January 2003 Archives

Ted Halstead highlights on the New York Times op-ed page one of the ideas he included in his (with Michael Lind) recent book The Radical Center: mandatory health insurance. He explains:

For the same reasons most states require drivers to carry car insurance, the federal government should require all Americans to purchase basic health insurance. Those who cannot afford the full cost should receive public subsidies. Mandatory self-insurance would provide fully portable coverage to all Americans, while lowering insurance costs, raising the quality of care, maintaining a private insurance market and offering citizens more choice.

The grand bargain underlying compulsory health insurance would be universal coverage in exchange for universal responsibility. Of the 41 million Americans without health insurance, a full two-thirds are below the age of 35. Mandating tens of millions of young and relatively healthy Americans to join the insurance risk pool would drive down the costs for everyone. Insured patients are also less likely to rely on expensive hospital emergency rooms for their basic medical care.

In order for our economy to continue to grow, we must sever the connection between our jobs and our health care. Workers will not tolerate the "creative destruction" so beloved by free marketeers if their health coverage is part of that gamble.

David Broder unearths a cautionary note for President Bush contained within the State of the Union message given by his father 13 days into the Gulf War's initial bombing campaign.

"We will succeed in the gulf," the first George Bush said. "And when we do, the world community will have sent an enduring warning to any dictator or despot . . . who contemplates outlaw aggression."

The "enduring warning" did not endure. Twelve years later we are back in the gulf, facing imminent war. And with far fewer allies this time.

Some belated (thanks to a balky internet connection) thoughts about President Bush's State of the Union address Tuesday night:

1. Is listening different than watching? I did not actually see the President make his speech. I listened to it while driving to San Jose for a hockey game. I often end up listening to these speeches, especially now that I live in the Pacific Time Zone. Listening, I thought the president was strong at the beginning and at the end (which does not necessarily mean I agreed with him). He seemed to drift in the latter portion of the domestic section.

2. Leaving it for future generations. Was I the only person who found it disconcerting for President Bush to focus on tax cuts, which will leave a huge debt burden for future generations -- especially while trying to finance the baby boom generation's retirement, just four paragraphs after stating that "This country has many challenges. We will not deny, we will not ignore, we will not pass along our problems to other Congresses, to other presidents, and other generations. We will confront them with focus and clarity and courage." That was a very good line. It was a well stated principle. Unfortunately, it took only about 100 words for the president to break that vow.

3. Hydrogen cars, good! While I question President Bush's dedication to this issue (is he serious, or was it just a nice softener before the Iraq portion that came later), there is no doubt that the United States needs a massive, Manhattan Project scale plan to end our reliance on fossil fuels. We will see if the funding actually appears, after all, we are still waiting for the White House to fully fund its "No Child Left Behind" education reforms.

4. Answering the wrong Iraq question. President Bush made a strong case for why Saddam Hussein is a bad, evil person. But we know that. (Well, at least some of us who are unconvinced about whether this war is a good idea do.) The question President Bush refuses to address is: what has changed that makes containment unworkable? Why does it not make sense for the world to send in two, three, ten times more inspectors to do their work around Iraq? Why should we not focus our military strength on Al Qaeda and other terrorist networks while inspectors leave Saddam impotent?

Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, argues that while the United States has improved its ability to fight the war on terror, it has yet to find the will to win the war on terror.

Lugar offers a five-point plan for improving our foreign relations so we can win the war. The White House should take their fellow Republican's advice.

Nat Hentoff wonders if the Bill of Rights and the principle of separation of powers matter after the 4th Circuit Court's decision in the case of Yaser Esam Hamdi. (Hamdi is an American citizen being held indefinitely in solitary confinement and without access to his lawyer in connection with the war on terror.)

Hentoff writes:

Attorney General John Ashcroft declared the decision was an "important victory for the president's ability to protect the American people in time of war."

Looked at closely, the decision was actually a victory by the government over due process — fairness — that is at the core of our constitutional system. At the same time, it was a defeat for another foundation of American justice: the separation of powers. The 4th Circuit so agreeably deferred to the executive branch of government that Mr. Hamdi did not receive meaningful judicial review of his imprisonment.

The White House should take Peggy Noonan's advice and forget the passion and the soaring rhetoric about Iraq in his State of the Union address.

Noonan says that there is nothing more powerful than facts. She writes:

Most of the public believes--even many antiwar protestors say they believe--that Saddam is a bad and dangerous man, and that the world will be less safe if he develops nuclear weapons, if he doesn't already have them. Saddam doesn't have a lot of fans. Mr. Bush doesn't have to make a case against him; he needs to make the final case, the irrefutable one.

And for this, what's needed is the slow and steady buildup of fact upon fact, like brick upon brick. Mr. Bush has to build a final forceful case in a way the world can't miss.

As Noonan explains, rhetoric and soaring language are worthless unless they are based in facts. It is a lesson the White House would do well to heed.

The Chicago Tribune's Steve Chapman marvels at the Bush Administration's ability to bring our allies together...against us.

After all, getting the French and Germans, or the Russians and Chinese, to agree is quite the diplomatic accomplishment. Except, of course, when they are agreeing that your Iraq policy is wrong.

Worse, Chapman explains that our Iraq adventures could open other more dangerous doors with which we will need allied assistance.

If we launch the war over the objections of our friends, we may find none of them eager to put boots on the ground to help with reconstruction. So we could end up with 100,000 American soldiers pinned down indefinitely, undertaking the type of nation-building that Bush used to reject.

But nation-building may be the least of our burdens. A large force of U.S. soldiers and civilians stationed in the Middle East will furnish the equivalent of an all-you-can-eat buffet for Osama bin Laden. (Remember him?) Postwar Iraq promises to be a magnet for Al Qaeda operatives eager to resume the fight against America. If we can't prevent terrorist attacks in places like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, imagine what we can expect in Iraq.

Making the problem worse is that the Middle East has a lot of terrorist organizations that have been preoccupied with Israel in the past, but may decide to use this opportunity to bloody its chief ally. Factions of groups like Hamas and Hezbollah may begin targeting Americans with a vengeance--and not just in Iraq.

Newsday editorializes: "Government decisions driven by anecdote, ideology and special interests usually make for bad law."

The editorial explains that the medical malpractice reform debate includes many anecdotes, strong ideological leanings, and special interest involvement -- but woefully little factual information.

Trudy Rubin writes that "United States is losing the global battle for hearts and minds on its anti-terror war, if you judge from the reactions of top European, Asian, Arab and Latin American business leaders attending the annual World Economic Forum..."

Rubin makes three excellent and reasonable suggestions to begin reversing this process. They include:

1. After a disgraceful year of dilly-dallying, get down to serious nation-building in Afghanistan.
   
2. Recalibrate the program that hauls in noncitizens from a list of mostly Muslim nations for registration.
   
3. Back up the President's humanitarian rhetoric - about more foreign aid, more help fighting HIV/AIDS - with action.
   

Bill Gates Sr. and Chuck Collins today make a noble and important defense of the estate tax.

They note that those who are leading the fight for the unfairly named "death tax's" abolition are making claims that have not been adequately examined by the media. For example:

Many of the allegations leveled against the estate tax over the last decade are grossly inaccurate and have not been adequately scrutinized. For instance, while proponents claim the estate tax is "double taxation," studies show that the bulk of assets in taxable estates consists of appreciated stocks and real estate, wealth that has never been subject to taxation.

The notion that the estate tax destroys family farms has also been exposed as a myth. Journalists have asked the pro-repeal American Farm Bureau to produce a single example of a farm lost because of the estate tax -- and they've come up empty-handed. Meanwhile, organizations that represent truly small-scale farmers, such as the National Farmers Union, oppose repeal and support reasonable reform.

The estate tax is used as a scapegoat for myriad business succession challenges that are unrelated to taxation. Passing a business or farm on to children may not work, but the real stumbling blocks tend to be whether the heirs want to take over a business or whether a market still exists.

If you care about equality of opportunity, then the estate tax matters. Societies with great hereditary concentrations of wealth and power are not friendly to furnishing strong stepping stones of opportunity, including affordable education, homeownership and small business financing. They are more focused on preserving wealth and power than creating avenues for new wealth creation and opportunity.

When does spin become delusion? Presidential advisor Karl Rove recently made that leap at a press gathering. Mary McGrory writes:

It was a sellout at the St. Regis, and it brought out all the ham in Rove. He put on a stellar performance in a one-man sketch that could have been subtitled "Life With George." It had a considerable element of fantasy, and it showed that the consigliere shares another major trait with his capo: audacity.

Bush's audacity in presenting an economic package that looked like a handout to the rich -- and then rounding on his critics with charges of class warfare -- was breathtaking. Rove went him one better: He claims his boss is a "populist."

And, he added, amid dropping jaws and lowered eclairs, "Give him a choice between Wall Street and Main Street, and he'll choose Main Street every time."

The federal budget process has collapsed. The president will unveil his 2004 budget before Congress has completed its 2003 budget work (for a budget year that is already nearly four months old).

The 2003 budget plan finally passed by the Senate funds pork projects but skimps on homeland security. It also utilizes other budget tricks to meet its targets.

The Washington Post rightly notes that:

The process is bad for the country and a discredit to the Senate, the House and the Bush administration.

Talking Points Memo's Joshua Micah Marshall and Eschaton make important points today about how some media commentators cavalierly disregard the "black vote" as if those voters did not matter as much as whites.

As Marshall notes:

It's as though a party's political viability and health are best judged by how it fares in the white electorate.

Check out these links to read more.

The federal government's fiscal outlook grows redder by the week. Now analysts are saying, on the record, that their projections of a $300 billion deficit during this fiscal year are optimistic.

The government is headed for its largest deficit ever in nominal terms, and it may even begin to challenge the record in inflation-adjusted dollars.

The answer, of course, are more tax cuts for the wealthy. That is, apparently, the sole Republican answer to all ills. (One that will not work.)

In five years, the first of the baby boomers will reach the early eligibility age for Social Security benefits. Our government should be running large surpluses in preparation for the coming demographic tidal wave caused by the boomers' retirement.

Instead, fiscal irresponsibility is the order of the day.

It is about time.

Democrats finally are making it a priority to ask why tax cuts for the wealthy are justifiable while the White House refuses to meet its promises to help cities and states with their homeland security expenses.

Budgets are about priorities, Mr. President.

The Boston Phoenix's Dan Kennedy wonders:

There has still barely been a word about this in the national media. But the fact remains that someone leaked sealed court documents about a leading (if misleading) critic of the White House's Iraq policy on the eve of a likely military invasion. Is anyone in the media going to get to the bottom of this?

(Thanks to Atrios for the link.)

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) remains one of the biggest hypocrites in Congress. The Daily Kos does an excellent job explaining why.

Jules Witcover argues that Gary Hart would elevate the nature of the Democratic presidential contest if he decides to join the race.

I agree. Hart has important things to say about foreign policy, domestic security, and the war on terror. Even if he does not win, the Democrats need to discuss these issues and earn credibility on them. Hart's entry in the race will force all candidates to elevate their thoughts on these vital issues.

Dallas Morning News columnist Ruben Navarrette accuses Sen. Joseph Liberman (D-Conn.) of "liberal racism." The evidence? The Senator's comments last week about affirmative action and the role it may have played in National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice's rise.

Navarrette explains:

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice had appeared on the show [Meet the Press] moments before Mr. Lieberman. Asked her view of affirmative action, Dr. Rice said she thought that colleges should be able to consider race as one factor in an applicant's portfolio but that the Michigan program – which includes a point system – might have gone too far.

When he got his turn, Mr. Lieberman disagreed. He said that the Michigan program was perfectly fine and that minority applicants simply are given a hand up.

Mr. Lieberman should have stopped there. He didn't. He marched on. And that's when he stepped in it.

In fact, Mr. Lieberman insisted, "it is exactly programs like the Michigan program that helped a star like Condi Rice get to where she is today."

Stop the tape! Did Al Gore's running mate in 2000 and now the presumed front-runner for the 2004 Democratic nomination actually say that one of the highest-ranking women in the U.S. government – and a black woman at that – has gotten where she is because of affirmative action? This from the man who wants to lead the party that bills itself as enlightened and sensitive on racial matters.

E.J. Dionne writes about the "ruckus" caused by Rep. Charles Rangel's (D-N.Y.) suggestion to restart the draft.

While I think a draft goes too far, there needs to be an expansion in military and civilian national service. Dionne explains why:

Rangel struck a nerve because virtually all Americans know there is a hole in our post-9/11 expressions of patriotism. "What we're going through now," Rangel said in an interview, "is patriotism lite. Put a flag on your lapel. Put a flag on your car. Put a bigger one on your SUV."

Rangel fought in Korea with the Army's 2nd Infantry Division -- "We fought all the way up to the Yalu River," he says with pride -- and loves the flag, too. But it bothers him that while we hear almost daily that "we are at war," these declarations are divorced from any demands on us, except for those on active duty or in the reserves. Americans, he notes, aren't even being asked to pony up a little extra money to pay for this war.

The Bush Administration's failure to make it is to our nation's detriment and I fear it shall come back to haunt us.

The growing rift between Europe and the United States will cause foreign policy problems in the future. Noah Sudarsky writes that France and Germany are tired of an "arrogant and impetuous" United States and Bush Administration. That is why they are seeking to create a counter to the U.S. hyperpower.

I am rooting for Tampa Bay in tomorrow's Super Bowl. One of the reasons is Raider Owner Al Davis' horrible treatment of the city of Oakland and Alameda County.

It's gone so far that the Raiders are not helping with victory parade plans. The Raiders $1.1 billion lawsuit could bankrupt Oakland, a city reeling from financial problems.

This Raiders team is fun to watch. The players, with only a few exceptions, are professionals worthy of respect.

The owner, however, is not. I am tired of Al Davis' shenanigans and lawsuits. They detract from the game. They hurt his team's fans. No parade? Is he kidding? Of course, he yanked his team away from his loyal fans years ago, so one should not be surprised that his organization cares so little for the people who help finance his power.

Since my beloved Packers were eliminated long ago, I need some rooting rationale for the big game.

Since Davis' repeated poor treatment of Oakland makes me angry, this is as good a reason as any. Nothing could make Al Davis as uncomfortable as losing to a team coached by the man -- Jon Gruden -- he sent away one year ago. And (actual sports content) I think the Tampa Bay defense is just that good. Go Bucs!

Thomas Oliphant explains how the Bush Administration is trying more deception in its efforts to achieve what it calls "medical liability reform."

I am not against considering some sort of flexible cap on damages and court reforms to help stop frivolous lawsuits. But these reforms must be made in the overall context of insurance reform.

Oliphant also highlights another point people should remember. Bush last week gave once of his speeches "at Mercy Hospital in Scranton, Pa., three days after the hospital announced the settlement (for $7 million) of a lawsuit brought by the widow of a 73-year-old man who was a patient at the Mercy outfit in nearby Wilkes-Barre."

Bush should address that widow when he speaks about liability problems.

Paul Krugman uses an old story to explain how the Bush Administration is misleading the American people about its new tax cut plan.

He also highlights an important point about government budgets: they should reflect our national priorities. If they do not, the opposition party better be ready to make that case.

Krugman notes that you should be skeptical whenever you hear a political figure speak about "averages." An average, when it comes to a budget battle, is more often used to hide than illuminate. Krugman writes:

A liberal and a conservative were sitting in a bar. Then Bill Gates walked in. "Hey, we're rich!" shouted the conservative. "The average person in this bar is now worth more than a billion!" "That's silly," replied the liberal. "Bill Gates raises the average, but that doesn't make you or me any richer." "Hah!" said the conservative, "I see you're still practicing the discredited politics of class warfare."

Now, let's look at the consequences. A bleak fiscal outlook that has the White House waging war on spending (tax cuts that overwhelmingly help the rich are okay no matter what, remember). Since government spending decisions reflect our priorities, Krugman writes about the things the Bush White House must believe are unimportant:

It's not allocating enough money to meet its own goals for homeland security, or to provide adequate funding for Medicare. It has scaled back promised pay increases for the military. It's not providing a penny in aid to desperate state governments - it isn't even helping them meet the new burden of homeland security spending mandated from Washington. (Remember those promises, after Sept. 11, of aid to fire departments and police? That was then.)

That is the case Democrats need to make. Now.

E.J. Dionne explains why those who opposed ta holiday to remember Martin Luther King Jr. were so afraid of the idea and why we can be glad that they lost the argument.

They knew that every civic holiday honors not just a person or an event but also a set of ideas. On July 4, we celebrate the creation of a new nation but also its founding principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence. By marking King's birthday, the nation honors the civil rights era as a turning point in our history. It also declares the ideas that animated that movement as a permanent and inescapable part of our national heritage -- no less than those of the declaration that inspired them.

Is it any wonder that all who would prefer to sweep racism and the struggle against it under history's rug hoped we'd never establish this day of commemoration? Memory involves not simply a meditation upon the dead but a means of understanding the obligations of the living.

Robert Novak reports that Republican leaders are afraid of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's (D-N.Y.) increasing influence and power. Novak writes that:

A prominent conservative operative in Washington, fearing the prospect of Hillary Clinton on the Democratic ticket for vice president, is urging Senate Republicans ''not to do anything to help her ambitions by building a Senate record.'' Specifically, he urged not co-signing letters or co-sponsoring legislation with Clinton, not getting photographed with her, and not socializing or traveling with her.

Thomas Oliphant is rightly unimpressed with the Bush Administration's affirmative action argument. In fact, Oliphant writes:

If I were a university admissions official and George W. Bush were an applicant submitting a short essay on affirmative action, I would toss his application.

California now faces dueling deficit projections. Governor Davis says that it is a $34.6 billion problem. Nonpartisan Legislative Analyst Elizabeth Hill pegs the shortfall at $26.1 billion.

Republicans are charging the governor with deliberately overestimating the size of California's budget problem so taxes can be raised.

The San Jose Mercury News' Phil Yost explains why the difference between the two numbers is not as large as it may appear. Welcome to the often confusing world of government budgeting!

David Broder explains why the Republicans have boxed themselves into another racial controversy over the Georgia state flag and the Confederate symbol.

That flag was retired two years ago, when a new design, with markedly reduced prominence for the stars and bars of the Confederate battle emblem, was approved by Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes and rushed through the state legislature with a minimum of debate.

In the campaign last fall, Barnes's Republican challenger, Sonny Perdue, told voters he favored a public referendum on the flag issue. "Let us vote" signs blossomed on rural roads, and an outpouring of voters in those same counties helped make Perdue the first Republican elected governor of Georgia in 130 years.

He would rather avoid the consequences of his party's race-based outreach efforts.

Ellen Goodman thinks the Bush Administration may have tipped its hand about its upcoming abortion debate plans last month in Bangkok. She explains:

Our government went there to try to deep-six a UN agreement on family planning. After one of our delegates promoted abstinence-only education, after another warned of the risks of condoms, after a third shared her success story using the rhythm method, Assistant Secretary of State Gene Dewey took the podium. He said to the assembled: ''The United States supports the sanctity of life from conception to natural death.''

The ''United States''? Had he confused the USA with a right-to-life organization? Had he forgotten that abortion is legal in this country, protected by the Constitution?

Why are people nervous about the White House's current efforts to restrict civil liberties? Because of its overreactions, including its threats against U.S. District Judge Michael B. Mukasey.

Mukasey made a reasonable ruling (that Jose Padilla must be allowed to see his lawyers as part of his defense) and now our government contends that he is inviting a terror attack against this nation. This Washington Post editorial explores why our government is, once again, out of line.

Why are people talking about former Vermont Governor Howard Dean's run for the Democratic presidential nomination? As Mary McGrory explains, it might have something to do with the fact that he is talking about important issues and taking the Bush Administration to task for its mistakes. She writes:

At the National Press Club, before a forum sponsored by the Atlantic Monthly and the New America Foundation, Dean gave a brisk review of Washington's mistakes, the blunders of the president and the blinders on Congress. The president is all wet about the tax cuts, he says. The $350 billion deficit projected does not even include the $200 billion bill for the war forecast by economic adviser Larry Lindsey, who, Dean noted, got sacked for his politically incorrect math.

The country needs health insurance, says the doctor, yet Congress is arguing about the wrong thing, the patients' bill of rights, which would not make the slightest difference because "it would not bring health insurance to a single American."

Using no notes, Dean strode smartly through the issues. On education, he derides Bush's education bill as "no school left standing" because it is all mandate and no money. On the war, the president "has not made the case for a clear and present danger in Iraq" and should be telling us instead his postwar notions of occupation in Afghanistan and the nation-building he once rejected. "We need an energy policy," he told the attentive crowd. "We need to discuss this stuff."

Slate's Daniel Gross explains why you should not get too excited about Microsoft's first-ever plan to issue dividends.

California State Treasurer Phil Angelides has a big concern about President Bush's proposal to eliminate taxes on dividends. He fears that the plan will "cost California taxpayers $17 billion over the next decade in higher interest rates on state and municipal bonds."

At a time when the federal government should seek ways to assist the states as they face their worst fiscal crises in a decade, the White House proposes an economic plan that will make their situations worse.

Ted Widmer's review of David Frum's new book, The Right Man explains why some people -- like me -- are so reluctant to buy the White House's justification for war with Iraq. Widmer writes:

But The Right Man also contains more than a few land mines, most of which are left accidentally by Mr. Frum in his haste to prove his centrality to the party line. They should worry anyone concerned about the aimless and contradictory rhetoric of Bush foreign policy. One of the most fascinating sections describes the work leading to the "axis of evil" formulation in the State of the Union speech of January 2002. The first disturbing sign is that chief speechwriter Michael Gerson asked Mr. Frum to come up with the government’s justification for war with Iraq. This is bizarre no matter what your politics: Either the decision had been made to invade, but no one knew the reason, or—even worse—the Bush administration was genuinely interested in Mr. Frum’s opinion about whether or not to go to war. Last I heard, speechwriters are not supposed to determine the policy of the United States.

David Broder says it is time we take notice of Speaker Dennis Hastert's (R-Ill.) growing power and influence upon the nation's political agenda.

Remember how the Republicans who took control of the House of Representatives in 1994 argued that they were so morally straight and ethically conscious that they would not accept food, gifts, and lavish travel as gifts from lobbyists?

I guess those feelings are no longer operative.

Timothy Noah reminds us that one of the results of President Bush's tax cuts could be (and I would say will be) future increases in the payroll tax.

The payroll tax, of course, is highly regressive. Workers begin to pay it with their first dollar of earnings and then workers stop paying the Social Security portion of it at $87,000.

Of course, this strategy does fit in with the White House's desire to lower the tax burden on the rich and shift it to those who earn less...

That is the uncomfortable question Jane Eisner asks in today's Philadelphia Inquirer as she looks at another tragic death caused by child abuse.

Economist Phillip Longman explains that the floundering economy is not the sole cause of the fiscal problems facing the state and local governments.

Longman writes:

Governors, as well as hard-pressed local officials, rightly complain about the cost of unfunded mandates from Washington and about declining federal aid. The states are also on the hook for runaway Medicaid costs and for more than a few boondoggles conceived during the boom years of the late 1990s. But a deeper, structural deficit is also at work -- driven by demography and changes in the world economy -- that will continue eroding the finances of state and local governments even if boom times return. Unless this deficit is closed, state and local governments will wither, and more governmental power will likely wind up concentrated in Washington.

The largest single cause of the structural deficit is the shift toward a service economy. As recently as 1979, services accounted for 47 percent of personal consumption. Now health care costs, legal fees, education and other services account for roughly 60 percent of what we collectively spend on ourselves. And because the fast-growing service sector is largely exempt from sales taxes, this shift in consumption patterns makes the financing of state and local governments ever more difficult, even as the demand for the services provided by such governments goes up every year with growing populations and economies.

Robert Novak reports that last week Republican Senators complained bitterly to White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card about how the Bush Administration was withholding basic information from them about the potential war with Iraq.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.) opened the complaints:

Consequently, Warner had his colleagues' attention when he addressed Card. ''I will not tolerate,'' he boomed, ''a continuation of what's been going on the last two years.'' He cited cavalier treatment that denies information even to the venerable top Senate Republican on Armed Services. To specify whom he was talking about, Warner said he had breakfast scheduled the next morning with Rumsfeld and would tell the secretary of defense the same thing.

Sen. Kit Bond of Missouri next got up to tell Card that the administration had better put out more information justifying military action against Iraq as part of the war against terrorism. ''What is the connection between Iraq and al-Qaida?'' Bond asked. ''Don't worry,'' replied Card, indicating the information would come along.

If Republican Senators remain unconvinced about the need for war with Iraq, why why is it wrong for regular citizens ask the same pointed questions? (Answer: it is not wrong. Except in the minds of zealots.)

And how long should we tolerate a White House that does not deign to share information with either the people or their elected representatives?

Jonathan Turley thinks the recent outbreak of nepotism in Washington should concern us all. As he notes, the list of family appointments to government positions is too long to list in a column. (Gov. Frank Murkowski's recent decision to appoint his daughter to the Senate seat he had just vacated is a prime example of how this has become problematic.)

Ultimately, the problem is less about individual qualifications (or the lack thereof) as it is institutional integrity. With branches of government swapping siblings, spouses and offspring, our constitutional checks and balances become mired in personal debts and alliances.

Mary Williams Walsh reports in today's New York Times that many companies find their pension funds woefully underfunded after three years of stock market turmoil. She writes:

After a three-year bear market, many major American companies are spending large amounts to shore up pension plans that have deteriorated, sometimes drastically.

Many companies are also considering ways to reduce their pension obligations to workers, possibly undermining benefits for millions.

The biggest pension shortfall belongs to General Motors, which said on Thursday that its United States pension plans ended the year with a deficit of $19.3 billion, even though the company pumped in $2.6 billion. G.M. also said its pension costs would triple in 2003, severely depressing its profit.

Unfortunately, the federal government's financial position on this issue is even worse. As the Concord Coalition noted last week:

If the federal government required itself to calculate amortization charges on its benefit obligations - and recognize those obligations on its balance sheet as the private sector is required to do - the annual charge would be roughly $1.7 trillion. This is a sobering perspective for policymakers weighing how much new debt to incur in the name of economic “stimulus.”

That is, if they decide to meet them.

Thomas Oliphant explains how the White House is cooking the books (again) to justify its latest tax cut plan.

Even more worrisome, however, are Republican plans to make the first openly partisan appointment to the position of director of the nominally nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. As Oliphant notes:

All by itself, this appointment ought to be a signal to Wall Street, especially the interest rate-influencing bond market, to lose confidence in all ''official'' numbers coming out of this town.

I am sure future generations will love being left this bill.

Douglas Pike's excellent column in today's Philadelphia Inquirer makes several important points about the foolishness the Bush Administration's latest tax cut proposal represents.

Pike writes:

The plan's tilt to the rich is just the salted gash in an overpriced, ill-timed strategy. A 10-year, $670 billion tax cut is irresponsible at a time when budget deficits and the national debt are soaring. And even though the case for stimulus is strongest right now - with an economy growing too slowly to create new jobs - only one-sixth of that tax relief would happen this year. That makes no sense...

The annual cost for tax-free dividends is $36 billion in borrowed money, with two-thirds of the benefit going to the top 5 percent of taxpayers. Selling this change, Bush stressed that about half of all dividend income goes to senior citizens. He failed to mention that all his debt-financed tax cuts endanger people's retirement benefits by extending the current siphoning of Social Security reserves.

Clarence Page explains that the Bush Administration cares about at least one minority: the rich.

David Broder is unimpressed with the Bush Administration's arguments for its so-called stimulus plan.

He finds that it's about politics, and notes that on this issue (like many others) the White House has created a policy and is now trying every imaginable justification for it in hopes one will stick.

Broder explains:

Is it needed? In his first public appearance since he was fired last month as Treasury secretary, Paul O'Neill told a Sulgrave Club audience the other night that, with the economy growing at a 3 percent annual rate in the first three quarters of 2002, "it is hard to see a need for Keynesian remedies," i.e., further tax cuts and more stimulus.

Before the O'Neill talk, I asked one of my favorite Republican economics guides what he thought of the new Bush tax plan. He did not mince words. This man -- a veteran of the Nixon and Ford administrations and a friend and adviser to many officials in the Reagan and two Bush administrations -- said, "It may be the least defensible policy ever." I would amend that slightly: It is probably the most ill-considered since Treasury Secretary John Connally persuaded President Nixon to freeze wages and prices in 1971.

Like that move -- designed to help Nixon's reelection in 1972, whatever the damaging long-term consequences -- this latest pack of proposals reeks of politics. The proposal to eliminate taxes on dividends -- the centerpiece of the plan and the source of more than half its staggering cost -- looks like "the wrong reform at the wrong time," my mentor said.

One should not hold one's breath waiting for such a proposal.

One might think we could expect a little better from the personal responsibility crowd.

But over time we have come to learn the Bush Administration's MO: when in doubt, and nothing else seems to work, blame Clinton. This from the "adults" running foreign policy for the Bush Administration.

(Funny how North Korea was not presenting much of a problem until the Bush speechwriters decided axis of evil was a cool phrase to use to make their boss seem tough...)

Others writing about this:
Daily Kos
Talking Points Memo

Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) says that he has the "fire in the belly" to make a run at the presidency. As the outgoing chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Graham has credibility when he says that one of his themes will discuss that:

"The American people are at greater risk today than they were the day before September 11," he said. Graham, the ranking Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, cited intelligence estimates of a 75 percent chance of a terrorist attack should Saddam Hussein find himself on the verge of losing power. "I think it's outrageous that virtually nothing has been done to reduce our vulnerabilities," Graham said.

Remember how the Bush Administration was going to bring "adults" to run our country's foreign policy?

I am quite unimpressed in the supposed adults decisionmaking after reading this review of how the White House came to decide that removing Saddam Hussein from power was the highest priority.

Perhaps that is why the White House is having such a hard time justifying the effort to the American people. (A CBS Poll last week showed a perference for diplomacy over war by a 63-29 margin.)

Illinois Governor George Ryan today made the courageous decision to commute all death sentences in his state. The Chicago Tribune reports:

Ryan said three years of study since he declared a moratorium on executions in 2000 only raised more questions about the how the death penalty is imposed in Illinois. He cited problems with trials, sentencing, the appeals process and the state's "spectacular failure" to reform a system that has condemned innocent men to die.

My former colleagues at the Concord Coalition yesterday released an excellent issue statement about the Bush tax cut plan.

The report is quite sobering. Placing this debate into a larger context, Concord notes:

The nation now faces two history-bending challenges: global terrorism and global aging. Meeting the first may require marshalling new resources far above the extra spending already legislated. We know that meeting the second will test the ability of society to provide a decent standard of living for the old without imposing a crushing tax burden on the young. America should not approach this fiscal gauntlet encumbered by deficits as far as the eye can see. To do so would be to ignore every principle of public finance, generational equity, and long-term economic stewardship.

This is, of course, not the policy encouraged by this White House. If there was still any doubt, fiscal conservatism is no longer a synonym for fiscal responsibility. It is time for writers, editorialists, and analysts to make note of this change.

Nicholas Kristof analyzes conservatives' campaign against condom use. A campaign that condemns millions of people to death.

It has been slow to start, but the International Olympic Committee may begin an investigation into allegations that Saddam Hussein's son imprisons and tortures athletes for his own kind of sport.

One question: why is it the Canadian IOC member and not the U.S. delegate making this an issue?

President Bush touts his leadership on education since he fought to pass his No Child Left Behind Act.

Too bad he refuses to fully fund the program. Conservatives were supposed to hate symbolism over substance.

As the Hartford Courant smartly argues:

It is one thing for the federal government to demand accountability and excellence in education. It is quite another to squeeze states by failing to provide the resources.

I always wonder why the media allows themselves to be treated this way. The Associated Press' Jennifer Loven writes:

Journalists escorted into a Cabinet meeting on Monday were allowed just four questions. On Wednesday, the media were ushered in at the beginning of a session with congressional leaders from both parties. Bush tersely informed them that no questions would be welcomed.

"I'm going to have a statement and then we'll ask you to leave so we can get down to our business," he said. After his statement and the signing of legislation extending federal unemployment benefits, he reiterated the point. "Get out of the room as quickly as you came in," he said.

Of course, some reporters may be upset enough with this attitude to dig a little deeper into this Administration's policies and stop accepting the pablum dished out by Press Secretary Ari Fleischer as gospel. One can hope.

(Thanks to the Daily Kos for the link.)

Remember when George W. Bush was promising that there was no way his economic plans could case large budget deficits? Jonathan Chait does. He writes:

Perhaps the hardest part of criticizing the Bush administration's economic logic is simply keeping track of it from week to week.

Brookings Institution economist William Gale makes a noteworthy observation about President Bush's economic stimulus plans:

"Whenever the president talks about war, he talks about a spirit of shared sacrifice," Gale said. "But for rich people, shared sacrifice appears to be accepting tax cuts, and for the poor, it seems to be accepting cuts in social spending. There seems to be a disconnect bordering on the dishonest."

Northern Virginia police should not be permitted to repeat their series of public drunkenness raids in area bars and taverns without a thorough review of the procedures they will use.

Carol Morello's story describes a capricious situation where police officers entered bars and picked people for sobriety tests seemingly at random. The story opens with the tale of a designated driver -- who was quite sober -- being picked out of one crowd for the test.

Drinking and driving is horrible, stupid, and should be avoided. But this tactic goes well beyond what is reasonable. Morello writes:

But civil libertarians, restaurateurs and many of their customers who were either questioned or arrested have decried the police tactic. They said many people who were drinking responsibly and causing no commotion now have the Class 4 misdemeanor of public intoxication on their record, and many more potential customers were scared away for good out of fear that a drink or two could get them arrested.

"It does smack of a pending police state if law enforcement is going into establishments to monitor behavior," said Lynne Breaux, executive director of the Metropolitan Washington Restaurant Association. "At the same time, we strongly oppose any combination of drinking and driving."

It is harrassment that Northern Virginia authorities have an obligation to end.

E.J. Dionne commits class warfare today, which the Bush Administration opposes except when using it.

The New York Times' Floyd Norris explains how the Bush tax plan could hurt state and local government finances. He writes:

But the dividend plan could hurt those same state and local governments, by raising their borrowing costs and reducing their tax revenues.

Individual investors seeking to minimize their taxes have long purchased municipal bonds, issued by state and local governments, because they owe no federal income tax on the interest, and often no state income tax either.

"The principal attraction of muni bonds is that the interest income is exempt," said Robert Willens, a tax analyst at Lehman Brothers. "If dividends were exempt, and you also had the potential of capital gains, some stocks would look a lot more attractive than muni bonds."

The existence of another investment that offers tax-free income would probably mean that issuers of municipal bonds would have to pay higher interest rates when they borrowed money.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) has decided not to run for president.

Timothy Noah explains one of the possible reasons why.

Slate's William Saletan explains how President Bush is trying to make "senior citizen" a euphemism to replace the real target -- the "rich" -- in order to sell his new economic plan.

Liberals don't dispute that half the beneficiaries of a dividend tax repeal would be old folks. They simply note that the bulk of these old folks also happen to be well-off. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that under Bush's plan "nearly 40 percent of the benefits of the tax cut that would accrue to elderly individuals would flow to the 2.5 percent of elderly people with incomes exceeding $200,000. Nearly three-quarters of the benefits that would go to the elderly would flow to the 19 percent of elderly with incomes above $75,000." Citizens for Tax Justice calculates that most of the benefits received by old folks would go to those making more than $200,000.

Thomas Friedman makes an obvious point that many of Bush Administration's Iraq policy supporters would rather forget:

I say this possible Iraq war is partly about oil because it is impossible to explain the Bush team's behavior otherwise. Why are they going after Saddam Hussein with the 82nd Airborne and North Korea with diplomatic kid gloves — when North Korea already has nuclear weapons, the missiles to deliver them, a record of selling dangerous weapons to anyone with cash, 100,000 U.S. troops in its missile range and a leader who is even more cruel to his own people than Saddam?

One reason, of course, is that it is easier to go after Saddam. But the other reason is oil — even if the president doesn't want to admit it. (Mr. Bush's recent attempt to hype the Iraqi threat by saying that an Iraqi attack on America — which is most unlikely — "would cripple our economy" was embarrassing. It made the president look as if he was groping for an excuse to go to war, absent a smoking gun.)

Friedman makes a case for whether a war for partly oil proves moral or immoral. The moral course he describes is the wise one. I doubt, however, it is in line with what the Bush Administration's planners are thinking.

The Washington Post calls on the governors of Maryland and Virginia to lead redistricting process reform efforts in their states.

Redistricting, which follows the census every decade, should be an opportunity to make districts competitive and, thereby, to hold incumbents accountable despite the changing demographics of a state. In most states, however, legislatures seek to protect incumbency and to lock in the advantage of the party in power by drawing as many safe seats for that party as possible. Members accomplish this by crowding voters of the other party into densely packed safe districts -- the result being that districts become either more liberal or more conservative than the population at large, and the center grows weaker. Both Maryland and Virginia last time around experienced ugly redistricting fights: Democrats in Maryland squeezed Rep. Constance A. Morella out of her seat, for example, while Virginia Republicans packed minority voters into noncontiguous districts. Nobody knows in either state which party will be in power to abuse the process next time. But absent reform, it will surely happen again -- and one certain loser will be the public.

The House, which the Framers indended to reflect the passions of the populace, now is less competitive than the Senate.

A few wise legislators could spark a much-needed national reform movement. While the next round of redistricting may be seven years away, in political terms that is a distressingly short time period to make needed changes.

Lean Left's Kevin Raybould has some advice for those "people" who insist on sending hate e-mail to him.

Remember how much Republicans loved leadership term limits? How they were supposed to prove that the revolutionaries behind the 1994 Gingrich revolution were better than the career politicians they sought to replace?

I guess those sentiments are no longer operative.

Update: David Broder has a more generous view of this GOP flip-flop. He writes:

Term limits were part of the Republicans' effort to downgrade the role of government and the competence needed to lead it. Now that more of them have seen government from the inside, they have a better appreciation of what is needed to make it work.

The New York Times reminds us that Sen. John Breaux (D-La.) changed his mind and now wants to create an universal health care system.

His plan is not as good as the one Matthew Miller outlined with the help of a liberal and a conservative member of Congress in this October 2000 Atlantic Monthly article, but it is a good starting point for a national conversation we have neglected far too long.

The White House and Congress may want to step out of their tax cut party long enough to fund their planned smallpox vaccination effort. The New York Times' Lawrence K. Altman and Anahad O'Connor explain why:

Many local health departments across the nation say they will have to curtail an array of services, including cancer and tuberculosis screening and children's dental examinations, to meet the needs of President Bush's federal smallpox vaccination program.

In interviews, health officials from New York to Seattle said much of the $940 million that Congress allocated to the Department of Health and Human Services last May for bioterrorism preparedness had been spent for steps to respond to the anthrax threats of 2001. Without extra money, they said, they will have to divert time and staff members from traditional programs to smallpox.

Are tax cuts or health care and terror preparedness more important to the GOP? Budgets are about national priorities, and we will soon learn where the Bush Administration and Congress' majorities stand.

Rep. Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) is going to run for president.

Too bad he did not try to make some of these points before the November 2002 elections. It certainly is not worse than the message he developed then.

Doctors reactions to the latest year of double digit increases in malpractice insurance prices -- as the Washington Post explains, doctors "flee states with the highest rates, refuse to perform high-risk procedures, retire early out of frustration or stage protests" -- are the latest symptom of the nation's growing health care crisis.

A crisis that places peoples' health in jeopardy and places our nation's future economy in jeopardy.

Taegan Goodard wonders on his Political Wire blog whether President Bush is planning multiple wars after seeing this remark from the president's press conference yesterday.

President Bush plans to outline his new economic stimulus plan in a speech on Tuesday. The first details have leaked, just in time for the weekend punditry's opinion mafia to provide their close analysis.

The Bush plans are not as bad as they could have been. Economists, in fact, will make strong arguments that a cut in the tax on dividends makes economic sense.

Leaks suggest that Bush is willing to sacrifice rate cuts to get a 50 percent cut in the taxation of dividends. Democrats should feel fortunate that Bush has so far not embraced the payroll tax cut proposals.

If Bush reversed course and traded his misguided support of the temporary estate tax elimination from the last tax cut round for a payroll tax cut today, he would gain a huge rhetorical advantage on the economy. (It would also expose one of Social Security's greatest faults -- the mythical savings of the Social Security Trust Fund -- assisting the administration in its plans to fight for partial privatization.)

That said, I fail to see how a $300 billion plan over 10 years will stimulate a $10 trillion economy. Perhaps the White House is hoping that doing something -- no matter how small -- is better than appearing to do nothing.

Slate's William Saletan says that Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) is way ahead of his competitors when it comes to honing a message. Even better, argues Saletan, he's found a proven winner.

Does that mean he'll win? No, of course not. But it does mean that the other Democratic contenders better figure out a one-sentence answer for why they are running for president. And quick.

Jonathan Turley says that it is time to take a step back and look at the larger picture drawn by all of the Bush Administration's incremental steps against civil liberties and privacy protection since the September 11 terrorist attacks. Turley rightly sees much about which we should worry.

James Pinkerton notes that all U.S. civilians, everywere, are at risk in the new asymmetrical war on terror. But, as he explains:

Americans don't mind bearing these burdens; they are being promised victory in the "war on terror." We have proved that we can win symmetrical wars. But this is an asymmetrical war. It's not a war against an army, but rather a war against a tactic, against resentment, against beliefs and ideas. And we have yet to prove we can win that.

Robert Samuelson is unimpressed with the recent announcement that an10 major investment banks have agreed to pay $1.4 billion for misleading investors. He writes:

It may be a fitting end to a year of corporate scandal, but anyone who thinks the settlement will make investing much safer or more honest is probably someone who thought -- only a few years ago -- that the Internet was the greatest invention since the steam engine.

Here's the 28th annual Lake Superior State University "List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness."

Communication would be improved if most of these words or phrases were never used again.

Here's one of the rare recognitions of this type that is well deserved. The choice is David Letterman. The New York Observer explains why.

Updates: The Instapundit agrees. So does Bryan Preston.

Business leaders should not be surprised when they face the backlash in the coming years as a result of their selfishness and stupidity.

Bob Herbert describes one story that comes from the recent layoffs at Verizon Communications.

Perhaps the top one percent thinks that the rest of America will sit by forever while they cut health benefits, layoff employees, and lie about their finances while continuing to take multimillion dollar bonus packages regardless of performance. But I believe they will be in for a shock when the working and middle classes strike back against this plutocracy.

Stanford Law Professor William B. Gould IV writes today about the 140th Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.

As we mark the historic anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation today, it will be appropriate to ask not only the former Senate majority leader but many of his colleagues on his side of the aisle, about which side they support -- that of Jefferson Davis (who viewed Lincoln's executive order as "execrable") or the flag of "Right and Equality" that brought him down two years later in the midst of unprecedented casualties and suffering. Only then can we truly begin to bind up the wounds of which Lincoln spoke eloquently in his historic Second Inaugural Address.

David Broder explains today why observers should not expect an outbreak of bipartisanism on Capitol Hill when the 108th Congress begins.

The two parties are further apart than they have been in previous decades. The level of partisan discipline, moreover, is stronger than ever. Broder writes:

Each year, CQ counts the number of votes on which a majority of Republicans oppose the stand taken by a majority of Democrats. Then it calculates the percentage of times on which each member has voted with the party majority on those roll calls.

When I averaged the year-by-year results for both chambers, I found the percentage of partisan-divide roll calls has gone from 39 percent in the 1970s to 47 percent in the 1980s to 58 percent in the 1990s.

Even more striking is the growth in cohesion -- call it discipline or philosophical agreement -- within both party caucuses. In the 1970s, on the partisan roll calls, the average member of Congress backed the party position 65 percent of the time. In the 1980s, the average degree of partisan loyalty rose to 73 percent; and in the 1990s, to 81 percent. In these past two years, it has been 87 percent.

We know 2002 was not a good economic year. For the markets, it was one of the worst in recent history. The Washington Post's Anitha Reddy reports:

It was a year of historic drops. The Dow sank 1679.87 points, or 16.8 percent, in 2002 -- its worst performance since 1977. The Nasdaq lost nearly a third of its value, falling 614.89 points -- its third-worst decline and the first time it has fallen for three straight years. The S&P 500 plunged 268.26 points, or 23.4 percent.

Two labor leaders face the death penalty "for subversion of the power of the state" because they participated in demonstrations following the closure of their factory last year.

I hope you enjoy a pleasant and safe start to the New Year!