Tag: Obama

An Unbiased Perspective

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Admittedly I am a person who does not believe that anyone is unbiased – and I’m fine with that. The closest a person comes to unbiased is when they can state a position which contradicts their biases or while acknowledging how that position does not support their biases. When President Obama said that $100 Million here and there eventually adds up to real money in Washington I could not help but notice when Paul Krugman – not exactly the strongest proponent of smaller government – disagreed. He calculated that $100 million per day for an entire four year term would only be 2% of one year’s budget. His conclusion was perfect:

OK, politics is theater. But you could argue that the president shouldn’t feed the bogus claim that we can close fiscal gaps by eliminating a bit of waste.

Tags fiscal restraint, money, New York Times, Obama

culture National

Political Action vs Reaction

Post author By David
Post date April 15, 2009
15 Comments on Political Action vs Reaction

It’s tax day and I doubt anybody who reads this has not heard in advance about the many "Tea Party" events that have been planned around the country for today. Ive been hearing about them from various sources for months and I have been conflicted in my feelings related to such activities. From a constitutional perspective we have a first amendment right to free speech and peaceable assembly so barring any violence there is no question as to the legality of these events. My conflict is in the way the events are being promoted.

Many of the public figures who are promoting these events paint them as a kind of legitimate political action. Among those who really care about the issues of constitutionally limited government and perpetual government deficit spending there are many, such as myself, who recognize that these tea parties have no possibility of bringing about real political results – they are a grand publicity stunt played off of the frustrations of one segment of the population. As such they are merely a political reaction and political reactions are easy to spin. Promoters are spinning this as an argument against larger government and deficit spending. Detractors are spinning it as a bunch of ridiculous anti-Obama rallies.

Real political action, in contrast to political reactions, is very difficult to spin. It takes much more time and effort than simply gathering some press coverage and getting people to show up one day carrying signs and shouting in megaphones. Real political action, for those who are interested, would include regularly seeking information on issues of interest to you. It would include attending county party organizing conventions. As Rob Miller so aptly said, "If you believe that you have something to contribute to the American experience, you should come to a county convention." In Davis County that would be this Saturday (4/18) for both Democrats and Republicans. If you really want to make a difference you should be looking to be a delegate to county and state party conventions (or even national conventions if you are so inclined). It means participating in those caucus meetings and conventions where parties are organized and candidates are chosen. It means not letting your party get away with ignoring its principles in the name of political expedience. (That does not preclude the possibility of compromise, but it does reject the argument that all of politics is compromise.)

Thankfully today I have come to my own resolution regarding that internal conflict. Real political action is what this country desperately needs from many more people of all political persuasions. We need people who are willing to put in the work and engage in civil debate even when the debate gets spirited. While political reactions do not qualify as real, effective political action they can serve as a first step for those who have not participated in real political action before. I hope that whatever else happens with the tea party events we will see many among the attendees who will start to take part in lasting political action.

Tags civic participation, deficits, Obama, taxes

National

New Government Website

In keeping with his propensity to launch new .gov websites (e.g. change.gov, recovery.gov, sigtarp.gov) President Obama has launched a new website where he can share some ideas that he knows won’t pass any Congress (Democrat or Republican) no matter how sound those ideas might be. It’s called AprilFools.gov. He includes ideas that are possible but not very likely, such as nominating cabinet picks without tax problems but the really depressing list is found among the ideas listed under “Impossible” –

The Senate refusing to confirm cabinet nominees because of tax (or similar) problems. (Note that those nominees who were not confirmed all withdrew before a vote was ever taken.)
Balancing the budget for one month.
Ending government waste.
Lowering real taxes on the middle class. (He’s proposed it, but he seems to know and accept that it won’t survive the Congerssional budgeting process.)

Tags government, money, Obama, technology

National

Change You Can Believe In

Many of the conservative Republicans who opposed John McCain even after he was the last Republican Presidential Candidate of 2008 rightly observed that the differences between McCain and Obama (or McCain and Bush, or Obama and Bush) were largely cosmetic in nature. They were not swayed by the rhetoric of change from the Obama campaign, but they would probably have welcomed a real substantive change even from a Democrat if any were offered. Over at the Financial Times today, Clive Crook captures the truth of this foresight in his column:

Mr Obama’s campaign always exaggerated the difference he would make on foreign policy. His style could hardly be more different from the caricature of US supremacism projected by George W. Bush, but the underlying issues were unlikely to be any easier to deal with. So it has proved. In many areas of foreign and security policy, in contrast to the clear break he is attempting in domestic policy, Mr Obama is mostly rebranding Mr Bush’s approach.

Mr Crook is absolutely right here except in his categorization of government policy as either foreign or domestic. I would say that a more accurate categorization would break foreign policy into military and trade policies while breaking domestic policy into social, monetary, and security policy. Of those categories the difference between Republican and Democratic positions are only cosmetically different on military, trade, monetary, and security policy. The only substantial difference between the two parties recently (if there is any substantial difference to be found) is in social policy.

Once upon a time the Republican party stood for something different from the Democratic party, but somewhere that changed so that functionally (meaning without regard to what both parties say) they all stand for codifying the status quo – whatever that may be on any given day.

I have some advise for a Republican party that is grasping for an identity – stand for something. Become a party of change that voters really can believe in. Everyone knows how hollow it sounds to have Republicans harping about lowering the deficit spending and not propping up "private" enterprise. It does not matter that those are good ideas that are worth standing for. In order to stand for something Republican parties around the nation need to demonstrate by their actions in those areas where they have some power (various governors and state legislatures) that they will act upon the principles that the party is vocal about. As they do that the next step should be to replace most of the Republicans in Congress with a new generation of Representatives and Senators who have not been betraying their avowed principles (or even actively standing in opposition to accepted party positions).

A clean break wtih the past and a clear adherence to party principles will be the only thing that gives the party a chance to re-emerge in its own right. Otherwise the national GOP will have to wait for people to get fed up with the foibles of the Democrats, just as they have becaome fed up wtih insincerity within the Republican ranks.

Tags change, Obama, parties, Republican

National

Half Truths

Regardless of what political agenda is being pushed I hate to see people speak or perpetuate half truths. I try very hard not to do that myself. Today I would like to tell the story of two half truths.

The second half truth is the declaration by President Obama that he intends to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term. His declaration is coupled with him reminding us of a half truth that President Bush put forward throughout his presidency – namely the fact that his military expenditures were largely left out of the regular budgeting process – relying instead on supplemental appropriations to cover the large gaps in funding the massive military missions. This declaration is made as an attempt to hide the fact that he is proposing record deficits for his entire term and there is nothing to suggest that he will ever propose anything approaching a balanced budget even if he serves two full terms.

In response to Obama’s half-truth many Republicans are perpetuating the first half-truth by sharing the following graph (or some similar variation):

Obama Budget

If we were to admit the full truth the graph would look more like this graph (which I created based on the best information I could find online without excessive research):

Obama Budget

Looking at the complete picture we see that the Bush fiscal record is 1) incomplete and 2) abused the budgetary process to obscure the financial cost of our military engagements. We also see another myth being put forward, that the extraordinary 2009 budget is attributed to Obama. The truth is that Obama took office 7 months into FY2009 and the bulk of that budget was spent by the Bush administration. On the other side, we see that Obama inflated the FY2009 budget by including the appropriations that Bush would have acquired through supplemental appropriations and by frontloading some of his new priorities so that he could claim to cut the deficit in half while running deficits that are larger than anything seen during the Bush administration.

I am convinced that any good goal has as much chance of succeeding while acknowledging the full truth than it has when only presenting half the truth. am also convinced that while both parties have been outrageously fiscally irresponsible the democratic party is even more bold about pretending that we can put that fiscal responsibility on the shoulders of generations unborn.

Tags 2009, Bush, fiscal restraint, Obama, parties

National

Define “Change”

I have come to the conclusion that I should not listen to national news – it just gets me agitated.

I was driving home listening to NPR and was treated to actual soundbites from the rallying speech that President Obama gave to the Democratic caucus meeting. I had head about that, but hearing these gems really showed that many people must mistake the fact that Obama is articulate by assuming that everything he says must therefore be intelligent and accurate.

The audio clips I heard had the president emphasizing that the people elected him (and the rest of Congress) to change the direction of the country and were not seeking "more of the same." What really got to me was this well phrased analogy:

"I don’t care whether you are driving an SUV or a hybrid, if you are headed toward a cliff you have to change direction."

He’s absolutely right. My reaction was that instead of changing direction when faced with an economic cliff, the president and Congress are accelerating and hoping to grow wings by the time they reach the edge. Let’s examine the "change" that he is promoting.

The president calls inaction irresponsible – it seems to me that inaction is not something that the Bush administration can ever be accused of. In other words inaction would probably be the clearest for of change. Last year the administration got a $150 Billion dollar stimulus bill and later received another $700 Billion to unfreeze the credit markets. That’s $850 Billion in spending last year of money that we don’t have and the result is that we are still in a recession with no end in sight. The change that Obama is promoting is something on the order of $800 Billion in new spending of money that we don’t have. I’m beginning to think the politicians really don’t know the difference between legal tender and monopoly money (too bad the IRS knows the difference all too well).

President Bush and his Republican Congress raised deficit spending to an art form. When Bush got a Democratic Congress there was no change in habits. Now President Obama and his Democratic Congress are trying to build an art acadamy around Bush’s art form – that’s not the change I was looking for.

I understand that the argument Obama is trying to make is that the country is sick and honestly needs surgury. That is an argument that I can accept. The problem is that we have already tried surgury by hatchet – it doesn’t work very well. Our Republican senators are trying to insist on using a scalpel for the surgery. Their profligate economic past opens them up to accusations of hypocrisy – and many of them might very well be acting in full hypocrisy. Regarless of how hypocritical they are being the fact is that surgury with a scalpel is safer and more likely to not kill the patient. This leads to another inconvenient truth. Assuming that the patient survives surgury (whether by hatchet or by scalpel) to get a liver transplant we need to recognize that the disease was not a bad liver, it was alcoholism. Just because you have had a transplant does not mean that it’s safe to go back to the bar.

Tags bailout, Bush, economics, legislation, media, money, Obama

culture National

Disturbing Trend

I want to be supportive of our President. I just want to make that clear because I don’t expect this post will convey that feeling.

I’m sure part of it is the spirit of partisanship, and part of it is the media propensity to focus on the scandalous, but I don’t think that any other President has had as pervasive a problem as President Obama is having in getting appointees who have not made very basic financial mistakes.

- Timothy Geithner, the Treasury Secretary owed $26K in back taxes
- Bill Richardson withdrew his name from consideration as Commerce Secretary because of a grand jury investigation into a pay-to-play scheme
- Hillary Clinton’s nomination as Secretary of State was contingent upon some disclosure issues regarding foreign donors to Bill Clinton’s foundation – her confirmation was held up by one day because of lingering concerns
- Tom Daschle will likely still become withdrew his name from consideration to become the Secretary of Health and Human Services despite the fuss about his failure to pay $140K in taxes on a political gift
- Nancy Killefer withdrew her name from filling the position of Chief Performance Officer because of failure to pay unemployment taxes for her domestic help

I’m not sure if it’s comforting or disturbing to think that this may have much less to do with poor picks by the president and more to do with the culture of "anything you can get away with is fine" in Washington.

Tags Clinton, corruption, money, Obama, political figures, taxes

culture National

Inauguration Day

After reading/hearing news coverage of today’s activities I have come to a couple of conclusions. First, I have made a goal to attend a presidential inauguration – not just the parade, but the actual swearing-in ceremony with the inaugural address. I will not be picky about what president it is because for me it will be a celebration of the office and the government of this great nation. Second, I’m sick of the news coverage. The inauguration is certainly newsworthy but aside from some brief description of the crowds, the weather, and possibly some background about previous inaugurations the only coverage that the media can really offer of any value is the text of the inaugural address. (Here’s the official copy.) Besides that nothing that is planned is particularly newsworthy out of these events.

The fact is that this very important celebration is not made more real or valuable to me by all the extra commentary (beyond what I listed above). If the media wants to cover it all day that’s fine, just roll the cameras and stream the audio but get the talking heads off the screen – they have nothing to add.

So, congratulations to President Obama. I hope he enjoys this day and then gets right to work preserving, protecting, and defending the Constitution. And if I’m very lucky I could attend an inauguration as early as 2013.

Tags holidays, media, Obama

National

FOCA

Post author By David
Post date January 16, 2009
No Comments on FOCA

My sister-in-law suggested that her generally apolitical blog was not the place to engage in a debate on abortion. She’s probably right, but such a debate fits just fine here. In many ways the debate on abortion is settled. An absolute ban on abortion is not likely to ever be a reality in this nation and truly unrestricted access to abortion is also a very low probability. Despite heated rhetoric, the fact is that both sides are entrenched and committed to making incremental gains related tot his ever simmering topic. Camille’s post was specifically about fighting the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) which Obama told Planned Parenthood he would sign as his first act as President. I think we can be very confident that it will not be his first act (because the economy is his first priority now) but that is no consolation to those who oppose this bill.

As always, I like to start with the actual legislation in question whenever possible. The claim by opponents is that this would eliminate all state and local statutes against any abortion. The text of the bill states:

Congress finds the following:

. . .

(4) The Roe v. Wade decision carefully balanced the rights of women to make important reproductive decisions with the state’s interest in potential life. Under Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, a woman’s right to choose to terminate her pregnancy is absolute only prior to fetal viability, with the state permitted to ban abortion after fetal viability except when necessary to protect the life or health of a woman.

. . .

SEC. 4. INTERFERENCE WITH REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH PROHIBITED.

(a) STATEMENT OF POLICY- It is the policy of the United States that every woman has the fundamental right to choose to bear a child, to terminate a pregnancy prior to fetal viability, or to terminate a pregnancy after fetal viability when necessary to protect the life or health of the woman.

(b) PROHIBITION OF INTERFERENCE- A government may not–

(1) deny or interfere with a woman’s right to choose–

(A) to bear a child;
(B) to terminate a pregnancy prior to viability; or
(C) to terminate a pregnancy after viability where termination is necessary to protect the life or health of the woman;

(emphasis added)

Sounds like the claim by the bills opponents is a bit overstated.

Those who support the bill obviously believe that this would remove some state and local restrictions on abortion that are unconstitutional. The problem here is that the Constitution has no position on the issue of abortion. The only restrictions on abortion related legislation are rooted in supreme court opinions. All those state and local regulations that push the boundaries are challenged in court. The language of this bill is so vague that it only reinforces the message that is supposedly set by existing rulings. In other words, all the laws that they expect to remove can already be challenged, and any that would be upheld still could be upheld when challenged.

What this bill really accomplishes is to place in a statute what has already been placed in precedent. Perhaps this is an admission by abortion proponents that the ruling in Roe v Wade is a lousy ruling that amounts to an opinion not grounded in law. Anyone who has actually read Roe can see that it’s a huge logical leap from any law then existing.

My position is that FOCA is meaningless at best and reinforces the most illegal Supreme Court ruling I have ever read at worst. After having actually read the text of FOCA (it’s not very long) if you still want to sign the petition that Camille linked to, please do. I did.

Tags connections, issues, laws, Obama, Supreme Court, unconstitutional

culture

News Fluff/Flash

Apparently the nation is very interested that Obama Predicts a Florida Victory in tonight’s BCS National Championship game – just like we were dying to know whether Obama likes the BCS system. I don’t mean to pick on these stories, but they serve as good examples of some of the thoughts I am having as I read Breaking the News. What our President-elect thinks of collegiate sports is suddenly very important despite the fact that we have no proof the Obama is any more an expert on the subject than I am. Obama is not claiming to be an expert, he’s simply offering an opinion when the question is asked because that’s what any fan would do. This really is not a problem as far as what Obama is doing, but it is indicative of a problem that is widespread through the media – all too often what gets published is fluff even when there are important issues that we should be informed about. In fact, even when the important issues are covered the result is often fluff.

Because everyone knows who Obama is it may intrigue many to know his opinions on college sports just as a matter of curiosity – nothing wrong with that. The problem is when virtually everything gets the same level of treatment, whether it’s his guess on the outcome of tonight’s game or his plan for stimulating the economy and cutting the waste out of the federal government. To a large degree, our press today had tried to reduce important offices, such as the presidency, to something that is much easier to understand and report on – celebrity.

That seems to be indicative of the major problem that is spreading through media (old and new) – there is a tendancy to publish what is easy to cover in order to make sure that something is published. I have am not immune to that urge myself. It is very difficult to maintain any influence in the conversation, or keep the attention of any regular readers, if you cannot have some level of consistency in publishing. (Note that consistency and frequency are not the same thing, although they can influence each other.) Those who write primarily for themselves may take the time to really cover an important subject with some depth. (Those tend to be my favorite kind of articles.) Those who write in any noticable degree for an audience will feel the pull to get anything out, and thus will feel the urge to look for something manageable or dependable – often fluff.

Tags media, New York Times, Obama, thoughts