Obama’s Long Game on Gay Marriage

Obama’s announcement on his support of gay marriage is a political move, but it’s being misread by just about everyone, particularly by conservatives. Rush Limbaugh has repeatedly asked gay marriage supporters to recognize that Obama’s newfound support is irrelevant because he hasn’t done anything beyond express verbal support – only words. This is exactly the point, and conservatives need to watch out for Obama’s long game.

Conventional wisdom has now settled around Obama’s actions as energizing the left-wing base at the cost of some traditional independent voters. The theory is that independents who were open to voting for Obama will now reject Obama because of his support for gay marriage. But as Rush Limbaugh himself said, Obama hasn’t actually done anything. This allows Obama to play both sides of the issue.

Before now, Obama has claimed his position on gay marriage was evolving. This allowed him to support gay marriage – as all of his progressive supporters understood – while officially remaining on the side of a definition for traditional marriage. Now, he can claim to support gay marriage – satisfying his progressive supporters – without doing anything concrete. Since he isn’t doing anything concrete to advance the cause of gay marriage, he retains the ability to persuade traditional independent voters.

His argument will be pretty straightforward: “I personally support the right for gays to marry, but I won’t do anything to enforce my personal beliefs on the country. I said in my announcement to Robin Roberts that I support the state-by-state solution that is ongoing, and I won’t do anything at the federal level.”

He could even adapt one of Romney’s arguments about his Mormonism: “Just like voters shouldn’t hold Governor Romney’s personal Mormon beliefs against him at the ballot box, there is no reason for voters to hold my personal belief on gay marriage against me because I won’t impose it on voters.”

My advice to conservatives is to watch out for Obama’s long game. He has demonstrated himself to be quite politically adept, so don’t fall into the trap of describing his position as “nothing but words.” That is exactly his intent, and having conservative sound bites that back him up will not help once he focuses on winning the votes of independent voters.

Global Warming: Fact vs. Logic

Data alone rarely tell us anything; it isn’t proof of anything, it is only evidence. Data is best used to draw conclusions or make comparisons with other data to define relationships. Data can be very useful in establishing fact, but it does a very poor job of refuting arguments based on simple logic. If I tell you that the unemployment rate is 8.1%, there is data available to confirm or refute this fact. But if I tell you that unemployment is high, I’ve made a conclusion that cannot be refuted with data alone.

In general it seems that global warming skeptics are more familiar with both sides of the argument. They have heard the supporters’ arguments and have a passing familiarity with the global warming data. Global warming supporters, on the other hand, only pay attention to the data and are generally unfamiliar with the skeptical arguments.

I think the source of the problem is how each side views the global warming debate. To the supporters, global warming is simply a fact, therefore the only thing to consider is global warming data. But skeptics view global warming as an argument or a conclusion. The skeptical view opens up examination of the data and methodology to allow for different conclusions, whereas the supporter ignores opposing arguments because they believe global warming to be a fact.

Like in my unemployment example above, if global warming is a fact it can be proven with data. Lots and lots of data. But if global warming is a conclusion based on interpretation of data, the debate must necessarily focus on the logic or illogic surrounding the conclusion. While data may be useful, it is not always necessary to refute a logical argument.

Certain or Hard-Headed?

Since I began blogging, I’ve run into two brick walls on the subject of global warming. By brick walls I mean individuals who are scientifically-minded, ready with a plethora of facts and figures, and have a high level of certainty in their conclusion that man-caused global warming will lead to a global catastrophe. While neither of them was willing to entertain skeptical arguments or even consider that they could change their minds, I was the one described as hard-headed. Needless to say, the irony was lost on them.

What neither of them understood was that I am not skeptical of global warming data; I am skeptical about their conclusions. I am not a scientist and I’m not equipped to evaluate or judge the data in any way. The best I can do is evaluate methodologies and conclusions, which generally come down to reasoned and logical arguments.

The problem is that when I express a skeptical argument – a logical argument – my argument was countered with a seemingly unending stream of data. This is essentially a red herring, answering a challenge by providing an answer that ignores the challenge. The real problem is that we’re speaking a different language. Since the supporter assumes global warming is a fact, data is all that is needed to counter any argument. But data alone is insufficient to counter logic.

Here are some global warming examples to demonstrate, using a mix of my own statements with quotes from a book I’m currently reading, Still the Best Hope by Dennis Prager.

The Climate Changes

According to accepted estimates, the earth has warmed since the 1800s, although it has slowed or stopped in the last 10-15 years. “Professor Mojib Latif, a climate expert… and member of the IPCC, said that recent fluctuations in ocean currents in the North Atlantic (Arctic oscillation) may signal cooler temperatures ahead, perhaps for the next thirty years.” [Emphasis mine.]

Skeptics point to this spotty warming record as evidence that global warming cannot be entirely man-caused. First, carbon emissions continue to grow, so how to explain no warming in the last 10-15 years. Second, does anyone believe that carbon emissions will fall in the next 30 years to coincide with the Arctic oscillation? Of course not! So the linkage between carbon emissions and global temperature is not a solid one.

If it were a solid link, every time carbon emissions went up, so would the temperature; every time carbon emissions went down, so would the temperature. This is a simple logical argument that cannot be refuted by more data. Saying that current carbon emissions are causing current temperature increases is logically inconsistent with what we know of the past. A new logical argument needs to be presented; not more data.

Man vs. Nature

As we all learned in elementary school, the climate changes naturally; sometimes it warms and sometimes it cools. The age of the dinosaurs was tropical and Neanderthals lived through an ice age. Significantly, the earth has been warmer in the past when there were no man-caused carbon emissions. What amount of data can overcome the simple argument that the earth has been warmer in the past, without human carbon emissions?

Prager quotes Denis G. Rancourt, a professor of physics and environmental research, saying that “even doubling the present atmospheric CO2 concentration, to the unattainable value of 800 ppm… would have little discernible effect on global temperature or climate.” [Emphasis mine.] He is only one scientist, so I don’t claim to nullify all other global warming scientists by quoting him, but it’s clear that there are alternate global warming views that counter the so-called consensus.

Other arguments have been made that solar activity affects the earth’s climate. A couple of years ago it was reported that Mars is also experiencing global warming. Neither of these celestial bodies are within range of my SUV’s carbon emissions, so it seems logical that natural forces can influence the temperature of our planet. Absent a counter argument that undermines this logic or demonstrates a greater influence from man, what amount of data would be persuasive? What human activity could possibly affect the temperature on Mars?

An Ideal Temperature

Knowing that the earth has been warmer in the past and all life did not consequently die out, a skeptic might argue that there is no reason for us to stop global warming – if we are even able to stop it. Global cooling could be a problem as livable regions of the planet disappear and agriculture comes to a standstill, but why would warming of the planet be so bad? Is today’s temperature so ideal that we need to stop warming now?

Civilization owes its roots to global warming, which allowed mankind to reproduce, farm, and develop city centers. Rancourt again: “There is no known case of a sustained warming alone having negatively impacted an entire population… As a general rule, all life on Earth does better when it’s hotter: Compare ecological diversity and biotic density (or biomass) at the poles and at the equator…” [Emphasis mine.]

History has demonstrated what we all understand logically: a warmer environment is good for the planet and the species that live on it. Obviously, a temperature increase that brings us in line with Venus would be catastrophic, but the most catastrophic estimates we’re talking about are just a few degrees.

Data can only demonstrate the facts. At best, the data can be input into a computer model and estimate a future temperature. That prediction may or may not be accurate (the history of computer climate models is not a good one). But even if accurate, temperature data is simply data and we must use our minds to evaluate the data and draw conclusions. Offering a rebuttal to an argument using data alone is to misunderstand the debate you’ve walked into.

=====

Coup de grace

Rancourt is not a right-wing nut on the payroll of Big Oil. This particular global warming expert comes to us from the radical left. One further quote from Rancourt taken from Prager’s book: “I argue that by far the most destructive force on the planet is power-driven financiers and profit-driven corporations and their cartels backed by military might; and that the global warming myth is a red herring that contributes to hiding this truth.” Truly a man of the left.

Who Needs to Coexist? (Bumper Sticker)

When I see the "Coexist" bumper sticker on the back of every Prius I pass on the highway (and let's face it, the Prius is never passing me), I imagine the driver is directing her comment at Christians. The reputation of the Religious Right is that they want to impose their religion on the rest of us, but the Christians I've known haven't been like that at all.

I would alter the "coexist" bumper sticker to target those who really do seek to impose their religious beliefs on the rest of the world.

A Conservative Minimum Wage Policy

Every now and then the subject of raising the federal minimum wage comes up. At the beginning of his term, President Obama passed an increase to the minimum wage, and on the campaign trail Mitt Romney suggested indexing the minimum wage to inflation so that it will automatically increase in the future.

While both parties are willing to use the minimum wage as a political issue, there are clear ideological differences between conservatives and progressives when it comes to a federal minimum wage. Generally speaking, progressives support increasing the minimum wage for compassionate reasons and conservatives oppose increases for economic reasons.

History of the Minimum Wage

Early attempts to impose a federal minimum wage were struck down by the Supreme Court as interfering with the free market and an employer’s ability to negotiate employment contracts with employees. The first federal minimum wage was $0.25 per hour established in 1933, but was struck down in 1935. The federal minimum wage was re-established in 1938 – again at $0.25 per hour, or $3.77 in 2009 dollars – and has not been struck down since.

Many states now establish their own minimum wage above the federal minimum wage, the highest being Washington state at $9.04 per hour. Some states have decided to establish “living wages” that are intended to provide a minimum standard of living to all workers. Controversy around the minimum wage generally focuses on the economic effects of establishing what amounts to a price floor on labor.

How Conservatives Think About the Minimum Wage

The conservative position on the minimum wage is driven by a few different principles. The biggest driving principle is free markets. Conservatives believe that we should make our markets as free as possible, and setting prices on anything – including labor – is inappropriate interference. This is just as true when establishing a price floor called a minimum wage.

Earlier last century, conservatives argued that the federal government does not have a place setting a minimum wage (recall that a federal minimum wage was originally struck down in the courts), upholding the principle of limited government. Today, that argument is only heard from libertarians.

A third principle that affects the conservative view is equality of opportunity. Economists like Thomas Sowell have established that the minimum wage harms many minority groups – particularly African Americans – by increasing their unemployment relative to whites. While a minimum wage does not specifically target ethnic groups, the evidence is clear that minorities suffer a unfair disparate impact by artificially inflating the cost of labor.

What Progressives Say

I’ve found that progressives tend to ignore the economic effects of creating a price floor for wages, and instead focus on the need for a “living wage.” A living wage is always greater than the minimum wage and is intended to provide a dignified living to those who are the poorest. This ignores the fact that a significant majority of minimum wage workers live in households where income is 50% or more above the poverty line.

This highlights a key difference between left and right: the left focuses on the short-term effects on the employee while the right looks at the long-term effects on the employee as well as the impact on the employer. The left ignores the employer entirely. They don’t believe that raising the minimum wage increases the cost of doing business (or, if it does, the extra costs should just come out of profits) and leads to higher prices and fewer employees overall.

Progressives have also argued that increasing the minimum wage actually creates jobs. Speaking at a Center for American Progress event in 2011, a progressive economist claimed, “An increase of the minimum wage from $7.75 to $8.25 would give 10 million workers a raise,” and could stimulate economic growth to the tune of 50,000 new jobs. If true, couldn’t an increase to $8.75 stimulate economic growth twice as much and create 50,000 more new jobs? But why stop there with this kind of logic? Let’s just boost the minimum wage to $25 an hour and replace all of the jobs lost in the last recession.

Minimum Wage Policy

Ending the federal minimum wage or lowering it is politically untenable, but conservatives should obstruct minimum wage increases at every opportunity. Conservatives need to learn the arguments that support this policy, and justify their obstruction based on the following:

• Studies show that an increase in the minimum wage of as little as $0.75 will increase unemployment by 1% (based on today’s minimum wage).
• Studies also show that increasing the minimum wage ultimately hurts the poorest, youngest, and least experienced workers.
• Black teenagers are hardest hit by minimum wage laws.
• Increasing the minimum wage raises the costs of small businesses and violates free market principles by establishing a price floor on labor.

The World According to BizarrObama

There is a new blogger on the scene that I’d like you to check out. If you’re familiar with the Bizarro World of DC Comics, than the premise of the BizarrObama blog will make sense to you. Basically, BizarrObama is an opposite version of President Obama: one who doesn’t lie, describe his opponents using straw man arguments, or break promises. Basically, BizarrObama is a hero where Obama is a villain.

What appeals to me is the basic premise: what would an honest, civil, conservative version of Obama look and sound like? The blog is written using actual speech transcripts from Obama, but edited to reflect the voice of BizarrObama. Only time will tell if this premise turns into quality content and amusing satire. It’s very possible that no amount of editing will make an Obama speech entertaining to read.

Semi-Random Quotes: The Squeakquel

Looking Back on Obama’s 2012 Loss: “I think this president's problem is that he misread his mandate and the public mood in 2009, which led to a historic miscalculation on his part through the summer and fall of that year when he pushed the health care bill. He compounded the error in winter 2010, forcing the bill through after Scott Brown's victory. By that point, he just seemed to lose credibility with the vital center of the American public…”

-Jay Cost, 19-Apr-12 (Link)

Infantilizing the Life of Julia: “The creators of Julia… inadvertently captured something important about the progressive vision. Julia’s central relationship is to the state. It is her educator, banker, health-care provider, venture capitalist, and retirement fund. And she is, fundamentally, a taker. Every benefit she gets is cut-rate or free. She apparently doesn’t worry about paying taxes. It doesn’t enter her mind that the programs supporting her might add to the debt or might have unintended consequences. She has no moral qualms about forcing others to pay for her contraception, and her sense of patriotic duty is limited to getting as much government help as she can.”

-Rich Lowry, 4-May-12 (Link)

More Liberal Fascism: “[Jim McGovern’s (D-Mass)] People’s Rights Amendment declares that the Constitution protects only the rights of ‘natural persons,’ not such persons organized in corporations, and that Congress can impose on corporations whatever restrictions Congress deems ‘reasonable’… Newspapers, magazines, broadcasting entities, online journalism operations — and most religious institutions — are corporate entities. McGovern’s amendment would strip them of all constitutional rights… McGovern’s amendment would confer upon Congress the power to ban publishing corporations from producing books containing political advocacy, when Congress considers a ban reasonable — never mind the amendment’s rhetoric about the ‘inalienable’ rights people enjoy until they band together to act in corporate entities.”

-George Will, 4-May-12 (Link)

The Narcissistic Mind: “The logic of the narcissistic mind in matters of the war on terror works out something like this: The president will take credit for all the successes on his watch, without ever acknowledging reliance on the policies put in place during the eight years before he took office, much less admitting that he once did his best to undermine all of those inheritances that he eventually found so useful. And in matters concerning his predecessor, Obama will damn Bush for the bad economy that he left to his successor and yet ignore Bush for the successful anti-terrorism protocols that he passed on.”

-Victor Davis Hanson, 9-May-12 (Link)

The Basic Economics of the Minimum Wage

Discussions of the minimum wage have a lot of extra issues tied up within it. There are concerns about what can be done to help the poor and establish a living wage, as well as significant effects on minorities as the minimum wage increases. But at its core, discussions over the minimum wage are simply economic.

Removing the peripheral issues, consider wages as just another business cost. In the same way that a company acquires supplies and raw materials or purchases services from a vendor, businesses buy labor on the open market. Labor is sold at a price, just like other services and supplies. Labor of higher value is sold at a higher price than unskilled labor.

Your average business owner must run a simple economic calculation before hiring someone new: will the incremental value exceed the incremental cost of a new employee? For example, will a new sales rep sell enough product to cover her salary, plus overhead, taxes, and profit to the firm? Will a new administrative assistant save enough of an executive’s time to justify his salary?

When the minimum wage is increased, the cost of labor increases to most businesses. Just like when a supplier increases prices by 10%, a 10% increase in the minimum wage will raise operating costs. When costs go up, business owners have to make choices. Most commonly, they decide to raise prices to the customer, forgo profits, lay off workers, or avoid additional hiring. In other words, there are real economic consequences to increases in the minimum wage.

Prices Floors and Dynamic Markets

The minimum wage serves as a price floor for the labor market. This is contrary to free market principles because free markets are dynamic where prices are free to rise or fall. Establishing a price floor on anything is disruptive to the market because, when supply increases or demand falls, labor prices cannot drop as free market principles would generally dictate.

We generally do not accept price floors in the U.S. because we normally recognize the negative economic effects. For some reason, we ignore these effects in the labor market. For example, if the minimum price of milk were set at $3 per gallon in order to provide a living wage to milk producers, people might not notice right away. If that price were going to increase periodically to account for inflation or a certain standard of living, it might eventually rise to $10 or $15 per gallon, which would me noticeable.

Some premium products in the marketplace are able to establish their own price floors. For example, Apple sets the price on its products, and forbids retailers from selling below cost. You simply will not find a new iPad for less than $500, no matter where you shop. Oakley does the same with its sunglasses, establishing retail prices and preventing retailers from offering lower prices.

This kind of price setting is allowed because it involves a single company and its own products, and a price floor is not set across the industry. If you don’t want an iPad, you can buy another company’s tablet at a lower price. If you want to buy sunglasses, you have many other choices besides Oakley products. But you have no choice with the labor market when the federal government establishes a price floor for everyone.

Minimum Wage Effects on Unemployment

A consensus has formed among economists that increasing the minimum wage increases unemployment. In one 2009 study, more than 73% of economists who responded agreed with the statement that the minimum wage increases unemployment among unskilled and young workers. This same study shows a disconnect over policy, however, because almost half of those same economists continue to recommend increases.

A research group at the University of Vermont surveyed relevant research on the subject. A reading of the research makes it clear that the group was hostile to the idea that raising the minimum wage has negative economic effects. Ultimately, though, the group admitted that “most studies” confirm that “a 10 percent increase would most likely lead to... a 1 percent reduction in employment.”

It’s possible to find studies that contradict these effects on unemployment. Studies cited by Democrats to justify minimum wage increases tend to get their results by looking and unemployment rates immediately before and after an increase. The timing often coincides with periods of strong economic growth, particularly during the late 1980s and 1990s. But contradictory evidence exists. Since the last minimum wage increase in 2009, unemployment has only gone up.

Republicans generally counter the Democrat-cited studies by pointing to statistical analyses that show increases in the minimum wage result in lower employment than would have occurred had the market been allowed to grow without the increase. Put another way, unemployment may sometimes fall after an increase in the minimum wage, but it won’t fall as much as it would have if the minimum wage had not been increased at all.

Questions the Left Won’t Answer #2

How much is too much to pay in income tax?

Conservatives want lower taxes across the board and regularly propose new tax rates, from Herman Cain’s 9% flat tax to a two-tiered tax system of 10% and 25%. But the left only claims it wants to raise taxes or make sure the rich pay their fair share without ever specifying specific tax rates.

Even left-wing commenters at this very blog refuse to commit to specific tax rates. What’s a fair tax rate? At what point are we assessing too much in taxes? Is 100% too much? How ‘bout 80% or 60%? Is anyone on the left willing to commit to a tax rate that is simply too high, or do they want to leave the door open so they can always ask for more no matter what the current tax rate is?

An Actual Jobless Recovery

In the run up to the 2004 election, the media branded the Bush economy as a “jobless recovery.” This despite an average unemployment rate in 2004 of 5.6%. Where is the media now during an actual jobless recovery under President Obama?

In one example from 2003 in The Economist, unemployment was listed at 6% followed by the question, “Why is the job market so weak even though the economy is (just) growing?” The UK Guardian described 6.1% unemployment as Bush's “growing vulnerability” with jobs data showing the U.S. “in the grips of a jobless recovery.” In 2004, the New York Daily News described 5.6% unemployment with this headline: “Bush Jobless Recovery Hits Middle Class.”

The accusation of a jobless recovery against President Bush was a political charge with little basis in reality, but Obama’s jobless recovery is simple to demonstrate. We begin with the labor force participation rate in June 2009, the month that The Great Recession officially ended. Since labor force participation determines the denominator in the U3 unemployment calculation, we can determine what today’s unemployment rate would be if labor force participation were the same as June 2009.

The chart above makes it clear that Obama is presiding over an actual jobless recovery. In June 2009 when the recession ended, U3 unemployment was 9.5% with 65.7% of the labor force participating. As of April 2012, if the labor force participation rate were still 65.7%, U3 unemployment would be 10.2%.

In other words, unemployment is higher now than when the recession ended. If this is truly an economic recovery, it is a jobless recovery because fewer people are employed now than at the end of the recession. It’s an election year, just like in 2004, so where is our unbiased media reporting on the incumbent president’s “jobless recovery?”

Exploitation for Mutual Benefit

My daughter came home from school and described an essay question that she had to answer in class. She was asked to take a position on whether the railroad companies in the 1800s were a) exploiting workers or b) improving the standard of living of the many workers along the railroad. I thought I might try to answer the question.

First, the question as it’s posed creates a false dichotomy: it’s possible that the railroad companies were improving the standard of living of the workers at the same time that they were exploiting them. It certainly doesn’t have to be just one or the other. But I also started to consider the negative connotations that come with the word exploitation.

Implied in the question is that exploiting railroad workers is a bad thing, but I’m not so sure. While I suspect that many people do, I don’t have some core principle that tells me exploiting other people is always wrong. In fact, I can think of times when exploitation is normal and acceptable.

Counting Cards    In my twenties I learned to count cards at Blackjack. The purpose of counting cards is to approximate the remaining make-up of the deck of cards and translate that knowledge into playing and betting choices. In other words, knowing that there are more high cards in the deck is good for the player, I would exploit that knowledge to try and make money off of the casino.

Stock Markets    There is also an entire school of investment strategy designed to maximize returns in the stock market. Most investors attempt to learn as much as they can about a company or industry, extract and analyze data, in order to learn whether or not a stock is under- or over-priced. The investor will then exploit this knowledge that the rest of the market doesn’t have in order to profit.

Strippers    There is a certain kind of man who will frequent strip clubs. He is obviously exploiting the stripper’s daddy issues in order to see her naked. But the stripper is not without choice, and will make a very good living taking dollar bills from this exploitative patron. One could probably say the stripper is also exploiting the man in order to take more of his money.

Teen Workers    Similar to the railroad worker, in today’s job market we reserve the lowest paid jobs for teenagers who have no relevant experience and need to learn what it’s like to work for someone else. One could certainly argue that fast food managers are exploiting teenagers by paying them low wages for long hours, often late at night. But the teenager is being paid for her time and is gaining valuable experience that can be turned into higher wages in the future.

Apple in China    I’m also reminded of efforts by the New York Times and others to demonize Apple and supplier Foxconn for exploiting Chinese workers to build iPhones and iPads. I understand jobs at Foxconn are in very high demand even though the wages are well below the U.S. minimum wage. Apparently there are tens of thousands of workers who are willing to be exploited to improve their own standards of living.

Returning to the railroad workers of the 1800s, I can’t help but think the workers were trying to improve their lives just like those workers at Foxconn, teenage fast food workers, and strippers. Perhaps they were being exploited by the railroad companies, but I don’t think exploitation is always. When both parties are exercising their free will and are getting something of value, it’s a fair exchange regardless of whether or not one or both are being exploited.

A Presidential Response on Bin Laden

Do you ever wonder why the lead news story is the lead news story? For example, yesterday MSNBC.com ran with “Obama has a tough row to hoe with rural voters” and FoxNews.com went with “Edwards’ (sic) daughter flees trial in tears.” Are those really the two most important news items from yesterday?

Call me crazy, but I always thought the most significant news of the day should be the lead. Also yesterday, Gingrich officially ended his campaign, five 9/11 conspirators were arraigned, there was a suicide bomb in Kabul following the president’s visit, and job growth was reported to slow in April. I would argue all of those are more significant lead stories for a news agency, but apparently editors disagree with me.

I was reminded of this when I saw that three days have been spent discussing the death of bin Laden. What is less clear to me is why this would be a lead story now. Why exactly is the news being driven by a year-old story?

President Obama was asked about it at a press conference:

Christi Parsons: “We’re coming up on the one year anniversary of the killing of bin Laden. I wonder if you would share some thoughts on that anniversary and I also wanted to mention your likely opponent said anybody would have made that call, even Jimmy Carter. So I’m curious to see what you would say about that.”

President Obama: “Well let me make a couple of points. First of all Christi, I hardly think that you’ve seen any excessive celebration taking place here. I think that the American people rightly remember what we as a country accomplished in bringing to justice somebody who killed over 3,000 of our citizens. And it’s a mark of the excellence of our intelligence teams, our military teams, a political process that worked, and I think that for us to use that time for some reflection to give thanks to those who participated is entirely appropriate and that’s what’s been taking place.

“As far as my personal role and what other folks would do, I just recommend that everybody take a look at people’s previous statements in terms of whether they thought it was appropriate to go into Pakistan and take out bin Laden. I assume that people meant what they said when they said it…”

Mitt Romney was asked about it on the CBS Early Show

Mitt Romney: “The right course was to assassinate, execute, bin Laden and that’s precisely what happened and I congratulate the president for doing so and I’m confident that, of course I would have taken exactly the same decision. And the idea to try and politicize this and to say President Obama would have done it one way and Mitt Romney would have done it another is really disappointing. Let’s not make the capture or killing of bin Laden a politically divisive event. There are plenty of differences between President and Obama and myself, but let’s not make up ones.”

Had I been asked and I had the stature of a president or presidential nominee, I like to think I would have kept politics out of my own answer. Something like this:

The Heathen Republican: “That story is a year old and there are more important events happening right now. Last year we completed a multi-year mission to find bin Laden and bring him to justice, but that’s old news. Killing bin Laden was a big deal and an important event. I’m proud of the men and women responsible for his death. But we don’t have to talk about it every year on May 2nd.

“I’d prefer to talk about more pressing matters like putting people back to work, growing the American economy, and making sure I’m not responsible for the largest tax hike in American history on January 1st. There is enough going on today that we don’t have to spend time talking about past events.”

Questions the Left Won’t Answer #1

Why is the current global temperature the exact right temperature?

No one on the left ever answers this very straightforward question. They are so sure that our carbon emissions are polluting the air, warming the planet, and creating an environmental catastrophe. Yet the earth has been warmer in the past, as well as colder.

So why is the current temperature the right temperature? Why do we have to stop global warming in its tracks so that the earth stays this temperature? Why not one degree warmer or one degree cooler? Why aren’t they willing to consider that it is natural for the planet to warm up and cool down and that the current climate cycle is perfectly within that normal range?

Bush's Record Still Better Than Obama's (Charts)

In the rush to denigrate Republicans and the last Bush administration, people forget how good the first seven years actually were. After inheriting a recession following the bursting of the Internet bubble and a catastrophic terrorist attack on 9/11/01, President Bush’s policies helped us recover quickly and live in relative economic prosperity.

Everyone seems to think the economic collapse in September 2008 should forever define the Bush presidency, but that ignores the first seven years (if we’re being honest, the first 7 years and 3 quarters). Is the Bush legacy really dependent on the events of three months at the end of his term? Looking at what President Obama has failed to accomplish since taking office, I would gladly return to the Bush years.

To understand why, let’s pull out 2008 as an anomaly and look at how the first seven years of the Bush administration compare with the first three years of the Obama administration.

GDP Growth

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a key economic measure that quantifies total economic output in a country. The higher our GDP growth, the stronger our national economy. As the chart below demonstrates, President Bush was much better at managing GDP growth than President Obama.

Over the first seven years of the Bush administration, GDP growth averaged 5.0%, while Obama has averaged 1.8% GDP growth over his first three years. What’s most frightening is the recent dip in GDP (not shown) for 2012 when Obama claims to have engineered an economic recovery. (Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis)

Annual Deficits

The annual budget deficit is the difference between federal revenues and spending. Just like your household budget or your company’s balance sheet, ideally we don't want to spend more than we earn, keeping a low deficit (or even surplus). In Bush’s first seven years, the deficit averaged $476 billion, while Obama averaged $1,588 billion over just his first three years, more than three times what Bush spent. (Source: U.S. Treasury)

National Debt

The national debt is the accumulation of annual deficits, showing how much the federal government owes to itself and other creditors. Like deficits, it’s desirable to reduce the federal debt in real terms or as a percentage of GDP. Over President Bush’s first seven years, national debt grew an average of 6.8%, while it grew an average of 14.9% under President Obama. (Source: U.S. Treasury and the 2012 Economic Report of the President)

Unemployment and Labor Force Participation

Even though President Bush inherited a recession and had to deal with a terrorist attack soon after coming into office, he did a much better job of managing unemployment during his first seven years. The average unemployment rate was 5.1% under Bush, while President Obama – having also inherited a recession – has only been able to manage an average of 9.2%. (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics)

The Labor Force Participation rate is related to unemployment in that the denominator of U3 unemployment is based on the number of people in the labor force. It’s possible for the unemployment rate to fall even though people have left the labor force and remain unemployed. The goal is to increase or maintain labor force participation. President Bush averaged 66.4% and Obama averaged 64.6%, losing almost 2% of the labor force. (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics)

The War in Afghanistan

Aside from economic issues, President Obama promised to resolve the war in Afghanistan and, while he’s had some successes like the death of bin Laden, his surge plan has had ambiguous results. Some have argued that announcing our date of withdrawal was a poor decision, but the biggest concern is the increase in military deaths. While we lost an average of 79 military personnel per year under Bush, deaths have skyrocketed to an average of 411 per year under Obama. (Source: iCasualties.org)

Conclusion

John Myste, a combative and respectful friend of the blog, recently commented that he has no confidence that the Republican Party can improve the economy any more than President Obama, but I find Obama’s record to be suspect. From government spending to Afghanistan and from economic growth to unemployment, former President Bush has a much better record over a seven year period than President Obama over three years.

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2008 Notes

As I explained above, 2008 is anomalous, so I left the data out of most charts above. I suspect that some will argue that I’ve left the data out to make the Bush record look better than it is. While that argument is only valid if you believe Bush is solely responsible for the Great Recession, I’ve included the 2008 data below.

• GDP Growth: GDP growth in 2008 was 4.8% dropping Bush’s average from 5.0% to 4.9%
• Annual Deficits: The 2008 deficit was just over $1 trillion raising Bush’s average to $544 billion
• National Debt: The debt grew 11.3% in 2008 increasing Bush’s average to 7.4% per year
• Unemployment: Unemployment by quarter in 2008 was 4.4%, 4.6%, 4.7%, and 5% leaving the Bush administration average unchanged at 5.1% per quarter
• Labor Force Participation: In 2008, labor force participation fell to 66% leaving the Bush average unchanged at 66.4%

The Choice in November is Clear

House Representative Chaka Fattah (Democrat Pennsylvania) was quoted on Wednesday saying, “…those people who are unemployed, they're not going to be voting for the party [Republicans] who wants to cut their benefits…” (full quote here). With this ringing endorsement, I’m reminded of the choice we all have this coming November.

Choice #1    If you are unemployed and you want your unemployment benefits extended, then you must vote to reelect President Barack Obama. Republicans understand that continually extending unemployment benefits has prolonged our recovery and keeps the unemployment rate high, so Mitt Romney is unlikely to sign any law that extends your benefits (please note, this is not a cut in benefits, as Fattah says).

Choice #2    On the other hand, if you are unemployed and want the economy to grow normally, if you want GDP to reach its historical rate of growth, if you actually want to get a job, then you should vote for Mitt Romney. President Obama clearly has no idea how to generate economic growth or remove obstacles to the free market, so you have no choice but to vote Republican in November if you actually want to go back to work.

I guess the choice in November is clear:

• If you want more benefits from the government, vote Obama.
• If you want a job, vote Romney.

In Defense of Generalizations

Recently, comments from Ted Nugent have sparked an outcry from the left. Apparently his hate-filled rant against the president is evidence of the hate that fills all conservatives. But is it fair to generalize about everyone in a group based on the comments of one individual? How do we know when a generalization is fair or when it unfairly paints an entire group? When is it okay to generalize?

I’m a firm believer that generalizations are good and necessary for us to communicate, particularly about ideological issues. I think generalizations that are backed by specific examples are very informative and provide a basis for discussion that we would not have if we always had to discount statements because they don’t apply to every individual.

My saying that X is a progressive principle is not the same as saying that you, a progressive, believes X. And the fact that you may not believe in X does not mean it is not a progressive principle. Generalizations are not intended to describe every individual who is generalized; they are an aid in understanding groups of people who share traits.

But not all generalizations are useful, and many are fallacious. For example, choosing a single, extreme example and trying to paint every member of a group with those traits or beliefs is a poor use of generalization. I would argue that Ted Nugent is one such example.

The best generalizations are those that quote a representative individual with some authority – like President Obama to represent Democrats or progressives – or an organization that represents the group – like Center for American Progress. Quoting the Heritage Foundation or Ronald Reagan to make a generalization about conservatives would be similarly fair. Even if an individual conservative disagrees with a position held by the Heritage Foundation, the position can still be a useful generalization about conservatives.

The usual approach (from both sides of the ideological spectrum) is to cherry pick extreme quotes from the other side and then to generalize about everyone in the group. Of course, when this tactic is used against one side, they cry foul, as is currently the case over the Ted Nugent comments. Instead of the same old tripe about “both sides doing it,” let’s accept that generalization is useful and necessary, but there are right and wrong ways to do it.

If we cannot even agree that generalizations are an allowable debate tactic, I'm not sure how we can agree on anything else.

Smart vs. Stupid Global Warming Supporters

There is a hiccup in the global warming data that demonstrates no statistically significant global warming over the past 10-15 years. Global warming supporters rebut this data first by denying it and second by pointing to longer term trends that supposedly support their broader argument. There are better ways for them to respond, had they only given it a little thought first.

If I were a global warming supporter, I would be a smart one and not a stupid one like those described in the previous paragraph. As a smart global warming supporter, I would have looked at the data and seen it as a key victory in the ideological battle. After all, the environmentalists have been proposing curbs on greenhouse gasses, green energy alternatives, and higher emission standards for automobiles for at least three decades.

Given all of this, a smart global warming supporter would declare victory! “Look,” I would say, “all of the environmental policies of the 80s and 90s worked and we slowed or stopped global warming in its tracks.” This would be the smart approach, and it would lend credibility to the environmentalists so that they could continue their policies to prevent the resumption of global warming.

I have yet to hear of a single global warming supporter who has adopted this approach. This tells me that there may not be any smart global warming supporters, and maybe all of them are stupid. For example, they are stupid when they claim that the earth is still warming, even if the data says it is not. They are stupid when they say intense weather and cold weather patterns are evidence of global warming. And they’re stupid to have let this opportunity get away from them, since they could have declared victory and doubled-down on more green-friendly policies to keep the environment in check.

It’s too bad global warming supporters are so ideological and unwilling to accept new evidence into their world views. Global warming is about to jump the shark because average citizens see how it has been politicized, and how global warming scientists and supporters are unwilling to consider contrary evidence. It didn’t have to be that way; had they been a little smarter, they could have earned a little credibility and won the public debate.

Obama’s Own Record on Income Inequality

“So we’ve tried this trickle-down experiment before. It doesn’t work. And middle class families have seen too much of their security erode over the past few decades for us to tell them they’re going to have to do more because the wealthiest Americans are going to do less.”

-Barack Obama, April 14, 2012 weekly address

Let’s examine a hypothetical. President Obama likes to say that economic inequality is a problem in American society. If we were to examine a raw, unbiased data set that Democrats would approve of, how would they (and their media allies) respond to results from the past three years? I can imagine three possible outcomes.

#1 No Change in Trend    First, the data may show that income inequality has increased over the past few decades, and that trend has continued over the last three years. One explanation for not reversing the trend might be that a) broader trends are in play and/or b) a fix for economic inequality is simply outside the control of a single president and his policies. The latter explanation is inconsistent with the view that Bush's policies are to blame for the economic recession.

#2 Inequality Accelerates    Second, the data may show that income inequality has accelerated during the Obama administration. The most likely explanation for such data would be to pile additional blame on the economic collapse that began under President Bush and was inherited by Obama.

Naturally, the left will say, it is the result of Bush administration policies that accelerated income inequality. While Obama has been in office for three years, he has been busy engineering an economic recovery and can’t be blamed for his predecessor’s actions.

Alternatively, Democrats and the media will say that Obama has been unable to implement policies to fix income inequality because of Republicans who have obstructed him at every turn. This explanation is not credible since Democrats held full control of the executive and legislative branches during 2009 and 2010 (and I’ve already disproven the argument about Republican filibusters).

#3 Inequality Slows    Finally, the data may show that while income inequality has increased over the past few decades, it has slowed during the Obama administration. In this situation, Democrats would take credit for the improvement, crediting President Obama’s policies, and the media would back them up.

There is a fascinating disconnect between those last two outcomes. On the one hand, if results are bad we blame the prior administration and everything that Obama inherited. But if the results are good, we will give all of the credit to the Obama administration and forget whatever was inherited.

I guess the only thing left to do is pull the numbers on income inequality and see what’s happened during the Obama administration. But really, what’s the point? It’s like playing a rigged game of Heads-or-Tails with a Democrat. If it’s heads, Democrats win; if it’s tails, Republicans lose. Who needs data when you have the media in your corner?

Conservatives Are Normal, the Left is Radical

The dispute over left and right – not to mention the proud moderates in between – is a flawed debate. It assumes there is some proud middle ground between two radical factions, and that residing on the left or right wing is somehow a radical place to be. But this is not a true picture of reality, and it is a consequence of the left defining the political debate.

What is now considered the right wing, represented by conservatives and to a lesser degree the Republican Party, was once the normative middle ground. Belief in the nuclear family, non-intrusive government, fiscal responsibility, free markets, individual responsibility, and a strong military were once considered normal, but have been shoved to the right by left wing radicals who have decided that those values are outdated and unenlightened.

Defending Tradition, Not Culture
When conservatives are said to defend the status quo and protect tradition, it is often misunderstood as some desire to return to some idyllic notion of America from the 1950s or even colonial America. This misunderstanding paints conservatives as opposed to vaccines, technological progress, or science in general. All of these understandings are false.

Conservatives want to protect the core vision of our country and ourselves. We do not fight to conserve some idea of popular culture out of Father Knows Best; we fight for the underlying values that make our country unique and our people great. In the political realm, we fight to preserve and protect our form of government, its laws, and the processes around those laws.

The History of Normal
The normal viewpoint – the middle of the road viewpoint, if you will – has always been a plain language understanding of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. There is a reason the early decades of the last century are referred to as the Progressive Era; it’s because that is the time when the progressive viewpoint began altering this normal view of our country, and pulling it leftward.

Once again, this is not a defense of the cultural values that bred racism, segregation, or blue laws. This is a defense of what everyone in the country always understood our founding laws and our national vision to be. Our Constitution protects individual rights from the power of government; it enumerates specific powers to the federal government and leaves everything else to the state; and its plain language is sufficient to allow reasonable people to understand the basic law of the land.

This view of the world was once normal. This was the moderate, middle view of the country. Now it is considered a right wing view. The Progressive Era pushed the nation leftward, primarily through use of the three branches of government. It took many more decades for the left-wing view of the world to take hold in our culture, but succeeded through use of a biased media and control of most public universities.

Changing the Center of Gravity
By pulling the nation to the left and reinterpreting everything that previous generations understood to be normative, progressives have succeeded in painting those traditional values as right wing. But they don’t become right wing values unless the middle gets drawn so far to the left.

THIS IS OUR CHALLENGE as conservatives: to hold the line and reestablish the middle ground around a plain language understanding of our government and our laws; to stop the drift to the left both culturally and politically; and to show average Americans that the conservative view is the moderate view in a media environment dominated by the radical left.

The Four Lies Underlying the Buffett Rule

President Obama pushed his Buffett Rule all last week, which would create a minimum tax for anyone making more than $1 million per year at 30%. I wanted to write this post through the lens of the three tensions, but the Buffett Rule is purely political and has nothing to do with ideology or pragmatism. Instead, I’ll highlight four lies about the Buffett Rule.

The first lie is that the Buffett Rule is something unique and new to the world, when in fact it’s just a re-statement of the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). Its purpose is to make sure people don't avoid paying taxes by calculating a minimum tax, but the AMT has been doing that for years. The AMT has many problems and politicians of both parties want to kill it or fix it, so why would we repeat that mistake by creating a second AMT called the Buffett Rule?

The second lie involves CEOs and their secretaries. When I hear the argument that secretaries shouldn't pay more in taxes than millionaire bosses, I instinctively want to lower the tax burden on the secretary, not increase the tax burden of millionaires. Why is the president’s instinct to raise the millionaire’s taxes? President Obama is openly trying to punish the rich guy, which won’t help secretaries or anyone else.

Third, President Obama lies about the effect the Buffett Rule will have on the federal deficit. It simply won't do what Obama says it will, raising only $47 billion over 10 years (whereas the 2012 budget deficit is projected to be $1 trillion). The amount of revenue generated is insignificant compared to our deficits, so the only justification for it is to punish the wealthy.

Lastly, the Buffett Rule is designed to solve a problem that barely exists. To hear President Obama say it, every millionaire in the country is paying 15% in income taxes, while every secretary is paying more than 15%. Both stats are wrong according to the president’s own economic report.

Yes, some billionaires like Buffett and Romney make ALL of their money from capital gains and pay only the capital gains rate (minus deductions), but most pay a "normal" tax rate. According to the chart on p.86 of the 2012 Economic Report of the President (above), the top 1% of income earners pay an effective tax rate of just under 30%, while the middle 20% of income earners pay around 16-17%. What reason does President Obama have to lie so blatantly? Must be an election year.