A Weblog of Centrist Voices in American Politics
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A Weblog of Centrist Voices in American Politics | |
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June 17, 2005Comments
This is one of my favorite weekends of the year: the U.S. Open and Father's Day. And we are going to have perfect weather here. Posted by: Todd Pearson at June 17, 2005 12:37 PMLooking good here too. I am down for a twi-light 18 on sunday. Two interesting stories to note. Yesterday MSNBC had a WSJ story about the GOP looking for an exit strategy on social security. Worth checking out. Bottom line: who'll settle for solvency, real solvency? Me... Today's Globe reports on Mitt Romney's support for a 2008 anti-gay marriage amendment that also opposes civil unions. That splash was the sound of Romney sliding in this whole foot, far past just the toe. Reporters and Romney's minions stress he hasn't made any decision about running. But you can count on it that this splash means at least one thing. He's NOT going to run for re-election in MA. He's poisoned that well. I'd say it's a virtual certainty he's running for prez in 2008 unless he just can't line up the dough. With a venture capital background, Romney won't run without securing the level of funding he believes he'll need. Posted by: bk at June 17, 2005 12:47 PMI'd be jealous if I still golfed. Fortunately I'm poor enough at it that my bad game never upset me! I'm going to take the kids out and wet some hooks at the lake. Then in the spirit of animal torture, we shall cruelly release anything that isn't very tasty. Yep, that sounds like Romney closing doors and burning bridges, all right. In related news, the polls in New Jersey still show high support for gay marriage and low support for an anti-gay marriage amendment, in the wake of the recent appellate court decision. It'll be amusing to watch the state's-righters on the GOP side try to juggle that one into their agendas without llsing constituencies. Posted by: Tully at June 17, 2005 01:05 PMI know some of you are from the Boston area. Party on! By KEVIN FREKING, Associated Press Writer
Tully, Did you read the NJ ruling. I thought of you immediately. "...The State makes the same benefit, mixed-gender marriage, available to all individuals on the same basis. Whether or not plaintiffs wish to I'm jealous of the round of golf. It's past the boiling point down here, and I pretty much stay out of the game until the summer is over. Plan on spending the weekend with my son doing the beach and pool thing, although Tully did give me an idea...he's still pretty young, but it might be entertaining to take him fishing. You guys are right about Romney. His moderation was obviously expendable in light of his aspirations. I would think that he might be the suprise candidate on the right. With the rhetoric he's spewing as of late, I don't think the Massachusetts connection will hurt him in the South. As far as the NJ ruling...I actually agreed with it. I personally don't like the courts to legislate. I'm all for allowing the voters (or the Legislature) to allow gay marriage in the state. And, Tully's right...let's watch the state's rights crowd juggle this one. Posted by: AR at June 17, 2005 02:00 PMIt's a blast, Abel, when they first pull in a fish. Or even just see on caught and get to see it up-close for the first time. Just remember that the "patience quotient" of kids that age is minimal. Yup, WHQ. I told you that would play a role in the "constitutional" and "denied rights" legal rulings. We fought like hell here to keep the "anti" amendment off of the ballot because we knew it would pass, and that it would make gradual societal acceptance of committed gay relationships even more difficult, and the legal barriers greater. After three years, they finally got it on the ballot and passed it. Hell, we tried. It still has the same problems as the Nebraska referendum, which one court has already thrown out for denying non-gays significant traditional rights. So here's hoping.... I also saw the comment from one of the plaintiffs, complaining that she couldn't collect her partner's social security benefits without the legal status of "married." Straight to the crux of the financial side of the argument. Yes, legalizing gay marriage does affect others, as those both for and against are well aware. I think what gets me most about the "anti" arguments is that what they are trying to prevent is the very thing that would most likely ameliorate their chief complaint about gays (other than that simple visceral hatred of anything different), the "anonymous promiscuity" charges levelled at the "gay lifestyle." That's something that while it's true about a segment of gays is also true about a segment of singles in general. It's not as if single's bars and anonymous sex are a new thing! For any orientation. (I mean, didn't any of these people go to discos? I can understand not wanting to admit it, but...) The only real way to reduce that is to positively promote committed relationships--like marriage. Why is that only acceptable for straights? That's a question that seems unanswerable without delving into "sin" and other metaphysics. Which are a bit beyond the scope of the legal arguments, eh? One of my favorite cartoons from the whole debate is a reporter interviewing a politician. The politician says he's completely opposed to gay marriage. The reporter says, "So, I can tell your constituents that you favor sex outside of marriage?" Cracks me up every time. Posted by: Tully at June 17, 2005 02:19 PMI like that! Perhaps an even more elightening question would be "Congressman, could I assume therefore that you and your wife abstained until your wedding day?" Funny how a different standard is applied. Posted by: AR at June 17, 2005 02:26 PMI've fired an opening shot in a discussion on Foreign Law over at PrawsBlawg: http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2005/06/citing_foreign_.html (Comments too long to reproduce here). I'm actually writing what was originally going to be a blog post for Centerfields on judges and foreign law, but it's rather ballooned into a mini-essay, and I have no ETA on it as yet. I look forward to debating the issue over here at Centerfields when it's done. :) More news on on CAFTA over at MaineToday; my comments on the story (really just re-iterating what I said in the previous thread on Centerfields: The story asserts that "At one time, there seemed to be a general consensus in this country that open markets helped make the world more productive and more prosperous for everyone". And indeed, a century ago, the Populists fought FOR free trade and the corporations AGAINST free trade, while today, the populists - the Edwards Democrats and Buchanan Republicans one would call "America First-ers" - fight against free trade and the corporations fight for it. What could have caused this shift? The answer should be obvious. What has changed is that a century ago, we were concerned as consumers; today, we are concerned as people who need to make a living. The idea that opening Central America or China to American exports is in our interests is fallacious; if wages in those countries were such that the general populous could afford those goods, then we would not see the rush to outsource to those countries because of their low wages. One has only to look at our trade balance with China: since we entered into a free trade agreement with China - I should say, "since we dropped our tariffs on Chinese imports", as it is overgenerous to suggest that we are in anything vaguely resembling a free trade situation with China - imports from China have ballooned, while exports to China have remained in a flatline. Our trade deficit with Mexico, also, is a testament to just whose interests NAFTA was in. Now CAFTA offers us the change to cut our throats anew, in the name of a dogma which has a dismal track record for America, and whose benefits are so thoroughly well-known (and so thoroughly subtle) that no-one seems able to fully explain what they are. So often, in fact, has the "free trade good" mantra been uttered, our ability to question it has seemingly atrophied to the point where economists can now assert that "free trade creates American jobs", without anyone thinking to inquire as to where, how, and what those jobs might be. The CATO institute has long mantained that "less is more" where government is concerned; it now appears to apply the same mantra to jobs. Senator Olympia Snowe is absolutely right to be concerned with these moves; supporting CAFTA would be at variance with that oath which she has now taken repeatedly during her career representing Maine: "I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same".Posted by: Simon at June 17, 2005 02:27 PM The problem with free trade as a political football is that while the benefits are widespread and general and not that noticeable, the reciprocal pain is quite glaringly specific. EX: Everyone in the country pays a bit less for clothing, but those 482 union garment workers in your district have to find new jobs. Posted by: Tully at June 17, 2005 02:38 PMNot sure where one of my posts got off to, but over at realclearpolitics, Robert Novak is declaring Romney in the running, and has some interesting details about what Romney has been doing, including suggesting that he's taking an early fundraising lead. I know outside-MA conservatives think he's Rockerfeller GOP (his dad was), but Romney is the closest thing to a beefed up GWB 2.0 out there: better looking, better spoken, understands fundraising, proven good enough to fool liberals, anti-tax, pro-family, pro-life, anti gay marriage. Posted by: bk at June 17, 2005 02:45 PMBrian, What's Brownback going to do? Pass out meals at Gitmo? He's got a pretty harsh image, but I guess all things are possible. Posted by: AR at June 17, 2005 03:15 PMSimon, Absolutely. Romney's Presidential intentions have been clear to me from the day he began running for governor. This is why in my past posts Ive stressed how attuned I am to the idea that he was never really anything approaching a genuine moderate. When he's chosen to give an appearance of social moderation, these pseudo-moderate social positions have been clintonesquely lawyerly. And he's been ratcheting up over the last several months. He started out with his "I'm in a different place now" abortion statement, and now he's ratcheted his anti gay marriage position up a notch to explicitly oppose civil unions too. I'm not so sure the effort in MA will utterly stiff. It's a referendum effort, and it's not super hard to get these on the ballot. I expect that it will get turned back by voters after a hard fight, but that's far from a fait accompli. It's close enough that turnout could swing it, and I expect the differential to be less than 5%. It might be nice to get a concurrent amendment on the ballot to eliminate churches' tax exempt status, that would make for an even more fun show. Posted by: bk at June 17, 2005 03:21 PMWould CAFTA take jobs from Maine or China? The following list of industries from the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development doesn’t seem to include industries that would be severely impacted by CAFTA: A. Mature Industries: B. Emerging Industries: Rockerfeller GOPWow, do they still use that term. I grew up in NY State and remember Rocky well. Its funny it was before Reagan's famous phrase "tax and spend liberal". Though I wasn't particularly political at that time (junior high school when Rocky was Governor) I thought tax spend applied to him. To this day I'm still not sure what Rocky was. Posted by: c3 at June 17, 2005 03:37 PMWhether it affects Maine or China is asking the wrong question. The right question is, do free trade agreements help America or do they help countries on the other end of those agreements. One look at our trade deficit - particularly vis-a-vis China - should adequately answer that question. Posted by: Simon at June 17, 2005 03:40 PMBrownback's one of my congresscritters that I don't like, but I would point out that he is one of the few Republicans that actively seek out Democratic partnerships in areas where ideology isn't key. He's partnered with Rangel, Schumer, and the late Paul Wellstone in the past to bring beefed-up legislation against modern slavery and sex slavery into Congress, for example. And he's been a real backer of foreign humanitarian aid, both in famine relief and disease prevention, once again with some heavy bi-partisan backing. But he's so closely associated with some of the more extreme pro-life and "Christian culture" elements of the political right that I don't think he's all that nationally electable. Not that this would prevent him from stacking up money and resources to boost his position in Washington, by jumping in the ring and playing for convention chips. Many politicians run for President for just that reason, even when they know they can't win. Brownback has given every sign of doing just that. Posted by: Tully at June 17, 2005 03:45 PMSimon, the "trade deficit" is one of the most improperly cited and misunderstood figures in economics. It doesn't exactly mean what everyone thinks it means, and it's a whole lot of other things besides. Much more than goods and services, it represents international flows of capital investment. A negative balance of trade can actually be a good thing, and vice versa. Ask Japan, which has spent a decade in recession and stagnation from a surplus trade account. Just pointing at a balance of trade and calling it good or bad doesn't really tell you anything. Our biggest problem right now that shows up in the balance of trade figures is the federal budget deficit. It's the single largest contributor to the "trade deficit," dwarfing all others. But you won't change that element one whit by diddling with trade barriers, you have to change the spending habits of Congress. Posted by: Tully at June 17, 2005 04:04 PMSimon, Why do you think that a trade deficit is self-evidently bad? If the entire globe used the same currency and we had a fixed amount of it, I might agree. But we don't. Seems to me that a trade deficit might be bad, but it doesn't have to be. If our GDP keeps growing, and we continue to create additional value in the eyes of the remainder of the world, there's no reason a trade deficit must be an unsustainable problem indicative of an impending crisis. AND, if our GDP keeps growing and we keep create more additional value in the eyes of the world than other places do, then we in fact MUST have a trade deficit. So IMO, a trade deficit is just "potentially troubling if other things go badly wrong." But the fact is that, since there are more dollars all the time, because there are more things with more value all the time. atrade deficit is not necessarily indicative of anything more than the fact of our nation's extreme wealth and continued ability to create additional value in the eyes of the world. Posted by: bk at June 17, 2005 04:10 PMSimon, yes I do think CAFTA will improve the economies of Central America and therefore reduce the number of illegal immigrants entering the United States. Picking on CAFTA is troubling because Central American countries have such small populations and are so terribly poor. We should support anything that will improve their conditions even if it has a slightly negative impact on the US. I realize that their condition is not going to improve instantaneously, but increased trade will improve their life in the long run. Posted by: ROA at June 17, 2005 04:21 PMI've been working on a post about why increasing economic value means globalization is great stuff. For the moment, I'll simply point out that because we're making better stuff, old factory jobs are less and less helpful to us, but are a big deal over there. Posted by: Jon Kay at June 18, 2005 12:31 AMSpeaking of globalization, here's an IMHO interesting and thoughtful, if rather long, essay on productivity and globalization (via instapundit) http://techcentralstation.com/061705A.html '08-o-meter courtesy of Tradesports George Allen 18.6 Hillary Clinton 49.5 Party to win election Thanks, Scott. It will be interesting to keep that chart and compare notes in December of '08. Posted by: Blue Jean at June 19, 2005 10:13 PM |
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