There is one, abbreviated trading day left in 2012, and the question of the moment is what will happen tomorrow with the financial markets. The negotiations with the fiscal cliff have not gone well, so there is doubt now both for the immediate term (what will happen in the remainder of the lame duck session, which ends January 3) and for the short term (the two weeks or so following)--particularly, if there is no substantial agreement and the tax bite happens with initial 2013 paychecks to Americans. There will be a virulent public reaction if that happens, and the deal will get done.
Most of what I have to say about the fiscal cliff, what I think will happen, and what will happen, I have already said (or at least typed). The one new element, and it was a strong ingredient leading to the current form of stalemate, was a realization by the Republicans that letting the end of the year occur without agreement would allow them to achieve the necessary result of allowing wealthy individuals' taxes to rise without having to vote for it. This translated into a broad unwillingness for Republican Congressmen to back Speaker Boehner's disingenuous attempt at a show of strength (the so-called Plan B, raising taxes for just the wealthiest). The lame duck Congress could still get a shot at voting to reduce tax rates for the many without having to vote for an increase for anyone; it might not satisfy Grover Norquist, but would be eminently defensible before their party's voters. On the other hand, if there are no tough votes to be made, they could just as easily be made in the next Congress.
Anyway, we go into the last trading day of 2012 without an agreement (it's highly unlikely, but not impossible, that one could be sprung before 2 p.m. Eastern tomorrow). The markets have stopped believing so much in the eventual deal and started trading more on the absence of any current one; as a result the Dow Jones Index has dropped six of the last seven trading days--but so far, only about 3% since the 19th, to about 12,938.
The Markets on The Market
On intrade.com, struggling along though impeded by the website's decision to enforce more limitations on American participants (their positions have been closed out in recent days, though there are supposed to be new markets available to them), there are markets for the Dow ending at various levels: the key ones are over 13000, 12750, and 12500 (the odds outside that range are pretty much 100% or 0%, with the exception of the bet of a rebound over 13250, which has been purchased at a 5% chance by some contrarian). The 13000 bet has been a big loser for bullish bettors, dropping from 80% or so two weeks ago (well up from the 50-60% it ran for much of the year) to 20% by end of week, and now trading at about 10%. Of course, 13,000 would need only a slight increase (less than 0.5%) from the current level.
So, the consensus is for a drop, I'd say, but how big? The fact that there's only half a day of trading is not much of a limitation on the trading range, as the Dow could easily drop hundreds of points in minutes, or even at the very start of the day's trading. It just means there is less time in the trading day for some news, which would probably be positive, to affect trading. So, how much is the failure to agree priced in to current valuations? A drop to 12,750, about 1.5%, is a moderately-large one day change: the last trading is at 73.1% (as of 10:20 Central), but there is a huge gap between the bid value (in the 70's) and the asked value (97% or so), so this market has a very volatile future tomorrow, as those who may hold positions will seek to end them. A similar story holds for the market on the Dow finishing over 12,500--that would require a drop of some 3.5%, or as much as the total retreat of the last two weeks, but a bit of end-day panic could easily achieve it. The current quote on that one is at 99.7%, but that is misleading because the prior trades were in the low 90's. The highest bids are mid-90, and there are a lot more shares available at 99.7%--the seller has clearly cornered that market and is trying to take profits without risking a nervous Dec. 31.
Maybe more interesting than the short-term stock markets is what the bond markets think of the current madhouse. One piece of gossip I can offer is that Mohammed El-Erian, top dog at PIMCO, was taking a flight out of D.C. to L.A. yesterday--I saw him at Dulles Airport as I was waiting to catch a different flight. This would suggest no panic or news is expected, though of course time and distance mean less in today's society. If the bond market begins to lose confidence in the U.S., though, it will be a bigger threat to the economy than bad consumer confidence or a drop in the stock markets. That will not happen until mid-January, at the earliest, so there is still some time to avoid calamity.
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Sunday, December 23, 2012
Will It Be Different This Time?
I don't like repeating myself (he repeated), so I've kept mum so far about the Newtown, CT massacre in the elementary school and the gun issues. Please see my post called "The Usual",after the massacre in Aurora, CO, in which I predicted several aspects of the current controversy--not that it required a crystal ball or anything.
There are a couple of things that are different this time--the crime so senseless, horrendous and inhuman, the election so over, the utter insanity of taking out one's frustrations on first graders. I will say this: President Obama did have the courage to speak out--forcefully--this time, and damn the consequences. The NRA had to think it over, let the heat of the moment die a little, before they made "their contribution" to the debate. And the best they could think of was to put armed guards in every school? That is the epitome of throwing up one's hands and giving in to madness.
Apart from "the usual" suggestions, which are more obvious than usual in this case--no semi-automatic weapons or assault guns, close the gun show loophole and prosecute the online gun dealers who defy the laws, develop a database of mentally disturbed people who cannot buy guns--here's a new suggestion: Guns can have devices which limit their use to the authorized buyers; they won't work for anyone else. It could be based on palm prints, fingerprints, or retinal scan. Prohibit the manufacture or importation of the current, unsafe guns, and begin steps to incentivize people to replace their old ones with safe ones. It's radical, I know, but radical solutions need to be proposed. In 50 or 100 years, perhaps, we will actually be a civilized society, instead of a half-civilized, half-mad one.
As far as policing the schools, that is a job for the police--not school administrators, teachers, or private rent-a-cops. A simple solution is to have a mini-police station within shouting distance of public schools, which are increasingly clumped in shared campuses. So far, the epidemic of madness hasn't hit private schools so much, so it is a good time to consider what is/will be necessary for private schools to protect themselves. Much as I hate the militarization of education (enough in our lives is militarized already), we can't just accept that schools will be unsafe with millions--and I mean it--of unqualified (and I don't mean just untrained) gun-holders out there.
There are a couple of things that are different this time--the crime so senseless, horrendous and inhuman, the election so over, the utter insanity of taking out one's frustrations on first graders. I will say this: President Obama did have the courage to speak out--forcefully--this time, and damn the consequences. The NRA had to think it over, let the heat of the moment die a little, before they made "their contribution" to the debate. And the best they could think of was to put armed guards in every school? That is the epitome of throwing up one's hands and giving in to madness.
Apart from "the usual" suggestions, which are more obvious than usual in this case--no semi-automatic weapons or assault guns, close the gun show loophole and prosecute the online gun dealers who defy the laws, develop a database of mentally disturbed people who cannot buy guns--here's a new suggestion: Guns can have devices which limit their use to the authorized buyers; they won't work for anyone else. It could be based on palm prints, fingerprints, or retinal scan. Prohibit the manufacture or importation of the current, unsafe guns, and begin steps to incentivize people to replace their old ones with safe ones. It's radical, I know, but radical solutions need to be proposed. In 50 or 100 years, perhaps, we will actually be a civilized society, instead of a half-civilized, half-mad one.
As far as policing the schools, that is a job for the police--not school administrators, teachers, or private rent-a-cops. A simple solution is to have a mini-police station within shouting distance of public schools, which are increasingly clumped in shared campuses. So far, the epidemic of madness hasn't hit private schools so much, so it is a good time to consider what is/will be necessary for private schools to protect themselves. Much as I hate the militarization of education (enough in our lives is militarized already), we can't just accept that schools will be unsafe with millions--and I mean it--of unqualified (and I don't mean just untrained) gun-holders out there.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
121212 Concert
This is the last of its kind: there won't be a 13/13/13, for obvious reasons (not to mention the outside chance that the world as we know it ends next Friday). As for the benefit concert, I wouldn't say that this is the last--it still seems to be working as a project. I love the way this musical community comes together for an event such as this. One can be cynical and say, "Why don't they just give a couple of million dollars, instead of performing?" That person doesn't understand that they are giving of what is most dear to them, their talent and their time. There is a trade-off, though: most of them have a professional agenda, and it's definitely good publicity--in this case it applies particularly to Billy Joel.
As telethons go, this was definitely a good one, though it skews a bit old and white. Nobody seems to be policing the clock--some performers go extremely long, while others show restraint--I guess they don't have anywhere to go later.
The censor with his finger on the button had a busy night repeatedly cutting the seven words not allowed on TV!
Brief Reviews of the Talent
Bruce Springsteen--I came in during the middle. B.S. in good form from his recent touring, did "Born to Run" and that can't be bad. B
Roger Waters -- He's touring with "The Wall", so had his light show going. Included some "Dark Side"; "Comfortably Numb" with Eddie Vetter was a real highlight. A-
Bon Jovi--tolerable; at least did "Dead or Alive", their best song. Paid back the invite Bruce gave him during his set. B-
Eric Clapton - The best overall set of the night: "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" (acoustic); "Got to Get Better in a Little While"- great choice for the night; "Crossroads". The small band with just bass and drums with E.C. worked really well; a good change from some of the oversized ensembles. A
Rolling Stones - some crappy new song--not even the good one, "Gloom and Doom", which would've been kind of appropriate; "Jumpin' Jack Flash." Jagger has enough energy, had a couple of good wisecracks ("now NY has to come and help if it rains in London", "best collection ever of old British rockers") and it's good they showed, but basically a cameo. Keith must finally be on his last legs, performance-wise; Charlie Watts (the drummer--an original Stone), on the other hand, looks about 10 years younger than Jagger/Richards or Ronnie Wood. C
Alicia Keys--basically an improvised song or two. I liked it; it was heartfelt. B
The Who - they're touring now, so they've got their light show, too. Opened with "Who Are You"--always a good one that shows off their distinctive strengths: dynamics, lyrics, good use of prerecorded bits to augment their playing. Roger's voice is mighty shaky, and Pete's is gone. "The Beach (a/k/a Bell Boy)" - good choice - the clip of Keith Moon singing is both a sweet touch and incredibly stagy. "Pinball Wizard"--what can I say, except that it's a must-see for anyone? "See Me, Feel Me"--the best finale song, no? "Baba O'Riley" - probably not necessary, but always a popular one. "Love, Reign O'er Me". What's this last (acoustic) song - "Have some Tea With Me"? I'm very grateful that Pete Townshend is still making the effort; I hope those waiting for Kanye, Foo Fighters, or Chris Martin aren't too dismayed, because The 'Oo did go awfully long; I'd say that was basically the second set of their live performance, with encores. A
Kanye West - good that he came and performed for all the white folks, presumably mostly rich white folks, in the audience. Obviously not his usual crowd who knows all the words, but it was an interesting performance. Gotta like the reference to King Crimson ('21st century schizoid man"). Definitely an eccentric and intelligent dude; but what's with the skirt? B
Billy Joel - I've heard this was his idea--he's the Bob Geldof of the current age; it will do some good for his career, as there's a whole generation that has not heard of him. He starts with a complete song, with all the bells and whistles, written especially for the occasion: I'll call it "I've Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway"--a good line. I'll say this for him: He does have a prolific pen, good piano skills. "I'm Moving Out"; "I'm In a New York State of Mind". "In the Middle of the Night". "You May be Right". "Only the Good Die Young." I guess if it's his show, he gets to go long, too. He is a very old-fashioned performer; basically '50's style doo wop and crooning. B+
Chris Martin - Wearing a suit and tie? "Viva La Vida" (acoustic guitar)- my favorite Coldplay song, a tough way to perform it. Brings out Michael Stipe of R.E.M., who's suddenly looking very old--is he well? Martin oozes talent, he sounds like he has a cold. They do "Losing My Religion". Last song is "Us Against the World" (I had to look it up), with Martin switching to piano. A
Dave Grohl - The Foo Fighters guitarist is playing drums, as he did with Nirvana, with Nirvana bass player Chris Novoselic, Paul McCartney on bottleneck slide, and another guitarist, and they play a Nirvana-like song. An interesting novelty. B-
Paul McCartney - Looks like Sir Paul's got a real band behind him, but the song selection is a bit deficient. His face is much too young to be 70-something: Is he Botoxing? "Helter Skelter"; some new song ("Let Me Go There"?); some Wings song; brings out Diana Krall for another new one: "What If it Rains" (or is it "My Valentine"?)--this one written for his wife, Nancy, I'm thinking she's number 4. "Blackbird"--I didn't know it had political connotations about the civil rights movement until this moment, as it's surely not obvious, but not inconceivable, either. (Maybe it's part of his standard shtick; I know he likes to do this song live.) B-
Alicia Keys does a song called "New York" to close it.
Presenters and some comments thereof: Billy Crystal (some provocative political jokes)--testimonial for Long Beach, Adam Sandler (good example of the corny, funny song caricatures he used to do on SNL--"Hallelujah"), Jimmy Fallon--all excited, Chelsea Clinton--she was never introduced--she sounds just like her Mom; Puff Daddy and Olivia Wilde (also not introduced)--an incredible story of the hospital evacuated (didn't catch the name), Jon Stewart--Seaside Heights, Stephen Colbert--his jokes' tone seemed a little off, Steve Buscemi--good to see him relatively normal, not in role--First Responders, Chris Rock--Staten Island; Seth Myers and Bobby Moynihan- Bobby's "drunk uncle" from SNL, it's not one of their better gigs. Jake Gyllenhall - also Long Beach (wild hair/beard look; is it for a role?); Blake Lively--lovely girl--Fairfield, CT. Brian Williams - on a lot, as always charming, cool, with his amazingly asymmetrical face. Jason Sudeikis, Katie Holmes - Red Hook. Red Hook's tape got bumped for an ad--Ion channel finally they got tired of waiting to put on their WWE. After a few minutes of searching, I found the continuation on AMC--bless them!--during "Helter Skelter" with Paul and his band. So I don't know if I missed any music...
The charities: I do appreciate what they are doing, and they make a good case that the people need help. I like that they have been suggesting that some things will not be built back the way they used to be; in some cases it's just not the smart thing to do.
The Sponsors: Chase, Samsung, Delta. No doubt there are considerable expenses--the venue, the stage setting, the TV production. I wonder if they are paying any of the artists. That's enough of a plug for them.
My highlights (in order): 1) Eric Clapton's set; 2) Chris Martin with Michael Stipe; 3) Eddie Vetter with Roger Waters; 4) The Who--especially the songs from "Tommy".
Good that the Nirvana guys got together (and some credit to Dave Grohl--it's probably hard to go back to drums after you've been the front man/guitarist), but I'd say they need to work on more material before they are ready for the killer revival (if they have any desire at all to do that).
As telethons go, this was definitely a good one, though it skews a bit old and white. Nobody seems to be policing the clock--some performers go extremely long, while others show restraint--I guess they don't have anywhere to go later.
The censor with his finger on the button had a busy night repeatedly cutting the seven words not allowed on TV!
Brief Reviews of the Talent
Bruce Springsteen--I came in during the middle. B.S. in good form from his recent touring, did "Born to Run" and that can't be bad. B
Roger Waters -- He's touring with "The Wall", so had his light show going. Included some "Dark Side"; "Comfortably Numb" with Eddie Vetter was a real highlight. A-
Bon Jovi--tolerable; at least did "Dead or Alive", their best song. Paid back the invite Bruce gave him during his set. B-
Eric Clapton - The best overall set of the night: "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" (acoustic); "Got to Get Better in a Little While"- great choice for the night; "Crossroads". The small band with just bass and drums with E.C. worked really well; a good change from some of the oversized ensembles. A
Rolling Stones - some crappy new song--not even the good one, "Gloom and Doom", which would've been kind of appropriate; "Jumpin' Jack Flash." Jagger has enough energy, had a couple of good wisecracks ("now NY has to come and help if it rains in London", "best collection ever of old British rockers") and it's good they showed, but basically a cameo. Keith must finally be on his last legs, performance-wise; Charlie Watts (the drummer--an original Stone), on the other hand, looks about 10 years younger than Jagger/Richards or Ronnie Wood. C
Alicia Keys--basically an improvised song or two. I liked it; it was heartfelt. B
The Who - they're touring now, so they've got their light show, too. Opened with "Who Are You"--always a good one that shows off their distinctive strengths: dynamics, lyrics, good use of prerecorded bits to augment their playing. Roger's voice is mighty shaky, and Pete's is gone. "The Beach (a/k/a Bell Boy)" - good choice - the clip of Keith Moon singing is both a sweet touch and incredibly stagy. "Pinball Wizard"--what can I say, except that it's a must-see for anyone? "See Me, Feel Me"--the best finale song, no? "Baba O'Riley" - probably not necessary, but always a popular one. "Love, Reign O'er Me". What's this last (acoustic) song - "Have some Tea With Me"? I'm very grateful that Pete Townshend is still making the effort; I hope those waiting for Kanye, Foo Fighters, or Chris Martin aren't too dismayed, because The 'Oo did go awfully long; I'd say that was basically the second set of their live performance, with encores. A
Kanye West - good that he came and performed for all the white folks, presumably mostly rich white folks, in the audience. Obviously not his usual crowd who knows all the words, but it was an interesting performance. Gotta like the reference to King Crimson ('21st century schizoid man"). Definitely an eccentric and intelligent dude; but what's with the skirt? B
Billy Joel - I've heard this was his idea--he's the Bob Geldof of the current age; it will do some good for his career, as there's a whole generation that has not heard of him. He starts with a complete song, with all the bells and whistles, written especially for the occasion: I'll call it "I've Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway"--a good line. I'll say this for him: He does have a prolific pen, good piano skills. "I'm Moving Out"; "I'm In a New York State of Mind". "In the Middle of the Night". "You May be Right". "Only the Good Die Young." I guess if it's his show, he gets to go long, too. He is a very old-fashioned performer; basically '50's style doo wop and crooning. B+
Chris Martin - Wearing a suit and tie? "Viva La Vida" (acoustic guitar)- my favorite Coldplay song, a tough way to perform it. Brings out Michael Stipe of R.E.M., who's suddenly looking very old--is he well? Martin oozes talent, he sounds like he has a cold. They do "Losing My Religion". Last song is "Us Against the World" (I had to look it up), with Martin switching to piano. A
Dave Grohl - The Foo Fighters guitarist is playing drums, as he did with Nirvana, with Nirvana bass player Chris Novoselic, Paul McCartney on bottleneck slide, and another guitarist, and they play a Nirvana-like song. An interesting novelty. B-
Paul McCartney - Looks like Sir Paul's got a real band behind him, but the song selection is a bit deficient. His face is much too young to be 70-something: Is he Botoxing? "Helter Skelter"; some new song ("Let Me Go There"?); some Wings song; brings out Diana Krall for another new one: "What If it Rains" (or is it "My Valentine"?)--this one written for his wife, Nancy, I'm thinking she's number 4. "Blackbird"--I didn't know it had political connotations about the civil rights movement until this moment, as it's surely not obvious, but not inconceivable, either. (Maybe it's part of his standard shtick; I know he likes to do this song live.) B-
Alicia Keys does a song called "New York" to close it.
Presenters and some comments thereof: Billy Crystal (some provocative political jokes)--testimonial for Long Beach, Adam Sandler (good example of the corny, funny song caricatures he used to do on SNL--"Hallelujah"), Jimmy Fallon--all excited, Chelsea Clinton--she was never introduced--she sounds just like her Mom; Puff Daddy and Olivia Wilde (also not introduced)--an incredible story of the hospital evacuated (didn't catch the name), Jon Stewart--Seaside Heights, Stephen Colbert--his jokes' tone seemed a little off, Steve Buscemi--good to see him relatively normal, not in role--First Responders, Chris Rock--Staten Island; Seth Myers and Bobby Moynihan- Bobby's "drunk uncle" from SNL, it's not one of their better gigs. Jake Gyllenhall - also Long Beach (wild hair/beard look; is it for a role?); Blake Lively--lovely girl--Fairfield, CT. Brian Williams - on a lot, as always charming, cool, with his amazingly asymmetrical face. Jason Sudeikis, Katie Holmes - Red Hook. Red Hook's tape got bumped for an ad--Ion channel finally they got tired of waiting to put on their WWE. After a few minutes of searching, I found the continuation on AMC--bless them!--during "Helter Skelter" with Paul and his band. So I don't know if I missed any music...
The charities: I do appreciate what they are doing, and they make a good case that the people need help. I like that they have been suggesting that some things will not be built back the way they used to be; in some cases it's just not the smart thing to do.
The Sponsors: Chase, Samsung, Delta. No doubt there are considerable expenses--the venue, the stage setting, the TV production. I wonder if they are paying any of the artists. That's enough of a plug for them.
My highlights (in order): 1) Eric Clapton's set; 2) Chris Martin with Michael Stipe; 3) Eddie Vetter with Roger Waters; 4) The Who--especially the songs from "Tommy".
Good that the Nirvana guys got together (and some credit to Dave Grohl--it's probably hard to go back to drums after you've been the front man/guitarist), but I'd say they need to work on more material before they are ready for the killer revival (if they have any desire at all to do that).
Sunday, December 09, 2012
Talking Them Down from the Cliff....Pt. 2
We will post the third part when the deal is finally concluded, at which time we will reckon the meaningful winners and losers…and those in Washington, too.
The public posturing by the President and his supporters on the one hand, and by the Congressional Republicans on the other hand, has moved little since the initial positions taken just after the election’s results became clear. If anything, the lines drawn in the sand for their positions on taxes, the key element of this phase of the negotiations, have been dug more deeply, which will make them harder to cross. Both sides also seem to be saying that President Obama and Speaker Boehner have not yet begun face-to-face negotiations: Obama is saying that they will begin when the Republicans agree to the tax increases on the most wealthy, while Boehner, who has agreed to revenue increases but not tax rate increases, is looking for the President to put “real spending cuts”—by which he means cuts to the cost of entitlement programs—on the table before meaningful negotiations can begin.
Despite the gap in public, and even the lack of any acknowledged behind-the-scenes direct negotiations, there is movement in some of the positions and even optimism about the outcome. So far, Wall Street and the markets show no sign of alarm. It is by no means certain that any agreement will be reached by the end of the year, when the automatic end of tax cuts and beginning of sequestration begin, but there is no panic about that, because after that, the pressure to conclude a deal will rise sharply, and there is confidence on all sides that it will then get done.
The reckoning is that the President and the Democrats have most of the advantage: Obama's election win is still fresh (and the margin has grown as the counting completes) and the fall-back costs of failure to agree are deemed greater for the Republicans. The Tea Party Republicans may not feel the same way, though, as no agreement would mean the fastest reduction in the deficit, so if they get the upper hand with Boehner we could be in a stalemate next month which resembles the current National Hockey League lockout: no agreement, no negotiations, continuing erosion of the brand (in this case, of the U.S. dollar). As we pointed out in our previous post, Boehner needs to thread the needle in a deal which can convince 50-75 Republican Congressmen to come with him and not cause the other 160-180 ones to vote him out of his leadership position. The key difference between 2011 and now is that the conservative Republicans (and their lobbyist godfather, Grover Norquist) seem to have authorized Boehner to go ahead and make a deal which they will not support, in the interests of avoiding a generalized tax increase for which they would suffer severe political consequences.
Dealing Out the New, New Cards
How then is the emerging deal shaping up? This is where it gets very fuzzy, but some guesses may still be made. The Speaker offered $800 billion in additional revenues over ten years; Obama's proposal was $1.6 trillion. Splitting the difference would be $1.2 trillion, and that's certainly a likely figure. It also is the amount that had been tentatively agreed by Obama and Boehner two years ago, before Boehner got his negotiating legs cut out from under him by his caucus. Essentially, that would be Boehner's $800 billion in reduced "tax expenditures" plus Obama's $400 billion in tax rate increases for the wealthy. Somehow, this seems too easy; I would guess instead the revenue increase number will be cut back to $1 trillion, with somewhat less than the above figures both in the tax rate increases and in the deductions eliminated. This will allow both sides to claim a measure of victory, as it's always easier to get agreement on reducing tax increases than going the other way, and it will provide more room for phasing in tax increases gradually during this continuing period of vulnerability for the economy.
I'm looking for two gradations in the higher income rates, one for those with income over $1 million and one for $250K - $1 million; I'm looking for the proposed deduction cuts to be smoothed out to reduce the impact on moderate taxpayers, for a substantial shift in the income level when the infamous Alternative Minimum Tax begins to apply, and for tax rates on capital gains and dividends to be increased but to have a top rate lower than the marginal rate for the highest income ranges. The surprising thing is that both sides seem ready to throw the payroll tax reduction "holiday" of the past couple of years under the bus; this is surprising because the economy's recovery is still relatively weak, but the payroll tax cut is one that, by general agreement, can not be extended indefinitely (the money is needed to support the trust funds for Social Security and Medicare, which are shrinking); I thought it would be phased out over the next two years, but both sides seem to need to tote that money up for the promised savings they want to tout.
There will be a few hundred billion in cuts in discretionary expenses (Obama's Federal departments have been harvesting and storing them up for this purpose), and I'm looking for a couple hundred billion of new defense/security/intelligence cuts, as well (though not so much, or so blunt, as the sequestration cuts). There were already some cuts achieved in previous negotiations; those will be counted in the total of the final agreement. There will also be a very small amount of additional investments and aid to states in the final package, and some sort of agreement to fix the debt ceiling through 2014. The package of specific deficit reductions that will be announced--and it will come together quickly once the progress starts, somewhere in the calendar range of Dec. 26-Jan. 15--will be a bit small, in the range of $2.5-3.0 trillion, but it will include, on top of that, an agreement to find more from the big entitlement programs and from closing loopholes in the tax code. That amount will be small, but increasing, over the 10-year timeline that everyone has agreed to view, and will bring the total up to $4 trillion, enough--without including rapid economic growth into the calculations--to bring the deficit down but not eliminate it.
This will bring the second difficult aspect of this agreement, finding the formula that compels Congress and the President to accomplish this last trillion without specifying the details now. The specifics will take months, possibly the entire session of Congress, to work out. I will be very surprised if there is any agreement about Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security in either the lame-duck session or the initial months of the new Congress, and, to be frank, it would be unwise to try to revise the tax code in a hurry. Still, the staff groups are able to put a number around reasonable savings that would result from the process, and that will be the final slide in the Power Point presentation--that, and the fiscal handcuffing that would result if the special bipartisan groups to be formed cannot reach a result. I'm guessing it would be some sort of automatic additional increase in tax rates across the board, something everyone would seek to avoid.
I'm Entitled (to Spout Off, Anyway); How About You?
Now, to close, a few comments about the most knotty of all the problems, the question of what to do about the entitlements.
Social Security is the one with the least urgent problem; essentially the challenge is to maintain a large-enough surplus in the trust fund so that the program will never be a burden on the national debt, which until now it has not. The trust fund--which is a separate account from the overall Federal budget, but doesn't really have money stored away in Ft. Knox or anything--would begin to run an annual deficit in a few years, and if there are no changes, it would be depleted in 15 years or so, and after that full funding of it would begin to add to the deficit. All that is needed is to change the trajectory a little, and we would get safely past the most difficult years of our demographic challenge, the ones when the ratio of workers to retirees is lowest, until about 2050, and then it would essentially be self-funding indefinitely into the future. The pieties about holding the retirement age for Social Security are hypocritical; the resistance against reducing the cost of living adjustment (COLA) in it is not. People think that the age 65 for retirement is inviolate, but they are wrong; this was already changed in the famous deal made in the Eighties by Reagan and Tip O'Neill. It's gradually increasing, to 67 for full benefits (of course, one can retire earlier and get less); it could be adjusted a bit more over the next decade or two, and we'd be home free. The COLA is seductively attractive, in that it saves a ton of money over the long term, but that also means that the value of the benefit would be shrinking, and it's already very low.
Medicare is the largest problem in numerical terms, and in the sense that the current trajectory is going to bankrupt the program soonest. The Affordable Care Act, the infamous Obamacare of political demagoguery of all sides, has had a significant effect improving the finances of the program, but not nearly enough. The remedies which are usually proposed--increasing the age of eligibility, or reducing the benefits (the latter, in the wolf in sheep's clothing form of the Paul Ryan-proposed voucher program)--are the wrong ones. Reducing benefits--any way that you do it--means bankrupting more seniors; increasing the eligibility age actually just makes the economic dynamics worse. The best solution is actually the opposite: lowering the eligibility age, making it available to people 55 and older! Because their health costs are lower than older folks, bringing them into the program would improve the economics of the program. If we think of it as a business, raising the eligibility age focuses the program more on the unprofitable customers, expanding it brings in more profitable customers, improving the operating leverage. Of course, there would be no requirement for fifty-something-ers to buy in, but some would do so (those getting the worst deal from the private insurers), and employers would find it attractive to participate for their older employees (something which should be allowed through the reform). Instead of creating a death spiral for Medicare, expanding would create a virtuous cycle which, combined with changing it from fee-for-services to fee-for-customers, focusing on prevention and maintenance, could end up making the whole thing workable in the long run--and eliminating decades more of debates about whether the health insurance industry needs the challenge of "the public option", which otherwise is not going to go away.
I actually think Medicaid is the most difficult problem of the three to solve. Mostly Medicaid is about the assistance to states to provide for health services for those who can not afford health insurance, so its viability is challenged both by the dire state of the states' budgets and the rising costs of health. Already, many states are cutting their rolls of eligible people by fiat; soon, the horror stories will begin to pile up in those states. It's going to get worse, and some kind of Federal program to improve minimum standards for states will be worthless unless it is accompanied by an increase in funding--and the pressure will all be in the other direction. I have no proposed solution for the present, except that we must insist on holding the line against cuts and holding states responsible for the health of their poorest and the effectiveness of how the money is spent. Eventually, once other problems get addressed (Federal deficits, state revenues, the economy, health costs), we will come back to this one, and hopefully there will not be too great a cost in the meantime.
The public posturing by the President and his supporters on the one hand, and by the Congressional Republicans on the other hand, has moved little since the initial positions taken just after the election’s results became clear. If anything, the lines drawn in the sand for their positions on taxes, the key element of this phase of the negotiations, have been dug more deeply, which will make them harder to cross. Both sides also seem to be saying that President Obama and Speaker Boehner have not yet begun face-to-face negotiations: Obama is saying that they will begin when the Republicans agree to the tax increases on the most wealthy, while Boehner, who has agreed to revenue increases but not tax rate increases, is looking for the President to put “real spending cuts”—by which he means cuts to the cost of entitlement programs—on the table before meaningful negotiations can begin.
Despite the gap in public, and even the lack of any acknowledged behind-the-scenes direct negotiations, there is movement in some of the positions and even optimism about the outcome. So far, Wall Street and the markets show no sign of alarm. It is by no means certain that any agreement will be reached by the end of the year, when the automatic end of tax cuts and beginning of sequestration begin, but there is no panic about that, because after that, the pressure to conclude a deal will rise sharply, and there is confidence on all sides that it will then get done.
The reckoning is that the President and the Democrats have most of the advantage: Obama's election win is still fresh (and the margin has grown as the counting completes) and the fall-back costs of failure to agree are deemed greater for the Republicans. The Tea Party Republicans may not feel the same way, though, as no agreement would mean the fastest reduction in the deficit, so if they get the upper hand with Boehner we could be in a stalemate next month which resembles the current National Hockey League lockout: no agreement, no negotiations, continuing erosion of the brand (in this case, of the U.S. dollar). As we pointed out in our previous post, Boehner needs to thread the needle in a deal which can convince 50-75 Republican Congressmen to come with him and not cause the other 160-180 ones to vote him out of his leadership position. The key difference between 2011 and now is that the conservative Republicans (and their lobbyist godfather, Grover Norquist) seem to have authorized Boehner to go ahead and make a deal which they will not support, in the interests of avoiding a generalized tax increase for which they would suffer severe political consequences.
Dealing Out the New, New Cards
How then is the emerging deal shaping up? This is where it gets very fuzzy, but some guesses may still be made. The Speaker offered $800 billion in additional revenues over ten years; Obama's proposal was $1.6 trillion. Splitting the difference would be $1.2 trillion, and that's certainly a likely figure. It also is the amount that had been tentatively agreed by Obama and Boehner two years ago, before Boehner got his negotiating legs cut out from under him by his caucus. Essentially, that would be Boehner's $800 billion in reduced "tax expenditures" plus Obama's $400 billion in tax rate increases for the wealthy. Somehow, this seems too easy; I would guess instead the revenue increase number will be cut back to $1 trillion, with somewhat less than the above figures both in the tax rate increases and in the deductions eliminated. This will allow both sides to claim a measure of victory, as it's always easier to get agreement on reducing tax increases than going the other way, and it will provide more room for phasing in tax increases gradually during this continuing period of vulnerability for the economy.
I'm looking for two gradations in the higher income rates, one for those with income over $1 million and one for $250K - $1 million; I'm looking for the proposed deduction cuts to be smoothed out to reduce the impact on moderate taxpayers, for a substantial shift in the income level when the infamous Alternative Minimum Tax begins to apply, and for tax rates on capital gains and dividends to be increased but to have a top rate lower than the marginal rate for the highest income ranges. The surprising thing is that both sides seem ready to throw the payroll tax reduction "holiday" of the past couple of years under the bus; this is surprising because the economy's recovery is still relatively weak, but the payroll tax cut is one that, by general agreement, can not be extended indefinitely (the money is needed to support the trust funds for Social Security and Medicare, which are shrinking); I thought it would be phased out over the next two years, but both sides seem to need to tote that money up for the promised savings they want to tout.
There will be a few hundred billion in cuts in discretionary expenses (Obama's Federal departments have been harvesting and storing them up for this purpose), and I'm looking for a couple hundred billion of new defense/security/intelligence cuts, as well (though not so much, or so blunt, as the sequestration cuts). There were already some cuts achieved in previous negotiations; those will be counted in the total of the final agreement. There will also be a very small amount of additional investments and aid to states in the final package, and some sort of agreement to fix the debt ceiling through 2014. The package of specific deficit reductions that will be announced--and it will come together quickly once the progress starts, somewhere in the calendar range of Dec. 26-Jan. 15--will be a bit small, in the range of $2.5-3.0 trillion, but it will include, on top of that, an agreement to find more from the big entitlement programs and from closing loopholes in the tax code. That amount will be small, but increasing, over the 10-year timeline that everyone has agreed to view, and will bring the total up to $4 trillion, enough--without including rapid economic growth into the calculations--to bring the deficit down but not eliminate it.
This will bring the second difficult aspect of this agreement, finding the formula that compels Congress and the President to accomplish this last trillion without specifying the details now. The specifics will take months, possibly the entire session of Congress, to work out. I will be very surprised if there is any agreement about Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security in either the lame-duck session or the initial months of the new Congress, and, to be frank, it would be unwise to try to revise the tax code in a hurry. Still, the staff groups are able to put a number around reasonable savings that would result from the process, and that will be the final slide in the Power Point presentation--that, and the fiscal handcuffing that would result if the special bipartisan groups to be formed cannot reach a result. I'm guessing it would be some sort of automatic additional increase in tax rates across the board, something everyone would seek to avoid.
I'm Entitled (to Spout Off, Anyway); How About You?
Now, to close, a few comments about the most knotty of all the problems, the question of what to do about the entitlements.
Social Security is the one with the least urgent problem; essentially the challenge is to maintain a large-enough surplus in the trust fund so that the program will never be a burden on the national debt, which until now it has not. The trust fund--which is a separate account from the overall Federal budget, but doesn't really have money stored away in Ft. Knox or anything--would begin to run an annual deficit in a few years, and if there are no changes, it would be depleted in 15 years or so, and after that full funding of it would begin to add to the deficit. All that is needed is to change the trajectory a little, and we would get safely past the most difficult years of our demographic challenge, the ones when the ratio of workers to retirees is lowest, until about 2050, and then it would essentially be self-funding indefinitely into the future. The pieties about holding the retirement age for Social Security are hypocritical; the resistance against reducing the cost of living adjustment (COLA) in it is not. People think that the age 65 for retirement is inviolate, but they are wrong; this was already changed in the famous deal made in the Eighties by Reagan and Tip O'Neill. It's gradually increasing, to 67 for full benefits (of course, one can retire earlier and get less); it could be adjusted a bit more over the next decade or two, and we'd be home free. The COLA is seductively attractive, in that it saves a ton of money over the long term, but that also means that the value of the benefit would be shrinking, and it's already very low.
Medicare is the largest problem in numerical terms, and in the sense that the current trajectory is going to bankrupt the program soonest. The Affordable Care Act, the infamous Obamacare of political demagoguery of all sides, has had a significant effect improving the finances of the program, but not nearly enough. The remedies which are usually proposed--increasing the age of eligibility, or reducing the benefits (the latter, in the wolf in sheep's clothing form of the Paul Ryan-proposed voucher program)--are the wrong ones. Reducing benefits--any way that you do it--means bankrupting more seniors; increasing the eligibility age actually just makes the economic dynamics worse. The best solution is actually the opposite: lowering the eligibility age, making it available to people 55 and older! Because their health costs are lower than older folks, bringing them into the program would improve the economics of the program. If we think of it as a business, raising the eligibility age focuses the program more on the unprofitable customers, expanding it brings in more profitable customers, improving the operating leverage. Of course, there would be no requirement for fifty-something-ers to buy in, but some would do so (those getting the worst deal from the private insurers), and employers would find it attractive to participate for their older employees (something which should be allowed through the reform). Instead of creating a death spiral for Medicare, expanding would create a virtuous cycle which, combined with changing it from fee-for-services to fee-for-customers, focusing on prevention and maintenance, could end up making the whole thing workable in the long run--and eliminating decades more of debates about whether the health insurance industry needs the challenge of "the public option", which otherwise is not going to go away.
I actually think Medicaid is the most difficult problem of the three to solve. Mostly Medicaid is about the assistance to states to provide for health services for those who can not afford health insurance, so its viability is challenged both by the dire state of the states' budgets and the rising costs of health. Already, many states are cutting their rolls of eligible people by fiat; soon, the horror stories will begin to pile up in those states. It's going to get worse, and some kind of Federal program to improve minimum standards for states will be worthless unless it is accompanied by an increase in funding--and the pressure will all be in the other direction. I have no proposed solution for the present, except that we must insist on holding the line against cuts and holding states responsible for the health of their poorest and the effectiveness of how the money is spent. Eventually, once other problems get addressed (Federal deficits, state revenues, the economy, health costs), we will come back to this one, and hopefully there will not be too great a cost in the meantime.
Friday, December 07, 2012
Authenticity in the Movies
The title may seem antithetical--going to the movies is one of the classic escapist forms of entertainment, a chance to leave the world behind and concentrate on the flickering screen in a darkened room--but the quality of genuineness is one of the key qualities which identify a well-made film, and the environment--high-intensity attention, extreme magnification--makes inauthenticity apparent.
I'm going to focus here on regular feature films, as distinguished from the documentaries, which are a distinguished art form, one I wouldn't claim to be qualified to criticize, and one with very different entertainment value. So, what I'm talking about are the made-up stories, or stories re-told, historical fiction, or the re-creation of human events.
It's not just whether a film is realistic, though that is an element of what I'm trying to analyze. Like published fiction, the audience has agreed provisionally to suspend disbelief for the duration of the experience, so it doesn't have to be quite real. Artistically, though, breaking stereotypes and going beyond stock characters and situations--"making it real", as they say in hiphop society-- have periodically been sources of renewal for movies, revitalizing the genres when the rules that govern them become too confining. That's an aspiration, not a universal one in film, but a creditable one.
So, granted we are talking about the movies' artificial world, what I'm expecting from a well-made production is the avoidance of fakery. This adds greatly to the cost of making films, but it is generally money well spent, in that the ticket-buying public expects a convincing simulation of reality. It is for this reason that movie productions go "on location"--sometimes to the place where the story is set, but, if not, to a place that, in key characteristics, resembles it sufficiently.
Seeking the Really Fake
Now, I want to discuss two exceptions to the general principle of seeking the best possible imitation of what is real. One is the intentional inclusion of anachronism, or of something--a prop, a location--that obviously does not fit the scene. This is a risky strategy and not advisable except for humorous or satiric pupose; there are few other cases in which it would make sense for movie creators to call attention to the fact that they have chosen not to make their art the most convincing they could.
To give an example from Cloud Atlas, a film I consider generally very commendable, one aspect that has been criticized has been excessive or poor use of makeup. I have only seen the film once--sadly, it has disappeared far too quickly in this season of rapid-fire releases--but there is one scene in which I would agree with that criticism: in the formal dinner scene which concludes the 1847 episode, two characters clearly stood out unfavorably: Halle Berry and Doona Bae made up in whiteface. There are reasons that was done--to complete the concept that the principal cast members would appear in all six episodes--but in this particular case it creates a jarring reaction, a rejection of the scene as being less than what it should be.
The other exception to the strategy I would note is the transformation of film into theater, placing the action on a stage. Blurring the boundary of reality with artifice through use of the motif of the play within the play, or the film being made within the film, is in itself beyond questioning because of the success it has found: it can create an ironic tone to comment on the nature of drama or of life itself, as its use often seeks to pose a profound comment on the fundamental relationship between drama and real life. Think of Hamlet, 8 1/2, or, to cite dramatic use of a play in a film, Barton Fink. Reduction of a movie to a play, though, is a more problematic technique, one that has been attempted (and sharply criticized) in the new release of Anna Karenina. I want to see the movie, and I hope I will enjoy it, but it seems to me to be a wrong-headed approach to the work of the great Russian novelist Tolstoy and his use of the great panorama of his vast country--perhaps it's an attempt to capture the claustrophobia of the heroine's situation. I have seen other movies that have tried this approach; I can't think of any that have been successful doing it (Synecdoche, New York, anyone? I can't say I've managed to watch it, though I've tried). This minimalistic technique basically is an artistic statement rejecting the desirability, maybe even the possibility, of a realistic approach; as I say, I don't get it.
Another film genre I can't "get" is the musical, whether comic, dramatic, or pure song-and-dance. Pure opera has something to say for itself, as it posits a figurative musical reality which represents the essence of the mundane prosaic one, but all those stories where the dialogue stops and the characters break into song, or song-and-dance, are just too absurd for me to accept, even if the singing isn't dubbed and the music somehow fits the story. (Music soundtracks in movies are another topic, and one that I can't criticize effectively; I will say that an effective musical soundtrack must either enhance the storytelling by reflecting the interior emotions of the characters--addressing one of the great weaknesses of movies vs. books--or be totally lost within it, subtly framing the dialogue or action.) West Side Story is an example of the kind of disjointed fakey reality that bothers me; even though made with superior production, it is a fake that is only partly redeemed by the classical beauty of its Romeo and Juliet story and a little bit--not much, mind you--of reality intruding into the movie's artificial New York City of longing and songing. The new movie version of Les Miserables seeks to somehow make musical drama more realistic through hand-held camera work--adding a stylistic veneer of realism to a fakey form of rendering the original gritty, historically-based real-life drama.
When Unreality Needs Little Excuse
Science fiction is a special case, in that, for most of it, there is no objective reality to which the movie's created reality can be compared (an exception would be prehistoric drama--something like 1,000,000 B.C.--and its unfortunate tendency to have unintentional anachronism). In science fiction, the test of authenticity is usually whether--given the scenario--the action, the visual effects, and the dialogue are convincingly real. In this regard, the Cloud Atlas scenes from a futuristic Korea ("Corporea", in the book) are a highlight of the film. Avatar had, to me, several ludicrous premises to its story having to do with unrealistic aspects of a human society capable of interstellar travel, but once immersed in it, the look and feel--and the stubborn atavism of many of the human characters--were effective and believable. About Blade Runner, one could say much of the same: the whole notion of the androids created and living beyond human contact with built-in expiration dates seemed unrealistic, but if one accepted that, much of the behavior, the earthbound environment, the neo-noir storytelling, all made so much sense. Fantasy movies enjoy the same freedom of divorce from reality, but the same strictures of being true to their rules of engagement, thus the success of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings in faithfully re-creating its unreal world.
But then there are the stories that are just too far over the top, whether science fiction or just totally unrelated to any world we know or could know. The ones that, if one of them could only have happened, would have been the most amazing event in the history of humanity, greater in magnitude, import, and all-out achievement than the Bible's Greatest Story Ever Told. Their stories are legion--think of almost any Will Smith movie of recent years (I am Legend, Independence Day, Hancock, even his Wild Wild West), Nicholas Cage, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Bond, etc. Bond movies at least have the cover story of secrecy as to why these incredible exploits are unknown to us in the real world. In other words, I have a little trouble taking this kind of pure escapism seriously, which is why I love a movie like District 9, which uses a fake documentary style and incredible events to poke fun at the genre. Then there are the horror stories, the splatter flicks, vampires, zombies, etc. which fundamentally rely upon being totally unrealistic for their entertainment value: if they had any component that seemed at all realistic, they would be unendurable.
Even Better than the Real Thing
Finally, though, there are the movies that strive to tell real stories, and to do it in a way that feels real. In this, we allow the director the artistic license to enhance reality, because it makes the storytelling tolerably interesting, as long as the condensation of the storyline does not distort it excessively. Argo is a very interesting story based on a real, little-known caper, and most of it was well told. The locations--in Turkey, not Iran--seemed realistic, there is plenty of authenticity in the story, and even much of the Hollywood angle has its truth to it. Unfortunately, the movie goes off the rails at its climax, with an unrealistic car-chasing-plane scene which has no fundamental basis in the true story.
As much as I criticize Steven Spielberg for his emotional manipulation and his willingness to engage in escapist fantasy (E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Indiana Jones), he is a master of the art of telling true stories in a convincing way. In this regard, I cite Saving Private Ryan, Amistad, and Schindler's List, and now I have to say that he has outdone himself with Lincoln. With the assistance of extensive research, a superb screenplay by Tony Kushner, and a brilliant cast, headed by a performance by Daniel Day-Lewis so great that, like War Secretary Edwin Stanton's comment upon the moment of Lincoln's death, it "now...belongs to the ages", Spielberg has told a story that fools the viewer into the feeling that it is the real thing in every way. With Spielbergian manipulative power, he swept me into the world of 1865 Washington D.C. from the first scene to the end. Only when I saw it a second time could I see the artistry of his craft, and I encourage all to view it--repeatedly.
I refer to my previous prediction that the over-under bet for Oscars for the movie is seven. For me, that Lincoln should win Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor, and Best Picture are absolute certainty, no matter what the competition may be; I'd say it should also contend for 5-10 more: Supporting Actor (David Straitharn or Tommy Lee Jones, if they don't cancel each other's chances out), Best Actress (Sally Field should be nominated, at least), Best Director (maybe not), Music, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costumes, Film Editing, and Makeup.
There is, however, a movie that is rumored to have a real chance of topping Lincoln for Best Picture. * It's the only thing that could beat the real thing, a true story of great importance like that in Lincoln: a story about something real, important, and, better for box office, contemporary, but enhanced way beyond what is real for the purpose of storytelling. I'm referring to Zero Dark Thirty, in which Kathryn Bigelow apparently has once again shown the talent for doing just what she accomplished so well in The Hurt Locker, now applied to the hunt for Osama Bin Laden. The inverse of my description of horror films above, the intensity of Hurt Locker is beyond what can be endured, except that it has that moral urgency which comes from that relevance. Not being in the privileged fraternity of movie critics or insiders, I haven't seen it, but I think the Oscar race for Best Picture could end up being a classic battle between what is real, but old, and what is now, but even more than real.
*And it's about even with Lincoln in the odds on Intrade--which recently decided to boot off systematically all the illegal American accounts it used to wink at. I hope I can at least still get on--they claim they will have a new, legal form for Americans to participate.
I'm going to focus here on regular feature films, as distinguished from the documentaries, which are a distinguished art form, one I wouldn't claim to be qualified to criticize, and one with very different entertainment value. So, what I'm talking about are the made-up stories, or stories re-told, historical fiction, or the re-creation of human events.
It's not just whether a film is realistic, though that is an element of what I'm trying to analyze. Like published fiction, the audience has agreed provisionally to suspend disbelief for the duration of the experience, so it doesn't have to be quite real. Artistically, though, breaking stereotypes and going beyond stock characters and situations--"making it real", as they say in hiphop society-- have periodically been sources of renewal for movies, revitalizing the genres when the rules that govern them become too confining. That's an aspiration, not a universal one in film, but a creditable one.
So, granted we are talking about the movies' artificial world, what I'm expecting from a well-made production is the avoidance of fakery. This adds greatly to the cost of making films, but it is generally money well spent, in that the ticket-buying public expects a convincing simulation of reality. It is for this reason that movie productions go "on location"--sometimes to the place where the story is set, but, if not, to a place that, in key characteristics, resembles it sufficiently.
Seeking the Really Fake
Now, I want to discuss two exceptions to the general principle of seeking the best possible imitation of what is real. One is the intentional inclusion of anachronism, or of something--a prop, a location--that obviously does not fit the scene. This is a risky strategy and not advisable except for humorous or satiric pupose; there are few other cases in which it would make sense for movie creators to call attention to the fact that they have chosen not to make their art the most convincing they could.
To give an example from Cloud Atlas, a film I consider generally very commendable, one aspect that has been criticized has been excessive or poor use of makeup. I have only seen the film once--sadly, it has disappeared far too quickly in this season of rapid-fire releases--but there is one scene in which I would agree with that criticism: in the formal dinner scene which concludes the 1847 episode, two characters clearly stood out unfavorably: Halle Berry and Doona Bae made up in whiteface. There are reasons that was done--to complete the concept that the principal cast members would appear in all six episodes--but in this particular case it creates a jarring reaction, a rejection of the scene as being less than what it should be.
The other exception to the strategy I would note is the transformation of film into theater, placing the action on a stage. Blurring the boundary of reality with artifice through use of the motif of the play within the play, or the film being made within the film, is in itself beyond questioning because of the success it has found: it can create an ironic tone to comment on the nature of drama or of life itself, as its use often seeks to pose a profound comment on the fundamental relationship between drama and real life. Think of Hamlet, 8 1/2, or, to cite dramatic use of a play in a film, Barton Fink. Reduction of a movie to a play, though, is a more problematic technique, one that has been attempted (and sharply criticized) in the new release of Anna Karenina. I want to see the movie, and I hope I will enjoy it, but it seems to me to be a wrong-headed approach to the work of the great Russian novelist Tolstoy and his use of the great panorama of his vast country--perhaps it's an attempt to capture the claustrophobia of the heroine's situation. I have seen other movies that have tried this approach; I can't think of any that have been successful doing it (Synecdoche, New York, anyone? I can't say I've managed to watch it, though I've tried). This minimalistic technique basically is an artistic statement rejecting the desirability, maybe even the possibility, of a realistic approach; as I say, I don't get it.
Another film genre I can't "get" is the musical, whether comic, dramatic, or pure song-and-dance. Pure opera has something to say for itself, as it posits a figurative musical reality which represents the essence of the mundane prosaic one, but all those stories where the dialogue stops and the characters break into song, or song-and-dance, are just too absurd for me to accept, even if the singing isn't dubbed and the music somehow fits the story. (Music soundtracks in movies are another topic, and one that I can't criticize effectively; I will say that an effective musical soundtrack must either enhance the storytelling by reflecting the interior emotions of the characters--addressing one of the great weaknesses of movies vs. books--or be totally lost within it, subtly framing the dialogue or action.) West Side Story is an example of the kind of disjointed fakey reality that bothers me; even though made with superior production, it is a fake that is only partly redeemed by the classical beauty of its Romeo and Juliet story and a little bit--not much, mind you--of reality intruding into the movie's artificial New York City of longing and songing. The new movie version of Les Miserables seeks to somehow make musical drama more realistic through hand-held camera work--adding a stylistic veneer of realism to a fakey form of rendering the original gritty, historically-based real-life drama.
When Unreality Needs Little Excuse
Science fiction is a special case, in that, for most of it, there is no objective reality to which the movie's created reality can be compared (an exception would be prehistoric drama--something like 1,000,000 B.C.--and its unfortunate tendency to have unintentional anachronism). In science fiction, the test of authenticity is usually whether--given the scenario--the action, the visual effects, and the dialogue are convincingly real. In this regard, the Cloud Atlas scenes from a futuristic Korea ("Corporea", in the book) are a highlight of the film. Avatar had, to me, several ludicrous premises to its story having to do with unrealistic aspects of a human society capable of interstellar travel, but once immersed in it, the look and feel--and the stubborn atavism of many of the human characters--were effective and believable. About Blade Runner, one could say much of the same: the whole notion of the androids created and living beyond human contact with built-in expiration dates seemed unrealistic, but if one accepted that, much of the behavior, the earthbound environment, the neo-noir storytelling, all made so much sense. Fantasy movies enjoy the same freedom of divorce from reality, but the same strictures of being true to their rules of engagement, thus the success of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings in faithfully re-creating its unreal world.
But then there are the stories that are just too far over the top, whether science fiction or just totally unrelated to any world we know or could know. The ones that, if one of them could only have happened, would have been the most amazing event in the history of humanity, greater in magnitude, import, and all-out achievement than the Bible's Greatest Story Ever Told. Their stories are legion--think of almost any Will Smith movie of recent years (I am Legend, Independence Day, Hancock, even his Wild Wild West), Nicholas Cage, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Bond, etc. Bond movies at least have the cover story of secrecy as to why these incredible exploits are unknown to us in the real world. In other words, I have a little trouble taking this kind of pure escapism seriously, which is why I love a movie like District 9, which uses a fake documentary style and incredible events to poke fun at the genre. Then there are the horror stories, the splatter flicks, vampires, zombies, etc. which fundamentally rely upon being totally unrealistic for their entertainment value: if they had any component that seemed at all realistic, they would be unendurable.
Even Better than the Real Thing
Finally, though, there are the movies that strive to tell real stories, and to do it in a way that feels real. In this, we allow the director the artistic license to enhance reality, because it makes the storytelling tolerably interesting, as long as the condensation of the storyline does not distort it excessively. Argo is a very interesting story based on a real, little-known caper, and most of it was well told. The locations--in Turkey, not Iran--seemed realistic, there is plenty of authenticity in the story, and even much of the Hollywood angle has its truth to it. Unfortunately, the movie goes off the rails at its climax, with an unrealistic car-chasing-plane scene which has no fundamental basis in the true story.
As much as I criticize Steven Spielberg for his emotional manipulation and his willingness to engage in escapist fantasy (E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Indiana Jones), he is a master of the art of telling true stories in a convincing way. In this regard, I cite Saving Private Ryan, Amistad, and Schindler's List, and now I have to say that he has outdone himself with Lincoln. With the assistance of extensive research, a superb screenplay by Tony Kushner, and a brilliant cast, headed by a performance by Daniel Day-Lewis so great that, like War Secretary Edwin Stanton's comment upon the moment of Lincoln's death, it "now...belongs to the ages", Spielberg has told a story that fools the viewer into the feeling that it is the real thing in every way. With Spielbergian manipulative power, he swept me into the world of 1865 Washington D.C. from the first scene to the end. Only when I saw it a second time could I see the artistry of his craft, and I encourage all to view it--repeatedly.
I refer to my previous prediction that the over-under bet for Oscars for the movie is seven. For me, that Lincoln should win Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor, and Best Picture are absolute certainty, no matter what the competition may be; I'd say it should also contend for 5-10 more: Supporting Actor (David Straitharn or Tommy Lee Jones, if they don't cancel each other's chances out), Best Actress (Sally Field should be nominated, at least), Best Director (maybe not), Music, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costumes, Film Editing, and Makeup.
There is, however, a movie that is rumored to have a real chance of topping Lincoln for Best Picture. * It's the only thing that could beat the real thing, a true story of great importance like that in Lincoln: a story about something real, important, and, better for box office, contemporary, but enhanced way beyond what is real for the purpose of storytelling. I'm referring to Zero Dark Thirty, in which Kathryn Bigelow apparently has once again shown the talent for doing just what she accomplished so well in The Hurt Locker, now applied to the hunt for Osama Bin Laden. The inverse of my description of horror films above, the intensity of Hurt Locker is beyond what can be endured, except that it has that moral urgency which comes from that relevance. Not being in the privileged fraternity of movie critics or insiders, I haven't seen it, but I think the Oscar race for Best Picture could end up being a classic battle between what is real, but old, and what is now, but even more than real.
*And it's about even with Lincoln in the odds on Intrade--which recently decided to boot off systematically all the illegal American accounts it used to wink at. I hope I can at least still get on--they claim they will have a new, legal form for Americans to participate.
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
The November Spblorg
Before we got totally distracted by the looming election, our last post on sports left off just before the beginning of the baseball playoffs. Our Reds incredibly failed to convert on a two-game lead over the Giants with three home games, providing just the boost the San Franciscans needed to go on and win the pennant and the world championship. My preseason pick, the Detroit Tigers, also went down meekly before the Giants; their key failure was somehow losing the first game of the World Series when they had the world's best pitcher, Justin Verlander, and faced retread #4 starter Barry Zito. Congratulations to the Giants--and their smoke and mirrors!
We are excited about the new college and NBA basketball seasons, we will ignore the absence once again of NHL games, and we are somewhat dismayed by Chelsea's recent form in Premier and Champions League play, but, inevitably, this time of year we have to talk about football (American) a little. I am watching more games this year and enjoying them more, though I have more than a few complaints about what I'm seeing.
The Luck of the Irish
I was preparing to write the article I usually prepare this time of year about how the BCS screwed up, once again, and how their championship game would be unfair to someone. In this year's case, it appeared to be Notre Dame. With Kansas State and Oregon unbeaten and clearly ranked 1-2, and Notre Dame and Alabama (the best team, in spite of their upset loss the previous week to Texas A&M) destined to be outside looking in on the BCS biggie, it appeared the expansion of the championship to four teams, announced earlier this fall, was going to be a year too late.
What I did not expect--what no one expected--was that Saturday night both K-State and Oregon would fall from the ranks of the unbeaten. Kansas St. was thoroughly trounced by an eager Baylor team, while Stanford proved that, while the Cardinal can't quite maintain the consistency needed for a top ranking, it can beat anybody on a given day.
So, Notre Dame--which is unbeaten, has played some tough teams but has had more than its share of narrow, even lucky, wins against teams both good and bad--is now the only major college team that is undefeated and bowl-eligible (Ohio State has chosen to take its postseason ban this year), and would look to play (and probably get beaten by) Alabama in the championship game. One hurdle remains for each: Notre Dame must defeat their perennial nemesis, USC, and Alabama will need to win its SEC championship game (against Georgia or Florida).
USC has had a very difficult season, falling from a high early season ranking, and most recently being shown up by crosstown rival UCLA, and their star quarterback Matt Barkley will not be playing vs. Notre Dame, but I would not exclude the possibility of a win by the Trojans. They will be at home, and Notre Dame has often come up short against USC, especially when they really needed to win. As for Alabama, usually they look like world-beaters, but they did not that day (at home!) against Texas A&M, a team that has just moved into the SEC and has a tangled history with Alabama, having to do with various sainted coaches like Bear Bryant who started out there. It looks like the beginning of a great, renewed rivalry.
A&M's move into the SEC is hardly the worst of the new conference shake-out moves; look at the Big East, which will have a Western division entirely made up of schools west of the Mississippi, or the Big 10, which now has 14 teams (so which are the small 4, I wonder?) committed to it, due to adding Midwestern powerhouses Rutgers and Maryland. The Big 12 (formerly the Big 8) is down to 10, so it loses its prized conference championship. Notre Dame has committed to the ACC for everything except football, though it will play five games a year against ACC teams (should be better for their record than tough games with teams like Michigan and Michigan State). It's hard to tell which conferences are gaining and which are losing out, really: I think the Pac-12 and SEC are doing well, but I'm not sure about the rest. The Big 10 might seem to be doing well, but between postseason bans for its best teams (Ohio State and Penn State) and switching around, they will have one of the worst representatives in a BCS spot reserved for their league. A pox on all of them!
NFL: Who's Left Standing, Conscious?
Comments about "the product": I see an arms race between a desperate effort to use rules to protect quarterbacks from blind-side hits and defenses getting better and better at all-out pass rush. I see the evolution of fumbles from ballcarriers dropping the ball to defensive strategies which feature "tacklers" who don't tackle but punch at the midsection of the ballcarriers to try to loosen their hold so they can rip the ball out of their hands. The efforts to try to reduce the damage from concussions look more like trying to reduce future lawsuit damages than anything resembling real concern for safety and health. The most important game situation these days is often the judgement of the official in the replay booth looking at the super-slow motion to figure out whether the ball was completely ripped out of the rusher's arms before his knee touched the ground.
Still, despite the developing problems with the product and the feeling that the whole enterprise is doomed, interest remains high. There is both enough parity to make the outcome of almost any game in doubt before it starts, but there is also enough quality that some teams rise above mediocrity. There will be some new teams in the playoffs (49ers and Texans would be the current favorites to meet in the Super Bowl) and plenty of familiar faces as well (Green Bay, New Orleans have overcome poor early-season records and look dangerous, while Peyton Manning has re-emerged with Denver). Ratings should be good.
We are excited about the new college and NBA basketball seasons, we will ignore the absence once again of NHL games, and we are somewhat dismayed by Chelsea's recent form in Premier and Champions League play, but, inevitably, this time of year we have to talk about football (American) a little. I am watching more games this year and enjoying them more, though I have more than a few complaints about what I'm seeing.
The Luck of the Irish
I was preparing to write the article I usually prepare this time of year about how the BCS screwed up, once again, and how their championship game would be unfair to someone. In this year's case, it appeared to be Notre Dame. With Kansas State and Oregon unbeaten and clearly ranked 1-2, and Notre Dame and Alabama (the best team, in spite of their upset loss the previous week to Texas A&M) destined to be outside looking in on the BCS biggie, it appeared the expansion of the championship to four teams, announced earlier this fall, was going to be a year too late.
What I did not expect--what no one expected--was that Saturday night both K-State and Oregon would fall from the ranks of the unbeaten. Kansas St. was thoroughly trounced by an eager Baylor team, while Stanford proved that, while the Cardinal can't quite maintain the consistency needed for a top ranking, it can beat anybody on a given day.
So, Notre Dame--which is unbeaten, has played some tough teams but has had more than its share of narrow, even lucky, wins against teams both good and bad--is now the only major college team that is undefeated and bowl-eligible (Ohio State has chosen to take its postseason ban this year), and would look to play (and probably get beaten by) Alabama in the championship game. One hurdle remains for each: Notre Dame must defeat their perennial nemesis, USC, and Alabama will need to win its SEC championship game (against Georgia or Florida).
USC has had a very difficult season, falling from a high early season ranking, and most recently being shown up by crosstown rival UCLA, and their star quarterback Matt Barkley will not be playing vs. Notre Dame, but I would not exclude the possibility of a win by the Trojans. They will be at home, and Notre Dame has often come up short against USC, especially when they really needed to win. As for Alabama, usually they look like world-beaters, but they did not that day (at home!) against Texas A&M, a team that has just moved into the SEC and has a tangled history with Alabama, having to do with various sainted coaches like Bear Bryant who started out there. It looks like the beginning of a great, renewed rivalry.
A&M's move into the SEC is hardly the worst of the new conference shake-out moves; look at the Big East, which will have a Western division entirely made up of schools west of the Mississippi, or the Big 10, which now has 14 teams (so which are the small 4, I wonder?) committed to it, due to adding Midwestern powerhouses Rutgers and Maryland. The Big 12 (formerly the Big 8) is down to 10, so it loses its prized conference championship. Notre Dame has committed to the ACC for everything except football, though it will play five games a year against ACC teams (should be better for their record than tough games with teams like Michigan and Michigan State). It's hard to tell which conferences are gaining and which are losing out, really: I think the Pac-12 and SEC are doing well, but I'm not sure about the rest. The Big 10 might seem to be doing well, but between postseason bans for its best teams (Ohio State and Penn State) and switching around, they will have one of the worst representatives in a BCS spot reserved for their league. A pox on all of them!
NFL: Who's Left Standing, Conscious?
Comments about "the product": I see an arms race between a desperate effort to use rules to protect quarterbacks from blind-side hits and defenses getting better and better at all-out pass rush. I see the evolution of fumbles from ballcarriers dropping the ball to defensive strategies which feature "tacklers" who don't tackle but punch at the midsection of the ballcarriers to try to loosen their hold so they can rip the ball out of their hands. The efforts to try to reduce the damage from concussions look more like trying to reduce future lawsuit damages than anything resembling real concern for safety and health. The most important game situation these days is often the judgement of the official in the replay booth looking at the super-slow motion to figure out whether the ball was completely ripped out of the rusher's arms before his knee touched the ground.
Still, despite the developing problems with the product and the feeling that the whole enterprise is doomed, interest remains high. There is both enough parity to make the outcome of almost any game in doubt before it starts, but there is also enough quality that some teams rise above mediocrity. There will be some new teams in the playoffs (49ers and Texans would be the current favorites to meet in the Super Bowl) and plenty of familiar faces as well (Green Bay, New Orleans have overcome poor early-season records and look dangerous, while Peyton Manning has re-emerged with Denver). Ratings should be good.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Israel Hamas: Round X
The renewal of hostilities between Israel and Hamas, the bosses of the largely ungoverned Gaza territory, adds to the difficulty of a complex, intractable situation. Israel has put up with indiscriminate Hamas-sponsored rocket attacks on their homeland for too long. President Obama has tried to respond constructively--in particular, he has dispatched Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to try to seek a cease-fire. Obama is probably grateful to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu for holding off until the election was over.
As for Netanyahu, no doubt the offensive will provide a little extra boost to his party's performance in upcoming Likud elections, though he already seemed to be headed for re-election. The Israeli military has had a good amount of time to prepare a set of targets for a limited campaign of shock and awe; there is no need to go forward with the actual threatened ground invasion, which would be counterproductive.
It is beyond the Israelis' power to eliminate Hamas from Gaza, much as they would like to do that. Hamas has deep roots in the suffering populace, and the more Israel demonizes them, the more the people will support them. The real danger to Hamas was continuation of the peace under the unfavorable conditions that prevail there, because it makes clear the limitations of their self-governance under the current scheme.
There are many other players with a stake in this game, though. The Israel-Hamas confrontation marginalizes the Al Fatah leadership which controls the West Bank, at least for the time being. Their big production, arranging for the U.N. General Assembly to recognize them as the representatives of a sovereign state, will not have the desired effect--focusing the world's attention on their bid for statehood--when their rivals are in active resistance against the Israelis. Egypt's new President Morsi has to back Hamas, which like his own party is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, by providing them humanitarian aid, at the least, but he must also strive for peace or lose the backing of the US, which provides billions of aid annually and has no doubt put continuation of that aid at stake on his cooperation.
The new regional powerhouse, Turkey, also has the capability to become involved, as they have relations with both parties. The Turks seem to have a role in all of the Mideast's issues, and they would no doubt like the world's attention to move from Israel-Hamas back to addressing the problems of Syria, as the civil war there affects Turkey much more directly.
I am optimistic that all this mess will lead somewhere, which is more than can be said for the stale impasse of the last couple of years. The US will need to find a new emissary: Secretary Clinton wants out and looks tired. Israel actually has a potential Palestinian party with which it could negotiate in the current Al Fatah leadership, though it has been reluctant to engage (the Israelis say, "we have been willing to negotiate without preconditions", but don't seem to have actually made any effort to do so). I feel that Hamas may agree to allow Egypt to represent them in direct negotiations with Al Fatah, and then with Israel. Bad as this current situation is, it at least broke up the stasis of the last couple of years.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/11/15/assassinate-first-invade-later.html
As for Netanyahu, no doubt the offensive will provide a little extra boost to his party's performance in upcoming Likud elections, though he already seemed to be headed for re-election. The Israeli military has had a good amount of time to prepare a set of targets for a limited campaign of shock and awe; there is no need to go forward with the actual threatened ground invasion, which would be counterproductive.
It is beyond the Israelis' power to eliminate Hamas from Gaza, much as they would like to do that. Hamas has deep roots in the suffering populace, and the more Israel demonizes them, the more the people will support them. The real danger to Hamas was continuation of the peace under the unfavorable conditions that prevail there, because it makes clear the limitations of their self-governance under the current scheme.
There are many other players with a stake in this game, though. The Israel-Hamas confrontation marginalizes the Al Fatah leadership which controls the West Bank, at least for the time being. Their big production, arranging for the U.N. General Assembly to recognize them as the representatives of a sovereign state, will not have the desired effect--focusing the world's attention on their bid for statehood--when their rivals are in active resistance against the Israelis. Egypt's new President Morsi has to back Hamas, which like his own party is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, by providing them humanitarian aid, at the least, but he must also strive for peace or lose the backing of the US, which provides billions of aid annually and has no doubt put continuation of that aid at stake on his cooperation.
The new regional powerhouse, Turkey, also has the capability to become involved, as they have relations with both parties. The Turks seem to have a role in all of the Mideast's issues, and they would no doubt like the world's attention to move from Israel-Hamas back to addressing the problems of Syria, as the civil war there affects Turkey much more directly.
I am optimistic that all this mess will lead somewhere, which is more than can be said for the stale impasse of the last couple of years. The US will need to find a new emissary: Secretary Clinton wants out and looks tired. Israel actually has a potential Palestinian party with which it could negotiate in the current Al Fatah leadership, though it has been reluctant to engage (the Israelis say, "we have been willing to negotiate without preconditions", but don't seem to have actually made any effort to do so). I feel that Hamas may agree to allow Egypt to represent them in direct negotiations with Al Fatah, and then with Israel. Bad as this current situation is, it at least broke up the stasis of the last couple of years.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/11/15/assassinate-first-invade-later.html
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Talking Them Down from the Cliff
Oftentimes when I see a great cliff giving a precipitous drop down to the sea, I am surprised to see people down by the water bathing or sunning in privacy--think of the Amalfi coast, or Big Sur, Hawaii, or Cabo. It turns out that there was a way down from the heights, after all--without jumping or falling. It just takes clear eyesight and the patience to work one's way down.
When the deal was made some 16 months ago which led ultimately to the current Federal government predicament, in which major tax increases and substantial, rather indiscriminate cuts in spending will occur unless there is some legislative remedy, I was not one of those who was particularly critical of President Obama for making the deal. I didn't remember being that harsh on the deal itself (though now that I re-read the post, I gave it a D-) . I anticipated that there would be no intervening agreement, that it would indeed come to this, but I didn't think the automatic spending cuts and tax increases it stipulated as the default, should there be no future agreement, would be that harmful--it would at least address the growing debt problem.
Now, though, it is clear that austerity is not the right solution for the country at this time. There is a recovery, somewhat fragile, that could be snuffed out by tax increases and spending cuts. There is the example of Europe, for which the austerity programs have brought only increased strife and recession, or at least the expectation of it. So, it is still appropriate to put off the tax cuts for a while yet again. I think that will be the part of a package to set fiscal policy for upcoming years that should be the easiest to approve.
Just when the tax cuts should end, and which should end sooner--that's the hard part. Obama laid down his marker today--just give me the extension of the tax cut for the middle class and I will sign it--and Speaker Boehner has laid down his: no tax increase for "small businesses" (read: high-income taxpayers), no "delinking" of the tax cuts between the middle class ones and the high-income ones. Obama claims that the voters ratified his policy of higher taxes for the wealthy, but not for the middle class; Boehner claims the voters returned his House majority for no tax increase for "job creators".
For any deal, Obama will need to thread the needle: pull together the Democrats, get a few Republican Senators to go along (it would be too much to try to get Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to agree to anything--he is watching his back for 2014 and will hold a hard line), and get Speaker John Boehner and enough Republican Representatives to ensure passage. The last will be the hardest part, as Boehner will have to tread a fine line between what can be agreed and what will undermine his leadership of his party's caucus.
There are two strategies Obama could use to try to resolve the impasse. The power play would be to insist on ending the tax cuts for the wealthy and preserving those for those less wealthy, going to the public to get support for his position. It wouldn't happen quickly, though: Obama would have to be willing to play to the brink, and let tax cuts end in January. Then, when the pain is visible throughout America in the reductions in take-home pay, if Obama has played his cards right, the outcry would force the Republicans to give ground. The finesse play is to maintain the tax rates, allow the payroll tax cuts to phase out over time, but try to achieve the necessary revenue increases through elimination of tax-favored income (such as capital gains, dividends, and the carry interest) and reducing deductions for upper-income taxpayers.
The latter approach is the one that will be more readily acceptable to Republicans in Congress, but it will be difficult to achieve the revenue increases that are needed for the "balanced approach" on which Obama will insist (roughly, $1 trillion over ten years, starting small and growing over time) purely through these methods. Also, there is a legitimate question whether increasing taxes on some of these investment-oriented "tax expenditures" like capital gains and dividends, or maintaining corporate tax rates at their current high level would be a healthy thing for the economy. For this reason, I would tend to go the other way, and urge the gradual relaxation of the tax cuts (increase in tax rates), even for the "middle class", but on different schedules for the wealthiest (over $1 million income), the upper-income, and the middle class. If Obama can achieve some agreement on this approach in the next two months, without going over the edge, it will be a huge victory for all.
Some deductions that serve no policy purpose (such as for the expenses of moving jobs overseas, a poster child for the need for tax reforms) and loopholes set up for a privileged few should be phased out or eliminated, but most deductions are there for a good reason and should be preserved. The mortgage interest deduction is not so well justified, but it will be impossible, and inadvisable given the beginning of recovery for the housing market, to do more than cut it a little around the edges (cap on the deductible interest, gradual reduction of the deduction for second homes, etc.) I am not in favor of any approach that tries to solve the problem by adding to the tax burden on the lower classes, such as a VAT or flatter tax. As for the end of the payroll tax reduction, that could be preserved through finesse, by eliminating the cap on the payroll tax for Social Security, which currently kicks in the low six-digit incomes.
Once the question of who gets gored when with additional taxes, the rest of the deal is not so hard to describe. The "sequestration" cuts across the board in social programs and defense will be replaced with specific cuts that can be identified and worked out. The big "entitlement programs"--Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security--can have cost improvements identified, but it will take years, not months, to work out how those would occur. The outlines of this deal can and should be worked out now, with the lame duck Congress, though many details will be sorted out in the next Congress. The key things for now are: agreement on the 3-to-1 cuts to revenue ratio, the dates when revenue increases will come, agreement on the debt ceiling for the next year or so, and agreement on the distribution of targeted cuts by department.
I am optimistic that some progress will be made over the next few weeks, and I am pulling for Speaker Boehner to succeed in his difficult task: if he gives too many accommodations to the Democrats, the Republican rank-and-file will overthrow him, and the resulting leadership (Eric Cantor & Paul Ryan), who are more than willing to take him down, would renew the impasse. For this reason, I think Obama should go slowly in attacking the Republicans, and the progressives who pushed Obama over the top once again this year should be patient--at least until it is clear that the "good cop" approach can not succeed.
When the deal was made some 16 months ago which led ultimately to the current Federal government predicament, in which major tax increases and substantial, rather indiscriminate cuts in spending will occur unless there is some legislative remedy, I was not one of those who was particularly critical of President Obama for making the deal. I didn't remember being that harsh on the deal itself (though now that I re-read the post, I gave it a D-) . I anticipated that there would be no intervening agreement, that it would indeed come to this, but I didn't think the automatic spending cuts and tax increases it stipulated as the default, should there be no future agreement, would be that harmful--it would at least address the growing debt problem.
Now, though, it is clear that austerity is not the right solution for the country at this time. There is a recovery, somewhat fragile, that could be snuffed out by tax increases and spending cuts. There is the example of Europe, for which the austerity programs have brought only increased strife and recession, or at least the expectation of it. So, it is still appropriate to put off the tax cuts for a while yet again. I think that will be the part of a package to set fiscal policy for upcoming years that should be the easiest to approve.
Just when the tax cuts should end, and which should end sooner--that's the hard part. Obama laid down his marker today--just give me the extension of the tax cut for the middle class and I will sign it--and Speaker Boehner has laid down his: no tax increase for "small businesses" (read: high-income taxpayers), no "delinking" of the tax cuts between the middle class ones and the high-income ones. Obama claims that the voters ratified his policy of higher taxes for the wealthy, but not for the middle class; Boehner claims the voters returned his House majority for no tax increase for "job creators".
For any deal, Obama will need to thread the needle: pull together the Democrats, get a few Republican Senators to go along (it would be too much to try to get Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to agree to anything--he is watching his back for 2014 and will hold a hard line), and get Speaker John Boehner and enough Republican Representatives to ensure passage. The last will be the hardest part, as Boehner will have to tread a fine line between what can be agreed and what will undermine his leadership of his party's caucus.
There are two strategies Obama could use to try to resolve the impasse. The power play would be to insist on ending the tax cuts for the wealthy and preserving those for those less wealthy, going to the public to get support for his position. It wouldn't happen quickly, though: Obama would have to be willing to play to the brink, and let tax cuts end in January. Then, when the pain is visible throughout America in the reductions in take-home pay, if Obama has played his cards right, the outcry would force the Republicans to give ground. The finesse play is to maintain the tax rates, allow the payroll tax cuts to phase out over time, but try to achieve the necessary revenue increases through elimination of tax-favored income (such as capital gains, dividends, and the carry interest) and reducing deductions for upper-income taxpayers.
The latter approach is the one that will be more readily acceptable to Republicans in Congress, but it will be difficult to achieve the revenue increases that are needed for the "balanced approach" on which Obama will insist (roughly, $1 trillion over ten years, starting small and growing over time) purely through these methods. Also, there is a legitimate question whether increasing taxes on some of these investment-oriented "tax expenditures" like capital gains and dividends, or maintaining corporate tax rates at their current high level would be a healthy thing for the economy. For this reason, I would tend to go the other way, and urge the gradual relaxation of the tax cuts (increase in tax rates), even for the "middle class", but on different schedules for the wealthiest (over $1 million income), the upper-income, and the middle class. If Obama can achieve some agreement on this approach in the next two months, without going over the edge, it will be a huge victory for all.
Some deductions that serve no policy purpose (such as for the expenses of moving jobs overseas, a poster child for the need for tax reforms) and loopholes set up for a privileged few should be phased out or eliminated, but most deductions are there for a good reason and should be preserved. The mortgage interest deduction is not so well justified, but it will be impossible, and inadvisable given the beginning of recovery for the housing market, to do more than cut it a little around the edges (cap on the deductible interest, gradual reduction of the deduction for second homes, etc.) I am not in favor of any approach that tries to solve the problem by adding to the tax burden on the lower classes, such as a VAT or flatter tax. As for the end of the payroll tax reduction, that could be preserved through finesse, by eliminating the cap on the payroll tax for Social Security, which currently kicks in the low six-digit incomes.
Once the question of who gets gored when with additional taxes, the rest of the deal is not so hard to describe. The "sequestration" cuts across the board in social programs and defense will be replaced with specific cuts that can be identified and worked out. The big "entitlement programs"--Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security--can have cost improvements identified, but it will take years, not months, to work out how those would occur. The outlines of this deal can and should be worked out now, with the lame duck Congress, though many details will be sorted out in the next Congress. The key things for now are: agreement on the 3-to-1 cuts to revenue ratio, the dates when revenue increases will come, agreement on the debt ceiling for the next year or so, and agreement on the distribution of targeted cuts by department.
I am optimistic that some progress will be made over the next few weeks, and I am pulling for Speaker Boehner to succeed in his difficult task: if he gives too many accommodations to the Democrats, the Republican rank-and-file will overthrow him, and the resulting leadership (Eric Cantor & Paul Ryan), who are more than willing to take him down, would renew the impasse. For this reason, I think Obama should go slowly in attacking the Republicans, and the progressives who pushed Obama over the top once again this year should be patient--at least until it is clear that the "good cop" approach can not succeed.
Friday, November 09, 2012
Warrior-Hero Petraeus Falls on His Sword
The resignation of CIA Director David Petraeus has provided a shock to post-election Washington today. Petraeus, who was the hero of the surge in Iraq, literally wrote the book on counter-terrorism for the US military, and led the Afghanistan effort for the allies as well before returning stateside to head the CIA, resigned because of an extra-marital affair that was about to become publicly known.
To me, there is something a little fishy about the resignation and its timing. Of course, a CIA Director should have impeccable behavior, so as not to attract trouble, attention, or, especially, blackmailers. That's exactly what's fishy about it, though: the blackmail threat depends on the CIA Director trying to keep the affair secret. Once it's out in the public, that danger is reduced. And, while we should all behave ourselves and obey our marriage vows, adultery is not sufficient ground--even in the shark tank of Washington--to force a powerful, popular military hero like Petraeus to have to resign his position.
What I have heard today is that his lover, a glamorous woman who is his official biographer, may have--I repeat, may have--had private access to classified documents. There is apparently an FBI investigation of this possibility. Actually, I don't find this very unusual, except for the fact that Petraeus, as CIA Director, is not supposed to have any life or privacy.
One could conclude that this is another case of how the fishbowl in Washington tends to make life in it untenable for normal people, but there is a wrinkle, a story that is not quite emerging. I got a hint of it in the days before the election, when I read in one of the blogs that compiles political news that Mitt Romney's silence on The Benghazi Affair in the last days was not due to his inability to make a coherent attack on the Administration's behavior before, during, or after it, but because he had been advised--in his confidential briefings on national security which he, as the nominee of a major party, had been receiving--that the Libya story would end up principally faulting Petraeus' CIA, rather than Obama and the State Department. Romney, according to the story, did not want to take on Petraeus, a presumed Republican (though that may not be correct) and certainly a figure of popular respect, so he had gone silent on the issue, though many in his party were eager for him to continue his attacks in the final days of the campaign.
I didn't credit the story at the time: Romney had backed off his hawkish critique of Obama at the foreign policy debate, and, after twice putting his foot in his mouth about Benghazi, it made sense to me for him to keep quiet, regardless of where the story was going. It now appears to me, though, that Petraeus knew his days were numbered because of Benghazi, and with his private behavior compromised, decided it was the right time to end his public service and avoid putting everyone through the wringer. That painful experience will apparently fall to Michael Morell, a long-time intelligence pro who will be the acting CIA Director and apparently is a good candidate for accountability. If Morell can successfully defend the Agency's actions in Libya, I'm guessing he would earn the job permanently.
I like the ring of this title--sounds like something from the Iliad.
To me, there is something a little fishy about the resignation and its timing. Of course, a CIA Director should have impeccable behavior, so as not to attract trouble, attention, or, especially, blackmailers. That's exactly what's fishy about it, though: the blackmail threat depends on the CIA Director trying to keep the affair secret. Once it's out in the public, that danger is reduced. And, while we should all behave ourselves and obey our marriage vows, adultery is not sufficient ground--even in the shark tank of Washington--to force a powerful, popular military hero like Petraeus to have to resign his position.
What I have heard today is that his lover, a glamorous woman who is his official biographer, may have--I repeat, may have--had private access to classified documents. There is apparently an FBI investigation of this possibility. Actually, I don't find this very unusual, except for the fact that Petraeus, as CIA Director, is not supposed to have any life or privacy.
One could conclude that this is another case of how the fishbowl in Washington tends to make life in it untenable for normal people, but there is a wrinkle, a story that is not quite emerging. I got a hint of it in the days before the election, when I read in one of the blogs that compiles political news that Mitt Romney's silence on The Benghazi Affair in the last days was not due to his inability to make a coherent attack on the Administration's behavior before, during, or after it, but because he had been advised--in his confidential briefings on national security which he, as the nominee of a major party, had been receiving--that the Libya story would end up principally faulting Petraeus' CIA, rather than Obama and the State Department. Romney, according to the story, did not want to take on Petraeus, a presumed Republican (though that may not be correct) and certainly a figure of popular respect, so he had gone silent on the issue, though many in his party were eager for him to continue his attacks in the final days of the campaign.
I didn't credit the story at the time: Romney had backed off his hawkish critique of Obama at the foreign policy debate, and, after twice putting his foot in his mouth about Benghazi, it made sense to me for him to keep quiet, regardless of where the story was going. It now appears to me, though, that Petraeus knew his days were numbered because of Benghazi, and with his private behavior compromised, decided it was the right time to end his public service and avoid putting everyone through the wringer. That painful experience will apparently fall to Michael Morell, a long-time intelligence pro who will be the acting CIA Director and apparently is a good candidate for accountability. If Morell can successfully defend the Agency's actions in Libya, I'm guessing he would earn the job permanently.
I like the ring of this title--sounds like something from the Iliad.
Electoral Recap
The 2012 election results were an eloquent response to the shellacking the Democrats suffered in the 2010 midterm elections. In terms of response to the legislative miasma that followed, and to the political challenge which the Republican resurgence presented, the needle on the political meter shifted back toward the historic 2008 result.
Which is not to say that all was restored. In voting for the House of Representatives, Democrats nationally had a small advantage, but the net result of the redistricting after 2010 and the census that year gave the Republicans a structural advantage in this election. Seven races remain undecided at this point, but the results indicate the final Republican advantage will be 235-200, a pickup of seven seats nationally for the Democrats, but far short of the objective.
In the Senate, it was the Republicans who fell short. Presented with a golden opportunity to reclaim control, the Republicans failed to capture Democratic seats in 22 of 23 seats (Nebraska was their only pickup), while the Democrats gained in 3 of 10 (Massachusetts, Indiana, and--if the independent Senator-elect Angus King follows expectation--Maine). Instead of gaining the 3-4 seats that they needed, the Republicans lost two. Tea party extremist positions cost them in Missouri and Indiana, but that was not universally the case: more moderate Republicans went down to defeat in Massachusetts and Wisconsin. Montana was perhaps the most striking result, as a mainstream (that is to say, a conservative establishment) Republican lost narrowly to the incumbent moderate Democrat.
In the main event, the Democrats had the better candidate, better execution of its strategy, and President Obama obtained a surprisingly clear victory. After 2008, I declared the Obama campaign to be the best in the history of electoral politics; if anything, this year's accomplishment was even more impressive. The key successes of the Obama campaign were as follows: 1) Spending money early and successfully defining Romney as an out-of-touch elitist; 2) Identifying a rich crop of new supporters and getting them to turn out on election day; and 3) Tactics in the swing states, which ensured the Electoral College victory.
I am most impressed by 3), as the Obama-Biden ticket won all of the nine swing states except North Carolina and, of those identified as crucial for the shortest route to the winning 270 electoral votes, all were won by several points. The four closest states (besides the 2-point win for Romney in NC) were Florida, 1 point; Ohio, 2 points; Virginia, 3 points; and Colorado, 4.5 points. Much was made of Ohio, and in the event, it was the call for Ohio which put Obama over the top, but actually the tipping point state --the closest state which Obama needed to win--was Colorado: even if Obama had lost Ohio, Florida, and Virginia, with Colorado he would have had 272 electoral votes. The other swing states were all won more easily, 5-6 point margins; that was quite an accomplishment.
The Republicans' many deficiencies were evident--the three largest were their failures to appeal to women and to Latinos, and a totally wrong-headed strategy to try to suppress votes in the swing states. Suppression totally backfired--they were defeated in every court case, and the effort backfired and got many additional African-Americans to show up, stand in line for whatever time was needed, and vote for Obama. In retrospect, I don't think Romney was that bad of a candidate for them--all of his competitors in the primaries were far worse in terms of their potential in a general election--though his campaign direction was not so good. Romney's Etch-a-Sketch approach to rewriting his positions in the latter stages of the campaign actually worked fairly well with low-information ndependents, who were somehow convinced by his moderate-sounding positions in the debates after much more radical positions in the primary. He suffered a little from conveying a general, and accurate, impression of untrustworthiness, of being an empty suit--what did he really believe?--but it didn't hurt him much with the party base at the end, as they had nowhere else to go.
At the end of the day, the Republicans and their supporters spent an incredible amount of money unwisely. That is encouraging on the one hand (more money does not equal victory), but, on the other, may make it harder to convince the public that this campaign financing system is unworkable.
First Look at 2016
For the Democrats, it will be Hillary Clinton's nomination if she wants it. She says she doesn't, but that kind of opportunity is hard to resist, particularly for someone who has tried for the golden ring in the past. If she doesn't run, it will probably be between Biden (who will be 73) and Gov. Cuomo of New York; I like Cuomo's chances in that race, as Democrats will want to continue the momentum of attracting post-Boomers and millennials, and Cuomo has been a successful governor.
For the Republicans, Chris Christie of New Jersey is one that many fancy, but I do not: the Republicans will not forgive his cozying up to Obama in the last days of the campaign on the relief effort, after Superstorm Sandy, and it will raise cynics' impression that Christie was already playing for '16 and was not a team player. I think they will be looking to change from both the establishment, Bushite candidates and the Tea Party-inflections of the past couple of years. I see Marco Rubio as the favorite, if personal issues with his past do not end up disqualifying him. Paul Ryan could be an effective challenger to Rubio, in a primary campaign which could be a huge improvement over this year's dismaying show.
Which is not to say that all was restored. In voting for the House of Representatives, Democrats nationally had a small advantage, but the net result of the redistricting after 2010 and the census that year gave the Republicans a structural advantage in this election. Seven races remain undecided at this point, but the results indicate the final Republican advantage will be 235-200, a pickup of seven seats nationally for the Democrats, but far short of the objective.
In the Senate, it was the Republicans who fell short. Presented with a golden opportunity to reclaim control, the Republicans failed to capture Democratic seats in 22 of 23 seats (Nebraska was their only pickup), while the Democrats gained in 3 of 10 (Massachusetts, Indiana, and--if the independent Senator-elect Angus King follows expectation--Maine). Instead of gaining the 3-4 seats that they needed, the Republicans lost two. Tea party extremist positions cost them in Missouri and Indiana, but that was not universally the case: more moderate Republicans went down to defeat in Massachusetts and Wisconsin. Montana was perhaps the most striking result, as a mainstream (that is to say, a conservative establishment) Republican lost narrowly to the incumbent moderate Democrat.
In the main event, the Democrats had the better candidate, better execution of its strategy, and President Obama obtained a surprisingly clear victory. After 2008, I declared the Obama campaign to be the best in the history of electoral politics; if anything, this year's accomplishment was even more impressive. The key successes of the Obama campaign were as follows: 1) Spending money early and successfully defining Romney as an out-of-touch elitist; 2) Identifying a rich crop of new supporters and getting them to turn out on election day; and 3) Tactics in the swing states, which ensured the Electoral College victory.
I am most impressed by 3), as the Obama-Biden ticket won all of the nine swing states except North Carolina and, of those identified as crucial for the shortest route to the winning 270 electoral votes, all were won by several points. The four closest states (besides the 2-point win for Romney in NC) were Florida, 1 point; Ohio, 2 points; Virginia, 3 points; and Colorado, 4.5 points. Much was made of Ohio, and in the event, it was the call for Ohio which put Obama over the top, but actually the tipping point state --the closest state which Obama needed to win--was Colorado: even if Obama had lost Ohio, Florida, and Virginia, with Colorado he would have had 272 electoral votes. The other swing states were all won more easily, 5-6 point margins; that was quite an accomplishment.
The Republicans' many deficiencies were evident--the three largest were their failures to appeal to women and to Latinos, and a totally wrong-headed strategy to try to suppress votes in the swing states. Suppression totally backfired--they were defeated in every court case, and the effort backfired and got many additional African-Americans to show up, stand in line for whatever time was needed, and vote for Obama. In retrospect, I don't think Romney was that bad of a candidate for them--all of his competitors in the primaries were far worse in terms of their potential in a general election--though his campaign direction was not so good. Romney's Etch-a-Sketch approach to rewriting his positions in the latter stages of the campaign actually worked fairly well with low-information ndependents, who were somehow convinced by his moderate-sounding positions in the debates after much more radical positions in the primary. He suffered a little from conveying a general, and accurate, impression of untrustworthiness, of being an empty suit--what did he really believe?--but it didn't hurt him much with the party base at the end, as they had nowhere else to go.
At the end of the day, the Republicans and their supporters spent an incredible amount of money unwisely. That is encouraging on the one hand (more money does not equal victory), but, on the other, may make it harder to convince the public that this campaign financing system is unworkable.
First Look at 2016
For the Democrats, it will be Hillary Clinton's nomination if she wants it. She says she doesn't, but that kind of opportunity is hard to resist, particularly for someone who has tried for the golden ring in the past. If she doesn't run, it will probably be between Biden (who will be 73) and Gov. Cuomo of New York; I like Cuomo's chances in that race, as Democrats will want to continue the momentum of attracting post-Boomers and millennials, and Cuomo has been a successful governor.
For the Republicans, Chris Christie of New Jersey is one that many fancy, but I do not: the Republicans will not forgive his cozying up to Obama in the last days of the campaign on the relief effort, after Superstorm Sandy, and it will raise cynics' impression that Christie was already playing for '16 and was not a team player. I think they will be looking to change from both the establishment, Bushite candidates and the Tea Party-inflections of the past couple of years. I see Marco Rubio as the favorite, if personal issues with his past do not end up disqualifying him. Paul Ryan could be an effective challenger to Rubio, in a primary campaign which could be a huge improvement over this year's dismaying show.
Tuesday, November 06, 2012
Election Night
5:00 p.m. Central time. No score.
I'll be switching back and forth between CNN and Fox News tonight. Fox will be covering the same set of facts, and I will be interested to hear what they say.
I kept busy most of the day to keep me from going crazy--went to the gym, slow lunch, etc. I did turn on CNN an hour ago--it was amusing, as always to see Carville and Matalin talk at and past each other. Matalin seems to be hinting that the CNN exit poll is showing strong (popular vote) for Romney--something they will not tell us. Nice hairdo, Mary--no, seriously.
5:10 p.m. Gergen made a good point, that the exit polls in 2004 suggested Kerry would win the election. This is one reason why they don't want to talk about what the total results of the Presidential contest are.
5:39 p.m. This is probably the toughest hour: the news teams are all "fired up and ready to go" (the Obama pep talk phrase), but they have nothing to say yet.
I am watching two things closely in the states of Kentucky and Indiana, which are reporting part of their results (split by time zones): the Donnelly-Mourdock race for Senate in Indiana, and the race of Ben Chandler (D) in the House, trying to hold onto a moderate district near Lexington, in a state that is going to go big for Romney.
Intrade.com has it at 70-30 Obama, which tells me that there has been no leak of meaningful information. No movement yet.
6:16 p.m.CNN: Romney 8, Obama 3; Fox: Romney 19, Obama 3. Kentucky, Vermont (and Indiana, on Fox) called. Still not much to say, but John King had a nice factoid about Vigo County, Indiana (where Terre Haute is): the county has been in accord with the winner of the Presidential race all but twice in the last 125 years; last time it was wrong was 1952. And it's 49-49 with 78% of the county's vote in!
6:44 p.m. Romney 33, Obama 3. South Carolina and West Virginia called for Romney. No surprises yet--Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, all too close to call, though it sounded as though North Carolina is close to being called (for Romney, I presume). I'm kind of surprised Georgia is taking a while to call--maybe theyre just slow.
Donnelly now leading Mourdock; that would be a wrong prediction by me, but I'll gladly take it.
In a few minutes, a number of states will close their polls, and the game will finally get underway.
7:01 a.m. Obama 78, Romney 71 (Fox). Fox likes to call them quickly, but they haven't even listed the ones they just called--it was 49-3 Romney two minutes ago (with Georgia). Obama: IL, MA, DE, DC, CT, MD, NJ, RI, 3 of 4 in ME (!); Romney: AL, MS, OK.
Obama 64, Romney 40 (CNN). They haven't called GA, NJ, MS, AL. They added AR at some point.
It's beginning to look as though the provisional ballot problem in Ohio (they won't be released for 10 days, and there's a lot of them) could mean the state will not be called tonight. If my prediction (290-248) is right, and that will probably depend in particular on the close race in Colorado, then he may still be anointed the winner regardless of Ohio's 18 EV.
7:27 p.m. Romney 82, Obama 78 (Fox). They called TN for Romney--no issue there. Rove is on there trying to make the argument that the fragmentary indications in VA, FL, OH all favor Romney. His argument is that the swing counties have swung to Romney; Obama will have to make it up with turnout in the areas where he is strong.
8:00 p.m. Romney 152, Obama 123 (CNN). Romney: KS, LA, NE (3 of 5 so far), ND, SD, TX, WY, Obama: MI, NY (and MS, NJ, which they should've called a long time ago).
Romney 149, Obama 127 (Fox). I think Nebraska and Maine are the discrepancies, with the potential for splitting their votes.
8:15 p.m. Fox went to 149-147, the extra 20 is Pennsylvania! The fact they called it quickly is a very good sign for Obama. The Fox commentators are beginning to accept that, unless they get Ohio, they will not win. The "smart blonde" on there, whatever her name, is carping about the auto bailout issue and how Romney lost it. CNN has not called PA.
8:26 p.m. Obama 157, Romney 149. Fox calls Wisconsin for Obama. I saw on CNN that the Exit Poll there was 52-46 for Obama; not enough for CNN to call. CNN is being good about showing their exit poll results in states, while Fox is showing itself considerably more aggressive in calling races based on them, which is fine if they don't end up walking any of the states back. Based on Fox, Obama should win this election.
CNN is at 152-123, Romney, because they haven't called PA, WI. (Fox is now at 153-153; I think the extra 4 EV for Obama was a mistake?) They have some key results from swing counties in CO (Arapahoe, near Denver), that suggests he may win there.
8:48 p.m. Fox still at 153-153, CNN at 152-143 (they called PA). Big news is the pickup of Senate seats by Donnelly in IN and Elizabeth Warren in MA! Intrade.com has shifted to 94% for Obama, due to the shift in sentiment for Ohio (90% for Obama) and Florida (82% for Obama). In particular, Ohio's quote on Intrade dropped from 30% to 10% in the last hour.
9:00 p.m. Florida and Ohio are on the verge of being called for Obama, though they may stay there for awhile. NH called for Obama, UT for Romney. 158-147 Romney on CNN, 162-157 Romney on Fox. (Wisconsin the main difference.) Popular vote a little to Romney, but could shift when CA comes in. Rove still believes in Ohio for Romney, but isn't speaking about Florida.
9:50 p.m. 169-157 Romney (CNN); 174-173 Romney (Fox). CNN has called AZ for Romney, MN for Obama. IA, MO are counting slow; haven't been called. CNN is so focused on the Presidential race, I have heard nothing about the House--ever. Fox just made an announcement a while ago that the Republicans would keep control, though they do cycle House race data fairly continuously, without any comment.
10:05 p.m Obama 244-203 (Fox), Fox has called NC, MO, MT for Romney, but CA, WA, HI for Obama. 10:12 p.m. 18 votes just popped into Obama's column on Fox--must be...Ohio?
Yes! It's all over but the shouting. A great feat for Obama's campaign and for him.
CNN calls it at 10:18 p.m.
As for the Senate, there is still some doubt: Heidi Heitkamp is holding a tiny lead over Rick Berg in ND, which would be a great upset. Tammy Baldwin is holding a narrow lead in Wisconsin; I was calling it the other way, though Baldwin had been favored in recent days. Montana has just begun to count; it won't be decided for hours. Right now, Shelly Berkley is leading in Nevada, which could be a major upset. Tim Kaine picked up a big victory in Virginia. So the Democrats should end up with 2-3 seats more than the 51 that I projected.
In terms of the predictions, I think I did very well on the popular vote, though we will see. Nate Silver should take credit: he has had the 332-206 as the most probable Electoral vote, consistently, for months, and it may end up being exactly right. My mistakes appear to be Florida and Virginia.
I'll be switching back and forth between CNN and Fox News tonight. Fox will be covering the same set of facts, and I will be interested to hear what they say.
I kept busy most of the day to keep me from going crazy--went to the gym, slow lunch, etc. I did turn on CNN an hour ago--it was amusing, as always to see Carville and Matalin talk at and past each other. Matalin seems to be hinting that the CNN exit poll is showing strong (popular vote) for Romney--something they will not tell us. Nice hairdo, Mary--no, seriously.
5:10 p.m. Gergen made a good point, that the exit polls in 2004 suggested Kerry would win the election. This is one reason why they don't want to talk about what the total results of the Presidential contest are.
5:39 p.m. This is probably the toughest hour: the news teams are all "fired up and ready to go" (the Obama pep talk phrase), but they have nothing to say yet.
I am watching two things closely in the states of Kentucky and Indiana, which are reporting part of their results (split by time zones): the Donnelly-Mourdock race for Senate in Indiana, and the race of Ben Chandler (D) in the House, trying to hold onto a moderate district near Lexington, in a state that is going to go big for Romney.
Intrade.com has it at 70-30 Obama, which tells me that there has been no leak of meaningful information. No movement yet.
6:16 p.m.CNN: Romney 8, Obama 3; Fox: Romney 19, Obama 3. Kentucky, Vermont (and Indiana, on Fox) called. Still not much to say, but John King had a nice factoid about Vigo County, Indiana (where Terre Haute is): the county has been in accord with the winner of the Presidential race all but twice in the last 125 years; last time it was wrong was 1952. And it's 49-49 with 78% of the county's vote in!
6:44 p.m. Romney 33, Obama 3. South Carolina and West Virginia called for Romney. No surprises yet--Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, all too close to call, though it sounded as though North Carolina is close to being called (for Romney, I presume). I'm kind of surprised Georgia is taking a while to call--maybe theyre just slow.
Donnelly now leading Mourdock; that would be a wrong prediction by me, but I'll gladly take it.
In a few minutes, a number of states will close their polls, and the game will finally get underway.
7:01 a.m. Obama 78, Romney 71 (Fox). Fox likes to call them quickly, but they haven't even listed the ones they just called--it was 49-3 Romney two minutes ago (with Georgia). Obama: IL, MA, DE, DC, CT, MD, NJ, RI, 3 of 4 in ME (!); Romney: AL, MS, OK.
Obama 64, Romney 40 (CNN). They haven't called GA, NJ, MS, AL. They added AR at some point.
It's beginning to look as though the provisional ballot problem in Ohio (they won't be released for 10 days, and there's a lot of them) could mean the state will not be called tonight. If my prediction (290-248) is right, and that will probably depend in particular on the close race in Colorado, then he may still be anointed the winner regardless of Ohio's 18 EV.
7:27 p.m. Romney 82, Obama 78 (Fox). They called TN for Romney--no issue there. Rove is on there trying to make the argument that the fragmentary indications in VA, FL, OH all favor Romney. His argument is that the swing counties have swung to Romney; Obama will have to make it up with turnout in the areas where he is strong.
8:00 p.m. Romney 152, Obama 123 (CNN). Romney: KS, LA, NE (3 of 5 so far), ND, SD, TX, WY, Obama: MI, NY (and MS, NJ, which they should've called a long time ago).
Romney 149, Obama 127 (Fox). I think Nebraska and Maine are the discrepancies, with the potential for splitting their votes.
8:15 p.m. Fox went to 149-147, the extra 20 is Pennsylvania! The fact they called it quickly is a very good sign for Obama. The Fox commentators are beginning to accept that, unless they get Ohio, they will not win. The "smart blonde" on there, whatever her name, is carping about the auto bailout issue and how Romney lost it. CNN has not called PA.
8:26 p.m. Obama 157, Romney 149. Fox calls Wisconsin for Obama. I saw on CNN that the Exit Poll there was 52-46 for Obama; not enough for CNN to call. CNN is being good about showing their exit poll results in states, while Fox is showing itself considerably more aggressive in calling races based on them, which is fine if they don't end up walking any of the states back. Based on Fox, Obama should win this election.
CNN is at 152-123, Romney, because they haven't called PA, WI. (Fox is now at 153-153; I think the extra 4 EV for Obama was a mistake?) They have some key results from swing counties in CO (Arapahoe, near Denver), that suggests he may win there.
8:48 p.m. Fox still at 153-153, CNN at 152-143 (they called PA). Big news is the pickup of Senate seats by Donnelly in IN and Elizabeth Warren in MA! Intrade.com has shifted to 94% for Obama, due to the shift in sentiment for Ohio (90% for Obama) and Florida (82% for Obama). In particular, Ohio's quote on Intrade dropped from 30% to 10% in the last hour.
9:00 p.m. Florida and Ohio are on the verge of being called for Obama, though they may stay there for awhile. NH called for Obama, UT for Romney. 158-147 Romney on CNN, 162-157 Romney on Fox. (Wisconsin the main difference.) Popular vote a little to Romney, but could shift when CA comes in. Rove still believes in Ohio for Romney, but isn't speaking about Florida.
9:50 p.m. 169-157 Romney (CNN); 174-173 Romney (Fox). CNN has called AZ for Romney, MN for Obama. IA, MO are counting slow; haven't been called. CNN is so focused on the Presidential race, I have heard nothing about the House--ever. Fox just made an announcement a while ago that the Republicans would keep control, though they do cycle House race data fairly continuously, without any comment.
10:05 p.m Obama 244-203 (Fox), Fox has called NC, MO, MT for Romney, but CA, WA, HI for Obama. 10:12 p.m. 18 votes just popped into Obama's column on Fox--must be...Ohio?
Yes! It's all over but the shouting. A great feat for Obama's campaign and for him.
CNN calls it at 10:18 p.m.
As for the Senate, there is still some doubt: Heidi Heitkamp is holding a tiny lead over Rick Berg in ND, which would be a great upset. Tammy Baldwin is holding a narrow lead in Wisconsin; I was calling it the other way, though Baldwin had been favored in recent days. Montana has just begun to count; it won't be decided for hours. Right now, Shelly Berkley is leading in Nevada, which could be a major upset. Tim Kaine picked up a big victory in Virginia. So the Democrats should end up with 2-3 seats more than the 51 that I projected.
In terms of the predictions, I think I did very well on the popular vote, though we will see. Nate Silver should take credit: he has had the 332-206 as the most probable Electoral vote, consistently, for months, and it may end up being exactly right. My mistakes appear to be Florida and Virginia.
Saturday, November 03, 2012
Getting Down to Cases, Pt. 3
In this post with detailed predictions for the Presidential race, we will basically just go down the list of the states that were not automatic locks for one party or the other from the beginning of the general election campaign, starting from those for which there is the least doubt and finishing with the ones which appear to be closest.
The starting point of the discussion are that there are 23 Republican states with 191 electoral votes and 17 Democratic states (plus the District of Columbia) with 217 electoral votes about which there is very little doubt. They include a few states, like Minnesota, New Mexico, and Michigan for the Democratic ticket, and Arizona and Indiana (which Obama won narrowly in 2008) for the Republicans, which may end up having fairly small margins, on the order of 5-7 percent. These states are not realistically in the plans of their opponents, though, and they have not been deluged with advertisements as the other 10 states have. So, we proceed from there, analyzing the other 130 electoral votes which will surely decide the election*:
North Carolina (15 Electoral votes) - It is a sign of the tightness of this election that this, the 10th closest state, is not a sure thing; the polls there have not universally had Romney leading, but most of them do, and both candidates are bypassing the state this weekend, suggesting they both know how it will end up--with Romney (3 pt. margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama, 217-206.
Pennsylvania (20 ) - If Superstorm Sandy is to have a meaningful impact on the Presidential election (apart from Obama's strong handling of the crisis or NYC Mayor Bloomberg's endorsement of Obama afterwards prompted by the storm), it will be in this state (none of the other ones in the affected area on the Eastern Seaboard are close), and that effect can only hurt Obama. It's close enough that a couple hundred thousand votes suppressed by the difficulty of getting to polling places, or by the disruption in people's lives, could turn this state in the Republicans' favor. I don't think it will be quite enough, though, and I think this will be viewed by the Republicans as the big missed opportunity if Romney loses: more effort, sooner, could have allowed him to take this state from Obama (3.5 pt margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama, 237-206.
Nevada (6 ) - This state is usually shown as a toss-up, but Obama is consistently polling narrowly ahead, and turnout--driven by Sen. Harry Reid's political machine--will favor the Democrats. (4 pt margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 243-206.
Next come the two most consequential states in the election:
Florida (29) - This state is a must-win for Romney--winning is basically impossible for him without it--and would be a great trophy for Obama, the difference between a narrow Electoral college win and a safe one. Obama was leading in the polling at his peak, before the first debate; now he looks to be trailing. Romney (1.5 pt. margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama 243-235.
Ohio (18) - Winning the state is not equal to winning the election, but losing it would put either at the brink of defeat. Romney's biggest problem is that he has never led Obama in the state by any meaningful margin, although he was equal or near-equal at Obama's lowest point (before the second debate). Obama's efforts to help the auto industry, and the somewhat-related fact that its economy is doing relatively well at the present, mean this will not be the closest state Obama wins. (1.5 pt. margin, about 70,000 votes). Obama 261-235.
New Hampshire (4) - This state has gone back and forth, but Obama is leading fairly consistently in the last couple of weeks. (2 pt. margin, about 10,000 votes) Obama 265-235.
Iowa (6) - This state has polled extremely close. There hasn't been that much polling there, so there's considerable doubt, but this is not a particularly strong state for Romney (he narrowly lost the popular vote to Rick Santorum in the caucuses), and it has supported Obama well in the past. (1.5 pt margin, about 20,000 votes) Obama 271-235.
Wisconsin (10) - Obama is polling ahead by an average of 3-5 points in recent weeks, but I think this is one state in which the progressive forces are fatigued, perhaps a bit demoralized, by the continuing partisan battles within the state, which has come out most recently in favor of the Republicans (Gov. Scott Walker's surviving the recall). So, I think this may be the one swing state where turnout will favor the Republicans, closing Obama's margin to a very narrow one (0.7 pt margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 281-235.
Virginia (13) - The polling has gone back and forth in this state, and no one has it as anything other than a toss-up if he/she has not forced himself/herself to call each state's outcome. Virginia is one of the earliest ones to begin to report its votes, and it does so very quickly. What we will see then, very quickly, is that the race in the state is too close to call. It may go late into the night, or it may not be decided until the next day, but I'm thinking the overall race will already be decided when it is called--for Romney (0.1 pt margin, about 3,000 votes). Obama 281-248.
Colorado (9) - I would say that the polling has been rather consistent for the past month or so in Colorado--it's a tie. Some are suggesting that this state leans Republican in 2012 (analysis of early voting there supports that thesis), but I think it will end up being the clearest case of Democratic turnout affecting the outcome. There is a ballot item to legalize possession of marijuana in the state, and I believe that will bring out additional young voters on election day, and that it will make the difference--for Obama--in an extremely close state. (1 pt. margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 290-248.
So, that's my prediction--Obama 290 Electoral Votes, Romney 248.
Now, here's a tip for watching on Election Night. There will be some states--Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, Virginia--that we should expect will be too close to call even late into the night. Florida and Ohio may or may not be so close, but they are complex political puzzles with areas that are blue, red, and purple, and those may report their votes unevenly through the evening, so we may expect they will take a while to resolve. So, look at these two states instead, which are both generally put as "Leaning Democratic" rather than toss-ups: Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Wisconsin could be a positive bellwether for Obama. If he wins there fairly comfortably (4 pts or more), that would indicate the turnout is working for him, the white working-class vote in the Upper Midwest is holding, and his firewall states should protect him in the end from any close losses in the nail-biters. Pennsylvania could be a bellwether in the opposite direction: If Obama can not win the state by 2-4 percent, which means that he is not clearly holding the suburban counties of Philadelphia, he could be in big trouble nationally with suburban voters. And, if he should lose the state, it will be very hard for him to win re-election-- Pennsylvania is about as much a must-win state for Obama as Florida is for Romney.
Finally, the question of the popular vote. The national tracking polls in the past two weeks, more often than not, are showing Romney either tied or leading by 1-2 points (sometimes more). It is certainly feasible that Romney could win the popular vote and lose the electoral vote, and I think that outcome would be justice (for 2000)--perhaps justice leading to a greater justice, in which the Electoral College is eliminated (needs a Constitutional amendment) or success of the legislative movement in which 270 or more electoral votes would be guaranteed to the winner of the popular vote.
I do not think that is going to happen this year, though; I think the intrade.com "market" for the event (different candidates win the popular and electoral votes) at 25% is a bit of a sucker bet; I think the chances are more like 10% (Nate Silver's simulations have it at about 5%). Instead, I think this will be one of those elections like 1960, or like 1968, in which a very small popular vote margin is magnified by the all-or-nothing nature of the Electoral College. I will predict a popular vote victory for Obama of about 0.5%, about 600,000 votes. If that is the case, it will go into the books as yet one more case in which the winner of the election receives less than 50% of the people's vote. For the record, I predict Obama 49.4%, Romney 48.9%, Others 1.7%.
*I don't want to forget the fine states of Nebraska and Maine, which award individual electoral votes based on the results of each Congressional district. One of the Nebraska Congressional districts in 2008 went, against the whole state, for Obama, so the state legislature tried to make more certain, through redistricting, that this wouldn't happen again. I think for this election at least they will be successful, and also that both of the Maine districts will go for the state-winner, Obama.
The starting point of the discussion are that there are 23 Republican states with 191 electoral votes and 17 Democratic states (plus the District of Columbia) with 217 electoral votes about which there is very little doubt. They include a few states, like Minnesota, New Mexico, and Michigan for the Democratic ticket, and Arizona and Indiana (which Obama won narrowly in 2008) for the Republicans, which may end up having fairly small margins, on the order of 5-7 percent. These states are not realistically in the plans of their opponents, though, and they have not been deluged with advertisements as the other 10 states have. So, we proceed from there, analyzing the other 130 electoral votes which will surely decide the election*:
North Carolina (15 Electoral votes) - It is a sign of the tightness of this election that this, the 10th closest state, is not a sure thing; the polls there have not universally had Romney leading, but most of them do, and both candidates are bypassing the state this weekend, suggesting they both know how it will end up--with Romney (3 pt. margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama, 217-206.
Pennsylvania (20 ) - If Superstorm Sandy is to have a meaningful impact on the Presidential election (apart from Obama's strong handling of the crisis or NYC Mayor Bloomberg's endorsement of Obama afterwards prompted by the storm), it will be in this state (none of the other ones in the affected area on the Eastern Seaboard are close), and that effect can only hurt Obama. It's close enough that a couple hundred thousand votes suppressed by the difficulty of getting to polling places, or by the disruption in people's lives, could turn this state in the Republicans' favor. I don't think it will be quite enough, though, and I think this will be viewed by the Republicans as the big missed opportunity if Romney loses: more effort, sooner, could have allowed him to take this state from Obama (3.5 pt margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama, 237-206.
Nevada (6 ) - This state is usually shown as a toss-up, but Obama is consistently polling narrowly ahead, and turnout--driven by Sen. Harry Reid's political machine--will favor the Democrats. (4 pt margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 243-206.
Next come the two most consequential states in the election:
Florida (29) - This state is a must-win for Romney--winning is basically impossible for him without it--and would be a great trophy for Obama, the difference between a narrow Electoral college win and a safe one. Obama was leading in the polling at his peak, before the first debate; now he looks to be trailing. Romney (1.5 pt. margin, about 100,000 votes). Obama 243-235.
Ohio (18) - Winning the state is not equal to winning the election, but losing it would put either at the brink of defeat. Romney's biggest problem is that he has never led Obama in the state by any meaningful margin, although he was equal or near-equal at Obama's lowest point (before the second debate). Obama's efforts to help the auto industry, and the somewhat-related fact that its economy is doing relatively well at the present, mean this will not be the closest state Obama wins. (1.5 pt. margin, about 70,000 votes). Obama 261-235.
New Hampshire (4) - This state has gone back and forth, but Obama is leading fairly consistently in the last couple of weeks. (2 pt. margin, about 10,000 votes) Obama 265-235.
Iowa (6) - This state has polled extremely close. There hasn't been that much polling there, so there's considerable doubt, but this is not a particularly strong state for Romney (he narrowly lost the popular vote to Rick Santorum in the caucuses), and it has supported Obama well in the past. (1.5 pt margin, about 20,000 votes) Obama 271-235.
Wisconsin (10) - Obama is polling ahead by an average of 3-5 points in recent weeks, but I think this is one state in which the progressive forces are fatigued, perhaps a bit demoralized, by the continuing partisan battles within the state, which has come out most recently in favor of the Republicans (Gov. Scott Walker's surviving the recall). So, I think this may be the one swing state where turnout will favor the Republicans, closing Obama's margin to a very narrow one (0.7 pt margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 281-235.
Virginia (13) - The polling has gone back and forth in this state, and no one has it as anything other than a toss-up if he/she has not forced himself/herself to call each state's outcome. Virginia is one of the earliest ones to begin to report its votes, and it does so very quickly. What we will see then, very quickly, is that the race in the state is too close to call. It may go late into the night, or it may not be decided until the next day, but I'm thinking the overall race will already be decided when it is called--for Romney (0.1 pt margin, about 3,000 votes). Obama 281-248.
Colorado (9) - I would say that the polling has been rather consistent for the past month or so in Colorado--it's a tie. Some are suggesting that this state leans Republican in 2012 (analysis of early voting there supports that thesis), but I think it will end up being the clearest case of Democratic turnout affecting the outcome. There is a ballot item to legalize possession of marijuana in the state, and I believe that will bring out additional young voters on election day, and that it will make the difference--for Obama--in an extremely close state. (1 pt. margin, about 20,000 votes). Obama 290-248.
So, that's my prediction--Obama 290 Electoral Votes, Romney 248.
Now, here's a tip for watching on Election Night. There will be some states--Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, Virginia--that we should expect will be too close to call even late into the night. Florida and Ohio may or may not be so close, but they are complex political puzzles with areas that are blue, red, and purple, and those may report their votes unevenly through the evening, so we may expect they will take a while to resolve. So, look at these two states instead, which are both generally put as "Leaning Democratic" rather than toss-ups: Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Wisconsin could be a positive bellwether for Obama. If he wins there fairly comfortably (4 pts or more), that would indicate the turnout is working for him, the white working-class vote in the Upper Midwest is holding, and his firewall states should protect him in the end from any close losses in the nail-biters. Pennsylvania could be a bellwether in the opposite direction: If Obama can not win the state by 2-4 percent, which means that he is not clearly holding the suburban counties of Philadelphia, he could be in big trouble nationally with suburban voters. And, if he should lose the state, it will be very hard for him to win re-election-- Pennsylvania is about as much a must-win state for Obama as Florida is for Romney.
Finally, the question of the popular vote. The national tracking polls in the past two weeks, more often than not, are showing Romney either tied or leading by 1-2 points (sometimes more). It is certainly feasible that Romney could win the popular vote and lose the electoral vote, and I think that outcome would be justice (for 2000)--perhaps justice leading to a greater justice, in which the Electoral College is eliminated (needs a Constitutional amendment) or success of the legislative movement in which 270 or more electoral votes would be guaranteed to the winner of the popular vote.
I do not think that is going to happen this year, though; I think the intrade.com "market" for the event (different candidates win the popular and electoral votes) at 25% is a bit of a sucker bet; I think the chances are more like 10% (Nate Silver's simulations have it at about 5%). Instead, I think this will be one of those elections like 1960, or like 1968, in which a very small popular vote margin is magnified by the all-or-nothing nature of the Electoral College. I will predict a popular vote victory for Obama of about 0.5%, about 600,000 votes. If that is the case, it will go into the books as yet one more case in which the winner of the election receives less than 50% of the people's vote. For the record, I predict Obama 49.4%, Romney 48.9%, Others 1.7%.
*I don't want to forget the fine states of Nebraska and Maine, which award individual electoral votes based on the results of each Congressional district. One of the Nebraska Congressional districts in 2008 went, against the whole state, for Obama, so the state legislature tried to make more certain, through redistricting, that this wouldn't happen again. I think for this election at least they will be successful, and also that both of the Maine districts will go for the state-winner, Obama.
Getting Down to Cases, Pt. 2
At last! We can now--finally--address the question of who should be the President of the US for 2013-2017. And, more importantly, who it will be. Here, we examine the broad landscape under which the election will be held; then we will look at the key state elections which will decide the contest .
The US Economy
It has been a truism of this electoral campaign that the US economy is not what it should be, that Americans are justified in thinking that things should be better than what they are, which is a 1-2% annual GDP per capita growth, slow but steady increase in jobs, and very little inflation (apart from, sporadically, increase in certain energy products). The Republicans use this as the premise for arguing for a change in the Presidency; the Democrats accept it as a tenet it would be impolitic to deny.
I, on the other hand, disagree with this; I would call it an axiomatic falsehood. The fact that things may have (and I emphasize, may) been better in the past is no reason to assert that things will be/should be better in the future--it is not an entitlement that we, the richest nation in the world, should grow more than other nations. I question even whether this would be desirable, even if it were possible; it would suggest that the rest of the world's economies would not be able to keep up, which would bode ill for us all in the long term (lack of markets, lack of political or economic stability). I would deny that our rich are overtaxed, that small businesses are handcuffed by anything (except banks' unwillingness to lend to them), that there is too much uncertainty about tax policy. I would accept that we have an imbalance of work, in which many are underemployed while many others are overemployed, and that in general there is not enough work needed by our public and private employers to support the domestic cash-flow demands of our families.
I am extremely skeptical of the likelihood of the program of either major party's candidate making a significant difference in the employment level of the economy, so let's not get too hung up on the (minor) differences their policies would produce in that area. Instead, let's think about the substance of their economic policies, the chances they can get them done, and what their real effects would be.
Mitt Romney's domestic policies are more like suggestions, couched as they are in ambiguities and contradictions, but they come down to reducing the tax rates for the middle class and all above, reducing corporate taxes, reducing taxes that only affect the wealthy like dividends and capital gains, and reducing deductibility limits for higher income brackets--I think. He wants a package that is revenue neutral but can't get there with the deductions that he has--it seems--put off the table. He claims to have reductions in spending, but won't specify those, either: apparently they exclude defense, foreign aid (seemingly, and surprisingly, based on his last debate tack), and the safety net. Clearly, the cuts would have to include some of the agencies which limit the depredations of big business. He does seem inclined to conduct some kind of big negotiation and make a big deal, which might be OK if we had some idea what it was that he would, or would not, accept in such a deal. I would guarantee that his deal would be one acceptable to Grover Norquist and the tax reduction pledge to which most of his party is bound. Which means it's one that the Democrats of the Senate are unlikely to accept.
Barack Obama's plan is one that could achieve bipartisan support in a different political environment. Essentially it will promise benefits for most of the country in the form of needed investments in infrastructure, and I'm sure it will be well-distributed across the districts and states of the Senators and Represenatives who will support it. He would pay for it by agreeing to progressive cuts targeted to certain areas over time (replacing the across-the-board cuts in discretionary spending, including the military, that the sequestration plan currently in law would require) and some revenue increases that would also be phased in over time. The criticism of the package, which could prevent it even coming to a vote in the Republican House of Orange we expect to continue, will be that it does not do enough to reduce the deficit soon enough, and that it does not do anything to "fix" Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. A true fix of these programs--some kind of cuts in amount, timing, or extent of benefits, or increase in payroll taxes to pay for continuing current levels of benefit--is something that I think is beyond the capability of any likely form of Federal government in the next Congress. Maybe it could come in the 2015-2017 one, when the danger will be closer, the President weaker, and the Congressional makeup could be changed one way or the other from what I expect to be the continuation of the current power stalemate. In that regard, failure to give serious consideration to Obama's plan could cause the dam to break in the Democrats' direction, so I see there being a great deal of pressure on the Republican House leadership to allow the vote, and then to defeat it. I expect that the most Congress will end up passing in the next session is more stopgap spending with more improvised budget cuts.
The Rest of the World
Back to Romney for a moment. One clear aspect of his program is to increase exports, which sounds good and reasonable, but, in the event, might be a big failure. The reason is that the global economy, excluding the US now, seems perched on the edge of a significant growth recession. Europe's austerity programs are severely limiting possible growth there, while Asia's growth is slowing, as well. Labeling China a "serial currency manipulator on Day One", as Romney has pledged to do, will do nothing real but will trigger protectionist provisions from the US (so it would be counter to his program); it would antagonize the Chinese, who are sensitive to such symbolic slights, and it certainly won't result in increased exports to China. Though Obama has not made such a point of it, he also promises increased exports (if I remember correctly, double the 2009 level by 2016); though the global economy is not likely to be better or worse if he is elected, he would do a better job maintaining friendly relations with our trade partners, of that there should be little doubt.
In terms of foreign policy and the role of commander-in-chief of the military, Obama has been successful for the most part. He has done what the American people wanted (especially with regard to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by ignoring the Pakistani government to attack al Qaeda), worked well with our neighbors, and achieved much. There are some major pieces of unfinished business--clearing out Guantanamo, making progress in the Israeli-Palestinian standoff, and bringing Iran's nuclear program to some satisfactory resolution--but there is no reason to oppose him based on the results, and no reason to prefer Romney in this area. After making various hawkish criticisms of Obama in the primary campaign, Romney (or his advisers) realized as much before the final debate, and he ended up agreeing with Obama more often than not. In particular, Romney avoided the opportunity to put his foot in it a third time with regard to the tragic results in Benghazi on September 11--in this, he disappointed his loyal neo-con backers, who want him to poison relations with the governments emerging from the Arab Spring. I will credit Romney with eschewing such an approach and avoiding a disaster, at least on that occasion.
Government Beyond the White House
While I think that the first term of the Obama Administration deserves an overall grade somewhere in the "Very Good" range, there are big problems with all other parts of our government. Congress, of course, is totally ineffective; its greatest problems are due to the perennial campaign and unlimited campaign spending, but the difficulty of doing anything to reduce the potency of the filibuster also rates mention. Obama's political appointees are languishing in most or all Cabinet departments, with more problems on the way as first-termers depart, unless there is an agreement with the Senate to start giving nominations prompt consideration. The Supreme Court is a disaster area, and one can only imagine things getting worse unless Obama has a chance to nominate a replacement to one of the Far-Right Four or the unsound swing vote, Justice Anthony Kennedy.
The governments in the worst shape are the state and local ones. It is fine to suggest more devolution of power from the central government to the periphery (as long as basic rights are protected when this is done); it is a completely different matter whether these local entities have the capacity, the talent, or the monetary resources to handle additional responsibilities. I see this as one of the key areas the next President will need to address, with something like President Nixon's (yes, his!) Revenue Sharing a likely solution.
Finally, our political environment is poisonously bad. I'm not saying this because of the partisan battles; that is the way of our republic, and the voters should be able to judge. The problem is the extremely high cost of bad quality in our political system, in which any damned fools with lots of money can say any sort of lie, and there is no possibility of penalizing the liars. The other problems are lack of progress in statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. or toward eliminating or emasculating the Electoral College, and lack of any consistent approach to issues of voter registration, decennial redistricting, and access to polls.
With regard to the very last point, let me leave you with a question: what would have happened if Hurricane Sandy had hit this weekend, not last weekend? I am not sure I can describe what the results would have been, but it is safe to say that our election would also have been a casualty of the calamity.
The US Economy
It has been a truism of this electoral campaign that the US economy is not what it should be, that Americans are justified in thinking that things should be better than what they are, which is a 1-2% annual GDP per capita growth, slow but steady increase in jobs, and very little inflation (apart from, sporadically, increase in certain energy products). The Republicans use this as the premise for arguing for a change in the Presidency; the Democrats accept it as a tenet it would be impolitic to deny.
I, on the other hand, disagree with this; I would call it an axiomatic falsehood. The fact that things may have (and I emphasize, may) been better in the past is no reason to assert that things will be/should be better in the future--it is not an entitlement that we, the richest nation in the world, should grow more than other nations. I question even whether this would be desirable, even if it were possible; it would suggest that the rest of the world's economies would not be able to keep up, which would bode ill for us all in the long term (lack of markets, lack of political or economic stability). I would deny that our rich are overtaxed, that small businesses are handcuffed by anything (except banks' unwillingness to lend to them), that there is too much uncertainty about tax policy. I would accept that we have an imbalance of work, in which many are underemployed while many others are overemployed, and that in general there is not enough work needed by our public and private employers to support the domestic cash-flow demands of our families.
I am extremely skeptical of the likelihood of the program of either major party's candidate making a significant difference in the employment level of the economy, so let's not get too hung up on the (minor) differences their policies would produce in that area. Instead, let's think about the substance of their economic policies, the chances they can get them done, and what their real effects would be.
Mitt Romney's domestic policies are more like suggestions, couched as they are in ambiguities and contradictions, but they come down to reducing the tax rates for the middle class and all above, reducing corporate taxes, reducing taxes that only affect the wealthy like dividends and capital gains, and reducing deductibility limits for higher income brackets--I think. He wants a package that is revenue neutral but can't get there with the deductions that he has--it seems--put off the table. He claims to have reductions in spending, but won't specify those, either: apparently they exclude defense, foreign aid (seemingly, and surprisingly, based on his last debate tack), and the safety net. Clearly, the cuts would have to include some of the agencies which limit the depredations of big business. He does seem inclined to conduct some kind of big negotiation and make a big deal, which might be OK if we had some idea what it was that he would, or would not, accept in such a deal. I would guarantee that his deal would be one acceptable to Grover Norquist and the tax reduction pledge to which most of his party is bound. Which means it's one that the Democrats of the Senate are unlikely to accept.
Barack Obama's plan is one that could achieve bipartisan support in a different political environment. Essentially it will promise benefits for most of the country in the form of needed investments in infrastructure, and I'm sure it will be well-distributed across the districts and states of the Senators and Represenatives who will support it. He would pay for it by agreeing to progressive cuts targeted to certain areas over time (replacing the across-the-board cuts in discretionary spending, including the military, that the sequestration plan currently in law would require) and some revenue increases that would also be phased in over time. The criticism of the package, which could prevent it even coming to a vote in the Republican House of Orange we expect to continue, will be that it does not do enough to reduce the deficit soon enough, and that it does not do anything to "fix" Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. A true fix of these programs--some kind of cuts in amount, timing, or extent of benefits, or increase in payroll taxes to pay for continuing current levels of benefit--is something that I think is beyond the capability of any likely form of Federal government in the next Congress. Maybe it could come in the 2015-2017 one, when the danger will be closer, the President weaker, and the Congressional makeup could be changed one way or the other from what I expect to be the continuation of the current power stalemate. In that regard, failure to give serious consideration to Obama's plan could cause the dam to break in the Democrats' direction, so I see there being a great deal of pressure on the Republican House leadership to allow the vote, and then to defeat it. I expect that the most Congress will end up passing in the next session is more stopgap spending with more improvised budget cuts.
The Rest of the World
Back to Romney for a moment. One clear aspect of his program is to increase exports, which sounds good and reasonable, but, in the event, might be a big failure. The reason is that the global economy, excluding the US now, seems perched on the edge of a significant growth recession. Europe's austerity programs are severely limiting possible growth there, while Asia's growth is slowing, as well. Labeling China a "serial currency manipulator on Day One", as Romney has pledged to do, will do nothing real but will trigger protectionist provisions from the US (so it would be counter to his program); it would antagonize the Chinese, who are sensitive to such symbolic slights, and it certainly won't result in increased exports to China. Though Obama has not made such a point of it, he also promises increased exports (if I remember correctly, double the 2009 level by 2016); though the global economy is not likely to be better or worse if he is elected, he would do a better job maintaining friendly relations with our trade partners, of that there should be little doubt.
In terms of foreign policy and the role of commander-in-chief of the military, Obama has been successful for the most part. He has done what the American people wanted (especially with regard to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by ignoring the Pakistani government to attack al Qaeda), worked well with our neighbors, and achieved much. There are some major pieces of unfinished business--clearing out Guantanamo, making progress in the Israeli-Palestinian standoff, and bringing Iran's nuclear program to some satisfactory resolution--but there is no reason to oppose him based on the results, and no reason to prefer Romney in this area. After making various hawkish criticisms of Obama in the primary campaign, Romney (or his advisers) realized as much before the final debate, and he ended up agreeing with Obama more often than not. In particular, Romney avoided the opportunity to put his foot in it a third time with regard to the tragic results in Benghazi on September 11--in this, he disappointed his loyal neo-con backers, who want him to poison relations with the governments emerging from the Arab Spring. I will credit Romney with eschewing such an approach and avoiding a disaster, at least on that occasion.
Government Beyond the White House
While I think that the first term of the Obama Administration deserves an overall grade somewhere in the "Very Good" range, there are big problems with all other parts of our government. Congress, of course, is totally ineffective; its greatest problems are due to the perennial campaign and unlimited campaign spending, but the difficulty of doing anything to reduce the potency of the filibuster also rates mention. Obama's political appointees are languishing in most or all Cabinet departments, with more problems on the way as first-termers depart, unless there is an agreement with the Senate to start giving nominations prompt consideration. The Supreme Court is a disaster area, and one can only imagine things getting worse unless Obama has a chance to nominate a replacement to one of the Far-Right Four or the unsound swing vote, Justice Anthony Kennedy.
The governments in the worst shape are the state and local ones. It is fine to suggest more devolution of power from the central government to the periphery (as long as basic rights are protected when this is done); it is a completely different matter whether these local entities have the capacity, the talent, or the monetary resources to handle additional responsibilities. I see this as one of the key areas the next President will need to address, with something like President Nixon's (yes, his!) Revenue Sharing a likely solution.
Finally, our political environment is poisonously bad. I'm not saying this because of the partisan battles; that is the way of our republic, and the voters should be able to judge. The problem is the extremely high cost of bad quality in our political system, in which any damned fools with lots of money can say any sort of lie, and there is no possibility of penalizing the liars. The other problems are lack of progress in statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. or toward eliminating or emasculating the Electoral College, and lack of any consistent approach to issues of voter registration, decennial redistricting, and access to polls.
With regard to the very last point, let me leave you with a question: what would have happened if Hurricane Sandy had hit this weekend, not last weekend? I am not sure I can describe what the results would have been, but it is safe to say that our election would also have been a casualty of the calamity.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Election 2012: Getting Down to Cases Pt. 1
No more distractions! The baseball playoffs kept my mind away from obsessing about the elections (the World Series, a little less), then there was the wild weekend just past and Sandy. Now, though, it is time to look at things squarely, without blinders, and tell 'em like I see 'em (before the other pundits go on record).
The House of Representatives
First, some individual races I'll be watching for clues on Election Night:
IL - 8 Tammy Duckworth (D) vs. Joe Walsh. Technically an open seat, Congressman Walsh is shifting to a new district, a somewhat unfavorable one created by the Democratic Legislature in redistricting. Along with Allen West (see below), he rates as one of the worst legacies of the Tea Party wave in 2010. A win by him over Iraq wounded vet and helicopter pilot Duckworth would be disastrous, though I believe it to be unlikely. If he did win, it would be the David Duke Effect (also known as the Tom Bradley Effect), in which the vote goes far stronger to an extreme right-winger than the constituents' polled opinions would suggest.
NH - 1 Frank Guinta (R - incumbent) vs. Carol Shea-Porter. The other New Hampshire district looks to be a pickup for the Democrats with Ann McLane Kuster; this one, a rematch from a close 2010 race, is a tougher task. A win by Shea-Porter should equate to a comfortable Obama win in New Hampshire.
FL - 18 Allen West (R- incumbent) vs. Patrick Murphy. West is flat-out one of the worst, full of bombastic bigotry, and beating him is a big priority for the Democratic party; Murphy is young and a bit green. It's a district in the Gold Coast area, slightly favoring the Democrats, but West's incumbency, and a lot of money, even up the odds.
AZ -2 Ron Barber ( D- incumbent) vs. Martha McSally. Barber won the seat in a special election when Gaby Giffords had to give it up; he used to work as an aide for her. He is favored to hold it.
UT - 4 Jim Matheson (D - incumbent) vs. Mia Love. Matheson is a moderate Democrat (not too liberal, but not a Blue Dog) trying to survive redistricting in a heavily red state. Ms. Love is a new Republican heroine, a conservative black Mormon mayor who spoke at the convention.
It would take a sudden storm surge greater than Sandy to send the Democrats over the top this year--every inch of gain will be hard-fought. I predict a gain of 12-13 seats, to 205-206, short of the 25-seat gain which would be needed to return control to the Democrats.
The Senate
We begin by tabulating the seats either not up for election this year, locked up for their incumbents, or in the cases of the open seats in Texas and Hawaii, the obvious favorites, Republican Ted Cruz and Democrat Mazie Hirono. This is an exercise we did long ago, and our current version of this brings the point of departure count of seats to 42-42, leaving an incredible 16 races close enough to be worth talking about. I will address each of the sixteen briefly, starting with the ones that have the clearest leaders and moving to the ones that are inseparably close, and give the running total:
Maine - Angus King will win the seat with about 60% of the vote. The question is whether this moderately liberal independent can be relied upon to caucus with the Democrats. It no longer appears that his will be the decisive vote for control of the Senate, though. Called here a "Democratic pickup". D, 43-42.
Nebraska - Former Gov./Sen. Bob Kerrey has run a good, hard race against a Tea Party extremist, but it is an uphill struggle for him, or for any Democrat in this state to hold onto Ben Nelson's seat that was--just barely--counted in the Democratic column. . Republican pickup. 43-43.
New Mexico - Congressman Martin Heinrich has opened a lead against former Republican Congresswoman Heather Wilson, both from Albuquerque. I saw a televised debate between them on C-Span: Heinrich is solid on the arguments but not too impressive as a speaker, Wilson still cagey but looking a bit drawn and tired. Heinrich has opened a lead. D, 44-43.
Pennsylvania - Incumbent Democrat Bob Casey has run a weak campaign this year, nothing like what he did six years ago in destroying Rick Santorum. It does appear he will win, though--the Sandy Effect (see the Presidential prediction post) should not be enough to bring him down. D, 45-43.
Florida - Incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson has been challenged, mostly by the huge spending made in the state by Republicans and PAC's, but it appears he will survive--again. D, 46-43.
Connecticut - The seat being vacated by Joe Lieberman, it should go Democratic, but free-wheeling Republican Linda McMahon has spent big money of her own on her candidacy as a Republican, and she has closed the gap. Which doesn't mean she will win, though. D, 47-43.
Ohio - Sherrod Brown is holding on in the ultimate battleground state by a few points (like the President is doing in Ohio, as well), despite being barraged by attack ads. D, 48-43.
Arizona - Rep. Jeff Flake is holding off Democratic nominee Richard Carmona, who has run a good race. Flake is still a slight favorite to hold onto the seat being vacated by Jon Kyl. D, 48-44.
Nevada - Republican Dean Heller won the seat in a special election after it was vacated by disgraced Sen. John Ensign. Heller now seems likely to hold off the challenge of Rep. Shelley Berkley. /D, 48-45.
Massachusetts - I expected this to be one of the closest races, and it is certainly one that will get more than its share of attention on Election Night. I see it as a fairly safe win for Elizabeth Warren, though, over that special election interloper, the incumbent Republican Scott Brown. Basically, he was brought down by his association with the national party. Democratic pickup. D, 49-45.
Missouri - Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill should be losing this one, despite the advantages of incumbency. Instead, her opponent is the infamous Todd "Legitimate Rape" Akin, so she should pull out a 2-4 point win. D, 50-45.
North Dakota - This race for the seat Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad is vacating should favor the Republicans for a pickup. Democratic nominee Heidi Heitkamp has run a good political race, tilting a bit populist and anti-liberal to some extent, while seeking plenty of national party and feminist support. North Dakota also has the most vigorous economy in the country, due to a big oil boom. Still, got to go with the Republican Rick Berg here. Republican pickup. D, 50-46.
Virginia - After Massachusetts, and alongside the fate of the extremist Tea Party candidates in Missouri and Indiana, this race rates as one of the biggest stories of the night. Two former governors battling for an open seat with big budgets, major national party involvement, and, of course, the complexity added by Virginia's being one of the most critical swing states in the Presidential election. I give a slight edge (1-2 points) to President Obama's former national party chairman, former Gov. Tim Kaine. D, 51-46.
Indiana - Vying for the seat held by Republican Dick Luger are the Tea Party extremist who defeated him in the Republican primary, Richard "Rape pregnancy? God planned it" Mourdock and moderate (even conservative) Democratic Rep. Joe Donnelly. Despite repeated gaffes (Mourdock insisting on speaking honestly), I think he will win, very narrowly--I don't trust the Indiana voters to do the right thing. D, 51-47.
Wisconsin - Democrat Tammy Baldwin has run a strong race to hold the seat of the departing Herb Kohl, but she has a competent, popular, fairly-moderate opponent in former Gov. Tommy Thompson. After this spring's recall vote which went to Gov. Scott Walker, I don't trust the Wisconsin voters much, either. Republican pickup. D, 51-48.
Finally--
Montana - Moderate (even conservative) Senator Jon Tester (the farmer with the crewcut) has run hard to save his seat; he has a typical Western Republican (think: Goldwater-type) opponent in Rep. Denny Rehberg. I expect this race to be too close to call all night, maybe even subject to a recount with the outcome in doubt. At the end of the day, though, I think the Republican will win. Republican pickup. D, 51-49.
So, my picks are for four seats gained by the Republicans vs. two for the Democrats, a net gain of two. I'm leaning toward the Republicans' winning the closest races, with the exception of Virginia's. The Democrats would still hold a majority that would be somewhat safe, assuming Maine's King goes with them, even without the tie-breaking vote of the Vice President. We will look at the race for Joe Biden's seat (and, President Obama's), in our next post.
The House of Representatives
First, some individual races I'll be watching for clues on Election Night:
IL - 8 Tammy Duckworth (D) vs. Joe Walsh. Technically an open seat, Congressman Walsh is shifting to a new district, a somewhat unfavorable one created by the Democratic Legislature in redistricting. Along with Allen West (see below), he rates as one of the worst legacies of the Tea Party wave in 2010. A win by him over Iraq wounded vet and helicopter pilot Duckworth would be disastrous, though I believe it to be unlikely. If he did win, it would be the David Duke Effect (also known as the Tom Bradley Effect), in which the vote goes far stronger to an extreme right-winger than the constituents' polled opinions would suggest.
NH - 1 Frank Guinta (R - incumbent) vs. Carol Shea-Porter. The other New Hampshire district looks to be a pickup for the Democrats with Ann McLane Kuster; this one, a rematch from a close 2010 race, is a tougher task. A win by Shea-Porter should equate to a comfortable Obama win in New Hampshire.
FL - 18 Allen West (R- incumbent) vs. Patrick Murphy. West is flat-out one of the worst, full of bombastic bigotry, and beating him is a big priority for the Democratic party; Murphy is young and a bit green. It's a district in the Gold Coast area, slightly favoring the Democrats, but West's incumbency, and a lot of money, even up the odds.
AZ -2 Ron Barber ( D- incumbent) vs. Martha McSally. Barber won the seat in a special election when Gaby Giffords had to give it up; he used to work as an aide for her. He is favored to hold it.
UT - 4 Jim Matheson (D - incumbent) vs. Mia Love. Matheson is a moderate Democrat (not too liberal, but not a Blue Dog) trying to survive redistricting in a heavily red state. Ms. Love is a new Republican heroine, a conservative black Mormon mayor who spoke at the convention.
It would take a sudden storm surge greater than Sandy to send the Democrats over the top this year--every inch of gain will be hard-fought. I predict a gain of 12-13 seats, to 205-206, short of the 25-seat gain which would be needed to return control to the Democrats.
The Senate
We begin by tabulating the seats either not up for election this year, locked up for their incumbents, or in the cases of the open seats in Texas and Hawaii, the obvious favorites, Republican Ted Cruz and Democrat Mazie Hirono. This is an exercise we did long ago, and our current version of this brings the point of departure count of seats to 42-42, leaving an incredible 16 races close enough to be worth talking about. I will address each of the sixteen briefly, starting with the ones that have the clearest leaders and moving to the ones that are inseparably close, and give the running total:
Maine - Angus King will win the seat with about 60% of the vote. The question is whether this moderately liberal independent can be relied upon to caucus with the Democrats. It no longer appears that his will be the decisive vote for control of the Senate, though. Called here a "Democratic pickup". D, 43-42.
Nebraska - Former Gov./Sen. Bob Kerrey has run a good, hard race against a Tea Party extremist, but it is an uphill struggle for him, or for any Democrat in this state to hold onto Ben Nelson's seat that was--just barely--counted in the Democratic column. . Republican pickup. 43-43.
New Mexico - Congressman Martin Heinrich has opened a lead against former Republican Congresswoman Heather Wilson, both from Albuquerque. I saw a televised debate between them on C-Span: Heinrich is solid on the arguments but not too impressive as a speaker, Wilson still cagey but looking a bit drawn and tired. Heinrich has opened a lead. D, 44-43.
Pennsylvania - Incumbent Democrat Bob Casey has run a weak campaign this year, nothing like what he did six years ago in destroying Rick Santorum. It does appear he will win, though--the Sandy Effect (see the Presidential prediction post) should not be enough to bring him down. D, 45-43.
Florida - Incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson has been challenged, mostly by the huge spending made in the state by Republicans and PAC's, but it appears he will survive--again. D, 46-43.
Connecticut - The seat being vacated by Joe Lieberman, it should go Democratic, but free-wheeling Republican Linda McMahon has spent big money of her own on her candidacy as a Republican, and she has closed the gap. Which doesn't mean she will win, though. D, 47-43.
Ohio - Sherrod Brown is holding on in the ultimate battleground state by a few points (like the President is doing in Ohio, as well), despite being barraged by attack ads. D, 48-43.
Arizona - Rep. Jeff Flake is holding off Democratic nominee Richard Carmona, who has run a good race. Flake is still a slight favorite to hold onto the seat being vacated by Jon Kyl. D, 48-44.
Nevada - Republican Dean Heller won the seat in a special election after it was vacated by disgraced Sen. John Ensign. Heller now seems likely to hold off the challenge of Rep. Shelley Berkley. /D, 48-45.
Massachusetts - I expected this to be one of the closest races, and it is certainly one that will get more than its share of attention on Election Night. I see it as a fairly safe win for Elizabeth Warren, though, over that special election interloper, the incumbent Republican Scott Brown. Basically, he was brought down by his association with the national party. Democratic pickup. D, 49-45.
Missouri - Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill should be losing this one, despite the advantages of incumbency. Instead, her opponent is the infamous Todd "Legitimate Rape" Akin, so she should pull out a 2-4 point win. D, 50-45.
North Dakota - This race for the seat Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad is vacating should favor the Republicans for a pickup. Democratic nominee Heidi Heitkamp has run a good political race, tilting a bit populist and anti-liberal to some extent, while seeking plenty of national party and feminist support. North Dakota also has the most vigorous economy in the country, due to a big oil boom. Still, got to go with the Republican Rick Berg here. Republican pickup. D, 50-46.
Virginia - After Massachusetts, and alongside the fate of the extremist Tea Party candidates in Missouri and Indiana, this race rates as one of the biggest stories of the night. Two former governors battling for an open seat with big budgets, major national party involvement, and, of course, the complexity added by Virginia's being one of the most critical swing states in the Presidential election. I give a slight edge (1-2 points) to President Obama's former national party chairman, former Gov. Tim Kaine. D, 51-46.
Indiana - Vying for the seat held by Republican Dick Luger are the Tea Party extremist who defeated him in the Republican primary, Richard "Rape pregnancy? God planned it" Mourdock and moderate (even conservative) Democratic Rep. Joe Donnelly. Despite repeated gaffes (Mourdock insisting on speaking honestly), I think he will win, very narrowly--I don't trust the Indiana voters to do the right thing. D, 51-47.
Wisconsin - Democrat Tammy Baldwin has run a strong race to hold the seat of the departing Herb Kohl, but she has a competent, popular, fairly-moderate opponent in former Gov. Tommy Thompson. After this spring's recall vote which went to Gov. Scott Walker, I don't trust the Wisconsin voters much, either. Republican pickup. D, 51-48.
Finally--
Montana - Moderate (even conservative) Senator Jon Tester (the farmer with the crewcut) has run hard to save his seat; he has a typical Western Republican (think: Goldwater-type) opponent in Rep. Denny Rehberg. I expect this race to be too close to call all night, maybe even subject to a recount with the outcome in doubt. At the end of the day, though, I think the Republican will win. Republican pickup. D, 51-49.
So, my picks are for four seats gained by the Republicans vs. two for the Democrats, a net gain of two. I'm leaning toward the Republicans' winning the closest races, with the exception of Virginia's. The Democrats would still hold a majority that would be somewhat safe, assuming Maine's King goes with them, even without the tie-breaking vote of the Vice President. We will look at the race for Joe Biden's seat (and, President Obama's), in our next post.
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