One year ago I wrote a post entitled, seven years of the Bush economy.
Well, today it's time to update and close the book on it. Of course there are those who will point out that eight years ago today the economy was slowing down and heading towards a recession and they are right. But it is hardly like the economy that George Bush is handing the keys to, to Barack Obama is a model of stability. In fact if anything the numbers look much, much worse today than they did eight years ago. But so be it. Fairly or not, January 20th is more than just a symbolic date. It is the day in which total control over the Presidency passes in its completeness from one President to the next. And so, let's look at the same metrics we did a year ago: the stock market, the dollar/euro exchange rate, net job creation, the spot price of oil and the national debt.
The stock market closed on January 20, 2001 at 10,587.60. It's last close before January 20, 2009 is 8281.22. I will update this number tomorrow so we have consistency and post it as the final number for Bush (or start of Obama.) HERE IS THE UPDATE: IF I USED IT CONSISTENTLY WITH THE WAY I USED THE 1/20/01 CLOSE, IT WOULD BE 7949.09. BUT EVEN IF WE KEEP THE OLD NUMBER the stock market under Bush has fallen a net 22% over the past eight years. AND YES, IT DID NOW CLOSE AT 7949.09. FROM NOW ON IT'S OBAMA'S MARKET. If it's still below 8,000 by 2012 you are welcome to stuff this post back in my face. But I expect him to succeed and it will go up significantly from 7949.09 by then.
And 22% in eight years is enough that Bush apologists can't blame it on the 2002 recession, Clinton's economic policies or 9/11. The truth is, if you were heavily invested in the U.S. stock market in 2001, you probably have lost money. And the decision by Congress not to tie Social Security to the stock market looks to have been a very wise one. T-bonds may be boring, but they haven't lost money.
On January 20, 2001 it cost $.94 to buy one euro (in fact it got as low as eighty-three cents later on that summer.) Right now it costs $1.32 to buy one euro. True that this is better than the price of $1.45 that it was a year ago, but it is a fact that you would have made just better than a 40% profit over the past eight years if you had at the start of the Bush administration simply traded all your dollars in for euros and hidden the euros in your mattress. A lot better than losing 22 percent in the stock market.
Over the course of eight years, George W. Bush presided over the net creation of 3.8 million jobs. This averages out to less than 40,000 per month (vs. an average of over 200,000 per month over the preceding eight years.) Again, Bush apologists like to not count the loss of 2.8 million during the first two years of the Bush Presidency, and blame that on Clinton. But if it is then what would they say about current projections that the U.S. could lose even more than that many jobs over the next two years, and if it doesn't it will likely be due to government jobs created under the Obama stimulus plan? Again-- January 20 is the day of the handover. Any other date you choose to compare is arbitrary-- but then you take ownership of that much of the coming economy as well. Further, even using numbers from the truncated middle part of the Bush administration when we were not in a recession-- about 8.5 million created in four years, Bush still falls short of the monthly average over all eight years of the Clinton administration. No matter how you slice it, the Bush economy did very poorly in terms of job creation.
Price of crude oil: Was $25.98 per barrel eight years ago, and is $34.20 today. This is the one number where Bush is much better off today than he was last year. And if it had simply increased from $25.98 to $34.20 in eight years I'd be the first one to say the President Bush deserved credit for keeping oil prices under control. Only, he can't get credit for that since as recently as this summer it was pushing above $140 a barrel, and the resulting record gasoline prices delivered a hammer blow to an already soft economy over the summer. Further, much of the decline is credited to falling demand caused by the fact that millions fewer people are on the road going to work, because they don't have jobs to go to. The wild price gyrations have also played havoc with everything from the energy resale markets to automobile sales.
The national debt has increased from 5.8 trillion dollars to (including bailouts): 11.8 trillion dollars. In other words, it has more than doubled. Or in other words, Bush ran up more accumulated debt than every President combined from George Washington through his father (the reason I don't include Clinton in that is because the national debt actually experienced a slight decline under Clinton.)
Of course another dodge that Bush apologists often use is to argue that the President and his administration don't really have much effect on the economy. That is of course ridiculous. Even ignoring the fact that trillions of dollars in spending are controlled by the Government, some Government policies that influence the economy include tax policy, monetary policy, energy policy, trade policy, labor policy, regulatory policy and immigration policy. Funny to hear conservatives who scream about how bad tax increases, minimum wage hikes or pollution controls will be for the economy, suddenly switch gears when we are talking about Bush and saying that his policies had no effect on the economy. Clearly, they did, and clearly it was not the effect they had intended.
I did not include unemployment of course in the post a year ago and was (incorrectly) challenged on it. So I will mention it here: When Bush took office, the unemployment rate was 4.2% It is now pushing past seven percent. So Bush benefits by the fact that I didn't include it as one of my metrics.
The simple fact is that the Bush economy was spectacularly bad-- both from an historical perspective and when taken on its own. Of the five original metrics I used, only one-- crude oil prices-- looks good for Bush, and that only if you ignore the intervening history. And eight years is long enough that excuses aren't good enough. Any President can have a bad year or even a bad term, but this guy has owned most of the decade of the 2000's. And his economy has failed.
Showing posts with label George Bush. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George Bush. Show all posts
Monday, January 19, 2009
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Bush throws a 'Hail Mary'
Most Presidents, ten days before the end of their administration, would be busy packing, signing letters of reference for their staff, soliciting donors for their Presidential libraries, figuring out who they want to pardon,...
That's what most outgoing Presidents would be doing.
But then George W. Bush is one of a kind (thank God for that.)
In just his last ten days in office, he's looking to spend another third of a trillion dollars.
Specifically, he's asking Congress for the other half of the $700 billion TARP bailout fund. Recall that when the bill was passed, it was carefully divided into two halves-- half for Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to pass around, and half that would be appropriated after the new administration took office. Bush and Paulson have exhausted their half.
Congressional Democrats were notified Friday afternoon by the White House that they could get a request soon for the second half of the allocated bailout funds. Once Congress receives the request for the money, both chambers can try to block the release of the money if they do so within an expedited time frame....
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed unhappiness with the way Treasury used the first $350 billion to capitalize banks. Specifically, they object to how Treasury made investments with few strings attached and no process for tracking how the banks are using the money.
They also are unhappy that none of the $350 billion allocated to date has been used to prevent foreclosures.
No, instead of using them to help ordinary Americans, banks and other corporations that received Federal bailout funds with no strings attached used them for, among other things, a posh party thrown for AIG executives at a resort in California and the swallowing up of smaller but solvent banks by larger ones, a taxpayer-funded orgy of a short and nostalgic return to the era of 'mergers and acquisitions.' That's what banks used to do when they had money, and nobody bothered to make sure they wouldn't spend Federal funds to do the same thing again.
In fact, virtually the only part of the first half that was given with any real strings attached was the final $14 billion, given as a loan to the auto industry.
So now, Bush is claiming that he needs the other $350 billion. But he's not saying anything about who he plans to give it to, or why they need it. If there is another imminent financial crisis about to happen, then I want to know what my $1,000 share of that debt is being spent on. Not so some bank can buy some other bank, or so insurance executives can go to a spa and get me to pay for their pedicure. If the roof is about to cave in, and it can't wait for ten days, then I want to know why and how much it is going to cost. If absolutely necessary then release exactly what is needed and send it directly to the recipient-- with a clearly stated itemization of how it will be spent. But that's all. Don't hand Bush another $350 billion. The way he spends money, it will all be gone even faster than he will be.
Who is he looking to pay off, anyway?
That's what most outgoing Presidents would be doing.
But then George W. Bush is one of a kind (thank God for that.)
In just his last ten days in office, he's looking to spend another third of a trillion dollars.
Specifically, he's asking Congress for the other half of the $700 billion TARP bailout fund. Recall that when the bill was passed, it was carefully divided into two halves-- half for Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to pass around, and half that would be appropriated after the new administration took office. Bush and Paulson have exhausted their half.
Congressional Democrats were notified Friday afternoon by the White House that they could get a request soon for the second half of the allocated bailout funds. Once Congress receives the request for the money, both chambers can try to block the release of the money if they do so within an expedited time frame....
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed unhappiness with the way Treasury used the first $350 billion to capitalize banks. Specifically, they object to how Treasury made investments with few strings attached and no process for tracking how the banks are using the money.
They also are unhappy that none of the $350 billion allocated to date has been used to prevent foreclosures.
No, instead of using them to help ordinary Americans, banks and other corporations that received Federal bailout funds with no strings attached used them for, among other things, a posh party thrown for AIG executives at a resort in California and the swallowing up of smaller but solvent banks by larger ones, a taxpayer-funded orgy of a short and nostalgic return to the era of 'mergers and acquisitions.' That's what banks used to do when they had money, and nobody bothered to make sure they wouldn't spend Federal funds to do the same thing again.
In fact, virtually the only part of the first half that was given with any real strings attached was the final $14 billion, given as a loan to the auto industry.
So now, Bush is claiming that he needs the other $350 billion. But he's not saying anything about who he plans to give it to, or why they need it. If there is another imminent financial crisis about to happen, then I want to know what my $1,000 share of that debt is being spent on. Not so some bank can buy some other bank, or so insurance executives can go to a spa and get me to pay for their pedicure. If the roof is about to cave in, and it can't wait for ten days, then I want to know why and how much it is going to cost. If absolutely necessary then release exactly what is needed and send it directly to the recipient-- with a clearly stated itemization of how it will be spent. But that's all. Don't hand Bush another $350 billion. The way he spends money, it will all be gone even faster than he will be.
Who is he looking to pay off, anyway?
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Spending so fast we can even bust the national debt clock ahead of schedule.
This week the national debt clock in New York exceeded the number of digits it was designed for (picture.) There is now a '1' reading in the place reserved for the dollar sign while someone has glued a handmade dollar sign next to the 1.
The sign is maintained by a private foundation and was originally put in place almost two decades ago when the national debt was around two trillion dollars. It is due to be replaced in 2009 with a new sign, presumably one in which the ten trillions place will be represented by a digit. During the late 1990's when the nation regularly ran a budget surplus, the clock was even turned off for a couple of years (I guess it's not programed to run backwards.)
When President Bush was inaugurated in 2001, the national debt was $5.8 trillion. So in his seven plus years he has nearly doubled it.
That's the price of 'fuzzy math' (as he accused Al Gore of.) He thinks he is being a 'fiscal conservative' because he can cut a million or two here and there for the national parks, but has had no problem with tossing around trillions like they were play money (a trillion in tax cuts, a trillion for Iraq and another trillion in corporate welfare for the pharmaceutical industry courtesy of the prescription drug 'benefit' that Bush and Congressional Republicans passed in 2003.
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
Nothing new to tell me how John McCain's plan would be any different from what got us here
What really stuck out to me from last night's debate is that in the face of the global economic crisis, Senator McCain couldn't suggest anything other than tax cuts (mainly oriented towards the wealthy) and his stale old economic plan that looks almost indistiguishable from George Bush's economic plan.
If tax cuts were the secret to prosperity then you'd think after the $1.3 trillion Bush tax cut plan that was passed in March 2001, we'd all be flying high by now. I guess you can judge how high you are flying (AIG execs attending their taxpayer funded 'retreat' and others with golden parachutes excepted, of course.) We will be paying for the Bush tax cuts for generations to come.
But in fact, even during the most prosperous years of the Bush administration 200,000 jobs created in a month was considered 'good.' But that was less than the monthly average during the Clinton years. So let's get this straight-- the best that George Bush's economy could do anytime during his term was below Clinton's average.
And Senator Obama was right-- real incomes have gone down. He offers a different plan, one that is oriented towards making sure that ordinary people have what they need to survive, whether it is help with their mortgages or whether it is health insurance they can afford.
Some may call that socialism. So be it. Call it what you want, but it's obvious that after trying conservatism and massive tax cuts for eight years and seeing where that led us, maybe a dose of European-style socialism doesn't sound all that bad anymore. They are having the economic crisis in Europe like they are having it here (inevitable in a global economy) but at least in Europe nobody is afraid they might get sick and not be able to afford the doctor.
If tax cuts were the secret to prosperity then you'd think after the $1.3 trillion Bush tax cut plan that was passed in March 2001, we'd all be flying high by now. I guess you can judge how high you are flying (AIG execs attending their taxpayer funded 'retreat' and others with golden parachutes excepted, of course.) We will be paying for the Bush tax cuts for generations to come.
But in fact, even during the most prosperous years of the Bush administration 200,000 jobs created in a month was considered 'good.' But that was less than the monthly average during the Clinton years. So let's get this straight-- the best that George Bush's economy could do anytime during his term was below Clinton's average.
And Senator Obama was right-- real incomes have gone down. He offers a different plan, one that is oriented towards making sure that ordinary people have what they need to survive, whether it is help with their mortgages or whether it is health insurance they can afford.
Some may call that socialism. So be it. Call it what you want, but it's obvious that after trying conservatism and massive tax cuts for eight years and seeing where that led us, maybe a dose of European-style socialism doesn't sound all that bad anymore. They are having the economic crisis in Europe like they are having it here (inevitable in a global economy) but at least in Europe nobody is afraid they might get sick and not be able to afford the doctor.
Monday, September 22, 2008
The price of a missed opportunity
I'd like to take you back for a moment, to a time when American policy makers faced an enormous decision.
The time was during the spring of 2002. Following the September 11 attacks, the U.S. had assembled a truly international coalition (remember the world was on our side at that time) to go after al-Qaeda and their Taliban allies in Afghanistan. In an extraordinarily brilliant operation we had driven al-Qaeda from their stronghold in Tora Bora and by working with local warlords had driven the Taliban into a small sliver of mountains and caves in southwest-central Afghanistan.
Though nothing is ever perfect, we won a smashing victory by January of 2002. The one blunder we made was in contracting local Afghan forces to go in and finish off bin Laden instead of doing it ourselves, and he apparently still had either the influence or the money to make his way through their lines. But bin Laden and al-Qaeda were effectively non-entities and the only real question was how long he could stay ahead of our dragnet. We had at that time the full cooperation of the Pakistani military as well. The warlords and other Afghans who had chafed under the rule of the Taliban were glad enough to be gone from it, and the future looked pretty bright.
But then George Bush decided to essentially leave things as they were in Afghanistan, leaving only enough forces there to carry on a war of attrition and he turned our attention to Iraq.
The first major American politician to speak out against the change was Al Gore. He made it clear in the summer of 2002 that we should finish the job in Afghanistan and that it was a mistake to take our eye off the ball. So Republicans accused Gore of playing politics with national security so he could run for President in 2004. Gore responded by making a statement that he would not seek the Presidency in 2004 and continued to press for finishing the job in Afghanistan. I think this is why Republicans so detest Al Gore, more so than pretty much any other Democratic politician (even Bill Clinton.) It is clear that this one area of disagreement would likely have defined where a Gore Presidency would have diverged from the events of the Bush Presidency, and every day that goes by with more bad news from Afghanistan makes it clear that Gore was onto something.
Since then we've seen a muscular re-emergence of the Taliban. The local warlords (who have dubious loyalty to begin with and can be easily bought) began to reconsider their allegiances (why stick with us when it was clear that we were no longer prioritizing them?) The U.S. and our Afghan allies have pretty much become restricted to the cities and military bases, and control only the countryside they are patrolling in, and when they leave it reverts to Taliban control (President Mohammed Karzai has been derisively referred to as 'the mayor of Kabul,' a poke at how far his authority extends.) I've said it before and I've said it again-- the situation we now find ourselves in in Afghanistan is exactly the situation the Soviet Union found itself in during the 1980's. To most Afghans, we have become the Soviet Union.
More ominously the Taliban have strengthened themselves in Pakistan as well as Afghanistan. With the unpopular Musharraf dictatorship itself stirring up opposition to its rule (and by implication support for Islamicists) our best hope for a reliable ally in the war against terror was former Prime Minister Benizir Bhutto. But she was killed, and it is still unknown exactly who was responsible and whether the failure of Pakistan's intelligence service to protect her was by design or incompetence. After seven years of war the Pakistani military and intelligence service, always full of Islamist sympathizers, have lost patience with America and now are led by a weak civilian government that is a very very questionable ally. There is ample reason to suspect that bin Laden and the rest of the al-Qaeda leadership now resides on the Pakistani side of the border. We've conducted more and more raids into Pakistan. The Pakistanis say they want advance notice, but with their intel service rife with Taliban informants we might as well CC al-Qaeda directly if we plan to tell the Pakistanis what we are doing. This week things came to an ugly, ugly head. A massive truck bomb at the Marriott hotel killed scores of people. It is clearly the work of either al-Qaeda or the Taliban (does it even matter anymore which one?) The target was twofold: a clear message to the Pakistani government that they are in grave danger if they continue to work with the Americans at all (a message they appear to have gotten with their first action to kick out the FBI and announce they will run the investigation themselves) and to western interests in Pakistan directly-- obviously the Marriott is an American hotel chain and this one was a favorite of western diplomats and media members, some of whom are among the victims.
Most worrisome of all, Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Right now there is no reason to believe that any Islamicists have access to their nuclear arsenal, but with the situation deteriorating as it is, can anyone be confident that they won't have such access soon? If the specter of a nuclear cloud over an American city courtesy of a weapon smuggled in by terrorists was used to scare people into supporting the Iraq war, perhaps by allowing al-Qaeda and the Taliban to recover in Afghanistan and then expand over the border and establish themselves so strongly in Pakistan the Bush administration has in fact brought that specter far closer to reality than you or I want to imagine.
Now let's concede for the moment that after five long years of war Iraq appears to be stabilized. It won't become a Jeffersonian democracy to be sure, but we have routed al-Qaeda in Iraq (recall that while Saddam Hussein didn't want any organization operating in Iraq that he didn't control, bin Laden sent Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to Baghdad in December 2002 when war was imminent officially to seek dental treatment but in fact to begin organizing al-Qaeda in Iraq.) The Sunnis and Shiites are not carrying out ethnic cleansing anymore. And we know for sure that Saddam's alleged WMD stockpile was a ruse designed to maintain his internal power and scare his blood enemy the Iranians.
But let's say Iraq is a success. Forget for a moment the five years of war there, or the trillion dollar pricetag or the 4,000 American soldiers who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq. There is just one question. is there ANYTHING AT ALL we gain from Iraq that makes it worth the price of letting our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan escape the noose and grow back as they have? With Pakistan and its nukes now part of the equation, the answer is clearly no.
The best evidence that conservatives know they have screwed up is found in the stretching they go through to justify their ill-fated decision to shift focus. The last time I put up a post on the Afghan situation they kept alluding to the losses al-Qaeda and the Taliban have taken since we went to war on October 7, 2001. Point conceded (though they've never been as strong in Pakistan as they are today.) But that argument misses the point. By January 2002 they were driven back to near total defeat. That was when we took our foot off their neck instead of finishing the job. And as a result they are now a virulent cancer, and in a political climate there where our options are far worse than they were at the time. To claim that because they are weaker now than they were on September 11 so we need not worry is like claiming that because Russia is weaker now than the Soviet Union was during the height of the Cold War therefore there is nothing to fear from Putin. Obviously there is a lot to fear from Putin (the past couple of months should have made that clear) and there is a lot to fear from the Taliban and AQ.
Leaving the root of the weed in the ground instead of finishing it off will likely go down as the most consequential decision of the Bush Presidency, and I only hope that the next President will figure out a way to put together a plan that really does get rid of them once and for all.
The time was during the spring of 2002. Following the September 11 attacks, the U.S. had assembled a truly international coalition (remember the world was on our side at that time) to go after al-Qaeda and their Taliban allies in Afghanistan. In an extraordinarily brilliant operation we had driven al-Qaeda from their stronghold in Tora Bora and by working with local warlords had driven the Taliban into a small sliver of mountains and caves in southwest-central Afghanistan.
Though nothing is ever perfect, we won a smashing victory by January of 2002. The one blunder we made was in contracting local Afghan forces to go in and finish off bin Laden instead of doing it ourselves, and he apparently still had either the influence or the money to make his way through their lines. But bin Laden and al-Qaeda were effectively non-entities and the only real question was how long he could stay ahead of our dragnet. We had at that time the full cooperation of the Pakistani military as well. The warlords and other Afghans who had chafed under the rule of the Taliban were glad enough to be gone from it, and the future looked pretty bright.
But then George Bush decided to essentially leave things as they were in Afghanistan, leaving only enough forces there to carry on a war of attrition and he turned our attention to Iraq.
The first major American politician to speak out against the change was Al Gore. He made it clear in the summer of 2002 that we should finish the job in Afghanistan and that it was a mistake to take our eye off the ball. So Republicans accused Gore of playing politics with national security so he could run for President in 2004. Gore responded by making a statement that he would not seek the Presidency in 2004 and continued to press for finishing the job in Afghanistan. I think this is why Republicans so detest Al Gore, more so than pretty much any other Democratic politician (even Bill Clinton.) It is clear that this one area of disagreement would likely have defined where a Gore Presidency would have diverged from the events of the Bush Presidency, and every day that goes by with more bad news from Afghanistan makes it clear that Gore was onto something.
Since then we've seen a muscular re-emergence of the Taliban. The local warlords (who have dubious loyalty to begin with and can be easily bought) began to reconsider their allegiances (why stick with us when it was clear that we were no longer prioritizing them?) The U.S. and our Afghan allies have pretty much become restricted to the cities and military bases, and control only the countryside they are patrolling in, and when they leave it reverts to Taliban control (President Mohammed Karzai has been derisively referred to as 'the mayor of Kabul,' a poke at how far his authority extends.) I've said it before and I've said it again-- the situation we now find ourselves in in Afghanistan is exactly the situation the Soviet Union found itself in during the 1980's. To most Afghans, we have become the Soviet Union.
More ominously the Taliban have strengthened themselves in Pakistan as well as Afghanistan. With the unpopular Musharraf dictatorship itself stirring up opposition to its rule (and by implication support for Islamicists) our best hope for a reliable ally in the war against terror was former Prime Minister Benizir Bhutto. But she was killed, and it is still unknown exactly who was responsible and whether the failure of Pakistan's intelligence service to protect her was by design or incompetence. After seven years of war the Pakistani military and intelligence service, always full of Islamist sympathizers, have lost patience with America and now are led by a weak civilian government that is a very very questionable ally. There is ample reason to suspect that bin Laden and the rest of the al-Qaeda leadership now resides on the Pakistani side of the border. We've conducted more and more raids into Pakistan. The Pakistanis say they want advance notice, but with their intel service rife with Taliban informants we might as well CC al-Qaeda directly if we plan to tell the Pakistanis what we are doing. This week things came to an ugly, ugly head. A massive truck bomb at the Marriott hotel killed scores of people. It is clearly the work of either al-Qaeda or the Taliban (does it even matter anymore which one?) The target was twofold: a clear message to the Pakistani government that they are in grave danger if they continue to work with the Americans at all (a message they appear to have gotten with their first action to kick out the FBI and announce they will run the investigation themselves) and to western interests in Pakistan directly-- obviously the Marriott is an American hotel chain and this one was a favorite of western diplomats and media members, some of whom are among the victims.
Most worrisome of all, Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Right now there is no reason to believe that any Islamicists have access to their nuclear arsenal, but with the situation deteriorating as it is, can anyone be confident that they won't have such access soon? If the specter of a nuclear cloud over an American city courtesy of a weapon smuggled in by terrorists was used to scare people into supporting the Iraq war, perhaps by allowing al-Qaeda and the Taliban to recover in Afghanistan and then expand over the border and establish themselves so strongly in Pakistan the Bush administration has in fact brought that specter far closer to reality than you or I want to imagine.
Now let's concede for the moment that after five long years of war Iraq appears to be stabilized. It won't become a Jeffersonian democracy to be sure, but we have routed al-Qaeda in Iraq (recall that while Saddam Hussein didn't want any organization operating in Iraq that he didn't control, bin Laden sent Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to Baghdad in December 2002 when war was imminent officially to seek dental treatment but in fact to begin organizing al-Qaeda in Iraq.) The Sunnis and Shiites are not carrying out ethnic cleansing anymore. And we know for sure that Saddam's alleged WMD stockpile was a ruse designed to maintain his internal power and scare his blood enemy the Iranians.
But let's say Iraq is a success. Forget for a moment the five years of war there, or the trillion dollar pricetag or the 4,000 American soldiers who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in Iraq. There is just one question. is there ANYTHING AT ALL we gain from Iraq that makes it worth the price of letting our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan escape the noose and grow back as they have? With Pakistan and its nukes now part of the equation, the answer is clearly no.
The best evidence that conservatives know they have screwed up is found in the stretching they go through to justify their ill-fated decision to shift focus. The last time I put up a post on the Afghan situation they kept alluding to the losses al-Qaeda and the Taliban have taken since we went to war on October 7, 2001. Point conceded (though they've never been as strong in Pakistan as they are today.) But that argument misses the point. By January 2002 they were driven back to near total defeat. That was when we took our foot off their neck instead of finishing the job. And as a result they are now a virulent cancer, and in a political climate there where our options are far worse than they were at the time. To claim that because they are weaker now than they were on September 11 so we need not worry is like claiming that because Russia is weaker now than the Soviet Union was during the height of the Cold War therefore there is nothing to fear from Putin. Obviously there is a lot to fear from Putin (the past couple of months should have made that clear) and there is a lot to fear from the Taliban and AQ.
Leaving the root of the weed in the ground instead of finishing it off will likely go down as the most consequential decision of the Bush Presidency, and I only hope that the next President will figure out a way to put together a plan that really does get rid of them once and for all.
Friday, September 19, 2008
An idea for Federal bailouts: let We the People keep 20%
For a change, it looks like George W. Bush did the right thing. Not that he had a lot of choice.
We came remarkably close earlier this week to a repeat of the events of 1929. Bush, whose legacy is already about as bad as it could be, along with his two biggest economic appointees-- Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, was faced with a stark choice between being Herbert Hoover or Franklin Roosevelt.
He and Bernanke and Paulson picked Roosevelt and moved to have the Federal Government aggressively intervene in the banking system to stave off a collapse. Things had gotten so bad at one point this week that investors were actually paying money to park their investments in safe treasury bonds, the first time since the great Depression that the effective interest rate on any kind of federal note had been negative.
A lot of pro-deregulation market oriented conservatives howled at the price tag of the federal bailout-- maybe as high as a trillion dollars. It joins the Iraq war and the medicare prescription drug handout to the pharmaceutical industry as trillion dollar debt busters that the Bush administration has given us. Unlike the first two however this one is absolutely necessary. Without it, well we'd be stuck in 1929 and all that that would augur for a very bleak future.
That isn't to say though that we should just let things go on as business as usual.
To start with, there is some outrage to go around. For instance, here are some golden parachute numbers, for CEO's of firms that failed monumentally:
Stanley O'Neill, Merrill Lynch: $161 million.
Jimmy Cayne, Bear Stearns: $61.3 million (plus another $4 million plus in J.P. Morgan stock, the company that ended up absorbing Bear Stearns.)
Michael Perry, IndyMac Bank: $37.5 million
Richard Fuld, Lehman Brothers: $22 million
Robert Willumstad (AIG July-Sept. 2008): $7 million
Martin Sullivan (AIG 2005-2008): $47 million
I'm sure I could run any bank into the ground as well as these guys did. Why can't I get that kind of cash?
Here is the good golden parachute news:
Daniel Mudd, Fannie Mae: $0
Richard Syron, Freddie Mac: $0.
Federal regulators, thanks to the hybrid nature of the companies to begin with, were able to ensure that Mudd's and Syron's golden parachutes failed to deploy. Chalk up two big wins for Federal control.
Beyond that, it is abundantly clear that the 'free market' that American conservatives like to sing about, really means that the rewards are private, but the risk is the responsiblity of all of us. Some hardcore ideologues on the right have been speaking out against the bailouts this week suggesting that we should just let the whole system fail and come crashing down. I guess they wouldn't have a problem with us going back to the 1930's when millions of ordinary people lived under bridges and ate boiled weeds for dinner but I do have a problem with that. Rather, I believe that since ultimately we as a society are on the hook for the long term stability of our economy anyway, and that the economy is tied to the stability of these banks, we should share in the rewards that come with this risk.
I don't necessarily mean through higher taxes either. Some are right that if you tax wealth then the wealthy will find and exploit loopholes to escape taxes. That's not a reason to give up on getting them to pay their fair share in taxes but it does mean that we can't expect to count on taxation of companies who can certainly employ enough lobbyists to create all the loopholes they need as the only answer here.
Nor does regulation provide the answer (though I do agree that we will need to take a look at tightening regulation). We already know that even as these institutions and banks were failing they employed armies of lobbyists and made millions of dollars in campaign contributions all over Washington so it's a fact that regulations can be skirted or rewritten over time (as institutional memories of why they were there in the first place fade).
And yeah, I'd love to see Washington ban corporate lobbyists but you and I both know that isn't going to happen anytime soon, or if it does there will be some loophole left open so they can still funnel money to candidates. So let's talk about practical solutions here, not pie-in-the-sky pledges to 'change Washington' as a way to prevent another crisis originating on Wall Street.
No, what I propose is very simple and straightforward. If the Federal Government is going to effectively back up institutions and banks that make risky decisions and then step in and absorb the fallout when the risks become reality, then we (collectively, as taxpayers) should share in the rewards. Let the Treasury Department hang onto a share-- say in the 10-20% range-- of stock in the company, and mandate that this stock remain under the control of the Federal government for at least 20 years after any bailout. That way if and when the company regains profitability then We the People will get a direct return on our 'investment' (made as it was under the darkest of circumstances.)
This may be criticized as 'socialistic' but let's face it-- the bailout and takeover of Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and AIG are nothing else. Maintaining a 20% federal ownership of companies like these actually would achieve three goals: 1. it would over time pay us all back as a society so that we wouldn't just be paying out good money for bad, 2. it would help stabilize the share price as the company clawed its way back, and 3. while 20% isn't a majority and the major decisions would ultimately be left to the rest of the investors and the CEO they appoint, it's a big enough piece that the government would have a lot of input. Treasury Secretaries are by nature a cautious bunch so having a representative of the treasury department representing taxpayer interests in a corporate boardroom meeting might influence those decisions in a more cautious direction but clearly that isn't such a bad thing.
And then once 20 years are past, the treasury department could slowly release our shares onto the open market, using the profits to pay off our own national debt or to pay for other spending (possibly reducing the need to collect taxes from the rest of us.)
We came remarkably close earlier this week to a repeat of the events of 1929. Bush, whose legacy is already about as bad as it could be, along with his two biggest economic appointees-- Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, was faced with a stark choice between being Herbert Hoover or Franklin Roosevelt.
He and Bernanke and Paulson picked Roosevelt and moved to have the Federal Government aggressively intervene in the banking system to stave off a collapse. Things had gotten so bad at one point this week that investors were actually paying money to park their investments in safe treasury bonds, the first time since the great Depression that the effective interest rate on any kind of federal note had been negative.
A lot of pro-deregulation market oriented conservatives howled at the price tag of the federal bailout-- maybe as high as a trillion dollars. It joins the Iraq war and the medicare prescription drug handout to the pharmaceutical industry as trillion dollar debt busters that the Bush administration has given us. Unlike the first two however this one is absolutely necessary. Without it, well we'd be stuck in 1929 and all that that would augur for a very bleak future.
That isn't to say though that we should just let things go on as business as usual.
To start with, there is some outrage to go around. For instance, here are some golden parachute numbers, for CEO's of firms that failed monumentally:
Stanley O'Neill, Merrill Lynch: $161 million.
Jimmy Cayne, Bear Stearns: $61.3 million (plus another $4 million plus in J.P. Morgan stock, the company that ended up absorbing Bear Stearns.)
Michael Perry, IndyMac Bank: $37.5 million
Richard Fuld, Lehman Brothers: $22 million
Robert Willumstad (AIG July-Sept. 2008): $7 million
Martin Sullivan (AIG 2005-2008): $47 million
I'm sure I could run any bank into the ground as well as these guys did. Why can't I get that kind of cash?
Here is the good golden parachute news:
Daniel Mudd, Fannie Mae: $0
Richard Syron, Freddie Mac: $0.
Federal regulators, thanks to the hybrid nature of the companies to begin with, were able to ensure that Mudd's and Syron's golden parachutes failed to deploy. Chalk up two big wins for Federal control.
Beyond that, it is abundantly clear that the 'free market' that American conservatives like to sing about, really means that the rewards are private, but the risk is the responsiblity of all of us. Some hardcore ideologues on the right have been speaking out against the bailouts this week suggesting that we should just let the whole system fail and come crashing down. I guess they wouldn't have a problem with us going back to the 1930's when millions of ordinary people lived under bridges and ate boiled weeds for dinner but I do have a problem with that. Rather, I believe that since ultimately we as a society are on the hook for the long term stability of our economy anyway, and that the economy is tied to the stability of these banks, we should share in the rewards that come with this risk.
I don't necessarily mean through higher taxes either. Some are right that if you tax wealth then the wealthy will find and exploit loopholes to escape taxes. That's not a reason to give up on getting them to pay their fair share in taxes but it does mean that we can't expect to count on taxation of companies who can certainly employ enough lobbyists to create all the loopholes they need as the only answer here.
Nor does regulation provide the answer (though I do agree that we will need to take a look at tightening regulation). We already know that even as these institutions and banks were failing they employed armies of lobbyists and made millions of dollars in campaign contributions all over Washington so it's a fact that regulations can be skirted or rewritten over time (as institutional memories of why they were there in the first place fade).
And yeah, I'd love to see Washington ban corporate lobbyists but you and I both know that isn't going to happen anytime soon, or if it does there will be some loophole left open so they can still funnel money to candidates. So let's talk about practical solutions here, not pie-in-the-sky pledges to 'change Washington' as a way to prevent another crisis originating on Wall Street.
No, what I propose is very simple and straightforward. If the Federal Government is going to effectively back up institutions and banks that make risky decisions and then step in and absorb the fallout when the risks become reality, then we (collectively, as taxpayers) should share in the rewards. Let the Treasury Department hang onto a share-- say in the 10-20% range-- of stock in the company, and mandate that this stock remain under the control of the Federal government for at least 20 years after any bailout. That way if and when the company regains profitability then We the People will get a direct return on our 'investment' (made as it was under the darkest of circumstances.)
This may be criticized as 'socialistic' but let's face it-- the bailout and takeover of Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and AIG are nothing else. Maintaining a 20% federal ownership of companies like these actually would achieve three goals: 1. it would over time pay us all back as a society so that we wouldn't just be paying out good money for bad, 2. it would help stabilize the share price as the company clawed its way back, and 3. while 20% isn't a majority and the major decisions would ultimately be left to the rest of the investors and the CEO they appoint, it's a big enough piece that the government would have a lot of input. Treasury Secretaries are by nature a cautious bunch so having a representative of the treasury department representing taxpayer interests in a corporate boardroom meeting might influence those decisions in a more cautious direction but clearly that isn't such a bad thing.
And then once 20 years are past, the treasury department could slowly release our shares onto the open market, using the profits to pay off our own national debt or to pay for other spending (possibly reducing the need to collect taxes from the rest of us.)
Friday, September 05, 2008
unemployment figures highlight Bush-McCain economic failures.
Today we found out that unemployment in August shot up to 6.1%. This is up more than a full percentage point since April, representing literally millions of people out of work.
Job losses were widespread. Unlike in past months when they have been concentrated in manufacturing and construction, we are now seeing job losses in retail and other services. People are just buying what they have to and nothing more.
So what is John McCain's plan? For starters, he said nothing specific about it in his speech on Thursday. He pledged to cut taxes and cut spending. Yeah. Wasn't this the Bush approach? The Bush tax cuts (which McCain has flip-flopped on, going from opposing them when they were passed to now supporting their extension) achieved an enormous budget deficit which led to a weakening dollar, the subsidizing of companies to build new factories in Asia to which they sent American jobs, and reckless investment in the housing bubble which turned out to be built on sand and destroyed the savings and jobs of millions of Americans when it came crashing down.
He really doesn't plan to do anything about the economy, except the same things as Bush has.
We can't afford four more years of this kind of failed policy.
Job losses were widespread. Unlike in past months when they have been concentrated in manufacturing and construction, we are now seeing job losses in retail and other services. People are just buying what they have to and nothing more.
So what is John McCain's plan? For starters, he said nothing specific about it in his speech on Thursday. He pledged to cut taxes and cut spending. Yeah. Wasn't this the Bush approach? The Bush tax cuts (which McCain has flip-flopped on, going from opposing them when they were passed to now supporting their extension) achieved an enormous budget deficit which led to a weakening dollar, the subsidizing of companies to build new factories in Asia to which they sent American jobs, and reckless investment in the housing bubble which turned out to be built on sand and destroyed the savings and jobs of millions of Americans when it came crashing down.
He really doesn't plan to do anything about the economy, except the same things as Bush has.
We can't afford four more years of this kind of failed policy.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
And this is an accomplishment he's PROUD of?
President Bush went to his last G-8 summit this week, and spent the week with other leaders of developed countries discussing a variety of topics, not the least of which was curbing the emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants. Of course President Bush has always been the one sticking his foot in the way of any real attempt to do anything about pollution. So when it was over, as his successor will go to the next G-8 summit, he decided to say goodbye to his old (and some new) partners.
"Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter," said the President with a broad grin on his face.
And just to show what a huge accomplishment he thought that was he gave it some extra emphasis.
He then punched the air while grinning widely, as the rest of those present including Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy looked on in shock.
Some joke, huh? And just a day after the White House had to issue an official apology to Italy after President Bush was given travel notes describing Italy as a 'country known for corruption and vice.'
Of course this isn't the first time that Bush has embarrassed America at the G-8 summit. Remember two years ago when he goosed Angela Merkel in an episode that was so bizarre that I still have trouble comprehending it (though it's been hard to not notice that since then Merkel, who was elected as a Bush ally, has been noticeably cool toward Bush and kept her distance from him.)
I've watched lots of Presidents, including some conservative Presidents who I disagreed with, like Nixon, Reagan and Bush's father. But I've never seen a President who has so consistently been a poor representative of our country on international trips (and that's even counting the time when Jimmy Carter vomited in the lap of the prime minister of Japan after eating sushi.) Bush's behavior is strange, bizarre and disjointed. The only thing I wonder about is whether he behaves that way all the time, just that on these international trips it's harder for his handlers to keep it under wraps.
"Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter," said the President with a broad grin on his face.
And just to show what a huge accomplishment he thought that was he gave it some extra emphasis.
He then punched the air while grinning widely, as the rest of those present including Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy looked on in shock.
Some joke, huh? And just a day after the White House had to issue an official apology to Italy after President Bush was given travel notes describing Italy as a 'country known for corruption and vice.'
Of course this isn't the first time that Bush has embarrassed America at the G-8 summit. Remember two years ago when he goosed Angela Merkel in an episode that was so bizarre that I still have trouble comprehending it (though it's been hard to not notice that since then Merkel, who was elected as a Bush ally, has been noticeably cool toward Bush and kept her distance from him.)
I've watched lots of Presidents, including some conservative Presidents who I disagreed with, like Nixon, Reagan and Bush's father. But I've never seen a President who has so consistently been a poor representative of our country on international trips (and that's even counting the time when Jimmy Carter vomited in the lap of the prime minister of Japan after eating sushi.) Bush's behavior is strange, bizarre and disjointed. The only thing I wonder about is whether he behaves that way all the time, just that on these international trips it's harder for his handlers to keep it under wraps.
Saturday, April 19, 2008
McCain has nothing to say about Social Security. But he's already said enough.
In 2005, President Bush introduced a plan to borrow $2 trillion to begin privatizing Social Security. He told us that if Social Security was left as it is now then it would begin running a deficit in 2014 and become insolvent by 2042.
Well, that failed. The President was actually completely correct about the crisis that Social Security is facing, but his solution to privatize the system would have done little to prevent its impending collapse while putting at risk the retirement income of millions of people.
So how does the man who wants to succeed him as Republican nominee and President feel about the issue?
Well, I went to John McCain's website and in his 'search this site' button I typed in, "social security" and well,
what I get is:
"No documents were found."
Frankly it is frightening that a man who wants to be President of the United States has so little to say about Social Security that the two words don't appear together even one time on his website.
Luckily though there is a record of what he thinks.
On April 1, 1998 he voted, "Yes" to Senate concurrent resolution 86 which would have set up private accounts using the then-surplus.
And in the New York Times on January 11, 2000, an article about McCain's plans for Social Security said:
McCain will present today his first comprehensive plan for apportioning the spoils of the nation’s current prosperity, calling for. a program to shore up Social Security through the establishment of individual retirement accounts. McCain also specifically allocates money to help Medicare, which like Social Security faces a financial shortfall as the population ages. He calls for workers to have the option of investing at least 20% of their Social Security payroll taxes in private accounts.
In a 1999 Fox News interview McCain was quoted as saying,
Allow people to invest part of their taxes earmarked for Social Security to investment, in investments of their choice. I am convinced that that will make the Social Security system solvent.
In 2005, McCain supported the Bush initiative.
In a GOP debate in Orlando, Florida on October 21, 2007, he was quoted as saying
It's got to be bipartisan. And you have to go to the American people and say we won't raise your taxes. We need personal savings accounts, but we got to fix this system.
He wants it to be bipartisan, and his language is a bit more nuanced, but it's clear that he still hasn't given up on privatization.
Now I know why he hasn't said anything at all this year about Social Security. If he hadn't thought about such a major issue, I'd question his qualifications to be President. But he's thought plenty about it, and he appears to agree with President Bush on it. So I'm not questioning whether he's qualified, but rather I'm questioning whether his failure to put in on his website is because he knows darn good and well that many people would view his plans as extreme, as well they should.
Well, that failed. The President was actually completely correct about the crisis that Social Security is facing, but his solution to privatize the system would have done little to prevent its impending collapse while putting at risk the retirement income of millions of people.
So how does the man who wants to succeed him as Republican nominee and President feel about the issue?
Well, I went to John McCain's website and in his 'search this site' button I typed in, "social security" and well,
what I get is:
"No documents were found."
Frankly it is frightening that a man who wants to be President of the United States has so little to say about Social Security that the two words don't appear together even one time on his website.
Luckily though there is a record of what he thinks.
On April 1, 1998 he voted, "Yes" to Senate concurrent resolution 86 which would have set up private accounts using the then-surplus.
And in the New York Times on January 11, 2000, an article about McCain's plans for Social Security said:
McCain will present today his first comprehensive plan for apportioning the spoils of the nation’s current prosperity, calling for. a program to shore up Social Security through the establishment of individual retirement accounts. McCain also specifically allocates money to help Medicare, which like Social Security faces a financial shortfall as the population ages. He calls for workers to have the option of investing at least 20% of their Social Security payroll taxes in private accounts.
In a 1999 Fox News interview McCain was quoted as saying,
Allow people to invest part of their taxes earmarked for Social Security to investment, in investments of their choice. I am convinced that that will make the Social Security system solvent.
In 2005, McCain supported the Bush initiative.
In a GOP debate in Orlando, Florida on October 21, 2007, he was quoted as saying
It's got to be bipartisan. And you have to go to the American people and say we won't raise your taxes. We need personal savings accounts, but we got to fix this system.
He wants it to be bipartisan, and his language is a bit more nuanced, but it's clear that he still hasn't given up on privatization.
Now I know why he hasn't said anything at all this year about Social Security. If he hadn't thought about such a major issue, I'd question his qualifications to be President. But he's thought plenty about it, and he appears to agree with President Bush on it. So I'm not questioning whether he's qualified, but rather I'm questioning whether his failure to put in on his website is because he knows darn good and well that many people would view his plans as extreme, as well they should.
Friday, April 18, 2008
Bush proposal on global warming too little, too late.
President Bush, after finally acknowleging the fact of global warming in the face of overwhelming scientific evidence in favor of it, is offering a proposal that will slow down the rate of growth of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. and finally in twenty years lead to a reduction in such gases.
That is a small step in the right direction, but it is indeed a small one. There is a concern here that if we sign onto Bush's plan then the next President could be hamstrung by it. I suggest that we go ahead until next year and let the next President decide what kind of plan he or she wants to put together, and move forward with that plan.
That is a small step in the right direction, but it is indeed a small one. There is a concern here that if we sign onto Bush's plan then the next President could be hamstrung by it. I suggest that we go ahead until next year and let the next President decide what kind of plan he or she wants to put together, and move forward with that plan.
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
The size of the army
During the recent discussion on Iraq and Afghanistan, we are being confronted again with a hard, cold reality-- that we simply do not have enough ground troops to fully cover the manpower needs of both wars (and you can forget about the idea that our military, at least in terms of being able to invade and occupy yet another country, is an effective deterrent anymore to Iran or anyone else who wishes to pull our tail.
Republicans often love to point out that the military was downsized after the end of the Cold War during the early 1990's and blame Democrats. That is at best an oversimplification however and at worst an outright revision of history. Following the end of the Cold War, the idea of a 'peace dividend' in which less would be spent on the military in the absence of the Soviet threat was widely bandied about Washington by politicians on both the left and the right. In hindsight, it may have been naive to suppose that there would not be other threats, and to fail to anticipate the threat from Islamic extremism, but it is certainly not anything that our friends on the right warned us about back then any more than anyone on the left assumed this would be a problem moving forward. And further, the military of the 1990's was plenty big enough to handle minor crises and wars in places like Haiti and the Balkans.
Since 2003, when we put Afghanistan on the back burner and invaded Iraq though we've had a consistent manpower shortage. The army has struggled to meet recruiting goals, tours have been extended, we've sent national guard units to fight in frontline combat operations in much higher numbers than we ever had before, we've 'stop-lossed' thousands of soldiers who were due to leave the army and some people are back in Iraq on their third and fourth tours. And recently it has become even clearer, as the administration has all but admitted that we don't have enough troops for Afghanistan because of how many are tied up in Iraq.
There was also a mini-scandal of sorts that came out this week in that it turns out the number of new recruits who have 'waivers' allowing them to join the army despite juvenile convictions or other issues has jumped from about 5% of all new recruits in 2004-2005 to a rate so far this year running at around 13%. For the record, that doesn't bother me at all since I believe that many young people make mistakes when they are younger and I don't believe that getting busted for underage drinking, drug use or some other petty crime in high school should disqualify someone who wants to turn his or her life around from doing so in the military.
We can still bomb the heck out of anyone who gets in our way but in the kinds of guerilla wars we find ourselves fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, overwhelming air superiority is at best only a minor benefit. In fact, this points out one of the basic problems we've had. We still spend as much as twenty times as much on our military as any other country in the world. So funding isn't the issue. But we've bought far too much expensive military hardware that has little use in today's wars, while neglecting the most basic of resources-- the 'boots on the ground.' We still have thousands of nuclear warheads, including those in storage, but not enough feet with boots on them. Some of this has to do with the structure of Washington itself-- makers of expensive planes and other high-tech equipment have a whole lot more lobbying muscle in Washington than does anyone whose priority is simply to make sure that we have a military tuned to the demands of the present and foreseeable future.
It is also true that during the 2004 campaign John Kerry promised that if elected he would authorize and expansion of the army to include the creation of two new combat divisions. George Bush was asked about it once during the campaign and said he'd 'consider it.' Unfortunately Bush won that election, and whether for reasons of pride (because the idea originated with his opponent) or because he is too dumb to realize the urgent need for a larger ground army, he never followed up on the proposal. Of course it takes time to authorize, pay for, recruit, train and equip a larger army (not that much time though-- in WWII we trained, equipped, won the war and had them back home in less than four years.) But had the President borrowed a good idea from his opponent and asked for the two divisions back when he began his second term they would be well on the way towards being usable and giving us the capability to fight two ground-intensive wars that we now lack.
I don't believe that we have to spend any more money to get a larger military either. I believe that instead of spending over a billion dollars on a single bomber, we should maybe look at reprioritizing our military budget and prioritize towards having more ground troops available and fully trained and equipped.
Republicans often love to point out that the military was downsized after the end of the Cold War during the early 1990's and blame Democrats. That is at best an oversimplification however and at worst an outright revision of history. Following the end of the Cold War, the idea of a 'peace dividend' in which less would be spent on the military in the absence of the Soviet threat was widely bandied about Washington by politicians on both the left and the right. In hindsight, it may have been naive to suppose that there would not be other threats, and to fail to anticipate the threat from Islamic extremism, but it is certainly not anything that our friends on the right warned us about back then any more than anyone on the left assumed this would be a problem moving forward. And further, the military of the 1990's was plenty big enough to handle minor crises and wars in places like Haiti and the Balkans.
Since 2003, when we put Afghanistan on the back burner and invaded Iraq though we've had a consistent manpower shortage. The army has struggled to meet recruiting goals, tours have been extended, we've sent national guard units to fight in frontline combat operations in much higher numbers than we ever had before, we've 'stop-lossed' thousands of soldiers who were due to leave the army and some people are back in Iraq on their third and fourth tours. And recently it has become even clearer, as the administration has all but admitted that we don't have enough troops for Afghanistan because of how many are tied up in Iraq.
There was also a mini-scandal of sorts that came out this week in that it turns out the number of new recruits who have 'waivers' allowing them to join the army despite juvenile convictions or other issues has jumped from about 5% of all new recruits in 2004-2005 to a rate so far this year running at around 13%. For the record, that doesn't bother me at all since I believe that many young people make mistakes when they are younger and I don't believe that getting busted for underage drinking, drug use or some other petty crime in high school should disqualify someone who wants to turn his or her life around from doing so in the military.
We can still bomb the heck out of anyone who gets in our way but in the kinds of guerilla wars we find ourselves fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, overwhelming air superiority is at best only a minor benefit. In fact, this points out one of the basic problems we've had. We still spend as much as twenty times as much on our military as any other country in the world. So funding isn't the issue. But we've bought far too much expensive military hardware that has little use in today's wars, while neglecting the most basic of resources-- the 'boots on the ground.' We still have thousands of nuclear warheads, including those in storage, but not enough feet with boots on them. Some of this has to do with the structure of Washington itself-- makers of expensive planes and other high-tech equipment have a whole lot more lobbying muscle in Washington than does anyone whose priority is simply to make sure that we have a military tuned to the demands of the present and foreseeable future.
It is also true that during the 2004 campaign John Kerry promised that if elected he would authorize and expansion of the army to include the creation of two new combat divisions. George Bush was asked about it once during the campaign and said he'd 'consider it.' Unfortunately Bush won that election, and whether for reasons of pride (because the idea originated with his opponent) or because he is too dumb to realize the urgent need for a larger ground army, he never followed up on the proposal. Of course it takes time to authorize, pay for, recruit, train and equip a larger army (not that much time though-- in WWII we trained, equipped, won the war and had them back home in less than four years.) But had the President borrowed a good idea from his opponent and asked for the two divisions back when he began his second term they would be well on the way towards being usable and giving us the capability to fight two ground-intensive wars that we now lack.
I don't believe that we have to spend any more money to get a larger military either. I believe that instead of spending over a billion dollars on a single bomber, we should maybe look at reprioritizing our military budget and prioritize towards having more ground troops available and fully trained and equipped.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Patrolling in Kabul is 'romantic?' Either the President is delusional or kinky in a very strange way.
Well we now know what President Bush's definition of 'romantic' is. serving in the Afghan war.
I must say, I'm a little envious," Bush said. "If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed.
"It must be exciting for you ... in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You're really making history, and thanks," Bush said.
Yeah. uh-huh. If he was younger he'd serve. This from a guy who pulled strings to get out of going to Vietnam.
Not seeing your family for months on end, patrolling streets half a world away and hoping not to encounter any suicide bombers along the way, or at least hoping that if there are any then you will find them before they find you. Seeing blood and death and carnage. Wondering why the administration didn't put in enough troops at the outset to do more than turn Afghanisan into an endless war of attrition against an enemy with a steady stream of recruits. Going to bed each night with the realization that you've cheated death once again and the time until you see your family again is one day shorter.
There are a lot of words that kind of image conjures up in my mind, but 'romantic' isn't one of them.
I must say, I'm a little envious," Bush said. "If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed.
"It must be exciting for you ... in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You're really making history, and thanks," Bush said.
Yeah. uh-huh. If he was younger he'd serve. This from a guy who pulled strings to get out of going to Vietnam.
Not seeing your family for months on end, patrolling streets half a world away and hoping not to encounter any suicide bombers along the way, or at least hoping that if there are any then you will find them before they find you. Seeing blood and death and carnage. Wondering why the administration didn't put in enough troops at the outset to do more than turn Afghanisan into an endless war of attrition against an enemy with a steady stream of recruits. Going to bed each night with the realization that you've cheated death once again and the time until you see your family again is one day shorter.
There are a lot of words that kind of image conjures up in my mind, but 'romantic' isn't one of them.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Meet Mr. McCain-- part I (the conservative Republican)
The media likes to harp on John McCain as some kind of a 'moderate' (not a conservative). And recently he has been only reluctantly accepted by many conservatives while others have continued to whine about his getting the nomination. They claim that because of his support and authorship of a few specific bills that McCain is 'not a true conservative.'
Well, they don't need to worry. He is. And trust me, by the time the election rolls around all or virtually all of the conservatives will be back on board. President Bush already is, and has been lavish in his praise of the man who gave his former rival, Bush, the notorious 'Hug' at the 2004 GOP convention:
Don't ever forget that hug, because it makes it clear like nothing else ever could who McCain's master is, and where his loyalty lies. The trick will be to get people tho believe that McCain is some kind of a 'moderate' to realize that he isn't.
Start with the fact that McCain has a lifetime 82% rationg from the American Conservative Union. This puts him much more in line with most Senate Republicans than it does with 'moderates.' McCain has a 100% anti-choice voting record in the Senate and uniformly supports any kind of a bill that opposes abortion. Of course hardcore conservatives like to harp on the fact that he hasn't supported amending the Constitution to make abortion illegal, but part of the reason is because McCain is smart enough to realize that such an amendment (just like an anti-gay marriage amendment) is a pipe dream that would never be ratified by the legislatures in 3/4 of the states, as required by law. So he instead pushes legislation to make it as restrictive as possible.
Further, when asked about Supreme Court nominees, McCain recently asserted his support of the Bush nominees on the Supreme Court, especially Chief Justice John Roberts. He disparaged Justice Antonin Scalia for 'wearing his conservatism on his sleeve.' This upset some talk show hosts but the truth of the matter is that if McCain appoints judges like John Roberts-- quiet conservatives who keep their conservatism hidden deep down in their vest pockets-- the result will be the same as if he appointed a loudmouth like Scalia. So look at what happens: John McCain is portrayed as a moderate, but the result if he is elected is that we will get more consevative judges.
John McCain has long opposed what he sees as 'pork' spending. Of course most so-called 'pork' is money that is invested in projects, especially in rural areas, which help people and communities but might not be affordable without the federal support. Recently though he has in fact redoubled his attacks and suggested that he will if he is President simply veto bills that have 'pork' in them, regardless of whether they are worthwhile projects or not.
Now granted, one could ask the 'anti-pork' crusader whether President Bush should have vetoed his own bill that directed $10 million to create the William H. Rehnquist Center here in Arizona (memorializing another arch-conservative Supreme Court justice who McCain admires a great deal.) But certainly his promise to blanket veto spending on such projects is hardly 'moderate.' It could be justified as hard-nosed fiscal responsibility though, if it weren't for his stance on the Bush tax cuts. Though McCain, still angry over his 2000 loss to Bush opposed the Bush tax cuts in 2001, he now supports making them permanent. And of course that will cost the government far more in revenue that the relative trifle he plans to save with his vetoes.
Health care? Well, just read what John McCain's own website says about it (if you dig deep enough and scroll down to near the bottom.)
Reform the tax code to eliminate the bias toward employer-sponsored health insurance, and provide all individuals with a $2,500 tax credit ($5,000 for families)
Now, the average family insurance policy now costs in excess of $12,000. So in other words, McCain plans to discourage your employer from continuing to offer you insurance, and replace it with a tax credit for less than half of what the premium is now (so if your employer pays half your premium now, then you will be $1,000 in the hole.) And of course if you or a family member has health issues like being a cancer survivor or having a chronic illness or disability then your premium will go much, much higher (if you can buy insurance at all once your employer quits covering you) but Mr. McCain's partial tax subsidy won't rise to cover it. So the bottom line is that the McCain plan will create more uninsured than there are now. Yup, that's what conservatives do too.
Above all, McCain is a strong conservative on foreign policy, especially the Iraq war. McCain is the chairman of the Board of Directors for the International Republican Insitute (IRI). The IRI is a para-governmental organization which was originally founded by Jeanne Kirkpatrick and other conservatives during the Reagan administration to provide a counter to Jimmy Carter's work certifying foreign elections. It found a new lease on life during the Bush administration. Because it is not a governmental agency, the IRI can conduct foreign policy (including setting up elections and educating foreign voters and perhaps less laudible goals than that-- including spreading American-style conservatism) where direct involvement by the State Department could violate U.S. or foreign laws. A quick glance at the full membership of the Board of Directors shows that in addition to McCain, it includes Paul Bremer (the first U.S. ambassador to Iraq during the war), Bush I-era cronies Brent Scowcroft and Lawrence Eagleburger, former GOP chairman Frank Fahrenkopf and three other sitting or former Congressmen or Senators (all Republicans) and various members of the military-industrial complex.
McCain voted enthusiastically for the AUMF in October 2002 and was a supporter of the 'surge' from its opening days. He has spared no expense, supporting close to a trillion dollars in new Iraq spending (all while grousing about a few million in 'pork'; well, McCain recently admitted that he didn't understand economics.) McCain recently said that he is willing to stay in Iraq for a hundred years (Yikes!) So it is obvious that on the Iraq war, a McCain administration would be another four years of the Bush administration.
Part of the appeal that John McCain has to independents and moderates is that they don't see him as being as 'bad' as other Republicans.
Well, he is every bit as bad. Maybe he can see the benefits of working with Democrats on a handful of issues that will get him a lot of press, but on the issues that count, he's still just as conservative. And like his 'huggy buddy' McCain gets stuck on an issue, and he is a stubborn jackass who won't change his mind even when everyone can see that he is wrong.
So don't be fooled by John McCain. He's a conservative. He's just a smart enough conservative that he knows how to play the media game and once in a while keep up appearances. But his supporters in Virginia who the other night when he finally won the primary broke into chants of, 'four more years,' know better. They are Bush backers, and this year McCain is their man.
Well, they don't need to worry. He is. And trust me, by the time the election rolls around all or virtually all of the conservatives will be back on board. President Bush already is, and has been lavish in his praise of the man who gave his former rival, Bush, the notorious 'Hug' at the 2004 GOP convention:
Don't ever forget that hug, because it makes it clear like nothing else ever could who McCain's master is, and where his loyalty lies. The trick will be to get people tho believe that McCain is some kind of a 'moderate' to realize that he isn't.
Start with the fact that McCain has a lifetime 82% rationg from the American Conservative Union. This puts him much more in line with most Senate Republicans than it does with 'moderates.' McCain has a 100% anti-choice voting record in the Senate and uniformly supports any kind of a bill that opposes abortion. Of course hardcore conservatives like to harp on the fact that he hasn't supported amending the Constitution to make abortion illegal, but part of the reason is because McCain is smart enough to realize that such an amendment (just like an anti-gay marriage amendment) is a pipe dream that would never be ratified by the legislatures in 3/4 of the states, as required by law. So he instead pushes legislation to make it as restrictive as possible.
Further, when asked about Supreme Court nominees, McCain recently asserted his support of the Bush nominees on the Supreme Court, especially Chief Justice John Roberts. He disparaged Justice Antonin Scalia for 'wearing his conservatism on his sleeve.' This upset some talk show hosts but the truth of the matter is that if McCain appoints judges like John Roberts-- quiet conservatives who keep their conservatism hidden deep down in their vest pockets-- the result will be the same as if he appointed a loudmouth like Scalia. So look at what happens: John McCain is portrayed as a moderate, but the result if he is elected is that we will get more consevative judges.
John McCain has long opposed what he sees as 'pork' spending. Of course most so-called 'pork' is money that is invested in projects, especially in rural areas, which help people and communities but might not be affordable without the federal support. Recently though he has in fact redoubled his attacks and suggested that he will if he is President simply veto bills that have 'pork' in them, regardless of whether they are worthwhile projects or not.
Now granted, one could ask the 'anti-pork' crusader whether President Bush should have vetoed his own bill that directed $10 million to create the William H. Rehnquist Center here in Arizona (memorializing another arch-conservative Supreme Court justice who McCain admires a great deal.) But certainly his promise to blanket veto spending on such projects is hardly 'moderate.' It could be justified as hard-nosed fiscal responsibility though, if it weren't for his stance on the Bush tax cuts. Though McCain, still angry over his 2000 loss to Bush opposed the Bush tax cuts in 2001, he now supports making them permanent. And of course that will cost the government far more in revenue that the relative trifle he plans to save with his vetoes.
Health care? Well, just read what John McCain's own website says about it (if you dig deep enough and scroll down to near the bottom.)
Reform the tax code to eliminate the bias toward employer-sponsored health insurance, and provide all individuals with a $2,500 tax credit ($5,000 for families)
Now, the average family insurance policy now costs in excess of $12,000. So in other words, McCain plans to discourage your employer from continuing to offer you insurance, and replace it with a tax credit for less than half of what the premium is now (so if your employer pays half your premium now, then you will be $1,000 in the hole.) And of course if you or a family member has health issues like being a cancer survivor or having a chronic illness or disability then your premium will go much, much higher (if you can buy insurance at all once your employer quits covering you) but Mr. McCain's partial tax subsidy won't rise to cover it. So the bottom line is that the McCain plan will create more uninsured than there are now. Yup, that's what conservatives do too.
Above all, McCain is a strong conservative on foreign policy, especially the Iraq war. McCain is the chairman of the Board of Directors for the International Republican Insitute (IRI). The IRI is a para-governmental organization which was originally founded by Jeanne Kirkpatrick and other conservatives during the Reagan administration to provide a counter to Jimmy Carter's work certifying foreign elections. It found a new lease on life during the Bush administration. Because it is not a governmental agency, the IRI can conduct foreign policy (including setting up elections and educating foreign voters and perhaps less laudible goals than that-- including spreading American-style conservatism) where direct involvement by the State Department could violate U.S. or foreign laws. A quick glance at the full membership of the Board of Directors shows that in addition to McCain, it includes Paul Bremer (the first U.S. ambassador to Iraq during the war), Bush I-era cronies Brent Scowcroft and Lawrence Eagleburger, former GOP chairman Frank Fahrenkopf and three other sitting or former Congressmen or Senators (all Republicans) and various members of the military-industrial complex.
McCain voted enthusiastically for the AUMF in October 2002 and was a supporter of the 'surge' from its opening days. He has spared no expense, supporting close to a trillion dollars in new Iraq spending (all while grousing about a few million in 'pork'; well, McCain recently admitted that he didn't understand economics.) McCain recently said that he is willing to stay in Iraq for a hundred years (Yikes!) So it is obvious that on the Iraq war, a McCain administration would be another four years of the Bush administration.
Part of the appeal that John McCain has to independents and moderates is that they don't see him as being as 'bad' as other Republicans.
Well, he is every bit as bad. Maybe he can see the benefits of working with Democrats on a handful of issues that will get him a lot of press, but on the issues that count, he's still just as conservative. And like his 'huggy buddy' McCain gets stuck on an issue, and he is a stubborn jackass who won't change his mind even when everyone can see that he is wrong.
So don't be fooled by John McCain. He's a conservative. He's just a smart enough conservative that he knows how to play the media game and once in a while keep up appearances. But his supporters in Virginia who the other night when he finally won the primary broke into chants of, 'four more years,' know better. They are Bush backers, and this year McCain is their man.
Monday, January 21, 2008
Seven years of the Bush economy
Yesterday marked seven years since George W. Bush took office. And one year from today someone else will take over and inherit a far different country than the one that President Bush took over on January 20, 2001.
In Biblical times (and more recently as apprenticeships) seven years was the standard period of servitude, and after seven years it was long enough to assess whether someone had done a good job or a poor one.
I could do a very broad post, touching on everything from war to crime and academic performance, but I will limit this post to looking at that most basic of issue, the economy (which ultimately is what everything else sooner or later rides on).
The fact of the matter is that today, on the seventh anniversay of President Bush's inauguration, the Bush record on the economy is just not good. Some years have been better or worse but let's just look at the whole.
Taking a look at some numbers:
On January 20, 2001 the Dow stood at 10,587.60, so where it is today represents an average yearly growth rate of just over 2%. In other words, the average boring, conservative bond fund outperformed the market average.
Or better yet, invest in foreign funds:
On January 20, 2001 it cost $0.9400 to buy one euro. Today it costs $ 1.4482 to buy one euro.
George W. Bush has presided over the creation of a net eight million jobs in seven years. Which means he will have to create twelve million more just this year just to catch up with his predecessor. Put another way, if the economy adds 200,000 jobs in a month that is now considered good news, while it was considered a mediocre month during the Clinton years.
On January 20, 2001 the spot price for a barrel of crude was $25.98. That has practically quadrupled in seven years. And it is with the deepest irony that one remembers the response during the 2000 election season to criticism that George Bush and Dick Cheney were both oil men was that some on the right suggested that oil men would understand the industry and know how to keep down energy prices for the rest of us.
The national debt has increased from $5.8 trillion to almost nine trillion dollars.
It is true that Bush has one more year to serve. But that is not very promising, with the most optimistic outlook for this year being only that we avoid a recession.
In Biblical times (and more recently as apprenticeships) seven years was the standard period of servitude, and after seven years it was long enough to assess whether someone had done a good job or a poor one.
I could do a very broad post, touching on everything from war to crime and academic performance, but I will limit this post to looking at that most basic of issue, the economy (which ultimately is what everything else sooner or later rides on).
The fact of the matter is that today, on the seventh anniversay of President Bush's inauguration, the Bush record on the economy is just not good. Some years have been better or worse but let's just look at the whole.
Taking a look at some numbers:
On January 20, 2001 the Dow stood at 10,587.60, so where it is today represents an average yearly growth rate of just over 2%. In other words, the average boring, conservative bond fund outperformed the market average.
Or better yet, invest in foreign funds:
On January 20, 2001 it cost $0.9400 to buy one euro. Today it costs $ 1.4482 to buy one euro.
George W. Bush has presided over the creation of a net eight million jobs in seven years. Which means he will have to create twelve million more just this year just to catch up with his predecessor. Put another way, if the economy adds 200,000 jobs in a month that is now considered good news, while it was considered a mediocre month during the Clinton years.
On January 20, 2001 the spot price for a barrel of crude was $25.98. That has practically quadrupled in seven years. And it is with the deepest irony that one remembers the response during the 2000 election season to criticism that George Bush and Dick Cheney were both oil men was that some on the right suggested that oil men would understand the industry and know how to keep down energy prices for the rest of us.
The national debt has increased from $5.8 trillion to almost nine trillion dollars.
It is true that Bush has one more year to serve. But that is not very promising, with the most optimistic outlook for this year being only that we avoid a recession.
Friday, December 28, 2007
President is doing the right thing by vetoing bill.
It is exceedingly rare that I agree with George W. Bush, and even more so that I agree with him or say he is right about anything pertaining to Iraq, but I will say that he is right in his statement that he will veto the defense spending bill, depsite provisions (which everyone agrees are sorely needed) increasing soldiers' pay and spending more on veterans funding.
At issue is a provision in the bill which would allow survivors or relatives of victims of atrocities committed by the regime of Saddam Hussein to sue the present Iraqi government. The provision would have frozen Iraqi assets as soon as a suit was filed. The Iraqi government had threatened to withdraw $25 billion in assets from American banks.
I have no problem with the concept that victims of Saddam's regime should be able to sue for damages and receive compensation for the horrible things that were done to them. And it is a longstanding international principle that the successor government (in this case the present Iraqi government) is responsible for settling matters attributable to the nation, including those charged to the previous government. Usually this applies to international debts and obligations (banknotes, for example) but it can apply to individual human rights cases (so for example the German government has set up a fund to help pay Holocaust victims.) It is also true that much of the Iraqi assets in question were accrued under Saddam's regime.
However, while I believe that it would be entirely appropriate for the present government of Iraq to set up a system to compensate Saddam's victims or their families and dedicate to that fund money which was accrued by Saddam's government, such settlements have to be set up in a structured and clearly defined manner. The bill the President is vetoing would simply have allowed lawsuits to proceed in a haphazard manner and result in the freezing of all the assets. Another closely related fact of the matter is that there are many thousands, maybe even millions of people who could file suit. However if this were simply pursued in U.S. courts, the likelihood is that those few who got in first would receive the lion's share of the cash (they, and their lawyers) in which case the assets would soon be used up and there would be nothing left for most of the victims.
I hope that the reason for the President's veto is because he understands this and recognizes that there should be a provision in place allowing victims of the former regime to collect damages, just that it has to be set up by the Iraqi government in a formal legal framework, as opposed to simply doing the bidding of the al-Maliki government and having no concern at all for the rights of those who did suffer.
At issue is a provision in the bill which would allow survivors or relatives of victims of atrocities committed by the regime of Saddam Hussein to sue the present Iraqi government. The provision would have frozen Iraqi assets as soon as a suit was filed. The Iraqi government had threatened to withdraw $25 billion in assets from American banks.
I have no problem with the concept that victims of Saddam's regime should be able to sue for damages and receive compensation for the horrible things that were done to them. And it is a longstanding international principle that the successor government (in this case the present Iraqi government) is responsible for settling matters attributable to the nation, including those charged to the previous government. Usually this applies to international debts and obligations (banknotes, for example) but it can apply to individual human rights cases (so for example the German government has set up a fund to help pay Holocaust victims.) It is also true that much of the Iraqi assets in question were accrued under Saddam's regime.
However, while I believe that it would be entirely appropriate for the present government of Iraq to set up a system to compensate Saddam's victims or their families and dedicate to that fund money which was accrued by Saddam's government, such settlements have to be set up in a structured and clearly defined manner. The bill the President is vetoing would simply have allowed lawsuits to proceed in a haphazard manner and result in the freezing of all the assets. Another closely related fact of the matter is that there are many thousands, maybe even millions of people who could file suit. However if this were simply pursued in U.S. courts, the likelihood is that those few who got in first would receive the lion's share of the cash (they, and their lawyers) in which case the assets would soon be used up and there would be nothing left for most of the victims.
I hope that the reason for the President's veto is because he understands this and recognizes that there should be a provision in place allowing victims of the former regime to collect damages, just that it has to be set up by the Iraqi government in a formal legal framework, as opposed to simply doing the bidding of the al-Maliki government and having no concern at all for the rights of those who did suffer.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Bush doctrine: we support democracy-- except where we don't.
Today the Supreme Court of Pakistan threw out five of the six complaints that had been lodged against the election last month of General Pervez Musharrif as President of Pakistan.
Of course, the whole thing is a sham. The 'election' was carefully conducted only among three hundred or so assembly members, virtually assuring that Muharrif would be re-elected. However the opposition to Musharrif, who seized power in a coup nearly a decade ago and has steadfastly refused to give any of it up, complained to Pakistan's Supreme Court and asked that the election be declared illegal. On the eve of the ruling, which would have gone against Musharrif, he declared 'emergency law' and summarily dismissed all of the Supreme Court justices who refused to sign a loyalty oath to him. He then filled the vacancies with his hand-picked replacements, so that the decision rendered today might as well have been written by Musharrif personally.
President Bush has asked that Musharrif leave the army. So he will. That doesn't make him any less of a dictator, nor does it do any more to legitimize his 'election' than the rump Supreme Court decision we saw today. (I could add an acerbic comment here about Bush and elections and Supreme Court decisions, but you all know what I'd say, so I won't.)
What it does is point out in stark relief two things.
1, The support of 'democracy' everywhere that Bush pledged in his second inaugural speech is null and void in countries where the dictator kisses up to us.
2. Bush was a fool for fashioning our whole policy in Pakistan around Pervez Musharrif. There is no 'plan B,' and now State Department officials are feverishly trying to craft one in case someone other than Musharrif emerges from the present crisis as being in control in Pakistan. Sound familiar?
Of course, the whole thing is a sham. The 'election' was carefully conducted only among three hundred or so assembly members, virtually assuring that Muharrif would be re-elected. However the opposition to Musharrif, who seized power in a coup nearly a decade ago and has steadfastly refused to give any of it up, complained to Pakistan's Supreme Court and asked that the election be declared illegal. On the eve of the ruling, which would have gone against Musharrif, he declared 'emergency law' and summarily dismissed all of the Supreme Court justices who refused to sign a loyalty oath to him. He then filled the vacancies with his hand-picked replacements, so that the decision rendered today might as well have been written by Musharrif personally.
President Bush has asked that Musharrif leave the army. So he will. That doesn't make him any less of a dictator, nor does it do any more to legitimize his 'election' than the rump Supreme Court decision we saw today. (I could add an acerbic comment here about Bush and elections and Supreme Court decisions, but you all know what I'd say, so I won't.)
What it does is point out in stark relief two things.
1, The support of 'democracy' everywhere that Bush pledged in his second inaugural speech is null and void in countries where the dictator kisses up to us.
2. Bush was a fool for fashioning our whole policy in Pakistan around Pervez Musharrif. There is no 'plan B,' and now State Department officials are feverishly trying to craft one in case someone other than Musharrif emerges from the present crisis as being in control in Pakistan. Sound familiar?
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Leading from a weak hand.
One of the hallmarks of George W. Bush has been his stubborn refusal to change course no matter what, even when he is clearly way off track. We have seen it over the years in everything from his legislative agenda to his steadfast and unswerving determination to invade and then remain in Iraq, no matter what it has cost us.
It has even occasionally won him political victories, such as in the continuing funding of the Iraq war over this past summer (after all, arguing with Bush about this is a little like playing a highway game of chicken with a blind man.) But such victories have been pyrrhic. The cost to his presidency, his party and the nation have far outweighed the dubious benefits of whatever he believes he has gained.
And so we see now with the SCHIPS program, which President Bush promises to veto. He certainly will veto it, and claim that he is therefore standing for 'fiscal responsibility.' Of course vetoing a five year, $35 billion expansion of the program that covers medical costs for poor and uninsured children is dwarfed by the half trillion dollars he has already poured down a real rathole in Iraq, not to mention the nearly $200 billion in new Iraq spending he is seeking.
In fact, it is a good thing that the college aid bill that I wrote the last post on passed at about the same time as the SCHIPS fight was gearing up. The President, while expressing reservations, signed it. And the reason is clear-- he had a choice of either standing against the SCHIPS bill OR the college bill, but he did not have the political capital left, even within his own party, to be able to make a veto stand on both. So he quietly signed the college aid bill even though it is certainly a bill which would never have either been passed nor signed during the past six years of Republican control over the House.
That is however why I am optimistic that regardless of what this President thinks, sooner or later he will lose on Iraq and have to bring the troops home. His party would not support him on two vetoes, and the one he chose was arguably the more politically damaging of the two-- despite attempts to falsely spin it as an attack on the elderly (though most elderly are smart enough to remember which party it was that actually did try to privatize Social Security two years ago) there is no question that Republicans will have to answer why they were unwilling to increase the tax on a cigar anywhere upward from a nickel in order to pay for kids health care. Certainly not a question they will want to have to answer.
Iraq funding will certainly come up as well next year. And as the election draws closer it will be harder and harder for wavering war supporters to stick with their Hawkish President. And sooner or later they may well abandon him when it matters most. His unwillingness to bend dooms many in his own party.
Well, when it happens I will just heat up some popcorn and enjoy the show.
It has even occasionally won him political victories, such as in the continuing funding of the Iraq war over this past summer (after all, arguing with Bush about this is a little like playing a highway game of chicken with a blind man.) But such victories have been pyrrhic. The cost to his presidency, his party and the nation have far outweighed the dubious benefits of whatever he believes he has gained.
And so we see now with the SCHIPS program, which President Bush promises to veto. He certainly will veto it, and claim that he is therefore standing for 'fiscal responsibility.' Of course vetoing a five year, $35 billion expansion of the program that covers medical costs for poor and uninsured children is dwarfed by the half trillion dollars he has already poured down a real rathole in Iraq, not to mention the nearly $200 billion in new Iraq spending he is seeking.
In fact, it is a good thing that the college aid bill that I wrote the last post on passed at about the same time as the SCHIPS fight was gearing up. The President, while expressing reservations, signed it. And the reason is clear-- he had a choice of either standing against the SCHIPS bill OR the college bill, but he did not have the political capital left, even within his own party, to be able to make a veto stand on both. So he quietly signed the college aid bill even though it is certainly a bill which would never have either been passed nor signed during the past six years of Republican control over the House.
That is however why I am optimistic that regardless of what this President thinks, sooner or later he will lose on Iraq and have to bring the troops home. His party would not support him on two vetoes, and the one he chose was arguably the more politically damaging of the two-- despite attempts to falsely spin it as an attack on the elderly (though most elderly are smart enough to remember which party it was that actually did try to privatize Social Security two years ago) there is no question that Republicans will have to answer why they were unwilling to increase the tax on a cigar anywhere upward from a nickel in order to pay for kids health care. Certainly not a question they will want to have to answer.
Iraq funding will certainly come up as well next year. And as the election draws closer it will be harder and harder for wavering war supporters to stick with their Hawkish President. And sooner or later they may well abandon him when it matters most. His unwillingness to bend dooms many in his own party.
Well, when it happens I will just heat up some popcorn and enjoy the show.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Bush suggests opposing junta in Myanmar, three years after his campaign broke the law to buy campaign wear from there
Today George Bush tried to shift the focus away from his botched job in Iraq and focused on the demonstrations led by Buddhist monks in Myanmar (formerly Burma) against the dictatorship there.
I would love to see the junta go, and there is no doubt that they are among the worst violators of human rights in the world, but it is interesting that the President should discover this now.
He certainly didn't care about it in 2004, when his campaign broke the law to purchase campaign gear from Burma!
The official merchandise Web site for President George W. Bush's re-election campaign has sold clothing made in Burma, whose goods were banned by Bush from the U.S. last year to punish its military dictatorship.
The merchandise sold on www.georgewbushstore.com includes a $49.95 fleece pullover, embroidered with the Bush-Cheney '04 logo and bearing a label stating it was made in Burma, now Myanmar. The jacket was sent to Newsday as part of an order that included a shirt made in Mexico and a hat not bearing a country-of-origin label.
Poor Bush. I'd call him a hypocrite for this, but I'm not sure that's the whole story. The truth is, he's accumulated so much crap by now that he can't even keep track of it all.
I would love to see the junta go, and there is no doubt that they are among the worst violators of human rights in the world, but it is interesting that the President should discover this now.
He certainly didn't care about it in 2004, when his campaign broke the law to purchase campaign gear from Burma!
The official merchandise Web site for President George W. Bush's re-election campaign has sold clothing made in Burma, whose goods were banned by Bush from the U.S. last year to punish its military dictatorship.
The merchandise sold on www.georgewbushstore.com includes a $49.95 fleece pullover, embroidered with the Bush-Cheney '04 logo and bearing a label stating it was made in Burma, now Myanmar. The jacket was sent to Newsday as part of an order that included a shirt made in Mexico and a hat not bearing a country-of-origin label.
Poor Bush. I'd call him a hypocrite for this, but I'm not sure that's the whole story. The truth is, he's accumulated so much crap by now that he can't even keep track of it all.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
The lights are off, the doors are locked and everyone else has left the building-- but President Bush still is talking about a 'win' in Iraq.
Today President Bush said once again that we have to 'win' in Iraq.
Leaving aside the fact that we've grown tired of this stale old line in support of keeping us moving in place in a war that has become intractable and likely unwinnable, I'd like to know exactly how he defines, 'win.' The ever-murky and changing mission has made it virtually impossible to even know what exactly a 'win' was.
Certainly if a 'win' was to get rid of Saddam Hussein, then since that is done, we should bring all our troops home, in say, four years ago. If it was to get rid of any WMD's, then we should also bring our troops back years ago, certainly after the administration made the announcement on January 12, 2005 that they were calling off the search for WMD's after two years of exhaustive searching had turned up nothing other than a handful of left over and decomposing mustard gas cannisters from the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980's that had apparently been stuck on a back shelf somewhere and forgotten about. If it was about letting the Iraqis elect a government, then that has also been done, though they elected a fundamentalist Shi'ite government that is essentially a puppet of the Shi'ite militias who support them. If a 'win' was to keep Iraq peaceful and prevent Islamist terrorists from disrupting the country, then-- wait a second, Saddam was doing that. If a 'win' means some sort of a smashing military victory, then somebody better read about what exactly a guerilla war is.
As a matter of fact, George W. Bush himself declared that all major combat operations were over on May 1, 2003 under that 'Mission Accomplished' banner. The cost then was 139 American lives and about $45 billion, in the course of six weeks. According to what was said then, that was a 'win.'
Since then we've lost 25 times as many American lives, spent fifteen times as much money, and been there for about 35 times as long.
So I figure by now, we must have 'won' Iraq at least a couple of dozen times. So let's bring our troops home now, I don't know if we can stand much more of this kind of 'winning.'
Leaving aside the fact that we've grown tired of this stale old line in support of keeping us moving in place in a war that has become intractable and likely unwinnable, I'd like to know exactly how he defines, 'win.' The ever-murky and changing mission has made it virtually impossible to even know what exactly a 'win' was.
Certainly if a 'win' was to get rid of Saddam Hussein, then since that is done, we should bring all our troops home, in say, four years ago. If it was to get rid of any WMD's, then we should also bring our troops back years ago, certainly after the administration made the announcement on January 12, 2005 that they were calling off the search for WMD's after two years of exhaustive searching had turned up nothing other than a handful of left over and decomposing mustard gas cannisters from the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980's that had apparently been stuck on a back shelf somewhere and forgotten about. If it was about letting the Iraqis elect a government, then that has also been done, though they elected a fundamentalist Shi'ite government that is essentially a puppet of the Shi'ite militias who support them. If a 'win' was to keep Iraq peaceful and prevent Islamist terrorists from disrupting the country, then-- wait a second, Saddam was doing that. If a 'win' means some sort of a smashing military victory, then somebody better read about what exactly a guerilla war is.
As a matter of fact, George W. Bush himself declared that all major combat operations were over on May 1, 2003 under that 'Mission Accomplished' banner. The cost then was 139 American lives and about $45 billion, in the course of six weeks. According to what was said then, that was a 'win.'
Since then we've lost 25 times as many American lives, spent fifteen times as much money, and been there for about 35 times as long.
So I figure by now, we must have 'won' Iraq at least a couple of dozen times. So let's bring our troops home now, I don't know if we can stand much more of this kind of 'winning.'
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Why I haven't jumped onto the impeachment bandwagon.
These days, it seems that one can't go very far in the liberal blogsphere without running into someone advocating impeachment, of both Bush and Cheney, for the crime of leading the United States into a ruinous war in Iraq. This started a couple of years ago, and I thought it would peter out as the fad of the day, but instead it seems to have grown stronger and picked up adherents. In fact at our next state party meeting in August, a resolution has been put forward by the Progressive Caucus of the Arizona Democratic Party, not only supporting impeachment, but directing the members of our Congressional delegation to support it.
And the thought is certainly appealing and I can understand where the sentiment comes from. It originates in the 2000 election, and the belief (which I share) that this President was never legitimately elected, and used a combination of dirty tricks, luck and a Supreme Court decision to strongarm his way into the White House. Then, once there, he has indeed been guilty of pushing America into a war which it turns out was a vat of acid that has eroded our military capability, our financial wellbeing and the status of the United States as a superpower. On July 2, 2003 he told insurgents then starting to pick off American troops in Iraq, 'bring it on.' For a President to dare an enemy to attack American troops in the field is reckless, cowardly and inexcusable.
Mostly, President Bush has been wrong because his ideology is wrong. The rest of the time, he's been wrong because he is incompetent.
But I oppose impeaching him.
The first reason is because whatever harm he has already done (and it's been an awful lot), he has by now been effectively neutered. He can't even get the members of the Senate from his own party to stand firm in favor of his war. The so-called 'surge,' has had mixed results at best, and has resulted in a rapid approach of the half trillion dollar mark in terms of the cost of this war, and now in three consecutive months it triple digit U.S. military fatalities-- a figure exceeded now five times in the past nine months, but only three times in the three and a half years of war prior to last October. George Bush and Dick Cheney will leave office on January 20, 2009-- scarcely a year and a half down the road-- weakened and with no legacy at all. None. Even Jimmy Carter, who Republicans love to lambaste, left office with the Camp David peace accords between Israel and Egypt, and the passage of a new and comprehensive energy policy (which we'd have been much better off if we'd followed through with) in his bag of mementos.
Beyond that, though, impeaching the President would be unlikely to succeed. Even if you could get enough House Democrats to back it (unlikely for a measure with 10 cosponsors as of this writing), and also back impeachment against Dick Cheney (which would require a completely seperate trial), to convict in the Senate, you'd need the votes of sixteen Republicans (seventeen if Lieberman voted not to convict, which is likely). True, up to ten Republicans have recently raised some concerns about Iraq (with Snowe of Maine, Smith of Oregon and Hagel of Nebraska having outright signed onto a Democratic measure for withdrawal), but that is not the same as signing onto removal from office, and to get up to seventeen is unrealistic. Period. And then you'd have to go through the whole thing all over again and get up to that number again for Cheney. Truth is, I don't see it happening. Besides, if it did then it would end-- not Bush and Cheney's career on January 20, 2009, but rather Nancy Pelosi's career (she'd be compelled by the Constitution to resign from the speakership and become a caretaker President for a year-- and with the party nominee likely chosen by this February, she wouldn't even have the option Gerald Ford had to try and run for a full term.)
Further, it is hard to see what good this could possibly do for us on matters that are important to us. How does impeaching President Bush get us any closer to universal health care, a living wage for all Americans, an end to poverty and most importantly getting us out of Iraq? There is only one way to be sure of the first three-- which is to expand the Democratic majority in Congress and elect a Democratic President next year. Hard to see how impeaching Bush will do either. As to Iraq, Republican Senators are now defecting in numbers that suggest that we could, especially as the election gets closer, be able to put through a real withdrawal bill. But again, it's hard to see how impeachment would help us get that done. It could hurt though, a lot.
I hope we have the good sense to stay focused on what matters-- next year's election. Because if we try to impeach the President, and then on January 20, 2009, a Republican is taking the oath of office, we would only have ourselves to blame.
And the thought is certainly appealing and I can understand where the sentiment comes from. It originates in the 2000 election, and the belief (which I share) that this President was never legitimately elected, and used a combination of dirty tricks, luck and a Supreme Court decision to strongarm his way into the White House. Then, once there, he has indeed been guilty of pushing America into a war which it turns out was a vat of acid that has eroded our military capability, our financial wellbeing and the status of the United States as a superpower. On July 2, 2003 he told insurgents then starting to pick off American troops in Iraq, 'bring it on.' For a President to dare an enemy to attack American troops in the field is reckless, cowardly and inexcusable.
Mostly, President Bush has been wrong because his ideology is wrong. The rest of the time, he's been wrong because he is incompetent.
But I oppose impeaching him.
The first reason is because whatever harm he has already done (and it's been an awful lot), he has by now been effectively neutered. He can't even get the members of the Senate from his own party to stand firm in favor of his war. The so-called 'surge,' has had mixed results at best, and has resulted in a rapid approach of the half trillion dollar mark in terms of the cost of this war, and now in three consecutive months it triple digit U.S. military fatalities-- a figure exceeded now five times in the past nine months, but only three times in the three and a half years of war prior to last October. George Bush and Dick Cheney will leave office on January 20, 2009-- scarcely a year and a half down the road-- weakened and with no legacy at all. None. Even Jimmy Carter, who Republicans love to lambaste, left office with the Camp David peace accords between Israel and Egypt, and the passage of a new and comprehensive energy policy (which we'd have been much better off if we'd followed through with) in his bag of mementos.
Beyond that, though, impeaching the President would be unlikely to succeed. Even if you could get enough House Democrats to back it (unlikely for a measure with 10 cosponsors as of this writing), and also back impeachment against Dick Cheney (which would require a completely seperate trial), to convict in the Senate, you'd need the votes of sixteen Republicans (seventeen if Lieberman voted not to convict, which is likely). True, up to ten Republicans have recently raised some concerns about Iraq (with Snowe of Maine, Smith of Oregon and Hagel of Nebraska having outright signed onto a Democratic measure for withdrawal), but that is not the same as signing onto removal from office, and to get up to seventeen is unrealistic. Period. And then you'd have to go through the whole thing all over again and get up to that number again for Cheney. Truth is, I don't see it happening. Besides, if it did then it would end-- not Bush and Cheney's career on January 20, 2009, but rather Nancy Pelosi's career (she'd be compelled by the Constitution to resign from the speakership and become a caretaker President for a year-- and with the party nominee likely chosen by this February, she wouldn't even have the option Gerald Ford had to try and run for a full term.)
Further, it is hard to see what good this could possibly do for us on matters that are important to us. How does impeaching President Bush get us any closer to universal health care, a living wage for all Americans, an end to poverty and most importantly getting us out of Iraq? There is only one way to be sure of the first three-- which is to expand the Democratic majority in Congress and elect a Democratic President next year. Hard to see how impeaching Bush will do either. As to Iraq, Republican Senators are now defecting in numbers that suggest that we could, especially as the election gets closer, be able to put through a real withdrawal bill. But again, it's hard to see how impeachment would help us get that done. It could hurt though, a lot.
I hope we have the good sense to stay focused on what matters-- next year's election. Because if we try to impeach the President, and then on January 20, 2009, a Republican is taking the oath of office, we would only have ourselves to blame.
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