weekly response

Culture War Queen
By Leo Brown
[President Obama's Weekly Address]

Much ado has been made of the American tendency to vote against our own economic self-interest. In his famous response to Karl Rove's 'conservative coalition' of the 2004 presidential election, Thomas Frank published a book entitled What's the Matter with Kansas? Mr. Frank makes the case that social issues are used as a distraction while the conservative elite push through discriminatory tax and spending policy.

In a two-party system, there might not be a candidate who opposes gay marriage while favoring progressive tax policy, and poor evangelical Christians don't have the option of mixing and matching.

Eight years after the beginning of President Bush's second term, social issues - the 'culture wars' - remain at the fore, but the terrain has shifted. As state after state legalizes gay marriage, LGBT rights are increasingly considered civil rights, if only as a matter of grudging pragmatism. Other social issues that were once blamed on immorality and the degradation of Western culture, such as abortion rights and environmental activism, have been complicated by a richer understanding of our circumstances. Less often, today, do we hear about the supposed Judeo-Christian origins of our nation. Tempers and passions may not have chilled, but a sense of slight chaos has permeated some of these most iconic ideological standoffs.

Budget concerns, on the other hand, have emerged as the latest opportunity for posturing and political feud. It's clear that over time, all but a few pariah states will legalize gay marriage, but no one is sure how the budget mess will resolve. In this sense, it is a perfect political tool, allowing for grandstanding and condescension from all angles.

Furthermore, though Americans have been receiving handouts from the government since the Declaration of Independence, it seems to have become passe to publicly ask for them. This is a familiar and sad perversion of 'self-sufficiency,' a most treasured folk value firmly grounded in American exceptionalism.

In his weekly address, President Obama asks us to consider how $40 per paycheck might impact a working family's financial situation. It's clear where he is going with this. Will the underprivileged masses vote with their wallets, or will they buy a manufactured narrative of warped nostalgia that disregards their economic needs? Will they choose cash or pride?

Republican voters have found in a presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, the embodiment of their oppressor. The enormously wealthy Mr. Romney doesn't seem to viscerally feel the 'culture war' values of the Republican base, but he croons conservatism and callous economic policy. It remains to be seen whether Republicans primary voters will buy his pitch.

Certainly, Mr. Romney's family wouldn't miss $40 per paycheck. But how would he answer President Obama's thought experiment? Regardless of whether Mr. Romney really believes conservative economic policy is best for our GDP, does he realize how it would impact an average family? Has he ever bought his own groceries or a tank of gas?

President Obama has announced that Congress should not adjourn for the holidays until they extend payroll tax cuts for working class families. Clearly, this is the right thing to do, both for the economy and as a matter of simple compassion. Whereas eliminating this tax cut would be a punch in the gut to millions of families living on the brink of homelessness and malnutrition, its impact on the national budget would barely register against the enormous costs of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and defense spending.

...America voted for divided government, not dysfunctional government...

But, President Obama contends in this week's address, a dysfunctional government we have. And although the President officially disagrees with Standard & Poor's downgrade of the U.S. credit rating, he would surely agree with this one main thrust of the report:

"We lowered our long-term rating on the U.S. because we believe that the prolonged controversy over raising the statutory debt ceiling and the related fiscal policy debate indicate that further near-term progress containing the growth in public spending, especially on entitlements, or on reaching an agreement on raising revenues is less likely than we previously assumed and will remain a contentious and fitful process."

Contentious and fitful. Like children. Or, perhaps more relevantly, like pillars of hubris, swollen with pride, holding the course so as not to appear weak.

As such, in the aftermath of the debt ceiling hoo-ha, Republicans remain adamantly opposed to tax hikes for the rich. This might feel good inside, but the House majority is not doing itself any favors. On the contrary, they have everything to gain by backpedaling, even just a touch. Approval of Congress is at a historic low, and numerous polls (I'll link one example) show that a majority of Americans, even a majority of Republican voters, want the newly-anointed bipartisan "supercommittee" to reach a compromise.

I'm confident that the sooner Republicans stop hollering about "no new taxes," the less silly they will appear. Wouldn't it make sense to count the deficit war as a political victory and move on? After all, they made the President look weak, triggered a credit downgrade which wreaked havoc on the stock market, and took a wonderfully uncompromising stand against taxes. Now would be an ideal time to pick some fresh, new talking points before the public begins to notice the real-world consequences of this round of GOP political bullying. After all, Standard and Poor's has noticed, and they've raised quite the stink. That's sort of like police lights in your rearview mirror. A fair time to pull over, even if you were literally in the middle of saying that you'll never get a speeding ticket.

But the party faithful prattles on. At the Republican presidential debate last night, when asked if they would reject a deal that concedes one dollar of tax increases for every ten dollars of spending cuts, all eight candidates stuck their hands up like a band of crazed teacher's pets. Not a flicker of hesitation.

I understand that in a primary campaign, it is sometimes necessary to appeal to the party base, but I honestly think these people are not helping themselves. The American public can indeed be fooled, and we don't always pay close attention to important, relevant political matters. But when it's this obvious, when politicians repeatedly flout their refusal to compromise, their ideological stasis, for such an extended period of time, few thinking voters will take them seriously. So what are they trying to accomplish?

Not that it's much consolation, but it was at least a little gratifying to see President Obama call out Tea Party shenanigans this Saturday, chastising "one faction of one party" for refusing to compromise their extreme positions in the debt ceiling debate. And following this frank, pleading address, it seems that Congressional leaders have finally reached a deal sufficiently revolting to the wings of both parties. The deal includes $2.4 trillion of cuts over ten years, no tax hikes for the rich, and no cuts of Social Security, Pell grants, Medicaid or Medicare. Barring unexpected political fiasco, the broad (and, sadly, unorganized) moderate caucus of Congress will be able to pass this legislation tomorrow, presumably without the votes of extreme Tea Partiers or hard-line liberals.

Among the accomplishments of the last few weeks, the Tea Party may have finally and conclusively outed itself to the American masses as a band of bona fide wack jobs. Their unyielding stance on taxes and blithe embrace of default leave no doubt (if any remained) that this powerful caucus is not fit to govern. But we are stuck with them for the immediate future, and I heard for the first time today on NPR's "All Things Considered" a gesture towards an organized and practical response to our predicament. A "restoration of sanity," as Jon Stewart might have.

The American Dream Movement is the brainchild of Van Jones, a former White House advisor to President Obama. Unlike Mr. Stewart's Rally to Restore Sanity, which placed a premium on fun, this movement presents itself as a serious political player designed to combat Tea Party fervor. Whereas the Tea Party calls for the end of government, the American Dream Movement values some of the things that government offers, such as Social Security and education grants. Mr. Jones believes that a silent majority of Americans oppose Tea Party policies, and he hopes to inspire them to political protest and action.

We will soon know whether this movement has as much traction as Mr. Jones claims. But if the last few weeks have taught us anything, it is painfully clear that any political voice, no matter how radical and irrational, has the power to tarnish the compromises that occur every day in government. In such a scary, precarious world, all thinking citizens have sacred responsibility to yell back. By adopting some of the Tea Party's organizing tactics (if not their positions), perhaps Mr. Jones will be able to lug the center of out policy debates back towards the left, closer to where it belongs.

In this week's terse, joyless address, President Obama reminds the nation that both parties share responsibility for the last decade of unbridled government spending. In the wake of Speaker Boehner's abrupt departure from White House budget negotiations this Friday, the President makes no apparent effort to maintain his hopeful, inspired tone of the last few weeks. This address features not a glimpse of his pearly whites, not even a "have a great weekend!" As such, the summer's foul political stasis persists. The President trudges through an epic struggle of careful political maneuvering and tortured reasoning, compromise futile, for upon his every offer, Republican leaders deftly triangulate to claim a new baseline, desperate to assuage their radical constituents.

I admire President Obama's enduring commitment to civil discourse, and he certainly honors his campaign promise to bring compromise to Washington. But aside from showcasing himself as a reasonable, fair man, this approach has not yielded the necessary results. The proposals Republicans have deigned to consider all rely overwhelmingly on spending cuts, including substantial cuts to Social Security and Medicare, while protecting the corporate rich from paying fair tax rates. The President has invited these proposals by indulging the notion, now common, that both parties deserve equal blame for the current crisis. While the blame game can be dangerous and unproductive, and the President has much to gain from keeping his composure through the entire haul, I am starting to think that progress can only be made once the nation is reminded, with a bit more precision, why the budget deficit is so large.

The fact is, the majority of today's debt accumulated with President Bush at the helm. The extraordinarily costly War on Terror added nearly $800 billion to the bill before President Obama took his oath of office. In addition to increased investment in national security, the growing cost of entitlement programs during the Bush years was not funded by new revenues. Whether or not you feel that these various spending initiatives enacted by President Bush were justified, he and his supporters will proudly point out that taxes remained constant throughout his presidency. Quite obviously, this is the reason why the deficit rose much more quickly than the GDP during the last decade.

If President Obama is bold enough to point out a few of these basic, indisputable facts, his adversaries will surely accuse him of "playing the blame game." But without getting too dirty or personal, it is important for the many interested parties - including politicians, the media, and the public - to hear from the President himself some specific details about the history of our debt. By repeatedly and vaguely asserting that blame must be shared, the President isn't helping people understand what is really going on. But if folks hear him spell out why the budget deficit grew so rapidly over the last decade, even if they refuse to listen at first, they will, perhaps, be more likely to support politicians who espouse responsible, logical economic policy.

Debt math is often confusing and always fuzzy, but check out this graphic, which clearly shows the relative impact of tax cuts on the budget. Also, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman captures the exasperated plight of the left in his latest column, published yesterday in The New York Times.

This week's presidential video address is not all that different from the last, reflecting stubborn intertia in the struggle to address our nation's budget challenge. Once again, President Obama presents the centerpiece of his argument for tax hikes: that the wealthiest Americans, including large corporations and oil companies, can sacrifice a few dollars in order to budget for priorities such as Medicare, scholarships and research grants. To me, this seems like a reasonable bit of logic, but somehow, the President's approach has managed to antagonize Republicans and Democrats alike. According to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Congress and the President need to figure out some sort of budget plan by August 2nd in order to avoid defaulting on the nation's debt. But as President Obama attempts to strike a compromise with Republicans, who remain unwilling to consider a single tax hike, he risks losing the support of Democrats, who are becoming increasingly suspicious of the President's motives and loyalties.

Some have written, as I mentioned in my comments under last week's post, that President Obama's rhetoric has sounded alarmingly conservative of late. In this week's address, the President announces again that we have to make sure "our government lives within its means," just as American families do. Liberals have good reason to fear the consequences of this notion; many before have fallen for the seductive populist logic that government should regularly and faithfully pay off its debt, including President Herbert Hoover during the Great Depression. The last thing we need as the fragile economy recovers is senseless, unnecessary government austerity.

Listening to the President speak during his weekly address and at last week's Twitter Town Hall event, I began to think about his comments in a context that might allow him a bit more ideological wiggle room. He frightens the left by saying the government needs to live within its means, a turn of phrase typically associated with thinly-veiled free-market libertarian nonsense. But in the context of a historic budget deficit and a weak economy, and even during less extraordinary times, a government "living within its means" will not resemble a responsible family or individual with that same approach. Never does the President suggest that we need to eliminate our budget deficit; returning to a Clinton-era fiscal state couldn't possibly happen anytime soon. But should government spend its money carefully and responsibly, investing in useful, well-run programs that hold the promise of future returns? Absolutely, and Republicans are lucky to be working with a president so willing to scour the national budget for opportunities to cut pointless spending. With any luck, they will realize their good fortune just in time to eliminate unhelpful corporate tax cuts.

Cross your toes, and maybe by next week, the President will be able to announce that things have progressed! And for an intriguing time capsule, check out this ominous piece written by David Leonhardt, published by The New York Times in 2009, detailing the nation's dangerous fiscal state and how it might erupt in the near future.

President Obama is hopeful (video), for “Democrats and Republicans agree on the need to solve the problem” and reduce the national deficit. But such vague accordance will not deliver results unless substantiated by a set of concrete goals and priorities. As in any productive negotiation, both parties need to convey clearly and frankly what they can give up, what they cannot, and what is up for discussion. By establishing common ground and shared objectives at the outset of the conversation, perhaps individual temperament and pride will figure in less prominently as the President and Congress attempt to reach a useful compromise.

Most Republican members of Congress, including House Speaker John Boehner, Majority Whip Eric Cantor, and a swath of newly elected Tea Party heroes, are staunchly unwilling to vote for new tax increases. Further exacerbating the situation, these politicians have repeatedly announced their convictions to constituents and the media. In this week’s address, the President explains – again – that by eliminating tax cuts for the wealthy, the government can continue to provide college scholarships, health care, research grants, and postal service. But as the President’s frustration mounts, his pleas fall on deaf, obstinate ears. His political adversaries have built their political identity upon a promise to reign in government spending and slash taxes whenever possible. For these individuals, this discussion is no longer simply ideological (if it ever really was). Their pride, integrity, and purpose as elected officials are at stake; they have drawn a line in the sand and moved beyond reason in their vehement dogma.

The President’s demands are sensible, but in order to reduce the deficit, he requires the cooperation of at least some Republicans. Rather than honing in on the one policy option – raising taxes – most offensive to Tea Party sensibilities, the President might have more luck if he temporarily diverts attention from this sensitive, emotional issue. Instead of beginning the discussion by announcing, “We need to cut taxes in order to protect these programs,” President Obama could try saying, “We need to keep college scholarships, right? And medical research, too. Let’s think about how we could do that. Where can we save?”

This strategy would allow Republicans and Democrats to finally establish meaningful points of agreement. It doesn’t really help if everyone in Congress agrees that we need to reduce the deficit, just as the nuances of military engagement in Afghanistan remain contentious even while everyone in Washington wears a flag pin. Until the Republicans and Democrats agree on approximately how much the deficit must be reduced, and until they pencil in a few federally funded programs that must be protected (the postal service might be a nice place to start), negotiations will remain stagnant. But if the parties can stomach this degree of cooperation, it could trigger some important prerequisites to progress: media and political attention to taxes might simmer down, Republicans can tout the negotiations as a partisan victory, and President Obama can quietly strong-arm tax hikes for the wealthy into the final budget plan. In the current state of political inertia, the President has little to gain by digging in his heels and dignifying the mulish Republican posture. Rather, he can diffuse the petty, sour attitude of the opposition by extending an olive branch and allowing the GOP to begin a conversation without abandoning their steadfast principles. Tax hikes need to be part of the deficit reduction plan, but there’s no sense in forcing Republicans in Congress to publicly acknowledge this reality just yet.

For another perspective on the current state of the Republican party, check out The Mother of All No-Brainers, written by David Brooks and published yesterday in The New York Times. Mr. Brooks is a right-leaning moderate journalist.