Cromwell

The new plans for Walkercare and Marcocare were released earlier this week.  While they contain significant differences that will be discussed in a subsequent post, they are both in fundamental agreement with the House Republican budget in their treatment of Medicare and Medicaid.  It is fair to say, therefore, that with the exception of a few outliers, there is a GOP consensus on these programs.

1.  Medicare:  While the GOP clearly plans to cut and privatize Medicare, it is important to recognize that these two concepts are not the same, and must be analyzed separately.  In other words, it is perfectly possible to privatize without cutting, and it is similarly possible to cut without privatizing.

Privatization is a powerful ideological issue for the GOP, which tends to view it as an end in itself regardless of its practical consequences.  From my perspective, there is no ideological reason either to support or oppose privatization;  the only important issue is which approach will provide more value to the public.

There are two conflicting models at work here.  The prevailing Medicare model assumes that the best way to control costs is to create a non-profit consumer cartel with as much bargaining power as possible.  The basis for this approach is the innumerable problems with the workings of the market in health care (local monopolies, lack of price transparency, imbalance of knowledge between consumers and providers, etc.)  The GOP takes the position that the market for health care is, or ought to be, little different than the market for other goods and services, and that the best way to hold down costs is through private sector competition.

The outcome of this debate should be determined by evidence, not ideology.  All of the evidence I have seen, both domestically and abroad, indicates that costs are best controlled by consumer cartels operated by governments.  There is, therefore, no good reason to privatize.

As to cuts, the philosophy is that cost increases have been driven by the overconsumption of health care services, and that, by forcing consumers to have more “skin in the game,” excessive consumption will stop.  The problem here is that every study I have seen indicates that the real discrepancy between health care costs in our country and abroad is based, not on different consumption patterns, but on huge differences in unit prices.  GOP Medicare cuts, therefore, will only serve to shift costs from the government to individual consumers;  they will not result in meaningful reductions in unit costs.

2. Medicaid:  The idea of block grants is not, in and of itself, harmful.  The key questions are:

Do the cost formulas built into the block grant program adequately address population growth, medical inflation, and economic downturns?

Can state governments dominated by Reactionaries in whose view many Medicaid beneficiaries are not “real Americans” be trusted to use the program’s funds for their intended purposes, as opposed to, say, tax cuts?

Applying these tests to the GOP plan, the answer to both questions is clearly no.  The GOP plan is intended, not to improve value, but to reduce benefits to people who do not vote Republican in order to provide money for tax cuts for their constituents.

 

At some point during a debate in 2016, Hillary Clinton is going to be asked a question about the finances of Social Security.  If she advocates kicking the can on the program’s deficits, she is going to be ravaged by the Republicans and the mainstream media for fiscal irresponsibility.  How should she deal with this?

FICA is not imposed on wages over a specified threshold.  As a result, overall marginal tax rates for moderately affluent workers actually go down once the threshold has been exceeded.  This is a product of the dual nature of Social Security as both a insurance program and a safety net;  as a welfare measure, the threshold makes no sense, but as an insurance program, it does, because SS benefits do not increase beyond a second specified limit.   Which of the two natures of the program should prevail on this point is, or at least should be, an open question.

It is doubtful that most Americans are aware that people making, say, $150,000 a year have a lower overall (income plus FICA) marginal tax rate than those making $100,000.   It is equally unlikely that they would approve if they knew.  If Mrs. Clinton suggests removing the cap (with some possible countervailing adjustments to the benefit threshold, as well),  she would provide a fiscally responsible solution to the SS deficit, while at the same time striking a blow against inequality and addressing an apparent inequity in the system.  That approach should be infinitely more popular with the average American worker than an increase in the retirement age.

 

Observations on proposals from most of the GOP presidential candidates to raise the retirement age:

1.  This issue is a fault line dividing the Pro-Business Pragmatists from the Reactionaries that is completely consistent with the more obvious one on immigration.  PBPs support both raising the retirement age and additional immigration because they need the largest possible workforce to keep wages down.  Reactionaries have no interest in suppressing wages, and do not view government programs that redistribute wealth as bad so long as the primary beneficiaries of those programs are hard-working, God-fearing, white, real Americans like themselves (for the same reason, don’t expect Reactionaries to support cuts in agricultural subsidies).   This could become a significant issue in the campaign if Donald Trump maintains his position in the polls and adheres to the Reactionary line (if, on the other hand, Huckabee is the only candidate opposing Social Security cuts, he can be ignored).

2.  If the plan is for a slow, phased-in increase in the retirement age, it is too late, because the boomers are already starting to leave the workforce.  From a PBP perspective, this proposal should have been made and approved at least ten years ago.

3.  Notwithstanding #2, the impacts of the Great Recession on the nest eggs of many boomers may require them to continue working against their wishes, which will further the PBP agenda without the need for any Social Security “reforms.”

4.  On the whole, then, the current proposals would appear to come with substantial political risk, but offer few practical rewards.

 

There are essentially two ways to negotiate.  Option A involves taking extremely tough opening positions, doing lots of blustering, making frequent threats to walk away, and making concessions, if at all, only at the last minute.  Option B, on the other hand, means identifying and mostly sticking to a reasonable opening position and minimizing posturing through the process.

I am reminded of this when I listen to the GOP candidates talk about foreign policy.  While there are significant differences among the candidates on the wisdom of overseas military interventions, all of them seem to accept the default position that we need to increase our defense budget, remind both our friends and foes how great and powerful we are on a regular basis, and take extremely hard lines in negotiations, presumably backed by the threat of force in many cases.

Does Option A work better than Option B?  It depends on the circumstances.  If one is negotiating on a bilateral basis with a weak-willed opponent, quite possibly.  If, on the other hand, one is trying to maintain the unity of a coalition of parties with substantially different interests, almost certainly not.  Option A also increases the likelihood of failure and the risk that one might have to take undesired drastic action thereafter in order to maintain credibility with the other side and the world in general.

In the case of Iran, the notion that we could have held the international consensus together while using Option A is a fantasy.

Much ink has been spilled recently over whether Donald Trump is the logical result of Republican ideology, its complete negation, or something else.  As with many things, it depends on individual issues and your point of view.

As to his style, Trump has a perfect understanding of the GOP electorate’s clamor for swagger.   He swaggers better than any Republican in my memory.  He makes Chris Christie look like a shrinking violet.  In that sense, he is the very personification of the GOP.

He also learned from the 2012 primary season that nothing arouses the ire of the reactionary masses more than illegal immigration, and that it is impossible to take too hard a line on that point, regardless of whether it makes sense or not.  Here again, his views are an accurate reflection of those of his constituents.

On other issues, he is all over the place.  My guess is that the drip-drip-dripping of negative ads from the other candidates on these issues will ultimately erode and then destroy his candidacy.  That will take time and the expenditure of untold millions of dollars, however.

There once was a woman named Hill

Whose campaign was winning, but still

Confronted with tales

About missing e-mails

She told her supporters to chill.

 

There once was a bully named Chris

Whose words had the force of a fist.

While he shouted at teachers

And called unions leeches

The voters just wouldn’t take notice.

Haunted by Bridgegate, and outswaggered by Trump, he cuts a rather pathetic figure these days.

It appears that Jeb! is taking the position that the Iraq War was a success as of 2008 due to his brother’s brave decision to escalate a few years earlier, and that the Obama Administration consequently frittered away the fruits of victory, thereby creating favorable conditions for the rise of IS.  Naturally, this argument completely disregards the big picture:  given the lack of democratic experience and the brutal sectarian divides within Iraq, the only possible political outcomes were a weak, corrupt, highly sectarian government dominated by Shiites and friendly to Iran; or a coup and a dictatorship run by a light beer version of Saddam.  Neither of these types of regimes would have been worth the costs of the invasion, and the former would result in an increase in Iranian influence in the region, which was to be avoided at all cost.  That is what has happened, of course.

But let’s leave all that aside, and confine our analysis to the argument as it stands.  When you deconstruct it, it consists of the following:

1.  Obama is responsible for the selection of the inept and corrupt Maliki as Prime Minister.

2.  Obama is responsible for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.

3.  If American troops had stayed in reasonable numbers in Iraq, there would be no IS.

This line of reasoning disregards the following:

1.  Maliki came to power under the Bush Administration, which supported him without any public reservations.

2.  Maliki remained in power following the subsequent election after a lengthy standoff to which there was no other obvious resolution.  The Obama Administration did not embrace him so much as it acquiesced to him, given the outcome of the election and Iran’s overriding influence with the Shiite parties.

3.  Obama did not intend to withdraw from Iraq.  The withdrawal was driven by the Iraqi government, largely due to the insistence of its Iranian patron.  The triumphant manner in which the withdrawal was advertised was an exercise in making lemonade out of lemons for political purposes.

4.  Assuming, for purposes of argument, that we had kept 10-20,000 troops in Iraq, that would have done nothing to solve the problem of IS in Syria, and there is no logical connection between the presence or absence of American troops and Maliki’s misguided treatment of the Sunnis, which created the necessary public support for IS.  In other words, we advised him repeatedly to handle the Sunnis with care, and he ignored us;  why would he have behaved any differently just because there were American troops in Iraq?

The bottom line is that if Jeb! wants to associate himself even more fully with his brother and refight Iraq in the 2016 election, he can have at it.

Like many of you, I suspect, I was totally puzzled by Mike Huckabee’s comments about using the Fifth and Fourteen Amendments to put an end to abortion.   I think I figured it out this morning.

The chain of reasoning goes like this:

1.  The Roe case was decided improperly;

2.  As President,  I would be obligated to interpret the Constitution, and those interpretations would have at least as much legal authority as those promulgated by the Supreme Court;

3.  In my opinion, the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments protect the unborn, and prevail over any inconsistent state or federal legislation; therefore

4.  Any state or federal law authorizing abortion is unconstitutional, and may not be enforced.  There is no need for a constitutional amendment or even for authorizing federal legislation;  the Constitution is self-implementing on this point, just as it was on school desegregation in the 1950’s and 1960’s.

In essence, what he is doing is putting himself in the position of the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education, and using the executive branch to enforce his view of what federal law is regardless of the forty year line of Supreme Court precedents finding a constitutional right to abortion.  Logically, one can imagine him sending the military to, say, New York, and closing down abortion clinics using this reasoning.

There would be no reason for him to stop with abortion.  One would have to assume that he would similarly tell the states that the Supreme Court’s decisions on same-sex marriage are invalid and revive the enforcement of DOMA.

If elected, Huckabee is promising to provoke the greatest constitutional crisis in this country since Watergate.  Fortunately for us, it isn’t going to happen.

 

Absolutely nothing, which is the point.  While some ideas regarding ethics may be timeless, knowledge about the universe and its workings is cumulative.  As a result, any attempt to use the literal language in religious texts that are over a thousand years old as the source of all wisdom is doomed to fail.

In case you are wondering, this was prompted by an article in the New York Times which explained how IS justifies raping and enslaving women and even underage girls on the basis of passages from the Koran.

Today we move from the Middle East to the less controversial topic of abortion.  By way of background, my views on this subject are as follows:

1.  While it can hardly be denied that life begins at conception, the notion that a fertilized egg is a human being, and that its destruction constitutes homicide, defies common sense.

2.  The point at which a fetus becomes a human being, and is therefore entitled to some degree of legal protection, is a functional/biological question.  If the fetus has the reasonable potential to survive and function on its own, it meets the test.  Traditionally, and in the Roe case, this standard has been described as “viability.”

3.  Due to medical advances, it is possible that the point of viability can change over time.

4.  I have a serious problem with people who claim to be “pro-life,” but whose interest in providing support for the child disappears the minute it is born ( i.e., go get a job and be a rugged individual like me, you little baby moocher!)

5.  Conservative critics of the legal reasoning in Roe have the better of the argument.  I personally think the balancing test was appropriate from a policy perspective, but the legal foundation for it was very shaky, and the decision should have been left to the legislatures of the individual states.

With that in mind, I turn my attention to a posting by Ross Douthat in yesterday’s New York Times on the politics of abortion.  Douthat is a conservative columnist who wears his Catholicism on his sleeve.  While I rarely agree with him, his writings are thoughtful and steeped in a long line of conservative tradition, so, unlike many of his right-wing colleagues, I take him seriously.

Deconstructing his arguments into syllogisms, and using terminology describing the factions of the Republican Party from my previous posts that is unfamiliar to him, he says the following:

1.  As a good Catholic, I fully embrace the idea that human life begins at conception.  Response:  See #1 and #2 above.  I don’t remember ever reading his views on the death penalty, so I am not certain how truly “pro-life” he is.  On abortion, however, his record speaks for itself.

2.  I am a member of the Christian Democratic faction of the Republican Party.  As such, I support at least the concept of an effective welfare state that provides protections to every member of society, no matter how poor or powerless he is. Response:  Ross is more skeptical of the use of American military power than most of his CD colleagues, which I view as a good thing.  Otherwise, this is true.

3.  Unfortunately, my faction represents a small minority of the Republican Party.  The Democratic Party is more or less unanimously opposed to further restrictions on abortion, so my only allies in this battle are the Reactionaries in the GOP.  Response:  True.

4.  My goal of limiting abortions to the maximum extent possible in the short run, and banning them altogether in the future, takes precedence over my concerns about the social costs of requiring women to have unwanted children (which, in any event, I take to be overblown).  As a result, I will swallow my principles regarding the welfare state and support the Reactionary agenda in the hopes of getting things done.  Response:  There is a reason this blog is named after Thomas Cromwell and not Thomas More.  I take the social costs far more seriously than he does, and I am not volunteering to pay for them.

5.  I see no problem in making opportunistic arguments against particular abortion practices that have nothing to do with the rationale for my ultimate objective of banning abortions altogether as long as they move the cause in the right direction.  Response:  This has all the intellectual honesty of the supporters of medical marijuana legislation who privately view it as an opening to recreational use, but only talk about the benefits of medical uses in public.  Or, if you like, of Iranian war hawks who claim to believe that Iran can be compelled to fundamentally change its policies through sanctions, when the opposite is clearly true.

Even though it would be very difficult for him to embrace any sort of compromise on this issue, he does discuss the possibility of reaching a middle ground that would be more acceptable to the general public than the current judicially-created status quo.   Personally, I would be willing to accept the following:

1.  Reopen the issue of the date of viability.  Put all of the medical facts, as they exist today, on the table and see where the discussion goes.  If the facts support an earlier viability date, so be it.

2.  In exchange for that, abortion opponents would have to agree to two things.  First, put an end to the harassment of abortion clinics through spurious rules that purport to protect the health of the mother, but which have no basis in sound medical practice.  Second, agree to raise taxes to the extent necessary to provide the medical and social services for the mothers of the unwanted children, and for the children themselves.

Any takers?

An open letter to President Putin:

Dear Vlad the Impaler:

The ostensible objectives of your Syria policy are to maintain Russian influence and to prevent the rise of Islamic extremist groups.  Your unspoken objective is to cause trouble for the US, just to prove you can, for old time’s sake.

Your policy has been a disaster for Russia.  By offending the Saudis, you have driven down the cost of oil and crippled your economy.  IS is thriving.  And your guy is losing.

In spite of what you may think, we honestly don’t care if you keep your influence in Syria, because the Cold War is over, and your side lost.  We just want an end to IS and to the regime’s human rights violations.  It would be nice if we could cut the cord between Iran and Hezbollah, but that is not necessarily a deal-breaker for us.

We can make an agreement that is in both sides’ interests if you are willing to dump Assad and replace him with someone cleaner.  Are you on board?

Waiting for your call, I am

Cromwell

 

Here are the facts, as I see them:

1.  The international sanctions that are currently in place were directed solely towards Iran’s nuclear program, not at its support of Shiite military forces elsewhere in the Middle East.

2.  The approval of these sanctions was a largely unrecognized diplomatic victory for the Obama Administration which created the leverage for the nuclear deal.

3.  Our relationships with Russia and China are, at best, complicated, so we cannot rely on their good will in this process.  Russia in particular has gone out of the way in the past to play spoiler in the Middle East.  It supports the Assad regime and, by implication, Iranian efforts to prop it up.

4.  Therefore, there is absolutely no reason to believe that Russia and China would agree to reinstate, and even strengthen, sanctions against Iran in the event the US repudiates the agreement to which they have given their consent.

5.  Without the support of the entire international community, it is preposterous to think that sanctions can fundamentally alter Iranian behavior.

6.  As a result, the only way to eliminate the Iranian nuclear program is through war, or at least a thoroughly credible threat of war.  I know of no reason why it can be safely assumed that the Iranian regime would cave in the face of an ultimatum, and if one were issued and rejected, we would have no choice but to go to war, probably without much international support.  The questions, then, are what kind of war would be fought, and what would our objectives be?

7.  It is assumed in some quarters that a few surgical air strikes would be sufficient to eliminate the Iranian nuclear infrastructure.  In fact, the process would be much slower and messier than that;  it would initially require the destruction of the Iranian air defense system, and any attempt to target the regime’s ability to build centrifuges would involve bombing civilian areas.  (Thanks for an article by Zack Beauchamp on Vox for this insight)

8.  The Iranians would undoubtedly retaliate.  Under other circumstances, it could be assumed that this would include a missile attack on Israel by Hezbollah, but Hezbollah may be too overstretched at the present time to help.  Terrorist attacks on American military personnel in Iraq would be likely.  The big question is whether Iran would threaten to close the Straits of Hormuz.

9.  Closing the Straits would be a low-tech operation, using small boats and mines.  It would be very difficult to prevent, particularly in the early stages of the conflict.  A complete and immediate blockade of the Iranian coastline would be required to avoid it.  Even the mere threat of closure would cause the price of oil to skyrocket, and would do untold damage to the US economy.

10.  Even if the air strikes appeared to be successful, we would not have sufficient intelligence to know exactly how much damage was done.  As a result, we would probably have to follow up on a regular basis.  In other words, we would be committing to “cutting the grass” for an indefinite period of time.

11.  Assuming, for purposes of argument, that the Iranian nuclear program could be wiped off the face of the earth, that would not eliminate Iranian support of Shiite military groups throughout the Middle East.  Fundamental revisions to the objectives of the Iranian state cannot be accomplished without regime change, which appears to be the goal of the Israeli government and many US hawks.

12.  Bombing will not result in regime change.  It will increase public support in Iran for the regime, and (probably) even for the nuclear program.

13.  There are two plausible ways to bring about regime change.  The first is an Iraq-style invasion and long-term occupation, with all of the attendant costs, which would be far greater than they were in Iraq, given the larger size of the country to be occupied.  The second, if you want to avoid that, would be the complete destruction of the country, probably through the use of nuclear weapons.

The nuclear deal is the product of negotiations, not an ultimatum, so it is not and could not be perfect.  The real question is whether there is a better alternative.  If our objective is limited to the destruction of the nuclear program, the alternative is air strikes for an indefinite period of time.  If our objective is regime change, it means an invasion and occupation or a nuclear attack.  I do not believe these are better options.

The Thirty Years’ War lasted as long as it did because it was essentially three conflicts in one:

1.  A constitutional crisis within the Holy Roman Empire;

2.  A religious war involving Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists; and

3.  A great power battle involving France, Spain, Denmark, and Sweden.

The war going on in Syria and Iraq today has similar components:

1.  A struggle for power within both countries;

2.  A sectarian conflict involving Shiites and two factions of Sunnis; and

3.  A proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, with the US, Russia, and Turkey pursuing their own interests, as well.

History tells us there is no simple and clean way out of this mess.

 

The Obama Administration clearly decided years ago that the only possible way of reaching an outcome that would be reasonably consistent with our interests and values (i.e., no sectarian massacres, ongoing militia battles, or American ground war and occupation) would be through a negotiated settlement.  As a result, our policy, which in reality has been quite consistent, has looked indecisive and unheroic.  I believe there have been three stages to this approach:

1.  Make a deal with the Russians:  In the early stages of the conflict, it seemed possible to ease Assad out of power by persuading the Russians to find a more acceptable surrogate.  Unfortunately, the Russians, for a variety of good and not-so-good reasons, would not go along with this, and the regime did not fall, which led to:

2.  Hope that a stalemate would result, and the parties would be driven to make a deal:   A stalemate of sorts did occur, but this stage was dominated by the unforeseen rise of IS, which clearly could not be a party to any kind of negotiated settlement.  So here is where we are:

3.  Focus on IS, and keep your options open:   The ideal solution would be the replacement of Assad by a much cleaner member of his regime, some degree of nonsectarian democratic reform, and a broad alliance of the remaining elements of the regime and the more moderate rebel groups against IS.  If that proves to be impossible, strangle IS (the greater danger to US interests) and then deal with the regime.  Russian and Iranian cooperation is almost certainly necessary to make the preferred scenario realistic.

The connection between #3 and the Iranian nuclear deal is obvious.  It would appear that the Russians are starting to show some flexibility, as well.  We will see.