SDP focuses on national politics with a special emphasis on South Dakota. It also includes posts on philosophy, science and culture. SDP was founded by Jason Van Beek, who stopped blogging after becoming a staffer for Sen. John Thune (R-SD) and is currently operated by Ken Blanchard.
On the last day before summer vacation, our grade school was treated to a movie at the local theater. We watched "Flipper". Curiously, the only thing I remember (beside the fact that The Rifleman, Chuck Connors, was in it) is the main characters huddling in the corner of a building during a hurricane. One said to another: "don't worry: no hurricane would dare blow done a US Post Office!"
That awe and respect for federal government is, for better or worse, a thing of the distant past. For better or worse, the same may be true of the Post Office. From the WaPo:
The U.S. Postal Service is on the verge of defaulting on billions of dollars in payments due to the U.S. Treasury, but Congress isn't any closer to resolving the delivery service's financial woes.
On Wednesday the first of two legally required payments come due, a $5.5 billion obligation to fund future postal retiree health benefits. Another $5.6 billion is due at the end of September. But with mail volume and revenues plummeting — leading to roughly $25 million in losses each day — USPS has warned it will be unable to make the payments and may need to delay other obligations, including a $1.5 billion payment to the Labor Department for workers compensation.
The Postal Service doesn't use taxpayer money to fund operations, but is regulated by Congress, which for years has passed short-term resolutions to prop up its sagging finances.
The Post Office is in an unenviable position. It is not funded by taxes but has to produce its own revenues. However, it is also The United States Post Office, and so has to keep Congress happy. It cannot make the kind of decisions (closing unprofitable centers, cutting delivery to five days a week) that a private corporation might make to keep in business. So here we are.
General Motors is in a rather different but similarly unenviable position. It is a corporation with a dysfunctional and apparently irremediable culture. The natural remedy for that situation is bankruptcy and or extinction, in favor of new corporations that do not have the same defects. That natural outcome was avoided by the Federal bailout. Unfortunately, there are some things that federal money can't fix. From Mickey Kaus:
I've been told that after its Rattnerized bailout GM is "back," a dramatic "success story." The president himself has boasted "General Motors is back on top." Yet now a few weeks later Bloomberg says the company is in a "slump"–it's right there, in the headline: "slump." How can the bailed out, comebacked, turned around success story GM be in a slump when the U.S. auto market as a whole is growing rapidly? It's almost as if an easily spun media wildly underestimated the problems at GM (and the inadequacy of the administration's fixes) in a way that helped President Obama's favored narrative (and pleased a major advertiser at the same time!) …
P.S.: Why is all this executive turmoil happening now? It's very hard for an outsider to know exactly what is going on, but there are three theories. 1) GM CEO Akerson is panicking (Truth About Cars' theory); 2) Akerson is kind of incompetent and hires people he then chases away or has to fire; 3) … I'm thinking of a third. … What's the third? I know there's a third. …
P.P.S.: I'd forgotten that in April, 2010 President Obama told the nation (in his weekly radio address) "It won't be too long before the stock the Treasury is holding in GM could be sold …."
Two years later, the Treasury still owns more than 26% of GM. The stock price of the dramatic administration success story is too low to sell without taking gigantic, embarrassing losses.
The President was right to insist that Government has a role in making the market work. It is equally true that Government frequently makes the market work less efficiently for most of the people involved. Saving GM may have been good for the unions and for the corporate managers (at least temporarily) but it was not necessarily good for the United States or its people.
What is quite evident is that Government is no damn good at all when it comes to managing the markets. I don't think that Mr. Obama knows this. I don't think he is capable of learning it.
The band plays on, doesn't it? Last month's dismal jobs reports were followed by reports of dismal GDP growth.
The White House predicts this year's federal budget deficit will end up at $1.2 trillion, marking the fourth consecutive year of trillion dollar-plus deficits during President Barack Obama's administration.
The bleak figures, while expected, are sure to add fuel to the already heated presidential campaign, in which Obama's handling of the economy and the budget is a main topic. Friday's release came as the government announced that U.S. economic growth slowed to an annual rate of just 1.5 percent in the second quarter of this year, as consumers cut back sharply on spending.
Well, at least something is growing robustly, even if it's the public debt. On that note, let's take a look at the polls.
The RCP average gives Obama a lead nationally of 1.1%. That's an average of seven polls. Obama's best showing is the NBC poll, which gives him a lead of six points (49-43%). Romney's best showing is the Rasmussen poll, which gives Romney a lead of 5 points (49-44%). Gallup has it tied 46% each.
Gallup has a very large sample, reports a five day average, and has been using the same methodology all year. That filters out most of the noise over time. It does, however, sample registered voters. Rasmussen has fairly large samples over two days, and filters for likely voters.
The only other poll to target likely voters is NPR, which gives Obama a two point lead. NPR's sample is 36% Democrat, 31% independent, and 29% Republican. That assumes that Democrats will enjoy a turnout advantage over Republicans of 7%.
That is as great as 2008 and is considerably larger than the trend of the last 25 years. Indeed, it is larger than the percentage of registered voters identifying as Democrats in all but one major poll. This comes at a time when Republicans enjoy a pronounced advantage in enthusiasm, as I noted in the last post. The only reason to assume such an advantage is that one doesn't want to confirm the Rasmussen results.
The race is somewhere between a dead heat and a two or three point Romney lead. If the election were held today, Romney would win.
More unfortunate news for the Democrats. From Gallup:
Since the vast majority of voters majority of voters always vote the same way, what frequently determines elections is not how people vote but which people vote. Note that in 2004 the Democrats enjoyed a 17 point advantage in enthusiasm. Dubya still won. The gap was much greater in 2008. Obama wins.
So what do the Gallup numbers mean right now? I can't tell because I can't know whether the numbers are accurate. Too many things changed over the last eight years and pollsters can control only for some of them.
What we can say is that if these numbers are correct, written in them is doom for Obama and for a lot of Congressional Democrats.
So who take responsibility for the lousy economy? The answer is the President. That's the way it's supposed to work, regardless of how much leverage the President has. It's part of his job to take responsibility.
President Obama has never understood this and for a long time it seemed like he would be the real "Teflon President". That seems to be about to end. From a Poll by The Hill:
Two-thirds of likely voters say the weak economy is Washington's fault, and more blame President Obama than anybody else, according to a new poll for The Hill.
It found that 66 percent believe paltry job growth and slow economic recovery is the result of bad policy. Thirty-four percent say Obama is the most to blame, followed by 23 percent who say Congress is the culprit. Twenty percent point the finger at Wall Street, and 18 percent cite former President George W. Bush…
The poll, conducted for The Hill by Pulse Opinion Research, found 53 percent of voters say Obama has taken the wrong actions and has slowed the economy down. Forty-two percent said he has taken the right actions to revive the economy, while six percent said they were not sure.
The Administration's position has been that it was all Bush's fault and things would be even worse without Obama's policies. It appears that there may be a statute of limitations on both arguments.
Meanwhile it may be that the Obama Administration Campaign has been doing Romney more good than harm with its attack on his Bain record. From USAToday:
By more than 2-1, 63%-29%, those surveyed say Romney's background in business, including his tenure at the private equity firm Bain Capital, would cause him to make good decisions, not bad ones, in dealing with the nation's economic problems over the next four years…
Republicans and Republican-leaning independents are much more enthusiastic about the election, an important factor in persuading supporters to vote. By 18 points, 51%-33%, they report being more enthusiastic than usual about voting. In contrast, Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents by 4 points say they are less enthusiastic than usual, 43%-39%.
A record number of Americans express skepticism about the activist role of government Obama espouses; 61% say the government is trying to do too many things that should be left to individuals and businesses. That's the highest number since Gallup began asking the question in 1992.
It might have occurred to some voters that, even if Romney was bad for some of the employees of companies that Bain invested in (a dubious claim), he was at least good for Bain which was his chief responsibility as a corporate officer. We can't judge what kind of executive Obama might have been in other contexts. Up to four years ago he had never been in charge of anything other than a campaign.
When the Tea Party movement arose after 2008, the American Left launched a full court press to discredit it. There were three general lines in the strategy: that the Tea Party was encouraging or even engaging in political violence, that the Tea Party people were pervasively racist, and that the Tea Party was "astroturfed", i.e., created by rich conservatives.
All three charges were obvious nonsense. The Tea Party meetings, of which there were thousands across the US, were as spontaneous as any political movement ever was. No doubt some had wealthy benefactors, but the vast majority of the meetings and organizations were locally funded and organized. No doubt some of those who showed up at Tea Party meetings were racist. It would be astounding if that were not true. It is easier, however, to show evidence of anti-Semitism among the people who showed up at Occupy events, anti-war rallies, or among Democrats in general, than to show racism among Tea Party folks.
The most common calumny against the Tea Party, however, was the line about political violence. Joel Gehrke, writing at the Beltway Confidential site, provides a brief history of the attempts by the MSM to falsely link the Tea Party to acts of violence.
Exhibit A, of course, was the appalling journalistic sin committed by ABC News' Brian Ross as the Aurora Colorado shooting was hitting the airwaves. Here is the actual quote:
Stephanopoulos: I'm going to go to Brian Ross. You've been investigating the background of Jim Holmes here. You found something that might be significant.
Ross: There's a Jim Holmes of Aurora, Colo., page on the Colorado Tea party site as well, talking about him joining the Tea Party last year. Now, we don't know if this is the same Jim Holmes. But it's Jim Holmes of Aurora, Colo.
It turns out that there are a lot of fellows named Jim Holmes running around. Apparently, according to James Taranto, there are almost three thousand of them. So why did Ross pick this one innocent JH out? For the simple reason that he was listed in a Tea Party document that someone on Ross's staff managed to Google.
Ross not only managed to slander thousands of Americans who did nothing more than show up for public meetings but also to finger, briefly (if with a caveat) an innocent man. The caveat (we don't know if this is the same Jim Holmes) makes the scandal worse. Imagine for a moment, dear reader, if you fingered by Ross as the person who maybe, we don't know yet, might be the mass murder.
There are conspiracy crackpots and racists on the right and all honest conservatives should vehemently disavow them. The Left should give up its passionate desire to demonize the Tea Party movement.
The eWaves are afroth with unsupported speculation, hand wringing, condemnation and counter-condemnation over the atrocity in Colorado. Uncharacteristically, I won't add my bit (at least not just yet). Whatever we may learn in the days to come, I am confident that there is very little we will be willing and able to do about it.
For a bit of relief, I will return to what we can do something about. The President committed a major Kinsley gaffe last week. He made the mistake of telling us what he really thinks at a moment when he had all the attention focused on his opponent. Here is what the President said:
There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me -- because they want to give something back. They know they didn't -- look, if you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own. You didn't get there on your own. I'm always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something -- there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there.
If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you've got a business -- you didn't build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn't get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.
Conservatives in general and the Romney campaign in particular pounced on nine words:
If you've got a business -- you didn't build that.
How you view that sentence depends on the meaning of "that". If it means "roads and bridges" as the Administration insists, then it is obviously true in most cases. Entrepreneurs don't generally build such things in the US; they only pay for them. If "that" means the business you built, as the other side thinks it does, then it is manifestly false and insulting. Having watched a portion of the speech, it certainly sounds like the President meant the latter. However, I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
The passage in context is nonetheless very revealing. Liberals and conservatives both recognize the roll of individual effort in private enterprise and the role of government in laying the foundation for private enterprise. Conservatives like to emphasize the former whereas liberals like to emphasize the latter. A lot of the difference between the two lies precisely in what they like to talk about.
I find the first part of the comment above more problematic than the second.
I'm always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something -- there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there.
The President does seem to be saying that successful entrepreneurs don't deserve much credit for their successes. It isn't their hard work or genius that made them successful or even luck; it's government. I think that's insulting and unfair.
Still, Mr. Obama obviously has a point. Collective action through government provides a lot of the conditions that make private enterprise possible. That would be a very relevant point if one side in the debate were arguing for the abolition of government. Of course that is not the case. Mitt is no more an anarchist than Barack is a Bolshevik. The problem with the President's comment is that it is an attempt for force a false choice, in order to avoid confronting the real issues.
Precisely to the degree that you value government, you have to be concerned that government can work. To make it work, you have to make it fiscally solvent. At the local, state, and national levels, many governments are going belly up, financially. Three California cities have declared or are on the point of declaring bankruptcy. I believe Scranton is at the same point. The national government is on the same trajectory. That is the issue that the President should be addressing rather than ducking. The question is not whether to abolish government, but how to keep the ones we have from abolishing themselves.
A second problem with the President's comments is that he shows no awareness of the flip side of the argument. Yes, government provides conditions for private endeavors, but it also puts a lot of obstacles in the way. Government frequently makes it much more expensive to start a business or hire new employees. When that burden grows large, both jobs and tax revenues fall off. Ryan Streeter has this at the Indy Star:
Politicians typically believe that job creation happens when existing businesses, big and small, hire more people. That seems reasonable, but it's not quite right. The reality is that almost all new jobs five years from now will be created by companies that don't exist today. Job growth in America is driven almost entirely by new companies, or what we typically call "startups." According to Hudson Institute economist Tim Kane, new companies created 3.5 million jobs in 2005, while 10-year-old companies the same year created 355,000 jobs but lost 422,000.
The reason this fact is important to grasp is because startups themselves are declining. Based on the best estimates I've seen from Kane's work, we would have roughly 2 million more jobs each year in America if we were creating new firms at the same rate as in the 1980s. In other words, despite what we tell ourselves, entrepreneurship is declining in America, and job creation is suffering as a result.
Yes, Mr. President, there are a lot of smart and industrious people out there and only some of them will found the next Apple and Microsoft. Whether fair or not, some entrepreneurs get to be Steve Jobs or Bill Gates. In doing so, they provide almost all the jobs that other hardworking people will apply for. They also generate the wealth that government can spend on all the good things that it does.
Perhaps that is the problem the President should be thinking about: how to return to the business creation of the 1980's. He isn't paying attention to that, of course. He isn't paying attention to job creation at all. As one dreadful jobs report after another arrives, the President is focusing on other things. Over the last six months, he has held about 100 fundraisers. He hasn't met with his jobs council once. That is something we can do something about.
In my home state of Arkansas, one of those transactions would count as a felony. The other would count as commerce. In a closely related story, Anthony Weiner was considering a run for mayor of New York. Apparently, the Weiner pulled out.
On a slightly more serious note, I see that the CBS/NYT poll has Romney one point ahead of Obama nationally, among registered voters. CBS calls this a "dead heat" and "effective tie". In fact, it is an "effective" Romney lead, since Romney is likely to do better among actual voters than theoretical voters.
I wouldn't put much stock in this poll, but it is interesting.
The president's supporters are more likely to strongly back their candidate. Fifty-two percent [of Obama voters] strongly favor Mr. Obama, while just 29 percent of Romney voters strongly back the presumptive Republican nominee.
No surprise there, with my insertion. Romney will never be as sexy as Obama. However:
Republicans are more enthusiastic than Democrats when it comes to voting in this election, though just one in three registered voters overall are more enthusiastic than they were in the past. Roughly half of Republicans say they are more enthusiastic compared to past elections - up from 36 percent in March - while just 27 percent of Democrats say the same.
That, of course, is the bottom line. It doesn't matter, electorally speaking, how much you love the one or the other, unless you are prepared to vote. Now consider these two paragraphs:
Fifty-four percent of registered voters cite the economy and jobs as "extremely" important in their presidential vote, more than any other issue. Here Romney has the edge: 49 percent of registered voters say he would do a better job handling the economy and jobs, while 41 percent cite Mr. Obama…
Mr. Obama's overall approval rating stands at 44 percent, with 46 percent disapproving. His approval rating on the economy is just 39 percent – 55 percent disapprove – and his approval rating on foreign policy is 41 percent. His approval rating on the economy has dropped five points since April.
A 44/46% approval-disapproval rating overall and a 39/55% approval-disapproval rating on the issue that registered voters consider "extremely important" looks like bad news for the incumbent.
I put more stock in the Gallup poll at this point, simply because it is consistent in method over time. Gallup has Obama's approval rating "effectively" tied, with 46% approving, 47% disapproving. The poll gives Obama a two point lead, nationally.
The Obama campaign is pulling out all the stops to define Romney as a cannibal capitalist before the voters get a really good look at him. It's pretty clear that it isn't working. Romney and Obama are tied at about 46 or 47% each. I continue to think that it's Obama who has to change those numbers. If they continue into autumn, Romney wins.
Meanwhile, shadow Speaker Nancy Pelosi has apparently decided that the Democratic National Convention is one place that House Democrats don't want to be. From the Politico:
House minority leader Nancy Pelosi says Democratic members should stay home and campaign in their districts rather than go to the party's national convention in North Carolina.
"I'm not encouraging anyone to go to the convention, having nothing to do with anything except I think they should stay home, campaign in their districts, use their financial and political resources to help them win their election," Pelosi said in an exclusive interview for POLITICO Live's "On Congress," a new weekly show to be streamed live on POLITICO's website and broadcast on NewsChannel 8 on Wednesdays.
The California Democrat suggested that since Barack Obama is an incumbent, there is less of a need for Democrats to attend the convention.
That is a remarkable statement. It tells us what Pelosi thinks the game board looks like. The Democrats aren't playing for national power as a coherent party. They are playing for survival and it's every Congressperson for his or her self. The President, with his 46%, is on his own.
I can't help wondering whether the President could have counted on more support from Congressional Democrats if he had bothered to get to know some of them, instead of vanishing the moment the photo shoot was over.
I have posted a lot of horror movie reviews over the years, but not so many of late. I just haven't seen very many films interesting enough to review. I am happy to say that I found one on Netflix Instant Watch: Absentia. This independent film was written and directed by Mike Flanagan. I hope he has more where this one came from, because it is one of the best horror movies I have seen in the last decade.
The film begins with a woman (Courtney Bell) replacing a weathered missing person notice on a poll with a fresh one that she pulls out of a large leather bag. Tricia's husband disappeared seven years prior. Though she is in the process of applying for a death certificate and is in fact pregnant, she is clearly having trouble letting go. Her younger sister Callie (Katie Parker) arrives to lend moral support. Callie is almost but not quite drug free. These items of emotional baggage are the material which the fine cinematography and haunting score can work on.
In view from Tricia's front stoop is the opening of one of those pedestrian tunnels that run under a highway. If you have ever walked through one, you may recall that they are ominous enough all on their own in broad daylight. Callie has brought a gift for the baby: a copy of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. In case you are wondering, that's a clue.
I won't reveal any more details, for this is one film that tells its story efficiently and effectively. An event that occurs about a third of the way through ratchets the story up to another level. It ratchets up again a bit later into full bore horror.
I have had a fondness for spooky stories all my life. I am not alone, to judge by the volume of horror cinema produced each year. I like the tension produced by wanting and not wanting to see what is just out of sight. The film keeps this tension perfectly balanced all the way through.
I also like the way that a good horror films explores the architecture of human fear and the way that cultures have managed and exploited those fears. At its best, the horror genre affords new ways to see and map that architecture. Evolutionary psychology has noted that phobias form around things that tended to kill our ancestors. That is why we fear spiders but not automobiles or tobacco. A fear of tight spaces, darkness, and being dragged away not only haunted our ancestors but also haunted our ancestor's ancestors. These are the stuff of fairy tales. Absentia is a modern fairy tale, as dark as the unexpurgated versions of those that emerge from the darkness of Europe and other places.
More than one character in the film articulates the modern view of such stories. In addition to being entertaining, they are one of the ways that we manage our fears of what we cannot predict and what we cannot secure ourselves against. That is a rational, scientific interpretation of the supernatural and it describes how things really are. I don't believe in real demons or malevolent ghosts.
However, once you step over the line between world time and dream time, as you must to enjoy the story, the relationship between myth and rational interpretation reverses itself. In horror land, the rational interpretation is the lie that we tell ourselves in order to avoid facing very dark realities.
One very neat trick that the movie pulls is to give us different visual accounts of the same event. First we see something horrifying happen that leaves no doubt about the supernatural forces at work. Then a character will see in his or her mind how it might have happened a different way, with only ordinary forces at work. For a moment the viewer has to wonder which view is the real one; but only for a moment, happily. The rational interpretation is self-deception.
So long as you know the difference between fiction and reality, it can be enlightening to see what the world looks like the other way round. It is a useful reminder that reason and common sense are not the same things as knowledge, even if they are the best guides to truth and practice. It is certainly entertaining, if you like the spooky tale. Absentia is an almost flawless horror film.
In 1988 I traveled to Oxford, England, to present a paper at an international conference on the Holocaust. I won't bother you with details about the conference, because what I want to talk about is the beer. It was the high point of the "Real Ale Movement", sponsored by CAMRA (campaign for real ale).
Real ale is cask-conditioned beer. The beer finishes its fermenting in its cask and then is extracted at the bar with a hand pump. The result is an almost flat beer (only a thin bit of foam) consumed at "cellar temperature," which effectively means room temperature. When "well-kept", this is pure beer essence. The hop aroma is pronounced and every flavor God intended is available in the brew.
I fell head over heels in love with it, drinking more than my physician would recommend at the White Horse and the Turf pubs, and other Oxford venues. When I returned to the U.S., I felt a deep sense of loss. I frequently had a dream where some bearded guy was pumping out ale into my glass, only to wake up just as he handed it to me.
Returning to England after almost twenty-five years, I wondered whether the experience could possibly live up to my memory. It didn't, of course. That is not to say that it wasn't wonderful. I drank a pint of 'Old Golden Hen' in London at a pub called The Bag O' Nails. I would be content to drink that, once a day, for the rest of my days if fate allowed it. I also drank a lot of fine ale at The Prince of Wales, the pub I adopted down Church Street in Oxford. It was all very fine, but the original magic was lacking.
One reason for the difference in my impressions was that in 1988, really good beer was rare in these United States. That changed dramatically in short order with the rise of the brew pub (where beer is brewed and sold on the premises) and the microbrewery. Very few of these establishments offer cask conditioned ale, though I have sampled some of that at the Goose Island brew pub in Chicago and in a pub in D.C. Almost all brew pub and microbrewery ale is served under pressure. Still, the gap between good beer in the U.S. and good beer in Britain is happily very narrow today.
Another reason for the loss of magic was obviously that an idea held for decades in the mind usually loses its connection with reality. That leads me to my experiences in Spain. England was a side trip down memory lane (and through the Churchill War Rooms and Westminster Abbey).
In Madrid I switched to drinking wine. If you toss a tennis ball down one of the winding streets leading to the Puerta del Sol (the central plaza of Madrid), it will probably bounce off the tables outside several small restaurants. Madrileños love to eat out under the open sky and no wonder. The temperatures were in the eighties (or low nineties) with little humidity and always a pleasant breeze. Traveling in a group of five, we could get several plates of delicious and inventive tapas and a couple of bottles of good house wine for about 20 euros ($25) per happy person. I could put up with that for a while.
While we were there, I managed to observe so good old fashion Spanish protests. One was a protest of miners. The other was an anti-austerity protest, inspired by Spain's attempt to get the solvent and not quite so insolvent nations of Europe to bail out her banks. Both struck me as protests against reality.
The protests also struck me as evidence of the distortion and heartbreak created by old and isolated ideas. Europe's elites have been pursuing European Unity for so long that they have largely forgotten why. In the course of pursing that dream, they responded to every challenge by isolating the cherished idea from reality instead of adjusting it to circumstances. The result is the dilemma in which Spain finds itself now, and which the rest of Europe cannot find a way to resolve or escape. I doubt that the Euro can be saved but whether it can or cannot, there will be unfortunate consequences not only for Europe but for the world economy. Ideas have consequences.
For another model on how to manage a civilization, look to the Iffley Church. While enjoying Oxford, I stayed at the Hawkwell House, a lovely hotel in Iffley village. A short walk from the Hawkwell brings you past The Prince of Wales and then along the Thames into Oxford center. Adjust the route a little and you come to the Iffley Church. Part of it was built about a hundred years after the Norman Conquest. Over the centuries, the building was extended to accommodate larger congregations. When we visited it, I noted a post on the wall recruiting youngsters for something that appeared to be the English version of vacation Bible school.
The Iffley Church is an example of a very old idea that persists to this day because generation after generation of worshipers met the times they lived in with imagination and courage. Whatever you think of their theology, they were not isolated from reality. Whatever its future may be, the Iffley Church still lives and breathes. May there always be an England and a Spain.
Ps. I probably should add, in the interests of full disclosure, that I bought a Cuban cigar with an American credit card in Oxford and smoked it on the balcony of a Spanish hotel. I figure I was supporting both the people's revolution and globalization. Call me well rounded.
My thanks to Miranda and Professor Schaff for filling in while I was abroad. I haven't had time yet to look at the comments on the recent posts or reply to those on my posts before I left. I will respond to Professor Schaff's July 4th election post. Jon thinks that Obama is going to win. He relies largely on Nate Silver's projections and the Intrade odds, and he thinks that Obama has an easier route to 270 electoral votes.
Nate Silver is a forecaster. He tries to assemble a package of data sources that has been reliable in the past. That's how a weatherman tries to tell you whether it will rain tomorrow. Given these numbers, 2 out of 3 times, it rains. Jay Cost is an analyst. He tries to map the general forces that will determine the outcome. That's how a weatherman tries to predict the weather over the next week. Given these fronts, etc., this is what seems to be shaping up.
I find Cost's approach more interesting and more plausible. Cost ranks a number of forces from strongest to weakest in this order: party identification, right track/wrong track, evaluation of incumbent, and net campaign effects. Cost notes that a President usually gets a share of the vote equal to his approval rating.
After the back-to-back debacles of 1980 and 1984, the Democratic party essentially rebuilt its core coalition. Since 1988 the party has not fallen below 46 percent of the two party vote, either in the presidential contest or the national House race. That looks to be the core Democratic base of support in this country.
If we go by his job approval, this is roughly all President Obama is holding at the moment. He pulls in a little bit more in most polls most of the time, but not very much.
I note that the President's approval rating has been consistently lower than 50% for some time. His approval rating has been over 50% in only two polls since May. It has been at 50% only in two polls out of the most recent ten.
Jon compares this election with 2004.
Romney, like John Kerry, is essentially an acceptable but uninspiring figure, not the kind of guy who convinces a nation to oust an incumbent president. And like 2004, an incumbent president with some very noticeable weaknesses will win, and win ugly.
I note, however, that this is precisely the point at which George W. Bush's approval rating climbed above 50% in the Gallup polls in 2004. It remained there for most of the remainder of the election cycle. Bush won narrowly, but convincingly. Gallup has given Obama a 50% approval rating only very briefly in 2011, when bin Laden was killed. Other than that, he has been below 50% for most of the last two years. This looks to have solidified. Unless the President can move those numbers, the odds are against him.
As for the Electoral College numbers, I am with Charlie Cook. They matter only in a very close election and then only in the last days. If either candidate wins the national vote by more than a hair, that candidate will win enough of the battleground states to give him the victory. Right now Obama has the lead in national polls by a few points. Most of these are polling registered voters or all voters. The few that poll likely voters show a tie. Again, however, except for the Pew poll, no national poll puts Obama at let alone over 50%.
Obama is running a very negative campaign. What else can he do? With the President's numbers, however, it is not enough to tear Romney down. He has to convince the voters that Romney is unacceptable. He doesn't seem to be accomplishing that yet and he may be using all the ammunition he has rather early in the game.
At some point, Obama is going to have to pull his numbers up over the halfway mark. I think we know by now that the President is not effective at making a case for himself and his policies. This isn't going to change. Not only is his approval rating lower than Bush's 2004 numbers at comparable points, but the wrong track numbers are considerably worse. He is also running against much worse economic numbers. The recent job growth numbers are terrible.
Of course, Romney has to pull his numbers up as well. That is usually easier for a challenger than for an incumbent, whom the voters know all too well by this point. Where is Obama going to get the four or five points he needs? Right now I can't see it. If Obama can't get that, uninspiring Romney wins by default.
As my guest blogging nears its end, there are some web sites that I thought I'd recommend. These are sites that I came to know since my time as a regular blogger here.
Rod Dreher is the author of Crunchy Cons, a book with a really long subtitle. There is much in that book that folks on both the right and the left can agree on. The same is true of his blog, found at the American Conservative. Obviously, Dreher is coming from the right, but a brief stroll through his site will tell you that he is not reading from the Republican hymn book (just note Dreher's obvious contempt for Mitt Romney). Dreher is highly influenced by the agrarian localist poet and essayist Wendell Berry. So are the folks at the Front Porch Republic. To know what this site is about, read the inaugural essay by Patrick Deneen, A Republic of Front Porches. A brief snippet:
We are daily less a republic because we daily perceive less of what are common or public things – res publica. Without the literal spaces where we come to know what we have in common through speech, habit and memory, we regard politics as a competitive spectator sport and government as a distant imposition – but in any event, anything but self-rule.
Both Dreher and the Porchers dislike Big Government and Big Business. I wrote about this here.
In a similar vein is the indominatible Mars Hill Audio Journal. This podcast is what the title says, a journal in audio form. It consists of the highly literate host, Ken Meyers, interviewing authors about their latest work. Each edition has 6-8 interviews of around 15 minutes each. So each edition is just over an hour, usually. Meyers is quite open that this is a Christian project (the name suggests that). He is interested in how Christianity and Christians encounter the culture. But as such, the podcast touches on art, literature, history, philosophy, technology and, yes, theology. This is a subscription service, but you can listen to some free samples here. You'll note that one of those samples is Patrick Deneen talking about Wendell Berry. In fact, I'd say that's a good place to start, along with anything by Weaton English professor Alan Jacobs, the most frequent Mars Hill guest. Just peruse the subject matter and you'll get an idea of the breadth of topics covered. I think even a brief encounter with Mars Hill Audio will convince you that these are discussions working on a high intellectual level.
According to The Drudge Report, Condoleezza Rice may be on Mitt Romney’s short list of running mate candidates. Rice is beautiful, classy, and intelligent and was, I thought, an eloquent defender of President Bush’s policies during her tenure as Secretary of State. The time she spent in that role has also given her considerable foreign policy experience, which might be to her advantage.
Nevertheless, I think she would be a terrible choice for Mitt Romney, who is already struggling to win the support of his base. As Darius Dixon of Politico puts it, a recent Gallup poll shows that “Mitt Romney has to mend gaps in the Republican voter base among Midwesterners, young voters, the highly religious and conservative Republicans.”
None of these are likely to be particularly excited about Rice.
Conservative Republicans distrust Romney partly because of his fiscal record and partly because of his record on social issues. The fact that he still maintains that “Romneycare” was the right decision for Massachusetts does not sit well with some of us. Neither are we sure we trust his sudden change from a pro-choice to a pro-life candidate.
Yet the right running mate could help rally unenthusiastic conservatives around Romney. Choosing someone like Colonel Alan West, Ken Cuccinelli or even Ron Paul might do the trick.
But Rice is weak in many of the same areas as Romney. Many conservative Republicans view Rice as a liberal Republican, rather than a conservative ally. Conservatives may distrust Romney’s views on abortion, but they find Rice’s “mildly pro-choice” views even more objectionable. Furthermore, according to The Atlanta Journal Constitution, Rice believes that “most illegal immigrants ought to stay in the country”. Meanwhile, many conservatives are against granting amnesty to illegal immigrants. Because Rice's positions are often quite different from those of strong conservatives, it is unlikely that she will bring Romney many new voters from the right.
This might not matter so much if she could bring in a substantial number of votes from the left. Unfortunately, I don't think she can. Liberal voters who might approve of the fact that Rice is pro-choice already have a pro-choice candidate, who also has the advantage of being an incumbent. Pro-immigration voters already have a president who signed the DREAM act. And it’s difficult to see what Rice might offer liberal voters that President Obama doesn’t already. Furthermore, many will remember her ties to the War on Terror and will oppose her for it.
Besides, we have already seen the reception Rice has gotten from the left. From legitimate criticism to the publication of racist cartoons and insults like “Aunt Jemima”, the left has offered evidence that it will not support a candidate like Rice.
In fact, Romney has quite a challenge before him. Choosing a running mate who can both please his base and attract liberal voters seems to be an almost impossible task. But I have a solution.
Romney could pick Justice Roberts as his running mate. Roberts won a good deal of praise from the left when he sided with the left wing of the Supreme Court by upholding The Affordable Care act. Suddenly at least some liberals view him as intelligent and nuances. Perhaps his intelligent and nuanced views might win over some liberal voters.
Meanwhile, the choice of Roberts for VP would deight many conservatives, despite the fact that they are, by and large, upset with him. It would give them a way to get him off the bench.
If the three most important words in real estate are "location, location, location," then it seem the three most important words of this election are "jobs, jobs, jobs."
Thus the latest jobs report can't be good news for President Obama. Yes, I am late getting to this, but here is one part of the CNBC story:
"A measure of unemployment that includes discouraged workers ticked higher to 14.9 percent, its highest level since February, while the labor force participation rate stayed near a 30-year low at 63.8 percent."
The Obama administration was quick to announce that we shouldn't read too much into one month's job report. The Romney campaign pounced on that one with this documentation of previous White House statements on monthly jobs reports:
June 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is informative to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/07/06/employment-situation-june)
February 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/03/09/employment-situation-february)
January 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/02/03/employment-situation-january)
October 2011: “The monthly employment and unemployment numbers are volatile and employment estimates are subject to substantial revision. There is no better example than August’s jobs figure, which was initially reported at zero and in the latest revision increased to 104,000. This illustrates why the Administration always stresses it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/11/04/employment-situation-october)
July 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative. It is essential that we continue our efforts to move in the right direction and replace job losses with robust job gains.” (LINK: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/08/06/employment-situation-july)
That's thirty times that Obama administration has had to tell us not to read too much into disappointing jobs reports. One has to think that when you tell people not to read too much into such reports thirty times, then maybe it's time to start reading into them.
My own view is that when it comes to the economy the president is like the quarterback. When the football team wins, the quarterback gets too much credit. When it loses, he gets too much blame. So is Obama responsible for the job market? A little, but probably not as much as both he and Romney would like us to believe. But that's the way the game is played. OBama himself said that if he could not get the economy turned around in three years then he deserved to be a one term president. Well...
According to The Associated Press, The Sioux Falls Council is considering placing a ban on texting , tweeting and Facebooking while driving. I am tentatively in favor of the ban, although I have heard some sensible arguments against it.
Some of my conservative friends argue that it is just another example of governmental intrusion in private affairs. I would argue that when a private action puts members of the public in danger, it ceases to be private. And in this case, I would put concerns over safety over concerns over privacy – though I am certainly willing to entertain arguments against that position.
Jim Sollisch of The Christian Science Monitor brings up another argument. Some people, he says, argue that texters are so addicted to using their phones, that a ban will not stop them. Instead, say this arguments proponents, “they’ll put the phones deeper in their laps to avoid detection and the result will be an increase in accidents.”
While Sollisch says such an argument sounds crazy, he notes that statistics from The Highway Data Loss Institute seem to lend evidence to this argument. Apparently, 3 out of 4 states that adopted texting bans saw an increase in texting-related incidents. Interestingly, he reports that in Minnesota, “accidents actually increased 9 per cent after the texting ban went into effect.”
I support the ban anyway. I’ve never been particularly fond of the “people will do it anyway” line of reasoning. Some people will do almost anything no matter what the consequences are. Some people will kill, some people will steal, some people will rape. But I still think there ought to be laws against such things.
For one, it’s important not to condone such behavior. For another, it’s important to create ways in which victims of such actions can seek restitution. If theft were made legal, for instance, it would be hard for the victim to obtain any sort of compensation from the perpetrator.
Furthermore, making actions illegal does often serve as a strong deterrent, particularly when the punishment for committing an offense is strong and well enforced.
Sure, many people might continue to text and drive regularly if all they faced was a small fine. But what if the fine was a significant amount? What if texting and driving came with a $5,000 fine and people were stopped regularly for the act? Or what if it could earn you jail time? I suspect that the number of incidents of accidents caused by texting and driving would go down. Therefore, at least for now, I think The Sioux Falls City Council is right to consider the ban.
Commenter Larry, in his own uniquely vulgar way, notes that I was quoted today in the Argus Leader in this story by David Montegomery about the Noem-Varilek race. David was very patient in talking to me yesterday while I lay in a hammock in my backyard with a three-year-old jumping on me.
I find it interesting that the Noem camp, once again, is nationalizing the race by comparing Varilek to Obama. I understand that you do this when you are a challenger, but as an incumbent, shouldn't you be running on your record? Perhaps they will at some future time. As is hinted at in the article, but didn't quite make publication, I have yet to see a poll in this race. Someone let me know if they have. My suspicion, though, is that Varilek is a virtual unknown to a sizable number of South Dakotans, maybe even as much as half, with a significant fund-raising deficit. For some reason he is not in the OpenSecrets data base, but Montegomery told me he has raised about $300,000 as of the last report. Well, according to OpenSecrets, at last report Noem had $1.2 million cash on hand. This funding level and discrepancy will not cut it for Varilek. Varilek will have to spend what little money he has just getting people to know who he is even before he starts convincing them that he is worth electing.
On an unrelated note, have folks been following the foibles of Secretary of State Jason Gant? Jon Ellis and Bob Mercer have. I thought it was unwise for Gant to endorse in the Begalka v. Rausch primary, and said so in a KSFY interview, and one wonders why he let Pat Powers run a campaign business while working for the chief election officer of the state. Bad form, sir. We all know that the Secretary of State office is elected as a partisan office, but as the chief election officer of the state, the Secretary of State has a special duty to remain above the political fray as much as possible. As Ellis notes, Gant is not up for reelection for two years, but does anyone doubt he will now pick up a Republican challenger? Chris Nelson, where are you? (Yes, I know, on the PUC).
I'd rather have a veep steak. There is much speculation about Mitt Romney's Vice-Presidential pick. Truth is, there probably are no more than three or four people who really know which prospective candidate is on top and who isn't. But that doesn't stop us from yacking about it.
I've been interviewed three times now in the past few weeks (see here, for example) about whether John Thune will be Romney's pick. Short answer: no. Longer answer is that while Thune passes the old facial validity test, in what will be a close election I don't think he brings enough electorally to the table to reach the top teir of Romney's list.
People talk about Rob Portman, but I think his linkage to the Bush Administration makes him a dangerous pick. Also there is much speculation about Tim Pawlenty. While I think Romney can do better, Pawlenty is a good campaigner who maybe can help in the crucial midwest.
Those are some boring white guy picks. Unfortunately for Romney, the non-white, non-guys in the REpublican party who might fit the bill are not ready from prime time. Marco Rubio, Kelly Ayotte, Brain Sandoval and Susana Martinez may all be future stars of the party, but they were all elected in 2010. It's going to be hard (but not impossible) to argue that they are ready to be president.
This is why I think Bobby Jindal of Louisiana is a perfect choice. Let's be honest, his dark skin helps. Mitt Romney is the kind of guy who just stepped out of a Stuff White People Like gag. A little unconventionality helps. Also, no one doubts Jindal's competence. Look at his bio. This is a guy who the best universities in the world were recruiting at a young age. He has executive and legislative experience. He has deep knowledge of health care. The one knock on him is that he flubbed the Republican SOTU response a few years ago. That should not be an insurmountable mistake. While Jindal does not come from a competative state, I think he will cause people to look at Romney a second time. It is true that no one votes for the VP. That's why the first rule of VP picks is do no harm. Second, you hope that a VP will at least cause some people to take a second look at your candidacy. I think Jindal can do that while bringing policy credentials to the mix.
This all makes me think that the one bad thing about an Obama loss in November is that we won't have Joe Biden around anymore. That guy is the best sit-com on TV since Seinfeld.
What does this crew think? If you were to pick for Romney (and Democrats, try to be serious) who do you think would help most?
As KB is on vacation I have agreed to guest blog a bit, although I see that Typepad is not putting names on the bottom of the posts. As I believe Madame Flint may also be blogging, I will put my initials in the text of my posts at the end.
A couple months ago I guest blogged about the state of the presidential race. I am not going to take the time to track down that blog post, but essentially I said that I saw Obama with a slight lead and an easier route to 270. But, I said, a better analysis would have to wait until mid-summer. Well, that time is here.
I see nothing to change my position. Let me note two pieces of information. First, Nate Silver at 538 blog has Mr. Obama about a 2-1 favortite. Also, Intrade odds today are about 56% Obama, 40% Romney. Both of these numbers represent an increase by Obama as compared to the last month, likely reflecting Obama's win at the Supreme Court last week, and as such represent a blip.
Still, most polls and models are showing Obama ahead slightly and ahead in almost all battleground states. I think Romney will almost certainly win North Carolina, Missouri and Arizona, and probably Florida. But that's not enough to get to 270.
The early advertising tells us what each campaign is up to and what they think their best arguments are. Romney, of course, is going to hit the president on a mediocre to poor economic record and then tout his own business acumen. Obama does seem to be running a largely negative campaign. As he does not have much in the way of a positive record to run on, he must make Romney unacceptable. Thus all the ads essentially painting Romney as an out of touch plutocrat.
In the end I think this will be enough. Romney is nowhere near the best the Republican party has to offer. But given that this primary field was perhaps the worst in my lifetime for either party, Romney essentially was the only one who could pass a smell test. He is not a formidable candidate as, say, Mitch Daniels might have been. The Obama campaign will successfully caricature him (and of course there is something there to caricature) render him unacceptable to enough people. This election does remind me of 2004. Romney, like John Kerry, is essentially an acceptable but uninspiring figure, not the kind of guy who convinces a nation to oust an incumbent president. And like 2004, an incumbent president with some very noticeable weaknesses will win, and win ugly.
I should note that I think Silver is essentially correct in giving Romney about a 35% chance to win. This means that there are any number of scenarios that allow Romney to win. He is not a dead man walking like Bob Dole in 1996. While I strongly suspect that the election's structure is in Obama's favor, Romney just needs hard work and a little luck to pull it out.
I read an interesting article by Katie Roiphe on Slate this week that addressed the following question: Should men who don’t want to father children be forced to pay child support?
Roiphe does not probe very deeply into the issue. In fact, she seems almost reluctant to think it through, saying, at one point:
Our tendency is to give to the pregnant woman the moral high ground, whatever she chooses, but there may be a more honest, rigorous interpretation that does not involve high ground and instead involves the ambiguous murk in which most of the rest of our lives take place.
I was with her until she got to the murk. It reminds me a little of the emanating penumbra.
Might there not be a more honest view of the issue of “choice?” Roiphe may be satisfied to let her life take place in an ambiguous murkiness, but I am not sure we all should be. Why not examine the issue outside of the murkiness?
Should men have to pay for fathering children? If a woman has a “right to choose” that trumps the life of her unborn baby – why shouldn’t the man? Is there something that ought to prevent him from having the same right?
Some would argue that there is. The man does not have to carry the baby – therefore, in order to choose to father a child when the woman involved does not want to have one, he would have to violate a woman’s right to “bodily integrity” by forcing her to give birth to a child she did not wish to have.
Alright. Maybe. But this is not an argument that ought to prevent a man from choosing to walk away. By walking away, he does not force the woman to carry a child she does not want to carry. He does not put a burden on her body that she has not chosen to bear herself. Is it, then, truly fair to say that a man should not have the right to just walk away? Shouldn’t he have the right to choose?
Roiphe admits that it may not always be fair to force men to pay child support for children they never wanted. But, she asks, “In a practical world how could we enforce the idea that a man who didn’t really want a child wasn’t responsible for the child?”
Easy. Just say the man has the right to choose. Make child support optional. Do away with it altogether. It’s really not that hard.
But Roiphe asks another question.
How many deadbeat dads would step forward with their reluctance, their ambivalence, as a way to worm their way out of responsibility?
I don’t know. How many deadbeat moms have wormed their way out of responsibility? Why is it “worming” when a man does it, but an act of great independence when a woman does? Why is it ok to label Dads who are unwilling to take responsibility for their actions as “deadbeats”, while we praise women for their decisions when they choose to abort their children? Why not praise men for exhibiting their independence? Why not applaud the fact that they can now go on to achieve their dreams?
NARAL’s web site has pages of stories of women who brag that because they chose to have an abortion, they were able to go to college, get a degree and do well for themselves. I have never seen such a site for men who choose to embrace their freedom, rather than allowing another person to become a burden on their lives and finances. Is there really any good reason why there shouldn’t be one?
Finally, Roiphe writes the following:
It is very hard to see how this could be written into law, the didn’t-want-him argument, without wide-scale abuse and harm to the children involved.
Oh! Harm to the children involved! I suppose the father’s rights couldn’t trump the rights of the children involved. Could they?
-Miranda
(I apologize for not signing this post earlier. I did not realize typepad was no longer publishing names. Thanks, Dr. Schaff.)
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