Posted on 03/12/2009 12:16:31 PM PDT by Tolik
One Big Thing
In this fiscal crisis, the public wanted one big thing to quote Archilochus: A reform of the banking industry that offered federal-guaranteed lines of credit to ensure liquidity, and a new transparency so investors would at least know that their supposedly blue-chip AIG stocks or Lehman Brother portfolio was, in fact, a house of cards based on the serial reselling of sub-prime mortgages—and in the end hinged on whether a wage-earning Bill Smith in Merced could keep servicing an 8% loan on a $400,000, 3,000 sf home that he bought with no down payment.
But that one thing was not to be—and instead from Obama we got the entire kitchen sink—drain, pipes, basin, and faucets thrown at us all at once.
Not the Obama they knew?
I think Warren Buffet, Jim Cramer, Jack Welch and other in-the-news, conflicted capitalists counted on Obama being a sort of Robert Rubin, Clintonite neoliberal like themselves.
So he would come in, rail for a week at most about Bush this/that, greed, Wall Street, extend the financial guarantees of Paulson, and then talk up the economy, calm fears, and pretty much do what every other President has done when faced with bad recessions: loosen money, stimulate a bit, talk up free trade, promise no new tax hikes, extend unemployment benefits, put other agendas on hold, forgo the class warfare talk, bring in captains of industry to assure them of calm, of long-term plans to encourage investment, and of soothing rhetoric of friendship and support.
In other words, they assumed that with an Obama Presidency they thought they would be in control, feel good about themselves for supporting a non-traditional candidate, and get a break from the Bush-bashing of their Euro and Asian friends when they jetted to conferences abroad, dropped in at Davos, or hit the party circuit in DC and NY.
It was not to be. Instead right away, Obama started the prairie-fire them/us rhetoric about the “rich” this and the “rich that. The more he denied he was for protectionism, the more someone in his cabinet evoked it. When one did the math on his proposed $250,000 income and above tax hikes, it was not hard (in high-tax states) to reach a confiscatory rate of 70%. And when Wall Street sighed thinking ‘Hmmm, at least the money will pay down the debt’; they were shocked to discover ‘No!, the new revenue won’t even pay for the existing deficits.’ And now they fathom that Obama will be wildly trumping both the Bush deficits and the Clinton tax hikes all at once.
Moreover, in teen-age fashion, Obama daily blamed Bush for the mess, rather than talked up the US. To get an agenda across that would reshape American life, he evoked the Great Depression from November to February to scare the nation into increasing the government share of GDP. Ossified, secular, shrinking, pacifist, static, and statist Europe was clearly the model
Instead of Bill Clinton’s “focusing like a laser” on the economy and the “It’s the economy, stupid!”, we got talk of nationalizing health care, free education, cap-and-trade, 8,000 earmarks,and trash the oil companies. And abroad, his team’s massage was, “We dislike Bush even more than you (fill in the blanks: Europeans, Arabs, Iranians, etc.) did”
Again, instead of getting some old Wall Street capitalists or some crusty CEOs sprinkled here and there in the cabinet, Wall Street sees either novices like Geithner (who reminds me of what I remember of toady graduate students trying to conjugate the subjunctive mood in Greek for their professors), or nominees that are cheats, dodgers, and party hacks like Daschle, Richardson, and Solis, or left-wing crusaders like Holder (Americans are “cowards”) and Chu (California’s farms are doomed).
In short, they don’t see anything that is helping, and a lot that will make things worse. And the result?
Suddenly, American capitalists are at Rick’s in Casablanca and shocked!—Obama is acting more like the Chicago organizer, the most partisan Senator in the Congress, the devoted Rev. Wright attendee, the pal of Bill Ayers and Rashid Khalidi—and not the neoliberal who both lets the financer alone and makes him feel better about himself.
Contradictions
Is bailout money the same as aid? If so, will the new government adjudicate what professors make, given that their universities are recipients of federal largess—and in many cases the professors themselves get direct government support. If so, will thousands here in Fresno County in California also be told—in the manner food stamp recipients cannot use their charge cards directly to buy beer and cigarettes—that the government is mandating how they spend their dole (no galas for execs; thus no parties for those who receive housing vouchers and food support?).
A Note on Hypocrisies
Speaker Nancy Pelosi is taking a beating because she seems to think the U.S. military must keep variously-sized jets on 24/7 call for her private use. Once again—nemesis strikes.
So, CEO’s cannot employ such toys, but their censors, as the proverbial pigs on two feet inside the farmhouse, surely can? In this new culture of Obama, confusion grows over public/private spheres and the wages of hypocrisy. Two points we forget: zillionaires are free to use their private, non-federal bailout money to do all sorts of indulgent things; government officials who both emulate and castigate them are hypocrites for doing the same.
Second, an earth in the balance Al Gore who made millions chastising us for not being green should not fly on private jets. And yes, we don’t care whether a Rush Limbaugh, who ridicules man-made global warming, takes off in his Gulfstream. Again, just as conservative moralists suffer the wages of hypocrisy for running up deficits and getting caught in unmentionable acts in public bathroom stalls, so in-your-face egalitarians like a Gore or Kerry or Kennedy suffer the same charge when their private lives they enjoy are at odds with the public lectures they give for others.
Where will they go?
Another released Guantanamo detainee (#008; aka Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul; now aka Mullah Abdullah Zakir; now again aka Taliban military chief—southern Afghanistan operations against US and coalition troops) has joined the Taliban ranks, this time as a major field commander. Next prediction: Obama will not close the base as promised by January 20, 2010. To do so would be like the U.S. letting out top Nazi generals detained in camps in the South during World War II (wait!— not quite: we usually shot any non-uniformed enemy combatant we caught on the field of battle). The danger at Guantanamo is that we are now whittled down now to the hard-core killers, and each inmate released increases the chances for something really terrible ensuing. Just one Khalid Sheik Mohammed who kills again will essentially destroy the Obama legacy—and I have to assume his team grasps that?
War—what war on terrorism?
What happened to the war on terror?—in the sense that bin Laden’s popularity ratings have plummeted, that we have not been hit again, and that even worldwide al Qaeda is somnolent?
That may change, but for now surely we are witnessing the wages of eight years of FISA, the Patriot Act, overseas renditions, Guantanamo, tens of thousands of Islamists ‘attrited’ in Iraq (cf. the much ridiculed ‘flypaper trap’ theory), the routing of the Taliban from Afghanistan, Predator attacks in Pakistan, and quiet European intelligence work that would be classified as “shredding the Constitution” if it were done here in the US.
In this regard, Obama’s campaign rhetoric once again has boxed him in: “Bush did it” doesn’t work when Bush really did do it—and so kept us safe for seven years. Obama’s problem is that if he overturns these protocols and we are hit, his Presidency is finished; but if he doesn’t, his leftwing base continues to ankle-bite him as a hypocrite. (Note well: many on the left who demand that he close Guantanamo won’t be so ready to support Obama should a released terrorist strike the US homeland; if you doubt that, collate all the names of the DC neo-con insiders who demanded the preemptive invasion of Iraq, and somewhere along the line abandoned the war, bailed on the effort, and blamed Bush’s ‘screwed up’ occupation for their ‘brilliant’ three-week war.)
Where does all this lead?
A modest prediction, if the economy does not show positive growth by the third quarter of this year, the media will finally turn on Obama. His upper-middle class devotees will finally associate their shattered 401(k)s, their lost home equity, and their new tax hikes to come with Obama. And the world’s vultures, as in 1977-80, will begin descending to tear and pull at the corpse of the US imperium. At that point we will see a virulent backlash against the Obama critics, who will be castigated as unfair, hoping Obama would fail, mean, even racist who are colluding in ruining America’s dream.
It won’t be pretty, this national frenzy, but it was entirely avoidable. All Obama had to do was give Bush a little credit or at least frame his departures from prior policies in a sort of bad/worse choice dilemma; focus on the financial industry alone; talk up the US economy; rein in the Pelosi/Reid lunancy; and stop all the messianic talk of highest ethical standards in cosmic history while nominating the likes of Daschle and Richardson.
But nemesis doesn’t work that way—ask Oedipus or Hector.
Let me know if you want in or out.
Links: FR Index of his articles: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/keyword?k=victordavishanson
His website: http://victorhanson.com/
NRO archive: http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson-archive.asp
Pajamasmedia: http://victordavishanson.pajamasmedia.com/
Now Obama Tells Us?
What an honest campaign would have sounded like.
By Victor Davis Hansonhttp://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=YTI0ZDBlOWI2NzNhZTAxYzBjZDg1ODVlYmNiMmZmMzY=
Imagine that last fall, before being elected, Barack Obama had outlined the positions he has embraced since being inaugurated. An honest campaign speech could have gone something like this:
“As we approach Election Day, the American people should not waste the crisis we find ourselves in.
“Consequently, if elected, I promise to get us over the Bush financial meltdown with a stimulus program that will borrow $787 billion — which, of course, will add to the already sizable budget deficit (nearly $500 billion) projected in the Bush administration’s last budget.
“By March of next year, my new $3.6 trillion budget will include a spending bill with over 8,500 budget earmarks to target in-need constituents.
“In addition to the stimulus/borrowing plan, I intend to devote $634 billion to fund a new supplementary national health-care system. But that is not all. Unfortunately, the initial Bush bank bailout of some $700 billion also may well have to be augmented by an additional $750 billion.
“Although my new spending proposals may raise the federal deficit in my first year to $1.75 trillion, I promise the American people that by the end of my first term, I will halve the federal deficit — albeit adding another $3 to $5 trillion to the national debt.
“Those savings can be accomplished by upping the federal income tax to about 40 percent on those rich 5 percent of Americans who currently pay only 60 percent of our aggregate income taxes — as well as lifting Social Security caps on their payroll taxes and cutting out many of their tax deductions.
“With state income taxes, federal income tax, and Social Security and payroll taxes, along with new cutbacks in deductions, some of these rich will pay over 60 percent of their incomes in taxes. That is not an unreasonable rate in comparison with past levels — or the fact that well over 40 percent of Americans do not make enough to pay any federal income taxes.
“I expect that Wall Street may react negatively to these proposals. We may see the Dow fall an additional 2,000 to 3,000 points after I’m elected. It may descend to under 7,000 during my first weeks of office. And this may be the moment when the economy continues to cool and unemployment rises.
“But to deal with this reaction of entrenched interests, I promise a fresh team of hard-nosed American professionals — understanding that it is impossible to ensure that none have past insider connections and occasional tax problems.
“From the former Clinton administration, I will select Rahm Emanuel to run my staff. To oversee revenue, Timothy Geithner will assemble a large team at Treasury. Senator Clinton herself will run State, and I will anchor my cabinet with pros like Tom Daschle, Eric Holder, Bill Richardson, and Hilda Solis.
“On matters of protecting civil liberties, I assure the American people that I have examined the Patriot Act, the FISA accords, and renditions — and I have discovered that they, in fact, do not shred our Constitution. I will, however, shut down Guantanamo Bay — but must keep it open another year and appoint a task force to study the issue.
“Our new direction in energy policy will center on cap-and-trade initiatives that promote wind and solar power. While we won’t rule out oil, gas, coal, and nuclear development, problems with greenhouse-gas emissions and nuclear waste mean that these ossified 20th-century industries — including new offshore-drilling development — must be discouraged and further taxed or regulated to subsidize our green future.
“Abroad, I promise to give America a new image. My first television interview will be with al Arabiya. Due to both new initiatives and my unique background, I can reassure them that no longer will the United States alienate the Muslim world. Our aim is to return to stable and friendly relations with the Middle East characteristic of 20-30 years ago.
“Indeed, on matters in the Middle East, I will bring back my suspended adviser Samantha Power. I look forward to her input, along with that of Charles Freeman, former ambassador to Saudi Arabia and critic of Israel, as head of the National Intelligence Council, to craft new directions in the region.
“We expect to open new dialogues with Basher al-Assad of Syria and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran without preconditions. And to further the cause of peace in the Middle East, the United States will pledge almost $1 billion to help rebuild the Gaza strip that is governed by Hamas.”
Now all that would have been hope and change that we could have voted on.
No, the Obama team does not have that intellectual horsepower yet. They need to have it happen in such a way that it stings them bad before they would feel it, let alone think it.
In 1933 Germany's elite thought the same about Hitler.
Ladies and gentlemen, VDH has hit another one out of the park.
Good point.
Dem Congress is to the Left of Obama as well.
I've been around too long to believe that.
VDH Bump.
Heh, normally VDH is measured, but this is as close to a rant (granted a well thought out rant) that I’ve seen from him in a while. :)
Sounds pretty well thought out to me.
Nothing like some of Ben Stein’s overheated emotionalism.
Probably true if it’s just the economy we’re talking about. But.... if we’ve got 300,000 casualties in say, Chicago because someone from the “religion of peace” managed to get a nuclear device into Calumet Harbor, the I figure that’ll probably do it.
"Not the Obama they knew? I think Warren Buffet, Jim Cramer, Jack Welch and other in-the-news, conflicted capitalists counted on Obama being a sort of Robert Rubin, Clintonite neoliberal like themselves."
It shows that the combination of materialism and moral relativism is not very reliable even just in materialistic terms.
For the morally and spiritually blind - the economy is going down with the frozen embryonic stem cells.
I pray you’re right. Still.....
Obama and his people ran as the anti-Bush, capping a years-long, incessant anti-Bush campaign in the media, and they're stuck with that posture. Even were they astute enough to realize that the sort of approach VDH describes here could easily be presented as the grace of the winner, they simply can't bring themselves to it emotionally. Now it's too late.
I think, though, that Obama himself is coming into what must to him be a horrifying realization that Bush had reasons for doing as he did that are quite outside the adolescent fulminations of his enemies on the left. What has happened simply is that they started to believe those fulminations and commited themselves to policies predicated on flawed premises because it felt so good to hate. I can't honestly feel sorry for anyone mired in their own muck that way. They created it, let them wallow in it.
Great column! Nemesis - means give what is due from the Greek. Recall that nemesis is notoriously slow.
Unfortunately we appear to have a typical Chicago hack politician with all that entails. Think for a minute about the Untouchables and you know all that one needs to know.
The unfortunate thing is.....WE HAVE TO “WALLOW in it” too....
The reason for the gap between expectations and experience may be that Obama was always a figurehead, a spokesperson without any real administrative experience.
He doesn't focus on prosperity because he doesn't have any real experience getting things done. His answer to everything is to give a speech about it.
Obama is the third Senator to move directly into the presidency. The other two were Harding and Kennedy, and both of them had trouble handling the job.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.