Sep
30
Gore Vidal on Barack Obama:
Last year he famously switched allegiance from Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama during the Democratic nomination process for president. Now, he reveals, he regrets his change of heart. How’s Obama doing? “Dreadfully.”
But he’s inexperienced. He has a total inability to understand military matters.
But no time to think that Gore Vidal is some sort of sage, here he is on the Republican Party:
Obama believes the Republican Party is a party when in fact it’s a mindset, like Hitler Youth
Can I please call this idiot a hack?
Update:
I read on further. Gore Vidal on Timothy McVeigh:
Vidal became a supportive correspondent of Timothy McVeigh, who blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City in 1995 killing 168 people. The huge loss of life, indeed McVeigh’s act of mass murder, goes unmentioned by Vidal. “He was a true patriot, a Constitution man,”
Sep
30
Is It Time For Republicans To Jump On Board Healthcare Reform?
Filed Under American Politics | 49 Comments
Yesterday in the Senate Finance Committee, the public option was rejected not once but twice with some significant no votes from Democrats. The first of the amendments (the Obama option) had five of thirteen Democrats voting against it.
David Frum in response makes an interesting suggestion. Now might be the time for Republicans to jump aboard:
Until now, the threat of a government-run healthcare plan has deterred Republicans from negotiations with the administration. They were (reasonably) afraid of being mousetrapped into a philosophically unacceptable deal. But if the single most threatening element of such a deal has been voted down by Democrats, the field looks different. Instead of worrying about worst-case scenarios, Republicans now can begin to think: are there things we want? Might we successfully wedge centrist Democrats away from the Chuck Schumers?
Obama, Pelosi and the Democrats have too much political capital invested in healthcare reform, they have to pass something no matter how watered down, especially with their majorities. But at the same time, the Democrats, in particular the moderates and blue-dogs, will want some Republican cover on the bill. Wholly owning the reform could be potentially disastrous for the Democrats in 2010.
But it poses problems for the GOP too. If they oppose healthcare reform en masse, but it proves to be popular in the long run, they will always painted as the party of “no”. But there is an opportunity here to turn what is most likely inevitable healthcare reform into something much more palatable. For example, they could temper the mandated coverage into “catastrophic” rather than general coverage. They could get some form of tort reform and they could explore ways to make reform less costly for the country in the long run. And Frum’s suggestion of using engagement by the GOP to create a wedge between moderate and progressive Democrats has benefits too. The more GOP-ised healthcare reform becomes, the less the liberal Democrats will like it. Negotiated successfully, it may well happen that the progressives will find any bill unpalatable and they may well become the ones viewed as being obstructionist.
Sep
28
The AGW Debate
Filed Under General Politics | 46 Comments
Intersting debate on AGW in the comments, which I’d like to hijack and centralise here if you don’t mind. I do so, so that I can credit Martin Meenagh with another interesting post of which I thought his opening paragraph was particularly true:
The twenty years before 1999 brought forth many pathologies. One was a crazy worship of ideal market systems and their imposition on everyday life, regardless of people; others included neoconservatism, faith-based abusive atheism, uncontrolled tort and human rights law, the definition of men and women as sexual beings alone, and Pelagian approaches to criminals. Another was global warming.
I’m not totally comfortable with the science on this issue, but my scepticism needs AGW to be proven, and I think we’re a long way from that.
I’ll leave Martin with the final word:
Don’t stop thinking. Don’t turn off your critical rationality. Just don’t treat grant dependent scientists as priests, or let the media-political class think for you.
Sep
28
Conservative Intellectualism
Filed Under American Politics, Conservatism | 2 Comments
No, not an oxy-moron.
As I’ve said before, I’m interested in the narrative of American conservative history, and one of the key features of that history, is the intellectual search for the meaning of conservatism. The likes of William Buckley, Whittaker Chambers, Russel Kirk, Irving Kristol and Milton Friedman along with many others attempted to develop an understanding of conservatism that often defied a traditional Burkean conception. The many threaded and often divergent philosophies eventually coalesced into a pragmatic if sometimes fractious fusion that forms what is generally considered conservatism today.
What worries me, is that this intellectual tradition has dried up. Conservatism is now being defined by how to put policies into place at the expense of continuing to explore what it means. And whilst I’m a strong believer in conservative populism, that still requires a living guiding philosophy, not just a dead canon of thought.
And so this piece by Charles Murray, lamenting the passing of three of conservatism’s intellectual greats struck a chord with me:
I have been brooding about the cumulative void. First we lost Milton Friedman, who died in November 2006, then William F. Buckley, Jr., in February 2008, and then on September 18, Irving Kristol. The respective giants of the libertarian, conservative, and neoconservative Right, all gone within three years.
…
The comparisons with the voices of the Right today are unavoidable (The Left’s no better, but they’re not for me to worry about). There are many exceptions in print and some on radio and television. But who got on the cover of Time magazine the same week as Irving died? Glenn Beck, sticking his tongue out. He and others like him comprise far too much of the public face of the Right today—crudely sarcastic when they are not being angry, mean-spirited, and often embarrassingly ignorant. The antithesis of Friedman, Buckley, and Kristol.
I expect to be told that I’m too squeamish. We’re in a battle for America’s soul at a pivotal moment. But the very truth of that statement—we are indeed in a battle for America’s soul—makes it a good idea to stop and think about when the American Right was truly influential. It didn’t start after right-wing talk shows got big. It started in the 1960s, as Friedman, Buckley, and Kristol were hitting their stride. It flowered in the 1970s, then reached its apogee in the 1980s when their ideas were given political force by Ronald Reagan—another man of civility, good humor, and optimism. Don’t tell me that we have to put up with the Glenn Becks of the world to be successful. Within living memory, the Right was successful.
Whilst I agree with Murray on the timeline of conservative success, I do disagree with him on one point. Conservatism does need the shock and awe value of the rabble rousers; intellectuals aren’t likely to be rousing any rabbles, but it needs to be tempered by an understanding of the nature of conservatism. Resentment at progressive change, blanket obedience to pre-determined dogma and cliched observance of ritualistic America does not cut it. We need to be sold on why conservatism is the right path, and for that, we need a conservative intellectual renaissance that can be filtered through the pundits and politicians to the people.
Sep
28
Defining Liberalism And Conservatism
Filed Under American Politics, Conservatism, Liberalism | 57 Comments
Whilst holding my nose and trying not too breath, I was reading the Balloon Juice site (far too many noxious gasses there) when I came upon a post trying to define conservatism and liberalism. Now intelligence and Balloon Juice are strange bedfellows so very little was achieved, so I figured we might do better.
Some noteworthy quotations from people that matter:
Conservatism
Abraham Lincoln:
“What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried”
Dennis Prager:
“Liberals tend to put the onus of your success on society and conservatives on you and your family.”
And one of my favourite definitions of conservative from Michael Oakshott:
“To be conservative…..is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limited to the unbounded, the near to the distant, the sufficient to the superabundant, the convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss.”
Liberalism*
Hubert H Humphrey:
“Liberalism, above all, means emancipation — emancipation from one’s fears, his inadequacies, from prejudice, from discrimination… from poverty.”
Friedrich Von Hayek:
What the liberal must ask, first of all, is not how fast or how far we should move, but where we should move.
My own limited definition, is that liberalism is the kick up the backside that conservatism needs, whilst conservatism is the brake on liberal excess.
Now it’s your turn.
* I had trouble finding some good liberal quotes that weren’t critical or back-slappingly self-congratulatory. That’s probably because “liberalism” is too broad a subject to be defined easily. Both Republicans and democrats can lay claim to being liberal, either in it’s modern or classical sense. It might be easier to define progressivism or left-liberalism.
Sep
28
Michele Bachmann refuses to answer a question about the dead census worker in Kentucky.
Big deal. She doesn’t represent Kentucky. There is no evidence that the death of the census worker was politically motivated, and yet this doesn’t stop HuffPo, Balloon Juice and Andrew Sullivan making the insinuation (or in Balloon Juice’s case, more than an insinuation). From the strongest critics of Glenn Beck, comes the palpable excitement at the possibility of violence in American politics.
Nothing more needs to be said about these shameless people.
Sep
27
Open Post
Filed Under Uncategorized | 41 Comments
As Israel has some tough weeks ahead, I thought I’d cheer him up:
Sep
27
The Effects Of Regulation
Filed Under American Politics | 40 Comments
HotAir have the details of a report conducted into the effects of regulation on the disastrous Californian economy:
This study measures and reports the cost of regulation to small business in the State of California. It uses original analyses and a general equilibrium framework to identify and measure the cost of regulation as measured by the loss of economic output to the State’s gross product, after controlling for variables known to influence output. It also measures second order costs resulting from regulatory activity by studying the total impact – direct, indirect, and induced. The study finds that the total cost of regulation to the State of California is $492.994 billion which is almost five times the State’s general fund budget, and almost a third of the State’s gross product. The cost of regulation results in an employment loss of 3.8 million jobs which is a tenth of the State’s population. Since small business constitute 99.2% of all employer businesses in California, and all of non-employer business, the regulatory cost is borne almost completely by small business. The total cost of regulation was $134,122.48 per small business in California in 2007, labor income not created or lost was $4,359.55 per small business, indirect business taxes not generated or lost were $57,260.15 per small business, and finally roughly one job lost per small business.
Barack Obama and the Democrats are trying to increase the amount of regulation in the economy, through Cap and Trade and Health Care reform. The dysfunctional California should provide a stark warning as to the effects of such measures.
It could be argued however that California restricts itself economically by making it harder to raise taxes to compensate for economic problems. A two-thirds majority is required to pass a budget in the State House, and Proposition 13 limits the amount of property taxes that can be raised. But Obama has done that too himself to with his promise to not raise taxes on the middle classes.
An overly regulated economy and self-imposed taxation restrictions do not point to strong economic recovery. Small businesses in America provide the dynamism that fuels economic growth and they are the ones best placed to react quicker to increases or decreases in regulation.
Sep
26
Just For Your Weekend
Filed Under Videos | 106 Comments
To help you pass the time, The Telegraph gives you the 30 most baffling newsreader moments. And hilarity ensues. Warning mind – some bad language.
Inspired by this. Watch the female co-anchors face.
Enjoy.
Sep
26
The Complexities Of TARP
Filed Under American Politics | 5 Comments
I have a confession to make. I never really understood the financial breakdown, short of some fairly routine talking points. You see, economics is just not my thing. Who was at fault? That depends of course on who you believe. For some, it was the unregulated actions of greedy bankers, for others the naive attempt to encourage lenders to lend money to people who can’t afford it. I suspect that it was a combination of all of those things.
However, the fact that government action averted a catastrophe has a degree of bi-partisan consensus. Or at least, it saved us from a short-term catastrophe. The question is, did government action (ie TARP) really save us in the long term?
Neil Barofsky is the Inspector General charged with overseeing the legal compliance aspects of TARP. Hi review in this interview with the Huffington Post is somewhat troubling:
Q: Are We Safe?
Barofsky: I can’t tell you whether we are safe or not, I don’t know the answer to that question. If you see what has happened since then (Banking collapse and TARP), banks that were too big to fail are bigger than ever, they’ve become consolidated. With government’s encouragement, some of the largest banks became larger and are more interconnected than ever…When TARP was announced, the whole purpose was a statement that we’re not going to let our large financial institutions fail. And with that, we may be in a far more dangerous place today than we were a year ago.
I’m happy to be corrected on this, but it feels like all that has been done is that for three trillion and change, all that has happened is that the problem has just been pushed into the future to a time that because of the trillions we’ve spent, there won’t be that money again.
The problem with the bank bailout as I see it, is that it creates a precedent. Banks haven’t been chastened by events, they know they will be bailed out again if their business practices fail. So my question is this. Should they have been allowed to go under, and the moneys used to bail out the banks, used instead to shore up the repercussions on Main Street? At least in that way, the money would have been more targeted, spent on actual negative events rather speculatively spent averting possible negative events.
Anyway, watch the interview (only five minutes or so). It’s very interesting.