Morning Fog

AIG - More Bailing?

AIG, the company notorious for its leaky boat and the 300 million people in it bailing, has reported a loss for its last fiscal quarter.  Some people may be tempted to attribute that to overly generous bonuses, but I'm sure that's not the case.

Anyway, CEO Robert Benmosche professes optimism, and says that he's increasingly confident about the company's long-term future.  But the company's public filing left the door open:  they "may need additional support from the U.S. government."  Now, there's a company with a sense of humor!

Health Care Summit

After Thursday's big health care discussion among the President, leading Democrats, and leading Republicans, not much has changed.  Republicans are claiming victory, but how silly is it to suggest the Democratic initiative for the talks, issued weeks in advance with full public discussion of the public and political goals, could be an "ambush?"  Or, with that much advance notice, how dumb would Republicans have to be to walk into such an "ambush?"  (Don't answer that!)

Democrats are claiming victory, but the suggestion that Obama was professorial, or put the Republicans in their place like errant children, is not necessarily a positive.  Americans generally don't want intelligence in their Presidents; they prefer a studied indifference to "book-l'arnin'" (thus Bush over Gore, Eisenhower over Stevenson) or someone who can successfully disguise the fact that he has any (Clinton made people believe that "Rhodes Scholar" meant he had worked for the Arkansas Highway Department during his high school years). 

Politically, it seems the Democrats gained the edge (and it would be odd if they didn't, with the benefit of an incumbent President leading the discussion) - enough to demonstrate the utter uninterestedness of Republican leaders in making any but the most minor cosmetic changes in health care.  They now have a little political cover for proceeding down the reconciliation path, if they can get their recalcitrant blue dogs to get on board. 

Defending Toyota

Amid all the furor over Toyota recalls and appearances by the company's top executives at Congressional hearings, there is a subtext being heard here and there to the effect that the U.S. government, the media, and even ordinary drivers are unfairly "picking on" Toyota, exaggerating its difficulties.  The sub-subtext is that Congress is motivated to persecute poor little Toyota because the USG is a part owner of GM and Chrysler!

That's a pretty scurrilous accusation.  Toyota dealers have been riding high for at least three decades, with their cars flying off the lots, often at full list prices for the most popular models, so they've never experienced a down market. We can understand, but not forgive, their frustration and their paranoia in lashing out at Congress.  The latest entry in this war of words, however, is someone who should - quite certainly does - know better, namely Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi 

The suggestion that the USG would pursue a vendetta against Toyota because of its ownership stake in GM is both offensive and unfounded.  Barbour asks if the government inquiry can be seen as unbiased; the Governor from Toyota might ask if his defense of the company can be seen as unbiased.  After all, as Barbour himself says, he pulled out many stops to get Toyota to build a plant in Mississippi.  The motive of his unmitigatedly self-serving promotional article is quite clear.  Barbour is sometimes mentioned as a Presidential candidate; this little foray into the world of opinion-making ought to pretty well dampen that kind of speculation.

Does Congress too often rush to public hearings whenever there are political points to be made?  Absolutely.  But from any reasonable perspective, the treatment Toyota is getting is perfectly normal, and is fully commensurate with the kinds of treatment other companies have received.  It's precisely because Toyota has so long been accepted as a paragon that the increasingly damaging chain of recall and cover-up has become such a hot news item.

Pawlenty Offers GOP Health Care Ideas

I noticed that Gov. Tim Pawlenty, one of at least 20 Republican Presidential hopefuls for 2012, recently allowed a five-point list of Republican health care proposals to be published under his name.   It didn't attract a lot of attention, although it's intended as a presentation of ideas for the February 25 health care summit.  It's nice to see any Republican attempting to be constructive, but it's starting to happen as candidates for office realize they've got to have some kind of platform.

Pawlenty's list isn't all bad.  What he calls "incentivizing" health care consumers (No. 1 on the list), and "pay for performance" (No. 2) are both small steps toward the broader idea of consumer-driven care.  Small, because real change in this direction would challenge the profit margins of GOP-client big businesses, hospitals, and medical groups.  Is Pawlenty willing to tackle that?  Still, as he says, Minnesota has a system aimed at making changes in this direction, and we should look at it.

Hardly anyone will be against "modernizing health insurance," (No. 5), by which he means portability, no discrimination against preexisting conditions, and health savings accounts.  But it's  not much of a contribution to the dialogue, since all this already exists in the Administration bill that Pawlenty's Elephantine Party members insist on jettisoning.

Liability reform (No. 3) is another idea that most health reformers agree could make a small contribution to reducing costs of health care.  Obama has supported it though many Democrats in Congress have not.  Question for Pawlenty and his party:  If you want to argue that it's unconstitutional for the federal government to require people to buy health insurance, isn't it also unconstitutional to impose limits on settlements that can be imposed in malpractice suits?  I personally don't think either of these things is unconstitutional, but...

Finally, Item 4: "Interstate health care insurance."  Here, I think, is the wolf in sheep's clothing.  It sounds reasonable, as Pawlenty says, that there's no reason a Minnesotan shouldn't be able to buy insurance in another state.  Well, except that insurance in the U.S. is regulated (if at all) by states.  Some states have stronger consumer protections and higher requirements than others.  Insurance companies often tend to avoid issuing policies in states where they can't meet the standard, meaning that "out-of-state" insurance usually means substandard quality.  If Pawlenty means only that a Minnesotan should be able to buy insurance from any insurance company registered and approved by the Minnesota state insurance authorities, I suspect that's already the case (it is in most states).  If he means they should go buy it anywhere, that's a problem, as Ezra Klein explains in detail here.  It's kind of like going to have your car's brakes fixed in Mexico; it's likely to be a chance you don't want to take.

Overall, Pawlenty deserves credit for at least putting some ideas on the table.  He's shown some political courage in proposing two ideas that could lead to real innovation but which are opposed by most Republicans.  Two other proposals are already a part of the Obama plan, leaving only one that's a terrible idea.  So the question arises, as the old lady used to say, "Where's the beef?"  Why couldn't we have heard these ideas earlier from Republicans; was it really worth the wait for such thin gruel; and by the way, where in Pawlenty's proposals are the Republican ideas for reducing costs NOW of existing care (especially Medicare)?  Liability reform won't cut it.

  

Adult Supervision And Leadership

I'm aware that the Obama administration pulled out every stop to try to avoid the mistakes Clinton made in approaching the inexplicably controversial issue of improving health care.  That's what led them to a quasi-Maoist approach, opting to let a thousand flowers bloom, turning the whole process over to Congress, and standing back.

The one thing that might have made that approach worthwhile -- since Obama campaigned on a theme of greater bipartisanship -- was a measure of cooperation from Republicans, which did not materialize.  Even with that hope in mind, though, it was foolhardy to trust in Congress, or in his own fractious party, to produce a viable plan.  It appears now that there was a disconnect between the desires and expectations of the President, and those of his party's chieftains Pelosi and Reid.

I've frequently offered the opinion that Congress is too parochial to be relied upon for anything of broad scope or national value; it's a group that needs adult leadership, and that can only come from the Executive branch.  Today, though, I would refer readers to Steven Pearlstein's column this week in the Washington Post, which makes similar points in a convincing way. 

In a related vein, Morning Fog has mentioned from time to time that relying too much on Congress wasn't the only procedural mistake the Obama White House has made; there has also been a noticeable tendency to go for the ideal outcome, uncurbed by political reality.  (The whole question of Guantánamo is one.)   But the White House staff is not monolithic; Dana Milbank makes the case that, rather than blaming chief of staff Rahm Emanuel for the lack of progress, Obama ought to have heeded his realistic political advice -- after all, let's recall that Obama worked hard to get Emanuel to take the job; he must have had reason for doing so.  Assuming Milbank's facts about who advocated what are correct, his argument is persuasive.

Quirks of History

Recently I saw a play called "The Rivalry," written by Norman Corwin in 1959 to mark the centennial of the Lincoln-Douglas debates and more broadly, the 1858 contest between those two politicans to win a Senate seat in Illinois.  Though the play apparently didn't top the charts on Broadway in the late 1950's, some of its themes resonate today.

It was fascinating to see how time can wreak complete role reversals.  In the debates, it was Douglas, the Democrat, who argued what we now would identify as the racist point of view.  One of the key issues at the time was whether the people of the Nebraska Territory should be allowed to choose, after achieving statehood, whether to legalize slavery.  Douglas argued that they should.  Lincoln, a Whig at the time but only two years later, the first Presidential candidate of the new Republican Party, argued that preventing the spread of slavery to new states was a moral imperative not susceptible to decision by vote.  (Lincoln lost that election, by the way, though he won a more important one in 1860.)

In contrast, many of today's Republican politicans have assumed the racist cloak.  I say this not because they are necessarily committed racists themselves, nor because they oppose Obama (that's their job) -- but because since the mid-1960s, it has been politically convenient to pick up the votes of the old Democratic-segregationist South.  In a multitude of subtle ways, they curry favor with the racist element of our society, finding it prudent not to close the door on them. 

That's pretty much the GOP approach to the "tea party" (i.e., don't close the door, or as Reagan called it, "the big tent").  This Courtland Milloy commentary on a gent named Tom Tancredo, a former politician who is not surprisingly no longer in office, provides food for thought in this context.

Recently I saw a play called "The Rivalry," written by Norman Corwin in 1959 to mark the centennial of the Lincoln-Douglas debates and more broadly, the 1858 contest between those two politicans to win a Senate seat in Illinois.  Though the play apparently didn't top the charts on Broadway in the late 1950's, some of its themes resonate today.

It was fascinating to see how time can wreak complete role reversals.  In the debates, it was Douglas, the Democrat, who argued what we now would identify as the racist point of view.  One of the key issues at the time was whether the people of the Nebraska Territory should be allowed to choose, after achieving statehood, whether to legalize slavery.  Douglas argued that they should.  Lincoln, a Whig at the time but only two years later, the first Presidential candidate of the new Republican Party, argued that preventing the spread of slavery to new states was a moral imperative not susceptible to decision by vote.  (Lincoln lost that election, by the way, though he won a more important one in 1860.)

In contrast, many of today's Republican politicans have assumed the racist cloak.  I say this not because they are necessarily committed racists themselves, nor because they oppose Obama (that's their job) -- but because since the mid-1960s, it has been politically convenient to pick up the votes of the old Democratic-segregationist South.  In a multitude of subtle ways, they curry favor with the racist element of our society, finding it prudent not to close the door on them. 

That's pretty much the GOP approach to the "tea party" (i.e., don't close the door, or as Reagan called it, "the big tent").  This Courtland Milloy commentary on a gent named Tom Tancredo, a former politician who is not surprisingly no longer in office, provides food for thought in this context.

A Deficit Commission With A Deficit

Republicans have reportedly agreed -- reluctantly of course -- to take part in a bipartisan commission on dealing with the deficit.  That is, almost the same commission that senior Republicans at first proposed, and then voted against when Obama called for it.  The difference is that, having defeated a commission that would have had real power to put its recommendations into effect, these stalwart legislators of Geezers Obstructing Progress now are prepared to participate in an emasculated commission whose recommendations they can turn down.  Thus, they can appear to be doing something about a problem they admit is serious -- while actually insuring that nothing will be done. 

Obama is correct in saying that the commission's mission is daunting because the issues involved -- the rationalization of our out-of-control entitlements, among others -- are politically charged and likely to enrage various special interests.  That takes courage, a commodity in very short supply in today's Washington.  Can we expect that lawmakers already nervous about where they'll be parking their behinds next January will really come out publicly for the sort of bold, unpopular belt-tightening measures that are needed?  

No, in fact they're already backpedaling from such potentially disastrous (for them) ideas by setting preconditions:  "No tax increases."  Well, of course that's a very popular (and populist) motto but it's irresponsible and unrealistic.   I can be pretty sure that Joseph Stack, the fun-loving wacko that flew his airplane into an IRS office yesterday, must have been a Republican -- because apparently, like these GOP legislators (perhaps even influenced by them?) he seems to have believed that government services can somehow be provided without anyone having to pay for them.

There's one small hope for the commission:  Maybe all those Representatives and Senators who are hurrying to announce their retirements could do all the rest of us a big favor by doing the sensible, responsible thing:  pushing to develop and enact some measures before they step out the door in January.  It's likely a very slim hope. 

Snow And Jobs

I suppose one of the hardest things for any politician to plan for, or deal with, is the fundamental impatience of the average citizen. 

Yesterday in another forum I commented on the attitude most people seem to have after the recent snowstorm:  "Well, sure, we've had more snow than was ever recorded in more than 100 years, but darn, it's been a week so why isn't everything completely back to normal?  One local columnist accurately noted how this kind of childish annoyance at minor inconvenience has wrecked more than one politician's hopes of reelection.

The same seems to apply to the unemployment situation.  A year ago, the President and economists pretty much across the spectrum warned that the jobs situation would get worse before it got better, and that our best efforts would probably only mitigate the worst effects.  That seems to be about what happened; unemployment figures do appear to be looking up a little bit now, but the main effects of TARP have been largely invisible (a job NOT lost doesn't register anywhere).  Those who have lost jobs are understandably frustrated, and even if they may grasp intellectually that things are improving generally, they'll be much more likely to voice impatience and exasperation that things haven't got better for them personally.

This excerpt from a report by Jake Tapper on ABC News this morning says it all:

The Obama administration credits the stimulus with saving or creating two million jobs. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office puts that figure between 800,000 and 2.4 million. Obama today projected that the stimulus funding will save or create another 1.5 to 2 million jobs this year. But a New York Times/CBS News poll out today shows that only 6 percent of Americans believe the plan has created any jobs, with 48 percent thinking it won't, a number higher than late last year.

I guess we need for jobs to be as abundant next week as snow was last week (would anyone complain if there were too many available jobs? -- yes, that would drive down wages/salaries).  Meanwhile, hapless politicians can only wish that the very visible snow were less so, and that the mostly unnoticed jobs saved/created so far were more clearly evident.  

Bye-Bye Bayh: A Congress Resigns From Its Fate

I just posted about the individual aspects of Indiana Senator Bayh's decision to resign, but what about the national implications?   Congresspersons and Senators of all stripes seem to be resigning in droves rather than face another reelection battle.  (The resident wag points out that skunks have stripes too, but doesn't know if a group of skunks is a "drove.")

Obviously, the factors I mentioned in my Bayh item play a big role.  People see a Republican-created economic meltdown but are also fed up with the a do-nothing Democratic-led Congress that seems unable or unwilling to do anything about it.  Obama's favorability ratings suffer along with the Congress that he relied on too much without being willing or able to crack enough heads to bring about a semblance of productive party unity. 

Pundits predict net Democratic losses -- that's a pretty safe bet in any off-year between Presidential elections.  The question is how much of a loss the Dems might suffer, and while political observers naturally succumb to the temptation to predict, I don't think it's really determinable at this point. 

Although so far more Republicans than Democrats have resigned, analysts remain focused on the Democratic side.  That's based mainly on a look at the specific constituencies of the resigners -- where an outgoing incumbent is likely to be replaced by a member of his own party, and where not.  However, the tendency to focus on Democrats is enhanced by several factors:  There's more drama in a loss of majority; resigning Democrats comprise more prominent, senior legislators including several hallowed dynasty-names (Bayh, Dodd, Kennedy) among them; and finding a suitable Republican candidate to replace an exiting incumbent is an easier job - they won't have trouble learning their lines quickly (NO to everything!). 

But given that only 36% of voters now say they would vote to reelect their incumbent, Republicans may also suffer losses.  A great deal will depend on the individual candidates selected.

The "rash" of resignations isn't yet as great a flood as it seems.  According to something I've read but can't find now, there are so far 43 announced resignations from the Senate and House at this point.   In 2008, a total of 39 resigned before elections.  This isn't exactly a sea change in my book, though it won't take too many more throwing in the towel to make it one. 

To the extent it becomes a flood, I think one of the more interesting political questions is why so many battle-hardened political veterans would, in this particular election, give up in unison.  The anti-incumbent mood of the country provides one answer and I take it as a hopeful sign.  For too long, incumbents seeking reelection have won, thanks to built-in advantages of name recognition, funding, and gerrymandering.  A shakeup can't hurt.  A shakeup of, say, 100 changeovers rather than just 43, would be significant and might even indicate that, win or lose in personal or Party popularity, Obama's message of doing things differently has resonated in the electorate.   

Could we see a new Congress in early 2011 that's actually more productive than the logjam we have now?  I won't hold my breath, but it's a possibility. 

Bye-Bye Bayh - Indiana Senator Resigns

Anyone tracking U.S. politics by now knows that Senator Evan Bayh, considered a "moderate" Democrat, announced two days ago that he planned to resign from the Senate, mainly (he claims) because he isn't happy with the lack of bipartisanship in Congress.  So...Congress is broken, but we've known that for many years. 

Bayh ought to have seen it twelve years ago when he first ran for the Senate -- if he did, I suppose we should give him credit for persisting in trying (?) to improve a bad situation; if he didn't, and is just seeing it now, let's give him a low grade for political savvy and a lower one for gold ol' Midwestern stick-to-it-iveness. 

All of which is to say, I can't completely buy Bayh's stated reasons for resigning.  Not, at least, without intermingling a few other thoughts.  Bayh's chance of reelection is more doubtful than it was just a few months ago:

• Because the popularity of Democrats is on a downslope, especially as the President's own approval ratings decline, and Bayh is a Democrat in a Republican state.
• Because pseudo-grass-roots "movements" like the Tea Party reflect a broad dissatisfaction with incumbents of any party these days.
• Because apparently his wife sits on several corporation boards, and this threatened to become an issue in the campaign.
• Because he supported energy reform and health care/insurance reform; the same corporate America that fights these efforts tooth and nail has recently been freed by the Supreme Court from limits on its spending in direct support of candidates for office.

In short: Bayh faced a difficult reelection campaign, and I have to think that's the real reason for his resignation, perhaps with a little concern for family aspects thrown in.  He doesn't appear to have the passion for politics that would sustain a Bayh dynasty in Indiana (and there are interesting parallels here with the Kennedy clan).  I applaud him for trying to strike a blow for bipartisanship on his way out the door, but I also fault him for giving up in the face of a fight, when professional pols opine that he is well-funded enough, and well-known enough, to have fought his way through the challenge.