There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self.
Hindu proverb
Krauthammer's Slobbering Love Affair With Post-Midterm Obama
It turned out that he got what any president would want to have for re-election. He got the middle-class cuts... ... He's willing to swallow [70 billion for the upper class] in order to get billions, tens, hundreds of billions of dollars of extra spending and other cuts and extension of the cuts he had instituted in his stimulus one...What's happened since [Krauthammer's "Comeback Kid" post]? He passed "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," something that liberals have been trying to get for 17 years, and tomorrow he's going to get a huge success, victory on the START treaty ....And this for a guy six weeks ago got absolutely slaughtered in an election with historic losses in the House. You've got to be smart to be able to pull that off.I critiqued Krauthammer's original post in last Friday's post and I don't intend to repeat here what I just wrote in the post, but in response to his decision not only to reaffirm his original conclusion but to expand on it, (John Stossel, forgive me): GIVE ME A BREAK! This goes beyond putting lipstick on a pig.
First of all, take "don't ask, don't tell": it's mostly an ideological, symbolic thing; it's not like, with nearly 10% unemployment, the military had problems staffing positions particularly well-suited to gays. Gays were NOT forbidden from servicing in the military--the policy was: just don't talk about your sexual orientation. This issue was more one of incidental individual liberties that had absolutely nothing to do with the professional duties of being a soldier. It was likely to be imposed by the courts if the Congress had not acted.
But let's face it: the Democrats had--and still have in this lame-duck Congress, massive majorities in both Houses of Congress. The only real question was whether the Senate Democrats could attract maybe a handful of 40 or 41 Republicans needed to overcome the threat of a filibuster (including Scott Brown (R-MA), whom on the record had already accepted gay marriage in his home state). I was always convinced they would do that (although I don't recall if I published that opinion). The Senate Democrats had blundered their way on the issue, trying to tie it to defense appropriations in a heavy-handed way to coax GOP votes on the issue, feeling they had a win-win politically: if the GOP voted against defense appropriations, it could be used next election... At least 3 Republicans at the time had signaled they would be willing to support a version of a standalone DADT measure but wanted a clean defense bill.
So you might ask: if they had the votes all along, why didn't they push for the bill sooner? My guess: the mid-term elections. The Democrats, concerned about their prospects during the mid-terms, probably didn't want to expose colleagues in swing districts or states, particularly given the gay marriage issue.
Second, take the START Treaty (which passed today 71-26). The fact is that arms limitation treaties have ALWAYS drawn bipartisan support. Every single living former GOP Secretary of State had endorsed the new START treaty. The only question was whether the Democrats could convince at least 9 of 42 Republicans needed to achieve the two-thirds vote necessary. The GOP senators realized the timing of the vote, once again, was primarily political in nature--a complex treaty should not be deliberated in a brief lame-duck session crammed with other pressing agenda items like taxes and budget extensions. But, Charles, let's do a reality check here: the first Start Treaty was confirmed on October 1, 1992 (NOT a lame duck Congress) by a vote of 93-9. So, yes, Obama got the confirmation by Constitutional requirements with almost a handful of votes to spare. But did this vote, where Obama received significantly less than half of the GOP, have the same bipartisan legitimacy of the first Start treaty under President GHW Bush? No.
Before Charles waxes yet more enthusiasm, let us remind him that despite huge majorities, the Democrats didn't achieve a number of long-cherished goals in this lame-duck Congress: (1) immigration reform; (2) a class-warfare tax cut extension; and (3) a $1.1T budget deal with hundreds of earmarks, instead of an extension to the next Congress, when the GOP-controlled House will have a whack at the numbers.
Even more importantly, let's look at the other things on the scoreboard where Obama failed to do during this super-majority Congress--which he will NEVER have again as President: he didn't get a health care public option or nationalization, card check, climate change, closure of Gitmo, substantive change over Bush policies in Iraq or Afghanistan, etc. After Specter defected to the Dems, giving them a veto-sustaining 60 votes, the wind was at Obama's back; Republicans were demoralized, with a number deciding to retire and clearly on the defensive. With the possible exception of the treaty, he could have moved earlier on the tax cuts and other legislation or fashioned deals more favorable to his position. He made, in my view, both a tactical and strategic error not to compromise earlier. I think if he had targeted winning maybe a third of GOP votes with certain exceptions, he would have largely co-opted the opposition.
Hugh "Politics As Usual" Jidette for President--NOT!
The national debt is being targeted by Peterson Foundation with a tongue-in-cheek Presidential candidacy of a typical pandering politician Hugh Jidette (a play on words, i.e., "huge debt"). A heartfelt THUMBS UP for the campaign!
Let Our Kids Pay from Peterson Foundation on Vimeo.
California Gets a Reality Check, but Unions Rename State "Denial"
The video below does a good job at highlighting how unions, which don't understand the meaning of the term "shared sacrifice", have been counterproductive (in fact, for their own long-term viability). No pensions will be paid when the state goes belly-up.
I have to say that if there's any Democrat whom is interesting from a tax-and-spend perspective, it's Governor-elect Jerry Brown. If there was ever an eclectic politician, it was Jerry Brown. Remember how Sarah Palin boasts of having put the governor's plane on eBay and of dismissing the governor's mansion domestic staff? In fact, Jerry Brown decided not to live in the governor's mansion during his first two terms as governor. Whereas he notoriously flip-flopped on tax-cutting Proposition 13, he was a notorious fiscal hawk as governor, even at one point holding spending under the inflation rate; he argued for lean government before Rick Santelli ever raged at Obama's morally hazardous program spending. He's advocated doing away with the Department of Education, flat-rate taxes, charter school programs, and term limits. (However, he is far from conservative on a number of issues, e.g., his refusal to defend Proposition 8 which restored the traditional definition of marriage, various environmental issues, etc. I remember listening to his election night address and heard so much progressive spin that within 30 seconds I had to mute the TV.)
If California has any prayer--after the census showed California's population growth stagnant over the past decade and many business migrating to more business-friendly Texas (with no state income tax)--Brown is going to have to become the kind of fiscal conservative the Governator never was--and he's going to have to jawbone the very unions for which he's heavily indebted for his election.
Perhaps the People's Republic of California couldn't understand an Austrian accent, but if it was Governor Guillemette, there would have been a very tough negotiation. For example, just to throw out a number, I would tell all current pensioners, effectively immediately, you are capped at $15K yearly. Period. You pay 50% of your health care. Period. Argue and the cap goes down $1000 and your health care share goes up 5% each iteration. You must be 65 to qualify for pension benefits. Period. Argue, and it goes up 1 year per iteration. For workers under the age of 50, you are now in a defined contribution plan and we match up to 3% of your annual salary. You will be credited with the net present value of 3% of your original salary/year for each year of tenure. All teachers earning more than the median income will have compensation frozen immediately, and teachers with 30 years of experience will be offered a buyout equal to a full year of base compensation salary (I would offer merit-based or market-based (e.g., math/science) exceptions). No more 6-figure salaries or compensation for ANY public servant, no time-and-a-half, no double-dipping.
I bet if any California progressive or union official read the above, their heads would have already exploded by now. I'm sure unions would scream contracts and threaten lawsuits. Make my day; I would outrace them to the courtroom. The progressives have made that state insolvent, and if I had to get a California initiative passed or to go court to nullify unsustainable contracts, I would do it--the votes of unemployed private-sector people, without similar tenure, pay or benefits, count as much as those of union members. I need lower taxes to rebuild the economy, and I need to cover past debt and at the same time maintain essential services. I would make sure I get my veto-sustaining legislative partners elected, and I will make each super-spending liberal eat any spending bill without REAL cuts (none of this symbolic "we'll take it out of the annual spending increase" crap). I would jawbone each California legislator, telling them to treat each dollar spent as one their own kids and grandkids will have to pay off in an even tougher economy.
Of course, I probably couldn't get elected to my local school board. (I'm sure the fact that I'm unmarried and don't have kids would be held against me...) And if I ever ran for a national or statewide election, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh would attack me as a "RINO" and most of my blog posts (that's probably good enough for a 20% bump in the polls...) But I defy any reader of this blog to say that I'm wishy-washy or engaging in political spin.
Political Humor
"A lot of companies had their Christmas parties tonight. A lot of people couldn't make it because their company is in India." –Jay Leno
[Well, employees did get a nice electronics gift for Christmas, but nobody understands the Chinese instructions, not even the Indian call center...]
"The WikiLeaks guy is under house arrest with a strict curfew. If there's anything a guy who leaks secret government documents respects, it's a curfew." –David Letterman
[It wasn't going to be house arrest until Julian Assange showed the judge his own file. Assange is allowed to have house guests, so long as he wears an American-made condom to deal with his own leak problem...]
Musical Interlude: Holiday Tunes
Bing Crosby, "I Wish You a Merry Christmas"
