Only a couple days after announcing a big breakthrough on financial reform, the same package may be back on the brink. First, Senator Feingold announced that he would vote against the measure.
I am writing you to express my strong opposition to the $19 billion bank tax that was included in the financial reform bill during the conference committee," wrote Brown. "This tax was not in the Senate version of the bill, which I supported. If the final version of this bill contains these higher taxes, I will not support it."
This only leaves four undecided Senators: Grassley of Iowa, Snowe and Collins of Maine and Senator Cantwell of Washington. All would have to vote for the measure for it to get sixty votes.
If you've read this site some, you know I have no use for the Federal Reserve. I also believe that Ben Bernanke is wilfully repeating the mistakes of his predecessor, Alan Greenspan. Still, I am watching most of the opposition, from both sides, to the renomination of Bernanke and almost all is political in nature.
The folks are ticked off. They are looking for someone to blame and the Fed Chairman is an easy target. It's also the wrong target. The Federal Reserve itself has plenty of blame, in my opinion, for the current financial crisis. Furthermore, I believe that the Bernanke's current loose money policy will have a devastating effect on our economy down the road.
What most politicians are trying to do is blame Bernanke for the current crisis. That's, of course, nonsense. Bernanke took over at the end of 2006. By then, the wheels were already long in motion for our current crisis and nothing was going to stop it. It's clear, however, that most in Congress haven't the faintest clue what the role of the Fed is and what Bernanke has done in his office. Here's what Boxer said.
In a statement Friday morning, Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, came out against Mr. Bernanke, who was named to his post during the Bush administration. She said she had “a lot of respect” for him and praised him for preventing the economic crisis from getting even worse. “However, it is time for a change,” she said. “It is time for Main Street to have a champion at the Fed.”
“Our next Federal Reserve chairman must represent a clean break from the failed policies of the past,” Ms. Boxer said.
I'd ask Senator Boxer two questions. First, what Fed Chairman represented the interests of Main Street and second, how can we have a Fed Chairman that has a clean break with the past. The Federal Reserve is the bankers' bank. By nature, he represents the interests of the banks. Ordinary citizens can't get a loan at the Fed's window. Only banks can. How would a Fed Chairman represent the interests of Main Street as Fed Chairman? Given that this crisis touched all parts of our financial world, how exactly would we get someone with a clean break from the past. To do that, we'd need to get a Fed Chairman entirely void of financial experience over the last ten years.
Both Jeff Sessions and Jon Cornyn have put some of the blame for the current crisis on the shoulders of Bernanke, and here's how Oregon Senator Jeff Merkey characterized the scenario.
Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley said Friday he would vote against granting a second term to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, concluding that Bernanke was partly to blame for the nation's deep recession and that he is ill-equipped to lead a recovery.
In explaining his decision in a floor speech, Merkley credited Bernanke for the major role he played in keeping the nation from tumbling into a depression.
That is not enough to justify another four-year term, Merkley said, suggesting that that Bernanke was too close to bankers and Wall Street financiers. Merkley, who serves on the Senate Banking Committee, also opposed Bernanke's nomination for a second term when the question came before the committee.
Let's try and put this into perspective. What Fed policies caused the crisis? Wasn't it the loose monetary policies that caused interest rates to be kept far too low far too long? This is what Merkey blames Bernanke for even though it was Greenspan's leadership that had these policies. What policies is Merkey crediting Bernake for in lessening the current crisis? Isn't it the same loose money policies that have caused interest rates to be even lower for an even longer period?
Senator Merkey is blaming Bernanke for the policies of Alan Greenspan. Worse than that, he's then congratulating Bernanke for instituting the same policies. This is the level of political thought on the Federal Reserve out of Congress.
In 2002-2003, these same Senators were congratulating Alan Greenspan for saving the same country from the brink for the exact same policies. Now, years later they are blaming the same Fed for the policies of the past. At the same time, they are congratulating the same Fed for those very same policies in the present.
You want to take a politician and strip them of all their power, turn them weak, and powerless. Then, you put them in the middle of a town hall meeting with their constituents. We saw a heavy dose of this during the summer break. That was preceded by the media making allusions that politicians would get an earful when they got back home. So, citizens, almost on cue, took that to heart.
it appears clear that what we saw over the summer was not some anomaly. In fact, town halls may no longer be simply for the true political junkie. It may now be a standard for the average citizen to confront their representative and turn the tables on them. Many citizens often feel powerless over their politician. Yes, of course, it is we the people that elect our representative. We each only have one vote and we often feel they represent interests closer to D.C. than to our own homes.
Yet, when a politician schedules a town hall, they have nowhere to hide. It's them on their own feeling the fury of hundreds if not thousands. The images, sights, and sounds from the town halls over the summer are seared in our minds. Angry voters screaming at their representatives while the politicians stand (or sit) helplessly. Most of the time, even when they try and speak, they're immediately cut off by the screams and excitement.
There's a sort of poetic justice to the town hall format. These politicians hold the fate of millions in their hands and they arrogantly proclaim to speak for the people. At a town hall, there's nowhere to hide. They're entirely powerless. All the misdeeds that each commits for months and years in D.C. are then on display and the politician has nowhere to hide. For political drama, there's little that's more dramatic.
The latest reincarnation of this was a town hall that Russ Feingold held. Feingold, to his credit, not only went to an area of Wisconsin that is heavily Republican but remained cool and professional throughout each encounter. Even so, the drama was at a maximum.
At the beginning of the movie Wall Street, then struggling Bud Fox, after being stiffed on a trade, says "my dream is to be on the other end of that call".
In this world, power is centered in the few. The rest dream of just one chance to reverse that and have the power in their hands. Town halls are exactly that opportunity. That's what makes them a phenomenon. It is the people's chance to take the power away from the politicians and for once leave the politician vulnerable and exposed.
Last week, I wrote this piece to counter the so called distortions of Fox News. Generally, I think I was accurate however there was one area which I got monumentally wrong. I want to correct the record for many reasons, and not the least of which is that the issue is vitally important. It had to do with number six which involves a segment between Trace Gallagher and Bill Sammon
I tried to minimize the distortion, however there's no minimizing this distortion. I spoke with Julian Sanchez of the CATO institute, and after getting the facts, there's no defending this segment. Both Sammon and Gallagher couldn't have gotten it more wrong. First, let's define the issue.
Sammon and Gallagher talked about three portions of the Patriot Act that they claimed the Democrats were trying to remove. Both also claimed that each of the three played a role in capturing terrorists going back to Zac Moussaoui. The first is entirely inaccurate and the second is dubious at best. The three provisions are the loan wolf provision, roving wiretaps and section 215.
The loan wolf provision allows the Feds, almost always the FBI, to identify someone as a terrorist even though they aren't necessarily part of a terrorist group. In this case, a terrorist doesn't have to be part of Al Qaeda to be treated by FISA as a terrorist and thus have all sorts of Patriot Act applications apply to them. These folks would still have to be citizens of another nation. They would also still have to have contact with folks overseas. The application would apply to someone that came to this country and then became "radicalized" by reading things on the internet, going to a Mosque, or any other way that someone gets radicalized.
So, in other words, someone comes to the country for something legitimate: going to school, a job, etc. Then, they get radicalized and they decide to try and pull off a terrorist attack. In the process of doing this, they make contact with terrrorists, or those with terrorist connections, overseas. Then, this person begins to plot a terrorist attack. Then, such a person would become a "loan wolf". This provision is the only one of the three that is scheduled to be sunsetted. Yet, Mr. Sanchez said that this provision has never been used. This makes sense because it appears the "loan wolf" is much more theoretical than anything rooted in reality. If someone were to get radicalized, they're much more likely to travel to the Middle East and get trained first. Then, they would officially be part of a terrorist group. Furthermore, Sammon and Gallagher suggested that this provision could have been used on Zac Moussaoui. That seems dubious since he was part of Al Qaeda, and Mr. Sanchez said the Senate looked at Moussaoui's situation. At issue was his computer. The Feds never opened it or looked inside. According to the Senate investigation, that happened mostly due to incompetence, rigid federal procedures, and a lack of communication. The Senate concluded that no one needed any new laws to open the computer.
The second provision is the roving wire taps. Traditionally, when you get a warrant to tap some media, you have to be very specific: a certain phone for a certain purpose for instance. We all know that even criminals have become astute. There's pre paid cells, a plethora of email accounts, and all sorts of other available communication for criminals and terrorists. If the Feds had to get a new warrant everytime a criminal or a terrorist changed media (say from one pre paid cell to another) they'd always lose valuable time. So, roving wiretaps don't only make sense in terrorist investigations but even in criminal investigations of say the Mafia. In fact, according to Sanchez, no one wants to sunset this provision. Rather, the provision was, in his opinion and that of Nadler, Feingold, and Conyers, too broad. The changes are unbelievably wonky and frankly, most of it was above my own head. What is important is that no one wanted to sunset this provision. Rather, Nadler, Feingold and Conyers wanted to tighten up the provision so that the standards were more difficult to meet so that the power wasn't as broad. Now, it may be a matter of debate whether the current power is too broad or just fine, but frankly, that's not a debate that either Gallagher or Sammon are equipped to be a part of. Such a debate would require a libertarian expert like Julian Sanchez facing off with another more hawkish expert.
The third provision is called the 215 order. The section 215 order appears to be the broadest. To explain it, I need to use an example. Let's say that a tip comes in that in Glenview, Il. there is a group of terrorists. You, at this point, don't even need to know specifically who they are. You just need to meet a standard with a judge that there are terrorists there. This warrant allows the Feds, again almost always the FBI, to conduct searches without letting the suspected terrorists know. This section is again terribly wonky, but in some cases, the feds can get a warrant to ask for any hardware store in the town of Glenview for all their receipts as part of the investigation. They can do this if they suspect that terrorists are buying bomb making material there. With this section, again Nadler, Feingold, and Conyers are trying to tighten up the requirements to receive this warrant. No one is trying to remove the power entirely. Again, there is plenty of debate for whether the tightening is appropriate or not but that debate must be left to an expert like Julian Sanchez to debate with another expert of a differing philosophy and not Trace Gallagher and Bill Sammon.
In fact, this debate over the Patriot Act has gone the way of most debates, and that is on ideological stereotypes. If you are against the Patriot Act, you want to give terrorists rights. If you are for the Patriot Act, you don't care about civil liberties. For almost all, it's that simple. It isn't. I asked Mr. Sanchez what he thought of the Patriot Act and his answer was revealing. He told me that such a question was too broad. The Patriot Act is a collection of about 150 provisions. Some he liked and others he didn't. His fear is political. He believes that politicians will error on the side of national security because they don't want to be blamed for allowing a terrorist attack. It's much more difficult to prove a violation of civil liberties.
He fears that the Patriot Act could be used by the feds to go after drug cartels when they don't have enough evidence to get a regular warrant. If the Patriot Act becomes too broad then the FBI will link Colombian drug money to Al Qaeda and get warrants using broad powers. He's not saying that's happening. He is, however, saying that this can happen if no one is curbing the powers in the Patriot Act.
In fact, these debates are for wonks like Julian Sanchez, and that's the problem. Folks on television will often come on to give opinions without consulting with experts and then mislead due to their own naivite. That's what I did, but I have now corrected the record, and hopefully, so too will Fox News.
Barack Obama is now famous for his rhetoric of rising above partisanship and reaching across and ending partisan politics. While Obama has certainly been able to say these things with a charisma that is not usually found, he is not the first politician to say it. Here is some of the high minded rhetoric that Barack Obama says...
We're tired of being divided. We are tired of running into ideological walls and partisan roadblocks. We're tired of appeals to our worst instincts and our greatest fears. So I say this to you guys, that America is desperate for leadership. I absolutely feel it everywhere I go. They are longing for direction and they want to believe again.
and...
And it is because of these failures that we not only have a moment of great challenge, but also a moment of great opportunity. We have a chance to bring the country together in a new majority -- to finally tackle problems that George Bush made far worse but that had festered long before George Bush ever took office -- problems that we've talked about year after year after year after year.
And that is why the same old Washington textbook campaigns just won't do in this election. That's why not answering questions because we are afraid our answers won't be popular just won't do. That's why telling the American people what we think they want to hear instead of telling the American people what they need to hear just won't do. Triangulating and poll-driven positions because we're worried about what Mitt or Rudy might say about us just won't do. If we are really serious about winning this election, Democrats, we can't live in fear of losing it.
So, clearly, Obama has built his campaign as a politician that transcends politics as usual. He makes himself out to be an agent of change. He makes himself out to be the individual to finally shake things up in Washington so that it is a government that takes care of people rather than takes from them. While this is noble and lofty rhetoric, one has to ask if Obama has any accomplishments that go with this.
Even those with knowledge of Obama's accomplishment point vaguely to "work" on bills regarding ethics reform and even more nebulous work on health care reform in the Illinois Senate. The reality is that Obama's actual accomplishments are very bare, but more importantly, he has never shown the kind of courage necessary to really bridge partisan divides. His rhetoric maybe lofty, but it is backed up with absolutely nothing that tells anyone that he will be able to deliver.
While Obama talks about transcending politics, reaching across the aisle, and being able to transcend partisanship, there is one candidate in this race with a history of actually accomplishing these lofty goals: John McCain.
On the issue of climate control, McCain again reached across the aisle, this time to Joe Lieberman. McCain/Lieberman became nearly the scourge of his own party that McCain/Feingold was. Once again, at political risk, McCain reached across the aisle to work in a bi partisan manner. It is ironic that this bill never became law specifically because members of his own party blocked it. For all of Obama's talk, I welcome anyone to name one issue on which he bucks to establishment of his party, let alone introduced a bill that bucked it.
I believe McCain's biggest coup of bi partisanship came with the Gang of 14. The battle over judges became more and more contentious over the years. During 2005, it came to a head, as judge after judge was being filibustered by the Democrats. The Republicans proposed the so called nuclear option that would remove the filibuster on judges. McCain saw this issue in a unique way. If the nuclear option was employed, it would change a rule that had been around when Daniel Webster roamed the halls of Congress. He felt that such traditions were more important than partisanship. Thus, he lead a group of 14 Senators, 7 Democrats and 7 Republicans, in creating this so called Gang of 14. They created a nebulous term, extraordinary circumstances, however since, no judges have been filibustered and the nuclear option hasn't been employed.
My Conservative brethren hold this as one of many unforgiveable actions by McCain, however I believe that political gamesmanship is disastrous for all. (Just read more about the 2003 fiasco over redistricting in Texas to see what happens when neither side backs down in a game of political gamesmanship) Had the Republicans employed the nuclear option, the Democrats would likely have walked out and shut the government down. Who knows where the crisis would have ended? In Texas, the Democrats went to Oklahoma and Tom Delay ordered their arrest in a public fiasco in which both sides exhibitied the most ugly characteristics of politics. McCain lead a group of fourteen Senators that avoided such a Mexican showdown.
On the issue of judges, Obama has stayed largely silent. He voted against both justice Roberts and Alito. On the issue of abortion, his position is so radical that he is actually to the left of Planned Parenthood on the issue. We don't know what sorts of judges he would choose because he has never said and no one has asked. His radical social agenda indicate someone more left than Ruth Ginsberg, and it is unclear how such a choice would accomplish any of the lofty rhetoric he proclaims.
Finally, McCain's boldest piece of bi partisanship came during the most recent campaign season. During the campaign this past summer, McCain reached out to liberal icon Ted Kennedy to try and pass comprehensive immigration reform. His contentious and controversial idea made him the scourge of his own party and nearly killed his campaign. It ultimately failed, however without a doubt it was political courage of the highest order. During the primary season he reached out to an enemy of most of the voters he was seeking and tried to legislate on a contentious and controversial issue. It was an unprecedented and bold move by a Presidential candidate. (On the other hand, Barack Obama has skipped the votes on most of the most controversial issues of the day during the primary season)
So, what we have is a contrast between rhetoric and reality. There is one candidate in this race preaching about bi partisanship, change, and shaking things up and another one with a history of doing so. To truly reach across the aisle, buck partisanship, and bring everyone together requires political courage. It requires courage to buck your natural constituency and reach out to folks your supporters despise. It requires the gumption to withstand the attacks of your ideological comrades. One candidate has a history of doing all of these things, and the other one, a Democrat, was was voted most liberal Senator in 2007. In other words, while he talks about trascending politics, his voting record shows he is the exact opposite. It is quite ironic that Obama preaches bi partisanship and change, because on the merits, he is all talk on both issues and McCain, his opponent, has a unique and remarkable history of accomplishment on both issues.
Please note. I welcome any and all comments from any political perspective. I will not stand or approve any swearing, and personal attacks will likely also not be approved.
