Month: February 2024

What would a perfect Biden alternative look like? Here’s the wish list:

1. A man takes the culture war issue out of play, but the right woman would be OK, too. For purposes of this list, “he” consequently includes “she.”
2. He would be young, energetic, and charismatic.
3. He can appeal to older voters on substance and younger ones on style.
4. He comes from the Midwest or a purple state.
5. He has no ties to the Biden Administration and therefore cannot be blamed for its perceived failures.
6. He has experience running a national campaign.

This candidate does not currently exist in the flesh. He never does. Biden himself isn’t even close, which is why the base doesn’t love him, even though he did his best to be FDR for the 21st century in the first two years of his term.

In my opinion, the three alternatives that come the closest to the ideal are Klobuchar, Whitmer, and Booker. In the highly unlikely event that we actually do have an open convention, root for one of them to win.

Given the prevailing views about the purpose of government, its very limited resources, and the availability of cheap land, it is hardly surprising that nothing like a welfare state existed in America in 1787. If you needed help, you looked to churches and private charities for it. In light of that, how would the FFs view today’s federal safety net?

The FFs also didn’t live in a world of periodic financial crises, large cities, and a working class subject to occasional spasms of mass unemployment, or one with universal suffrage. This is just a guess, but I think even Hamilton, who worked himself up from nothing, would have accepted the concept of a welfare state (probably a pretty stingy one) as a guarantee of political stability in a democratic state. After all, Bismarck wasn’t exactly a fan of democracy, either.

What about the governors? They have relevant executive experience, and they can’t be credibly tied to Biden. Would they be considered seriously by the convention?

The two obvious options are Gavin Newsom and Gretchen Whitmer. The former is something of a national figure, is more moderate than one might think at first glance, and gives every indication of wanting the job. The latter faced down some really extreme MAGA forces in a very important swing state that could decide the election. She has a reasonable case, too.

But neither has ever run a national race. Neither has been subject to the kind of media scrutiny that comes with a presidential campaign. Newsom has the additional disadvantage of governing a state with image issues in much of America. While both of them are more energetic and charismatic than Biden, is either of them really an improvement?

The economy of 1787 bore no resemblance to the one we had today. A large majority of Americans were small farmers; there were workshops, but no factories; the “working class” consisted largely of apprentices, not laborers; there were no multi-state corporations; and most of the goods that Americans consumed were produced within a few miles of their residence, with the remainder being imported. Large landowners possessed a disproportionate amount of influence, but only in their neighborhoods. There was no need for antitrust law.

What would the FFs say about antitrust under today’s conditions? Hamilton was essentially an 18th century Whig, so you can imagine him supporting big business, subject to reasonable regulation by the state. Jefferson and his followers envisioned an America run by yeomen farmers and small businessmen. They opposed governmental intervention in the economy in their day, but under today’s very different conditions, you have to think they would be strong champions of the use of antitrust law against huge corporations, because the government is responsible to the voting public, while the corporations answer primarily to their wealthy owners.

Notwithstanding what Thomas and Scalia might tell you, here are two important facts about gun ownership in the late 18th century:

1. Individual gun ownership was uncommon, because guns were not mass produced, and were expensive. Guns did not proliferate in America until after the Civil War.
2. There was a very good reason the Second Amendment references the militia; the Anti-Federalists were worried that a standing army in the hands of a more powerful central government would be an instrument of tyranny. Their theory was that the Revolution had been won by individual state militias, not Washington and the Continental Army. The Second Amendment was primarily an attempt to reassure them on that point, not a statement about the right of self-defense.

In light of that, do you really think any of the FFs would support the private ownership of AR-15s? I suspect not.

Harris polls even worse than Biden. As I noted in my last post, she also makes it possible for Trump to run a campaign based on identity, which is right up his alley. Are there better alternatives for the open convention?

In this post, I will focus on the Washington options, which are as follows:

1. PETE BUTTIGIEG: On the plus side, he is young, bright, and reasonably dynamic, and he has experience running a national campaign. On the negative side, he is a gay technocrat and a controversial member of the Biden Administration. The contrast with Trump could hardly be more striking, and some elements of the left would find his candidacy inspiring, but I don’t see him as a realistic alternative.
2. ELIZABETH WARREN AND BERNIE SANDERS: Too old and too far left. It would make no sense to dump an elderly moderate in favor of an almost equally elderly lefty.
3. AMY KLOBUCHAR: She has experience running a national campaign, she isn’t tied to Biden, she is moderate enough for a general election, and she comes from the Midwest, which is a decided plus. Any female nominee will present Trump with identity politics opportunities, but that could boomerang on him with moderate voters. She would be a reasonable choice, but could she set a convention on fire? I doubt it.
4. CORY BOOKER: An experienced moderate, similar to Klobuchar, but black instead of female and tied to New Jersey. He’s a slightly less plausible choice.

I think Klobuchar would be the best of this lot, but what about the governors? I will address them tomorrow.

Ezra Klein is the latest NYT commentator calling for an open convention. With Biden’s polling numbers in the dumps, he reasons, what do the Democrats have to lose?

It would be very hard, in addition to being very divisive, for the Democrats to choose someone else. The nominee would have to run a campaign designed by Biden, largely with people chosen by Biden, with money raised for Biden, without any meaningful time for preparation. In addition, there is a very good chance the nominee would be without any experience running a national campaign. How is that going to work?

Nevertheless, over the next few days, I will examine the possible alternatives. The most obvious of these, of course, is Harris. Biden would feel obligated to provide her with an endorsement of sorts. She has been fully vetted and has experience running a national campaign. Ideologically, she would be acceptable to virtually everyone in the party. Finally, her reputation as being a poor campaigner is mostly unmerited; like many of the 2020 Democrats, she had trouble finding room on the spectrum between Biden and Sanders. That would not be an issue running against Trump.

But Harris comes with two huge disadvantages. First, as Biden’s VP, she can credibly be attacked for any perceived shortcomings in his administration. Second, she is Trump’s dream opponent, because she lets the man on golf cart lean into his favorite tactic–identity politics. Black? Check. Female? Check. From California, the land of fruits and nuts? Check. By the end of the campaign, Trump will have half the country convinced that Harris is a Black Panther.

I don’t think America is ready for that yet. What are the other options? I will discuss them in subsequent posts.

Jefferson was kind of the Mao of his day; he thought knowledge was expanding so fast that each generation should redo the Constitution. He would have laughed at originalism, but he was an extremist on the subject. What about the others?

The Constitution was viewed, even by its strongest defenders, as a series of grubby compromises that only represented an incremental improvement over the status quo. None of the Founding Fathers got anything like what he really wanted in the process. And then, of course, there was the slavery issue.

Is it safe, therefore, to assume that the FFs would be astonished to hear that an America which looks nothing like the one they knew considers itself to be bound by their values on issues such as business regulations and guns? Yes, it is.

The cure for unmoored religious fanaticism has always been the evidence before your eyes. If you can’t trust that anymore, you may be more inclined to go along with someone’s narrative, no matter how facially absurd it might be.

Does that ring any bells for you?

Probably the bravest man in the world, and the most predictable death since Prigozhin. Will the House GOP take note? Don’t bet on it.

Mitch McConnell did America a service by rounding up enough GOP votes to pass aid to Ukraine. The bill now goes to the House, where extremists and dysfunction rule. What happens now?

Mike Johnson is in a familiar spot; a large majority of House members supports aid to Ukraine, but a majority of Republicans does not. His choices are the same as they are on funding the government; he can build credibility with the far right (and Trump) by refusing to bring any Ukraine aid bill to the floor, but thereby risk going down in history as the man who delivered Ukraine to Putin, or he can support some sort of face-saving compromise that will be supported primarily by Democrats. Which will it be?

The implications of losing Ukraine are different than the repercussions of shutting down the government, so I’m not making any predictions on this one.

Here are my musings on today’s events:

1. The prosecution is going to present this as a sort of prequel to January 6: Trump steals the 2016 election by paying hush money to a porn star.
2. The early trial date is getting the headlines, but the real story here is that the judge rejected Trump’s fairly plausible legal defense. That’s two shots of bad news in one day.
3. Trump is, of course, complaining that the trial date interferes with his campaigning. The truth is that his campaign strategy revolves around his daily crucifixions by the judicial system. The trial, in that sense, will help him more than it hurts him with the GOP electorate. Whether the same is true with independent voters is another matter.
4. The trial is going to come down to a credibility test between Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels on one hand and Trump on the other. I don’t see how Trump can avoid testifying if he wants to win.
5. Imagine being the prosecutor who gets to puncture the credibility of the man who told 30,000 lies in office. It should be like shooting fish in a barrel.
6. Unfortunately, it probably won’t be on TV.
7. Trump’s base will not accept the outcome if he is convicted, no matter what the evidence shows. They will chalk it up to a biased judge and a blue state jury. To them, it will just be more proof of how much the system hates their hero.
8. I can’t imagine Nikki Haley withdrawing from the race until the outcome of the trial is known, and its political impacts can be felt.

To be honest, China in the Mao years–a country with a growing population and a pathetically weak economy, based on agriculture–was kind of a Malthusian dystopia, so the one-child policy made some sense at the time. The CCP’s error was to refuse to change course as soon as conditions changed. Today, China has a declining worker base, an aging population, an inadequate welfare state, and an imbalance between males and females. It is a recipe for big trouble in the future.

Xi, of course, wants lots of babies, but not even the CCP can successfully make those kinds of demands on its citizens. Halfhearted attempts to expand the welfare state to accommodate working women have failed to produce the desired results. What should Xi do, and what will he actually do?

The logical way to solve the problem, in addition to building an economy based on consumption rather than investments in infrastructure, is to persuade Chinese men to play a much greater role in the rearing of children. Chinese women are not going to agree to take on that task when they are expected to work 72 hours a week outside the house. Unfortunately, prevailing social norms in China, as elsewhere, will be difficult to overcome. My prediction is that Xi, who is more accustomed to giving commands than using persuasion, will actually respond by making birth control much more difficult to get.

The Democrats retook the Santos seat last night. There were a raft of special circumstances in this special election, including snow, the degree of public attention, a Democratic quasi-incumbent, and the Santos factor, that warn us against drawing too many conclusions from it. That said, turnout was high in spite of the snow, which suggests that the Democrats have a good chance to retain the seat in November. What other lessons can we learn from yesterday?

I think House GOP dysfunction is starting to bite, which, along with a number of revised electoral boundaries all over the country, will help the Democrats win the House in November. I don’t think the results of one special election tell us anything meaningful about a Trump-Biden race, however. The principal issues in that campaign will be GOP extremism, Biden’s acuity, and the perceived state of the economy. The last of the three will make the ultimate difference, one way or the other.

You can’t reasonably argue that China is more woke than Russia. It hasn’t invaded any of its neighbors. Given the recent changes in the Russian regime, it probably isn’t much more repressive, either. And yet, the extreme right admires Putin, and identifies China as the ultimate enemy. Why?

Two reasons–one legitimate, and one not. The legitimate reason is that China represents far more of an economic threat than the Russians do, even though Chinese prosperity brings opportunities for American businesses and workers as well as challenges. The illegitimate one is racist–the right views Putin, a white Christian, as one of us, but sees the Chinese as a totally alien culture which must be crushed, because it cannot be understood or accommodated.