Month: March 2019

The GOP ran furiously against Obamacare in the 2012 and 2016 elections. They attacked its perceived flaws from every possible angle, including from the left. They promised a new system that would cover more people and provide better coverage at a lower price. The nature of the new system, however, was never spelled out during the campaigns.

Once in power, Trump and the Republicans found they had no idea how to meet their conflicting promises, particularly since their hidden agenda was actually to make health insurance less, and not more, readily available. The Senate took a series of votes on a variety of different schemes, all of which would have made the public worse off than under Obamacare. All of them failed, because, in the final analysis, not enough senators were willing to vote for something that reduced the number of insured.

Sounds a bit like Brexit, no? Brexit was ridiculously oversold by its proponents, who are now offering a choice between becoming an EU vassal state or economic chaos. The correct answer is none of the above.

Man-made climate change is real, and a genuine threat to our country, according to Joe Manchin and Lisa Murkowski in a Saturday WaPo op-ed. Our states are already feeling its effects, and we’re determined to do something about it. Not that ridiculous Green New Deal, of course–something reasonable. We don’t know what it is yet, but we’ll be listening to scientists, and it’ll be great. Trust us. Trust us.

Naturally, I reacted to that with a mixture of scorn and laughter. And yet, it may be meaningful in ways that M & M do not intend. Here’s my analysis:

1. You might think that they are in similar positions with regard to fossil fuels and climate change, but they aren’t. West Virginia isn’t feeling any special effects of climate change, but coal mining there is more nostalgia than reality. On the other hand, Alaska is basically Saudi Arabia with snow, but it genuinely is feeling the impacts of climate change; critical infrastructure is cracking as the permafrost melts, coastal areas are flooding, and polar bears are starting to hang out in areas where they are unwelcome. Murkowski is going to need federal help to deal with those problems (which, of course, are largely created by the burning of Alaskan oil).
2. Once you concede that climate change is real, and that scientists are not charlatans, it will be difficult to keep the discussion contained. At a minimum, it will be embarrassing to Trump, and should generate lots of interesting questions during the 2020 campaign.
3. My guess is that M & M’s “solution” will be to ask for lots of money for their respective states for job training, infrastructure protection, and investments in speculative technology to create, among other things, “clean coal.” If everyone else in Congress jumps on this train, you will at least have the embryo of a program to adapt to climate change up front, rather than appropriating huge amounts of money to deal with disasters after the fact. It’s not even close to a real solution, but it would be better than what we have right now.

Just as the mythical King Midas turned everything he touched to gold, Donald Trump turns everything he touches to . . . fertilizer. He discredits everything he discusses, including:

1. Liberal democracy;
2. The judicial system;
3. The FBI;
4. The CIA;
5. The media;
6. Our foreign alliances;
7. Evangelical religion;
8. The NFL; and
9. Golf.

He doesn’t have any respect for anything except his own ego. There is no room in his world for anything but him. If you had to pick one reason, among so many, why he has to go, you could do a lot worse than that one.

Theresa May lost her party’s majority at the last general election by running an uninspired campaign. She botched the Brexit negotiations by, among other things, failing to identify a viable position before invoking Article 50. She said no deal was better than a bad deal, ultimately made a bad deal, and then told the country her bad deal was better than no deal. Her deal was defeated by a huge margin in the House of Commons. She responded by pretending to negotiate something different with the EU, while actually trying to run out the clock. Tomorrow, it is almost certain that her deal will be defeated by a very large margin again.

In spite of this miserable record, when the dust settles, she will still be the PM. How can that possibly be? BECAUSE ALL OF THE PLAUSIBLE ALTERNATIVES ARE EVEN WORSE.

That’s all you need to know about the state of UK politics today.

“This is an emergency, damn it!” screams the headline of a Vox article written by a man named David Roberts. We’re already dealing with the environmental equivalent of World War II, and we’re losing. The Republicans won’t help; bipartisan action is impossible. And so, the only possible solution is “people power;” inspire millennials with a vision of forceful action, throw in some “socialism” to resolve their economic issues, and the Republicans will drown in a blue/green tidal wave. Otherwise, we’re all basically doomed.

It’s the “revolution,” with polar bears substituting for Bernie Sanders.

Based on the science, Roberts has a case. The problem, of course, is that the weather here was perfectly pleasant yesterday. It doesn’t feel like an emergency. There is no meteorological equivalent of Pearl Harbor. And so, by my estimate, 30 percent of the American public rejects the entire notion of climate change, while 65 percent view it as a serious problem, but one that is less urgent than, say, health care costs or cheap Chinese imports. That leaves about 5 percent of the population to engineer the green “revolution.”

Washington’s rejection of a carbon tax suggests that 5 percent simply isn’t enough “people power” to win elections in a blue state, let alone the country as a whole. If Mr. Roberts thinks the green “revolution” is essential for our survival, he needs to stop wasting his time writing explainers for left-leaning Vox readers and take his message to old people in mobile home parks who are terrified of socialism and who, unlike most younger people, actually vote.

Paul Krugman suggests a three-pronged approach to paying for new Democratic programs: borrow at the current low interest rates for investments with a relatively high rate of return; tax the wealthy to pay for new, fairly small-bore social programs; and create new, broad-based taxes to pay for massive expansions of the welfare state, such as Medicare-for-All. Does that make conceptual sense?

Yes, but I have questions about some GND “investments.” To the extent that these expenditures result in clear efficiencies, and thus generate a predictable rate of return, they aren’t a problem. Some expenditures, however, are only intended to improve the quality of life for everyone over the long run. Some may fail entirely. You can reasonably expect investors to demand higher interest rates for securities intended to finance these kinds of programs. That could present some issues for the economy as a whole down the road.

GND advocates would say that GND bonds should be viewed as the equivalent of war bonds, which offered relatively low interest rates. The problem with this argument is that the public in general does not view climate change as a reasonable analogy to World War II. More on that in a subsequent post.

And so, the cast of characters is pretty well set at this point. The notable exceptions, of course, are Beto and Biden, both of whom are expected to run. How do they stack up against each other?

In a lot of ways, they are polar opposites. Biden probably has suits that are older than Beto. He couldn’t possibly be more qualified; that is a bona fide question with Beto, who has no meaningful administrative experience at a level higher than a small city council. On the other hand, Beto is a born campaigner, with charisma to burn; Biden’s previous presidential campaigns resulted in ignominious failures, and it is unlikely that he has improved with age.

The surprising thing, however, is that they are relatively similar from an ideological perspective. Just because Beto has a strong appeal to young people doesn’t mean he’s a Sanders-style leftist. He’s proof of my argument that you can be colorful and successful without making lots of ridiculous promises you can’t keep, particularly when such an obvious and vulnerable foil resides in the White House.

It’s not hard to imagine Biden agreeing to serve as a transitional figure for a single term with Beto as his running mate (the Killer B ticket?) and presumed heir. I’m not saying that will happen, but it definitely could, and it would be fine with me.

No, in spite of appearances, this is not an ad for KFC.

Say what you want about Bernie Sanders, he knows exactly who he is and what he believes. He panders less than most of his opponents. If you ask him a question, he will probably give you a straight answer. If you don’t like the answer, that’s your problem, not his.

That’s why he stands out among the other Democratic candidates, and why you can call him hot and spicy even though he’s an old white guy and a known commodity.

He was the right-wing leader of one of the world’s greatest democracies. A nationalist to the core, his loathing of Muslims was the key to his electoral success.

He came to office promising to cut taxes and regulations, to protect his country from the Chinese, and to secure the border. He had mixed success, and his prospects for re-election were uncertain.

Is it Trump or Modi? You decide.

The polls that I have seen show Remain at about 50 percent and the two Brexit alternatives (no deal and the May deal) at about 25 percent. Those numbers clearly suggest that the May deal will fail again when it comes up for a vote next week, although the margin may not be quite as daunting. Parliament will probably follow up by directing her to seek an extension, but that will only be possible with the consent of the EU. What will the EU do?

I think it will depend on the margin of defeat. If it appears that May has a plausible shot at winning in a few months, an extension would make sense, and is probably assured. If not, what’s the point? There aren’t going to be any further meaningful negotiations. If the British government can’t decide what it wants, the EU might as well keep the hard deadline and see what happens.

India isn’t an aggressive mercantilist state, like China, but it is thoroughly protectionist. As a result, you could make a case for Trump’s decision to increase tariffs on Indian goods if you view the issue in narrowly economic terms.

But to do that is borderline insane. India has immense geopolitical significance. It has to be the centerpiece of any effort to balance the growing Chinese dominance of the Far East. Furthermore, it is teetering on the verge of war with Pakistan, which is effectively evolving into a Chinese client state. Is this really the time to send the “America First, and everyone else sucks” message to the Indians?

This is yet another example of how the nationalist and internationalist strains of Trumpist/Bannonist thought can’t be reconciled. The results will be awful.

CLs like Bret Stephens and Veronique de Rugy are purists. They know, and they feel in their bones, that economic growth is only really possible with limited government. The free market always knows best; the government, on the other hand, knows nothing. Let the big dog off his leash and watch him eat!

China, of course, is a rebuttal to the CLs. You can hardly tout it as a shining example of limited government, and yet it grows at over 6 percent per year. It shouldn’t exist, according to the CLs, and yet it indubitably does. How can this be explained?

Just you wait–China is doomed, they say. Don’t pay any attention to all of that growth; China will implode, just as the Soviet Union did. It has to. Adam Smith says so.

To which I say: don’t hold your breath. China isn’t going away, any more than South Korea and Japan, neither of which is exactly a laissez-faire paradise, will in the foreseeable future.

Michael Bloomberg has decided not to split the Democratic Party by running for president. On social and cultural issues, his views are impeccably liberal. He has promised to spend a very large amount of his own money to defeat Trump and advance causes that are near and dear to the hearts of liberals. He’s a hero, right?

Not so fast! If you’re on the realo or the identity side of the graph, you will absolutely welcome his support against Trump and his rancid ideology. However, if you’re in the class/fundi quadrant, like Bernie Sanders, you view Bloomberg (well-meaning or not) as the enemy, because he is an obstacle to the “revolution.” And it is the “revolution” that is the objective here, not just defeating Trump.

This is the other side of the coin from the reactionary worker question. The Democrats will do best in 2020 if they finesse the issue, accept assistance from everyone who offers it, and avoid making an explicit choice. That said, if they succeed in winning power, the decision will be staring them in the face after they take office, and this time, they won’t be able to duck it.

Hillary Clinton called them “deplorables;” they are reactionary workers who vote against their economic interests for reasons based on nostalgia, culture, or racism. Every Democratic candidate will need a strategy to deal with them. Are they Trump accomplices or victims?

If you’re running a campaign based on class, the answer is simple–they’re dupes of a faux populist and his billionaire friends. If you can just get them to see where their interests really lie, they will rise up against Wall Street and put you in the White House. Your whole campaign is based on that premise. If you’re an identity politician, however, you may well choose to write off the reactionary workers and ally yourself with, among others, white people who are wealthy, but socially liberal.

The reality of the situation is that the idea of the reactionary as a dupe of the right-wing wealthy is largely a convenient fiction. That said, there are a few that could be flipped, and it is worth the effort to do so.

I’ve read three interesting columns addressing some of the same subjects over the last 24 hours:

1. An interview with Brad DeLong on Vox.com in which DeLong argues that the center-left should guide and support the left, not lead it, because there is no responsible center-right partner among the Republicans with whom to work to get things done.
2. A column by Tim Wu in the NYT in which the author takes the position that Americans are actually united in support of a number of leftist economic positions, but that “industry groups” and “experts” are frustrating their will.
3. A column by Ross Douthat in the NYT which argues that the center-left lost its influence by capitulating to the left on social and cultural influences.

Are any of them right? Not exactly, although DeLong is closest. Here are my reactions:

1. No, the center-left is not dead, at least among the electorate. The results of the 2018 election prove that, as does Biden’s current position in the polls.
2. Douthat is correct when he points out that the Democratic Party as a whole has moved left on social issues, and that the drift probably created more antagonism with the Reactionary faction of the GOP. Just as the GOP undervalues, from its perspective, the cuts in discretionary spending that have occurred over the last several years, the Democrats take their victories on social issues for granted, and tend to forget how much they inflame the right. The suggestion, however, that the center-left would have found more support among the public, and more cooperative partners among the GOP, conflicts with the facts. Obama didn’t support gay marriage in 2009, and nobody had heard of #MeToo. How much GOP support was there for any of his policy initiatives?
3. Wu’s observations about public support for leftist economics are accurate, but meaningless, because many of the people who take these positions are reactionaries who vote for the GOP for racial and cultural reasons. It is these values voters, not “experts” or “donors” or some other dark forces, that block the path of higher taxes for the rich and more social spending, because their deal with the PBPs on tax cuts and welfare spending is the foundation of the current GOP.
4. DeLong correctly notes that Obama actually advocated positions on health care and the environment that had been espoused by GOP leaders in prior years, and that the GOP opposed them for opportunistic reasons. What he doesn’t seem to acknowledge, however, is that Obama actually accomplished quite a lot of the center-left agenda while in office. In a lot of ways, the center-left agenda is still the status quo.
5. DeLong has a point about the lack of a responsible center-right partner in today’s world. That could change, however, if the Democrats demolish Trumpism in 2020. Otherwise, significant change will have to wait on the “revolution” and the abolition of the filibuster. We’ll see.