The Joy of Being a Mad, Ignorant Citizen

 

I'm still learning about the fault lines of local Portland politics. Everyone is a Democrat here, so that's no help. We just completely revamped our city governmental structure, abandoning the "commission" model (where elected city commissioners were responsible for particular bureaus of city governance) in favor of city council featuring three elected members each from four geographic districts. I think that's an improvement, though the last election was a bit of a free-for-all.

Anyway, Portland is in a time of budget cuts, and the city council is deciding what to slash. One proposed cut is to permanently close the Multnomah Arts Center (MAC), where I happen to be currently taking an introductory drawing class (if you want a charcoal self-portrait that will haunt your nightmares, hit me up). Since I'm enjoying my class (and am anticipating taking my son to family art classes when he's a bit older), I was horrified at the prospect that the center might close -- it's got a lot of great programming and it's five minutes from my house. So I wrote to my city councilors urging they keep the MAC open and find other places to make budget cuts (I apparently wasn't the only one).

Congratulate me on being an engaged public citizen? Maybe. But the thing is, here's the relevant information I was bringing to the table in forming this opinion and deciding to yell at my councilors about it:

1. I like the MAC.

End of list. 

Obviously, in the abstract the MAC is a nice thing and worthy of support. But in times of scarcity, the question is about relative priorities -- the money has to come from somewhere. And for my part, I have no idea what other things might be cut instead of the MAC is kept open, nor do I have any insight in how to weigh potential competing priorities even if I was told of potential alternatives. And moreover, I don't really have any interest in learning more. "There must be another way", I say, while having no idea what those alternatives might be and no interest in finding out.

To be clear, I'm not saying it's likely that the MAC is actually a good place to cut. The hue and cry to save it makes me feel more confident that there really are better places to trim from. And the proposal to close the MAC came from one councilor -- it's not a situation where all the experts agree this needs to be done while I stubbornly refuse to accept it. 

But the point is that I'm getting to be an uninformed voter (for real this time!) and it is glorious. I just get to see something I don't like and be mad about it! Do you know how much more relaxing that is compared to when you do know the difficulties and complexities of an issue? I can also decide that the reason we're facing the need for such cuts is Donald Trump. Do I know that? No, but I can't imagine his slash and burn attack on effective governance is doing Portland any favors, and that's good enough for me!

This could get addictive. I have to be careful.

The One Thing The Sanford Primary Is Good For

Former South Carolina Governor and Representative Mark Sanford (R) has announced a primary challenge against President Trump. This could have been valuable, except that instead of challenging Trump on the basis of his rank bigotry -- which Sanford is actually decently positioned to tackle -- he's focusing his campaign on the national debt. Seriously.

The one benefit of a Sanford challenge (and his inevitably mauling) is that it does give a clean resolution to the "it's not that I like Trump's rank bigotry, I just think Democrats are profligate spenders and I couldn't bring myself to vote for them" narrative:

"So then you'll vote for a Republican alternative who focuses on fiscal responsibility and doesn't carry Trump's bigoted baggage?"

"Hell no. #MAGA2020!"

(Of course, this perhaps assumes that Republicans will even allow a primary challenge to Trump which -- well, let's just say not all states are onboard with that).

Who Cares About Deficits?

I've been meaning to welcome my old debate teammate (and very, very technically, former co-blogger) Emily Mirengoff to the blogosphere. She's been writing an ongoing series on education that is well-worth your time.

Her blog is titled "A Moderate Mindset", and last month she put up a post entitled "A Moderate Solution to the Government Shutdown." I, too, have sometimes written on the moderate label, a characterization I'm sure Emily would find laughable (in my defense, see my "The Moderator's Voice" post, where I discuss how I reconcile my currente leftist beliefs with what I take to be the virtues of "moderation" -- I think she might view it with a surprising level of agreement).

In any event, here were the counters of her proposal:

On the Obamacare issue, the Republicans are dead wrong. The law passed; they were unable to overturn it; and they shouldn't be holding the budget hostage in retaliation.

On the debt ceiling issue, the Democrats have spiraled completely out of control. Below is a video of a Democrat who agrees with me. He may look familiar to you; he’s a political rising star named Senator Barack Obama.

[...]

So here’s the compromise: President Obama agrees to institute a real debt ceiling–and actually adheres to it by cutting down government spending–and in return, the Republicans abandon their doomed anti-Obamacare campaign. It would truly be an astounding day for the U.S. government: Both parties acting reasonably! Compromise! The government re-opening!

Okay, from one erstwhile moderate to another, let's rap.

On the one hand, we have Republicans unreasonably holding the country hostage while they engage in futile efforts to try to block the healthcare law. They should knock this off, and that would be their side of the compromise. Now, a substantial part of the "problem" here isn't that Republicans oppose the Affordable Care Act. That's their prerogative! It's that they're engaging in extreme levels of hostage taking to substitute for the fact that they are not, currently, in a position to repeal the ACA. I take it that Emily is not proposing that Republicans not try to overturn the ACA if in the future they happened to regain control of Congress and the Executive Branch (such a promise would be unreasonable and entirely unenforceable in any event). So the Republican side of the compromise would be "stop trying to repeal Obamacare until you actually are able to repeal Obamacare." That's not nothing, given that the ongoing GOP temper tantrum on this issue is doing real damage to the country, but you can imagine why Democrats wouldn't exactly be leaping for joy over it.

On the other side, Democrats are supposed to accede to spending cuts in order to bring the deficit under control. The "Democrats have spiraled completely out of control" on the debt, and the way to fix it is spending cuts. We might begin by quibbling with the notion that Democrats have not concerned themselves with deficits -- tough to swing, given that deficits have been slashed dramatically during Obama's tenure in office. But since we're still running a deficit, debts continue to accumulate, and the debt ceiling remains a problem. To the extent we care about reducing our debt load, more steps need to be taken.

The real question is, why is this a "Democratic" sacrifice? The answer is that, somewhat strangely, Emily says we should reduce our deficit level solely by reference to spending cuts. But that is only one way to skin the cat -- another way of reducing deficits, of course, is by raising additional revenue.

Put another way, let's say we posit that Republicans care about deficits and Democrats don't. Republicans would demand steps for deficits to be reduced. Democrats wouldn't be particularly interested because (per stipulation) they don't care about deficits. And they'd be concretely adverse to cutting spending on social programs they value. But Democrats don't really have any objection to raising taxes on the wealthy, or removing the privileged and distorted position capital gains enjoy vis-a-vis other forms of income in our tax code. So presumably, if what Republicans cared about was "deficits", this would be an easy agreement to hammer out: high-income taxes are raised, deficits go down, everyone is happy.

This, of course, is not the terms of the debate. As Jon Chait has noted, the Republican position on deficits is that they would do anything to reduce the debt load, except contemplate any increase in taxes whatsoever. It is a very impressive thing that the GOP has managed to stake out this position -- rejecting even 10:1 spending cut/tax increase propositions -- while still convincing people that their primary concern is with deficits, rather than with cutting spending. And not just any government spending, either: As we learned from the Farm Bill debacle, the real object is slashing government spending that helps poorer Americans, demanding slashes to food stamps while fighting bitterly to maintain subsidies to wealthy agricultural producers (even the National Review found this to be beyond the pale). Certain spending -- for example, defense spending, or corporate subsidies -- doesn't seem to be problematic to the Republican Party at all. Hell, the Affordable Care Act reduces deficits -- yet for some reason this does not endear it to supposedly deficit-conscious Republican congressfolk. Deficit reduction is, at most, a tertiary issue -- perhaps a happy side-effect of depriving impoverished Americans of food, but nowhere near as important as insuring that income earned via capital are taxed at half the rate of earnings won through labor.

I should say that while I obviously oppose these Republican policy priorities substantively, I'm not really bothered by the fact that these are their priorities as opposed to deficit-cutting. Republicans have policy objections to government spending money on healthcare, food stamps, unemployment insurance, and other programs that primarily benefit poorer Americans. If, as a consequence, deficits are also reduced, that's a nice benefit, but it is a bonus, not the primary motivator, and where there are available deficit-reduction opportunities that don't cohere to these priorities (such as raising taxes, or, for that matter, passing the Affordable Care Act), they'll oppose them. Democrats, for their part, support these sorts of programs and wish to expand them. While they'd probably be willing to mitigate their impact on the deficit by passing higher taxes on wealthy Americans, that isn't their priority either and if that avenue is unavailable they'd rather keep the programs and expand the deficit. All of that is perfectly fine, it just demonstrates that deficits and debt are not actually what's driving the current controversy between the parties, and so bootstrapping the debt ceiling to the argument doesn't make a lot of sense.

The real lesson we've learned, hopefully, from the past few months is that the debt ceiling isn't something to grandstand about (and I hope Barack Obama, looking back on his senatorial self, has been appropriately chastened). So my moderate proposal flowing out of the shutdown crisis is considerably simpler: abolish the debt ceiling outright.

Note I am not saying that Congress should rack up infinite deficits. But the amount of debt we incur in a given year is a product of the budget negotiated within Congress and approved by the President, and the presence of a debt ceiling doesn't change that. All the debt ceiling does is threaten a global economic meltdown whenever Congress, as is often, can't get its act together. In essence, what the debt ceiling does is say "we, Congress, cannot be trusted to pass budgets which reduce our debt load. As a consequence of that dysfunction, we will periodically put the entire world at the risk of an unnecessary massive economic calamity unless we decide to take an affirmative step to stop it." This is not sound policy, whether as a tool for reducing the debt or for anything else.

If Congress wants to incur less debt, it should achieve that through the budgetary process. We should incur as much debt (or not) as results from the negotiated balance of revenues to spending that Congress approves in its budget. If that results in too-high debt levels, then the budget should be rerenegotiated to either lower spending or increase revenues. Periodically arming, defusing, and then rearming a ticking time bomb is neither helpful nor sensible. And that lesson, hopefully, has become quite clear.

The Populace of No

McClatchey polls America on the fiscal cliff. And it turns out, we're quite worried about it. 70% say it matters if we make a deal. 74% say that the parties should compromise rather than stay steadfast on principle.

And then voters are asked whether they support various plans for reducing the deficit.

Democrats oppose every option except raising taxes on the rich. Republicans oppose every option, period.

Cleanup Roundup

We're moving next week, and so the slow process of cleaning and organizing our apartment begins.

* * *

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) may be one of my all-time favorite Republican crazies. Here, he frets that women who have access to free birth control will never birth again. Ain't no pregnancy like an involuntary pregnancy!

Lithuanian mayor runs over luxury car parked in a bike lane with a tank. Bring him stateside.

FYI: Black family life in the antebellum south really sucked.

The other day, Jon Chait raised a specter of hope regarding the debt compromise, arguing that the "default" cuts in defense spending will cause lobbyists to work feverishly to avert them via revenue increases. Today, Matt Yglesias puts the kiboosh on it.

Eating while Black.

Frankly, I think Jennifer Rubin's Norway post scarcely makes the top ten reasons she should be axed from the WaPo. Alas, the ombudsman disagrees.

I Can't Look

I can't even bring myself to look at the details of the debt ceiling "compromise". It infuriates me that we had to give into a bunch of immature thugs who decided holding the country's economy hostage was the best way to secure draconian cuts to government while the working class continues to struggle.

And it could have been avoided if we simply were willing to realize that one major political party is not comprised of members fit to govern. As Paul Krugman points out, the reason the President didn't get a debt ceiling extension in December was because he was convinced Republicans would act responsibly. Hind-sight may be 20-20, but it is rapidly becoming apparent that that's always the wrong answer.

The debt ceiling scandal (and frankly, that's what this is -- a scandal) has revealed a Republican Party split into three branches:

(1) Those who knew that refusing to raise the debt ceiling would be a catastrophe but were too spineless to stand up to the rest of their party. Exemplified by Rep. John Boehner (R-OH).

(2) Those who knew that refusing to raise the debt ceiling would be a catastrophe and who relished the idea of exploiting that fact for their own political gain. Exemplified by Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA).

(3) Those who really didn't grasp that voluntarily defaulting on our debt would be the economic equivalent of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Exemplified by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN).

The cowardly, the avaricious, and the delusional. Ladies and gentlemen, your modern GOP.

Boehner is bragging at the massive success Republicans reaped for these tactics -- and he's right. When one party cares about the economic future of the country, and one party made it abundantly clear they're willing to shoot the hostage if it comes to that, what can you do? How do you stop yourself from getting rolled again?

The only thing I can think of is for Obama to start throwing elbows. The Senate can't do squat with McConnell's auto-filibuster policy, so it has to come from the White House. And I don't mean Oval Office speeches with a slightly raised voice. I mean the force of the executive branch. Recess appointments, new agency regulations designed to piss of the right, and take the leash off the DOJ on politically sensitive topics like corruption and the VRA. The minute this deal is signed -- because, horrible as I'm sure it is (any deal that isn't "a clean increase" is horrible to me), it has to be signed -- it's time to send a message back. You pull a knife on the American economy, we pull a gun on Republican priorities.

No more mister nice President.

The Enforceability of the BBA

I never really thought of this, but how exactly would a Balanced Budget Amendment be enforced?

I can think of three models that make sense. The first would involve judicial enforcement. In other words, if the budget is not balanced under whatever specific language is adopted, someone would have standing to sue and stop money from being spent. The second would be self-enforcing. In other words, the amendment could contain a legislative trigger that would be activated if the budget was unbalanced, saying, for instance, that any additional spending would have to approved by a supermajority of Congress.

The third view would treat the amendment as aspirational. Advocates of including positive rights in the text (the right to housing, the right to education, or the right to a job) often say that the point is not to make these rights judicially enforceable. Instead, the idea is that their codification will change the political culture and exert a strong pull on elected officials. The same could be true for a balanced budget amendment.

I don't think proponents of the BBA anticipate or would be satisfied with options two or three. But with respect to the first, it is worth noting that -- unless the amendment contained specific language privileging spending cuts over all other tactics that could be used to balance a budget -- judicial enforcement could easily include injunctions to raise taxes or sell off government property.

And if they do cut spending, how exactly would they determine which programs to cut? Would it just be the ones the judge disliked the most? Finally, a way for Jack Weinstein to get us out of Iraq!

Debtpocalypse Watch: Day Two

As we move into the second day of Speaker John Boehner's furious negotiations with the far-right fringe to secure the votes needed to pass his debt ceiling plan, which would solve this crisis once and for all is a massive waste of time because it's DOA in the Senate, let's examine what is sticking in the right-wing's craw:

The inclusion of the extra money for Pell Grants could cost Republican votes.

Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.) has compared Pell Grants to “welfare”.

"So you can go to college on Pell Grants — maybe I should not be telling anybody this because it’s turning out to be the welfare of the 21st century," Rehberg told Blog Talk Radio in April. "You can go to school, collect your Pell Grants, get food stamps, low-income energy assistance, Section 8 housing, and all of a sudden we find ourselves subsidizing people that don’t have to graduate from college.”

"Hmmm ... I could vote to save the country from economic ruination. But then poor people might go to college. I hate these tough, grueling political choices."

Meanwhile, word is that Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) has flipped to "yes" on the Boehner plan. Flake had called the negotiations over this bill "refreshing" because nobody's children were threatened. Folks think Flake is exaggerating about the bad old days. Tell that to former Rep. Nick Smith (R-MI).

I have to admit, having basically resigned myself to debtpocalypse, I know find this whole charade to be uproariously funny. Boehner is killing himself to crawl across the finish line of a bill which stands no chance of ever becoming law. As Jon Chait points out, Republicans are delusional if they think this will ever pass. It is "like a kidnapper demanding for the release of your child $100,000 and your other child." It's a terrible plan, that will likely be made worse by whatever Boehner will have to do to wrangle those last couple extremist votes, and isn't going anywhere.

All Teed Up

Dear Anderson Cooper,

I know it was an eventful night what with the Republican Party being massive fuck-ups, but you can't interview Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) and not ask him whether he's massively delinquent on child support. I mean that story just broke! Do you think that if the Democrats anointed Rep. David Wu (OR) to speak for them tonight, folks wouldn't ask about his alleged sexual assault? Trick question -- David Wu would never take on the voice of a leading Democrat right now.

Meanwhile, my dad says that if Boehner can't rustle up the votes for this plan, he's got to resign as Speaker. Not in the "out of shame" sense (though sure), but in the "he clearly doesn't have the ability to control his own caucus anymore" sense.

"Deficit Hawks"

Jon Chait introduces the least effective lobby in Congress.

The Personal Debt Ceiling

A conservative blog dedicated to tossing California Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D) has some harsh words regarding her proposal that we raise the American debt ceiling:

Here is what Americans know. Americans know that when they go into debt, they don’t have the luxury of endlessly raising their own debt ceiling. Only the federal government does that.

Perhaps I'm mistaken, but I think this clearly, factually wrong. A debt ceiling is a self-imposed limit on the amount of debt one is willing to take on. But one always has the option of taking on more debt, if -- and this is the critical part -- there is a willing lender (charging interest rates you're willing to pay). That's the point behind it being "self-imposed".

Suppose I take out a loan for $10,000. A year later, I haven't finished paying off that $10,000, but I decide I want another $10,000 loan. Can I do that? Yes, of course I can -- if I can find a lender who is willing to make the loan and I'm willing and able to make interest payments.

The United States is in the same boat -- like the average family, we can take on debt so long as we have willing lenders and can make interest payments. Which there are, and we can -- indeed, interest rates on American debt are very low because the market seems to think we're good for it.

In a market-based economy, the real "debt ceiling" is a function of market forces -- you hit your limit when you can't form a transaction where the debtor can pay interest that the lender is willing to accept in exchange for the loan. The statutory debt ceiling is a governmental regulation that substitutes a centralized legislative command for basic market forces.

Belt-Tightening

One of the ongoing challenges for the House Republican majority has been finding programs to cut. It turns out, "waste, fraud, and abuse" actually doesn't cover a substantial portion of the federal budget, which means our adorable "small-government" crusaders need to start hacking away at programs that people like. Like Medicare. Or Social Security. Or defense.

Not willing to do any of those things, Republicans have been left scrambling a little bit. But they've apparently found one program whose beneficiaries may need to resign themselves to a bit of, er, "belt-tightening": Food stamps!

Poor people -- what lucky duckies. It's time to get them off the government hog, so we don't have to make cuts in areas that might really hurt. Like farm subsidies.

Fiscal Hackery FTW

Can you smell the seriousity?

Wisconsin's Republican governor, Scott Walker, says that concern over his state's relatively modest budget crisis motivates his drive to strip public-sector employees of their ability to bargain collectively. And, yet, he just decided to put Wisconsin into a fiscal strait-jacket, signing a bill Tuesday that would require a two-thirds supermajority in the state legislature or a state-wide referendum to raise a range of taxes. This is not the sign of a serious budget hawk, whatever you think of Walker's policies on public-sector unions.

I'm not sure how serious to take any one on the question of deficits (I'm not sure how much I care about the topic myself). But with Republicans, I really think it's difficult to even draw a coherent line through their fiscal positions. They support slashing public programs to groups they don't like, but they turn around and plow the savings back into tax breaks for the wealthy -- a massively regressive upwards wealth distribution. None of it goes into deficit reduction. And of course, there are plenty of governmental spending categories -- particularly on the federal level (defense) but also in terms of state-subsidies -- that Republicans absolutely refuse to cut.

Democrats may not be interested in cutting spending (though I'm sure they have their list of programs worth cutting -- starting with overblown weapons budgets and continuing over to abstinence-only education), but at least they're willing to support the tax rates necessary to pay for their ambitions.

I've Got ... Site Specificity

In a stunning upset, Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) has not just issued a platitude about "cutting government spending", but has actually identified specific areas for cuts. And those cuts include, amazingly enough, reductions in the defense budget (to the tune of nearly $70 billion). Other reductions include a pay freeze for federal employees, cutting the federal workforce, and selling excess federal land (which isn't really a spending cut so much as it is a temporary cash infusion).

One doesn't have to think Rep. Brady's plan is wise to at least give him credit for doing what so many Republicans have shied away from doing -- saying "I will cut this." So good for him.

Still, it's worth noting that Brady's plan would shave less than $200 billion off the deficit, not an insignificant figure, but hardly the whole hog. If Republicans are going to insist that tax cuts aren't something we, quote, "pay for", we're not really going to be in a position to do any serious tackling of the budget deficit.

This

Jon Chait:

The constituency for entitlement cuts -- which is the sine qua non of any serious reduction in the size of government -- is 7% of the population. Which is to say, actual small government conservatism -- as opposed to opposition to unspecified waste or a misunderstanding of the size of the foreign aid budget -- is essentially nonexistent at the popular level.

By contrast, raising taxes on the wealthy as a step towards deficit reduction carries with it the support of 61% of all Americans.

Voters are Morons, Part 566

I'd like to use this as a an opportunity to mock California voters in particular, but Kevin Drum is undoubtedly right that it probably applies nationwide:

Californians object to increasing taxes in order to pare the state's massive budget deficit, and instead favor closing the breach through spending cuts. But they oppose cuts—and even prefer more spending—on programs that make up 85% of the state's general fund obligations, a new Los Angeles Times/USC Poll has found.

That paradox rests on Californians' firm belief that the state's deficit—estimated last week at nearly $25 billion over the next 18 months—can be squared through trimming waste and inefficiencies rather than cutting the programs they hold dear. Despite tens of billions that have been cut from the state budget in recent years, just a quarter of California voters believed that state services would have to be curtailed to close the deficit.

I remember reading a study which first asked voters if they believed foreign aid should be cut -- the answer being a resounding "yes". The next question was how much the respondents believed we spent on foreign aid -- an amount they overstated dramatically. Finally, when asked how much we should spend on foreign aid, they gave a figure that was something like triple what we spend currently.

When Did We Suddenly Have To "Pay For" Things?

I feel like there is no greater illustration of the hollow GOP concern for the deficit than this exchange between Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and David Gregory:

GREGORY: For a final time, I’ll go back to my question which is, the extension of the tax cuts would cost $3.2 trillion. That’s borrowed money, that adds to the deficit. Do you have a plan to pay for that extension?

MCCONNELL: You’re talking about current tax policy. Why did it all of a sudden become something that we, quote, ‘pay for’?

Senator McConnell may have once again darted across the McConnell Line.

Timmy, Please

Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, widely viewed as a rising GOP star, has a plan for getting the budget back into balance:

Balancing the budget will require some tough decisions. Congress must reduce discretionary spending in real terms, with exceptions for key programs such as military, veterans, and public safety. The Congress must also reject costly new spending initiatives, like new health care entitlements.

There is, alas, a problem:

Someone needs to tell Pawlenty that discretionary spending except for "military, veterans, and public safety" is less than $400 billion a year. A real reduction of, say 10 percent (a ridiculous amount but use it for simplicity sake) would save a little more than $40 billion from the baseline and that doesn't come close to doing what needs to be done.

Finish us off, Matt Yglesias:

If I were planning on running for election, I might not be comfortable saying “to deal with the long-term federal budget deficit we need higher taxes and we need to slow the growth of Medicare spending.” But if you’re not willing to say “we need higher taxes and we need to slow the growth of Medicare spending” then you shouldn’t run around talking about the long-term federal budget deficit. There’s really nothing else to say about it.

Fictive Republican budget hawkery strikes again!

Deficit Thinking

Jon Chait slams the joint Judd Gregg (R-NH)/Kent Conrad (D-NE) proposed commission on reducing the deficit, which comes laden with a bunch of new supermajority requirements effectively guaranteeing its recommendations go nowhere:

To say that this procedure "is designed to get results" shows a very odd understanding of American political institutions. Conrad and Gregg seem to think that instituting major reforms in the public interest is rare because the threshold for passing legislation is too low. Thus they've designed a process that creates new and higher supermajority requirements, on an issue where getting even 51% to sign on is probably impossible. And if that fails, maybe they'll conclude the process was too easy. Next time they could also require the commission members to create a cold fusion reactor or retrieve a magical ring from inside a volcano.

My favorite part of the above quote, specifically, its example of retrieving a magical ring from the volcano, is that it casts the commissioners as members of the Nazgul.

But Now You're Back Here, Baby

Republican Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) "The era of big government is clearly back."

Why, I never realized it had left in the first place. I'd be fascinated to see Rep. Price's voting record over the last three years, to determine just how recent a vintage this concern over deficits really is. For example, it would be very strange for a deficit hawk to vote against the 2007 pay-as-you-go resolution (H. Res. 6).