Department of No Surprises: From Charleston to Murrieta to Washington, D.C.

 

In July, 2014 protesters gathered to block DHS busses carrying Central American women and children in Murrieta, CA.  It was ugly, and unnecessary, and gave the town a dismal national reputation. [HuffPo]  Murrieta is in the 42nd Congressional District, with a 46.6% white population, 36.2% Hispanic,  5.1% African American, and 8.8% Asian American. The district has been consistently Republican since 2003.  So, why review this information today?  Because the Representative from this California district, Ken Calvert, has raised the bloody flag in the halls of Congress.

“The amendment to the House’s Interior and Environment spending bill would allow for the display of Confederate flags at national cemeteries managed by the National Park Service (NPS) even though members voted to ban the practice earlier this week. It would counteract another amendment to the same bill blocking the service from selling Confederate flag memorabilia in gift shops in the future. 

Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) offered the amendment in the closing minutes of floor debate on the spending bill Wednesday night. He made only a token statement in support of the amendment before setting up a roll call vote on it for Thursday.” [The Hill] 

Even though Representative Calvert’s amendment hit the floor during the waning hours of the Congressional day, it drew fire overnight when House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) commented:

Hoyer called the amendment, introduced by Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.) Wednesday night on a spending bill, “appalling.” He challenged House Republicans to vote against it and preserve amendments banning Confederate flag sales at national parks and displays at national cemeteries.

“That racist, divisive flag of slavery, segregation, and secession is not an appropriate symbol to sell or fly in our national parks and cemeteries run by the National Park Service,” Hoyer said in a statement early Thursday. [The Hill]

Representative Hoyer wasn’t the only member of Congress appalled by the  Calvert amendment.  Minnesota Rep. Betty McCollum retorted: “After the murder of nine black parishioners, I never thought that the U.S. House of Representatives would join those who would want to see this flag flown by passing an amendment to ensure” the continued flying of the Confederate flag, McCollum said.” [Roll Call]

Thus evaporated any remaining Democratic support for an otherwise unlikeable Department of Interior appropriations bill.  Representative McCollum wasn’t alone; several other Democratic party Representatives took to the floor to lambaste the idea of voting on the Calvert amendment today, July 9, 2015. [The Hill]

Representative Calvert offered an explanation for his amendment, saying he had been asked by Representatives from southern states to introduce it, and there were Republican members of the House who would not support the Interior Department’s appropriation bill be cause of earlier language banning the CSA battle flag in grounds under DoI administration. [The Hill]

And now we come to the totally predictable part of the story – encapsulated by the remarks of Speaker John Boehner (R-OH):

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) told reporters the spending bill had been pulled to avoid the issue from becoming a “political football.” “That bill is going to sit in abeyance until we come to some resolution,” he said.” [The Hill]

This, from the Speaker who said only days ago in the immediate aftermath of the Charleston Church massacre, that Congress would be “the adults in the room.”

So, we have yet another major piece of legislation sitting “in abeyance” while the House Republicans engage in their internecine battles over whether or not to allow the pennon of slavery, Jim Crow, segregation, and racism to flap on federal grounds.  Additionally, it truly is remarkable that yet again House Republicans have slipped their own poison pill into what was one of their own bills.

This seems less like gridlock between two adversarial parties, and more like what happens when a single party with a majority in Congress cannot control its own caucus.  The Democrats should be perfectly pleased that an appropriations bill which stripped the EPA of essential authority to regulate clean air and clean water is “in abeyance.”  Republicans who wanted to dismantle the EPA’s authority to control pollution may be wondering how and why a California Representative could so easily thwart their plans with a truly insensitive and racially charged amendment on behalf of his southern brethren.

We may have to look no further than the angry faces of the anti-immigrant protesters in his district – Welcome Back to Murrieta?

Getting From the Swampy No to a Functional Yes

With all due respect to my fellow liberals and progressives — and with this introduction you know the criticism is about to pour forth — enough ink and pixels have given their all in the effort to analyze, explain, or otherwise explicate the ‘problems with the Republican Party’ specifically those who’ve been elected to the House of Representatives.  Enough. It doesn’t matter all that much.

It doesn’t really matter, for example if one adopts the “Neoconfederate” model [Salon] or the “two foundings” explanation [Salon], and we can argue if the ‘two foundings’ in question were the Continental Congress and the Federal System, or the Early Federal Period and the U.S. Civil War.  It’s interesting, it’s academic, and as amusing and thought provoking as the argument is it’s not very useful at the moment.

It doesn’t matter too much if the origins of the present dysfunction are religious, social, racial, psychological, pathological, psychiatric,  or a combination of all the above. What matters is that something is very fundamentally wrong with the way the people’s business in conducted in the Congress of the United States.

Getting To No

As of January 6, 2013 there were 48 members of the Tea Party Caucus, all Republicans.  Of the 435 voting members of the House, 234 are Republican, 199 are Democrats. Two independents caucus with the Democrats.  218 votes are needed to pass legislation. If all the members directly affiliated with the Tea Party Caucus refuse to join their other GOP caucus members, the GOP leadership can control only 186 votes.

In short, the ultra-conservatives in the House of Representatives do not have anywhere near the number of votes necessary to enact the agenda of their choosing, but they have more than enough votes to prevent the leadership from enacting legislation cobbled together with Democratic support.

This is the perfect recipe for NO. No action. No real pragmatic politics. No major legislation. No long term solutions.  The high wire act in the 113th Congress is more conducive to (1) short term stop gap measures to alleviate large problems, (2) interim short term budget appropriations and resource allocations, and (3) periodic breakdowns.

Little wonder then the Absolutely Do Nothing Congress has passed only 34 “ceremonial” bills and “108” substantive bills so far. [WaPo] However, if governmental gridlock is the desired result then the 113th is doing splendidly.

Getting Nothing Done

One of the problems with polarized politics is that hyperbole replaces reasoned discussion, and all too often things become A CRISIS!  There are a couple of ways a crisis can occur. First, and most obviously, there is a situation, unforeseen, which arises from a natural or man-made disaster or catastrophe.  Floods, tornadoes, an attack, an unpredictable infrastructure failure might all qualify as a crisis.

The second crisis category is manufactured.  There appear to be two forms of manufacturing of late. One manifestation is the “political crisis” in which a problem of long standing has been ignored or left unresolved for enough time to create an overwhelming backlog — the Veterans’ Administration issues in regard to wait time for medical services is a classic, as is the number of refugee children who have arrived unattended from Central America — a number that’s been increasing since October 2013.

The other form is more ephemeral and depends upon the Crisis, or Scandal du Jour.  For example, the Benghazi attack in 2012 has generated 25,000 pages of documents submitted in 13 hearings. That the documents have done nothing but reinforce the initial reporting, and that the hearings have generated nothing but easy copy and headlines, is immaterial.  The Congress is ‘dealing with the crisis…’

Meanwhile

While Congress fritters and frets its way to the end of the 113th session there are some issues which may fall into the first manufactured category — the backlog swamp.

Infrastructure: Residents of Los Angeles were recently reminded that 92 year old water pipes cannot be expected to last forever, and when they fail they have no regard for sacred public spaces — like Pauley Pavilion. Over 170 school buildings and 165 bridges in New York were constructed over a century ago. The average age of the 6,800 water lines in New York is 69 years, and 2/3rds of them are susceptible to internal corrosion and failure. [FutNy]  One out of every nine bridges in this country falls in the structurally deficient category, and the average age of a U.S. bridge is 42 years.  [2013RC] We have a early 20th century power grid which is supposed to keep us going in the 21st century. Failure to address aviation needs is costing the U.S. economy valuable revenue as a result of congestion and delays.  [2013rc]

Civil Rights:  The Civil Rights Act, and the provisions safeguarding voting in America are overdue for review. Voter intimidation, suppression, and curtailment are no longer the sole province of the old Confederacy.  We continue to put this issue on the back burner at our peril as a democracy.

Public Health and Safety: Heart disease and cancer continue to be the main causes of death in this country, but Alzheimer’s is climbing up the tables.  An aging population will require more health care services in a wider variety of settings than our current system can address.  We kill 34,677 of us every year in traffic accidents, but we continue to defer highway improvements because of budget constraints.

We kill off 26,631 individuals annually in firearm accidents, another 19,766 in firearm related suicides, and yet another 11,101 in firearm homicides. [CDC]  Still we wrangle about requiring universal background checks and how we might prevent straw purchases.  We can’t even seem to agree that stalkers and spousal abusers shouldn’t have immediate access to firearms.

Whether it’s Alzheimer’s or assault rifles, we’re still operating with entirely too many Medically Under-served Areas, there are 297 such reports for Nevada, and a search of neighboring California turns up 2,065 records. [HRSA]

Immigration: We have a mess going in this department.  It’s hard to ignore the fundamentally racist rantings of the Deport’em Now crowd, who never seem to have much to say about the northern border.  However, we will need to tune them out, or at least down,  if we are going to attract the best and brightest scientific and technical minds we’ll need for a 21st century economy.  We’ll need to figure out how to invite in those who have joined our Armed Forces, willing to die for this country, only to discover later there are voices demanding that they mustn’t  live here. Something rational needs to be done to meet the needs of children who came here as toddlers and have known no other country, and those who have one native born or naturalized parent and another who is not.  Comprehensive immigration policy reform would help. So would adequately funding the judicial, social, and educational components of our immigration policy — security is the easy part — it’s the larger, more complicated portions of the problem we’re delaying.

Might we add more to this list? — items which if we let them progress on their own long enough we’ll find ourselves in a “crisis” situation — climate change, income disparity and inequality, educational funding and curriculum development, and the regulation of capital markets to improve stability.

Our Bottom Line

One of the more egregious practices of failing businesses is the Run To Ruin mentality.  Got an aging delivery truck? Never mind, just keep depreciating it without putting any funds in replacement and capital improvement accounts, and when the thing finally gives up the ghost go out and get another loan to cover the cost.  Delaying serious proposals for maintaining our national safety, health, economy, and infrastructure is tantamount to adopting the Run to Ruin model on a national scale.

Another highly questionable business practice which will lead directly to bankruptcy court is the Disposable Asset Theory of Management  wherein all facets of an enterprise are ultimately disposable, including personnel.  Low wages and paltry benefits yielding high employee turnover? No problem, just hire more and cheaper labor. With 3 job seekers for every position available there will always be somebody.  Eventually those training and retraining expenses will add up, predictably levels of service will decline… and those adherents of the DAT management style should be looking for a buyer sooner rather than later.  Deferring the issues of hiring and retaining well trained and competent public employees is, again, like trying to run the country on the cheap (DAT) and then expressing surprise when “things don’t get done.”

By far one of the most predictable ways to go out of business is to ignore the changing circumstances and economic atmosphere around a firm.  Ever so redundantly speaking — Rule Number One: If you have an increasing share of a declining market you are in very real trouble. Think Kodak.

Let’s be optimistic and believe that eventually we will move from dependence on fossil fuels and toward renewable energy sources.  In old fashioned retail terms this means fossil fuels will be a declining market.  So, WHY are we subsidizing an industrial sector which we know to be on the way out?  Again, if we take a short-term defensive approach to energy policy we’ll be violating Old Rule Number One in ways that will not be helpful in the future — or we can wait for the Crisis in which the oil sector sputters out and takes a chunk of the economy with it.

Avoiding the Run to Ruin, Disposable Asset Theory, and the Ostrich Stance mistakes means we are going to have to stop lurching from crisis to crisis, and start doing some serious public policy planning.  We need to stop talking about running government like a business, and start doing precisely that — running it as a long term, asset rich, enterprise with public service as its core.

Instead of the Doctrine Of No, how about functioning based on the belief that Harry Truman was right: “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”

VA Health Care: “Postponed Proceedings”

The bills to improve the performance of Veterans Administration operations have passed the House and the Senate, in fact they’ve been waiting for a conference committee to iron out the differences between the two bills since mid June. That’s why it’s disappointing to find the following update on the progress of the final bill posted as follows:

“7/17/2014 POSTPONED PROCEEDINGS – At the conclusion of debate on the Barber motion to instruct conferees on H.R. 3230, the Chair put the question on adoption of the motion to instruct conferees and by voice vote, announced the noes had prevailed. Mr. Barber demanded the yeas and nays and the Chair postponed further proceedings until a time to be announced.”

No instructions from the House, no conference, no conference no conclusion.  What are the differences between the House and Senate versions?

# The House bill specifically bans the use of bonuses for VA employees, while the Senate version does not. The VA has already suspended performance awards of this nature.

# The Senate bill would allow the VA to lease 26 new facilities for veterans’ health care and would allocate $500 million for hiring new staff.  The House version doesn’t contain these provisions.

# The Senate bill provides for guaranteed in-state tuition for veterans at public colleges and universities; the House version of the bill does not.

# The Senate version of the legislation provides for expanding access to care for military sexual assault victims. The House version does not include this provision.  [WaPo]

# The House version assumes a maximum wait time of 14 days, the Senate version could allow up to 30 days. [CBO]

# The CBO analyzed the costs of implementation for securing private health care services when VA service could not be provided

“The Senate bill would require that all privately provided care be implemented through contracts. CBO expects the costs of contracted care to be closer to commercial rates, which are generally higher than Medicare rates. Although such contracts would probably be used under the House bill to cover some care, CBO estimates that the average payment rate under the House bill, including both contractual and non-contractual payments, would be lower than that under the Senate bill.” [CBO]

# The House version would allow direct reimbursement to private facilities, while under the terms of the Senate version as analyzed by the CBO the VA would negotiate contracts with providing facilities.  Thus, the access might be faster under the House version, but with less expense predictability than if the terms of the Senate version were applied.

Unfortunately, the situation is reduced to a battle over money.  The CBO released its appraisal of the costs on June 17, 2014:

House Version: “Based on that preliminary assessment, CBO estimates that implementing sections 2 and 3 of the House bill for that two-year period would have a net cost of about $44 billion over the 2014-2019 period, assuming appropriation of the necessary amounts. That net amount comprises increased costs of about $51 billion for VA, less a reduction of $7 billion in federal spending for Medicare and Medicaid.” […] All told, CBO expects that if the bill was fully implemented, some veterans would ultimately seek additional care that would cost the federal government about $54 billion a year, after accounting for savings to other federal programs.”

New “scoring” from the CBO reduced the figure from the original $54 billion to approximately $30 billion, but the negotiations were still stalled. [Hill]

Conferees from the House have been looking to cover the costs by using discretionary funding, those from the Senate are supporting a mandatory funding formula.  The House sponsor, Rep. Jeff Miller (R-FL), argued: “The Senate wants to throw money at a situation that is not defined, in an amount of money that is not defined. We’re re trying to define the issue and figure out how to pay for it,” Miller said.” [MilTimes]

Miller’s assessment may be overlooking the differences in the cost predictability between the provisions for paying private entities for health care services for veterans.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) expressed his impatience with the protracted timeline of the conferencing, “We’re having a little trouble getting the House to help us complete the conference,” Reid said.. “You know … just because we want something done when we’re in conference doesn’t mean it gets done.” [The Hill]

In the mean time — proceedings are postponed.

Pushing Their Buttons: Then and Now

Watching the Republicans marching carefully in the footprints of their fore-bearers makes for interesting television, and bad governance.   It doesn’t appear to matter to the Anti-New Dealers still among us that Social Security (and cuts thereto) is the Third Rail of American politics, and it’s instructive that the Tea Party Lady held up her sign reading: “Keep the Government Out of My Medicare.”    Their logic is simplicity itself: If it’s about the collective welfare of the United States and its citizens it’s Socialism.  If it’s Socialism then it must be Anti-American.

100% Americanism

Return with us now to the Red Scare — not the McCarthy Era, the first Red Scare.  The groundwork was laid by George Creel, President Wilson’s chairman of the United States Committee on Public Information, who was tasked with encouraging a reluctant nation into World War I.  [PBS] Americans were listening to the Four Minute Men in their movie theaters, some 7,555,190 speeches between April 1917 and November 1918.  They read some 6,000 press releases, and perhaps saw about 200,000 slide shows.  [SW] The Chambers of Commerce were recruited to help distribute the materials, as well as the Boy Scouts and various fraternal societies.  All the speeches, press releases, periodicals, and propagandizing had one point: Hate The Hun.

And then the war ended.  The Russian regime crumbled, and the Communists installed a new government. In the U.S. returning soldiers had trouble finding work, farmers who had been encouraged to plant fence to fence during the war found themselves with surplus crops and declining prices.   During this unstable period Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. and other interested officers formed the American Legion at the “Paris Caucus.” Subsequent organization of the modern version of the Grand Army of the Republic, lead to the adoption of its promotion of 100% Americanism at its 1919 convention.  The events in Centralia, Washington, November 1919, helped change the conversation.

The Centralia American Legion organized a parade for Armistice Day 1919, while members of the IWW worried that their headquarters were going to be raided, as had been the case with other IWW offices since August 1917.  There continues to be controversy about who shot first, who shot whom, and why anyone was shooting at all, but the result was that four people were dead, and the American Legion’s notion of 100% Americanism was attached in popular imagination with anti-IWW sentiment.  In this milieu it didn’t take too much imagination to substitute “Bolsheviks” for “Huns,” and associate Labor with Bolsheviks.  1920 was a turbulent time, with Red Hunting Results:

As a result of the strikes and unrest, the strikers were branded as “Reds” and as being unpatriotic.  Fear of strikes leading to a Communist revolution spread throughout the country.   Hysteria took hold.  “Red hunting” became the national obsession.  Colleges were deemed to be hotbeds of Bolshevism, and professors were labeled as radicals.  The hunt reached down to public secondary schools where many teachers were fired for current or prior membership in even the most mildly of leftist organizations. [UMKC]

That some opinion leaders tried to differentiate between socialism and communism didn’t substantially alter the ideological landscape or still some of the more radical rhetoric.   Anarchy, socialism, communism, even support for organized labor was “Left” and bad, conservatism and the “Right” was 100% American.

Fast forward to the late 20th century, after the enactment of Social Security and Medicare, and we have Rand Paul, then of  Kentucky Taxpayers United, explaining why Social Security is a Ponzi Scheme and Medicare is … (you guessed it) … Socialism. [TPM]

Privatization

Since there are 57,469,232 Social Security beneficiaries as of June 2013, of whom 40,298,999 are retired persons, 6,216,500 are survivors, and 10,953,733 are disabled individuals and their dependents [SSA] it’s no longer politically expedient to speak of repealing Social Security.   The modern opponents instead talk about privatizing the system.  Their “free market” solution to a non-existent problem involves transforming the Social Security program into “private individual accounts” to be invested in Wall Street.   Failing that, the opponents would like very much to have access to the Special Issue securities, which are held in the Social Security Trust Funds and are currently not available to the public.

The last serious attempt at Privatization came in President George W. Bush’s February 5, 2005 State of the Union speech the details of which changed as the President was buffeted by political winds.  The final gasps included private accounts, reduced benefits, clawback provisions, and limited investment in unspecified index funds. [CAP] By the end of 2005 the President’s proposal was DOA.   In fact, as of March 2005 about 58% of our “100% Americans” were opposed to the proposal.  [WaPo]

The privatization of Medicare isn’t meeting with much more enthusiasm, polling conducted in 2011  found 58% of Americans opposed the GOP plan to replace the Medicare program with private health policies for seniors  subsidized with coupons from the federal government.  [TPR]

In short, when faced with a choice of privatization or the “socialism” of the Social Security and Medicare, the American public prefers a little “socialism” in its political mix.

And now we come to the third button.

Republicans did a good job of associating the provisions of the “Obamacare” law with socialism, but perhaps not so much when the actual name of the law is put forward.  A Kaiser Family Foundation tracking poll in March 2013 found a majority favorable rating for the major elements of the Affordable Care Act, except for the individual mandate.   In short, people liked the tax credits for small business owners, closing the infamous dough-nut hole in Medicare Part D, creating insurance exchanges or marketplaces, extending coverage for dependents, subsidy assistance for those purchasing health care insurance, expanding Medicaid, etc… they liked the parts but not the demagogued whole.

The irony is that a minority in the House of Representatives, still held in thrall by the antiquated sloganeering of the early 20th century anti-Left siren songs, could bring down the economic system they purport to espouse — turning their paeans into a eulogy for the free market system.

Hostage Takers

I’ve almost lost count, but today the House of Representatives will vote for the  42nd or 43rd time to repeal the Affordable Care Act.   On this occasion the hostage is the national debt ceiling — a singularly inappropriate captive.

The Hostage

The conservative rejoinder is that the failure to raise the debt ceiling merely puts the brakes to any additional government borrowing. [WSJ] We could, argue the apologists for Congressional hostage taking, pay for our debt service with current revenues.  Uh, that would be “no:” the debt limit simply allows the Treasury to borrow the funds to finance spending that past Congresses and presidents already have undertaken.  In other words, it has no impact on future spending or taxes.” [TDB]  The Council on Foreign Relations replies:

“The government must be able to issue new debt as long as it continues to run a budget deficit. The debt limit, or “ceiling,” sets the maximum amount of outstanding federal debt the U.S. government can incur by law. As of January 2013, this number stands at $16.39 trillion. Increasing the debt limit does not enlarge the nation’s financial commitments, but allows the government to fund obligations already legislated by Congress.”

and this does have consequences:

“Many analysts say congressional gridlock over the debt limit will likely sow significant uncertainty in the bond markets and place upward pressure on interest rates. Rate increases would not only hike future borrowing costs of the federal government, but would also raise capital costs for struggling U.S. businesses and cash-strapped homebuyers. In addition, rising rates could divert future taxpayer money away from much-needed federal investments in such areas as infrastructure, education, and health care.” [CFR]

The Ransom Note

The Republicans would like very much to halt the full implementation of the Affordable Care Act — before people decide they like it.  They already like it if it’s called the Affordable Care Act.  Polling indicates the public likes the major provisions of the law when specific questions are asked.  [113C2013] [TP/Gallup] [Gallup] [NPR] [WaPo]

However, that’s not the only message in the ransom note — there’s the controversial Keystone Pipeline added to the mix, to transport oil from Canada to international port facilities in Texas.  [TheHill]

The Hostage Takers

While superficially this looks like the Republicans vs. the Democrats, or the House Republicans vs. the President, the battle is between segments of the GOP, and  might be better observed as comedian John Fugelsang quipped: “It’s Syria and Iraq shoved in a Cuisinart.”

The right wing of the GOP faces off with Speaker John Boehner, Boehner faces off with his pragmatic cohorts; Senator Cruz (R-Alberta) faces off with Senator Harry Reid, and his House colleagues are beside themselves…

The Tea Party Republicans will throw their latest tantrum, it will do nothing and go nowhere, except toward creating the very “uncertainty” in the markets they so often decry.

The Campaign for the Middle Class Isn’t Over

The candidates are no longer running ads, the campaigns have been shut down, BUT the campaign for the American Middle Class continues.  The next phase comes as the Congress debates how to reduce the national debt — brought to us by two wars fought “off the books,” ill considered tax rate reductions, and a nasty recession.  If the American Middle Class is to avoid the detonation of the Austerity Bomb (aka the Fiscal Cliff) then we need to:

(1) Let our Senators and Representatives know that without an increase in the tax rates for millionaires and billionaires the ARITHMETIC necessary to reduce the national debt doesn’t add up.

(2) Remind our Senators and Representatives that federal discretionary spending has already been cut by $840 billion to $916 billion over the next ten years [QS] in the Budget Control Act of 2011.

(3) Let our Senators and Representatives know that we understand merely closing a few loopholes in the tax code isn’t nearly enough to make a serious dent in the national debt.  If they are serious about debt reduction then “increasing revenues” can’t be a code phrase for “tinkering with deductions and loopholes.”

If millionaires and billionaires don’t want a national debt passed along to their children and grandchildren — it just might behoove them to help pay off some of it.