The Fair Way to Report

The non-coverage of Ron Paul, and now the coverage of Ron Paul, give me an example of how badly the press reports on candidates. Here is my recipe for a fair, interesting, informative way to cover a candidate

• Do your homework first--know the candidate's policy positions, their strengths and weaknesses.
• Let the candidate present their positions and their strengths. Give them a fair chance to do this without interrupting with gotcha questions.
• Follow-up on the policy weaknesses and professional/leadership weaknesses. Revealing these weaknesses is an important task for the press because the candidate isn't going to do it himself, and opponents will tend to exaggerate.
  

So what was wrong with the coverage on Paul?

• First no coverage.
• Then coverage only as a no-hoper.
• Then coverage only of the newsletter scandal. 
• No reporting on his policy proposals.
  
• No critique of his policy weaknesses.

The first and the last are the biggest failures of the press. On second thought, they are all failures, and I'm not sure which is the worst, especially considering that the press could easily do a better job. If only they would divert some of their resources away from repetition, celebrity reporting, and media frenzy, they would have many more half-decent stories on this at-least-moderately-important presidential race.

 The only guaranteed airtime for Paul

I critique Paul's general policy approach here and "sound money" ideas here.

A New Year... minus the election jitters

Today feels more like Thanksgiving to me than Hangover Day. It's warm, so I took a walk with my honey in our historical downtown, and I just enjoyed the small pleasures like sunshine, well-built modest older houses, the smooth bark and twisty branches in an evergreen hedge. I thought about my kids at home (twenty-somethings) and how they are good-hearted and honest.

It's hard for me to worry too much about the fate of the US on a day like today. We aren't currently at our strongest, but we are a wealthy country with a lot of reserves. I don't believe anyone on the left or the right is trying to subvert and destroy our country. Of course we need to be vigilant, work hard, and make the best decisions we can. Maybe we also need to back down on the fear and suspicion.

I'm going to reveal something surprising--I used to be a pessimist. For many years, I was one. But then I noticed many aspects of my life turned out well, like my career, my relationship with my parents and siblings, my kids, my town. Now I'm an optimist because that's what life has taught me.

Thank you, God, life, nature, and everyone.

 A different town, but the same feeling

One risk in the next election

In case you haven't noticed, my biggest concern throughout this blog has been the deficit, and it's my focus still in my thinking about who I favor in the 2012 election. There is a scenario that especially scares me: one-party domination.

In the last decade, the worst economic moves have been made when one party had control over the presidency, the House, and the Senate:

• Bush tax cuts - responsible for a large part of our deficit
  
• Stimulus bill - an unfocused mixture of reasonable spending and money-down-the-hole projects
  
• Obamacare - a too-big answer to a real problem
  

At the 2012 election, we are facing the possibility of all three bodies in Republican hands. (I don't see the Democrats recapturing the House, and they have a better than 50% chance of losing the Senate.)

That worries me because I recall what the Republicans did last time they held the triple crown. We can't afford more Bush-type tax cuts, but I don't trust newly elected Republicans to see it that way. Many Republican candidates are promising major tax cuts already.

Although the Republicans have been stalwarts on balancing increased spending with revenue (or revenue gimmicks), we've seen before how quickly they abandon all that good sense when they direct the deficit spending. As painful as gridlock and obstruction may be, at least there is one good result: less spending and no big tax cuts.

To prevent one-party domination, I'll be voting for a Democratic president and a Democratic senator, even if I kind of like the Republican. We need elected officials who will block the stupidity of a thundering herd of partisans. In 2009, it was a herd of Democrats and the Senate blocked some of their excesses. In 2013, it's likely to be Republicans, so we'll need as Democratic a Senate as possible, and a Democratic president as insurance if the Senate fails.

Update 1/31/12. Read how I reevaluate after a weak SOTU address.

Reflections on partisanship

Partisanship is more the norm, but bipartisanship also has a robust history. I was asking myself the question: is it really worse now than it was in the past? Yes, I think so. In the past 3 years, Congress has negotiated virtually no bills. A few measures have been so popular that they passed easily, most recently a jobs bill for veterans, but that it isn't the hard work of negotiating a compromise. All the compromises in the past year have occurred as time ticked down to a shutdown or a hard expiration date.

A welfare reform bill or education bill worked on by both Bush and Kennedy would be unthinkable today. There had been camaraderie among senators in past years, but not now.

Not So Small Beginnings

I tried to think back to when this nearly constant animosity started, and I think it was during Reagan presidency. There won't be any proof of this, but I think there was a near constant barrage of disagreement and belittling critique of the man, his intelligence, and his policies. It wasn't surprising, because Reagan was an existential threat to the liberal-leaning status quo. He wanted to roll back a scary number of the gains liberal had made: welfare, abortion, tax-free student loans, decreased military spending, women's liberation.

One of the most blatant of the liberals' attacks was on Robert Bork, Reagan's nominee to the Supreme Court. Republican neither forgave or forgot, and Supreme Court nominations have been generally been contentious ever since. (To be clear, I agreed with the fight against Bork. He was a frighteningly persuasive reactionary, and I don't use those terms lightly.)

 "I'll see you and raise you five."

This form of partisanship, with constant attacks, became even more pronounced during the Clinton administration. The tools--congregational hearings, constant news leaks, rumors, special prosecutors (blessedly defunct now)--had all been used before by Democrats out to embarrass a Republican administration. Perhaps the Republicans added a few new tricks, such as finding PACs or think-tanks that would  financially sponsor accusers on press junkets (though it's possible that wasn't a new twist).

The Republicans really upped the ante with their impeachment proceeding against Bill Clinton. Even a strong electoral repudiation of the Republicans didn't deter the House Republican leadership, who commenced impeachment proceeding after losing a significant number of seats in the 1998 off-year election. Since then, the partisanship has barely had even a Christmas truce, except perhaps Gore's altruistic concession of the disputed 2000 presidential election. Each president has been accused so often of being "the most polarizing figure ever" that it could be a title equivalent with 'Mr. President.' I'm so tired and cynical about all this partisanship that I don't want to chronicle any more of it in this post. Suffice to say that it continues unabated.

I don't have a hopeful note to end on. No pithy quip. I still pray for an end to this partisanship, but without any spirit of hopefulness. Sorry to be such a downer.

 ... just another day at the beach

Extras
Google counts:

• "Impeach Carter"   - 5140 results, none contemporaneous.
• "Impeach Reagan" - 10,700 results
• "Impeach Clinton"  - 62,900 results
• "Impeach Bush"       - 2.2 million results
• "Impeach Obama"  - 1.0 million results

Supreme partisan Jon Kyl

Species identification - Lousy arguments

We've all heard about logical fallacies and rhetorical tricks. The straw man argument, ad hominem attacks, exaggeration, etc. I'd like to catalog more of these arguing tactics. Reader suggestions and verbatim examples are strongly encouraged:

1. Straw man - An opponent raises up a terribly weak point in your favor and busts it down. It's like punching a kid.
2. Ad hominem attack - You're a complete jerk, or moron, or traitor, or ... Your opponent may be a complete jerk too, but it doesn't make the underlying argument better or worse.
3. Correlation is causation - Obama caused the recession, the debt, etc. This is a big one because it can be used in so many situations.
4. Case closed - Annoying, one-sided closure of the argument.Variant: End of story, Period.
5. Irrelevant - Annoying, one-sided judgment of what the boundaries of an argument will be.
6. Limit choices argument -- Status quo or my candidate. EPA overreach or no EPA. Keep all the Bush tax cuts or none of them. You can reframe the argument: someone is offering 0% or 100% and ignoring all the possibilities in between.
7. Demand for proof - This can be legitimate, for example when someone asserts a fact, like 47% of people pay no income tax, or makes other kinds of assertions. But it's also used to derail the argument. It can be used as a straw man, an offhand assertion that isn't central to the argument, but an opponent picks it as a weak point and demands data.
8. Ignoring context - This is major, and is related to declaring information irrelevant. No extenuating circumstances matter. For example, unemployment was under 8% when Obama was elected and soared to 10%.
9. Creating a diversion, or "look over there, something worse" - Someone is clearly desperate when they try to distract you and steal your chess pieces. Point out the maneuver, and hammer the point you just made. It was probably a winner.
10. False comparisons - Our poor people are richer than 95% of the world. Implication is that they aren't poor, so the money shouldn't be spent on them. A give-away is the mention of different countries or  different eras.
11. Exaggeration - Making what is bad infinitely worse. Example: Taking away our freedoms, ruined the economy, if it wasn't for medicare we would all die.
12. False assertion - Claiming something that isn't true or is only an opinion. This is a case when demanding evidence is a good idea. Ex. Obama is the worst president in my lifetime. 

Examples:

Look at Europe and Cuba and every other place that has government run health care, they are in big financial trouble. - Correlation is causation.

Additions:

13.  It's common sense - Common sense always supports your side. This is similar to asserting something without evidence and declaring "case closed."

14. The well-known "No true Scotsman" argument. This is used to discredit someone so you don't have to listen to their point. All Americans should rally around the president. But here's an American who isn't rallying around. Must not be a true American.

15. Gotcha question - A question meant to derail a discussion rather than clarify positions or weak points. A gotcha question isn't on an important point in the argument, but on trivia. It functions similarly to the demand for proof (#7), and is similarly obnoxious in having a know-it-all smell to it. Example: "Pop quiz time: When MLK was in jail, ... which 1960 presidential candidate called Coretta Scott King to express sympathy and support: JFK, or RMN? Take all the time you need before responding...."

*****************************************************************
If you'd like, add  your own examples in the comments.

Links to the 13 or 20 top fallacies. Link to a good list of 42 fallacies with excellent examples and very little Latin.

Update 8/21/19. Quite a comprehensive list, but it doesn't list Gish Gallop, which is a great name, though I thought it was called fish gallop, which is even better.

Planning your repatriation holiday

You may see this proposal in the platform of Republicans. They advocate a tax holiday for companies bringing home the profits collected in other countries, called repatriation. I'm much less a business expert than some who read this blog, so I may be about to subject myself to cruel humiliation, but I'll attempt to explain this anyway.

The federal government taxes profits that US companies earn in foreign countries. It gives credit for taxes paid in the original country, but the companies still have to pay tax beyond that up to the top rate of 35%. Since the income tax rate on US companies is so high, companies may park the profits and not take them officially. Companies are asking for a tax holiday to bring the profits back to the US, reinvest them here, and grow the economy.

Sounds like a no-brainer, right? Not quite. This is a great line, but I hope it isn't successful like the "corporate gains and dividends are double taxed" argument. The truth, which the companies won't be mentioning, is that much of the money is already deposited in US banks. Also, the last repatriation holiday resulted in a lot of stock buybacks, not new investment.

So, when I read this talking point sometime next year, I'll be ready with this comeback:

This is a convenient argument for bigwigs who would like to increase their personal wealth. A tax holiday would allow executives to 1) repatriate profits, 2) avoid corporate taxes, 3) initiate stock buy-backs, 4) raise the stock price, 5) sell stock at higher prices, 6) take capital gains at 15% next year (if Obama is re-elected) or possibly 0% in 2013 if there’s a Republican president. But it’s very important for executives to get this repatriation tax holiday soon, because special low capital gains rates may be over at the end of 2012.

Do I think they’re planning to reinvest? No, but they hope other people will believe it.

All that money pining to come home

Anyone but Romney

...Except Dopey, Loony, Sleezy, Geezer, Niney, Prig, and Snoozy.

Maybe it's a bit early to post this, but I got started on the nicknames with Dopey and decided to run with it. Who knows, maybe they will pick Dopey.