The Ultimate Reality TV Program- Running for US President

Over the past few months, I've had discussions with numerous acquaintances about the current Presidential campaigns and race.

Some of them, like me, enjoy the free comedy and sheer craziness of this race. Others bemoan the continued exposure of Americans to ceaseless campaigning.

It was in the midst of a discussion about this with an acquaintance the other day that I realized the truth.

The modern Presidential race has become the ultimate in reality television.

Where else can you find more people publicly humiliating themselves, sacrificing more privacy, subjecting themselves to more investigation, by more people, for a longer time?

Truly, our Presidential campaigners display an ability to scrape, bow and grovel for the ultimate prize in a manner that surpasses the most disgusting prime-time reality television series.

And you know what? I think that's great.

As I noted in this recent post, it's questionable that Bill Clinton could get elected in 2008. When he ran sixteen years ago, the mostly-liberal press and media could be counted on to sweep embarrassments like Jennifer Flowers off of the front pages and news hours in short order. Once vanished from the major media, those stories had nowhere to go, and died.

Now, they live on via cable news networks, YouTube and a cornucopia of political blogs.

Not only do I enjoy the marathon campaign this time around. I think it redounds to America's lasting benefit.

With time and numerous investigators probing every detail of the candidates' claims, positions, and prior records, we learn much more about the candidates than they ever intended.

As Jefferson preferred, an ultimate free press is proving the undoing of liars and poseurs who would be President.

Hooray for the internet and unbridled, free media in America- especially during campaign seasons!

What Obama & The Liberals Don't "Get" About The Situation with His Minister

The recent firestorm involving Obama's (hastily retired) church minister who was seen on DVD excoriating whites and the US has been completely misunderstood by liberals and, most notably, the candidate himself.

It's not about the minister. It is about how Obama reacted, or did not react, over the 20 year period.


Various liberal pundits keep dredging up Jerry Fallwell, Pat Robertson or Billy Graham in order to defend Jeremiah Wright. I've seen Alan Colmes, the not-too-bright foil for Fox News' Sean Hannity, squawk about these white ministers several times now whenever Jeremiah Wright is the subject of discussion.

What Colmes, and his ilk, don't grasp is that Americans are not as concerned about what Wright did or said. They know where he stands, what he said and what he did.


It's Obama whose judgment people now question.


See the difference?


In all of Obama's attempts to make this issue go away, he has yet to provide a convincing explanation for his judgment and inaction.


He briefly touched on it in his "race" speech, veiling his inaction behind a generic reference to others not leaving their church just because they had a minor difference of opinion with 'something' that their minister said.


On The View last week, he ducked the issue entirely, putting so many conditions in the way, at Barbara Walters' behest, that his reply became totally absurd and silly.

But what Amercians wonder is this- is Obama insensitive to racist speak and actions?

Is the Senator who helped drive Don Imus from the air waves last year for one show in which racist words were uttered going to do nothing while his own minister rails against whites and the US over the course of twenty years?

Is this an example of the judgment Obama will use if elected President?

Wright will be who he is, and Obama is not responsible for him.

Obama is responsible for his own actions and reactions to Wright's racist and anti-American speech.

If I had just one question to ask Obama, it would be this:

How do you reconcile your hounding Don Imus off the air for a limited amount of admittedly racist comments, yet have no explanation for your tolerance and accommodation of your minister's racist remarks over two decades- remarks of which you admit you were aware?

We're not questioning the character of Obama's minister, per se. We're questioning Obama's judgment and choice of advisers.

Could Bill Clinton Get Elected Today?

No, he could not.


Think about what happened to Obama and Hillary last month.

Obama's minister resurfaced in a big way, derailing his campaign for most of the month. And it's not over yet.

Then Hillary got caught in a clear, calculated, obvious lie regarding being 'under sniper fire' and 'running for the vehicles' on the tarmac in Bosnia. Too bad video existed depicting her slowly exiting the plane, stopping to accept flowers from a local girl, and then lazily reviewing the US troops gathered for the occasion.

As the Wall Street Journal's Danieal Henninger noted several weeks ago, now the existence of YouTube and cable news channels assures that gaffes like these never die. They are hung, suspended electronically on the internet, for all time.

Bloggers like me write about them. Others link to the videos or the news stories. It never ends.

In this environment, how would Slick Willie ever have successfully scuttled the Jennifer Flowers story for the duration of the campaign? Or the several other bimbos from his past? The woman who alleged he raped her while he was Governor in Arkansas?

Or Hillary's improbably cattle futures profits with "Red" Bone, her broker? And the budding Whitewater scandals?

If he had managed to make it to the Oval Office, scandals like Vince Foster's suicide/murder, Travelgate and the infamous Hillary Healthcare Task Force would have lived on to dog him as he suffered impeachment during his second election campaign.

Truly, modern communications have changed Presidential campaigns drastically, and forever. Candidates like both Clintons, and, evidently, Obama, who depend upon fresh media news cycles to hide their most recent scandal or major embarrassing incident or relationship, are out of luck.

On the internet, in the hands of unpaid, but not uninterested bloggers, fact-checkers and self-appointed critics, these stories never go away. Ever.

Welcome to 2008's gift to the ever-changing world of US Presidential election campaigns.

On The Effects Of Direct Election of Senators

A few months ago, I accidentally happened onto this topic in a discussion with a friend of mine. I was reflecting on why it seems the norm that US Senators are, for the most part, inactive windbags. They rarely are capable of solo actions, but spend a lot of time talking, per the chamber's rather fusty old rules.

The other day, I finally remembered that I wanted to research how and why Senators became directly elected. And precisely how they were indirectly elected prior to the 17th amendment.

If you go to this page on the Senate website, you can read about how Senators were originally elected, per the Founding Fathers' intentions.

As the page notes,

"They decided that state legislatures should select senators, without any involvement by the House of Representatives. The state legislatures, they argued, would provide the necessary "filtration" to produce better senators—the elect of the elected. The framers hoped that this arrangement would give state political leaders a sense of participation, calming their fears about the dangers of a strong centralized government. The advantage of this plan, they believed, was that all laws would be passed by a "dual constituency" composed of a body elected directly by the people (or at least the white males entitled to vote) and one chosen by the elected legislators of individual states.

After several decades, as service in the Senate became more highly prized and political parties gained wider influence in directing state legislative operations, this system of indirect election began to break down. When separate parties controlled a legislature's two houses, deadlocks frequently deprived states of their full Senate representation.

A plan for direct popular election lingered for decades. Finally, a campaign to make governmental institutions more responsive to the people propelled the measure to ratification in 1913 as the Constitution's Seventeenth Amendment. "

Just reflecting on the original mechanism for Senate election, it's easy to see how differently Senators prior to 1913 would behave, as opposed to modern Senators. Senators chosen by their state's political party leaders would almost of necessity be committed to the welfare of their state over their own career. Because they didn't really 'run' for the office, fund-raising, politicking as it is currently understood, and the appeal to voters' baser motivations probably didn't occur as they do today.

I can imagine Senators of that day truly behaving as the Constitution's architects intended, worrying less about their seat than carefully addressing major issues to the benefit of the country and their state.

For another opinion on the direct election via the 17th Amendment you can read this webpage,
from which this passage is taken,

"The Seventeenth Amendment has dramatically reshaped the structure of the Senate.... The indirect election of Senators under the original constitution was designed to give Senators a degree of quality and independence from politics that is absent today.... to my mind this increased politicization of the Senate tends to make the Senate less, rather than more, equipped to responsibly and competently carry out the advice and consent powers given to it under the Constitution.

I think it is an open question as to whether the Framers would have entrusted the advice and consent power to the Senate in the same manner had they known that eventually Senators would be elected directly by the people in partisan elections, and as a result, the nature and tenor of the confirmation process would deviate so dramatically from what was originally anticipated.

I would say the same thing about Senate trial on Impeachment. When the Framers entrusted to the Senate the power to conduct trials regarding impeachment, they anticipated that the indirect election of Senators by state legislatures would tend to elevate to the Senate individuals largely independent of political pressures and selected based on their distinction, rather than politics. One can see how with that anticipation the Framers could imagine the Senate sitting as a sort of jury weighing the evidence on the impeachment of a public official.... The performance of the Senate during the Clinton impeachment showed the way in which impeachment is now an extension of politics, rather than the Senate sitting as a sort of sober jury, relatively independent of political pressures."


I agree with this writer. Three of this year's Presidential contenders, Obama, Hillary and Edwards, would probably never have even become Senators under the indirect election process. Much of today's partisan bitterness, which seems to have begun to gain ground in the 1970s, would probably be absent.

It may sound odd, but I believe we'd be taking a big step forward if we repealed the 17th amendment and returned to party appointment/election, via the state legislatures, of US Senators.

More Wrong Economic Thinking By Liberal Democrats About US Incomes Inequality- Myth #2a

In the past few months, I have written three pieces on economic myths. Two of them are relevant to today's post appeared here and here. Those two posts discuss, respectively, US income inequality myths, and US income mobility.

On March 10th of this year, Brad Schiller, a professor of economics at American University, wrote the editorial "The Inequality Myth," published in the Wall Street Journal.

The occasion was the publication of the annual release of census date on US incomes. As usual, the initial headlines focused on simplistic and misleading 'findings,' as Schiller wrote,

"Two observations grabbed the headlines. First, the data indicate that the top-earning 20% of households get half of all the income generated in the country, while the lowest-earning 20% of households get a meager 3.4%. That disparity has widened over time: In 1970, their respective shares were 43.3% and 4.1%. These income-share numbers buttress the popular notion that the "rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer."

The second observation in the Census reports relates to the well-being of the middle class. The median household income in 2006 was $48,201, just a trifle ahead of its 1998 level ($48,034). That seems to confirm middle-class stagnation."

So far, so good for liberal politicians, especially those running for President, right? But Schiller then notes,

"While there is some substance to these fears of widening inequality and middle-class stagnation, the situation is not nearly as clear-cut. Demographic changes in the size and composition of U.S. households have distorted the statistics in important ways."

Schiller deals with the first 'finding' as follows,

"First, we can easily dismiss the notion that the poor are getting poorer. All the Census Bureau tells us is that the share of the pie consumed by the poor has been shrinking (to 3.4% in 2006 from 4.1% in 1970). But the "pie" has grown enormously. This year's real GDP of $14 trillion is three times that of 1970. So the absolute size of the slice received by the bottom 20% has increased to $476 billion from $181 billion. Allowing for population growth shows that the average income of people at the bottom of the income distribution has risen 36%.

They're not rich, but they're certainly not poorer. In reality, economic growth has raised incomes across the board."

So politicians critical of current US economic health only focus on the raw percentages of incomes by quintile, and pronounce the economy 'less equal.' But Schiller clearly demonstrates that this is simply not so. That, in fact, the economic growth of the US economy has lifted the lowest quintile's average income 36%.

Then Schiller turns to the second issues, household composition. He wrote,

"The "typical" household, however, keeps changing. Since 1970 there has been a dramatic rise in divorced, never-married and single-person households. Back in 1970, the married Ozzie and Harriet family was the norm: 71% of all U.S. households were two-parent families. Now the ratio is only 51%. In the process of this social revolution, the average household size has shrunk to 2.57 persons from 3.14 -- a drop of 18%. The meaning? Even a "stagnant" average household income implies a higher standard of living for the average household member.

Last year, the Census Bureau published a new set of income statistics that adjusted for changing household size and composition. In a single year (2006), this "equivalence-adjusted" computation increased the income share of the poor by 8% and reduced the standard measure of inequality (Gini coefficient) by 4%. Such "equivalency" adjustments would mute unadjusted inequality trends even more.

A closer look at household trends reveals that the percentage of one-person households has jumped to 27% from 17%. That's right: More than one out of four U.S. households now has only one occupant. Who are these people? Overwhelmingly, they are Generation Xers whose good jobs and high pay have permitted them to move out of their parental homes and establish their own residences. The rest are largely seniors who have enough savings and income to escape from their grandchildren and enjoy the serenity of an independent household. Both transitions are evidence of rising affluence, not increasing hardship. Yet this splintering of the extended family exerts strong downward statistical pressure on the average income of U.S. households. Had the Generation Xers and their affluent grandparents all stayed under the same roof the average household income would be higher, but most of us would be worse off."

Schiller again demonstrates how the simple results of the latest census data can be very misleading. Because household size has, on average, shrunk, income/person has risen within each household. That is, more households means a lower income/household, the basic census measure, while the actual income/person has risen, when household size is factored in.

Addressing income mobility, Schiller writes,

"The supposed decline of the poor and middle class is exaggerated even more by the dynamics of population growth. When people look at the "poor" in any two years, they think they're looking at the same people. That's rarely true, especially over longer periods of time."

This is, of course, the companion wrong economic thinking that liberal politicians such as Hillary and Obama and, most prominently, John Edwards spout. They look at supposed increase in income inequality, and then marry that with the supposition that the same people reside in the same income quintiles over time, and deduce that Americans are experiencing flat or falling incomes.

On this topic, Schiller points out,

"Since 1998, the U.S. population has increased by over 20 million. Nearly half of that growth has come from immigration, legal and illegal. Overwhelmingly, these immigrants enter at the lowest rungs on the income ladder. Statistically, this immigrant surge not only reduces the income of the "average" household, but also changes the occupants of the lowest income classes.

To understand what's happening here, envision a line of people queued up for March Madness tickets. Individuals move up the line as tickets are purchased. But new people keep coming. So the line never gets shorter, even though individuals are advancing.

Something similar happens with the distribution of income. People keep entering the distribution line from the bottom. Even though individuals are moving up the line, the middle of the line never seems to move. Hence, an unchanged -- or even receding -- median marker could co-exist with individual advancement. The people who were at the middle marker before have moved up the distribution line. This is the kind of income mobility that has long characterized U.S. income dynamics."

That last paragraph bears rereading. The median may remain static, but who is at the median changes quite a bit in America on an annual basis. Then Schiller delivers a mathematical coup de grace by noting,

"When you look at the really big picture, it's apparent that living standards are rising across the entire spectrum of incomes. Just since 2000, GDP has risen by 18% while the population has grown by 6%. So per capita incomes have clearly been rising. The growth of per capita income since 1980 or 1970 has simply been spectacular.

Some people would have you believe that all of this added income was funneled to the rich. But the math doesn't work out.

The increase in nominal GDP since 2000 amounts to over $4 trillion annually. If you assume that all that money went to the wealthiest 10% of U.S. households, that bonanza would come to a whopping $350,000 per household. Yet according to the Census Bureau, the top 10% of households has an average income of $200,000 or so. The implied bonanza is so absurd that the notion that only the rich have gained from the economic growth can be dismissed out of hand. Clearly, there is a lot of economic advancement across a broad swath of population. Dramatic changes in household composition, household size and immigration tend to obscure this reality."

Schiller concludes on this note,

"More Americans own homes and new cars today than ever before, despite slowdowns in both industries. Laptop computers, iPhones and flat-panel TVs are fast becoming necessities rather than luxury items.

The average American household is doing pretty well. The evident gap between income realities and political rhetoric may help explain why the "two Americas" theme, first asserted by John Edwards and since echoed by Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama, may ultimately fail to resonate with voters. On Election Day, voters may well turn to the candidate with the greater focus on a strong economy that increases everyone's income."

So, ask yourself this. If most Americans have actually moved up in incomes and quintiles over time, they don't actually experience what the headline conclusions that the Democratic candidates- Hillary, Obama and Edwards- claim to be largely true.

If only those actually experiencing an income effect that equates with the Democrats will vote for them, and those are shown to be rather few in number, by dint of Mr. Schiller's thorough and excellent analysis, does that not suggest that most people, even in, say, the third and second income quintiles, won't vote for those candidates? Because they maintain a view of US incomes (im)mobility and inequality that simply won't resonate as valid with most voters?