Occam's Razor

Like many liberals, I am going through a painful disillusionment phase with Barack Obama. I am disheartened and saddened by his approach to governing since his reelection. I fear he is setting Democrats up for failure in 2014.

If there is one thing that unites Democrats it is a passion for the needs of the middle class and the poor. Since his reelection Barack Obama is showing signs that he is putting some nebulous legacy and quest to “get things done no matter what the odds” ahead of the best interests of the American people.

The most painful aspect has been Obama’s repeated declarations, most explicitly in his FY2014 budget, that he is prepared to scale back social security cost of living adjustments and increase Medicare payments in order to balance the budget. He says this will only happen if Republicans agree as part of a grand bargain to also raise taxes elsewhere.

Obama is way too smart a politician to not realize that social security is not contributing to the deficit. Indeed in most years it diminishes the deficit by putting its surpluses into the treasury. This proposed means of diminishing social security benefits is through a mechanism called “chained CPI” (consumer price index). Basically it would reduce inflation protections built into social security, on the assumption that people will reduce spending patterns when prices rise, for example going with ground beef instead of steaks. However, the elderly spend a disproportionate amount of their income on health care expenses, which has proven resistant to the “ground beef for steak” approach. Regardless, this would still amount to a cut in income generally compared with inflation for people who can least afford to take the hit. This means they will endure a reduction of standard of living, which is already pretty poor for many social security beneficiaries without pensions or high valued 401Ks. Worse, it would do nothing to control the deficit. Obama appears to be willing to balance the budget on the backs of those least able to afford it, and who contributed to their social security over the years based on certain assumptions which may well go by the wayside. It’s unfair and it is back stabbing.

As for Medicare, the president is proposing means testing, essentially requiring those at somewhat higher income levels to contribute more in the way of deductibles and copays when we use Medicare. There is no question that Medicare is a growing entitlement and there is enormous waste in the system. I am all for removing the waste in the system, which can be done by moving it from a fee-for-service model to an outcome-based payment model. As a driver of medical inflation, Medicare is a laggard not a leader, with significantly lower costs and inflation per enrollee than private health insurance. As for means testing, it is unfair because those who earn more have contributed more of their income over the years toward Medicare, effectively subsidizing the care for those at lower income levels. The tax is 1.45% of your income. Someone making $20,000 pays $290 a year in Medicare taxes. Someone at my income level pays closer to $1900 a year in Medicare taxes. The result of this proposed change would be to charge people like me more for the same benefits when we claim them after having already paid more by contributing more to the system during our working lives. It’s sort of like paying an income tax twice. It is fundamentally unfair.

To add insult to injury, yesterday the president signed into law changes to the STOCK act that essentially undid the work of the last Congress to provide better visibility into stocks owned by members of Congress and the Administration. This was a no-brainer for a supposedly progressive president: veto it.

Meanwhile, the former organization Obama for American has morphed into Organizing for Action, and the organization has been petitioning people like me to contribute to it, supposedly to help promote progressive causes. What is progressive about cutting social security benefits for people in a solvent system? Why would I contribute to an organization that works for a president who wants to do the exact opposite of what Vice President Joe Biden promised in the last campaign: not to cut social security benefits, not even by one dime? How do I get excited about sending them money when they want people to contribute more toward Medicare instead of removing the waste in the system?

The worst part is this could easily set up a repeat of the disastrous 2010 election, which brought in Tea Party members that have largely obstructed work from getting done. What drives people to the polls is motivation. Seniors, already disinclined to vote for Democrats, will be even gladder to vote for Republicans who promise not to cut their social security benefits, as even Paul Ryan has pledged. How do you excite the Democratic base to turn out when they are being asked to enthusiastically endorse an agenda that further stiffs it to the working class and seems more a product of Republican thinking than Democratic thinking?

To say the least all of this is disappointing, which amounts to leaving us Democrats dispirited, which gives us little incentive to vote or to get further engaged in politics, which is supposedly the whole purpose of Organizing for Action. But OFA is really about promoting the president’s agenda, not the people’s agenda. They no longer align.

I will support and vote for true Democrats who will fight for the working class, who will fight to ensure that everyone pays their fair share, including corporations that pay increasing fewer taxes every year. Once these under taxed groups have paid their taxes, then I will consider tax increases on the working class. I will not vote for Republican-lite candidates.

I hope Obama wakes up because he is making a fatal mistake not just to his legacy, but to his agenda and to the needs of Americans. The compromise he is chasing simply will not happen with the current Congress, which is good, because Republicans in Congress will put lower spending ahead of deficit reduction, as they have shown time and again. However, there is no reason to move our goalpost first when they won’t move their post at all. The mere act of moving proves not statesmanship but cowardice because it will show conciliation without affect. It also drains energy from progressives and makes us feel all our energy was for naught.

Democrats would be wise to estrange themselves from Obama and OFA. I know I am until he asks for contrition and puts the American people ahead of the concerns of the rich.

I love to give advice, even though if I am inconsistent in following my own advice. Recently after their losses in the latest election I gave some advice to Republicans. Today, I figure turnabout is fair play. Here is some advice for Democrats.

Democrats, it’s easy to assume that due to changing demographics that Republicans are in permanent decline and that in a few election cycles Congress will resemble itself during the 1960s and 1970s, when it was overwhelmingly Democratic. That may happen but if you think this will happen solely because of demographic changes, you are wrong. It may not happen at all.

Republicans still control the House, and a majority of governorships and state legislatures. In short, the party remains a huge and powerful political force. Even at the national level, Democratic control is fragile. Democratic control of the House remains elusive and made less likely by redistricting and the resulting highly gerrymandered districts. In the Senate, Democrats survived a very tough election and actually added a couple of seats to their majority. Our 55 seats include two independent senators caucusing with the Democrats. In 2014, Democrats will again be fighting headwinds as more Democrats run for reelection than Republicans.

Of course to really get things done in the Senate a party needs a supermajority, which is 60 seats. However, even when we have 60 seats, it is very easy for Democrats to split into factions. Democrats rarely show the sort of unanimity that Republicans do. The Affordable Care Act was a prime example, passing late and watered down, with certain senators in conservative leaning states (like Max Baucus) leveraging oversized influence and some senators (Joe Lieberman comes to mind) acting obnoxious and petulant. In retrospect, it’s amazing it was passed into law in even its watered down state.

The news is better on the presidential front. It used to be that by default Republicans were more likely to win presidential contests, due to various demographic and electoral vote advantages. Those days appear over. It is unlikely that any true conservative Republican (at least “conservative” in its modern and antediluvian form) can win for the foreseeable future. Of course, it all depends on who gets nominated, and arguably Democrats have nominated some stinkers with little national appeal including John Kerry, Walter Mondale and Michael Dukakis. In short, when choosing nominees Democrats can tend to be as highly-partisan as Republicans, choosing from their hearts instead of their heads. Choose someone without broad appeal and the party is likely to lose despite favorable demographics.

Looking at the 2012 election, two factors worked in the Democrats favor. First were the obvious demographic changes that are turning traditionally red states blue. I live in such a state (Virginia), but it is blue principally only in national elections. We have a Republican house and senate, and a Republican governor, and an attorney general on the right side of the Tea Party. Other states like Ohio, traditionally a swing state, have a similarly Republican disposition but are turning reliably blue in national elections. The most important reason that Democrats won this time is that they turned out the base. Democrats outnumber Republicans nationally, so they win when they turn out the base. They tend to lose, and lose badly, when they stay home. Independents tend to swing more toward voting Republican, so turning out the base is critical for maintaining and extending Democratic control. This means that selecting candidates on all levels that both excite the base but have mainstream appeal is critical for increasing Democratic power.

We may have a few cycles where Republicans will give Democrats a break. This is because Republicans have not really come to terms with their loss, which means finding a strategy appeals to moderates. At least at the moment, the critical mass of Republicans figure doing more of what lost them the last election, just with more sincerity, is how to get back into power. Perhaps after a couple more election drubbings they will figure it out.

Democrats have a tendency to settle into comfortable factions within the party. This is less of a concern than it used to be, as conservative Democrats are in decline and liberal Democrats are ascending. When this happens, Democrats can become as ideologically stubborn as Republicans. However, it tends to hurt them more than it does Republicans. One of these fault lines has traditionally been in the area of gun control. Thoughtful Democrats need to discern between issues that they can win on and those they cannot. The gun control debate cannot be won at the ballot box, at least not for a couple of generations. Consequently there is no point wasting energy advocating for such issues. It will only boomerang against Democrats, despite the fact that sensible gun control regulation probably makes complete logical sense.

Instead, Democrats need to concentrate on issues that appeal to both Democrats and Independents generally. Gay marriage is one of these issues where the national consensus has changed. Americans fundamentally agree with the notion of equality and fairness, at least under the law. Being the party of the workingman is never bad either. Democrats need to continue to advocate for people at the low and middle income levels, and target policies that help these groups. There is no downside to this. Democrats also need to avoid bad habits, like sucking up to Wall Street, which is almost always going to vote Republican, or at least for the party which panders to their selfish interests the most. That Wall Street almost invariably does better under Democratic administrations seems lost on them.

Democrats also need to advocate for policies that are in the best interest of people generally, not necessarily those that are in the best interest of their most vocal groups. A good example of this is public schools and support of teachers’ unions. Democrats should insist that every child deserves a high quality education, even if they cannot afford it. They should not assume that a dysfunctional public school system that puts the needs of teachers ahead of students is acceptable. The public school model is clearly under stress, particularly in poorer neighborhoods. Democrats should be open to charter schools particularly in districts where public schools are clearly below par. They should also advocate for policies that nurture healthy students so they have the capacity to learn. This may mean, for example, that three healthy meals a day are served at schools. The school may need to morph to be more than a center of education, but be thought of as a second home for students, whose parents likely aren’t working 9 to 5. They should advocate for safe public housing for poorer students, with residency contingent upon good behavior and for the upkeep of rental property. It should be obvious to Democrats that the real problem with education in poor areas is not substandard teachers (although certainly there are many of them) but are mostly due to environmental factors. These include the lack of affordable healthy food, and stressful families and neighborhoods. Republicans, of course, will choose to remain clueless of this reality, since their brains cannot seem to absorb that a multiplicity of factors affect ability to learn, not evil union-loving teachers.

In short Democrats, having power is not about living drunk on the privilege of power when you get it. It’s about refusing to be headstrong when you are granted power and keeping a relentless focus on improving the common good. Democrats have to earn their keep. When they get sloppy for too long, they will lose power. More importantly, much of the good they have done can be lost too, and that would be the true tragedy.

It’s a subtle thing but for many of us Democrats, a jarring thing. Republicans no longer seem to be able to call my party the Democratic Party. It’s the “Democrat Party”.

From my Washington Post today I learned that Republicans first called us the “Democrat Party” in 1976. I don’t recall it but slowly over the years it has picked up momentum. Now it’s like you can get kicked out of the Republican Party for calling our party its true name. You will never hear the term on Fox News.

Why do Republicans do it? I have two principle theories. The first is that since they abhor Democrats, saying “Democrat Party” it is jarring, and thus preferred. So it’s sort of like swearing. As I noted some time back, the purpose of swearing is to draw undue attention and emphasis. Four letter words are not just four letters for no good reason. It keeps it short, sweet and memorable because it is just one syllable. Democratic is four syllables, and that doesn’t roll off the tongue well for simple minded folk like Republicans. It must offend them that there are still three syllables in Democrat. So far at least they haven’t figured out a way to shorten it some more. Sometimes Democrats are called “Dems”, but I don’t hear Republicans use this much and it doesn’t sound particularly mean. Perhaps it will come over time. If it does it will probably get bastardized. Democratic Party, Democrat Party, Dems, maybe the Damns will be last, as in “that Dem Party, nothin’ but a bunch of god damns.” (Just a warning to Republicans: damn is a verb, not a noun. Oh wait, they don’t care.)

My other theory is that Republicans don’t understand elementary grammar. “Party” of course is a noun (at least in this usage), so “democratic” when it is used with party is an adjective; it must modify a noun. We are a party of Democrats, so we are the Democratic Party. A republic is a form of government with representational government. A party that believes in representational government would obviously be the Republican Party, not the Republic Party. This suggests that Democrats at least stayed awake in English class, while Republicans slept through it. Actually, this would explain a lot.

If Republicans truly believe in representative government, they have a strange way of showing it. Lately voter suppression is all the rage in red states. It’s not general voter suppression they are interested in, just suppressing votes from those who might disagree with their philosophy. So they keep adding burdensome and nitpicky hurdles to keep people of color or young people from voting. Their general intent is so obvious that yesterday a federal appeals court rejected Texas’s redistricting plan. The gerrymandering was so extreme that Texans did not even try to hide it. Texas Governor Rick Perry was proud of his plan.

“Republican” is just a label, of course. Curiously it can be used as both a noun and an adjective. The same is not true of democrat. However, Republicans don’t believe in representative government unless voters vote Republican. With voter suppression laws under the guise of cracking down on nonexistent voter fraud, they at least have a pretext for these laws. Sometimes they are more explicit. Some Republicans want to repeal the 17^th Amendment, which requires the people of a state to directly elect their senators. Previously they were appointed by state governments, typically by the legislature. The 17^th Amendment did not occur through happenstance. One of the major reasons the 17^th Amendment was adopted was because some state legislatures were corrupt. Senators tended to represent the interests of those who funded the campaigns of people who sought state offices, thus ensuring that even state issues were not represented in Congress. Some Republicans today want to go back to that system, as it is what the founding fathers envisioned. In other words, they would rather have special interests control the Senate than the people. This is hardly in the spirit of a republican government.

Democrats, on the other hand, strongly believe in the democratic principle, which is that we are all equal and we each have an equal right to vote. This wasn’t always the case. Democrats today are spiritually the Republicans of 1862, when Abraham Lincoln was elected. In the 19^th century, Democrats represented the wealthy industrialists in the northeast and land owning southern whites. It took many decades for the switch to happen. It began with the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt and likely ended in 1972 when George McGovern was nominated for president. Traditional southern Democrats realized that they were not Democrats and bolted for the Republican Party. Senator Zell Miller, an alleged Georgia Democrat, was probably the last one to leave. Miller gave a speech at the 2004 Republican National Convention sounding very much like the Republican he was. Today’s Democrats care very much about making sure that everyone who can vote can do so easily. It’s not that Democrats are not above a little gerrymandering too. Democrats in Maryland took their opportunity last year to make their state a little bluer, making some in the panhandle unhappy by combining their area with liberal Montgomery County. Unlike Texas, Maryland has no history of voter discrimination through gerrymandering.

Since Republicans seem intent to remain uncivil and call our party the Democrat Party, turnabout is fair play. I have been thinking of shortened versions of the Republican Party. We could simply call it the Republic Party, but that would suggest they actually believe in republican government, which clearly they do not. Since Republicans seem open to using any tactic, legal or illegal, to get their way, they remind me a lot of gangsters.

So I suggest Democrats brand them with a more appropriate moniker. Let’s call them the Rethuglican Party. At least it is accurate.

This is the year when because of the bad economy Republicans are supposed to be shoe-ins for election. When the president is floundering due to a bad economy and high unemployment (so the theory goes) the alternative, no matter how poor a choice, should coast to election.

Elections tend to be fickle events and often turn on last minute happenings. Still, when one projects the current state of politics forward to November, conventional wisdom seems likely to lose. If I were President Obama, I would not spend too much time worrying about his reelection. Instead, I would spend more time working to elect a Congress that will work with him during a second term. Trends suggest this election will resemble the Election of 1964. In that election, President Lyndon Johnson cruised to an easy election. (He assumed the presidency on the death of President Kennedy.) Democrats also picked up thirty-four House seats and two Senate seats.

Back in 1964, the Republican Party was about as confused a party as they are today. The conventional wisdom forty-eight years ago was that New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller would cruise to his party’s nomination. Rockefeller though had some Newt Gingrich in him. He was not the bombastic, bomb-throwing Republican like Newt. That dubious honor went to Senator Barry Goldwater (Arizona). Rockefeller was an establishment Republican. He spent much of his time as governor building highways, not fretting about cutting taxes. Rockefeller modeled Gingrich in that his personal life left much to be desired. In 1963, he divorced his wife and married a woman fifteen years his younger on the rebound. In the divorce settlement, his new wife’s ex-husband was granted custody of her children. This fed rumors of adultery, which became a serious liability for Rockefeller, and helped drive the candidacy of the bombastic Barry Goldwater.

For those pining for a true conservative, Goldwater more than delivered. He wanted a much more aggressive war in Vietnam than Johnson had delivered, and was fanatically anticommunist. His rhetoric suggested that preemptive use of nuclear weapons was okay, which greatly alarmed most Americans. Despite this, Goldwater was successful in achieving the nomination, in part due to Rockefeller’s marital missteps. He even narrowly won the California primary, which largely sealed his nomination. The contrast could hardly have been sharper in the 1964 election: a true conservative vs. a Texas Democrat who was part redneck but doggedly in favor of civil rights. Goldwater won only six states and accumulated only 52 electoral votes.

Contrast Rockefeller and Goldwater with the current field of Republican presidential candidates. No matter who is eventually nominated, they will be (to quote Mitt Romney) “severely conservative”, or at least be forced to run as one. With the possible exception of Mitt Romney, each is as at least as alarming as Barry Goldwater was in 1964. There is nothing the least bit moderate about any of them, at least judging by their rhetoric. Moreover, each carries “severe” baggage. Romney is the flip flopper to end all flip floppers, willing to say virtually anything for a vote. Gingrich has a history with Americans that conjures up nastiness and revulsion. Ron Paul wants to go back on the gold standard, favors a policy of isolationism, plus wants to cut the government roughly in half. Rick Santorum thinks birth control should not even be covered by insurance plans. This is borne out in polls where each candidate is polled against President Obama in a hypothetical election. Talking Points Memo keeps a list of these head to head matchups. In the best of them for Republicans, Obama leads Romney by seven points. If the election were held today, he would trounce Gingrich by thirteen points, Ron Paul by ten points and Santorum by seven points.

As I said, dynamics can change as the campaigns get underway. However, it’s already understood that Republicans are underwhelmed with their candidates this year. This is evidenced by substantially lower rates of participation by Republicans in primaries and caucuses to date compared with recent years. Unless their nominee can subsequently animate Republicans in a way they so far haven’t, this trend is likely to continue through the election, giving Democrats an enthusiasm advantage. Surprisingly, Democrats appear to be rallying behind Obama in this election, and their enthusiasm level seems quite high, in spite of the fact that Obama has governed the country more like a 1970s establishment Republican than a Democrat.

Of course, the biggest factor determining this election the state will be of the economy. It remains to be seen how it will play out, but the recovery seems to be becoming tangible to ordinary Americans at last, with the unemployment rate likely to be below eight percent in a month or two. This is a rate that is still too high, but the unemployment rate seems to be steadily dropping rather than holding steady. As a trend, it suggests whatever Obama is doing is working, at least belatedly. Independents would be hard-pressed to choose an unknown commodity over a known one that is delivering, particularly when the choice may affect their job prospects and bank balances.

Will all this good economic news make the public more forgiving toward their Congress? There is little evidence of this, with approval ratings of Congress hovering in the 10 to 13 percent range. What’s hard to figure out is how much of this disgust will translate into “throw my representative out of Congress too”. If so will it be bipartisan, or partisan? Given the likely higher enthusiasm from Democrats in this election, it seems likely that Democrats will benefit from these dynamics rather than Republicans. Republicans have two small factors in their favor: voter ID laws likely to reduce votes from minorities and completion of redistricting, making Republicans more likely to retain seats than lose them.

There are a lot of retiring Democratic senators this year, so Democrats will be fighting headwinds trying to retain their narrow control of the Senate. 2010 turned out to be a change election in favor of House Republicans. Two years though of a Tea Party dominated House have left most Americans infuriated with their obstructionism and unwillingness to compromise. Disapproval of Congress is today higher than it was prior to the 2010 election. Given that many Republicans are likely to sit out this election, it’s not unreasonable to think that Democrats will regain control of the House. I think the odds are at least 50/50 Democrats will succeed.

I do suspect that barring any great surprises that Obama will cruise to an easy reelection. This will be for no other reason that he is a defender of the status quo, and Americans like their Social Security and Medicare. The Senate is likelier than not to switch to Republican control, but only narrowly if it occurs. The means that Democrats can keep the Senate as bollixed up as Republicans have done. If I had to bet, I’d bet that Democrats will regain the House, marginally lose the Senate and retain the White House.

In the election’s aftermath, Republicans will have to look at the wreckage. The sober ones will have to ask how much of it was self-inflicted by moving even further to the right. As Barry Goldwater put it in the 1964 election, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” Maybe not, but extremism by nominees for a political party is likely to be a vote loser. After much moaning and groaning, this may open a welcome space for centrist Republicans again. They are likely to find plenty of independents that were reluctantly voting for Democrats only because there was no centrist Republicans.

What really distinguishes the United States from most other countries? For me, two things came to mind, and both are related. First, in America it seems to be much more about “me” rather than about “we”. That seems to be implicit with our notion of freedom, at least as Americans have come to understand it. Second, since it’s all about “me” and we see selfishness as a virtue, many of us have lost empathy for those not like us, if we ever acquired it at all. For many Americans, getting in touch with others not like us is dead last on our list of priorities. In fact, we are often openly hostile to the whole idea and want to bend policy on all levels to make sure this value permeates all government and society.

“Me” vs. “we” characterizes in two words our great and seemingly never-ending national political debate. As with most things, being exclusively “me” or exclusively “we” tends to be unworkable in the real world. Right now the “me” crowd is in control, at least in the House of Representatives but arguably in a majority of state houses as well. The “me” crowd are principally Republicans. The “we” crowd are principally Democrats. It seems that mostly neither side can understand where the other is coming from.

Political forces seem aligned to never allow one crowd to get into ascendancy for long. Arguably, the passage of the Affordable Care Act last year was a recent peak for the “we” crowd’s success in exercising its political power. Granted, for many of us it did not go far enough. Its passage, rather than settling the issue, had the effect of whipping the “me” crowd into a hornet’s nest of activity. To the “me” crowd, just about anything that the “we” crowd enacts into law amounts to socialism, because they see it as redistribution of wealth. (That the whole point of government is to redistribute wealth seems to escape them.) In their minds, any redistribution of wealth is socialism. Passage of the Affordable Care Act stirred up the “me” crowd, perhaps beyond expectations. It resulted in a near record eighty-seven new House Republicans in the 2010 election.

As Democrats discovered when they swept into power in 2008, controlling the reins of power is a heady experience that usually quickly leads to a reaction commensurate with the newly acquired power. It was swift in coming last November, not so much in Washington where Democrats still control the Senate and the White House, but in state capitals where Republicans found themselves with veto proof majorities. The tendency, particularly when your party is highly united, is to push your agenda through with all deliberate speed and to take no prisoners. (Democrats, perhaps because we have so many divergent opinions, frequently divide among themselves.) Therefore, being true to form, states like Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin overturned previous long-standing laws allowing public employees to collectively bargain. Republicans could have addressed just the issue in front of them (aligning taxes with public expenditures) and likely not have triggered any reaction. Instead, they went for the ideological “cure”. Collective bargaining for public employees became unlawful, not because it saved money, but because collectivism in any form sounded socialistic, and was “we” behavior rather than “me” behavior.

Arguably, too much “we” behavior can be dangerous and foolish too. We can see it being played out in the European debt crisis. In general, the more socialistic the state, the bigger the debt crisis was. However, the degree of socialism was just one contributing factor. The competence of government was also a major contributing factor. Arguably Germany is as socialistic, if not more so, than Greece and Spain who are struggling with debt. However, Germany also has a strong manufacturing sector whose growth makes their level of socialism affordable. Greece and Spain have suffered from poor economies for decades, and Greece in particular has been run by a succession of incompetent, if not corrupt governors.

The converse is true as well. Too much “me” behavior is dangerous and foolish. Republicans are quickly reaching a dangerous and foolish phase where ideology is substituting for critical thinking. As Ezra Klein pointed out recently, as bad as our deficit spending is, the long-term costs get worse if you are not regularly doing things like fixing our infrastructure. For example, it is much more costly to replacing bridges later compared to repairing them now. This is not a matter of ideology; it’s a matter of fact. Chopping government spending in an unintelligent fashion, as seems to be the rage in the House, is counterproductive. An intelligent response to our deficit would include raising taxes, particularly on those who can easily afford to contribute more, and cutting programs that are demonstrably inefficient or don’t solve the intended problem. It also involves looking at programs that are inefficient but necessary, like Medicare, and figuring out how to make them efficient.

If your philosophy is always “me first” then at some point you end up narcissistic, which means you become unconcerned or inured to the problems of others. The problem with narcissism is that it gives you a false perspective and feeds feelings of righteousness as well. “Me first” does not solve the problem of global warming. You can, of course, assert that it is not happening, which many “me first” types are happy to do. Perhaps even worse is to acknowledge it and simply not care. It’s kind of like a criminal saying, “I know I torched that house but, hey, it wasn’t my house.”

“Me first always” is a very dangerous ideology. It is like choosing to go through life wearing blinders. It’s like Mr. Magoo driving his car unaware of the pedestrians his Rolls Royce has run over. At its essence, “me first” either denies or discounts the connections between people and our environment. The opposite is true. Our connections mean everything. None of us would be alive had we not had concerned parents who nurtured us. None of us would have flourished without teachers, who connected with us as people so that we could learn to deal effectively with reality. It is little wonder then that the public is solidly behind teachers and other public employees in Wisconsin and elsewhere. If you have a “me first” view then you don’t care about people like firefighters or public school teachers. Whereas, if you are a typical parent who is trying to raise a child to adulthood, your child’s success depends on teachers. You can make the obvious connection between overcrowded classrooms and the probability of your child’s success in life. Teachers are not your enemy; they are your friends and provide a critical service. It is in your interest to see them succeed, so your child succeeds and thus to ensure teachers are treated decently by government. For a “me first” person like Governor Scott Walker, none of this matters.

The result is a predictable and surprisingly powerful blowback, which might make this latest Republican resurgence remarkably short-lived. The public is quickly rediscovering why they do not like Republicans. They see them as people enthralled with tearing things down, not building things up. They see them as people remarkably detached from the real world. They see them as people who are not only narcissistic, but sadistic as well, and even gleefully sadistic. Their sadistic tendencies are now on display all over the country. Most of the rest of us find it revolting. They are the antithesis of the Christian values so many of these Republicans claim to champion.

How we resolve these polarities, if we do it at all, will be telling. It will be interesting to see which polarized politicians, if any, will find the courage to move toward compromise rather than embrace the destruction of rigid adherence to ideology alone. For those that do, perhaps they can thank a teacher.

Last December, I wrote about how Republicans politically manipulate us. Political manipulation, of course, is hardly new. It is certainly not illegal, although the egregiousness of it lately from the Right, not to mention the many boldfaced lies by politicians and their surrogates like Fox News often makes it infuriating. I promised back then that I would offer my suggestions on how Democrats can change this dynamic. Here, at last, are my thoughts.

It is important for Democrats and Progressives to understand the dynamics of political campaigns and how it varies from governing. Campaigns are designed to win power. Governing is the wise execution of power, to the extent you can execute it within the political context. When voters elect large majorities favoring Republicans, such as occurred in the 2010 election, this happen for a variety of reasons. Issues certainly are a factor in votes and when the economy is doing badly and jobs are hard to get those in power can expect to get hammered. The Karl Roves though understand that election outcomes are a result of three primary factors: firing up the bases so they vote en masse, depressing the opposition’s base if possible (in some cases this results in electoral fraud, like making it difficult for minorities to vote) and finally swinging as many independents your way as possible. The one that matters the most is firing up your own base.

Independents being independent will tend to swing with the issues of the day. If you can’t get a job you will blame it on the bums in charge and vote for the opposition party. Republicans and Democrats will largely vote the party line. To win independents, framing the issue is important. Republicans are excellent at framing issues. “Obamacare”, a term they made up, is a one-word frame. When they mention “Obamacare”, in the same sentence they also mention the one thing about the law that raises the most dander: the requirement in the law to purchase health insurance. The idea is to focus one fact to the exclusion of everything else and blow it up disproportionately. It works. So to compete, Democrats need to find their own frame. I will have more on that in a bit.

Most elections will swing toward voter apathy, but Americans tend to vote more in presidential election years than in other election years. Regardless, our recent voting history is pretty dismal. Even in a presidential election year, roughly only half of eligible voters will vote. So those who win, as Republicans proved in the 2010 election, disproportionately vote in higher numbers than others. They are “fired up” about something. The Glenn Becks and Rush Limbaughs of the world play the role of evangelists to the faithful. Money flows, and in a typical year Republicans, having deeper pockets, will outspend Democrats.

Polarization thus fires up political bases. One of the reasons moderates have become so rare is that no one gets excited over a moderate. It is easier for a party to nominate a moderate if the opposition can be painted as extreme. These days though a party will prefer to choose someone from the extreme ends, if possible, in order to fire up the base.

In the 2008 election, Democrats were genuinely fired up principally between two candidates: Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The energy was with the Obama campaign because it excited the imagination of more Democrats. Plus, Obama was framed (truly or not) as a “transformational figure”. In 2008, voters had eight years of Bush-Cheney and found it very disagreeable. They wanted change. “Change” became Obama’s frame and it worked successfully not only energizing Democrats but also many Independents.

Picking the right candidate thus becomes crucial. Ideally it should be someone who will fire up the base but when election time rolls around can pivot toward the center and be seen as “sensible” by moderates and independents. Among potential Republican candidates in 2012, there are not many that fall into this category. Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty are the only two that I see that could realistically compete against Obama in 2012. There must be a compelling reason to oust an incumbent president. Polling suggests without some much worse economic news there likely will not be this animus. Romney and Pawlenty though just might have a chance.

Winning an election and governing are two completely different experiences, as Obama is finding out. This is where you need someone who can pivot toward the center and pull his party with him. It annoys progressives like me when this means we get a less than perfect health care bill like the Affordable Care Act. However, unless a party has overwhelming majorities in Congress you will never get the “ideal” solution implemented into law. House Republicans are going to discover this unfortunate reality in March when the current continuing resolution funding the federal government expires. A federal government shutdown in March, likely lasting some weeks, is very likely if not inevitable. It will probably take senior citizens not getting their social security checks to prod these Republican purists toward some pragmatism and middle ground. The longer Republicans obstruct, the greater the political price they will pay. At the moment, they do not understand this, and that includes Newt Gingrich who should know better. Democrats can use this blindness to their advantage.

Political success thus comes from firing up the base for the elections to win more political power, then convincing the base to accept half a loaf when governing actually starts. Whichever political party does this best ultimately has the most political clout. With a few exceptions, like Franklin Roosevelt’s overwhelmingly Democratic congress, political compromise is necessary and must happen. Even in Roosevelt’s case, while Congress was aligned with him, the Supreme Court was not. There will always be opposition.

What is remarkable about Obama’s first two years in office was how much he and the Democratic congress actually accomplished. This was a feat not seen for decades. It drew the expected political opposition, and drove much of the animus that occurred in the last election. In 2008, voters wanted change. Obama and the Democrats largely delivered and in the process paid a price.

What frame or frames should Democrats use in 2012? Republicans know the secret: it must be a KISS (Keep it Simple, Stupid) frame. Here is the frame that I would use: Republican Recklessness. Republicans want radical and reckless changes to our system of government. America, however, is a moderate country. So vote Democratic to protect our safety net and to keep reasonable people in charge.

Democrats can point to successes, and there have been many. The Affordable Care Act is noteworthy, but probably not something to highlight right now. One can point to the way the Obama Administration is winding down costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, how Democrats kept the economy from collapsing (bailing out GM, Ford and other major companies were successes, saving thousands of jobs), ensured that the jobless received benefits during a dramatic economic downturn, and kept a basic floor under the people of this country during a very rough time. It should not be much harder than that. There are so many examples of reckless policies from the Republicans it is hard to know where to begin, but obviously highlighting their proposed cuts to Social Security are on the table. Democrats should be a little fearless for a change and say Republicans plan to decimate Social Security and Medicare. The evidence is all around. Americans won’t need much convincing.

That’s how to win in 2012 or at least break Republican gains. Democrats should be able to pick up seats in the House, but holding on to the Senate will still be tough. But it’s a frame that can win, and the underlying truth of it will be hard for any sober person to disagree with.

President Obama gave a pretty good state of the union speech on Tuesday. He ended it with the usual rhetorical flourish that speaks more to our aspirations than to reality. He closed with:

We do big things. The idea of America endures. Our destiny remains our choice. And tonight, more than two centuries later, it’s because of our people that our future is hopeful, our journey goes forward, and the state of our union is strong.

I won’t be running for president so there is no chance that I will be giving a state of the union speech. However, if I were to give one it would read in part a lot like this:

Thank you very much. As you know it is my duty as president to annually report on the state of the union. Unfortunately, I have to report that the state of our union is fractious. At no time since the Civil War have we been so divided as a nation. Extremes on both sides of the aisle are pulling us apart as a country. This extreme polarity as well as refusal on both sides to move toward meaningful compromise are undermining our national security, economic growth and put our nationhood at jeopardy.

Barry Goldwater once famously said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” Goldwater was dead wrong. Our liberty is only sustained through finding and expanding our common ground. It happens by moving toward consensus rather than confrontation. At this critical time, true patriotism will be measured in our ability to come to consensus and make painful but necessary choices that one Congress and White House after another has punted.

We cannot undo these past damages, but we can move toward a sustainable and prosperous future for our country. Finger pointing no longer serves any national purpose. None of us here are blameless. We all contributed to our national problems. It includes me, Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi and new Speaker John Boehner. Many of us followed what we believed was the right and sustainable path. Sometimes an individual policy we advocated may have been right for the nation. However, if it is not congruent with our national needs it is still wrong. What can be said is that, in the aggregate, we were all wrong and have been mostly going in the wrong direction for decades.

For example, taking care of our senior citizens in retirement is a worthy national endeavor, but only if programs for them like Social Security and Medicare are put on a sound footing and are soberly and competently administered. It is scandalous that both Democrats and Republicans allowed Medicare costs to expand without addressing its inefficiencies and creating a plan to keep it solvent. Similarly, it is scandalous that both Democrats and Republicans allowed the last Administration to lead us into a war based on false pretenses. It was scandalous to offer tax cuts without offsetting these tax cuts with reductions in government services. My administration, previous administrations and previous Congresses failed to competently manage and govern our own country. Time and time again we put short-term thinking and ideology ahead of the national interest.

These are facts beyond any reasonable dispute. The evidence is overwhelming and can be found in record numbers of mortgage defaults, our bloated budget deficits, the high unemployment, the growing ranks of our homeless, our obesity epidemic and a fouled environment. By virtually any metric that you can use, our government has failed our job as national stewards. We, its leaders, have failed America.

The state of our union is fractious at best and alarming at worse. Now we must right-size our government so that it meets the needs of our nation. We need a new national strategy and we need sound tactics that align with our national strategy. Our strategy requires clear national goals, and both parties must agree on these national goals.

I offer six goals. Our most immediate challenge is not the budget deficit, as wrenching as it is in scope and size. It is to break the back of unemployment in this country, which has been dangerously high. In breaking the back of unemployment, we must do it in a way that creates good jobs that will restore our fading middle class. We don’t want to restore it by putting talented people to work flipping burgers or sweeping floors. Prosperity drives everything and makes anything possible. We can do this today by continuing to invest in common sense infrastructure projects, all of which will aid our current and future prosperity. To facilitate that our infrastructure investments are made wisely, we need an independent commission that places our money in investments that will create an improved infrastructure in the most productive ways possible.

That is our short-term goal and it should be easy for us all to agree on. However, infrastructure does not just happen. It will take money, and if we cannot agree on something simple like raising taxes on the rich to levels that were in effect in the Clinton administration, then we must keep borrowing the money. Projects that promote short-term employment and are most needed to improve our infrastructure should get the highest priority.

Our long-term goals should also not be controversial. I propose five long-term goals, in priority:

1. Ending the extreme partisanship in this country
2. Fix the federal government’s deficit spending
3. Living in a sustainable way
4. Making the United States the 21^st century leader for new technologies and services
5. Ensuring that all Americans receive quality health care

First, partisanship. Partisanship is not necessarily bad. However, our partisanship has reached extreme and dangerous levels. This did not happen by accident. It happened because we permit gerrymandering of our legislative districts where partisan interests are unduly represented and the interests of moderates were squeezed out. To solve this problem, Congress must pass and the states must ratify a constitutional amendment requiring all states to draw federal congressional districts in a politically impartial manner to be overseen by our federal judiciary.

Our government’s deficit spending has reached dangerous levels. We do not want America’s future to be like Greece’s present. To achieve fiscal solvency, a number of unpopular things must be done. Entitlements like Medicare must either have self-funding mechanisms in place or be limited to a percent of GDP or the federal budget by law. Both must be governed by independent and impartial commissions empowered to make changes to the system to ensure their viability. Medicare spending, for example, could be limited to twenty percent of federal expenditures or require premium increases annually to ensure that it remains solvent. Do these things and most of our other federal financial problems will take care of themselves.

America’s failure to live in a sustainable way increases the likelihood of war and suffering at levels so extreme they are hard to imagine, but are frighteningly real. Climate change and population growth are already causing wars, unrest and mass migration. It contributed to unrest in Tunisia. We must find a way to cap our population growth and live sustainably with nature. Our failure to get our environmental act together inside our country and with the rest of the world ultimately dooms not just our country but also our species. It will change life irretrievably here in our sacred home, the Earth. However, if we succeed we will do so by developing many of the products the world needs so that it too can live sustainably. Being green is not just good for the planet, it is good for our prosperity and it helps mitigate future wars and immense suffering.

To prosper, we must out innovate the rest of the world. Our prosperity rests in nurturing our human capital. Not only do we want to create business environments to allow companies like Google and Apple to flourish, we want to make sure that our children receive a first class education so when it is their time they can out innovate the rest of the world in the future. This cannot happen when we won’t pay teachers salaries that correspond to their importance to our nation, or when school districts in states like Oregon cannot afford to put their children in public schools five days a week.

Lastly, but certainly not least, we must make health care available and affordable to all, not just to those who can afford it. America cannot flourish unless we are healthy. There are plenty of examples in other countries of national health care systems that work. Some align very well with the American way. Japan’s health care system, for example, offers enormous competition at very reasonable prices. Let’s let an independent commission tell us which of these many plans will work best here in the United States, then let’s move aggressively forward to make it happen in our nation.

I am offering six steps toward a prosperous and sustainable future for our country. I need each of you to work in the common national interest. If you do so, you and this Congress will be forever revered in our national history.

Thank you and good night.

Michael Bloomberg for President? The mayor of New York City is making noises like he may be running for president. Anyhow, so suggests Washington Post columnist Dan Balz in today’s paper, quoting the $18 billion three-term mayor of the Big Apple from various recent speeches. One thing is for sure: it’s hard to pin Bloomberg down to a political party or ideology. He used to be a Democrat, found it convenient to run for mayor as a Republican, then when he last ran for mayor decided he was an Independent. No question about it: it helps to be a billionaire. A month before he was reelected to a third term (for which he had to cajole the City Council to amend the city’s charter), he had spent $63 million on his campaign, drowning out his closest opposition sixteen to one. In a Democratic city, he won grudging respect from the governed. His approval ratings hovered in the sixties for a long time and are now in the mid forties. For a politician these days, those are good numbers

As a partisan Democrat, I have a grudging respect for the guy. Good: he supports same sex marriage and gun control, although I suspect the latter just within his city. He raised taxes in 2003 and as a result steadied the city’s precarious financial position. He believes in immigration reform and is generally pro-environmental. Not so good: he thinks us lefties are, well, kind of weird. He’s convinced we think that only more government will solve problems when we really want government to do the people’s business when other means clearly don’t work. He does not want to decriminalize marijuana although he admits to having used it (and enjoyed it). He considers himself a fiscal conservative, although he is not the kind that Grover Norquist would recognize. He supported the War in Iraq. He is not exactly anti-development and has taken the side of developers over preservationists. In 2004, this very smart man endorsed George W. Bush for his second term at the Republican National Convention. He must have been smoking that stuff he does not want to decriminalize.

Will Bloomberg run for president in 2012? An astute businessman, Balz suggests he won’t unless he is convinced that the polls suggest it is viable. History would be stacked against him. Arguably, Ross Perot’s run as an independent in 1992 put Bill Clinton in the Oval Office. Still, these are unique times. The country is deeply divided but there remains an independent middle deeply disgusted with both parties. If this group can constitute a critical mass that is greater than the mass of partisan Republicans and Democrats, Bloomberg could win. With $18 billion, he can self finance a national campaign.

I sometimes wonder if those of us who are partisan are just as sick of the partisanship as the rest of the country. I cannot be alone. I am deeply scared for our country. President Obama’s most recent attempt to tack toward the middle has left me very troubled. Yet, I am not sure if I were in his shoes that I could have done anything differently. The current political dynamics stink and the only way to move even a very modest agenda seems to require dances with the devil. I guess I should not be surprised that Republicans will put tax cuts over deficit reduction. It is just crazy insane to borrow hundreds of billions of dollars to finance tax cuts to multimillionaires who not only don’t need it but cannot even think of ways to spend it. Republican audacity simply knows no limits.

Our country desperately needs a few things that seem likely to elude us. We need to be one united states again, instead of the sectarian divided states that we clearly are. We need politicians to behave reasonably, not to be rewarded for ever more virulent and extreme positions. Instead, we have the irresistible force colliding with the immovable object. All that generates is great destruction, destruction that achieves the aims of neither the left, nor the right, nor the middle but likely will make the Chinese happy.

For me this is Bloomberg’s appeal. We already have a Congress overwhelmingly white and wealthy, but we don’t have a whole lot of people in Congress who can act rationally. This is because no matter what side you are on, you don’t get there unless you echo the party line. President Obama’s latest capitulation to Republicans is a case in point. Democrats, at least House Democrats, are outraged and rightly feel they have been betrayed. Obama can stalk the center, but he is going to find it a lonely spot. It may sway independents and maybe even get him reelected, but it won’t grow the center. What’s the point of having a second term if it will be one where he is continuously hamstrung and where little of any real benefit results? Instead, Obama will become an even larger piñata, with Democrats taking swings at him as well as Republicans.

Bloomberg doesn’t come with that baggage. Is he a Republican, Democrat or Independent? Does it matter? No, because neither side will find a reason to like him and will only feel threatened by his candidacy, should he run. Bloomberg’s credentials as mayor, his pragmatism, his fearlessness to tell things and they are, and (let’s face it) his great wealth that gives him the means to do so, are compelling credentials, just the sort of stuff we need. Which is why, although I am a partisan Democrat, I might have to vote for him. Why? Because our national situation is so bad that whether the president is Republican or Democrat, their political affiliation would only fan the flames of further national dysfunction. To get beyond it, the first step may be an independent mediator in the form of an independent presidential candidate with the right credentials, the right attitude, and the money to challenge all the political parties and the entrenched special interests out there. Bloomberg’s got all these things.

If I were to give Bloomberg advice, it would be not to run as an Independent, but to run under the Coffee Party banner. The Coffee Party is arguably not a real party, but it could become one quickly enough. The Coffee Party is simply a bunch of moderate and reasonable people, with a slightly leftward bent, sick of excessive partisanship and incivility by both parties. They believe we can rise beyond our partisanship and ideology and just be reasonable. Like Michael Bloomberg has demonstrated as mayor.

It’s not widely know, but Abraham Lincoln was the first Republican president. The Republican Party coalesced around the old American Whig and other parties after the Whigs disintegrated. They were the counterpoint to the Democratic Party, which in its day was unmistakable from today’s Republican Party. Abraham Lincoln himself was a Whig for most of his life. The time for a party of moderates may be rising. The time for deeply polarizing Democratic and Republican parties may be waning.

I am convinced that pragmatic and moderate people are the majority in this country; they are just not heard. Bloomberg, affiliated and running under a Coffee Party might sweep not only himself into office, but throw out both Republicans and Democrats from Congress. Moderate Americans just need a viable alternative and need to rise up en masse. Right now, they don’t have a party which is viably centrist. It’s either the devil they know or the devil they don’t.

If such a party were viable and if Bloomberg were associated with it, I might switch. More than anything else, we must govern in a civil and reasonable fashion again. Continuing down our current path yields disunity and a rapid descent into second world status. As a patriot, I cannot stand for it.

Polls, polls. There are so many of them out there at the moment and most of them trying to figure out how us voters will vote on November 2^nd. Here’s what I’ve gleaned from them: voters are frustrated and feel Washington is disconnected from their lives. They are mad as hell and ready to vote their incumbent out of office. They don’t approve of Democrats in Congress, but like Republicans in Congress even less. They are lukewarm at best about President Obama, but as least his approval numbers tend to hover in the forties, which is good for this toxic political environment. If the election were held today, Republicans would retake the House but probably not the Senate, but regardless of who wins, the voters don’t expect a whole lot to change. In addition, a sizeable number of us must have been smoking something because one in five of us actually believe President Obama is a secret Muslim.

Frustration is understandable. Voters voted for change, but they don’t much like the change they got, not that they liked what they had before either. And speaking of change, many of them are living on it, and food stamps, and extended unemployment benefits and maybe living in their parents’ basement. The job market is a depressing mess and those jobs that are available tend to pay a lot less than the ones lost.

Everyone wants relief from their misery, to know that real prosperity is ahead and that we can go back to living comfortable and predictable lives again. If anything in the Republican pitch is resonating, it is the vision of the white clapboard house with the picket fence and a flower garden in the front. Also, it sure would be nice to have our homes worth something close to what we paid for it, and to see our 401-K’s recover.

We can certainly wish for these things, but to expect them to all materialize rapidly is ludicrous. Unemployment is but a symptom of our real problem: a government and society still vastly overleveraged. Republicans can rail against the perceived socialist Democrats. Democrats can hiss back at Republicans for putting us deeply into debt and creating costly and unnecessary wars. All that hatred and vitriol though accomplishes nothing, which is why the anger that will be expressed on November 2^nd will not bring relief. We all seem to understand that we can change the cast of players in Congress and the White House, but the relief we crave for is not going to magically appear. We face problems that no ideology can fix and no quick political voodoo can solve. Collectively, the nation is grieving, wailing for a time that is lost and not likely to come again, at least not anytime very soon.

With rare exceptions, politicians cannot be elected by telling us the truth. They tell us what we want to hear, and wrap their narrative around all sorts of other villains, most of them props. Yet, now of all times we must hear the truth, the truth that we know in are hearts. In case you are not listening to yours in the quiet of the night, here’s what it is saying. I can’t take credit for it. It was articulated by Walt Kelly many decades ago in the comic strip Pogo.

America, it’s time for some very strong coffee and to face some uncomfortable facts. First, we live in a democratic republic. Like it or not, we created this mess not that other guy. We created it by voting in people who told us what we wanted to hear. We also created it by tolerating a government that worked for the special interests, instead of demanding one that worked for us. Most of us selfishly tuned out our civics lessons. Instead, we grew fat, tone deaf and apathetic. Don’t care, can’t make any difference, so why bother? Still, for better or worse, it’s our government. We own it. We are all stockholders and the board of directors is out of control. We can’t all emigrate so we have to sober up and fix it.

It’s not the Democrats that need to fix it, nor the Republicans, nor the Independents, nor the Kiwanis Club of Passaic, New Jersey. We need to fix it. We need to fix it together. To fix things, no one is going to get what they want. We are going to have to reach that hardest of places here in American government: consensus. And it is going to be painful. Yeah, I know it’s already painful and you want the pain to go away, but to get to that promised land is going to require more pain. It will require years of pain at best, decades at worst. We have to undo a whole lot of self-inflicted damage and fundamentally change our orientation. Moreover, the stakes could not be higher. If we do not, we are facing the likely bankruptcy and eventual dissolution of the United States. I may have more on that in a later post.

America, we need to so sober up quickly, stop the incessant finger pointing and get busy. Republicans, to get to consensus, you must accept that America will not be the libertarian, Christian, largely white, God-fearing, ultra low tax utopia that you want it to be. By the way, it never was, and never will be. Democrats, America will never be the liberal, gun-free, vegetarian, eco-friendly, blissfully multicultural Birkenstock wearing utopia you want it to be. Independents: no party has a solution that is going to make you happy. The middle ground may not be ideal but if we want to actually solve some of our problems rather than find ourselves a second-class country, it’s a place we all have to get to again.

You get to the middle through this forgotten process called achieving consensus, or, failing that, compromise. We do it all the time in the business world. Not a week goes by where I work where some dispute does not comes up. My team and I do what we have learned to do: we talk an issue through, realizing that while we don’t always agree with each other, we respect each other enough to come to consensus. It’s sort of like therapy. Why should it be anathema for our political parties to do something as civil as I do at least once a week?

Take a deep breath because here’s a sample of what compromise will mean. For liberals this will mean some constraints on entitlements. It may mean something like Medicare costs cannot grow faster than the cost of living in general or a requirement to not allow Medicare costs to exceed a portion of the budget. It will mean that when we find some new medical problem we will not immediately be able to throw money at it, at least not without taking it from somewhere else out. For conservatives, it means that health care vouchers are out. We will mend the Medicare and Medicaid systems we have and make them the best we can with the money we can afford to invest in them, and they won’t be run by the private sector. Yeah, I know these ideas give both liberals and conservatives hives. Grow up.

We all need to suck it in because we are all in this together. We should not take anything off the table, not set any condition that will make us hide in our corners and pout. I was disappointed in President Obama recently when he suggested that the Bush tax cuts for the middle class should never be rescinded, even while he promoted restoring them for the rich. (It is true that when he set up the deficit commission he said everything was on the table, including potential tax increases should the commission recommend them. But that was then, not now.) While increasing taxes on the middle class may not be a good idea in a recession, any prudent stewards of the country would have to agree that in normal times taxes can at least be where they were when President Clinton was in office. We managed just fine, had terrific prosperity and even had a couple years of surpluses. Congress even had pay go rules which basically said you had to either raise taxes or cut something else if you want to propose a new program. Unfortunately, since Clinton left office the public debt has increased by at least half again (more than five trillion dollars). Our goal is not just a balanced budget, but paying down our debt. It means moving prudently and deliberately toward a balanced budget. That is but the first step. It also means paying back principle on our debt as well as interest on it, so our debt load decreases over time. What this really means in essence (steel yourself) is paying more in taxes and probably getting less.

So no one feels singled out, the pain must be spread evenly, and that’s where it will get even harder because we excel at creating tax policies where someone else gets the short end of the stick. It could be something simple like raising the tax rates five percent for everyone. Yes, this will mean a lower standard of living for us in the short run. However, it will also mean that we will be paying down our debt and our grandchildren will not inherit such an onerous debt.

Maybe there is someone in Congress brave enough to tell us the truth. There is at least one columnist. I know I would vote for such a brave politician. No more crying; no more whining. We made our fiscal mess and we must clean it up. If you ask me, anyone who stakes out an ideological position not to do so is unpatriotic at best, and a traitor at worst. This is our country. We are one United States or divided we will fall. We will not grow our way out of this problem. This problem will not ease until the burden of our national debt starts to lift from our collective shoulders.

In about two months, citizens will go to their polling station and choose their elected officials. God help us, because no matter which way we are likely to vote nationally, we’re going to be screwing ourselves and our nation.

If the election were held today, it looks likely that Republicans would retake the House, but the outcome is much less certain in the Senate. There is some possibility that Democrats will retain both houses of Congress, but even in that event Democrats will be trying to govern with much smaller majorities. Regardless of who wins, Barack Obama will still be our president. This means the only possible outcome is more dysfunction between branches of government, exacerbating the sorts of tactics that Americans are already sick of.

Polls show that voters don’t like either Democrats or Republicans and pine for this idealistic notion that both parties will somehow put nation above party. As if. Instead, they have to vote from the slate of candidates they got. The dynamics suggest that in about ten percent of the House races (a remarkably high number) voters will vote their local bum out and vote in the bum from the other party.

Sweeping your current bum or bums out of office may give the illusion of changing the dynamics, but it will not. Partisanship will only increase, if that is possible. So if you think you are already frustrated with government now, just wait until you vote your passions and elect a newer even more highly partisan set of into office. I’m afraid Extra Strength Tylenol won’t cure this headache.

Only one part of the Republican agenda is clear: they will spend most of their time until the 2012 elections investigating the Obama Administration at length for alleged malfeasance. It will definitely take some digging because so far, the Obama Administration has been remarkably scandal free. At least Republicans will know what scandal looks like, because they are experts at it. Whether malfeasance actually exists or not is beside the point. One of the few powers Congress can wield in this environment will be the power of investigation so all that is needed is the possibility of malfeasance. So instead of just bottling up appointees and judicial nominations, Republicans will likely bollix up the rest of government as well, ensuring little actual governing is done. This will, of course, give them something to run on in 2012: can’t you see how little Democrats accomplished?

The other power Congress holds is, of course, the power of the purse. With an expected influx of Tea Party activists, expect that a sizeable minority of Republicans simply won’t vote for anything that resembles spending. If you want a preview, simply look to California where its dysfunctional system requires two thirds of both houses to pass a budget. While that is not true in Congress, in the Senate either party can effectively hold the other party hostage unless one side can cobble together sixty votes. The House though may start to envy the Senate. Pity orange-skinned speaker-in-waiting John Boehner. He will have the impossible task of trying to govern House Republicans, a sizable minority of whom won’t allow themselves to be swayed on any issue. After all, they will have gotten into Congress on a platform of no compromises anytime, anywhere.

Yet spending bills must be passed at some point, right? In California, the answer is “no” as long as Republicans stayed united. The ensuing mess led to massive cuts and layoffs, leaving California a largely dysfunctional state and, not coincidentally, with one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. I suspect that we will see a repeat of the budget showdown of 1995, which furloughed millions of federal workers and left most agencies, except the few that had an appropriation, mothballed. This time though, emboldened with fresh Tea Party members, it is likely that House Republicans simply won’t give in at all. The Senate is likely to be more reasonable, but it’s unlikely an acceptable spending bill will emerge from conference that either the House or the Senate will endorse.

Even if one emerges, can it sustain a presidential veto since in all likelihood such a budget will extend or expand tax cuts for the rich while decimating social spending? The answer is already clear (no), but if dealing with the budget were not enough, there are other recent laws, such as the health care reform law, that Republicans are chomping at the bit to repeal. They ultimately won’t go anywhere either during this presidency, but it will engender a lot of negative energy and hot air.

I expect that unstoppable force is going to meet immovable object. The result will not be pretty and will sour voters even more on government. Congress may look at its current dismal approval ratings as the good old days.

Is there good news in all this? Yes. The good news is that the issues animating voters to the polls this year, our less than stellar economy, is likely to finally recede in voters mind in 2011 and 2012 as our slow recovery is actually felt by the working class, albeit in fits and starts. The economy won’t be quite what it was, but we are likely to see the unemployment rate recede to more politically acceptable levels. Both sides will of course claim credit for it while castigating the other side that the economy isn’t doing better. Voters will get to sort it all out again in 2012.

The surest path to returning a Republican to the Oval Office in 2012 is of course to bet against our recovery, which is why disingenuous Republicans will be doing just that. They will secretly welcome high unemployment and exploding deficits, because it undermines the Obama Administration. In short, there is little upside for Republicans to improve the economy, deficits and the employment picture, particularly if it vindicates the unpopular but necessary long-term strategies Democrats and the Obama Administration have been fostering to achieve long-term growth.

I wish there was an island I could go somewhere until it all blows over in 2012. Meanwhile, I fear for our republic. Governing requires compromise and there will be none of it until 2013 at the earliest. My only question is who will ultimately be held responsible for the ensuing mess? The Republicans of course hope it will be Democrats and the Obama Administration, but if 1995 is any guide having the ability to govern but refusing to do so sours voters’ opinions of you, particularly when social security checks don’t arrive on time. In short, obstinacy is an effective short-term strategy, but a poor long-term strategy for staying in power. Say what you like about the Democrats, but at least they governed, despite near unanimous Republican opposition.

Consequently, any electoral gains Republicans make in this year’s election are likely to recede in 2012.