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Undecided No More: It’s Obama
Almost a month ago, I wrote that I had taken the Obama sticker off the back of my truck and gone back on the fence.
In large part, I needed to take a step back. Having declared myself for a candidate, I was finding myself defensive of him, and thus not able to evaluate positions fairly. Likewise, the screeches and screaming that arose around Sarah Palin’s elevation to the GOP ticket — ludicrously over the top — made it utterly impossible to judge her at all.
So I pulled back… and the intervening weeks have been illuminating. I’m not on the fence anymore, but I didn’t come down quite where I expected.
In one of TMV’s recent thoughtful threads, I defined myself as fiscally-conservative and socially-liberal, to which commenter CStanley replied:
Do you consider your fiscal conservatism or your social liberalism to be more important at this time?
Events have overtaken us, and my fiscal conservatism is strongly ascendant. But recent events have underscored much deeper problems than the economy per se; I’ve realized that our legislative branch is warped and corrupted beyond my capacity to tolerate.
I’ve also come to believe that the next president, whoever he is, will not be able to move many of his proposals forward. Whether it’s Barack Obama or John McCain, the realities of our economy are going to radically alter what might have been for years to come.
In the face of these conclusions, the worries I have about a radical agenda from the extreme edges of a one-party government lose significance.
My feeling that Congress owns a disproportionate amount of our fiscal problems also informs my choice for President. Yes, McCain has a number of proposals that superficially address various aspects of our economic woes, but I see neither the depth nor the coherence required of real reform. Alternatively, while I agree that some of Obama’s proposals could conceivably make an economic downturn worse, his much broader scope and understanding of the wider issues is reassuring. The real devil, when it comes to Obama’s approach, will be in the implementation details — which brings us full circle to the dysfunctional Congress.
Taken altogether, then, here’s where I’ve come down: I’m supporting Barack Obama for the presidency.
Much of my reasoning mirrors that of fellow TMV co-blogger and former fence-sitter Pete Abel — but there’s another consideration that rests on a previously undiscussed dimension to my foundational politics: foreign policy.
It’s fashionable in some quarters lately to disdain international regard for the United States, but it’s folly to think that global opinion is irrelevant. From national security to the economy… immigration to medicine… we are, and will continue to be, part of a wider network. Scoffing at our international reputation may be an understandable defensive mechanism, but it’s a nose-off-the-face level of foolishness.
The relationships we have with various interests around the world are both delicate and fluid; navigating them in this modern world calls for deliberative thinking and introspective reaction. Ideologues and moralists — as we’ve all witnessed in many scenarios — are destabilizing on the world stage, yet John McCain strikes me as both. Moreover, his predilection for grandstanding has been on rampant display recently, and I’m not at all sure he’s emotionally stable enough for the demands on a Commander in Chief.
There is a place for Maverickiness in this world, but it’s not the Oval Office.
In contrast, Barack Obama has displayed an almost surreal capacity for calm in the eye of a storm, and while I think this will be strongly tested if he becomes president, I also feel that his steadier temperament is far more likely to resist panicked or Hail Mary reactions.
Along with my presidential choice, though, I’ll be actively supporting congressional candidates who have demonstrated fiscal responsibility — or, in the case of non-incumbents, will give a public commitment to it.
Unfortunately, I expect to find very few of those to support.
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33 Responses to “Undecided No More: It’s Obama”
Since we agree on virtually all points, you'll have to take my comment with a grain of salt. But I had not thought of and am intrigued by the following argument you make:
“I’ve also come to believe that the next president, whoever he is, will not be able to move many of his proposals forward. Whether it’s Barack Obama or John McCain, the realities of our economy are going to radically alter what might have been for years to come.
In the face of these conclusions, the worries I have about a radical agenda from the extreme edges of a one-party government lose significance.”
I checked out Project Vote Smart over the weekend and discovered that the Libertarian candidate for my Congressional district (Maryland 2) is actually a better choice for me than the incumbent Dem I was planning to support. You never know – there could be a better candidate out there for you to support in the local races.
:>
Pete, Leaving aside the conclusions I articulated in this post, moving precipitously toward economic ruin — via expensive and/or expansive new programs (with accompanying spending) — would immediately trigger a Republican congress in 2010.
Put into partisan-think — I think Obama's too smart to bury his own party that way.
Amanda — yes, you're absolutely right. Although I don't have an actual choice for my Representative (it's Ron Paul, running unopposed), I am considering a vote for the Libertarian candidate for the Senate.
Polimom, I respectfully disagree with your reasoning…well more so your mindset.
What I mean is that fiscal “conservatism” vs. “liberalism” doesn't have much meaning at the moment or for the near future. Even “fiscal” doesn't as that implies the focus is on budgeting issues.
What we are facing is a systemic crisis, not only for the current system but more broadly how we approach economics in general. Over the next decade the world will be forever transformed in one way or another, there is no choice about that.
The key focus should not be on government expenditures per se, but concerns about what we want our future economy to look like and how to transition to that point in a way that tries to maximize the probability of success and minimize pain. Not only are those two goals extremely hard to navigate, but they are also often contradictory and operate on multiple timescales.
For instance, the bulk of Democrats AND Republicans at this point are doing things in a way that they hope to preserve the current system by trying to get asset prices to go back up (or at least stabilize) even if it means destroying the value of money and leading to long term massive inflation. (Europe is also in this boat). And that's if they succeed, so far all signs show that they are unable to due to massive deflationary forces.
Democrats are doing it in the name of “caring” about people and Republicans in the name of supporting growth by supporting “businesses” but neither are really analyzing what the consequences are or providing alternative visions for how we can avoid this mess in the future.
I think Obama is better able to handle this because of his strategic vision and natural ability to look to create new paradigms. On the other hand he also is operationally conservative and will attempt to support the current structure as long as possible. It will be important for traditional conservatives to put pressure on him to cut his losses just as it will be important for traditional liberals to make sure that the transitioning phase will help prevent another Great Depression amount of suffering.
The way forward revolves almost exclusively on infrastructure improvements, namely energy, and making sure that money that is spent is wholly supported by scientific evidence that we'll be getting the most bang for our buck. Once on the other side then we can argue about how to structure economic principles and regulations to try to prevent a collapse in the future.
I haven't seen anything about McCain that suggest he can provide a vision that the country can collectively work towards at all. I think he is more likely to try to do anything to stop failure until it looks inevitable and then just throw in the towel and not provide guidance about a path forward.
Hunh. Mikkel, I've read your comment 3 times, and I don't actually see where our thinking diverges. Perhaps it's because I used the word “fiscal” in the opening of the main economy paragraph?
Because I absolutely agree that Obama's grasp of the economy and its systemic flaws is both broader and deeper than McCain's, and I tried to articulate that here.
Perhaps we agree entirely but I was caught up on a particular word.
To me it sounded like you are saying that “although Obama supports expanding government spending through increasing health care, energy spending, spending money to try to lessen foreclosures etc., while McCain is more 'conservative' (in quotes because I don't think his plan is when looked at from a revenue perspective) I support Obama because…”
While I'm trying to say that I think the Republican and Democratic principles are both wrong because they fail to solve underlying issues. The Democrats that voted against the bailout did so because there was no money to help “stop” foreclosures…even though that's impossible (or at least the mechanism to do so would have vast unintended side effects). The Republicans that didn't support it did so because they don't want “government spending.”
Most of the smart economists I read didn't support the bill because it was the wrong thing to do and a waste of money, but would support other actions that are highly expensive under certain conditions and that have certain aims (that most people would be upset about because they haven't accepted that they are necessary).
I guess what I”m trying to say is that I think that neither Obama nor McCain can really do much to stop the bleeding — or at least shouldn't — until we are about another year or two into this. I read your post as saying that Obama is “less bad” while I think he is going to be “more bad” until a certain point and then once that point is reached be fair superior.
I don't think that Obama can help stop the house of cards from crumbling but he has the ability to help guide a rebuilding.
That make more sense?
It does… and in some ways you're right that we're differing slightly. My view of the bail-out was not based on “no spending”, but that we can't keep kicking the can down the road. I thought (and still think) that a re-set is overdue, and we'll put our collective heads back into the sand otherwise.
Re: the current situation, and the election, though: My feeling is that whatever they thought they were going to do ain't happenin'. And my worries about one-party government is less a Dem (or Rep) specific issue as it is a concern about a push from the more extremists in the party — a worry that I think may be nullified by the economic realities.
While I have not been a supporter of Senator Obama, I find this passage in particular from Polimom compelling:
“Barack Obama has displayed an almost surreal capacity for calm in the eye of a storm. . .I also feel that his steadier temperament is far more likely to resist panicked or Hail Mary reactions.”
I do not know if Obama's almost supernatural discipline and calm is a pose or not . . . (perhaps this distinction does not really matter in a president). . . but given the idiocies demonstrated on the Hill in the recent bailout, I think most Americans would find a calm, reassuring hand on the tiller of the ship of state reassuring amid economic turmoil.
I find Obama's health policy is too right wing . . . and his foreign policy too left wing.
But I think his calm and discipline are very very reassuring for many Americans, when the world is in the midst of not even a bear, but a Chicken Little, market.
OT somewhat, but this is the latest on McCain's health care policy:
“John McCain would pay for his health plan with major reductions to Medicare and Medicaid, a top aide said, in a move that independent analysts estimate could result in cuts of $1.3 trillion over 10 years to the government programs.
…The McCain campaign hasn't given a specific figure for the cuts, but didn't dispute the analysts' estimate….Those government health-care programs serve seniors, poor families and the disabled. “
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122315505846605…
I hope no one at TMV is planning on getting older or disabled under a McCain presidency.
“My view of the bail-out was not based on “no spending”, but that we can't keep kicking the can down the road. “
Yes the plan that a lot of economists are developing has the key features of:
Letting housing deflate more…this would cause even more foreclosures and people of course would lose a lot more of their wealth.
Letting all of the institutions that are the worst fail (this would be a lot).
Recapitalizing the better banks directly and the government takes a huge stake in them.
Increasing regulations and disallowing so much leverage.
Buying houses if they spiral below historical values.
In essence they advocate massive government intervention, but in a way to just try to stop a never ending free fall and that would provide liquidity to good companies. However their plan would still create much more asset deflation and much lower economic growth rates than have been projected.
This will mess with all side's plans as the government plans will be woefully underfunded but the private sector won't get back nearly to the growth it had between '81 and '07. In essence it will be about changing our lifestyles significantly, which is what few people are looking forward to.
Obama, no matter what, comes packing with the Clintons in his holster.
Bottom line, with the stock market plummeting and our nation on the brink of peril, Team Obama is the only one that will deliver us whole as a nation to go on thriving. The Clinton resume' nudging Obama in the right path will bring us back from the dead.
Period. No logical rebuttal can be offered to that conclusion..
So…
Following the breadcrumbs of logic, anyone left still supporting McCain at this point is anti-American and seeks ultimately to undo our very nation by electing an irresponsible, erratic maverick cowboy closely associated with the very powers that brought us to this brink. Foreign nations don't trust McCain. Even our allies are looking at McCain with jaded eyes and now with their economies crashing, will have no warm feelings for “another four more years”. Our enemies, who sit more strong than we are today, thanks in part to McCain himself, sit poised and stubbornly opposed to negotiations with anyone who even hints of Bush-style cowboyism.
I love America. I want to see it recover…badly… There is only one way at this terrible point: Team Obama. It brings diplomacy, it brings sanity and it brings the Clinton resume'. I sincerely hope that Obama cuts any deal necessary to ensure the Clintons stay vocally and visibly on board and fully armed to be at Obama's side. With them and all the wise supporters in Congress we can save our country.
Otherwise, brush up on your chinese, russian and arabic because we're going to be their prison wives..
Ugh, I think you're all wrong (perhaps unsurprisingly, but it's discouraging because all of the commenters here are people whose thinking I respect.)
Mikkel, I find your answers to be most compelling yet I can't help but think that you project your own depth and intelligence onto Obama. I just don't find his record to be convincing at all (I've mentioned repeatedly, for instance, that the real story behind the Ayers connection is the utter failure of the CAC at the expense of $160 million to IL taxpayers) and education is one of the hallmarks of the investment that Obama now feels we have to undertake on the national level. I don't disagree in principle on the importance of education, but I have a huge fundamental disagreement with liberals on the degree to which federal involvement is helpful and I truly believe that every time the liberal side wins that argument our education system falls further behind while our debt grows even more.
I guess I'll have to agree to disagree because on foreign policy too I have a fundamental disagreement on core cause of our rifts with other countries. Certainly Bush's rhetoric and demeanor haven't helped matters but mainly he's been the scapegoat as other countries have simply been vying for some of the power that the US had by default at the end of the Cold War. Old alliances are shifting and being congenial to those who are trying to reposition themselves isn't always in the US best interest either. Truth is that I prefer a lot more finesse than Bush, but not so much bending over as I think Obama will show.
Put into partisan-think — I think Obama's too smart to bury his own party that wayScary thing there Polimom is the number of times I've said the exact thing about Nancy Pelosi when she first ascended to the leadership of the House. In some ways it's proven true because she didn't push for impeachment or to defund troops, yet she hasn't proven smart enough to actually push a moderate agenda or to tone down the partisanship either.
Marlowe: Truth is that no one should plan on getting old or sick no matter who wins the election, because we can't pay for the exploding costs of Medicare. At least McCain's being honest and even if he can't cut costs as much as he's saying (of course he can't), I'd prefer to vote for the person who will seriously attempt to cut the massive fraud and waste in a program that will grow beyond our capacity to pay for it.
I agree with this. Hopefully this election will begin the process of change.
CStanley–
Complaints about Pelosi's unwillingness to compromise are laughable in the face of President Bush's intransigence.
I'm not aware of the CAC thing at all (maybe because I skip almost all the political threads) what is that?
Also about the education thing, the primary thing I've read him support is increased teacher pay based on merit and also grants that local districts would compete for and then continued funding would be based on increased performance and whether they can help expand the successes into other districts. Both of them had relatively low price tags and I thought were pretty conservative in approach (maybe he has changed things when I wasn't paying attention).
My primary thinking about Obama is from reading exposés on what drives his thought process and decision making, and how he changes positions based on new evidence.
Now I will be the first to admit that he makes “wrong” decisions (bailout bill, farm bill, etc.) because he is trying to balance political motives with expert opinion and sometimes the political ones win out. You could even argue that he is always going to err on doing unhelpful things for political reasons and I will admit that it is a leap of faith to support him eventually doing the right thing. On the other hand I have read parallel things about McCain and I don't see any ability to even synthesize new information and use it to alter his path.
If you want me to be honest though I am worried that Obama isn't really going to be that good either. I've often (and increasingly) wished that I could be an advisor because I think I understand his (at least publically projected) temperament and thought process enough that I could use some of my “depth and intelligence” (although I'd argue that I cheat because I have nothing on the line) to influence his views…..or if I'm unable to realize that he's not the one to have hopes for either.
George: If you become that which you claim to hate, then you deserve to be criticized for it all the more.
Mikkel: CAC= Chicago Annenburg Challenge. You have heard of that, no?
Thanks for your candor in the final paragraph.
CStanley–
Shouldn't your standards for the other side be at least as high as the standards for your own side?
I didn't know what it was called. I also never heard anything about the, you know, actual project it's all about Ayers. I read up about that but not about whether it worked.
A couple of points now that I'm looking up the actual program. I've seen from multiple sources it says $50 million (matched with another $60 million from other private contributions), not $160 million and secondly they all say that it was from a private philanthropic foundation, not taxpayers. Where did you get the $160 million of tax payer money from?
The Foundation concluded that there was no improvement in performance from the money that was spent.
A few initial impressions:
Since it didn't work I'd be very interested in hearing from Obama why he thought it didn't work, what they learned from the experiment and why he thinks that his similar grant program (with taxpayer money) would help.
The fact that it didn't work doesn't mean it was a “waste.” It looks like the program ran more or less like it was supposed to and there was research done. The ideas didn't actually help education but from a scientific standpoint if the money was spent properly and helped give insight into education then it was money well spent….as long as we keep the conclusions in mind going forward.
If the Republicans were focused more on attacking his policies instead of associations then maybe Obama would be pressured to explain his position and thinking, and then they could have an argument about whether his ideas are good or not. So far it looks like nearly every one is just interested because Ayers was on the board and …well that's the extent of their thought process.
My thoughts, summed up nicely:
I think that you are absolutely correct Polimom. While there are many attributes about each candidate that I find less-than-desirable, Barack Obama is the guy who gives me hope that our country will get through the 'tough waters' in a calm and levelheaded way. The idea of a 'maverick' at the helm, using bluster and more aggressive rhetoric about our problems (not to mention with other world leaders) is increasingly frightening to me.
Kudos to you.
Actually, George, I'd say the opposite-I think if people would hold their own side to the standards that they hold the other, we'd be in much better shape. I've said it here before: I think it's often far to easy to overlook the faults of people with whom you have a certain amount of agreement- the ends tend to justify the means.
Mikkel: there's a lot more info here:
http://globallabor.blogspot.com/
You're right that I may have overstated the public funding because it was initially set up with private philanthropic money from Annenburg. I'll have to look at that more closely.
Reading the executive summary of the final report it looks like the program was helpful (you can argue about whether it was for the amount of money spent).
Basically it looks like they tried increasing resources to a lot of schools, saw that it wasn't working in most of them and then attempted to understand why and cut off the schools that didn't have the fundamental administrative requirements for success.
Its conclusion is that increased monetary support is NOT sufficient to cause improvement and talks about some broad overlapping changes that need to align to actually help, and it sounds optimistic that even though test scores hadn't improved, there was marked social improvement that could lead to higher scores in the future. I assume that specifics are scattered throughout the 200 page+ report that I don't have time to read right now.
Also I see that they only spent $35 million or so and much of the rest went into the successor: the Chicago Public Education Fund which looks like it is continuing a grant based model.
The foundation's executive summary is certainly a place to start, but naturally they're going to cast the results in the best possible light- and unless people are completely misrepresenting quotes from their final report I've seen statements that indicated that their goals in increasing test scores weren't met because the schools involved improved on par with the rest of Chicago schools. True that that's not the only goal of education improvement, but apparently it was part of their internal evaluations so it must have been a goal.
BTW, I will correct my earlier statement about taxpayer funds because it apparently was private money. I think the issue is that a good bit of the money in the view of critics went to political cronies who were supportive of the agenda and politicians like Obama.
No the first sentence is “there was no statistical improvement.”
My take away message was that it was a failure to actually improve anything but it was helpful it determining some future areas of study. (My instant thought was that during periods of rapid increase and decrease it is difficult to get statistical improvement. It could be that the overall increase was masking benefits of the program that would be seen once the increases stopped or even declined…of course this requires massive long term programs that are politically unpalatable and perhaps realistically impossible, but it's seen all the time in systems.)
From a scientific outlook where outcome failure is the norm, it looks like the whole ordeal wasn't a failure because they knew more than they did before. I am agnostic on whether it was a good use of resources because on one hand it seems like a lot, on the other only $40k per school doesn't seem like much at all….so unless there was a lot of graft…
so unless there was a lot of graft…
That's my impression, because from what I've seen the programs weren't even meant to put money directly into schools but instead into these external partner entities (which coincidentally happened to be voter registration groups and political donors and boosters of many of the principles involved in the foundation.)
CStanley–
This is what I said:
This is what you said:
I'm not really why you think what you said is the opposite of what I said.
???
Um, because holding your own side to standards at least as high as what you set for the other side (which is what I advocate) is the opposite of holding the other side to standards at least as high as what you set for your own.
The difference in what I'm saying is that when we all evaluate the guys that we oppose, we set high standards or scrutinize them thoroughly (because we're cynical about them, don't give them the benefit of the doubt.) That's the standard that I think we should apply to all politicians- the ones that we mostly agree with as well as the ones we don't agree with.
The way you phrased it was to use the standards that you apply to your own party (which for most people are pretty lax standards, if we're honest about it- because we often overlook things since we still think that party being in power is better than the other party being in power) when you evaluate members of the opposing party. I guess I can see the confusion because both of us argue for equal standards being applied on both sides- but which party you use to set the standard does make a difference as to whether that's a high bar or a low one.
Honestly, CStanley, do you think we don't know how to read?
Oh my. All I can is, by this time you should know how much I object whenever you misrepresent what I've said.
So please stop doing it.
CStanley, I'm not sure whether your making accusations of corruption or ineptitude or what. The truth is that many many well intentioned and well conceived programs fail, not only at all levels of government, but also academic and philanthropic including church projects.
And it's very common for the funds of such programs to go to the investigators, analysts etc. Often the best use of resources is to analyze and recommend, or to offer some kind of technical assistance or technology transfer. These could all be seen as going into the pockets of the organizations involved, but there's nothing wrong with that design per se.
I don't see any allegations, let alone proof, of malfeasance of any kind here. Things fail, we learn. Where's the smoking gun? In this discussion of standards, it seems you are expecting that successful and talented people have made no mistakes.
And the “mistake” if it was one, was just being on a nonprofit board.
CS: “The difference in what I'm saying is that when we all evaluate the guys that we oppose, we set high standards or scrutinize them thoroughly (because we're cynical about them, don't give them the benefit of the doubt.) That's the standard that I think we should apply to all politicians- the ones that we mostly agree with as well as the ones we don't agree with.”
I have to say I didn't notice a big difference in the two statements, but now that you clear it up I agree. Some people do tend to give a “pass” to those they agree with and hold those they disagree with to a higher standard.
I try NOT to do that but I've seen it here from time to time. Not you CS, nor George, and others on both sides.
Oh, I'll even admit that I catch myself doing it sometimes, or at least have to stop and consider why I feel that something that the liberals did was worse than something comparable than what the conservatives did (sometimes there are legitimate reasons for that difference, other times I have to admit that it's just my gut reaction.)
But thanks for exonerating me, Rambie.