Comments on: A Rare Foray Into Political Strategy

By: FridayGoneHome

FridayGoneHome — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 18:29:39 +0000

Late to the party, but I have a proverbial “stupid question” that has been bugging me for a few weeks: Don't the policies and sweeping changes we've seen over the last month, not to mention the processes for their enactment, throw a big ol' wrench in Naomi Klein's “disaster capitalism” theory? I mean, her point – that capitalism uses catastrophe, natural or man-made, to tighten its stranglehold on a system – seems to be washed out by the sweeping shift in the opposite direction brought about by, surprise, economic disaster. That is to say, disaster opportunism isn't exclusive to free market capitalism. We just enacted a trillion dollars of rich, spendy goodness, with less than a week of debate. Even if Friedman were guilty of all that Klein contends, he'd never be so bold to think that his policy choices would have such a swift wind at their backs.

That's all. I said it, and I'm glad. Moving on. . . . .

By: FridayGoneHome

FridayGoneHome — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 10:29:39 +0000

That's all. I said it, and I'm glad. Moving on. . . . .

By: ottovbvs

ottovbvs — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 13:20:59 +0000

This crisis climate is the worst of all possible worlds for Republicans. They are completely and indisputably associated with this entire shambles in the public mind outside of movement conservatives. As long as this climate persists and with solid majorities in both houses it all plays to Obama's strengths as a superb communicator. The budget has consolidated his base, pulled the very clever new CEO trick of putting all the bad new out front, and in it's substance as Clive Crook at the FT says “the intelligence of the administration shines through.” It's quite clear to me that Obama is the most formidable political talent to hit these shores since FDR. Reagan, Kennedy and Clinton were good but this guys definitely in Roosevelt territory, and serendiptously he has arrived in power with almost the exact set of circumstances that FDR faced in '33. The Republicans were in a huge hole to start with faced with this set of facts but they seem to have chosen to hunker down in a stance of irredentism which if it goes on for long enough will be very damaging if not fatal to them as a national party. I'm not sure there is a way out there dilemma at the moment. The economy is going to start recovering by early 2010 and as often happens when recovery sets in it can be fairly rapid except on the employment front which tend to lag somewhat. The natural resilience of the US economy combined with the huge amount of visible and the just as important invisible from Fed and treasury is going to make recovery certain.

By: Aaron

Aaron — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 21:40:21 +0000

Just to add to the previous comment, I know Will is “working the long angle” here, but this angle seems to me to be so long that it is closer to a straight line, the opposite end of which is 180 degrees away from where you started from. Friedman, for example, never called himself a Republican, but knew that he was much more closely aligned with Reagan than FDR, or Obama for that matter, and despised the libs.

By: Aaron

Aaron — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 21:14:58 +0000

I love reading Will, but he drives me somewhat batty. I find it ironic that he despises McCain (which I, as do most conservatives, do as well and wish to see him defeated in his next primary, if not election) because. to me, he reminds me somewhat of McCain in as much as he seems to relish a sort of 'Maverick' status. Perhaps I am reading into this, but he seems to me to get much more enjoyment out of denigrating Republicans (rightly so in most cases) than he does Democrats. As does McCain by the way – he is much harsher on Republicans than he is on liberals. i.e, “clear-eyed take on Obama, SADLY, seems so fresh” vs. “inveterate bullshitter like McCain”. I do not understand this idea that liberals are really more closely aligned with libertarians b/c somehow liberals will abandon the central tenets of their command and control centralized planning mentality once they clearly see the light, while conservatives, who, although they share the same intellectual framework of Hayek, Buchanan, Friedman, Adam Smith are somehow beyond the pale. The main argument I have seen from him on this is that these economists supported social welfare, though argued for its distribution mechanism to be composed much differently than that we have in our current bureaucracy. However, conservatives also support social welfare. I have not seen or heard of one conservative calling for the outright abolition of welfare. I have heard them argue that it needs to be constructed in such a way that it does not destroy whole segments of the population by creating a dependance on the state. Maybe I'm just ranting here….

By: K. Larson

K. Larson — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 20:11:22 +0000

Will,
I believe you may have missed another strategic option:

Decry Obama's policies while voting for them.

Democrats will take credit for success regardless of Republican choices, yet Republicans can only succeed if they A) were perceived as being opposed to Democrat boondoggles and B) did not "sabotage" the legislation that "would have saved the economy".

You were right that voters aren't logicians. I say they are aware of only what is said on the cable news, and do not check voting records. The above strategy allows the Republicans to be blameless in any Democrat failure while ceding the inevitable Democrat victory that follows success.

As to why the Republicans have not done so... We can conjecture that Republicans would prefer individually to vote against the democrat package because doing so increases the credibility of their objection and gets them cable TV time (and causes them to feel less spineless). The would all prefer that every OTHER republican vote yes and they vote no. The equilibrium result is that they all vote no in the hopes that the "other guy" will pick up the slack. And there we have the current situation.

By: Paul G. Brown

Paul G. Brown — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 18:41:30 +0000

Vangel - Obama's not saying that the way to solve the deficit is a bigger deficit.

He's saying that the way to minimize the harm suffered during the current economic downturn is to run a (larger) deficit in the short to medium term. He's ALSO saying that -- in the medium to long term -- he plans to return fiscal policy to a neutral setting (ie. reduce or eliminate the budget deficit, much as Clinton & the GOP congress did in the 1990s).

The question I've not seen asked, or answered, is "At the end of this process, what will be the net change in the proportion of GDP that we can attribute to G?" That number is a rough-and-ready metric to measure the degree to which government is impinging on our economic liberties.

It might be that if the non-government economy grows rapidly enough we will see G fall as proportion of the pie. But I doubt it. The long term trend, everywhere in the developed world, is for a steady and continual growth of G as a proportion of overall economic activity.

By: Vangel

Vangel — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 18:05:36 +0000

Jindal's embarrassing performance? As a Canadian who thinks that both of your major parties are incompetent hypocrites I thought that Jindal was fine. The bottom line is that Obama's logic does not work. He can't blame the massive deficit that he inherited on the crisis and argue that the best way out is a bigger deficit and more spending. And while you are correct to note that most American voters do not understand logic there is nothing wrong with Jindal taking a stand that is based on principle. Of course, it would help if Republicans also weren't such hypocrites but that is an argument for another day.

By: mk

mk — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 17:27:09 +0000

I mentioned this in the other thread, but Obama's argument takes the form:
"X is the right thing to do. I know you will do X."

Since some parts of X have not been fully debated, the statement is presumptuous.

The real incoherence here is with earlier Obama statements such as:
"I will listen to you, especially when we disagree."

Unless the "listening" is an empty exercise.

By: Mark G

Mark G — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 17:09:12 +0000

If, in fact, the D's plans are doomed to fail, presumably the R's will be winners again in the post-failure election, regardless or whether the plans they are offering at that point are better or worse.

By: Mark G

Mark G — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 17:06:13 +0000

Except, of course, our host, who we all agree is eminently sensible.

By: Paul G. Brown

Paul G. Brown — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 05:16:52 +0000

of course, principled, smart and pointed opposition — rather than lying about the text of a public document like legislation — or adapting and evolving your ideology — like the left did in recognizing the dis-utility of dogmatic socialism and embracing social democratic ideas; that's just too much, isn't it?

I expect, as I age, I will slowly grow tired and reflexively more conservative. But I hope I never lose my grip on reality, and am constantly prepared to wrestle with the world as it is, rather than promulgate myths about how the world ought to be.

By: knb

knb — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 03:25:27 +0000

The main problem for Republicans is that they always come across as mean. The democrats talk about helping poor people, giving medicine to babies, and “creating jobs”. Its very difficult to explain why the government can't do all that stuff without cannibalizing the productive sector. So instead the republicans fight back by scaring people with gays and terrorists and other bogeymen.

I think that the Republicans have to try to win the economic argument using actual logic instead of fighting demagoguery with demagoguery. The alternative is to run to the center on economic issues. If they do that though, they will look like followers, with the democrats being the leaders. Why vote for Democrats Lite when you can have the real thing?

By: odograph

odograph — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 00:48:34 +0000

" The only plausible Republican strategy is to put forward an attractive personality able to forcefully and intelligently explain in a relatively detailed way why the Dem’s plans are likely to fail, and to forcefully and intelligently articulate a plan likely to work better."

Do they have such a plan?

(I hope it's not to bring in Grover Nordquist to say "cut my taxes" and then hope for the best)

By: Jack

Jack — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 22:49:23 +0000

Surely part of the reason they will be dismissed as partisans is that they are *also* spouting nonsense.

As far as I can tell the entire economic conversation consists of 80% nonsense, 20% sense and no way for anyone to tell the two apart as every “expert” -even when they actually are experts- is embedded in an ideologically motivated institution or has made their ideological motivations clear in such a way that they cannot be trusted.