David Brooks and Suicide Marches
Needless to say, I do not share Pete Abel‘s positive response to David Brooks’ “Liberal Suicide March” column today. In fact, after reading the entire column — every self-important, fatuous word of it — I wish I had done like Barbara O’Brien and refrained:
I can’t bring myself to read David Brooks’s latest, which is headlined “Liberal Suicide March.” You can read it if you want to. I just want to link to some of the commentary inspired by the column.
It’s revealing as hell that Brooks thinks Obama and the Democratic leadership in Congress is “out of touch” with…. not ordinary Americans…. but with moderates. Like him, for example, and the other members of the media and political chattering classes whose lives are completely divorced from the reality most Americans face every day.
It’s not that interesting to watch the Democrats lose touch with America. That’s because the plotline is exactly the same. The party is led by insular liberals from big cities and the coasts, who neither understand nor sympathize with moderates. They have their own cherry-picking pollsters, their own media and activist cocoon, their own plans to lavishly spend borrowed money to buy votes.
From big cities and the coasts, now, is it? And just exactly where is David Brooks from? Toronto, as it turns out. And look at a few of the places he’s worked: The Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal, The Weekly Standard! I mean, please. There’s nothing wrong with being a conservative or working for conservative publications, but don’t pretend that when you oppose making the wealthiest Americans pay a surtax to help fund health care reform that includes a public option, that you are speaking for the vast majority of Americans, who are far more likely to be situated like this, than like this.
Then, again, he isn’t even claiming to be speaking for ordinary Americans who are losing insurance by the thousands every week. He is speaking for himself — for his own narrow little stratum of extremely well-paid, amply and comprehensively insured, politically and socially well-connected pundits and politicos. He is a Bubble Dweller, par excellence.
Sen. Jim DeMint was much more honest than David Brooks when he declared, in that now infamous conference call with conservative activists, that if they (Republicans and conservative Democrats) can kill health care reform, “it will be [Obama's] Waterloo. It will break him. …” If Obama does succeed in getting the health care reform package he wants, with a strong public option and the surtax on the wealthy, it will make him, not break him. Sen. DeMint knows that. If Americans did not want the health care reform package that Republicans — full strength and decaffeinated — insist Americans are so opposed to, why would bringing it down “break” Obama and be his “Waterloo”? The only winning scenario for the GOP is defeat for Obama on health care reform.
Steve Benen wrote about this yesterday:
The strategy is surprisingly transparent — slow things down, kill real reform, crush Obama.
Now, as a tactical matter, this makes sense. DeMint, Steele, Castellanos, and Kristol are Republicans, who a) don’t support health care reform; and b) are committed to undermining the majority party and the president. Opposition parties are supposed to oppose, so these characters are playing their appropriate role. (The real-world consequences for Americans and their families would be devastating, of course, if the GOP approach is successful, but I’m speaking only to the political strategy.)
I just like to point out, from time to time, that these folks can’t succeed on their own. They simply don’t have the votes. They can call for delays, changes, watered down bills, obstructionism, etc., but Democrats are in a position to finally reform health care anyway.
The only way for this Republican strategy to succeed — literally, the only way — is for Democrats to help them. The GOP has its plan, but no way to execute it effectively. They’ve already been turned out by the electorate.
Success or failure of health care reform will be dependent entirely on whether members of the governing party side with members of the minority party.
So, to bring it back to David Brooks’ column, he is right that there is a “suicide march” going on in Congress — but it’s not the liberals who are on that march. It’s the conservative Democrats — Blue Dog, centrist, call them what you will. They have nothing to gain and everything to lose by banding together with Republicans to kill health care reform. Obviously, they don’t see it that way, but they will be the first to be looking for another line of work after the midterm elections if Obama’s health care package goes down.
25 Responses to “David Brooks and Suicide Marches”
I've read not only your comments on this, but Brooks' and Pete's. You seem to still feel that there is a groundswell of support for the healthcare reform proposals currently on the table. Given the poll results over the last week, from sources you yourself have previously cited, which now show Obama's public plan to garner less support than those who oppose it, I have to wonder if Pete isn't on to something.
People seem to be catching on to the fact, as I noted here in New York previously, that the stimulus money is being squandered in wasteful fashion, failing to produce much in the way of jobs or prosperity, and mostly promoting an agenda of a Democratic Party wish list. You can say, “Oh, but it takes more time” but the early results are far from promising. The health care reform is needed, but again, it's looking more and more like a classic case of overreach. Yes, we need to insure more people, but destroying an entire industry (and all its attendant jobs) while risking the coverage many people currently manage is a turn off to many. And how will we pay for it?
“Tax the rich?” It's a great, populist idea to some, but in America many of us who are not “the rich” are still working hard to try to become the rich. We don't hate them. We want to get there. And if we do manage it, we'd like to know that the government isn't waiting to tax the hell out of us because we made “too much money.”
Some of these policies really do look, at least to me, like a suicide march by the Democrats. As little as sixty days ago I would have predicted that the Democrats would have continued their march to success in 2010 and the GOP was on their way to further becoming a non-party with no influence. Today I'm wondering if the Democrats will still even hold a majority in Congress after next year's elections and Obama is looking more and more like a one term wonder.
Don't get me wrong. I don't disagree with everything he's done. I like his stance on foreign policy and I like his America first domestic production directions. But on the rest of the economy, health care, taxes, etc. it seems to me as if he's setting himself up for failure and setting us up for some serious pain on the economic front.
So, to bring it back to David Brooks’ column, he is right that there is a “suicide march” going on in Congress — but it’s not the liberals who are on that march. It’s the conservative Democrats — Blue Dog, centrist, call them what you will. They have nothing to gain and everything to lose by banding together with Republicans to kill health care reform. Obviously, they don’t see it that way, but they will be the first to be looking for another line of work after the midterm elections if Obama’s health care package goes down.
Yes running the moderates out of the party worked so well for the GOP, the Democrats should give it a try.
“Yes running the moderates out of the party worked so well for the GOP, the Democrats should give it a try.“
From a former RINO, may I just say… hear hear!
I for myself don't know what to think. Hearing my worst fears confirmed about TARP (which will be like Iraq War opposition in the coming years, do not doubt), I feel very reluctant, even as an Obama supporter, to think that they have our best interests at heart with healthcare. Obama, for example, has said nothing about curbing predatory trial lawyers and tort reform…those topics being a big no-no shows a gigantic red flag to me.
I would be all for a public option and a chance to undermine the insurance industry, but the “tax the rich” proposal breathes unfairness to the essential American character, that no group is singled out for blame. I would be all for higher taxes no ALL brackets, but only if they got rid of certain things, like red light cameras and entrapment happy policia. I would be willing to pay money for a LOT of things if I could actually believe it could lead to REAL reform. But Obama has proved to be no better than Bush at hemorrhaging money to lobbyists and the wealthy financial elite. The stimulus, as Jazz as pointed out, is being pissed around different government agencies rather than going to the states, or the people. Why should I trust him for healthcare reform?
“These things take time.” Yeah, they said that about Iraq too.
hey have nothing to gain and everything to lose by banding together with Republicans to kill health care reform.
The Blue Dogs need to cautious because they are looking out for their own self interest. Many of them come from once held Repub districts or states that could very well swing back. If they go along with this, they will soon find themselves back in their home states. I've mentioned this on Pete's thread before; perhaps we may begin hearing that good old “DINO” term come back in fashion. After all, you are already calling them out for not toting the line.
Health care reform is an important issue for lots of people.
It's true Obama approval numbers are going down, but they're still, I think, above the percentage of the vote he received last November.
Meanwhile, I don't think Republicans are gaining support.
If health care reform doesn't happen, does everyone think Republicans will be off the hook for that failure?
I meant to add this bit of analysis from Marc Ambinder:
HA HA HA HA!
Oh yes, please Democrats, follow wise Kathy's advice, and try to govern by moving even further to the Left!
Liberals, especially far-Left Liberals, never never seem to get it. They are no more liked or trusted than the Far Right wing of the Republicans. Each shares the trait of delusional thinking they are right, beyond criticism, and supported by a larger group of Americans than they are.
And each is death to their respective party's majority as they gain in influence.
So, on behalf of all us who do not want to to see this Brave New World from Comrades Pelosi and Obama, A Shiny, Happy Future, I again beg you to move Left you Democrats, move Left.
Given the poll results over the last week, from sources you yourself have previously cited, which now show Obama's public plan to garner less support than those who oppose it, I have to wonder if Pete isn't on to something.
The thing is, Jazz, that that poll you're referring to (I assume it's the WaPo/ABC News poll that came out yesterday, or the day before) does not show that Obama's public plan has less support than it had before. That's the spin the famously liberal media are all putting on it (not to mention conservative bloggers), but that interpretation is simply not supported by the question that was asked.. Poll respondents were asked to answer the question, Do you Approve or Disapprove of the way Obama is handling health care reform?” The answer to that question was 49% Approve, a drop from 57% last time the question was asked.
It should be obvious to any fair-minded person that saying “I do not approve of the way Obama is handling health care reform” does NOT necessarily mean “I do not approve of Obama's public health care option.”
Today I'm wondering if the Democrats will still even hold a majority in Congress after next year's elections and Obama is looking more and more like a one term wonder.
If Congress passes, and Obama signs, a health care reform package that includes a strong public health care option and other measures to insure 97% of the American people, which Obama says the plan he wants will do, then the Democrats will not only hold on to their majority, but you'll see the Republicans go even further down the road to total irrelevancy. However, if the GOP succeeds, with the help of conservative Democrats, in delaying and effectively killing this health care reform package, and if there is no meaningful health care reform package by the end of the year, then Republicans will, imo, definitely be in the ascendancy. Democrats, especially Blue Dogs, will be voted out like crazy. The GOP's *only* chance for political revival is to take away from the Democrats the single most important achievement they have to have in order to stay in power. There is absolutely no question that Clinton's popularity began to plummet after the Repubs used the same fear tactics to scuttle any meaningful health care reform, and the same thing will happen if they do it to Obama.
I would also add that the thousands of Americans losing health benefits every single week, swelling that 50 million even more, are in all likelihood not terribly sympathetic to your argument that we need to protect the insurance industry. Also, taxing wealthier Americans to pay for public goods like health care is not “punishment” and it's not an indication that anyone “hates” rich people. It's an indication that Americans believe that being rich does not absolve you of being a good citizen and contributing to the public good. If the rich don't want to pay their fair share for public policies that are absolutely essential to our health (in the broadest sense of that word) as a nation, they should go start another country somewhere that restricts citizenship to people over a certain income — say $250,000 for a family of four.
taxing wealthier Americans to pay for public goods like health care is not “punishment” and it's not an indication that anyone “hates” rich people.
You are correct. It is not an indication of either of those. It is however an indication of a mindset that money and wealth belongs first and foremost to the State, who should be the arbitrator of how wealth is redistributed and allocated for the 'common good', which despite your protestations is Socialism/Communism.
Kathy -
I forgot – currently, the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans make 19 percent of the country's income and pay 37 percent of the taxes. The top 10 percent pay 68 percent. The bottom 50 percent of earners pay 3 percent of taxes.
Where, in your mind, is the upper limit of what the 'rich should pay? Is there, in your mind, any limit at all, or should the top 10% pay 100 of the taxes for the other 90%, for instance?
Thank you, Jazz. You have shown us why Obama will fail. Because America is full of people who would agree with your post. Including these parts:
“People seem to be catching on to the fact, as I noted here in New York previously, that the stimulus money is being squandered in wasteful fashion, failing to produce much in the way of jobs or prosperity, and mostly promoting an agenda of a Democratic Party wish list. You can say, “Oh, but it takes more time” but the early results are far from promising. The health care reform is needed, but again, it's looking more and more like a classic case of overreach. Yes, we need to insure more people, but destroying an entire industry (and all its attendant jobs) while risking the coverage many people currently manage is a turn off to many. And how will we pay for it?”
Where is your proof for that statement? Why, it doesn't exist, of course. It's BS. But you're in good company. I have no doubt that that Michael Steele, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and the RNC all agree with it. But they have no proof, either. I know you're not really trying to be like those folks but this argument certainly goes along with them and theirs. Because the people you are currently siding with in this debate do not want any health care reform that would actually make a difference in people's lives. Like your argument, they defend the status quo at all costs. Even as you say that it is needed you are buying into the arguments that will guarantee that it never happens.
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'”Tax the rich?” It's a great, populist idea to some, but in America many of us who are not “the rich” are still working hard to try to become the rich. We don't hate them. We want to get there. And if we do manage it, we'd like to know that the government isn't waiting to tax the hell out of us because we made “too much money.”'
At what point does the drive to become wealthy yourself become a viable excuse for leaving much of the nation behind? How many years have the majority of Americans not seen an increase in their salaries while the wealthy have accrued an even greater share of the nation's wealth? At what point does the fantasy of becoming one of the tiny minority of the truly wealthy break down? The day before you die? Is that the only value we are supposed to have? The reality of the tax proposals is that they do not break the wealthy. They don't even hurt them badly. But once again, your arguments echo the right wing extremists you claim to be far away from now.
I didn't really think you were some kind of right wing loon, Jazz. But this post certainly does repeat their arguments. The next thing we know you'll be posting things agreeing with the Pajamas Media view of Walter Cronkite, that commie-symp traitor to America.
BTW, read anything lately on the reality of economic mobility in America as opposed to the old myths?
It's hard to imagine how one might do an even-handed mobility analysis, but that one doesn't appear to have succeeded. Men's salaries might be flat over three decades because with so many women entering the workforce men represent a smaller share, because they're working less hard, or simply because the inflation correction factor derives from the average income so the average must by definition be flat.
The notion of mobility isn't about averages, it's about individuals and whether hard work and determination can make a difference. Even if you prove solidly that the averages haven't budged a nickel, that doesn't mean individuals have no mobility.
And this claim that the poor are worse and worse off is just ludicrous. Look back 100, 50, even 20 years, and we're all enjoying more choices and conveniences than ever before. Even the poorest of us enjoys better health care than the richest of us did 100 years ago–whether or not he can pay for it.
Where, in your mind, is the upper limit of what the 'rich should pay?
Well, AR, considering that the top income tax rate was 91% from the end of of WWII to 1964, at which time it was cut to 70%, until 1981, when it was cut again to 50%, I'd say the top income earners are still getting a bargain with a toop bracket of 45%. Of course, I realize that even 28%, which became the top income tax bracket in 1986 thanks largely to Jack Kemp,is a much more fair top rate for someone making over 2 million a year to have to deal with, I'd still say that 45% is a good place to start. Don't think of it as raising taxes ion the rich. Think of it as restoring to what it was before Reaganomics slashed the top bracket as Reagan's gift to the multimillionaires of America.
I'm kind of analytical by nature; care about numbers and their accuracy, in other words. Up above we see the claim that there are upwards of 50 million Americans without health insurance. I know a few of them, and some are family members. One is in between jobs (close to getting hired after a couple of months on the market) and has not acted on his COBRA eligibility. Another is a hard working young Mexican-American in a small business that has no insurance; he chooses to do other things with his money, like saving for his own business. That's his choice. Etc. So it is against this backdrop that I read the following:
One of the most persistent examples of modern-day statisticulation is the sufficiently true claim that 46 million (it becomes 50 million when senators really get keyed up) Americans are without health insurance….. And no matter how often the figure is debunked, no matter how many studies point to its inexact nature, it's just too politically inviting not to embrace.
Wherever we stand on health care policy, surely we can admit that it's just as important to understand why Americans are uninsured as it is to get a handle on how many Americans are uninsured.
… The 46 million figure is based on unreliable Census Bureau data. … The less unreliable Congressional Budget Office puts the number at around 31 million. And even that number, former CBO Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin claims, is an “incomplete and potentially misleading picture of the uninsured population.”
For one reason, the uninsured figure counts every American (and illegal immigrant) who has been uninsured for any time frame during a year, even if they happen to be between jobs or changing insurance plans…. According to the CBO, 45 percent of the uninsured are uninsured for four months or less.
… Another portion of uninsured Americans already qualify for an existing government health insurance program — and government already controls 46 percent of spending on health care — for which they have not signed up.
The CBO estimates that as many as 15 percent of the chronically uninsured are already eligible for help. The Urban Institute … found that 25 percent of the uninsured qualify for some program.
Most … will concur that health care is too expensive (though most citizens would likely concur that everything is too expensive) and something should be done. So when Obama tells us that 46 million Americans are uninsured, he is implying that 46 million people can't afford health insurance. That, too, is absurd.
In a study for the National Bureau of Economic Research, “Is Health Insurance Affordable for the Uninsured?,” Stanford economists say that “based on a plausible range of definitions and assumptions . . . health insurance is affordable for between one quarter and three quarters of adults who are not insured.”
Turns out that 8.4 million uninsured Americans are making $50,000 to $74,999 and 9.1 million more are making more than $75,000. Health insurance is just incompatible with their lifestyles, I guess.
Children and mortgages …. can quickly make $50,000 seem like a pittance. Then again, 27 percent of all adults in their 20s (many, I presume, without offspring) choose not to have health insurance. Many of them surely have the means to purchase insurance, but … considering the tradeoffs … say no thanks.
These facts …. point out that many statistics, to quote Huff again, get by “only because the magic of numbers brings about a suspension of common sense.”
— Edited for brevity, original was written by David Harsanyi (Denver Post)
I recall a recent comment made by Elizabeth Edwards about what percentage of the country's spending on medical care went into the pocket of certain pharma exec who was let go with lots of stock options and severance pay, etc. It didn't pass the smell test, frankly, so I got out my calculator and sharp pencil. Turns out it was orders of magnitude “off”. But I saw that reference in a number of places for days after that…. it became kind of “common knowledge”. But it was just flat out wrong.
It is however an indication of a mindset that money and wealth belongs first and foremost to the State, who should be the arbitrator of how wealth is redistributed and allocated for the 'common good', which despite your protestations is Socialism/Communism.
AR: What you call “the State”was described by one great man as “government of the people, by the people, and for the people”; and by another group of great men (all quite wealthy, by the way) as “Governments [,which] are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,” for the purpose of securing the rights that the people decide they want government to secure — in the case of the people who founded this country, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” were “among those rights.”
Now, given that Barack Obama was elected last November with a healthy majority of the popular vote in order to carry out what Americans, as a people, decided were the top priorities, and given in addition that health care reform was absolutely the centerpiece of Obama's policy platform, and that he is now giving Americans *exactly* what they wanted and asked for, I would say this hot air you're blowing about “the State” and “socialism/Communism” has exactly zero validity.
From Kathy:
“considering that the top income tax rate was 91% from the end of of WWII to 1964, at which time it was cut to 70%, until 1981, when it was cut again to 50%, I'd say the top income earners are still getting a bargain“
Kathy, I was just reading your piece about the black Harvard professor getting arrested in his own home. (Well done, by the way, and I agree with most of your view on it.) But let's remember, in the 1800's he would have been working as a slave and getting beaten with a buggy whip. In the 1900's he wouldn't have been allowed to vote and might have been strung up by the Klan. He's getting “a pretty good bargain” just being allowed to have a house there in the first place, don't you think?
Hopefully you'll see that the ridiculous example I just offered is pretty much the same as your argument. Do you really think it was ok for the govt. to tax anyone at more than 90%? Just because we're doing better at something today doesn't mean that a slide backwards is somehow acceptable.
Kathy, there's no such thing as “what Americans, as a people, decided.” If the current health care wrangle makes anything plain, it's that there is no consensus. We are many different interest groups arguing many different priorities and opinions, virtually all of them claiming to be looking out for the majority.
Do you really think it was ok for the govt. to tax anyone at more than 90%?
I take your point, but your analogy is flawed, imo. For your analogy to work, justice would be no top bracket, not a 90% one. People who argue for a flat tax are arguing that Americans of all incomes and any incomes should pay the same percentage of their income in taxes, because that is equal treatment — just as black people having the same privilege as white people of struggling to open their front door w/o being thought a burglar would be equal treatment.
The principle with the Gates story is that skin color should not be used to determine motivation or intent to commit an illegal act.Is the principle with taxation that wealth, or relative wealth, should not be used to determine the financial contribution of every American to a policy in which all Americans have a vital interest? Is the principle with paying for health care reform in particular that all Americans should pay one flat tax rate to pay for it? Or is the principle perhaps that wealthier Americans who have health benefits and aren't going to lose them have no interest in helping to pay for reform that guarantees affordable access to health care for everyone and should not be asked to pay for it?
When I quoted those historic tax brackets, my purpose was not to suggest that 90% is an appropriate or reasonable or fair top tax bracket. My purpose was to suggest that (a) health care reform is a vital need in which all Americans have a stake, and that all Americans should pay their fair share for it; and that (b) the anger and anguish over the very *idea* of wealthy Americans paying more — for a vital societal need in which they have an equal stake — because they *have* more is absurd. And, too, my point was to inject a sense of proportion. 90% is too high. 28% is way too low. 45% seems eminently fair to me.
If the current health care wrangle makes anything plain, it's that there is no people-wide consensus. We are many different interest groups arguing many different priorities and opinions, virtually all claiming to be looking out for the majority.
Yes, and exactly the same is true of every other issue in American society — or any society. That did not prevent the previous president from cutting taxes for the wealthiest Americans, or from invading Iraq on false pretenses using billions and billions and billions of dollars that could have been spent on …. hmm, let's see — health care reform?
And, too, my point was to inject a sense of proportion. 90% is too high. 28% is way too low. 45% seems eminently fair to me.
Probably because your own tax bracket is much lower, so it's easy to think it's “eminently fair” to take a much larger proportion of income from those who earn more.
Since I've yet to hear an actual proposal for alternative options from our right-leaning commenters, let me ask you. I'll start by noting that conservatives don't seem to understand the exponential function, so I advise you to read up on that. Insurance rates go up 7% a year. The doubling rate (70/x) is 10 years. In 10 years you'll be paying twice what you do now for insurance, in 20 years 4 times as much. The government will be spending $4,000 per employer-covered worker from general revenue and the insurance company will be 17% of that in overhead and profit, with no contribution to actual health care. In another 10 years it will be $8,000. First question. How will you pay for it? Where do YOU get the extra tax revenue to double down on payments to private insurance companies?
Second question. Would you favor penalties for not being privately insured, essentially creating (more) government-mandated spending on private insurance? (Tempted to ask if you have insurance company stock, but truth is that if THAT plan gets enacted, I'll buy some myself).
As to the points about the rich and how greatly they are saddled with tax burden, their wealth and income has skyrocketed, while the middle class has declined in spending power every year, every decade. Nothing has “trickled down” and what we have instead is a growing wealth gap, with the MAJORITY of Americans suffering on the wrong side of that gap (remember majority rule? It defines democracy). The GOP has succeeded so far in getting the majority to go along with lavish rewards for the rich, and certainly I see that theme here. Jazz and AR would like to see us continue to vote against our interests and for the interests of the wealthy, including the insurance company CEOs, who AVERAGE $14 million a year in income. If they can continue to convince America to drain her pockets into theirs, maybe they're worth that much in compensation.
You should take some economics courses before you start anymore blabber. Mr. Jazz has you pegged correctly. Being a moderate myself, I support Obama in many ways. Indeed it is nice to have a President who can formulate a sentence without snickering before off-loading some ill-advised cliche.The stimulus is a joke…surely a cave in to the Democratic establishment and the inefficient allocation of resources. Same old same old I am sorry to say.
And, I find Brooks to be honest, straight-forward and much more balanced than those like yourself whose positions are jaundiced by the foolhardy fire of partisanship.
And, for the record, I voted for Bill Clinton. Twice.
Please. Go away.