Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category

Not Atticus Finch, Not Even John Yoo

Sunday, March 14th, 2010

There is a noble tradition in the legal community to provide legal aid pro bono for ill-disposed defendants unable to secure legal representation. The archetype attorney is this regard is  the fictional Atticus Finch in  Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mocking Bird. Atticus Finch engaged in a professional and vigorous defense of Thomas “Tom” Robinson, a black man wrongly accused of raping a young white woman. Finch defended Robinson despite the fact that the defense earned him the anger and disapprobation of his community. Why Did Finch defend Robinson? Most probably from a conviction that Tom’s was innocent. Perhaps  Finch believed that, innocent or not, criminal defendants are entitled to a defense. Perhaps Finch believed that the procedures used against Robinson violated his rights. Most readers of To Kill a Mockingbird would believe that all three factors were involved.

For an attorney to seek a case,  pro bono, when not directed by a court is a deliberate choice. It is a choice that involves a commitment of resources and time. Hence, the nature of the choice says something about the priorities, perspectives, and beliefs of the attorney. This issue has recently been raised with respect the attorneys selected by Attorney General Eric Holder. Apparently, seven of these attorneys defended detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Eric Holder has refused to disclose the names of these political appointees (not civil servants).

Now there are any number of reasons that these attorneys were involved in these cases. They may have been directed by the firms to do so. They could have believed in the innocence of those involved. They could have believed that the detainees ought to be tried in civilian rather than military courts. There are a host of possible reasons. Defending someone certainly does not imply any sympathy for the underlying crime or even a belief on the part of the attorney that the argument used for defense is ultimately valid.

If, however, these choices were made because the attorneys had a disagreement (perhaps a very reasonable ones) with US policy, this disposition is certainly a subject of reasonable inquiry. If these attorneys — now political appointees — are of the legal opinion that, for example,  people seized overseas by the military are criminals rather than prisoners of war that does not make them bad people sympathetic to the Taliban. But it does make their positions legitimate political issues and indicative the Administration’s policy with regard to detainees.

If Attorney General Eric Holder believed that this politically-appointed attorneys had a popular legal approach with regard to detainees, he would not be shy about their names and positions. Holder’s reluctance to publicly name his staff is a concession Holder’s conviction that the positions of his appointees might be  politically difficult to defend. Atticus Finch had the courage to publicly stand behind his choices, not hide behind anonymity.

In To Kill a Mocking Bird, Atticus Finch stood up against his life-long friends and neighbors to defend Tom Robinson. Although some of the attorneys hiding in the Department of Justice may be politically embarrassed now, among their professional peers at large firms, their was a mad scramble to get “street creds” by challenging the Bush Department of Justice.

Bill Kristol and Liz Cheney are over the top in referring to the lawyers at the “Al Qaeda Seven,” perhaps implying a sympathy with Al Qaeda. However, this criticism is far milder than the  attacks experienced by John Yoo, the attorney who wrote legal analysis for the Bush Administration, on the what what is or is not torture. John Yoo is willing to not only to be public about his opinions, but for making his best efforts he was accused in the popular press of war crimes and awarded a DOJ Office of Professional Responsibility investigation run by Obama politically appointees in the DOJ. It took a career a DOJ attorney, David Margolis, to counterman the recommendation that Yoo be referred for disbarment.

It is very legitimate to criticize Yoo on his legal opinions, just as it is legitimate to critique the policy perspectives of the current DOJ political appointees after they emerge from behind the skirts of AG Eric Holder. But Yoo, who is willing to publicly argue for his positions, must do so in an environment that requires real intellectual courage.

Public Sentiment is Everything

Saturday, March 6th, 2010

“In this and like communities, public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently he who moulds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes and decisions possible or impossible to be executed.”Abraham Lincoln.

Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas engaged a series of debates in pursuit of the Senate seat from Illinois in 1858. The campaign was indirect in that state legislatures appointed Senators at the time. Hence, Lincoln and Douglas were entrusted with the banners of their respective parties (Republican and Democrat) to wrestle control of the Illinois legislature.

The key Lincoln argument was that the Federal Government can and ought to control whether or not slavery was permitted in the territories as they became states. That had been the conventional wisdom since the adoption of the US Constitution. Moreover, Lincoln was concerned that the logical extension of the infamous Dred Scott decision — a radical departure from Constitutional precedent asserting that local state law against slavery was superseded by Constitutional protections of property — was that states would be prohibited from banning slavery. Douglas argued for local popular sovereignty as to the question of the extension of slavery. Douglas refused to concede that the logic of the Court in Dred Scott would be used to compel slavery to by recognized in all states.

Lincoln was subject to the criticism of hypocrisy. He personally objected to slavery, but it was not his position to abolish slavery in those states in which it had already been established. The key [1] he used to free himself cage of hypocrisy was the observation that “Public sentiment is everything.” In the South, public sentiment would make the abolition of slavery impossible. Perhaps with time, public sentiment would change, but it was imprudent to impose a policy against which there was strong public antipathy. Lincoln was right. Ultimately, it would take a bloody Civil War to eliminate slavery.

We do not argue here that opposition to the particular health care reform offered by the Democrats is morally equivalent to the abolition of slavery  in 1858, or opposition to the current bill is as blind to the real moral issues as Stephen Douglas was. Indeed, there is a strong argument that individual freedom and liberty, at the very core of the anti-slavery position, animates opposition to the current health care bill. However, independent of the correctness of one policy or another, it is clear that a majority of Americans oppose the health care reform as the Democrats have cobbled it together. Most people want to start over with a clean slate to construct a more reasonable, less radical, and more transparent approach to change. Public sentiment is strongly against the President and Congress.

President Barack Obama fancies himself in the mold of Abraham Lincoln, a tall well-spoken person from Illinois, elected President despite modest beginnings. If the comparison is to be more than superficial, Obama ought to adopt the profound wisdom of his erstwhile political model. Leadership in this case requires making a successful public case for Obama’s brand of health care reform before compelling its implementation against the clear public sentiment. Obama has the opportunity to be one who is “deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions.”

[1] David Zarefsky, “‘Public Sentiment Is Everything’: Lincoln’s View of Political Persuasion,” Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Summer 1994.

Government Annuities?

Sunday, February 21st, 2010

For many people, 401(k) or 403(b) savings form a key component of their retirement plans. When these plans were first instituted in the early 1980s, few people anticipated how important these programs would become in many people’s portfolios. Perhaps most importantly, such savings free individuals from dependence on their companies for retirement benefits. These accounts, in most cases, allow individuals to choose investments that would provide growth and income irrespective of the long-term prospects of their companies. The holdings in reasonably diversified 401(k) plans would not be significantly affected by the fortunes of any few companies.

During retirement, individuals have many choices with respect to what to do with their retirement account accumulations. They could maintain their own investments and withdrawal a portion every year to live upon. The advantages of such an approach are that individuals have control over their investments and that when they pass on they can leave some money to their heirs. The disadvantage is that people can make unwise investment decisions or they can simply outlive their resources. To mitigate this possibility, some people purchase annuities. For a fixed investment, an insurance company agrees to pay a person pension for a fixed period of for life (and sometimes the life of the spouse). The insurance company assumes the risk of longevity. If an individual retiree dies earlier than expected, the insurance company makes money. A long-lived retiree may cost the insurance company money. In essence, the risk of longevity is shared.

Apparently, the Federal government is looking at encouraging people to move more to the annuity option. The government may be reasonably concerned about encouraging rational evaluations of risk and the informing the choices about retirement options. The government could deal with this by making investment tools and advice available to aid in retirement decisions.

However, some people are concerned that the government is looking enviously on all the assets accumulated in retirement accounts. It is possible for the government to offer annuities at actuarially unsound rates to obtain current funds in exchange for government-backed promises of future income. The House Education and Labor Committee is focusing on ways of directing 401(k) funds into Treasury bonds. Indeed, the goal seems to be melding 401(k) resources into a Social Security like system – first as a voluntary choice, and perhaps later as a requirement. In the open market, Treasury bonds are priced at their market value. A government promise for future incomes in a government social program, need not be priced appropriately. The underfunding of Social Security demonstrates this.

Whether bailing out banks, car companies, or individuals,  the government exercises much of its power by transferring funds from people who make responsible decisions to those who make unwise ones. Those frugal enough to have forgone current income to save in 401(k) plans now are conspicuous targets. I suspect that people have such a proprietary view of the money they have saved, that any attempt by government to unfairly seize these funds (regardless of any promised benefits) will doom any politician that suggested it. People feel strongly about what they consider the Social Security they “earned.” How much more protective of will they be of funds they more directly earned?

Iraq Victory Has a Thousand Fathers

Sunday, February 14th, 2010

On January 10, 2007, then Senator Barack Obama expressed his opposition about a US troop surge in Iraq to create a security window within which the Iraqis could begin secure their own country, `’I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”  This was not an off-the-cuff analysis offered without serious consideration.. Four days later, Obama he explained:

“We cannot impose a military solution on what has effectively become a civil war. And until we acknowledge that reality — we can send 15,000 more troops, 20,000 more troops, 30,000 more troops, I don’t know any expert on the region or any military officer that I’ve spoken to privately that believes that that is going to make a substantial difference on the situation on the ground.”

That same month, 86 Americans and 1800 Iraqis were being killed in Iraq. The surge was not in place until the summer of a 2007, and by that time nearly 2,000 Iraqis and 100 Americans were loosing their lives each month. But Obama was certain “…that the surge has not worked and we will not see a different report eight weeks from now.”

By the time President George Bush left office, American service deaths were down to 16 per month, many of these were non-combat related. Perhaps more impressively, Iraqi civilian casualties were reduced by more than an order-of-magnitude. The situation had turned so dramatically, that the Bush Administration and the Iraqi government signed the Status of Forces Agreement, whereby American forces would leave Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and US forces would be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011.

Reluctant to give the Bush Administration credit for its judgment but required by events to concede the improvement in Iraq in late 2008, Barack grudgingly offered that, “I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated — by the way, including President Bush and the other supporters. It has gone very well.” May all presidents be praised with the assessment that their policies were more successful than even they expected.

However, this last week came the final turn around when Vice-President Joe Biden claimed credit for the success in Iraq when he said,

“I’m very optimistic about — about Iraq, and this can be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the, uh, end of the summer. You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government.”

This was particularly amusing coming from Joe Biden’s mouth (an orifice through which many odd words have passed). Biden’s solution had been to divide Iraq into three. As President John Kennedy famously quipped,“Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.” Biden’s proud assertion of achievment put Iraq in the category of victory, when everyone claims credit for it. When things go badly like the economy, it was Bush’s fault. When things go well its the Obama Administration that succeeded.

Even after the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union collapsed, the Left refused to acknowledge that President Ronald Reagan’s policies were part of the cause of that victory. Despite, what the Left was saying in the 1980s, we are now told that the Soviet Union was ready to collapse of its own weight and Reagan was just fortunate to be president at the time. Whatever Reagan’s  policies their effect was imposed over a decade so any  cause and effect are more difficult to link. In the case of Iraq, violence was growing so rapidly in 2007 and was quelled so quickly after the surge that therelationship between the surge and the improvement in Iraq is impossible to deny. While the surge may not have been a sufficient condition for the improvement in Iraq, it was certainly a necessary one.

The Culture of the Constitution

Sunday, January 31st, 2010

The US Constitution is the longest living constitution that has provided an effective framework for self government for over two hundred years. It has served a country that began as thirteen relatively independent states that grew into a continental nation. Although there have been twenty-seven amendments, the document has remained largely intact. The longevity of the US Constitution is not just a consequence of its clever design. Indeed, is product of both considerable political genius as well as the compromises necessary to weld together the original disparate states.

Despite the genius of the US Constitution, it can not be simply adopted by any country with the same success. The functioning of the US Constitution also relies upon a deference to the disciplines of the US Constitution by government officials and the people. A president must rely on the Congress to pass legislation, Congress must grant latitude to the chief executive to manage the government, particularly in foreign relations. Both must respect the Constitutional limits adjudicated by the US Supreme Court. Because the Supreme Court is the least democratic branch of government, it must be reticent overrule the decisions of the other two branches.

Of course, the Civil War was the ultimate challenge to the Constitution and the Union, but there have been cases where the three branches of government have chafed up against one another. President Andrew Jackson largely ignored the US Supreme Court when it ruled in favor of Cherokee Indians over the depredations of the state of Georgia (Worcester v. Georgia). President Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the Supreme Court with additional justices, when it ruled against hist initiatives. Congress has tried to constrain the discretion of the President with War Powers Act. And many have suggested that sometimes the Supreme Court has exceeded its authority, particularly the Warren Court.  Despite these and other important lapses, it is important to maintain the forms of respect, especially between the different branches of government.

In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled earlier this week that the speech of corporations were protected by the First Amendment. Specifically, corporations and other associations of people could spend money on independent — uncoordinated with the candidates’ campaigns — efforts to persuade people to vote one way or another. There is some disagreement with the ruing both those who believe, as George Will explains, “Americans need to be swaddled in regulations of political speech.”

Despite the attendant controversy, it remains remains disconcerting for President Barack Obama to use his the latest State of the Union address to lecture Supreme Court to the applause of Congress for a decision he disagreed with.  Obama said:

“With all due deference to separation of powers, last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests –- including foreign corporations –- to spend without limit in our elections. (Applause.) I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. [Applause.] They should be decided by the American people. And I’d urge Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps to correct some of these problems.”

Leave aside for the moment that the President’s remonstrance was based on false premises. The Court in its decision explicitly allowed restrictions of foreign expenditures in US campaigns. It was disrespectful and rude to argue with and criticize the justices, when they are in no position to respond. The remarks smacked of presidential imperialism and was beneath Obama who is supposed to be a Constitutional scholar. Obama knows better. He may come to regret undermining the Court when some time in the future  the Court must suffer under diminished authority and respect when issuing a ruling with which Obama is sympathetic.

One the other hand, Obama is to be congratulated when he met with the Republican caucus this week. The exchange was civil and benefited both the Republicans and the President. Obama should consider institutionalizing the meeting on perhaps a quarterly basis.

Edward Kennedy’s Gifts

Sunday, January 24th, 2010

All politicians make political calculations, weighing different options in the messy process of legislation and forming political arrangements. Political compromise and adjustment is a necessary and important skill for free societies governed by a combination of chief executives and legislatures, often of different political parties. However, is it wrong to admit a guilty pleasure – schadenfreude – when Machiavellian manipulations, outside the scope of political good faith and respect for free institutions, backfire?  For at least a couple of these pleasures, we can turn to the late Senator Edward Kennedy.

Perhaps Edward Kennedy’s greatest unintentional gift to Conservatives came during the 1980 presidential campaign. High inflation, high unemployment, and high interest rates had severely eroded the political popularity of President Jimmy Carter. The political positions of  Kennedy and Carter did not differ much substantively, but a weak incumbent gave Kennedy an opportunity for a primary challenge and ti serve personal ambition. Although Kennedy won only ten primaries to Carter’s twenty-four, Kennedy ate away at Carter’s support by continuing his challenge to the convention, hoping for rules changes there that might give Kennedy the nomination. The number of Carter delegates was too overwhelming and they defeated Kennedy’s procedural challenges at the convention. Out of respect, Kennedy was given the opportunity to address the convention. In a rousing conclusion, Kennedy acknowledged defeat but despite his loss “the work goes on, the cause continues, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”   The speech made Carter’s later performance seem mediocre. Although Carter survived the Kennedy challenge, he emerged from the Democratic National Convention weaker, leading a demoralized and divided Democratic Party, helping in part to usher the Reagan era. Thank you.

In 2004, the other Senator from Massachusetts, John Kerry, was running against President George W. Bush. If Kerry managed to defeat the incumbent president, under state law, Republican Governor Mitt Romney would appoint a Senator to fill out the term. A Republican Senator from Massachusetts was too much for Democrats to stomach. With the encouragement of Kennedy, the Democratically-dominated state legislature gamed the system. They changed the law to establish a special election to fill vacancies.  Reasonable and well-intentioned people can disagree about  the appropriate procedure  for filling a senatorial vacancy. However, this change was not based on principle, but was intentionally designed to gane the system for immediate political advantage. This decision would ultimately come back to haunt Kennedy and Democrats in Massachusetts.

Kennedy’s signature issue was health care. He has always advocated a government managed and financed health care system. When he unfortunately took ill in 2009 with what proved to be terminal cancer he knew that he might not survive to usher through health care reform. His last votes in the Senate were in early April 2009. If Kennedy had resigned under these circumstances, he could have provided ample opportunity for a hand-picked successor to win election as Senator with his direct endorsement. However, political vanity was more important and Kennedy hung on to his office until his death in August, 2009. The cause of health care reform would have been better served if he resigned, but a personal desire to keep his office-for-life overwhelmed this calculation. Kennedy did not know with certainty that  clinging to office would undermine the cause of his life, but he did know that he was no longer capable of leading or even participating in the fight in the Senate. Kennedy clutched to his office until the end. Is it too mean-spirited to exploit the metaphor that while health care legislation was drowning, Kennedy was swimming to the shore of personal political indulgence?

If the Massachusetts senatorial succession procedure had not been altered in unashamedly political manipulation in 2004,  Democratic Governor Deval Patrick would have appointed a Democrat to fill out Edward Kennedy’s term. There would have been no opportunity for Republican Scott Brown to ride a wave a political dissatisfaction with conspicuous manipulations and payoffs to arrive at medicare legislation, and  to  upset the Democratic candidate Martha Coakley. Scott’s election killed health care legislation in its current form and wounded the Democratic Party. For this we, we can in no small measure thank Edward Kennedy and recognize the justice that self-aggrandizement and political corruption was not in this case rewarded.

Cool and Sedate Reflection

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

There are two traditional models for political representation: that of  a “delegate” or a  “trustee.”

A delegate is sent to a representative body to vote the way he believes his constituents would want him to. Such a delegate aligns his views directly with the collective views of the people he represents. He embodies his constituency. The delegate theory of representation is favored by populists and some early founders.  In the extreme limit, the delegate theory reduces to a more efficient way to implement a plebiscite democracy — the kind of democracy that through referenda has made California almost ungovernable.

The trustee model of representation holds that a constituency votes for a representative whose judgment they trust and rely upon. A trustee has the time to consider legislation in detail, and pursues legislation that would balance the benefits of the whole polity and the local constituency – even if the constituency disagrees with a particular position. In the extreme limit, a trustee model of the representation can degenerate to rule by the elite.

Some Congressional and Senatorial representatives subscribe to a hybrid of the above models. They believe they are sent to Washington to vote a certain way on one or two conspicuous issues  (e.g., gun control, abortion, farm legislation), while they are free to exercise their judgment in most other areas.

Conservatives, at least those who have not surrendered to populist temptations, subscribe to the trustee theory of representation, as advocated by William Burke and articulated by Alexander Hamilton in Federalist 71:

“The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they entrust the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion, or to every transient impulse… When occasions present themselves, in which the interests of the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those interests, to withstand the temporary delusion, in order to give them time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection.”

How should the trustee model of representation apply to the current debate about health care “reform?” A clear majority of Americans are doubtful of and opposed to the current version(s) of health care reform as they understand it (them) . Nonetheless, if in its  best deliberative judgment, Congress believes the reform is in the best interests of the country, then  the trustee model of representation would suggest that they vote in accordance with their best judgment.

There remain, however, several mitigating factors. The current health care reform proposal represents very radical adjustments of present arrangements,  and prudence suggests that we can expect comparably large unintended consequences. The results of truly “cool and sedate” deliberation rarely result in abrupt or radical changes.  Moreover, the ultimate success of such a complicated enterprise depends in part on its acceptance by the polity. Even if one believes that health care reform could theoretically produce better results, if the country does not subscribe to the same conclusion, it may reduce the probability of success. Strong public animosity to legislation is not an irrelevant consideration to someone entrusted as a representative.

It would be disingenuous for Democrats to argue that they are modulating the passing whims of the people with “cool and sedate  reflection,” while negotiating behind closed doors and buying  off special interests with targeted deals for Louisiana, Nebraska, and the unions. Rather than reducing volatility, Congress seems to be rushing headlong to pass a bill before popular sentiment makes it more difficult for representatives concerned about re-election to support the bill.

Liberal Democrats would be understandably disappointed if they cannot manage health care reform. However, the compromises  being agreed to (and supported by large pharmaceutical and  insurance companies) will likely create a system far different from the one they originally envisioned. Indeed, if presented with the current proposal a year ago, they would likely be embarrassed by it. The drive to get something — anything — rather than calm consideration is the driving ethos. Part of the discipline of a democracy is to maintain the good judgment not to push the polity too far from the direction they can be persuaded to travel. This political discipline and respect for the governed has been trampled in the stampede to health care. It is time for Congress to step back, pause, and reflect coolly and sedately about appropriate changes to current health insurance arrangements.

Health Care and the Consent of the Governed

Sunday, January 3rd, 2010

It is easy to fall into the conceit that we face greater political challenges than our predecessors; that politics now is meaner and more divisive than it used to be. One virtue of studying American history is to remind us that the many of the same challenges we face now were faced before, albeit on a different political terrain and by almost certainly greater minds.

Modern students should also be suitably chastened to recall that political positions have shifted over time in unanticipated ways. Contemporary Democrats, who worship at foot of their political patron saint Thomas Jefferson, should remember his visceral antipathy to a strong national government. Republicans, who trace their political heritage to the first Republican president, Abraham Lincoln, may be disconcerted as his willingness to use strong national power when necessary.

In their eagerness to pass heath care reform, Democrats should perhaps consider the counsel of the first chief justice, John Marshall.  In 1823, many were focused on legislation to limit the power of the national judiciary. Ultimately, the effort failed in no small part because the passions of the moment created bills that were so single-minded that legislators failed to provide due deliberation on the full impact of what they were considering. It seems that the perceived necessity of passing something is overwhelming the true necessity of passing something well considered.

With the current health care bill widely unpopular and that structure of the bill complex to accommodate the necessity of cobbling together a narrow majority, Democrats would do well to consider the words on Marshall in a letter to Henry Clay.

“One of the most dangerous things in legislation is to enact a general law of great and extensive influence to effect a particular object; or to legislate for a nation under a strong excitement which must be suspected to influence the judgment. If the mental eye be directed to a single object it is not easy for the legislator intent on that object to look all around him and to perceive and guard against the mischief with which his measure may burn.”

If we are to embark changes of wide consequence in a society ruled by the consent of the governed, it is undoubted wise to do so only buttressed with wide public acceptance and support.

High Front End Costs, Back End Benefits

Sunday, December 27th, 2009

“The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience.” Albert Camus.

While individual and private collective charity is noble and common, welfare payments  viewed as charity financed by taxes have never been particularly popular. This is the reason why social welfare programs like Social Security and Medicare, despite of the fact that they largely represent transfer payments with clear winners and losers, are depicted as social insurance not welfare. People are persuaded that they are participating in a large pension program, where they contribute now and receive benefits at retirement as if money were stored is some specific account for them. Moreover, at the start of these programs, there were few beneficiaries so the costs and pain were low. Long-term sustainability was not an issue.Correctly or incorrectly, there is a sense of underlying justice to the transaction. That is why seniors remain so defensive about these programs. They feel entitled on the basis of their previous payments, even if those payments are in no way actually related to the benefits. This is the political genius underpinning the social welfare state — and why Democrats may have overstepped on the current“health care reform.”

It is impossible to predict the final state of the health care bill once it leaves conference committee. However, in order to make the bill financially palatable, the goal was to have a program that is deficit neutral. One can argue about whether the economic assumptions provided the Congressional Budget Office for the forecasts were realistic. However,  here is no question that in order to maintain plan deficit neutrality over the first decade, the taxes start for the first few year before the benefits commence in earnest. The pain is front loaded while the benefits come along the back end, the exact opposite of traditional strategies for extending social welfare programs. In the longer term, no one seriously believes that the program is financially balanced.

The strategy of the Left should be to get as many people dependent upon the benefits, to feel a sense of entitlement, before the costs come tumbling in. There is a precedent for a social program that did not work out because the costs were too obvious and the benefits less so. In 1987, Congress passed a catastrophic health care program for seniors. The idea was to limit the out-of-pocket expenses for seniors will chronic long-term health expenses. The goal may have been laudable, but it was largely paid for by middle class seniors, many of whom had difficulty affording the additional premiums (really taxes).  Seniors largely did not feel that they were benefiting from the new social contract. Two years later, the program was ended as frustrated seniors marshaled their ample political power against Congress. We shall see whether the health care changes suffer the same fate.

The Just War Speech

Sunday, December 13th, 2009

In 1933, a period when Great Britain was still staggering and exhausted by the human loss of World War I, the Oxford Union Debating Society considered the proposition, “That this House will in no circumstances fight for its King and Country.” Even given the extremely categorical nature of the resolution, it passed overwhelmingly 275-153. It is amusing at this distance in history to see those in favor of the resolution unselfconsciously arguing, “It is no mere coincidence that the only country fighting for the cause of peace, Soviet Russia, is the country that has rid itself of the war-mongering clique.” The prevalent attitude  then in Great Britain, as evidenced by  the outcome of the debate, is part of the reason that in the words of President John Kennedy, “England slept” as European Fascism grew in power.

Ultimately, the consummate evil of the Nazi Regime and the ensuing war after a period of shameful appeasement woke England and the rest of the world from the pleasant dream of a world ruled by pacifist sentiments.  It was a lesson that should be hard to forget, but the peace in Europe for decades — a peace secured by  World War II — has largely erased the memory of the terrible necessity of war. The Europeans have enjoyed a generation where disputes in Europe are resolved by politics and committees. Wars as a means of resolving disputes seem barbaric and unnecessary.

In this context,  the Nobel Peace Prize Committee awarded President Barack Obama the its prize. President George Bush represented an America that sometimes found it necessary to its security to wage war. Obama was not Bush and ran for election on a policy that was largely critical of Bush’s war efforts. To his credit President  Obama and the the chagrin of his hosts recently stepped up to his duty to lecture the European elites, especially those on the Nobel Committee, on Just War Theory:

“But as a head of state sworn to protect and defend my nation, I cannot be guided by their examples alone. I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people. For make no mistake: Evil does exist in the world. A non-violent movement could not have halted Hitler’s armies. Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda’s leaders to lay down their arms. To say that force may sometimes be necessary is not a call to cynicism — it is a recognition of history; the imperfections of man and the limits of reason.”

Even if Obama appreciated Just War Theory long ago, we can be certain that his appreciation of its importance has grown given his responsibilities as President. It is a reminder of just how far European elites have fallen from this understanding, that Obama’s elucidation of the possibility of a just war took his hosts in Norway by surprise. The paragraph above represents words that could have been delivered by any elected leader and particularly by any American president. The Nobel Committee may have been disappointed.