5.7%

Promising, but not very.

A few qualifications on today’s Q4 GDP number [PDF]: First, it will almost certainly be adjusted down. Second, and more importantly, a huge portion of growth was due to inventory shifts, which are obviously not sustainable over the long-term. Here’s the key section:

Real final sales of domestic product — GDP less change in private inventories — increased 2.2 percent in the fourth quarter, compared with an increase of 1.5 percent in the third.

2.2% isn’t going to bring on boom times, but it’s better than 1.5%, so there’s that. Still, we’re not out of the woods yet.

A Rudy Awakening

I know, I know, he’s an easy target, and I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but I think every American should watch this video and then never listen to Rudy Giuliani ever again:

The State of Our Union Is… Sassy!

The State of the Union is so overhyped. The speech rarely has any substantive political effect, and it’s important to remember that Obama’s first-year problem has not, depite the past month, been one of narrative. Matt Yglesias makes a great point today:

[W]hat we’ve learned time and again over the past year is that there’s only so far that great speeches get you. [...] Obama seized the mantle of responsibility, pragmatism, and seriousness while challenging the GOP to show some good faith and willingness to be a constructive partner in government. But what he’s never been able to do is to generate the kind of specific, concrete political pressure on incumbent Republican senators that inspires them to vote “yes” on his bills or confirm his nominees. And nothing in his speech changes that dynamic.

It wasn’t a great speech, but it didn’t need to be. No speech is every going to change Olympia Snowe’s vote, or make Lieberman less of an asshole. But what I saw, and what I think the American people saw, was a pissed-off President not afraid to call out his enemies. He’s angry, and so are we! It was a brilliant piece of performance art. Watching Boehner and Cantor smirk through Obama’s rousing defense of the stimulus and bailouts and tax cuts served as a reminder of the fact that the Republicans are simply refusing to legislate. They’re not doing their jobs, and they’re incredibly unpopular because of it! There’s a reason Obama is far more popular than anyone in Congress, and, pace Scott Brown, it’s decidedly not because Americans are against health care reform. The triumph of last night was the return of 2008 Obama, just when we need him.

(more…)

A Solution To All Our Problems

Since the Senate is the source of so many political problems, here’s a great idea, via James Fallows, for how to fix it: let’s rearrange all the states! (Click to enlarge.)

Can the Party of ‘No’ Keep It Up?

Yesterday, I wrote about the Republican strategy of stonewalling the President and the Democrats on every major policy issue. It has been fairly successful for them! But short-term political wins do not necessarily yield long-term political gain. Jonathan Bernstein explains why rejectionism is a dangerous game:

What’s the cost to Republicans?  First, on policy, they lose the ability to negotiate on behalf of their important constituency groups; as we’ve seen, this can have the effect of actually driving some of these groups (the doctors, for example) right out of the party.  Second, embracing the crazy yields, well, the crazy in charge of your party.  Republicans stand to gain in the 2010 cycle because the economy is lousy, because Democrats have a lot of exposure after two terrific cycles, and because the party of the president almost always does badly in midterms.  If, however, Republicans nominate candidates who have embraced the crazy, they will be far more vulnerable to counterattacks than if they nominate good, solid candidates (and not every Democratic candidate will emulate Martha Coakley and not get around to attacking crazy things that their opponents say until the last 48 hours).

However, no one is going to listen to advice like that.  Republicans are invested in a particular interpretation of 1994, and yesterday’s election is only going to reinforce that interpretation, whether it’s correct or not.

Creative Obstruction

The political fallout from Scott Brown’s insurgent win has me thinking about the nature of our democracy. The way the republic is set up, if a large enough group of legislators—say, hypothetically, the Senate Republican caucus—simply chooses not to negotiate in good faith with the other side, offering only ideological proposals that have no basis in reality—say, hypothetically, deficit reduction and no cuts to Medicare—they can completely obstruct the agenda of even a huge majority like that the Democrats currently have (and will continue to have, don’t let’s forget, even in the wake of the Brown-out).

There is a certain brash creativity to this.

The Republicans stated, quite loudly, as soon as President Obama announced his intention to pursue health care reform in early 2009, that they would kill it. Straight up said it. A moderate few pretended to negotiate, but according to Harry Reid “it was a waste of time dealing with [Republican Senator Olympia Snowe] because she had no intention of ever working anything out.” The GOP can claim to have offered alternative legislation, but look at Jim DeMint’s proposals and try to tell me with a straight face that they would solve any problems. You can’t.

The Republicans’ capacity to obstruct has much to do with Senate rules and procedures. Use of the filibuster has jumped to historical highs in the past few years. There are many people, myself included, who believe that America might be better off if the Senate were simply abolished. If wishes were horses…

The broader point is that American democracy is imperfect, and always will be. A small minority can, with audacity and consistency, stop the government in its tracks. That old dinosaur The Village Voice captured it best today with their headline: “Scott Brown Wins Mass. Race, Giving GOP 41-59 Majority in the Senate.”

All eyes now turn to Obama. His reaction will determine how the Democrats will govern with only a 19-seat majority in the Senate. I leave you, for a dash of hope, with Jonathan Chait:

Here is what I think will happen. The shock and panic will play itself out over a few days. Then the Democrats will assess the situation and realize that letting health care die represents their worst possible option. And then they will make a deal to pass the Senate bill through the House. I am not positive this will happen, but it’s my bet, because elected officials at the national level, dim though they can be, are usually shrewd enough to recognize their political self-interest.

In the meantime, the display of hysteria is actually disgusting.

Is HCR Dead Without Coakley?

Not necessarily. And now for some backtracking.

In my last post, I bemoaned the likely election of Republican Scott Brown in the Massachusetts special Senate election today as the death knell to passage of health care reform, since the obstructionism of Senate Republicans has made it impossible, pretty much since Obama’s inauguration, to pass anything without a supermajority.

That was probably a little hasty, and a little misleading. Here’s why:

1. Even if Brown wins tonight, that doesn’t mean health care is immediately dead. It would take at least 10 days, probably 15, to certify the election, possibly giving the Democrats time to push a bill through with interim Senator Paul Kirk’s vote. Of course, nobody prefers that HCR pass on a technicality or the outcome of a lawsuit over MA special elections law, but for those of us who think HCR is more important than politics, this outcome would be better than nothing.
2. It might not even matter what happens in the Senate. Nancy Pelosi is going around telling reporters that “we will have health care—one way or another” and Steny Hoyer was quoted saying the Senate bill “clearly is better than nothing.” These remarks seem to indicate that House Democratic leaders are willing to push the Senate version through, despite the abortion language that has Bart Stupak (ugh) and friends saying they’ll vote it down. Whether Pelosi has the votes remains to be seen.
3. Martha Coakley could still win. Nate Silver gives her a 25% chance of winning, and emphasizes an important fact about this:

People are acting, however, as though 25 percent is the same as zero percent. And—as disappointing as it might be to be in this position—obviously it is not. This is not some basketball game where the score suddenly became Brown 75, Coakley 25; a 25 percent chance of winning means, quite literally, 25 percent.

So let’s lay it out there: Brown is heavily favored to win, although it’s far from certain; the outcomes of special elections are notoriously difficult to predict. If Brown does win, passage of health care reform becomes significantly more difficult, although not impossible. No matter what happens, Lost returns with new episodes on February 2nd.

And one more thing: the outcome of one special election in Massachusetts is not a “referendum” on the President and his “liberal agenda.” That’s idiotic, and if you think it’s true you watch far too much Fox News and know far too little about MA politics. The tenor of this election reflects dissatisfaction with the corruption and hackishness of the good-old-boy Democratic party in Massachusetts—concealed for so many decades behind the enormous historical stature of Ted Kennedy—coupled with a populist Tea Party-style uprising over the economy and channeled into a contest between a charismatic unknown and a career pol who can’t campaign to save her life.

But you should still vote for Coakley.

Voting for Scott Brown Is Stupid

I’m serious. If you live in Massachusetts and vote for Scott Brown (or that other confusing “Kennedy” guy)  today, I will never forgive you.

Martha Coakley is a terrible, awful, no good, nearly worthless candidate—there were far better alternatives—but if  you don’t vote for her you are effectively voting against extending health insurance coverage to some 30 million people. There’s a decent chance you’re one of them!

There’s also the fact that Scott Brown is a crazy wingnut, but at this point I’m less concerned with that and more worried about the fate of national health care reform resting in the hands of a few moderate voters who are sick of the Kennedys.

Required Reading for the New Decade

If you’re like me, you’re still catching up on the several thousand items in your RSS reader neglected during the holidays. But if you want a break from slogging through all that chatter, take a little time to read Jim Manzi’s long essay in the winter issue of National Affairs, “Keeping America’s Edge.” I don’t agree with a lot of it, but it’s the rare sort of piece that grapples with the Big Socioeconomic Issues of the day in a realistic, intellectually honest manner. Cheers to Manzi.