Miscellaneous Thoughts on 2016

by Ross Dothan

NOV 12 11:37 AM, 2014

http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/12/miscellaneous-thoughts-on-2016/?comments#permid=13311433

I'll repeat my prediction here, first made on election night 2014, that, in spite of their overwhelming victory, the GOP has not basically changed from a party which lives from, fosters and perpetuates, social conflict and political ignorance through the multitude of "nut cases" in its midst. 

There is no "reform conservative" renewal of the GOP, as much as Douthat and Brooks would like to talk it into existance. To think that Marco Rubio is the best the GOP might have to offer in 2016 is just too pathetic for words.

The "nut cases" in the GOP, including Cruz (and Huckabee, btw) will dominate the primaries and will continue to make the GOP a laughing stock on the national level. And with their current majority in both houses, the GOP will continue to pound away at repealing ACA, and will focus on devisive issues to feed the ignorance and prejudices of their core constituents, and thus fail the test of actually governing at the national level.

Having supported Hillory Clinton in 2008 until the "bitter end", even I am not enthused by the prospect of her candidacy in 2016 (her statements on Syria recently demostrate a complete unawareness of our mistakes in the Middle East), but in a face-off between Hillary and Marco Rubio (or Paul Rand), she will be obviously the superior candidate, in intellectual capacity, experience and stature.

Freud and the Middle East

by Thomas L. Friedman

NOV. 11, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/12/opinion/freud-and-the-middle-east.html?comments#permid=13311111

"What politicians here tell you in private is usually irrelevant. What matters most, ... is what they say in public in their own language to their own people."

Coming from a Pulitzer Prize winning "journalist" this "realization" comes frighteningly late. Going back through Mr. Friedman's commentary on the Middle East, his analysis often seems simplistic, as in his repeated statements that social media/twitter would be the boon of a new Arabic liberal/democratic awakening, and gullible, as in his frequent exhortations that the "solutions" were those he had just heard in his latest interview (in English) with a Middle East "personality", political or not - remember his commentary on the idea that the problem/solution in the Middle East had its roots entirely in ecology and access to water.

As a complete amateur (albeit, fairly well read), I have been hammering away in my comments, that the problems in the Middle East are at their root a centuries old religious war, not unlike the long battle beween Catholics and Protestants in Europe. It would have been helpful if Mr. Friedman had accepted this reality (very well described in this piece) before he acted as a cheerleader for the brainless US intervention in Iraq, where we completely ignored this underlying religious conflict in the Middle East, and in our pathetically simplistic way (fed by the unique situation of WW II) assumed that we would be welcomed as "liberators".

We poked a stick into a hornets nest and created ISIS.

The Big Sleep

by Timothy Egan

NOV. 6, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/07/opinion/timothy-egan-the-big-sleep.html?comments#permid=13274102

This commentary skirts the real issues - there is a deeply rooted (Constitution, both explicitly in the way elections are defined, essentially mandating a two-party system, and implicitly in its current interpretation, e.g. one $, one vote, rather than one person one vote) problems with America's version of representative democracy, which puts it into constant, continual election campaign mode, with no time left for actual governing - Mr. Egan proposes concentrating on 2016 to avoid the hard task of dealing with the realities posed of 2014.

Many, if not most other system of representative democracy have a parliamentary system, where the conflict between legislative and executive is not pre-programmed, but indeed completely eliminated, as the majority in parliament (even if a coalition of some sort) is always the legislative also. These systems also allow for more than just two (relevant) political parties, which permits "protest votes" (such as this mid-term obviously was, at least in a substantive part) to be reflected in a third or new party, rather having one of the only two parties be hyjaked by crazies, which even the GOP now admits they have been. These parliamentary systems also do a much better job of limiting the length and cost of political campaigns, so that time and energy remains to actually govern in between.

So, as the loosers in the mid-term, let's not just stick our heads in the sand for the next two years, but work hard to be constructive partners. They won!

Triumph of the Wrong

by Paul Krugman

NOV. 6, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/07/opinion/paul-krugman-triumph-of-the-wrong.html?comments#permid=13273825

While I agree with the substance of Prof. Krugman's commentary, i.e. the GOP was/is wrong in virtually all its problem assessments and policy proposals, we must remember that they, indeed, achieved a resounding electoral victory, both on the local and national levels. And in a democracy, which we still sotra, kinda are (or claim to be), that is what counts.

Democrats/liberals/progressives must avoid falling into the "we're right/you're wrong" obstinence trap, which the GOP demonstrated so abysmally during the past six years, and instead cooperate on issues vital to the US (immigration, health care, reducing inequality, revitalizing the middle class, etc.) even if the policies put forward by the GOP are not ideal. For example, if "tax reform" comes to mean just simplifying the tax code and eliminating some of the most egregious loop holes, but does not include rebalancing the tax burden in favor of the lower and middle class. let's support it anyway. If immigration reform falls short of allowing the 10 or so million "illegals" to emerge from underground, let's support it anyway. Even small, incremental, non-optimum steps are preferable to the complete log-jam we have experienced in the past decade.

There is one area where I would absolutely draw the line, however, and that is the ACA. If the GOP continues their insane attacks against the demonstrable benefits of ACA, the President should use his full veto power to stop such moves.

The Governing Party

by David Brooks

NOV. 6, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/07/opinion/david-brooks-the-governing-party.html?comments#permid=13273505

This is an understandibly euphoric view of the mid-term elections. There is no denying that conservatives won a huge victory and that the GOP has been greatly streangthended. 

I hope, but doubt, that the crazy phase of the GOP is indeed behind us. As Mr. Brooks and most other conservative talking heads have stated, the spotlight is now fully on the GOP in Congress to use their majority to actually get something done, rather than continue to spend most of their time and energy to discredit President Obama (which has been their stated objective over the past six years).

The first test will be, if they can give up on their insane efforts to rollback, or otherwise weaken the ACA. By most objective analyses the ACA, although far from perfect, has achived its primary goals of reducing the number of uninsured, stopping the inhumane practices by insurance companies to deny needed coverage, and to stem the explosive growth of health care costs. Yet we already hear renewed battle cries by prominent Republicans, like Ted Cruz, that the opposition to ACA is still at the forefront of Conservative thinking.

The other urgent test for the GOP is, if they can actually come up with legislation to address some of the urgent problems faced by the US. I would even give the GOP credit if such legislation, although I may not agree with the policy, actually represents an honest attemp to solve a problem, rather than just to make a political statement and/or maneuver Obama into vetoing legislation.

For Republicans, What Counts as Victory?

By Russ Douthat

NOVEMBER 4, 2014 12:59 PM

http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/04/for-republicans-what-counts-as-victory/?comments#permid=13245582

Now that the election evening projections seem to validate the polling over the past few weeks, and the GOP is set to take control of both houses, it is interesting (and for me, scary) to imagine what the GOP will do with that victory.

My suspicion, given past performance, is that the GOP, in a typical show of ill-tempered malice will immediately move to repeal, roll-back, or whatever you want to call it, the ACA. In addition, they will probably also propose a bunch of policies designed not to solve any real national problems (like immigration and the continuing stagnation of our once famous middle class), but rather which are designed to embarrass Pres. Obama.

Resurrecting the Rantings of a Grumpy Old Guy

Given the recent events, both domestically (the 2014 Mid-Term) and internationally (primarily our blundering back into Iraq and the Middle East in general), I feel compelled to resurrect this blog - I need a means of working off my frustrations about all the bad news.

As before, most of my posts will be copies of "Comments" I submit, responding to articles and editorials, primarily in the NYT. Each of these comments will lead off with links to the original article or editorial to which my blog post is a response.