Mother Jones - Comments for "The Great Persuader"

Insanity, according to Einstein, is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Since astronomical debt spending has led to maxed out borrowing, increasing astronomical spending under Obama is still "wrong track."

Well, Brian, thank you for highlighting one of the stupidest, most dishonest post-election comments.

As for tacking on "the same guy also congratulated Obama", well that's just a steaming load of nothing.

I read The Corner commentary on election night, and it was shameful.

On an historic night, when America elected her first black President, pretty much every post went like this:

"Wow, that's historic! Now that that's out of the way, here's why our new Marxist President sucks, supports infacticide, and will be the end of America as we know it."

The Republican Party created Obama's mandate during the campaign: He's a socialist.

Let the socialism begin!

Robert--
Your comment is spot on. It's time to push forward on the economic front. No more triangulation is needed. Time to spend political capital. Obama should tread carefully on social issues, that's the area where the 'other side' needs to be respected. In terms of economic policy, the 'other side' needs to be destroyed forever. Grover Norquist et al need to suffer bad. Now's the chance.

PS--This is also just good politics. Obama's opponent in 2012 is most likely to be a socially conservative, economically populist guy like Huckabee.

Sorry I haven't read comments above but I'm sure I'm not the only person who finds this sentence absurd

"The public face of his economic policy, after all, was almost entirely based on tax cuts, a distinctly conservative notion."

Mr Drum has fallen for conservative lies. Their actual policies are tax cuts for rich people. Their hero Reagan signed into law a huge tax increase on the non-rich (Greenspan commission proposals). In practice they cut taxes for rich people.

Their trick is to distract people from tax progressivity by pretending that the only choice on taxes is high or low. Obama has shifted the debate to more or less progressive. I have long thought that such an approach to the debate would destroy the Republican party. The evidence from Tuesday is not proof (there were many reasons for the Republicans to lose) but it is still evidence that Obama's approach to politics works, not just for one election but to change the debate forever. McCain argued "cutting your taxes is welfare. What about all the plubmers who make over $250,000 a year". This is not (just) because he is nuts. There is no way to convince the American people that they prefer the Republican approach to Obama's approach.

He was fighting on Republican turf the same way Grant was on confederate turf at Appamatox. With his tax proposal he has stormed their citadel, crushed their army and left them with the choice between surrender and Guerilla warfare (they will chose the second) [earlier historical analogy was the red army was fighting on German turf in the battle of Berlin -- it was correctly spelled but politically not ideal).

Drum's framing is exactly falling for the Republican trick which have made the last 28 years such a political disaster in the USA.

No one but Mondale runs on a platform of raising taxes. Transforming the debate to one about progressivity is more than any reasonable person could hope for from one candidate no matter how brilliant.

Also Obama's proposal is good policy.

I think the claim is wrong in many ways. First, the Obama tax cuts consist of giving money to non-rich people (at the expense of the rich) and providing incentives for low skilled people to work (setting a good example for their kids).

This approach has been tried at a much much smaller scale by the Clinton administration (the Clinton tax increase included an increase in the earned income tax credit).

Judged crudely the results were spectacular. Of course it was partly luck with investments in information tech finally producing a productivity speed up but the increase in labor force participation, the shift of the Phillips curve etc are exactly what the most extreme advocates of Obama's policy would have predicted.

In contrast taxing the super rich will, I honestly believe, have good effects totally aside from getting the money (Matt Yglesias has made many eloquent and convincing arguments for this). The super rich are concentrated in finance. This is a big cost as many smart people are not doing other things that are definitely socially useful but don't make one super rich. The financial geniuses sure seem to have produced something worth less than nothing haven't they ? Wouldn't you rather they had been less numerous energetic and creative ?

Causing the finanical sector to shrink by taxing the incomes of the top financiers would, I would guess, be excellent policy even if the revenues were wasted (by the way Larry Summers sometimes argues this -- one of the issues on which he flip flops).

On the other hand the case for high taxes on low and moderate income is based on ... what ?

1) We need money for universal healthcare, anti-poverty programs, green infrastructure investment/subsidies etc etc etc and we can't get it just by taxing the rich.

A resonable argument (given Obama's current proposal especially) but not true. The US rich are so rich that there is plenty of money to grab there. The problem is political. Only if people are convinced that taxing the rich has nothing to do with taxing them will it be possible to get the money for the treasury. I had great hopes for Obama's doughnut FICA increase (which is even more directed at the rich than his income tax plan). I still do even though he de-emphasized it and it might not happen. Then again it might (tax the rich to save social security is the worlds second best slogan after tax the rich and spread it out thin (the current proposal)).

2. It is demagogic populism.

This is true. What's wrong with that ? If it is good policy, the fact that people support it for selfish reasons or envy of the rich doesn't make it bad policy.

Here the idea is that politicians prove their virtue by advocating unpopular policies (based on forcing people to face the bitter truth -- or in this case the untruth that the US federal government can't do it's job and cut taxes for the non-rich).

I don't want virtuous politicians. I want politicians who win and implement good policies. The fact that something is popular doesn't mean it is wrong. Look what happened to Mondale.

3 It's class war. It would be better to unite than to divide.

This is true. So what ? Who said it is always bad to represent the class interests no matter how large the class and how mild the suffering for the tiny class that will be only super rich rather than ultra rich will be.

I understand your point, and agree with this:

Of course, if his policies are viewed as successful, and the company thrives in terms of economics and security, then his perception as a liberal will be mostly irrelevant.

[noting the freudian typo country->company :) ]

Correction -- not "31% of moderates", but 31% of voters (that would be 70% of the 44% who said they were moderates).

JS,

We can take this liberal/moderate/conservative analysis too far, but with respect to what we have been discussing, the attempt to assess voters feelings toward "liberal" though the election statistics would start with how many of the moderates voting for Obama considered him to be liberal. My guess is that most did not (since he did not campaign as one), so that if as president he starts acting as a liberal, he will "lose" some of those people. With 48% of the voters again him already, it does not take much slippage for him to go below 50% on approval ratings. Of course, if his policies are viewed as successful, and the company thrives in terms of economics and security, then his perception as a liberal will be mostly irrelevant. I just think it will be dangerous for him politically and a gift to republicans for him to plunge into liberal causes right away.

Brian, I question whether half of moderates have a negative view of liberals.

Clearly that is where the game is won or lost, though. Using you numbers, it would seem that 31% of moderates voted for Obama (22+31=53), and of those who didn't at least some must find liberals acceptable -- just not this liberal.

By the way, if they had asked me I would probably have said that I am "moderate" too -- because I don't consider myself to be extreme in any way, and I am fiscally conservative to the extent that I don't approve of trillion dollar expenditures for unworthy causes.

JS.

Your math is correct but your conclusion higly flawed both as election analysis (how many of the 44% moderate actually viewed Obama as "liberal") and does not pertain to how people will view a President Obama if he does liberal stuff after campaigning as a centrist.

We are talking about whether Obamma will promptly cast himself as a liberal. He probably will. If so, he will identify with 22% of the population and become the subject of criticism from at least 34%. The 44% moderates shun the liberal label for themselves, so some good number of them must have a negative view of liberals. Even if it is just half, then you would have 56% viewing President Obama the liberal in a negative light. He should try to avoid that, but I doubt that he will or could with liberal democrats chomping for action.

22% described themselves as liberal, 44% as moderate, and 34% as conservative.

liberal+moderate = 66%

Evidently, enough of the moderates do not find a problem with the label "liberal" to make a majority.

Brian: I think that presidents normally do not positively affect the economy (other than with tax cuts)

Thank you for confirming my point. You just said that only "conservative" economic principles are good for growth. Hence no need to ever re-examine your ideas, since all evidence to the contrary can safely be attributed to luck.

JS,

Exit polls showed 22% of Americans consider themselves liberal. If McCain tried to do what you say, he did it very poorly.

Alex,
I think that presidents normally do not positively affect the economy (other than with tax cuts), but they can mess it up. The "lucky" point about Obama is that, even if he messes it up somewhat, the problems will be blamed on Bush and by 2012 the economy likely will be improving even if Obama initially messes it up.

Brian: Obama and his fellow liberals may be the beneficiary of very lucky timing.

Since you know that "conservative" economic principles are better for growth, any success that Obama may have will be strictly due to luck, right?

he may be stuck supporing them and being quickly labeled a liberal.

McCain and the RNC just spent hundreds of millions of dollars labeling Obama a liberal -- in fact the "most liberal" senator.

The result? Obama 53%, McCain 46%.

So maybe the word "liberal" has regained its normal meaning in the language, and the Republican spin no longer works.