Missing: Real fiscal negotiations

. . . chasing a fetish instead

For some unknown reason, the GOP decided to forego fiscal negotiations in the run-up to the appropriations for next year, and focus only on defunding Obamacare. They turned Obamacare into a fetish and focused all their energies on it.

Obamacare is certainly not the only political fetish. In fact, politics is full of fetishes. Each party tries to raise up their fetishes and burn those of their opponents. Here are a few fetishes off the top of my head: assault weapons ban, balanced budget amendment, green jobs, DADT, "real Americans," ...

Actually, I ran out of fetishes sooner than I would have thought. To me, a fetish is a practically useless but politically powerful piece of policy or jargon. In actuality, it doesn't matter, but politicians latch onto it for political grandstanding. Obamacare doesn't really fit this definition, since it will have real consequences, but it has been turned into a fetish because politicians have inflated its symbolism to a great degree.

Negotiate or bust

So, back to the point. Instead of doing some horse-trading on funding this and that, cutting hither and thither, the GOP has wasted months on Obamacare. They did manage to pass a bill in the House cutting 5% from the food stamp budget, but that's it. Maybe someone in the GOP (not you, Rand Paul) remembered to make up a prioritized list of other cuts, and will whip it out after the Obamacare offensive is defeated. If not, the GOP will yet again be caught out with no negotiation strategy. This happened in December '11, Feb '12, Dec '12, and March '13. When will the GOP learn?

The Dems, of course, like spending as much as they can get away with, so they aren't taking up the slack and suggesting their own cuts. Nancy Pelosi says there's nothing more to cut, but also that the Dems will work with the GOP to make government more efficient and end duplication of services. Her negotiation strategy is "you go first." This cynical strategy isn't good for the country at all, but those hopeless Republicans don't have anything better.

I hope we can get back to the situation in 2011 when the Tea Party was pushing for some real cuts, and they weren't going to back down. That was a realistic goal and it worked.

Right now they're engaged in a folly, and they seem to be throwing more energy at it than they had in 2011. Why are they flushing away their power on an unattainable goal? The only answer I have is that they don't know and don't care what is achievable and what isn't.

Perhaps we were damned lucky that they focused on budget cuts in 2011 and not Obamacare. Maybe it was just dumb luck, and not any wisdom at all. If the Tea Party chooses its goal irrationally, they are going to be a bull in a china shop until they're shot down. On the basis of 2013 vs. 2011, I'm not ready yet to declare the Tea Party totally irrational, but that's definitely on the list of possible explanations.

So, to the Tea Party, please go back to demanding some fiscal restraint. Show that your 2011 rational choice wasn't an aberration.

Image: washingtonpost.com

Extras. The food stamp cut mentioned above was 5% of a $80 billion budget that's doubled since 2008. The stimulus increased the grants, but that is also due to end, which may mean the total cuts are larger, perhaps on the order of 10%. The Dems are screaming about "food insecurity," which means one person in a household skipped as few as one meal a month due to food availability. Fetish, anyone?

Bernstein: GOP is "post-policy"--they have no proposals. Josh Barro complains about the lack of rational healthcare reform ideas among the GOP. Yeah, I noticed that.

Is Obamacare ALREADY a train wreck?

Everyone has heard this. Obamacare is a train wreck. Well, I don't take anyone's word for it. As I frequently tell other internet commenters, your assertion doesn't make it true. So what is the evidence that Obamacare is already a train wreck, even before exchanges crash, subsidy costs balloon, and healthcare providers are so pissed off that they give surly care?

The evidence:

1. In a Gallup poll of small employers, 40% are holding back on hiring because of concerns about the employers mandates in Obamacare. Well, maybe this is true, or maybe it's like the polls showing how many people thought that Obama wasn't born in the US. Some of the respondents will have political reasons for complaining about Obamacare. Refuting data: see the graph below showing trend in full time employment. Or maybe the sluggish job growth is due to a combination of Obamacare and poor sales and demand. On the whole, I think there's some validity to this complaint.
2. People are losing their satisfactory healthcare plans and being dumped into exchanges or forced to pay more for plans they don't want. This is true, but for how many? This tweeter says "After over 5 yrs of no group health ins I finally get a job that offers it and here's the thanks I get [a cancellation notice]. If you think about it for a minute, that tweet isn't a slam-dunk against Obamacare.
3. Here's a rehash of reasons from Heritage Foundation, including job losses due to taxes on medical devices and lower Medicare reimbursements. They mention less than 3000 jobs lost, not a horrifying number considering that the US lost 524,000 jobs in December 2008. 

No, Obamacare isn't a train wreck at this point. It's not as though no one knows how to implement it, what the rules are, or when they will have that information (might describe Dodd-Frank, but not Obamacare). It may turn out to be a train wreck, but it's politically motivated jumping-the-gun to call it a train wreck at this point.

Image: oops, lost the link

Graph above:  theatlantic.com

Extra. Obamacare will explode medical spending, just like Medicare did. I have a few obvious questions about this, including asking about the effect of covering mostly the healthy instead of the elderly. But the kicker in this article is that Medicare didn't positively affect mortality rates. Um, does that means Medicare is an expensive failure? Please defund Medicare immediately and see how that turns out.

Short: The shooter's Navy career

Here's a fairly detailed description of the Navy Yard shooter's career in the Navy. Elsewhere I read that around 25% of recruits have a similarly poor discipline record (sorry, can't find the link).

I don't think the Navy is at fault. The problem is that our society is more stressed than it had been, and more people are acting out in many ways. There won't be a quick fix for that, and a bandaid law probably won't have more than marginal effect. Still, I think we should try to improve the situation, with increased vigilance and reduced availability of guns. However, the best possible change, reducing the angry gun culture in this country, isn't likely to occur and certainly can't be mandated by law.

Can you pick out the bad ones?

Image: cruelkev2.blogspot.com

Short: Who's selling out whom in the GOP?

I didn't notice last night, but there's a snafu going on in the GOP right now. It seems that after goading the GOP for months to defund Obamacare, and within hours of the House announcing that it would try to do so, Ted Cruz announced that the Senate won't go along with that.

This shouldn't have been news to anyone. Dems hold the majority in the Senate. There is no way on earth that they were going to pass a continuing resolution that defunds Obamacare. So why is this news to various GOP congressmen or GOP constituencies? Perhaps some operatives have been spinning a story and forgetting (wink, wink) to mention a couple details. And perhaps some incredibly foolish people in the audience didn't realize this.

Now a bunch of people are pissed, and others are trying to quell it. Here are some of the reactions from HotAir:

Strategic: "I don’t understand the anger and angst towards Cruz. What has he said that he hasn’t always said? And did he say he was caving himself? The reality has always been that only the House can defund ObamaCare. If the House doesn’t agree to a CR, then there’s no CR."

Pissed: "Vichy Republicans: If you do not stand firm against Obamacare, and try hard to stop it, I hope you have a job lined up after 2014." 

Even more pissed: "You lying sacks of %#^?~{€*?. You’re not getting money from me or my new generation of voters me and Mammy is influencing. We’re not walking door to door for you. We’re not working phones for you. We’re not supporting one freaking #^*+!{]~£ thing you push unless you DEFUND OBAMACARE and STOP PUSHING AMNESTY!!!"

Cruz lied? "I went to Cruz’ event in Dallas. They specifically said this was not true. They said if you shut the government down, the statutory spending in Øbamacare does happen. However, if you defund the whole program, no spending on it happens at all."

Resolute: "We need to be their backbone – or broomstick if you will." 

Resigned: "Lord save us from this ridiculous soap opera. If there were really the votes to undo the ACA in a meaningful way — something I strongly favor, by the way — they could just repeal it. The idea that R’s, controlling one branch of Congress, can defund a law that they lack the votes to repeal is a fantasy." 

I think this disagreement will blow over... until the strategy fails, if it does as I expect it to. Then there will be more recriminations among the GOP. I'm not going to guess what those will be. I refuse to even try crawling up into those reptile brains.

Image: ijreview.com

Extras. A boring explanation of the plan using a checkbook metaphor. When you look at the details, is defunding even enough?

Tough sell: Obamacare isn't worth causing chaos

Conservatives have had an interesting line of argument: (bear with it... for now.)

• They aren't the ones who want to shut down government.
• They want government to keep going, but without Obamacare.
• It's the Dems who are shutting down government just to preserve a program that Americans don't even like.
• IT'S THE DEMS' FAULT.

Well, that's how the argument goes. There is a simple, step-wise logic to the argument. It's actually the mirror image of the Democratic argument -- the DEMS aren't the ones who want to shut down government; the DEMS want government to keep going, but WITH Obamacare; it's the GOP who are shutting down...

See, the arguments are mirror images. They work for both sides or for neither, which is intensely frustrating and leaves me wanting to yell "But... but...."

So, if the shutdown happens, who will be successful in selling this argument which works for either side? I want that question to linger here for a while.

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Let's assume that both the Dems and the GOP have their bases locked up.

• For some low-information voters who haven't heard the argument yet, whichever side they hear first, they may believe. 
• People who are really fearful of Obamacare will go with the GOP side.
• People who have gotten used to the Senate being the more mature, moderate, and deliberative body will see what the Senate does, and go against the GOP crazies.
• People who thought the issue was settled with the 2012 election will go against the GOP partisans who just... won't... get... the... message!

So, although the GOP was successful in making Obamacare somewhat unpopular, I don't think they were successful enough to get Americans to support chaos for the sake of blocking it. But we shall see.

Who will end up in the dunk tank?

Image: www.completerantallsorillia.com

Addendum 9/29/13. The shutdown arguments of the Dems and the GOP are mirror-images, but this argument does favor one side.

• The GOP argument
• We really want to change US law.
• We don't have the votes to do it.
• We'll threaten shutdown, default, or havoc to get the changes we want.
• Maybe we'll need a second amendment solution if that doesn't work.

• The Dem argument
• If you really want to change US law, put together the votes in Congress.

This shows how they aren't the same argument.

Save the country--defund Obamacare

This has been a mantra for conservatives for several years now: Obamacare will ruin the US. I won't repeat the nonsense of how Obamacare will cause the collapse of the US, or refute that nonsense here.

Though the GOP ran on this slogan, they didn't win. Certainly many GOP representatives and senators won election or re-election on that platform, but they lost the presidency and lost seats in the House and Senate. However, the campaigns were complicated with  fiscal issues, personality issues, abortion issues, psycho personal viewpoints on abortion,etc. It wasn't a clear referendum on Obamacare.

Finally we will have a one-on-one decision about Obamacare. It will be Obamacare vs. no Obamacare. Non-essential government will shut down on October 1, and it will stay that way until one side or the other capitulates.

Who will capitulate? Supposedly it will be the side that gets more blame from the general public. But there won't be a vote to determine that, so it will be whoever floods Congress with more calls. Ted Cruz has famously told conservatives "Don't blink," meaning don't capitulate, no matter what. I'm fairly sure he won't consider whether sentiment is running against the shutdown, but many in Congress will consider it. So soon we will see.

What's the likely outcome? As I noted, the last election wasn't a straight up-or-down decision on Obamacare, as it is now, so there is room for a different outcome.

Still, I'm going with the indicators from the 2012 election. Obamacare will survive. The kill-Obamacare-before-it-breathes forces will lose. If the shutdown lasts too long, the losers will pay an extra penalty for their stubbornness, and we should see that in the 2014 midterm elections.

One benefit of this showdown is that the test will finally be performed, and we will have an outcome. All those conservatives urging a tough stance on this issue will find out whether they are the majority or not. If they're wrong, I hope they will finally STFU.

Image: tdicamps.wikia.com

Short: Why I love Plain Blog

The matchlight flares up blindingly.

Suddenly I see so clearly why I like (love?) the Plain Blog about Politics. Here it is:

• It's based on data. In particular, the author (a PhD and professor) has a deep knowledge of US political history, and he takes a data-driven approach. 

This is a refreshing difference from the mostly ideological approach that political writers take.  Here's the author, Jonathan Bernstein, destroying the idea that a loss on the Syria vote will destroy the Obama presidency:

...there's one permutation that absolutely, no question about it, would destroy the rest of Barack Obama's presidency is: a disastrous war. Ask Lyndon Johnson or George W. Bush. Or Harry Truman...   

None of the other permutations [including losing a Syria vote] are anywhere close to that kind of threat to the Obama presidency. Presidents lose key votes which are then mostly forgotten all the time. They pursue policies which poll badly, but are then mostly forgotten, all the time. There are important things to say about all of that, because "mostly" isn't completely. But the first thing to get right when considering the effects of Syria policy on the rest of the Obama presidency is that the scale of a Vietnam or an Iraq (or a Korea, for that matter) overwhelms everything else we might talk about.

However, it wasn't reading the blog that brought on this epiphany. I was pursuing an argument on another blog where I'm trying to get a blogger to alter his view of Obama's fiscal program. How am I trying to do this? With data. 

Do your views conform with the data, or do you have to ignore the data (ignore facts) to maintain your political position? Everyone should be asking themselves that ALL THE TIME. Sadly, that isn't what happens.