Category: national politics & policies

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media and media people national politics & policies video

Suppressed Data Trends

One thing you notice when engaging in public policy discussions is the misuse of statistics in a particular way: truncating a timeline of data, to focus almost exclusively on short-term trends rather than a more meaningful long-term (“secular”) accounting of trends.

For example, you will often see proponents of state aid discuss the decrease in poverty after the War on Poverty began. And there definitely has been. But when we look at long-term trends, we see a long history of diminishing poverty levels in America, and improvements were more dramatic before, not after, the increase in welfare state spending in the 1960s.

Another trend line you might notice regards crime. Some folks focus on very recent upticks in some violent crimes, and demand that we “do something.” But the longer-term trend has been for a reduction in almost all forms of crime since the early 1990s.

What if something similar has been going on in “climate change”/“global warming” politics and reportage?

Along with even more disturbing near-term mis-reporting.

Tony Heller from RealClimateScience.com.

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national politics & policies too much government

PayGo Piffle

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, #PayGo, austerity, spending

Republicans are especially good at deficit spending. Give them control of the presidency and both houses of Congress, and watch the money flow! It happened under George W. Bush, and now under President Donald Trump.

But note: the Democrats have gained control of the House of Representatives. We might see some restraint on government growth, if for no better reason than “divided government,” in which the two major parties can more effectively do damage to each other’s spending.

Nancy Pelosi, again Speaker of the House, has a monkey wrench to throw into Republican spending plans, not excluding that much-promised, little acted-upon Trump promise, “The Wall.” 

It is called “PayGo,” or, in the Twittersphere, #PayGo.

Not something new (Democrats have used it before), the House rule aims to limit any new expenditures to equal cuts in old spending.

Effective? Well, in capping the deficit at a trillion dollars annually . . . until they vote for exceptions to the rule. 

And effective enough to annoy Republicans!

And now, to rile up progressives, too.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has made a big deal about her opposition. She has opposed Pelosi’s attempt to re-establish the rule. 

Heedless of any danger that could result from further adding to the now-$22 trillion national debt, progressives scorn the idea of fiscal responsibility as “austerian,” claiming the whole idea was somehow disproven by “economic history,” in the Tweeted words of Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.).

The “real” beneficiaries would be the corporations, progs say, and that PayGo would work against the “progressive agenda” of increasing government programs without limit.

Typical political piffle.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, #PayGo, austerity, spending

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Accountability general freedom meme moral hazard national politics & policies

Madison on Perpetual War

James Madison, quote, freedom, war, warfare

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”

—James Madison, Political Observations, Apr. 20, 1795 in: Letters and Other Writings of James Madison, vol. 4, p. 491 (1865)

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government transparency national politics & policies

Full Frontal Negotiations

Pence, Vice President, sleeping, transparency, negotiations

Last week’s political circus reached a new level of Big Top.

Or three rings, as President Donald Trump hosted two Democratic leaders in the White House, debating border security and government shutdown — in public. House Minority Leader, soon-to-be Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) were somewhat uncomfortable with Donald Trump’s decision to hash out their differences in front of the cameras and the American people.

It was quite the comedy. Yet Vice President Mike Pence all but snored. While many pundits once again expressed their frustrations with a lack of solemn decorum from Trump, Pence provided not solemnity but somnolence.

The idea of government negotiations being done out in the open isn’t new. Transparency is good, if rarely practiced. But it did not take long for Mrs. Pelosi and Mr. Schumer to express alarm at this foray into Reality TV. 

“We’re here to have a conversation the careful way,” Pelosi informed the president, “so I don’t think we should have a debate in front of the press on this.”

Once upon a time, Dems promised transparency. Barack Obama campaigned on negotiating health care reform on C-SPAN — only to renege on that pledge when the negotiations got going.

In olden days, Democrat President Grover Cleveland practiced political transparency when he was governor of New York (1883-1885), pointedly leaving the door to his office open whenever discussing any subject whatsoever with anyone.*

And let’s tip the hat to Mike Pence. Ridiculed when it came out that he would not meet in private with any woman not his wife, upon the arrival of #MeToo and the Kavanaugh hearings, Pence appeared genius.

If a sleepy one.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* Cleveland was not so transparent when, during a crisis in his second presidency, he secretly had his jaw operated upon in a boat in international waters.

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Accountability national politics & policies term limits

Mrs. Term Limits?

Nancy Pelosi, term limits

Do politicians oppose term limits on principle?

For the answer to be yes, we would first have to explain to them what principles are.

Sure, politicians adamantly oppose term limits that cut against their self-interest, i.e. apply to them. But they are often for term limits . . . when the limitation applies to others.

The exception to this rule? When limiting one’s own terms — or pledging to do so in the future — is absolutely essential in order to win an election.

Take the case of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who wishes to be elected Speaker in January by the new Democratic House majority.

Mrs. Pelosi is an unlikely candidate . . . for Mrs. Term Limits. And yet, she has agreed to support a new rule imposing term limits on leadership positions — even her own speakership.

What gives?

A number of newly elected congresspeople won their seats on a promise to change Washington. And to gain votes, they had pledged not to support the exceedingly unpopular, long-serving Swamp Creature for speaker.

Or should that be Mrs. Swamp Creature?

Now with Democrats comprising a narrow 17-seat majority in the new Congress, these young upstarts wield enough votes to deny Pelosi the position she covets.

So, against the objections of her longtime lieutenants, Pelosi has promised these “rebels” that she will not merely bring before her caucus a new rule imposing limits of three terms for leadership positions, including her own, but she also insists that even if that rule fails to win the support of the Democratic caucus, she will personally, voluntarily, abide by those limits.

Meet the Missus. Don’t ask about her previous status.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Nancy Pelosi, term limits

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore

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free trade & free markets national politics & policies Popular too much government

Christmas Is Coming

Trump, Santa, NAFTA, trade

When I was a kid, every December day was like a rocket-launch countdown ’til Christmas.

Republicans in the House of Representatives have fewer days to tick off: the days remaining to do something before Democrats take over. Days left in session? Eight.

We know what Trump wants them to do: pass his negotiated replacement for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

Last week, “Trump held a high-profile signing ceremony with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto at the G-20 summit in Argentina,” Eric Boehm writes at Reason. “The leaders of the three countries put their signatures to the final version of the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA), but the deal must still be ratified by each domestic government.”

And some in the Republican House are uneasy, because they “disagree with the Trump administration on trade issues and correctly see the USMCA as moving North America further from free trade.”

Though Donald Trump has given us some reason to think he might have multilateral free trade in mind as his real goal, the current state of the USMCA does not bolster that.

But it could be worse — the Democrats could scuttle the rewrite, just to spite Trump. This would allow Trump to go “nuclear” and withdraw from NAFTA unilaterally without a replacement.

“This would be disastrous for the American economy,” Senator Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) says, “and would kick off a constitutional battle between the branches over trade power.”

That sounds like a lump of coal for Christmas. But I wonder: can a constitutional battle be all bad if it raises awareness of . . . the Constitution?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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