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Ari Fleischer: Still Spinnin’ after all these years

Monday, June 15, 2009

Are Republicans deluded, liars or both? Today’s example is Ari Fleischer, who says that George Bush deserves credit for the reformist surge in Iran. On one level these kinds of claims are untestable, but what we know about human nature argues strongly against Ari’s position.

Both Bush and Ahmadinejad were deeply unpopular in their own countries. They depended upon one another; whenever Bush needed to goose his numbers he would trot out a Middle East nasty, often Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad, in turn, depended on a United States threat to distract attention from the economic woes that he helped inflict on Iran. Ahmadinejad was probably better served by the scare tactics, since the threat was real. Bush really did want to attack Iran.

Once Obama got in, Iranians could feel somewhat freer to discount the red, white and blue menace and go with anyone but Ahmadinejad, which is what they apparently tried to do. If Bush can be credited with any role in the reformist upsurge, it is a only in a negative sense. He turned the pressure up so high that it was easy for Obama to relieve it by a few words and gestures. The people of Iran felt free to vote their domestic interests because the foreign threat receded. Ahmadinejad couldn’t sell fear, and without it he had nothing left.

That’s a large part of what happened here in the past few years. If any emotion put the Republicans in position to win (with a helping heap of questionable Ohio ballots) it was fear-a waning fear but one that was still strong. By 2008 that fear level couldn’t be sustained, and the other distractions Republicans commonly employ (e.g., fear of the “other”, whether that other be black, brown, gay, or Muslim) lost their effectiveness in light of the looming economic crisis.

So some of the same forces that beat the Republicans in 2008 created conditions in Iran that forced Khamenei to steal an election that his chosen candidate might easily have won had Bush still been in office.


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Sunday Morning Trivia

Sunday, June 14, 2009

I try to write something on this blog at least once a day, and I freely admit that some days it’s mostly filler. For instance, yesterday I heaped scorn on Charles Krauthammer. I admit it: no fruit can hang lower. Well, almost no fruit.

We come now, again, to Maureen Dowd. She only writes two columns a week, and she has people to help her. She writes for the New York Times, and her columns appear on Sunday, perhaps the most prestigious space in the nation.

This week, the following things have happened:

1. The Iranians have had an election stolen out from under them.

2. Another right wing domestic terrorist has committed yet another violent act; the right wingers who have reinforced the crackpot theories that drive these people have run for cover; and Rush Limbaugh has actually tried to paint this racist, anti-Semitic self proclaimed Nazi as a leftist.

3. The health care debate has entered a critical phase.

4. The Republicans have threatened to walk out on the Sotomayor hearings.

5. The supplemental war funding bill is in trouble, due to a combination of Democrats who are leery of the open ended war in Afghanistan and Republicans who don’t want to bail out the IMF (the funds for which have somehow been attached to the war funding bill).

The list goes on, of course. The list above is not necessarily in order of importance, but surely these issues would be at the top of any thinking persons list.

If you extend that list, somewhere around number 10,000 you get to the issue covered by Dowd’s column. What does she deem important enough for the Sunday Times?

Her ability to write a double entendre lead to an article about high definition television, followed by a rambling discussion of the challenges faced by our vacuous talking heads (along with Dowd, of course-it’s always about Dowd) in dealing with the challenges presented by those added pixels. Dowd doesn’t just fiddle, she plays a string quartet while Rome burns.

If this were an aberration, it would be merely puzzling. In fact, it’s the rule. Week after week Dowd (who is, to our shame, often categorized as a left leaning pundit, though how that can be ascertained is a mystery) entertains us with extended meditations on trivia, with herself in the starring role. I realize she was recruited to fill the women’s position so ably filled by Anna Quindlen, but really, how hard could it be to find a woman who has opinions about, you know, important stuff. How hard can it be to write two columns a week that have just a bit of substance? I know we bloggers are objects of journalistic scorn, but can you imagine what Dowd would serve up if she had to produce something every day?

Well, it’s not a total loss. It’s the weekend, and Dowd made my life just a bit easier by serving up such a tempting target.

Update: In case you’re interested, you can read about the war supplemental, and the reason the IMF funding is attached to it here. Interesting, most of those anti-IMF votes are Republicans, who don’t seem at all put off by the possibility of being attacked for not supporting the troops.


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Another day, another meme

Saturday, June 13, 2009

One of the latest right wing memes accuses Obama of having a Messiah Complex. Charles Krauthammer runs with that argument in a column reproduced in this morning’s Day. (I will not link to Krauthammer, but you should have no trouble finding it). Krauthammer is actually a psychiatrist, though you’d never know it by reading his drivel. As evidence for Obama’s messianic leanings he cites the fact that when Obama goes overseas he tries to find common ground with others and admits that the United States is not perfect. To be honest, Krauthammer’s argument has a bit of dishonest nuance: he accuses Obama of positing a moral equivalency between the failings of the United States and those of other nations in situations in which one could argue that the faults are not always equivalent. (Though in some cases, one can argue that the U.S. has acted more egregiously). In any event, Obama did not say or imply any equivalency; he just stated the facts and, in any event, the argument doesn’t support Krauthammer’s premise

There are two interesting points here. First, the increasingly weird use of language by the right wing.

Here’s Krauthammer diagnosing Obama:

Not that Obama considers himself divine. (He sees himself as merely messianic, or at worst, apostolic.)

What does this even mean? Here are the definitions of messianic:

  • Of or relating to a messiah: messianic hopes.
  • Of or characterized by messianism: messianic nationalism.

For good measure, here are the definitions of messianism:

  • Belief in a messiah.
  • Belief that a particular cause or movement is destined to triumph or save the world.
  • Zealous devotion to a leader, cause, or movement.

Finally, here are the definitions of apostolic.

  1. Of or relating to an apostle.
    1. Of, relating to, or contemporary with the 12 Apostles.
    2. Of, relating to, or derived from the teaching or practice of the 12 Apostles.
    1. Of or relating to a succession of spiritual authority from the 12 Apostles, regarded by Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and some others to have been perpetuated by successive ordinations of bishops and to be requisite for valid orders and administration of sacraments.
    2. Roman Catholic Church Of or relating to the pope as the successor of Saint Peter; papal.

Let’s be charitable. None of the definitions actually apply, but maybe Krauthammer means that Obama feels he has been chosen by God to save the world (messianic) or that he feels he is doing God’s work in the world (apostolic). Obama has never stated or implied anything of the sort, though as a Christian he is supposed to do God’s work in the world. The term “Messiah Complex” is not used by Krauthhammer (it’s in the Day’s headline), but the diagnosis is implied, though from the internet we learn that there is no such diagnosis:

A messiah complex is a state of mind in which the individual incorrectly believes he/she is, or is destined to become, a savior. The messiah complex does not appear in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)1

So the upshot is that Krauthammer believes that Obama has a serious problem because he went overseas and admitted that everyone has their faults. In doing so, Krauthammer uses words that he has totally liberated from their ordinary meanings.

But my first reaction to this column was: Where was the good doctor when we needed him? I mean when we had a President who could say the following without evoking comment from the sages on the right (there are lots more quotes at the link):

1. I am driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, ‘George go and fight these terrorists in Afghanistan’. And I did. And then God would tell me ‘George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq’. And I did. Sharm el-Sheikh August 2003

2. I trust God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn’t do my job.
Statement made during campaign visit to Amish community, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Jul. 9, 2004

Similarly, when did Krauthammer sound the alarm about W’s decision to take advice from his “Heavenly Father” rather than the earthly father who got it right about invading Iraq:

Did Mr. Bush ask his father for any advice? “I asked the president about this. And President Bush said, ‘Well, no,’ and then he got defensive about it,” says Woodward. “Then he said something that really struck me. He said of his father, ‘He is the wrong father to appeal to for advice. The wrong father to go to, to appeal to in terms of strength.’ And then he said, ‘There’s a higher Father that I appeal to.’”

Umm, I’m no psychiatrist (though I have dealt with the mentally ill for years as part of my job) but I venture to say that if this man hadn’t been president he would have been safely locked up somewhere. I have no doubt there’s a spot on the DSM just for him.

We must pity folks like Krauthammer, who can’t see the beam in their own eyes. Their flailing attempts to bring down Obama tell so much more about them than about him.

One more thing: Obama is the President of the United States. Despite all George Bush could do, it is still the most powerful position in the world. If Obama believes he has been chosen to change the world, it’s because he has been chosen, and because that’s his job. The difference between Obama and Bush is that Obama believes he was chosen by the American people (because he was) and Bush believed he was chosen by God (perhaps because he wasn’t really chosen by the American people).


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Friday Night Music-All Wet Edition

Friday, June 12, 2009

No pearls of wisdom tonight, since we are committed to going somewhere. However, Friday Night Music being a sacred tradition, I had to put up something.

Given the recent weather, this seemed appropriate. We’ve been slogging through rain all week. You can let it get you down, or cultivate the right attitude.

Gene Kelly in Singin’ in the Rain.


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Comments

Thursday, June 11, 2009

One nice thing about the fact that I get few comments is that few people are inconvenienced when something goes wrong with the comment feature. I just attempted to update my spam filter, which keeps out comment spam, which has been on the increase lately. (I see it, but it doesn’t get on the blog). I just upgraded the spam filter, which didn’t install correctly, so I had to re-install it. It is quite possible that anyone who comments legitimately will have their comments held up for me to approve, even if I’ve approved you in the past.

Sorry for any inconvenience.


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Casting the feature as a bug

Thursday, June 11, 2009

The AMA is opposed to a public option in the health care bill. (It has since tried to soften its opposition, but only rhetorically). The AMA agrees with some Republicans, if there is a public option, people might prefer it:

But in comments submitted to the Senate Finance Committee, the American Medical Association said: “The A.M.A. does not believe that creating a public health insurance option for non-disabled individuals under age 65 is the best way to expand health insurance coverage and lower costs. The introduction of a new public plan threatens to restrict patient choice by driving out private insurers, which currently provide coverage for nearly 70 percent of Americans.”

If private insurers are pushed out of the market, the group said, “the corresponding surge in public plan participation would likely lead to an explosion of costs that would need to be absorbed by taxpayers.”

One of the arguments I’ve never understood against public health plans is the one contained in the second quoted paragraph. The last time I checked the taxpayers were already absorbing exploding health costs. They were and are doing it in their capacity as consumers of health care. Insurance companies act as de facto taxing entities, with the disadvantage that consumers don’t get to vote for their overlords, and corporations demand exorbitant profits, something governments don’t do. Nor do governments tend to spend more than 20% of their budget figuring out ways to deny benefits. Added to the direct premiums we all pay are the indirect premiums they pay through their employer and the costs of expensive ER they absorb in one way or another because the uninsured do, in fact, have half assed but costly health care under the current system.

Most people (excluding doctrinaire right wingers) don’t really care where their health care dollars go. What they want is to get good health care for the least amount of money. If a government plan can get them there, then that’s what they want. At this point, most people have concluded that a government plan is the most likely route to that end. Judging by the experience everywhere else in the civilized world, they are, no doubt, correct.

By the way, for all those that would argue that Medicare is in financial trouble, recall that it is an insurance program for that slice of the population that requires the most health care. It’s costs are still rising more slowly that those of private health insurers. Medicare for all would no doubt require more money, but it would be more efficient than the system we have today, and overall it would be cheaper.

It is to be hoped that the public option passes, and that the dire predictions of the AMA and the Republicans are realized: that it drives the inefficient, deny-at-all-costs private companies out of the business. Then we can have decent health care at reasonable cost for everyone. In the final analysis, there are certain goods and services that are so vital that no private company can be given the right to control their distribution. Everyone is comfortable with the concept of public water companies, for instance. Here in Groton we have a public utility, that delivers electricity, cable and internet cheaper than its private competitors. A good argument can be made that in this day and age, all three of those commodities are so vital that government should be at least a player, to keep the corporations close to honest. We have seen the result of leaving health care to the corporations. We spend huge amounts of money for a horrible health care system, though we are constantly propagandized with the baseless claim that we have the best health care in the world.


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Tweet, Tweet, Tweet

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

The Republicans appear to be dominating the political part of the world of Twitter. This was a self conscious strategy; having been thoroughly trounced in the blogosphere, they were not going to let themselves get beat again. So we get to read about Charles Grassley’s inane non-sequiturs, Gingrich’s fact free claims of Sotomayor’s alleged racism, or McCain’s rants about earmarks.

Whether by accident or design, Twitter is the perfect medium for Republicans. Given the character limit per tweet it doesn’t only encourage, it demands superficial thinking. Thus McCain, Newt, Grassley, et. al., can send a tweet to their media friends, who will dutifully pass it on, unanalyzed, to the public.

McCain, for instance, can tweet about earmarkswithout having to address the merits of the earmarks he attacks, or come to terms with the fact that the spending he attacks is such a small sliver of the federal budget that eliminating all earmarks, as he suggests, would make virtually no difference to the budget. It’s sufficient that the earmarks attacked sound funny, or can be made to sound funny by some creative misrepresentation.

In the political realm Twitter is as close as the Internet comes to talk radio. Thought free repetition of talking points, simplistic slogans about complex issues, mindless reinforcement of preconceived notions, all with no need to ever defend your position with facts and logical arguments. It’s the perfect environment for Republicans.


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Madoff investors cry foul

Monday, June 8, 2009

I have a certain amount of sympathy for the Madoff victims, but I’m not sure it extends to giving them an AIG sized bailout. According to the Times ( “Victims of Madoff Seek Claims Overhaul“):

In a step that would substantially increase the price tag for Bernard L. Madoff’s long-running Ponzi scheme, lawyers for a group of his victims are asking a federal bankruptcy judge to reject the way their losses in the fraud are being calculated.

The customers say that, by law, they should be given credit for the full value of the securities shown on the last account statements they received before Mr. Madoff’s arrest in mid-December, even though they were bogus and none of the trades were ever made. According to court filings, those account balances add up to more than $64 billion.

Apparently, if the money the court appointed trustee recovers from Madoff is not sufficient to cover the losses, we taxpayers will be making up the difference (once the money in the Securities Investor Protection Corporation runs out). In some cases, Madoff simply padded his favored customer’s statements, giving them a greater benefit from the fraud than others. The victims argument would have the effect of making the government guarantee not just the losses, but the promises of the fraudster themselves.

It so happens that I was involved in litigation involving a Ponzi scheme some years ago, albeit a much cruder variant than Madoff practiced. Let us call the Ponzi practitioner “J.S.” J.S. took money from his investors and gave them back promissory notes payable in 6 months at 12% annual interest. That’s not so outrageous, except he also promised them substantial weekly payments in addition to the interest (with no reduction in principal) during the life of the loan. The effective rate of return was on the order of a couple of hundred percent or more.

Okay, I agree, anyone should have realized it was a scam. Yet in fact, when all is said and done, I’d say the mix of honest dupes, semi-honest dupes, and “investors” who figured they’d make out well before the house of cards fell down was probably pretty close to the like percentage in the Madoff case.

I got involved when some investors came to me when J.S. stopped paying. I couldn’t interest the Norwich police, who said it was a civil matter. (Eventually the feds thought differently, and J.S. did time). I told my clients we could sue in civil court, but I was sure we would never recover a dime.

Then, a miracle happened.

J.S. won 9 million dollars in the Massachusetts lottery. We saw his smiling face on the front page of the New London Day, and within weeks Mark Block and I brought him into involuntary bankruptcy, and a trustee was appointed (for some reason the Judge wasn’t willing to let J.S. run his own affairs in a Chapter 11), the winning lottery ticket (which paid off over a term of years) was sold, and the “investors” were paid.

They were paid in pretty much the same manner as the Madoff trustee proposes paying the Madoff victims. They were paid a percentage of the difference between the amount they invested and the amount of payments they received from J.S. It would have been laughable to insist that the weekly payments not be considered in determining the amount due, even though, according to J.S., those payments didn’t reduce the principal amount of the debt at all. People who got in early would have been advantaged over latecomers, for no particular reason.

Now there are differences between the two cases. As I say, J.S. was rather crude compared to Madoff, and his victims were definitely middle class, not the affluent types that Madoff targeted. Still, when it comes to determining a fair way to determine losses, its hard to beat the way we did it, or the way the trustee proposes in the Madoff case. The investors have a right to get their money back, but they don’t have the right to have Madoff’s promises fulfilled, particularly if we the taxpayers have to fulfill them. It’s bad enough we had to pay off on AIG’s credit default swaps, we should certainly not have to guarantee performance of a Ponzi scheme. (Okay, maybe credit default swaps are a lot like Ponzi schemes, but you know what I mean).


Filed in Corporate Crime, Economics | | Comments (1)

Peonies

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Stuck at home today, as my bicycle is in the hospital. The first 10 speed I ever bought cost me $100.00. Over the years they’ve grown increasingly complex and expensive. The gear levers on my current bike, which are integrated somehow with the brake lever, simply stopped functioning. I don’t even know how they work, so I can’t fix them myself, and the bike shop opines that they need replacement. They’re going to cost half again what that first bike cost.

So, anyway, to further document the passing seasons, here’s the lone (so far) peony blooming in our front yard.

I am advised that peonies and ants have a symbiotic relationship. The blooms won’t open without the ant; I’m not sure what the ant gets out of his labor. Maybe just the joy or working, given the ant’s peculiar personality. You can see one in this close-up, if you look real hard.


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Shocking news from New London

Sunday, June 7, 2009

According to the Day, New London’s new police chief, Margaret Ackley, has promised a “no-nonsense, positive approach” to her job.

I was shocked to hear about it. It seems to me that the all-nonsense negative approach has not been given a fair trial.

Yes, there are some who might say that New London has been using that approach for years, but the fact is that at best New London has taken a mostly nonsense, mostly negative approach.

Ask any Republican (if you can find one) what went wrong in the past eight years and he’ll (they are just about all white males these days) tell you that George Bush wasn’t conservative enough. Why, they’re even using the “L” word about him, now that he’s gone.

The same goes for New London. Sure, they’ve tried nonsense on occasion. Just ask poor Nathan Hale, whose peripatetic school house is, I believe, once again on the move. But they really haven’t given it a fair chance. Every time someone advocates something truly non-sensical someone comes along and stops it, or at least grafts some sensible provisions into it. And as to negativity, no one will publicly advocate negativity, though in their hearts almost everyone is negative about New London.

But what’s truly shocking about the new chief’s stance is the fact that she sprung it on us only after she was selected for the job. Would anyone have considered her for the job if they had known in advance that she wasn’t going to allow any nonsense at all? Isn’t that a bit rigid on her part? It’s just not the New London way. I join my Republican brothers in demanding that we give nonsense a fair try before abandoning it as a policy. There are still pockets of New London that have not yet been destroyed, and a sound all-nonsense policy should take care of them in a matter of years.


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