Thursday, February 26, 2009

Jindal's World

This was not a fair fight. No, this was more along the lines of Ali - Liston. Bobby Jindal was completely over-matched, and it showed. Rather than getting bludgeoned by speedy fists, he was furiously pelted by someone who knows how to craft a sentence above the 8th grade level. This, apparently, is not something that can be said about Jindal's speech writer! Maybe Jindal can at least use that old excuse, "hey, I didn't write it, I just had to read it."

It's hard to know what planet Bobby -- "Americans can do anything" -- Jindal, and by implication the bulk of the Republican Party, has been living on for the past few years, but it clearly has not been the same one the rest of us toil upon. This short speech, all of 12+ minutes, was an exercise in self delusion. Jindal attempted to blame Democrats for "Big Government," deficit spending only a month or so after the end of a singularly disastrous period of Republican governance. A period in which Jindal's party took Clinton surpluses and proceeded to run them up into the most fantastic deficits in our country's history. Jindal argued that "... Democrats have spent our children's money on things we don't need." How quaint, apparently Jindal is not familiar with such prudent Republican spending as, say, the IRAQ WAR?

About mid-way through his remarks, Jindal, seeking to thump away on that old GOP meme about how government is really the problem, uttered this bit of balderdash from between his lips, "THE STRENGTH OF AMERICA IS NOT FOUND IN OUR GOVERNMENT." Wow, at a time when many Americans are really facing difficult and uncertain times, only the Republicans would stoop so low as to try and further alienate people from the one remaining institution that can and should be a source of aid, their very own government.

If we are indeed a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, then what else can we draw from this shocking statement other than that Jindal does not really believe we are a strong people, and with compassion, should help one another through our shared government. Moreover, aside from the astonishing nonsense of what he's saying, if Jindal and other Republicans really believe this tripe, then why do they want to be a part of our government, that is, to govern? Why does anyone in Jindal's Party want to be part of the government? As far as I'm concerned they can do the rest of us a big favor and just stay home and leave the governing to adults. We'd all be a lot better off, Republicans included.

Jindal then moved on to a few other hot-button issues, notable among these was health care. He had the chutzpah to suggest that Republicans want, and by implication are working for, universal health care for all Americans. This was classic right-wing smoke and mirrors. This bald-faced fib comes from the spokesman of the Party that had been in power for eight straight years--with control of both the Congress and White House for most of it--and that did exactly NOTHING on health care!! Indeed, they clearly love health care so much that Jindal's own President vetoed health care for children, twice! Now that's what I call tough love.

According to Jindal, "Americans can do anything." While I generally share Jindal's professed belief in the resilience of my fellow citizens, I was always taught that one should also be honest when making self assessments. Indeed, given the current state of affairs in the Nation, it would appear to seeing eyes that there are a few things that Americans cannot seem to do. These would include, for example; 1) Managing banks. 2) Managing large manufacturing enterprises, such as, for example, car companies. 3) Finding weapons of mass destruction. 4) Providing health care for all our citizens. Interestingly, of the first three items listed I'm willing to bet that the particular Americans who can't seem to do these things are overwhelmingly registered Republicans. Funny how that is. Moreover, these are examples where government was taken "out of the way," so to speak, so as to let those enterprising Americans in charge of our corporations lead us all to financial nirvana. Isn't it just a tad ironic that after working so vigorously to "get government off their backs," these Americans whom Jindal argues can do anything are the first to run to Uncle Sam to get on the public bailout dole?

Maybe the strength of America really should be and needs to be in it's government? At any rate, it presently is most certainly not found in it's Republican-stuffed corporate board-rooms! While that conclusion should be as emphatically clear as an Ali jab, you can be sure that you would never hear it cross the lips of Bobby Jindal.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Guitar tracks

In one of my first posts I indicated that I am a guitar hobbyist, and that I would try and post some examples of my playing. So here are a few songs. Please comment if you like, but keep in mind that the operative term is hobbyist. One of the tracks has my son doing back-up vocals of a sort, he was whining about how hungry he was, hence the name. Just click on the title, and you should find the mp3 files. I also added a link above my blog-list. Enjoy.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Bad Banking

If even after what seems a never ending string of financial debacles you were still not completely convinced that the status of the US economy was anything but abysmal, then ruminating on the following chart for just a few seconds should help to remove any remaining optimism. The figure, compiled by Speaker of the House Pelosi's office, shows the run of job losses for several recent recessions and compares them with our current economic downturn. You can easily pick out the "Republican Depression" (ie. our current economic nightmare), it's the green curve that is heading South faster than a jackrabbit fleeing the gun sights of Dick Cheney. The scary thing, other than there being no evidence for a slowing in job losses, is that it's not even clear that the rate of job losses has reached it's peak. That is, the next few months could see the economy shed even more jobs than the last few.

Having gotten their proverbial butts kicked in the recent election, the Republicans were keen to make some changes to show voters and their constituents that they had not become completely irrelevant. Thus, newly elected National Committee Chair Michael Steele's first public utterances were basically along the lines of, "wrong? what's wrong? there's nothing wrong with our party, we just have to do a better job of selling our ideas." Yes, I kid you not, it was the old, we're just not good salesmen routine. Well Michael, good luck with that.

But not to worry so much, the Republicans did manage to latch onto what they argued was a "winning" political issue, watering down and stalling what almost all reputable economists consider a vital government spending program to stimulate the "rigor mortising" economy. Not a single House Republican saw fit to vote in favor of Obama's economic recovery plan, that's right, not a single one! And over in the Senate, mental steam engines such as Mitch McConnell were arguing that the bill did not have, wait for it, enough tax cuts! Even in the face of overwhelming data that shows that the fastest way to stimulate the economy, read add jobs, is by direct government spending--and essentially everyone agrees that creating more jobs is our most pressing economic need--the Republicans are still calling for more tax cuts. Word has it that the new Republican leadership is also working on the tax cut cure for cancer bill. Maybe they should get Michael Steele working on that.

Unfortunately, the Democrats, and President Obama in particular, have not done a good job of explaining why the spending plan is so important, nor countering the specious arguments put forth by Republicans and their echo chamber of talking heads in the main stream media. Rather, Obama seemed to be selling a "bipartisanship" stimulus bill, almost as if "bipartisanship" would feed hungry mouths, and keep roofs over people's heads. "Johnny, be a good boy and pass me another helping of the bipartisanship, please." Of course, there is nothing inherently problematic about seeking votes and allies across the aisle, however, it should not be a requirement for passage of a bill, particularly when the other side preconditions its support on the same failed policies that wrecked America in the first place. In such a case, the President needs to be much more aggressive in pushing the right ideas and facing down the Republicans when they propose the same useless and counterproductive policies. Indeed, Obama's desire for the illusive "bipartisanship" has resulted in a bill out of the Senate that cut too much useful spending and included ineffective tax cuts, simply to get all of three Republican votes. No, if Republicans cannot see fit to do the right thing, then Obama needs to get tough and go directly before the American people and hammer the Republicans as the Party of Herbert Hoover, that, having driven the ship of state over a cliff, are now unwilling to aid in its recovery.

Of course, with the Republicans having suddenly discovered a voice for fiscal restraint (after running up the biggest deficits in history, and amidst a depression no less), it was not much of a surprise that they could find many a willing media servant, who, if not mouthing Republican talking points verbatim, could at least be counted on to completely obfuscate the truth. Most notable in this regard was the vanilla-brained Charlie (don't call me Charles) Gibson of ABC News. In perhaps a record low moment (among many) Gibson, while questioning President Obama couldn't seem to get his little head around the concept that government spending is, by definition, economic stimulus. Gibson argued that, "a lot of people have said it's a spending bill and not a stimulus." So much for not being able to grasp perhaps the most fundamental fact surrounding the issue. Not even able to grasp this truism, how could we expect anything more but pablum from Gibson. As economist Dean Baker so eloquently put it, "Spending that is not stimulus is like cash that is not money. Spending is stimulus, spending is stimulus. Any spending will generate jobs. It is that simple. ... Any reporter who does not understand this fact has no business reporting on the economy." How much is ABC paying Charlie Gibson?

Meanwhile, all is clearly not the "Change We Need" in the White House. Evidence of this is clear in Obama's selections to head his economic team. Both Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and chief economic advisor, and ex-Clintonista, Lawrence Summers are so deeply entrenched in the policy and regulatory regimes that helped to fuel and precipitate the crisis, that one can still see the umbilical cords connecting them with Wall Street. Indeed, Geithner only just recently "announced" his new plan for Treasury to prop up the collapsing banks. I put announced in quotes because when you discuss a plan but then give essential no specifics, it's not really much of an announcement is it? The response from investors was swift, they either couldn't figure out what Geithner was actually talking about doing or they felt that it perhaps wasn't the "sweet-heart" deal that they had quite hoped for from the former Wall Street man. Either way, the stock market took another significant vacation in a southerly direction.

From Geithner's terse statements and pronouncements since, it has become clear that one aspect of the new bailout plan is the formation of a fed-run "bad bank" that will essentially accrue to itself much of the toxic securities that many banks find in abundance on their rose-red balance sheets. Of course, the name is telling, because the joke's on us, guess who the "bad bankers" are? That's right, it's just us poor tax paying suckers who are going to get stuck with all the bad debts made by these rich folks for whom the requirement of being restricted to, say a paltry salary of $500,000 a year is a travesty to scarring to bear. And what do we get for assuming all the risk in this little transaction? In real capitalism those who assume the risks stand to receive the biggest rewards, but not so much in this case. There is no indication that Geithner intends to obtain stakes in the bailed out banks for the government, so that taxpayers would get some compensation if and when the banks become profitable. But this is certainly not "real" capitalism. No, what we are witnessing here is more socialism for the rich, and social Darwinism for the rest of us. This is effectively the same dynamic that has led us to this point. Profits are privatized, but losses and risk are subsidized with the public's money. Put more simply, gamblers get to play at the table with someone elses money. Not the kind of system that you would expect to generate probity and restraint is it? Nope, the operating term here is corruption of the highest order.

At this stage a much more sensible, equitable, and arguably effective plan would be for receivership (ie, nationalization) of the failed and failing institutions. Indeed, many of the economists who foresaw the devastation and were ignored are calling for nationalization as the most effective solution, but the voices of those who best understood the situation and saw it coming continue to be largely ignored. A good example here is Nouriel Roubini, professor of economics at the Stern School, NY and no communist he, who argues eloquently that from a pragmatic standpoint the only remaining workable solution is nationalization. Let's see how long it takes the likes of Geithner and Summers to reach the same conclusion. I won't be holding my breath.