Last November I wrote a posting on "What a Difference Money Makes" in foreign policy. The thrust of the it was that Chinese President Hu Jintao had just completed a trip to Europe during which he indicated that China would help Europe with the fiscal problems of several countries. At the time China had already bought some Greek debt and was willing to help other countries such as Portugal, Spain, Italy and Ireland.
While the Chinese President was using that country's almost $3 trillion in foreign reserves to make friends and influence people, President Obama, struggling with debt and budget problems, was on a 10-day Asian tour to promote sales of U.S. products to create jobs in this country. In short, we were and continue to be in an economic/fiscal mismatch with China. We are broke while China is awash in cash.
That mismatch was again apparent last week when Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited Europe and said China will be investing in more European bonds. This came as a welcome relief to the Europeans who are again trying to settle the problem of Greek insolvency and potential fiscal default. In Hungary Wen said China would be buying more of that country's bonds while at the same time financing through loans about $1.4 billion of development projects in Hungary.
While Wen was once again spreading Chinese largesse across Europe, U.S. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner was criticizing the Europeans for failing to have a unified voice in dealing with its financial bailout issues. One could ask Geithner where our own unified voice is in dealing with the U.S. debt limit and mega spending cut issues. And just about two weeks ago outgoing U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates strongly criticized Europe for its failure to live up to its NATO commitments and underfunding their defense establishments. While both Geithner and Gates may be justified in their criticisms, their complaints to Europe stood in sharp contrast to China's positive commitments to help Europe with its current most pressing problem -- avoiding bankruptcies in several countries and protecting the viability of the Euro as a major world currency. The economic mismatch will continue globally for a long time, but perhaps the least we could do is to do less preaching to other nations. (See posting, "The Gospel According to Us").
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Also to be noted is that China's international charm offensive does not extend to its disputes with several Asian countries over control of the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. The dispute pits China against Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei over control of the islands and their rich offshore resources, including gas and oil. The dispute has been particularly acute between China and the Philippines and Vietnam who charge that China is using its naval power to bully those countries that dispute its claims to the Spratlys. China has also told the United States to stay out of its territorial disputes with its neighbors.
While on the subject of China, it was interesting to note that China has now stepped into the Libya crisis, seeming to charm both sides. It has elected not to choose sides but rather serve as a negotiator with Gaddafi while at the same time hosting representatives of Libya's National Transition Council (the rebels) in Beijing.
In foreign policy, charm, like money, counts for something.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Sunday, June 26, 2011
POTPOURRI: Obama/Afghanistan; More Congressional Time Off; "Money Blurts"
President Obama's speech on Afghanistan was puzzling. The announcement on troop withdrawals are certainly welcome, although the timetable is slow. But the underlying case made for withdrawals, however welcome, had the tone of former President Bush's "mission accomplished" boast immediately after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. And we know how that turned out.
Obama seemed to be focusing the case for withdrawal on having dealt al-Qaeda such severe setbacks that it is no longer a threat in Afghanistan. The capstone for this assessment was the killing of Osama bin Laden. The problem is that the thrust of our continuing war in Afghanistan has been against the Taliban not al-Qaeda. Obama did say that the U.S. and NATO forces have "inflicted serious losses" on the Taliban and "taken a number of strongholds." However, such claims sound similar to "light at the end of the tunnel" claims made in Vietnam four decades ago. Those claims were challenged at that time and there are serious doubts about how successful we have really been against the Taliban.
In Afghanistan our so-called counterinsurgency strategy is a "win the hearts and minds" of the people while building up Afghanistan's own security forces as we pull out, a la Vietnam. We have indeed pushed our forces into such Taliban strongholds as Kandahar while Taliban forces have resorted to terrorist bombings in Kabul and other cities and regained their hold in some rural areas. These rural areas, plus the Taliban havens in Pakistan, are likely to serve as the bases for expanding their control as our forces are withdrawn. And Kandahar itself is the former core of Taliban strength and there is reasonable doubt that it can be held by Afghan forces after our withdrawal.
We seem to be counting on achieving some kind of political settlement with the Taliban to head off its return to pre-war control of the country and again serve as host to al-Qaeda or other terrorist organizations which can attack us or our friends or destabilize Afghanistan or neighboring Pakistan. Thus, in focusing on the severe setbacks to al-Qaeda as the primary basis for "mission accomplished", the President downplayed the fact that the war has been with the Taliban which shows little sign of going away despite our claims.
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Now to the homefront and the partisan battle over raising the debt ceiling in tandem with mega reductions in federal spending. The point of this posting is the utter frustration and disgust with Congress in getting the job done.
Much has been made of the August 2 deadline for raising the federal debt ceiling above the $14.3 trillion limit set previously by Congress. Much has been also said about how failure to meet this deadline threatens a federal default in its debt obligations and the consequent devastating effect this would have on our own and the international economies. It has also been pointed out that any package worked out by Vice President Biden and a small bipartisan congressional group also would require considerable additional time to legislate the multiple pieces of legislation required to make spending cuts or other changes in specific programs such as Medicare. Presumably whatever progress was made in the Biden negotiations prior to the "our way or no way" (meaning absolutely no tax increases) walk out by GOP House Majority Leader Cantor last week will become the basis for President Obama and Speaker Boehner getting the deal further down the tracks. Hopefully, what lies down the tracks is not a train wreck.
With all of these debt/spending problems Congress has carved out still more recess time for itself between now and the August 2 deadline, to be followed on August 8 by a month long summer vacation for the already underworked lawmakers. The Senate will take a week off (July 4-10) for the Independence Day holiday while the House will recess June 27-July 5, followed by another week off July 18-24. So Independence Day for Congress means independence from legislative work so they can go home and campaign/raise money for next year's elections. The GOP controlled House is particularly generous to itself on recess time. They, of course, would say that work on the debt/spending problems will continue behind the scenes, but for the public it simply has the appearance of a self-serving, dysfunctional Congress. And isn't there anything else to deal with except the fiscal issues and passing gotcha legislation designed to appeal to the political base; are there no immigration, energy, or education problems?
0-0-0-0-0
Speaking of political fund raising, politicians may have come up with a new low in how to fatten their coffers. A Washington Post article called it "money blurts". It works this way. A politician says something outrageous and after it goes out over talk shows and blogs small donors rush to the phone and contribute to the person making the statement. According to the Post article, presidential wannabe Michelle Bachmann's statement on cable news accusing President Obama of "anti-American views" netted her $1 million in contributions. But the idea may not be so new. In 2009, GOP Congressman Joe Wilson of South Carolina called out "You lie" during an Obama speech in Congress. Within a week he got $2 million in contributions.
So what used to be called "sound bites" may now reach new heights as well planned "money blurts". Just what we need.
Obama seemed to be focusing the case for withdrawal on having dealt al-Qaeda such severe setbacks that it is no longer a threat in Afghanistan. The capstone for this assessment was the killing of Osama bin Laden. The problem is that the thrust of our continuing war in Afghanistan has been against the Taliban not al-Qaeda. Obama did say that the U.S. and NATO forces have "inflicted serious losses" on the Taliban and "taken a number of strongholds." However, such claims sound similar to "light at the end of the tunnel" claims made in Vietnam four decades ago. Those claims were challenged at that time and there are serious doubts about how successful we have really been against the Taliban.
In Afghanistan our so-called counterinsurgency strategy is a "win the hearts and minds" of the people while building up Afghanistan's own security forces as we pull out, a la Vietnam. We have indeed pushed our forces into such Taliban strongholds as Kandahar while Taliban forces have resorted to terrorist bombings in Kabul and other cities and regained their hold in some rural areas. These rural areas, plus the Taliban havens in Pakistan, are likely to serve as the bases for expanding their control as our forces are withdrawn. And Kandahar itself is the former core of Taliban strength and there is reasonable doubt that it can be held by Afghan forces after our withdrawal.
We seem to be counting on achieving some kind of political settlement with the Taliban to head off its return to pre-war control of the country and again serve as host to al-Qaeda or other terrorist organizations which can attack us or our friends or destabilize Afghanistan or neighboring Pakistan. Thus, in focusing on the severe setbacks to al-Qaeda as the primary basis for "mission accomplished", the President downplayed the fact that the war has been with the Taliban which shows little sign of going away despite our claims.
0-0-0-0-0-0
Now to the homefront and the partisan battle over raising the debt ceiling in tandem with mega reductions in federal spending. The point of this posting is the utter frustration and disgust with Congress in getting the job done.
Much has been made of the August 2 deadline for raising the federal debt ceiling above the $14.3 trillion limit set previously by Congress. Much has been also said about how failure to meet this deadline threatens a federal default in its debt obligations and the consequent devastating effect this would have on our own and the international economies. It has also been pointed out that any package worked out by Vice President Biden and a small bipartisan congressional group also would require considerable additional time to legislate the multiple pieces of legislation required to make spending cuts or other changes in specific programs such as Medicare. Presumably whatever progress was made in the Biden negotiations prior to the "our way or no way" (meaning absolutely no tax increases) walk out by GOP House Majority Leader Cantor last week will become the basis for President Obama and Speaker Boehner getting the deal further down the tracks. Hopefully, what lies down the tracks is not a train wreck.
With all of these debt/spending problems Congress has carved out still more recess time for itself between now and the August 2 deadline, to be followed on August 8 by a month long summer vacation for the already underworked lawmakers. The Senate will take a week off (July 4-10) for the Independence Day holiday while the House will recess June 27-July 5, followed by another week off July 18-24. So Independence Day for Congress means independence from legislative work so they can go home and campaign/raise money for next year's elections. The GOP controlled House is particularly generous to itself on recess time. They, of course, would say that work on the debt/spending problems will continue behind the scenes, but for the public it simply has the appearance of a self-serving, dysfunctional Congress. And isn't there anything else to deal with except the fiscal issues and passing gotcha legislation designed to appeal to the political base; are there no immigration, energy, or education problems?
0-0-0-0-0
Speaking of political fund raising, politicians may have come up with a new low in how to fatten their coffers. A Washington Post article called it "money blurts". It works this way. A politician says something outrageous and after it goes out over talk shows and blogs small donors rush to the phone and contribute to the person making the statement. According to the Post article, presidential wannabe Michelle Bachmann's statement on cable news accusing President Obama of "anti-American views" netted her $1 million in contributions. But the idea may not be so new. In 2009, GOP Congressman Joe Wilson of South Carolina called out "You lie" during an Obama speech in Congress. Within a week he got $2 million in contributions.
So what used to be called "sound bites" may now reach new heights as well planned "money blurts". Just what we need.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
MYTHS AND MYSTERIES OF GOP JOB CREATION
In a previous posting the point was made that what George H.W. Bush called "voodoo economics" in l980, later engraved in the tablets as Reaganomics, has become the fundamental economic policy of Republicans and some conservative Democrats. A key characteristic of that policy of cutting taxes is its clear tilt toward the wealthy and the corporate world. Flanking that tax policy is Republican cut spending policy, meaning mega reductions in the federal budget. Together these tax and spending policies, in the absence of an explicit job creation program, represent the GOP answer to creating new jobs to speed up recovery from the Great Recession.
First, a few comments on the trickle down tax policy described in the previous posting with the imagery of Hubert Humphrey: to feed the birds, you first have to feed the elephants.
The U.S. economy is driven by consumer spending; it represents 70 percent of economic activity in this country. A fundamental part of our current economic problem is lack of consumer spending, thus dragging the economy down. Will trickle down tax policy create jobs and pay checks which in turn will increase consumer demand? It can be argued that it is UNLIKELY that much of the additional money of the tax cuts going to the wealthy and big business would be used for job-creation investments. Corporations are more likely to use their added profits to increase the dividends to shareholders or buy back stock from these shareholders. Another likely use for the added profits would be for buying or merging with other companies, a strategy which often results in job cuts, not additions. Investments in machinery may be made but this often means replacing capital for labor, while the companies making the machinery may or may not add new jobs or rehire laid off workers.
As to the additional money going to shareholders, part of this will go to employees who hold securities through their 401k plans where the money is likely to stay until future retirement. Wealthy shareholders will use some of their money for buying additional shares, the proceeds of which may or may not be used for job-creation investments. With industrial capacity being used at only 75-76 percent, there doesn't seem to be much of an incentive to add to that capacity until there is increased demand which is a function of trickle up (see previous post) economics, not trickle down.
Further, while the GOP talks of corporate tax cuts to spur investments, U.S. corporations are already sitting on about $1.5 trillion in cash, much of it retained and untaxed overseas. If job creation investments through tax cuts are that attractive, then why haven't corporations used some of the cash-on-hand for such investments? In 2005 Congress passed a tax holiday for overseas corporate cash, allowing the corporations for one year to bring home money and it would be taxed at just 5 percent, compared with the normal rate of 35 percent. A recent report indicated that the money brought back did little for job creation, although it did boost revenues for the government. If another such holiday is enacted it may even encourage corporations to shift more jobs abroad to increase their overseas holdings anticipating that every few years they will get a tax holiday.
Second, the cut spending pillar of GOP economic policy. To me this is even more mystical than tax policy as a spur to job creation. This is not to say that spending cuts are not needed; they are needed to restore the fiscal health of the federal government. President Obama and congressional Democrats are biting the bullet on the need to cut spending while at the same time resisting SOME of the specifics. For the GOP, the spending cuts serve both fiscal and philosophic goals. For economic policy mega cuts are a GOP "must" since such cuts in spending are needed to offset the huge losses of revenues through their tax cuts for the wealthy and big business, even with the increased revenues that they say will be generated by the tax cuts. And such cuts are a political demand of the party's fiscal hawks and its tea party supporters. Increasing revenues through increased taxes is a definite "no"to Republicans.
But spending cuts are likely to mean job losses rather than more jobs. For example, the community development block grant (CDBG) funds many jobs at the local level. It can be used for such things as social services, housing rehabilitation, and paving streets and sidewalks. Any of these uses translate into local jobs for those providing soft services or those working on housing rehab or infrastructure jobs. Yet that program is slated for a major cut from the current $4+ billion funding level, and probably total elimination over the next 2-3 years. Likewise for reduced spending for other public works programs such as highway construction and projects of the Army Corps of Engineers, which sometimes fall into the pork barrel category.
Thus what is trickling down is less job-creating federal money at the same time that state and local governments are already making their own big reductions. Over the past several months, state and local governments have chopped over 20,000 jobs per month while industrial jobs have been increasing, although not at a rate needed to lower the unemployment rate. Another piece of evidence is that fewer state and local bond issues are being offered to pay for capital projects which would provide employment.
Fiscally hard pressed states are also providing less money to local governments both through less general aid and less for education, the latter resulting in large layoffs of teachers. Local governments are receiving less money from the states at the same time the locals are experiencing lower revenues from property taxes as assessed property values have been dropping because of the collapse of the housing market. The GOP and tea party followers may say all of this is good because it shrinks government at all levels, a conservative philosophic goal devoutly wished. But the jobs lost in such shrinkage cannot be brushed aside as spending cuts which, by some wave of the wand, become part of an overall GOP job-creation policy.
In short, the GOP should stop trying to create the illusion of having a job creation program based on trickle down tax and spending policies. Support a real job-creation program even if it requires the unthinkable -- a new stimulus program. Such is my own illusion.
First, a few comments on the trickle down tax policy described in the previous posting with the imagery of Hubert Humphrey: to feed the birds, you first have to feed the elephants.
The U.S. economy is driven by consumer spending; it represents 70 percent of economic activity in this country. A fundamental part of our current economic problem is lack of consumer spending, thus dragging the economy down. Will trickle down tax policy create jobs and pay checks which in turn will increase consumer demand? It can be argued that it is UNLIKELY that much of the additional money of the tax cuts going to the wealthy and big business would be used for job-creation investments. Corporations are more likely to use their added profits to increase the dividends to shareholders or buy back stock from these shareholders. Another likely use for the added profits would be for buying or merging with other companies, a strategy which often results in job cuts, not additions. Investments in machinery may be made but this often means replacing capital for labor, while the companies making the machinery may or may not add new jobs or rehire laid off workers.
As to the additional money going to shareholders, part of this will go to employees who hold securities through their 401k plans where the money is likely to stay until future retirement. Wealthy shareholders will use some of their money for buying additional shares, the proceeds of which may or may not be used for job-creation investments. With industrial capacity being used at only 75-76 percent, there doesn't seem to be much of an incentive to add to that capacity until there is increased demand which is a function of trickle up (see previous post) economics, not trickle down.
Further, while the GOP talks of corporate tax cuts to spur investments, U.S. corporations are already sitting on about $1.5 trillion in cash, much of it retained and untaxed overseas. If job creation investments through tax cuts are that attractive, then why haven't corporations used some of the cash-on-hand for such investments? In 2005 Congress passed a tax holiday for overseas corporate cash, allowing the corporations for one year to bring home money and it would be taxed at just 5 percent, compared with the normal rate of 35 percent. A recent report indicated that the money brought back did little for job creation, although it did boost revenues for the government. If another such holiday is enacted it may even encourage corporations to shift more jobs abroad to increase their overseas holdings anticipating that every few years they will get a tax holiday.
Second, the cut spending pillar of GOP economic policy. To me this is even more mystical than tax policy as a spur to job creation. This is not to say that spending cuts are not needed; they are needed to restore the fiscal health of the federal government. President Obama and congressional Democrats are biting the bullet on the need to cut spending while at the same time resisting SOME of the specifics. For the GOP, the spending cuts serve both fiscal and philosophic goals. For economic policy mega cuts are a GOP "must" since such cuts in spending are needed to offset the huge losses of revenues through their tax cuts for the wealthy and big business, even with the increased revenues that they say will be generated by the tax cuts. And such cuts are a political demand of the party's fiscal hawks and its tea party supporters. Increasing revenues through increased taxes is a definite "no"to Republicans.
But spending cuts are likely to mean job losses rather than more jobs. For example, the community development block grant (CDBG) funds many jobs at the local level. It can be used for such things as social services, housing rehabilitation, and paving streets and sidewalks. Any of these uses translate into local jobs for those providing soft services or those working on housing rehab or infrastructure jobs. Yet that program is slated for a major cut from the current $4+ billion funding level, and probably total elimination over the next 2-3 years. Likewise for reduced spending for other public works programs such as highway construction and projects of the Army Corps of Engineers, which sometimes fall into the pork barrel category.
Thus what is trickling down is less job-creating federal money at the same time that state and local governments are already making their own big reductions. Over the past several months, state and local governments have chopped over 20,000 jobs per month while industrial jobs have been increasing, although not at a rate needed to lower the unemployment rate. Another piece of evidence is that fewer state and local bond issues are being offered to pay for capital projects which would provide employment.
Fiscally hard pressed states are also providing less money to local governments both through less general aid and less for education, the latter resulting in large layoffs of teachers. Local governments are receiving less money from the states at the same time the locals are experiencing lower revenues from property taxes as assessed property values have been dropping because of the collapse of the housing market. The GOP and tea party followers may say all of this is good because it shrinks government at all levels, a conservative philosophic goal devoutly wished. But the jobs lost in such shrinkage cannot be brushed aside as spending cuts which, by some wave of the wand, become part of an overall GOP job-creation policy.
In short, the GOP should stop trying to create the illusion of having a job creation program based on trickle down tax and spending policies. Support a real job-creation program even if it requires the unthinkable -- a new stimulus program. Such is my own illusion.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
POLITICAL STABILITY: AFGHANISTAN AND THE ARAB SPRING
Last week I was watching Morning Joe, an early morning talk show on MSNBC, hosted by Joe Scarborough; the show covers a range of subjects each day. On this particular day a portion of the program focused on Afghanistan, the problems there now and what lies ahead. A history professor on the show offered the view that we need to maintain a military presence there beyond 2014, the date for the withdrawal of the last U.S. and NATO combat forces. The professor said that a continued U.S. involvement there was needed to assure stability, with the expectation that given time the Afghan government will develop, with U.S. and NATO assistance, its own security force to replace foreign military support.
The use of the word "stability" troubled me because it is truly a misleading term. We tend to use the western democratic model as the measure of stability. That is, to oversimplify, a political structure that provides representative government through periodic elections. It can be a so-called presidential system with separation of powers such as we have in the U.S. or a parliamentary government based on legislative supremacy such as found in Great Britain and Germany. Regardless of the specific constitutional, written or unwritten, architecture, the western model is underpinned by a strong sense of national identity which, however noisy the clash and clang, is the ultimate medium for conflict resolution and the peaceful transference of political power through elections.
The crucial point here is the belief that this model is the necessary form for providing stability. That is certainly not true. Political philosophers from the time of Plato have been seeking the answer to what is necessary for political stability. Plato had his all-wise Philosopher King with its implied authoritarianism. Aristotle, his pupil, saw it very differently. His foundation for stability, while not defined in such terms, was the existence of a large, moderating middle class. Thomas Hobbes, a political thinker troubled by the unsettled times of civil conflict in England in the 17th century, said that what was needed for political stability was an absolute monarch. A century later in England, John Locke was making the case for legislative supremacy as the structural basis of civil order.
In short, there is no single political architecture for providing stability. It should also be understood that stability does not mean the absence of political, social, or economic conflict but only that such conflicts are dealt with, although not necessarily resolved, without systemic violence and collapse. While the U.S. and Britain were providing such stability through democratic processes in the last century, Stalin was providing Russia with stability anchored in that country's history of absolutism from the Czars through the fall of communism in l991. Even Hitler, in his demonic way, exploited the German sense of national identy and brought a short period of internal stability-through-obedience following the tumultuous post World War I years in Germany. That period was a time of severe economic shocks including continuing high unemployment and an off-the-chart inflation in the early 1920s, an inflation which economically wiped out the middle class and to this day is embedded in German fears of inflation more than recession.
So when one talks of "stability" and how it is achieved, beware. In Afghanistan it might even be argued that for a period about equal to Hitler's stability, the Taliban provided a form of very repressive stability. The case might also be made that stability was, more or less, provided in Egypt by decades of rule by President Mubarak and by the Assads in Syria, although in the case of Syria that stability is currently being challenged as it was successfully challenged in Tunisia and Egypt. Likewise autocratic rule in Libya and Yemen, and continuing authoritarianism in Saudi Arabia.
Now the so-called Arab Spring, in unseating these sources of stability, however repressive, has set in motion new forces of potential political instability. As said above, the binding force of stability is some sense of national identity. But the evidence so far seems to indicate an unleashing of some basic forms of instability -- the re-emergence of tribal-based loyalty and a new wave of religious conflict that had been suppressed, not extinguished, by the autocratic rule of one Muslim sect or another. Historic tribal divisions seem to be resurfacing in Libya and Yemen. Violent and growing religious conflict is found in the historic Sunni-Shia split in Iraq and Bahrain. Whether these deep, historical fault lines can be diminished in a way that a national identity or a similar basis of loyalty can emerge, however slowly, remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, the search for stability in some of these countries may emerge as new autocratic rule such as majority Shia domination at the expense of the Sunni in Iraq, or the reverse in Bahrain. Or a kind of factionalized stability such as found historically in Afghanistan with a thin veil of mutual accommodation among war lords obscuring a basic instability. Alternatively for Afghanistan and some other countries of the Arab world, a very fragile, temporary coalition of basically antagonistic tribal/ethnic/religious participants may emerge with each maneuvering for its own advantage in anticipation of the coalition falling apart.
So scratch below the surface and you will find that the search for stability can produce a Jefferson or a Stalin.
The use of the word "stability" troubled me because it is truly a misleading term. We tend to use the western democratic model as the measure of stability. That is, to oversimplify, a political structure that provides representative government through periodic elections. It can be a so-called presidential system with separation of powers such as we have in the U.S. or a parliamentary government based on legislative supremacy such as found in Great Britain and Germany. Regardless of the specific constitutional, written or unwritten, architecture, the western model is underpinned by a strong sense of national identity which, however noisy the clash and clang, is the ultimate medium for conflict resolution and the peaceful transference of political power through elections.
The crucial point here is the belief that this model is the necessary form for providing stability. That is certainly not true. Political philosophers from the time of Plato have been seeking the answer to what is necessary for political stability. Plato had his all-wise Philosopher King with its implied authoritarianism. Aristotle, his pupil, saw it very differently. His foundation for stability, while not defined in such terms, was the existence of a large, moderating middle class. Thomas Hobbes, a political thinker troubled by the unsettled times of civil conflict in England in the 17th century, said that what was needed for political stability was an absolute monarch. A century later in England, John Locke was making the case for legislative supremacy as the structural basis of civil order.
In short, there is no single political architecture for providing stability. It should also be understood that stability does not mean the absence of political, social, or economic conflict but only that such conflicts are dealt with, although not necessarily resolved, without systemic violence and collapse. While the U.S. and Britain were providing such stability through democratic processes in the last century, Stalin was providing Russia with stability anchored in that country's history of absolutism from the Czars through the fall of communism in l991. Even Hitler, in his demonic way, exploited the German sense of national identy and brought a short period of internal stability-through-obedience following the tumultuous post World War I years in Germany. That period was a time of severe economic shocks including continuing high unemployment and an off-the-chart inflation in the early 1920s, an inflation which economically wiped out the middle class and to this day is embedded in German fears of inflation more than recession.
So when one talks of "stability" and how it is achieved, beware. In Afghanistan it might even be argued that for a period about equal to Hitler's stability, the Taliban provided a form of very repressive stability. The case might also be made that stability was, more or less, provided in Egypt by decades of rule by President Mubarak and by the Assads in Syria, although in the case of Syria that stability is currently being challenged as it was successfully challenged in Tunisia and Egypt. Likewise autocratic rule in Libya and Yemen, and continuing authoritarianism in Saudi Arabia.
Now the so-called Arab Spring, in unseating these sources of stability, however repressive, has set in motion new forces of potential political instability. As said above, the binding force of stability is some sense of national identity. But the evidence so far seems to indicate an unleashing of some basic forms of instability -- the re-emergence of tribal-based loyalty and a new wave of religious conflict that had been suppressed, not extinguished, by the autocratic rule of one Muslim sect or another. Historic tribal divisions seem to be resurfacing in Libya and Yemen. Violent and growing religious conflict is found in the historic Sunni-Shia split in Iraq and Bahrain. Whether these deep, historical fault lines can be diminished in a way that a national identity or a similar basis of loyalty can emerge, however slowly, remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, the search for stability in some of these countries may emerge as new autocratic rule such as majority Shia domination at the expense of the Sunni in Iraq, or the reverse in Bahrain. Or a kind of factionalized stability such as found historically in Afghanistan with a thin veil of mutual accommodation among war lords obscuring a basic instability. Alternatively for Afghanistan and some other countries of the Arab world, a very fragile, temporary coalition of basically antagonistic tribal/ethnic/religious participants may emerge with each maneuvering for its own advantage in anticipation of the coalition falling apart.
So scratch below the surface and you will find that the search for stability can produce a Jefferson or a Stalin.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
"VOODOO ECONOMICS" IS ALIVE AND WELL
Once upon a time two Republicans were competing for the party's presidential nomination. One wannabe labeled his competition's economic plan as "voodoo economics". The other would-be said nonsense and won the nomination. And both lived happily ever after. Ronald Reagan went on to be elected President in l980, while George H.W. Bush deleted the phrase from his memory bank and was chosen by Reagan as his running mate.
The big economic problem at the time was stagflation, the nasty combination of high unemployment and high inflation. What Bush called voodoo economics is what is now called supply side economics by its adherents or trickle down theory by its opponents. One central feature of supply side theory is that lowering taxes will increase revenues. The underpinning for supply side theory was provided by the "Laffer curve", named after economist Arthur Laffer who said the idea itself came out of the Middle Ages. Stripped of the Laffer econbabble, supply side economics worked like liberal Democrat Hubert Humphrey (one time senator and later Vice President) described in semi-scatological imagery: to feed the birds, you first have to feed the elephants.
What was called voodoo economics three decades ago has now become the fundamental economic argument of the Republican party. Cut the taxes of the wealthy, individuals and corporations (the elephants), and the added wealth to them will be invested and work its way to all those below (the birds) as benefits in the form of jobs and income. Thus, in the absence of any real job creation program to offer, Republicans use their strong, traditional pro-wealthy/business bias as a make-believe solution for creating much needed new jobs to hasten economic recovery from the Great Recession.
The most discussed aspect of the trickle down theory has been the continuing GOP push to make permanent all of the "temporary" income tax cuts of the former President George W. Bush. President Obama and a large majority of Democrats want to end the tax cuts for the upper income earners while retaining the tax cuts of the middle class. All of the Bush tax cuts are currently scheduled to expire at the end of 2012. The Democratic approach stands in direct contrast to GOP support of trickle down economics. While defying laws of hydraulics, the Democratic approach could be called trickle up, demand side, or stimulus spending (high unlikely) economics. That is, increase the money going to the birds and they will spend much of it thereby increasing the demand for goods and services of the elephants. (I first used "trickle up" in research while at The Brookings Institution; it drew raised eyebrows but was allowed to stand.)
But the trickle down vs. trickle up issue has gone far beyond the question of what to do about the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, the most extreme case being the tax plan proposed by GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty. His pro-wealthy proposal calls not only for cutting the top corporate tax rate from 35 to 15 percent but also for abolishing all taxes on dividends, capital gains, and estates, a position held by many Republicans. He would also change the tax structure for personal income taxes to have just two rates, 10 and 25 percent, instead of the current six rates, 10-35 percent. In one sense his personal income tax rate changes would be in accord with various proposals that have been made in the past to have a single flat tax or at least fewer rates. However, such proposals usually also include a major overhaul of the tax code to cut out the various deductions and credits, often incorrectly called loopholes, which are used to reduce taxes actually paid by many in both middle and upper income brackets or to give rebates to lower income earners. Pawlenty's plan as it stands now would do nothing about such provisions of the tax code. In short, he would cut the taxes, but retain the deductions and credits which further cut the revenue base. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center said Pawlenty's plan would cost over $11 trillion in lost revenues over a 10 year period. Pawlenty's plan did not address the issue of reduced spending.
To conclude. What George H.W. Bush called voodoo economics is back, but not as a new or fresh theory, but as a fundamental part of the traditional Republican predisposition toward the wealthy and business.
The big economic problem at the time was stagflation, the nasty combination of high unemployment and high inflation. What Bush called voodoo economics is what is now called supply side economics by its adherents or trickle down theory by its opponents. One central feature of supply side theory is that lowering taxes will increase revenues. The underpinning for supply side theory was provided by the "Laffer curve", named after economist Arthur Laffer who said the idea itself came out of the Middle Ages. Stripped of the Laffer econbabble, supply side economics worked like liberal Democrat Hubert Humphrey (one time senator and later Vice President) described in semi-scatological imagery: to feed the birds, you first have to feed the elephants.
What was called voodoo economics three decades ago has now become the fundamental economic argument of the Republican party. Cut the taxes of the wealthy, individuals and corporations (the elephants), and the added wealth to them will be invested and work its way to all those below (the birds) as benefits in the form of jobs and income. Thus, in the absence of any real job creation program to offer, Republicans use their strong, traditional pro-wealthy/business bias as a make-believe solution for creating much needed new jobs to hasten economic recovery from the Great Recession.
The most discussed aspect of the trickle down theory has been the continuing GOP push to make permanent all of the "temporary" income tax cuts of the former President George W. Bush. President Obama and a large majority of Democrats want to end the tax cuts for the upper income earners while retaining the tax cuts of the middle class. All of the Bush tax cuts are currently scheduled to expire at the end of 2012. The Democratic approach stands in direct contrast to GOP support of trickle down economics. While defying laws of hydraulics, the Democratic approach could be called trickle up, demand side, or stimulus spending (high unlikely) economics. That is, increase the money going to the birds and they will spend much of it thereby increasing the demand for goods and services of the elephants. (I first used "trickle up" in research while at The Brookings Institution; it drew raised eyebrows but was allowed to stand.)
But the trickle down vs. trickle up issue has gone far beyond the question of what to do about the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, the most extreme case being the tax plan proposed by GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty. His pro-wealthy proposal calls not only for cutting the top corporate tax rate from 35 to 15 percent but also for abolishing all taxes on dividends, capital gains, and estates, a position held by many Republicans. He would also change the tax structure for personal income taxes to have just two rates, 10 and 25 percent, instead of the current six rates, 10-35 percent. In one sense his personal income tax rate changes would be in accord with various proposals that have been made in the past to have a single flat tax or at least fewer rates. However, such proposals usually also include a major overhaul of the tax code to cut out the various deductions and credits, often incorrectly called loopholes, which are used to reduce taxes actually paid by many in both middle and upper income brackets or to give rebates to lower income earners. Pawlenty's plan as it stands now would do nothing about such provisions of the tax code. In short, he would cut the taxes, but retain the deductions and credits which further cut the revenue base. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center said Pawlenty's plan would cost over $11 trillion in lost revenues over a 10 year period. Pawlenty's plan did not address the issue of reduced spending.
To conclude. What George H.W. Bush called voodoo economics is back, but not as a new or fresh theory, but as a fundamental part of the traditional Republican predisposition toward the wealthy and business.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
AFGHANISTAN: THE EVOLUTION OF LOWERED EXPECTATIONS
On April 20, my posting was on the Revolution of Rising Expectations (RRE), described as a l950s-70s phrase "to explain the outlook in colonial and post-colonial countries as the population looked to a brighter future." It seems that we can now reformulate RRE to ELE, the Evolution of Lowered Expectations. We see ELE in this country, reflecting a view among many that the Great Recession has put our economy in a deep hole and when we finally get out, we will have a different world of less prosperity and an uncertain and perhaps dimmer future. But this posting about ELE is not about our economy and our future prospects, but about our expectations beyond our shoreline, specifically Afghanistan but perhaps elsewhere also.
The ELE way of thinking was stated most succinctly by Ryan Crocker in his hearing last week before a Senate committee considering his confirmation as the new U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan. In his testimony he stated that the U.S. must continue its very large aid program to Afghanistan to achieve a "good enough" government, meaning to keep that country from returning to its former role as a home for al-Qaeda or other terrorists. Put that way, Crocker's testimony seemed to allow for a political settlement with the Taliban, a major target of our military action. So over the 10 years of our war in Afghanistan our grand goal of nation building to establish democracy in that historically very non-democratic country has evolved into a cross-your-fingers hope that we can even get a "good enough" government in Kabul to prevent its returning to being a haven for terrorists.
Nation building as a goal of American foreign/military policy reached its most recent zenith with the invasion of Iraq in 2003 to overthrow dictator Saddam Hussein and to implant democracy in the middle of the Muslim Mideast. As envisioned by the Bush administration, the democratic impulse would then spread from Iraq to other countries in the region. A similar hope accompanied the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 to overthrow the tyranny of the Taliban which was also hosting Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorists.
By the time President Obama took office we had abandoned the nation building goal, but beyond defeating the Taliban it was not clear if we had a level of expectation for the Afghan government for any democratic structure and its ability to govern. Presuming that Crocker's statement approximates Obama policy, we will now settle for a "good enough" government. But even that may be difficult to achieve.
If the Karzai government, with some democratic trappings such as elections however corrupt, is the basic building block for achieving "good enough", we may find ourselves greatly disappointed. Several previous postings have focused on the corruption of the Karzai government, corruption which was noted in a Senate report last week that focused on the $19 billion in aid going to Afghanistan over the last 10 years. Presumably the "good enough" standard doesn't include an expectation of even reasonably clean government, only that it be sufficiently capable of providing its own security and keeping a new generation of terrorists out of the country. For that we can continue to live with the corruption in the government as we have been accepting and helping to finance that corruption for the last 10 years.
If "good enough" means reasonable political stability, there are also many challenges ahead, particularly if any political settlement to end the war includes some form of governing participation of the Taliban. Historically Afghanistan has been a country fragmented by tribal/ethnic divisions that permitted local war lords to control their piece of territory. These divisions have not disappeared and contribute to the fact that control by Karzai's government does not extend much beyond Kabul. Any expansion of security and control is tied to the presence of U.S./NATO troops. Nothing has occurred that is converting these tribal/ethnic loyalties into any sense of national identity which underpins political stability, such stability being at least one element of achieving "good enough". Further, Pakistan, which has been a key backer of the Taliban past and present, has little interest in the emergence of a unifying national identity that would undermine its ability to interfere in the governance of Afghanistan.
Finally, with the beginning of troop withdrawals this summer to be concluded by 2014, there is reason to be skeptical that the modest "good enough" goal can be achieved by that time. In continuing aid beyond the military withdrawal, that would at least be a change of course from the l990s when we more or less abandoned Afghanistan after we had succeeded in achieving the goal of ousting the Russians. The final question: is there an ELE standard below "good enough"?
The ELE way of thinking was stated most succinctly by Ryan Crocker in his hearing last week before a Senate committee considering his confirmation as the new U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan. In his testimony he stated that the U.S. must continue its very large aid program to Afghanistan to achieve a "good enough" government, meaning to keep that country from returning to its former role as a home for al-Qaeda or other terrorists. Put that way, Crocker's testimony seemed to allow for a political settlement with the Taliban, a major target of our military action. So over the 10 years of our war in Afghanistan our grand goal of nation building to establish democracy in that historically very non-democratic country has evolved into a cross-your-fingers hope that we can even get a "good enough" government in Kabul to prevent its returning to being a haven for terrorists.
Nation building as a goal of American foreign/military policy reached its most recent zenith with the invasion of Iraq in 2003 to overthrow dictator Saddam Hussein and to implant democracy in the middle of the Muslim Mideast. As envisioned by the Bush administration, the democratic impulse would then spread from Iraq to other countries in the region. A similar hope accompanied the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 to overthrow the tyranny of the Taliban which was also hosting Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda terrorists.
By the time President Obama took office we had abandoned the nation building goal, but beyond defeating the Taliban it was not clear if we had a level of expectation for the Afghan government for any democratic structure and its ability to govern. Presuming that Crocker's statement approximates Obama policy, we will now settle for a "good enough" government. But even that may be difficult to achieve.
If the Karzai government, with some democratic trappings such as elections however corrupt, is the basic building block for achieving "good enough", we may find ourselves greatly disappointed. Several previous postings have focused on the corruption of the Karzai government, corruption which was noted in a Senate report last week that focused on the $19 billion in aid going to Afghanistan over the last 10 years. Presumably the "good enough" standard doesn't include an expectation of even reasonably clean government, only that it be sufficiently capable of providing its own security and keeping a new generation of terrorists out of the country. For that we can continue to live with the corruption in the government as we have been accepting and helping to finance that corruption for the last 10 years.
If "good enough" means reasonable political stability, there are also many challenges ahead, particularly if any political settlement to end the war includes some form of governing participation of the Taliban. Historically Afghanistan has been a country fragmented by tribal/ethnic divisions that permitted local war lords to control their piece of territory. These divisions have not disappeared and contribute to the fact that control by Karzai's government does not extend much beyond Kabul. Any expansion of security and control is tied to the presence of U.S./NATO troops. Nothing has occurred that is converting these tribal/ethnic loyalties into any sense of national identity which underpins political stability, such stability being at least one element of achieving "good enough". Further, Pakistan, which has been a key backer of the Taliban past and present, has little interest in the emergence of a unifying national identity that would undermine its ability to interfere in the governance of Afghanistan.
Finally, with the beginning of troop withdrawals this summer to be concluded by 2014, there is reason to be skeptical that the modest "good enough" goal can be achieved by that time. In continuing aid beyond the military withdrawal, that would at least be a change of course from the l990s when we more or less abandoned Afghanistan after we had succeeded in achieving the goal of ousting the Russians. The final question: is there an ELE standard below "good enough"?
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
"DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN": WAR AND THE BUDGET
Yogi Berra certainly had a way with words. This time his "deja vu" took me back about 35 years to my teaching days, And that backward glance was triggered last week by the House debate over U.S. military involvement in Libya via NATO, combined with the long running saga over federal spending, the budget, and debt. First, the context for the mental return to yesteryear. In the early l970s it was evident that congressional powers in war making and budget decisions were in sharp decline. A book written by Senator Joe Clark in l976, called Congress "the sapless branch" of government.
The Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war, yet by the early 70s the U.S. had fought the Korean war in the 50s and was fighting a major ongoing battle in Vietnam, both without a declaration of war by Congress. To give the constitutional authority new meaning, in l973, Congress passed over a presidential veto a War Powers Resolution (WPR) that required the President to notify Congress of intentions to involve the country in military conflict. And, unless Congress authorized such involvement, U.S. forces could only be used for 60 days before withdrawal had to begin, the withdrawal time limited to 30 days.
Over the 38-year history of the WPR, sometimes the President has gone to Congress for authorization to use military force such as former President George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003. On other occasions Congress was ignored such as President Clinton's military involvement in Bosnia and Kosovo in the l990s, but presidential assertion of the commander in chief role and war-making preogatives was nonpartisan. It was an institutional battle between the President and Congress. Last week liberal Democratic Representative Kucinich proposed a resolution that would give President Obama just an additional 15 days before ending this country's military participation with NATO in the Libyan conflict. The Kucinich proposal lost by a vote of 148-265 but the House then approved a resolution of Speaker Boehner rebuking Obama over the Libyan involvement without coming to Congress for authorization. It was another re-run of Congress seeking to reassert its power in war making.
As to the second issue of Congress and the budget, the early 70s found the congressional role in the budget process weak and getting weaker. The immediate issue was President Nixon openly challenging Congress on its power of the purse by refusing to spend money appropriated by Congress for items Nixon opposed. This was referred to as the impoundments issue. But while impoundments were the immediate cause of the presidential-congressional confrontation, it reflected the basic institutional weakness of Congress in the overall budget process.
The President had (and still has) a centralized process for drawing up his budget, a process that requires the multitude of bureaucracies to come to the President's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to make the case for the money they want. From this process came a single overall budget the President submitted to Congress early each year. Congress, on the other hand, would break that budget request into a dozen or so pieces with each piece going to separate subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee. The final overall congressional budget then turned out to be whatever the separate pieces added up to. To remedy its weakened role in the budgetary process, Congress passed the Budget and Impoundments Control Act of l974.
To briefly summarize and oversimplify how it was intended to strengthen Congress, the act created the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) which gave the lawmakers their own resources for budget analysis, similar to OMB. It also established a firm schedule for Congress to follow in setting a total amount for the budget and amounts to be provided for major spending categories. The various committees and subcommittees involved in budget making were then required to fit their spending requests into these categories. The final step would be reconciling the money requested by committees in the various spending categories with the overall congressional budget target. All of this would be done between the time Congress received the President's budget in late January or early February and the beginning of the new fiscal year about eight months later, October 1.
While all of this looked good on paper and did introduce some discipline into congressional decision making, the very structured process crumbled over the years, reaching its low point just last year when not a single appropriation bill was passed. Now that process has become further mired in extreme partisan politics as well as being currently entangled in another process for raising the federal debt ceiling above the $14.3 trillion limit. So now when you hear the rhetoric of spending cuts, it is often unclear whether the cuts are related to the regular budgetary process, however fractured that has become, or the debt ceiling issue, or some of each.
But whether it be Libya and war powers, issues of taxing and spending, or the hardline partisanship, Congress, the onetime "sapless branch" of government, cannot escape the current public perception of its being the "broken branch" as a 2008 book has labeled it.
The Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war, yet by the early 70s the U.S. had fought the Korean war in the 50s and was fighting a major ongoing battle in Vietnam, both without a declaration of war by Congress. To give the constitutional authority new meaning, in l973, Congress passed over a presidential veto a War Powers Resolution (WPR) that required the President to notify Congress of intentions to involve the country in military conflict. And, unless Congress authorized such involvement, U.S. forces could only be used for 60 days before withdrawal had to begin, the withdrawal time limited to 30 days.
Over the 38-year history of the WPR, sometimes the President has gone to Congress for authorization to use military force such as former President George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003. On other occasions Congress was ignored such as President Clinton's military involvement in Bosnia and Kosovo in the l990s, but presidential assertion of the commander in chief role and war-making preogatives was nonpartisan. It was an institutional battle between the President and Congress. Last week liberal Democratic Representative Kucinich proposed a resolution that would give President Obama just an additional 15 days before ending this country's military participation with NATO in the Libyan conflict. The Kucinich proposal lost by a vote of 148-265 but the House then approved a resolution of Speaker Boehner rebuking Obama over the Libyan involvement without coming to Congress for authorization. It was another re-run of Congress seeking to reassert its power in war making.
As to the second issue of Congress and the budget, the early 70s found the congressional role in the budget process weak and getting weaker. The immediate issue was President Nixon openly challenging Congress on its power of the purse by refusing to spend money appropriated by Congress for items Nixon opposed. This was referred to as the impoundments issue. But while impoundments were the immediate cause of the presidential-congressional confrontation, it reflected the basic institutional weakness of Congress in the overall budget process.
The President had (and still has) a centralized process for drawing up his budget, a process that requires the multitude of bureaucracies to come to the President's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to make the case for the money they want. From this process came a single overall budget the President submitted to Congress early each year. Congress, on the other hand, would break that budget request into a dozen or so pieces with each piece going to separate subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee. The final overall congressional budget then turned out to be whatever the separate pieces added up to. To remedy its weakened role in the budgetary process, Congress passed the Budget and Impoundments Control Act of l974.
To briefly summarize and oversimplify how it was intended to strengthen Congress, the act created the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) which gave the lawmakers their own resources for budget analysis, similar to OMB. It also established a firm schedule for Congress to follow in setting a total amount for the budget and amounts to be provided for major spending categories. The various committees and subcommittees involved in budget making were then required to fit their spending requests into these categories. The final step would be reconciling the money requested by committees in the various spending categories with the overall congressional budget target. All of this would be done between the time Congress received the President's budget in late January or early February and the beginning of the new fiscal year about eight months later, October 1.
While all of this looked good on paper and did introduce some discipline into congressional decision making, the very structured process crumbled over the years, reaching its low point just last year when not a single appropriation bill was passed. Now that process has become further mired in extreme partisan politics as well as being currently entangled in another process for raising the federal debt ceiling above the $14.3 trillion limit. So now when you hear the rhetoric of spending cuts, it is often unclear whether the cuts are related to the regular budgetary process, however fractured that has become, or the debt ceiling issue, or some of each.
But whether it be Libya and war powers, issues of taxing and spending, or the hardline partisanship, Congress, the onetime "sapless branch" of government, cannot escape the current public perception of its being the "broken branch" as a 2008 book has labeled it.
Sunday, June 5, 2011
REPUBLICANS AND IMMIGRATION
Beware, the Republicans may take up immigration "reform". When the GOP talks reform of anything it usually reflects the party's tilt toward the wealthy and corporate America. For example, reform of the tax code means converting the "temporary" tax cuts of former President Bush to benefit the upper income brackets into permanent reductions.
Now the U.S. House Republican Technology Group is proposing to "examine current visa and immigration laws to make sure we attract and retain the best and brightest from around the world." The business community, particularly the high tech sector, couldn't have said it any better. To be fair, it couldn't really be expected that this particular House Group would venture into the more complex and politically hazardous world of general immigration reform. It's not their turf. But what the Group did make more evident is the silence of the GOP about getting into any broader areas of immigration reform. Thus the Republicans so far have cherry picked the immigration issue and come up with a business-desired piece of the action.
The question now is whether Speaker Boehner, his leadership team, and the GOP rank and file will take the next step from this working group position into a legislative proposal to be brought to the House floor. If it gets that far, the House Democrats may seek to broaden the proposal into something bigger. The GOP could block that effort by bringing a bill to the floor with no amendments allowed. If the Democrats are permitted to offer a broader amendment, it is almost certain to go down to defeat if it tries to resurrect a comprehensive reform proposal or even the less sweeping DREAM Act.
The comprehensive approach is aimed, among other things, at creating a path to citizenship for the estimated 12-15 million undocumented residents currently living in the U.S., primarily Hispanics. The DREAM bill is a more limited proposal to create a path for undocumented high school graduates who could gain residency status and citizenship through two years of military service or two years as a student in a four-year college.
The last time the comprehensive approach was tried was during the Bush administration. Bush supported the reforms but the bill failed to get the 60 votes needed to cut off a filibuster. At the time the reform was supported by key GOP Senators such as McCain, Kyl, and Graham who have since switched to opposition as the GOP has increasingly moved to the right to satisfy the most conservative wing of the party. The DREAM Act, sometimes included within a comprehensive plan, was last rejected in late 2010 when it passed the Democratic-controlled House but failed to get the 60 votes needed for Senate consideration.
Bringing up an immigration bill limited to visas for skilled persons has political risk for the GOP. Whether or not it permits Democratic amendments to broaden the bill, rejection of such a Democratic effort would send yet another signal to the growing Hispanic community that the GOP is sticking to its nativist views on immigration reform. "Nativist" in this context means seeking to preserve a white, protestant-based culture in this country. On the other hand, that may be just the signal the GOP wishes to send to its right wing base which includes the tea party movement.
A recent story in our local paper about new law in Georgia illustrates how a state effort to create its own set of immigration restrictions can create its own homegrown blowback. The Republican-controlled Georgia government recently passed legislation to get at both persons who knowingly transport or harbor undocumented persons and at the undocumented themselves who can't produce proper identification. The new restrictions, due to go into effect on July 1, have, according to state fruit and vegetable growers, made migrant farm workers wary of coming to the state for work. Now the growers are complaining to the state about the new law, saying they have had little luck in the past in hiring unemployed Georgia workers whom the farm owners say don't want to do that kind of work.
These are hardly new grower complaints; that has been the mantra for years of growers across the country who have been used to hiring migrant workers, often undocumented, at low pay and few or no benefits. And if farmers in Georgia are concerned about their state's new law, growers across the country who use migrant labor for harvesting must be even more concerned that congressional Republicans may consider legislation that would require growers to certify the legal status of all workers before they can be hired.
But whatever the GOP lawmakers decide to do, you can be sure it won't include either the comprehensive reform or DREAM approach.
Now the U.S. House Republican Technology Group is proposing to "examine current visa and immigration laws to make sure we attract and retain the best and brightest from around the world." The business community, particularly the high tech sector, couldn't have said it any better. To be fair, it couldn't really be expected that this particular House Group would venture into the more complex and politically hazardous world of general immigration reform. It's not their turf. But what the Group did make more evident is the silence of the GOP about getting into any broader areas of immigration reform. Thus the Republicans so far have cherry picked the immigration issue and come up with a business-desired piece of the action.
The question now is whether Speaker Boehner, his leadership team, and the GOP rank and file will take the next step from this working group position into a legislative proposal to be brought to the House floor. If it gets that far, the House Democrats may seek to broaden the proposal into something bigger. The GOP could block that effort by bringing a bill to the floor with no amendments allowed. If the Democrats are permitted to offer a broader amendment, it is almost certain to go down to defeat if it tries to resurrect a comprehensive reform proposal or even the less sweeping DREAM Act.
The comprehensive approach is aimed, among other things, at creating a path to citizenship for the estimated 12-15 million undocumented residents currently living in the U.S., primarily Hispanics. The DREAM bill is a more limited proposal to create a path for undocumented high school graduates who could gain residency status and citizenship through two years of military service or two years as a student in a four-year college.
The last time the comprehensive approach was tried was during the Bush administration. Bush supported the reforms but the bill failed to get the 60 votes needed to cut off a filibuster. At the time the reform was supported by key GOP Senators such as McCain, Kyl, and Graham who have since switched to opposition as the GOP has increasingly moved to the right to satisfy the most conservative wing of the party. The DREAM Act, sometimes included within a comprehensive plan, was last rejected in late 2010 when it passed the Democratic-controlled House but failed to get the 60 votes needed for Senate consideration.
Bringing up an immigration bill limited to visas for skilled persons has political risk for the GOP. Whether or not it permits Democratic amendments to broaden the bill, rejection of such a Democratic effort would send yet another signal to the growing Hispanic community that the GOP is sticking to its nativist views on immigration reform. "Nativist" in this context means seeking to preserve a white, protestant-based culture in this country. On the other hand, that may be just the signal the GOP wishes to send to its right wing base which includes the tea party movement.
A recent story in our local paper about new law in Georgia illustrates how a state effort to create its own set of immigration restrictions can create its own homegrown blowback. The Republican-controlled Georgia government recently passed legislation to get at both persons who knowingly transport or harbor undocumented persons and at the undocumented themselves who can't produce proper identification. The new restrictions, due to go into effect on July 1, have, according to state fruit and vegetable growers, made migrant farm workers wary of coming to the state for work. Now the growers are complaining to the state about the new law, saying they have had little luck in the past in hiring unemployed Georgia workers whom the farm owners say don't want to do that kind of work.
These are hardly new grower complaints; that has been the mantra for years of growers across the country who have been used to hiring migrant workers, often undocumented, at low pay and few or no benefits. And if farmers in Georgia are concerned about their state's new law, growers across the country who use migrant labor for harvesting must be even more concerned that congressional Republicans may consider legislation that would require growers to certify the legal status of all workers before they can be hired.
But whatever the GOP lawmakers decide to do, you can be sure it won't include either the comprehensive reform or DREAM approach.
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