Cromwell

Joe Biden probably can’t do much at this point to address the “bad vibe” economy, but Jerome Powell can. Will he?

Powell was appointed by Donald Trump, but Trump did nothing but make his life miserable through 2020, so he has every personal incentive to keep the economy humming through next November. In addition, the Fed’s independence would be very much on the table during a new Trump Administration. On the other hand, Powell clearly feels strongly about maintaining the Fed’s credibility on inflation, which suggests that interest rate cuts over the next few months are a bad bet.

If the inflation numbers align with the political incentives around, say, April, I think we will see some rate cuts; that would be an easy decision. If the inflation numbers are disappointing, however, I think the Fed will put more weight on protecting its credibility and just hope against hope that the voters see reason in November.

Gaza will essentially be an enormous pile of rubble when the war is over. The Palestinians will be living in unspeakable misery. There will be no food, fuel, shelter, jobs, or sanitary facilities for the civilian population. Who is going to fix this problem?

Two possibilities can be dismissed immediately. First, the Egyptians are not going to permit the Palestinians to be moved to a new refugee camp in their territory. Second, the Israeli government will be in no position to fix the damage it is so busy creating. As usual, it will be demanding aid from the international community.

So who will fill the gap? The US and the EU will refuse to pony up unless the Israeli government makes a really serious effort to resolve the underlying political problem with the Palestinians. This is where Biden can really use his leverage with the Israelis. Most of the Arab states will react the same way. The Chinese don’t believe in charity, so they won’t help in any meaningful way. Qatar and Iran, both of whom have good relations with Hamas, will try to funnel in some aid, but the scope of the damage is way too great for them to handle. International organizations largely funded by the US and the EU won’t have enough money to solve the problem, either.

The current Israeli government has no interest in engaging in any serious talks about Palestinian rights. That means one of two things is going to happen: either the government is replaced by a new centrist one that is willing to engage in serious negotiations over a two-state solution in exchange for economic assistance; or the international response will be much too little, too late, and the misery will persist for the foreseeable future.

I would put my money on B.

Nikki Haley, like many politicians, wants to have it both ways. On the one hand, she has made it clear that she personally opposes abortion and will sign basically any federal prohibition that ends up on her desk after she is elected president. On the other hand, she wants pro-choice women to know she feels their pain, and she has opined that federal legislation is impossible, due to the filibuster. Something for everyone, it seems.

But she hasn’t been asked the real questions, which are as follows:

1. If you are elected president, how vigorously, if at all, will you support attempts by the reactionary right to repeal the filibuster?
2. If the filibuster problem can be overcome, how do you propose to enforce anti-abortion legislation in blue states in which the population strongly supports abortion rights? In other words, how will you avoid turning the new legislation into the 21st century equivalent of Prohibition or the Fugitive Slave Act?

I would love to hear the answers to those questions, but I doubt I ever will.

In its never-ending battle to persuade us that neoliberal economics are, in fact, good for working people, the last issue of The Economist featured a leader and an article telling us that inequality never actually rose that much and is currently falling. The justifications for these statements are rising real wages for unskilled workers over the last few years and a few new, hotly disputed studies which allegedly establish that inequality has barely increased “since the 1960s.” Should we accept these arguments?

The two propositions should be taken separately. There is, in fact, plenty of evidence that the combination of demographic change and a hot American economy has helped unskilled workers and reduced inequality–not that Biden is being given any credit for it. The demographic change is here to stay but will matter only if the pace of globalization remains slow; after all, there are still plenty of underemployed people in Asia and Africa to pick up the slack. In addition, AI may wind up reducing the demand for labor; we just don’t know. Finally, fiscal problems may ultimately result in an economic slowdown and lower real wages for workers. The Economist should take that possibility seriously, since it has been predicting a recession for most of Biden’s term.

As to the studies, they aren’t quoted at length, but as far as I can tell, they have the following flaws:

1. Using “the 1960s” as a baseline presents a problem for two reasons. First of all, I can’t tell if that means before or after the approval Great Society programs; second, the relevant date for lovers of neoliberalism is 1980, not 1960. The Reagan era is when inequality really took off, thanks to the tax cuts.
2. As I’ve noted before, it appears that the authors of the studies are including transfer payments in government health care programs in their analysis, which essentially makes soaring American health care costs an economic plus for workers rather than a painful offset. That’s stupid.
3. The studies clearly focus on incomes, not wealth. We all know that rising asset prices are primarily responsible for the increase in inequality. A genuine, unbiased review of the inequality issue would take net worth as well as realized income into account.

Imagine that you are LIndsey Graham, and you have to choose a GOP candidate for president. Your options are a woman from your home state who agrees with everything you say about American foreign policy, and a guy who wants to leave Ukraine to its fate and withdraw from NATO. You, of course, choose the guy who stands for everything you disagree with. It’s pathetic.

You believe strongly that Ukraine should be protected from Russian imperialism. But when your party tells you that the border is more important and should be traded for aid to Ukraine, you go along without a peep. That’s pathetic, too.

Graham was recently quoted as saying Trump won’t really withdraw from NATO; he’s just using the threat as leverage to force the Europeans to spend more money on defense. Sure, Lindsey. Telling the world you’re just bluffing doesn’t sound like a great negotiating tactic to me, particularly since the Europeans are, in fact, spending more money on defense.

If Trump is elected, he will abandon both Ukraine and NATO, and Graham won’t do a damn thing to stop him. He’ll say a few things in private, and then shut up, just as he always does, because he wants to play golf with the man on golf cart. That’s what is really important to him.

The GOP, seeing the opportunity to split liberals from progressives, is currently ignoring its own issues with antisemitism (remember the “good people” in Charlottesville?) and defining the term in a way that operates to its advantage. But what is its real meaning?

Let’s start with some relatively easy real world examples. Criticizing the Israeli government for specific kinds of behavior towards Palestinians is not antisemitism, because if it were, millions of Israelis would be considered antisemitic. On the other hand, making disparaging remarks about all Jews, regardless of context, clearly is antisemitic. That is the category into which right-wing antisemites fall.

The following actions are harder cases:

1. Taking the position that the Jewish state should be replaced by a democratic state in which Jews and Palestinians have equal rights;
2. Making unequivocal statements that Israel should be destroyed, but saying nothing about Jews elsewhere; and
3. Making more equivocal statements that could be understood by reasonable listeners to call for the destruction of Israel.

To me, any statement that puts Jews and Arabs on equal footing is acceptable, so #1 is not antisemitism even if it contemplates a radical change to Israel, as it currently exists. #2 singles out Israeli Jews for ethnic cleansing and is thus antisemitic. #3 depends on context, but most people are entitled to the benefit of the doubt. If you don’t have a record of clearly calling for the destruction of Israel, it should be assumed that you only want a much better deal for the Palestinians.

As to the behavior of progressive students on Ivy League campuses, the distinction between harassment and pure speech is the bright line for me. Some right-wing commentators have argued that left-wing intimidation of reactionary students on issues pertaining to race and gender should be treated the same way. On this point, I agree with them. People with unpopular views, whether left or right, should be protected from intimidation, but not from criticism.

In the same column that was the subject of my last post, David French tells us that Mike Huckabee, in response to a question about DeSantis and Trump, opined that there are two virtues–loyalty and confidentiality–and that a virtuous person faithfully follows his leader and shuts up.

That’s what right-wing religion has come to in this country. This is an ethical system fit for the Mafia, not for Christians.

David French tells us that three words explain Trump’s attraction to fundamentalists: certainty; ferocity; and solidarity. Is he right?

Yes, but he left out a fourth word: minority. Fundamentalists weren’t a threat to liberal democracy as long as they were convinced they represented a majority of Americans. Changing demographics, the election of a black president, increasingly empty churches, and extreme opinions on social media and Fox News have persuaded them that the apocalypse is nigh and that only a monopoly on political power can prevent it. Trump looks like a fighter to them, so his moral failings, if anything, are an asset, not a liability.

The man has now been indicted on tax fraud charges to go along with the previous gun allegations. These are two issues on which the GOP, were anyone other than the president’s son involved, would logically sympathize with the defendant. After all, they believe in absolute Second Amendment rights, and they have been trying to defund the IRS for years.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for an admission of hypocrisy, however.

On the GOP stance on Ukraine.

To withhold needed aid is insane.

To help Putin to win

Is a terrible sin.

If he does, we will know who to blame.

Ron DeSantis doesn’t have a problem with Trump being an authoritarian. No, his issue with Trump is that the man was an inept, easily distracted authoritarian–a man on golf cart, not a man on horseback.

That’s certainly comforting to those of us who value liberal democracy.

Trump 1.0 was, in fact, a man on golf cart, as I pointed out on many occasions. 2.0 is angrier and more familiar with the workings of government; he will also have a cadre of dedicated reactionary functionaries to help him destroy the system this time around. Given his innumerable personal shortcomings, he will never be a perfect authoritarian, but he is much more likely to be a man on horseback the second time around.

As far as I can tell, the majority of GOP senators still support aid for Ukraine. Nevertheless, they have chosen to treat opposing Putin as a concession in exchange for massive changes to immigration law. Do you blame the Democrats for doubting them?

For their part, the Democrats are more than willing to consider immigration law changes in order to stop the bleeding in places like New York and Chicago. Do you blame the Republicans for pushing them to do something they want to do in any event?

And you thought the stupid chicken games were over when the debt ceiling was lifted. Silly you. And me.

If you ask a certain kind of reactionary, he will tell you that America has run completely off the rails. It is terminally ill from the twin diseases of socialism and wokeness. He’s normally a libertarian–a constitutional conservative–but hard times for real Americans call for extreme measures. We need a dictator, at least temporarily, to completely purge the system of the twin terrors and make America great again. Then, but only then, we can go back to the era of limited government.

The great irony here, of course, is that the intensely anti-socialist right is borrowing and repurposing a concept from Marxist thought: the dictatorship of the proletariat. Call it the dictatorship of the unwoke.

The new year could have been much worse.

I’ll talk about the family first.

We spent the winter in NC.

A mighty frosty place to be.

_______

Our home repairs are almost done.

I can’t say it’s been loads of fun.

I call it a mixed blessing, for

I liked the way it was before.

_______

We drove with Darcy to the coast.

We had a gracious Vrbo host.

We crossed that off our bucket list

But my wife tripped and broke her wrist.

_______________

We had planned a trip for June

But with the wrist, it was too soon.

OH, PA, TN, AR–

We went in fall, but just by car.

_____________

Darcy’s fine; she just turned six.

She still has lots of puppy tricks.

My wife’s involved in several hustles.

She’s the brains; I’m just the muscle.

____________

In other news, the debt was paid

But conflict raged, and nerves were frayed.

The blue team had a decent year

But Trump still leaves us full of fear.

____________

So what of 2024?

Too many flash points to keep score.

Will liberalism meet its death?

Just keep the faith and hold your breath.

The dance has already begun. When GOP leaders are asked about Trump’s increasingly unhinged statements, they respond in one of two ways:

1. “Hehe. You know Trump. He’s always saying anything that comes into his head. He doesn’t really mean it. Even if he did, the system has enough checks and balances to keep him from being an authoritarian. Nothing to worry about here.”
2. “So what if Trump sounds like a corrupt authoritarian. WHAT ABOUT HUNTER BIDEN, THE TRUMP PROSECUTIONS, AND THE VACCINE MANDATES???? Biden is just as big a corrupt authoritarian as Trump, and he’s running America into the ground. Trump will save us and make America great again!”

This is complete rubbish, of course. Trump 1.0 was a disaster; Trump 2.0 would be much, much worse. His authoritarian statements should be taken both seriously and literally.