issue: Politics

Did the Debt Deal Open the Door to a Third Party?

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Most political reporters have chalked up the debt ceiling deal as a “W” for House Republicans and a humiliating loss for President Obama. But when we consult actual voters, the political scorecard looks quite different.

Americans, says veteran pollster Stan Greenberg, aren’t just irritated by the games politicians play, they are “explosively angry” at Washington. There’s no love lost for either party, but Congressional Republicans now actually rank lowest in public esteem. The only “winners” in the debt limit fiasco were potential third party candidates.

According to Greenberg’s latest Democracy Corps survey, a majority of Americans (53 percent) say they would consider voting for a third party candidate. That could just be a momentary measure of public disgust, but it also points to the first serious opening for a challenge to the two-party duopoly since Obama took office. And when you break down the numbers by party affiliation, or lack of it, things start to get interesting.

By a whopping, 45-point margin (70-25) independents are the most receptive to a third party candidate. These voters swung decisively toward Obama in 2008, cementing his majority, but they are utterly up for grabs in 2012.

Democrats, on the other hand, are the most solid in their partisan commitment. By 57-39 percent, they reject the idea of a third party challenge. The big surprise is how open Republicans seem to be to bolting from their party’s ticket. A substantial majority (58-38) say they are willing to consider a third party alternative, with 38 percent “strongly” willing.

It’s hard to know exactly what to make of this. Maybe these numbers register tepid enthusiasm for GOP front runner Mitt Romney (the poll was taken before Michele Bachmann won Iowa’s straw poll and Rick Perry threw his Stetson in the ring). It’s possible GOP voters just don’t see the candidate yet who can unhorse Barack Obama. But since there aren’t many GOP moderates left, there’s another, more chilling possibility: Maybe the current crop of GOP hopefuls aren’t conservative enough for a sizeable chunk of the Republican base.

In any case, what Greenberg describes as the “unsettled” nature of Republicans’ partisan attachment could be good news for Obama and the Democrats. It could portend renegade candidacies that splinter conservatives; it’s not difficult, for example, to imagine Ron Paul running on a libertarian line if he doesn’t win the GOP nomination.

On the other hand, the public’s increasingly sour mood toward politics as usual has thrown the spotlight on a new political venture called Americans Elect. It’s a non-profit (full disclosure: I’ve volunteered to help) that is organizing a virtual or online nominating convention next June. The basic idea is to use the internet and social media to bypass the duopoly and give voters who don’t feel at home in either party a way to directly chose their own presidential ticket and platform.

Americans Elect isn’t a third party but is offering what it describes as a “second process” for choosing the next president. And it’s working to ensure that whoever wins the internet-based convention will be guaranteed ballot access in all 50 states.

I’ll have more to say about this intriguing experiment in empowering voters later. For now, it’s enough to say that the debt debacle has whetted Americans’ appetite for something completely different in national politics – and political entrepreneurs are responding.

The Consumption Economy Is Dying-Let it Die

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

With the stock market plunging, we’ve heard plenty of warnings that a “pullback” in consumer spending could trigger another recession. Let me suggest an alternative. The last thing this economy needs is more debt-fueled consumer spending which mainly creates jobs overseas. Instead, we should be focused on boosting investment in physical, human, and knowledge capital.

Now, who am I to be dissing the American consumer? Don’t I know that consumer spending “accounts for 70% of economic activity,” as many economic reporters have written in recent weeks? (Indeed, if I have to read that number in another story, I might be forced to go all Office Space on a piece of expensive consumer electronics.)

It’s true that consumer spending creates economic activity. But it’s not true that all that economic activity is in the United States. Many of the consumer goods we buy are imported. If you buy a shirt or television, you are stimulating manufacturing jobs in China, or perhaps Mexico. You aren’t doing as much to stimulate jobs at home.

This is true across the economy, but a helpful example is the clothing, or apparel, industry. Since the fourth quarter of 2007, clothing purchases by consumers have increased by about 5% in real terms, according to the latest figures from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Over roughly the same period, shipments from U.S. apparel factories fell by 31% in real terms, while apparel jobs fell by 26%. The winner: Factories in China and elsewhere making clothes for the U.S. market.

It’s not just clothes, of course. In many stores, it’s getting harder and harder to even find products that say “Made in the U.S.A.” That’s one reason why much of the economic stimulus escaped out the back door in the form of imports.

Now, this doesn’t mean imports are evil. When we buy goods from overseas, we generate some jobs in retail and wholesale. If you buy a shirt for cheaper than it would otherwise be if we made it here, you have more money left over to buy other things, like health care.

But the big problem with consumer spending is that if you buy a product made outside the U.S., it doesn’t encourage domestic investment. And that’s what we really need. In the past, a dollar spent on a shirt would start a virtuous circle, as the clothing factory expanded, adding more workers and buying new sewing machines. That investment in new machines, in turn, would create more business for the sewing machine company, who would then hire more workers who would need new shirts.

Today, the cycle is happening overseas. We have a genuine investment shortfall in the U.S., where both business and government are way below historical norms for spending on equipment, buildings, software, and infrastructure.

Consider this: Personal consumption in real terms is 11% below its long-term trend, based on the 1997-2007 period. That sounds bad enough. But nondefense government investment is 17% below its long term trend, as state and local governments cut back. And counting all private sector enterprises, nonnresidential investment is a stunning 25% below its long-term trend.

nonresidential investment.png

These figures are devastating for our economic future, both short and long-term. Low investment means fewer jobs and weaker productivity growth. The longer the investment shortfall lasts, the more damage it does. However, we’re not going to close the shortfall by encouraging debt-financed consumer spending. Instead, we need to redirect resources to productive investment.

Here’s a couple of examples of what we can do. First, I like to see the Obama administration publicly identify and applaud “investment heroes”: the top companies who are investing domestically in either physical capital or knowledge capital (R&D, design, and other forms of intellectual investment). The bully pulpit of the president can be a wonderful tool, if it directed toward the right cause, and this would send a signal of the importance of investment.

Second, Obama should come out in favor of countercyclical regulatory policy. We should accelerate the regulatory approval process during periods of economic weakness to boost corporate investment, just as countercyclical monetary and fiscal policy have been used to stimulate consumer spending. This is a message that has to be sent from the top to encourage regulators to consider the effects of their action on the economy.
The potential list of policies to boost investment goes on and on, including targeted infrastructure spending, as I described in my previous Atlantic piece, and perhaps a rationalization of the corporate tax code.

But what’s important is that none of these policies is about boosting consumer spending. If we want Americans to prosper, we need consumer spending to become less important to the economy, not more. In the end, we need a production economy, not a consumption economy.

The piece was originally written for the Atlantic.

Photo credit: Grace

Wingnut Watch: Wisconsin Recall Relief and Iowa Showdown

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

There is joy and relief in Wingnut World today thanks to the narrow failure of Wisconsin Democrats to win enough recall elections to take over the state’s Senate chamber (needing three new seats out of the six being contested, Democrats won two and lost the crucial third by just over 2,000 votes). Though this was a very unusual election in which vast quantities of last-minute conservative money (a total of $8 million was spent in the pivotal district, a bit more than the average state legislative race) probably made the difference, you can expect many jabberers from the Right to call this the final, definitive victory of the people over “labor bosses” determined to keep Scott Walker from giving job-creators the encouragement they need to invest in the state. Next week’s recall elections for two Democratic senators, which are not expected to go well for Republicans, probably won’t get as much national attention. Democrats will then have a tough decision to make about whether to seek a recall of Walker next year. But overall, the main importance of the Wisconsin struggle is that it will likely become a sort of laboratory for what the contending parties—and their ideological allies—will do nationally in 2012.

Aside from Wisconsin, and the continued preparatory skirmishing over the budget timeline set out in the August 1 debt limit, there are two main preoccupations among conservative activists and talkers. One is the war of interpretation over economic developments, including the threat of a double-dip recession, the Standard & Poor’s downgrading of its rating for federal bonds, and the extreme instability of U.S. and global stock markets. So far few, if any, conservatives are bending their general line on the ontological necessity of sharp and immediate federal spending cuts and radical deficit reduction measures in the face of poor economic growth indicators. For example, conservatives have shown no signs of interest in the president’s call for extension of the payroll tax cuts agreed to last December. Presidential candidate Michele Bachmann gets points for audacious consistency in arguing that the bond downgrading, explained by S&P as in no small part attributable to pessimism about future debt limit agreements because of Republican fanaticism on taxes, was actually caused by the debt limit agreement itself.

The second preoccupation in Wingnut World, as in the broader world of political junkies, is with the developments in the Republican presidential race that will unfold over the next few days. In Iowa, a presidential candidate debate on Thursday will immediately be followed by Saturday’s State Republican Party straw poll in Ames. The debate, sponsored by Fox News and the conservative Washington Examiner, will include not only the candidates competing in the Straw Poll, but also Mitt Romney, who is not, and could therefore be the target of zingers from rivals desperately trying to create some turnout-generating buzz in Ames.

In terms of what is likely to happen at the Straw Poll, there is a general consensus that Tim Pawlenty has the best organization but little enthusiasm; Michele Bachmann has the most enthusiasm but a questionable organization; Rick Santorum could well surprise people by doing better than Herman Cain; and Ron Paul, with the right combination of committed supporters and superior organization, could win the whole thing if turnout is not very high. Both Pawlenty and Bachmann really need a win in Ames. But it’s Pawlenty who needs it the most, having focused on Iowa for many months and positioned himself to become the “electable conservative alternative to Mitt Romney” down the road. His limited financial means and terrible poll standings across the country—and the impending entry of another “electable conservative alternative to Mitt Romney,” Rick Perry—could mean curtains if he doesn’t pull off the Straw Poll victory.

Speaking of Perry, he’s apparently going to announce or at least semi-announce his candidacy in South Carolina in the friendly confines of the annual get-together of Erick Erickson’s Red State community. The fact that his speech in Charleston occurs the very same day as the Straw Poll has caused some angst among Iowa Republicans, who view it as an effort to horn in on their media attention. So it’s not surprising Perry is planning to scurry up to Iowa (to Bachmann’s original home town of Waterloo) on Sunday. From Perry’s point of view, a Paul win in Ames, damaging Bachmann and perhaps finishing off T-Paw, and making the entire exercise (which he skipped) otherwise irrelevant, would be ideal. But even before announcing, Perry has managed to vault himself into the top tier of candidates, essentially succeeding in taking over T-Paw’s spot as the putative “unity candidate” between the electability-challenged Bachmann and the ideologically-challenged Romney. That’s quite a feat for a guy who keeps flip-flopping on hot-button social issues; has gotten dangerously cozy with religious extremists; has a habit of startling his fellow-conservatives with stunts like his 2008 championship of Rudy Guiliani; and has never been terribly popular in his own state.

Photo credit: WordShore.

STATEMENT: PPI Warns of Rigid Ideologues on Supercommittee

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

PRESS CONTACT: Steven Chlapecka – schlapecka@ppionline.org, T: 202.525.3931

WASHINGTON D.C. –PPI issued the following statement on the new congressional “supercommittee”:

“The composition of the congressional supercommittee gives leaders of the Senate and House of Representatives a unique opportunity to forge a bipartisan plan for deficit reduction. PPI encourages both Democratic and Republican congressional leadership to appoint pragmatic members and give them the political flexibility needed to make difficult sacrifices that put our country’s future before partisan interest.

“If the supercommittee is composed of rigid ideologues who staunchly refuse to compromise on increased tax revenues or reformed entitlement programs, this week’s legislation will trigger unnecessary cuts to discretionary and defense spending. PPI fears these draconian cuts would further weaken our economy, sacrifice overdue investments in infrastructure and education, and cripple our military. Failure to compromise on the deficit’s biggest drivers–entitlements and taxes–should not jeopardize these national priorities.”

Wingnut Watch: Pivoting to Ames

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Formally, at least, Wingnut World was divided over the big votes earlier this week on the debt limit increase “compromise” package. Even as conservative blogs (generally) urged a “no” vote, with varying degrees of heat, House Republicans approved the bill by a robust 174-66 margin. The House Tea Party Caucus even favored it 33-29, though the major “splits” were less ideological than institutional; virtually anyone with a connection to the House GOP leadership or in a senior committee position voted “yea.”

But in the immediate wake of the vote, conservatives seem to have united in a strategy of utilizing the “deal” to plot an incessant, scorched-earth campaign for more spending cuts, and particularly an assault on entitlements. The deal certainly does provide many opportunities for additional fights: an appropriations battle prior to the end of the fiscal year (less than two months from now), which will almost certainly involve another effort to shut down the government; a “disapproval” vote for the president’s scheduled second-stage increase in the debt limit, which will probably occur in early October; the “debt committee” struggle over additional deficit reduction measures in November, which will occur against the background of pending automatic spending cuts that will occur in December if no action is taken; and then a longer-term fight over tax policy in 2012 in anticipation of the expiration of the Bush tax cuts at the end of that year.

While many wingnuts are relishing these battles, they will involve some intra-conservative tensions, especially in terms of the priority assigned to protection of defense spending and avoidance of revenue increases, and the relative emphasis placed on entitlements cuts as opposed to even deeper discretionary spending cuts than are already baked into the cake in the debt limit deal. On the former front, it’s worth noting that three presidential candidates who opposed the deal—Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty and Michele Bachmann—all cited fears of defense cuts as a factor. Efforts to resolve the conflict between defense hawks and anti-tax militants will probably push conservatives into the perilous territory of insisting on major cuts in Social Security, Medicare benefits and Medicaid. The programs are all protected in the “deal” from automatic cuts and the cuts themselves are unpopular and reinforce Democratic attacks on earlier Republican support for Paul Ryan’s radical Medicare and Medicaid proposals. Indeed, one of the major conservative grievances about what is otherwise a pretty solid victory for their cause is that the “deal” did not provide bipartisan cover for significant changes in the big entitlement programs.

All these issues, of course, will be problematic for the GOP presidential candidates, for whom the schedule of regular fiscal battles through the nominating process and into the general election campaign, will represent at best a major distraction, and at worst a long series of right-wing litmus tests in which there is only one right answer. Without question, this scenario will make it hard for any eventual nominee to “pivot” to a swing-voter friendly general election strategy.

At the moment, though, the would-be 45th presidents have other, more immediate, fish to fry. The candidates competing in the August 13 Iowa GOP Straw Poll are moving into the pre-event mobilization phase, buying tickets for anyone they think will vote for them in Ames that day, gassing up the vans and buses, planning entertainment for attendees, and managing expectations. The big question according to most handicappers is whether Pawlenty’s statewide organization can overcome Bachmann’s enthusiasm and momentum. There’s some talk that Ron Paul could sneak past both Minnesotans and pull off an upset. Rick Santorum’s organizational efforts could well push him past Herman Cain, who does a lot better in the polls but hasn’t spent much time in the state.

Meanwhile, a candidate who is not competing in Ames but is expected by most observers to announce his candidacy soon afterwards, Rick Perry, is having some issues with his outreach to the Christian Right. After last week’s conspicuous Perry flip-flop towards support for a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, he’s now executed a similar maneuver on abortion, eschewing earlier statements in favor of state control of that subject and endorsing a federal constitutional ban. Additionally, there are signs that the big prayer rally he is sponsoring in Houston this weekend could have an attendance problem. A spokesman for the event, however, had this to say:

We are not really concerned with the quantity of people that come. It’s frankly more about the powerful event that will speak to those who do come. It’s never been about the numbers.

That’s probably code for what matters to Team Perry–who is on the podium representing important Christian Right factions, not who is in the seats taking in the show. They are basically props.

Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore

Wingnut Watch: Jim DeMint’s Filibuster, T-Paw and Bachmann’s Catfight.

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Like most politically active Americans, the residents of Wingnut World are heavily focused on the debt limit negotiations. Unlike many politically active Americans, hard-core conservatives by and large are just fine with a failure to reach any agreement. In some cases, it’s because they don’t buy the idea that failure to raise the debt limit will cause a default on federal government obligations. The “Full Faith and Credit Act”, introduced some time back by Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Club for Growth) and backed by most Tea Party groups, is designed to bolster that case by directing the Treasury to pay creditors, the armed services, and Social Security recipients first if the debt limit is reached (this approach, of dubious legality, would virtually guarantee a major shutdown of unprotected federal programs).

Then there are those conservatives who don’t necessarily dispute that a debt limit increase is necessary to avoid a default, or that a default would produce economic havoc, but nonetheless argue that cutting federal spending, taxes and debt is more important (economically and morally) in the long run. Thus, they are adamantly opposed to any deal that doesn’t meet the politically impossible “Cut, Cap and Balance” template. This is the official position of the 183 conservative organizations, including those that have signed onto the “Cut, Cap and Balance” Pledge, along with nine presidential candidates (ten if you count likely candidate Rick Perry), 12 senators and 39 House Members. There is no deal anywhere in the works that these folks can support without subjecting themselves to charges of hypocrisy and betrayal. And the senators among them—including wingnut Big Dog Jim DeMint—have regularly threatened a filibuster against any deal they don’t like, which would produce highly dangerous delays even if it is not backed by sufficient votes to thwart the majority.

Outside this circle of solemn oaths to wreck the national economy if it’s necessary to pursue their ideological agenda, conservatives vary in what they might consider acceptable, with some focused on the precise extent of the concessions that might be wrung from the administration and congressional Democrats, and some standing with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in making political point-scoring against the administration the top priority. Virtually no conservatives have conceded the possibility of a deal including revenue measures that aren’t pared with tax rate cuts. And on top of everything else, profound institutional rivalries between House and Senate Republicans that have already become a problem in coordinating GOP strategy will make expeditious final action difficult. It’s going to be a very long week.

Meanwhile, on the presidential campaign trail, the rivalry between those Minnesota twins, Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty, has been heating up. T-Paw has recently taken several shots at Bachmann’s record in Congress—and lack of executive experience—along with making what looked to be a thinly veiled reference to her medical condition as a possible problem (he later flatly stated he had never seen Bachmann suffer from any incapacity in fulfilling her duties). Bachmann fired back harshly with a denunciation of Pawlenty’s earlier positions on health reform, climate change, and TARP, suggesting he had a lot in common with Barack Obama.

The knife-fight reflects the fact that Pawlenty is fighting for his political life in Iowa, and can ill afford to lose badly to Bachmann at the August 13 Iowa GOP Straw Poll. But both Minnesotans are increasingly laboring under the tall shadow of Texas Governor Rick Perry, who is reportedly 99% sure to announce a candidacy next month. Already in the double-digits in national and some state polls (a statute that poor T-Paw has yet to reach after months of campaigning), Perry probably benefitted from the decision of the Iowa GOP to keep him off the Straw Poll ballot, which means he doesn’t have to rush his announcement and won’t suffer from a poor showing in Ames. But Perry also courted controversy on the Right the other day by expressing indifference to New York’s recent legalization of same-sex marriage on states’ rights grounds:

“Our friends in New York six weeks ago passed a statute that said marriage can be between two people of the same sex. And you know what? That’s New York, and that’s their business, and that’s fine with me,” he said to applause from several hundred GOP donors in Aspen, Colo. “That is their call. If you believe in the 10th Amendment, stay out of their business.”

This comment immediately attracted criticism from Christian Right leaders, including Gary Bauer and Iowa kingmaker Bob Vander Plaats, who don’t think their “marriage is between a man and a woman” stance is a matter of state preference any more than individual preference. Perry’s stance, and the casual attitude he conveyed in talking about it, could give Bachmann fresh traction in her struggle to compete with the Texan for Christian Right support.

No Bargain for America

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

When you compromise between a good plan and a bad plan, you get a less good plan. So what happens when you compromise between two bad plans? We’re about to find out, as Congress this week tries to reconcile deficit reduction blueprints drawn up by House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

That we are now reduced to fallback House and Senate plans reflects the failure of the nation’s political leadership to rise to the occasion and forge a common approach to solving the debt crisis. The road not taken was the “grand bargain” every serious budget analyst knows is substantively and politically the only way to control the debt: trade more tax revenues for cuts in the unsustainable growth of entitlement spending.

While it’s easy to assume a posture of Olympian detachment and blame both sides for this failure of nerve, it’s wrong. The grand bargain died because House Republicans killed it. As President Obama said last night, it was scuttled by the “ideological rigidity” of Tea Party extremists who are trying to dictate national fiscal policy from the House.

Recall that once it was clear that he couldn’t get a “clean” bill raising the debt limit, President Obama decided to go big. That is, he pushed for a big debt reduction package of about $4 trillion, which would stabilize and eventually shrink the debt. That idea appealed to Boehner – at first. But when House GOP freshmen made it clear they would not vote to raise revenues, insisting that our massive deficits be closed through spending cuts alone, Boehner walked away from talks with the President. Not once, but twice.

As liberals ruefully noted, the House GOP’s zero-concessions approach contrasted sharply with Obama’s pliability. First he agreed to trillions of dollars of domestic spending cuts. Then he offered to put entitlements on the table, causing conniptions among the “progressives” who oppose long-overdue reforms in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The president endorsed a package that was 3-1 spending cuts over tax revenues. Rather than accept it and declare victory, conservatives demanded unconditional surrender.

So now the spotlight shifts to the Boehner and Reid plans. Both fall well short of what the country needs. Boehner calls for a two-step process: First, Congress would cap discretionary spending and raise the debt ceiling by $1 trillion. Then a bicameral joint committee would be charged with finding another $1.8 trillion in savings. If Congress approves the second tranche, it would lift the debt ceiling by the same amount.

The Reid bill also would cut discretionary spending by nearly $3 trillion over the next decade, and leave revenues untouched. But as critics have rightly pointed out, that includes savings from military spending as the U.S. interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down that have been accounted for already. Nonetheless, Obama last night endorsed Reid’s approach, which has the virtue of extending the debt ceiling until after the next presidential election.

Neither bill, of course, offers a permanent solution to the debt crisis. It’s not even clear that each could pass its respective House of Congress. It’s not hard to imagine Tea Party types balking because the bill doesn’t cut deeply enough, or because they’d rather force the country into default as a way of defunding federal programs. Some Senate liberals are chafing over Reid’s approach, which does not ask the rich to pay higher taxes or even close tax loopholes, thereby putting the entire burden of debt reduction on domestic spending.

In the end, as everyone expects, some kind of package will be cobbled together to avoid a prolonged default. But that means the whole sorry spectacle, replete with dogmatic posturing and politically evasive behavior will drag on into next year.

Photo Credit: Robert Reed Daly

Wingnut Watch: Cut, Cap, Balance, Perry.

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

It’s a High Noon moment in Wingnut World, as conservatives do everything possible to sabotage a deal to increase the debt limit even as their congressional leaders negotiate behind the scenes to make a deal possible. Yesterday’s near-party-line vote in the House passing the “Cut, Cap, Balance Act” represented a particularly vivid demonstration of conservative inflexibility and its grip on the GOP. CCB would write directly into the U.S. Constitution the Right’s current contention that fiscal problems are always and invariably the result of excessive spending, and that a fixed, ideal ratio between spending and GDP can be deduced and legislated forever.

But extreme as the CCB exercise appeared in terms of all precedent, from the perspective of many conservative activists it was a bit of a wimpy compromise. CCB suggests, after all, there is a circumstance—an insanely remote circumstance, to be sure—under which a debt limit increase would be appropriate. That’s offensive to those who earlier staked out a “just say no” position Indeed, two of the nine votes cast by House Republicans against the CCB bill were from presidential candidates Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul. Bachmann had just, earlier this week, become the ninth candidate (everyone in the race other than heresiarch Jon Huntsman) to sign the Cut-Cap-Balance Pledge, after adding a proviso that she wouldn’t support a debt limit increase until such time as the Affordable Care Act of 2010 is repealed.

With CCB going nowhere in the Senate, Wingnuts now have at least a few days to fulminate against, and then to oppose, any actual debt limit deal. Their public rationales for obstructionism vary: Many conservatives are default denialists, who claim there are actually no significant economic consequences to a failed debt limit increase because the feds will figure out some way to pay creditors until something can be worked out. Others are what might be called bullies-and-bluffers, who are convinced (like some of their brethren on the Left) that the president and congressional Democrats will always and invariably surrender in any negotiations on any subject, making the maximum hard line the appropriate GOP starting point. And still others profess to believe that excessive federal spending—and/or the continued existence of entitlements like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid—is the real threat to the economy and indeed to human liberty, making some short-term global economic collapse a small price to pay for a return to the lost Eden of the Coolidge Administration.

If, of course, a deal is struck and somehow can be maneuvered through Congress with just enough Republican votes to obtain a majority, we’ll see a whole new cycle of recriminations against this fresh “betrayal” by “RINOs”, complete with threats of primary challenges and maybe even third parties. That any such deal will almost certainly involve unprecedented Democratic concessions on spending, bipartisan “cover” for unpopular changes in entitlements, and abandonment of longstanding Democratic demands for higher taxes on the wealthy, won’t cut much ice on the Right.

As the countdown to default continues in Washington, two very different countdowns are underway on the presidential campaign trail: the countdown to the first real contest of the cycle, the August 13 Iowa GOP Straw Poll, and the countdown to Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s decision on whether to join the race.

Michele Bachmann continues to be the favorite to win the Straw Poll; she’s using her hard-line position on the debt limit to maximum advantage in Iowa, making it the subject of her first statewide TV ad (entitled “Courage”). But she’s now undergoing the first real rough patch of intense media scrutiny and personal questions, some undoubtedly inspired by her opponents. At present, the chattering classes are buzzing over anonymous claims that she is frequently incapacitated by migraine headaches and/or treatment for that condition.

Meanwhile, speculation mounts that Perry will soon jump in (though it’s no more definitive than earlier claims that Haley Barbour and Mitch Daniels were minutes away from candidacy). The implications of a Perry run depend on how you see his appeal. Some observers appear to think that the combination of his fundraising prowess, his Tea Party connections, and the “story” of Texas’ economic success, is simply unbeatable. The Hill’s Christian Heinze, for example, who is following the race full-time, appears to think Perry would almost immediately create a one-on-one battle for the nomination with Mitt Romney as Tea Partiers abandoned Bachmann and Cain for the pretty-boy Texan. But as Heinze himself notes, some New Hampshire Tea Folk, however, are raising questions about Perry’s chronic resistance to anti-immigration laws and rhetoric (a smart stance in Texas, but not necessarily elsewhere) and his staunch support for Rudy Giuliani in 2008. And Texans do not quite seem to share the national conservative belief they are living in an economic paradise engineered by Perry’s determination to give corporate executives absolutely everything they want.

If Perry does run—before or after his August 6 prayer-a-thon event in Houston that is certain to raise some questions about his relationship with the theocratic wing of conservative evangelicalism—he will face an immediate strategic decision about whether to plunge into the Iowa Caucus campaign full-bore (it’s already a bit late for a Straw Poll bid by Perry, though the Iowa GOP could put him on the ballot for the event), or instead lay a trap in South Carolina for whoever wins Iowa and New Hampshire (say, Bachmann and Romney). A complicating factor for a Dixiefied strategy by Perry is that wingnut kingmaker Sen. Jim DeMint has successfully convinced most Palmetto State pols and donors to hold off on any candidate endorsements or financial commitments until after Labor Day, apparently to increase his own leverage over the field. Leave it to virulently anti-union South Carolina Republicans to make Labor Day a signpost for keeping rightward ideological pressure on their party and its presidential field.

Photo credit: Bonzo McGrue

Balanced Budget Amendment: A Gimmicky Disaster-in-Waiting.

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

By refusing to budge on tax revenues, House Republicans have blown a rare chance to get Democrats to swallow trillions of dollars in federal budget cuts. As New York Times columnist David Brooks notes in a shrewd piece today, cuts of such magnitude would have provoked a rancorous split between President Obama and liberals.

Instead, Republicans have opted for ideological purity, including today’s purely symbolic vote on a balanced budget amendment that isn’t going anywhere.

The Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) is an almost perfect embodiment of the contemporary GOP’s gimmicky approach to governing. It’s an uncomplicated way to convey toughness, and it allows conservatives to drape themselves in the mantle of fiscal responsibility without taking the heat for cutting specific programs. And like many of the faux solutions to which Republicans seem fatally attracted, it would damage our economy.

A balanced budget amendment would handcuff the federal government in times of emergency. Backers say the rule could be waived during recessions, but it’s never clear until after when recessions begin and end. Since most of the states have balanced budget mandates, only Washington can spend at the right time and on a scale sufficient to exert counter-cyclical pressure during downturns. The federal government’s superior resources and borrowing capacity make it in effect the nation’s fiscal reserve.

Republicans almost rammed through a BBA in 1997. In the years that followed, the Clinton administration produced balanced budgets the old-fashioned way, by cutting actual programs and making trade-offs among competing public priorities.

Nonetheless, House Republicans once again claim that only a Constitutional amendment can force Congress to do its fiscal duty. Their “Cut, Cap and Balance” plan not only would bar budget deficits, but would also limit federal spending to 18% of economic output, two points below the average of the past several decades.

In other words, it would force massively disruptive cuts in all federal spending, from Medicare and Social Security to the Pentagon and domestic programs. Not even Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, the GOP’s uber fiscal hawk, goes this far.

At the same time, the proposed amendment would make it well-nigh impossible to raise taxes, which would require a two-thirds vote in the House and the Senate. It’s a formula for rigidity at best and fiscal paralysis at worst. It would invite judicial interference in a power the Constitution unambiguously delegates to Congress – the power of the purse – and narrow the scope of democratic decision-making.

So why are House Republicans pushing it now? Because they know that, in the end, at least some House Republicans will have to vote to raise the debt limit to avert an economic calamity. They want the political cover of having voted for a “permanent” solution to the debt crisis – the BBA – to shield them from the Tea Party’s wrath.

Senate Democrats of course aren’t about to let Republicans write their economic ideology into the nation’s fundamental law, and President Obama has threatened a veto. Still, it’d be a relief if Republicans could find ways to score political points with their base that don’t injure our economy — either by plunging the nation into default, or enshrining archaic notions of a feeble national government in the U.S. Constitution.

Photo Credit: Common Pixels

What Would Reagan Do?

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Guess who said this:

“The full consequences of a default – or even the serious prospect of default – by the United States are impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate. Denigration of the full faith and credit of the United States would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and the value of the dollar.”

President Obama? Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner? No, Ronald Reagan, in a 1983 letter to then-Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker. And yet GOP Sen. Jim DeMint called Geithner a “Chicken Little” for issuing an almost identical warning against undermining America’s global creditworthiness.

The Republicans have come a long way since Ronald Reagan occupied the Oval Office – and it’s mostly been downhill.

Winning no prizes for statesmanship is House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who argues that it’s more important to prevent the government from raising a penny more in tax revenue than to prevent it from going bankrupt and defaulting on its debts. He says Republicans are making a major concession to Obama just by considering his request to raise the debt ceiling.

The Gipper must be rolling in his grave. Unlike Cantor, he didn’t worry that doing his public duty might be construed as a favor to his political opponents. Reagan was no fan of higher taxes either, but he manned up and raised them when that became necessary to corral federal deficits and restore fiscal responsibility.

What would Reagan do today? The best way to answer that is to look at what he actually did do as president.

First, Reagan pushed through the giant 1981 tax cut that marked America’s first misbegotten experiment with supply side economics. Whatever stimulative effect it may have had was soon overwhelmed by Fed Chairman Paul Volker’s decision to raise interest rates to wring inflation out of the economy. America suffered a harrowing recession in 1982, and federal deficits exploded.

Reagan urged the nation to “stay the course,” but on taxes he changed course. In 1982, when unemployment stood at 10.1 percent, he signed the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which increased taxes by around one percent of GDP. Irate conservatives blamed the baleful influence of Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole. A young GOP backbencher and bombthrower, Newt Gingrich, famously called Dole “the tax collector of the welfare state.”

That was something of a bad rap, however, since Reagan ended up raising taxes a total of 11 times during his presidency. Unlike today’s Republicans, he believed fiscal discipline was more important than supply side theories and he understood that compromise is crucial to advancing national interests. In his second term, Reagan embraced a Democratic proposal to broaden the tax base by closing loopholes, and use the savings to bring rates down. The Tax Reform Act of 1986 simplified the tax code by drastically reducing the number of deductions and the number of tax brackets.

Reagan’s determination to not let deficits get too far out of hand continued under his successor. President George H.W. Bush even broke his “read my lips” pledge in 1990, pushing a deficit reduction package that cut spending by $324 billion and raised revenues by $159 billion over five years. Many conservatives were apoplectic, but Bush’s brave move helped put America on track toward the budget surpluses that President Bill Clinton achieved in the late 1990s.

Tea Party Republicans reject that legacy – even though it led to the balanced budget they are now loudly demanding. As conservative NYT columnist David Brooks wrote recently, that’s a radical departure from the party’s tradition of fiscal rectitude as well as the political give and take that makes democratic politics work.

It’s also repudiation of Reagan, the man conservatives love to venerate and name airports after but, as it turns out, honor in the breach when it comes to protecting the full faith and credit of the United States.

Photo Credit: Brett Tatman

Will Cantor Blow Up the Economy?

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The stock market plunged over 150 points yesterday as Republicans hardened their stance in debt reduction talks with the White House. The sharp drop was a timely reminder that a political failure to raise the debt ceiling would be a body blow to America’s already weak economy.

The odds of that happening rose sharply this weekend, as House Speaker John Boehner broke off talks with President Obama because he couldn’t get Republicans to support a fiscal “grand bargain” that would include higher tax revenues. That puts Majority Leader Eric Cantor in charge of GOP negotiating strategy — and on the spot.

Unlike Boehner, who seems to have the quaint idea that voters sent him to Washington to solve problems, Cantor is a faithful medium for channeling the Tea Party’s anti-Washington wrath. Rather than prepare his troops for the compromises and shared sacrifices that reducing America’s debts inevitably will entail, he’s been a zealous enforcer of the GOP’s “zero tolerance” dogma on taxes.

Cantor says Republicans can live with closing tax loopholes, as long as every penny saved goes into lowering tax rates. Meanwhile, most House Republicans last week opposed even modest efforts to trim defense spending. So here in essence is Cantor’s generous offer to President Obama and the Democrats: You agree to cut domestic programs by about $2 trillion now and we’ll vote to raise the debt ceiling by that amount. Oh, and after that, we’ll start whacking entitlement programs.

What a deal! Since no self-respecting Democrat would ever bargain on such one-sided terms, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that House Republicans actually want to plunge the nation into a new economic crisis. Do they really hate taxes – or Obama – that much? Or maybe in their revolutionary fervor the Tea Party patriots have unwittingly internalized the old Bolshevic slogan: “the worse, the better.”

In any case, the public seems to be in no mood for a politically manufactured crisis on top of the steady drumbeat of bad economic news — and Obama has deftly set up Republicans to take the political fall.

In contrast to the GOP’s truculence on taxes, the president has appeared reasonable, flexible and persistent in trying to get Republicans to “yes.” To the chagrin of many Democrats, he’s offered to cut $3 in federal spending for every $1 in new revenue. Obama is receptive to the idea of lowering tax rates, as long as some revenue is left over for cutting deficits, and last week even gave liberals chilblains by offering to put entitlement reform on the table.

In slapping away the President’s outstretched hand, the GOP seems to be in the grip of not one but two mass delusions.

The first is that Americans are groaning under crushing tax burdens that would make Pharaoh blush. But the federal tax take has sunk to just 15 percent of GDP, far below its usual average of 19 percent.

The second delusion is that failing to raise the debt ceiling might have no repercussions. On Fox News Sunday, Sen. Jim DeMint accused Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner of trying to scare Republicans into making a bad deal. “Secretary Geithner has been irresponsible. He’s playing Chicken Little here. The fact is that we will pay our debts if it’s the last dollar we have… We’re not going to default.”

DeMint’s logic apparently is this: Since tax revenues are sufficient to cover about 55-60 percent of what Washington spends, there will be plenty of money to pay our foreign creditors. There just won’t be nearly enough to finance federal programs but, who’ll miss them? One possible answer: Social Security recipients, whose checks are supposed to be mailed Aug. 3. Others include military personnel, federal employees, and all those families hoping to visit National Parks during their summer vacation.

When the public backlash comes, Republicans won’t be able to say they weren’t warned. Geithner broke it down clearly this weekend on NBC’s Meet the Press:

“Remember…we have to borrow now 40 cents for every dollar we spend…And every week starting the week of August 2, we have to go out and finance roughly $100 billion in maturing obligations of the government. We make 80 million checks a month to Americans, 55 million people on Social Security benefits, millions more Americans on veterans’ benefits, Medicare, Medicaid, people who supply our troops in combat. Eighty million checks a month.”

The imponderable here is the markets’ reaction to a failure to lift the debt ceiling. There’s a serious risk of higher interest rates, plunging confidence in the dollar and an even deeper freeze on job-creating investments in the U.S. economy.

Eric Cantor imagines the public is behind him on taxes. More likely, he’s saddling up to lead a fiscal reprisal of Picketts’ Charge.

Photo Credit: Republican Conference

Wingnut Watch: Cut, Cap, and Pledge

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

As negotiations in Washington over a prospective debt limit increase stall and sputter, the process is not exactly getting an assist from Republican presidential candidates. With the exception of Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman, the field is joining conservative activists demanding that congressional GOPers hold the line against any revenue increases as part of a solution in favor of huge domestic spending cuts. Romney hedged his bets by signing onto the notorious “cut, cap and balance” pledge to oppose any debt limit increase not associated with big immediate spending cuts, a permanent limitation of federal spending to a fixed (and much lower) percentage of GDP, and a balanced budget constitutional amendment with a supermajority requirement for tax increases. Using his pledge signature as cover, the former governor is refusing to comment on the specifics of negotiations.

On the other hand Michele Bachmann, who is surging in Iowa and other states, and has earned some grief for (so far) failing to sign the CCB pledge, is settling into her own hard line of unconditionally opposing any debt limit increase (a demand for spending cuts large enough to obviate the need for an increase in the limit). As we get closer to the first real event of the 2012 presidential cycle, the August 13 Iowa State GOP Straw Poll, you can expect the candidates competing there — Bachmann, Pawlenty, Cain and Paul — to get more emphatically shrill about prospects for a “betrayal” of conservatives by their purported leaders in Congress.

While Bachmann has run some risks by declining to sign the CCB pledge (especially the displeasure of South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, one of its most prominent sponsors), she wasted no time signing onto a very different and more controversial “pledge”: the “Marriage Vow” released last week by the Iowa social conservative group known as The FAMiLY LEADER. The “Vow” contains a host of radical “pro-family” commitments, from standard right-wing fare like total opposition to same-sex unions to more exotic positions such as tougher divorce laws, opposition to women serving in combat, a national effort to wipe out porn, and natalist support for “robust” child-bearing. The pledge also includes a preamble with even more controversial propositions like the claim that African-Americans under slavery had a stronger family structure than they do today, and arguments that it’s “anti-scientific” to believe there is a genetic basis for homosexuality.

The language about slavery set off a firestorm, which made The FAMiLY LEADER scramble to make revisions, and gave candidates other than Bachmann and Rick Santorum (another early signatory) a good excuse to hold off on taking the “Wedding Vow.” What makes the situation difficult for candidates is that the promulgator of the pledge, FAMiLY LEADER President Bob Vander Plaats, is a big wheel in Iowa GOP politics (he was co-chair of Mike Huckabee’s 2008 Iowa campaign, and leader of the successful 2010 effort to recall three judges who supported the state Supreme Court’s 2009 decision legalizing same-sex marriages). Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty (who hasn’t taken a position on the pledge) particularly lust for Vander Plaats’ support, or at least his neutrality.

Meanwhile, in the broader context of the Iowa battle, a new poll of likely caucus-goers from The Iowa Republican site confirms Michele Bachmann’s surge in the state, showing her moving ahead of Mitt Romney (whom she narrowly trailed in a recent Des Moines Register poll) by a 25 to 21 percent margin. The poll also had some much-needed good news for T-Paw after his sixth-place showing in the Register survey: TIR has him inching past Herman Cain into third place with an anemic but still better-than-usual 9 percent. Moreover, the poll gave both Bachmann and Pawlenty significantly better favorable-unfavorable ratings than Romney, who has a barely visible Iowa campaign and is not competing in the August 13 Straw Poll. Interestingly enough, the survey showed Bachmann doing well with all ideological subgroups in the Iowa GOP (perhaps due to her mostly autobiographical ads and speeches so far)– a situation that greater scrutiny of her platform and background may not sustain. If T-Paw is able to parlay his strong organization into at least a second-place finish in Ames, he has some reason to hope he could catch Bachmann by the time of the Caucuses as voters learn more about her long association with extremist causes.

On a more immediate note, voters in southern California are going to the polls today in a special election to choose a successor to retired Congresswoman Jane Harman. In this solidly Democratic district, the favorite all along has been Los Angeles City Councilwoman Janice Hahn, who enjoys strong labor and party-establishment backing. But wealthy Tea Party Republican Craig Huey, who upset Democratic Secretary of State Deborah Bowen for a runoff spot in a May special election primary, has been running surprisingly well against Hahn in polls and in estimates of early voting. Hahn will probably still win. But in a very low-turnout scenario, an upset is possible, which would neutralize the Democratic optimism generated by a victory in a recent special congressional election in New York, and also perhaps indirectly validate a sexually and racially loaded web ad run by “independent” conservatives against Hahn widely viewed as the most offensive political ad since, well, forever.

Photo Credit: TalkMediaNews

The Price of Civility

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Recently released polls have shown disappointing returns for Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman, whose percentage of the vote has hovered around 3 percent since early May, and received no noticeable bump from his June 21 campaign announcement. It gets worse: Only 42 percent of Republicans actually know of Huntsman, 20 percent less than the average candidate. Huntsman’s poll number plateau lends credence to Washington Post Columnist Dana Milbank’s view that Huntsman and his amicable approach were doomed on arrival.

In a “normal” presidential cycle, Huntsman should be polling much better. His ability to test the president in an area of strength, foreign policy, and position as the most moderate candidate should resonate with a larger niche of independent voters allowed to participate in early state primaries like New Hampshire. But campaigning on the moral high road in this Republican Party nomination contest may come with a hefty toll.

Huntsman is mired support levels similar to Newt Gingrich, and has one of the lowest positive intensity scores (the percent strongly favorable minus the percent strongly unfavorable and gage of the “intensity of support among a candidate’s base of followers.”) out of any of the candidates at (+2). The positive intensity score is critical to building up a volunteer base that is eager to engage in critical but mechanical activities like phone banking, and fight harder at early manpower-driven campaign events like the Iowa caucuses.

Herman Cain, who is more in line with the Republican base, has similar recognition levels but higher intensity numbers at (+25). Cain’s fiery rhetoric, not just his policy, drives his positive intensity levels. Herman Cain‘s bombastic language underscores his policy, and reinforces his firebrand image and in-line with the base policies. Huntsman’s politeness pledge lacks the wherewithal to aggressively contrast his positions with the other contenders, coming off as bland and out-of-synch with the Republicans.

Civil campaigns have a three-part cycle: an initial surplus of press, followed by a drastic drop-off of publicity, ending with the candidate languishing in obscurity. The initial glut of press at the onset of their campaign seems like a severance package to compensate candidates for the minimum attention they receive after the initial surge.

Beyond reducing visibility, limited press also restricts a candidate’s number of defining moments. Each moment carries more weight in marking a candidate’s personality – Huntsman’s desire for civility has labeled him boring and uninteresting. Furthermore, the nature of a campaign drives the media’s branding. Huntsman’s tough-guy motorcycle doesn’t help shake his nice guy image and all the connotations and lack of attention such monikers bring. Here’s a striking figure: only five percent of the 42 percent Republicans that know of Huntsman support his candidacy strongly. That’s just 2 percent of all Republican voters overall. Rising above the fray in politics is an honorable notion, but like most things, it comes with a price.

Huntsman’s low recognition is a by-product of his polite campaign. Conflict drives newspapers and the press drives identification. Politeness just doesn’t generate any headlines.

Photo Credit: David Keller

Will Marshall Tackles Democrat Entitlement Anger in Politico’s Arena

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

PPI President Will Marshall today discussed the “Hill Democrats Entitlement Mentality” in a post for Politico’s Arena today.

“House liberals, on the other hand, want to use “protecting Medicare” as a cudgel against GOP opponents in next year’s elections. That’s understandable, but can Democrats really afford to torpedo prospects for long-term debt reduction to win a few marginal House districts?”

Read the full post here.

Wingnut Watch: The Perry Proposition

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The “invisible primary” of Republican presidential candidates positioning themselves to become the Wingnut alternative to Mitt Romney is now getting close to its first major landmarks: the “closing of the field” when Republicans stop fantasizing about late entries who will shake up the race, and the August 13 Iowa State GOP straw poll, which will likely end the campaigns of poorly financed also-rans who can’t show significant grassroots support in Iowa or other early states.

Although bored pundits will probably continue to offer implausible scenarios for late candidacies by Chris Christie or Jeb Bush right on through the autumn, the only real mystery left is whether Texas Gov. Rick Perry will enter the race. He will reportedly decide for or against by the end of this month.

Meanwhile, several campaigns are holding on by a thread, and will probably be liquidated (or reduced to a platform from which the candidates can make free debate appearances to sell their books or keep their names in the public eye) after the straw poll. The most obvious casualty of earlier events is Newt Gingrich, who never had much of a chance at the nomination even before a series of missteps chased off most of his staff. Rick Santorum’s all-abortion all-the-time candidacy hasn’t gone anywhere. Herman Cain is the candidate most likely to be “winnowed” in Ames. His earlier surge in support in the early states has subsided to a considerable extent. More importantly, his languorous campaign pace, reminiscent of 2008 candidate Fred Thompson, has frustrated his staff and supporters; in just the last couple of weeks, he’s lost his top staffers in both New Hampshire and Iowa. In the latter state, that couldn’t come at a worse time, when he needs the organizational heft to convert the cheers he generates with his stock speech into tangible support in the straw poll. His second quarter fundraising numbers, showing he raised just under $2.5 million, didn’t impress anybody.

The candidate most desperately in need of a strong showing in Ames is Tim Pawlenty, who continues to struggle in the polls and whose reported $4.2 million second-quarter haul was even less impressive than Cain’s, given T-Paw’s heavy expenses in Iowa. Anything other than a first or strong second-place finish in the straw poll could kill off Pawlenty entirely, eliminate the prospects of a “consensus” candidate who appeals equally to all of the GOP’s conservative factions, and set up a potentially protracted and divisive nomination contest between Romney and either Michele Bachmann or (if he runs) Rick Perry.

While a Perry candidacy excites a lot of observers, it remains a debatable proposition. Yes, on paper he looks formidable. He’s a candidate equally rooted in the Tea Party Movement and the Christian Right. He’s got a great economic “story” to tell, dubious as his claims really are to have generated Texas’ impressive (if generally low-wage) record of recent job growth. He’s considered good-looking by those who like the rugged Marlboro Man stereotype of masculinity. He’s a good stump speaker who enjoys campaigning far more than governing, and has no moral compunctions about serving up big platters of the rawest red meat. And he’s a proven fundraiser who has the important Republican Governors Association rolodex in his pocket.

On the other hand, a PPP poll just last week showed Perry losing a hypothetical general election contest to Barack Obama in his home state of Texas, performing worse than Michele Bachmann, Tim Pawlenty or Herman Cain (and far worse than Mitt Romney). This sign that Perry has clay of feet in his cowboy boots could be a real problem, particularly if his message depicts him as the economic savior of the Lone Star State, whose residents would normally be expected to toss rose petals in his path to the White House.

Perry also has a timing problem. If he is to compete in the Iowa straw poll, he can’t delay his candidacy much longer. But announcing a campaign this month would significantly undermine the legitimacy of his much-ballyhooed August 6 prayer rally in Houston, dubbed “The Response,” which is reportedly intended to usher in a convergence of Christian Right support for a Perry candidacy. Getting in after Ames could be risky, since it could enable Michele Bachmann to become the celebrity national candidate of precisely the Tea Party/social conservative coalition that Perry would offer to lead.

Meanwhile, Bachmann is riding pretty high at the moment, though her own second-quarter fundraising numbers have yet to be revealed. She has a reputation as a champion fundraiser (she holds the all-time record for cup-rattling in a House race, having pulled in an astonishing $13 million for her 2010 re-election contest). Whatever she’s raised, it is unlikely to match Mitt Romney’s reported haul of just under $20 million. But it will almost certainly be more than her fellow Minnesotan T-Paw, who is presently struggling to get some right-wing leverage from association with their state’s current government shutdown.

All in all, the dynamics of the contest continue to pull the field even further to the Right, as Bachmann, Pawlenty and potentially Perry battle to become the anti-Romney in an atmosphere of partisan meta-conflict in Washington over the debt limit. The two dynamics, moreover, may be reinforcing each other: six candidates, including Romney and T-Paw, have now signed the maximalist “cut, cap and balance pledge” rejecting any debt limit increase that is not accompanied by deep cuts in domestic spending (without revenue measures), a cap on federal spending linked to a low percentage of GDP, and a balanced budget constitutional amendment that includes a super-majority requirement for tax increases. Bachmann is actually trying to outflank cut-cap-balance candidates on the right by demanding repeal of “ObamaCare” as a precondition for a debt limit increase. As we approach white-knuckle time in the shaping of the 2012 field, the GOP is spending little time worrying about how poorly it may be positioning itself to face Barack Obama.

Photo Credit: Iowa Politics

Campaign Finance Reformers Take Heart

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Being a campaign finance reformer in the era of Citizens United is good for job security and bad for one’s sense of personal achievement. Most people agree that the need for sweeping reform is greater than ever and most people fear that it’s harder than ever to achieve. “Most people” are right.

And as if Congress and the President were not a tough enough audience already in the era of billion-dollar, incumbent-dominated campaigns, the Supreme Court, by a narrow majority, has repeatedly shown an activist zeal for striking down hard-won reforms of the past. All that’s not to mention the perpetual partisan deadlock at the onetime election law watchdog, the FEC.

Which is why a week of back-to-back victories for campaign finance reform, however modest, is a step worth marking on the long road back to democratic accountability in America. In a pair of decisions each at the Supreme Court and FEC this week, existing campaign reforms were reaffirmed and a pathway to more comprehensive reforms in future was acknowledged by the Court.

First, in a long-awaited Supreme Court decision Monday on public funding, a 5-4 majority struck down a narrow provision of Arizona’s landmark Clean Elections law, which the “triggered” matching funds to publicly funded candidates who are outspent by private money. On the surface, this may seem like a defeat, but — crucially — the Court’s ruling left unquestioned the constitutionality of public funding writ large. In fact, Chief Justice Roberts, in his majority opinion, even went out of his way to say that nothing in the narrow decision should be interpreted as foreclosing public funding.

While the majority’s wrongheaded decision in the Arizona case will cause some consternation for reformers in that state, simple fixes to the “trigger” provision are available and more than a dozen other public funding states and municipalities remain uneffected. More important still, the push for public funding of federal elections is, if anything, bolstered by the Court’s conclusion that reforms cherishing and expanding free speech–rather than more incremental, limits-based reforms–is the clear path forward.

In a second fortuitous act this week, the Supreme Court denied cert in a separate public funding challenge to Connecticut’s model Citizens Election Program. In refusing to take the case, the high court cemented a lower court ruling upholding the constitutionality of a system that has seen three-quarters of state legislators and all statewide officials elected without accepting a dime in special interest money.

Downtown at the FEC, a pair of decisions on Thursday provided surprising reinforcement to existing campaign finance regulations. First, in a rare unanimous decision, the three Republican and three Democratic Commissioners denied a request from the new crop of partisan “Super PACs” to allow political candidates to raise unlimited funds on behalf of such entities, which are supposed to remain independent of federal candidates under existing law. The decision averted a major new loophole in the McCain-Feingold ban on solicitation of unlimited soft money by candidates and officeholders on behalf of the parties. While far from sufficient to stem the tide of unlimited corporate and union “independent” spending in elections, the decision amounts to an unusual show of respect for existing law from an otherwise impotent and highly partisan FEC.

Finally, in a second rare show of bipartisan agreement, the FEC granted comedian Stephen Colbert a narrow media exemption in response to his high-profile request, allowing him to promote his Super PAC only on his show. The decision averts a major potential loophole, whereby media corporations could have granted unlimited in-kind support to politician-pundits who appear regularly on the air. Instead, it upholds the century-old ban on direct corporate contributions to candidate campaigns.

To be sure, campaign finance reform will not be won through occasional concessions at the Supreme Court or the FEC. It will take a movement of the American people demanding change from Congress. But when those bodies which interpret and enforce the law are respectful of its meaning and intent, and mindful of the directions it must take, patriots and reformers take heart.

Photo Credit: thelastminute