Tag Archives: Barack Obama

He’s One of Them

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Last month, the philosopher Robert Paul Wolff gave his answer to that pressing question: “why does the Right hate Obamacare?”. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind me quoting a few paragraphs:

“There is now a sizable fraction of the American public, and a considerable number of Representatives and Senators, who say that they consider Obamacare an assault on everything they hold dear, a fatal blow to the American Way, a Socialist plot to destroy life as we know it, an evil so great that it is worth bringing the government to a halt and threatening the world financial system to defund it or even slow marginally the pace at which its provisions go into effect….

The Civil Rights Movement, launched by African-Americans half a century ago, threatened, and eventually began to break down … legal, customary, residential, and employment barriers.  It was at this time that the old familiar political rhetoric about “working men and women” also began to change. The new rhetoric spoke of “middle-class Americans,” which, although no one acknowledged it, was a thinly veiled code for “not Black.”  As economic pressures mounted on those in the lower half of the income pyramid, Whites wrapped themselves in the oft-reiterated reassurance that at least they did not live in the Inner City (which is to say, Black neighborhoods), that they were “Middle Class.”  All of the political discourse came to be about the needs, the concerns, the prospects of the Middle Class, which to millions of Americans, whether they could even articulate it, meant “not Black.”

All of this crumbled, frighteningly, calamitously, disastrously, when a Black man was elected president.  “Free, white, and twenty-one” ceased to be the boast of the working-class White man. Statistics do not matter, trends do not matter, probabilities do not matter, income distribution differentials do not matter. If a Black man with a Black wife and two Black children is President of the United States, then a fundamental metaphysical break has occurred in the spiritual foundation on which White America has built its self-congratulatory self-image for three centuries and more.

Hysterical Whites tried every form of denial. Obama’s election was theft. Obama is not an American. Obama is a Muslim. Obama is a socialist…. When Obama was reelected, vast numbers of Americans went into terminal denial. They seized upon the ACA simply because it was, as everyone knew, Obama’s signature domestic accomplishment. To repeal it, to defund it, to make it as though it had never existed, would be in some measure to deny that he had ever been President. The actual details of the ACA matter not at all. Neither do the actual felt medical needs of those driven insane by the very fact of Obama’s tenure in the White House. None of that has anything at all to do with the real cause of the hysteria. Why are millions of Americans driven beyond hysteria by the ACA? 

BECAUSE OBAMA IS BLACK.”

The full text is here:

http://robertpaulwolff.blogspot.com/2013/09/why-does-right-hate-obamacare.html

How Obama Could Protect the Economy and Get Rid of Boehner at the Same Time

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The 14th Amendment was added to the U.S. Constitution in 1868 in the aftermath of the Civil War. It deals with issues resulting from that conflict. Its most famous language is the so-called “equal protection” clause: no state shall “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws”.

The rebellious Southern states were required to ratify the 14th Amendment in order to regain representation in Congress. Of course, since they were traitors (a.k.a. “rebels”), Southern politicians bitterly opposed the 14th Amendment. How dare the Federal government require that all persons, including former slaves, receive “equal protection of the laws”!

Now, 152 years after the Southern rebellion, we are facing a new crisis, primarily instigated by politicians from the same Southern states. This time it would be a financial and economic crisis, brought about by America’s failure to pay its debts. Nobody knows how the crisis would play out, but since bonds issued by the Treasury Department are the foundation of our nation’s banking system and play a vital role in the banking systems of other countries, it’s likely that America’s failure to honor its debts would do more damage to the global economy than the horrendous financial crisis of 2008.

The Constitution makes no mention of a debt ceiling. That limitation on the Treasury Department’s ability to take on new debt (i.e. to borrow money by selling government bonds) was foolishly imposed by Congress in the Liberty Bond Act of 1917. With that law, Congress gave itself the authority to set a maximum dollar amount for the federal debt, despite the fact that it’s Congress that tells the President how much money to spend when it approves the Federal budget.

Since the members of Congress are relatively sensible for the most part, they periodically raise the debt limit so the Federal government has enough money to do the various things the law requires it to do (make Medicare payments, buy cruise missiles, etc.).

If Congress refuses to raise the debt limit, therefore, the President is caught in a dilemma. He either has to borrow more money without Congressional approval or not pay what the government owes to bondholders, employees, government contractors, retirees and so on — thereby doing untold damage to the world’s economy and our own national security.

Fortunately, the 14th Amendment includes a clause devoted to the national debt. Section 4 of the amendment states:

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Legal scholars are now arguing about which law the President should obey. I’m not a legal scholar, but I have no doubt that the appropriate thing for the President (any President) to do if Congress fails to raise the debt limit, thereby “questioning the validity” of the public debt, is to obey the Constitution and borrow whatever funds are necessary to pay the government’s bills.

The Constitution, after all, is the “supreme law of the land”. Even crazy Tea Party people claim to honor the Constitution. The Constitution, which requires the President to “preserve, protect and defend” it, should take precedence over the Liberty Bond Act of 1917.

The last time there was a Republican-generated debt ceiling crisis, the President ruled out the 14th Amendment as a solution. At yesterday’s press conference, however, he mentioned the 14th Amendment but didn’t rule it out. He did say it isn’t a “magic bullet” and made the valid point that bonds issued without clear Congressional approval might be of questionable value. For example, buyers would probably demand higher interest rates before purchasing such government securities.

Nevertheless, it still seems that the most prudent course would be for the President to ignore the debt ceiling and continue to issue government bonds. In fact, it might be a wonderful strategy.

One likely outcome is that the Republican majority in the House of Representatives would impeach the President, just like they impeached President Clinton. But the Democrats in the Senate would never convict Obama of “high crimes and misdemeanors” for using his emergency powers to protect our national security. In fact, it’s very likely that the House Republicans would become even less popular than they are now, leading to gains for Democrats in the 2014 mid-term election.

Some recent polling suggests the Democrats might pick up as many as 30 seats in the House if the election were held today. Since they only need 18 more seats to become the majority party in the House, Obama needs to do whatever he can to maintain the Republicans’ unpopularity. Goading them into a misguided impeachment vote could do the trick, giving the Democrats control of both houses of Congress for the last two years of his Presidency. No more Speaker of the House John Boehner!

The Republicans would still have the filibuster in the Senate, of course, but that’s a topic for another day.

The Fire This Time

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More from political cartoonist David Horsey of the Los Angeles Times here:

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-republicans-blame-obama-20131006,0,2739790.story

Jonathan Chait’s conclusion to a thoughtful article in New York magazine:

In our Founders’ defense, it’s hard to design any political system strong enough to withstand a party as ideologically radical and epistemically closed as the contemporary GOP. (Its proximate casus belli—forestalling the onset of universal health insurance—is alien to every other major conservative party in the industrialized world.) The tea-party insurgents turn out to be right that the Obama era has seen a fundamental challenge to the constitutional order of American government. They were wrong about who was waging it.

http://nymag.com/news/politics/nationalinterest/government-shutdown-2013-10/

Patience and the Affordable Care Act

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It’s always bothered me that the Obama administration didn’t come up with a catchy name for the health insurance provisions of the Affordable Care Act. We’ve got “Social Security”, “Medicare” and “Medicaid”, so why couldn’t the administration come up with an equally helpful name for this thing, instead of leaving an opening for it to be called “Obamacare”?

I bet if Saint Ronald was still President, one of the first things on his agenda would have been to give his pet program a great name that would help sell it to the American people. But Obama apparently thinks he’s above such things.

Nevertheless, the important thing is that this landmark legislation is going into effect two days from now, regardless of what any misguided, foolish, cowardly and/or evil House Republicans do in the meantime.

I know people (including myself) who will probably be taking advantage of the ACA in the relatively near future, so I’ve been wondering how much it’s going to cost. Unfortunately, there are reports in the media that suggest what “average” premiums will be. There was one such unhelpful article in the New York Times today: “‘Affordable Care’ or a Rip-Off?”.

The problem is that you can’t know what a person’s or a family’s costs will be until you factor in where they live, how old they are and, especially, what their income is. Many or most people in this country, not just the poorest among us, will be eligible for subsidies from the government. In fact, if you’re eligible for a subsidy, you won’t even have to wait for the IRS to send you a check. The subsidy will be applied right up front when you pay your insurance premium (which means that some people won’t have to pay anything at all).

There is good news here. The health insurance premiums being discussed so far are generally cheaper than what people would pay for private health insurance today, and the premiums are going to be lower, often much lower, for many of us after the subsidies are applied.

So maybe everyone who’s interested should wait a couple days and then go to https://www.healthcare.gov/ to see the real numbers (and also see the pretty young woman with a big smile on her face). I’m sure we can all wait a couple more days.

Here’s today’s New York Times editorial on the importance of the ACA and the subsidies:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/29/opinion/sunday/dawn-of-a-revolution-in-health-care.html?

If you’re in the mood for even more good news, take a look at this column from Nicholas Kristof. Here’s his conclusion, supported by statistics from the World Bank, the Gates Foundation and the U.S. Agency for International Development:

So let’s acknowledge that there’s plenty of work remaining — and that cycles of poverty in America must be a top priority at home — yet also celebrate a triumph for humanity. The world of extreme poverty and disease that characterized life for most people throughout history may now finally be on its way out.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/29/opinion/sunday/kristof-a-way-of-life-is-ending-thank-goodness.html?

Responding to the Use of Chemical Weapons (3rd Edition)

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Getting killed or maimed by a chemical weapon isn’t necessarily worse than being killed or maimed by a bullet or high explosive. Being aware of their terrible effects, however, almost all countries have agreed not to use chemical weapons. And despite the fact that we’ve been lied to before by our political leaders (for example, regarding the Gulf of Tonkin incident and Iraq’s weapons program), it seems likely that President Obama is telling the truth and correctly interpreting the evidence that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons — to devastating effect.

Before the President spoke yesterday, I would have bet that he was going to tell the Navy to launch cruise missiles against targets in Syria. Other presidents have made similar decisions, without Congressional approval and certainly without a declaration of war. That can be the right thing for a President to do in extraordinary circumstances. Yet I was hoping that Obama would wait for the report of the U.N. inspectors and also seek approval from Congress. If it’s clear that the Syrian government launched this attack, there should be a response, but that response doesn’t need to be immediate. It should also be a response supported by Congress, since we’re supposed to be a democracy.

Now there will be a debate in Congress. as well as a continuing debate in the media. We’ll hear many good reasons why the United States shouldn’t do anything, and some very good reasons for doing something. Maybe this will be one of those cases in which the “wisdom of crowds” will result in a good decision, even an improvement on what the President wants to do. Unfortunately, Congress, especially this Congress, rarely does anything wise.

This is the third time I’ve written this post, after deleting it twice. There is a strong moral case for doing something to stop the Syrian government and other governments from using chemical weapons, even though that may be a difficult thing to do and there will be unforeseeable consequences. We can’t know yet whether those possible consequences tip the scale toward doing nothing. 

The truth is that I don’t know what I’d do if I were Obama or a member of Congress. What’s happening in Syria (and Egypt, Iraq, etc.) may be so sick and so irrational that there is nothing for the rest of us to do but watch, hoping that these people will get tired of hating and killing each other or that someone will eventually exert control over the situation. One of those things might happen, probably after we’re dead and gone.