Obamacare Works, Period

The other day, Reihan Salam was on Real Time, but didn't manage to air all of his anti-Obamacare tropes before the host switched to a different subject. One he did manage to voice is the suggestion that the 74% of Republicans who like their benefits under their PPACA health insurance policies are wrong. I'm not sure how the logic of that argument works, as they either like their benefits or they don't. Perhaps he means that they're wrong in principle, as they should instead prefer the status quo ante or some unidentified alternative program, but endorsing that position would suggest that Salam doesn't think the program represents good policy even if it provides people with what they assert to be good health insurance coverage.

Salam did suggest that the only reason Obamacare is working is because it is subsidized. In a sense that's true, as it is the subsidies that help create the volume of enrollees necessary to create the large risk pools that allow the program to work, enrolling all applicants without regard to preexisting conditions. But outside of that narrow context, Salam is wrong. As somebody who has purchased a PPACA policy without a subsidy, I can attest that I was able to choose and enjoy a policy that provides coverage superior to anything I was able to purchase as an individual consumer prior to the Act's effective date, and that the price of the policy was reasonable even without a subsidy. The manner in which the PPACA's policies are priced for dependents allowed me to obtain coverage comparable to that which I had previously received through COBRA but at a lower price.

Although the pre-PPACA policy I had purchased to cover the period between the expiration of my COBRA eligibility and January 1, 2014, cost less than my PPACA-compliant policy, it also offered far less. I also didn't have to try to remember years of detailed medical information which the insurance company could use to find pretextual reasons to increase my rates or deny care. I recognize that many Republicans, perhaps including Salam, believe that having inadequate health insurance coverage is a feature, not a bug, forcing people to pay a greater portion or all of the cost of certain basic care, mental health care, addiction treatment and the like, and that the ideal health insurance policy involves a HSA and only catastrophic insurance coverage, I would have a greater appreciation for that argument if an appreciable number of its advocates were willing to walk the walk -- legislate or contract away their own health insurance benefits for the inadequate coverage they wish to foist off on the rest of the country.

Salam suggested that there is inequity in having a multi-tiered health insurance system, with Medicare being less attractive than PPACA plans, which he asserted are less attractive than employer-sponsored plans. It's important to note that I've seen employer-sponsored plans that are far less attractive than most plans available under the PPACA, and the plan I purchased was quite comparable to the employer-sponsored plan I had been continuing through COBRA, so I don't find his argument of inequity between employer-sponsored plans and PPACA plans to be particularly compelling. As for Medicare offering less than private health insurance, I see no evidence that the Republican Party at large views that as a problem that needs to be fixed. A party whose governors have largely chosen to grandstand, harming their states and large numbers of their constituents by refusing to expand Medicaid. Inequities exist, but it's not clear that we should prioritize their elimination over other healthcare reforms, or even that the people want inequities removed as opposed to the establishment of a reasonable minimum for what health insurance plans must offer.

Typical Republican alternatives to the PPACA have involved either throwing everybody into the individual market, with low-coverage catastrophic insurance and HSAs, or a voucher system where (if you qualify) you get a voucher or tax credit with which you are to pay for your insurance and fund your uninsured care. Those proposals bring back some of the worst aspects of the former system, at best foisting those previously deemed uninsurable or who would face staggering insurance costs due to pre-existing conditions into government programs -- after all, why should we expect health insurance companies insure sick people when that cost can be borne by the taxpayer? To the extent that the Republicans attempt to bridge the gap between the Gingrich-style plans and the PPACA, including large risk pools and exchanges, but most notably preventing insurance companies from raising premiums for people with pre-existing conditions, the more necessary it becomes to impose some form of mandate -- and even if you automatically enroll people in insurance while using the voucher or subsidy they left unused, such that you can argue that "It's not a mandate", somebody has to foot the bill.

On the whole, Salam is one of the more honest and thoughtful commentators on the Republican side. I would like to see him address the issue of health care in light of his abilities. We can start with the fact that there is no actual Republican health insurance reform that is being seriously advanced within the party. We can add to that, the fact that reforms that will shake the system are likely to cause people to lose their current insurance, whether that occurs abruptly or as a new policy is phased in. In other words, unless the Republican Party wants to take an enormous political risk that implicates all of its anti-Obamacare rhetoric, we're looking at incremental reforms, not the reinvention of health insurance and the healthcare market. Within that context, what reform ideas would Salam propose that have any chance of getting passed by the Republican majority in the House, let alone becoming law? If the answer is, "None", then he's reinforcing what many, and probably most supporters of the PPACA already acknowledge -- as flawed as the law may be, it's the best law that could get through Congress.

Voting on Civil Rights

On a recent episode of Real Time, Reihan Salam argued that it would be a positive thing to hold direct votes on certain civil rights issues, such as gay marriage, rather than achieving equality through the courts. Rev. Al Sharpton took issue with Salam, pointing out that if people had voted on civil rights he would still be riding at the back of the bus, and with a "bad eyed driver" so would Salam. In large part, Sharpton is correct - had civil rights been expected to pass on a state-by-state basis some states would have acted promptly but others would have been slow to act, and we would likely still be waiting on a number of states.

I'm not sure what the concept is behind popular voting for civil rights. If there's popular support for a civil rights movement but for some reason the nation's legislatures are slow to act, court action addressing the situation is not likely to be unpopular. If there's a lack of popular support, direct voting won't bring about change, and it would thus fall on legislatures and the courts to implement any change against the will of the people.

The theory appears to be that if you have a few successful votes around the nation, you will start to shift the balance and eventually create a tipping point at which people will back away from their prejudices and accept that they, also, should support the civil rights movement. Reihan focused on Roe v. Wade as opposed to segregation and Jim Crow, and Sharpton was correct to bring the issue back into focus.

Reihan can protest that had reproductive rights been allowed to progress on a state-by-state basis we would not have abortion (and contraception) rights as a front-and-center issue in every federal election. But if the objection people have to Roe v. Wade is that stripped states of their rights, and imposed on certain states a policy that the majority of their residents found objectionable, why isn't the same true of the civil rights movement in general? Even in states that saw violent opposition to the civil rights movement, there is now a general acceptance that segregation is neither "equal" nor consistent with our nation's values.

Another objection to the notion that important civil rights issues should be resolved by plebiscite is that we live in a representative democracy. As a matter of routine, important decisions are made by our elected representatives in part under the theory that they're better informed than the people at large, and are better positioned to avoid the passions and prejudices of the day. Why would we want to add an asterisk to our system of government, such that we would revert to a direct democracy on those issues over which the people are most passionate or prejudiced? That doesn't sound to me like a recipe for a state-by-state transformation of the nation, with gradual realization that other groups of people deserve additional civil rights. It sounds to me like a formula to preserve the status quo in much or all of the country.

The plebiscite approach also raises a question of finality: If people can vote to grant civil rights, why can't they also vote to take them away? If we are supposed to get some sort of finality and social acceptance of the grant of civil rights by proceeding state-by-state, how is that achieved when every election cycle has a new initiative to repeal those rights on the ballot. When the Supreme Court has rolled back the protections of cases like Roe v. Wade, or policies such as affirmative action, the tendency has not been for legislatures and ballot initiatives to move to protect the status quo. Quite the opposite - we see immediate activity to roll back rights that had previously been accepted or assumed, and some legislatures immediately setting up legislation for the next "test case" to push through the courts in the hope of achieving a further rollback of rights.

In the context of gay marriage, when the issue has been placed on the ballot in states like California we have already seen well-funded "anti-" campaigns run by outside groups that oppose gay marriage. If repeal is permitted, that would happen in most or all election cycles. If repeal were not permitted, the argument for resolving civil rights issues by plebiscite becomes incoherent.

Those who favor the "state's rights" or plebiscite approach often also express a certain contemptuousness for the Surpeme Court, speaking of it as an unelected body, a small number of elites who get to decide very important issues, and that the public has little recourse even when the decision is against the overwhelming will of the people. So I look at my copy of the Constitution (1780), I review the case in which the Supreme Court established itself as the final arbiter of constitutionality (Marbury v Madison, 1803), and I say to myself, "Wow - how is it that nobody has noticed this until now?"

No, what I actually do is again note that our system of government was designed to have an independent judiciary, a Supreme Court that would render opinions on matters of constitutionality, and that for all of its flaws the approach has held up for more than two centuries. I note also the contextual nature of the argument - those who criticize the elitist, non-democratic nature of the Supreme Court when it is expanding civil rights do not express similar sentiments when the Supreme Court rolls them back, nor do they express similar sentiments when the Supreme Court expands other rights that they support.

Nobody is suggesting anything more than a gut check for which issues should be taken out of the Supreme Court's hands and (supposedly) resolved gradually, over time, by plebiscite or state legislative action. If you shake your fist angrily that Roe v. Wade deprives state and local governments, and the people they represent, of their right to fashion laws and outcomes that fit their circumstances, why are you celebrating D.C. v. Heller for depriving local governments of a tool they view as important to suppressing crime and keeping their streets safe?

When I look back on the civil rights movement and cases like Brown v. Board, and compare present level of controversy to Roe v. Wade, I don't see that public acceptance of civil rights is tied to how those rights are implemented. I see that there are people with strong religious and moral objections to abortion rights, and even to contraception, who don't care about policy arguments, they want a "no ifs, ands or buts" ban, or something very close to it. I can respect strongly held moral beliefs, I can respect adherence to the teachings of your church, but I don't believe that either should trump either constitutional process or efforts to form sound public policy.

Absolute vs. Relative Economic Mobility

A while back, Matthew Yglesias wrote that, in response to the fact that our society does not have much income mobility,

The smartest conservatives, ahead of the curve, are reframing the issue again. Maybe it doesn't matter whether sons are able to move up the hierarchy from where their fathers were, maybe what matters is whether kids generally grow up to have higher absolute incomes than their parents.

I can see where Yglesias is coming from, in arguing that those attempting to reframe the issue fall among "the smartest conservatives". Yglesias, himself, has sympathy for the position and the article that inspired Yglesias's comment identifies the smart conservative, Reihan Salam, as one of the proponents of this redefinition.

But no, it's not going to happen.

Why not? First, because the "Horatio Alger" myth is central to Republican policy - tax policy, social policy, educational policy.... Consider how, four years ago, "Joe the Plumber" became the poster child for keeping taxes low on the rich. An average, blue collar guy who had aspirations of joining the 1%. You don't get the masses to rally behind regressive policies if you're blunt with them,

"You'll never benefit from these budget cuts and tax preferences, and your boss probably won't either, but rich people will keep a lot more money in their pockets. And your children will fare marginally better than you did, unless present economic trends continue in which case all bets are off."

Second, once you start offering up the nation of "relative social mobility" you lend credence to the concept of "relative poverty", and for that matter to indexing the minimum wage to inflation, to "living wage" laws, and other measures to ensure that your promise of that modest economic improvement become a reality. By the same token, people want "more than that" for their children. People want to believe that their kids could grow up to be successful, even to become President. If while running for office you puncture those dreams with a, "Yeah, your kid might win the lottery, but odds are his life will only be marginally better than yours," even if it's true you're not going to see the working masses embrace your campaign.

Third, you open the door to people challenging you by pointing to past eras of greater income mobility, or other countries that enjoy greater income mobility, and asking "What's the biggest difference between then and now". If your answer boils down to, "The biggest difference is income inequality, and our tax policies and subsidies - which we are not going to change - have so significantly skewed that balance in favor of the rich that as long as you keep voting for us things won't get better and will probably get worse," once again people aren't going to embrace your policies or campaign.

Should our politicians be more honest both about the limits of income mobility and how present policy creates and perpetuates a de facto class structure? Probably so. But it's unlikely enough that Democrats are going to be that honest about a structure they helped create. It's simply not plausible that the modern Republican party is going to be that honest about the results of its key policies.

Border Defense and Military Spending

There's no dispute. Whether you're talking dollars or comparing U.S. expenditures to those of other nations, the U.S. spends a vast amount of money on its military. If you add in the cost of the nation's ongoing wars, the U.S. outspends every other nation in the world, combined. I'll credit Reihan Salam with being one of the few conservatives to directly address this issue, specifically for recognizing that the expenditure flows from our nation's expectations of the military and its role in the world, but that there is room for legitimate debate over that role.

Here are a couple of things that a President might not like to talk about, but has to think about. In many parts of the world, fresh water sources are being depleted. In many parts of the world, global warming threatens the food supply and will cause desertification. The drug war is destabilizing many nations, including Mexico. As things get worse in the rest of the world, it is likely that more people will attempt to illegally enter the United States. And while we can talk about measures that might be taken to reduce carbon emissions, how other countries might be assisted in developing their own economies and preparing strategies for potential food and water shortages, or how legalization of certain drugs would reduce the cash flow to drug cartels around the world, the fact is that Congress isn't prepared to take any serious action on any of those issues. Meanwhile, odds are that additional nations are going to join "the nuclear club," some of which are likely to be hit in the not-so-distant future by shortages of affordable food and fresh water.

Within that context, if you're the President, you might prefer to cut the military budget and redefine the role of the military, hoping that you can form military coalitions to address future problems. Or you might look at the future and perceive a need to maintain or even to expand the role of the military in order to be reasonably able to unilaterally defend U.S. interests as the global situation deteriorates. In that latter context, your Defense Secretary might sound a lot like Robert Gates, looking for ways to cut spending not in order to reduce military spending but to be able to maintain or expand the mission of the military without increasing the military budget. (By doing things such as reducing retirement benefits for military personnel.)

Yes, it's a fair retort, "But we could start taking steps, right now, to fix those problems or at least to mitigate their effects." But you know what? You can easily pass the military budget. You can easily pass supplemental war spending. You can easily pass a $600 billion border security bill, with the opposition party arguing "It's not enough". But when it comes to revisiting the nation's approach to drugs, carbon emissions, or whether there's an alternative to being a military hyperpower in a world that is likely to become less stable, you're likely to get Congressional consensus on only one thing: "We can't cut the military budget; if anything, we should spend more."

Give Politicians and Pundits the Benefit of the Doubt?

You must be joking.

Seriously, I hear from time to time that our nation's opinion leaders are sincere. That they aren't being deceptive, disingenuous, dishonest, but are merely stating valid opinions that, if you took a step back and thought about them, are a perfectly reasonably approach to an important problem or issue. And no, I don't want to overstate my case - there are some politicians and commentators who attempt exactly that. You may disagree with them some, most, or even all of the time yet still recognize that they're making a sincere contribution to the public discourse.

But most of the time, their voices are drowned out by the cacophony of voices that are more interested in gaining or solidifying their grip on money, power, or access to those with money and power than with making anything approaching an honest contribution to the debate. Sure, with some of them you have to wonder, "is it malice or stupidity", but in most cases it's... well, malice is (usually) too strong a word - malice may be present and directed at their political adversaries or those who dare question their bloviations, but even if their actions and policy proposals could have that effect their goal is not actually to harm the nation. The better word is probably "avarice".

Looking to the political world, we've historically been assured that a lot of the rancor between politicians is a fiction - that behind the scenes they're reasonable, public political foes may be close friends (e.g., Orrin Hatch and Ted Kennedy), and that what we see in public is largely a dog and pony show for the benefit of the folks back home. Of course there are issues where there are true, deep disputes, but even then we were to believe that politicians were working to bridge divides.

I suspect that was more true in the past, but there is a price to that sort of deception. When you ally yourself with and make public statements pandering to causes you don't believe, use angry, dishonest rhetoric to attack your political opponents, and spend more time thinking about how to ensure yourself a gilded life once your 'service' as an elected official ends than you do thinking about how to do what's best for the nation, the behind-the-scenes comity is going to diminish. We end up with people like Evan Bayh who spend years being part of the problem - then look at the mess they helped to create, declare that their job isn't fun any more, and quit. It sure is easier to quit than it is to grab a broom and clean up, but for some reason the media now loves quitters.

Bayh is correct that we should not glorify the Senate of the past, and this is far from the first time Congress has been dysfunctional. Politicians have been lying to gain votes, influence, wealth and power from the moment somebody dreamed up the election process. The media has at times been even worse in its eagerness to pander to political leaders. But what seems to have largely broken down is the sense that there is an institution that is responsible for its members - the media as an institution, the Senate, the House of Representatives, political parties.... Sure, it's possible to cross one of the few bright lines that can cause you to suffer a career setback or to lose your job, but for the most part a Member of Congress can shoot off her mouth in the most irresponsible of manners while suffering no disadvantage - or, I hate to say it, in order to gain power, publicity, and fame.

We're at a point where a Republican candidate for office can openly admit that his campaign is based upon fear-mongering and irresponsible, inflammatory, and obviously false rhetoric, and not only have the argument be treated as reasonable, but be given column space in a national newspaper to make his case. A rebuke from his party? Don't make me laugh. Acting like a petulant child can make you the toast of your party.

The media loves itself a loose cannon. It's time to get a quote, or have somebody appear on TV to take a position on an issue. Do they want a politician who is going to be nice, respect the opposing position, politely reject false arguments from both sides, and lay out the facts and issues as she truly sees them? Or do they call a politician they know will eagerly dissemble, or one who will reliably make claims about the other side that are ridiculous, inflammatory, often obviously false, but definitely attention-getting and quotable? They'll do the latter and, when challenged as to why they show such disregard for the truth, will hem and haw about not taking stances, "letting the public decide", or about how they're actually providing "news entertainment" or are merely sharing opinions, and that their productions should not be confused with actual news.

And then check out those talking heads on TV - how the various "experts" and politicians dispatched to TV shows, and often the hosts of those shows themselves, start regurgitating a set of talking points or repeating a specific word or phrase to negatively brand an issue or individual. Occasionally you'll see somebody call out the proponents of such a phrase - something that unfortunately is most likely to happen on The Daily Show than on an actual news show - but for the most part even if the host isn't joining in he's reluctant to offend his guest by pointing out to the audience that they're being fed propaganda. (Who would have dared say, for example, "Emperor Kingston, you're wearing no flag pin" - Figuratively or literally?)

Then you have the op/ed contributors from the nation's most prominent newspapers. Again, yes, some write sincere columns about important issues, doing their best to illuminate a problem and to inspire people to move to correct it. And the rest of the media world cries out, "Boring". The columnist who can be counted on to dogmatically advance the position of a political party or special interest group? Even if his only qualification is that he was once among the speechwriting team for Socks the Cat or Barney the Dog? That's interesting - that will get you on TV. And if you put on a good show, whatever the truth happens to be, you'll get invited back.

Yes, sometimes the politician or commentator has a set of preconceived notions that make him a good fit with the special interest group that is willing to pay his exorbitant speaking fees or underwrite an "educational" junket, but the goal is to clap on a set of golden handcuffs. To keep the politician or opinion leader fat and happy so that he never even considers focusing on the 10% of the issues where he differs in opinion from his sponsor, let alone takes a step back to examine his preconceived notions. The system rewards greed and laziness.

How do you even get one of those rare, highly coveted positions? Some national newspapers will claim that they are looking for balance, political left vs. political right, and to a small degree they offer that. But take a specific look at the Washington Post. You'll find that whatever the columnist's claimed political belief, no recent hire for the op-ed page has challenged the core beliefs of Fred Hiatt or his editorial board. War is good, especially in the Middle East, deficits are bad except to pay for war, we need to privatize education and kick unions in the teeth.... Predictable as clockwork. If you are somehow hired but consistently disagree with his board's stances, you can expect to be sent packing.

Over at the Times, let's just say that there's a reason Ross Douthat was hired instead of his Grand New Party co-author Reihan Salam, despite the fact that Salam is a much more interesting thinker. Meanwhile, the columnists who play ball with special interest groups can parlay their positions into lucrative book contracts, speaking engagements, etc., subject to loosey-goosey disclosure rules that are much more about preventing their editors from being embarrassed than they are about ensuring integrity.

Among the pundits who are less interested (for whatever reason) in achieving fame and building up their personal fortunes, there's an unfortunate tendency to avoid stirring the pot - on rare occasion it happens, but for the most part columnists pretend that the errors and misrepresentations of their peers don't exist. When referenced it's usually in as innocuous a manner as possible - "a recent column suggested", rather than directly addressing the errant columnist. Some columnists seem desperate for ideas - coming up with new subjects for biweekly columns can, no doubt, at times be difficult - and become part of the echo chamber, repeating a theme or story that is already in circulation. Some appear to do little more than to paraphrase the latest memo issued by a particular trade group or partisan think tank.

But digging into the issues, analyzing competing arguments and presenting cogent conclusions? For many, if not most, that's too much work. Besides, "their readers are more interested in the horse race", right? What does it matter if one side has superior policy positions, or one side is arguing contrary to established fact - the real story is in which narrative is winning. Besides, it's hard to learn stuff, and even harder to explain it in a succinct, clear manner. So why try? Isn't that somebody else's job?

So yeah - I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but only if I first get the sense that you're doing your job. If you prefer to be a hack, to lazily play "he said, she said" games rather than study and analyze the facts, cover the horse race instead of the issues, act as a stenographer for a special interest group, or pretend that everybody is honest and acting in good faith (because it's easier than taking on the peers and institutions that provide you with that six to seven figure income) on the other hand....

Don't Look for Salvation in the Tea Party Movement

Reihan Salam is a smart guy, but I don't know what to make of this:

If large numbers of Republicans outside of the South and the Mountain West win seats in 2010, particularly suburban swing seats, there will be a built-in constituency for a more pragmatic brand of center-right politics. The Tea Party could pave the way for a more inclusive political movement that embraces the same fiscal conservatism while leaving aside more polarizing cultural messages, as seen in the Scott Brown campaign. This would parallel the evolution of the antiwar movement between 2003 to 2008, from a fringe movement that alienated moderates to a tendency that came to embrace a large majority of the public.

The Tea Party movement could help increase GOP turnout in the midterm elections, which of course could help the GOP win seats. Given that, statistically speaking, the opposition party should pick up seats in the upcoming election, and anti-incumbent sentiments are high, all's the better for the GOP.

But Scott Brown is not "the exception who proves the rule." Scott Brown got a lot of support because he was a Republican poised to win "Ted Kennedy's seat". If he were an incumbent in Arizona or Utah, the same Tea Partiers who sent him checks would be launching a primary challenge and calling for his head on a platter. The Tea Party movement is not about making the rest of the nation more like Massachusetts. For better or for worse, Scott Brown cares about being reelected, so you can expect that he will be playing to the larger population of Massachusetts voters as opposed to trying to meet Tea Party litmus tests.

Meanwhile, the Tea Party has not come out for one thing - not one thing - that would substantively improve the nation. When they were talking about protesting the auto industry bailout in Detroit, Motor City Tea Partiers objected. They're not for Medicare cuts - they're in the "Keep your government hands off my Medicare" camp. In fact, one of the things that seems to motivate them is the thought that healthcare reform might be funded in part by cuts to Medicare. They're not for Social Security reform. They're not for cuts in military spending. They're not for cuts in subsidies for agriculture or ethanol. They're not for ending the mortgage interest deduction. Sure, they're for cuts - but only cuts that affect other people. In that sense they're part of a grand American tradition, but....

Meanwhile, in Maine,

In Maine, the newly adopted GOP platform outlines various changes, although its ambiguous language leaves the meaning of many sections open to interpretation. There’s a call to restore “Constitutional Law as the basis for the judiciary,” to “reassert the principle that ‘Freedom of Religion’ does not mean ‘Freedom from Religion,’ ” to “return to the principles of Austrian Economics,” and to remove “obstacles created by government” to the private development of natural gas, oil, coal, and nuclear power.

Other parts are clearer: a rejection of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, elimination of the US Department of Education and the Federal Reserve, and a freeze and prohibition on stimulus spending. Healthcare is “not a right” but “a service” that can be addressed only by using “market based solutions.”

To the extent that the Tea Party is responsible for that platform, as is suggested by the article, what part of it sounds like a sensible, carefully crafted platform for the future, and what part of it sounds like reactionary populism? (For "more of the same," see also the "Contract From America".) Is that platform more likely to help or hinder the state's GOP candidates?

Reihan suggests that the Tea Party movement will allow the GOP to move away from "more polarizing cultural messages". Well, if the Contract From America signifies anything, that movement won't include religious tolerance. And if Arizona signifies anything, it won't be a greater tolerance toward immigrants. Whether or not it's mentioned, being pro-life will remain a central part of the GOP platform. So... when and how does the party shift back from cultural issues to the economic - freed by the Tea Party to cut any spending it wants, except for the military, Medicare, Social Security, and agricultural or energy subsidies?

Yes, the Tea Party may transform the Republican Party, and may help it gain seats. But really, what political ideology improves itself by harnessing itself to a populist movement, at best substituting one set of litmus tests for another - and more realistically, adding the Tea Party's litmus tests to those already adopted through years of similar dependence on the religious right.

In his final comment on the anti-war movement, Reihan confuses the message with the messenger and ends up with a bad analogy. Sure, some of the groups that organized anti-Iraq war protests were unpopular with the public, but before we went into Iraq the anti-war movement was winning the debate. As one would expect, once the war was launched the public got behind the war, the President, and the armed forces.

Same As It Ever Was

Matt Miller anticipates "class warfare" between the haves and the have-mores:

For several years I've predicted that a new wild card in American life -- the presence of economic resentment at the bottom of the top 1 percent of our income distribution -- would become a powerful force for reform. The SEC's fraud case against Goldman Sachs may be the first shot in what I think of as the revolt of the "lower upper class."

Lower Uppers are doctors, accountants, engineers and lawyers. At companies they're mostly people above the rank of vice president and below the CEO. Their comrades include well-fed members of the media (and even part-time Post columnists who earn their livings as consultants). They include government officials -- and, yes, SEC lawyers -- who didn't make or inherit fortunes before entering public service. Lower Uppers are professionals who by dint of education, hard work and good luck are living better than 99 percent of anyone who has ever walked the planet. They're also people who can't help but notice how many people with credentials much like their own seem to be living in the kind of Gatsby-like splendor they'll never enjoy.

This stings. If people no smarter or better than you are making $10 million or $50 million or $100 million in a single year, while you're working yourself ragged to scrape by on a million or two -- or, God forbid, $300,000 -- then something must be wrong.

Especially when it's clear that many of the Ultrarich are not simply reaping the rewards of the "free market" but of rigged systems that are as likely to reward failure as success.

Miller anticipates that this could rear its head in a "big skirmish" over taxes, leading to a "nightmare" scenario for the "Ultras":

First they're trying to close down our derivatives casino, the Ultras fret. Next they'll turn private equity's dubious capital gains into (more highly taxed) ordinary income. Before you know it, they'll claim the economy will hum along fine even if we raise marginal tax rates on income above $5 million a year to 50 percent! The revenge of the Lower Uppers may have only just begun. . . .

You know, just the other day I was noting that if I had a seven figure income, I could deal with a 50% tax rate. But as part of a discussion about how when you are making big money, taxes hurt a lot less than they do when you're struggling. I did concede that to a Donald Trump type, who "must" have six or seven fully staffed mansions at his disposal, along with at least one private jet for travel between them, such a tax increase may require an "unacceptable" level of sacrifice. But for the rest of us, living on $500,000+ per year, after taxes, wouldn't be much of a trauma.

But I digress.

I don't find any great insight in the idea that these "class warfare" issues may ultimately be resolved among the upper / ruling classes because that's the way they've been resolved pretty much since the dawn of time. Most of the population isn't attuned to politics. A relatively small subset of people who follow politics are sufficiently wealthy or connected to have the ear of politicians. And that's the level at which policy gets made.

Yes, if enough people in the top five percent of the population become offended by a policy, even if it's favored by the top 1%, they have the necessary access and clout to press for change. Whatever is (or is not) going on in the streets, the bulk of the transformative moments in our nation's history have been driven by the attitudes of the top 5%. Agitation on the streets may be what inspires the elite to examine an issue, but save for those exceptionally rare occasions when it appears that revolution may follow, mass movements can be placated, ignored or, if necessary, suppressed. Or, if the elites decide that it's time for change, the agitation can be useful.

Perhaps Mr. Miller saw Capitalism: A Love Story, or otherwise came across Citigroup's theory of "plutonomy". Or perhaps it simply occurred to him that if you create a system that's overtly skewed toward showering riches on plutocrats, you will eventually generate significant resentment. The difference between his perspective (the rich will turn on the ultra-rich) and Citgroup's ("labor will fight back against the rising profit share of the rich") is that, in my opinion, he more accurately identifies the segment of the society from which pressure for change would have to come.

As a society, as long as we can convince the guy making $10 per hour that, as long as he works hard every day, he can become rich, we don't have to worry about a mass movement. It's when the people who know better decide to stop defending that myth that the ultra-rich have a problem. Turning to Reihan Salam,

There is at least one structural change that is undeniable: namely that there's been a delinkage between corporate profits and the health of the U.S. labor market. U.S.-based multinationals now look to emerging market economies as engines of growth. At home, these firms continue to aggressively cut costs and produce more with fewer workers. This has meant robust productivity increases, a sign of good things to come. But hiring and expansion is happening where the breakneck growth is happening, and that is not in the United States.

The real danger for Citigroup and other proponents of "plutonomy" is that the top 5% of wage earners will respond not only to the concerns of the middle and upper middle class that their economic future is threatened - that, even with college educations, their children won't do as well as they have done - but that the to 5% of earners will recognize that their own futures, and their children's futures, are being plundered to feed the anti-meritocracy of the "Ultras".

Games Without Frontiers

Reihan Salam offers an odd attack on President Obama today, first complaining that Obama's not popular with Israelis:

Last year, many latched onto poll numbers that suggested that President Obama only had the support of 4 percent of Israelis. Yet those shockingly low numbers were misleading. Another survey, sponsored by the New America Foundation, found that 41 percent of Israelis held a favorable opinion of Obama, while 37 percent held an unfavorable opinion. Interestingly, only 42 percent of respondents believed that Obama supports Israel. If we accept that reality lies somewhere between these extremes, one gets the impression that while the White House has alienated many Israelis, the damage isn't necessarily permanent.

The first question that should come to mind is, what has President Obama done that would make Israelis so suspicious of him? Calling for a halt to illegal settlement construction in the West Bank, then backing off the minute Israel refused to comply? The horror. Beyond that... what? For that matter, for what other military conflicts does Reihan demand that U.S. foreign policy track and follow popular opinion in the nations affected by our policies?

Reihan echoes the bromide, "The oft-heard critique is that by seeking Israeli concessions on settlement-building first, the White House was asking Israelis to give up something tangible without getting anything in return." He appears to believe that to be true, betraying a fundamental ignorance of the history (even of recent history) both of the settlements and of the conflict, as well as the facts on the ground. To quote Ariel Sharon, “Everybody has to move; run and grab as many hilltops as they can to enlarge the settlements, because everything we take now will stay ours.... Everything we don't grab will go to them.” (A bit more on Sharon).

Really, though, all he needs to do is take a look at a map reflecting the present situation and it should be self-evident why the freezing and scaling back of Israel's settlements is critical to a two-state solution. Why people who are deeply concerned about the future of Israel believe that the present approach will make a two-state solution impossible, if it has not already achieved that end. If it is toxic to Israeli public opinion for a U.S. Administration to address the realities of the conflict and the steps necessary to its resolution, the U.S. has three choices: Stay out of things (but given our relationship with Israel and the situation in the Middle East, we'll inevitably get dragged back in), tackle the tough issues (including settlements), or wuss out in the manner of G.W. Bush and his roadmap to nowhere. Perhaps Reihan would reply that wussing out boosted Bush's popularity in Israel, and was thus a good thing, even though the all of the problems that made the conflict difficult to solve became worse over his eight years of incompetent administration?

Reihan proceeds to complain that Biden criticized Israel's announcement of massive new construction in East Jerusalem, lecturing,

East Jerusalem is viewed very differently from the West Bank and Gaza. A government announcement of a ten-month freeze on settlement construction did not include Jerusalem, and there is very little appetite for surrendering an inch of the city to a future Palestinian state.

It's of course assumed that the Palestinians will surrender much of East Jerusalem - Reihan appears to believe that this should be regarded as a done deal such that asking Israel not to bulldoze Palestinian neighborhoods, or assuming that the Palestinians will have no claim to a future capital in Jerusalem, as asking the Israelis "give up something tangible without getting anything in return". Wrong on two counts: First, being asked to give up something that's not yours is not asking much, even if you really like it and don't want to give it back. Second, the Palestinian accession to a massive transfer of their historic lands to Israel should not be shrugged off with a "What else can you give up?"

It's hard to see the awkwardness of Biden's visit so far having a broader political impact. But it does contribute to the impression, fair or unfair, that President Obama is presiding over an era of diminished American influence, in which allies and rivals alike feel comfortable thumbing their noses at a White House focused above all else on its domestic priorities.

"Fair or unfair." How quaint, coming at the tail end of an editorial by which, no matter what Obama does, he loses. If we pretend that he can obtain the cooperation of Congress for the imposation of serious pressure on Israel to return to meaningful peace talks - the type of talks that could conceivable result in a two-state solution with genuine Palestinian statehood - Reihan would presumably be whining that Israelis don't like or trust Obama. If he attempts to push ahead without Congress at his back, Reihan will probably make the same complaint but blame him for the fact that his calls for good faith acts by both sides are unfair to Israel, asking them to "give something up" before they get something in return.

If the Netanyahu Administration chooses to disregard President Obama because it recognizes that his ability to pressure Israel is hamstrung by Congress, and that many pundits will help them out both by rallying to their side and caricature Obama as weak if they ignore his requests and by decrying him as "unpopular with Israelis" if he finds a way to turn up the pressure, what incentive do they have to cooperate?

Moreover, if we assume the criticism to be sincere, what does it say about the critic's grasp of international relations and foreign policy? Is the problem that President Obama hasn't found a way to be "effective"? Or is the problem that after eight years of disastrous foreign policy under Bush, bogging the U.S. down in two wars at enormous financial and diplomatic cost, any President would be facing similar problems. Those who seem to think that Obama should "get angry", perhaps pounding shoes on tables or threatening to wipe nations off the face of the earth, seem to have forgotten the distance President Bush put between the U.S. and its allies with his "with us or against us" brand of foreign policy and military intervention. You spend how many years teaching our allies that we don't actually care what they think, we will act unilaterally even when they voice strong concerns about our actions, and that life goes on pretty much as normal when they ignore our demands, and expect that to turn around on a dime the minute a new President takes office? Welcome to the real world.

Update: Some thoughts from Daniel Larison on "enabling reckless allies".

The conduct of U.S. foreign policy is really quite a comedy show. Washington insists on trying to make regimes over which it has no leverage and no influence do things that they are never going to do, and it refuses to use what leverage it has over its allies to achieve its stated goals in their part of the world.