Right Wing Nut House

I just finished visiting the blog Crooked Timbers and, as is the case when I read stuff by very smart people, I need an aspirin because my head hurts. I take that as a sign that too much brainy stuff is crammed into my head and I must access the release valve so that some of the older crap can dribble out of my ears to make room for the next clump of logical, coherent, analysis from writers who know a helluva lot more about philosophy and politics than I do.

I lose a lot of long term memory that way, but hopefully, nothing major like the batting averages for the 2005 World Champion White Sox or the names of my children. (Do I have any children? Too late.)

Some very smart writers give me both a headache and make me want to throw up. Juan Cole comes to mind because even though I find his history writing the bomb, he is a nauseating self-referentialist and a terrorist apologist. Come to think of it, just about anyone who writes a blog is guilty of the former so perhaps I am being too hard on Professor Cole as far as his constant self promotion is concerned. His views on Hezbullah and Hamas are another matter and not only have me gagging but also make me want to take a shower after reading him. Same thing happens to me after trying to read Jane Hamsher’s foul mouthed spewings which only goes to show that you can have the mind of slug and still engender massive disgust. Nice trick, that.

There is great virtue in reading stuff by people more intelligent than you are. First of all, generally speaking, you learn something new - even if it’s that the writer is a dork and despite his brilliance, would benefit from the intellectual equivalent of a bracing thwack across the noggin with a two by four. Beyond that, learned writers offer perspectives you will never find by reading most columnists (the sainted Buckley one of the few exceptions), bloggers, or pundits, or by listening to your bartender expound on the mysteries of the universe (despite the fact that most PHD’s in philosophy work as mixologists or cab drivers).

That said, this well toned argument by Henry Farrell at Crooked Timbers on whether or not Barack Obama is turning America into a European style social democracy should be must reading for those who have been complaining about the president’s “socialist” policies.

Farrell quotes Roger Cohen on turning America into France-lite:

To paraphrase Mauriac, I love France, but I don’t want there to be two of them, least of all if one is in the United States. … I think President Obama’s counter-revolution goes in the right direction. … Still, the $3.6 trillion Obama budget made me a little queasy. There is a touch of France in its “étatisme” — the state as all-embracing solution rather than problem — and there’s more than a touch of France in the bash-the-rich righteousness with which the new president cast his plans as “a threat to the status quo in Washington.” … You know possibility when you breathe it. For an immigrant, it lies in the ease of American identity and the boundlessness of American horizons after the narrower confines of European nationhood and the stifling attentions of the European nanny state, which has often made it more attractive not to work than to work. High French unemployment was never much of a mystery. Americans, at least in their imaginations, have always lived at the new frontier; French frontiers have not shifted much in centuries. Churn is the American way. … If America loses sight of these truths, it will cease to be itself.

Cohen sums up the argument nicely, referencing American exceptionalsm without naming it explicitly. Any such mention of exceptionalism would put him in very bad odor with some of his friends on the left who have a jaundiced view of such old fashioned, outmoded, jingoistic nonsense.

Farrell also quotes from this Clive Crook piece at National Journal where the author speaks the forbidden words and points out that if we were to adopt some French social policies (health insurance, labor protections, etc.) that we would not become some kind of French-American hybrid while maintaining our “exceptional” character but rather something totally different:

I was hoping that Brooks would press Shields to say what exactly it is about France he objects to, what makes him recoil at the parallel. Where has France gone too far, in the view of an American liberal? … Presumably, liberals approve of the universal health care, the generous and extensive welfare state, the comprehensive worker protections, the stricter regulation, the vastly more-generous subsidies for higher education, the stronger unions, the higher taxes, and especially the higher taxes on the rich. … Perhaps some liberals privately long to make the United States over in the image of France, but the great majority, I imagine, are more interested in taking the things they regard as best in the European economic model—all the things I just listed—and combining those “socially enlightened” policies with the traditional economic virtues of the United States. Take French social policies and welfare-state institutions and add them to the American work ethic, spirit of self-reliance, and appetite for change. Et voila, the best of both worlds. Color me skeptical. Culture shapes institutions and vice versa. Culture—that bundle of traits of self-reliance, self-determination, innovation, and striving for success—underpins the American exception. … In ordinary times, this culture makes it hard for a government to push the United States in a European direction … But now, maybe, the time is ripe. This unusually severe economic crisis has called American capitalism into question, highlighting its weaknesses and making it easier to forget its strengths. Liberalism has a rare opportunity. … But the interaction between culture and institutions works both ways. Change the system and, with time, you will change the culture.

Farrell’s take deals with the shocks to the political economies of Europe in the 90’s when the “Anglo-Saxon” model of capitalism seemed to be the road to take in a globalized economy:

France and other countries faced a profound crisis – a crisis which in some ways was even more profound than that facing the US today. They have faced continuing pressures to ‘reform’ institutions in a more market-liberal direction over the succeeding two decades. And they have indeed changed in some very important ways. But France did not converge onto the US model despite these pressures. If it had, presumably Crook’s and Cohen’s criticisms would be rather different than the ones that they are making Instead, it has reformed along a divergent trajectory to the US, with continued heavy state involvement in the economy but of a different variety than previously.

This reinforces a near-universal finding of the relevant literature in political economy as I read it. While there is some diffusion of policy lessons across states, it tends to have limited consequences. Different countries respond to common shocks in very different ways, because of their existing institutional structures. National economic trajectories are quite robust. Even in major crises, advanced capitalist countries tend to tinker around the edges of their institutional systems rather than opt for wholesale reform, let alone converging on a perceived ‘better national model’ elsewhere.

And this is what is happening in the US. The Obama proposals are not particularly radical departures from existing practice in the US. They are certainly nothing like traditional European social democracy. Even David Brooks effectively acknowledges this, when he says that they are potentially problematic in combination rather than individually. They aren’t going to set the US on a different national trajectory, let alone make it ‘French’ or ‘European.’ Some of us might like to see this happen, but it isn’t going to, even given the ideological trauma that the US is undergoing. And arguing that American individualism is likely to wilt if exposed to nasty foreign influences smacks more of a kind of capitalist-road José Bové-ism than any serious kind of intellectual analysis.

Reformer, not radical? Farrell seems to be saying that because our “Americanism” is so ingrained, that Obama can slap all the social democratic nonsense he wishes over the exceptionalism template and we will remain virtually unchanged in a cultural sense. I agree. A little more “progressive” in our tax and spending policies perhaps. But it will take a lot more than universal health insurance or card check legislation to destroy what has taken 400 years to build. The problem is, it is not Obama’s policies per se that are necessarily “radical” but rather the ways and means he will achieve them.

But I think Farrell is missing one part of the argument - the practical political effect of Obama’s transformative agenda. This is where the real “change” will occur - a change that will fundamentally alter the relationship between the governed and the governors. For this, we must look to the last American president who attempted transformation - Ronald Reagan.

At bottom, Reagan’s revolution was also firmly grounded in a non-radical departure from existing practice. Reagan did not repeal the Great Society or the New Deal. Social spending skyrocketed under his leadership, anywhere from 3-5% above inflation. Part of this was the fact that he was dealing with a Democratic majority in the House (and, for the last two years, the Senate). The traditional guarantors of aid to the poor made sure there was plenty of funding available to take care of their dependent constituency. Reagan managed to cut the rate of growth as a percentage of GDP in social spending, nothing more - a not inconsequential achievement given the spending trajectory we had been on in the 1970’s.

But even beyond that, Reagan’s “revolution” altered the national conversation on entitlements, bringing some much needed realism and perspective to the debate. Whether this caused a backlash or was itself a product of middle class resentment I will let the historians duke it out to discover the truth of the matter. I don’t see President Obama trying to bring us back to the days when the only question about entitlements was “How much more do we spend?” That part of the Reagan legacy seems secure and may be a starting point to finally come to grips with the frightening prospect of stupdendous social security and medicare outlays 20 years down the road that could literally bankrupt us (if Obama doesn’t beat the clock and do it sooner).

Further, Obama is not going to “undo” the Reagan tax revolution, not when 48 million Americans are paying no taxes at all and the marginal rates he proposes will still fall far short of the rates in place when Reagan took office. Again, Reagan’s tax policies were not really radical in retrospect (Bush’s tax cuts fit that bill nicely) but the changed perspective on taxation - influenced by the California tax revolt that was occurring at the same time - may have been radical in the sense that it reversed 50 years of thinking about taxation. Seeing taxes as personal property and that the government that confiscates the least, governs the best may have to undergo some slight adjustments given our current deficits but the overarching belief that low taxes are a beneficial model for our government will outlast Obama.

So the question of how radical Obama’s policies might be must be seen in the context of politics and history. While grounded, as Farrell rightly points out, in practices and theories of the past, the “remaking” of America that I and others see in Obama’s policies have more to do with a psychological barrier being broken with regards to government intervention in the economy and the resulting alteration of the national conversation about the efficacy of statist solutions to a myriad of social problems. Not France and yet, not America as we have known it either. I realize that “change” is what people voted for but did they vote for the kind of Middle Class dependency that some of Obama’s policies would seem to promote? I struggled with this question in a post I wrote last month, “If Government Makes Life Easier, Does That Make it Better?”

The transformation of American society from one that values liberty to one that embraces dependency has taken longer than any other western nation. This has largely been due to American conservatisms steadfast refusal to abandon what Kirk calls the “voluntary community” in favor of the stifling hand of collectivism. Where once only the poor felt the deadening hand of statism which created a permanent underclass, destroyed the family, and smothered ambition, now the middle class is in line to be granted similar attention…

Liberals do not like to discuss the loss of freedom their collectivist ideas entail. But we are clearly in an era where choices are to be limited for the middle class in order to make life less of a burden . And any society that limits choice, limits freedom.

But isn’t this what the people want, what they are demanding? How can you live in a democracy and tell people that government acting to make your life easier is wrong and that the alternative - struggling to make the right choices for yourself and your family and where not choosing wisely might cost you - is the preferred, indeed the “American” way of self sufficiency and taking responsibility for your own life?

There is nothing noble in suffering but I would posit the notion that independence is, in and of itself, enobling and in any society that values freedom, the slide into dependency cannot be allowed without a recognition of what we lose as well as what is gained. There are 400 years of struggle behind us to create a society where the individual took responsibility for his own well being and that of his family, his fortunes rising or falling based on his native abilities and talents. The reward was “an earned life” of personal satisfaction and a feeling of self worth and accomplishment that you simply cannot experience if you depend on government for as much as we do today. Or as much as we will in the near future if more of our freedoms are given up in the name of personal security and comfort.

Farrell does not believe that kind of “rugged individualism” is at stake in an Obama presidency. I believe it is. I believe the real transformation that Obama’s ideas and policies represent might not make us into a France (which isn’t really the point) but will result in a different kind of America - one that is inconsistent with our founding and an anathema to conservative (traditional) principles upon which we have built a society unique among men. And what I find despicable is the president and his cohorts using the “opportunity” of an economic crisis to bring about these transformative policies by subterfuge. They wouldn’t fly otherwise and they know it.

Give us a stand up fight without resorting to political tricks of fear mongering and partisan bitchery and I would guarantee the bulk of Americans would be standing with us and not the president.

They were just whispers a couple of weeks ago - a hint there, a question here. But if you believe Howard Fineman, the inside the beltway crowd has taken the mettle of our new president and discovered that despite all the hype, Obama may not be all he’s cracked up to be.

I hasten to add that this has not and probably will not affect his enormous personal popularlity anytime soon. The mass of citizens have more common sense than the elites and a lot more patience as well. But to people who follow politics as a religion and look for signs and portents as a soothsayer would look for harbingers in the entrails of a frog, there are a few things to be worried about when looking at our president’s performance so far.

What has he done in 50 days? He has proposed much and accomplished some. The primal push of his presidency - the stimulus bill - is getting it from both sides with conservatives deriding it as pork while liberals already saying it wasn’t big enough. This is something we better get used to from the left because they area establishing the parameters of debate when the ultimate let down occurs and it is shown that Obama’s massive spending is not working. The battle cry will be “not enough!” rather than “let’s try something else!”

But why not enough? Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton, and even President Obama himself have all used the exact same phrase to describe their approach to governance in these times of economic hardship; “In crisis, there is opportunity.” I am convinced this phrase will come back to haunt them because if the first stimulus bill wasn’t enough to get the economy moving, it was because it was loaded up with “opportunity” spending that had nothing to do with economic recovery and everything to do with remaking America. In other words, a great deal of the spending in the stimulus package was discretionary and not crisis-related.

And now Obama wants to come back for more? For hundreds of billions that will be for “real” stimulus?” He’s got to be kidding. What this shows is a frightening prospect; Obama cares less about economic recovery than he does about changing America to reflect his left wing vision.

This is also born out in how he has established his priorities. At Obama’s first press conference, he refused to discuss what his administration was going to do about the banking crisis because he “didn’t want to steal any thunder” from his Treasury Secretary who was going to announce the plan the next day.

This was a lie. There was no “thunder” to steal because his Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had no plan to announce. Once that became apparent, the markets began a serious slide to oblivion. And here we are more than 5 weeks later and Geithner is still mum about his plans to save the banks. This is causing not only a lack of confidence but has opened the Administration up to questions about their basic competence. It has made Geithner a butt of jokes and has even led to calls in some quarters for his resignation.

Did Obama think we wouldn’t notice? Did he believe that people would simply forget his promise to have a plan? And here is where wildly misplaced priorities come into play. The fact is, the key to this whole economic mess is getting the banks to lend money again. Obama could pass 10 stimulus bills and it wouldn’t make a difference because as long as credit is frozen, our economy will continue its free fall.

This begs the obvious question; why did the Obama Administration choose to try and pass the stimulus bill before solving the banking crisis? Why didn’t they concentrate on that fundamental problem rather than ram an $800 billion spending free for all down our throats when even its supporters say didn’t contain enough money to immediately stimulate the economy? Shouldn’t they have been working from the first hours after the election on trying to solve the problem that, more than any other factor, could lead to a catastrophe for our nation and the world?

Or was it more important to take advantage of the “opportunity” found in the crisis to fund liberal programs that the president feels will remake America?

Obama claims he can work on more than one problem at a time:

“I know there are some who believe we can only handle one challenge at a time,” Obama stated today. “They forget that Lincoln helped lay down the transcontinental railroad, passed the Homestead Act, and created the National Academy of Sciences in the midst of Civil War. Likewise, President Roosevelt didn’t have the luxury of choosing between ending a Depression and fighting a war. President Kennedy didn’t have the luxury of choosing between civil rights and sending us to the moon. And we don’t have the luxury of choosing between getting our economy moving now and rebuilding it over the long term.”

As Jules Crittenden points out, Roosevelt needed the war to get out of the depression. And Kennedy? I know Obama went to Columbia and all but Holy Smokes! Kennedy hardly “chose” civil rights - it was forced on him by the courage of the Freedom Riders and the demonstrations in Selma and elsewhere. Kennedy was furious with King for forcing his hand and sicced Bobby on him to try and get him to pull back. Also, as Jules points out, civil rights and the moon program together did not cost the government even a tenth of a stimulus bill in today’s dollars.

That’s beside the point, however. Yes, presidents can and should deal with more than one problem at a time. But Barack Obama is starting to look suspiciously like Jimmy Carter who tried to do so much those first 3 months that he ended up accomplishing very little. This description of Obama by Howard Fineman is eerily Carteresque:

Obama may be mistaking motion for progress, calling signals for a game plan. A busy, industrious overachiever, he likes to check off boxes on a long to-do list. A genial, amenable guy, he likes to appeal to every constituency, or at least not write off any. A beau ideal of Harvard Law, he can’t wait to tackle extra-credit answers on the exam.

But there is only one question on this great test of American fate: can he lead us away from plunging into another Depression?

Carter was so desperate to be liked and yet, ended up being universally despised because he ineptly used the powers at his command. What do you call a president who puts economic recovery as a secondary goal in a deep recession while being unable to come to grips with the fundamental reasons for the downturn?

Inept? Incompetent? Misguided? In over his head?

Fineman:

If the establishment still has power, it is a three-sided force, churning from inside the Beltway, from Manhattan-based media and from what remains of corporate America. Much of what they are saying is contradictory, but all of it is focused on the president:

• The $787 billion stimulus, gargantuan as it was, was in fact too small and not aimed clearly enough at only immediate job-creation.
• The $275 billion home-mortgage-refinancing plan, assembled by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, is too complex and indirect.
• The president gave up the moral high ground on spending not so much with the “stim” but with the $400 billion supplemental spending bill, larded as it was with 9,000 earmarks.
• The administration is throwing good money after bad in at least two cases-the sinkhole that is Citigroup (there are many healthy banks) and General Motors (they deserve what they get).
• The failure to call for genuine sacrifice on the part of all Americans, despite the rhetorical claim that everyone would have to “give up” something.
• A willingness to give too much leeway to Congress to handle crucial details, from the stim to the vague promise to “reform” medical care without stating what costs could be cut.
• A 2010 budget that tries to do far too much, with way too rosy predictions on future revenues and growth of the economy. This led those who fear we are about to go over Niagara Falls to deride Obama as a paddler who’d rather redesign the canoe.
• A treasury secretary who has been ridiculed on “Saturday Night Live” and compared to Doogie Howser, Barney Fife and Macaulay Culkin in “Home Alone”-and those are the nice ones.
• A seeming paralysis in the face of the banking crisis: unwilling to nationalize banks, yet unable to figure out how to handle toxic assets in another way-by, say, setting up a “bad bank” catch basin.

There’s more at the link but you get the idea. We are, for all intents and purposes, adrift and at sea with the president’s answer to every problem to spend more, borrow more, and use the crisis as an opportunity to tear at the fabric of our founding. The Administration is frozen about what to do with banks that are teetering on the edge of insolvency (along with the entire banking system) and appear not to be focusing on the chaos their incomprehensible delay in proposing solutions to solve the problem is causing. Instead, we get nonsense about comparing the stock market to tracking polls rather than a vote of “no confidence” in Obama’s plans - or lack thereof.

Are these just the growing pains that all presidents go through when they first take office? I’m sure some of this can be ascribed to that notion. It is, after all, still very early in Obama’s term. And I would hardly write off one so gifted so easily.

But Jimmy Carter was also seen as brilliant, a super technocrat who could answer the question of the day, “Is the presidency too big for one man?” It took Reagan - chuckling and snoozing his way through history - to definitively answer that question; it depends on the man.

To those who read the signs of this administration, the question is not if the presidency is too big for one man but whether the man currently occupying the office is up to the challenges that face us.

The jury is still out on whether or not he is.

Mark Tapscott thinks so:

Did you feel it? The political ground shifting beneath President Barack Obama since his speech last week to Congress? It’s been downhill since and I’m not referring mainly to the Dow Jones record-setting dive. The pivot point of the shift was the speech, or rather what the speech did to the evolving public narrative of Obama.

The case Mr. Tapscott tries to make seems a little forced to me - at this point. Here are a few of his bullets:

1. Increased audiences for Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.

2. Some Democrats in Congress bailing on the omnibus spending package and the tax increases in Obama’s budget.

3. A coherent conservative critique appears to be emerging. As evidence, Tapscott points to two excellent articles this week that provide plenty of logical conservative ammunition to critics.

Paralleling these developments, a potentially devastatng conservative case against Obama is coming together rapidly. Two influential columns this week tell the tale: On Thursday, Daniel Henninger offers this crucial observation in a WSJ piece otherwise devoted to asking why Republicans aren’t more eagerly and quickly taking advantage of the fact the Obama Democrats have all but declared war on the 75 percent of the U.S. economy that is private and therefore productive of the nation’s wealth:

“Beyond the stock market, there is a reason why, despite much goodwill toward his presidency, the Obama response to the faltering economy has left many feeling undone. There isn’t much in his plan to stir the national soul. It’s about ’sacrifice’ now so that we can live for a future of small electric cars and windmills. This may move the Democratic Party’s faith communities, but it cannot revive a great nation. If the Democrats want to embrace market failure as a basis for their ideology, let them have it. As politics, it’s a downer.”

The second column appeared today in The Washington Post and was written by Charles Krauthammer. Obama’s mastery of public speaking has heretofore served to deflect attention away from the details of what he is actually proposing. And there is in those details, according to Krauthammer, a fundamental deception: Obama summons visions of catastrophe that are the result of too little government regulation of the financial markets and he offers as a solution vastly more government regulation of …. health care, energy and education.

“The ‘day of reckoning’ has now arrived. And because ‘it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we’ll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament,’ Obama has come to redeem us with his far-seeing program of universal, heavily nationalized health care; a cap-and-trade tax on energy; and a major federalization of education with universal access to college as the goal.

“Amazing. As an explanation of our current economic difficulties, this is total fantasy. As a cure for rapidly growing joblessness, a massive destruction of wealth, a deepening worldwide recession, this is perhaps the greatest non sequitur ever foisted upon the American people,” Krauthammer said.

I think Mark is getting a little ahead of himself - as are many conservatives - who see the entire narrative, so carefully constructed over these many months by the media about Obama, suddenly shifting to reflect the realities of what the president is proposing as well as the myths surrounding his brilliance, his competence, and even his work ethic.

Wall Street is making its judgement as we speak. They cannot afford to listen to spin or engage in the kind of pretense about the Obama administration many Democrats are currently trying to foist upon us. They, like us, realize that the president’s personnel shop is in shambles, that his Treasury Secretary is the most spectacularly underperforming cabinet member in American history (given the fact that we were told the economic recovery depended on us ignoring the fact that he is a tax criminal and confirming him anyway), that there is no plan at all to deal with the banking crisis that worsens as you read this, that his foreign policy gaffes continue to make the United States look weak, indecisive, and ridiculous, and that in the midst of the worse economic crisis in a generation, the White House has chosen to waste time and effort to demonize a talk show host and try to paint his face on the Republican party.

We know all this. But the idea that these facts have altered or are even in the process of altering the fundamental narrative about Obama and his Administration is premature and borders on wishful thinking. As long as the Democrats can keep this a Republican economy, Obama will remain relatively unscathed. Defections from Democratic ranks on his budget will be few and given their huge majority in the House, insignificant. Even the declining stock market will be spun as sour grapes by the rich who don’t want to see their taxes raised.

Expectations on recovery are so low at this point that they will be able to spin any rise in job creation as occurring as a result of their porkulus package - even if, as most economists predict, the overall jobless rate will continue to climb. And as long as Republicans fail to offer anything remotely resembling an alternative to Obama’s ruinously transformative spending plans, the Democrats can paint the opposition to Obama as being obstructionist. (Adopting some of Newt Gingirich’s 12 points to recovery would be a nice start).

I think Tapscott is right about a consensus forming among the right regarding how to go about criticizing the president. Lord knows there’s enough ammo. The problem is getting by the major gatekeepers in the media who are still in a full blown Obama swoon. Some of the puff pieces on this guy and his family have been incredible. He buys his kids a new swingset and that rates cutsie article in AP. Some sex therapist writes on NBC’s website about the “5 Love Lessons” we can get from watching the Obama’s. No thanks, they appear much too demure for my tastes. As I have written previously, “I like my sports violent and my sex hot, sweaty, and loud.” The Obama’s strike me as a couple that would enjoy reading “The Kama Sutra” in the original Sanskrit or whatever while I prefer classic porn of the Debbie Does Dallas era.

Sorry, but in order to get beyond a narrative that holds up the first couple as idealized, perfect sex partners worthy of being imitated, we have some work to do. And I don’t think altering the narrative will happen in one “Eureka!” moment but rather a gradual chipping away at the myths, the lies, the spin, and the sleight of hand Democrats will use to distract people from the truly awful results that will occur when Obama’s policies come a cropper.

Unless I miss my guess, that day is coming sooner than the Democrats or Obama could possibly dream.

I have returned from my trip to Washington after an irritating day of travel yesterday. The tiny plane that I took from DC to Philly (I was supposed to lay over an hour there) was delayed taking off because the Captain - bless him - decided to de-ice the plane before we left. Because of his caution, I missed my connecting flight to Chicago but considering the alternative of flying through a snow and ice storm without de-icing, I am not going to complain.

I’m sure you’ve heard plenty already about CPAC and what or what it didn’t accomplish. For myself, if I were to give the conference a grade it would be a D+. Much red meat - little substance. I understand that this is not unusal for CPAC but given the urgency of the need for reform and the fact that so many people who are actually engaged in the process of reform were present. I thought there might be a little more debate and brainstorming than there ended up being.

The real business of the conference took place behind the scenes at the social gatherings hosted by some of the many groups who exhibited at the conference. As a blogger, I got invited to quite of few of these shindigs and I can tell you that most of the debate about where the movement (and to a lesser extent the Republican party) should be headed took place among activists, lawyers, lobbyists, political pros, non-profit staff, and pundits who shared a drink or two while assessing the prospects for change.

I’m not going to name drop but it is probable if you follow politics closely, you would have heard of or seen on TV a lot of people that I spoke to. Some knew of my writings and were interested in what I had to say. Others wanted the perspective of the blogosphere - which I was happy to give them as honestly as I could. In all instances, I was encouraged by the hunger to seek a new path for conservatism that would lead back to the top.

I hasten to add that no one was suggesting that conservtive principles be abandoned. In that respect, almost everyone agreed with Newt Gingrich that we should be a movement of “bold pastels” as Ronald Reagan put it - our ideals put forth confidently and with certainty. The number one symptom that many agreed was holding conservatism back at this point was timidity in the face of Obama’s success. This was before Rush Limbaugh’s speech on Saturday so I am unsure if there were some who wouldn’t change their mind about that after hearing Rush.

What about Rush? A great performance. But a blueprint for change? I’m afraid not. In fact, Limbaugh set himself squarely on the side of those who believe there isn’t much wrong with conservatism except we’re not being conservative enough. This is depressing if only because Limbaugh - rightly or wrongly - is seen as a leader of the conservative movement. I think this rather silly even though Rush has transcended the notion of pure celebrity and entered the political realm. Limbaugh - who placed the “life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness” clause in the Constitution’s preamble rather than the Declaration of Indpenendence - had similar problems with placing his conservative beliefs in a coherent context.  Being for individual liberty and accomplishment is fine. But Rush said precious little more about the definition of conservatism from there on out.

But on the positive side, Limbaugh gave a stirring and devastating critique of Obama’s bail out culture. Some described it as “angry” which I would agree with wholeheartedly. And why not? It is nonsense to believe that conservatives shouldn’t be angry with what Obama is doing to the country. The people voted for change, not the fundamental alterations that Obama is carrying out using the economic crisis as an excuse for massive intrusions by the government into the private sector. Some of this is certainly unavoidable. But I am beginning to believe that Obama’s concern for the economy is secondary to his ambition to change this country from what it was - a free, capitalist superpower -  to what he wants it to be - a mostly free, mixed economy, second rate power.

Limbaugh’s red meat address actually did some good; it cheered conservatives at a time they needed a boost. But Limbaugh actually may have started something of a civil war with his criticism of Newt Gingrich and those of us who believe that something is wrong with conservatism and that more is needed than simply believing more strongly in the movement and throwing up candidates who are even more “conservative” (according to Limbaugh’s lights) than we have in the recent past.

Gingrich, who gave an equally harsh appraisal of Obama and the Democrats, managed to shoehorn in some very telling comments about conservatism. In fact, I believe he spoke the most important words of the conference when he said, ”

“And so it is time to recreate the party of the American people and to recognize that that is a much bigger party than the Republican party. In every major political speech Ronald Reagan reached out to Democrats and Independents as well as Republicans, and he understood to govern in America you have to bring people together in a tripartisan majority. We are bigger than the Republican party, we stand for principles that transcend the Republican party, and we’re going to fight for the principles that lead to economic growth and jobs.”

I’m not sure if Limbaugh doesn’t mean “Republican” when he says “conservative.” There are many of us who believe that conservatism should no longer be the handmaiden of a party that uses the good name of conservatism and whose acts are  totally at odds with the way a conservative legislator should vote. Rather, we believe it should be the other way around; that conservatism should be the tail that wags the Republican party dog, that if they want our money, our activists, and our support, they should comport themselves in such a way as to gain our confidence so that they not only call themselves “conservative” but act that way as well.

(I hope to compare and contrast the Gingrich-Limbaugh speeches tomorrow.)

CPAC was one of the more interesting things I’ve done these last four years I’ve spent as a blogger. I hope I don’t regret spending my own money in a few months. But considering how seriously I take the present course of conservatism, it was probably well spent even if the worst happens and my job disappears.

This story is not news. It is not surprising in the least - to right or left. Nor is it indicative of anything we don’t already know about Congress as an institution and to a large degree, the elected members who fill out its ranks.

What is surprising is the size and scope of this developing scandal which has about 1/4 of the United States Congress dropping earmarks into a spending bill directed to the clients of one lobbying firm - a company already under investigation by the FBI for funnelling illegal campaign contributions to Pennsylvania congressman John Murtha (D).

CQ Politics has the details:

No matter what the outcome of the federal investigation, PMA’s earmark success illustrates how a well-connected lobbying firm operates on Capitol Hill. And earmark accountability rules imposed by the Democrats in 2007 make it possible to see how extensively PMA worked the Hill for its clients.

In the spending bill managed by Murtha, the fiscal 2008 Defense appropriation, 104 House members got earmarks for projects sought by PMA clients, according to Congressional Quarterly’s analysis of a database constructed by Ashdown’s group.

Those House members, plus a handful of senators, combined to route nearly $300 million in public money to clients of PMA through that one law (PL 110-116).

And when the lawmakers were in need — as they all are to finance their campaigns — PMA came through for them.

According to CQ MoneyLine, the same House members who took responsibility for PMA’s earmarks in that spending bill have, since 2001, accepted a cumulative $1,815,138 in campaign contributions from PMA’s political action committee and employees of the firm.

It should be said up front that there is no evidence - yet - any of these members took illegal contribtions. They aren’t doing anything that almost everyone else is doing. Indeed, this kind of pay for play is rampant around the country from courthouses, to statehouses, to the White House. What it proves is that for all the “reform” that has supposedly taken place in Washington going all the way back to the 1970’s - “sunshine” laws, lobbying reform, campaign finance reform, limiting junkets, etc. - there is still the back room, the wink and a handshake over cocktails, the speech “honorariums” given by lobbying firms at events held in warm, exotic locations, and the whispered agreements outside the rooms where conference committees work to craft the laws of the land.

There is also nothing illegal about earmarks. As I have tried to explain before, one member’s “earmark” that wastes spending is another man’s necessity. Yes, there are bogus examples like the Bridge to Nowhere, and the post office named after the member built in a town of 10 people. No doubt there are roads to nowhere too. But getting rid of the practice would actually be detrimental. Many times, a Congressman will put an earmark in a spending bill because the federal agency being funded refuses to spend money on genuinely worthy projects. Here again, there is a perception gap; what might be a “worthy” project for one district might be seen by someone living in another as waste. The authors of the book “The Wrong Stuff: The Extraordinary Saga of Randy “Duke” Cunningham, The Most Corrupt Congressman Ever Caught” point this out in an excellent explanation of what earmarks are and why they are used:

In truth, there is nothing illegal about earmarks and, as the authors point out in a brilliant chapter on the practice, they can be used for good at times. As an example of earmarks being used for a beneficial purpose, a lone Texas Congressman steered billions of dollars to the Afghan resistance fighting Soviet occupation in the 1980’s. Said Representative Charlie Wilson (whose story was told in the hugely entertaining Charlie Wilson’s War) “There are three branches of the government and you have to explain that to the executive branch every once and a while and earmarks are the best way to do that.” Wilson believed that the Afghan resistance would never have triumphed without earmarks because the CIA would not have spent the money effectively.

Having said that, there is absolutely no doubt the process must be reformed - something the Democrats tried in 2007 but ended up doing a half assed job because their own members balked at reforms that would truly bite. There is a little more transparency but still no debate over measures that can be as expensive as a billion dollars. And then there is the impossible to police practice of members giving preferment to campaign contributors and well heeled lobbyists not to mention the whole, bloody practice has gone beyond reason, beyond necessity, and beyond belief:

Earmarks were a problem going back in the 1980’s. For example, the authors point to the 1987 Transportation bill vetoed by an astonished Ronald Reagan who counted no less than 121 earmarks in the bill. Both the House and Senate – Democrats and Republicans – shrugged off the Gipper’s disapproval and passed the bill over the President’s veto overwhelmingly. In 1991, the number of earmarks in the pork laden Transportation bill had grown to 538; 1850 by 1998; and by 2005 the total number of earmarks reached a mind numbing 6,373 costing an additional $24.2 billion. (Source: Taxpayers for Common Sense).

Newt Gingrich and the Republicans saw the earmark as a ticket to a permanent majority. The Republicans would place newer or more vulnerable members on one of the Appropriations Committees which would give them access to the lobbyists who, in exchange for an earmark, would fill their campaign coffers with cash as well as shower the member with gifts, junkets, and other goodies.

Earmarks were part of the so-called “K-Street Strategy” where lobbyists became enormously influential not only in re-electing Republicans but in crafting and critiquing legislation. It corrupted the Republican party and, with the Democrats having their own “K-Street” connections, has already corrupted them too.

Earmarks are a symptom. It is the whole rotten ediface of governance in America that is corrupt and I don’t know whether it’s because the people we elect are of a mean moral character or the system itself is just too much of a temptation for politicians to pass up the opportunity to enrich themselves. Probably both. Surely this is not the kind of government imagined by Madison. Even Hamilton might have raised an eyebrow at the excesses of self aggrandizing politicians who may come to Washington determined to resist the siren calls of lobbyists and their gift horses only to fall prey in the end to apathy or worse, the belief that “everybody does it” so why should I be a chump?

I have grown cynical since 1979 when I found myself in Washington as a 24 year old sprite, agog at the majesty and towering historical figures with whom I was rubbing shoulders. But the reverence I had for politicians and our system of government back then was misplaced. I see now that the stately buildings, the stirring rhetoric, the passion, the belief in ideas was a mirage, a beautiful facade behind which was the crumbling, rotten ruins of 200 years of hopes, aspirations and bloody sacrifce made irrelevant by hard-eyed, cynical men who exploited people like me and what I believed for their own gain. By the time I left Washington 6 years later, I had been disabused of my boyish naivete, having seen the grubby underside of politics and governing as well as the grasping, conniving nature of so many who weild power, ideally to benefit the people but instead, to protect and enrich a wealthy elite. The education of Rick Moran was complete.

And yet, my cynicism has always been tempered by the realization that they are, after all, human and that the fault was mine for placing they and the government of the nation I love on such a high pedestal. Today, I see things with a little harder edge to my observations. But I still believe that the men and women who represent us can do a much better job while maintaining their integrity. If they can’t help themselves, then laws and rules must be designed to lead them not into temptation - make it so hard for them to exploit their position for personal gain that they either keep their souls or go back to selling used cars or whatever activity their debauched character finds comfortable.

If they are going to act like kids in a candy store when they get to Washington, perhaps it’s time to start treating them like children who need to be constantly taught the right thing to do. It’s apparent that somewhere along the way, most Members of Congress forgot those basic lessons and need remedial instruction.

My friend Tom Elia at the New Editor raised this question in an email and it bears looking into.

The fact is, if this mess with Burris had been made public back on February 5 when the Illinois senator submitted his “corrected” affadavit to the Democratic Majority Leader, there is a pretty good chance that the Illinois senator would not have been able to vote on the stimulus bill in the senate on the 13th.

Why? Because pressure would have been building - as it is now - for the “lying little sneak” to resign his seat. It seems surreal but Roland Burris has now changed his story about contacts with Governor Blagojevich’s henchmen about the senate seat at least 4 times - twice yesterday alone. If he had been forced to resign in a similar time period that is shaping up now, there would have been no 60th vote on the stimulus bill in the senate, no cloture, and the bill would have been sent back to conference.

So which Democrats knew of this affidavit and why wasn’t it made public immediately? Burris says he sent the affidavit to the chairman of the impeachment committee who then promptly sat on it until the Chicago Sun Times got wind of the story at which point Burris himself gave it to the newspaper. The committee chairman was Barbara Flynn Currie, House Majority Leader.

Barbara Flynn Currie has represented the 25th Congressional district in the Illinois House since 1979. That district includes Hyde Park - former home for many years of President Barack Obama.

Just sayin’.

So what does Rep. Currie say about the affadavit? Not much:

Currie acknowledged receiving Burris’ letter but said she was unfamiliar with its contents.

After being read Burris’ account of his dealings with Robert Blagojevich, Currie said: “Very odd. I don’t know there is anything actionable here, but I would like to check the record.”

“Unfamiliar with its contents?” And we’re expected to believe that the second ranking Democrat in the Illinois House never opened a letter from the junior senator from her state, that there was no cover letter explaining what was inside, and that Burris’s lawyer had not contacted Currie’s office to see what she was going to do?

The chances that there were other Democrats - local and national - who knew of this “corrected” affidavit and what was in it would seem to be pretty good. What would be your first move as a state party leader if you discovered that your junior senator was basically a liar? Or, even putting the best face on it, was going to be involved in a huge political firestorm as a result of a convenient memory loss?

I would think a call to Illinois’ senior senator Dick Durbin might be in order, don’t you? Durbin, the #2 Democrat in the senate, just might have mentioned it in passing to Harry Reid, wouldn’t you think?

Speculation, yes. And logical? You decide.

The point being, Democrats were willing to sit on this story until the stimulus vote was safely passed. The vote in the senate was Friday the 13th and the Sun Times story appeared the next day. But what if the story had broken on February 6th, the day after Burris says he gave the letter to Currie? The story would have been vying with the stim bill for attention and the calls now emanating from Republican quarters in Illinois for Burris to step down would have been huge news. Who knows what national Republicans would have done? They very well may have demanded Burris recuse himself from voting until the matter was cleared up - a perfectly reasonable request. If that had happened - or if Burris had been pressured to step down as he still may do - there would have been no 60th vote for cloture.

This would seem to be a very powerful incentive for Democrats to cover up Burris’s lies, keeping the country, the people of Illinois, and the opposition in the dark about a matter that, if known at the time of his confirmation by the senate, may have resulted in Burris being rejected.

So what to do with Burris? Here’s Harry Reid prior to Burris’s testimony before the impeachment hearing:

After days in which Senate leaders had demonstrated determined resistance to Burris’ appointment to the Senate by scandal-tainted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, Reid praised Burris as “candid and forthright.” And he suggested the testimony Burris is to give Thursday before the state legislature’s impeachment committee could be crucial to his prospects of gaining the seat.

“He’s going to go answer any other questions they might have. He’s not trying to avoid any responsibility and trying to hide anything,” said Reid (D-Nev.) “Once that’s done, we’ll be in a different position and see what we are going to do.”

If that testimony - now under investigation for perjury - was “crucial to his prospects of gaining the seat” what say you now, Harry Reid? You have a sitting senator, appointed by a sleazy governor, who quite possibly perjured himself at a hearing you yourself deemed “crucial” to a decision on his fitness for office. Does the Democratic party stand for ethics and transparency? Did you know of Burris’s problems with the truth and sit on the story until after the stimulus bill was passed?

There are few in Illinois who believe Burris outside of the predictable support he is receiving from the African American community. The Chicago Tribune editorial board blog, Vox Pop, is calling on the senator to resign:

The hole just gets deeper and deeper, and Burris keeps digging. He has no credibility.

And many Democrats are losing theirs.

Illinois House Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie (D-Chicago), who chaired the impeachment panel, sat on Burris’ amended testimony for more than a week.

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid vowed that no Senate appointment by the disgraced Rod Blagojevich would stand—until Blagojevich appointed Burris.

They told Burris to go to the impeachment committee and testify fully and truthfully. And he did not.

And now what? “He went before the state Legislature and he obviously convinced them, but we’ll have to see… I hope he didn’t try to avoid or mislead anyone…” Reid said Tuesday. Durbin is on an overseas trip and hasn’t bothered to comment on the tomfoolery back home. Late Tuesday came word that the Senate Ethics Committee has started a preliminary inquiry.

Finally, remember that Illinois Democrats failed to do right by the people and schedule a special election for this Senate vacancy. If they had done that, voters today might be weighing the lost credibility of candidate Burris, instead of expressing their disgust with Senator Burris.

Disgraceful. Disgraceful all around.

There’s only one honorable action for Burris: resign.

Oh that this all would have been happening last week instead of this week. What might have been…

UPDATE

From commenter Aurelius:

Wasn’t the Senate cloture vote for the stimulus package 61-36 (http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2009/02/09/stimulus_vote/)? So even with Burris out or incapacitated the vote in favor presumably would be 60. That’s still meets the supermajority requirement. Say if Burris resigned and no one was appointed immediately. Then there would be two Senate seats vacant and the supermajority requirement would be reduced to 59 (3/5 of all senators). So Burris resigning even could be a strategy to pass the bill. The only argument that works is whether the problems with Burris make it politically dangerous for the majority party to press cloture and passage of the stimulus.

My response:

Ah - you are correct - I think. And thinking about it, if it was that desperate of a situation, they probably would have wheeled Ted Kennedy in to vote.

Still, when Reid found out about Burris’s lying - if he found out and I think it a good bet he did - the senate vote was in doubt. So the motivation to cover up still would have been there.

UPDATE II

Dan Riehl sends along this old Jim Lindgren post about House Majority Leader Currie. Lindgren is a constituent and thinks quite highly over her. Indeed, Currie has apparently marched to a reformist tune during her career.

But this is a partisan political matter. And, as Lindgren points out, Currie is actually friends with the president. It is not beyond imagining that Currie sat on Burris’s letter so as not to make any trouble for her friend’s efforts to get his stim bill through the senate. Nor is it impossible to imagine Currie ringing up Senator Durkin and relaying the contents of Burris’s “corrected” affidavit and warning of big trouble ahead.

Burris may or may not have affected the outcome of the vote if this scandal had broken a week earlier. But the very fact that the letter was kept quiet shows that the Democrats knew it contained political dynamite and that at the very least, it would have complicated matters in the senate. Reid had no idea when Burris handed in this letter if he had enough votes for cloture. Reason enough to cover up the truth from the people of Illinois and the GOP opposition.

Read this piece from Veronique de Rugy at Reason Magazine about what exactly our legislators voted on yesterday.

It will turn your stomach, at the very least. With the economy falling down around our ears, these pork-loving, cynical, selfish bastards larded up a spending bill with some provisions that will easily make the Hall of Fame of Wasteful Spending.

A partial list:

• $24 million for United States Department of Agriculture buildings and rent
• $176 million for renovating Agricultural Research Service buildings
• $290 million for flood prevention
• $50 million for watershed rehabilitation
• $1.4 billion for wastewater disposal programs
• $295 million for administrative expenses associated with food stamp programs
• $1 billion for the 2010 Census
• $200 million for public computer centers at community colleges and libraries
• $650 million for the digital TV converter box coupon program
• $2 billion for Byrne Justice Assistance Grant program
• $10 million to combat Mexican gunrunners
• $125 million for rural communities to combat drug crimes
• $1 billion for the Community Oriented Policing Services program
• $1 billion for NASA
• $300 million to purchase scientific instruments for colleges and museums
• $400 million for equipment and facilities at the National Science Foundation
• $3.7 billion to conduct “green” renovations on military bases

Again, for dimwitted lefties who may be lurking out there, some of this spending is no doubt needed - but has absolutely no business being attached to this bill. Why can’t some of these programs be funded through normal legislative channels? Because the whole Congress knows they would never be able to spend the amounts earmarked in this stimulus package or even pass some of these spending provisions at all unless we had a president out there deliberately and cynically ginning up fear in order to scare people and thus justifying its passage as a result of a national emergency.

And that’s not all:

The conference report dedicates 30 percent of all discretionary spending to 33 new programs totaling $95 billion and expands 73 programs which are normally part of the regular appropriations process by $92 billion.

That’s 33 new government programs brought into existence that, like almost all government programs, will take on a life of its own and we will be funding them long after you and I have let this planet for more hospitable climes.

Also, that’s another 73 programs getting money in this stimulus that should have gone through the regular appropriations process but didn’t because Democrats wanted to spend more money on them than they could possibly get going through channels.

That kind of thing happens occasionally. Bills will have riders attached that have little to do with the nature of the spending but is stuck in there by some member as the result of a favor. But it has never been done to this gargantuan extent nor with such blatant disregard for rules and procedures.

Finally, de Rugy shows us some things that were put back in conference that the senate had taken out:

So now funds can go to museums, stadiums, arts centers, theaters, parks, or highway beautification projects. Most significantly, this reopens the door for many of the projects on the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ wish list of “shovel ready” projects that includes many items that are nothing but waste and pork, such as doorbells, construction of dog parks, replacement of street lights, and money for a “mob museum.”

“No earmarks” doesn’t mean that Democratic mayors aren’t salivating over the prospect of getting their hands on this cash for their little pet projects. The only people who will benefit by that kind of spending are the political supporters and cronies of the big city mayors.

I am suffering from “outrage fatigue” this morning. And after reading de Rugy’s piece, I feel like getting sick to my stomach. The rank cynicism it took to write this bill and then sell it as a panacea for what ails us is perhaps the greatest betrayal of the public trust in my lifetime.

I only hope there are American historians a hundred years from now to write about it.

This blog post originally appeared in The American Thinker

One after another, Obamagaffes just keep coming. Two, sometimes three times a day, we are witness to the fruits of electing someone president who quite simply, had no business running for the office in the first place.

I’m tired of writing about it except that it sets up my prescient and trenchant analysis directed at our good friends on the left:

I told ya so.

I hate to say it but we have got to find a way to right the ship at the White House. History has reached out and tapped this novice on the shoulder at a time when there is real danger his bungling will result in a catastrophic economic collapse as bad as the worst in our history.

Many historians believe that the Panic of 1837 (a speculative boom to bust combined with an inflationary crisis) was even worse than the Depresssion in the 1930’s. One third of all banks in the US failed. For different reasons, we are looking at a similar crisis today in the financial markets. It is not likely that we will see 1/3 of all banks in the country go under. But unless our unsteady and clueless Treasury Secretary can get his act together - and quickly - the dominoes will begin to topple, starting with giants like Citibank, working its way down to powerful regional banks like Fifth Third.

The idea of building up anticipation for the announcement of a plan to deal with this crisis as the White House did all last weekend and then first, delaying the announcment a day and then sending out Geithner with not much of a plan at all is shocking. Didn’t the bozos at the White House have any clue that the markets were on tenterhooks waiting for this plan? When nothing much materialized, many concluded that the White House and their financial wunderkind Geithner were stymied. They didn’t know how to solve the crisis and were fumbling around in the dark, trying to figure out what to do. The markets reacted accordingly and here we are, three days out from Geithner’s “deer in headlights” appearance before Congress where he was actually laughed at by members and Congressional staffs, and we still haven’t fleshed out many details of how this “plan” is going to work , how much it will cost the taxpayer, which banks will get more cash, which will be lucky enough to have toxic assets removed from their balance sheets, and on and on into the darkness.

We know that bank executives will have their salaries set by the Treasury Department, though so that’s something. Congratulations to Geithner and his boss for concentrating on the real important stuff like playing the class warfare game by sticking it to the rich bankers.

They’ve screwed up monumentally on the big stuff like the “Financial Stability Act” that no one knows how it will work as well as the stimulus bill that even if you believe we need to spend every dime of it, one must be concerned that this 1500 page monster of a bill will never be read in its entirety because the Democrats and the White House refuse to publish it and there isn’t enough time to read it and study it anyway.

The frightening fact that this reveals is that these guys aren’t really that smart after all. For all the talk of a “team of rivals” and the brilliance of our president and his people, the truth is a lot more prosaic; they have proven themselves to be as incompetent and thick headed as Bush ever was. Personnel problems the likes we have never seen with Judd Gregg the latest colossal blunder. Obama’s promise that if the stim bill passes, the head of Caterpillar will rehire some people has been revealed to be a lie or wishful thinking on the part of the president when the CEO - a supporter of the president - contradicted his optimistic rhetoric.

Then there’s the aggrandizing of power within the White House, marginalizing the Secretary of State and the bureaucracy. The last president that tried this? Nixon. And he was roundly criticized when it turned out the State Department never knew what the White House was doing behind its back. This led to some comical foreign policy blunders including the temporary derailment of our rapproachment with China. One could add the politicizing of the census, a tiff with the military over Iraq that had the president retreating from his campaign rhetoric about withdrawal, a rambling, disjointed press conference that resembled a question and answer session between 3rd graders and their teacher, and the general feeling emenating from the administration that no one is in charge.

All of this would be enough Obamagaffes for one term and yet we are barely 3 weeks into his presidency.

It’s time to call in some wiser heads. Obama would hate it but utilizing Bill Clinton’s knowledge and experience would probably help a great deal. Clinton, was if nothing else, a competent manager of the executive branch. One of the problems right now is that the Obama people still think they’re in Chicago. They were absolutely tone deaf to the tax problems of Geithner and Daschle as well as being blissfully ignorant of the impact that Bill Richardson’s real troubles with the law might have. Clinton might be of great help in fixing their broken personnel operation; no more lobbyists and find honest people who know what they’re doing.

Obama has done well in calling in some of the other Democratic graybeards like George Mitchell and Ambassador Holbrooke. Perhaps he can expand that list to include some other old Clinton hands. Not permanent hires but people he can call on to guide him through the maze that is Washington. God knows, we need this White House to get its act together and fast. Otherwise, Obama is going to have the shortest honeymoon in history. And there are so many challenges ahead that getting things right now is vital to his - and our - future success.

Right now, his party is still united behind him and the American people seem willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. But continuing to stumble and stagger around will cause people to lose confidence in him in a hurry. Democrats, a notoriously fractious and disunited bunch ordinarily, might return to their old ways if Obama proves not up to the job.

And if, despite all his rhetoric about his stimulus bill saving the day, the economy really begins to tank, the American people will desert him faster than you can say “Hope and Change.”

The chances of deep sixing the stimulus monstrosity and starting over again are as near to absolute zero as you can get in politics. The reputations of Speaker Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the president himself are on the line and a defeat of the conference report in the senate (still a possibility after the House tries to restore many of the cuts made by the senate), would be very damaging to that triumvirate, especially the president.

But if ever there were a case where the leaders of the Democratic party should swallow their pride and take the hit on their credibility by tearing up this piece of legislation and starting over, this is it.

Not much of a chance of that happening what with Obama going on national TV tonight and a cloture vote scheduled in the senate tomorrow. So Obama will probably ratchet up the fear mongering to heights not seen since Democrats ran commercials accusing Republicans of wanting to kill poor children and force old people to eat dog food. It is one thing to tell us the truth about our dire economic straits. It is quite another to try and make people believe that only by passing his $900 billion panic panacea will we avoid “catastrophe.”

And what are the consequences of all these dark nostrums being purveyed by a candidate who usually spoke in optimistic and hopeful language on the campaign trail?

Brad Blakeman, a senior aide to Mr. Bush from 2001 to 2004, said the new president’s language is immature.

“It’s not presidential. An American leader needs to be hopeful and optimistic - and truthful. Everything he says is parsed; everything he says is searched for deep meaning. When he goes to ‘DefCon 5′ on the economy and says that we’re on the brink of catastrophe, it’s absolutely insane.”

With his fiery rhetoric, the new president runs the risk of terrifying consumers and investors, which could depress the economy even further. While the economy is bad, it is a far cry from Great Depression levels, when as many as 30 percent of Americans were unemployed, compared with the 7.6 percent now.

Every president must walk a rhetorical tightrope when talking about the economy, a lesson Mr. Bush learned quickly, being bashed just after taking office for delivering somber news. The United States was just entering a mild recession - it had been in one, it turns out, for about nine months - and the new president said so.

Liberals went berserk.

“Every time we turn around, this guy is bad-mouthing the economy. Is that lifting our spirit or dumping on it in order to sell his tax cut?” liberal comentator Bill Press said on CNN. Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter, in an article headlined “Thanks Ever So Much, President Poor-Mouth,” said, “Even if Bush turns out to be right in his predictions of gloom, that doesn’t mean he was right to make them.” The New York Times lectured Mr. Bush, saying that presidents were supposed to be “cheerleaders for the nation’s economy.”

Of course, when Bush began to tout his economic accomplishments in the lead up to the 2004 election, he was skewered for being too Pollyanish and for not being “realistic.” So much for being a “Cheerleader” for the nation’s economy.

I made this point in my PJ Media column today:

That’s right. The candidate of “Hope and Change” has decided to be a president who espouses “Fear and Loathing.” Fear of financial Armageddon unless we do as we are told and blindly give in to his $900 billion panic panacea for the economy and loathing of the opposition — an opposition Obama unfairly portrays as opposing him out of spite and because a popular talk radio host is telling them what to do.

It is a far cry from the way Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan handled economic crises that in some ways were more dire than what Barack Obama is facing today. Both men came to office at a time when the American spirit was limping and lost. Both men were confronted with unprecedented economic problems (double digit inflation and interest rates in 1981 were an impossibility according to the books).

And yet, both men eschewed fear mongering and sought to lift the people out of themselves in order to bring back hope and allow the natural optimism of the American people to come to the fore. Arguments rage to this day whether FDR’s massive spending helped or hurt the economy. And Reagan’s tax cuts began a spiral of deficits that, save for a brief period in the 1990s, fostered a climate of “let the kids pay for it” on Capitol Hill.

But few can argue that FDR and the Gipper didn’t succeed in changing the dynamics of the crisis they were facing by inspiring the people to believe in themselves again and that better times were ahead.

Obama does not want Americans to believe in themselves. He wants them to believe in him…”

Now let’s be realistic and grant President Obama some leeway in this matter. A leader uses every tool at his disposal in order to succeed in getting the public behind him. And fear mongering is one way - the dirty, easy way - to accomplish that goal. A much better way to is to inspire hope and optimism in the future, “lifting the people out of themselves” as I say in my column. But if Obama can’t find the words then he is left with trying to scare us into supporting him.

The problem is that if the stimulus doesn’t work - and there are many smarter than you or I who say it won’t in its present form - then the American people will feel betrayed. If catastrophe occurs after warning that the way to avoid it was to pass his stimulus bill, only the true Obamabots will stick with him because he will have lost everyone else. He has promised relief if the bill is passed and when it is not forthcoming, his credibility will take a hit from which it will never recover.

The risks for Obama are considerable. He and the Democrats will have no one else to blame if the package fails to boost the economy. Obama himself has said his first term can be judged on whether it succeeds, whether it creates or saves the 3 million to 4 million jobs he promises.

And if the economy fails to show marked signs of improvement — a possibility indeed — Republicans will have a megabillion-dollar “I told you so” in their pockets, just in time for the 2010 midterm elections and Obama’s own reelection bid in 2012.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said the fallout from a Democrat-only bill will be “squarely in the president and the Democratic leadership’s lap.”

The flip side of that risk belongs to Republicans. The economy may very well create 4 million new jobs in the next few years. It would create 3 million in the worst of times anyway. Obama has set the bar so low that if he succeeds (even if the unemployment rate continues to go up) the GOP is toast in 2010.

But the real problem remains the rank cynicism of Obama in carrying on with business as usual despite his promises to change things in Washington. His personnel problems, his refusal to even listen to Republicans who pointed out some $150 billion in pure pork in the stimulus bill, and his ceding responsibility for the crafting of the bill to Nancy Pelosi and David Obey - two of the most far left liberals in the House - all show a leader both unsure of himself and a betrayer of the public’s faith in him. Couple this with his exaggerated rhetoric and dire predictions regarding the bail out measure and you have a president whose biggest boosters are even starting to ask questions about his competency.

After a distinctly rocky start to his presidency, he has admitted he “screwed up” and is returning to one thing in his political career that he has perfected – campaigning. In Elkhart, Indiana, today and Fort Myers, Florida, tomorrow, Mr Obama will try to seize back control of the political agenda with question-and-answer sessions with voters in two of the swing states that gave him victory.

Already, however, he is struggling, and the product he is now selling is not himself but a near-trillion-dollar economic “stimulus” package loaded with pet Democratic spending projects that has awakened slumbering Republicans in Congress and is now supported by barely a third of Americans. In between the Indiana and Florida stops, he will return to the White House for a prime-time press conference in which he will appeal directly to citizens and seek to rekindle the magic of his campaign.

Which President Obama will turn up remains to be seen. Last week, he began as a wide-eyed bystander buffeted by events as he lost his key confidant, Tom Daschle, amid an uproar over $128,000 in unpaid taxes for a chauffeur and limousine. Mr Obama and his advisers believed the oversight did not matter because the over-arching virtue of the new White House could not be doubted. He was wrong and seemed out of touch in believing that ordinary people would not notice the contrast between the practice of politics as usual and his campaign slogans against it.

The White House is now in damage-control mode. After Robert Gibbs, Mr Obama’s spokesman, was lampooned by Jon Stewart on The Daily Show as a non-answering automaton in the mode of President George W Bush’s press secretaries, former campaign strategist David Axelrod was dispatched to television studios to make the stimulus case. However, this was tinkering around the edges.

As Jimmy Carter found out to his detriment, these early weeks and months in the White House set the tone for the entire term of office. Carter spun his wheels for 3 months, causing even the Washington Post to ask who was in charge. Carter first tried an energy package which got bogged down in committee. He then tried a little stimulus of his own but he allowed the process to get so out of control that he eventually scrubbed the whole plan. In short, nothing was done. Carter had wasted the first three months of his presidency and could never get the momentum back. He was basically judged a failed incompetent before the cherry blossoms had bloomed in the tidal basin.

Obama goes before the press tonight to try and save his stimulus and perhaps even his presidency. He may eventually get his bill. But it will almost certainly be a straight party line vote with one or two Republicans in the senate jumping ship. And then?

More bailouts as Treasury Secretary Geithner will be forced to go back to Congress this week and beg for more TARP money to save our banking system. And then it will be the automakers turn again in the spring, and the the states again next fall, and who knows what other industries who are too big to fail or who are generous with their donations to Democratic candidates will be able to milk the taxpayer in this crisis.

Will every bailout bill be a “catastrophe” if we don’t support it? How often can Obama go to the well and drink from the cup of fear and loathing before the people simply tune him out and identify as him as just another partisan politician?

Sooner than he could possibly dream.

“Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it,”
(Essayist, philosopher, novelist, and non-historian George Santayana)

One of the things I find fascinating about the debate over the stimulus bill is that proponents claim that they have learned the lessons of history both from FDR’s New Deal and the more recent Japanese “Lost Decade” in that while massive government spending didn’t work to bring those economies out of a serious tailspin, this stimulus bill will do the trick.

The reason? The sheer size of the monstrosity will act like a defibrillator and shock the economy back to life. Proponents advance the idea that neither FDR or the Japanese were bold enough in their spending on infrastructure to do any good. What is needed is truly gargantuan government outlays over a long period of time.

Paul Krugman has been advancing this theory as have those who are responsible for pushing the plan forward. Treasury Secretary Geithner:

In a nutshell, Japan’s experience suggests that infrastructure spending, while a blunt instrument, can help revive a developed economy, say many economists and one very important American official: Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, who was a young financial attaché in Japan during the collapse and subsequent doldrums. One lesson Mr. Geithner has said he took away from that experience is that spending must come in quick, massive doses, and be continued until recovery takes firm root.

Moreover, it matters what gets built: Japan spent too much on increasingly wasteful roads and bridges, and not enough in areas like education and social services, which studies show deliver more bang for the buck than infrastructure spending.

“It is not enough just to hire workers to dig holes and then fill them in again,” said Toshihiro Ihori, an economics professor at the University of Tokyo. “One lesson from Japan is that public works get the best results when they create something useful for the future.”

There is $80 billion in funding for education over the next two years in the current stimulus bill But when you consider the current budget of the entire Department of Education is $59.2 billion, one begins to see the truly massive size of this “stimulus.”

This $80 billion will go to:

Education for the Disadvantaged
Impact Aid
School Improvement Programs
Innovation and Improvement
Special Education
Rehabilitation Services and Disability Research
Student Financial Assistance
Student Aid Administration
Higher Education
Institute of Education Sciences
School Modernization, Renovation, and Repair
Higher Education Modernization, Renovation, and Repair

Building new schools and rehabbing old ones is probably legitimate spending on infrastructure that will pay off immediately and long term. Student aid? With the credit crunch, another legitimate outlay.

Special education is underfunded nationwide but why include it in a “stimulus bill?” Because otherwise the amount being asked - $13 billion - would never make it out of committee much less survive as a separate entity. Hence, they tack it on to the stimulus and threaten “catastrophe” for the economy unless we pass it.

What about spending for higher education? If one dime goes to Harvard we should scream bloody murder. There’s a school with a multi-billion dollar endowment. If they want improvements in their campus or if they want to invite some performance artist who will smear feces all over himself and spout rancid poetry, fine. Let them do it on their own dime.

Ditto for most of the bigger schools out there who have rich and generous alumni. Something is wrong if these institutions get any money from the taxpayer when they are sitting on massive amounts of money in the form of endowments and building funds.

And as far as this stimulus funding “School improvement programs,” do we really want the guy who ran the Annenberg Schools Project in Chicago - a massive waste of $100 million in private funds that didn’t improve Chicago schools one iota - telling America how to improve their schools? And let’s not even bring up his Education Secretary, a former Superintendent of those same Chicago Schools. His stellar credentials include running a school system where barely half the kids graduated from high school and where reading comprehension skills were so bad that it was estimated 30% of high school graduates were functionally illiterate.

The point being, what kind of “lesson” did these jamokes learn from the Japanese and New Deal efforts to jumpstart the economy using government funds? Maybe we should ask the Japanese:

Most Japanese economists have tended to take a bleaker view of their nation’s track record, saying that Japan spent more than enough money, but wasted too much of it on roads to nowhere and other unneeded projects.

Dr. Ihori of the University of Tokyo did a survey of public works in the 1990s, concluding that the spending created almost no additional economic growth. Instead of spreading beneficial ripple effects across the economy, he found that the spending actually led to declines in business investment by driving out private investors. He also said job creation was too narrowly focused in the construction industry in rural areas to give much benefit to the overall economy.

He agreed with other critics that the 1990s stimulus failed because too much of it went to roads and bridges, overbuilding this already heavily developed nation. Critics also said decisions on how to spend the money were made behind closed doors by bureaucrats, politicians and the construction industry, and often reflected political considerations more than economic. Dr. Ihori said the United States appeared to be striking a better balance by investing in new energy and information-technology infrastructure as well as replacing aging infrastructure.

Japan’s experience also seems to argue for spending heavily to promote social development. A 1998 report by the Japan Institute for Local Government, a nonprofit policy research group, found that every 1 trillion yen, or about $11.2 billion, spent on social services like care for the elderly and monthly pension payments added 1.64 trillion yen in growth. Financing for schools and education delivered an even bigger boost of 1.74 trillion yen, the report found.

I can see spending money on some of these education projects, but $80 billion over two years? Sounds to me like an invitation to massive waste. But then, this payoff to the teachers unions (who love to tinker with new ways to make our children ignorant) isn’t necessarily meant to jumpstart the economy but will pay off in the long term. And as Rahm Emanuel has said, “Why waste a crisis?” Use fear mongering to scare people into supporting a bill that spends hundreds of billions in tax monies on programs that otherwise would either not get passed or not receive half the amount earmarked for them in this stimulus bill.

Another huge outlay in this bill is money to the states. This would be funneled through a variety of departments so it is hard to put a number on the total amount but it is well over $300 billion. A lot of this will be targeted monies to education and health care programs. Some of it will be of the “no strings attached” variety which has politicians like Mayor Daley of Chicago licking his chops. Along with money for extended unemployment benefits which is needed in this economy (Note to my rightie friends: There are no jobs out there at the moment - MacDonald’s isn’t even hiring), a case can be made to include a large portion of these funds in a stimulus bill to deal with the crisis.

Here’s the problem: If Mr. Keynes is in charge of our fiscal policy - and he clearly is - what does this mean for the future?

Beyond that, proponents of Keynesian-style stimulus spending in the United States say that Japan’s approach failed to accomplish more not because of waste but because it was never tried wholeheartedly. They argue that instead of making one big push to pump up the economy with economic shock therapy, Japan spread its spending out over several years, diluting the effects.

After years of heavy spending in the first half of the 1990s, economists say, Japan’s leaders grew concerned about growing budget deficits and cut back too soon, snuffing out the recovery in its infancy, much as Roosevelt did to the American economy in 1936. Growth that, by 1996, had reached 3 percent was suffocated by premature spending cuts and tax increases, they say. While spending remained high in the late 1990s, Japan never gave the economy another full-fledged push, these economists say.

They also say that the size of Japan’s apparently successful stimulus in the early 1990s suggests that the United States will need to spend far more than the current $820 billion to get results. Between 1991 and 1995, Japan spent some $2.1 trillion on public works, in an economy roughly half as large as that of the United States, according to the Cabinet Office. “Stimulus worked in Japan when it was tried,” said David Weinstein, a professor of Japanese economics at Columbia University. “Japan’s lesson is that, if anything, the current U.S. stimulus will not be enough.”

In other words, prepare yourself for Stimulus II and probably III, IV, and V. This is the US of A and by God, we don’t do anything half-assed.

It apparently doesn’t matter that this kind of spending didn’t work in the 1930’s or in Japan in the 1990’s. But we are going to plunge ahead anyway and in what can only be termed a radical departure from sanity, we are going to ignore Mr. Santayana - who after all wasn’t even an historian - and double or triple down holding 16 while the dealer has a Jack up. Even if we win, we lose because it ain’t our money we’re betting with. And if we lose, the bottom falls out and the US probably defaults.

Santayana should have stuck to poetry and philosophy.