The debt limit compromise

The New Neo Posted on by

If you look at today’s Memeorandum page, you’ll see that the debt ceiling compromise story totally dominates the news.

Most of the articles are of the “who won?” variety (even though the vote hasn’t occurred yet, everyone’s assuming it will pass). No need to link to them; just look at the page yourself and start clicking, if you’re interested. Most of them seem to think that the winners were the Republicans and the Tea Party. But I think most on the right would agree, instead, with commenter “J.J.,” who wrote here:

This deal does nothing about the spending problem. Just puts a bit of lipstick on the pig. Or as some might say ”“ kicks the can down the road. This is what I expected.

It’s hard to see that anyone “won,” especially if America’s credit might be downgraded anyway (see also this). The prolonged negotiations involved in making this especially stinky variety of sausage may have further shaken creditors’ already-waning faith in America’s ability and willingness to pay its bills.

The Tea Party wanted far deeper cuts than this. Liberals, the left, and Obama wanted tax hikes. And the public didn’t want the process of “negotiations” to go on this long, although politicians had reasons for believing the pressure involved in a down-to-the-wire dickering to be strategically advantageous.

This is just a first baby step. More must be done. What might it be?

I will go out on a small limb here and say that there’s nothing all that wrong (and even a few things right) with some manageable amount of deficit spending by the federal government. It’s the magnitude it has reached in the last few years that has become untenable and unsustainable, especially when projected only a short time into the future.

Somehow, and soon, entitlements must be reined in, or taxes raised, or both. There is no other way out. To accomplish these feats without undue hardship, and in an effective manner—to trim entitlements without harming people who have relied on them and paid into the system, and to do so for the next generations as well, and to raise taxes in a manner that doesn’t burden business and harm the recovery, and which actually takes in the amount of revenue needed rather than causing the overly-taxed to flee and/or become less productive—takes skill and wisdom that I’m afraid members of Congress do not possess (actually, I’m not sure who does).

So let’s not pretend it’s easy, although I defer to none in my contempt for Congress as a whole. But balancing (or at least getting into better balance) the budget of the federal government is nothing like balancing the budget of a household. Politicians must get elected and listen to the cries of constituents who want what they want when they want it. And cutting spending in the midst of an attempt to recover from a recession has its own dangers; it has the potential to put a damper on the economy itself.

It does no good to pretend that these problems don’t exist, and that solutions are simple. If the law of unintended consequences is any guide (and it usually is), any attempt to solve the problem will not go exactly as planned.

That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. Congress is going to have to tackle this, for real. This is what is contemplated:

Both Republicans and Democrats have proposed drumming up a committee of 12 legislators, handpicked by both parties, to deal with the most complicated issues involved in a likely debt-ceiling compromise. It will be up to this “super committee’’ to complete the epic task of cutting $2.8 trillion in spending from the federal budget.

According to the agreement reached yesterday, committee members would have only until the end of November to complete the job, and when they approve a final set of cuts, the rest of Congress would be given a simple choice: take them or leave them.

The first step in the process would take place immediately: raising the debt limit by nearly $1 trillion and cutting spending by a slightly larger amount over a decade.

That would be followed by creation of the super committee to recommend an additional $1.8 trillion or more in deficit cuts, targeting benefit programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security or overhauling the tax code.

Best of luck. As the article points out, the committee will be tasked to do what Congress couldn’t, and there’s no indication it would do any better.

The problem is not just that Democrats are stupid and Republicans are mean, or vice versa, or both—although in some cases that may indeed be true. The real problem is that the problems are real, and the disagreements are real, and that predicting what the economy will do as a result of government intervention is an iffy task. But doing nothing is not a viable option.

Debt compromise

The New Neo Posted on by

So, is this it?

And was it really Obama who stalled things all along?:

In many respects, the deal will, if approved by all parties, resemble the contours of a short-lived pact negotiated last weekend by House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. Obama rejected that deal, forcing Congress to wrestle with other inferior legislative options throughout the week.

[NOTE: Here’s an interesting analysis of the compromise proposal.]

The theater in DC continues…

The New Neo Posted on by

…although it’s not all that entertaining, and the seats are “obstructed view.”

The Boehner plan was never about something that would be implemented, anyway. Everyone knew it would be rejected by the Senate. It was in the nature of a serve in tennis—and certainly not an ace—just a start, to get the ball in play.

Now it’s in Reid’s court. This piece describes his latest move as an attempt at a compromise that will appeal to the GOP. But when you actually read what the two changes are, it’s almost impossible to see how they could sweeten the deal in any meaningful way.

The truth as I see it is that each party is philosophically opposed to the other’s stand on this issue, and see this as an exceedingly important showdown. But beyond the substantive disagreements is the need to appeal to constituents. No one wants to be turned out of office in 2012, and in the House everyone is up for grabs.

The results of the election of 2010 put the fear of being dismissed by the voters into everyone, not just the Democrats. The electorate is angry and impatient and will not forgive transgressions. That’s another reason true compromise is difficult, if not impossible.

The Incredible Journey

The New Neo Posted on by

A mountain lion traveled from South Dakota to New Haven, a distance of 2000 miles:

Biologists estimate the size of the mountain lion population at about 100,000 in North America, mostly living in western regions and seldom traveling more than 100 miles. It was the first confirmed wild mountain lion in Connecticut in more than 100 years…The lean, 140-pound male was killed June 11 when it was hit by a sport utility vehicle at night on the Wilbur Cross Parkway in the New Haven suburb of Milford.

Why the journey? Nobody knows. But maybe it wanted to see the coast.

And speaking of coasts and mountain lions, there this haunting ballad from my youth:

After I posted that, I was curious about the origins of the song (and especially how the girl got to be the jackpot in the card game), and I found that it’s based on this poem set in old Big Sur. Here’s how it went down, in the poem, which is more forthcoming than the song on the subject:

I sat in a card game at Jolon;
I played with a man there named Juan.
And after I’d won all his money
He said, “Your homestead ‘gainst my daughter, Dawn.”

I turned up the ace, I had won her!
My heart which was down at my feet
Jumped up to my throat in a hurry;
Like a young summer field she was sweet.

He opened the door to the kitchen;
He called the girl with a curse;
“Take her, God damn her, you won her!
She’s yours now for better or worse.”

A bit more research led me to Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, who’s rather well-known for a somewhat more gruff rendition “South Coast.” I was stunned to learn something of his background on Wiki; it’s quite a story in itself (and no, this is not the Onion):

Elliot Charles Adnopoz [who became Ramblin’ Jack Elliott] was born in Brooklyn, New York to Jewish parents in 1931. Elliott grew up inspired by the rodeos at Madison Square Garden, and wanted to be a cowboy. Though encouraged to follow his father’s example and become a surgeon, Elliott rebelled, running away from home at the age of 15 to join Col. Jim Eskew’s Rodeo, the only rodeo east of the Mississippi. They traveled throughout the Mid-Atlantic states and New England. He was only with them for three months before his parents tracked him down and had him sent home, but Elliott was exposed to his first singing cowboy, Brahmer Rogers, a rodeo clown who played guitar and five-string banjo, sang songs, and recited poetry. Back home, Elliott taught himself guitar and started busking for a living. Eventually he got together with Woody Guthrie and stayed with him as an admirer and student.

Ramblin’, indeed.

My kind of food–maybe

The New Neo Posted on by

Wow.

You can eat tons of this stuff and not gain weight.

Only thing is, would you want to eat it? My reaction to most-reduced calorie food, or food that uses substitutes (carob, artificial sweetener, what-have-you) is that it’s unappetizing. Give me the real thing–just don’t give me too much of it.

Debt ceiling negotiations, redux

The New Neo Posted on by

The other day I wrote a post about the debt ceiling negotiations. Few people in the comments section agreed with my point of view. But I had expected that, and I expect it for this one, too, which is fine; I don’t need a bunch of yes-men (yes-persons?) on the blog.

So, here I go again. But first, a little overview.

I don’t think that people in the blogosphere are typical of the average American. I’m not talking about their political persuasions—liberal, conservative, or in-between. I’m talking about their intensity about politics, and their interest in it and patience for reading and thinking about it.

Residents of the blogosphere talk amongst themselves. A lot; in fact. And in that process they tend to fire each other up with ever-increasing fervor. And so people who are already fairly intense and even fanatical about their points of view often become even more so.

That’s what I perceive happening on the right side of the right side of the blogosphere now regarding the debt ceiling bill (let’s call that faction the Tea Party side for the sake of simplicity).

From its beginning, the Tea Party movement was painted by the MSM and the Democrats as a bunch of racists. That was a lie, although unfortunately a fairly successful one. What was even more successful was the MSM/Democrat effort to paint Tea Partiers as a bunch of wild-eyed crazy fanatics. But, for the most part, what the Tea Party actually consisted of (and what appealed to me about it) was a bunch of fiscal conservatives and even moderates who were angry at the escalating government spending of the last decade (and more) by both parties, and wanted it to be reined in by new leaders that the Tea Party would help promote.

That was the goal, and to a significant degree it was accomplished in the Congressional elections of 2010. But although the House was won, the Senate remains in Democrat hands, and of course the presidency as well.

That’s where we stand today. And that’s a huge part of what’s stalling the current negotiations over the debt ceiling bill. There is not only a rift between Republicans and Democrats, but between the two wings of the Republican Party.

Those of you who are with the Tea Partiers say fine, bring it on, this is what we sent them there for. Hang tough. Don’t cave like the Republicans in the Bush Congress, those Democrats Lite who brought us the swelling deficit that Obama later blew up even further. We’re tired of compromise. We have the power. Let’s use it! And oh, default won’t happen and/or won’t be so bad.

I won’t debate the fiscal merits of the Tea Party case. That’s not what this post is about, nor do I have all the facts at my fingertips. You might say the devil is in the details, and if you haven’t learned the details of each proposal and tried to ascertain exactly what their consequences will be then you should just shut up. But I have been frustrated in my attempts to do so. Most of what I’ve read seems to be a combination of cheerleading, spin, and glib summaries. I have yet to find what I would consider a dispassionate and objective discussion of all the issues and proposals involved, or even an attempt at one.

You might say that I ought to have the patience to wade through it all. You might say that if I read enough about it, it would come clear. But it hasn’t happened. And I submit that I am far more typical of most of the American public than those who pick through this stuff with a fine-tooth comb and argue about how many tax loopholes can dance on the head of a pin.

People are sick of Congress, sick of this president, sick of the whole thing. They are not reading a lot of details. They are just seeing the overview and the sound bites and getting impressions from that. And their impressions are bad.

What do the people want? I think it’s this: Reined-in spending. A bona fide and serious attempt to reduce the debt enough to make it manageable. A government that seems reasonable run by people who can work together to actually accomplish these things. A pipe dream, probably.

The Tea Party members of Congress who are hanging tough may get what they want. They may force enough concessions from Boehner that they get a bill they can vote for. Then what? The Senate almost certainly won’t pass it, and whatever you or I may prognosticate about the next step is probably incorrect—except that the public will grow ever more weary and disillusioned and angry and frightened.

“Frightened” is an important part of it. You might say there’s no reason for the looming prospect of a default to frighten anyone; it’s bogus. You haven’t convinced me, though. One thing I do know is that if people are frightened, it affects the economy negatively. Whatever the economics of a pending default may be, the current climate of fear and uncertainty has very negative effects on the stock market and investment in general. And this cannot be good. The longer it lasts, the worse it probably will be.

[NOTE: Oh, and as far as the substantive issues go, will the addition of a balanced-budget amendment mean that the Boehner bill will pass muster, and pass?]

Aretha’s big sis, Janis’s predecessor

The New Neo Posted on by

Who?

Erma Franklin, that’s who.

Aretha’s older sister, she was nominated for a Grammy for the original 1967 R&B version of “Piece Of My Heart,” a song later made far more famous by Janis Joplin.

I’d never heard Erma’s rendition of the song before, but I was expecting it to be almost unrecognizable and very different from Joplin’s version. After all, Erma herself said she didn’t know it was the same song when she first heard Joplin sing it on the radio.

But I don’t know why. Yes, Erma has a more conventional R&B way of performing it, minus the screams and embellishments and the Dionysian desperation and vulnerability that were Joplin’s trademarks. But still, it’s very very much the same song, and Erma’s pretty great herself even in comparison to the other two Very Greats:

The song was written by Bert Berns and Jerry Ragovoy—two Jewish guys, one from the Bronx and one from Philadelphia.

Go figure.

Berns also wrote “Twist and Shout” and the abominable (IMHO) “Hang on Sloopy,” and was an influential producer as well. As for Ragovoy, he also composed “Time Is On My Side;” as well as “Cry Baby,” “Try (Just a Little Bit Harder), and “Get it While You Can” (all covered by Joplin); and “Stay With Me.”

Here’s the incomparable Janis, by the way, in case you never saw/heard her, or to refresh your memory:

And here’s Erma’s reprise of “Piece” in 1992. She still looks and sounds mighty good.

“Gentle justice” meets mass murder

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve got a new piece up at PJ, entitled “‘Gentle Justice’ Meets Mass Murderer.” It discusses the Norwegian policies of unarmed police and short penal terms in light of Breivik’s attacks.

That was one of those articles that could have easily been 100,000 words rather than 1,000, there was so much information. So of necessity, the piece just skims the surface of what I would like to have said.

The research for it was quite fascinating, although very disturbing. As part of my reading, I studied the reactions of the victims in a number of other mass shootings and tried to compare them to Utoya. This part of my reading never appeared in the PJ article, which already had threatened to become too long. But I discovered that, in general, it is extraordinarily difficult for unarmed people to mount any sort of effective response to someone with a gun, even if the former way outnumber the latter.

It’s not that no one ever tries. It’s just that, in order to be successful, the response usually needs to be co-ordinated in some way, and that is nearly impossible under the circumstances of most surprise mass shootings. At Columbine, for example, there were two gunman rather than one, and the students were fragmented geographically. Several were taken by surprise while walking around or sitting outside. The bulk of the victims already knew there were shooters in the school, and were hiding under tables in the library. When Harris and Klebold entered the room, the other students couldn’t get an overview of what was happening—which was that the murderous pair went around, seemingly randomly, firing at the students under the tables (sometimes without even looking to see who was there).

Contrast to the situation at Ft. Hood, where instead of high school students the victims were soldiers, and there was only a single perpetrator. Nevertheless, it was very difficult to mount any sort of defense until armed police appeared on the scene and shot Hasan. The Ft. Hood shooting lasted a lot less time than the Columbine killings (which in turn lasted for a shorter time than is commonly thought, somewhere between 19 and 25 minutes or so). But at Ft. Hood there were still at least three attempts by unarmed soldiers to stop Hasan in his murderous rampage. This is what happened to them:

According to witnesses, Army reserve Captain John Gaffaney attempted to stop Hasan, either by charging him or throwing a chair at him, but was mortally wounded in the process. Civilian physician assistant Michael Cahill also tried to charge Hasan with a chair before being shot and killed. Army reserve Specialist Logan Burnette tried to stop Hasan by throwing a folding table at him, but he was shot in the left hip, fell down, and crawled to a nearby cubicle.

With a few exceptions, it’s generally only armed people that can stop an armed gunman. That, or the gunman running out of ammunition—or running out of steam, like the Columbine killers, who still had plenty of ammunition but unaccountably decided to stop killings others and to kill themselves instead.

I may write a longer post some time on this topic. Till then, go to PJ and read about Norway. You can comment there, or here, or both.

The Obama adminstration versus the environmental scientist???

The New Neo Posted on by

I can’t make a whole lot of sense of what’s happening here. But I know it sounds potentially interesting.

Very:

A federal wildlife biologist whose observation in 2004 of presumably drowned polar bears in the Arctic helped to galvanize the global warming movement has been placed on administrative leave and is being investigated for scientific misconduct, possibly over the veracity of that article.

Charles Monnett, an Anchorage-based scientist with the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, or BOEMRE, was told July 18 that he was being put on leave, pending results of an investigation into “integrity issues.” But he has not yet been informed by the inspector general’s office of specific charges or questions related to the scientific integrity of his work, said Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

On Thursday, Ruch’s watchdog group plans to file a complaint with the agency on Monnett’s behalf, asserting that Obama administration officials have “actively persecuted” him in violation of policy intended to protect scientists from political interference.

The Obama administration, “actively persecuting” the environmental scientist? WTF??