Peggy Noonan's weekend Wall Street Journal editorial is largely about the Wednesday evening CNBC GOP candidates' event. I wrote my initial reactions about the event here.
Noonan begins with a humorous send up of manic, maniacal Jim Cramer's performance, as well as Maria Bartiromo's. On these we agree. She then meanders through the rest of her half-page piece to arrive at two succinct paragraphs,
"Republicans should sober up. They should be thinking not about what the Republican at the local GOP meeting is thinking, but what the independent across the street is thinking. He's catching the Cain story on TV and thinking: "This guy may have a problem. I want more evidence, but if it's true, then man, we don't need to go there again."
That independent is a pretty important guy. The GOP better start doing a better job of considering how he sees things. He doesn't live in Republo-world, but he's right across the street, and he votes. He's going to pick the next president."
Which is exactly what I've been contending for many months. Only I would go, and have gone, further. I think the GOP should be making sure, if among the publicly-available polls, none does this, of providing timely poll numbers, before each major primary event for the major candidates, for independents' preferences among the GOP candidates.
That's all that will matter, so there's really no point being concerned about who registered Republicans favor. With only about 25% of the voting public registered with a major party, that leaves the 50-60% of independents as far more important than the registered Republicans will be in electing a president next year.
I endorsed Cain prior the recent sexual harassment allegations. But the truth is, no matter who I'd like to see nominated by the GOP, I'll vote for the candidate on the ballot who has the highest poll numbers among independents, assuming I can learn who that is by the day of my state's primary election.
If by referring to "the GOP better start doing a better job of considering how he (independents) see things," Noonan means party officials, she's being opaque. She should explicitly counsel the RNC to publicize the GOP candidates' poll numbers among independents and make a better case to GOP voters about this important strategy for nominating a winning candidate next year.
If she means GOP voters, she's probably right. I don't know if enough Republicans realize what I have long held, and Noonan has now belatedly also come to see.
But it is critical. I tell every Republican I know about this approach to voting for a nominee. It's the only way the party will retake the White House next year.
Showing posts with label Noonan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Noonan. Show all posts
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Friday, November 4, 2011
Paul Ryan On Crony Capitalism
At the end of a predictably dull and meandering column in last weekend's edition of the Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan launched into an attack on crony capitalism.
She began by fingering Franklin Raines and James Johnson for having taken advantage of Fannie's and Freddie's GSE status to reap outsized bonuses while wrecking the companies and leaving them to be seized by the government at a cost to taxpayers of some $140B.
Next, Noonan mentions Paul Ryan as having the good sense to identify, in a speech at the Heritage Foundation, such crony capitalism as what occurred at the GSEs.
He railed against 'corporate welfare,' which is an accurate charge.
Perhaps his most concise line, as recounted by Noonan, was this one,
"The 'true sources of inequity in this country are the corporate welfare that enriches the powerful, and empty promises that betray the powerless. The real class warfare that threatens us is 'a class of bureaucrats and connected crony capitalists trying to rise above the rest of us, call the shots, rig the rules, and preserve their place atop society.' "
Noonan concluded her piece opining,
"If more Republicans thought- and spoke- like this, the party would flourish. People would be less fearful for the future. And Mr. Obama wouldn't be seeing his numbers go up."
She's right. Thus my anger at recent news concerning my own Congressman, Leonard Lance's involvement in another bid to give more power to Fannie.
Ryan's remarks explain why those who consider themselves of common interest with the Tea Party, like me, grow disgusted with even elected Republicans. In my state, the GOP is far more liberal than it is further west. My own Representative clearly embodies that against which Paul Ryan rails.
I wonder if Ryan even acknowledges Lance and, if so, what he thinks of my Congressman.
Ryan's clear speaking and thinking suggest he could, if he has the stomach for it, eventually occupy the Oval Office. He has the sensibilities and intellect to get there. But the rest of what is required to be elected, including the sort of character assassination being visited upon Herman Cain this week by anonymous parties, could be too much for the Wisconsin Representative.
She began by fingering Franklin Raines and James Johnson for having taken advantage of Fannie's and Freddie's GSE status to reap outsized bonuses while wrecking the companies and leaving them to be seized by the government at a cost to taxpayers of some $140B.
Next, Noonan mentions Paul Ryan as having the good sense to identify, in a speech at the Heritage Foundation, such crony capitalism as what occurred at the GSEs.
He railed against 'corporate welfare,' which is an accurate charge.
Perhaps his most concise line, as recounted by Noonan, was this one,
"The 'true sources of inequity in this country are the corporate welfare that enriches the powerful, and empty promises that betray the powerless. The real class warfare that threatens us is 'a class of bureaucrats and connected crony capitalists trying to rise above the rest of us, call the shots, rig the rules, and preserve their place atop society.' "
Noonan concluded her piece opining,
"If more Republicans thought- and spoke- like this, the party would flourish. People would be less fearful for the future. And Mr. Obama wouldn't be seeing his numbers go up."
She's right. Thus my anger at recent news concerning my own Congressman, Leonard Lance's involvement in another bid to give more power to Fannie.
Ryan's remarks explain why those who consider themselves of common interest with the Tea Party, like me, grow disgusted with even elected Republicans. In my state, the GOP is far more liberal than it is further west. My own Representative clearly embodies that against which Paul Ryan rails.
I wonder if Ryan even acknowledges Lance and, if so, what he thinks of my Congressman.
Ryan's clear speaking and thinking suggest he could, if he has the stomach for it, eventually occupy the Oval Office. He has the sensibilities and intellect to get there. But the rest of what is required to be elected, including the sort of character assassination being visited upon Herman Cain this week by anonymous parties, could be too much for the Wisconsin Representative.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Peggy Noonan Commenting On GOP Presidential Events
I was a bit horrified to read Peggy Noonan's weekend Wall Street Journal piece extolling the combative faux-debates in which GOP presidential candidates have been attacking each other.
Noonan seems oblivious to the damage these sessions do to all the candidates, and the ammunition they provide to Wonderboy's campaign staffers.
As I noted in my prior post, the RNC should have gotten out in front of this disturbing and destructive trend back in the spring of this year. As so-called debates, which really are not any such thing, have become the new political reality television entertainment, and only the GOP is playing, the potential for lasting damage to the party's eventual nominee is huge.
Let's be clear- what's really important is for the GOP nominee to win independent and, in the case of Herman Cain, black votes. To dwell on the attacks of 8 or 9 candidates, representing less than 10 votes, on each other, is to miss the point. The RNC should be soliciting networks to provide formats in which independent and registered Republicans can directly question the candidates. Those millions of votes are what count- not the opinions of other candidates.
Focusing on having candidates tear each other apart is a thinly-veiled insult to voters' intelligence, because it suggests that those voters don't know what is important to themselves, nor how to examine each candidate's positions.
I don't know what Noonan was thinking when she wrote that post. Her old boss, Ronald Reagan, would, it seems, have not approved.
Noonan seems oblivious to the damage these sessions do to all the candidates, and the ammunition they provide to Wonderboy's campaign staffers.
As I noted in my prior post, the RNC should have gotten out in front of this disturbing and destructive trend back in the spring of this year. As so-called debates, which really are not any such thing, have become the new political reality television entertainment, and only the GOP is playing, the potential for lasting damage to the party's eventual nominee is huge.
Let's be clear- what's really important is for the GOP nominee to win independent and, in the case of Herman Cain, black votes. To dwell on the attacks of 8 or 9 candidates, representing less than 10 votes, on each other, is to miss the point. The RNC should be soliciting networks to provide formats in which independent and registered Republicans can directly question the candidates. Those millions of votes are what count- not the opinions of other candidates.
Focusing on having candidates tear each other apart is a thinly-veiled insult to voters' intelligence, because it suggests that those voters don't know what is important to themselves, nor how to examine each candidate's positions.
I don't know what Noonan was thinking when she wrote that post. Her old boss, Ronald Reagan, would, it seems, have not approved.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
More Handwringing by Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal
Peggy Noonan was in rare, full whiny form last Sunday in her Wall Street Journal weekend column. Here are some passages from the piece,
"What I'm seeing is a new convergence of thought among Democrats and Republicans who are not in Washington and not part of the political matrix. They are in new agreement about our essential problems and priorities: that the economy comes first, all other crises (in foreign affairs, in our culture) come second, because they cannot be helped without an economy that is healthy and growing. They all agree—no one really argues about this anymore—the government is going bankrupt. They all agree the entitlement system has to be reformed. Heck, they all respect Paul Ryan, for his seriousness. They all want grown-ups to come forward with ideas that maybe each party wouldn't love but that might do the country some good.
That is what I see in every business and professional meeting, in conversations with Democrats and Republicans: a new convergence of thought among the thoughtful.
Which makes this a promising moment. For once everyone knows what time it is. It's not like 2008, '04 and '00, when establishments were polarized.
But here's the most remarkable thing I saw this week. I watched, by computer, two focus groups of so-called Wal-Mart moms—middle- and working-class women who'd shopped at least once the past month at Wal-Marts. The polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, assembled the groups, 10 women in Orlando, Fla., and 10 in Des Moines, Iowa. In Orlando they were mothers in their 20s and 30s; in Des Moines in their 40s and 50s.
In Orlando they were asked to describe in a word or two how things are going in the country. The responses: "Depressing," "different," "discouraged," "sour" and "bad." Any positive words to describe our country right now? Silence. How, asked the moderator, do you see our economic troubles in your life? "I see it every day in my job," one woman said. Two weeks ago her company put up a posting for a position. Two hundred fifty applicants responded, "all overqualified."
Another: "Most houses in my neighborhood are under foreclosure or for sale." Another: "If I had the financial stability I think I'd just get out of here."
They don't say "unemployment," they said "laid off," and they all had stories of a husband, a father, themselves. One woman's husband left her, so she took the kids to live with her parents. Then her father was laid off, then her brother-in-law.
They're all trying to save money however they can—juggling credit cards, couponing, not eating out, no vacations, changing where they shop, buying the cheapest food in bulk. One woman spoke of donating blood. Another said she wasn't raising her boys for college so much as to be "self-sufficient." She was teaching them how to collect aluminum cans.
How does this time compare with a few years ago when the recession started? "I feel like it's getting worse." Were things better for you in 2008? "Oh yeah," they said, heads nodding. What is your immediate fear? "Saving money for Christmas—that we won't be able to buy Christmas presents." "Losing my job. That's my fear every day." "That my parents are going through all their savings."
They all think the government is lying about the jobless numbers. It's worse than the official reports.
Who are the culprits behind our economic calamity? "The banks and the people who took the loans." But more the banks, because they had, as one woman put it, "the authority." When they gave out the loans, people thought "it must have been OK." People were "lured in" by the banks—don't worry, home values will keep going up—which pocketed the fees and kept walking.
People lampoon the Occupy Wall Street movement as a bunch of marginal freaks, but these women from the heart of the country shared a basic resentment: The banks got bailed out, everyone else was left holding the bag.
How do they feel about Mr. Obama? Silence. Then "indifferent," "disappointed," "great speaker." A woman in Iowa said, "Lukewarm." No one railed against him, there was no anger. There was a lot of "He tried." "He hasn't done the stuff that he said he would," said one woman.
Both groups were feistier about Congress. "They're playing a game." "What have they done? They wasted a lot of time." In Iowa the words they used were "Dysfunctional," "sides," "defensive," "childish" and "can't work together." Are Democrats more to blame or the Republicans? "The same," said a woman, and everyone nodded.
What do they want in a political leader? Someone who cares about "Jane Doe on Main Street that can't pay her electric bill." Someone "with passion not for himself but for America."
Do elected officials in Washington know how you live? In Orlando there was a chorus of noes: "They have a bunch of chefs cook for them." "They're more privileged." "They're compensated above and beyond their salaries. They have health care."
Do they care about you? "No, not so much." "They won't care till they're affected."
What do you want Washington to do? From Iowa: "Fix it." "Start looking at the big picture."
What do you want from leaders. From Iowa: "Someone who isn't hollow."
They all said they care about 2012. They all said they'd vote.
We are in a remarkable moment. Everyone understands the stakes. Everyone wants action. From comfortable professionals to people barely scraping by, everyone wants both parties to work together, to think of our country and not themselves.
And of course everyone really gets this except Washington, which says it gets it and doesn't.
But those who think 2012 is just a clash of big parties had better wake up. They think they're pulling and pushing in a tug of war, but they are dancing on the precipice."
What a bunch of treacle.
This January saw the largest incoming group of House freshman in, what, 80 years? Those 80+ new GOP freshman aren't all having their meals cooked for them by personal chefs. Doesn't Noonan know of the Utah GOP Rep who lives in his office? And he's not the only one.
Yes, people are scared. But Noonan, a political veteran, seems unable to exercise her own judgement and explain to her readers that these so-called Wal-Mart women don't seem to distinguish between the GOP House working to cut spending and reduce government interference in the economy, while the Democrats keep trying to spend, tax and regulate even more.
It's not like two children fighting over nothing important. There are very important ideological differences which Representatives like Paul Ryan articulate.
Shame on Peggy for not bothering to point this out.
What these women complain about regarding Congress applies more, I suspect, to multi-term Senators and Representatives, and less to freshmen of either chamber or party. Those recently-elected members of Congress are likely quite attuned to the economic pain of their constituents.
Even Democrats like Ben Nelson and Claire McCaskill are trying to avoid Wonderboy and move to the center in hopes of being re-elected.
I remain firm in my belief that what some see as gridlock is simply the Congressional pendulum of power moving through the bottom of its arc as the liberal Democrats give way to full Senate and House majorities for a decidedly conservative GOP. Perhaps the Oval Office, as well.
Then Republican majorities will do what needs to be done to move the American economy forward again- cut regulation, remove government interference in health care, energy, autos, and more. Reduce uncertainty involving taxes, regulation and other things government does which cause investors to wait rather than invest.
Noonan writes as if Wal-Mart women know it all, and every Congress member is an aloof, wealthy dunce. That every adult who unwisely signed a mortgage loan for more than they could pay is a victim.
Does Peggy honestly think all of the lenders wanted their borrowers to default? Is she no longer capable of providing objective criticism of the greedy behavior of so many Americans who unwisely spent and lived beyond their means?
That's just not so. Much of what we are now witnessing is a last, violent gasp of 80 years of failed liberal Democratic social policies which have bankrupted our nation.
"What I'm seeing is a new convergence of thought among Democrats and Republicans who are not in Washington and not part of the political matrix. They are in new agreement about our essential problems and priorities: that the economy comes first, all other crises (in foreign affairs, in our culture) come second, because they cannot be helped without an economy that is healthy and growing. They all agree—no one really argues about this anymore—the government is going bankrupt. They all agree the entitlement system has to be reformed. Heck, they all respect Paul Ryan, for his seriousness. They all want grown-ups to come forward with ideas that maybe each party wouldn't love but that might do the country some good.
That is what I see in every business and professional meeting, in conversations with Democrats and Republicans: a new convergence of thought among the thoughtful.
Which makes this a promising moment. For once everyone knows what time it is. It's not like 2008, '04 and '00, when establishments were polarized.
But here's the most remarkable thing I saw this week. I watched, by computer, two focus groups of so-called Wal-Mart moms—middle- and working-class women who'd shopped at least once the past month at Wal-Marts. The polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, assembled the groups, 10 women in Orlando, Fla., and 10 in Des Moines, Iowa. In Orlando they were mothers in their 20s and 30s; in Des Moines in their 40s and 50s.
In Orlando they were asked to describe in a word or two how things are going in the country. The responses: "Depressing," "different," "discouraged," "sour" and "bad." Any positive words to describe our country right now? Silence. How, asked the moderator, do you see our economic troubles in your life? "I see it every day in my job," one woman said. Two weeks ago her company put up a posting for a position. Two hundred fifty applicants responded, "all overqualified."
Another: "Most houses in my neighborhood are under foreclosure or for sale." Another: "If I had the financial stability I think I'd just get out of here."
They don't say "unemployment," they said "laid off," and they all had stories of a husband, a father, themselves. One woman's husband left her, so she took the kids to live with her parents. Then her father was laid off, then her brother-in-law.
They're all trying to save money however they can—juggling credit cards, couponing, not eating out, no vacations, changing where they shop, buying the cheapest food in bulk. One woman spoke of donating blood. Another said she wasn't raising her boys for college so much as to be "self-sufficient." She was teaching them how to collect aluminum cans.
How does this time compare with a few years ago when the recession started? "I feel like it's getting worse." Were things better for you in 2008? "Oh yeah," they said, heads nodding. What is your immediate fear? "Saving money for Christmas—that we won't be able to buy Christmas presents." "Losing my job. That's my fear every day." "That my parents are going through all their savings."
They all think the government is lying about the jobless numbers. It's worse than the official reports.
Who are the culprits behind our economic calamity? "The banks and the people who took the loans." But more the banks, because they had, as one woman put it, "the authority." When they gave out the loans, people thought "it must have been OK." People were "lured in" by the banks—don't worry, home values will keep going up—which pocketed the fees and kept walking.
People lampoon the Occupy Wall Street movement as a bunch of marginal freaks, but these women from the heart of the country shared a basic resentment: The banks got bailed out, everyone else was left holding the bag.
How do they feel about Mr. Obama? Silence. Then "indifferent," "disappointed," "great speaker." A woman in Iowa said, "Lukewarm." No one railed against him, there was no anger. There was a lot of "He tried." "He hasn't done the stuff that he said he would," said one woman.
Both groups were feistier about Congress. "They're playing a game." "What have they done? They wasted a lot of time." In Iowa the words they used were "Dysfunctional," "sides," "defensive," "childish" and "can't work together." Are Democrats more to blame or the Republicans? "The same," said a woman, and everyone nodded.
What do they want in a political leader? Someone who cares about "Jane Doe on Main Street that can't pay her electric bill." Someone "with passion not for himself but for America."
Do elected officials in Washington know how you live? In Orlando there was a chorus of noes: "They have a bunch of chefs cook for them." "They're more privileged." "They're compensated above and beyond their salaries. They have health care."
Do they care about you? "No, not so much." "They won't care till they're affected."
What do you want Washington to do? From Iowa: "Fix it." "Start looking at the big picture."
What do you want from leaders. From Iowa: "Someone who isn't hollow."
They all said they care about 2012. They all said they'd vote.
We are in a remarkable moment. Everyone understands the stakes. Everyone wants action. From comfortable professionals to people barely scraping by, everyone wants both parties to work together, to think of our country and not themselves.
And of course everyone really gets this except Washington, which says it gets it and doesn't.
But those who think 2012 is just a clash of big parties had better wake up. They think they're pulling and pushing in a tug of war, but they are dancing on the precipice."
What a bunch of treacle.
This January saw the largest incoming group of House freshman in, what, 80 years? Those 80+ new GOP freshman aren't all having their meals cooked for them by personal chefs. Doesn't Noonan know of the Utah GOP Rep who lives in his office? And he's not the only one.
Yes, people are scared. But Noonan, a political veteran, seems unable to exercise her own judgement and explain to her readers that these so-called Wal-Mart women don't seem to distinguish between the GOP House working to cut spending and reduce government interference in the economy, while the Democrats keep trying to spend, tax and regulate even more.
It's not like two children fighting over nothing important. There are very important ideological differences which Representatives like Paul Ryan articulate.
Shame on Peggy for not bothering to point this out.
What these women complain about regarding Congress applies more, I suspect, to multi-term Senators and Representatives, and less to freshmen of either chamber or party. Those recently-elected members of Congress are likely quite attuned to the economic pain of their constituents.
Even Democrats like Ben Nelson and Claire McCaskill are trying to avoid Wonderboy and move to the center in hopes of being re-elected.
I remain firm in my belief that what some see as gridlock is simply the Congressional pendulum of power moving through the bottom of its arc as the liberal Democrats give way to full Senate and House majorities for a decidedly conservative GOP. Perhaps the Oval Office, as well.
Then Republican majorities will do what needs to be done to move the American economy forward again- cut regulation, remove government interference in health care, energy, autos, and more. Reduce uncertainty involving taxes, regulation and other things government does which cause investors to wait rather than invest.
Noonan writes as if Wal-Mart women know it all, and every Congress member is an aloof, wealthy dunce. That every adult who unwisely signed a mortgage loan for more than they could pay is a victim.
Does Peggy honestly think all of the lenders wanted their borrowers to default? Is she no longer capable of providing objective criticism of the greedy behavior of so many Americans who unwisely spent and lived beyond their means?
That's just not so. Much of what we are now witnessing is a last, violent gasp of 80 years of failed liberal Democratic social policies which have bankrupted our nation.
Monday, September 26, 2011
Regarding Ron Suskind's Confidence Men
Peggy Noonan's column in this past weekend's edition of the Wall Street Journal, entitled Amateur Hour at the White House, began with a reference to Ron Suskind's just-published book, Confidence Men.
She wrote,
"If Mr. Suskind is right, I have been wrong in my critiques of the president's economic policy. None of it was as bad as I said. It was much worse.
The most famous part of the book is the Larry Summers quote that he saw it as a "Home Alone" administration, with no grown-ups in charge. But there's more than that. Most of us remember the president as in a difficult position from day one: two wars and an economic crash, good luck with that. But Mr. Suskind recasts the picture.
He ran meetings as if they were afternoon talk shows. An unnamed adviser says the 2009 stimulus legislation was the result of "poor conceptualizing." Another: "We should have spent more time thinking about where the money was being spent, rather than simply that there was this hole of a certain size in the economy that needed to be filled, so fill it." Well, yes.
The decision to focus on health care was the president's own. It could have been even worse. Some staffers advised him—this was just after the American economy lost almost 600,000 jobs in one month—that he should focus on global warming.
Mr. Suskind's book is controversial, and some of his sources have accused him of misquoting them. The White House says Mr. Suskind talked to too many disgruntled former staffers. But he seems to have talked to a lot of gruntled ones, too. The overarching portrait of chaos, lack of intellectual depth and absence of political wisdom, from a Pulitzer Prize-winning former reporter at this paper, rings true."
It's worse than that. Last week stories ran regarding Anita Dunn and Christine Romer telling Wonderboy that the anti-female bias in the upper echelons of his administration was so bad it could trigger a lawsuit. Dunn denied the stories and claimed Suskind misquoted her.
Imagine how shocked she must have been when the New York Times wrote that Suskind played the tape of the interview and......he stands vindicated.
My question is, how arrogant must Wonderboy have been to allow such access to be granted, such stories to stream out of his White House. And just in time for the election cycle.
I'm not at all sure Noonan is correct in characterizing Summers' comments as the worst. But the coming weeks should bring more interesting tidbits along similar lines.
She wrote,
"If Mr. Suskind is right, I have been wrong in my critiques of the president's economic policy. None of it was as bad as I said. It was much worse.
The most famous part of the book is the Larry Summers quote that he saw it as a "Home Alone" administration, with no grown-ups in charge. But there's more than that. Most of us remember the president as in a difficult position from day one: two wars and an economic crash, good luck with that. But Mr. Suskind recasts the picture.
He ran meetings as if they were afternoon talk shows. An unnamed adviser says the 2009 stimulus legislation was the result of "poor conceptualizing." Another: "We should have spent more time thinking about where the money was being spent, rather than simply that there was this hole of a certain size in the economy that needed to be filled, so fill it." Well, yes.
The decision to focus on health care was the president's own. It could have been even worse. Some staffers advised him—this was just after the American economy lost almost 600,000 jobs in one month—that he should focus on global warming.
Mr. Suskind's book is controversial, and some of his sources have accused him of misquoting them. The White House says Mr. Suskind talked to too many disgruntled former staffers. But he seems to have talked to a lot of gruntled ones, too. The overarching portrait of chaos, lack of intellectual depth and absence of political wisdom, from a Pulitzer Prize-winning former reporter at this paper, rings true."
It's worse than that. Last week stories ran regarding Anita Dunn and Christine Romer telling Wonderboy that the anti-female bias in the upper echelons of his administration was so bad it could trigger a lawsuit. Dunn denied the stories and claimed Suskind misquoted her.
Imagine how shocked she must have been when the New York Times wrote that Suskind played the tape of the interview and......he stands vindicated.
My question is, how arrogant must Wonderboy have been to allow such access to be granted, such stories to stream out of his White House. And just in time for the election cycle.
I'm not at all sure Noonan is correct in characterizing Summers' comments as the worst. But the coming weeks should bring more interesting tidbits along similar lines.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Regarding Peggy Noonan's Latest Drivel
Peggy Noonan's condition, whatever it exactly is, must be worsening. Her column in last weekend's Wall Street Journal seemed to reach a new low in coherence, though it did manage to make some sense at the end.
She lauded the Senate's 'Gang of Six' proposals, nebulous as they are reported to be, writing,
"...but to quickly push it aside would be a real missed opportunity. Those who critique the plan can help it. Its cuts in entitlements and its attempts to reform them are unclear and appear insufficient. If the Senate passed a final proposal along Gang of Six lines, House Republicans would have to make the bill more concrete, more reliable in its mechanisms. And they'd probably have to make deeper cuts...."
And, to quote an old West Virginia-born ATT colleague of mine,
"If a pig had wings it'd be a chicken."
Gee, Peggy, were you taking your nap last week when the House passed its Cut, Cap and Balance bill? Or its detailed Ryan budget a few months ago? Both of which are all you describe, so that the Senate could have merely met in conference with the House to hash out details and pass both.
My point is, the House already did what Noonan suggests, so why would anybody need a less-specific so-called plan from the Senate?
They don't.
Which is why the Gang of Six proposals are worthless. They are a navel-contemplation among six percent of one chamber of Congress, while another 529 Congressional members would like to have a say. Sort of a Super Congress prototype.
Hell, just confine it to the Senate. What about the handful of new GOP Senators like Johnson of Wisconsin, Paul of Kentucky, and Rubio of Florida? Don't you think Tom Coburn and his other two GOP Gang of Three have slighted the former, making them feel useless, having just arrived on a wave of Tea Party passions for spending cuts?
There's something else about the Gang of Six proposal that smacks of arrogance. Even Noonan admitted,
"It could not be turned into specific legislation quickly....Kent Conrad said Thursday morning it could take six months to get it all done and through the appropriate committees."
Then what in God's name is anyone doing considering it in the same timeframe as the debt limit? Aside from being a self-serving distraction for some Senators, it's something that could have been done anytime.
Shame on Conrad and his colleagues for trying to elbow their way onto the debt limit stage with something that has no place there, but could have and should have been more broadly broached in the Senate months ago.
Here's a guy- Conrad- who can't manage to do his job and get a budget through the Senate for over 800 days, but finds time for his little skull sessions with five other Senators so he can grab some valuable media time and attention.
But, after completely misreading the Gang of Six proposals and blowing her coverage of it, Noonan turned around and wrote some sensible things about Wonderboy's disgraceful behavior of the last month or so.
"For the longest time he didn't care about spending, and now he cares about spending. Good, both in terms of policy and for him. But his decision to become engaged has become a decision to dominate, to have his face in front of the television cameras with his news conferences, pronouncements, and what his communications people are probably calling his "ownership" of any final agreement. He's trying to come across as the boss, the indispensable man, the leader. And, of course, the reasonable one.
That's all very nice and part of Political Positioning 101, but at this point it's not helping. He's becoming box-office poison. His numbers are falling. The RealClearPolitics composite job approval poll rating has him down six points since June 2, when the debt-ceiling crisis began. That fall, from 52% to 46%, exactly tracks his heightened media presence and his increased attempts to be seen as dominant. Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, said that if he ran for president today he'd lose, that his job-approval numbers are "worse than they appear," and that he continues to have real trouble with undecided voters.
And if you've watched him lately, you know why. When he speaks on the debt negotiations, he is not only extremely boring, with airy and bromidic language—really they are soul-killing, his talking points—but he never seems to be playing it straight. He always seems to be finagling, playing the angles in some higher game that only he gets. In two and a half years he has reached the point that took George W. Bush five years to reach: People aren't listening anymore.
The other day he announced the Gang of Six agreement with words that enveloped the plan in his poisonous embrace: "I wanted to give folks a quick update on the progress that we're making." We're. He has "continued to urge both Democrats and Republicans to come together." What would those little devils do without Papa? "The good news is that today a group of senators . . . put forward a proposal that is broadly consistent with the approach that I've urged." I've urged. Me, me, me.
That approach includes "shared sacrifice, and everybody is giving up something." He was like a mother coming in and cheerily announcing: "Dinner's served! Less for everybody!"
We're trying to begin a comeback, not a famine. We're trying to take actions that will allow us to grow.
He's like a walking headache. He's probably triggering Michele Bachmann's migraines.
The Gang of Six members themselves should have been given the stage to make their own announcement, and their own best case.
The president, if he is seriously trying to avert a debt crisis, should stay in his office, meet with members, and work the phones, all with a new humility, which would be well received. It is odd how he patronizes those with more experience and depth in national affairs.
He should keep his face off TV. He should encourage, cajole, work things through, be serious, get a responsible deal, and then re-emerge with joy and the look of a winner as he jointly announces it to the nation. Then his people should leak that he got what he wanted, the best possible deal, and the left has no idea the ruin he averted and the thanks they owe him.
For now, for his sake and the sake of an ultimate plan, he should choose Strategic Silence."
I like how Noonan was so blunt about how Wonderboy tries to focus everything on himself, as if he's the parent of a bunch of recalcitrant, wayward children. In fact, people like Paul Ryan have more time in Congress than Wonderboy had before he ran for his current office. In the two years prior to this job, he essentially voted 'present' in the Senate while preparing to run for the White House.
He is the least-experienced guy among 536 elected federal officials ostensibly trying to do something.
Chances are, if he would just shut up and stay off camera, the Congressional leaders and their troops could get something passed, then just shove it down the First Rookie's throat and tell him to sign it or don't bother campaigning for another term.
She lauded the Senate's 'Gang of Six' proposals, nebulous as they are reported to be, writing,
"...but to quickly push it aside would be a real missed opportunity. Those who critique the plan can help it. Its cuts in entitlements and its attempts to reform them are unclear and appear insufficient. If the Senate passed a final proposal along Gang of Six lines, House Republicans would have to make the bill more concrete, more reliable in its mechanisms. And they'd probably have to make deeper cuts...."
And, to quote an old West Virginia-born ATT colleague of mine,
"If a pig had wings it'd be a chicken."
Gee, Peggy, were you taking your nap last week when the House passed its Cut, Cap and Balance bill? Or its detailed Ryan budget a few months ago? Both of which are all you describe, so that the Senate could have merely met in conference with the House to hash out details and pass both.
My point is, the House already did what Noonan suggests, so why would anybody need a less-specific so-called plan from the Senate?
They don't.
Which is why the Gang of Six proposals are worthless. They are a navel-contemplation among six percent of one chamber of Congress, while another 529 Congressional members would like to have a say. Sort of a Super Congress prototype.
Hell, just confine it to the Senate. What about the handful of new GOP Senators like Johnson of Wisconsin, Paul of Kentucky, and Rubio of Florida? Don't you think Tom Coburn and his other two GOP Gang of Three have slighted the former, making them feel useless, having just arrived on a wave of Tea Party passions for spending cuts?
There's something else about the Gang of Six proposal that smacks of arrogance. Even Noonan admitted,
"It could not be turned into specific legislation quickly....Kent Conrad said Thursday morning it could take six months to get it all done and through the appropriate committees."
Then what in God's name is anyone doing considering it in the same timeframe as the debt limit? Aside from being a self-serving distraction for some Senators, it's something that could have been done anytime.
Shame on Conrad and his colleagues for trying to elbow their way onto the debt limit stage with something that has no place there, but could have and should have been more broadly broached in the Senate months ago.
Here's a guy- Conrad- who can't manage to do his job and get a budget through the Senate for over 800 days, but finds time for his little skull sessions with five other Senators so he can grab some valuable media time and attention.
But, after completely misreading the Gang of Six proposals and blowing her coverage of it, Noonan turned around and wrote some sensible things about Wonderboy's disgraceful behavior of the last month or so.
"For the longest time he didn't care about spending, and now he cares about spending. Good, both in terms of policy and for him. But his decision to become engaged has become a decision to dominate, to have his face in front of the television cameras with his news conferences, pronouncements, and what his communications people are probably calling his "ownership" of any final agreement. He's trying to come across as the boss, the indispensable man, the leader. And, of course, the reasonable one.
That's all very nice and part of Political Positioning 101, but at this point it's not helping. He's becoming box-office poison. His numbers are falling. The RealClearPolitics composite job approval poll rating has him down six points since June 2, when the debt-ceiling crisis began. That fall, from 52% to 46%, exactly tracks his heightened media presence and his increased attempts to be seen as dominant. Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, said that if he ran for president today he'd lose, that his job-approval numbers are "worse than they appear," and that he continues to have real trouble with undecided voters.
And if you've watched him lately, you know why. When he speaks on the debt negotiations, he is not only extremely boring, with airy and bromidic language—really they are soul-killing, his talking points—but he never seems to be playing it straight. He always seems to be finagling, playing the angles in some higher game that only he gets. In two and a half years he has reached the point that took George W. Bush five years to reach: People aren't listening anymore.
The other day he announced the Gang of Six agreement with words that enveloped the plan in his poisonous embrace: "I wanted to give folks a quick update on the progress that we're making." We're. He has "continued to urge both Democrats and Republicans to come together." What would those little devils do without Papa? "The good news is that today a group of senators . . . put forward a proposal that is broadly consistent with the approach that I've urged." I've urged. Me, me, me.
That approach includes "shared sacrifice, and everybody is giving up something." He was like a mother coming in and cheerily announcing: "Dinner's served! Less for everybody!"
We're trying to begin a comeback, not a famine. We're trying to take actions that will allow us to grow.
He's like a walking headache. He's probably triggering Michele Bachmann's migraines.
The Gang of Six members themselves should have been given the stage to make their own announcement, and their own best case.
The president, if he is seriously trying to avert a debt crisis, should stay in his office, meet with members, and work the phones, all with a new humility, which would be well received. It is odd how he patronizes those with more experience and depth in national affairs.
He should keep his face off TV. He should encourage, cajole, work things through, be serious, get a responsible deal, and then re-emerge with joy and the look of a winner as he jointly announces it to the nation. Then his people should leak that he got what he wanted, the best possible deal, and the left has no idea the ruin he averted and the thanks they owe him.
For now, for his sake and the sake of an ultimate plan, he should choose Strategic Silence."
I like how Noonan was so blunt about how Wonderboy tries to focus everything on himself, as if he's the parent of a bunch of recalcitrant, wayward children. In fact, people like Paul Ryan have more time in Congress than Wonderboy had before he ran for his current office. In the two years prior to this job, he essentially voted 'present' in the Senate while preparing to run for the White House.
He is the least-experienced guy among 536 elected federal officials ostensibly trying to do something.
Chances are, if he would just shut up and stay off camera, the Congressional leaders and their troops could get something passed, then just shove it down the First Rookie's throat and tell him to sign it or don't bother campaigning for another term.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Peggy Noonan Goes Socialist
I managed to make it through Peggy Noonan's weekend editorial in the Wall Street Journal. Maybe it was due to the picture of a thoughtful Paul Ryan, chin on hand, that drove me forward.
The editorial was nothing particularly new or special. It was, after all, Peggy Noonan, herself now long in the tooth, with very little, if anything worthwhile to express anymore.
Instead, Noonan plumped for socialism with this passage about older Americans and health care,
"Rep. Paul Ryan was at the summit, soldiering on. His main problem on Medicare is that people fear the complexities and demands of a new delivery system.
People who draw up legislation, people capable of mastering the facts of the huge and complicated federal budget, often think other people are just like them....But normal people don't wear green eyeshades...But normal people are more likely to sit slouched at the kitchen table with their head in their hands. "Oh no, another big decision, another headache, 50 calls to an insurance company, another go-round with the passive-aggressive phone answerer who, even though she's never met me, calls me Freddy as she puts me on hold.
Here's the great thing about Medicare: You turn 65 and it's there. They give you a card and the nurse takes it."
In the next paragraph, Noonan contradicts herself on that salient last point, noting that, even now, due to low reimbursement rates, some doctors refuse to take "the card."
It's actually far worse than that. I have an acquaintance who had to help an aged relative with Medicare-covered treatment for an ailment. The amount of red tape, paperwork and time spent arguing with various Medicare officials was not to be believed. The relative was sent bills for erroneous out-of-pocket expenses running to tens of thousands of dollars. Days were spent, often in increments of 3-4 hours, either speaking or on hold with government bureaucrats at various offices throughout the region and Washington.
But Noonan's larger mistake is to portray the insulation of Americans from making their own decisions on how to spend their own money on health insurance. If people can buy homes, homeowners and car insurance, surely they are capable of and ought to take an interest in their health insurance, as well.
That's why allowing market forces to compete by providing differing price points, service and quality levels of health insurance is a good thing. Instead of one take-it-or-leave-it government-run, unresponsive health insurance system, multiple private insurers will compete for customers in an open market where bad performance will cost them customers.
It's a sad day when one of Ronald Reagan's speechwriters plumps for government health care. Her former boss was the modern paragon of individual freedom and self-determination.
Now Noonan is arguing for seniors to just be given a "card" and have others make their decisions about their money for them.
The editorial was nothing particularly new or special. It was, after all, Peggy Noonan, herself now long in the tooth, with very little, if anything worthwhile to express anymore.
Instead, Noonan plumped for socialism with this passage about older Americans and health care,
"Rep. Paul Ryan was at the summit, soldiering on. His main problem on Medicare is that people fear the complexities and demands of a new delivery system.
People who draw up legislation, people capable of mastering the facts of the huge and complicated federal budget, often think other people are just like them....But normal people don't wear green eyeshades...But normal people are more likely to sit slouched at the kitchen table with their head in their hands. "Oh no, another big decision, another headache, 50 calls to an insurance company, another go-round with the passive-aggressive phone answerer who, even though she's never met me, calls me Freddy as she puts me on hold.
Here's the great thing about Medicare: You turn 65 and it's there. They give you a card and the nurse takes it."
In the next paragraph, Noonan contradicts herself on that salient last point, noting that, even now, due to low reimbursement rates, some doctors refuse to take "the card."
It's actually far worse than that. I have an acquaintance who had to help an aged relative with Medicare-covered treatment for an ailment. The amount of red tape, paperwork and time spent arguing with various Medicare officials was not to be believed. The relative was sent bills for erroneous out-of-pocket expenses running to tens of thousands of dollars. Days were spent, often in increments of 3-4 hours, either speaking or on hold with government bureaucrats at various offices throughout the region and Washington.
But Noonan's larger mistake is to portray the insulation of Americans from making their own decisions on how to spend their own money on health insurance. If people can buy homes, homeowners and car insurance, surely they are capable of and ought to take an interest in their health insurance, as well.
That's why allowing market forces to compete by providing differing price points, service and quality levels of health insurance is a good thing. Instead of one take-it-or-leave-it government-run, unresponsive health insurance system, multiple private insurers will compete for customers in an open market where bad performance will cost them customers.
It's a sad day when one of Ronald Reagan's speechwriters plumps for government health care. Her former boss was the modern paragon of individual freedom and self-determination.
Now Noonan is arguing for seniors to just be given a "card" and have others make their decisions about their money for them.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Peggy Noonan Gratuitously Blesses The Tea Party!
Apparently indicating that Tea Party activists aren't legitimate until she says so, Peggy Noonan titled her most recent weekend Wall Street Journal editorial Why It's Time for the Tea Party.
As a conservative independent who attended last year's 9-12 rally at the Capitol, and another against the passage of ObamaCare at the same location, I find Noonan's attitude to be arrogant and repugnant.
As a card-carrying member of the nation's established political class and parties, Noonan and her ilk are the ones who put us where we now are. Sure, sure, every one of us voted, or didn't, for candidates who put us deeply into debt, gave us an entitlement society, and have poured sand into the gears of our economy.
But you know what I mean. They- meaning both parties' careerists, including Noonan- made it nearly impossible for an average person of modest means to run and win a Congressional election. Our choices have become basically liberal Democrats or their opponents, liberal Democrats-Lite, a/k/a Republicans.
This weekend's Journal editorial cataloging the disappearance of New York's Republican party into a sort of weird, grafting onto the Democrats, creating a single, self-perpetuating group of politicos, is not far from describing the national scene, as well.
Does any truly independent voter want John Boehner as the next Speaker, or Mitch McConnell as the Senate Leader? Doubtful.
Noonan, now trying to pretend she's been objective and non-aligned all this time, gives us her own little analogy of why Tea Partiers are up in arms. Are, to quote the Peter Finch's character from Network,
"Mad as hell and (I'm) not going to take it anymore."
Yes, we are- finally- ready to "do something about it."
Even to the point of nominating otherwise unaccomplished people like Christine O'Donnell in Delaware to run as the Republican candidate for the Senate. It's become so alarming how badly our professional political class has run America to the brink of financial disaster, economic lethargy and defense lapses that we'll vote for someone who simply promises to vote to limit government and shrink spending. Nothing else really matters at this point.
That's certainly how I feel. It's why I'd vote for anyone to the right of my idiotic Representative, Lance Leonard. Or maybe It's Leonard Lance. Does it really matter? He's a buffoon, whichever his name is.
Noonan thinks it's news to write,
"The populist movement is more a critique of the GOP than a wing of it."
Really, Peggy. Gee, Glenn Beck has been saying that for, what, since CNBC's Rick Santelli called for the first Tea Party in Chicago on July 4th of last year?
Then Noonan solemnly invents two devices, "the yardstick" and "the clock" to explain the Tea Party. You can't make this stuff up. The issues are already painfully simple, but, apparently, not simple enough for Noonan.
Here's the shorter version: independent voters are tired of career pols of both parties taking too much power at the federal level, as well as spending and taxing too much. It's reached a tipping point in the view of many voters. There, I did it in two sentences.
Of course, I have an advantage, Peggy. I've actually been to Tea Party functions, met real members/participants and talked with them.
Have you?
That said, Noonan, after carefully disguising her tracks for 90% of her column, finally shows her true colors in the final two paragraphs of her editorial,
"A movement like this can help a nation by acting as a corrective, or it can descend into a corrosive populism that celebrates unknowingness as authenticity, that confuses showiness with seriousness and vulgarity with true conviction. Parts could become swept by a desire just to tear down, to destroy.
But establishments exist for a reason. It is true that the party establishment is compromised, and by many things, but one of them is experience. They've lived through a lot, seen a lot, know the national terrain. They know how things work. They know the history. I wonder if tea party members know how fragile are the institutions that help keep the country together.
One difference so far between the tea party and the great wave of conservatives that elected Ronald Reagan in 1980 is the latter was a true coalition—not only North and South, East and West but right-wingers, intellectuals who were former leftists, and former Democrats. When they won presidential landslides in 1980, '84 and '88, they brought the center with them. That in the end is how you win. Will the center join arms and work with the tea party? That's a great question of 2012."
Nice try, Peggy, but this isn't Revolutionary France, and there is no Robespierre. And, by the way, Peggy, nearly nothing that the Gipper accomplished lasted. His major failing, in what I call Conservatism 1.0, was to not cement via Constitutional Amendments some of the limited, temporary headway he made against the Welfare State. This time, under Conservativism 2.0, we might get there.
God, let's hope the Tea Party Senators and Representatives don't work with the center, but clean them the hell out of power and do the unthinkables. Like enforce absolute budget cuts, real balanced budgets, and shrink federal regulatory reach and power back to levels with which the country can actually prosper and enjoy personal liberty and freedom once more.
As a conservative independent who attended last year's 9-12 rally at the Capitol, and another against the passage of ObamaCare at the same location, I find Noonan's attitude to be arrogant and repugnant.
As a card-carrying member of the nation's established political class and parties, Noonan and her ilk are the ones who put us where we now are. Sure, sure, every one of us voted, or didn't, for candidates who put us deeply into debt, gave us an entitlement society, and have poured sand into the gears of our economy.
But you know what I mean. They- meaning both parties' careerists, including Noonan- made it nearly impossible for an average person of modest means to run and win a Congressional election. Our choices have become basically liberal Democrats or their opponents, liberal Democrats-Lite, a/k/a Republicans.
This weekend's Journal editorial cataloging the disappearance of New York's Republican party into a sort of weird, grafting onto the Democrats, creating a single, self-perpetuating group of politicos, is not far from describing the national scene, as well.
Does any truly independent voter want John Boehner as the next Speaker, or Mitch McConnell as the Senate Leader? Doubtful.
Noonan, now trying to pretend she's been objective and non-aligned all this time, gives us her own little analogy of why Tea Partiers are up in arms. Are, to quote the Peter Finch's character from Network,
"Mad as hell and (I'm) not going to take it anymore."
Yes, we are- finally- ready to "do something about it."
Even to the point of nominating otherwise unaccomplished people like Christine O'Donnell in Delaware to run as the Republican candidate for the Senate. It's become so alarming how badly our professional political class has run America to the brink of financial disaster, economic lethargy and defense lapses that we'll vote for someone who simply promises to vote to limit government and shrink spending. Nothing else really matters at this point.
That's certainly how I feel. It's why I'd vote for anyone to the right of my idiotic Representative, Lance Leonard. Or maybe It's Leonard Lance. Does it really matter? He's a buffoon, whichever his name is.
Noonan thinks it's news to write,
"The populist movement is more a critique of the GOP than a wing of it."
Really, Peggy. Gee, Glenn Beck has been saying that for, what, since CNBC's Rick Santelli called for the first Tea Party in Chicago on July 4th of last year?
Then Noonan solemnly invents two devices, "the yardstick" and "the clock" to explain the Tea Party. You can't make this stuff up. The issues are already painfully simple, but, apparently, not simple enough for Noonan.
Here's the shorter version: independent voters are tired of career pols of both parties taking too much power at the federal level, as well as spending and taxing too much. It's reached a tipping point in the view of many voters. There, I did it in two sentences.
Of course, I have an advantage, Peggy. I've actually been to Tea Party functions, met real members/participants and talked with them.
Have you?
That said, Noonan, after carefully disguising her tracks for 90% of her column, finally shows her true colors in the final two paragraphs of her editorial,
"A movement like this can help a nation by acting as a corrective, or it can descend into a corrosive populism that celebrates unknowingness as authenticity, that confuses showiness with seriousness and vulgarity with true conviction. Parts could become swept by a desire just to tear down, to destroy.
But establishments exist for a reason. It is true that the party establishment is compromised, and by many things, but one of them is experience. They've lived through a lot, seen a lot, know the national terrain. They know how things work. They know the history. I wonder if tea party members know how fragile are the institutions that help keep the country together.
One difference so far between the tea party and the great wave of conservatives that elected Ronald Reagan in 1980 is the latter was a true coalition—not only North and South, East and West but right-wingers, intellectuals who were former leftists, and former Democrats. When they won presidential landslides in 1980, '84 and '88, they brought the center with them. That in the end is how you win. Will the center join arms and work with the tea party? That's a great question of 2012."
Nice try, Peggy, but this isn't Revolutionary France, and there is no Robespierre. And, by the way, Peggy, nearly nothing that the Gipper accomplished lasted. His major failing, in what I call Conservatism 1.0, was to not cement via Constitutional Amendments some of the limited, temporary headway he made against the Welfare State. This time, under Conservativism 2.0, we might get there.
God, let's hope the Tea Party Senators and Representatives don't work with the center, but clean them the hell out of power and do the unthinkables. Like enforce absolute budget cuts, real balanced budgets, and shrink federal regulatory reach and power back to levels with which the country can actually prosper and enjoy personal liberty and freedom once more.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Peggy Noonan's Misguided Rant
Peggy Noonan moved a little further around the bend toward total irrelevancy with her latest Wall Street Journal editorial.
Skipping the nauseating details of her weekend column, suffice to say she feels that there is too much passion and animosity in today's politics. She appeals for 'lower temperatures' in debates on key issues.
If only in this regard, Noonan is showing her total disconnection from the state of the US federal government and the peril in which the Constitution, and our Republic are in.
Ronald Reagan, for whom Noonan worked as a speechwriter, and her affiliation with whom basically launched her subsequent pundit's career, left office over twenty years ago. As successful as he was, Reagan didn't cement any of his changes in a sufficient manner to cause lasting effects in the federal government.
If you recall anything about Reagan's temperament, it was his blunt voicing of a conservative viewpoint while criticizing liberal ones.
Noonan is wrong. Even her old boss, if he were alive and still in possession of his mental faculties, would disagree with her concern over the passion and heat in today's political discourse.
Let's be honest here. Today's Congressional Democrats, and Wonderboy, are no longer attempting to honor their oaths of office. Every Congressman and Senator who voted for the health care bill, and Wonderboy, qualifies for impeachment. Only a Democratic majority impedes the just removal from office of the lot of them.
Back in Noonan's heyday, working for the Gipper, Democrats had many more centrists in their Congressional fold. Not so today.
Noonan can't seem to rouse herself from torpor to realize that today's federal Democrats are appointing communists and socialists to federal offices and legislating a march toward complete socialization of America.
We don't need less heat and passion. We need more!
Noonan is a relic of a bygone era of polite discourse and little difference between two quasi-progressive political parties.
For better or for worse, the left's takeover of the Democratic party and march to the extreme left this past year has, by contrast, sent the Republicans further right.
It's about time. In fact, it's past time.
Following on Reagan's time as president, this coming second wave of conservatism will hopefully have learned to thing bigger and have the concrete ready to pour around their actions, once in power.
It's not immediately obvious, but Ronald Reagan was the first non-progressive president since TR at the turn of the last century. In only eight years, with no Constitutional amendments or lasting legislation passed, Reagan's efforts resulted in 25 twenty more years of economic expansion and generally less bothersome regulation.
Imagine what a determined, impassioned next wave of conservative Congressmen and Senators, with a GOP president in 2013, can and will do?
But only if the fire and heat of anger over the Democrats' socialistic takeover of America is stoked white hot and unleashed in subsequent Novembers.
Skipping the nauseating details of her weekend column, suffice to say she feels that there is too much passion and animosity in today's politics. She appeals for 'lower temperatures' in debates on key issues.
If only in this regard, Noonan is showing her total disconnection from the state of the US federal government and the peril in which the Constitution, and our Republic are in.
Ronald Reagan, for whom Noonan worked as a speechwriter, and her affiliation with whom basically launched her subsequent pundit's career, left office over twenty years ago. As successful as he was, Reagan didn't cement any of his changes in a sufficient manner to cause lasting effects in the federal government.
If you recall anything about Reagan's temperament, it was his blunt voicing of a conservative viewpoint while criticizing liberal ones.
Noonan is wrong. Even her old boss, if he were alive and still in possession of his mental faculties, would disagree with her concern over the passion and heat in today's political discourse.
Let's be honest here. Today's Congressional Democrats, and Wonderboy, are no longer attempting to honor their oaths of office. Every Congressman and Senator who voted for the health care bill, and Wonderboy, qualifies for impeachment. Only a Democratic majority impedes the just removal from office of the lot of them.
Back in Noonan's heyday, working for the Gipper, Democrats had many more centrists in their Congressional fold. Not so today.
Noonan can't seem to rouse herself from torpor to realize that today's federal Democrats are appointing communists and socialists to federal offices and legislating a march toward complete socialization of America.
We don't need less heat and passion. We need more!
Noonan is a relic of a bygone era of polite discourse and little difference between two quasi-progressive political parties.
For better or for worse, the left's takeover of the Democratic party and march to the extreme left this past year has, by contrast, sent the Republicans further right.
It's about time. In fact, it's past time.
Following on Reagan's time as president, this coming second wave of conservatism will hopefully have learned to thing bigger and have the concrete ready to pour around their actions, once in power.
It's not immediately obvious, but Ronald Reagan was the first non-progressive president since TR at the turn of the last century. In only eight years, with no Constitutional amendments or lasting legislation passed, Reagan's efforts resulted in 25 twenty more years of economic expansion and generally less bothersome regulation.
Imagine what a determined, impassioned next wave of conservative Congressmen and Senators, with a GOP president in 2013, can and will do?
But only if the fire and heat of anger over the Democrats' socialistic takeover of America is stoked white hot and unleashed in subsequent Novembers.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Peggy Noonan Almost Hits the Mark
Peggy Noonan almost got it right this weekend in the Wall Street Journal when she opined,
"This is historic. This is something new in modern political history, and I'm not sure we're fully noticing it. Americans are starting to think the problems we are facing cannot be solved.
Part of the reason is that the problems- debt, spending, war- seem too big. But a larger part is that our government, from the White House through Congress and so many state and local governments, seems to be demonstrating every day that they cannot make things better. They are not offering a new path, they are only offering old paths- spend more, regulate more, tax more in an attempt to make us more healthy locally and nationally. And in the long term everyone- well, not those in government, but most everyone else- seems to know that won't work. It's not a way out."
Noonan actually refutes herself by the end of that second paragraph. If she had simply added the phrase,
"by our increasingly professional, lifetime political class"
to that last sentence in the first paragraph, she'd have hit the mark exactly.
How is it she could write "well, not those in government, but most everyone else- seems to know that won't work," but claim we are dispirited and feel overwhelmed by our problems?
Nobody I know, with a brain, thinks our problems are overwhelming us.
They think the problems are overwhelming power-hungry professional pols who just want lifetime sinecures and more power.
Sensible Americans understand that we must spend less via government, trim entitlements, reverse 60 years of deficit spending, and focus on defining objectives for our current combat situations, then achieve the objectives.
These problems are far from insoluble by Americans who want to go about their business unhampered by government.
But for too-long-sitting Senators and Representatives with half a dozen years in office and dreams of as many more, or one of their state's Senate seats, those solutions don't sound like fun.
Less power. More accountability. Fewer lush promises made with other peoples' taxes.
Maybe Noonan's friends are too set in their government ways, and, by extension, so is Noonan.
She almost had it right.
But not quite.
She knows the right answer, but, like so many careerists in and around national politics, she can't bring herself to say it.
Term limits. Less federal power. No more professional politicians.
It's that simple. Solving that problem might be overwhelming. But not debt and spending. Not even war.
"This is historic. This is something new in modern political history, and I'm not sure we're fully noticing it. Americans are starting to think the problems we are facing cannot be solved.
Part of the reason is that the problems- debt, spending, war- seem too big. But a larger part is that our government, from the White House through Congress and so many state and local governments, seems to be demonstrating every day that they cannot make things better. They are not offering a new path, they are only offering old paths- spend more, regulate more, tax more in an attempt to make us more healthy locally and nationally. And in the long term everyone- well, not those in government, but most everyone else- seems to know that won't work. It's not a way out."
Noonan actually refutes herself by the end of that second paragraph. If she had simply added the phrase,
"by our increasingly professional, lifetime political class"
to that last sentence in the first paragraph, she'd have hit the mark exactly.
How is it she could write "well, not those in government, but most everyone else- seems to know that won't work," but claim we are dispirited and feel overwhelmed by our problems?
Nobody I know, with a brain, thinks our problems are overwhelming us.
They think the problems are overwhelming power-hungry professional pols who just want lifetime sinecures and more power.
Sensible Americans understand that we must spend less via government, trim entitlements, reverse 60 years of deficit spending, and focus on defining objectives for our current combat situations, then achieve the objectives.
These problems are far from insoluble by Americans who want to go about their business unhampered by government.
But for too-long-sitting Senators and Representatives with half a dozen years in office and dreams of as many more, or one of their state's Senate seats, those solutions don't sound like fun.
Less power. More accountability. Fewer lush promises made with other peoples' taxes.
Maybe Noonan's friends are too set in their government ways, and, by extension, so is Noonan.
She almost had it right.
But not quite.
She knows the right answer, but, like so many careerists in and around national politics, she can't bring herself to say it.
Term limits. Less federal power. No more professional politicians.
It's that simple. Solving that problem might be overwhelming. But not debt and spending. Not even war.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Peggy Noonan On Obama-Care
Peggy Noona wrote a so-so piece in the weekend Wall Street Journal hypothetically returning FDR and Nixon to life to counsel their respective parties. Interesting, entertaining, but not really very practical.
The prior weekend's column, however, had some interesting aspects to it. Written for the 25-26 July edition of the Journal, Noonan began by roundly criticizing Wonderboy's dreadful healthcare press conference earlier that week.
In the second half of the piece, Noonan provided her personal belief as to why she thinks massive government-run healthcare will fail. The first two included reasons not everyone might immediately notice: current freedom of doctors to selectively discount fees, and the aversion by the majority of Americans to paying for abortions with federal healthcare dollars.
But her last contention was, for me, by far the most interesting and, frankly, typically wacked out Noonanspeak.
The former Reagan speechwriter believes that Wonderboy's new healthcare will finally give the upper classes, with their better education, diets, lower smoking rates, and better fitness, all positively correlated, by the way, the right and avenue by which to curb unhealthy behaviors of the lower-class masses. As Noonan wrote,
"Only a generation ago such criticisms would have been considered rude and unacceptable. But they are part of the ugly, chafing price of having the government in something: Suddenly it can make big and very personal demands on you.
Those who live in a way that isn't sufficiently healthy "cost us money" and "drive up premiums." Mr. Obama himself said something like it in his press conference, when he spoke of a person who might not buy health insurance. If he gets hit by a bus, "the rest of us have to pay for it."
Under a national health-care plan, we might be hearing that a lot. You don't exercise, you smoke, you drink, you eat too much, and "the rest of us have to pay for it."
Wake up, Dear. It's already been the case for decades.
Have you never heard of health insurance mandates, Peggy?
See, I don't think these sentiments are at all ugly. And I think people have been voicing them, at least in certain behaviors, for decades.
But what really has had me feeling that way for ages is the fact that I can't buy a tailor-made health insurance policy for my lifestyle and specific needs. I don't need obstetrics or pediatric care. Since I exercise constantly, eat heathily, don't smoke or drink, I want a big, big discount on my policy.
But I can't get one. Instead, I'm carrying the load of a lot of unhealthy, sedentary fatties who are allowed to average-in to my policy class. Not to mention the higher price Americans have paid for steel or cars for years, thanks to the unions in those sectors securing generous, free or cheap healthcare which, of course, made it nearly costless for those blue collar workers to live incredibly unhealthily.
I don't think there's anything wrong with condemnation in the public square of unhealthy lifestyle habits, so long as we are all forced to buy mandate-loaded policies, and carry those with pre-existing conditions at no extra charge.
So, Peggy, you got this one all wrong. It's actually high time we either make criticism of unhealthy living explicit, or free us all to be allowed mandate-free policies.
There is no middle ground.
The prior weekend's column, however, had some interesting aspects to it. Written for the 25-26 July edition of the Journal, Noonan began by roundly criticizing Wonderboy's dreadful healthcare press conference earlier that week.
In the second half of the piece, Noonan provided her personal belief as to why she thinks massive government-run healthcare will fail. The first two included reasons not everyone might immediately notice: current freedom of doctors to selectively discount fees, and the aversion by the majority of Americans to paying for abortions with federal healthcare dollars.
But her last contention was, for me, by far the most interesting and, frankly, typically wacked out Noonanspeak.
The former Reagan speechwriter believes that Wonderboy's new healthcare will finally give the upper classes, with their better education, diets, lower smoking rates, and better fitness, all positively correlated, by the way, the right and avenue by which to curb unhealthy behaviors of the lower-class masses. As Noonan wrote,
"Only a generation ago such criticisms would have been considered rude and unacceptable. But they are part of the ugly, chafing price of having the government in something: Suddenly it can make big and very personal demands on you.
Those who live in a way that isn't sufficiently healthy "cost us money" and "drive up premiums." Mr. Obama himself said something like it in his press conference, when he spoke of a person who might not buy health insurance. If he gets hit by a bus, "the rest of us have to pay for it."
Under a national health-care plan, we might be hearing that a lot. You don't exercise, you smoke, you drink, you eat too much, and "the rest of us have to pay for it."
Wake up, Dear. It's already been the case for decades.
Have you never heard of health insurance mandates, Peggy?
See, I don't think these sentiments are at all ugly. And I think people have been voicing them, at least in certain behaviors, for decades.
But what really has had me feeling that way for ages is the fact that I can't buy a tailor-made health insurance policy for my lifestyle and specific needs. I don't need obstetrics or pediatric care. Since I exercise constantly, eat heathily, don't smoke or drink, I want a big, big discount on my policy.
But I can't get one. Instead, I'm carrying the load of a lot of unhealthy, sedentary fatties who are allowed to average-in to my policy class. Not to mention the higher price Americans have paid for steel or cars for years, thanks to the unions in those sectors securing generous, free or cheap healthcare which, of course, made it nearly costless for those blue collar workers to live incredibly unhealthily.
I don't think there's anything wrong with condemnation in the public square of unhealthy lifestyle habits, so long as we are all forced to buy mandate-loaded policies, and carry those with pre-existing conditions at no extra charge.
So, Peggy, you got this one all wrong. It's actually high time we either make criticism of unhealthy living explicit, or free us all to be allowed mandate-free policies.
There is no middle ground.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
More Wrong-headed Blather From Peggy Noonan
Peggy Noonan's stream-of-consciousness editorials in the Wall Street Journal's weekend editions are growing increasingly more bizarre.
This past weekend, Noonan couldn't fill an entire column with any one topic- the lunar landing anniversary, Supreme Court nominee hearings, or even comedian Al Franken's stolen election.
But what really caught my attention was her focusing on Hillary Clinton's lameduck status as Secretary of State.
Sure, Noonan is correct. But others, including me, warned of Wonderboy's tactic of isolating and neutering Clinton by his 'offer' of the cabinet position. Noonan points out how many little czars have been created to pre-empt and limit Clinton's scope in key geographic areas, such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Mideast.
I'll agree that Hillary looked totally stupid in a picture on the Journal's Monday morning front page, wearing a bright, floral lei while the accompanying headline declared that she was being dissed by India's Environmental Minister on climate-control issues.
But Noonan seems way off base, at least to me, when she finished her column with this contention,
"They will look like kids playing with history. Hillary isn't a kid. She's experienced and has been roughed up by history. Watch. She'll roll right back."
No, she won't. She's nowhere near as relevantly 'experienced' as Noonan believes. And by joining Wonderboy's cabinet, she removed herself from an ability to observe and opine on current Democratic administration domestic activities. She will now be lacking in credibility on these issues, and moreso, if/when she departs the cabinet prematurely.
If you don't like Sarah Palin's early resignation, what will you consider Hillary's? Different?
Further, Hillary lost because, among other things, she was outrun in the campaign. She gave it her best shot, and lost. She lost a huge early lead, chose the wrong moments to turn on the faux tears, and became emotional in a very bad way, too late.
Ironically, for all the hue and cry that Republicans don't have adequate leaders to field a slate for the next presidential season, I think it's the Democrats who are in trouble.
Wonderboy will either be a crippled, one-term failure, or have his heels nipped at by various second-rate contenders. But I think it's unlikely Hillary will be one of them.
She lost once. She joined the hated opposition's team. And she took a portfolio that effectively removed her from having any sort of domestic issues voice. I doubt she could rev up a funding and grassroots machine now.
I don't happen to have made a thorough study of the phenomenon, but I think second acts like Hillary's would have to be in presidential campaigns are rare. Especially with her relative lack of governmental experience, having only been a Senator, and from a broadly recognized carpetbagging state.
To my knowledge, even Nixon and Reagan had to skip an election, and were more experienced. No Democrat has lost, then won, in half a century.
I think Noonan is simply off her rocker on this one.
This past weekend, Noonan couldn't fill an entire column with any one topic- the lunar landing anniversary, Supreme Court nominee hearings, or even comedian Al Franken's stolen election.
But what really caught my attention was her focusing on Hillary Clinton's lameduck status as Secretary of State.
Sure, Noonan is correct. But others, including me, warned of Wonderboy's tactic of isolating and neutering Clinton by his 'offer' of the cabinet position. Noonan points out how many little czars have been created to pre-empt and limit Clinton's scope in key geographic areas, such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Mideast.
I'll agree that Hillary looked totally stupid in a picture on the Journal's Monday morning front page, wearing a bright, floral lei while the accompanying headline declared that she was being dissed by India's Environmental Minister on climate-control issues.
But Noonan seems way off base, at least to me, when she finished her column with this contention,
"They will look like kids playing with history. Hillary isn't a kid. She's experienced and has been roughed up by history. Watch. She'll roll right back."
No, she won't. She's nowhere near as relevantly 'experienced' as Noonan believes. And by joining Wonderboy's cabinet, she removed herself from an ability to observe and opine on current Democratic administration domestic activities. She will now be lacking in credibility on these issues, and moreso, if/when she departs the cabinet prematurely.
If you don't like Sarah Palin's early resignation, what will you consider Hillary's? Different?
Further, Hillary lost because, among other things, she was outrun in the campaign. She gave it her best shot, and lost. She lost a huge early lead, chose the wrong moments to turn on the faux tears, and became emotional in a very bad way, too late.
Ironically, for all the hue and cry that Republicans don't have adequate leaders to field a slate for the next presidential season, I think it's the Democrats who are in trouble.
Wonderboy will either be a crippled, one-term failure, or have his heels nipped at by various second-rate contenders. But I think it's unlikely Hillary will be one of them.
She lost once. She joined the hated opposition's team. And she took a portfolio that effectively removed her from having any sort of domestic issues voice. I doubt she could rev up a funding and grassroots machine now.
I don't happen to have made a thorough study of the phenomenon, but I think second acts like Hillary's would have to be in presidential campaigns are rare. Especially with her relative lack of governmental experience, having only been a Senator, and from a broadly recognized carpetbagging state.
To my knowledge, even Nixon and Reagan had to skip an election, and were more experienced. No Democrat has lost, then won, in half a century.
I think Noonan is simply off her rocker on this one.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Peggy Noonan Cracks On Wonderboy
To the utter shock of my business partner and myself, Peggy Noonan actually wrote a cogent, well-reasoned, sensible column in last weekend's Wall Street Journal.
Her ratio of readable/nonsensical pieces is, sadly, still about 1/25, or roughly 2 worthwhile columns each year.
But last weekend's was actually a terrific one.
After spending months glorifying Wonderboy and his new approach to politics, Noonan has finally woken up to the fact that he is foundering desperately.
"The president seems everywhere and nowhere, not fully focused on the matters at hand. He's trying to keep up with the news cycle with less and less to say. "I am angry" about AIG's bonuses. The administration seems buffeted, ad hoc. Policy seems makeshift, provisional. James K. Galbraith captures some of this in The Washington Monthly: "The president has an economic program. But there is, so far, no clear statement of the thinking behind the program."
Mr. Obama likes to say presidents can do more than one thing at a time, but in fact modern presidents are lucky to do one thing at a time, never mind two. Great forces are arrayed against them.
Her ratio of readable/nonsensical pieces is, sadly, still about 1/25, or roughly 2 worthwhile columns each year.
But last weekend's was actually a terrific one.
After spending months glorifying Wonderboy and his new approach to politics, Noonan has finally woken up to the fact that he is foundering desperately.
"The president seems everywhere and nowhere, not fully focused on the matters at hand. He's trying to keep up with the news cycle with less and less to say. "I am angry" about AIG's bonuses. The administration seems buffeted, ad hoc. Policy seems makeshift, provisional. James K. Galbraith captures some of this in The Washington Monthly: "The president has an economic program. But there is, so far, no clear statement of the thinking behind the program."
Mr. Obama likes to say presidents can do more than one thing at a time, but in fact modern presidents are lucky to do one thing at a time, never mind two. Great forces are arrayed against them.
These are the two great issues, the economic crisis and our safety. In the face of them, what strikes one is the weightlessness of the Obama administration, the jumping from issue to issue and venue to venue from day to day. Isaiah Berlin famously suggested a leader is a fox or a hedgehog. The fox knows many things but the hedgehog knows one big thing. In political leadership the hedgehog has certain significant advantages, focus and clarity of vision among them. Most presidents are one or the other. So far Mr. Obama seems neither."
It's noteworthy, at this point, to recall the president for whom Noonan once worked.
The Gipper was so effective because he really only focused on three things during his eight years as US president:
-Cut federal spending, or at least its rate of growth
-Cut tax rates
-Rebuild defense while abetting the fall of the Soviet Union.
He accomplished all three.
Finally, Peggy Noonan has woken up and realized that Wonderboy is way, way overmatched by the job. He's drowning and totally incapable of effectively handling the office he wanted so badly.
By accident, I saw a few seconds of his performance on Jay Leno. It was one time I couldn't get to the television controller to hit the 'mute' button fast enough.
What I heard Wonderboy say was something to the effect of,
'I ran for President because I wanted to change things.'
Not,
"Given my success at running the state of Illinois as a two-term Governor, I wanted to bring my skill and expertise to Washington."
Nor,
"With my background as a successful business executive, I wanted to use my talents and experience to fix things in Washington."
No, it's just,
"Hey, I woke up one day and said, why not run for President? I haven't done anything in my life to remotely qualify me. But I have ideas I'd like implemented."
And now, Peggy Noonan is waking up to this fact. He has no executive nor management skills, nor experience, on which to draw.
And we are evidently stuck with him for almost four more years.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
A Very Few Rare Words of Lucidity from Peggy Noonan
Despite my reservations about Peggy Noonan's lucidity in the past six months or so, she managed to write a few sentences of clarity this month.
Last weekend, she penned a mostly mawkish personal survey of economic malaise on the upper East side of New York City.
Buried near the end of her mostly-boring piece, however, were a few paragraphs starkly contrasting Chesley Sullenberger and Nadya Suleman, a/k/a "octomom."
Noonan slyly offered as a test of real national depression that people think America is becoming more represented by the Sulemans than the Sullenbergers. It's a clever backdoor approach to noting the current state of behaviors of some lower-income Americans, after decades of a calculated assault on prior American values by liberal Democrats.
The other noteworthy few sentences from Noonan occurred a weekend or two before this past one.
In a single column, she blasted the stimulus bill, Wonderboy and Frisco Nan. It was pretty good stuff, if very rare and, one suspects, almost accidental.
Noonan rightly painted Nan as just a hacked up pol from San Francisco who doesn't really understand the solemnity and importance of being Speaker of the House of Representatives.
She similarly chided Wonderboy for backing the very sloppy, pork-ridden bill Frisco Nan authored. Noonan believes Americans have had it with excess of all sorts, and that the current Democratic leaders in Congress and the White House are busy indulging themselves, at great risk to their political futures.
On this point too, I am agreement with Noonan.
Last weekend, she penned a mostly mawkish personal survey of economic malaise on the upper East side of New York City.
Buried near the end of her mostly-boring piece, however, were a few paragraphs starkly contrasting Chesley Sullenberger and Nadya Suleman, a/k/a "octomom."
Noonan slyly offered as a test of real national depression that people think America is becoming more represented by the Sulemans than the Sullenbergers. It's a clever backdoor approach to noting the current state of behaviors of some lower-income Americans, after decades of a calculated assault on prior American values by liberal Democrats.
The other noteworthy few sentences from Noonan occurred a weekend or two before this past one.
In a single column, she blasted the stimulus bill, Wonderboy and Frisco Nan. It was pretty good stuff, if very rare and, one suspects, almost accidental.
Noonan rightly painted Nan as just a hacked up pol from San Francisco who doesn't really understand the solemnity and importance of being Speaker of the House of Representatives.
She similarly chided Wonderboy for backing the very sloppy, pork-ridden bill Frisco Nan authored. Noonan believes Americans have had it with excess of all sorts, and that the current Democratic leaders in Congress and the White House are busy indulging themselves, at great risk to their political futures.
On this point too, I am agreement with Noonan.
Monday, December 29, 2008
More Drivel From Peggy Noonan
Last week, Peggy Noonan's weekend column in the Wall Street Journal reached a new low. Marked by her now-typical uneasy segue between various topics like stream of consciousness writing, she alleged that Americans now want a 'non-empty suit' to lead them out of their current troubles.
Citing Bernie Madoff and other failed 'leaders' who were just empty suits, Noonan believes Americans now look to a real leader.
Forgive me for being true to my roots, but I think she's wrong. Americans function best when the leader, as in the style of Ronald Reagan, motivates us to be our own best selves and perform, rather than, as FDR, seizing control and forcibly using government to act.
It's a rare situation in which a single person can omnisciently perform all the tasks necessary to rescue America from some problem. Even JFK simply pointed the country toward the moon, rather than provided the detail of how we would achieve the goal.
That's why I think Noonan is so terribly off base in her rant. Last of all among people Americans should trust is the newly-elected First Rookie Senator from Illinois. With absolutely no experience managing or leading anything, his only hope would be to lead like Reagan.
Instead, he's already messing with details as he tries to re-order economic priorities by government fiat, rather than more-efficient market forces.
In any case, it's a sad day when a former Reagan speechwriter begins calling for more government-detailed actions to rescue a society of 300 million people.
Citing Bernie Madoff and other failed 'leaders' who were just empty suits, Noonan believes Americans now look to a real leader.
Forgive me for being true to my roots, but I think she's wrong. Americans function best when the leader, as in the style of Ronald Reagan, motivates us to be our own best selves and perform, rather than, as FDR, seizing control and forcibly using government to act.
It's a rare situation in which a single person can omnisciently perform all the tasks necessary to rescue America from some problem. Even JFK simply pointed the country toward the moon, rather than provided the detail of how we would achieve the goal.
That's why I think Noonan is so terribly off base in her rant. Last of all among people Americans should trust is the newly-elected First Rookie Senator from Illinois. With absolutely no experience managing or leading anything, his only hope would be to lead like Reagan.
Instead, he's already messing with details as he tries to re-order economic priorities by government fiat, rather than more-efficient market forces.
In any case, it's a sad day when a former Reagan speechwriter begins calling for more government-detailed actions to rescue a society of 300 million people.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Peggy Noonan's Latest Blathering
Peggy Noonan has, I think, finally gone around the bend and become completely irrelevant. Her column in this weekend's Wall Street Journal demonstrated, for anyone still in doubt, how entrenched and narrow-minded she has become as a Washington insider, in perspective, if not geographically.
Among the nastier passages regarding Sarah Palin, the focus of her "Palin's Failin'" editorial, are these,
"There has never been a second's debate among liberals, to use an old-fashioned word that may yet return to vogue, over Mrs. Palin: She was a dope and unqualified from the start. Conservatives and Republicans, on the other hand, continue to battle it out: Was her choice a success or a disaster? And if one holds negative views, should one say so? For conservatives in general, but certainly for writers, the answer is a variation on Edmund Burke: You owe your readers not your industry only but your judgment, and you betray instead of serve them if you sacrifice it to what may or may not be their opinion.
But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition?
Her supporters accuse her critics of snobbery: Maybe she's not a big "egghead" but she has brilliant instincts and inner toughness. But what instincts?
In the end the Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics. It's no good, not for conservatism and not for the country. And yes, it is a mark against John McCain, against his judgment and idealism."
In my opinion, Noonan is simply off her rocker. Why Noonan wrote glowingly of Harry Truman, but savages the equally-unknown and inexpressive Palin is beyond me. Except, of course, if you simply write Noonan off as a beltway veteran.
After all, nobod knew who Truman was upon his nomination. Roosevelt never even spoke with him personally. Truman's only managerial experience was his failed clothing store in Kansas City.
How else to explain her preference for that idiot, "Lying Joe" Biden, over Palin, as a potential President?
Biden has been a wrong-headed moron with too many years in our temple to Windbaggery, the US Senate. He's done nothing.
Palin has been an executive of real governments. One municipal, one state. Hard work, if you want it.
In case Noonan has forgotten, Vice-Presidents are typically chosen for a reason other than being qualified to be President. Like it or not, that's the truth.
The first reason is typically to attract a key segment of the voting population which eludes the Presidential candidate. The next reason would be some particular theme, as in Palin's case.
Noonan simply dismisses anything outside the Beltway now. Even the freshman Senator from Illinois is okay with her, evidently because he stumbled into a Senate seat only two years ago.
How can anyone criticize Palin as unfit to be President, yet give the Illinois rookie a pass?
This, alone, I contend, marks Noonan as a washed-up has been in business of political commentary. If she's not biased, then she's just lost all perspective, judgment and common sense.
Among the nastier passages regarding Sarah Palin, the focus of her "Palin's Failin'" editorial, are these,
"There has never been a second's debate among liberals, to use an old-fashioned word that may yet return to vogue, over Mrs. Palin: She was a dope and unqualified from the start. Conservatives and Republicans, on the other hand, continue to battle it out: Was her choice a success or a disaster? And if one holds negative views, should one say so? For conservatives in general, but certainly for writers, the answer is a variation on Edmund Burke: You owe your readers not your industry only but your judgment, and you betray instead of serve them if you sacrifice it to what may or may not be their opinion.
But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she has the tools, the equipment, the knowledge or the philosophical grounding one hopes for, and expects, in a holder of high office. She is a person of great ambition, but the question remains: What is the purpose of the ambition?
Her supporters accuse her critics of snobbery: Maybe she's not a big "egghead" but she has brilliant instincts and inner toughness. But what instincts?
In the end the Palin candidacy is a symptom and expression of a new vulgarization in American politics. It's no good, not for conservatism and not for the country. And yes, it is a mark against John McCain, against his judgment and idealism."
In my opinion, Noonan is simply off her rocker. Why Noonan wrote glowingly of Harry Truman, but savages the equally-unknown and inexpressive Palin is beyond me. Except, of course, if you simply write Noonan off as a beltway veteran.
And I do.
After all, nobod knew who Truman was upon his nomination. Roosevelt never even spoke with him personally. Truman's only managerial experience was his failed clothing store in Kansas City.
How else to explain her preference for that idiot, "Lying Joe" Biden, over Palin, as a potential President?
Biden has been a wrong-headed moron with too many years in our temple to Windbaggery, the US Senate. He's done nothing.
Palin has been an executive of real governments. One municipal, one state. Hard work, if you want it.
In case Noonan has forgotten, Vice-Presidents are typically chosen for a reason other than being qualified to be President. Like it or not, that's the truth.
The first reason is typically to attract a key segment of the voting population which eludes the Presidential candidate. The next reason would be some particular theme, as in Palin's case.
Noonan simply dismisses anything outside the Beltway now. Even the freshman Senator from Illinois is okay with her, evidently because he stumbled into a Senate seat only two years ago.
How can anyone criticize Palin as unfit to be President, yet give the Illinois rookie a pass?
This, alone, I contend, marks Noonan as a washed-up has been in business of political commentary. If she's not biased, then she's just lost all perspective, judgment and common sense.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Political Fallout From Last Week's Financial Sector Situation
It's been a sad week for American politics. Seems that everybody connected with or commenting on the Presidential race is hysterical over recent developments in the financial services sector, and believes we are facing the likes of the Great Depression.
Peggy Noonan, who seems to have finally become senile, wrote in this weekend's edition of the Wall Street Journal that George Bush should have issued some statement immediately upon Monday morning. His failure to do so, she contends, paints him as a modern-day Herbert Hoover.
This, she says, will lose McCain the election.
McCain, for his part, published a rather overwhelming and misguided array of bromides he would attempt to push through and enforce. As is so typical in Presidential election years, the contenders don't really have a deep knowledge of the problems, and they want to appear to satisfy populist fears, so they trot out some shallow, fierce-sounding measures that won't really fix anything, but sound like they will punish the 'greedy' on Wall Street.
The Illinois rookie Senator, showing his true colors, says nothing, preferring to deliberate.
At least you can say that the financial services mess is forcing both candidates to (further) reveal their true natures. McCain shoots from the hip with some proposals to prevent future recurrences, and address current problems, while his opponent, being inexperienced at almost everything save running for office, says little.
Maybe that's the best we can take away from their responses.
In truth, Presidents may propose, but Congress disposes. And, thus, no matter what a candidate promises, he has to work through a Senate and House of decidedly different demeanor than an action-oriented, newly-elected President.
Peggy Noonan, who seems to have finally become senile, wrote in this weekend's edition of the Wall Street Journal that George Bush should have issued some statement immediately upon Monday morning. His failure to do so, she contends, paints him as a modern-day Herbert Hoover.
This, she says, will lose McCain the election.
McCain, for his part, published a rather overwhelming and misguided array of bromides he would attempt to push through and enforce. As is so typical in Presidential election years, the contenders don't really have a deep knowledge of the problems, and they want to appear to satisfy populist fears, so they trot out some shallow, fierce-sounding measures that won't really fix anything, but sound like they will punish the 'greedy' on Wall Street.
The Illinois rookie Senator, showing his true colors, says nothing, preferring to deliberate.
At least you can say that the financial services mess is forcing both candidates to (further) reveal their true natures. McCain shoots from the hip with some proposals to prevent future recurrences, and address current problems, while his opponent, being inexperienced at almost everything save running for office, says little.
Maybe that's the best we can take away from their responses.
In truth, Presidents may propose, but Congress disposes. And, thus, no matter what a candidate promises, he has to work through a Senate and House of decidedly different demeanor than an action-oriented, newly-elected President.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Electing Minorities in America
In all the hoopla of this past week's Democratic Presidential campaign trail, something seems to have been forgotten.
Most people don't vote single issues, even when the issue is being a minority.
The Wall Street Journal had a long, glowing piece about Obama this weekend. It cited how many white voters believe he is beyond the race issues of the 1960s, and showed a bar graph demonstrating that Americans are now 'ready' for a black President.
Then we have Hillary, playing the gender card, after being roughed up in last weekend's debate. Her husband accused the other candidates of taking advantage of her gender, and 'Swift boating' her.
Peggy Noonan got this one right, in her weekend column in the Wall Street Journal. Contrasting Hillary with Margaret Thatcher, she pointed out that lots of people, men and women, simply don't trust Hillary's blind ambition.
Personally, I don't have any problem with the idea of a woman, or any particular ethnic group member becoming President. So long as they meet the requirements and have a genuine interest in America's long term welfare, their specific group membership is irrelevant.
What is surprising is how the media continues to behave as if gender or race is the only reason people wouldn't vote for Hillary or Obama.
I won't vote for Hillary because she's a largely inexperienced, power-hungry socialist. She's met few, if any, large, expensive governmental programs she doesn't like, and will tax anyone, except her wealthy contributors, to pay for them.
It has nothing to do with her gender. That merely clouds things, in my opinion. To not vote for Hillary is not to reject women candidates for President. Merely that woman candidate.
The same is true for Obama. He has nothing remotely resembling the experience one would like to see in a President. Again, the Journal article made it seem as if a vote against, or not for, Obama, is a racist vote.
But that's not true. It totally overlooks Obama's nearly-total absence of any legitimate experience which would prepare him to lead this country. He's had only two years in the Senate- which is composed of largely do-nothing legislators. Prior to that, he served in the Illinois state legislature.
You wonder if Obama knows how to do anything- anything at all.
As with Hillary, I'm not against Obama because he's black. I don't think he's qualified a qualified person, no conditionality, to be President.
To reject Obama is not to reject minority candidates. Only that minority candidate. Jesse Jackson wasn't elected, either. And not because he is black. He was totally ill prepared to be President- and still is.
What really bothers me is how easily the media turns these two candidates' campaigns into litmus tests on gender and race, thus obscuring their relative inexperience and lack of qualifications for the high office they seek.
This is the sort of coverage that results in false impressions that America isn't ready for a woman or minority President.
Of course we are. We just need to see some women or minorities who are actually capable of executing the office of the President effectively.
Most people don't vote single issues, even when the issue is being a minority.
The Wall Street Journal had a long, glowing piece about Obama this weekend. It cited how many white voters believe he is beyond the race issues of the 1960s, and showed a bar graph demonstrating that Americans are now 'ready' for a black President.
Then we have Hillary, playing the gender card, after being roughed up in last weekend's debate. Her husband accused the other candidates of taking advantage of her gender, and 'Swift boating' her.
Peggy Noonan got this one right, in her weekend column in the Wall Street Journal. Contrasting Hillary with Margaret Thatcher, she pointed out that lots of people, men and women, simply don't trust Hillary's blind ambition.
Personally, I don't have any problem with the idea of a woman, or any particular ethnic group member becoming President. So long as they meet the requirements and have a genuine interest in America's long term welfare, their specific group membership is irrelevant.
What is surprising is how the media continues to behave as if gender or race is the only reason people wouldn't vote for Hillary or Obama.
I won't vote for Hillary because she's a largely inexperienced, power-hungry socialist. She's met few, if any, large, expensive governmental programs she doesn't like, and will tax anyone, except her wealthy contributors, to pay for them.
It has nothing to do with her gender. That merely clouds things, in my opinion. To not vote for Hillary is not to reject women candidates for President. Merely that woman candidate.
The same is true for Obama. He has nothing remotely resembling the experience one would like to see in a President. Again, the Journal article made it seem as if a vote against, or not for, Obama, is a racist vote.
But that's not true. It totally overlooks Obama's nearly-total absence of any legitimate experience which would prepare him to lead this country. He's had only two years in the Senate- which is composed of largely do-nothing legislators. Prior to that, he served in the Illinois state legislature.
You wonder if Obama knows how to do anything- anything at all.
As with Hillary, I'm not against Obama because he's black. I don't think he's qualified a qualified person, no conditionality, to be President.
To reject Obama is not to reject minority candidates. Only that minority candidate. Jesse Jackson wasn't elected, either. And not because he is black. He was totally ill prepared to be President- and still is.
What really bothers me is how easily the media turns these two candidates' campaigns into litmus tests on gender and race, thus obscuring their relative inexperience and lack of qualifications for the high office they seek.
This is the sort of coverage that results in false impressions that America isn't ready for a woman or minority President.
Of course we are. We just need to see some women or minorities who are actually capable of executing the office of the President effectively.
Monday, November 5, 2007
Peggy Noonan On Hillary's Revelations
Peggy Noonan redeemed herself with a great article in the Weekend Wall Street Journal concerning Hillary's behavior in the recent Democratic candidates' debate. She articulated clearly something I've felt about Hillary all along.
Noonan writes,
"The story is not that Mrs. Clinton signaled, in attitude and demeanor, who she believes is her most dangerous foe, the great impediment between her and an easy glide to the nomination. Yes, that would be Tim Russert.
The story is that she talked about policy. Not talking points, but policy. In talking about it she seemed, for the first time, to be revealing what's inside.
It was startling. It's 1993 in there. The year before her fall, and rise.
But the larger point is that her policy approach revealed all the impulses not of the New Centrism but the Old Leftism. Her statements were redolent of the 1990s phrase "command and control." They reflect a bias toward the old tax-raising on people who aren't rich, who aren't protected, the old "my friends and I know best, and we'll fill you dullards in on the details later."
The problem for Mrs. Clinton is not that people sense she will raise taxes. It's that they don't think she'll raise them on the real and truly rich. The rich are her friends. They contribute to her, dine with her, have access to her. They have an army of accountants. They're protected even from her.
But she can stick it to others, and in the way of modern liberalism for roughly half a century now, one suspects she'll define affluence down. That she would hike taxes on people who make $150,000 a year.
But those "rich" -- people who make $200,000 and have two kids and a mortgage and pay local and state taxes in, say, New Jersey -- they don't see themselves as rich. Because they're not. They're already carrying too much of the freight.
It seemed to me she made it quite possible to assume you know who she'll be making war on. And this -- much more than the latest scandal, the Chinatown funny money and the bundling -- could, and I think would, engender real opposition down the road. The big chink in her armor is not stylistic, it is about policy. It is about the great baseline question in all political life: Whose ox is being gored?"
It pleases me to see someone else also finally feel that Hillary's basic tax-the-middle-class-and-spend policy is the problem. It's such a throwback to the old, losing ways of her party that you wonder how she can believe she'll win with that message.
This is where I think that content can trump form. As I wrote here recently, of an acquaintance who reminded me of Howard Dean's fall from front-running grace four years ago, money and momentum in no way assure victory- either for the nomination, nor for the Presidency itself.
In their own self-interest, Hillary's largely-hapless or worn-out competitors are at last beginning to chip away at her Teflon coating. The inconsistencies are showing through, as are the megalomaniac projects and dreams of vast new Federal programs, paid for with vast new tax revenues from ever-less-wealthy Americans.
Call me naive, or too simple, but I think that Americans instinctively protect their wallets when threatened with such a free-taxing and -spending politician.
I think that reality is at last beginning to catch up to Hillary's campaign. And money won't protect her when it does.
Noonan writes,
"The story is not that Mrs. Clinton signaled, in attitude and demeanor, who she believes is her most dangerous foe, the great impediment between her and an easy glide to the nomination. Yes, that would be Tim Russert.
The story is that she talked about policy. Not talking points, but policy. In talking about it she seemed, for the first time, to be revealing what's inside.
It was startling. It's 1993 in there. The year before her fall, and rise.
But the larger point is that her policy approach revealed all the impulses not of the New Centrism but the Old Leftism. Her statements were redolent of the 1990s phrase "command and control." They reflect a bias toward the old tax-raising on people who aren't rich, who aren't protected, the old "my friends and I know best, and we'll fill you dullards in on the details later."
The problem for Mrs. Clinton is not that people sense she will raise taxes. It's that they don't think she'll raise them on the real and truly rich. The rich are her friends. They contribute to her, dine with her, have access to her. They have an army of accountants. They're protected even from her.
But she can stick it to others, and in the way of modern liberalism for roughly half a century now, one suspects she'll define affluence down. That she would hike taxes on people who make $150,000 a year.
But those "rich" -- people who make $200,000 and have two kids and a mortgage and pay local and state taxes in, say, New Jersey -- they don't see themselves as rich. Because they're not. They're already carrying too much of the freight.
It seemed to me she made it quite possible to assume you know who she'll be making war on. And this -- much more than the latest scandal, the Chinatown funny money and the bundling -- could, and I think would, engender real opposition down the road. The big chink in her armor is not stylistic, it is about policy. It is about the great baseline question in all political life: Whose ox is being gored?"
It pleases me to see someone else also finally feel that Hillary's basic tax-the-middle-class-and-spend policy is the problem. It's such a throwback to the old, losing ways of her party that you wonder how she can believe she'll win with that message.
This is where I think that content can trump form. As I wrote here recently, of an acquaintance who reminded me of Howard Dean's fall from front-running grace four years ago, money and momentum in no way assure victory- either for the nomination, nor for the Presidency itself.
In their own self-interest, Hillary's largely-hapless or worn-out competitors are at last beginning to chip away at her Teflon coating. The inconsistencies are showing through, as are the megalomaniac projects and dreams of vast new Federal programs, paid for with vast new tax revenues from ever-less-wealthy Americans.
Call me naive, or too simple, but I think that Americans instinctively protect their wallets when threatened with such a free-taxing and -spending politician.
I think that reality is at last beginning to catch up to Hillary's campaign. And money won't protect her when it does.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
More Out of Touch Ramblings from Peggy Noonan
This Friday's Wall Street Journal column by Peggy Noonan, one-time Reagan speech writer, may have hit a new low for being out of touch with reality.
She lauded Chris Dodd and Joe Biden for having good sense and a grasp of complex issues. She boosted Obama for his 'thoughtful look.'
Oh my God! What in the world has gotten into Noonan?
These are not "good" candidates. Dodd and Biden are relatively minor, attention-seeking, long-in-the-tooth Senators of the Dole and McCain model. They run on the same "it's my turn, dammit!" platform.
Being a longtime insider, I don't think Noonan can really see this anymore.
The Democratic party doesn't have a 'really good' candidate. They have various damaged candidates scrambling after a soon-to-be-vacant Oval Office with no incumbent running.
The good news, though, is that if one of them gets in, it's a fair bet that they will only enjoy at most two years of Congressional majority, before the whole gang gets carried away with spending, liberal legislation, etc., and get the Republicans back in control of the House and Senate.
She lauded Chris Dodd and Joe Biden for having good sense and a grasp of complex issues. She boosted Obama for his 'thoughtful look.'
Oh my God! What in the world has gotten into Noonan?
These are not "good" candidates. Dodd and Biden are relatively minor, attention-seeking, long-in-the-tooth Senators of the Dole and McCain model. They run on the same "it's my turn, dammit!" platform.
Being a longtime insider, I don't think Noonan can really see this anymore.
The Democratic party doesn't have a 'really good' candidate. They have various damaged candidates scrambling after a soon-to-be-vacant Oval Office with no incumbent running.
The good news, though, is that if one of them gets in, it's a fair bet that they will only enjoy at most two years of Congressional majority, before the whole gang gets carried away with spending, liberal legislation, etc., and get the Republicans back in control of the House and Senate.
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