Right in San Francisco

Inequality: The Obama Legacy

    The State of the Union speech really had two messages:

     1. We are faced with three years of a lame duck. President Obama will not try to work with Congress and has no illusions of accomplishing much that is significant. He has not rethought Obamacare, the NSA, tax policy, energy policy, or anything else that is holding back the economy. We can probably live with that domestically; unfortunately, President Putin, Xi Jinping, and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei of Iran also understand his powerlessness.

    2. The theme of income inequality will dominate President Obama's rhetoric, in a virtuous feedback loop with the media and the Left. The political challenge for conservatives is to preserve and enhance those institutions which make America the world's greatest "land of opportunity" while balancing personal responsibility and a "social safety net." There is much practical experience on our side.

     Some thoughts:

        1. Unemployment is the primary problem.  The poverty rate among those with full time work is 3%; for those without it is 33%. The predominant emphasis needs to be on increasing full time employment. Many of President Obama's policy positions - on energy, on taxes, on Obamacare, on the minimum wage - work against job creation.

        2. Progress has been made since Lyndon Johnson started the "War on Poverty" 50 years ago. The official poverty rate has been reduced from 19% to 15%. (Other measures show more improvement.)  For seniors, Social Security and Medicare have helped reduce it from 35% to 9%.  Opportunity has been spread more broadly with better access to education at k-12 and college levels. Racial and gender discrimination has been reduced. However, in the aggregate the ability to climb the economic ladder has remained about the same over decades. It is still hard to get off of the bottom rung and the top rung is not very crowded.

        3. The largest correlation with poverty is single parent families. When the "War on Poverty" began some 93% of babies were born into two parent families; now it is about 60%. The poverty rate for single parent families is about 37%; for two parent families it is about 7%.  Rick Santorum had it right with his advice to get an education, get a job, and get married before having kids. A leader with Obama's following could do a lot of good if he preached a bit of tough love. Good policy; bad politics; won't happen.

      4. It is a blinding flash of the (politically unspeakable) obvious that the presence of 11 million low-skilled illegal immigrants exerts a substantial downward pressure on the economic well-being of lower and lower-middle class Americans. Given enough time the growth of the economy will absorb most of the impact, but it is a significant part of the reason that the poor are where they are and the unconstrained influx must be stopped.

    5. If the public is to support a government safety net, it must contain only a minimal amount of corruption. President Obama's decision in 2012 to amend, by executive order, the work requirement of President Clinton's 1996 Welfare Reform Act went badly in the wrong direction. Ditto the loosened requirements that have seen food stamps hover around 47 million recipients - about twice the level of a decade ago. Ditto the honor system for Obamacare subsidies.   

    6. For the young American, it is not enough to get a college degree. Stories abound about the 15% of US cab drivers that have a college degree and the reality that about half of recent college graduates are not employed in jobs requiring a degree. The simple answer? Not only does more education still correlate highly with lower unemployment and higher wages, but prospects are vastly better for healthcare workers, teachers, and natural resource professionals than for artists and humanities majors. Opportunity is not only for IT workers.

    Outside of Washington - and particularly at the individual level - the inequality problem is manageable. Would that politicians were rewarded for doing what really helps rather than for soaring speeches which are calculated to divide.

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This week's video demonstrates the contrast between the receptions given by rank and file military to President Bush and President Obama. People risking their lives like to believe that their leaders are in it to win.

bill bowen - 1/31/14 

Designing the Ideal Presidential Candidate

    There is a truism in consumer product marketing that it is easier to find out what people want and make it for them than to make what you want to make and go find customers for it. Similarly in politics, with the Republican field being so wide open there is an opportunity to start with what the customers want rather than what some Party or campaign machine wants to sell. Let's paint some broad swaths.

    It is too simplistic to think that voters always want a change after eight years, but the tendency to change parties is striking. Since World War II there have been eight changes of party in presidential elections and only three transitions within the party. One of the three continuity transitions was forced - Johnson succeeded the assasinated Kennedy and was himself reelected once. (Ford succeeded the disgraced incumbent Nixon and lost on his own.) Only Truman and George HW Bush were elected to succeed an incumbent of their own party - the unusually popular Roosevelt and Reagan. Everything being nearly equal, the tie goes to the challenger party.

    According to Real Clear Politics' average,  President Obama's approvals declined from 65% to 48% in his first year, bounced along until a peak of 53% for the 2012 election, and have since dropped to about 43%, as Rasmussen's "wrong track" has generally hovered around 60%. The reasons for the decline contain the fodder for not only Republican campaign themes, but also for defining the ideal candidate, at least in terms of probability of success. For explanations, lets try (1) a stagnant economy with record low labor participation rate four and a half years years after the Great Recession officially ended; (2) a vapid foreign policy characterized by withdrawal from world leadership; (3) pitiful managerial ability painfully demonstrated by Obamacare, the runaway NSA, Fast and Furious, Benghazi, and on and on. (The Left would agree, but point to immigration reform, accountability for Wall Street, and global warming.)  Blame comes slowly, but even left-wing publications now frequently agree with the shape of the facts.

    So, the Republican candidate biography:

        - Executive experience. Probably a governor, possibly a military or business leader. We've had two terms with a junior senator with no experience with hiring and holding staff accountable (Sibelius; IRS; Benghazi), making difficult trade-offs (trillion dollar deficits without actual budgets), and making hard decisions (Afghanistan; Syria; Keystone Pipeline).

        - Personal qualities. Intelligence - at least enough to manage subordinates in a complex, unpredictable world. Integrity - if somebody tells you that you can keep your doctor, you'd better be able to keep your doctor. Gravitas - the inate tendency to be taken seriously. (Democrats would want some demographics; for Republicans, not so much.)

        - Attitudes. Belief that the United States is exceptional in world history in terms of liberty and opportunity - as well as wealth and power - and a necessary force for good in the world. It is hard to understand how we elected someone who didn't share these convictions, and we cannot affort to make that same mistake again.

        - Policies. Clear, consistent positions on the things that Middle America considers to be the most important.

             -- Domestically, a focus on getting people back to work rather than victimhood. The winner will be able to articulate how tax policy, regulatory reform, and education can drive American competitiveness and mass prosperity in the 21st Century.

            -- Internationally, rebuilding of the alliances that led to a prosperous and secure world for 60 years. The "do do rule" must be restored - what we say we will do, we do do.  

    With Reince Priebus sending out surveys asking for preferences among 32 potential candidates (oh, and asking for donations), it is helpful to start with the criteria, rather than the state of Chris Cristie's problems. With a bit of subjectivity in fitting potential candidates to the above criteria, the shopping list includes Jeb Bush, Chris Cristie, Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, Rick Perry, and Scott Walker with a potential VP nod to Nikki Haley and Susana Martinez. Any non-governor will have a large hill to climb.

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This week's video presents a sobering perspective of America's immigration policies and world poverty.

bill bowen - 1/24/14

 

President Obama's "Power of the Pen"

      Since the Republicans took over the House in 2010, there has been much talk about gridlock. In fact, the role of Harry Reid has been to prevent House bills from darkening the President's doorstep, with budgeting, prior to the past month, left to "continuing resolutions" and Obama ruling by executive order and regulation rather than trying to find common ground. With this week's braggadocio that he had a pen to sign executive orders and a phone to engage the public, Obama has called attention to his disinterest in even attempting to find areas of cooperation.

    While stories on the Internet about executive orders declaring martial law are beyond the pale, there is reason to be concerned about the Constitutional Law professor's distain for the role of Congress:

        - In Noel v Canning, the Supreme Court is considering appointments to the National Labor Relations Board made by President Obama using "recess appointments" when the Senate was technically in session - the problem being that the administration could not get confirmation of their union-favoring nominees through the Senate. The result: a likely Supreme Court decision striking down the appointments and leaving over 100 NLRB (largely pro-union) decisions in limbo.

        -  Robert Wilkins  has been appointed to the DC Appeals Court, giving Democrats a 7-4 majority on the court which deals, among other things, with the legality of federal regulations. Appointments to break a 4 to 4 tie had been held up by Senate Republicans on grounds of ideology rather than competence, but became possible in December (at least for the current Senate) when Harry Reid changed the rules to allow approval by a simple majority rather than a 60 vote hurdle. A little more ink has been added to Obama's pen.

      At least in numbers, Obama has not been out of line with his recent predecessors, issuing 35 to 40 executive orders per year, most dealing with routine functions of government.  Some decisions - such as the refusal to deport underage illegal immigrants, the modification of work requirements for welfare, and the EPAs classification of carbon dioxide as a pollutant - probably required legislation, but were not successfully challenged by Republicans. (Under the Congressional Review Act of 1996 - part of the Contract with America - significant rules must be submitted to both houses of Congress and the Government Accounting Office. Only one rule - on ergonomics - has ever been disapproved by both houses.) If Obama follows through on his most recent threat to act unilaterally on immigration and the minimum wage he would probably provoke a House reaction to little effect and lawsuits to be resolved after he is gone.   

    Equally as problematic as the administration's actions are the decisions not to act when the law would seem to call for it - the constantly changing list of exceptions and delays on Obamacare; the non-enforcement of regulations keeping the IRS out of political enforcement; the lack of personal accountability of anybody for the mortgage-driven financial meltdown of 2008. Eric Holder has certainly be an expert at selective enforcement.

    Elections do have consequences. Fortunately, what can be done by executive order can be undone by executive order. A Republican Senate would help, but real change will have to wait until the 2016 elections.

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    No video this week. Instead this link provides the Wall Street Journal / Heritage Foundation's "financial freedom" ranking of countries based on such factors as fiscal soundness, government size, and property rights. The United States has dropped out of the top 10 for the first time.  

bill bowen - 1/17/2014    

Generational Politics

    Over the holidays there were many opportunities - with kids, friends' kids, and even grandkids - to reflect on the differences of political views between generations. Winston Churchill's famous aphorism - "Show me a young Conservative and I'll show you someone with no heart. Show me an old Liberal and I'll show you someone with no brains." - sheds some light, but there is more going on here. Three points:

    In one gathering where a group of San Francisco 20 to 35 year olds were asked to explain their generation's perspectives, the themes were the technological obsolescence of their elders, universal support for the usual "social justice causes" (gay marriage, equal rights for women, help for the homeless), and their personal need to focus on careers rather than politics. Most disappointing, on the technology question the concept of content seems less important than the tools that are used. Perhaps there is a Marshall McLuhan "the medium is the message" thought here - with two inch by three inch iPhone screens and 144 character tweets it is hard to get into nuance, much less conflicting opinions. One old fogey's opinion.

    The broader question of generational differences includes Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1966) versus Generation X (about 1966 to 1985) and Generation Y/ Millenials (about 1985 to 2005), but should really begin with the World War II generation to understand how relatively trivial the later issues and accomplishments are.

    - The world as we know it was set between 1941 and 1955 by a very serious generation led by visionaries. The defeat of Hitler and Tojo; the containment of Stalin and Mao. (Visit Auschwitz or read Yevtushenko's poetry about the Russian gulag if you can contemplate alternate histories.) The peaceful reconstruction of Germany and Japan. The establishment of the UN, NATO, SEATO, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund. The GI Bill, the interstate highway system, the rise of the middle class. I like Ike.

    - The Boomers had great social upheaval fueled by opposition to the Viet Nam draft, the birth control pill, and drugs, and including the Kennedy, Kennedy, and King assasinations.  Serious stuff; less serious than the 40s, but the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 could have been much worse. By the end of Reagan's time the international game was won and the nuclear Doomsday Clock started moving backwards. The country prospered as the dominant global economic, military, and cultural power.

    - The period of Gen X coming of political age has a milestone of 9/11 2001 and its aftermath in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the NSA as well as a general drift to the left, eventually countered by the Tea Party. Big Government has continued to get bigger - Medicare Part B; Obamacare; EPA - with a two term big government Republican president followed by a two term bigger government Democrat.

    So, the question is the attitude of the Gen Y / Millenials as they achieve political maturity. Ultimately it is not about tweets and Facebook versus Pinterest or Instagram, it is about the major events shaping the world as they start to pay attention - events that transcend the editorial board at the New York Times and the writers on the Daily Show. As a start they helped elect an African American president - any African American president. Here are a few others:

    - The reemergence of the thousand year old Sunni-Shia schism in the Muslim world as the US withdraws from a leadership role in the region. Maybe some Millenials won't care since we will be much less oil dependant, but the globe continues to shrink and the reduced American stature will eventually affect our allies and our commerce. And a Persian - Arab nuclear arms race will demand attention.

    - The painfully obvious fact that with Obamacare the federal government has exceeded its ability to effectively manage, whatever one's humanistic inclinations. In time, it won't be about the web site or even the president's lies - it will be about an understanding of the limited capabilities of government.

    -  In all eras, young people like liberty, and the "out of control" NSA of the last decade has to be a major offense - all the worse because it is an abuse of their technology and adversely affects the global attractiveness of American technology leaders.

    - The unemployment scars of the Bush/Obama economy will not be as deep as those of the Great Depression, but the 10 million youths unable to find work will definitely favor policies fueling economic growth. And they will eventually feel the burden of the $17 trillion debt that we are bequeathing them.

    - Perhaps most pervasive is the cynicism spawned by an incompetent president who lied to get his signature legislation passed, is bathed in cronyism, and is not interested in actually governing.

    It is so clear that the next generation should be conservatives. We just need to figure out how to explain it to them. Now, how does that hashtag thing work?

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    This week's video is Chris Cristie's response to his "Bridgegate" scandal. While ugly, his press conference offers a sharp contrast to President Obama's response to Fast and Furious, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, the NSA spying scandal, and numberous other "the president didn't know" incidents.

bill bowen - 1/10/14     

        

 

 

 

 

   

Hillary's State Department Resume

    New Year's Resolution # 1 - No Hillary posts until something really happens. Just this one exception (kind of like the resolution about creme brule.)

    The December CNN poll showing Hillary Clinton and Chris Cristie to be statistically tied as the leading candidates for 2016 reflects the importance of name recognition, but this far in advance, not much more. What is worth a bit of attention is the formation of the "Ready for Hillary" PAC which will be a better test of whether the Clintonistas who have been in the wasteland for 13 years can scare off potential Democratic opponents - younger (Maryland Governor O'Malley; NY Governor Cuomo; Massachusetts Senator Warren) and older (VP Biden; California Governor Brown who may just have some gas left in the tank.) The answer - highly unlikely. She will have to win a real contest within the Democratic Party.

    In the Democratic primaries or against a Republican opponent, a major question will be about her accomplishments as Secretary of State. Beyond the miles, where's the beef?  

    The first test is Benghazi. Media friends at the Times have started running articles about those Republicans who "long ago abandoned common sense and good judgment in pursuit of conspiracy-mongering and an obsessive effort to discredit President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham." Long before 2016 the machine would have us forget that Hillary's State Department left the consulate poorly defended, that senior Washington leaders chose not to send reinforcements, and that the investigation was delayed and desultory. Eventually, however, the Democrat or Republican debate opponent will be able to answer the Secretary's question of "what difference does it make" whether her ambassador's killers were terrorists or "some guys out for a walk." Does the Secretary know that we still have organized deadly terrorist opponents?

    More importantly, Secretary Clinton missed all of the big international developments of President Obama's first term:

    - The Arab Spring. Indecision lost opportunities in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, and Syria.

    - Spying. From the 2010 Bradley Manning/Julian Assange Wikileaks disclosures of thousands of State Department cables to the 2012 Edward Snowden release of NSA's trove of information, the Secretary was a silent observer as American diplomacy was pummeled.

    - Wars. A failure to negotiate a "status of forces" agreement with Iraq resulted in the complete withdrawal of NATO forces and a resurgent conflict between the Sunni's and the Shia. The expanded Afghan war dragged on through Hillary's term with no clear objectives, exit plan, or diplomatic agreement with President Karzai.    

     - Russia. Hillary's term coincided with Vladimir Putin's assertion of Russian influence as we backed off on missile defenses in Eastern Europe, winced as Putin granted asylum to Snowden, gave up leadership in Syria, and eventually saw Ukraine's leadership decide to throw in their lot with Russia rather than the European Union. So much for the "re-set".  

    - East Asia. The "pivot to Asia" has had little substance as China has expanded its confrontation with Japan and Vietnam in the South China Sea. Dennis Rodman was the de facto ambassador to North Korea.

    - Iran. We missed the chance to diminish Iran's allies in Syria and Hezbollah while the nuclear program inched along until after she left office.

    - Primary allies. Relations dropped substantially with Israel, the UK (the Churchill bust as an indicator), and Canada (XL Pipeline nominally a State Department decision.) 

    There is room to argue that the passive withdrawal around the world has been the result of President Obama's view that American presence abroad is more of a problem for the world than a benefit, and that Hillary could not contradict the Commander in Chief. In some circles that will work, but "I was just following orders" does not make a great campaign slogan.

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    This week's video is a reminder of what comes with Hillary.

bill bowen - 1/3/13