ryan (WI)
Although his convention speech was an embarrassment, Mitt Romney built up a sizeable base of support during the 2008 nominating cycle, and he has served as a good party soldier for John McCain in this election. Also, assuming that economic growth is stagnant, Romney may be able to win with the "I know how to create jobs" angle. Still, he comes across as a bit of a used car salesman at times, and, for the love of God, no one knows what he really stands for. He also may be passed by the younger generation of conservative Republicans. I find him to be perhaps the least plausible of the Big 4.
Republicans practically begged Dwight Eisenhower to run for office in 1952; they had been out of power for 20 years and thought that they were dying as a party. General David Petraeus may fill that same void. He is well-respected and may be to Obama what Colin Powell could have been to Bill Clinton: the general-turned-politician who ran circles around the sitting president. No one could question his seriousness, his talent, his knowledge, etc. And I get the feeling that some of the younger Republicans might defer to Petraeus' wisdom and simply bow out of the process early (trying to get on that ticket and position themselves for the future). But we don't know his opinions on social issues, and whether or not those views would be palatable to the base. If Petraeus starts angling, believe in it. It's VERY hard to control this process, and randomness plays a large role. But out of all the candidates I will discuss, Petraeus has the highest level of control over his chances.
Since exploding onto the scene a few months ago, Sarah Palin has been a lightning rod. The Left has demonized her. The Right has adored her. The media has scrutinized her as strongly as anyone I've ever seen. A full term as governor of Alaska (and, of course, reelection) would help blunt the experience charges. Palin would also have the benefit of being able to piggyback on any Obama success as proof that she has worthy experience. Palin needs to be a bit more cerebral, and she needs to be more comfortable in a one-on-one interview session. But she can repaint herself in a bunch of ways. Palin's not going away anytime soon, though I could see her skipping 2012. She may be the main reason why Romney's stock is far lower than it was in April. Palin already has name recoginition, and the Rush Limbaugh "Babies, guns, Jesus" endorsement. It's tough to imagine the conservative base picking Romney when Palin is an option.
Mike Huckabee started with absolutely no name recognition at all in 2007. One year later, he won big in Iowa and, with a bit of luck, may have battled for the nomination far more strongly than he did (try to counterfactually picture things if McCain hadn't won New Hampshire). The key for Huckabee is to expand past his Evangelical base. Huckabee can spend time consorting with the Club for Growth Republicans, saying he's found religion on low taxes, and he can preach the virtues of small government (which he did to great effect in his convention speech). Sheer "force of personality," as someone put it, would make him competitive in an election. And he's got a head-start this time. He could win Iowa much more solidly in 2012. He's strongly positioned.
If Palin does flame out, Bobby Jindal will be well-positioned to take the baton. He's proven himself to be a strong governor, attacking corruption in Louisiana's government, while doing an excellent job with hurricane preparedness. He's as conservative as can be, and he's smart as anyone--he's a Rhodes scholar. He'll be 41 in 2012... with a full term as a state governor under his belt. He's also an Indian-American Catholic, which I think actually helps him against Obama. He wouldn't lose the minority of racist Republicans to a white Democrat; he leaves them no other option. Jindal seems like the PERFECT VP for just about any Republican in 2012. But if you asked me about Obama at this time in 2004, I would have said that exact same sentence. Jindal may run to get on the ticket, or he may run to win the nomination. And he may win.
A commenter on a website said that "Tim Pawlenty's only chance to be president is if he gets to be VP first," and I sympathize with that. His "Sam's Club Republican" brand isn't particularly contagious or strong. He's an effective governor, but he comes across as bland or boring whenever I see him on TV. We're in an age of political rock stars, it seems, and the GOP has a slew to choose from: Crist, Jindal, Palin, among others. Pawlenty makes sense on a ticket if the Inland North keeps trending right, but it's just hard to imagine Pawlenty winning in a field with Jindal or Palin or Petraeus. He may be in 2012 what he was in 2008--a very safe VP choice. Safe might make more sense in 2012.
The "gay" rumors aside, Charlie Crist is an effective governor from an important state. I'm having trouble picturing his personality winning in Iowa, but he may be able to take New Hampshire and build momentum from there. Or hell, the whole nominating system might be different by then. He also looks presidential.
Jeb Bush and Condoleezza Rice face the same problem: Bush. Both are quite competent in their own fields; Jeb was one of the country's best governors is his time, and Condi is a brilliant foreign policy thinker and very capable leader in her own right. But the Democrats campaigned against Herbert Hoover for decades, and if GWB is remembered that way, the GOP will have to work to distance themselves from Bush as much as they can.
A Mark Sanford makes sense because of geography--Sanford would be well-positioned to win in Iowa, and South Carolina. He's also a very capable governor and a strong conservative on things like government spending. This may be a big issue in 2012.
We really won't have to pay too much attention to this until 2011, but I wanted to get a preliminary list out there.
Election Day Stories
There are lots of angles to analyze this election, but my first reaction is, "While this was not a catastrophe for Republicans, it was a very good night for the Dems" angle.
More on this later.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
A couple of quick hits...
1. Just to avoid charges of plagiarism, I wrote my post yesterday before reading the following in this week's Economist, from page 40:
This is a better description than my sprawling post.
2. The best campaign, or the worst campaign? Depends who you ask:
Best - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7701877.stm
Worst - http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24582660-7583,00.html
For many conservatives, the most alarming consequence of a Democratic supermajority in the Senate is that it would allow a President Obama to appoint any judges he likes. With five of the nine Supreme Court justices over 70 and many seats on lower courts deliberately left vacant by the Democratic Senate in anticipation of a Democratic president, that could have far-reaching consequences.
Mr Obama might make good choices—his choice of advisers has usually been sound. But he has promised to pick judges for their “empathy” and “understanding” of “what it’s like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old.” That could just be campaign blather, but conservatives fear he means it: that he really does want judges to favour the underdog rather than uphold the law dispassionately as their oath of office requires. Stephen Calabresi, a conservative jurist, says an Obama court could usher in ruinous shareholder lawsuits, huge punitive damages and even a constitutional right to welfare.
This is a better description than my sprawling post.
2. The best campaign, or the worst campaign? Depends who you ask:
Best - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7701877.stm
Worst - http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24582660-7583,00.html
Friday, October 31, 2008
Judicial Philosophy
There's been a lot of hearsay and speculation, I think, about Barack Obama's judicial philosophy. So I decided: why not see what the man himself said? Instead of looking at campaign speeches, I think it would be better to go to the legislative record.
The best speech I found was available at Obama's official Senate website. In the following speech, Obama laid out his case for voting against the nomination of Chief Justice John Roberts (who was, you'll remember, filling the seat of Chief Justice William Rehnquist).
http://obama.senate.gov/press/050922-remarks_of_sena/
First off, praise:
The Supreme Court could stand to have a couple more liberal appointments on it. Although I am conservative, an ideologically-balanced Supreme Court, with a diverse array of perspectives and opinions, leads to a better discourse and better decisions.
With that said, I do think that certain principles--namely, reverence for the laws and Constitution as they are written--trump others. Indeed, one can share those principles and come at problems from any number of ideological bents.
See, this, I do not accept. "Empathy" is for legislatures and executives. Judiciaries should be for impartality above all, not empathy. Empathy smacks of favoritism. The law shows no favorites.
Essentially, I read this as Barack Obama suggesting the following: some of the more contentious issues facing the Court should be decided based on the personal ideologies of the justices--and that ideology should be of a liberal bent. Notice the issues he selected: affirmative action, abortion decisions, a heavy-handed interpretation of the commerce clause. These are all positions advocated by a scholar or thinker of the left. They are also reasonably hot button issues. Obama is arguing that the Court should decide these hot button issues more personally than legally. He espounds on this next:
These issues that Obama raises are best addressed by laws. Not by interpreters of the law. Obama's perspective on the role of the Court is a far more wide-ranging one than that of his Democratic predecessor, John Kerry. Here's what Kerry had to say at the second presidential debate in '04:
That's definitely not how Obama would paint his decisions about nominees. And hell, it's not how he's painted them in this campaign. Here's what he said at a 2007 Planned Parenthood rally:
With Obama, it's not about how the law is written. It's about how the law should be.
This is a valid perspective, I think; Obama believes in judicial activism, and he wouldn't hide it under the label of "strict constructionism" (which many conservatives do, believing that "strict constructionism" in theory is "conservative judicial activism" in practice).
With an Obama presidency, the bigger issue isn't with the Supreme Court (where he will be replacing two liberal justices before anything else). It's with the lower courts, federal courts, appellate courts, etc. This is a different type of judge you would see at all levels of the federal government.
On a related note, Rasmussen ran an interesting poll a couple of weeks back. The labels are a bit misleading at points, but I think that the results are interesting anyway.
Let's break that down into a table:
These differences are pretty stark. A lot of this is based on the "talking points" of the various sides, but part of it is based in what I would deem actual, philosophical differences between the two candidates and their supporters.
This is another iteration of the process/outcome debate that shapes the American political discourse, and that has forever. Check out Allen Guelzo's Lincoln and Douglas: The Debates that Defined America for another iteration of that debate.
And, to get my own views out there, I think there are times where outcomes matter more (see: slavery), but I think that process and law must be revered in a democratic republic.
The best speech I found was available at Obama's official Senate website. In the following speech, Obama laid out his case for voting against the nomination of Chief Justice John Roberts (who was, you'll remember, filling the seat of Chief Justice William Rehnquist).
http://obama.senate.gov/press/050922-remarks_of_sena/
First off, praise:
[John Roberts] couldn't have achieved his excellent record as an advocate before the Supreme Court without that passion for the law, and it became apparent to me in our conversation that he does, in fact, deeply respect the basic precepts that go into deciding 95 percent of the cases that come before the Federal court -- adherence to precedence, a certain modesty in reading statutes and constitutional text, a respect for procedural regularity, and an impartiality in presiding over the adversarial system.
The Supreme Court could stand to have a couple more liberal appointments on it. Although I am conservative, an ideologically-balanced Supreme Court, with a diverse array of perspectives and opinions, leads to a better discourse and better decisions.
With that said, I do think that certain principles--namely, reverence for the laws and Constitution as they are written--trump others. Indeed, one can share those principles and come at problems from any number of ideological bents.
The problem I face -- a problem that has been voiced by some of my other colleagues, both those who are voting for Mr. Roberts and those who are voting against Mr. Roberts -- is that while adherence to legal precedent and rules of statutory or constitutional construction will dispose of 95 percent of the cases that come before a court, so that both a Scalia and a Ginsburg will arrive at the same place most of the time on those 95 percent of the cases -- what matters on the Supreme Court is those 5 percent of cases that are truly difficult. In those cases, adherence to precedent and rules of construction and interpretation will only get you through the 25th mile of the marathon. That last mile can only be determined on the basis of one's deepest values, one's core concerns, one's broader perspectives on how the world works, and the depth and breadth of one's empathy.
See, this, I do not accept. "Empathy" is for legislatures and executives. Judiciaries should be for impartality above all, not empathy. Empathy smacks of favoritism. The law shows no favorites.
In those 5 percent of hard cases, the constitutional text will not be directly on point. The language of the statute will not be perfectly clear. Legal process alone will not lead you to a rule of decision. In those circumstances, your decisions about whether affirmative action is an appropriate response to the history of discrimination in this country or whether a general right of privacy encompasses a more specific right of women to control their reproductive decisions or whether the commerce clause empowers Congress to speak on those issues of broad national concern that may be only tangentially related to what is easily defined as interstate commerce, whether a person who is disabled has the right to be accommodated so they can work alongside those who are nondisabled -- in those difficult cases, the critical ingredient is supplied by what is in the judge's heart.
Essentially, I read this as Barack Obama suggesting the following: some of the more contentious issues facing the Court should be decided based on the personal ideologies of the justices--and that ideology should be of a liberal bent. Notice the issues he selected: affirmative action, abortion decisions, a heavy-handed interpretation of the commerce clause. These are all positions advocated by a scholar or thinker of the left. They are also reasonably hot button issues. Obama is arguing that the Court should decide these hot button issues more personally than legally. He espounds on this next:
I talked to Judge Roberts about this. Judge Roberts confessed that, unlike maybe professional politicians, it is not easy for him to talk about his values and his deeper feelings. That is not how he is trained. He did say he doesn't like bullies and has always viewed the law as a way of evening out the playing field between the strong and the weak.
I was impressed with that statement because I view the law in much the same way. The problem I had is that when I examined Judge Roberts' record and history of public service, it is my personal estimation that he has far more often used his formidable skills on behalf of the strong in opposition to the weak. In his work in the White House and the Solicitor General's Office, he seemed to have consistently sided with those who were dismissive of efforts to eradicate the remnants of racial discrimination in our political process. In these same positions, he seemed dismissive of the concerns that it is harder to make it in this world and in this economy when you are a woman rather than a man.
I want to take Judge Roberts at his word that he doesn't like bullies and he sees the law and the Court as a means of evening the playing field between the strong and the weak. But given the gravity of the position to which he will undoubtedly ascend and the gravity of the decisions in which he will undoubtedly participate during his tenure on the Court, I ultimately have to give more weight to his deeds and the overarching political philosophy that he appears to have shared with those in power than to the assuring words that he provided me in our meeting.
These issues that Obama raises are best addressed by laws. Not by interpreters of the law. Obama's perspective on the role of the Court is a far more wide-ranging one than that of his Democratic predecessor, John Kerry. Here's what Kerry had to say at the second presidential debate in '04:
I subscribe to the Justice Potter Stewart standard. He was a justice on the Supreme Court of the United States. And he said the mark of a good judge, good justice, is that when you're reading their decision, their opinion, you can't tell if it's written by a man or woman, a liberal or a conservative, a Muslim, a Jew or a Christian. You just know you're reading a good judicial decision.
That's definitely not how Obama would paint his decisions about nominees. And hell, it's not how he's painted them in this campaign. Here's what he said at a 2007 Planned Parenthood rally:
We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges.
With Obama, it's not about how the law is written. It's about how the law should be.
This is a valid perspective, I think; Obama believes in judicial activism, and he wouldn't hide it under the label of "strict constructionism" (which many conservatives do, believing that "strict constructionism" in theory is "conservative judicial activism" in practice).
With an Obama presidency, the bigger issue isn't with the Supreme Court (where he will be replacing two liberal justices before anything else). It's with the lower courts, federal courts, appellate courts, etc. This is a different type of judge you would see at all levels of the federal government.
On a related note, Rasmussen ran an interesting poll a couple of weeks back. The labels are a bit misleading at points, but I think that the results are interesting anyway.
While 82% of voters who support McCain believe the justices should rule on what is in the Constitution, just 29% of Barack Obama’s supporters agree. Just 11% of McCain supporters say judges should rule based on the judge’s sense of fairness, while nearly half (49%) of Obama supporters agree.
Let's break that down into a table:
McCain Obama
"Constitution" 82% 29%
"Fairness" 11% 49%
These differences are pretty stark. A lot of this is based on the "talking points" of the various sides, but part of it is based in what I would deem actual, philosophical differences between the two candidates and their supporters.
This is another iteration of the process/outcome debate that shapes the American political discourse, and that has forever. Check out Allen Guelzo's Lincoln and Douglas: The Debates that Defined America for another iteration of that debate.
And, to get my own views out there, I think there are times where outcomes matter more (see: slavery), but I think that process and law must be revered in a democratic republic.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Second Thoughts
Here's another mini-hypothesis I'll lay out. I have no proof of this; it's just speculative:
McCain will do better than the polls indicate.
I think there will be an effect that pollsters will miss: I'll call it the "second thoughts" effect.
I think that there will be a small minority of people who are claiming to vote for Obama who will wake up on Election Day and have second thoughts about that decision. They'll think about the dangerous world and the dangerous, tumultuous economy, and they'll think that McCain is the known quantity. They'll walk into the voting booth, and they'll check off their ballot (or their touch screen) for McCain.
If McCain had run a more disciplined campaign, projecting a more "calm man in a storm" type demeanor, I think he would do far better with this group of people. But I still think that there will be people who decide on Election Day that Barack Obama is too inexperienced, too... different to be their choice for president. I think that some of this will be racism, but I think that most of it will be a bit of fear about what "change" actually means. I think that the McCain's ads about Obama being different will have some resonance on Election Day, even if they haven't so far.
I also think that there is some resentment towards BOTH parties, not just a stunning rejection of the Republican brand. So the idea of one-party government may also play into these thought processes.
Part of me doesn't want to see Obama lose if he's up by 6 or 7 in the polls. It just won't reflect well on the country. And I'd much rather see McCain win it straight, not win it based on the last-minute fears and reservations of a group of voters.
My guess is that the small minority doesn't flip the election to McCain. But I think it will be closer than the standard projections seem.
My advice: hold onto your hats. I don't think this one is over yet.
Also: Is this an October surprise?
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D942EFR80&show_article=1
McCain will do better than the polls indicate.
I think there will be an effect that pollsters will miss: I'll call it the "second thoughts" effect.
I think that there will be a small minority of people who are claiming to vote for Obama who will wake up on Election Day and have second thoughts about that decision. They'll think about the dangerous world and the dangerous, tumultuous economy, and they'll think that McCain is the known quantity. They'll walk into the voting booth, and they'll check off their ballot (or their touch screen) for McCain.
If McCain had run a more disciplined campaign, projecting a more "calm man in a storm" type demeanor, I think he would do far better with this group of people. But I still think that there will be people who decide on Election Day that Barack Obama is too inexperienced, too... different to be their choice for president. I think that some of this will be racism, but I think that most of it will be a bit of fear about what "change" actually means. I think that the McCain's ads about Obama being different will have some resonance on Election Day, even if they haven't so far.
I also think that there is some resentment towards BOTH parties, not just a stunning rejection of the Republican brand. So the idea of one-party government may also play into these thought processes.
Part of me doesn't want to see Obama lose if he's up by 6 or 7 in the polls. It just won't reflect well on the country. And I'd much rather see McCain win it straight, not win it based on the last-minute fears and reservations of a group of voters.
My guess is that the small minority doesn't flip the election to McCain. But I think it will be closer than the standard projections seem.
My advice: hold onto your hats. I don't think this one is over yet.
Also: Is this an October surprise?
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D942EFR80&show_article=1
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Speculative Hypothesis
If I were a political scientist or had access to a database of journal articles, I would research the following:
The share of the vote that a third party candidate gets is inversely proportional to enthusiasm for a main party candidate.
There may not be enough data for this one, but I would like to see a plot of "enthusiasm for candidate" against the share of the vote that base-attracting third party candidates got.
Why do I think this is important? I'll assert that Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader, between the two, do not get more than .4% of the popular vote. That would be even less than left-wing third party candidates got in 2004, four years after Nader voters were berated for costing Gore the presidency in 2000 (that year, Nader pulled 2.7%).
On the other side, I think that Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin may pull a larger total, perhaps 1-2% or higher, even. McCain isn't that popular with the Republican base, and there might be some anti-bailout protest votes, or some reemerging neo-isolationist sentiment (I'll spitball at 2%). It's yet another hill to climb for McCain.
The share of the vote that a third party candidate gets is inversely proportional to enthusiasm for a main party candidate.
There may not be enough data for this one, but I would like to see a plot of "enthusiasm for candidate" against the share of the vote that base-attracting third party candidates got.
Why do I think this is important? I'll assert that Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader, between the two, do not get more than .4% of the popular vote. That would be even less than left-wing third party candidates got in 2004, four years after Nader voters were berated for costing Gore the presidency in 2000 (that year, Nader pulled 2.7%).
On the other side, I think that Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin may pull a larger total, perhaps 1-2% or higher, even. McCain isn't that popular with the Republican base, and there might be some anti-bailout protest votes, or some reemerging neo-isolationist sentiment (I'll spitball at 2%). It's yet another hill to climb for McCain.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Palin: Analysis
After spending a solid week doing All-Palin-All-The-Time, I moved onto politics in this sphere. But 7 weeks after the announcement, I feel that it's a good time to take stock of the Palin pick. I'll use the framework I laid out back in August, and I'll add on some thoughts.
First off, some chest-thumping.
Palin seems to me an awful lot like a process of elimination pick. The housing gaffe eliminated wealth, Hillary not being chosen made a woman a better pick than a man, Obama's big speech means that boredom won't cut it, etc.
It appears that I was right on this, if the New Yorker is to be believed.
Earlier today, Nate Silver wrote something similar:
So, it's pretty clear from the evidence that Palin was not McCain's first choice, but she fit enough criteria to be the pick. There are a few questions that are worth exploring:
1. Has Palin been an embarrassment?
I think that this is an emphatic "no," but someone with different political beliefs might argue differently. Palin's partially ad-libbed convention address remains the strongest critique of Obama in the cycle (with Joe the Plumber giving her a run for her money), and her debate performance demonstrated her poise, if not much intellectual curiosity (or respect for the word "debate").
If Palin has a clear weakness right now as a politician, it's her ineptitude in the one-on-one interview. The modern presidential campaign requires a million one-on-one interviews, particularly in the early stages. Palin needs serious coaching on this front. I'd grade her a C+ in the Charlie Gibson interview, but a D/D- with Katie Couric. Palin needs to get into the Bs to be more relevant.
Many on the Left have developed an utter hatred for Palin for numerous reasons, but the venom spewed in her direction is a special kind of disgusting, certainly comparable to some of the worst smears said about Obama, and by respectable commentators, too! The more resonating images are of Tina Fey's dead-on portrayal of Palin as a lightweight. Palin has plenty of time to work against this image going into 2012, but she'll have to do things like, brush up on one-on-one interviews, and work on a more complex spoken vocabulary.
2. What's with the animus from the right's intelligentsia?
This is a more interesting thing. Let me run down some of the quotes about Sarah Palin from the conservative elite:
Also, I don't have a good exact quote for this one, but George Will described Sarah Palin as "McCain's female Sancho Panza."
Brooks, Frum, Parker, Noonan, Buckley, and Will represent the media's best conservative commentators. All six have not had kind things to say about Palin. What gives?
I think that this anger and disapproval comes from two points. The first is that intellectual conservatives are more strongly elitist about government than just about anyone else. One running joke in American politics is of liberals as "country club elitists," which is an interesting shift from the old starched-shirt caricatures of Republicans. Will and Brooks are as starched-shirt as you'll get, when it comes to commentators. While both have a healthy respect for "ordinary people" and their preferences (which I find lacking in elite Democratic circles), both are heavily "elitist."
Palin, whose image has been as anti-intellectual as can be, grates on these people.
But really, I think that if you were to ask Brooks, Frum, Parker, Noonan, Buckley and Will about their feelings for the current sitting president, none would offer kind words. I think that this is at the very core of the Palin hostility from the right. Palin reminds them of Bush. This class of conservative intellectuals would like to move back to its view of "traditional" conservatism, but Palin's personality and approach are a bit too Bush-like for this mind.
3. So, was Palin a net positive, or a net negative?
I'll cop out and argue "neutral." For one, she ignited the Republican base and brought in some much needed funds. I don't buy the "counter-fundraising" argument either. Let's sketch this out theoretically:
Obama $$ w/o Palin: $400 million
McCain $$ w/o Palin: $150 million
Obama $$ w/ Palin: $550 million
McCain $$ w/ Palin: $300 million
Even if the counter-fundraising b/c of Palin were equal (which I doubt heavily), the $150 million is more useful to McCain than it is to Obama; we're looking at a bit of diminishing returns at Obama's level of fundraising, anyway.
More critically, the Palin pick was a necessary gamble. The political environment was hostile to Republicans. The best ways out of that:
- Nominate a popular moderate Republican
- Nominate a fresh, unattached face
- Nominate a Democrat
The best popular moderate option would be Colin Powell, but that wouldn't have been an option, and there weren't many others. If you go too far to the Left (with, say, Lieberman), you risk alienating your base entirely (and there's simply no way McCain brings the Christian Right in with Lieberman on the ticket). Palin still remains an excellent tactical choice. She's as far away from the cancer of the national GOP as you could be.
But I think the McCain campaign missed an opportunity... and it comes down to the tactical nature of the McCain campaign.
I think it's hard to justify the way that the McCain campaign over-handled Palin in the early going. If I have read this correctly, the McCain campaign decided to keep Palin in hiding for a few weeks, only spoon-feeding her the McCain message and telling her to repeat it. It's a valid approach, but I'm convinced that it's a major reason why Palin struggled so much in the one-on-one interviews: she was overhandled and was not able to speak freely.
The only way to justify Palin not being let loose is that Steve Schmidt and the McCain campaign apparatus did not trust her enough on her own. And if that's the case, there's no way to justify the pick, try as I might.
I don't think that's the case. The rest of this is pure speculation on my part.
Let me take a brief step back and sketch out my interpretation of Obama's strategy:
1. Attach McCain to Bush.
2. Present Barack Obama as an American, but a uniquely-qualified American to handle the times in which we live.
3. Present Barack Obama as a defender of the middle class.
4. Using your massive money advantage, work an aggressive ground campaign and mobilize as many new voters who are swayed by his message as possible.
The Obama strategy was deliberate and consistent. The message: McCain is Bush. Obama is not. Obama is an American, actually, and one who cares about your needs. The other side is the heavy ground game, which far outpaces the McCain campaign. Obama's campaign is highly strategic. It has a set approach and has stuck with it through thick and thin.
I think that the McCain campaign strategy came down to the following:
1. Use free media to your advantage--control as many news cycles as you can.
2. Work to make the electorate distrust Barack Obama.
3. Distance yourself from Bush, but not severely enough to alienate the base.
4. See what works, and keep doing it.
The fourth point, I think, is the important one.
The McCain campaign approach was the equivalent of a guerrilla war. McCain had a small advantage in his couple-of-month head start--he could begin to frame the debate. That campaign failed quite badly--McCain didn't resonate with the general electorate all that much in the early months of '08. The Schmidt team came in with a tougher approach... one that started to pay dividends in July and August. Obama had something of a peak right around early July (for his Europe trip). The McCain campaign chipped away at his lead throughout those long summer months, bringing the race to the margin of error by August. It was working. McCain's campaign was running fairly humorous ads about Obama being a celebrity and out of touch, and the message was resonating, at least a bit. Much of the summer speculation about McCain's VP was more about how McCain could make the VP pick into something that vaulted him back into the race.
But guess what? By the time he made the pick, McCain was already BACK in the race, as per the polls. I think that the McCain campaign looked at the map, looked at the numbers, and said, "we might just win this damn thing straight up." And they decided that an unmanaged Palin was more of a risk. Why rock the boat? The flexible McCain campaign decided to hedge its Palin bet.
The gamble was picking Palin. The hedge was overhandling Palin. In the end, though, this kind of hedge just eliminated much of the prospects for large-scale success. McCain couldn't have known that the economy would turn so dramatically against Republicans, but it would have been sounder strategy to run a fast-and-loose campaign in this. McCain could have laughed off the first inconsistency and said, "Sarah's being Sarah. We're not going to agree on everything. We're mavericks!" It's possible that Palin would have self-destructed, but that's the nature of taking risks in a hostile year.
Recent reports have convinced me that McCain has given Palin more freedom to maneuver. But the damage, I think, is done.
Of course, the banking crisis happened, and that may well be the end of the story--we simply can't know if a more liberated Palin would have vaulted the ticket up by a few points, or would have driven it down by a few points, or wouldn't have done anything.
My criticism of the campaign, then, is this: while a brilliant operative who almost pulled off a massive upset, Steve Schmidt was seduced by friendly polls, making him adopt a more cautious approach rather than a bolder approach. Make no mistake: events dominate this narrative. But I think that Schmidt should have argued for a riskier approach.
First off, some chest-thumping.
Palin seems to me an awful lot like a process of elimination pick. The housing gaffe eliminated wealth, Hillary not being chosen made a woman a better pick than a man, Obama's big speech means that boredom won't cut it, etc.
It appears that I was right on this, if the New Yorker is to be believed.
... A week or so before McCain named her, however, sources close to the campaign say, McCain was intent on naming his fellow-senator Joe Lieberman, an independent, who left the Democratic Party in 2006. David Keene, the chairman of the American Conservative Union, who is close to a number of McCain’s top aides, told me that “McCain and Lindsey Graham”—the South Carolina senator, who has been McCain’s closest campaign companion—“really wanted Joe.” But Keene believed that “McCain was scared off” in the final days, after warnings from his advisers that choosing Lieberman would ignite a contentious floor fight at the Convention, as social conservatives revolted against Lieberman for being, among other things, pro-choice.
“They took it away from him,” a longtime friend of McCain—who asked not to be identified, since the campaign has declined to discuss its selection process—said of the advisers. “He was furious. He was pissed. It wasn’t what he wanted.” Another friend disputed this, characterizing McCain’s mood as one of “understanding resignation.”
With just days to go before the Convention, the choices were slim. Karl Rove favored McCain’s former rival Mitt Romney, but enough animus lingered from the primaries that McCain rejected the pairing. “I told Romney not to wait by the phone, because ‘he doesn’t like you,’ ” Keene, who favored the choice, said. “With John McCain, all politics is personal.” Other possible choices—such as former Representative Rob Portman, of Ohio, or Governor Tim Pawlenty, of Minnesota—seemed too conventional. They did not transmit McCain’s core message that he was a “maverick.” Finally, McCain’s top aides, including Steve Schmidt and Rick Davis, converged on Palin. ...
Earlier today, Nate Silver wrote something similar:
She was the compromise choice after those names were vetoed during the deliberation process -- not necessarily the best candidate, but the least unacceptable. Rarely does quality emerge from such a process of elimination -- ask yourself why wedding music is so bad, or airline food is so bland -- and this was no exception.
So, it's pretty clear from the evidence that Palin was not McCain's first choice, but she fit enough criteria to be the pick. There are a few questions that are worth exploring:
1. Has Palin been an embarrassment?
I think that this is an emphatic "no," but someone with different political beliefs might argue differently. Palin's partially ad-libbed convention address remains the strongest critique of Obama in the cycle (with Joe the Plumber giving her a run for her money), and her debate performance demonstrated her poise, if not much intellectual curiosity (or respect for the word "debate").
If Palin has a clear weakness right now as a politician, it's her ineptitude in the one-on-one interview. The modern presidential campaign requires a million one-on-one interviews, particularly in the early stages. Palin needs serious coaching on this front. I'd grade her a C+ in the Charlie Gibson interview, but a D/D- with Katie Couric. Palin needs to get into the Bs to be more relevant.
Many on the Left have developed an utter hatred for Palin for numerous reasons, but the venom spewed in her direction is a special kind of disgusting, certainly comparable to some of the worst smears said about Obama, and by respectable commentators, too! The more resonating images are of Tina Fey's dead-on portrayal of Palin as a lightweight. Palin has plenty of time to work against this image going into 2012, but she'll have to do things like, brush up on one-on-one interviews, and work on a more complex spoken vocabulary.
2. What's with the animus from the right's intelligentsia?
This is a more interesting thing. Let me run down some of the quotes about Sarah Palin from the conservative elite:
The Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics. It’s no good, not for conservatism and not for the country. And yes, it is a mark against John McCain. - Peggy Noonan
I will readily confess that I was one of many who swooned the day after the announcement. But it’s kind of like dating a supermodel. There comes a moment, unfortunately, where they start talking. - Christopher Buckley
Palin’s recent interviews with Charles Gibson, Sean Hannity, and now Katie Couric have all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate. Who Is Clearly Out Of Her League. - Kathleen Parker
[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. - David Brooks
If it were your decision, and you were putting your country first, would you put an untested small-town mayor a heartbeat away from the presidency? - David Frum
Also, I don't have a good exact quote for this one, but George Will described Sarah Palin as "McCain's female Sancho Panza."
Brooks, Frum, Parker, Noonan, Buckley, and Will represent the media's best conservative commentators. All six have not had kind things to say about Palin. What gives?
I think that this anger and disapproval comes from two points. The first is that intellectual conservatives are more strongly elitist about government than just about anyone else. One running joke in American politics is of liberals as "country club elitists," which is an interesting shift from the old starched-shirt caricatures of Republicans. Will and Brooks are as starched-shirt as you'll get, when it comes to commentators. While both have a healthy respect for "ordinary people" and their preferences (which I find lacking in elite Democratic circles), both are heavily "elitist."
Palin, whose image has been as anti-intellectual as can be, grates on these people.
But really, I think that if you were to ask Brooks, Frum, Parker, Noonan, Buckley and Will about their feelings for the current sitting president, none would offer kind words. I think that this is at the very core of the Palin hostility from the right. Palin reminds them of Bush. This class of conservative intellectuals would like to move back to its view of "traditional" conservatism, but Palin's personality and approach are a bit too Bush-like for this mind.
3. So, was Palin a net positive, or a net negative?
I'll cop out and argue "neutral." For one, she ignited the Republican base and brought in some much needed funds. I don't buy the "counter-fundraising" argument either. Let's sketch this out theoretically:
Obama $$ w/o Palin: $400 million
McCain $$ w/o Palin: $150 million
Obama $$ w/ Palin: $550 million
McCain $$ w/ Palin: $300 million
Even if the counter-fundraising b/c of Palin were equal (which I doubt heavily), the $150 million is more useful to McCain than it is to Obama; we're looking at a bit of diminishing returns at Obama's level of fundraising, anyway.
More critically, the Palin pick was a necessary gamble. The political environment was hostile to Republicans. The best ways out of that:
- Nominate a popular moderate Republican
- Nominate a fresh, unattached face
- Nominate a Democrat
The best popular moderate option would be Colin Powell, but that wouldn't have been an option, and there weren't many others. If you go too far to the Left (with, say, Lieberman), you risk alienating your base entirely (and there's simply no way McCain brings the Christian Right in with Lieberman on the ticket). Palin still remains an excellent tactical choice. She's as far away from the cancer of the national GOP as you could be.
But I think the McCain campaign missed an opportunity... and it comes down to the tactical nature of the McCain campaign.
I think it's hard to justify the way that the McCain campaign over-handled Palin in the early going. If I have read this correctly, the McCain campaign decided to keep Palin in hiding for a few weeks, only spoon-feeding her the McCain message and telling her to repeat it. It's a valid approach, but I'm convinced that it's a major reason why Palin struggled so much in the one-on-one interviews: she was overhandled and was not able to speak freely.
The only way to justify Palin not being let loose is that Steve Schmidt and the McCain campaign apparatus did not trust her enough on her own. And if that's the case, there's no way to justify the pick, try as I might.
I don't think that's the case. The rest of this is pure speculation on my part.
Let me take a brief step back and sketch out my interpretation of Obama's strategy:
1. Attach McCain to Bush.
2. Present Barack Obama as an American, but a uniquely-qualified American to handle the times in which we live.
3. Present Barack Obama as a defender of the middle class.
4. Using your massive money advantage, work an aggressive ground campaign and mobilize as many new voters who are swayed by his message as possible.
The Obama strategy was deliberate and consistent. The message: McCain is Bush. Obama is not. Obama is an American, actually, and one who cares about your needs. The other side is the heavy ground game, which far outpaces the McCain campaign. Obama's campaign is highly strategic. It has a set approach and has stuck with it through thick and thin.
I think that the McCain campaign strategy came down to the following:
1. Use free media to your advantage--control as many news cycles as you can.
2. Work to make the electorate distrust Barack Obama.
3. Distance yourself from Bush, but not severely enough to alienate the base.
4. See what works, and keep doing it.
The fourth point, I think, is the important one.
The McCain campaign approach was the equivalent of a guerrilla war. McCain had a small advantage in his couple-of-month head start--he could begin to frame the debate. That campaign failed quite badly--McCain didn't resonate with the general electorate all that much in the early months of '08. The Schmidt team came in with a tougher approach... one that started to pay dividends in July and August. Obama had something of a peak right around early July (for his Europe trip). The McCain campaign chipped away at his lead throughout those long summer months, bringing the race to the margin of error by August. It was working. McCain's campaign was running fairly humorous ads about Obama being a celebrity and out of touch, and the message was resonating, at least a bit. Much of the summer speculation about McCain's VP was more about how McCain could make the VP pick into something that vaulted him back into the race.
But guess what? By the time he made the pick, McCain was already BACK in the race, as per the polls. I think that the McCain campaign looked at the map, looked at the numbers, and said, "we might just win this damn thing straight up." And they decided that an unmanaged Palin was more of a risk. Why rock the boat? The flexible McCain campaign decided to hedge its Palin bet.
The gamble was picking Palin. The hedge was overhandling Palin. In the end, though, this kind of hedge just eliminated much of the prospects for large-scale success. McCain couldn't have known that the economy would turn so dramatically against Republicans, but it would have been sounder strategy to run a fast-and-loose campaign in this. McCain could have laughed off the first inconsistency and said, "Sarah's being Sarah. We're not going to agree on everything. We're mavericks!" It's possible that Palin would have self-destructed, but that's the nature of taking risks in a hostile year.
Recent reports have convinced me that McCain has given Palin more freedom to maneuver. But the damage, I think, is done.
Of course, the banking crisis happened, and that may well be the end of the story--we simply can't know if a more liberated Palin would have vaulted the ticket up by a few points, or would have driven it down by a few points, or wouldn't have done anything.
My criticism of the campaign, then, is this: while a brilliant operative who almost pulled off a massive upset, Steve Schmidt was seduced by friendly polls, making him adopt a more cautious approach rather than a bolder approach. Make no mistake: events dominate this narrative. But I think that Schmidt should have argued for a riskier approach.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Endorsement: John McCain for President
I'll be quite honest: I've soured on the idea of writing endorsements in general. I'm quite clearly not a moderate--I skew to the right. So any endorsement I write will inevitably be colored by that fact. But I'll do it anyway.
--------------------------------
Five years ago, if you had told me that a liberal State Senator with the middle name "Hussein" was going to be on the cusp of the presidency, I would have said that you were insane. Barack Obama's five-year rise from obscurity to the verge of the highest office in the land is a wonderfully American story, and it is one that should be repeated. It is among the most implausible--indeed, Abraham Lincoln's response to Stephen Douglas at Peoria had brought him some publicity as early as 1854, and Lincoln got in at the ground floor of a brand new party. Obama ascended to the top of an entrenched party with unbelievable speed.
Barack Obama, of course, represents an historic opportunity for America. Obama's election would be irrefutible proof that the US is far less racist than its reputation. As Andrew Sullivan has written, there is an inevitable surge in American "soft power" by electing a dark-skinned man named "Barack Obama" in countries like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, where America is viewed as evil. His election could empower millions of disillusioned African-Americans who see that they too could be successful in a country where the odds often appeared dramatically stacked against them. If Barack Obama can be elected president, America is really a land of hopes and dreams.
All of these things would be negated by a McCain victory. Commentators would write with feigned apoplexy about American racism preventing Obama from his ascension to the highest office. Abroad, Americans would be perceived as irreparably racist in refusing to elect a black man who represents a significant change during what are clearly tough times. Disillusioned African-Americans, perhaps having invested a lot of stock in an Obama election, will wake up even more disillusioned about the promise of America.
Together, this is what I would call the "symbolic significance" of an Obama election. On its own, it represents a compelling reason to vote for Mr Obama--in this respect, the world is a better place on November 5 if Obama wins, and a far worse place if he loses.
Any vote I could cast for Barack Obama would be based on this narrative. It's as if circumstances are pointing a gun at my head: even though you disagree with the man, you should vote for him anyway, because the end result is better for the country.
I can't in good conscience cast a vote for that reason, though I won't fault anyone if they do. At the end of the day, no matter how hard the media tries to paint him as a centrist, Barack Obama is a hard-left liberal. He is hostile to trade and wealth, and he believes that government is the solution to just about any problem you can concoct. I disagree with those positions.
Barack Obama is torn, of course, between what he must know to be true--that international trade is critical to economic growth--and the xenophobic pro-labor elements in his party that fear international trade and find scapegoats for job loss.
Obama is not an anti-trader like John Edwards (the worst kind of scum in the Democratic Party). He is, however, an opponent of free trade. A unilateral renegotiation of NAFTA at this time seems pretty silly to me.
Why does trade matter? Well, for me, as someone who finds the Republican social conservative agenda to be a bit abhorrent at times, it's refreshing to find a Democrat who ardently defends trade. Bill Richardson impressed me for this reason (but sadly for few other reasons). As a conservative free-trader, if the Democrat doesn't support free trade, it's awfully hard for me to pull the lever for him/her. And Barack Obama is simply more opposed to free trade than I would have hoped.
Obama is also hostile to wealth in general. McCain was not the most qualified candidate to bring this to light--because he is equally hostile to wealth (compare their post-financial meltdown speeches and McCain's likening of Wall Street to a "casino"). It took the musings of the great philosopher-craftsman Joe the Plumber to bring in a philosophical defense of lower taxes:
This is the first moral defense of a flat tax I have seen on the national political stage since Steve Forbes. Joe the Plumber, of course, is a conservative. He probably wouldn't vote for Obama anyway. But by bringing this into the discourse, Mr. Wurzelbacher has done a service to the campaign.
These economic issues may seem petty, particularly in comparison to the sheer volume of "symbolic power" that an Obama election would represent. But there's much more at stake this time. Odds are strongly in favor of the Democrats picking up seats in House races, perhaps driving the majority to a 90-100 seat difference. There is a mathematical chance that the Democrats also get 60 votes in the Senate--essentially, a filibuster-proof majority. As much as Obama claims to want to work across the aisle, can he really stop the rush of programs that would inevitably come from an anti-market, anti-wealth, pro-labor party? Would Obama veto any excessive spending in that environment? A reinstitution of the "Fairness Doctrine?" The oxymoronically-named "Employee Free Choice Act?" Hostile new restrictions to trade? It's inconceivable.
But most frightening is the sheer amount of power that the Bush Administration has assumed in this financial crisis. The best president to have at this time would be Calvin Coolidge--one who believed that the powers of the presidency were limited. Neither McCain nor Obama is anything like Coolidge. McCain's beau ideal of a statesman is TR, who presided over a massive expansion of the powers of the presidency. Obama's appears to be FDR. But Obama would be working with a liberal Congress. McCain would at least be working against it.
McCain's hostility to wealth aside, there's plenty to recommend him. He has a legitimate record of working across party lines, making him neatly qualified to manage divided government. He is not an aggressive social conservative, and he seems to be a federalist on most social issues. He has pushed for lower taxes in this campaign, and he prefers to reform government rather than to expand it--I like his "hatchet" approach of a necessary spending freeze. He also strongly opposes torture, as a victim of it, a welcome change from recent Republican talking points.
McCain's health care policy also makes intrinsic sense--people should not be forced (economically) into an employer-provided health care system. The details would be hashed out in the Congress, I'm sure, but the basic principle of liberating health insurance from a World War II-era regime of employer-based coverage is a sound one. It will certainly help to lower costs, which is the fundamental problem with the current system.
On foreign policy, Obama would bring a welcome realism to the fold, while McCain is still an idealistic Wilsonian. But on Iraq, McCain was right--the surge worked. And while silent evidence problems abound in just about all analysis of the war, McCain was advocating more ground troops long before the Bush Administration came around to that view. If McCain supports war more than most political figures do, at least we know that McCain will run a war better than the Bush Administration. Obama, on the other hand, showed a strong reluctance to adjust his anti-Iraq War dogma to reflect new realities. This is worrisome. Sure, it's a political campaign, but facts and events should drive narratives.
In another year, I might be swayed by the "symbolic" power, enough even to vote for him (it would have required a sizable Republican Congressional majority). But with so much at stake, and with a liberal Congress chomping at the bit to pass its agenda, we need divided government now. With that, this conservative is meekly endorsing John McCain for president. If you, however, believe in the "symbolic significance" of an Obama election strongly enough, at least vote Republican in your Senate race of choice. (For me, that's Dick Zimmer over Frank Lautenberg. Zimmer is a pro-choice, moderate Republican, and Lautenberg is 135 years old and one of the more liberal Dems in the Senate.) To preserve any semblance of America's rugged individualism, we need to preserve that filibuster.
--------------------------------
Five years ago, if you had told me that a liberal State Senator with the middle name "Hussein" was going to be on the cusp of the presidency, I would have said that you were insane. Barack Obama's five-year rise from obscurity to the verge of the highest office in the land is a wonderfully American story, and it is one that should be repeated. It is among the most implausible--indeed, Abraham Lincoln's response to Stephen Douglas at Peoria had brought him some publicity as early as 1854, and Lincoln got in at the ground floor of a brand new party. Obama ascended to the top of an entrenched party with unbelievable speed.
Barack Obama, of course, represents an historic opportunity for America. Obama's election would be irrefutible proof that the US is far less racist than its reputation. As Andrew Sullivan has written, there is an inevitable surge in American "soft power" by electing a dark-skinned man named "Barack Obama" in countries like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, where America is viewed as evil. His election could empower millions of disillusioned African-Americans who see that they too could be successful in a country where the odds often appeared dramatically stacked against them. If Barack Obama can be elected president, America is really a land of hopes and dreams.
All of these things would be negated by a McCain victory. Commentators would write with feigned apoplexy about American racism preventing Obama from his ascension to the highest office. Abroad, Americans would be perceived as irreparably racist in refusing to elect a black man who represents a significant change during what are clearly tough times. Disillusioned African-Americans, perhaps having invested a lot of stock in an Obama election, will wake up even more disillusioned about the promise of America.
Together, this is what I would call the "symbolic significance" of an Obama election. On its own, it represents a compelling reason to vote for Mr Obama--in this respect, the world is a better place on November 5 if Obama wins, and a far worse place if he loses.
Any vote I could cast for Barack Obama would be based on this narrative. It's as if circumstances are pointing a gun at my head: even though you disagree with the man, you should vote for him anyway, because the end result is better for the country.
I can't in good conscience cast a vote for that reason, though I won't fault anyone if they do. At the end of the day, no matter how hard the media tries to paint him as a centrist, Barack Obama is a hard-left liberal. He is hostile to trade and wealth, and he believes that government is the solution to just about any problem you can concoct. I disagree with those positions.
Barack Obama is torn, of course, between what he must know to be true--that international trade is critical to economic growth--and the xenophobic pro-labor elements in his party that fear international trade and find scapegoats for job loss.
Obama is not an anti-trader like John Edwards (the worst kind of scum in the Democratic Party). He is, however, an opponent of free trade. A unilateral renegotiation of NAFTA at this time seems pretty silly to me.
Why does trade matter? Well, for me, as someone who finds the Republican social conservative agenda to be a bit abhorrent at times, it's refreshing to find a Democrat who ardently defends trade. Bill Richardson impressed me for this reason (but sadly for few other reasons). As a conservative free-trader, if the Democrat doesn't support free trade, it's awfully hard for me to pull the lever for him/her. And Barack Obama is simply more opposed to free trade than I would have hoped.
Obama is also hostile to wealth in general. McCain was not the most qualified candidate to bring this to light--because he is equally hostile to wealth (compare their post-financial meltdown speeches and McCain's likening of Wall Street to a "casino"). It took the musings of the great philosopher-craftsman Joe the Plumber to bring in a philosophical defense of lower taxes:
You know, me or -- you know, Bill Gates, I don't care who you are. If you worked for it, if it was your idea, and you implemented it, it's not right for someone to decide you made too much -- that you've done too good and now we're going to take some of it back.
This is the first moral defense of a flat tax I have seen on the national political stage since Steve Forbes. Joe the Plumber, of course, is a conservative. He probably wouldn't vote for Obama anyway. But by bringing this into the discourse, Mr. Wurzelbacher has done a service to the campaign.
These economic issues may seem petty, particularly in comparison to the sheer volume of "symbolic power" that an Obama election would represent. But there's much more at stake this time. Odds are strongly in favor of the Democrats picking up seats in House races, perhaps driving the majority to a 90-100 seat difference. There is a mathematical chance that the Democrats also get 60 votes in the Senate--essentially, a filibuster-proof majority. As much as Obama claims to want to work across the aisle, can he really stop the rush of programs that would inevitably come from an anti-market, anti-wealth, pro-labor party? Would Obama veto any excessive spending in that environment? A reinstitution of the "Fairness Doctrine?" The oxymoronically-named "Employee Free Choice Act?" Hostile new restrictions to trade? It's inconceivable.
But most frightening is the sheer amount of power that the Bush Administration has assumed in this financial crisis. The best president to have at this time would be Calvin Coolidge--one who believed that the powers of the presidency were limited. Neither McCain nor Obama is anything like Coolidge. McCain's beau ideal of a statesman is TR, who presided over a massive expansion of the powers of the presidency. Obama's appears to be FDR. But Obama would be working with a liberal Congress. McCain would at least be working against it.
McCain's hostility to wealth aside, there's plenty to recommend him. He has a legitimate record of working across party lines, making him neatly qualified to manage divided government. He is not an aggressive social conservative, and he seems to be a federalist on most social issues. He has pushed for lower taxes in this campaign, and he prefers to reform government rather than to expand it--I like his "hatchet" approach of a necessary spending freeze. He also strongly opposes torture, as a victim of it, a welcome change from recent Republican talking points.
McCain's health care policy also makes intrinsic sense--people should not be forced (economically) into an employer-provided health care system. The details would be hashed out in the Congress, I'm sure, but the basic principle of liberating health insurance from a World War II-era regime of employer-based coverage is a sound one. It will certainly help to lower costs, which is the fundamental problem with the current system.
On foreign policy, Obama would bring a welcome realism to the fold, while McCain is still an idealistic Wilsonian. But on Iraq, McCain was right--the surge worked. And while silent evidence problems abound in just about all analysis of the war, McCain was advocating more ground troops long before the Bush Administration came around to that view. If McCain supports war more than most political figures do, at least we know that McCain will run a war better than the Bush Administration. Obama, on the other hand, showed a strong reluctance to adjust his anti-Iraq War dogma to reflect new realities. This is worrisome. Sure, it's a political campaign, but facts and events should drive narratives.
In another year, I might be swayed by the "symbolic" power, enough even to vote for him (it would have required a sizable Republican Congressional majority). But with so much at stake, and with a liberal Congress chomping at the bit to pass its agenda, we need divided government now. With that, this conservative is meekly endorsing John McCain for president. If you, however, believe in the "symbolic significance" of an Obama election strongly enough, at least vote Republican in your Senate race of choice. (For me, that's Dick Zimmer over Frank Lautenberg. Zimmer is a pro-choice, moderate Republican, and Lautenberg is 135 years old and one of the more liberal Dems in the Senate.) To preserve any semblance of America's rugged individualism, we need to preserve that filibuster.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
More Comment: a Powell Endorsement?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lawrence-odonnell/colin-powell-is-ready-to_b_134777.html
Thesis: Colin Powell's imminent endorsement of Obama would "hammer the final nail in the coffin of the Republican campaign to hold onto the White House."
Quick Analysis: False.
Deeper Analysis: This is really two separate arguments in one.
1. Colin Powell is about to endorse Barack Obama.
2. Colin Powell's endorsement would be the final nail in the coffin for McCain.
I can't speak to the first argument at all, honestly; I know nothing about what goes on in the mind of Colin Powell. The second argument, I find strained.
I think that endorsements in October don't have very much impact, in this day and age. It's not that people have all decided; not everyone has.
So, why won't Powell's endorsement matter that much?
- It's late in the campaign. A Colin Powell endorsement of Barack Obama a year ago would have made much more of an impact. Less daily political news of significance would keep the political news class talking about the endorsement through several news cycles. More critically, that kind of endorsement would lend gravitas and significance to an untested candidate like Obama. I'm sure that many voters in Iowa simply discounted Obama for lack of experience. A Powell endorsement might have given those people pause. But at this stage, I think that Obama has largely convinced the convince-able that he is "ready to lead."
- Endorsements at this level don't matter that much. I have no evidence for this statement, but I think that down-ticket endorsements are more likely to have an impact on a race than up-ticket endorsements. Meaning, if Barack Obama endorses a House candidate, that has a far larger impact than if that House candidate endorses Barack Obama. It's akin to the coattails effect. Remember, the president has the power of the pulpit, in addition to all the other powers that come with the office. No political figure in America has the same power, so it's hard to put too much stock into endorsements at this level.
- Colin Powell is no longer a celebrity. There was a time when Colin Powell was highly respected. Hell, there was a time (1996) where Powell would have been the first black president, if he had chosen to run. But he's perceived as largely ineffectual as Bush's SecState, and he's undoubtedly tied to the Iraq War. Powell has left the limelight, for better or worse. I don't think he has the muscle he once did.
As a final point, I think that a lot of the perception of any Powell endorsement of Obama would be one more focused on skin color than party or ideology or anything else. I don't think that benefits Obama at all.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1008/Voting_for_Obama_anyway.html?showall
There's no real thesis to this. Just... sadness. This has been my great fear over the past few years: that people will turn away from individualism because it's easier if someone else makes decisions for you. I believe that individualism was a pillar of this country's development. I can't bear the sight of people running away from it.
Small sample size, of course, but I have feared this, and it appears to be coming to pass.
"I want the government to take over all of Wall Street and bankers and the car companies..."
"I'm sick of paying for health insurance at work."
It just makes me sick. More of a philosophical look at this in another post.
Thesis: Colin Powell's imminent endorsement of Obama would "hammer the final nail in the coffin of the Republican campaign to hold onto the White House."
Quick Analysis: False.
Deeper Analysis: This is really two separate arguments in one.
1. Colin Powell is about to endorse Barack Obama.
2. Colin Powell's endorsement would be the final nail in the coffin for McCain.
I can't speak to the first argument at all, honestly; I know nothing about what goes on in the mind of Colin Powell. The second argument, I find strained.
I think that endorsements in October don't have very much impact, in this day and age. It's not that people have all decided; not everyone has.
So, why won't Powell's endorsement matter that much?
- It's late in the campaign. A Colin Powell endorsement of Barack Obama a year ago would have made much more of an impact. Less daily political news of significance would keep the political news class talking about the endorsement through several news cycles. More critically, that kind of endorsement would lend gravitas and significance to an untested candidate like Obama. I'm sure that many voters in Iowa simply discounted Obama for lack of experience. A Powell endorsement might have given those people pause. But at this stage, I think that Obama has largely convinced the convince-able that he is "ready to lead."
- Endorsements at this level don't matter that much. I have no evidence for this statement, but I think that down-ticket endorsements are more likely to have an impact on a race than up-ticket endorsements. Meaning, if Barack Obama endorses a House candidate, that has a far larger impact than if that House candidate endorses Barack Obama. It's akin to the coattails effect. Remember, the president has the power of the pulpit, in addition to all the other powers that come with the office. No political figure in America has the same power, so it's hard to put too much stock into endorsements at this level.
- Colin Powell is no longer a celebrity. There was a time when Colin Powell was highly respected. Hell, there was a time (1996) where Powell would have been the first black president, if he had chosen to run. But he's perceived as largely ineffectual as Bush's SecState, and he's undoubtedly tied to the Iraq War. Powell has left the limelight, for better or worse. I don't think he has the muscle he once did.
As a final point, I think that a lot of the perception of any Powell endorsement of Obama would be one more focused on skin color than party or ideology or anything else. I don't think that benefits Obama at all.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1008/Voting_for_Obama_anyway.html?showall
There's no real thesis to this. Just... sadness. This has been my great fear over the past few years: that people will turn away from individualism because it's easier if someone else makes decisions for you. I believe that individualism was a pillar of this country's development. I can't bear the sight of people running away from it.
Small sample size, of course, but I have feared this, and it appears to be coming to pass.
"I want the government to take over all of Wall Street and bankers and the car companies..."
"I'm sick of paying for health insurance at work."
It just makes me sick. More of a philosophical look at this in another post.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Three Articles Worth Comment
A long ramble on three articles:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122367984585224675.html
Thesis: "In the history of empire -- or superpower or hyperpower -- no country has ever wielded its dominance as gently and judiciously as the United States has. Even those abroad and afar who feel they suffered as a result of American foreign policy ought to know that this planet as a whole will fare far worse under China or whatever country comes next, and would have suffered greatly had the Soviets won the Cold War."
Quick Analysis: True.
Deeper Analysis: While I strongly believe in the "gently and judiciously" angle, I'm not convinced that the "American century" is over.
Predicting the future is a difficult task, and while the American economy isn't looking too hot right now, the Chinese economy is suffering a tad, too. The US still has a large population, liberal immigration policies, and the world's strongest democratic traditions. All of these things are great for growth and for influence.
Things could grow much worse. Indeed, it's possible that a fully-Democratic government shifts strongly in favor of regulations, pumping up labor unions whose functions are at least a bit outdated, overregulating an economy (which needs smarter regulations, not a lot more regulations), destroying economic growth and then bringing to life the doomsday predictions of the deficit fear-peddlers. I can accept the premise of the article, but I'm not sure that we're quite ready for the Rome comparisons yet.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-10/the-conservative-case-for-obama
Thesis: "Necessity is the mother of bipartisanship. And so, for the first time in my life, I’ll be pulling the Democratic lever in November."
Quick Analysis: I don't think I'll be joining Mr. Buckley, but we'll see.
Deeper Analysis: Christopher Buckley is William F. Buckley's son. He wrote the excellent Thank You For Smoking and is an avowed libertarian-conservative. He's come out strongly in favor of voting for Barack Obama. His case:
- John McCain, a once-authentic, honorable politician, has changed into an "irascible, snarly" inauthentic politician by virtue of this tough campaign.
- The Sarah Palin pick was an embarrassment.
- Barack Obama is a very smart guy.
- As a very smart guy, he will "surely understand that traditional left-politics aren’t going to get us out of this pit we’ve dug for ourselves," and is clear on "what the historical moment is calling for."
My take on this? I find that McCain's campaign has disappointed me, though not immeasurably. Many of the lines of attack he has pursued are legitimate: Obama has attempted to portray himself as a centrist unifier when he has absolutely no record of being a centrist unifier (I was enraged when the AP described him as "centrist" in an article from 2007). On the contrary, Obama has a significantly unique past that has seen him associating with the worst parts of the Chicago political machine, in addition to some hard-core leftists. This is all one story, I think:
- Barack Obama says he's a centrist who can bring people together.
- Barack Obama has one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate and no record of bipartisan compromise (certainly less than McCain, who has an extensive record of bipartisan compromise).
- Barack Obama has worked with Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, and the worst parts of the Chicago political establishment.
This is a legitimate line of inquiry! The media's failing to investigate it more (preferring instead to deal with Sarah Palin's questionable firing of an incompetent police officer) is, to me, the leading indicator of some sort of press "bias" at work.
But back on point: some of the attacks of Obama as an "Other" and of Obama as "The One" smacked of immaturity and hostility. I'm certainly realistic about American politics, and really, very little is out of bounds. But I hoped for more from McCain.
The Palin pick has, for the most part, disappointed me, with the benefit of hindsight. I think she's been overhandled by the McCain campaign. Mostly, though, it appears to be true that it was too hard to bring a neophyte up to speed. Obama's campaign experience, if nothing else, gave him time to take positions on "The Issues." Palin, thrust into McCain's campaign, never had that luxury.
I want to see Sarah Palin run her own national campaign, not McCain's campaign. I want her to take a stand on federal power and the main issues of our time. I think that she has passed a minimum threshold test for national relevance; her convention speech was great, and she has demonstrated poise on a very large stage at a very early age for a politician. But we need to see more. And I'm pretty confident that we haven't seen the last of Sarah Palin.
Continuing on, I believe strongly that Barack Obama is a smart guy. I haven't read his books, but I have read his speeches, and he is the most logical thinker I have seen on the political stage... well, ever. Every point he makes is logical: A leads to B, B leads to C, C leads to D. It's professorial, but it's excellent.
I do not, however, believe that Obama will be immune to a Democratic Congress, particularly a filibuster-proof one (which is, to say the least, a statistical possibility). Any Democratic Congress will push a left-agenda hard over its two years. I think what we saw in 1992-1994 will be repeated (a president beholden to the Congressional base), but with far worse ramifications.
It is this critical point that I feel Buckley misses. A good conservative understands the benefits of limiting executive power, and whatever Obama wants to do, it is highly unlikely that he will push back against the liberal excesses of his Congress.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/10/obama_vs_free_speech.html
Thesis: "In this campaign, we have seen the coming of the Obama thugocracy, suppressing free speech, and we may see its flourishing in the four or eight years ahead."
Quick Analysis: Michael Barone's getting testy!
Deeper Analysis: When I first read this piece, I was shocked that it was Michael Barone. Barone is one of my... three favorite political analysts. I think Barone went a bit too far, but... I find it to ring true.
The Obama campaign and its surrogates have aggressively attacked legitimate lines of inquiry (as I postulated before). I can't say that I thought of the "Alien and Sedition Acts" when I first started recognizing this fact, but it's a valid comparison. The "Alien and Sedition Acts" were the products of surrogates of the (First) Adams administration, as Federalists tried desperately to protect the presidency from the evil Jeffersonians. The transfer of power, after the fact, was smooth and peaceful, establishing the precedent for the next two centuries. The laws were quietly repealed in 1801.
The larger picture is that Barone, a conservative, is coming to the realization that the next two years may well see a filibuster-proof Democratic majority. I think it has colored his recent analysis, sadly.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122367984585224675.html
Thesis: "In the history of empire -- or superpower or hyperpower -- no country has ever wielded its dominance as gently and judiciously as the United States has. Even those abroad and afar who feel they suffered as a result of American foreign policy ought to know that this planet as a whole will fare far worse under China or whatever country comes next, and would have suffered greatly had the Soviets won the Cold War."
Quick Analysis: True.
Deeper Analysis: While I strongly believe in the "gently and judiciously" angle, I'm not convinced that the "American century" is over.
Predicting the future is a difficult task, and while the American economy isn't looking too hot right now, the Chinese economy is suffering a tad, too. The US still has a large population, liberal immigration policies, and the world's strongest democratic traditions. All of these things are great for growth and for influence.
Things could grow much worse. Indeed, it's possible that a fully-Democratic government shifts strongly in favor of regulations, pumping up labor unions whose functions are at least a bit outdated, overregulating an economy (which needs smarter regulations, not a lot more regulations), destroying economic growth and then bringing to life the doomsday predictions of the deficit fear-peddlers. I can accept the premise of the article, but I'm not sure that we're quite ready for the Rome comparisons yet.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-10/the-conservative-case-for-obama
Thesis: "Necessity is the mother of bipartisanship. And so, for the first time in my life, I’ll be pulling the Democratic lever in November."
Quick Analysis: I don't think I'll be joining Mr. Buckley, but we'll see.
Deeper Analysis: Christopher Buckley is William F. Buckley's son. He wrote the excellent Thank You For Smoking and is an avowed libertarian-conservative. He's come out strongly in favor of voting for Barack Obama. His case:
- John McCain, a once-authentic, honorable politician, has changed into an "irascible, snarly" inauthentic politician by virtue of this tough campaign.
- The Sarah Palin pick was an embarrassment.
- Barack Obama is a very smart guy.
- As a very smart guy, he will "surely understand that traditional left-politics aren’t going to get us out of this pit we’ve dug for ourselves," and is clear on "what the historical moment is calling for."
My take on this? I find that McCain's campaign has disappointed me, though not immeasurably. Many of the lines of attack he has pursued are legitimate: Obama has attempted to portray himself as a centrist unifier when he has absolutely no record of being a centrist unifier (I was enraged when the AP described him as "centrist" in an article from 2007). On the contrary, Obama has a significantly unique past that has seen him associating with the worst parts of the Chicago political machine, in addition to some hard-core leftists. This is all one story, I think:
- Barack Obama says he's a centrist who can bring people together.
- Barack Obama has one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate and no record of bipartisan compromise (certainly less than McCain, who has an extensive record of bipartisan compromise).
- Barack Obama has worked with Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, and the worst parts of the Chicago political establishment.
This is a legitimate line of inquiry! The media's failing to investigate it more (preferring instead to deal with Sarah Palin's questionable firing of an incompetent police officer) is, to me, the leading indicator of some sort of press "bias" at work.
But back on point: some of the attacks of Obama as an "Other" and of Obama as "The One" smacked of immaturity and hostility. I'm certainly realistic about American politics, and really, very little is out of bounds. But I hoped for more from McCain.
The Palin pick has, for the most part, disappointed me, with the benefit of hindsight. I think she's been overhandled by the McCain campaign. Mostly, though, it appears to be true that it was too hard to bring a neophyte up to speed. Obama's campaign experience, if nothing else, gave him time to take positions on "The Issues." Palin, thrust into McCain's campaign, never had that luxury.
I want to see Sarah Palin run her own national campaign, not McCain's campaign. I want her to take a stand on federal power and the main issues of our time. I think that she has passed a minimum threshold test for national relevance; her convention speech was great, and she has demonstrated poise on a very large stage at a very early age for a politician. But we need to see more. And I'm pretty confident that we haven't seen the last of Sarah Palin.
Continuing on, I believe strongly that Barack Obama is a smart guy. I haven't read his books, but I have read his speeches, and he is the most logical thinker I have seen on the political stage... well, ever. Every point he makes is logical: A leads to B, B leads to C, C leads to D. It's professorial, but it's excellent.
I do not, however, believe that Obama will be immune to a Democratic Congress, particularly a filibuster-proof one (which is, to say the least, a statistical possibility). Any Democratic Congress will push a left-agenda hard over its two years. I think what we saw in 1992-1994 will be repeated (a president beholden to the Congressional base), but with far worse ramifications.
It is this critical point that I feel Buckley misses. A good conservative understands the benefits of limiting executive power, and whatever Obama wants to do, it is highly unlikely that he will push back against the liberal excesses of his Congress.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/10/obama_vs_free_speech.html
Thesis: "In this campaign, we have seen the coming of the Obama thugocracy, suppressing free speech, and we may see its flourishing in the four or eight years ahead."
Quick Analysis: Michael Barone's getting testy!
Deeper Analysis: When I first read this piece, I was shocked that it was Michael Barone. Barone is one of my... three favorite political analysts. I think Barone went a bit too far, but... I find it to ring true.
The Obama campaign and its surrogates have aggressively attacked legitimate lines of inquiry (as I postulated before). I can't say that I thought of the "Alien and Sedition Acts" when I first started recognizing this fact, but it's a valid comparison. The "Alien and Sedition Acts" were the products of surrogates of the (First) Adams administration, as Federalists tried desperately to protect the presidency from the evil Jeffersonians. The transfer of power, after the fact, was smooth and peaceful, establishing the precedent for the next two centuries. The laws were quietly repealed in 1801.
The larger picture is that Barone, a conservative, is coming to the realization that the next two years may well see a filibuster-proof Democratic majority. I think it has colored his recent analysis, sadly.
Friday, October 10, 2008
Thoughts 25 Days Out...
Some thoughts in the days leading up to the election:
I think it's pretty clear that the financial crisis has hurt McCain. I tend to subscribe to Jay Cost's view of it, that McCain was most affected by the crisis b/c he's a member of the Republican Party, the party that is historically associated with banking interests, not because of media talking points or because of his own impulsive desire to get himself in the thick of policy-making.
I hate to say that "it's over," because I think that a LOT can change in 3 weeks. But I think that the collapsing Dow is a reasonably proxy for McCain's electoral prospects. If the Dow is at 6500 on November 1, can anyone envision McCain winning the election? With all the fear that's floating around about retirement incomes, 401Ks, etc? I can't see it.
The truth is, I have no idea where the bottom is on this crisis. The fever may be breaking right now, or it may be getting far more severe. A market rebound (to, say, 10,000 in the next few weeks) would do a lot for McCain's campaign, but I'm not seeing that at all. McCain needs something to turn undecided voters his way; polls show Obama ahead by at least a small margin among decided voters. As far as I can tell, those things are:
- major national security issue
- economic stability/reduction of economic fear
The other thing is the electoral map. I think the worst case for McCain is something like a 364-174 loss. The most optimistic map I can possibly construct for McCain is a 321-217 win, and that includes Pennsylvania and Michigan going red (not happening). Obama has a massive committed-state cushion:
- Massachusetts
- Connecticut
- Maine
- Vermont
- Rhode Island
- New York
- New Jersey
- Maryland
- Washington DC
- Delaware
- Pennsylvania
- Michigan
- Illinois
- Wisconsin
- Iowa
- Minnesota
- California
- Washington
- Oregon
- Hawaii
That's 255 electoral votes.
So really, a McCain best case scenario is 283-255. The map favored Obama this year before the crisis. After the crisis? It's difficult to see him winning it.
It's hard to predict these things, but my intuition is that McCain will pick up some ground from where the polls are between now and the election, simply because I think it's easier for undecideds to see him in the Oval Office than it is Obama. But I don't think it would have been enough.
I think it's pretty clear that the financial crisis has hurt McCain. I tend to subscribe to Jay Cost's view of it, that McCain was most affected by the crisis b/c he's a member of the Republican Party, the party that is historically associated with banking interests, not because of media talking points or because of his own impulsive desire to get himself in the thick of policy-making.
I hate to say that "it's over," because I think that a LOT can change in 3 weeks. But I think that the collapsing Dow is a reasonably proxy for McCain's electoral prospects. If the Dow is at 6500 on November 1, can anyone envision McCain winning the election? With all the fear that's floating around about retirement incomes, 401Ks, etc? I can't see it.
The truth is, I have no idea where the bottom is on this crisis. The fever may be breaking right now, or it may be getting far more severe. A market rebound (to, say, 10,000 in the next few weeks) would do a lot for McCain's campaign, but I'm not seeing that at all. McCain needs something to turn undecided voters his way; polls show Obama ahead by at least a small margin among decided voters. As far as I can tell, those things are:
- major national security issue
- economic stability/reduction of economic fear
The other thing is the electoral map. I think the worst case for McCain is something like a 364-174 loss. The most optimistic map I can possibly construct for McCain is a 321-217 win, and that includes Pennsylvania and Michigan going red (not happening). Obama has a massive committed-state cushion:
- Massachusetts
- Connecticut
- Maine
- Vermont
- Rhode Island
- New York
- New Jersey
- Maryland
- Washington DC
- Delaware
- Pennsylvania
- Michigan
- Illinois
- Wisconsin
- Iowa
- Minnesota
- California
- Washington
- Oregon
- Hawaii
That's 255 electoral votes.
So really, a McCain best case scenario is 283-255. The map favored Obama this year before the crisis. After the crisis? It's difficult to see him winning it.
It's hard to predict these things, but my intuition is that McCain will pick up some ground from where the polls are between now and the election, simply because I think it's easier for undecideds to see him in the Oval Office than it is Obama. But I don't think it would have been enough.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
The Problem with Political Coverage (I)
OK, it's hard to say that there's one problem with political coverage. There are many, many problems with political coverage. We'll start with this one:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D93KD6Q00&show_article=1
The thesis of this bit of analysis from the AP is that Sarah Palin's recent attacks on Barack Obama's associations are "racially-tinged." I reject this line of analysis altogether, for what it's worth, but that's not the point I'm trying to hit.
1. With her criticism, Palin is taking on the running mate's traditional role of attacker, said Rich Galen, a Republican strategist. "There appears to be a newfound sense of confidence in Sarah Palin as a candidate, given her performance the other night," Galen said. "I think that they are comfortable enough with her now that she's got the standing with the electorate to take off after Obama."
2. "It's a giant changing of the subject," said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist. "The problem is the messenger. If you want to start throwing fire bombs, you don't send out the fluffy bunny to do it. I think people don't take Sarah Palin seriously."
Rich Galen and Jenny Backus CANNOT deliver analysis of the situation at all. They are delivering talking points, not analysis.
Galen's analysis is based on the following premises:
- Palin is confident.
- Palin did a great job in the debate.
- Palin has gravitas with the electorate.
Backus, on the other hand, bases her analysis on the following premises:
- Palin is a "fluffy bunny."
- No one takes Palin seriously.
Both bits of analysis are based on entirely different premises, but those premises reflect the stated political positions of the analysts! So why do we even use their opinions for copy? They are just part of the two campaigns' distinct attempts to shape the narrative and build support for their candidate of choice.
I think that both analysts, for what it's worth, are quite wrong.
- Palin did not do a "great job" at the debate, and she is still something of an unknown in the electorate.
- Palin's convention speech was the most effective attack on Barack Obama in the entire election cycle; she's not a "fluffy bunny."
These two conclusions, to me, are more fair than the politically-tinged ones of Backus and Galen. Why are "_______ strategists" even allowed to deliver analysis in non-partisan settings? It's not analysis at all. It's just another field for the campaigns to do battle. And whenever possible, the news media should be detached from the campaigns, not entangled with them.
AND: there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG with the line of inquiry vis-a-vis William Ayers. Associations matter. Obama is (rightfully) trying to downplay this, but he hasn't given people access to the critical documents needed to "exonerate" himself. William Ayers' priorities, beliefs, and goals are different from those of mainstream Americans. If Obama just worked with him to advance his OWN goals, that's fine--but if Obama sympathized with those goals at any time, he has to defend himself. The media cannot act as a gatekeeper in this spot; the media has to try to break down the gate.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D93KD6Q00&show_article=1
The thesis of this bit of analysis from the AP is that Sarah Palin's recent attacks on Barack Obama's associations are "racially-tinged." I reject this line of analysis altogether, for what it's worth, but that's not the point I'm trying to hit.
1. With her criticism, Palin is taking on the running mate's traditional role of attacker, said Rich Galen, a Republican strategist. "There appears to be a newfound sense of confidence in Sarah Palin as a candidate, given her performance the other night," Galen said. "I think that they are comfortable enough with her now that she's got the standing with the electorate to take off after Obama."
2. "It's a giant changing of the subject," said Jenny Backus, a Democratic strategist. "The problem is the messenger. If you want to start throwing fire bombs, you don't send out the fluffy bunny to do it. I think people don't take Sarah Palin seriously."
Rich Galen and Jenny Backus CANNOT deliver analysis of the situation at all. They are delivering talking points, not analysis.
Galen's analysis is based on the following premises:
- Palin is confident.
- Palin did a great job in the debate.
- Palin has gravitas with the electorate.
Backus, on the other hand, bases her analysis on the following premises:
- Palin is a "fluffy bunny."
- No one takes Palin seriously.
Both bits of analysis are based on entirely different premises, but those premises reflect the stated political positions of the analysts! So why do we even use their opinions for copy? They are just part of the two campaigns' distinct attempts to shape the narrative and build support for their candidate of choice.
I think that both analysts, for what it's worth, are quite wrong.
- Palin did not do a "great job" at the debate, and she is still something of an unknown in the electorate.
- Palin's convention speech was the most effective attack on Barack Obama in the entire election cycle; she's not a "fluffy bunny."
These two conclusions, to me, are more fair than the politically-tinged ones of Backus and Galen. Why are "_______ strategists" even allowed to deliver analysis in non-partisan settings? It's not analysis at all. It's just another field for the campaigns to do battle. And whenever possible, the news media should be detached from the campaigns, not entangled with them.
AND: there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG with the line of inquiry vis-a-vis William Ayers. Associations matter. Obama is (rightfully) trying to downplay this, but he hasn't given people access to the critical documents needed to "exonerate" himself. William Ayers' priorities, beliefs, and goals are different from those of mainstream Americans. If Obama just worked with him to advance his OWN goals, that's fine--but if Obama sympathized with those goals at any time, he has to defend himself. The media cannot act as a gatekeeper in this spot; the media has to try to break down the gate.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Great Analogy...
From Brad Smith over at RedState.com:
It is true that relatively few voters (though by no means none) go into the booth thinking, "I like Obama over McCain, but I am voting for McCain because I like Palin more." But for virtually all voters the VP nominee is part of the large backdrop that fills the canvas, and makes the top of the ticket seem better or worse. To say the VP won't change votes is like saying a movie score won't change people's appreciation of the movie - we know that that is simply not true, the movie score is vitally important... even if few viewers walk out going, "Man, if it weren't for the score, I wouldn't have liked that movie."
It is true that relatively few voters (though by no means none) go into the booth thinking, "I like Obama over McCain, but I am voting for McCain because I like Palin more." But for virtually all voters the VP nominee is part of the large backdrop that fills the canvas, and makes the top of the ticket seem better or worse. To say the VP won't change votes is like saying a movie score won't change people's appreciation of the movie - we know that that is simply not true, the movie score is vitally important... even if few viewers walk out going, "Man, if it weren't for the score, I wouldn't have liked that movie."
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Debate
9:10 PM - "Deregulation" is the Democrats' central theme so far.
9:25 PM - "$4 billion tax break" - another Democratic talking point. For what it's worth, I think Palin's doing a good job here. Biden isn't stumbling much, too; he's well-prepared.
9:32 PM - Biden's point about "knowing the causes" is sound.
9:41 PM - Palin has done well but simply has avoided answering questions with much nuance. It's actually a very effective way to work in these terribly-formatted debates. Palin would have no chance in an actual, straight-up debate.
9:25 PM - "$4 billion tax break" - another Democratic talking point. For what it's worth, I think Palin's doing a good job here. Biden isn't stumbling much, too; he's well-prepared.
9:32 PM - Biden's point about "knowing the causes" is sound.
9:41 PM - Palin has done well but simply has avoided answering questions with much nuance. It's actually a very effective way to work in these terribly-formatted debates. Palin would have no chance in an actual, straight-up debate.
Monday, September 29, 2008
FAIL.
Plenty of blame to go around on this one. I've gotta say: Pelosi's railing against the right was not the best way to ensure that they would accede to a bill they hated. Good work, Madam Speaker.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey3ZlsmIkz4&eurl
The partial transcription that follows is my own:
----------
Madam Speaker, when was the last time anyone ever asked you for $700 billion?
That's a staggering figure. And many questions have arisen from that request, and we have been hearing, I think, a very informed debate on all sides of this issue here today. I'm proud of the debate.
$700 billion. A staggering number, but only a part of the cost of the failed Bush economic policies to our country--policies that were built on budget recklessness. When President Bush took office, he inherited President Clinton's surpluses, four years in a row, budget surpluses, on a trajectory of $5.6 trillion in surplus. And with his reckless economic policies, within two years, he had turned that around. And now eight years later, the foundation of that fiscal irresponsibility, combined with an "anything goes" economic policy, have taken us to where we are today.
They claim to be free-market advocates, when it's really an "anything goes" mentality. No regulation, no supervision, no discipline. And if you fail, you will have a golden parachute, and the taxpayer will bail you out. Those days are over. The party is over in that respect.
Democrats believe in a free market. We know that it can create jobs, it can create wealth, it can create many good things in our economy. But in this case, in its unbridled form, as encouraged, supported by the Republicans--some in the Republican Party, not all--it has created not jobs, not capital. It has created chaos. And it's that chaos that the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Fed came to see us just about a week and a half ago. ...
-------------
I want to flesh this out a bit. To some representatives, a vote for this bill could be seen as an acknowledgment of Pelosi's remarks. It's not personal or anything like that. It's something akin to the film version of "The Crucible." Daniel Day-Lewis' character refuses to put his name on the church door because "it's all he has." Conservative House Republicans will go to their graves believing that government, not right-wing free-market economics, caused this problem. To vote for the bill after Pelosi's tirade would, in some ways, be surrendering their good names. And, of course, Daniel Day-Lewis' character was hanged as he recited the Our Father.
On the other side, I have great respect for Paul Ryan. He rambled and misspoke a couple of times, but his sentiments are my sentiments.
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/vidLink.php?b=1222703292&e=1222703892&n=1
The transcription that follows is my own.
------------
... A lot of us have lost a lot of sleep; a lot of us have looked at this situation. When Secretary Paulson came to us about a week ago, he gave us a three page bill that said "give me a blank checkbook and put $700 billion in it."
I was offended at that time.
And so what happened since then? We added 107 pages of taxpayer protection to that bill. We understand the gravity of this situation, and we worked with our colleagues on the other side, to make this bill a better bill. We made sure that there's upside for the taxpayers, so that when this happens, when profits come to these companies, we get their stock warrants, so that the first person in line to get those profits is the American taxpayer so they can get their money back. We made sure that there's an insurance program that makes sure that Wall Street shares in the cost of this recovery plan. And we also made sure that the executives of these companies that made these bad bets don't profit from this recovery plan. We cut the initial cost in half in this bill; Congress will have to approve the second half of this next year.
Why did we do all this?
Because this Wall Street crisis is quickly becoming a Main Street crisis. It's quickly becoming a banking crisis.
What does that mean? Why does that matter to us? Why does that matter to Janesville, Wisconsin?
If it goes the way it could go, that means credit shuts down. Businesses can't get money to pay their payroll, to pay their employees. Students can't get student loans for next semester. People can't get car loans. Seniors may not have access to their savings. Are we standing at the edge of this abyss? Nobody knows, but maybe.
It's very probable.
Madam Speaker, this bill offends my principles. But I'm going to vote for this bill in order to preserve my principles, in order to preserve this free enterprise system. This is a Herbert Hoover moment. He made some big mistakes after the Great Depression, and we lived with those consequences for decades. Let's not make that mistake.
There's a lot of fear and a lot of panic out there. A lot of what this is about is getting that fear and panic out of the market. I think the White House bumbled this thing. They have brought this issue up to a crescendo, to a crisis, so that all eyes in the world markets are here on Congress. It's a heavy load to bear.
We have to deal with this panic. We have to deal with this fear. Colleagues, we're in the moment. This bill doesn't have everything I want in it. It got a lot of good things in it, but we're here. We're in this moment. And if we fail to do the right thing, heaven help us. If we fail to pass this, I fear the worst is yet to come.
The problem we have here is we're one month away from an election. We're all worried about losing our jobs. And all of us--most of us say "this thing needs to pass, but I want you to vote for it, not me." But unfortunately, a majority of us are going to have to vote for this. And we're going to have to do that because we have a chance of arresting that crash. Just maybe, this will work.
And so for me and for my own conscience, so I can look myself in the mirror tonight, so I can go to sleep with a clear conscience, I want to know that I did everything I could to stop it from getting worse, to stop this Wall Street problem from infecting Main Street.
And I want to get on my airplane and go home and see my three kids and my wife that I haven't seen in a week, and look them in the eye and know that I did what I thought was right for them and their future. And I believe with all my heart, as bad as this is, it could get a whole lot worse, and that's why I think we have to pass this bill. I yield.
-------
This appeared to be extemporaneous. His fumbles betray the fact that he's sleep-deprived, and they were numerous (he meant the Stock Market Crash, not the Great Depression). And I legitimately hate the "Wall Street/Main Street" thing that's been kicking around the discourse for the last few days. But I found this speech to be impassioned, important, and timely. It's too bad few listened.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey3ZlsmIkz4&eurl
The partial transcription that follows is my own:
----------
Madam Speaker, when was the last time anyone ever asked you for $700 billion?
That's a staggering figure. And many questions have arisen from that request, and we have been hearing, I think, a very informed debate on all sides of this issue here today. I'm proud of the debate.
$700 billion. A staggering number, but only a part of the cost of the failed Bush economic policies to our country--policies that were built on budget recklessness. When President Bush took office, he inherited President Clinton's surpluses, four years in a row, budget surpluses, on a trajectory of $5.6 trillion in surplus. And with his reckless economic policies, within two years, he had turned that around. And now eight years later, the foundation of that fiscal irresponsibility, combined with an "anything goes" economic policy, have taken us to where we are today.
They claim to be free-market advocates, when it's really an "anything goes" mentality. No regulation, no supervision, no discipline. And if you fail, you will have a golden parachute, and the taxpayer will bail you out. Those days are over. The party is over in that respect.
Democrats believe in a free market. We know that it can create jobs, it can create wealth, it can create many good things in our economy. But in this case, in its unbridled form, as encouraged, supported by the Republicans--some in the Republican Party, not all--it has created not jobs, not capital. It has created chaos. And it's that chaos that the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Fed came to see us just about a week and a half ago. ...
-------------
I want to flesh this out a bit. To some representatives, a vote for this bill could be seen as an acknowledgment of Pelosi's remarks. It's not personal or anything like that. It's something akin to the film version of "The Crucible." Daniel Day-Lewis' character refuses to put his name on the church door because "it's all he has." Conservative House Republicans will go to their graves believing that government, not right-wing free-market economics, caused this problem. To vote for the bill after Pelosi's tirade would, in some ways, be surrendering their good names. And, of course, Daniel Day-Lewis' character was hanged as he recited the Our Father.
On the other side, I have great respect for Paul Ryan. He rambled and misspoke a couple of times, but his sentiments are my sentiments.
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/vidLink.php?b=1222703292&e=1222703892&n=1
The transcription that follows is my own.
------------
... A lot of us have lost a lot of sleep; a lot of us have looked at this situation. When Secretary Paulson came to us about a week ago, he gave us a three page bill that said "give me a blank checkbook and put $700 billion in it."
I was offended at that time.
And so what happened since then? We added 107 pages of taxpayer protection to that bill. We understand the gravity of this situation, and we worked with our colleagues on the other side, to make this bill a better bill. We made sure that there's upside for the taxpayers, so that when this happens, when profits come to these companies, we get their stock warrants, so that the first person in line to get those profits is the American taxpayer so they can get their money back. We made sure that there's an insurance program that makes sure that Wall Street shares in the cost of this recovery plan. And we also made sure that the executives of these companies that made these bad bets don't profit from this recovery plan. We cut the initial cost in half in this bill; Congress will have to approve the second half of this next year.
Why did we do all this?
Because this Wall Street crisis is quickly becoming a Main Street crisis. It's quickly becoming a banking crisis.
What does that mean? Why does that matter to us? Why does that matter to Janesville, Wisconsin?
If it goes the way it could go, that means credit shuts down. Businesses can't get money to pay their payroll, to pay their employees. Students can't get student loans for next semester. People can't get car loans. Seniors may not have access to their savings. Are we standing at the edge of this abyss? Nobody knows, but maybe.
It's very probable.
Madam Speaker, this bill offends my principles. But I'm going to vote for this bill in order to preserve my principles, in order to preserve this free enterprise system. This is a Herbert Hoover moment. He made some big mistakes after the Great Depression, and we lived with those consequences for decades. Let's not make that mistake.
There's a lot of fear and a lot of panic out there. A lot of what this is about is getting that fear and panic out of the market. I think the White House bumbled this thing. They have brought this issue up to a crescendo, to a crisis, so that all eyes in the world markets are here on Congress. It's a heavy load to bear.
We have to deal with this panic. We have to deal with this fear. Colleagues, we're in the moment. This bill doesn't have everything I want in it. It got a lot of good things in it, but we're here. We're in this moment. And if we fail to do the right thing, heaven help us. If we fail to pass this, I fear the worst is yet to come.
The problem we have here is we're one month away from an election. We're all worried about losing our jobs. And all of us--most of us say "this thing needs to pass, but I want you to vote for it, not me." But unfortunately, a majority of us are going to have to vote for this. And we're going to have to do that because we have a chance of arresting that crash. Just maybe, this will work.
And so for me and for my own conscience, so I can look myself in the mirror tonight, so I can go to sleep with a clear conscience, I want to know that I did everything I could to stop it from getting worse, to stop this Wall Street problem from infecting Main Street.
And I want to get on my airplane and go home and see my three kids and my wife that I haven't seen in a week, and look them in the eye and know that I did what I thought was right for them and their future. And I believe with all my heart, as bad as this is, it could get a whole lot worse, and that's why I think we have to pass this bill. I yield.
-------
This appeared to be extemporaneous. His fumbles betray the fact that he's sleep-deprived, and they were numerous (he meant the Stock Market Crash, not the Great Depression). And I legitimately hate the "Wall Street/Main Street" thing that's been kicking around the discourse for the last few days. But I found this speech to be impassioned, important, and timely. It's too bad few listened.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Backbench Revolt!
My analysis of the economic crisis is predicated on four things about the "bailout" bill:
1. It's a crummy bill: it's laden with pork and favors, and there's not enough control over the expenditure of money.
2. Theoretically, it would be worth considering the Cantor-insurance plan, which is less heavy-handed and offers a way out.
3. None of this matters because the markets are facing a dire liquidity crisis and need a significant cash injection--and government is the only possible source of this injection on such short notice.
4. The government will make most of its money back, at the very least.
There is a "backbench revolt" going on, vis-a-vis this "bailout" bill.
The "rebels" are the opponents to the bailout. They are rebelling against the nominal leader of their party, George W. Bush. This is what the Brits would call a "backbench revolt," and it's somewhat similar to what happened with the repeal of the Corn Laws in England in the 1840s, actually; Peel's Tories, led by a young Benjamin Disraeli, rebelled against Peel for betraying his conservative principles.
There is a game of political chicken being played right now, and there's a lot of money at stake.
- The Democratic-controlled House could pass the bill without Republican support. The bill is hugely unpopular, though, and the Dems don't want to be left holding the bag without Republicans there, too. Pelosi refuses to pass the bill without 110 Republican votes.
- The Republicans don't like the bill on principle: the Democratic-controlled House has added some unseemly pork to it, and it's a very heavy-handed interference in the economy. They would rather the bill not pass at all.
- Someone has to concede: either Republicans have to hold their noses and vote "yes," or the Dems have to take the lead on the bill and pass it in spite of the backbench revolt. If no one concedes, the collision will be far worse than anything else. Thus, chicken.
Why is the bill hugely unpopular? A couple of reasons:
1. No one trusts Congress at all.
2. No one trusts Bush at all.
3. The people who are selling this message are economists and investors, who are considered either evil or shady.
4. The government is doing a terrible job at marketing this plan.
Francis Cianfrocca over at Redstate.com and Steve Conover at The Skeptical Optimist seem to have the best grip on the crisis.
1. It's a crummy bill: it's laden with pork and favors, and there's not enough control over the expenditure of money.
2. Theoretically, it would be worth considering the Cantor-insurance plan, which is less heavy-handed and offers a way out.
3. None of this matters because the markets are facing a dire liquidity crisis and need a significant cash injection--and government is the only possible source of this injection on such short notice.
4. The government will make most of its money back, at the very least.
There is a "backbench revolt" going on, vis-a-vis this "bailout" bill.
The "rebels" are the opponents to the bailout. They are rebelling against the nominal leader of their party, George W. Bush. This is what the Brits would call a "backbench revolt," and it's somewhat similar to what happened with the repeal of the Corn Laws in England in the 1840s, actually; Peel's Tories, led by a young Benjamin Disraeli, rebelled against Peel for betraying his conservative principles.
There is a game of political chicken being played right now, and there's a lot of money at stake.
- The Democratic-controlled House could pass the bill without Republican support. The bill is hugely unpopular, though, and the Dems don't want to be left holding the bag without Republicans there, too. Pelosi refuses to pass the bill without 110 Republican votes.
- The Republicans don't like the bill on principle: the Democratic-controlled House has added some unseemly pork to it, and it's a very heavy-handed interference in the economy. They would rather the bill not pass at all.
- Someone has to concede: either Republicans have to hold their noses and vote "yes," or the Dems have to take the lead on the bill and pass it in spite of the backbench revolt. If no one concedes, the collision will be far worse than anything else. Thus, chicken.
Why is the bill hugely unpopular? A couple of reasons:
1. No one trusts Congress at all.
2. No one trusts Bush at all.
3. The people who are selling this message are economists and investors, who are considered either evil or shady.
4. The government is doing a terrible job at marketing this plan.
Francis Cianfrocca over at Redstate.com and Steve Conover at The Skeptical Optimist seem to have the best grip on the crisis.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Bailout
What happens if we do nothing? I will set out to find answers to this today.
Note: I'm not saying I'm in favor of or opposed to the bailout. I just feel that the question should be asked and explored.
After doing some research, it seems that Francis Cianfrocca has as strong a grasp on the crisis as anyone else out there:
http://www.redstate.com/diaries/blackhedd/2008/sep/23/what-happens-if-theres-no-bailout/
http://www.redstate.com/diaries/redstate/2008/sep/22/a-few-important-questions-for-mr-paulson-and/
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=22017
Note: I'm not saying I'm in favor of or opposed to the bailout. I just feel that the question should be asked and explored.
After doing some research, it seems that Francis Cianfrocca has as strong a grasp on the crisis as anyone else out there:
http://www.redstate.com/diaries/blackhedd/2008/sep/23/what-happens-if-theres-no-bailout/
http://www.redstate.com/diaries/redstate/2008/sep/22/a-few-important-questions-for-mr-paulson-and/
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=22017
Friday, September 19, 2008
An Amateur's Musings on Economics
I'm no economist, but I dabble and try to learn. Please correct me if I'm wrong on any of these things.
1. The SEC's temporary ban on short selling is frightening.
Short sellers are necessary to keep markets in balance. The markets have exploded upwards today... but they are exploding without short sellers to capitalize on inflated positions. What happens when the ban is removed? I would argue that a significant market drop is necessary.
2. This is the inevitable correction for the explosion in financials mostly brought upon by globalization.
Three decades of strong growth (sometimes fueled by 30x leveraged debt) inevitably would require a correction.
3. A strong series of regulations are necessary here--but the most important thing to regulate is government intervention.
Simply put, the actions of the US government over the past couple of weeks have reaffirmed the idea that companies can be "too big to fail." With government policy as is, there is massive incentive to combine investment houses and insurance companies to reach a point of criticality for the economy. This is an anti-competitive practice, and it is quite clearly a response to the interventions of government.
If I'm reading this correctly, then, the right approach (after this crisis passes) is to offer disincentives for massive companies by making massive bailouts (like what AIG got) illegal. Gigantic companies cannot have the existence of the federal government as an insurance policy. It's anti-capitalistic and it hurts smaller, more efficient companies who succeed by being well-managed.
4. Please, Barack Obama, no tariffs if you win.
Does Hawley-Smoot ring a bell? International trade can keep things moving a bit. Hawley-Smoot II would be a massively unfortunate policy decision.
5. Please, Federal Reserve, no tightening of the money supply.
Deflation is far worse than inflation. If the economic crisis is a repeat of 70s-style malaise, so be it. A Great Depression II would not be fun.
I fear that capitalism will be the inevitable loser in a crisis that was caused by a myriad of things. Government intervention in the markets, over the years, is a big cause.
Confirmation bias? Perhaps. But I'm not giving up on the free market yet.
1. The SEC's temporary ban on short selling is frightening.
Short sellers are necessary to keep markets in balance. The markets have exploded upwards today... but they are exploding without short sellers to capitalize on inflated positions. What happens when the ban is removed? I would argue that a significant market drop is necessary.
2. This is the inevitable correction for the explosion in financials mostly brought upon by globalization.
Three decades of strong growth (sometimes fueled by 30x leveraged debt) inevitably would require a correction.
3. A strong series of regulations are necessary here--but the most important thing to regulate is government intervention.
Simply put, the actions of the US government over the past couple of weeks have reaffirmed the idea that companies can be "too big to fail." With government policy as is, there is massive incentive to combine investment houses and insurance companies to reach a point of criticality for the economy. This is an anti-competitive practice, and it is quite clearly a response to the interventions of government.
If I'm reading this correctly, then, the right approach (after this crisis passes) is to offer disincentives for massive companies by making massive bailouts (like what AIG got) illegal. Gigantic companies cannot have the existence of the federal government as an insurance policy. It's anti-capitalistic and it hurts smaller, more efficient companies who succeed by being well-managed.
4. Please, Barack Obama, no tariffs if you win.
Does Hawley-Smoot ring a bell? International trade can keep things moving a bit. Hawley-Smoot II would be a massively unfortunate policy decision.
5. Please, Federal Reserve, no tightening of the money supply.
Deflation is far worse than inflation. If the economic crisis is a repeat of 70s-style malaise, so be it. A Great Depression II would not be fun.
I fear that capitalism will be the inevitable loser in a crisis that was caused by a myriad of things. Government intervention in the markets, over the years, is a big cause.
Confirmation bias? Perhaps. But I'm not giving up on the free market yet.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
A Tough Out for McCain
Here's a partial transcript from McCain on The View:
http://www.breitbart.tv/html/173183.html
McCAIN: My interpretation of the Constitution of the United States is that the United States Supreme Court enforces the Constitution of the United States and does not legislate nor invent areas that are responsibilities, according to the Constitution, of the legislative branch.
HASSELBECK: So it was in how the law came up, it was in how Roe v. Wade came apart was the issue. You, you want it to be through the Constitution from the people not from the bench.
McCAIN: And I believe that if Roe v. Wade were overturned, then the states would make these decisions.
GOLDBERG: Sir.
McCAIN: Yes?
GOLDBERG: Can you just, and I don’t want to misinterpret what you’re saying. Did you say you wanted strict Constitutionalists? Because that, that-
McCAIN: No, I want people who interpret the Constitution of the United States the way our founding fathers envision-
GOLDBERG: Does that-
McCAIN: -for them to do.
GOLDBERG: Should I be worried about being a slave, about being returned to slavery because certain things happened in the Constitution that you had to change.
McCAIN: I, I understand your point.
GOLDBERG: Okay, okay.
McCAIN: I understand that point and I, I, [applause] thank you. That’s an excellent point.
GOLDBERG: Thank you sir.
McCAIN: And I thank you.
No, it's not an excellent point! It's a terrible, terrible point. And McCain can't say anything, b/c he's boxed into a corner by a raucous, enthusiastic audience response and by a need to be "politically correct."
Let's unpack this.
- McCain says that he supports judges who defer to the legislature. He indicates that Roe v. Wade was a bad court decision, and that abortion legislation should be left to the states. This is a perfectly reasonable position.
- Elizabeth Hasselbeck (conservative) offers a flattering depiction: McCain would prefer the people to decide, rather than five unelected officials.
- McCain affirms.
- Whoopi Goldberg tries to add her wisdom to the situation, asking if McCain wants "strict Constitutionalists."
- McCain tries to clarify, but largely affirms...
- ... and is cut off by Goldberg, who brings slavery into the picture, arguing that "things in the Constitution need to be changed"
- McCain concedes that this is an excellent point.
What????
It's not an excellent point at all. It derailed a perfectly legitimate line of inquiry in favor of an American Idol-style charade.
Goldberg's point is absurd. It obfuscates something that McCain can answer quite acceptably: the Court did NOT get rid of slavery. The Congress did!
The Court's last major ruling on slavery before the Civil War was Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857). The Court ruled that a slave who lived in free states for an extended period of time was still a slave. That was the issue that the Court was charged to settle.
But wait! The activist Taney court, in this case, decided to take it much further! They also ruled:
- Blacks were not citizens, and could not petition the Court. They were "of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations."
- Congress could not regulate the existence of slavery in the territories, which it had done quite effectively for the better part of the four previous decades of American history. The Missouri Compromise and its ilk were declared unconstitutional.
The slavery issue is the perfect issue to use in any debate against the wisdom and efficacy and justice of "judicial activism."
Under McCain's vision of the Supreme Court, the Court would not have been allowed to do what it did to Dred Scott, or to blacks in general. Goldberg's assertion that "she would become a slave again" is ridiculous! The Founding Fathers created a system where the highest law of the land could be amended. And it was amended to abolish slavery!
The legislature branch and the executive branch destroyed slavery. The judicial branch worked to strengthen it. In fact, one of the major impetuses for the thirteenth amendment was President Lincoln's fear that the Court would try to reimpose slavery!
Really, under McCain's vision of the balance of powers, the states would have the ability to legislate on issues related to abortion. Interference by the Court would be akin (on a smaller scale, of course) to the gross injustice propagated by the Taney Court in 1857.
McCain should be able to make the case against Goldberg... but he can't because of the idiotic studio audience for The View, and the image of attacking a popular celebrity on a political point. He comes across as looking stupid, confused, and/or befuddled. In reality, Goldberg is wrong. In a better world, she would be criticized for her flawed logic, but such is life.
http://www.breitbart.tv/html/173183.html
McCAIN: My interpretation of the Constitution of the United States is that the United States Supreme Court enforces the Constitution of the United States and does not legislate nor invent areas that are responsibilities, according to the Constitution, of the legislative branch.
HASSELBECK: So it was in how the law came up, it was in how Roe v. Wade came apart was the issue. You, you want it to be through the Constitution from the people not from the bench.
McCAIN: And I believe that if Roe v. Wade were overturned, then the states would make these decisions.
GOLDBERG: Sir.
McCAIN: Yes?
GOLDBERG: Can you just, and I don’t want to misinterpret what you’re saying. Did you say you wanted strict Constitutionalists? Because that, that-
McCAIN: No, I want people who interpret the Constitution of the United States the way our founding fathers envision-
GOLDBERG: Does that-
McCAIN: -for them to do.
GOLDBERG: Should I be worried about being a slave, about being returned to slavery because certain things happened in the Constitution that you had to change.
McCAIN: I, I understand your point.
GOLDBERG: Okay, okay.
McCAIN: I understand that point and I, I, [applause] thank you. That’s an excellent point.
GOLDBERG: Thank you sir.
McCAIN: And I thank you.
No, it's not an excellent point! It's a terrible, terrible point. And McCain can't say anything, b/c he's boxed into a corner by a raucous, enthusiastic audience response and by a need to be "politically correct."
Let's unpack this.
- McCain says that he supports judges who defer to the legislature. He indicates that Roe v. Wade was a bad court decision, and that abortion legislation should be left to the states. This is a perfectly reasonable position.
- Elizabeth Hasselbeck (conservative) offers a flattering depiction: McCain would prefer the people to decide, rather than five unelected officials.
- McCain affirms.
- Whoopi Goldberg tries to add her wisdom to the situation, asking if McCain wants "strict Constitutionalists."
- McCain tries to clarify, but largely affirms...
- ... and is cut off by Goldberg, who brings slavery into the picture, arguing that "things in the Constitution need to be changed"
- McCain concedes that this is an excellent point.
What????
It's not an excellent point at all. It derailed a perfectly legitimate line of inquiry in favor of an American Idol-style charade.
Goldberg's point is absurd. It obfuscates something that McCain can answer quite acceptably: the Court did NOT get rid of slavery. The Congress did!
The Court's last major ruling on slavery before the Civil War was Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857). The Court ruled that a slave who lived in free states for an extended period of time was still a slave. That was the issue that the Court was charged to settle.
But wait! The activist Taney court, in this case, decided to take it much further! They also ruled:
- Blacks were not citizens, and could not petition the Court. They were "of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations."
- Congress could not regulate the existence of slavery in the territories, which it had done quite effectively for the better part of the four previous decades of American history. The Missouri Compromise and its ilk were declared unconstitutional.
The slavery issue is the perfect issue to use in any debate against the wisdom and efficacy and justice of "judicial activism."
Under McCain's vision of the Supreme Court, the Court would not have been allowed to do what it did to Dred Scott, or to blacks in general. Goldberg's assertion that "she would become a slave again" is ridiculous! The Founding Fathers created a system where the highest law of the land could be amended. And it was amended to abolish slavery!
The legislature branch and the executive branch destroyed slavery. The judicial branch worked to strengthen it. In fact, one of the major impetuses for the thirteenth amendment was President Lincoln's fear that the Court would try to reimpose slavery!
Really, under McCain's vision of the balance of powers, the states would have the ability to legislate on issues related to abortion. Interference by the Court would be akin (on a smaller scale, of course) to the gross injustice propagated by the Taney Court in 1857.
McCain should be able to make the case against Goldberg... but he can't because of the idiotic studio audience for The View, and the image of attacking a popular celebrity on a political point. He comes across as looking stupid, confused, and/or befuddled. In reality, Goldberg is wrong. In a better world, she would be criticized for her flawed logic, but such is life.
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