I never understood why everyone jumped down John McCain’s throat for saying that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong.” It seemed like a self-evident truth.
But on Sunday, that optimistic message came from [Obama] economic adviser Christina Romer. When asked during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” if the fundamentals of the economy were sound, she replied: “Of course they are sound.” [MyWay]
Chalk it up to pure partisanship, I guess.
Barack Obama could read a string of fortune cookie messages and some people would come away thinking they’d heard the Gettysburg address.
He gave a great performance Tuesday. The speech itself, however, was a dud. So much skill operating on so lifeless a text. It was Vladimir Horowitz playing Chopsticks.
See here.
If Obama really did offer and Clinton did accept the position of Secretary of State, then Barack is dead to me.
Seeing as how my prediction for the Canadian election was pretty far off, I figured I’d give the American election a shot.
Obama: 349 - McCain: 189
Obama: 53% - McCain: 46%
They’re pretty much randomly chosen, though delibertately lower than many other predictions.
See here for Daniel Drezner’s prediction post.
Ilya Somin,
If Obama wins, he will have a strong Democratic majority in both houses of Congress to work with. This state of affairs is likely to lead to a significant expansion of government even in the best of times. However, now is clearly not the best of times. It is a time of economic crisis. And economic crises are also excellent opportunities to expand the powers of government - opportunities that politicians rarely let slip.
Obama’s ideological orientation also plays a role in my thinking. While I believe that his foremost objective is to get elected and reelected, I think he’s also an ideological big government liberal. His record in Congress and in Illinois reflect that. Obama might be willing to set aside ideology for the sake of political self-interest if the two conflict. But if he takes office at a time of crisis with large Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress, there won’t be any such conflict between political self-interest and his big government instincts. The two will in fact be mutually reinforcing. [The Volokh Conspiracy]
From the Reason symposium on Obama.
Bruce Bartlett,
Libertarians have to decide which is more important to them. But they must also consider that Congress will be overwhelmingly Democratic regardless of who wins the presidency. I think it is more likely that Obama will restrain Congress’s worst instincts, as the Clinton administration often did on issues such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, than that McCain will be able to do so with nothing but a veto pen. On balance, I think there’s a better chance that an Obama presidency will end up being preferable to a McCain presidency from a libertarian point of view. To put it another way, I prefer another Bill Clinton to another Gerald Ford.
Deirdre McCloskey,
Obama’s characteristic pose is listening. I’ve heard that when McCain works a room he finds out who is powerful and goes to them (”Excuse me, but there’s someone over there who matters more than you”), but Obama listens in an egalitarian way. Good on him. Remember, though, that we libertarian populists had similar hopes for Jimmy Carter, and we even thought Bill Clinton was listening.
Virginia Postrel,
The president’s power has a face, and Obama’s most fervent supporters believe he can repair the world with his face alone. Perhaps they’re right, at least for the first month or two. We can only hope that he will respect the multiplicity of American dreams and the unpredictable ways in which their pursuit provides the basis for a better future.
Jesse Walker,
Now the bad news. There’s a host of other broadcast regulations that Obama has not foresworn. In the worst-case scenario, they suggest a world where the FCC creates intrusive new rules by fiat, meddles more with the content of stations’ programs, and uses the pending extensions of broadband access as an opportunity to put its paws on the Internet. At a time when cultural production has been exploding, fueled by increasingly diverse and participatory new media, we would be stepping back toward the days when the broadcast media were a centralized and cozy public-private partnership.
It’s hard to imagine President Obama trying to bring back the fairness doctrine: Even if he’s prone to breaking his campaign promises, it’s just dumb to invite a fight with a big, noisy enemy that’s able to instantly mobilize an army of angry listeners. The real danger is more subtle and more mundane. It’s a bipartisan bureaucracy slowly, steadily increasing its power. [Reason]
David Henderson,
Obama emphasizes that he would cut taxes for people with incomes below $200,000. Interestingly, though, he would not cut any tax rates on ordinary income. Instead, he would grant various tax credits and phase them out as people’s income increases. This means, ironically, that although many people’s taxes would be lower under Obama, their marginal tax rates would be higher. Within the income range over which the tax credit phases out, for every additional dollar the person makes, he loses some of the credit, adding an additional tax rate on top of the statutory tax rate. This means that not just high-income people, but also many modest-income people, would have a reduced incentive to make income under the Obama tax plan.
While by free-market standards, McCain’s proposals are far superior to Obama’s, both have given away the store by voting earlier this month for central planning of financial markets. [Forbes]
Don Boudreaux:
Since telling Joe the Plumber of his wish to “spread the wealth around,” Barack Obama is being called a socialist. Is he one?
No. At least not in the classic sense of the term. “Socialism” originally meant government ownership of the major means of production and finance, such as land, coal mines, steel mills, automobile factories, and banks.
But what about a milder form of socialism? If reckoned as an attitude rather than a set of guidelines for running an economy, socialism might well describe Senator Obama’s economics. Anyone who speaks glibly of “spreading the wealth around” sees wealth not as resulting chiefly from individual effort, initiative, and risk-taking, but from great social forces beyond any private producer’s control….
Wealth, in this view, is produced principally by society. So society’s claim on it is at least as strong as that of any of the individuals in whose bank accounts it appears. More important, because wealth is produced mostly by society (rather than by individuals), taxing high-income earners more heavily will do little to reduce total wealth production. [Christian Science Monitor]
Economist Art Carden, continues the skepticism about Barack’s policies.
Both Senator Obama and Senator McCain have offered numerous proposals that are almost audacious in their economic illiteracy. As president, Senator Obama would do well to reexamine the economics of the changes he is proposing. Especially in a turbulent economy, many of his proposals exemplify exactly the kind of change we don’t need. [The Independent Institute]
Reason survey’s a large swath of people about their voting, past and present.
Brian Doherty
Who did you vote for in 2004 and 2000? I don’t vote, and don’t expect I ever shall. Being even one-scintillionth responsible for placing the unbelievable and unspeakable powers of the current U.S. government in the hands of any of the people seeking it strikes me as irresponsible in the extreme. Besides, as everyone knows, those who vote have no right to complain about the outcome.
Todd Zywicki has changed his mind about Obama:
Maybe I’m just slower at this than others, but it really took a long for it to sink in to me exactly how far left Obama really is. On every single issue that I am aware of, he seems to be at the far left end of the Democratic Party spectrum. I mean really out there.
I think that my slowness to really pick up on this was due to several factors. First, Obama’s demeanor is essentially moderate–he doesn’t come across as a Howard Dean crazy type. I think this leads one to assume his policies are moderate. Second, my resistance to McCain was really quite strong–I’ve criticized him here before, especially for the way it seems that he approaches problems. Third, until recently McCain has really run a terrible campaign in terms of explaining the differences between himself and Obama in terms of illustrating exactly how far left Obama is. Fourth, because of media bias, the media has tended to reinforce the idea that Obama is a moderate and not to highlight the embarrassing parts of his message.
Perhaps most fundamentally, given the history of the world over the past 25 years I think I just had assumed that no serious politician or thinker would in this day and age hold the sorts of views that Obama seems to hold. Raising taxes in a recession, protectionism, abolition of the secret ballot for union elections, big spending increases, nationalized health care, and most appallingly (to my mind) the potential reimposition of the “Fairness Doctrine”–I mean this is pretty serious stuff. And when combined with a Democratic Congress, I think we may be talking about (to use Thomas Sowell’s recent phrase) a “point of no return.” I guess I just assumed that Obama would be sort of Bill Clintonish–”the era of big government is over” and all that stuff. That he would have absorbed the basic insights of recent decades on taxes, trade, regulation, etc.
On Sunday Drudge was headlining that a radio interview from 2001 showed Obama favoring redistributing wealth via the court. However, as anyone who actually listened to the interview and took it in context could tell, it said no such things. The best commentary on Drudge’s ridiculousness comes from David Bernstein, someone not at all enamoured with Obama. He also makes a good point about the rhetoric surrounding this issue.
It’s true that most Americans, when asked by pollsters, think that it’s emphatically not the government’s job to redistribute wealth. But are people so stupid as to not recognize that when politicians talk about a “right to health care,” or “equalizing educational opportunities,” or “making the rich pay a fair share of taxes,” or “ensuring that all Americans have the means to go to college,” and so forth and so on, that they are advocating the redistribution of wealth? Is it okay for a politician to talk about the redistribution of wealth only so long as you don’t actually use phrases such as “redistribution” or “spreading the wealth,” in which case he suddenly becomes “socialist”? If so, then American political discourse, which I never thought to be especially elevated, is in even a worse state than I thought.
Richard Epstein explains the Obama he knows.
My Obama number is one. I know him through our association at the University of Chicago Law School and through mutual friends in the neighborhood. We have had one or two serious substantive discussions, and when I sent him e-mails from time to time in the early days of his Senate term, he always answered in a sensible and thoughtful fashion. And yet, for assessing the course of his likely presidency, I don’t know him at all.
It should come as no surprise that the traditionally liberal Hyde Park community is a veritable hotbed of support for Obama. So my manifest reluctance on his candidacy raises more than a single eyebrow: Loyalty for the home team counts.
The odd point is how his many learned and thoughtful supporters couch their endorsement. Almost without exception, they praise the man, not the program. Their claim is that Obama has proved himself to be a consummate politician who understands that the first principle of holding high office is to get reelected. His natural moderation in tone and demeanor, therefore, translate into getting advisers who know their substantive areas, and listening to them before making any rash moves. The dominant trope is that he will be a pragmatic president who will move in small increments toward the center, not in bold steps toward the left.
But is it all true? The short answer is that nobody knows. Virtually everyone who knows him recognizes that he plays his cards close to the vest, so that you can make your case to him without knowing whether it has registered. At this point, my fear is that the change in office will not lead to a change in his liberal voting record, as reinforced by a hyperactive Democratic platform. My great fear is that a landslide victory will give him solid majorities in both Houses of Congress, so that no stalling tactics by Republicans can slow down his legislative victory procession. At that point his innate pragmatism will line up with his strong left-of-center beliefs on issues that have thus far been muted during the campaign.
Put otherwise, Obama’s vague calls for change that “you can believe in” are, to my thinking, wholly retrograde in their implications. At heart, he is an unreconstructed New Dealer who can see, and articulate, both sides on every question–but only as a prelude to championing the old corporatist agenda with a vengeance.
Ilya Somin adds,
The danger of an Obama presidency is not so much the man himself as the political environment he is likely to have around him.
And earlier,
Obviously, nothing is certain. It could be that Obama’s agenda will be derailed by a massive political blunder on his part or by some unexpected event. It could be that the Republicans will somehow come back strong in the 2010 midterm elections. It could be that the economy will recover very quickly, curtailing Obama’s window of opportunity. I’m not certain that a major expansion of government will actually occur if Obama wins. But I do think it’s a strong possibility - certainly a greater than even chance.
I suppose he’d argue that he’s merely looking for honesty and commenting thusly. However it seems odd that he’s focusing on liberal talking points and not really addressing any falsehoods on the side of conservatives.
First he criticized Obama’s community organizing. Then defended Palin against being a creationist. Then he defended Palin’s “message” from God statement. Then he criticized Obama’s tax plan, twice. Then he defended religion and by association Palin’s evangelicalism. And most recently he defended McCain’s kindergarten sex-ed ad.
I see only two instances where he has spent any time criticizing McCain/Palin. Once on her general false stance on earmarks, which he promptly defended as “what one would expect of a governor” and that “her general style suggests the sort of politician who would be willing to fight, perhaps able to win, against a variety of entrenched interest groups.” Second he uncritically linked the open letter that made the rounds.
Now obviously Friedman is allowed to blog what he wants. Hell, he might even be correct in all of his criticisms, but I wonder why he has expended so much effort on one side of the issue. As a radical libertarian I would assume he finds little to like in either campaign, yet he seems to be focused more negatively on one side. Am I missing something?
I’d also like to focus on his most recent defense of what he calls ‘kiddie sex ed’. Friedman’s argument is basically this: the bill Obama voted for literally says “comprehensive sex education” and that ”K through 12 shall include instruction on the prevention of sexually transmitted infections, including the prevention, transmission and spread of HIV.”
Friedman does point out that “It’s true that the bill also says all instruction is to be age appropriate. Precisely how one provides age appropriate instruction in the prevention, transmission and spread of HIV to kindergartners has not, so far as I know, been explained by either the Obama campaign or anyone else.” Of course, an anonymous commenter promptly comes up with a logical and reasonable response:
Okay. That one is easy (you must not have experience with five year olds). “Children, when someone else is bleeding, don’t lick their blood, use it as finger paint, or touch the blood. You can get sick from touching other people’s blood sometimes.”
The commenter is wrong, Friedman does have experience with children–he has two. Of course they’re long past five, but nevertheless. I see absolutely nothing wrong with introducing such education at kindergarten. Obviously a long winded explanation of HIV is not going to be useful but, keeping in mind the “instruction is to be age appropriate” part that Friedman blithely dismisses, does not mean we can’t introduce public health concepts to young children.
Another commenter at Friedman’s blog points out another issue. Looking at the bill online shows the changes between the old and new bill that was voted upon. The commenter states: ”If this means what it seems to mean, then to vote for the bill is nothing more or less than to vote for the changes.”
If you look further down the bill, rather than merely skimming the top, you can see where the real changes happened. Specifically if you look at section 4 (and two lines up), lines 1-19 you can see exactly what Obama and his defenders are referring to:
33 Course material and instruction shall
34 teach pupils to not make unwanted physical and verbal-4- LRB093 05269 NHT 05359 b
1 sexual advances and how to say no to unwanted sexual
2 advances and shall include information about verbal,
3 physical, and visual sexual harassment, including without
4 limitation nonconsensual sexual advances, nonconsensual
5 physical sexual contact, and rape by an acquaintance. The
6 course material and instruction shall contain methods of
7 preventing sexual assault by an acquaintance, including
8 exercising good judgment and avoiding behavior that
9 impairs one’s judgment. The course material and
10 instruction shall emphasize personal accountability and
11 respect for others andPupils shall be taught that it is
12wrong to take advantage of or to exploit another person.
13The material and instructionshall also encourage youth
14 to resist negative peer pressure. The course material and
15 instruction shall inform pupils of the potential legal
16 consequences of sexual assault by an acquaintance.
17 Specifically, pupils shall be advised that it is unlawful
18 to touch an intimate part of another person as specified
19 in the Criminal Code of 1961.
Now obviously here you are going to run into the ‘age appropriate’ issue again, but there is no reason that a five year old can’t be taught about appropriate and inappropriate touching in a useful manner.
Thus, I think Friedman is completely and utterly wrong in defending the ad even if he says “I doubt Obama is in favor of explicit sex-ed for small children, which is what the McCain ad implies. But he did vote for the bill, and so is in a poor position to label a truthful description of what was in it as a lie.”
The problem, Dr. Friedman, is that it’s not a “truthful description”. It’s entirely possible to have a disgusting and wrong ad while quoting the wording accurately. If I take a random quote from the Old Testament describing god’s vengeance it might be an accurate ‘description’ but still a lie in regards to the overall message of the Bible. So no, the reporters have it right: the McCain ad is a lie.
I think commenter Joe best sums up Friedman’s recent psychology: “This contrarian game sometimes leads you off into the weeds.”
The American presidential race is officially a farce. John McCain is a spineless weasel and the right-wing needs to be bitch slapped.
My personal ideology is hard-core libertarian that is to say, a radical individualist. (Though David Friedman and Will Wilkinson have convinced me to question the Rothbardian deontological libertarianism and look more closely at the consequentialist approach, though I am too much of a utopian and don’t think I’ve come to the point of joining the “libertarian bargainer” position quite yet.) As Reason magazine sums it up aptly, I believe in Free Minds and Free Markets.
With this in mind, I have no particular love for either major American political party, both are ready and willing to increase and size and scope of government at a moment’s notice. Overall the Republicans are eager to control your life socially: marriage, homosexuality and the like. The Democrats on the other hand, are interested in controlling your economic lives through increased taxation and harmful regulation. Even with this distinction it’s not entirely accurate since both parties continue to regulate both aspects of modern life.
Nevertheless, I think that at this point with all of the lies and distortion that are being pumped out by the McCain campaign, especially about Sarah Palin, it’s time to abandon the Republican Titanic.
With the selection of Sarah Palin McCain’s true nature comes out as does the vile rhetoric of conservatives, especially the religious right. I actually don’t think Palin, when looked at in the abstract, is that bad a pick for vice president. As Radley Balko has said, “Palin is about the best libertarians could hope for from McCain.” I do like the idea that Palin is “outside the Beltway” and that she did take on some corruption. Additionally, Sarah Palin appears to be in support of jury nullification. She’s also basically likeable ignoring her policies (or lack thereof).
That said, the last two weeks have done more than enough for me to consider her and McCain dishonest and unworthy of support:
Obama, by far, is the superior candidate, especially intellectually, which is the most important thing to me. (Interestingly Canada’s election is being headed by three former academics.) There is, in my mind, only one conflict of interest. As Kevin Grier over at KPC has been hammering (here , here, and here) on about, gridlock is good for government. On the other hand, Alex Tabarrok makes a good case:
First, war. War is the antithesis of the libertarian philosophy of consent, voluntarism and trade.
I have no doubt that if Obama is elected there will be significant changes in the United States. Combine a Democratic White House with the Senate and House and there is bound to be a left-ward shift in economic policy-none of which will be in itself beneficial. Regardless I think getting out of Iraq and avoiding confrontation with Iran and Russia is important.
Having lived in Canada my whole life, I can say that a larger government does not mean the end of the world. I would argue that Canadians are nearly as free as Americans. Opening a business is simple, indeed according to the Heritage Foundation it takes only three days to start a business, compared to the United State’s six days. Additionally Canada ranks 7th in economic freedom by their rankings and the Fraser Institute ranks it 5th, tied with the United States. The two main shortfalls of Canada are a less rigidly enforced freedom of speech, though the constitution includes “freedom of expression” it lacks the clout of the First Amendment. Secondly, Canada’s health system fails many citizens despite being universal and tax funded.
Essentially, if the United States was to become somewhat more like Canada, it wouldn’t bother me that much. This is effectively what I see Barack Obama doing if elected. I see a shift towards universal healthcare (though more likely through tax funded health insurance rather than direct government run healthcare as in Canada and elsewhere) and an acceptance of homosexual marriage. I believe that Barack Obama, despite publically claiming otherwise, believes that homosexuals should have the right to marry, not just have civil unions.
But let’s be clear: I would much rather see a freer economy (less regulation, lower taxes, the end of corporate socialism, abolishing the death tax), the end to unjust wars and torture (Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, and perhaps even Afghanistan) and expanded personal freedom (marriage, sex and the drug-war). But I’m also realistic (cynical?) enough to realize that I’m not possibly going to get what I want. Thus I think taking a utilitarian and individualist approach requires me to give greater clout to the human death and destruction that the war in Iraq has caused and accept more economic regulation as a trade off.
I pray to Darwin that Obama wins and lives up to expectations.
Jimmy Carter called Barack Obama a “black boy” during a chat with Jim Lehrer.
JIMMY CARTER: Around the world. Around the world. And I think it already has sent a wave of approbation and admiration in many countries around the world, just knowing that this black boy who grew up with just a loving mother and grandparents — and that was about all he had to start with — does now have a chance to become the nominee of the Democratic Party for president.
Well.
Actually, Jimmy Carter said, in context, that Obama was once a black male child (”boy”) who had little has become one of the most important people in America.
This is not a great speech, and it is not a great delivery. Obama is unloading every catch-phrase that has been uttered at these conventions since Franklin Roosevelt. His arrogance punches you in the nose. And he is on the stage way too long. He will be appeal to many because of our times, but hopefully not enough.
Actually it was a great speech and it was possibly Obama’s best delivered speech to date. I much prefered his delivery tonight than at his A More Perfect Union speech.
The crowd is loving this Fighting Barack, but several times he’s seemed angry to the point of stridency.
I’m interested in seeing how it came across on TV.
It came across like a speech.
A fascinating night that gave us a peek at the fundamental contrast between these candidates. They both were very good, but in entirely different ways. Obama was relaxed, reflective, polished, and conversational—truer to the spirit of the event. McCain was energetic and forceful, but relied more on his favorite lines—treating it more like one of his townhall meetings (he had the advantage of an overwhelmingly friendly crowd). Obama was every bit the impressive, likable young man. McCain was the elder statesman telling his best stories. Obama was fluid and comfortable talking about his faith. McCain said the bare minimum about it. [Rich Lowry]
Meanwhile Michael Moynihan at Reason points (via Andrew Sullivan) to this article:
At the risk of heresy, let it be said that setting up the two presidential candidates for religious interrogation by an evangelical minister — no matter how beloved — is supremely wrong. It is also un-American.For the past several days, since mega-pastor Rick Warren interviewed Barack Obama and John McCain at his Saddleback Church, most political debate has focused on who won… The winner, of course, was Warren, who has managed to position himself as political arbiter in a nation founded on the separation of church and state. The loser was America…