Blood and Treasure

Source: iCasualties, CRS (.pdf)

In 2008 Obama campaigned on Afghanistan as "the good war"—so voters wouldn't think him too dovish. And as you can see we haven't been doubling down—more like quintupling down.

But for what? How does this end?

A wiser man once said: "It's time to admit that no amount of American lives can resolve the political disagreement that lies at the heart of someone else's civil war."

That was Barack Obama...in 2006.

(cross-posted at Library Grape)

Medicare as political football

What goes around, comes around.

Fisking the president, and a look back at 2008

Keith Hennessey takes a devastating axe to Obama's op-ed. Read it and weep.

I've become quite disappointed with the Democratic congress and Obama administration's handling of the economy. I'm convinced the situation would be measurably better if we had done a large payroll tax cut instead of the stimulus Christmas tree that has yet to kick in.

McCain and Palin know nothing of economics, which is part of why their campaign was incredibly pathetic. Yet were they in office, they'd be surrounded by advisors like Keith. This could potentially have outweighed their ignorance, if they listened well. But given how Democratic the congress is, much would turn on how they worked together. For all its flaws, the stimulus we have today is arguably better than nothing. Although its provisions have yet to kick in at a meaningful level, its psychological effect has been positive. Back in January, people needed to be reassured. Fear itself was a problem. People are less fearful now, and this is undoubtedly good. Unfortunately, it's impossible to know whether the interaction of McCain and a Democratic congress would have been better. I guesstimate 30-40% odds of being better.

The ideal political-economic situation would likely be Obama and a Republican congress. If I could swap this congress and administration out for Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

Which brings me to evaluating my satisfaction with voting straight Democrat last election...

My vote for congress in '06 and '08 turned on my exasperation with Republicans' handling of non-economic issues. The blind and unrepentant support for an unjust war, lack of oversight on the Bush administration's crimes against humanity, expansion of executive power, disregard for the rule of law, their hostility to equal rights, and absurdities like the Terri Schiavo law were far too much to take. I regret the economic consequences of my vote, and am unlikely to vote Democrat in the future, but such Republican excesses gave me no choice for these past two cycles. It was the right call.

Obama vs. McCain on the economy feels close to a toss-up. As mentioned, the interaction of a well-advised McCain with a Democratic congress could have been better, but it also could have been worse. So I'm close to ambivalent on this. But Obama vs. McCain on everything other than the economy is a solid win for Obama. He hasn't moved to right the Bush administration's wrongs as swiftly as most of us hoped, but McCain was essentially running for Bush's third term and that's what nightmares are made of.

And then there were sixty

Coleman finally concedes, so Democrats will have 60 Senators, including independents who caucus with them.

The professor vs. the fighter pilot

A vote vindicated.

Hating politics

Wilkinson sums up my feelings of late:

God, I hate politics. It really does make people stupid, especially those whose tribe is out of power. When Sonia Sotomayor was nominated, I knew nothing relevant about her judicial philosophy or, much more importantly, about her actual record as a judge. You’d think you’d wait to learn something about this before saying something about her, but no. People just proceeded to go crazy on cue.

Like Damon Root , I’m in favor of libertarian judicial activism. But I know that Barack Obama is no libertarian, and I knew he wasn’t going to nominate Kozinski or Posner. Too bad! So I was hoping for a relatively centrist liberal who sees some merit in libertarian arguments, especially about the protection of economic rights. As far as I can tell, there is nothing especially worrying about Sotomayor. She’s obviously super-qualified. And from what I’ve read, she seems like a highly competent, fairly moderate liberal who sticks pretty close to the law (which nobody really likes when they don’t like the law!) and is perfectly willing to side with Republican-appointed judges when that seems to her the right thing to do. What are people going batshit crazy over? I don’t get it. And I really don’t get why many Republicans have taken this opportunity to reinforce the already widespread impression that they are morally odious morons. God, I hate politics.

Hence why my posting has died down—I'm not reading much political fare and don't know how soon I'll want to start again.

The last two cycles (2006, 2008) were exhilarating in a "throw the bums out" kind of way. And Obama was probably the most amazing presidential candidate ever, so following the primaries, general, and his first few months in office has been pretty interesting.

But I think the novelty has passed. He's The Man now—unlikely to foul things up nearly as badly as his predecessor—and covering the day-to-day insanity of the party out power is becoming repetitious.

Just remember Jane's Law:

The devotees of the party in power are smug and arrogant. The devotees of the party out of power are insane.

I'd say it's standing up pretty well, what with Democrats' new spend-o-rama and the right's lunatic flailings.

Meanwhile the WSJ wants Republicans to play grown up.  If only...

Daily Show vs. ASU

Let's face it: they're just pissed McCain lost.

Cheney for President

Check out one of Ross Douthat's first regular NYT columns...

Watching Dick Cheney defend the Bush administration’s interrogation policies, it’s been hard to escape the impression that both the Republican Party and the country would be better off today if Cheney, rather than John McCain, had been a candidate for president in 2008.

He's right, in hindsight.

Les Misérables

Found a good quality embeddable of Susan Boyle:

I dreamed a dream in time gone by
When hope was high,
And life worth living
I dreamed that love would never die
I dreamed that God would be forgiving.

Then I was young and unafraid
When dreams were made and used,
And wasted
There was no ransom to be paid
No song unsung,
No wine untasted.

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hopes apart
As they turn your dreams to shame.

And still I dream he'll come to me
And we will live our lives together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms
We cannot weather...

I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I'm living
So different now from what it seems
Now life has killed
The dream I dreamed.

And this is still entertaining:

The sane governance tax

Dish reader:

I'm one of those “wealthy” people who will be pinched hard by Obama’s tax hike. I came to this country legally 17 years ago with $300.00 in my pocket but with good education. I struggled at the beginning but nevertheless, worked my way up in the high tech world. I too think that the Obama’s tax proposals are extremely unfair as if I don’t pay already enough to Uncle Sam. And this article on a liberal web site just infuriated me beyond belief.

But after listening to and reading about CPAC conference which is held currently in Washington, DC, I realized that I would rather take my chances with Obama than anybody from that group. I can’t imagine that these people were in power for 8 years and yearn for more. This rabid bunch MUST be kept away from any kind of power for all of our sake.

Andrew seconds:

I feel the same way. I came from a modest background in another country and arrived in the US with barely a cent of my own money. I've worked hard and earned the American dream - and now have to work for the government for well over half the year (a government that still persecutes me for being an HIV-survivor). Obama will take more of my money - and much, much more in the future. Liberalism believes in punishing hard-working successful people in this manner - and the more you succeed, the more they will punish you. But if I had to pick between him and the party of Sarah Palin and Joe The Plumber, it's really no contest.

I agree. And you can actually see a shift among the wealthiest Americans in returns from the last election, which I posted in November.



Sure looks to me like rich people are willing to pay more taxes if it means not having a party of Bushes, Palins, and Joe the Plumbers running the country.

The romance of ten letters a day

(meme) Political Punch:

The letter to President Obama came from a woman in Arizona whose husband lost his job. He was able to find work, but the new gig came with one-third the pay; the family is struggling to make their mortgage payments.

The letter from the Arizona woman illustrated a policy conundrum, recalled senior adviser David Axelrod. President Obama read it, and absorbed the lesson.

"She said they had made all their mortgage payments, but were running out of money," Axelrod said. "And they were told they could not renegotiate unless they were delinquent in their payments."

Before President Obama's housing speech last week, he'd made copies of his letter and "sent it to his financial team and said, 'This is the kind of person our housing plan should help," Axelrod recalled.

[...] Every day President Barack Obama is handed a special purple folder. The folder contains ten letters, and every day President Obama takes time to read them.

[...] these letters have been culled from the thousands the White House Correspondence Office receives each day from Americans who have taken the time to sit down and write to their president.

[...] In his first week in office, President Obama requested that he see 10 letters a day "representative of people's concerns, from people writing into the president," recalls Gibbs, "to help get him outside of the bubble, to get more than just the information you get as an elected official."

[...] Monday through Friday the head of White House Correspondence delivers ten letters to be read by the President, choosing among letters that are broadly representative of the day’s news and issues; ones that are broadly representative of President’s intake of current mail, phone calls to the comment line, and faxes from citizens; and messages that are particularly compelling.

This is what FDR did, and it seems...very romantic. I've gotten the feeling several times over the past few months.  On balance I find the change to be welcome; certainly far better than the despair of the Bush years.  And we all do seem to need some extra hope during these rough times.

Whenever I begin to think this way I remind myself of Wilkinson's romance post from after Election day:

Every four years, I find myself deeply disturbed by the fact that the office of chief executive of the national public goods administration agency is in fact, according to most people’s sense of things, the highest peak, the top of the heap. And the quadrennial reflex of vesting in a single powerful man so much hope for the future seems to me a truly depressing failure to internalize the spirit of American democracy. Last night’s celebratory catharsis was a long time coming. We needed it. But, frankly, I hope never to see again streets thronging with people chanting the victorious leader’s name.

The government of the state is profoundly important. And I think American voters picked a competent, decent, and sober executive officer. But this is not, headline writers, Barack Obama’s America. He is not your leader, any more than the mayor of your town is your leader. We are free people. We lead ourselves. He is set to be a high-ranking public administrator. Sure, there is romance in fame. But romance in politics is dangerous, misplaced, and beneath intelligent people. Were we more fully civilized, we would tolerate the yearnings projected on our leaders. Our tribal nature is not so easily escaped, after all. But we would try to escape it. We would discourage and condemn as irresponsible a romantic politics that tells us that if we all come together and want it hard enough, we’ll get it. We would spot the dangerous fallacy in condemning as “cynicism” all serious attempts to critically evaluate the content of political hopes.

I don’t say this to pick on Obama in particular. He’s a politican. Romance and elevation are crucial to winning a ruling coalition. They are tools. But smart people ought to be able to see through romance and elevation to the point of it all: the power to compel. McCain’s even worse with the “fight cynicism through glorious collective commitment” crap, which is one reason I’m glad he lost. The point is, Obama’s a politician, and politics is what it is: a ritualized and contained conflict over power. That’s not something to romanticize.

Is it possible to be romantic yet reality-based, hopeful yet critical, to have a very high respect without descending into Bush supporters' neo-monarchism or Palinite dementia...and, as Reagan would say: trust but verify? I try.

There are plenty of journalists and commentators who make a conscious effort every day to report as objectively as practical (or at least, will sell newspapers). And there are plenty of pundits and ideologues who almost always support their "side".

In this journal I try to moderate a mix of the two...to be a good cognitive citizen without being too rigid and angsty in advocating my libertarianism... which, like Wilkinson's, is disturbed by the lofty respect awarded to the the States' chief executive officer.

Obama calls on McCain

Awkward...



It's nice to be reminded we elected the right guy. Political Punch has more.

Obama's coalitions

Tom Schaller at Ezra's place:

In our piece, entitled "LBJ's Revenge: The 2008 Election and the Rise of the Great Society Coalition," we argue that the policies LBJ supported in the mid-60s led, not initially but eventually, to Barack Obama's winning general election coalition in 2008.

I have to give Phil credit for making the link between the Civil Rights Act (blacks, mostly), Immigration and Nationality Act (Latinos/as), and the Higher Education Act (upscale, educated whites), and the coalition Obama assembled last year. What LBJ could not have anticipated then -- or, more to the point, Hillary Clinton failed to prevent in 2008 -- was Obama's ability to also build a new coalition in the primary as well, specifically by taking the African-American vote away from its usual alliance with working-class whites and other non-whites and shifting it into coalition with young voters, college educated whites, and the liberal wing of the party. Absent the extra ballast from the black vote, that latter coalition has historically fallen short of the nomination, as candidates ranging from Eugene McCarthy to Bill Bradley to Howard Dean well know.

So, Obama built two new coalitions -- the first which no white Democrat probably could have, and for which the credit belongs almost exclusively to him and his unique appeal, and a second which he had to mobilize but would never have been available to him without a little help from his Democratic presidential predecessor.

Think about it: that extra ballast from the black vote allowed us young college educated whites to nominate Obama over Clinton in the primaries and change the course of history by putting an intellectual pragmatist & empiricist in the White House to clean up Bush's mess.

In other words: Yes We Did. I'm still kind of incredulous.

So I turn to these old videos yet again, as one of the few ways to express the feelings of closure & relief:

One more look back

Wealthy against incompetent governance

This breakdown has a graph showing the vote swing among the wealthiest Americans:



NYT economics blog concludes:

“angry yuppies who’ve hugely benefited from President Bush’s tax cuts…have become so outraged and alienated by the incompetence, crass social conservatism, and repeated insults to the nation’s intelligence of the Bush-era Republican Party that they’re voting with their hearts and heads instead of their wallets.”

There is probably some truth to that notion. Here are two other possibilities:

1.) A higher percentage of wealthy, liberal voters came to the polls this year and a higher percentage of their conservative counterparts stayed home

2.) In an election in which most voters said the economy was the most important issue, some wealthy individuals who tend to vote with their wallets, saw an Obama presidency as better for their long-term financial interests — and America’s — and were willing to overlook the immediate tax increase that is coming their way.

For a 'fresher on the McCain and Obama tax plans, see here.

The Obamas on election night

There's a big Flickr gallery with 5,000 pages going back to the start of the campaign. Here's the crew watching returns on election night:





7 year-old Sasha's expression is just adorable:







Here's one of my favs, they're watching McCain's concession speech. It must be a little unsettling listening to the crowd boo:





Above is the team that really did it. From left to right, Robert Gibbs, communications director who will become press secretary; David Plouffe, campaign manager; Barack Hussein Obama, president-elect; and David Axelrod, senior strategist who will come to Washington and be a senior advisor and "assistant to the president".

The later may not sound grand, but according to Ambinder:

Assistant to the president is a very coveted post with quasi-institutional prerogatives; assistants can (if the Obama administration chooses to continue the practice) pop in on the president whenever they want, and they're given review privileges over everything that goes out in the president's name.

Another thing to note about Axelrod is that he and Obama are both good friends with Rahmbo, and share a policy vision. Seems like it'll be a powerful trio for getting things done.

As for Plouffe's future, Klein comments:

He says he won't be working in the White House. This may or may not be related to the fact that he had a baby girl yesterday, making this a very good week for him.

Election result cartogram

Explanation here.

I will refrain from making a spent-penis joke about Florida.

Prop 8 fails?

According to exit polls, it's 52-48. If that holds up I'm not sure this night could get any better.

a massive generation gap: the under-30s voted for marriage equality by 67 to 31 percent. The over 65s voted for discrimination by 57 - 43 percent.

Well, that's the future alright.

UPDATE: unfortunately doesn't look like the count is following the exits...it's flipped to Yes 52.0% No 48.0% Precincts reporting: ~95.0%

Obama's speech

When McCain mentioned Obama's name in his concession, the crowd booed

When Obama mentioned Sen. McCain, his crowd cheered. Make of that what you will...

---

What a speech. Listening to him invoke Lincoln, that greatest of presidents, was fantastic. I don't have any deep thoughts, really just enjoying the moment.

Here's David Kurtz from TPM:

What to say?

Whether you agree with Obama's politics or not, this is an unbelievable historical moment, and so much bigger than myself. But I was part of it. Right now I'm just crying.