Michael Maiello's picture

    March Of The Centrists

    My latest column for The Daily was a reaction Thomas Friedman's recent New York Times column calling for a third party presidential candidate to be selected by some Internet Web site that he says is backed by flashy hedge fund money.

    Friedman's been banging the "radical center"gong for awhile now, as if it puts him above the usual third party advocates who (left or right) are generally looking for a candidate that's less centrist than the two major parties tend to be.  One of the unfortunate things that Ralph Nader said in 2000 was that Republicans and Democrats are the same thing. He should have said that at the leadership level, they serve the same masters.  Or that, taken together, they represent a way of thought that eschews radical solutions to real problems. They are not the same.  They have serious differences.  But they share a desire to basically preserve status quo America and to change it only at the margins. Usually, a third party advocate has a vision for a vastly changed America.

    Not Thomas.  He pretty much likes everything we have now but would prefer it with more globalization and less Social Security and Medicare.  We actually elected a guy who basically likes the system we have now but wants to tweak it at the margins (he's even open to Social Security and Medicare changes) who happens to be a Democrat.  Indeed, when it comes to policy, it's hard to see how Obama could be anything but Friedman's ideal leader.  I wonder what Friedman thinks he could accomplish by replacing Obama with Michael Bloomberg.  I'd argue that you would see basically no difference except that some people who hate Obama because he's black would decide to hate Bloomberg because he's Jewish.

    One other thing about the Friedman model  - it really always come back to a candidate like Bloomberg who is independently wealthy.  The idea here is that the candidate or party would be free from the influence of labor, the NRA, or any money raising group you could name.  The idea is that a rich man is incorruptible because he can't be bribed.  Think about how offensive that is.  It basically either claims that the wealthy have attained a higher moral plane than anyone else or that a political leader who is not beholden to Labor the NRA is morally superior to one who is.  Well, guess what?  If I were an avid gun collector, I'd probably want my leader to have some fealty to the NRA.  Instead, I'm an urban lefty.  And I'd like my leader to owe something to labor.  What I don't want to do is to hand political power to somebody so rich that they're not beholden to anyone.  That's how tyrants get made.

     

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    The noblesse oblige ​party!  Yes, of course, why didn't we think of that?


    I think the problem, if one to see it as that, is that most Americans want to keep the status quo, they just want to be on the winning side of the economic divide.  In other words, most Americans don't like radical change.  They may want the criminal bankers and stock brokers to be tossed in a jail cell, but they definitely don't want the government to nationalize the banks or to tear down the "free market" economy.


    "A mob is an ugly thing ..."


    And when we discuss the personal wealth of candidates, I think one needs to always think about Senator Kerry.  He represents I think the notion that for some, and I stress some, politicians, to be independently wealthy does allow them to be more a statesman and less of fundraiser.  Moreover, the corruption of people like Delay was because through their political power they could be live like and next to the wealthy jet set people. 


    I guess you could say the same for Kennedy and FDR.  They didn't have to claw their way up or worry about going down to the bottom ever again.  There are rich folks who have empathy for those who are far from rich, and then there are rich folks who can't see beyond their own back yards and don't want to.

    The people we elect to government positions should be chosen on the basis of their understanding of the problems and workings of the community, whether it's city, state, or country.  The amount of money they have at their disposal is or should be meaningless.  They've chosen a calling and they have to be held to it.  They're representatives of the people and once they've taken the oath of office, their own personal ambitions fall by the wayside.  They have work to do and it doesn't involve lining their own pockets or raising them to astronomical levels of celebrity.

    At least that's the way it's supposed to work.

     

     

     


    This kind of Wall Street and establishment move for a candidate who is even more "centrist" than Obama tells me that the plutocracy is getting very nervous about the gathering rage over the grotesque inequalities, class divisions and networks of exploitation and usury that have been exposed to sunlight by the Great Recession.  The same thing is happening in Europe: old political coalitions based largely on cultural values are breaking down under socio-economic stresses.  The distinctions between debtor and creditor, employee and employer, rent-payer and rent-collector are now becoming much more important than they were a decade ago, and whether one culturally affiliates with traditionalist Christian Democrats or liberal secular Social Democrats is somewhat less important.  The politics of Europe and the United States are being turned, for now, into a savage 19th century battle waged by creditors and employers to make sure that, above all else, society's owners are paid back by the people who are in hock to them, and that employees aren't able to organize sufficiently well to demand larger redistributed pieces of the pie.  Nominally "socialist" parties are working openly with bankers in Europe to enforce financial contracts and protect financial assets from the potential contagion of a brewing borrowers' rebellion.  Unemployment on both sides of the Atlantic is being kept very high intentionally to reduce the bargaining power of employees, subordinate them to effective social control, keep them at each others' throats politically, and maintain downward pressure on wages to protect the lifestyles of those who purchase luxury consumption goods in part with the income garnered from interest rents collected from the same stressed workers whose labor is being exploited.

    People like Friedman and his privileged friends, desperate to hold onto their ridiculously inflated social and economic positions and incomes in a dynamically changing world, can no longer trust the existing parties, whose ranks are swelling with angry ordinary people experiencing various forms and degrees of resentment.   The privileged and the money managers want a party that can be trusted, above all else, to protect their assets from the madding rabble, and protect their cultural privileges from the roiling cultural populism that is changing America across the spectrum.  They can't count on Barack Obama to make good on his promise to protect them forever from the people with pitchforks, because the cross-class coalition within Obama's own Democratic party is unraveling as people begin to look to shore up their material interests in response to economic stresses and threats.  At the same time, the Republican coalition is also in danger of unraveling along class lines.  If the populist elements of the "Tea Party" break from the country club and board room set, the anti-Wall Street populist resentment that characterizes some elements of Tea Party thought will no longer be checked and controlled by the needs of coalition politics.  Some Tea Partiers might become less susceptible to the basic race-and-nation Republican message that they should work hand-in-hand with plutocrats to protect their common white turf from transfer payments to black and brown people.  Eventually it might get through to them that they are being fleeced more on an average day by a scheming financial sector than they are in a year by all of those welfare mothers.

    Eventually, we might see some of the people who are funding this new radical centrism going to jail for their criminal fleecing of their own customers and social network co-denizens.  I'm sure Bernie Madoff would be lining up to contribute if he weren't in jail already.  No wonder the money guys are racing to enlist establishment mouthpieces like Friedman to build a new barricade around their stuff.

    Much contemporary prosperity is based on exploitation and the preservation of a brutal and degrading system of hard work for meager returns, organized by corporations run on an authoritarian and hierarchical model.  Friedman thinks the guys who mine the resources that go into the gadgets he uses, and assemble the shoes and clothes he wears, are spoiled and overpaid - if they are Americans at least - and that their wages need to fall until they are more in line with the typical Chinese or Indian flat-worlder who keeps Tom Friedman in the lifestyle to which he has become accustomed.  But I suspect Friedman can feel the future breathing down his neck, and it terrifies him.  A world in which informed opinion is a dime-a-dozen, and freely available all over the internet, isn't a world in which routine scribblers like Thomas Friedman and Richard Cohen will be able to continue to rake in hefty salaries and speaking fees from a dying cultural establishment erecting doomed monopoly barriers around its cultural citadels.


    Empirically, based on the data I've seen, Tea Party supporters are pro-establishment in the way you and I mean it, on economic issues.  The appearance of it being otherwise is part of a deliberately managed charade.  Yes, there is Ron Paul but no, his views are radically different from most of the Tea Party-supporting crowd, which cites war-mongering, racist, xenophobic, corporate establishment mouthpiece Glenn Beck as its most admired figure.

    That said, there is plenty of anti-establishment sentiment out there.  As usual, it is weak, diffuse, unorganized, with nothing resembling any positive program that has any widespread, organized buy-in.   

    I think I'm a good deal less radical than you sound.  I want many more of the political and economic elites who set and implement the status quo direction for the country now to adopt a longer-run view, grounded in long-run self interest and willing to make short-term sacrifices in the service of that longer-run self interest.  It would be based on what I believe would be an enlightened view that they themselves don't want to run the risks of what might happen if there comes to be a really severe breakdown of the US social order at some point.  That they and their families and friends live in this country and like it and would on the whole just as soon prefer to stay here rather than buy and move to one of the Alps in Switzerland, say.

    In that sense I have a conservative, reformist perspective.  I just think the status quo direction is unsustainable, on many levels, and that we are heading towards major and much more visible social breakdown and unrest if we don't deal with a number of critical problems the political and economic establishments don't want to deal with.  In that sense I think mine was FDR's perspective. 

    Our problems are different than then, not as severe economically, although nothing that can possibly serve as a "new normal" in a functioning society, as some here apparently believe.  We have some severe problems he and the country at that time did not face.  

    The point is: status quo direction will lead to a severe unraveling of this country in my view.  I want a correction and reforms, of a sort we have had historically, to avert that.  A revolution could lead to who knows what.  Not seeing a lot of George Washingtons and James Madisons around, I would not be particularly sanguine about what that might result in.  Although if that's what it comes to we'll have to deal with it as best we can, I suppose.

    Unfortunately the political and economic establishments so far have no interest in making the adjustments.  And those who believe adjustments are urgently needed are weak, diffuse, unorganized, ineffective, and with no program attracting much organized support.

    If and when the pitchforks come out we'll see the political and economic establishments head for the hills.  They'll of course decry the mobs whose rash and irrational and irresponsible and destructive actions they could have averted, if they had had the judgment and acuity to do so before it was too late.  


    Excellent post, destor.

    On many critical issues there is neither a "centrist" public constituency, or policy position, that makes any sense if what our country needs out of public policy is solutions to, or at least mitigation of, actual, real world problems.  

    What is the "centrist" position on carbon emissions reduction?  One side says we have to do it, now.  The other says we don't have to do it.  So the "centrist" says...what?  We should maybe think about it more?  Maybe forget about it for awhile, and hope the question will resolve itself?

    What is the "centrist" position on austerity vs. stimulus as a better bet to create jobs and get the economy going?

    What is the "centrist" position on whether we need further financial reform, or whether Dodd-Frank will do the job?

    What is the "centrist" position on labor unions and labor law reform?

    What is the "centrist" position on whether we need to a) drown government in the bathtub or b) acknowledge that a government of roughly the size we have, not capable of being drowned in anyone's bathtub, capable of being paid for over the long run, pursuing different policies in a number of areas, is required if we are to have a chance of a functional society in the world of today? 

    Is the "centrist" position on HC reform what we got (because it represents the "center" position among elected officials in Washington at that time, defined as what the 40th Senator will not kill by supporting a filibuster)?  Or a public option plan?  According to public opinion, it would be the latter.  So whose "centrism" are we talking about?  There is a major disconnect between what people outside Washington say they care about and want addressed, and what federal policy debates at the moment are even about.  Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson have done recent work backing this up empirically, among others. 

    AT wrote the other day that a great many Americans are attracted to the idea of "moderation"--which is often, I believe, incorrectly conflated with "centrism".  That's true.  But, it begs the question of how one defines "moderation".  If  "moderation" is defined conventionally as somewhere "between" two conventionally asserted [by whom?  Who gets to define what counts as "extreme"?  That question rarely seems to be asked.  The GOP and the Right define, and succeed in defining even in the heads of some Democrats, as "extreme left" positions that majorities of the public actually say they support.  So who is "extreme" in such instances?] "extremes", where exactly between those two "extremes" lies "moderation"?  Where is the dividing line between an "extreme" position vs. a "moderate" position?  Are all potential positions classifiable according to a binary categorization, in which they are either "moderate" or "extreme"? 

    That whole construct and way of thinking about politics, which dominates political discussion in this country and appears to be uncritically accepted by many, can-- depending on what the specific problems a society is faced with at a particular time in its history--be both incoherent and dysfunctional in my view.  

    Sometimes in a specific historical context the big issues of the day lend themselves better to the construction of a "vital center" (to use Schlesinger's phrase and of course he wrote a book by that title a long time ago that seemed to come back into fashion somewhat in recent years), meaning by "vital" one that serves the country well and commands substantial and reasonably durable public support. 

    Not today's big issues, not most of them.  For better or for worse.  Actually I think there could be a "vital center" today.  It just isn't anywhere near where today's 40th sitting Senator happens to be on the big issues of our day. 


    "What is the "centrist" position on austerity vs. stimulus as a better bet to create jobs and get the economy going?"

    A stimulus package that's half the size it needed to be, with too much tax cutting and not enough direct spending... Basically, what got us here now.


    Right.  And now...hmmm, can't get stimulus.  Well then, let's do some deficit reduction.  Maybe that'll help.  Whether consciously or not, it amounts to declining to come to terms with the arguments, which in some cases require choices between competing theories of action and how the world works or is most likely to.  It really unsettles me that we have a President who is, variously, a kinda-sorta, half-hearted Keynesian and at other times is a grand-bargain debt-reducer.  The buck stops with the President in the minds of the voters.  He has to take overall responsibility for pushing for policies that actually make some sense on policy grounds, that stand some chance of working, that have some logic and reasoning attached to them that could be articulated, to address what the public says it cares about.  Otherwise he's just letting himself be blown about in the winds, with no compass, no anchor, no real theory of action that has anything to do with dealing with policy approaches to real-world problems.  I think voters sense that when they see it and don't respond well to it.

    Or to take another example--Afghanistan, as chronicled in Woodward's book. The "centrist" position was defined, absurdly, around a difference of 10,000 or so in troop levels being proposed by competing factions.  It had nothing to do with squaring up to the strategic questions of why are we there and what are we hoping to achieve and why, specifically, would a difference of 10,000 troops in the near-term make a difference with regard to what are our actual and appropriate and sensible policy aims?  It was, in short, a compromise that appears to have been completely politically-driven, a decision made for the sake of making a decision, or because it was said earlier that a decision would be made.     

    Sometimes that's what decision-makers feel they have to do if they think the consequences of no decision are worse.  But no one should believe that approaching policy decisions in that way is likely to have anything to do with squaring up to an issue with a coherent policy attached to clear aims. 


    Destor, your assessment of Friedman's commitment to the status quo (more or less), in contrast to most third parties, is accurate and insightful. Your supposition that Obama fits his definition of a centrist leader is also accurate though somewhat less insightful since Friedman said so himself: "President Obama should dump the Democrats and run as an independent, which he is, at heart, anyway."

    I suggest, however, that pursuing radical objectives is not necessarily the best way to change the status quo, as least not in the U.S. Political change in the U.S. is constrained by several factors:

    • Checks and balances - which means that you need the White House, plus a majority in both both houses, and even then you have to deal with the courts (which FDR had some trouble with)
    • Parliamentary maneuvers (e.g. the filibuster) - which means that you need a super-majority in the Senate
    • Party disunity (relative to European systems) - which means that even a super-majority may not be enough (which Obama had some trouble with)

    Because of all these constraints, radical change driven by a single faction can only occur in the U.S. when some major catastrophe like war and/or depression propels one faction into overwhelming dominance. Call it the FDR model. It doesn't happen very often. (And frankly, the left wing is currently so far from attaining that kind of dominance that it would be a joke if it weren't so sad.)

    A much more common approach to change in the U.S. is the cooperative bipartisan model that Friedman yearns for. Lyndon Johnson and Teddy Roosevelt exemplify it. In this model, no one is going to line up any corporate overlords against the wall, but significant if gradual change is still possible. The bipartisan progressives of the the late 19th and early 20th century eliminated the spoils system and reined in the robber barons. Johnson initiated civil rights reform and developed the welfare system.

    If the constraints of our political system depress you, let me leave you with a sobering thought. If the U.S. somehow managed to dismantle our checks-and-balances and the two-party system, which radical faction do you think would be mostly likely to gain power and aggressively dismantle the status quo? Hint: it wouldn't be the Greens.


    Very clear and succinct summary of the nature of political change in this country.  The constitution created a model in which the status quo wouldn't change overnight.  It can be very frustrating. 


    I don't disagree with Genghis' view on our historical experience to date with the nature of political change in this country.  

    Where I think I differ from you, AT, and Genghis, is in seeing the current situation of the country as considerably more precarious and unstable than either of you seems to.  

    I know in the past, Genghis, you've said, it doesn't matter, the US system rules of change are what they are and we must, therefore, resign ourselves to that and deal with it.  For me, that amounts to a restatement of one aspect of our predicament, one that must still be surmounted.  You say we can't move otherwise.  I believe we must.  

    It would be helpful if a few of our uber-wealthy economic elites stepped up and started saying publicly and aggressively some things that are heresy for their social class but that need to be said.  Such as that it really isn't a good idea for us to make sure we have a weak and incompetent federal government that is easy for corporate elites to milk and give orders to.  Instead of investing in politics to make that happen.  It remains to be seen whether enough of us ordinary citizens will find ways to agitate and organize effectively, finding common cause with societal elites who have some social and political vision and good sense, to overcome the barriers and do what needs to be done to get this country to a better and more stable and promising place.  


    OK, Dreamer, we must. So lets forget the checks and balances for a moment, forget the filibuster, forget the frustrating realities of American politics. Let's just talk numbers. At the very least, we need a majority, right?

    How many senators stand against the "uber-wealthy economic elites"? VoteView lists 18 senators more liberal than Obama (from the 111th Congress). That's 17 now because #1 liberal Feingold lost in 2010. But maybe throw a few more in there for good measure, make it 20, even 25.

    What are you going to do with 25 senators? Change the system? 25 senators can't change the lunch menu. The votes aren't there. 2008-2010 was the biggest majority that the Democrats will see for a long while--and that included a bunch of Blue Dogs.

    As I've written before, liberals should focus on the long term, get more votes, get more power. But in the short term, you can shout "Must!" until your throat is raw; it won't accomplish anything.


    As I've written before, liberals should focus on the long term, get more votes, get more power. But in the short term, you can shout "Must!" until your throat is raw; it won't accomplish anything.

    It won't accomplish anything if I'm the only one "shouting", as you put it, "Must!"  (I didn't see myself as shouting, but never mind.) 

    If there's one thing that pushes my buttons these days it is statements by Democrats that sound to me irresolute, as offering easy outs for setting a low bar.  That's how your reminders, and AT's ready agreement, about the historical slowness of political change in this country struck me.  You see Democratic ordinary citizen activists as overly impatient and insufficiently committed to the long haul.  Which I think has been true, BTW.  But I feel we are all up against it now and need to act with a sense of urgency to reverse the tide.    

    Progressives have no voice in the national debate at this time.  We face the distinct prospect of next year being the only part of the political spectrum whose views and proposals are unrepresented in the presidential race, notwithstanding that progressives have by far the most relevant things to say and offer about the country's plight, and notwithstanding that progressive policies find at least as much support in public opinion polls as policies advocated by any other part of the political spectrum.   

    How do you win a majority if you abandon your values under duress?  The only way I know of to try to get a progressive voice in the national debate is to make some noise, insist on our relevance, and press our case.


    Dreamer, I meant no disrespect. I'm not sure who the ordinary citizen activists are, but I don't see you as overly impatient or insufficiently committed to the long haul. I haven't suggested that you abandon your values or muffle your voice. I haven't told you to go out and vote for Obama or anyone else.

    My criticism is simply that I think you're being unrealistic about the possibility of substantive near-term change. Any strategy that does not account for liberals' weak political position is destined to fail. You may disagree with me about that, and I'm certainly open to discussing how I'm wrong and how such change might come about it. But telling me that we have no choice does not refute my assessment.

    Given that context, my long-term suggestions are not meant to counsel patience but to offer a way out. There is a path to a liberal resurgence. It can begin today. I suspect that it has already begun and that your passion is part of it. But sadly, it cannot accomplish the change that you seek this year or next year or the year after.


    Yeah, well, I think you're both wrong. There's no possibility of substantive near-term change and no possibility of substantive long-term change.

    Although I'm being partly snarky, unfortunately, I'm also being partly non-snarky.


    Dreamer, I think the action for Progressives is in the states like Wisconsin and Ohio. I feel I have leveraged my contributions by contributing to the recall effort in Wisconsin and not contributing to Obama yet, or maybe never.

    I think we have a great deal to lose long term by a short term mistake now. Such a mistake would be to accept a two stage raise in the debt ceiling. So,imo, would be using the 14th Amendment prior to a lot of Wall St. "blood" in the streets.


    Genghis, I'm not gilding the lily here--that is a very good statement. And "catastrophe" is very much in my mind right now.

    My question as of now is how much blood on Wall Street will we need to see in order for a bi-partisan coalition to pass a decent bill over the heads of the hard core tea party faction. I believe that the tea party is and has been positioning itself to take down what remains of establishment Republicans.  Will a major financial, as you put it, "catastrophe" actually be required to take the tea party faction so far down in the minds of the public that establishment Republicans can deal in compromise with Democrats?

    Setting aside the deficit debate, if Obama receives a bill or package with a debt ceiling raise in two stages, and signs it, he will have capitulated to the tea party and he may actually take the heart out of hard core supporters such as myself. If he uses the 14th amendment short of a financial bloodbath the tea party will be emboldened and will use the 14th amendment in 2012 as a club, a la Obamacare, birtherism, etc. Even worse, it would unite Republicans and we'll spend the next 16 months hearing Fox News propose an impeachment.

    I hate to say it but the "catastrophe" route seems to me to be the most probable outcome, followed by a bi-partisan agreement that extends the debt ceiling into 2013 and hopefully buries the tea party along with it. How much of a catastrophe I don't know but I'd say just the starting point would be the 700 points down on the DJIA that happened during the Tarp debacle.

       


    I believe that the tea party is and has been positioning itself to take down what remains of establishment Republicans.  

    That might be a comforting thought for progressives but the data I've seen says they aren't economic progressives.  They're not calling for further financial reform, for example--they opposed what was done on Dodd-Frank last year.  

    What separates Tea Party-affiliated GOP elected officials from those who aren't is, most relevantly right now, their timelines on insisting on radical spending cuts and whether they are open to any additional revenue, or not. 

    The Tea Party-affiliated elected officials in the GOP caucus will go down in flames, and risk losing office and crashing the economy if it comes to that, insisting on radical spending cuts now, particularly to SS and Medicare.  But there are GOP elected officials not as sympathetic to the Tea Party hardliners who won't demand as steep domestic cuts right now because they fear doing that will cost them their jobs, and also hurt their party's political chances next year.  So one of main lines of tension is between somewhat more gradualist dismantlers vs. radical dismantlers within the GOP caucus.    

    The economic establishment has no attachment to social insurance--quite the contrary. They'd love to see it dismantled and privatized.  Lower taxes and more profit opportunities, both.  On that they agree with both Tea Party and more "establishment" GOP elected officials.


    The only real economic populism from the Tea Party was the opposition to the bank and AIG bailouts.  I also opposed those actions.  But we had different reasons.  The Tea Party doesn't want the government doing anything at all.  I thought the money could have been better spent directly on the people affected by the failures of those banks. They never would have gone for that.

    But, and this is what annoys me -- no Democrat would have gone for my plan either.


    Thanks Dreamer. I never remotely looked at the tea party as economic populists, gradualists, or fiscal conservatives. My opinion is that after the very first few weeks of what may have been a few fiscal conservatives, the tea party was taken over by the same right wing religious zealots who have been hanging around Republican primaries for over thirty years. I think they are anarchists, willing to bring the system down. If a two stage debt deal reaches the President's desk, he should veto it and let the chips fall.

     


    A bit more on Cantor (also, VA said Cantor declined to caucus with the House's Tea Party caucus, of around 58 or 60 members I believe, at a meeting which was said to have included talk of deposing Boehner), courtesy of Harold Meyerson at The American Prospect Online this morning, at: http://blog.prospect.org/harold_meyerson/2011/07/cantors-quandry.html

    ....In Boehner’s meeting with the House GOP caucus on Wednesday morning, Cantor, according to The Wall Street Journal, not only defended Boehner’s bill but declared that “he was tired of hearing Republicans criticizing other Republicans on cable television.” He called on caucus members to “rally together” to pass the speaker’s bill.

    Cantor’s pirouette may not be all that surprising; he is, after all, the No. 2 Republican in the House. But it makes perfect sense when we learn—courtesy of a terrific Alec MacGillis piece that ran in Monday’s Washington Post—that he’s the congressional point person for Wall Street hedge-fund operators and private-equity bankers. “For the past four years,” MacGillis reports, “Cantor has taken the lead in the House on fighting” proposals that would tax hedge-fund pay as ordinary income (it’s currently taxed at a rate of 15 percent) and other proposals that would compel the private-equity bankers to pay taxes at rates at least as high as their secretaries’. Indeed, MacGillis writes, it was Cantor’s opposition to the Democrats’ proposal to increase taxes on this very small number of gazillionaires that prompted his exit from the Biden negotiations.

    Cantor has been well rewarded for his services to the super-rich. In 2010, MacGillis documents, Cantor’s “two fundraising committees took in nearly $2 million from securities and investment firms and real estate companies, more than double the figure for Boehner.” His top-ten contributors included the employees at three leading investment firms: Steve Cohen’s hedge fund, SAC Capital Advisers ($64,964); KKR ($52,600); and Paul Singer’s hedge fund Elliott Management ($44,198).

    But now that push has arrived on the doorstep of shove, those Wall Street guys whom Cantor has served so faithfully want the debt ceiling raised lest financial havoc is loosed on the land...


    To Dreamer's comment, I would add that this battle will not be won or lost by a debt ceiling vote. The right wing has been taking down establishment Republicans for 35 years.

    My guess is that they will ultimately become victims of their own success. As you may have noticed, they don't have much of a governing strategy. The closer they get to power, the more they risk a backlash. But I don't know how long it will take or how far they have to go. I thought that the debacle that George W. Bush + Tom DeLay would have been enough, but apparently, that only got us a temporary reprieve.

    As for a major catastrophe, heaven forbid, it all depends who gets the blame for it.


    Genghis, on won or lost. I think the debt ceiling vote is the tea party's marker. Even if they can get a two stage debt ceiling deal to Obama's desk for a vote, it's a win for them.  In my opinion if the President receives a two stage debt deal and doesn't veto it, he will have lost the short term battle and added many years to the overall long term struggle. I for one will be more disgusted than I have ever been with him, even worse than his hiring of Geithner.

    I think we are kidding ourselves if we think the tea party can be beaten in this specific battle without a degree of hardship re the markets--it's cover for establishment Republicans, up to a point.   

    I run a manufacturing services company and have a lot to lose, as do most people. I
    want to make a stand now. I'm willing to take the hit--sorry about that. I don't have all that much time to stick around for the long term. But if the tea party wins this debt ceiling battle, i.e. Obama signs on to a two stage debt ceiling raise, it will only make it harder to stop the tea party the next time.

    As for blame, the tea party is now in the cross hairs, excuse the gun metaphor, and
    I think will be blamed for any meltdown. Jim Cramer, the CNBC colleague of what's his name, the trader whose rant propelled the tea party, last night referred to the tea party as anarchists. Sure, anecdotal evidence, but wouldn't have happened two months ago, imo.

    Just sayin', teach.   


    Top notch comment, Mr. Genghis.

    It reminded me of this DKos post where a Kossack reports of Obama's hand written note in June in reply to that Kossack's standard blogosphere rant about him selling out to Wall Street plutocrats, etc. (Note that photograph proof is included tthere as an attachment.)

    Perhaps it is not as Friedman posits that he is an independent at heart but rather that he is a Democrat whose strongest belief is in incrementalism and working it within the two party system. Certainly the disses that Senator Obama and candidate Obama lobbed towards similar populist rhetoric, standard in the blogosphere, are consistent with his attitude now.

    I am also reminded that Shrub Bush won was awarded the presidency with a large number of votes while sounding like he was a mild mannered reasonable fellow who would work with the other side of the aisle. In opposition to an Al Gore who preached that he was going to "fight."


    Thanks lamont. I've appreciated your comments around here.


    Destor,  Thomas Friedman is a very special, case the question always is, how could somebody who continuously says so many dumb things can have such a cool career? George W. Bush at least had the excuse that his family had money and fantastic connection. I suppose it says more about the people who pay Friedman and read him than about Friedman himself... He should worry, if it works for him, he'd be a fool not to stick with it.... However, if I were you, I wouldn't waste my time and talent trying to figure out some inner logic in his drivel.

    Having said that, I think Bloomberg might make a good president, especially because he is Jewish. I very much like the principled and evenhanded way he navigated the Ground-Zero mosque business. I get the feeling that only a Jewish president of the USA could whip the Israelis into line and if some POTUS doesn't man up and finally do, it will mean disaster for both the USA and Israel too.


    Freidman married an heiress to a billion-dollar fortune.  If anything, he's richer than G.W. Bush.

     


    Friedman's existence in such a competitive media environment is certainly puzzling and doesn't say much for meritocracy.  He has a very influential audience and I think, in his books, he was careful to tell these people what they want to hear.  If you want to make money at TED or in Aspen, you can't be a dangerous thinker.  Like Malcolm Gladwell, Friedman is expert at making the conventional wisdom sound clever while giving it the whiff of moral superiority.  Sigh.

    I agree about Bloomberg and the mosque issue.  I think he's been a good mayor.  But I don't think he's equipped for the White House.  He's a true CEO, the type who believes that while it would be nice for the people under him to buy into his agenda, that it isn't entirely necessary.  I doubt he'd accomplish much more or less than Obama has and, what more he might manage would likely anger progressives.


    E.J. Dionne's remarks covered the centrist topic well, too.  He believes, and I agree with him, that people are yearning for moderation, not centrism.

    [Obama's] advisers are said to be obsessed with the political center, but this leads to a reactive politics that won’t motivate the hope crowd that elected Obama in the first place. Neither will it alter a discourse whose terms were set during most of this debt fight by the right. There’s nothing wrong with moderation that immoderate doses of conviction and courage won’t cure.

    E.J.'s comment about centrism being reactive rather than springing from conviction and courage, is particularly apropos and accounts for Obama's alarming move to the right.  It also suggests to me a lack of core values.


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