Notes From the Unpowered

This column is being written in the midst of a power outage that has reduced many parts of the mid-Atlantic to primitive conditions. I have no right to complain. We installed a small generator after the last big power failure ("Snowmageddon") and at least have been able to sleep in air-conditioned comfort. We sincerely pity the million-plus people in our area and surrounding states who are coping with 95-plus temperatures and no power at all.

So while we are definitely among the lucky ones, the "derecho" outage has managed to short-circuit our 21st century lives anyway. Only the bedrooms are cool. The phones, Internet and televisions are dark. Even cellphones didn't function for 24 hours. Gas stations are closed. Supermarkets are dark and selling only nonperishable items. If you want meat, vegetables, eggs or milk, you'll need to drive another half hour.

The Wall Street Journal wasn't delivered, and reading the Washington Post by itself is like choking down medicine, especially in an election year. The dog is very sick, and we cannot contact the vet because the phones are dead. (Update: Dog is in veterinary emergency hospital, which thankfully does have power.)

Why does the nation's capital go through this convulsion so very often? People who live in other great cities report that they have seen decades go by without significant power outages. I've heard that they have trees, too. What is it about Washington? We gave Baghdad freedom and got their power grid in exchange? It's been four days, and they're saying it may be seven before power is restored. At the very least, we should be asking how much of an investment it would be to bury all the power lines. I would certainly prefer to spend precious tax dollars on that rather than on Obamacare.

Speaking of Obamacare, there's a theme among some commentators that Chief Justice John Roberts achieved a brilliant, John Marshall-esque long-term victory for conservatives. Don't fret, they soothe. Roberts is playing chess while we're all playing checkers. Just wait till he votes next term to overturn affirmative action and the Voting Rights Act.

Not so fast. If forced to choose between a correct vote on affirmative action and on Obamacare, I would have chosen the latter (and believed I could rely on Roberts for both). There will be many more opportunities to overturn affirmative action. But Obamacare was arguably much more important to the success of self-government. Affirmative action is morally wrong. But it won't bankrupt us, and it doesn't expand the reach of the federal government.

Whatever words were written about the Commerce Clause, the result speaks louder. Speculation about future Roberts' votes is just that. For now, we have reason to worry that, at worst, he succumbed to intimidation by the left and changed his vote to keep the court from being vilified, and at best, that he engaged in shoddy scholarship.

Still, the decision does force the Obama administration to acknowledge what it has steadfastly denied -- that Obamacare raises taxes on the middle class. Also, two liberal justices did agree that there are limits to federal power over the states vis a vis Medicaid. That's notable. So often it's conservative justices who disappoint their side. But in this case, which hasn't gotten much attention, two liberals agreed that the feds cannot bully the states.

The Medicaid feature of the decision may also force the truth about the law to emerge more quickly than would otherwise have been the case. Without the capacity to force states to expand their Medicaid programs, the federal government will be left with the responsibility to provide subsidized health insurance policies to millions more people.

Those with incomes up to - effectively -- 138 percent above the poverty line were to have been covered by Medicaid. Those with incomes - roughly -- between 100 and 400 percent above poverty were to use the exchanges. When the Congressional Budget Office first scored the bill, it estimated the subsidies for the exchanges based upon the Medicaid expansion. Without it, the subsidies for those purchasing in the exchange market will have to rise considerably. As Charles Blahous of Economics 21 explains, " . . . With the . . . Medicaid expansion, the law's health exchange subsidies might be fiscally unworkable. The Supreme Court may have just set in motion of chain of events that could lead to the law's being found as busting the budget, even under the highly favorable scoring methods used last time around."

"Unworkable" was always a good shorthand for the law. Now the court so praised for ratifying Obamacare has simultaneously made that verdict unavoidable.

Affirmative action is morally wrong. But it won't bankrupt us, and it doesn't expand the reach of the federal government.

No, it won't bankrupt us, but it does expand the Federal government's reach. The government ties all sorts of things to racial quotas, and claims that, for example, the presence of a student with a federally-guaranteed loan requires a college to engage in racial bean-counting per federal regulations.

"Affirmative action" increases costs of hiring or admission and costs of retention for all kinds of institutions, because they are forced to make race-based rather than merit-based decisions. It imposes costs on consumers because businesses have to act defensively in any situation involving a favored-class employee. It leads to endless lines at the Post Office or DMV because employees can't be required to work efficiently and can't be fired.

"People who live in other great cities report that they have seen decades go by without significant power outages."

We live in northeastern Maryland and lost power for 6 days last summer due to Irene.

With little else to do, I drove around a bit checking things out. I was stopped by a flagman while a crew was working on the lines up ahead. We started shooting the bull and it turned out he was a good ole boy (about 22) from Alabama.

After some small talk about overtime and such, he flat out said "Ya'll must be stupid up here". Why do you say that, I asked? "Back home, we never let trees get anywhere near the lines, even the residential ones".

And he was correct. Trees are over, under and through the lines almost everywhere in this area. The power company subsequently has a program trying to clear the trees back but it will take many years at the rate they're going. Lesson learned for my newly acquired generator self.

"People who live in other great cities report that they have seen decades go by without significant power outages. I've heard that they have trees, too. What is it about Washington?"

Actually, both Washingtons (city AND state) and for the same reason. The local citizenry doesn't want "their trees" either cut down or trimmed.

I now live in Washington (the state), and we have power outages if someone either spits on the sidewalk or breaks wind. All because the locals refuse to accept the notion that having a fifty foot tall power pole with a one-hundred-fifty foot tall fir tree a dozen feet away is NOT a good idea.

Previous to my transplantation to the "great" Northwest, I lived in Louisiana, where we rarely had weather-induced power outages, even during hurricanes. The SOLE difference is that the podunk power cooperative that served us in Lousiana kept the trees cut/trimmed.

Whatever words were written about the Commerce Clause, the result speaks louder. Speculation about future Roberts' votes is just that. For now, we have reason to worry that, at worst, he succumbed to intimidation by the left and changed his vote to keep the court from being vilified, and at best, that he engaged in shoddy scholarship.
The enforcer for intimidation by the left has always been “the media.” But of course, “the media” which really counts is actually wire service journalism. Wire service journalism requires the conceit of “journalistic objectivity” to cover for the fact that your newspaper contains reports written by people whom the editor of your paper doesn’t even know. The AP is a monopolistic organization, which exacerbates the situation, but the conceit of journalistic objectivity transcends any competitive boundaries - no matter how many wire services there might be, so long as each of them promotes the idea that “all journalists are objective” they have established “journalist” as either a title of nobility or, as I would argue is more opposite, a priesthood.
It is often said that First Amendment freedom of the press assures objectivity, but the cult of “journalistic objectivity" traces historically not to the founding era but to the post-Civil War era. It follows the establishment of the Associated Press historically, and it follows the logic of the wire service and was explicitly promoted by the AP. And the First Amendment does nothing to enforce objectivity, and plenty to protect idiosyncrasy and tendentiousness in journalism.
There is nothing wrong with the First Amendment, and objectivity is an ideal well worth seeking to attain. But any effort to attain objectivity must begin with self-examination - and claiming to actually be objective is hubris. It is absolutely incompatible with any serious attempt at objectivity. Consequently the one thing which absolutely must change is the credulousness of the American people.
It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing. Adam Smith
Journalism is at war with “incredulity,” and at war with prudence and wisdom in the electorate. Journalism uses a Newspeak version of “English” in which “liberalism” is equated with the interests of journalism and at odds with the very idea of wisdom and prudence in the general public. As long as journalism interests the public, journalism (which is indeed a singular entity under the “objective journalism” paradigm) believes that its PR power matters more than facts on the ground.

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