dagblog - Comments for "What If Obama Loses?"

Good point.Passion, idealism,

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 23:31:55 +0000

In reply to AD, thank you for all that. I

Good point.

Passion, idealism, and high principle each can stir the blood--and a party's faithful. Which can help win elections if what the public perceives of that isn't scary. "Pragmatism", or what passes for it, not always so much.

Thus we have references to Obama "debating with himself" or "negotiating with himself". These are traits that people who see themselves as intellectual, or intellectuals, tend to value. Those traits may be better than their opposites for governing to the extent that more searching and careful thinking prior to decisions, and better listening to criticisms to benefit from and learn from them, tend to lead to better decisions overall than governing by ideology.

The public seems to prefer its Presidents strong, confident, optimistic, resolute, and decisive. Bill Clinton: "Better to be seen as strong and wrong, than weak and right." We may have a general tendency in this society to perceive someone who comes off as intellectual as--not always correctly--deficient on these other qualities we value.

We've had a number of Presidents, usually Republicans, who seemed to be at no great pains to show people they are learned, but rather quite the opposite, that they are plain, ordinary men of the people. Eisenhower and Reagan were both a lot smarter and more aware than the public personas they projected. They'd get called dumb by some and not be bothered by that, knowing that many citizens on hearing that respond by seeing the media critics and political opponents who make those charges as elitist and also rude and maybe subversive and unpatriotic snobs, rather than believing their President really is dumb.

That has dovetailed nicely with a frequent GOP narrative in recent decades that Democrats are snooty, elitist intellectual types, not tough enough, not possessed of enough common sense, and maybe a tad weird to be entrusted with the Oval Office.

Oh, and no problem on my second try. If I write it more clearly the first time maybe I won't need to go back and do it again.

AD, thank you for all that. I

Peter Schwartz — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 22:50:37 +0000

In reply to (this is in reply to Peter

AD, thank you for all that. I feel a bit guilty that I provoked you into doing all that work just to clarify what you meant! I'm with you on all this. About this...

When their policies fail, they never say "oh well, our policies failed." They'll say they were never tried. Or: we didn't go far enough (the obverse of what those saying the stimulus wasn't large enough are saying.) Or, circumstances were such...Whatever. They don't concede what to the way of thinking of many here would be the obvious conclusion, that their policies were tried and failed. Supply-side economics under Reagan failed in reducing the federal deficit. Reagan had to accept tax increases after the initial large supply side cuts targeted heavily to the affluent. Has that stopped the Republicans from pushing the same policies since then? Hardly.

One of the reasons I think this happens is that it happens whenever someone is ideologically driven. When reality collides with principle, the reality is wrong. I think this happened with the old line Communists, and it's definitely true of conservatives these days.

John Chait wrote a very perceptive piece on this a while back. His basic thesis was: When liberals see their policies not working, they feel it incumbent upon themselves to admit it and try something else. But conservatives are driven more by principle. So, in one breath they'll say, "We have to cut spending," AND "What price freedom?" when it comes to defense spending.

Cutting taxes isn't only an economic act--say, a way of stimulating the economy--but the right thing to do. It's the people's money; the government shouldn't take it in the first place; and in the second place, they should take as little of it as necessary to cover the cost of the few things the Constitution says the government is allowed to do.

So, even if tax cuts don't stimulate the economy--the practical reason--they are still the right thing to do--the principled reason. Even if more guns caused more deaths, it would be wrong to abridge the right set out in the Second Amendment. A right is God-given and one human can't take away another human's rights. Even if all the pro-choice arguments are correct factually, abortion is still murder and therefore wrong.

I think liberals need to speak the language of principle in a way that reaches down into the basic brain of Americans: freedom, liberity, pursuit of happiness, opportunity, security. If you're swimming against these principles or your language is too convoluted, you are going to have trouble moving people. Obama is far too "reasonable" to get at this level--though he seemed to do it in the campaign. Who knows...

(this is in reply to Peter

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 20:08:39 +0000

In reply to What If Obama Loses?

(this is in reply to Peter Schwartz's 6/30 3:23 comment upthread)

You excerpted me:

if things get worse they more likely will get better than now sometime soon after that, rather than worse still (that latter hypothesis is extremely unlikely in my estimation).

and then wrote: "I don't see why this should be true necessarily. I think we still have a long to fall potentially--think real Great Depression."

I wasn't disagreeing with that. I was trying to state the argument, offered by some at dag, for not voting for Obama on the grounds that things have to get worse before they can get better. That argument, it seems to me, actually consists of two assertions, both of which one has to believe in order to buy it:

1. Things have to get worse in this context before they can get better.

While I hope this assertion is incorrect I don't think it is obvious that it actually is incorrect. Most unfortunately. And, in response to what you took me to be saying, it seems obvious to me that things could get much worse than they are.

2. If things get worse, they more than likely will get better than they are now.

This assertion I find I have no reason to believe. It strikes me as highly dubious, for many reasons, not least of which is that the asserted reasons for further deterioration, if that takes place, can always be, and will be, contested by the Republicans. When their policies fail, they never say "oh well, our policies failed." They'll say they were never tried. Or: we didn't go far enough (the obverse of what those saying the stimulus wasn't large enough are saying.) Or, circumstances were such...Whatever. They don't concede what to the way of thinking of many here would be the obvious conclusion, that their policies were tried and failed. Supply-side economics under Reagan failed in reducing the federal deficit. Reagan had to accept tax increases after the initial large supply side cuts targeted heavily to the affluent. Has that stopped the Republicans from pushing the same policies since then? Hardly.

Because I reject the second assertion, I reject that argument for not voting for Obama as a whole. Again, one has to accept both of those assertions to buy that argument. I don't. And so I don't.

You wrote:

If we think Obama is doing a terrible job creating jobs by pursuing in part Republican policies, well, Romney is promising to do ONLY that, and I'm sure the other Republicans are on board with that. At least Obama did SOME direct stimulus, as I understand it. At least he did get an UE extension. If we think Obama is Republican Lite and we don't like that, why acquiesce in the ascent of Republican Heavy? Obama snubbed progressives; Romney won't even acknowledge their existence except as enemies of American exceptionalism.

I was not saying I agree with those who believe Romney would likely be a Nixon goes to China Republican more progressive than Obama (or with a variant on that argument, which is that a [presumably] Democratic Congress with a Romney Administration would be more progressive than Congress has been under Obama so far.)

I was saying that some at dag have ruminated on that argument or the variant of it that I stated. And that if they really believe that, what they probably should do is register Republican and try to help Romney win his nomination fight. I don't happen to agree with that argument.

You excerpted me:

In general I think the more happy one is with Obama, with the current situation of the country and most likely range of policies that will get serious consideration in a 2nd Obama term, the more heavily one will weight the risk of losing the general.

and then wrote

I think Bruce indicated a third alternative. One doesn't have to be very happy with Obama's policies to enthusiastically support him in 2012 and, simultaneously, work for a more progressive agenda than Obama is pursuing. That strikes me as sensible. The presidency is simultaneously only one piece of the puzzle and an important one. If nothing else, he picks SC justices. He goes to war. So you want the guy who thinks more like you than the other guy AND at the same time, you work on many other fronts, including locally, and you work toward putting an even better guy in next time.

I didn't do a good job there of saying what I meant and what I think on that. I didn't mean to suggest that a vote for Obama means one is necessarily reasonably happy with him or with the condition of the country. It certainly irritates some of our dag denizens when they say they plan to vote for Obama and then someone "accuses"(!) them of thinking Obama is doing a good job, or of thinking the country doesn't have serious problems.

I do think it's true that those who are actually fairly happy with Obama overall, or who think the country's problems are, say, serious, but not grave, are going to find any argument for not voting for Obama downright nuts.

You wrote:

...I'm reasonably certain that making Obama a one-term president will have a broad spillover effect. The broad public won't say: Obama wasn't progressive enough. They will see it as a repudiation of progressive principles altogether.

Here's my unscientific evidence for this: When I'm talking politics with my FB friends and I say something like, "The stimulus didn't work well because it was loaded down with conservative policies like tax cuts," they laugh at me. They don't think Obama is at all a conservative in any way shape or form. When I say that the deregulation under Clinton occurred because Clinton was beguiled by the conservative passion for deregulation, they laugh at me. They see Clinton as a liberal, pure and simple. And that's the way they see Obama.

On that, if someone I knew responded to me in that way I would try to state, in as simple and clear a way as I knew how, and using as few words as possible, how stimulus works and that getting the size right matters a lot (size matters here), as was said at the time by a number of distinguished, prominent economists, unfortunately none of whom happened to have been hired by the Obama Administration. I'd offer to send them links on articles written at the time, in prominent media outlets, not obscure academic economics journals, if they seemed dubious. Just because someone says something doesn't mean it's true. I feel I need to set the record straight when people I know make assertions that I believe are incorrect, not let them stand. They can perceive whatever they want. But that doesn't mean what they're saying is accurate.

Beyond that, I might also challenge them more broadly on their assertion that "Obama is a liberal" by identifying, or offering to identify if my friend wanted me to, numerous things he has done and not done with which some liberals have strongly disagreed. Better yet, I'd say what liberals with whom I agree are pressing for in terms of a positive agenda, say why these would be very positive things for our country to do, note that those measures are supported by many who do not describe themselves as liberals, and cite public opinion poll data, or offer to, to back up my claim.

Again, someone saying something about him doesn't make it correct.

Ok, I know that's kind of a handful or two. Or three. I hope I did a better job clarifying on these points than I did trying to write them the first time.

I think it's fine and right

Peter Schwartz — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 19:42:58 +0000

In reply to Isn't an election actually

I think it's fine and right to try to pressure Obama to move left on specific policies.

If the criticism sounds like a global rejection of Obama as a president, however, it simply blends with the conservative rejection of Obama as president. The meme becomes NOBODY likes him, even his former friends who are now so disillusioned.

And since Obama is broadly viewed as a liberal, the liberal point of view is damaged. Liberals are seen as moving away from liberalism, broadly perceived. Liberalism is seen as having lost the election. No one parses these distinctions the way we do here unless they are political junkies.

In terms of "rebuilding," though I go back to Genghis. It takes time to rebuild. There is a battle of ideas to win. We need to win over a lot of people which is the only real impact we can have on elections or candidates--by getting a whole lot of people to agree with this on XYZ.

Just quickly, there are two areas I see: how does the economy really work and first principles.

Economy: One of the reasons Obama has moved right on the economy is that virtually everyone believes in the right's analysis in important ways. For example, IF we are, in fact, broke as a country, then our options are limited and we probably have to cut spending. IF the debt is a real, immediate problem, then our options are limited.

A LOT of people think these two things are true, and they aren't all conservative ideologues or political people hellbent on dismantling the welfare state. Our very own Resistance thinks this is true. Virtually every Democrat thinks this is true or thinks he needs to say it's true. The famed investor, Jim Rogers, thinks it's true. And here's the problem: They make a very common sense, easily grasped, argument for it.

I don't think we can recapture this flag during an election. It's a whole change in thinking that has to take place. You introduced me to MMT and I've tried to introduce it on FB to my "friends" and have actually gotten them, not to accept it, but to take notice.

Changing people's minds on issues like this is what I would call "rebuilding." But unless we can recapture this flag, we will always be on the losing end of political battles. A politician can't go against what most people think is common sense truth--unless they are really, really desperate and willing to believe anyone who can convince them that he can get them out of the ditch.

Principles: Liberals have ceded basic American principles like "freedom" to conservatives. IMO, this is what allows their candidates to act batshit crazy and still not be run out of town. How can people like Bachmann, Palin, Gohmert, Steven King and others say what they say and not get laughed out of court? I believe it's because they thoroughly control the rhetoric of basic American principles like "freedom," "security" and other words that won't come to mind right now.

FDR brilliantly appropriated the principle of freedom in his Four Freedoms, but since then, it seems, liberals have been reluctant to use these words, or claim them for our side. We always seem to have some eggheadish interpretation of them that no one can remember. We always sound phony when we talk about freedom. This needs to change and will take time.

So I think it's good to pressure Obama to the left as long as we don't come off as trashing him (unless we really don't care whether he survives). And rebuilding will take some time because we're going to have to recapture some flags and get a lot of folks to agree with us.

IMHO.

This one's getting harder for

AmericanDreamer — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 19:23:40 +0000

In reply to First, thanks for your kind

This one's getting harder for me to read and follow clearly so I'll post a reply as a new comment down at the bottom of the thread.

First, thanks for your kind

Peter Schwartz — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 19:13:27 +0000

In reply to As I have written, I am with

First, thanks for your kind words and back atcha. I agree with almost all of what you write. Here are some places I might take issue IF I understand you correctly:

if things get worse they more likely will get better than now sometime soon after that, rather than worse still (that latter hypothesis is extremely unlikely in my estimation).

I don't see why this should be true necessarily. I think we still have a long to fall potentially--think real Great Depression. How likely that is, I don't know, but it did happen here, and I guess could happen again. If one is gay or cares about that issue, DADT could be rolled back. If one is one of the 30 million who are slated to get health care coverage, that could be disappeared.

If we think Obama is doing a terrible job creating jobs by pursuing in part Republican policies, well, Romney is promising to do ONLY that, and I'm sure the other Republicans are on board with that. At least Obama did SOME direct stimulus, as I understand it. At least he did get an UE extension. If we think Obama is Republican Lite and we don't like that, why acquiesce in the ascent of Republican Heavy? Obama snubbed progressives; Romney won't even acknowledge their existence except as enemies of American exceptionalism.

In general I think the more happy one is with Obama, with the current situation of the country and most likely range of policies that will get serious consideration in a 2nd Obama term, the more heavily one will weight the risk of losing the general.

I think Bruce indicated a third alternative. One doesn't have to be very happy with Obama's policies to enthusiastically support him in 2012 and, simultaneously, work for a more progressive agenda than Obama is pursuing. That strikes me as sensible. The presidency is simultaneously only one piece of the puzzle and an important one. If nothing else, he picks SC justices. He goes to war. So you want the guy who thinks more like you than the other guy AND at the same time, you work on many other fronts, including locally, and you work toward putting an even better guy in next time.

I saw on the news how Kansas has enacted a new set of regulations for abortion clinics, effective immediately, that is so long and complicated that no existing clinic in Kansas can comply. If it stands and is implemented, it will make Kansas and good chunk of CO and MO abortion-free. Forget public funding for abortions; you just won't be able to get one, except in the back alley, for any amount of money. Gov. Sam Brownback signed that measure.

So a lot is happening that has very little to do with Obama--but that doesn't mean getting Obama re-elected isn't important. I'm reasonably certain that making Obama a one-term president will have a broad spillover effect. The broad public won't say: Obama wasn't progressive enough. They will see it as a repudiation of progressive principles altogether.

Here's my unscientific evidence for this: When I'm talking politics with my FB friends and I say something like, "The stimulus didn't work well because it was loaded down with conservative policies like tax cuts," they laugh at me. They don't think Obama is at all a conservative in any way shape or form. When I say that the deregulation under Clinton occurred because Clinton was beguiled by the conservative passion for deregulation, they laugh at me. They see Clinton as a liberal, pure and simple. And that's the way they see Obama.

Isn't an election actually

Dan Kervick — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 21:38:04 +0000

In reply to That is a good question.I

Isn't an election actually the best time to do the rebuilding? That's the only time when voters have any leverage. Once the elections are over, the politicians go back to doing their own thing until the next election.

As I have written, I am with

AmericanDreamer — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 20:50:39 +0000

In reply to That is a good question.I

As I have written, I am with you in strongly disagreeing with the argument Seaton has made that we should want the Republican to win because: things have to get worse, maybe much worse, before they can get better (not obviously false, unfortunately), *and* if things get worse they more likely will get better than now sometime soon after that, rather than worse still (that latter hypothesis is extremely unlikely in my estimation). I think that really dishonors the immense sacrifice and hard and good work of many who have gone before us moving the ball in the right direction. But beyond that and more importantly I just don't see a good argument for preferring the worse to the better candidate on those grounds.

If one wants to make a case that Romney could, and likely will be, a Nixon goes to China Republican more progressive than Obama...well, some at dag have already ruminated to that effect. That reflects an altogether different outlook. Folks who really believe this probably should register as Republicans and try to help Romney win it. It'll be the only presidential primary campaign that is in any doubt this time around.

I think a major part of what this discussion comes down to is, as you wrote in another one of your terrific recent comments, a disagreement about tactics, or maybe strategy. Which comes down to different perceptions of how the world works and/or predictions of how it would or will work, under different alternative scenarios.

My disagreement with individuals who decline to vote or vote 3rd party (assuming in the latter case that no credible, more-progressive-than-Obama 3rd party candidate enters and builds up enough of a head of steam to have a real chance of winning) in this upcoming election is that it is far too crude a "signal" to send.

*the signal is not received, and understood (not at all the same things), until after the election, when it is too late to make any difference to the current outcome.

*while the meaning of the "signal" may be crystal clear signal in the mind of the sender, it is anything but to the recipient--again, if indeed there is a recipient and an active, correctly comprehending and empowered, listened-to, listener/analyst on the other end. Believing the intended signal will be heard, understood and acted upon in the way the sender means and hopes for it to be is a big, and also curious, assumption, coming from folks who appear to think the Democratic party is presently inhabited by a bunch of oblivious, clueless dimwits.

*further muddying the waters is that there are always many different, sometimes conflicting, reasons why people don't vote, or vote 3rd party. One can try polling to see if there are clear patterns that one can learn something useful from. There is plenty of noise in that data. Focus groups always run a significant danger of giving you unrepresentative feedback.

Not all of the disagreement is on account of different views about the way the world works or is likely to work. In general I think the more happy one is with Obama, with the current situation of the country and most likely range of policies that will get serious consideration in a 2nd Obama term, the more heavily one will weight the risk of losing the general. And the less heavily one will value any asserted positive potential, because that positive potential just isn't seen as that great, or else the judgment is that things could not get much better in any case.

I wouldn't call him a fool,

Peter Schwartz — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 20:35:25 +0000

In reply to He's a fool, but he's our

I wouldn't call him a fool, but okay, if you like--yes.

He's a fool, but he's our

Resistance — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 19:19:24 +0000

In reply to In my view, it's always

He's a fool, but he's our fool ?