American Politics

[url]http://reason.com/archives/2010/02/08/back-to-the-drawing-board[/url]

If the US is in trouble then Australia is screwed too, we have Asians taking us over. I don't hate them but do not want them changing our economy.

the president’s habit of telling untruths

matt welch from the april 2010 issue

here’s how predictable the president’s slippery relationship with the truth has become: hours before the state of the union address, washington examiner reporter timothy p. carney posted a “pre-emptive fact check” that, among other things, prebutted any presidential claim to have “stopped the revolving door between government and corporate lobbying.” as it happened, that night barack obama made an even bolder (read: less truthful) claim: that “we’ve excluded lobbyists from policymaking jobs.”

in fact, more than 40 former lobbyists work in the administration, including such policy makers as deputy defense secretary william j. lynn (who was lobbying for raytheon as recently as 2008), office of the first lady director of policy and projects jocelyn frye (national partnership for women and families), white house director of intergovernmental affairs cecilia muñoz (national council of la raza), and treasury secretary chief of staff mark patterson (goldman sachs).

when carney confronted a white house spokeswoman with the falsehood, she conceded nothing. “as the president said,” she wrote, “we have turned away lobbyists for many, many positions.” just not all of them.

as such defiance suggests, this was no isolated slip of the tongue. the president, who promised in both word and style to usher in a “new era” of washington “responsibility,” routinely says things that aren’t true and supports initiatives that break campaign promises. when called on it, he mostly keeps digging. and when obliged to explain why american voters are turning so sharply away from his party and his policies, obama pins the blame not on his own deviations from verity but on his failure to “explain” things “more clearly to the american people.”

take the issue he has explained more than any other: health care. in the state of the union address, obama claimed that the congressional budget office (cbo) had estimated that “our approach” to health care reform “would bring down the deficit by as much as $1 trillion over the next two decades.” this is, strictly speaking, not true. the democrats’ “approach” to health care reform includes a permanent change to the medicare reimbursement rates for doctors, colloquially known as the “doc fix.” the cbo estimated that the doc fix, when combined with the health care reform legislative package, actually “would increase the budget deficit in 2019 by $23 billion relative to current law, an increment that would grow in subsequent years.” this is why house democrats stripped out the doc fix from the health care bill, and passed it separately; it made the cbo scores look bad, making it harder for the president to present bogus claims about deficit neutrality.

that bit of mendacity only scratches the surface of how congress and the administration gamed the system to produce nice-looking numbers. the cbo, by its own rules, has to take congress at its word when a piece of legislation promises unspecified future “cuts” in spending, even though an overwhelming majority of promised future cuts never come to pass (a fact that the cbo itself has repeatedly warned in supplementary comments). the senate promised more than $300 billion in such cuts. furthermore, the cbo scores bills in 10-year windows. so the senate delayed more than 99 percent of the reform package’s spending until 2014, thus allowing the decade of 2010–2019 to clock in under the magic $1 trillion number. add to all that chicanery the fact that every major health care entitlement expansion in u.s. history has vastly exceeded initial cost projections, and you have ample reasons for why americans believed, by a margin of more than 3 to 1, that health care reform would exacerbate rather than improve the deficit.

even when addressing black-and-white examples of broken promises —such as his vow to televise each and every bit of health care legislative negotiations on c-span—obama can’t quite resist the temptation to plead gray. when confronted directly on the broken c-span pledge during a january meeting with gop lawmakers, the president said: “look, the truth of the matter is that if you look at the health care process—just over the course of the year—overwhelmingly the majority of it actually was on c-span, because it was taking place in congressional hearings in which you guys were participating.”

presidential defiance, dissembling, and disinformation are nothing new, even if such political perennials are more disappointing coming from someone who still boasts (as he did in the state of the union address) of “telling hard truths” to the american people and “doing what’s best for the next generation.” voters pretty much knew that bill clinton was a slime ball when they sent him to the white house; barack obama held out the promise of being more dignified.

the difference between these two most recent democratic presidents, substantial to begin with (especially in the crucial area of economic policy), may come into sharper relief in 2010. clinton’s reptilian relationship with the truth, suffused as it always has been with a catch-me-if-you-can sense of personal preservation, actually turned out to have some uses for the nation when he changed course after the 1994 republican revolution and began co-opting some of the limited-government policies proposed by his opponents. it’s easier for a chameleon to change his spots.

obama’s dishonesty, by contrast, seems to spring from a different place. as a man who has spent most of his career wowing people with his words and very little of it converting those words into deeds, he has an activist’s gap between rhetoric and reality and a radio broadcaster’s promiscuous carelessness with cutting rhetorical corners. sure, it’s not technically true that the administration’s day-one lobbying reforms served “to get rid of the influence of…special interests,” as he claimed in a january radio address (to the contrary: federal lobbying in 2009 set an all-time record), but it’s easy to imagine that the president feels his combination of tighter employment restrictions for ex-lobbyists and stricter disclosure requirements for current ones is, in the context of the manichean fight between “the people” and “special interests,” good enough for government work. the perfect shouldn’t be the enemy of the good, and the critics who complain are just opportunistic literalists grasping for any club to beat back the march of progress. no need to give them an inch.

but there’s a less charitable explanation too. during the president’s nonstop gabfests before, during, and after the state of the union speech, he kept repeating the fiction that the medical industry’s “special interests” were significantly to blame for scotching his health care legislation. in fact, the administration and congress negotiated with those interests every step of the way, receiving crucial buy-in and millions in campaign contributions. pro-reform lobbyists outspent anti-reform lobbyists on advertising by a factor of 5 to 1. there’s a three-letter word for blaming the defeat of his bill on health care lobbyists, and it rhymes with pie.

and yet it smacks of something worse still. when a politician cannot fathom opposition to his policies except as the manifestation of wicked manipulation by bad guys, remediable only by more thorough “explanations” from the good guys, it indicates an unseemly paternalism. and if he cannot take the hint that bush-obama bailout-and-spend economics are deeply and increasingly unpopular, that indicates something immovable about his core economic ideology. with those two factors as backdrop, it’s hard to say which would be worse: if the president didn’t really believe what he said, or if he did.

matt welch (matt.welch@reason.com) is editor in chief of reason.

ABC News, March 21, 2010:

The House of Representatives passed the sweeping health care bill 219-212, securing a significant victory for President Obama, who lobbied hard this week for the controversial legislation. [url=http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/HealthCare/health-care-bill-house-passes-sweeping-reform-legislation/story?id=10162080]Link here[/url]Despite protests, "tea parties," town-hall testimony, and the will of the American people, 219 of the "elected nobility" of the United States decided they knew better and passed this monstrosity. At least they did, evidently, have an up-and-down vote.

They don't need the Senate to sign off on their "reconciliation". I bet Emperor Obama, [i]ar-rahimi, ar-rahmani,[/i] is just waiting for a sunny day in the Rose Garden to put his regal imprimatur on the document - signing away one more "right," that to take care of your body as you see fit, in the interest of "compassion to the poor".

Yeah, I know, I know, the Kirchners are worse. [i]There are worse countries in the world, for personal freedom.[/i] But the sticking-point here isn't really "health care as we know it," it's the President and Congress chipping away at our liberties in the USA.

[QUOTE=Westy] It's the President and Congress chipping away at our liberties in the USA.[/QUOTE]

You are terribly wrong. The right wingers have used incorrect, scare tactics. It is every citizens right to proper affordable health care.

While we're on the topic of the Obama Admin. 131 Republicans voted against the stimulus package one year ago. These same 131 hypocrates have taken millions upon millions of the money for their state.

Republicans are not taking the majority interest of their constituents but waging a shameful revolt against the Democratic congress and American citizens. They are simply put sore (the original biggest) losers. They have been conducting themselves unbecoming of a civil servant at every democratic president since JFK. BTW, does anyone know Limbaugh's departure date for Costa Rica?

Change is happening but if you live outside the US, in many ways, the US is sinking in its reputation. In Australia, Kevin Rudd is aggressively pro China, pretty much betting Australia's future on Asia. Even the left wing New York Times finds it troubling. His predecessor John Howard, was fiercely pro America like most Australian leaders. America is less on the news in the US these days...at least for positive news. People pay more attention to Asia.

Obama is popular with ordinary people around the world, extremely popular in Australia where he is planning to visit but many world leaders know the reality. Sarkozy called Obama weak, and its clear that the US-Israeli relationship is fraying, Joe Biden's strong words are very uncharacteristic for an American leader. Since when does a Frenchman call an American President weak?

America's 'changing reputation' is, IMHO, quite a superficial thing and largely just an up-and-down with its main allies, including my own country. Bush symbolised many things that large proportions of allied countries find/found offensive - one-upmanship, aggressive foreign policies, big business conflicts of interest, massive support for Israel in spite of that country's human rights breaches, passionately held and intrusive religion, and so on. Obama's image is much softer on nearly every one of those, and skin colour is less of an issue to populations in America's allies than it is in America.

These things are superficial in the sense that they are soft data - opinions and so on - even when statistically evaluated as has been done on a number of occasions.

The more core issues only change slightly if at all and are only in part under the President's control, as in any democracy. One is world money. Financially, China is steadily rising in global power and influence, and due to much stronger forces than mere politics.

The second is the effects of foreign policy over the years. America, like my own country, is a shaper of nations. Sometimes with lots if good intent, or sometimes the good intent is little more than internal marketing, to it's own peoples and those of its allies. In most cases, less powerful countries are devastated, changed or destroyed, usually to the benefit of the allies and usually - beyond superficial niceties - with their power to determine their own future set back significantly. This 'shaping' - whether in the form of military bombardment or economic occupation and control - is usually apparent to people on the ground. Holding an 'opinion' on such forces is a luxury - mostly they are more concerned with basics like having enough food, not stepping on a landmine, and trying not to get ill in the absence of health-care. To like or not like America other 'big players' frequent comes down to trying to manipulate aid packages to least disadvantage or trying to stay invisible.

Europe (including the country where I live most of the time) has long done absolution of generations for it's crimes against humanity associated with colonisation. These days, it is often judged on how much it supports or dissociates from the far more influential American policy. Europeans are less protected from the atrocities committed by their own governments than the U.S.A., but most of it still goes by most people unless they engage in extensive non-tourist travel and try to understand from the grass roots up (or the economically marginalised or natural resources removed or the napalmed or bombed or landmined or petty-dictator-installed interferences by CIAs, Mossads, MI6s, Vaticans - and that's before even considering beginners like the militant Islamic would-be shapers or big-business Christian fundamentalists).

So why should America care what other nations think of it? It is not, for instance, reliant on tourism. Every country has to deal with a level of corruption, incompetency, or simply bad calls in its government. Does it suck to be ashamed of one's country? Of course it does. But each if us has only limited abilities to change things. Other than that we should be patriotic (without bashing other countries) or emigrate to somewhere else.

It's difficult at times to reconcile the good and the bad things about one's country. To not make judgements about oneself or others. To avoid the blame game. The thing we are good at in the 'West' - America, Europe, Australia - is material accomplishment. The discipline to get things done. To engineer raw materials into the necessities of physical survival. But the pressures of doing so are often a big distraction from everything else. In many poor countries, places where the material side of things is less well accomplished, there is also less distraction. You either have enough food or you don't - simpler equations. What these nations are often very good at are the less material things. Knowing oneself, being able to communicate openly with others. Being able to smile just for the joy of living, of being alive, or of the company of another. This is also a good space to develop things like deeply held values, ideals, positive things. The West often finds these things difficult, even after putting lots of energy into them. When that is lacking, the human spirit looks for substitute joy, substitute ecstacy. Many parts of Europe have problems with teenage drunkenness. Or football madness/hooliganism. In America, people turn to new brands of religion or drugs to replace that inner sense of joy in living which is absent. Australia struggles to find a sense of important goals and values (beyond, say, going down the beach for a barbie - which by the way is nice of course). East and West are both full of strengths snd full of weaknesses. Like the 'battle of the sexes', too much energy is often spent defending one's own corner instead of genuinely trying to see things from a totally different perspective.

Many mongers go abroad as tourists, alone or with buddies, and take their own country in a protective 5-star bubble around them. Some want to go a bit further and, in seeking out p4p, develop a real interest in the countries they visit and the new perspectives. They learn new things about themselves and (the pay check calling) take them back to their own country, enriched by the experience.

Yes, I maybe hear you say, but what about the thousands of 'third-worlders' that come to western countries but end up staying. It would be more helpful if they came to the West to learn useful material skills and took those skills home to regenerate the material welfare if their own country ([I]useful ones[/I] - not bomb-making or how to lay landmines - we unfortunately export those without any effort on their part).

I quite agree. :)

You should spend time in Australia for an extended period of time, its not going to be "Western" for much longer. Most white Aussies are backward bogans these days, white Australia is at a moral collapse, high rates of stupidity. The most forward thinking group in Australia right now are the Chinese, they will eventually eclipse Anglo Aussies as the dominant group.

In the US, you have issues with Spanish speaking immigration, I spent a few years on the West Coast, traveled also to the East and quite a few places, its a well known fact that many Euro Americans do not like Hispanics. If that is false, please explain the Minutemen and all those other xenophobe movements. Australia had a xenophobe by the name of Pauline Hanson who tried to stir up anti Asian sentiment in the 1990s, she failed, she now left Australia. From what I know, the US will be majority Spanish speaking in a couple of decades, especially the Southwest. You cannot survive in Miami speaking English, cannot even clean toilets. Third worlders coming to the West? The West is fucked, get used to it. We dug our own grave.

[QUOTE=Australiasucks] its a well known fact[/QUOTE]
The United States is a country based on law. That is, the only thing that ultimately defines you as American is essentially legal. You can be a Russian-speaking native of Homer, Alaska or an Italian-speaking native of Boston's North End; the thing that holds you together, unlike many countries, is a fragile definition based on paper. This is the crux of why "Minutemen" have a problem with anyone who is in the United States illegally.

This is not to argue your point "its a well known fact that many Euro Americans do not like Hispanics". Many Hispanics do not like Euro Americans. Many people in Group X do not like Group Y. Many in Group Y do not like Group B. And so on. Embracing your point, I'd say it applies across all people and across time. The United States is dedicated to the idea that people are created equal, endowed with rights which are not the product of government, but the product of something more profound. Something which transcends your tribe.

I think you are also right on this point, things change. It's entirely true the United States today is not going to be the same in 100 years. At least if history shows us anything. If you look at how things were in 1910 and 1810, you find vast differences in the culture, economy, society, politics, morality, music, law. So, it should not surprise anyone to imagine the country will be much different over time. But it's not always clear how things are going to shift.

If, 500 years ago if you had said, "obviously China is going to be the dominant force in global history and culture over the coming 500 years", you could have mustered many facts and put together a very convincing argument. Certainly, you would have been in a much better position than anyone saying that Indian or Arab culture (the next most obvious choices) would dominate. If you had suggested that, say, England would really shape things the most, with Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Russia rounding out the pack, well, people would have thought you were joking or not quite right in the head. Hopefully, someone would politely change the subject.

Not me. You might notice I mentioned Spain above. Spain and Spanish culture is Western. Goya. Cervantes. Magellan. I'd just caution you if you think the United States will change radically if it becomes more "Latin" (or, frankly, even Mandarin). It might be different, but it's not obvious to me how it would be different. I would not want to predict and I don't figure I will give a hoot in 100 years anyway.

Well the analysis I see from the behavior of most your countrymen during the town hall "debates" is anything to go by, America is becoming more ungovernable. People were bringing guns to debates? Tea parties?? WTF.

Forget about the next 100 years, American influence will decline substantially over the next 20 years. Many people thought Obama was going to be America's Superman. Rolling Stone even had a picture of Obama as "A New Hope" alluding to him being Luke Skywalker. Whatever. The people in your country are the ones who make it run, the leadership is there to govern and guide and they, both parties, are doing everything possible to polarize America like nothing before.

I lived in America during the late 1990s, had a great experience but packed my bags after the tech crash in 2000. There are many similarities between the US and Australia, many are quite obvious. Both are democratic, both are built by immigrants and their descendants. In some ways America accommodates immigrants better, in some ways its Australia, I used to see people with mortgages and cars in California who could not speak a word of English and lived there for decades. Then again people just off the boat in Australia have access to our social services. Australians tend to be more passive in life, most people in Australia do not care that Oz is becoming an Asian country. They largely look on it as a good thing, for our pocketbooks it has been very good. Americans are more pro-active, hence the very vigorous debate about immigration in the US.

That being said, I think life will go on in America, and it will in Australia, but things will be different. For much of the 20th Century, America was the center of attention for the planet, its starting to lose this. Even in Australia, I see a lot more about Asia on the news than the US.

The real reason Euro Americans do not like Hispanics is due to the fact that many do not integrate into mainstream America and form parallel communities, also they tend to compete with working class whites and other Americans for jobs, I know African Americans who do not like them as well because of this. I spent five years in California, and I think I know what I am talking about. Also in many border states, working class whites have to compete with Mexicans, and the Mexicans take jobs for lower pay, pushing wages down. Working class Aussies do not really compete with any illegals, even a truck driver can earn about 120k a year. I also vividly remember when you call a business in the US you have to press 1 for English 2 for Spanish. WTF??? In that case why not accommodate the other non Anglo people? Asians, and others in the US, who wind up learning English.

[quote]The real reason Euro Americans do not like Hispanics is due to the fact that many do not integrate into mainstream America and form parallel communities, also they tend to compete with working class whites and other Americans for jobs, I know African Americans who do not like them as well because of this. I spent five years in California, and I think I know what I am talking about. Also in many border states, working class whites have to compete with Mexicans, and the Mexicans take jobs for lower pay, pushing wages down. Working class Aussies do not really compete with any illegals, even a truck driver can earn about 120k a year. I also vividly remember when you call a business in the US you have to press 1 for English 2 for Spanish. WTF??? In that case why not accommodate the other non Anglo people? Asians, and others in the US, who wind up learning English.[/quote]

I believe you may be quite correct


I also believe it may in fact be down to a confusion of policies. Most Western countries are quite comfortable materially and don't have to worry about real 'values.' One of the values that easily slips down the drain is any sense of nationhood, true patriotism. I don't mean flag-waving and endless rhetoric about 'our great nation.' But the sort of non-antagonistic pride that flows from self-knowledge and pride in one's own integrity.*

Consequently, immigration policies lack clear guidance. They are based on economic considerations without considering the essential qualities that gives people of any nation a sense of 'home' (and yet which vary from nation to nation). They are then dressed up with some human rights verbiage.

Asian immigrants often have a non-material advantage: their goals, whether laudable or not (and usually they are), means they are very focussed, and compete in the market place through dint of inner fortitude honed by years of material privation. (Not all Asian nations - Cambodians, for instance, happily treasure the ability to lie in a hammock while their immigrants develop the marketplace with hard work.)

The remedy is to get in touch with one's country's roots, separate out that which is wholesome from that which is pernicious, and adhere to the wholesome roots that are still relevant, as far as it is one's individual will to to so.

In America's case, this would mean exemplifying enterprise, creating big projects from tiny beginnings, but also ditching the neckchain of market-force religion that destroys it's power to think, act, even aspire, in a manner that is wholly from the heart (rather than some psychologically impregnated persona they call Christ). In other words, not likely to happen - not for a hundred years or so at least. So in terms of this generation, the US is a sinking ship unless you are a martyr to the future generations of the truly free.

One either has to love one's country, try to change it, or leave. There aren't really any other healthy options.

But the difficulty of even discussing this is that an American identifies very strongly with his country anyway - much more than a European or probably even an Australian. So any criticism of the system or judgement on the country is often taken as a personal affront rather than just a single academic observation that can be examined unemotionally. We will digress with the logical error of saying that 'many problems belong to other countries as well,' which is true, but sidesteps an issue too sensitive to raise. One has maybe to bear in mind that the U.S. is an enormous country, and many of its citizens have little or no idea of what it is like from a true external perspective (something I frequently hear from solo American travellers.) How can we discuss American greatness without bowing down in worship, without silencing constructive thoughts that are expressed only from a genuine love and respect of all that is good in America. For many decent Americans, even the thought is taboo.


*And we shouldn't forget that the untapped experience of subdued nations (such as American Indians and Australuan Aboriginees), as well as the influence of invading hoardes / immigrants, peaceful or otherwise, may provide a robust regeneration of essential values - though one doubts that the Sabine Women would agree. ;)

[QUOTE=Australiasucks]Well the analysis I see from the behavior of most your countrymen during the town hall "debates" is anything to go by, America is becoming more ungovernable. People were bringing guns to debates? Tea parties?? WTF.[/QUOTE]
Well, Americans have the right to assemble (#1 in our Bill of Rights) and bear arms (#2 in our Bill of Rights). So, there's some irony in your using this as an example of ungovernable America. :)

[QUOTE=Australiasucks]
The real reason Euro Americans do not like Hispanics is due to the fact that many do not integrate into mainstream America and form parallel communities, also they tend to compete with working class whites and other Americans for jobs, I know African Americans who do not like them as well because of this. [/QUOTE]

I can't claim to be an expert on why people hate, I'd suggest hate looks for any reason, and besides my point wasn't about racism, it was about U.S. immigration policy.

If you hold racist or ethnic stereotyping are the main issue here you have to say 'Euro Americans' generally stereotype foreign workers as having extra motivation, providing better value, willing and able to do "dirty" or seasonal work. Otherwise there would not be a market for foreign labor; think Japan. Obviously, the overwhelming marketplace of Americans are sympathetic (or at least ambivalent) toward immigrants, respect the fact they will hustle to do the work when other Americans don't seem to be so motivated. Many Americans identify with people who work hard and produce quality work.

As I mentioned, the reason immigration policy has gravity is that it plays against ideas about American identity and law. You could go read some of the material from say, the Center for Immigration Studies, if you want a more informative view of the 'more restrictive' side of the debate.

I have to sum up, you have a very American quality to you. Stereotypically, it's classic vulgar Americana to present yourself as an expert on a foreign country to a native of that country. "Let me tell you about your country"

So at least you've got that going for you. ;)

I spent times on both sides of the Pacific, I think Americans deep down have been sympathetic towards immigrants but I have noticed a very strong patriotic jingoist streak that has led to the minute man movement, the tea party movement is almost identical. There is a tiny movement against immigrants in Australia but its head left the country and its pretty much inactive. If I compared Australia to America today, Australia is a lot more immigrant family, and immigrants make up a larger percent of Australia's population than the US. Both countries though are more friendly towards immigrants than say Europe. Conditions are also different, Australia is largely empty, its ordinary citizens have much better economic and social protections than the average American and hence they tend to be more slack. In America, you have little protection(low minimum wage and your healthcare system only cares for with insurance), so hence any newcomer who succeeds is seen as a threat, so in that case both legal and illegal immigrants are cast into the same pot. There are plenty of Australian and British illegals in the US, but they do not experience the kind of social separation that their darker skinned counterparts experience.

Very disturbing article on US prisons, which has the highest number of prisoners in the world and how blacks are systematically targeted as criminals.

Interesting fact: Under apartheid in south africa, there were less number of blacks in prison than they are currently in US prisons under so called freedom and democracy.

[url]http://newilluminati.blog-city.com/america_behind_bars_the_usa_prison_state.htm[/url]

1. I am not sure what you are saying. South Africa has 49 million people. The US has 302 million. So, the same rate of imprisonment would still mean that there were 6 times more people in prison in the US than in RSA.

2. RSA has more black people infected with HIV than any other place in the world. So, is their democracy any worse (given that there will be a lot more dead black people and a lot more lost years of life)?

3. "...imprisoning 73 out of 1,000 people...." so you really mean to tell me that 7.3% of the population is behind bars? 21 million people. Twice the population of Michigan? The numbers don't add up. Later in the article, it says 376/ 100,000 whites, 997/100,000 Latinos, 2,526/100,000 Blacks. None of those numbers is anywhere near 73/1,000 (the first figure that the article quotes).

4. "Prison Industrial Complex......." Oh my God. Here were go again. Noam CHomsky has coined that phrase and it just WON'T die. It everything is a "X---Industrial complex." Not sure what it means, since there are MANY easier ways to make money than prisons.

I believe that you want to do some reading about the War on Drugs (which accounts for something like ALL of the differential in prison rates. The last book that I read about the War on Drugs was by Jeffery Miron (and I am planning on reading a couple more within the next few months), and he demonstrated the huge effects of drug laws on the prison population.

There is much more, but since the article is very obviously just agitprop, I can't be bothered to do a more thorough dissection. Life is too short.