Monday, October 13, 2003
Are Two Losers Better than One?
Ok, Kerry and Gephardt aren't really losers, they're just losing the primary race. One has no chance and the other has a small chance. But they're hoping not to go down alone:
These two presidential contenders, who for months have been eclipsed by the surging campaign of Howard Dean, have been fairly chummy of late — at Dr. Dean's expense.
At a debate two weeks ago in New York, for example, when Mr. Gephardt questioned Dr. Dean's support for Medicare, it was Mr. Kerry who came to Mr. Gephardt's side, saying his tactic was fair.
Aides to both men say there is no overt conspiracy, but they acknowledge that at least at a staff level, the Gephardt and Kerry campaigns are more than friendly: they are sharing information about Dr. Dean that helps fuel each another's attacks.
... Campaign aides say their back-channel communications do not exactly constitute an unholy alliance. Such contacts are to be expected, after all, in an insular political world where nearly everyone has worked with everyone else at one time or another.
The underlined sentence is some strong reporting by David Halbfinger. Here's the exchange that must have lead to this sentence:
HALBFINGER: Would you say that your back-channel communications with the Kerry (or Gephardt) camp represent an unholy alliance?
KERRY [or GEPHARDT] STAFFER: Not exactly.
AB
What's with Kinsley?
I vaguely recall reading something in the last week or two about an op-ed by Michael Kinsley that many thought was excessively anti-Clark, or anti-Clark and unfair. Who knows? I like generally like Kinsley's work, but I didn't read that one. But in today's Washington Post, Kinsley uses the following argument to tee-off on Clark [emphasis mine]:
A widespread fantasy among liberals who loathe the Bush administration, for example, is that Colin Powell will resign as secretary of state and "say what he really thinks." This will bring down the whole house of cards, these liberals believe. What he really thinks, they think, is more or less what they really think.
"Widespread"? If so, then I should know at least one person who expects that to happen. Seriously, a few hundred "liberals who loath the Bush administration" are likely to read this post in the next 24 hours. If you expect Powell to do this, please explain! Note that expecting him to resign in January of 2005 is not the same thing as expecting him to turn on the administration.
The rest of the op-ed makes about as much sense as the Powell part--maybe less.
AB
UPDATE: Behold the exquisite elegance of Kinsley's syllogism: if liberals' positive views about one General (Powell) are a "fantasy," then all positive views held by liberals about any General (Clark) must be fantasies. Of course, Kinsley's own logic hoists him on his own petard: if one thing Kinsley says about Liberals and Generals is nonsensical, then all things Kinsley says about Liberals and Generals are nonsensical.
UPDATE: I found the earlier post about a previous Kinsley piece; it's from Matt Yglesias at Tapped.
UPDATE 2: 300 or so visitors in the 12 hours since this post went up, many presumably liberal, but not one yet willing to fess up to this "widespread fantasy."
Low, Even for Astroturf
The Iraqi soldier astroturf is old news, but now it's mainstream news. Here's an exchange that would be amusing if it were not so depressingly revealing of the length GOP supporters will go to--in this case, as soldier's grenade wound is not bad news, but instead a great opportunity for some good PR:
Jackasses.But another letter, purportedly written by a GI hospitalized for wounds suffered in a grenade attack, came as a surprise to Pfc. Nick Deaconson of Beckley, W.Va., according to his dad.
The soldier received a congratulatory phone call from his father, Timothy, for getting the letter published in the local newspaper.
"When I told him he wrote such a good letter, he said: 'What letter?'" Timothy Deaconson told Gannett. "This is just not his (writing) style."
AB
UPDATE: Josh Marshall will be discussing this tonight on Aaron Brown's show (10:00 Eastern).
Remember Back When a Democrat Was in The White House?
Clinton, in his Jan. 19, 1999 State of the Union Speech:
ABFor the first time in three decades, the budget is balanced. From a deficit of $290 billion in 1992, we had a surplus of $70 billion last year. And now we are on course for budget surpluses for the next 25 years.
Thanks to the pioneering leadership of all of you, we have the lowest violent crime rate in a quarter century and the cleanest environment in a quarter century.
America is a strong force for peace from Northern Ireland, to Bosnia, to the Middle East.
Sunday, October 12, 2003
Four More Days to Secure Iraq
Today there was another major car bombing in Baghdad. That reminded me of the report issued this summer by a team of experts hand-picked by the Pentagon to assess the situation in Iraq. The group, led by former Assistant Defense Secretary John Hamre, concluded that the U.S. administration in Iraq had three months to get their act together. Specifically, the July 17 report said:
The next 12 months will be decisive; the next three months are crucial to turning around the security situation, which is volatile in key parts of the country. All players are watching closely to see how resolutely the coalition will handle this challenge. The Iraqi population has exceedingly high expectations, and the window for cooperation may close rapidly if they do not see progress on delivering security, basic services, opportunities for broad political involvement, and economic opportunity.Let’s see… three months from July 17 is… hmm… October 17? Can that be right? I must have done my math wrong, because that’s just 4 days from today. But with today’s car bombing, it seems like we still have some work to do in making Iraq secure. Adding it up, we’ve seen:
Two major car bomb attacks, killing at least 15 to 20 people…
One assassination of a Spanish intelligence official…
Numerous attacks on Iraqi oil assets, starting at least two pipeline fires and killing two oil company employees…
Seven US soldiers killed in guerrilla attacks…
And over 100 other attacks on US forces…
…All in just the PAST 8 DAYS.
Good thing we have 4 more days until the October 17 deadline for “turning around the security situation.”
Kash
Friday, October 10, 2003
Economists For Dean
I'm not one (yet), but if you like Howard Dean and you like numbers then you'll love Economists for Dean:
ABWe are a growing network of economists who believe that Howard Dean is the man to beat George W. Bush in 2004 and end what George Akerlof, 2001 Nobel laureate in economics, called the "worst government the US has ever had in its more than 200 years of history."
While we are all enthusiastic about Dean, we do not intend this site to be a center for expresssions of blind devotion to our man. Our analysis will be critical, and where we think Dean's got it wrong, we'll say so, and we expect our readers will, too.
Joe Wilson
Following in Josh Marshall's footsteps, Salon now has an interview, by Dave Talbot, of Joe Wilson. Here's something interesting that answers a question I've pondered a few times:
TALBOT: Why did you contribute to both campaigns?
WILSON: Well, I take great pride in being an American, and I don't believe either party has a monopoly on wisdom. It did seem to me that when Mr. Bush was running as a compassionate conservative, he was going to be the better of the two candidates. I thought it was important that we have the two best candidates. I contributed to the Bush campaign before they went to South Carolina and engaged in their smear tactics against Mr. McCain and his wife and children. And ultimately, as I look back on [my Bush contribution], I made a mistake.
If only more people has watched South Carolina and similarly perceived Bush as he truly is.
AB
UPDATE: this is worth thinking about as well, especially in light of Cheney's fear-mongering today ("Cheney told the conservative Heritage Foundation that terrorists are 'doing everything they can' to get weapons of mass destruction that could kill hundreds of thousands of Americans 'in a single day of horror.'"):
TALBOT: Do you think the U.S. is less safe now, post-invasion?
WILSON:Yes, absolutely. For three reasons. One is that we have 133,000 more potential targets out there, a lot closer to where harm can happen, that we've created another front for terrorism that we're now in the midst of. Secondly, if we're hit again here in the U.S., with all these National Guard call-ups, we've got a lot of our first-responders over there instead of here. And thirdly, just because of the way we've prosecuted this war and how offensive it's been to the rest of the world, especially the Muslim world, we've created an exponentially larger pool from which actual terrorists might be drawn down the road. I don't think we're safer at all as a consequence of this.
Cheney's fears may be valid, but the question is whether our actions are likely to increase or diminish the odds of those fears being realized. Wilson makes a strong and succinct case that we are less safe now than before the invasion.
Economists Who Should Know Better
Via the new Bush Blog, Max Sawicky caught a WSJ editorial (editorial here, subscription required) by three very sharp labor economists who should know better. Max gives their argument a quick drubbing and then issues a powerful warning to academic economists:
The greatest threat to academic economists is the chance that they will get an opportunity to publish on the WSJ editorial page. Robert Barro, Larry Lindsey, Kevin Hassett, Greg Mankiw, Glenn Hubbard, and now these three dudes, all very smart guys -- they write columns and turn into blithering idiots.
So, the WSJ editorial page transforms economists into blithering idiots, while a stint at AEI makes them into lying frauds. By comparison, writing for the NYT editorial pages is quite benign--it is only alleged to make an economist shrill.
AB
P.S. The basic point of the WSJ editorial is that lowering taxes raises the marginal return to investment in human capital and is therfore necessarily a good thing. Here was my response (written to Max) regarding this argument:
I'd expect more of that trio...Yes we know that cutting taxes raises the marginal return to just about everything. On the other hand, many of the things taxes fund also have high marginal returns. And massive deficits make the future less bright, which also lowers the marginal return to everything.
The Arnold Effect in Germany
From Reuters today:
The straight-talking Hollywood action star's election win in California has had an electrifying impact on Germany, leading to calls Friday for top politicians to voice clear ideas in simple language or be swept away at the polls.Is this good? Is this creepy? Maybe even downright scary? I honestly can’t quite tell.
“The more confused we are by what they say, the greater our longing for a man or woman with simple words,” wrote Bild newspaper columnist Franz Josef Wagner. “The only problem is that it's the wrong ones who usually master simple language.”
Schwarzenegger's victory in the California race for governor has led to editorials calling for German politicians to abandon their barely comprehensible speaking style in favor of “Klartext” (straight talk).
Kash
Producer Prices are Still Not Rising
Unfortunately, the US still appears to be flirting with deflation. The BLS released new PPI numbers this morning, showing no increase in prices (excluding food and energy):
The Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today that the seasonally adjusted Producer Price Index for Finished Goods gained 0.3 percent in September. This increase followed a 0.4-percent advance in August and a 0.1-percent rise in July. The index for finished goods other than foods and energy showed no change in September, compared with a 0.1-percent increase in the preceding month.I’ve put the latest numbers of the Core PPI and CPI rates (i.e. excluding food and energy prices) into a chart, to provide some context.
We’ll get new CPI numbers next Friday... but judging from today’s PPI report, don’t look for much of an increase. Why does this matter? Deflation (which means an inflation rate of roughly zero percent or less), if it happens, would be a serious problem for the US. One problem with it is that it is very hard to get out of. Japan has been trying for the better part of a decade. There are other problems with deflation, too, which I won’t get into right now.
As the weeks go by, Fed Governor Ben Bernanke is looking more and more prescient. In a fairly well-publicized speech in early September he said that he expected productivity growth to remain high, but that this would increase the slack in the economy and thus drive inflation lower and lower – implying that there is some risk of eventual deflation. Let’s hope that prices pick up some time soon – but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Kash
This Isn’t Your Father’s IMF
Yesterday I came across this tidbit, published yesterday by the IMF. It’s a synopsis of a speech made by Peter Heller, IMF Deputy Director for Fiscal Affairs:
Over the last decade, the IMF has moved forcefully to integrate issues of poverty reduction into the mainstream of its policy objectives in fostering growth and employment creation. This presentation examines the Fund's perspective on the promotion of poverty reduction and improved distributional outcomes. It examines the relative balance that must be sought as between strictly growth-enhancing policies and those policies that are specifically targeted at poverty reduction and equity. It also explores how issues of social justice and environmental sustainability are taken into account by the Fund in working with its member countries.Social justice? Environmental sustainability? Boy, the IMF sure has changed since the good old days when it was simply a source of short-term dollar loans for central banks during currency crunches under the Bretton-Woods system. It seems like they’ve really taken some of the criticism they’ve received over the past decade to heart…
Kash
Help President Bush
MoveOn.org has had some so-so ideas, and some very clever ideas. I like this suggestion that it just sent out to its members yesterday:
President Bush told the press on Tuesday that he doesn't "have any idea" whether the senior administration officials who blew a CIA operative's cover will ever be found. But if he just asked his staff to sign a legally binding affidavit confirming that they weren't involved, and referred anyone who wouldn't to the FBI, it's possible he could flush out the perpetrators in a day. To date, the President hasn't even discussed this matter with his staff.Sure it’s gimmicky, but it also effectively makes an important point. Where is that Plame investigation, anyway?
President Bush can do better than that. He could start by simply asking his staff to sign a legally binding affidavit. Show the President how easy it is. We've already done the President's homework for him by writing the affidavit. Now let's show him how easy it is for innocent people to legally declare their innocence. You can sign the affidavit and send it to the President in under a minute…
Kash
Texas Nearly Redistricted
In the end, it took the exterminator-turned-Congressman, Tom DeLay, to iron out the differences among the Texas Republicans over how best to divvy up the spoils of John Whitmire's cowardice (Whitmire is the Texas Senator who returned to Texas and gave Republicans a quorum):
...House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) spent three days in Austin this week brokering the final shape of the plan. State GOP leaders credited DeLay with playing a key role in resolving the final issue, an intraparty dispute between Republicans over congressional districts in West Texas.
DeLay's role in the bruising battle left Democrats embittered. "Like [Republicans] often do, they overreached," said Rep. Jim Dunnam, chairman of the Texas House Democratic Caucus. "Tom DeLay was here for three days. Obviously, it's pretty repulsive. This guy was elected to represent us in Washington, and he's got nothing better to do than come down here and mess up the Texas tradition of bipartisanship."
While Dunnam may think the Republicans have overreached, don't look for the win in Texas, or this week's victory in California, to slow them down much--with a firmer grip on the House, they may just decide to reach farther.
AB
What a Difference 30 Years Makes
The Washington Post has Nixon Tapes excerpts mentioning current Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld:
This next exchange is oddly reminiscent of what just happened to Rumsfeld on Iraq policy:Using the Nixon Tapes -- the gift that will forever keep on giving -- Mann found Nixon one night fretting about "the Rumsfeld problem."
...In an April 7, 1971, chat, Nixon, Kissinger and then-Chief of Staff H.R. "Bob" Haldeman talked about the war in Vietnam. "I think Rumsfeld may be not too long for this world," Nixon said, a few minutes later suggesting, "Let's dump him."
AB"He's just positioning himself to be close to The Washington Post and the New York Times," Kissinger said. (This is what the shrinks might call "projection.")
"Well then, let's dump him after this" speech to the nation that evening, Nixon said. "Good God, we're sending him . . . on a two-month holiday to Europe. . . . For what purpose?"
"To get him out of town," Kissinger said."
Thursday, October 09, 2003
Clark Update
It's been a tough week for the Clark campaign, and a lot of the controversy centers over the role that Clark's grass roots supporters (given that it's on the internet, perhaps that should be "fiber roots" supporters) will play versus the role that long time DC political strategists like Fabiani and Lehane will play. Right now, it's advantage: DC strategists.
But the internet supporters are down, but not out, as Tapped's Garance Franke-Rutte reports in this post (in a much more fair and balanced way than in her previous posts).
AB
P.S. I somewhat disagree with Franke-Rutte's characterization of Angry Bear as a "Clark-friendly blog", even though I'm listed as such at http://www.draftclark.com/. This is a Democrat-friendly blog. I also contend that my previous posts were attacks on her selective presentation of facts and quotations, not really attacks on her ("Clark-friendly blogs -- like Angry Bear and former Senate staffer Amy Sullivan's Political Aims -- have launched attacks on me for my reporting on the Draft movement"). On the other hand, she may have a point: comparing her to Bill Safire was probably below the belt.
UPDATE: Josh Marshall adds this:
Based on things I hear from various folks who are in the mix, I think that it's much less clear-cut than this Internet types versus the insiders line we're hearing.What surprises me and, to an extent, impresses me is that Clark has managed to do as well as he has, even with this sort of chaotic management at the home office.
...Getting a campaign up to speed in a few weeks is no simple task. If Clark is someone who will make a good president, he'll get this situation in hand.
...The big picture here is that there's a vacuum of authority in the campaign operation. Because of that, all the various currents in the Dem party -- out-of-power Clinton-Gore types, new-fangled Internet types, etc. -- are trying to fill that vacuum. Bottom line: Clark has to assert himself over his campaign back office.
Iraq and Spain
The US newspapers (e.g. the NYTimes) are reporting that a “Spanish diplomat” was killed today in Iraq by unknown gunmen. Spain has about 1,300 troops supporting the US in Iraq, btw. I gleaned two interesting points from the Spanish newspaper reports of the incident, however. First, according to the Spanish newspaper El Pais, the man killed, José Antonio Bernal Gómez, was an officer in the Spanish Air Force who worked for the Spanish intelligence agency (the Spanish CIA). I’m not sure if “diplomat” is a very good description of his activities.
Also, this incident provides a glimpse into the internal political debate in another country that's tangled up in Iraq. The spokesman for the center-right government called it a "terrorist attack" that "reaffirms that we must continue working to achieve stability in and the reconstruction of the Iraqi community." (Translations are my own.) Sounds reasonably similar to what our own government would say.
However, the leader of the center-left opposition group in Spain, Gaspar Llamazares, said that he was upset with the death of the Spaniard, but that he thought that this should serve as a reminder that while the Spanish government maintains its commitment to the "illegal war and occupation in Iraq," Spaniards will continue to be at risk. Strong stuff.
Kash
UPDATE: It looks like the NYTimes has changed their description of the man who was killed. They now report that he was "a Spanish intelligence officer."
As Texas Goes...
...So goes the nation if we aren't careful.
If you read only one CalPundit post, read this one. If you read only one really long post, also make it that one. Either way, read it. Here's Kevin's basic point, and it is well-illustrated throughout:
These are not the words of sane people. This is not "reform," this is not "common sense," and this is not "restraining government growth." This is plain and simple madness and the people behind it have real influence.AB
UPDATE: Link repaired (technical issues forced all of Kevin's permalinks to change).
Rumsfeld
I'm not quite sure exactly what this means, but I think it either implies that Don Rumsfeld is losing some portion of his mind or losing some portion of his authority. And, as far as Iraq is concerned, either one is probably an improvement. Here's a sample from the story, but the rest is worse:
Appearing at a NATO conference in Colorado Springs on Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Rumsfeld tried to dismiss any talk of his diminished role in Iraq policy, suggesting at one point that reporters should concentrate on "something more important," like the World Series prospects of his hometown Chicago Cubs.AB
P.S. Rumsfeld also said this:
"The way I read the memorandum is that it is basically what the responsibility of the N.S.C. is and always has been," he said. The agency's role, he added later, "is what it's always been," one of coordination.
Yes, unfortunately, memos are sent on the most trivial of topics, but really, when was the last time you got a memo saying "Just checking in. In case you were wondering, everything is the same. Thank you for your attention"?
UPDATE: Link fixed.
Wednesday, October 08, 2003
Anybody Catch This?
It must have been hilarious (via Joe Conason):
More fun with wussy Bill
Don't miss today's broadcast of "Fresh Air," the NPR program hosted by Terry Gross. I am reliably informed that her guest, Bill O'Reilly, fled the studios in a fit of anger -- and that the show will be played in its entirety, including his undignified exit. What did the tiny, soft-spoken Terry ask that drove big, blustering Bill from her Philadelphia studio? Hearing the Fox blowhard explode again may brighten an otherwise grim day.
For the record, Terry Gross is an extremely polite and generally accomodating interviewer, so the Loud One must have really, really, thin skin. Maybe Al Franken called in.
AB
UPDATE: The audio is here for the rest of today; thereafter, it looks like it will be here.
California Questions
1. How long will it take Arnold to lose popularity as services are cut in CA? Will we see W. campaigning with Arnold in CA next fall? Or will W. want to keep his distance?
2. Will the White House end its undeclared war on CA now, and actually try to help Arnold with CA's problems?
3. What do you think that Arnold will actually do now about CA’s budget problems? Will he keep talking in generalities, or will he actually make a policy decision at last?
4. Will a “Recall Arnold” movement make people realize how absurd CA’s recall process is? Will we see an initiative on the 2004 ballot to amend (or eliminate) CA’s recall process?
5. When Issa and friends started the Davis Recall movement less than three months after Davis’ election, did they really think that once they did it, someone else wouldn’t try to recall the Republican governor? How long will it take them to express shock and amazement at a Recall Arnold movement? Will they accuse Democrats of being sore losers, for trying to get rid of a governor who was just elected? Will anyone notice the hypocrisy?
6. Will a "Recall Arnold" movement succeed in gathering the necessary signatures to force a recall election?
7. Who were the 1+ million people who voted “NO” on the recall but then didn’t vote for Bustamante? What was their reasoning? I’m just curious...
Answers to any of these questions are welcome.
Kash
Arnold Wins!
First, I don't live in California, so this administration will be fun to watch. Second, G.W. Bush inherited a booming economy and made it much worse, but the economy and budget were in such great shape that even after the effects of Bush's policies, the economy was only moderately bad by historical standards (but terrible compared to Clinton's worst year). Sure, deficit projections are now at record-breaking levels, but that's our children's money so apparently nobody cares.
Here's my point: Arnold's inheriting a bad economy and a large deficit, not a surplus. Even if he does no worse than Davis, services will be cut, taxes will go up, or California's credit rating will further deteriorate--or some of all three will happen. Certainly, he will seek to blame Davis, but I don't think that will work. On the other hand, California voters elected this guy, so who knows what they will buy. As Kash cited earlier, the neat thing about democracy is that people get the government they deserve.
Me, I'll take butter or some butter-like substance with my popcorn.
AB
P.S. CalPundit says that the impending recall Shwarzenegger movement will be bad for California, and bad for Democracy. From a static point of view, I agree. But in terms of emphasizing the absurdity of what just happened, and perhaps preventing it in the future, I'm all for it: let the games begin!
Tuesday, October 07, 2003
The Arnold Economy
Currently, GDP growth is modest but decent while the jobs outlook is flat at best. So far, the most apt description of this historically novel situation has been "jobless recovery", but we may now have an even better moniker: The Arnold Economy. Blogger Barry of The Big Picture found this gem tucked away in IView Research's Weekly Report for October 6th (thanks for the tip, Barry):
...thanks to an economic recovery that continues to grope along (the "Arnold" economy?!)....
AB
Colin Powell, the Kay Report, and a Little Logic
NPR’s Morning Edition had an excellent story today about the Kay Report. We all know that the Kay Report found no WMDs in Iraq. But what I found more interesting were the implications regarding the containment of Iraq from 1991-2003. As NPR’s Mike Shuster put it:
Kay reported that the 1991 Gulf War, and the efforts of UN weapons inspectors coupled with economic sanctions had largely kept Saddam Hussein’s appetite for WMDs in check.No surprise there – it’s a reasonable reading of the Kay Report, though it is one that the Bushies have not emphasized, for obvious reasons. So imagine my surprise when they included a clip from Colin Powell last week saying the following regarding the Kay Report:
“[The Iraqis] were determined to have the capability to develop [WMDs], and it is clear that they never lost that intent. The programs were kept intact. They were just waiting to see if they could break out of sanctions, if they could break away from the constraints of the United Nations, and start all these programs back up again.”Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t this mean that Powell is saying that the containment of Iraq worked perfectly well to keep WMDs out of Hussein’s hands? Put another way, doesn’t this imply that Powell understands that, as long as the UN kept up its sanctions and other constraints, Iraq could not develop WMDs? The logical implication is that the war was not necessary to keep Hussein from getting WMDs. Too bad Colin Powell refuses to follow his own reasoning to its logical conclusion. Because if he did, he would have to admit that the war did nothing to keep the US safe from WMDs.
Kash
California Update
Turnout is reportedly quite high, which in a majority Democratic state, is probably good news for Davis:
California voters appeared to be turning out in large numbers today for the state's extraordinary election to decide whether Gov. Gray Davis (D) should be recalled from office and to choose one of 135 candidates vying to replace him.AB
What Would Rush Say? (If he hadn't been kicked out on his fat ass?)
As you all know, Rush Limbaugh resigned (apparently after being ordered to) from ESPN's pregame show. Now, sadly, we are left to try in vain to make sense of one of the most amazing Monday Night Football games ever -- a game that witnessed the biggest four minute comeback of all time -- without Rush's wit and wisdom. But I'll do my best to fill in for the sage analyst and pill junkie.
Harumph. What I want to focus on is the liberal white media and their corrupting of the overtime part of the game.
For those who didn't see the game, here's what happened in overtime. Tampa Bay won the toss and elected to receive, but they ended up punting, and the Colts started out at their own 13 yard line. They drove to the Tampa Bay 22 yard line and then Colts kicker Mike Vanderjagt missed the field goal, his first miss of the season. This was my first hint of what was really going on in this game. Could Vanderjagt have pulled it? Perhaps, but it was Colt's coach Tony Dungy's birthday. A questionable (but apparently technically correct) penalty gave Vanderjagt a second try, from 11 yards closer. Here's where it gets interesting. By all the laws of football and physics, Vanderjagt's second kick should have missed:
"Vanderjagt made the second kick -- barely, as it went off the right upright and through after being deflected at the line by a Tampa Bay player."
How the kick managed to go in is a mystery, unless you understand the awesome power of the liberal white media. Here's something you may not know about this game (pictured left is defeated Tampa Bay coach John Gruden; right is victorious Indianapolis coach Tony Dungy):
 |  |
Yes, it is all so very clear now:
The media has been very desirous that a blackSheesh. If the white liberal media keeps this up, soon black families will be able to enjoy dinner together without freaking out conservative white columnists and their families. Well, maybe not that soon.quarterbackcoach do well. There is a little hope invested inMcNabbDungy, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of this team that he didn't deserve. Thedefensekicker carried this team."
AB
Monday, October 06, 2003
Mankiw Believes in Rubinomics
Employing a startling new tactic that was surely designed to throw opponents off balance, Greg Mankiw took the unprecendented step for a Bush administration economist of sounding like an actual economist yesterday:
"Naturally the budget deficit is a cause for concern," Gregory Mankiw, chief economic adviser to President George W. Bush, told Germany's Handelsblatt newspaper. "It could push up interest rates.”Now Mankiw just needs to hold a Macro 101 class for some other members of the administration, past and present. Earlier this year, Dick Cheney and Mitch Daniels both said that they don’t believe that budget deficits push up interest rates. And Glenn Hubbard thought that this silly idea was just a partisan trick by the Democrats, which he labeled “Rubinomics.”
Who knows, maybe Bush will eventually even let the economists have some say in economic policy making…? Nah.
Kash
UPDATE: Brad DeLong points out that Mankiw needs to mention a couple of other well-known economic insights before he sounds like a real economist: budget deficits take a long time to fix, and so we should be starting now; and budget deficits almost never get fixed without a formal enforcement mechanism like the recently expired Budget Enforcement Act. Points well taken.
Leaking With a Vengeance
That's the title of this harsh story on the cover of Time. Here's the lead paragraph
She was smart and beautiful and disarming, married to a former ambassador and the 40-year-old mother of 3-year-old twins. Best of all, she had a job that let her try to save the world. At least she did until July 14. That's when her role as a cia spy tracking weapons of mass destruction (WMD) was revealed by columnist Robert Novak after two Bush Administration officials leaked her identity to him. Her exposure was more than just a personal tragedy, though it was certainly that too. "Her career as an undercover operative is over," says former CIA officer Jim Marcinkowski, now a prosecutor in Royal Oak, Mich. He was a classmate of Plame's during the year rookie spies spend at the Farm, the Camp Peary, Va., school where CIA recruits learn how to read code and sneak through checkpoints and memorize secret documents. At the Farm, Plame stood out, he recalls, for being the best shot with an AK-47 in the entire class. "She will no longer be safe traveling overseas," he says. "I liken that to the knee-capping of an athlete."
There's a lot more.
AB
Thoughts about California
First, this old proverb, sometimes attributed to Ben Franklin and more recently publicized by Hunter Thompson:
“In a democracy, people usually get the government they deserve, and deserve the government they get.”We’ll see what kind of government Californians deserve tomorrow.
Second, a question. Is California the only state that would boot out Davis, and vote in Schwarzenegger? Put another way, if there was a similar recall ballot in another state, would they vote to keep Davis in power? And would they choose someone over Schwarzenegger?
The reason I pose this second question is because I was talking to someone over the weekend who argued that California is just like the rest of the United States -- just with more democracy. I wonder if that person didn’t have a pretty good point…
Kash
Sunday, October 05, 2003
Once in a Blue Moon...
...someone does what he believes is the right thing even though it enrages his constituency and peers. And he knows he'll be shredded in the press and by friend and foe alike for doing said right thing. But he does it anyway. Even less frequently, he gets credit from unexpected places: making the final cut for a Nobel Peace Prize.
AB
P.S. Yes, it was easier for Ryan because he had no shot at reelection, but he knew all along the massive heat he would take for the blanket commutation, as opposed to the easy moratorium path. And he deserves credit for ignoring that.
Tom DeLay is on Board!
Mr. DeLay apparently wants a full investigation of the Plame affair.
At a press conference, Tom DeLay released a letter calling for an FBI investigation signed by the Republican House Leaders:Whether or not that specific story originated with the White House or its allies, clearly there is credible evidence that an organized campaign of slander and intimidation may exist. If these reports are true, the actions of the individuals responsible are pure and simple intimidation — no different than threatening jurors to change their verdicts in organized crime trials.(*)
Actually, that was back in 1998, when national security was threatened by allegations that the White House, and Sidney Blumenthal in particular, was feeding the media stories about Henry Hyde's infidelity. Later, it was learned that the source of the story was actually a friend of the estranged husband of the woman with whom Hyde was having the affair. Still, DeLay's point is well-taken; perhaps he should repeat it now that thing of substantive importance are at issue.
AB
(*) The Clinton Wars, p. 478, citing Republican Leaders Ask FBI to Look for Source of 'Dirt', Washington Times, September 18, 1998.
Saturday, October 04, 2003
Disgusting
Via Kuffner, this depressing story from the Austin-American Statesman:
[T]he House voted Thursday to adjourn until 2 p.m. Sunday for possible debate — which could go on beyond sundown — on any map approved by House-Senate conferees. House Speaker Tom Craddick said that if there is no map to be considered Sunday, the House would convene Monday.
Monday is Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement that begins at sundown Sunday. For Jews, the day is marked by fasting, daylong prayers and not working.
In an attempt to avoid a conflict with Yom Kippur, Rep. Jim Dunnam, D-Waco, on Thursday asked the House to adjourn until 8 p.m. Monday, when the observance would be over.
"I'm told by some of our members on the floor that they will have to be out of here by 3 o'clock p.m. (Sunday) so they can make their arrangements to observe the holiday," Dunnam told colleagues. "And I know and you know that we wouldn't do this on Easter."
Dunnam's motion was rejected, and the House, by a 66-35 margin, then voted to convene Sunday afternoon.
I'm neither Jewish nor religious, but at this point can the Texas Republicans just fess up and proclaim, "we've got the power right now and we're white Christians, so f*ck the Jews, Hispanics, and Blacks"?? There's no point keeping the hoods in the closet anymore, either. Just put them on and go to work--apparently your ignorant constituents will adore you for it.
AB
Friday, October 03, 2003
RSS
Apparently, my old RSS feed went down, so I've switched from using blogmatrix to using blogstreet, meaning you may have to update your aggregator. I think I've got the code right, but I'm not certain. If any techies feel like viewing the page source and checking it out, I will appreciate it greatly.
AB
On Dean
Just to clarify, I have no problems whatsoever with Dean. I simply do not want his supporters attacking the other Democratic candidates (and I'd be nonplussed if Dean approved of such steps). The same goes for all the candidates. For example, I was very disappointed in Kerry for his stupid "Dear Governor Dean" letter.
Goal number one is ending the primary with a minimally damaged candidate, or even better, pair of candidates. Who lands on the top of the ticket is a subordinate issue. It does--at least, at this early stage--appear that a combined Dean/Clark or Clark/Dean ticket will provide the strongest ticket (remember, Gore was Clinton's primary opponent until Clinton chose him in July 1992 as his running mate). I love the prospect of matching Clark's resume with Dean's grass-roots appeal, in either order. If the primaries degenerate to the level of Bradley vs. Gore, that won't happen.
AB
CORRECTION: Gore ran in 1988, but not in 1992. How quickly memory fades. Commenter GW Plunkett also points out that Reagan choosing Bush in 1980 was the only time in recent history that two opponents joined forces. Still, that was an acrimonious primary ("Voodoo Economics" and all), so I'll hold out hope for a pairing.
Governor Schwarzenegger?
MoveOn has really become a powerful cash machine. Previously, they raised $1 million in about a week to support the Texas Eleven. Now, in even less time, they've raised $500,000 to air anti-Schwarzenegger ads:
Dear MoveOn member,24 hours ago, we launched an emergency ad campaign to tell California voters the recent revelations about Arnold Schwarzenegger's life and character. As of 2pm, more than 12,000 people have contributed and enabled us to reach our goal of $500,000. The ad will begin playing throughout California on Sunday. It's appearing on at least 10 national news programs today. Incredible.
...We're asking yoou to participate in MoveOn phone banking to California to make sure that voters know the truth. Every Californian deserves to know the truth about this man who will be elected unless they vote No Recall on Tuesday. To sign up to help, click here:
Our online phone banking system is easy to use, and if you have free weekend minutes on your cell phone, you'll be able to make the calls for free. If thousands of MoveOn members call tens of thousands of California voters this weekend, that we could make the difference in this race.
Now, Schwarzenegger's complete lack of experience, lack of any substantive policy proposals, and vacuous responses to questions should be enough to persuade California voters not to support Schwarzenegger. Apparently, they are not. But a Bustamante withdrawal, plus a last minute ad barrage, plus some hardcore phone-banking, and Davis just might survive. It's a long shot, but a shot nonetheless. And what's the worst that can happen? You waste an hour or two phone banking, Schwarzenegger wins, and California remains in fiscal trouble, forcing Schwarzenegger to raise taxes or cut back on popular services, and you can spend the next 3 years knowing you tried to prevent the Republicans (and California) from boiling in a stew of their own making.
AB
Fact-Checking "FACT CHECK CLARK"
Tapped has two pieces up, "FACT CHECK CLARK, PART I" and the aptly titled follow-up, "FACT CHECK CLARK, PART II". Thanks to Tapped's recently instituted policy of signing posts, I can see that both were penned by Garance Franke-Ruta.
I was suspicious of these posts for two reasons: first, it was authored by Franke-Ruta, who seems to have a problem with the Clark campaign, at least insofar as its interactions with Blogovia are concerned. Here, I caught Franke-Ruta selectively extracting quotes to completely invert the meaning of a post at DraftClark.com (to make it seem like the DraftClarkers were disillusioned with Clark, rather than impressed by his quick recovery from a campaign trail error). Second, Franke-Ruta relied on quotes from a story in the Manchester Union Leader, a source that is presumably fairly friendly to Northeastern Democratic candidates.
What forms the substance of her charges? Franke-Ruta leads off with a line straight from the 2000 RNC fax machines about Gore: "Good grief. This [Clark's distortions] is getting ridiculous." She then explains,
First Wesley Clark told The Union Leader of New Hampshire, when asked how long he'd been a Democrat: "About, um, oh, I think it was maybe the third of September. Prior to that I wasn’t anything. In Arkansas, you don't register for parties, you vote in primaries and, of course, I voted in the Democratic primary."Then on Wednesday it turned out he still hadn't registered as a Democrat.
Then on Thursday, Clark's spokeswoman Kym Spell told The Associated Press: "A piece of paper doesn't make you a Democrat. . . . Wesley Clark is a real Democrat, and this is simply a tactic that the other guys are using to distract Americans from the real issues."
Let us channel Bob Somerby. First, is Clark's statement about people generally not registering for a given party in Arkansas true? Franke-Ruta declines to inform us. But AP writer David Hammer does the deep digging and leg work and called Arkansas' Secretary of State's Deputy for Elections, Janet Miller, whereupon he discovers that "only 4.4 percent of Arkansas' 1.5 million voters have declared any political party" [that's a quote from Hammer, who didn't put quotes around this phrase, not from Miller]. Here's another nugget from the AP piece:
Arkansans couldn't even declare party affiliation until 1996, after changes in 1995 to a state constitutional amendment added an optional party information box to registration forms.
But wait, Hammer has more:
"If you vote in a primary, you are declaring that you want a Republican or Democratic ballot for that year's elections, that's it," said Carolyn Staley, the clerk in Pulaski County where Clark is registered. "If you come back for a primary two years later, you can choose to vote in the other party if you wish."
Pulaski County records show that Clark registered to vote in 2002, casting a ballot in the Democratic primary and then voted in the general election.
Get it? Nobody registers for a party in Arkansas--ok, 95.6% of the people don't. Instead they reveal their party by which primary they vote in, and Clark voted in the Democratic Primary in 2002, so the Democrat for just 25 days allegation is quite a stretch, and Franke-Rute's presentation of the imbroglio is, once again, Safirian.
In fact, the very article Franke-Rute cites from the Manchester Union Leader contains Clark's explanation for what happened (via a spokesperson):
Clark spokesman Kym Spell told us last night that Clark was mistaken about his registration in his Union Leader interview. "He had filled out the paperwork but it never got down to the office,” she said.
"We discovered that when Business Week called." She said that "with all the excitement of the past two weeks, it never got filed.
"We’ve got it here (in Little Rock),” she said. And when he returns there, she said, he’ll file it.
Sorry about that," Spell added.
Now, that may or may not be true, but if a writer wants to call Clark a liar or an exaggerator, at least include the subject's explanation.
And, I'm on a roll now. Here's another cause for suspicion. The Manchester article's next nugget criticizes Clark for recently saying "First of all I would change the secretary of defense. . . [if Clark were in charge of Iraq]". Then the hammer strikes:
But in December 2000 Clark, on NBC’s "Today” show, had called Rumsfeld "an inspired choice. He’s got great experience, he’s got great international stature, he knows the issues.Mon Deiu and Sacre Bleu! What a giant flip-flop! Could anything have happened between December 2000 and last freakin' weekend that might have changed a General's mind, or that of any sane person in these United States, about Rumsfeld's competency?
Finally, the TAP author in question waxes on her independence:
Like Clark, I am an independent. But it was a big deal for me when I went down to the D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles and switched my party registration from Democrat to independent in 1999. It is that technicality only -- that little "piece of paper" -- that prevents me from calling myself a member of the Democratic Party. Yet it symbolizes a great deal more. And, because of that piece of paper, if I went around calling myself a Democrat, I'd be lying.
This may be true, but her bio shows that she went from the Washington City Paper (a worthy but very liberal alternative weekly in DC) to the American Prospect, so she's more likely to be independent as in disgruntled left/Green than independent as in the center. In fact, she's basically out as a Dean supporter (see this, this, and this). That's fine. But don't blog about this as if you are a neutral party: "The sad part of all this is that the question of party affiliation could have been handled in such a different way." The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
The actually sad part is when liberals--registered or not--waste time taking specious and disingenuous popshots like these at any of the Democratic candidates. Don't feed the Rove, especially not with lies, for he thrives on them like sweet, sweet, mother's milk.
As far as Fact Check Clark Part II goes, Garance seems to have one valid but very trivial point (Clark did not have the first interview with a blogger--as a Clark04.com, not Clark himself, previously claimed; Liberal Oasis interviewed Dean by email earlier) and one invalid and trivial point (Clark probably actually did have the first face-to-face interview with a blogger--Dean answering questions from bloggers probably isn't really an interview).
AB
P.S. Also at Tapped, Matt Y. has a bit more on the not really a Dem allegation.
UPDATE: Link added to explain what "Safirian" means (and to correct the spelling error).
A Suggestion for Wilson and Plame
John Dean, of Watergate fame, has a piece in Salon.com comparing the Plame affair to Watergate. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he argues that this scandal is more serious than Watergate was in some crucial respects. He also gives a very intriguing piece of advice in the Salon article:
Regardless of whether or not a special prosecutor is selected, I believe that Ambassador Wilson and his wife -- like the DNC official once did [during the Watergate scandal] -- should file a civil lawsuit, both to address the harm inflicted on them, and, equally important, to obtain the necessary tools (subpoena power and sworn testimony) to get to the bottom of this matter. This will not only enable them to make sure they don't merely become yesterday's news; it will give them some control over the situation.He argues that a similar move in during the Watergate scandal applied a lot of crucial pressure that helped to crack the case open -- and that it might have similar effects in this case. It's an interesting suggestion...
Kash
An Unemployment Report that’s Not Too Bad
Looking on the bright side, it’s good news for the US labor market that the unemployment rate was unchanged, at 6.1%, according to the data released today by the BLS. In fact, payrolls even grew by 57,000. This wasn’t enough to match the average of 100,000 or so new people that enter the work force each month in the US, and obviously wasn’t enough to make a dent in the net job losses of over 3 million people over the past 3 years… but at least it was net job creation for the American economy, for the first time in 8 months. This report was better than the average expectation among economists as reported by Briefing.com, which was for payrolls to shrink slightly.
On the not-so-bright side, it’s a bit unfortunate that a stable unemployment rate at 6.1% is “good news.” And, as I pointed out yesterday, we’re in the middle of what is supposed to be a high-growth period for the US economy.
Kash
Plaming On... with the Devil's Advocate
As AB noted below, Digby’s point about the Plame affair being (partly, at least) about the media itself is a good one. Maybe the media will indeed keep the story going, simply because they get to talk about themselves.
But I also think that in order to answer the question that I posed even further below about whether the Plame affair will die quietly or not, we also need to take a guess at the CIA’s motivation for bringing this business into the public spotlight in the first place. Why does that matter? Because depending on what you think the CIA is trying to accomplish, you may believe that the CIA has only just begun to make life difficult for the Bush administration.
Some of the best discussion that I’ve seen about the Plame affair has been on Brad DeLong’s blog. Among numerous other insightful discussions about this business DeLong makes the following point:
I agree with [Jack Balkin] that the "CIA" has declared bureaucratic war on the White House staff. But it's not clear to me that his explanation is sufficient -- the "you pushed us, we'll push you back" explanation. At this level, the "CIA" is the Director of Central Intelligence and his deputies, and they are as much the personal courtiers of George W. Bush as they are representatives of the career bureaucracy of the Agency. They would have had every incentive to find an alternative resolution than the one they have chosen: to try to deprive the president of the services of his trusted aides and to mire the White House in scandal is not likely to make George W. Bush happy to see them or eager to listen to them in the future.If the CIA has really decided to blow up the Bush administration, then they won’t let the story die, and we can probably expect the scandal to widen.
But let me continue to play Devil’s Advocate for a moment. One alternative and plausible theory that DeLong mentions is that Tenet was worried about losing his job – and now, of course, there’s no way that Bush can fire him. That story would imply that the CIA may well be done. They’ve accomplished their goal, and don’t care if the story dies at this point.
Alternatively, we could just go with the most obvious reason for the CIA’s “outing” of the bad Bushies. Isn't it possible that the CIA was simply tired of being kicked around by Rove, et al? What better way to get the White House to behave than to send them a stern reminder that the CIA is a veteran fighter in the inside-the-Beltway ring? I find it plausible that the CIA was genuinely angry about Plame’s cover being blown (on top of using Tenet as a scapegoat for the 16 words), and so they want the White House to know that they can't do that sort of thing. If that’s their motivation, then they’ve certainly succeeded, and have no further incentive to damage Bush. They figure that Bush will probably just lick his wounds, refocus on his reelection, and avoid any more embarrassing battles with the CIA over the next 13 months.
Mind you, I’m not convinced that the Plame affair will quietly die – and I certainly hope that it doesn’t. But I do think that the future course of this business is far from obvious. Other opinions are welcome…
Kash
More People Reading Angry Bear
That’s my favorite possible explanation for this story, from the front page of today’s New York Times:
The public's confidence in President Bush's ability to deal wisely with an international crisis has slid sharply over the past five months, the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll has found. And a clear majority are also uneasy about his ability to make the right decisions on the nation's economy.It’s gratifying to see that more and more people are realizing that our criticisms of this administration are exactly right. It’s also gratifying to see that, at least sometimes, the universe works the way it should, and that bad, short-sighted, and venal policies do indeed carry serious long-term costs for the policy makers.
Over all, the poll found, Americans are for the first time more critical than not of Mr. Bush's ability to handle both foreign and domestic problems, and a majority say the president does not share their priorities. Thirteen months before the 2004 election, a solid majority of Americans say the country is seriously on the wrong track, a classic danger sign for incumbents, and only about half of Americans approve of Mr. Bush's overall job performance.
Kash
Plame On!
Recently, Kash expressed some concern that "this disgusting episode of political payback and security manipulation will quickly fade away with little long-term repercussions on the Bush presidency?" I haven't disagreed with my esteemed co-blogger yet, and I'm not quite doing so now. But Digby raises an interesting point that I think has merit:
This is one time the media starlets are not going to be baby birds and sit in their nests waiting for the masticated RNC faxfacts to be dropped into their willing little beaks. In their minds this one is about something very, very important.
It's about them.
Count me as cautiously optimistic.
AB
Thursday, October 02, 2003
Shocking Hostility from the Arab World
The report released yesterday that found that the Arab world hates the US was nothing short of... absolutely obvious. I would have been happy to tell the State Department months ago that "Hostility toward America has reached shocking levels," and that "what is required is not merely tactical adaptation but strategic, and radical, transformation." Plus, I'm sure I would have been a bargain compared to the funding that the panel of experts required.
However, I probably would not have come up with this priceless line, from the panel's chair (as quoted in the Guardian): "You know, Woody Allen said 90% of life is just showing up," said Edward P Djerejian, an Arab specialist, former ambassador and White House spokesman, who led the group. "In the Arab world, the US just doesn't show up."
"And when the US does show up," he could have added, "they shoot."
Kash
The Plame Affair
It looks like things are settling down regarding the Plame affair. The wheels have slowly begun grinding on an FBI investigation that will probably take months, Bush's buddies are in charge of the investigation, the White House is effectively holding Congressional Republicans in line to stifle calls for an independent investigation, fallout from the affair seems to be quite contained, and the story has dropped out of the headlines in many media outlets.
Even a day or two ago I thought that we’d find out pretty quickly who leaked, that they’d be fired, and that Bush would suffer a noticeable (though probably not enormous) dent in his reputation. The rampant hypocrisy and arrogance that lead to this episode would have to have some sort of effect on the Bush presidency, wouldn't it?
But now I’m starting to consider another scenario: what if we don’t find out who leaked? What if the investigation takes months, and doesn’t ever uncover the leaker? Is it possible that this disgusting episode of political payback and security manipulation will quickly fade away with little long-term repercussions on the Bush presidency?
Kash
Are We Booming Yet?
This week’s initial unemployment claims were up a bit to 399,000, suggesting that tomorrow’s unemployment report may not look too good. There have been a few other worrying signs about the economy lately: manufacturing activity may have begun slowing again a bit, and consumer confidence is falling, not rising.
We’re supposed to be in the midst of a couple of high-growth quarters right now, with many economists’ forecasts in the 4%-5% range for economic growth in the third and fourth quarters of 2003. Business spending is indeed up strongly compared to a year ago, but otherwise the preliminary data sure doesn’t paint a picture of a very strong economy.
I wonder if we’re starting to see a reversal of the pattern that has kept the US economy going over the past couple of years. In 2001, 2002, and early 2003, strong consumer spending made up for weak business spending. I’m starting to have the hunch that the second half of 2003 and 2004 will feature the opposite pattern – strong business spending with weak consumer spending, as consumers worry more and more about their debt and their jobs.
We’ll know a little more tomorrow morning with the unemployment report...
Kash
Wednesday, October 01, 2003
Clark Interview
Josh Marshall interviewed Gen. Clark yesterday and the entire interview is available here. Here's a sample, but there's much more and it's worth reading:
ABAnd this administration comes in with an ideology that blocks its ability to see, articulate, and resolve those problems. It's an ideology that's a sharpened sort of right-wing Republican party ideology. It has no real intellectual base to it. It's just the ideology of a party. By intellectual base, I'm talking first, trickle-down economics. No reputable economist stands up and says, "Trickle down economics reallyworks." Because we know the marginal propensity to consume of people who are making $100,000 a year and less is much higher than the marginal propensity to consume of people who are making $350,000 a year and more.
So therefore when you say you're going to give money to the rich so they'll make jobs for the poor -- that's not a very efficient way of producing jobs in the American economy.
Rush Limbaugh's a Big Fat Idiot
Many of you probably have seen his comment from Sunday:
"I think what we've had here is a little social concern in the NFL. The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. There is a little hope invested in McNabb, and he got a lot of credit for the performance of this team that he didn't deserve. The defense carried this team."
Get it? McNabb's success, and presumably Michael Vick's stellar play last year, was all a part of the giant liberal media conspiracy.
Here's McNabb's reply:
"He said what he said. ... I'm sure he's not the only one that feels that way but it's somewhat shocking to actually hear that on national TV. An apology would do no good because he obviously thought about it before he said it."
Which I think, if you parse it, basically translates to "Limbaugh's an idiot and so is ESPN for hiring him, but if I got upset everything some idiot said something stupid about minorities on TV there'd be no time for practice." Here's Limbaugh's magnanimous response:
"All this has become the tempest that it is because I must have been right about something. If I wasn't right, there wouldn't be this cacophony of outrage that has sprung up in the sports writer community."
Philadelphia won 23-10 over the 2-1 Bills. Rush is a jackass, and so is anyone who takes anything he says seriously.
AB
Freewayblogging
For some time, reader Scarlet Pimpernel has been sending me pictures of various messages that someone or some group has been posting near Camp Pendleton on I-5 near San Diego. For example, the "we're all wearing the blue dress now" picture. That's a phrase I meant to use more, as in Whoever leaked Plame's name is wearing the blue dress now. I posted another pointed photograph here. And now, the entire collection is available online--updated as new banners arrive--at http://www.freewayblogger.com/.
AB
P.S. Speaking of Plame, this CalPundit post is an absolute must-read. Here's a sample from a former CIA agent [significant snipping follows; see CalPundit's post for the full exchange]:
She has been undercover for three decades, she is not as Bob Novak suggested a CIA analyst....So the fact that she's been undercover for three decades and that has been divulged is outrageous because she was put undercover for certain reasons...For these journalists to argue that this is no big deal and if I hear another Republican operative suggesting that well, this was just an analyst fine, let them go undercover. Let's put them overseas and let's out them and then see how they like it...I say this as a registered Republican. I'm on record giving contributions to the George Bush campaign...His entire intent was correctly as Ambassador Wilson noted: to intimidate, to suggest that there was some impropriety that somehow his wife was in a decision making position to influence his ability to go over and savage a stupid policy, an erroneous policy and frankly, what was a false policy of suggesting that there were nuclear material in Iraq that required this war....it sickens me to be a Republican to see this...We saw this in the 70s with Marchetti and others and Philip Agee who outed officers and they were killed...The principle's established: do not divulge the names of these people. In my own career trainee class I did not know Joe's wife last name; we went by our first initials....To realize this is a terrific woman, she's a woman of great integrity...
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
What the Hell....
...is wrong with Texans?
A high school band director has apologized for a halftime performance that included Adolf Hitler's anthem "Deutschland Uber Alles" and a student running across the field with a Nazi flag.
In fairness to the majority of Texans, the shool and its band were roundly booed.
AB
Best of the Blogs
I got a bit behind in my reading, so here are some highlights from my catching-up:
- Dan Drezner says that academic faculty are liberal and gives a compelling example from the humanities. Nevertheless, this argument is tiresome. While I'm not in a position to say one way or the other with regard to the humanities, I'm perfectly willing to believe that such departments are mostly liberal. Even so, this does not render them useless or even bad.
Liberal or not, read Steinbeck, Bellamy, Wright, and London. They all give compelling looks at the world as it was as viewed through a particular lens. Read Orwell, Solzhenitsyn, and Rand too (each is an important thinker whose works are common subjects in undergraduate curricula). Balance your Rawls with Nozick.
In my experience, professors are interested in, actually excited by, students who demonstrate an ability to engage in synthetic and critical--not leftist--thinking. And we'd do anything to see more competent writing, from any perspective. I have never seen anything that would prevent a smart conservative student from succeeding at the undergraduate level, which is the source of most criticism ("liberals are poisoning the minds of our youth!").
There may be a surfeit of liberal influence at the graduate level in the humanities, but that is likely offset by the center-Right views in most economics departments and business schools. I'm unsure about the typical composition of a political science department, but even assuming they are disproportionately liberal, the University of Chicago is also disproportionately (to the number of faculty and students, not necessarily to the structure of their arguments) influential and conservative. (Note that Matt Y. says that Harvard's philosophy department is liberal. But also see Crooked Timber. Speaking of Matt, he also has a Plame piece up at TAP).
- Charles Kuffner updates us on Texas redistricting events--they are in conference and the House and Senate are working from markedly different maps, meaning there will be delays, which is a good thing.
- Dave Neiwert explains why the Freepers may have to rethink Bush's anti-tort positions.
- The non-evil Roger Ailes reports on more Conservatives who may not be so anti-tort (at least, not anti-tort until their ridiculous case crumbles into dust).
- Jesse has the relevant law that senior (or top) administration officials apparently broke in the Plame outing.
- Marshall is also at the epicenter of Plame information, and this post is particularly amusing.
- TBogg has a roundup on why people are Republicans (ok, all the answers are from Democrats, but that doesn't make them untrue). Chujoe may be onto something with this explanation: "I had sex once, but it wasn't all that great--why should anybody else enjoy themselves."
AB
Good News!
You may be more likely to be in poverty, but at least you are also much less likely to have health insurance.
AB
Monday, September 29, 2003
Impeachable?
A lot of discussion is happening today about the Valerie Plame affair, both in media and in the blogosphere. I’ve even started seeing the word “impeachment” come up in a few places, such as on Brad DeLong’s blog.
But there are really two separate questions one can ask about this situation regarding impeachment, and I haven’t seen the distinction really made yet. The first question is whether this crime falls into the category of “impeachable offenses,” particularly as it was defined during the 1990s. My answer is that I’m not sure, yet, and that we probably need more information. The second question is whether, if the press and public answer yes to Q #1, Bush could actually face impeachment over the issue. I think the answer is absolutely not -- there is zero probability of that happening with the current Congress. Given the answer to Q #2, is it even relevant to ask Q #1?
Kash
The Birth Tax, Revisited
A friend posed an interesting question to me last week: exactly how much of the astonishing change in the finances of the US government is due to Bush, and how much is due to forces outside of his control? Put another way, exactly what is the magnitude of the tax increase that Bush has deliberately levied on future Americans?
The astonishing collapse of this nation’s government finances over the past three years is well known, and was discussed in some detail in this earlier post by AB. In January of 2001 the US government was expected to run a total surplus of $5 trillion between 2001 and 2010. But now our best guess is that the US will actually run a total deficit of $2.2 trillion through the end of the decade.
It turns out that it is possible to estimate exactly how much of the change is due to which factor, using some CBO data that I referred to in my earlier post about Cheney’s lies on MTP. I spent some time yesterday doing the necessary calculations.
Part of this change is nobody’s fault. The estimate from early 2001 was just plain wrong, in two ways: it relied on overly optimistic revenue projections, and didn’t count on a long and lingering economic downturn. And of course, another part of the discrepancy is due to expenses related to 9/11, which also can’t be blamed on Bush.
However, once additional interest expenses are taken into account, and assuming that the tax cuts currently set to expire are extended (as both President Bush and the Congress say they would like to do), deliberate decisions by Bush and Congressional Republicans are the source for $4.1 trillion of the change in the government’s finances through 2010. Here’s the breakdown:
Total discrepancy between 1/01 estimate and 8/03 estimate: $7.2 trillion
Change due to earlier misestimation + effects of recession: $2.6 trillion
Change due to higher spending for 9/11-related expenses: $0.4 trillion
Change due to higher spending unrelated to 9/11: $1.6 trillion
Change due tax cuts in 2001, 2002, and 2003: $2.5 trillion
The graph below shows the total change in the US government budget forecasts, decomposed into the four elements given above. If you assume that Bush and the Republicans had no control over the top two items, you still must conclude that they deliberately caused the majority of the change in Americans' future tax burden.
One interesting thing to note (and pointed out by AB in the earlier post about the birth tax) is that it is not just the tax cuts that have created the shortfall. Government spending has also been growing at breakneck speed. Increased spending for things unrelated to 9/11 will total roughly $1.6 trillion by the end of the decade. As noted by the Cato Institute, President Bush must share the blame for this. He has never vetoed a spending bill while presiding over double-digit increases in spending every year of his term. Compare this to President Reagan, who vetoed 22 spending bills during his first 3 years in office.
Look at it another way. What would budget deficits be if Clinton-era policies were still in place? The following graph shows three different scenarios: Clinton-era rates on both taxes and spending (though spending is augmented by 9/11 expenses); Clinton-era taxes but Bush spending levels; and Bush taxes and spending.
Hopefully this should put to rest the question of whether the terrible state of the US’s long-run finances is due to Bush, or to bad luck. It is unequivocally not due to bad luck.
Kash
Hitting the Fan
Calpundit and Marshall are all over these, but the administration is getting hit hard on Iraq, pre-war planning, pre-war intelligence, the purported and promoted Saddam/9-11 link, and The Valerie Plame Affair, all while the performance of the economy remains mixed. Time, Newsweek, the Washington Post, and the NYT all have very scathing pieces. Appearances by Rice and Powell on the Sunday talk show circuit appear to be of little help to the administration, Cheney having devalued such appearences two weeks ago. The next few weeks (and hopefully even the next 13 months or so) will not be fun for Rove et al. Still, Bush does have a growing mountain of cash.
AB
Saturday, September 27, 2003
More Poverty
I took this graph from the Census Poverty Report and then identified which presidents were in office during which periods.
Notice any patterns?
AB
Poverty Up, Income Down
The Census Bureau released the 2002 Poverty Report yesterday. In a nutshell, says the NYT,
The number of Americans living in poverty increased by 1.7 million last year, and the median household income declined by 1.1 percent, the Census Bureau reported today. The worsening economic conditions fell heaviest on Midwesterners and nonwhites.
It was the second straight year of adverse changes in both poverty and income, the first two-year downturn since the early 1990's.
Things are tough all over right now, but toughest in manufacturing-intensive areas (things are fine if you're one of the richest 400 people in the country, though).
At first glance, it seems tough to blame Bush for this--the manufacturing decline has been ongoing for decades. On the other hand, Bush's naked grab for Pennsylvania voters via unwise steel tariffs--tariffs that drove up the cost of steel--harmed domestic manufacturing that relies upon steel as an input, thereby costing the US economy 30,000-50,000 manufacturing jobs.
AB
Has the CIA Finally Had Enough?
MSNBC is reporting this interesting story:
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 — The CIA has asked the Justice Department to investigate allegations that the White House broke federal laws by revealing the identity of one of its undercover employees in retaliation against the woman’s husband, a former ambassador who publicly criticized President Bush’s since-discredited claim that Iraq had sought weapons-grade uranium from Africa, NBC News has learned.Has the CIA finally had enough of being the Bush White House’s scapegoat, punching-bag, and lackey? This could get interesting.
Kash
Protectionism and Congressional Republicans
Brad DeLong has a link to this, from Morgan Stanley economist Stephen Roach:
Cries of protectionism can be heard loud and clear in the hallowed halls of the US Congress. America’s jobless recovery has finally reached a breaking point. Republicans and Democrats, alike, are up in arms over the steady attrition of employment in this so-called economic recovery. Job-related distress is bad enough. But unrelenting layoffs, together with record and ever-widening US trade deficits, are a toxic combination in this highly charged political season. For Congress, the agenda is clear: It is now time for action against those deemed responsible for the distress of the American worker. China is the target.Protectionism becomes more popular during every economic downturn, and this one is no different. The only thing that changes is the target. During the last recession it was Japan, and during this one it will be China.
One question is, of course, how the “free-trader” George Bush will behave in the face of a protectionist movement in Congress. But that’s a boring question, since I think we all know the answer -- just as we can guess how he’ll behave in any situation where his principles come up against short-term political expediency.
So here’s the really interesting question in this case: How panicked are Congressional Republicans starting to feel about the 2004 elections? Will they feel so much election year pressure that they will do anything, including violating the free trade principles that so many of them supposedly espouse, to boost their popularity?
Kash
Friday, September 26, 2003
Another Vice Presidential Lie Confirmed
From Cheney’s Meet the Press appearance on Sept. 14, 2003:
CHENEY: ...And since I left Halliburton to become George Bush’s vice president, I’ve severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interests. I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven’t had now for over three years.And now from today’s Washington Post:
A Congressional Research Service report released yesterday concluded that federal ethics laws treat Vice President Cheney's annual deferred compensation checks and unexercised stock options as continuing financial interests in the Halliburton Co.Oops. Add that to the list from last week.
Kash
The Dean Bat
5½ days down, 4½ left to raise $5 million in 10 days. I just checked the Dean campaign’s fundraising “bat”, and as of Friday at 11am they had only raised about $1.4 million of that $5. Will they actually come up short on their fundraising goal? That would be a first for the Dean campaign. If so, we’ll have to wonder if the goal was too ambitious, or if Dean contributors are feeling a bit of donor fatigue.
Of course, at the end of the last quarter they raised several hundred thousand dollars a day, so they could still make it...
Kash
Thursday, September 25, 2003
Kerry to Dean: Please stop abusing the elderly
Kerry wrote a letter to Dean that I think does more to make Kerry look bad than to hurt Dean--the tone is basically "Dear Howard Dean, won't your please reconsider your position on this issue, as the result of your policy will be to starve children and the elderly". That is, it's not a letter to Dean at all, but rather a press release attacking Dean that is prefaced by "Dear Governor Dean" and followed by "Sincerely [sic], John Kerry".
In any event, the letter has this allegation:
Medicare is not, as you have said, "one of the worst things that ever happened and a bureaucratic disaster and one of the worst federal programs ever." It is a lifeline for seniors and people with disabilities. It is a compact between generations and an American value.
I'd like to know the context--Googling, it was from 1993, which makes me think Dean was advocating Medicare Manged Care, a program that at the time many were in favor of trying (it didn't turn out well, but the experiment was worthwhile). I also found another website that has the quote as "[Medicare is] one of the worst things that ever happened… a bureaucratic disaster…," suggesting that Mr. Kerry neglected to include some pertinent elipses in his Dean quote. But I can't find the un-elided quote anywhere. Any Deaniacs care to fill me in?
AB
RIAA
I think the record labels are taking the wrong approach to digital music--suing file sharers, crying to congress, and operating their own crappy music websites (pressplay and something or other) instead of innovating. Nevertheless, I'm basically sympathetic to the recording industry's copyright concerns (if I think $13.99 is too much to pay for a crappy CD then I should voice my opinion by not buying it, not by stealing the content). But they make it very hard to be on their side.
AB
Why you should read Bushwhacked
Ivins is always insightful if a bit far to the left and, in her own way, she's as funny as Franken. Here's Ivins on why liberals don't like Bush (from her column, not the book):
So George Dubya becomes president, having run as a "compassionate conservative," and what do we get? Hell's own conservative and zilch for compassion. His entire first eight months was tax cuts for the rich, tax cuts for the rich, tax cuts for the rich.
Then came 9/11, and we all rallied. Country under attack, most horrible thing, what can we do? Ready to give blood, get out of our cars and ride bicycles, whatever.
Shop, said the president. That and more tax cuts for the rich.
AB
Tempest in a Teapot?
The American Prospect has a piece up on the various Draft Clark movements. At various points, the story says that the movement was not as big as it made itself out to be, that it was not really grass-roots, but organized by long-time political strategists from the Clinton White House, and alleges that there is a major split among the two major Draft Clark sites (DraftWesleyClark.com and DraftClark2004.com). Along the way, the article mentions a bunch of Clark sites, such as the Clark Sphere and Digital Clark.
I'm not privy to the inner workings of the Clark movement, but one part of the story did make me suspect that the author (Garance Franke-Ruta) may be a strong Dean supporter. Here's Garance's characterization of how the Clark campain quickly alienated the bloggers who worked to draft Clark (even though later in the story, it was Democratic strategists, not bloggers behind the movement):
Stirling Newberry, 36, who runs DraftClark.com, used his Web site last week to disseminate -- and decry -- reports of Clark's newfound "suckage."
"We signed on for Draft Clark, not Draft Mary," an unsigned post on DraftClark.com read Friday, referring to Clark's cry to his press aide Mary Jacoby of "Mary, help!" when asked his position on the Iraq War by The New York Times.
Suckage! Yikes, not that! Yes, the quote is technically accurate, but let's take a look at the text of the actual post from DraftClark.com:
The word reporters were throwing around early to day was "suckage", and some were openly disappointed in the ugly turn in Clark's answers, canned, and being handed to them. We signed on for Draft Clark, not Draft Mary.
However, in the space of a few hours, the appearance has turned around - a rousing speech, a perfect clarification on the Iraq statement, and a looseness that comes with liberation. Everyone has had bad weeks - and Wes Clark's only lasted three days. If Clark can overcome the nagging problems and get back to his true nature, all of this will be part of the Clark mythology - how he embraced the problem and over came it, as he has before.
After all, if you think the Clark movement is balkanized and fractious, then it is the smallest of mole hills compared to the vast quarrelling arena of states, the congress and the federal agencies he will control. The expectation is that Clark must make things look easy, because this is easy compared to the job he wants to do. [more follows]
Far from anguished cries about suckage, the post is really about Clark's quick recovery--his bad week that lasted only three days. But that wouldn't have fit into Garance's story line.
AB
P.S. I'm not endorsing anyone at this point, but I am strongly against intra-Democratic silliness like this.
Presidential Reading Material
Earlier I posted this exchange from Brit Hume's Monday interview of President Bush:
HUME: How do you get your news?
BUSH: I get briefed by Andy Card and Condi in the morning. They come in and tell me. In all due respect, you've got a beautiful face and everything.
I glance at the headlines just to kind of a flavor for what's moving. I rarely read the stories, and get briefed by people who are probably read the news themselves. But like Condoleezza, in her case, the national security adviser is getting her news directly from the participants on the world stage.
HUME: Has that been your practice since day one, or is that a practice that you've...
BUSH: Practice since day one.
HUME: Really?
BUSH: Yes. You know, look, I have great respect for the media. I mean, our society is a good, solid democracy because of a good, solid media. But I also understand that a lot of times there's opinions mixed in with news. And I...
HUME: I won't disagree with that, sir.
This naturally leads one to wonder what Mr. Bush does read (we already knew he likes The Hungry Caterpillar). Fortunately, former librarian and current First Lady Laura Bush decided to fill us in:
She said the one of President Bush's favorites was the Dr. Seuss' book "Hop on Pop."
"George loved to read to our girls and they would actually act it out. He would lie on the floor and read 'Hop on Pop' and they would jump up and down on him."
AB
P.S. I was tempted to clip the quote and omit the part about reading it to the daughters, but that would be too Safirian.
Spies at Guantanamo
Two soldiers are now charged with espionage. From what I've read, it could be something as innocuous as passing messages to and from prisoners' family members in the Middle East, or it could be something more sinister. Overall, I'm having trouble coming up with a scenario in which prisoners at Guantanamo can do much of anything to harm US interests. I suppose al Qaeda leaders could be sending messages to followers to do something, but presumably those followers were going to do something bad anyway. And I find this part particularly implausible:
Officials are considering several theories regarding Yee and Al-Halabi. Among them: that the two were in a plot to help detainees escape or be rescued from the camp.Where the heck do you go from Guantanamo without taking an easily spotted plane? Florida? Havana? Any escapee surely does not speak Spanish and probably doesn't speak English. Crazy.
AB
The Clark Economic Proposal
Yesterday Clark issued his economic plan. Here’s an excerpted synopsis from the NYTimes:
General Clark, who is retired from the Army, said he would devote $100 billion over two years to three programs, which he said would not expand the federal deficit because he would repeal President Bush's tax cuts for people earning more than $200,000 a year.In my opinion, there are some good bits and some bad bits here. The good bits are the things that he wants to spend money on -- they'll definitely help the US economy over a period of 1-2 years. The financial aid to states would be particularly helpful, I think; I don’t have expertise on the effects that the hiring tax credit might have, but it sounds like a pretty good immediate stimulus.
...He said he would invest $40 billion over two years to create jobs that improve domestic security, including in the Coast Guard and Customs Service, as well as construction projects to strengthen bridges and tunnels that might be subject to terrorist attacks.
He would give $40 billion over two years to the states to ease cuts in health and education programs. And he would provide $20 billion over two years in tax incentives to businesses to create jobs, giving them a $5,000 tax credit for each employee they hire.
The bad bits are the things that the plan doesn’t address. It doesn’t do anything to help balance the US budget over the long haul, something that doesn’t need to happen next year, but definitely needs to happen over the next 3-5 years. Also, some of Bush’s tax cuts really need to go, in my opinion. The top of the list is the estate tax – for social, economic, and moral reasons I think that any decent Democratic plan should end its gradual repeal. Also, there should probably be some contingency attached to his proposal -- he doesn't need to try to boost the economy if the economy is already doing well, which it might be by January 2005.
One bit of unfair criticism that his plan has received: it’s similar to other Democrats’ proposals. I don’t care where the Democratic nominee got his plan from, as long as its a good plan.
Kash
What Would Happen?
Wow. You have probably figured out that I'm often a tad critical of the Bush administration. I think they've really screwed the pooch on Iraq (along with pretty much everything else they've touched), and I'm enjoying watching the Bushies squirm up on Capitol Hill as they take the heat for the (very forseeable) hefty price tag for Iraq. But I never really considered the possibility that they wouldn't get the money to rebuild Iraq. Until I read this:
WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) - President Bush has failed to make the case for more than $20 billion in funds to reconstruct Iraq included in the administration's recently unveiled $87 billion emergency spending request, the Senate's top Democrat said Tuesday.I'm still guessing the Congress will swallow hard and approve the full amount -- but what if they don't? We have all seen the polls showing that a large majority of Americans do not want Congress to approve the reconstruction funds. Many people, including me, warned very vocally before the war that it was going to be expensive and dangerous once we got tangled up there. But now that we're there, I can't help but think that we're responsible for helping to rebuild the country. Iraq could really turn into an even bigger disaster without US money for reconstruction... So it's interesting to think about what might happen if Congress doesn't go along with Bush's request.
"I think there is a real possibility that the [reconstruction funds] now requested by the administration do not have the support in the Senate sufficient to pass," said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D.
Kash
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
Gray Davis and Spam
If Gray Davis successfully ends spam in California by October 7th, I predict that he will win the recall election by a large margin. On the other hand, I'm not sure the law can do much about spam originating from outside of California, much less spam from Nigeria.
AB
Compare and Contrast
Here are two reports of the same incident yesterday in Iraq. First, from CNN, reporting from US headquarters in Baghdad:
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Coalition airstrikes killed an attacker early Tuesday after members of the U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne Division came under fire near Fallujah, west of the Iraqi capital, the Coalition Press Information Center said.Now, the same incident as reported by a reporter for the Guardian, who was at the scene of the incident:
According to the coalition, members of the 82nd Airborne came under attack near Fallujah -- a town about 43 miles (70 kilometers) west of Baghdad -- just after 2 a.m. (6 p.m. EDT Monday). Coalition forces pursued the attackers into a building and set up a perimeter around it before calling in air support.
Wednesday September 24, 2003, The Guardian: Rory McCarthy reports from al-Jisr, scene of the killing of three farmers at hands of US troopsKash
It was the middle of the night when the crack paratroopers from America's 82nd Airborne Division arrived outside Ali Khalaf's farmhouse in the parched fields of central Iraq.
"We heard voices and so my husband went out to check what was happening. We thought they were thieves," said [one of the Iraqis]. "My husband shouted at them and then immediately they started shooting."
By the family's account, the troops of the 82nd Airborne - known proudly as the "All American" - opened up a devastating barrage of gunfire lasting for at least an hour. When the shooting stopped, three farmers were dead and three others were injured, including Hudood's two sons, Tassin, 12, and Hussein, 10.
Eventually the shooting stopped, the soldiers pulled back and then they called in the air strike. At least seven missiles were fired but only one hit the house, tearing through the ceiling of an unoccupied storeroom.
..."My brother was a polite and decent man. He was poor and we had only enough farmland to survive," said Ali Khalaf's brother Zaidan, who lives nearby.
"None of us are interested in politics, none of us worked in Saddam's regime. We got nothing from Saddam... We don't have any weapons in our homes and we don't have any intention to fight the Americans."
Bush Economic Policy as Designed by Karl Rove
I’ve written about the issue of the value of the dollar a few times before, but it keeps coming up in the news. Here are some bits from a Washington Post story on the front page of today's business section:
The Bush administration has embarked on a high-stakes effort to reduce the value of the dollar in Asia, hoping to stimulate exports and jump-start the U.S. job market but risking a sudden spike in interest rates and an eventual slide on the stock market.It’s yet another example of how policy-making in the Bush administration is driven by short-term political concerns rather than sound long-run policies. They are facing lots of heat on manufacturing job losses. So, they have now decided to the reverse US policy of the last 10 years, which has been to say that we like a strong dollar. Their hope is to convince the US manufacturing sector that they’re trying to help. But their policy prescription is not going to work, as is typical of Bush administration economic policies, which are made by political hacks rather than economists.
..."It's domestic politics -- that's the long and short of it," said Daniel K. Tarullo, a Georgetown University law professor who was President Bill Clinton's senior international economic adviser. "This is the administration's effort to deflect attention from the hemorrhaging of manufacturing jobs from the United States by trying to place all the blame on other countries."
Here's why it won't work:
The hope is that a weaker dollar will make imports into the US seem more expensive to Americans, thus reducing the importing that the US does and shrinking the trade deficit. (*) Similarly, the hope is that a weaker dollar will make US exports seem cheaper to the rest of the world, so the US can export more. This, should, according to some reasonable but incomplete logic, increase the number of jobs in the US.
The problem is that things aren’t that simple. (That's why we international economists spend years learning how to think this sort of stuff through all the way.) There are three possible consequences of a weak dollar policy:
(1) The US buys fewer imports, and makes up the difference by domestically producing more of the goods that we used to be importing. Unfortunately, given a fixed number of factories and workers in the US at any point in time, this means we have to make less of something else. Resources are shifted away from some other types of production (such as producing US exports) into producing things that we used to import. Therefore, if this scenario happens, there’s no net increase in jobs, just a reallocation across industries.
(2) The US sells more exports, which means that production in the exporting sector goes up. Again, given how much stuff the US economy can produce in general, this means that the US will produce less of something else (such as those items that we can import instead), as resources shift into the exporting industries.
(3) The US buys fewer imports, and sells more exports. The only way this can happen is if US businesses and individuals buy less stuff -- more is being exported, after all, and the US is cutting back on consumption of those goods that it imports. Both of these things mean that overall consumption and business spending in the US must fall. Lower spending means an economic slowdown. And of course, an economic slowdown means that jobs are lost, not gained.
The most likely outcome is a mix of these three, with emphasis on #3. A weaker dollar will cause some foreign investors to shift their investments from the US to other countries. This will drive up interest rates in the US, which will reduce business spending and thus slow down the economy. The ONLY WAY that the US can reduce its trade deficit is if there’s an economic slowdown. So the policy hacks in the Bush administration, while embarking on a policy intended to garner votes in the manufacturing sector, are only going to further harm the US economy. Too bad they don't let economists run their economic policies.
Kash
(*) Think about it this way: if a bottle of Spanish wine (one of the best things in the world, btw) costs €10 in Spain, and the exchange rate is $1/€1, then it costs $10 in the US. But if the dollar gets weaker so that the exchange rate is $2/€1, then it costs $20 in the US. We would expect the US to buy less Spanish wine as a result.
Tuesday, September 23, 2003
Missed an Opportunity
The initial reviews weren't too bad, but the Times has a new story, Bush's U.N. Speech Gets Scathing Reviews on Capitol Hill. Here are some highlights:
- Mr. Daschle, who is not running for president, continued: "He has now asked for $87 billion more. And I wish he would have made a stronger case, a better case with more specificity about a plan. He hasn't presented a plan to the United Nations. He hasn't presented one to this country or to this Congress. It was a missed opportunity, and that's very disappointing."
- "But once again he has failed to tell us exactly what role he expects the United Nations to play now and what timetable he envisions for the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqi people," said Mr. Kerry, who is running for president.
- Lieberman of Connecticut, another White House hopeful, called the speech an "11th-hour, half-hearted appeal" delivered in an "I told you so" tone that makes it more difficult to secure international help in Iraq.
- Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, another presidential candidate, said that Mr. Bush had "missed an opportunity"
- Senator Bob Graham of Florida, accused Mr. Bush of taking a "my way or the highway" approach by trying to force other nations to comply with Washington's demands..."He missed an opportunity."
At least it's nice to see that the faxes at the DNC headquarters are working--the Democrats appear to have a unified message: "missed an opportunity."
Conservative pundit/editorialist Bill Saffire sagely observed that, "Hillary Clinton saying that Bush 'missed an opportunity' is clear evidence that she, in conjunction with the Templars, Free Masons, and The Trilateral Commission, are planning to sabotage the Democrats in 2004, thereby paving the way for Hillary Rodham's election in 2008--unless they do it in 2004."
AB
UN Speech
On balance, Bush's speech was apparently not as aggressive as the advance billing suggested (as I previously) speculated would be the case. On the other hand, it wasn't conciliatory either, and was sandwiched in between an obliquely critical speech by Annan (before) and a more direct critical statement by Chirac (after).
Looking for something he could find that other nations might agree with him on, Bush spent a fair amount of time decrying the international trafficking of women. Sex trafficking is a problem, and Angry Bear is firmly against it, but I fail to see the connection to the need for troops and money in Iraq. On the other hand, I have a pretty good idea of what the proposed solution will be: tax cuts.
AB
Another Great Deal
I'm starting to detect a trend here: I put a book up in the right panel and within a few days, Salon starts offering a free copy of the book when you subscribe to Salon Premium. This time it's a free copy of Ivins' new book, Bushwhacked.
AB
Hume and The Man
Expect, insofar as people watched Brit Hume's interview of Bush on Fox, Bush to get a bump in the otherwise southerly-trending polls. I watched only the last half hour, but Bush sounded about as smart and eloquent as I can imagine him ever sounding (note: this evaluation is relative to Bush's usual speaking style, not an absolute statement). He smirked occasionally at somewhat inappropriate times, but otherwise came across well. Look for Saffire and similar hacks to describe his treatment of Chirac and Schroeder as magnanimous.
On the other hand, Bush was helped a lot by Hume's friendly questioning. It wasn't so much softball as T-Ball.
On a related note, I heard on NPR and elsewhere that the rumors are that Bush's upcoming UN speech will be more demanding, almost rude, than polite and subdued (see, e.g., this and this)--reportedly, the president will basically again say to the UN, "If you want to be relevant, you have to give money and troops." The implied message being, "otherwise, screw you." I'm not sure I believe the hype, though. It smells more like an effort to push expectations down so it will be easier to claim success if the speech comes off even remotely well.
AB
P.S. Here's an amusing exchange:
HUME: How do you get your news?
BUSH: I get briefed by Andy Card and Condi in the morning. They come in and tell me. In all due respect, you've got a beautiful face and everything.
I glance at the headlines just to kind of a flavor for what's moving. I rarely read the stories, and get briefed by people who are probably read the news themselves. But like Condoleezza, in her case, the national security adviser is getting her news directly from the participants on the world stage.
HUME: Has that been your practice since day one, or is that a practice that you've...
BUSH: Practice since day one.
HUME: Really?
BUSH: Yes. You know, look, I have great respect for the media. I mean, our society is a good, solid democracy because of a good, solid media. But I also understand that a lot of times there's opinions mixed in with news. And I...
HUME: I won't disagree with that, sir.
Monday, September 22, 2003
Real-world Howie should act more like semi-fictional Howie
Howie Kurtz in a cameo in this week's episode of K-Street:
I'm not gonna launder your propaganda on this.
And I thought laundering propaganda was his full time job.
AB
Sunday, September 21, 2003
Democratic Primary News
First off, congrats to AB on hitting the 50,000 mark Monday!
Second, here's a piece of interesting and brand new Democratic primary news: Howard Dean’s campaign has put up “the bat” – i.e., their fundraising goal for the last 10 days of the quarter (which ends September 30). Their goal is pretty astonishing.
You may remember that at the end of the previous quarter, the Dean campaign blew everyone away by raising well over $7 million, which was millions ahead of his nearest rival. The record for fundraising in any quarter by a Democrat during the primary season is held by Bill Clinton, who raised $10.3 million in this quarter in 1996. One last piece of context: the highest estimates of funds raised by Gephardt, Kerry, or anyone else for this quarter are around $5 million.
The newly announced Dean campaign goal is to raise $5 million… in just 10 days.
Based on that, I would guess that their overall total for the quarter will therefore be in the neighborhood of $14 - $15 million. Which will truly make Dean the 800 pound gorilla of the Democratic candidates. Whatever your preference regarding the 10 Democratic candidates is, this has to contribute to the notion that it’s going to be really tough for anyone to stop Dean from getting the nomination at this point. Is it time to get used to a Dean v. Bush matchup?
Kash
Angry Bear Milestone
If you look at the hit counter (it counts unique IPs per day, not page views) at the bottom of the left panel sometime between 9:00 and 11:00 a.m. on Monday, you should see a number in the 50,000s! I've been a "Large Mammal" on N.Z. Bear's Blogosphere Ecosystem for a while now and traffic is growing steadily, now averaging around 400 visits per day. I'm aiming high and hoping to hit 1,000 a day by year's end.
Thanks to Dave Neiwert of Orcinus, who gave me my first link. Thanks also to Atrios and Matt Yglesias (also, here) for some early promotion; occasional links from CalPundit also helped drive traffic. I should also thank Mary Beth, Dwight Meredith, Charles Kuffner, Matt Stoller, and others who I'm unintentionally omitting.
Thanks also to Kash for his contributions. And of course, thanks to all the regular readers and welcome to new readers.
AB
UPDATE: It looks like visitor 50,000 hails from the University of New Mexico.
Texas Democrats: What Next?
Charles Kuffner is collecting posts:
Today a group of progressive Texas bloggers are all posting on the subject "What Texas Democrats Should Do Next". The following is a link to everyone's post for today's blogburst, which will be updated through the day as they come in. Please take the time to visit these links and see what a diverse group of people think needs to be done to make the Democrats more effective in Texas.
Check it out.
AB
Repeat Formula
In his latest budget, Bush proposed $8 billion in tax incentives aimed at domestic energy producers. The incentives take the form of accelerated depreciation and deferred taxation on new oil and gas exploration and pipeline capacity. While I'm ambivalent about the wisdom of that, there is at least a reasonable argument in favor: natural gas prices are very high; also, if we increase domestic oil production without going into ANWR, that's probably a good thing. The interesting part is that in the mark-up stage, the House "tax cut and spend" Republicans increased the incentives to $19b.
Now Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and a some Senate Republicans, along with the White House, are saying that $19b is too much. See the pattern? The proposal comes in at $8b in new incentives, then in committee it gets inflated to $19b, allowing the White House to then come out as fiscally disciplined when they hold the line at $8b. The initial proposal becomes the compromise position.
This is similar to, though in a slightly different order, the strategy behind the most recent Bush Birth Tax Increase Tax Cut: Bush proposes $750b, Congress (allegedly) trims it to $350b, we then get to hear the leader of the Free World use the phrase "little bitty" (*) to describe the reduced package, and then the package passes (though its true price tag is well over $350b). In the process, $350b becomes the compromise proposal and passes. Republicans get to call themselves fiscally conservative because they reigned in Bush's dramatic proposal.
Expect to see this play repeated until it stops working.
AB
(*) According to sources, Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson narrowly saved the dignity of the President and the nation during a last minute rewrite of the speech, replacing "itsy bitsy" with "little bitty" -- "teenie weenie" having been rejected in an even earlier draft.(**)
(**) This probably did not actually happen.
Update on Steel Tariffs
I’ve taken a close look at the ITC’s newly-released report on the impact of Bush’s steel tariffs (see my earlier post for more). Here are some selected bits of information that I’ve drawn from the report:
- Since the tariffs caused the price of their biggest input (steel) to go up, steel-consuming firms, such as auto parts producers, appliance manufacturers, construction firms, etc. have reduced employment. The US economy has lost between 33,500 and 50,000 manufacturing jobs as a direct result of the tariffs.
- Many steel-using firms – almost one out of ten – have moved significant amounts of production offshore to remain competitive in the face of the steel tariffs.
- Overall, US workers earned about $400 million less in wages during the year after the tariff, as a direct result.
- Employment in the steel industry itself has continued to fall. Employment fell by 26,000 (6.9%) in the year before the tariffs were imposed. But employment fell by 37,000 (10.6%) in the year after the tariffs. There is no estimate of whether the tariff had much impact on this continuing loss of jobs, but from this data it is obvious that it has not saved many jobs, if it saved any at all.
Presumably the Bush administration imposed the tariffs to try to help US manufacturing. (Though of course one could argue that the tariffs were purely a political calculation, and that the Bushies didn’t care about manufacturing jobs in general.) These reports therefore document yet another pathetic failure of the Bush administration.
Kash
Friday, September 19, 2003
Americans' Net Worth Up 10%!
Well, not all Americans, but if you are one of the 400 richest people in the country then, on average, your income is up 10%. If, on the other hand, you are part of the other 90%, then you are now paying higher interest rates on your loans, and bearing your share of the debt created by the Bush administration's "tax cuts for the wealthy and spend" policy, and more likely to be or become unemployed than you were a few years ago.
Interestingly, the two richest people on the list are both Democrats and both opposed ending the estate tax. Buffet also vigorously opposed reducing or eliminating the dividend tax (I don't know where Gates came down on that one).
AB
At First Glance...
...I thought they were talking about Newt Gingrich, then I thought "or maybe Rush Limbaugh," then I realized it was Diamond Bill Bennet.
AB
Bush the Diplomat
MSNBC NEWS SERVICES Sept. 19 — With little chance that a resolution on Iraq will be approved quickly, President Bush is pinning his hopes on face-to-face diplomacy — including meetings with two of the most vocal critics of his policy in Iraq, French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder — during his visit to the United Nations in New York on Tuesday.An excellent chance to put Bush’s outstanding diplomatic skills to work.
Kash
Yet Another Bush Failure: Steel Tariffs
Later today the International Trade Commission (ITC) will release its midterm report about the effects of the steel tariffs that Bush imposed in March of 2002. It looks like the steel tariffs have been yet another Bush failure.
The Washington Post discusses why, and has a fascinating peek into the Bush Administration's internal debate over the steel tariffs. The President who, while campaigning for President said that free trade was "not just monetary, but moral," and that he would "work to end tariffs and break down barriers everywhere, entirely, so the whole world trades in freedom," imposed the highest tariffs the US has had on steel in decades. Estimates mentioned in the Post article suggest that the steel tariffs have cost the US tens or potentially hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs over the past 18 months – and more importantly to the Bush administration, the tariffs have potentially cost them support in crucial swing states without winning the support of steel unions. That’s why the ITC report will make interesting reading. Well, okay, at least the summary will make interesting reading.
The real question is this: will the Bush administration realize that the steel tariffs have backfired, and reverse course? They have the option of reducing or eliminating the tariffs, if they wish. Which brings us to my favorite line from the Post article:
The only reason they won't do it [remove the tariffs] is if they're unwilling to admit they made a mistake," said a Republican strategist who works closely with the White House.Good thing this White House has so clearly demonstrated the ability to admit it when they make a mistake. Anyone want to place odds on the chances that they’ll reverse their steel policy?
Kash
US Morale in Iraq is Good. Really.
Today’s Guardian contains a powerful commentary written by Tim Predmore, a US soldier who has been serving with the 101st Airborne Division in Iraq since the beginning of hostilities. It starts off with this:
For the past six months, I have been participating in what I believe to be the great modern lie: Operation Iraqi Freedom.Luckily, the Bush administration and the Pentagon assure us that things are going well in Iraq, and that morale among the US troops in Iraq is good. Whew. So we don't have to worry when Predmore writes:
I once believed that I was serving for a cause - "to uphold and defend the constitution of the United States". Now I no longer believe that; I have lost my conviction, as well as my determination. I can no longer justify my service on the basis of what I believe to be half-truths and bold lies.Read the piece.
Kash
More Lies from the Vice President
Cheney’s lies about the existence of an Iraq – 9/11 connection on his Meet the Press appearance last Sunday got some long-overdue attention, as pointed out in yesterday’s AB post.
But Cheney, being the fair-minded guy that he is, didn’t restrict his lying to just one topic. He actually told several lies about economic issues in that appearance, as well. Let’s go to the tape…
Transcript from Meet the Press, September 14, 2003:
VICE PRES. CHENEY: The deficit that we’re running today, after we get the approval of the $87 billion, will still be less as a percentage of our total capacity to pay for it, our total economic activity in this country, than it was back in the ’80s or the deficits we ran in the ’90s. We’re still about 4.7 percent of our total GDP…. A significant chunk was taken out of the economy by what happened after the attacks of 9/11.How many lies about economic issues can we find in these few sentences? At least four.
MR. RUSSERT: And tax cuts.
VICE PRES. CHENEY: Tax cuts accounted for only about 25 percent of the deficit.
[And a minute later:]
VICE PRES. CHENEY: The cost of one attack on 9/11 was far greater than what we’re spending in Iraq.
1. “We’re still about 4.7% of GDP.”
In actuality, the White House projects that the budget deficit will be $455 billion in 2003, and that GDP will be $10,746 bn in 2003. (You can find the White House estimates here. ) If you add the administration’s request for $87 billion, my calculator tells me you get $542 billion. Which my calculator then tells me is 5.0% of GDP. (It’s a very clever calculator.) Wait, maybe he was referring to FY2004, not 2003. Well, the White House projection is a deficit of $475 billion in 2004, not including Iraq. Add in $87 bn, and you get $562 bn, which is… 5.0% of their projected 2004 GDP of $11,266 bn. So he lied: the deficit is significantly above “4.7% of GDP.”
2. “The deficit we’re running today… will still be less… than it was back in the 80s or the deficits we ran in the 90s.”
If you check the data (which you can find in Table 1.2 of this White House document), you will find that there are only two years in the 80s when the deficit was greater: 1983, and 1985 – and in 1985 it was just barely greater, at 5.1%. Cheney's statment implied that we regularly ran greater deficits back in the 80s. It is therefore misleading at best. And in the 90s? There are zero years in the 90s when the deficit was 5.0% of GDP, so that's just a plain old lie.
3. “Tax cuts accounted for only about 25 percent of the deficit.”
The CBO has conveniently provided estimates of the cost of the various Bush tax cuts, here here and here. If you add up the estimates of the cost of the tax cuts contained in those three CBO documents, you get a total cost of tax cuts of $199 billion for 2003 and $293 billion for 2004. The White House projection of the deficit is $455 billion in 2003, and $475 billion for 2004. My clever calculator tells me that the tax cuts therefore are responsible for 44% of the deficit this year, and 52% of the deficit next year, once the additional Iraq request is included. So he lied: tax cuts definitely account for more than “about 25 percent” of the deficit.
4. “The cost of one attack on 9/11 was far greater than what we’re spending in Iraq.”
The CBO also has conveniently estimated the cost of 9/11, published in this document. They added up all spending on disaster relief, increased spending on counter-terrorism, increased defense spending related to the invasion of Afghanistan and other counter-terror operations, victim compensation funds, and the airline bailouts. How much is it? The total of 2001 through 2004 will be about $68.3 billion. As far as I can tell, the Bush administration’s original request for $64 billion for Iraq, plus its new request for $87 billion for Iraq, adds up to a number larger than $68.3 billion. So Cheney had it exactly backwards: Spending in Iraq is far greater than the cost of the attack on 9/11.
Four easily verifiable lies in just a few sentences, by the Vice President of the United States on national television – pretty impressive! Lying liar.
Kash
Thursday, September 18, 2003
Blogs you might have missed
Here are some blogs that are new, new to me, or that don't get read as much as they should (in no particular order):
- Nitpicker (not sure how I missed that one until now).
- Skeptical Notion
- Modulator
- A Taxing Blog
- The Talent Show
- Eschaton
AB
UPDATE: Dwight Meredith (Politics, Law, and Autism) unfortunately decided to stop blogging (though I hope to someday see him showing up as a contributor to one of the group blogs out there). But Dwight is keeping his archives available, and he now has his posts indexed by category and sub-indexed by topic. Political posts are itemized here; Law posts here; Autism posts here. The system works pretty well. I was able to find one of my favorite posts (from any blog, not just PLA) very quickly.
UPDATE 2: I should also add Jack O'Toole to this list.
Comments Policy
I've noticed other bloggers catching a little flack when they delete comments without having an formal comment policy. To avoid that, here's my announcement:
Spam in the comments, even if it's promoting a lefty site, will be deleted. For example "Cool site. Great post. For more check out my blog at XYZ.blogspot.com." Linking your own, or others blog is fine, actually encouraged, whenever it's on point. If something is a clear cut and paste promo, that is clearly being posted as far and wide as possible, I'll delete it.We now return to our regularly scheduled worrying about the deficit and pointing out the flaws in Republican policies.Beyond that, I'm unlikely to delete posts based on content. I have a pretty high tolerance for offensiveness, so if you can manage to cross that line then you've done something pretty extreme (e.g., making overtly racist comments or threatening people) and I'll exercise my editorial powers.
AB
Sometimes Up is Up
First, Dick Cheney spends much of last Sunday lying. Finally the press wakes up and decides to write a few articles that point out the lies (e.g., this). And there actually was a bit of a backlash.
Then Don Rumsfeld actually tells the truth:
"I've not seen any indication that would lead me to believe that I could say that [Saddam Hussein had a role in 9/11]
Now Bush is telling the truth too:
"We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with Sept. 11," Bush said.
It would be nuts to predict a Cheney resignation is impending (and I'm not doing so), but both the Bush and Rumsfeld statements really do make the Vice President look like a fool, a liar, or both.
AB
UPDATE: Atrios offers a clue to what's going on here:
They're just trying to defuse the pack mentality of the press - once it's cool to pile on, they'll keep doing it.
Cheney made the usual lies and exagerrations, but they followed on the heels of declining satisfaction with the war and an unpopular request for $87b. Smelling the wind, members of the press started calling him on it--Cheney didn't do anything different, the Press did. As we saw with Gore, once members of the press get an idea stuck in their head, they'll run with it, facts to the contrary notwithstanding. Gore Lies. Bush Stupid. Blather, Write, Rewrite. So, to prevent a "Bush lies about the war" meme from really getting locked into the mind of the press, Cheney had to take the fall. We'll see if it worked.
UPDATE 2: Oops, Josh Marshall had this story yesterday.
UPDATE 3: And for a little more context--and to see that the conflation of Saddam and 9/11 predated Dick Cheney's Sunday MTP appearance--check out this September 6th post by Angry Bear's Friday blogger, Kash.
Grasso
New York — New York Stock Exchange chairman Richard Grasso resigned his position during an emergency board meeting last night as the growing condemnation over his $140-million (U.S.) compensation package threatened to damage the exchange itself.
There's a lot of outrage directed at Grasso and his giant compensation package. For example, CalPundit writes that
If people like Grasso are shunned and embarrassed over this kind of legalized thievery often enough, maybe we can put an end to it and redirect some of that money back to shareholders, to whom it properly belongs in the first place.
I agree that the money should be directed to shareholders, but that's the direct responsibility of the board (in this case the NYSE directors), not the CEO. The CEO's direct responsibility is to maximize the performance of the firm. The board's job is to represent shareholders' interests and exercise oversight over the CEO and topmanagementt.
Simplifying somewhat, if the CEO does his or her job well, then there's a pool of profit created every year ("free cash flow", as it's often called). Some portion of that is paid to top management, including the CEO, and the rest goes to shareholders. The board's job is to ensure that the allocation of those profits serves the interest of shareholders. Certainly, we hope that CEOs will voluntarily decline excessive pay. But when was the last time you turned down a pay raise? If your pay is too high, is it your fault or your manager's fault? I'd say the latter.
Perhaps Grasso should go, but by all accounts he ran the NYSE well, even though he was overpaid for it. The real culprits, the ones who really should go, are the directors of the NYSE. In this case, the directors are particularly culpable because they are primarily CEOs of companies that trade on the Big Board. As such, overpaying Grasso, whose job responsibilities include monitoring member companies, has the appearance if not the actuality of a pay-off for lax oversight.
AB
Wednesday, September 17, 2003
Lucky Duckies Again
In the current New Republic, Jacob Levy offers a modest defense of the WSJ editors for suggesting that we raise taxes on the poor (the "Lucky Duckies") in order to generate a consensus on cutting taxes. His argument is basically an appeal to we're-all-in-this-together-ism:
...it is the standard classical liberal argument for the rule of law, for not being ruled by an aristocracy exempt from the legislation it writes, and for hoping that justice will be blind. Only if laws are drafted and enforced without respect to persons or identities, only if they are prospective and general rather than retroactive and selective or arbitrary, can we expect anything like just governance.
To sometimes be yoked together under a shared institution in order to preserve its viability is the universal price of political life. ... It should always be done with a bit of bad conscience, and without denying the element of exploitation. But no one should pretend to be surprised that it's being done at all.
Thus, for example, Levy makes an analogy between "tax the poor" arguments from the Right and Rangel's calls for reinstating the draft (so that the wealthy, or at least their 18-27 year old children, will pay part of the price of a war and therefore think carefully before starting one). Levy also rightly points out that Liberals often use similar arguments to support Social Security and to oppose school vouchers.
However, the generally smart Levy leaves a big part of the taxation picture out of his argument: nowhere does he mention the distinction between payroll taxes (which the working poor do pay) and income taxes (which many of the working poor do not pay).(*) All people who work do in fact pay taxes, but some only pay payroll taxes (the taxes that fund Medicare and Social Security). By Levy's logic, there should be a national consensus to lower payroll taxes because everybody who works pays them. I've heard Democrats argue for such cuts, but no Republicans. In fact, because income over $87,000 is exempted from payroll taxes, Levy's argument could just as easily imply that the wealthy are not sufficiently "yoked together" in society's effort to fund Medicare and Social Security. Perhaps what Levy meant to say was "let's get rid of the payroll tax exemption on income over $87,000."
AB
(*) Usually, this omission is opportunistic--made so that Republicans can justify regressive tax cuts by pointing out that the top 1% pay 30% of all taxes or something like that. Then when pressed, they'll later say "by which I meant to say, but didn't and never do unless forced, 30% of all income taxes." In Levy's case, I suspect he was just trying to make the points that the WSJ proposal was similar in spirit to other proposals made by Democrats and that the "we're-all-in-this-together" argument has long been a part of politics. Still, if he's going to invoke Kant's Categorical Imperative, Levy should avoid mixing in Republican spin.
What are they thinking?
Seriously, go read this post by Nitpicker. Make sure to read to the end.
AB
P.S. Nitpicker didn't quote this amusing part from the original Washington Post story
Our personal favorite is a shot of the president looking out from the official limo in Beijing. The ID placard, done at the State Department, says he's in Tienemen Square.
No. No tiene men. No tiene women either. That would be Tiananmen Square.
Tuesday, September 16, 2003
Syria-ously
The previous post does not mean that Syria is not a problematic nation--it is. But it always has been, and primarily for Israel, not the U.S. directly. And I believe Syria and the entire world know who wins if war breaks out between Israel and Syria, which tends to keep Syria somewhat in check.
This new drive to mention the "Syrian threat" at every turn is a pretty transparent effort at distraction, even for this administration. After all, if Syria were such a threat, why did we invade a country without any actual weapons of mass destruction? Still, expect the administration to continue using such diversionary tactics until they stop working.
AB
Quick! Look Over There!
Evildoers and Evildoings in Syria!(*)
AB
(*) $87 billion? Quagmire? Unemployment? Deficit? Forget about those issues, we've go evildoers in Syria.
A Great Deal
Salon's latest promotion:
Subscribe to Salon Premium today and get a free copy of Paul Krugman's "The Great Unraveling."AB
Texas Special Session Number Three--Now with Democrats!
On day one, Democrats had their mike cut, got "quick-gavelled", sang "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen," and one was warned that her car would be towed if it remained parked at the Capitol (Democrats lose parking and other privileges until they pay the $57,000 fines, each, that the Republicans imposed during the boycott).
AB
Krugman Interview
Calpundit interviewed Paul Krugman, who was on tour promoting his book over the weekend. The entire transcript is here; it appears they talked for quite a while. In case you were wondering but you don't have time to read the whole thing, here's the big question and answer:
KEVIN: If you were king of the economy, what's the Krugman plan?
KRUGMAN: A phased elimination of all the Bush tax cuts, plus some additional taxes. I'd probably look first at some way to make the corporate profits tax actually effective again — the nominal rate is 35% but the effective rate is only 15% or so. Look at some cuts, maybe you start to talk about retirement age, and possibly some means testing of Medicare, and that's enough to bring the budget under control. And meanwhile you have to manage the economy, you have to talk about what we can do to actually get demand going faster, and there are lots of things you can do….
Of course, for anything remotely like that to happen, Democrats would have to control both houses of Congress and the Presidency, and even then the changes in the retirement age and means-testing for Medicare are unlikely. Krugman makes a good case that there a lot of things that can be worse than a top marginal tax rate over 33% and a tax on the countries wealthiest estates: inflation and high interest rates, for example.
AB
P.S. Some may also find this interesting:
I'm on the web, I read Josh Marshall regularly, and Atrios regularly, and I read you [CalPundit] occasionally, once every couple of days so I know what's going on.
UPDATE: Link fixed.
Monday, September 15, 2003
The Civil Service Laws
Republicans often deride the Civil Service Laws as creating a giant union of inefficient government employees, and in a very small way, they are right. It is in fact hard, though not impossible, to fire protected government workers, and that can lead to instances of startling incompetence. But that factor is partly offset because managers, knowing they will later find it difficult to fire bad workers, will place more emphasis on pre-hiring screening. In any case, Republicans generally cite such obstacles to hiring and firing as reasons to, in the interest of "flexibility," weaken or remove the Civil Service rules.
However, the Civil Service statutes serve another, and in my opinion, even more important purpose: ensuring that hiring and promotion decisions are made on the basis of competence rather than political patronage. So when I see Republicans weakening the Civil Service laws, I often suspect that some of the motivation is to facilitate patronage hires of political favorites.
Henry Waxman explained the issue well, in a May 2003 letter to Tom Davis (R-VA), chairman of the House Committee on Government Reform. At the time, the Dept. of Defense was seeking (I believe successfully) to get exemptions from the Civil Service statutes similar to those that the Homeland Security Department's:
Until the Civil Service Act of 1883, federal jobs were often awarded through the spoils system. Civil service jobs went to supporters of elected officials and loyal party members, which often led to incompetence and corruption.We’ve come a long way since 1883. But we’re about to embark on a path that will reverse many of the legislative accomplishments of the past century. Today, we begin the process of stripping away the fundamental rights of one-third of federal civilian employees. And in doing so, we’ll be opening the door for the rest of the federal workforce to have their rights taken away as well. That’s wrong. As yesterday’s hearing demonstrated, members on both sides of the aisle agree that the Defense Department needs certain flexibilities to allow it operate more effectively and more efficiently. But the bill we’re considering today goes well beyond those flexibilities. The Defense Department seeks blanket waivers from large parts of the civil service laws.
Why do they need such broad waivers? No one seems to know. At two hearings in this Committee and one hearing in the Armed Services Committee, members have asked DoD to justify its desire to be exempt from large portions of the civil service laws. ... Mr. Wolfowitz explained that it would be more efficient to bargain at the national level, instead of the local level. ... But when we asked Mr. Wolfowitz why the Department needed to be exempt from all collective bargaining responsibilities, he had no answer. He simply said that DoD should get this authority because the Department of Homeland Security got the same authority.
This reminds me of how kids behave. One child wants something just because his brother or sister got it, not because he needs it. Giving into that kind of logic is no way to be a parent, and it’s certainly no way to be a legislator.
So what's the real Republican motive behind the attacks on the Civil Service Laws? Flexibility or Patronage? Until yesterday, I always thought mostly the former but a fair bit of the latter. As the hiring of the loony, lying, partisan, and incompetent (but virulently anti-Clinton) L. Jean Lewis clearly demonstrates, I had the weights exactly wrong. (Story here; discussion and links here and here).
AB
Electronic Voting
This CNN story, Gaffe casts doubts on electronic voting, is a bit dated but important. In a nutshell, Diebold Election Systems Inc. is the leading vendor of electronic voting machines, particularly touch-screen voting machines. Diebold's machines have already been hacked (not in an actual election) and, as CNN reports, Diebold recently posted the results of absentee votes for an election in San Louis Obispo, CA hours before the polls were closed.
The odd part in all this is that Diebold, for some reason I've never heard explained, is opposed to having its system keep a paper record of the votes-for example, a simple step like having the machines print and store a hard copy of each voters' selections (or maybe the voter would review the hard copy and drop it in a box, though that increases the likelihood of a discrepancy). At the end of the day, the number of hard copies at each machine should equal the number of recorded electronic votes. If so, then electronic tabulation can proceed. If not, then the print-outs are counted manually. ATM machines have been doing something similar for decades. Has anyone heard why voting machine makers oppose this?
The Diebold FAQ does not address this question. However, it does say that "[The Diebold software's] process eliminates the need for the generation and storage of paper ballots for use with provisional voters," which leads me to suspect that the Diebold marketing people fear that states and municipalities would see little reason to buy Diebold machines if they still produce paper. I think that's misguided because, paper or not, touch-screen voting would still prevent over and under votes while also dramatically increasing the speed and accuracy of the count. But if a hacker breaks into the system, or even alleges to have done so, there needs to be a hard copy of all the ballots. It's so common sensical that it's sure not to happen.
AB
Huh?
Dick Cheney on Sunday (from the Washington Post):
"If we're successful in Iraq . . . then we will have struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11," he said in an hour-long interview on NBC's "Meet the Press."Iraq was the "geographic base" for 9/11? Here's another rather egregious statement:
Asked about his earlier dismissal of Gen. Eric K. Shinseki's prewar view that an occupation force would have to be "on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers," Cheney replied: "I still remain convinced that the judgment that we will need, quote, 'several hundred thousand for several years,' is not valid.
In fact, Shinseki had not mentioned "several years" in his testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Feb. 25.
But wait, there's more. After speculating for a while about Iraq/al Qaeda links, Cheney refused to speculate about Saudi Arabia:
"I don't want to speculate," he said, adding that Sept. 11 is "over with now, it's done, it's history and we can put it behind us."
Also, this exchange did not make the Washington Post story, but it's in the transcript of the Russert interview:
MR. RUSSERT: Democrats have written you letters and are suggesting profiteering by your former company Halliburton and this is how it was reported: “Halliburton, the company formerly headed by Vice President Cheney, has won contrast worth more than $1.7 billion under Operation Iraqi Freedom and stands to make hundreds of millions more dollars under a no-bid contract awarded by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, ...Were you involved in any way in the awarding of those contracts?VICE PRES. CHENEY: Of course not, Tim. Tim, ... when I ran Halliburton for five years and they were doing work for the Defense Department, which frankly they’ve been doing for 60 or 70 years, I never went near the Defense Department. I never lobbied the Defense Dep