Morning Fog

State Of The Union 2014

In the past I lamented the fact that Presidential "State of the Union" addresses to Congress have in modern history increasingly turned into laundry lists of projects and programs, rather than what might be a more inspiring presentation focused on themes and problems.

Yesterday's address by President Obama, his fifth, was not exactly an exception to this modern rule.  We would know this, even if we hadn't listened to or read the speech, thanks to media pundits who have mostly taken the view that this was a "weak" SotU because the proposals put forth - according to them - are incremental, small steps rather than grand programs.  They may be correct, but perhaps Obama has just learned from bitter experience, and in any case, analysts ought to recognize that it would be very unusual for any President to propose major new programs in his second term.  

There is also an irony here because I suspect it has been largely media pressures that have, over the years, driven the State of the Union address into laundry list territory.  Specific proposals are easier for journalists to analyze (and count, and list, and put into tables and charts).

Back to the address:  The Washington Post editorial today did a good job of pointing out several of the specific program proposals that seem ripe for bipartisan legislative effort if the Republican Party is prepared to embrace bipartisan efforts on behalf of the nation.  I need say no more.

Beyond the laundry list, though, Obama did rise to the occasion with a few useful broader points about our country and our contemporary politics -- broken Washington, for example, and the need to modernize our immigration law.

But the thing that most struck me was one phrase: "permanent war footing."   Yes!  Those who see only timid half-steps should take a close look at this one.  The country has been on a permanent war footing for at least two decades, and a semi-permanent one for at least three decades before that.  Time indeed, for us to get back to making war the exception rather than the rule.  It's not just to save servicepeople's lives and limbs. That's an important factor but more critical still is that all these wars, most of them wars of choice, have drained us economically and prevented us from dealing adequately with the real needs of a nation at peace:  jobs, safety net, economic well-being.  Here's one bold, sweeping proposal:  Will we get around to declaring war on incessant war?  Or is 2014 the new 1984? 

Whose Will Be Done, Will?

Columnist George Will this week wrote an especially peculiar defense of judicial "activism."

Peculiar, because:

The prime example he uses -- a woman who was barred from working as a flower-arranger by an association of professional flower arrangers -- seems so artificially selected.  From all the economic inequalities suffered by people all over the country every day, this single incident seems an improbable choice.  Maybe it was the only one Will could find to illustrate his point?

Well, hardly.  Where was Will when conservatives were opposing unions, opposing social security, opposing affordable health care, opposing the rights of varous minorities, or more recently, when they were (and still are) working to restrict access to the polls? 

On this point, Will would probably (now) say that it's a matter of protecting individual, rather than majority, rights.  But since when are conservatives interested in the individual cases of working people?   Has there been some sea change since political conservatives opposed extending unemployment benefits a few weeks ago? 

As you might imagine, all this peculiarity derives from the blade of an ax Will is grinding - he seeks to whack away at the supposedly untrammeled growth of government that judicial restraint (he claims) allows.  Judges, he argues, have tended to favor the "will of the majority" - as expressed by legislators - over the protection of individual rights - as expressed by Will's careful selection of the poor would-be flower arranger.  He'd like it to be the other way around.  

Will here adopts a libertarian creed that the defining value of U.S. government is not majority rule, but individual liberty.   The courts, he claims, should be more active on the latter side of the equation, declaring far more legislation to be unconstitutional.

It's an interesting argument but I would counter that the defining value of our system of government is not one or the other, but a balance of individual vs. majority rights. Will may be correct that courts could be more assertive in correcting clear instances of legislative overreach such as the Louisiana regulations governing florist licensing; but if he is of that opinion, he must also be in favor of court "activism" on a far larger scale, where legislators have attempted to curtail the rights of millions of individuals, as for example in civil rights, or in that little thing we know as Roe v. Wade.  

Coburn's Timing

Even before I'd read through the article announcing Senator Tom Coburn's intention to retire "early next year," my first thought was, why wouldn't he retire just a few months earlier, and save the people of Oklahoma the cost of a special election?

Well, it turns out, according to those "in the know," that Coburn himself, as a true honest conservative, would probably prefer to announce his retirement date early, so that an election could be scheduled and held at the same time as the general election in November 2014.  Good for him! 

So, maybe Coburn would choose to do that, if it were up to him.  But the Republican governor of his state may have other ideas.  Cost or not, some say that Republicans may prefer a special election because turnout is usually lower, and lower turnout often benefits Republican candidates.  I wouldn't think that it would really matter much -- a Republican candidate in Oklahoma?   And in any case, it's a bad deal for the people.

Coburn can't completely control this decision, but he can affect it -- if he announces his resignation date early, the door would at least be open for the current Governor of Oklahoma to get the special election scheduled right along with the general election.  Let's hope he does so. 

The Politics Of Misdirection

Misdirection -- the effort to recharacterize and issue as something it isn't -- appears completely to have taken over contemporary U.S. political discourse. 

It's not really a new trend -- in the Roosevelt era we were told social security contributions would be put in a "trust fund" for us, and in more recent times, one party has reveled in calling the estate tax a "death tax."   Yet it seems more prevalent now, as I skim over the news of just one recent day:

A conservative columnist (Kathleen Parker) complains of the liberal use of the term "income inequality," because in our society, it's taken for granted that not all incomes will be the same. The issue, she insists, is not fairness, but "justifying policies ... that can't otherwise easily be sold."  But both terms rather miss the real point, which is that the concentration of income in the hands of increasingly few clearly represents inequality of opportunity.  Upward mobility in the U.S. is now lower than in many other countries.  And that's the real issue.

A liberal columnist, Ruth Marcus, examines the suit by The Little Sisters of the Poor against the Affordable Care Act.  They assert that signing the waiver that would excuse them from paying for insurance covering birth control and abortions would of itself infringe their religious rights and make them participants in the government's system to guarantee those things. ?? Go figure. Misdirection.  It's not a religious matter at all; if any rights are being infringed, it's those of any employees such organizations may have. 

On the other side of the coin, though, Ms. Marcus also notes the administration's misdirection:  To deny contraceptive coverage is not "coming between a woman and her doctor," as the White House has claimed, but "coming between a woman and her insurance company." 

A writer on marijuana use recently cited evidence that young people's brains can be permanently damaged by pot.   A commenter countered that "the issue is not whether cannabis is safe for everybody; rather, it's freedom of choice."  Actually, though, the issue is whether marijuana is safe for anybody.  It's not, as the commenter suggests, analagous to peanuts.  (This particular misdirection effort, easily batted down, comes from an amateur misdirector, though he may be apprenticing for professional status and maybe even a career in politics.)

Perhaps it's my imagination. Perhaps this sort of thing is no more prevalent now than ever.  But I suspect it is, because in the past we still seemed to be able to get down to the brass tacks and deal with (some of) our social issues.  Now, we see little evidence that we can.  Is there a golden era ahead where we may, once again, be able to?  

There Oughta Be A Law -- Sometimes [2]

It's the in thing, legalizing marijuana.  The District of Columbia is considering a proposal to do it.  I think it's generally a bad idea, but on the analogy of alcohol, it's easy to see why many local jurisdictions are being tempted to do so.  I'm sure trying to enforce a total ban on the weed is one big time-consuming headache for police forces and for our justice system; in theory decriminalization frees them to fry bigger fish.  In fact it's a tacit recognition that a ban is practically unenforceable, whereas legalizing sale can bring in cold hard cash from taxes. 

So, I understand when they say that part of the proposal is that possession of relatively small amounts of the substance would be legal. 

But how about another part, the one that would allow people to grow the plants in their own premises?  (But "only three plants," no more.)  More legislative dumbness, it seems.  For how could that limit possibly be enforced?  I suppose that on the "throw-the-book" theory (see "There Oughta Be A Law Sometimes - Part I") it could add a few days to a penalty for anyone whose house was being raided for other infractions.

If the sale of marijuana is legal based on an analogy with alcohol, though, doesn't it make sense for it also to be regulated and taxed in the same way alcohol is?   Do we have laws anywhere (I'd be interested to know) permitting people to distill their own liquor as long as they only make a gallon? 

I'd think governments would want to restrict marijuana to sale, not cultivation.  Once you tell somebody they can grow the stuff, there's really no limit and no hope of enforcement.  And strapped local governments will just be losing money.

There Oughta Be A Law -- Sometimes [1]

Prince George's County, Maryland (directly northeast of Washington DC), it turns out, has a law against leaving a vehicle running when no one is in it.  I wish more jurisdictions did!

This one hadn't been much enforced, but it came up recently when  police began to ticket some of those people who just ran into a shop "for a sec" to get something.  The police said they had stepped up enforcement because of an increasing rate of theft of such vehicles.  No doubt reducing theft is a good thing from the owner's point of view, so maybe a few will pay heed.

For me, the greatest benefit might be environmental.  An idling automobile is a huge polluter, whether it's really "just a sec" of two minutes or so, or if it's several of my neighbors, who turn on their cars to "warm up" on cold days while they retreat into the house for 10, 15, or 20 minutes.  Car engines don't require warming up to run properly, as they did 40 or 50 years ago, so the only goal is creature comfort.  It's a pretty ridiculous waste of energy with a pernicious side effect.

Naturally I don't expect the local fuzz will be patrolling residential neighborhoods to ticket idling cars, though ... not in my lifetime.  So no doubt my neighbors will continue doing just what they've been doing.

Which brings me to my main point.  Wouldn't there be a lot fewer laws and regulations, and a lot less complication in life, if legislators could restrict themselves, however noble their intentions, to just making laws that can be enforced? Or should we suppose that such laws are intended as very mild discouragement to the handful of people who will observe them, while otherwise they become just part of that very heavy "book" for the time when they want to "throw the book" at somebody?

"Yes sir, you're under arrest for burglary, assault with a deadly weapon, driving under the influence ... and oh, by the way, I see you also left your car running, unattended.! "

  

Is There A Lesson In Iraq?

If you read the news from Iraq over the past week, you might wonder, "What went wrong?" and/or, "What next?"  After all the effort that the U.S. put into fighting and nation-building there, the progress Al-qaeda has recently made military is very disappointing. 

Events are still unfolding and we can't forersee the outcome, but it's tempting to conclude, as some have, that our efforts were in vain (so it's Bush's fault for having gone in there on a false pretext in the first place), or that our withdrawal was too hasty (so it's Obama's fault, for having been to much in a rush to get out).   I tend toward the latter view.  Why?  Obama's exit was at least based on a true premise (or two):  That the U.S. public was getting really tired of war, and that it was costing us a fortune.  Bush's initial sally, however, was based on a will-o-the-wisp that had never existed.

But on a deeper level, probably, it doesn't really matter.  Our history over at least the past six decades, beginning perhaps with Korea, has been a constant see-saw of war, usually with one President starting one (they do that) and another making haste for the exit (they do that, too).  Each party has played each role over time.  

David Ignatius's most recent column seeks to explain what's occurring in Iraq by looking at what occurred in the region, which is probably far more realistic.  He analyzes steps Iran has taken to make it happen, and if fault is to to be assigned, he blames missteps by the Maliki administration.

Now we're getting somewhere!  It's all very nice for U.S. politicians to talk of spreading democracy, but when we try, we seem to ignore some very learnable lessons. 

First, that the "democratizee" must meet certain conditions - at least a bit of a democratic tradition, strong institutions, a sense of national cohesiveness that is stronger than the centripetal forces of tribalism and sectarianism -- for otherwise it is almost certainly doomed to be very messy, if not a total failure.   

Second, that if it is to be undertaken, the "democratizer" will have to reckon with a lengthy, slow-acting process with many setbacks along the road -- the kind of thing for which we have, unfortunately for the dreams of Presidents and Senates, shown very little talent. 

Third, that events and players exogenous to us are also an important factor that we can't control.  Yes, Iran has, according to Ignatius, played a clever hand behind the scenes, and it's not surprising that they attempted to do so. 

Very similar lessons can be learned by reviewing what's happened with the Arab sping, especially in Egypt; or what's going on in Syria just now.   So it's not just Iraq, though our experience in that country does, or should, cause us more anguish than others as we consider the cost of it to us and probably to the people of Iraq.   

 

Global Science Surprises

Sometimes scientific developments can creep up on you with little cat feet, and before you know it, they've pounced.  Well, maybe not so much new technologies or theories themselves, but their implementation.

One such was global satellite positioning.  We knew for quite a while that those satellites were up there and thought they were for bouncing communications or television signals around.  Maybe GPS was already developing as an application, bit by bit, in the minds of scienctists and technicians.  That must be the case, because a system that can pinpoint a location anywhere on the globe with great accuracy doesn't just happen by itself overnight.

But for most of us, I think, there was one day or another when we rather suddenly became aware of GPS and its workings - maybe on the day, five years ago or five weeks ago, when we acquired a new cell phone and found it had that capability. 

Another such case is the worldwide system that has been developed to detect nuclear testing.  Specialists in the fields of seismic sensing or of test ban verification have been beavering away to realize the concept, but for most of the rest of us, the idea that it's effectively complete comes as news indeed, and its impressive capability and global reach are awe-inspiring.

The system doesn't only detect nuclear explosions; it can help to predict and pinpoint natural disasters like earthquakes (I assume it's the technology involved in tsunami warning systems), track falling meteorites, provide clues as to changes in the earth's crust. And this is another "surprise" that has historically accompanied many a scientific development -- a technology developed for a specific purpose often proves to have additional applications or benefits that no one realized or conceived of initially.   Thus the seismic sensor network, which sprang from a need to detect nuclear explosions in an arms-treaty context, has much broader uses that may actually prove more beneficial. 

This is no doubt the best argument for funding scientific research - funding that, because of its magnitude and lack of immediately visible commercial applications, usually must come from governments.

Meantime, on the political level, whether or not the new system can persuade the U.S. Senate to ratify an international test ban treaty, as arms-controllers and the seismologists hope, is a very different matter.  The Senate has resisted this treaty for years because there "was no means of verification."  I believe opponents will simply find other reasons to continue their opposition.

  

The Media's Frivolous Focus

It's another new year, the time when it's common to look back and assess.  What got done, what didn't.  This is true in our personal lives, as well as in business, politics, perhaps even art (I can't say for certain about that last one).

Washington Post opinion writer Dana Milbank ended his year with a cavil about the media:  The Media's Frivolous Focus."  (Yes, I stole his title for the title of this post.)  His theme is that the media, broadly conceived, are focusing on trivia such as Obama's not going to church on Christmas day, police coaxing a man off a ledge with a sandwich, Duck Dynasty, and the other bearded characters in the long-playing Darryl Issa drama set in Benghazi.

And that means that they neglect to cover serious topics like ending unemployement benefits when so many remain out of work; the continuing lack of a rebound in job creation; or the number of Americans who want and need health insurance but have been discouraged (both by GOP undermining of the law, and the unfortunate shortcomings of the website) from obtaining it.

All true. 

Milbank goes on to opine that if "the media," (of which I think he must count himself a part) were to deal more intensively with these serious issues, they "might do some good."

Not so true, I fear.   First, because our media have over time increasingly ceased to be news organizations so much as they are entertainment organizations.  And second because (and this must be said in defense of the media), nobody would pay any attention.  Topics like unemployment and illness are not only depressing (especially in our current state of political stalemate - boy, are they depressing) but boring.  And who wants to be depressed or bored over the holidays?

It's really our political leaders who need to be cheerleading to solve the problems Milbank cites, but they're not doing that just now.  Another common subject for year-end review is the performance of Congress and the President's popularity ranking; those assessments aren't coming out very positively either, but they're the ones that (should) count.