Overstating American Generosity

You keep reading how Americans are the most generous nation. "Superfreakonomics" states that Americans give 2% of GDP to charity. I'm suspicious that this is overstated. My guess is that most of that is giving to non-profit organizations that aren't strictly charities.

The key example of that is churches. Yes, many churches run soup kitchens, send tents to Haiti, and the like. But they also do a lot of non-need work targeted at their congregations. Is hiring a pastor an act of charity? Purchasing audiovisual equipment? Running a preschool? All of those serve to benefit their congregations, and you can't reasonably call them charitable work.

My suspicion is that the majority of church giving goes to activities like those, and not the soup kitchens, the tents for Haiti, and so forth. In other words, a lot of this charitable giving is really money spent by people to benefit themselves and their immediate community.

Maybe you don't like this example. What about public radio? I'll bet that donations to public radio are considered part of that 2% charitable giving (I assume the numbers come from the IRS). Does PBS feed the hungry or heal the sick? By and large, the benefits flow to the listeners of public radio. Their donations are not generosity so much as self interest.

Update: I read a little further in "Superfreakonomics" and found the authors obliquely hinting at the same point. I guess they wanted to avoid controversy, though, because they didn't go all the way with it.

A Christian Nation, Finally?

If the key principles that define America were derived from the Bible, how come it took 1500+ years of so-called Christian nations for a nation like America to happen? The Roman Empire was pretty Christian from the 4th century on. There was the Byzantine Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the various highly religious medieval nations like Spain and Poland, etc. All those were supposedly Christian nations, and yet all of those were wildly different from the United States of America. If the principles that define America are really in the Bible, and they're so obviously derived from the Bible and not, say, the Enlightenment philosophers, the Magna Carta, etc., then you'd think at least one of the many Christian nations over the 1500+ year history of Christian nations might have gotten there first.

Bowing Barack

For the record I also think Barack Obama shouldn't have bowed to the Emperor of Japan. Nor should he kiss the Pope's ring, if that ever happens. Of course, I also think both of those men should be up against the wall with the Queen of England, but that's neither here nor there.

Opposing Obama's Socialist Agenda

The whole thing about Obama's so-called socialist agenda is stupid. That's inarguable. He's about as centrist as one could expect a Democratic president to be. I've figured out what's really going on.

There are a lot of people who are going to dislike Barack Obama because of the color of his (father's) skin. They're never going to admit it, though, often not even to themselves. Nonetheless, they're going to be biased against him. The ridiculous "socialist agenda" attacks give them a channel for these feelings. It's stupid, it's factually incorrect, and makes them look like a bunch of idiots. But it's not racist, at least on its surface, which is all they're looking for.

Barack Obama, the 43rd President

Grover Cleveland served non-consecutive terms as both the 22nd and 24th President. If you count by distinct administrations, Barack Obama is the 44th President, but if you count by individuals, he's only the 43rd.

Election '08

Also, I know it's old old old news, but I just can't get over it. Sarah Palin? What the hell?

The downside of the end of the Bush years

It means he can't be impeached and thrown from office in disgrace (not that it was going to happen anyway). This exit is more dignity than he deserves. Am I bitter? A bit.

8 long years of Bush

You can't say it was a complete disaster. Given the talk around 4 years ago, I think escaping the Bush Presidency with only two wars is getting off a little light.

On the automaker bailout

Save the workers, let the companies die. If people are going to be hurt by the demise of the automakers, help the hurt, don't put the companies on life support. Seems pretty simple to me. Oh, right. Politics.

The Next Hillary Clinton?

Michelle Obama is 44. Hillary Clinton was 45 when Bill Clinton became President. Both are lawyers. Both were the moneymakers in the family. She's involved in her husband's policy decisions, like Hillary Clinton and unlike, say, Laura Bush. She's intelligent, well-educated, and a strong personality, all of which were true of Hillary Clinton. She's young enough that a potential political career will see many Presidential elections, giving her a number of openings. Hillary was married to "the first black President." Michelle Obama is married to the first black President.

If it's occurred to me, I'm sure it's occurred to them. If that's something she's interested in, look for her to take a role in policy initiatives. It won't be too prominent, but it'll be less fluffy than what Hillary Clinton did, if only because Clinton got dinged for overstating her weak resume as First Lady in the primaries. Potentially, she could spend eight years in the White House rounding out her resume as a liaison, executive, and diplomat. Look for her presence on blue ribbon commissions, humanitarian efforts, and Supreme Court justice nomination teams.

Then she could run for Barack Obama's former Senate seat in Illinois in 2016. His now-resigned term expires in 2010, so the next term would be up for election then. That would be most effective if he gets elected to a second term.

What would be best for her would be a successful 2 terms by her husband, followed by either 2 terms by a Republican or 1 Democratic term and 1 Republican term. In the former case, she wouldn't have to fight the uphill battle against an incumbent. The latter case would be harder. A worse scenario would be having to follow a 2-term Democratic President. Worst of all would be a Democratic President being elected in 2020, as she could not run at all then in 2024. 2028 would still be an option, even 2032, but by then she'd be 68.

If for some reason, Obama loses in 2012, it will harm her prospects, but not fatally. Dick Durbin, the other Senator from Illinois, is up for re-election in 2014, when he'll be 70. Maybe he won't want to run for a fourth term, giving her an opening.

She should aim for 8 years in the Senate like Hillary Clinton; her husband's 4 years before becoming President are a bizarre aberration. That would serve her up to run for President herself in 2024, at the age of 60. 4 or 8 years as an active First Lady followed by 8 or 10 more years as Senator would be more qualification than Barack Obama. If she plays her cards right, and learns from Hillary Clinton's mistakes, she would be a formidable candidate.

I told you so

I called Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State on Election Day, before the polls even opened in most of the country.

Forget how I predicted that Barack Obama would be Hillary's VP choice. However, I remain firmly convinced that Barack Obama entered the presidential race with that goal in mind. Maybe when he writes his (third) autobiography, he'll confirm it.

Presidential miscellaneous

I am so so so glad that Rudy Giuliani went down in flames in the primaries. Man, what a terrible President he would have been. The New McCain ain't much better (and the old one was no picnic), but Giuliani gave me chills. It was a huge relief that he was wiped out early.

Barack Obama has goofy ears.

Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State? Two in a box with Bill...

It would be pretty funny if Michael Bloomberg got his term limit law change through and then ran off to be Treasury Secretary. We certainly need someone of his caliber.

I would love to see Russell Feingold as Secretary of Homeland Security.

John McCain would be a disaster as President. I predict Barack Obama will be merely a disappointment. Part of it is that we have no real idea what he'll do; what he's said he'll do isn't something I think is worth a lot. What's more significant is that the problems are huge. It may be the America has peaked, and the best he can do is to slow the decline. People tend to over-estimate what the President can do*, and this next President is going to be severely hamstrung by broader forces.

* With the exception of George W. Bush. Say what you will about Bush (and I will, oh will I), the man's "imperial presidency" was a thing unlike any other.

If Barack Obama is elected, I'm worried what that will do in combination with a strong Democratic majority in Congress. On the other hand, maybe some things will be more likely to happen. Maybe only a strong Democratic majority can touch Social Security. The easiest, simplest way to defer its financial problems is to push the retirement age back to 67 or 68. Maybe there will be a large turnout of younger voters, making politicians a little more likely to buck the AARP legions. Also, I want a pony.

Test Your Knowledge: Presidential Surnames

A little sneakier and harder: how many distinct Presidential surnames have there been?

My protest vote

I wrote in "Ron Paul."

Oversimplified Presidential qualifications

Barack Obama = Mediocre judgment + minor experience

John McCain = Terrible judgment + major experience

Joe Biden = Mediocre judgment + major experience

Sarah Palin = Terrible judgment + minor experience

VP debate expectations

In the VP debate previews (example, they talk about ways the VP candidates can screw up. For Joseph Biden, they talk about him making trivial gaffes. He might say something that offends some people. He might ramble on, and be a little smug. On the other hand, what they talk about Sarah Palin is that she won't answer with specifics, and that she needs to talk about how she's Jane Six Pack rather than get bogged down in complex political issues.

The way they talk about the two candidates implies that these are roughly equivalent in significance. Biden's pitfall? He often expresses himself poorly, so he needs to exercise some discipline in his answers. Palin's pitfall? She doesn't know what the hell she's talking about, so she's has to throw up a smoke screen of folksy crap in order to escape with any dignity. How are those at all on the same level?

Sarah Palin is just like someone you know

The thing I find fascinating is that Sarah Palin was originally popular because people could relate to her as someone they knew from their everyday lives: the bubbly, over-achiever hockey mom who really gets involved in the community. Why she's fallen, hard, is that people realized she was in fact another person they knew from their everyday lives: that crazy mom who turns even the PTA into an insane obsessive power-play and forms weird hostile rivalries she executes through byzantine yet childish plots, seasoned with a dash of Fear of Anything Different.

source

The experience double standard

With Barack Obama, a lack of high-level political experience is a drawback. With Sarah Palin, it's a deal-breaker*. Why the double standard? Simple. The voters chose Obama. That doesn't necessarily reflect well on their judgment, but it is nonetheless their choice. Sarah Palin was chosen by no voters. Her selection also reflects less than ideal judgment, but in this case, it's John McCain's. You could make the argument that her potential election as Vice President counts as the voters choosing her, but it's at best an indirect choice. If the voters want to chose poorly with Obama, that's their right. However, they shouldn't be expected or even asked to endorse John McCain's poor choice.

* One of many.

Can't stop the talk

It's only 40 days until the election. They haven't had a single debate yet. They can't postpone. There just isn't time.

All 2008 presidential candidates are lacking

John McCain 2008 is not McCain 2000, and even McCain 2000 wasn't someone I'd vote for. He's the most likely to start a war, has been kissing up to the religious right, and, most fatally, does not appear to understand economics.

It doesn't matter how many times Barack Obama says the word "change." His policies are the same tired clichéed Democratic policies. His ability to deliver a speech is overrated, and the importance of such a skill vastly over-estimated. The man hasn't done anything.

I can't even make a protest vote this year. I might feel differently if Ron Paul was still running, but he's not. The alternative candidates in the 2008 election make me think maybe a 2-party system isn't as completely awful as I thought.

Bob Barr of the Libertarian? He found his "libertarian principles" at a convenient time, and his biggest issue is gun rights, which on a tolerant day I'm ambivalent about.

Then there's the Green Party. Cynthia McKinney? SRSLY? The woman who says George W. Bush knew about September 11th in advance? I guess the Green Party is happy with its place as a joke on the sidelines of American politics.

Constitution Party? Haha. I'd rather vote for McPalin than that reactionary fundamentalist they nominated. I don't know what Ron Paul was thinking when he endorsed him.

Ralph Nader? Flawed as he is, I guess he's all I have left.

Bush redux

The religious right's embrace of Sarah Palin demonstrates they have learned nothing from the lesson of George W. Bush. With Bush, they chose rapture over reason, ignoring obvious flaws because he shared their "values." Never mind that his abilities and record were weak at best. Now, while many of them have become disenchanted with Bush, they haven't figured out that the problem wasn't with Bush, but with them. You can't second-guess a result without second-guessing the process. Well, you can, but that would be stupid.

Sarah Palin's reproductive judgment

The big story with Sarah Palin's son Trig is how she had him even after she knew he would have Down's Syndrome. My question is different. How responsible is it for a woman who already has 4 children to decide to have another child at the age of 43, knowing the risks of things like Down's Syndrome? And, if it was an accidental pregnancy, how does a 43-year old woman with 4 children let such an accident happen? I know that no birth control is 100%, but do you really see Sarah Palin using contraception anyway? There's a 1% chance that it was pure accident, and a 99% chance that it was just plain bad judgment.

Presidential Portmanteaux

McCalin and Joe-Bama.

Sarah Palin, Guns Blazin'

Do you suppose that John McCain considered Bristol Palin's pregnancy to be a good thing? He knew it would invite controversy, which would then give Sarah Palin a justified platform to rant and rave and bash and boom. It would also cause Republicans to rally around her, just like they rallied around George W. Bush to defend his numerous flaws. Wheels within wheels.

Zell Miller (2004) ==Joe Lieberman (2008)

I don't see Lieberman challenging anyone to a duel, though.

The Democratic Convention is not news

Does anything meaningful happen? Isn't the conclusion pre-determined? So why is anyone paying any attention? Michelle Obama said nothing that we hadn't heard before. Hillary Clinton's speech was completely predictable as well. News implies novelty. It implies that there is new information to be had. The Democratic Convention is nothing but the same old thing recycled. It's a waste of attention.

A lovely shot of Hillary Clinton

Taken from this article.

I've always wondered if the media uses pictures like that to show people who's really in control. There are too many unfortunate photographs that appear in the media for it to be anything but intentional. On the other hand, the NY Times doesn't seem likely to take shots at Hillary Clinton, given she's one of New York's senators, and they endorsed her in the primary...

The Economist on Senator Jim Webb

"He looks like an angry potato."

p.46, June 21, 2008 issue.

Freedom is just too much work

A bill to authorize the previously-illegal NSA wiretapping program is stalled in Congress, meaning the government will have to revert to the previous, i.e., legal, way of doing things:

A return to the old rules, they said, would mean that government lawyers, analysts and linguists would once again have to prepare individual warrants, potentially thousands of them, for surveillance of terrorism targets overseas.

Telecommunications companies would also have to spend considerable time shutting down existing wiretaps, and then start them up again if ordered under new warrants, officials said. In some instances, the broad orders given to the companies starting last August cover tens of thousands of overseas phone numbers and e-mail addresses at one time, people with knowledge of the orders said.

My goodness! Are they saying it would take time, effort, and possibly even paperwork!?!? We might as well surrender now.

McCain Compromises on Principles, Episode 354

John McCain claims that the post-September 11th warrantless wiretapping was legal. He used to be someone you could admire, but now he's methodically disposing of everything that made him admirable.

Barack Obama's VP

The Economist describes the numerous ways in which an Obama/Clinton "dream team" is less than meets the eye. As a loyal reader, I agree with everything. Furthermore, in the person of Kansas Governor Kathleen Sibelius is a much more appealing VP candidate with many of Clinton's advantages and few of her disadvantages. I thought Bill Richardson before, but after seeing Clinton (somehow) sustain her appeal for so long, perhaps Obama would be better off with someone more like her. I don't see any Intrade contracts for her, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time.

The Next Hillary Clinton, again

The NY Times asks the same question that I asked 3 months ago: if Hillary Clinton isn't going to be the first female president, who will? They named basically the same names that I did. One thing that I noted was this:

That woman will come from the South, or west of the Mississippi. She will be a Democrat who has won in a red state, or a Republican who has emerged from the private sector to run for governor. She will have executive experience, and have served in a job like attorney general, where she will have proven herself to be "a fighter" (a caring one, of course).

I think perhaps the NY Times and I both suffered from a lack of imagination. Who would have guessed 6 years ago that the first black president would be someone like Barack Obama? You know, a first-term US Senator with a white mother who grew up overseas and in Hawaii... I would have guessed someone like Harold Ford: the scion of a political family from the South with a dozen years in the House, as well as having having a bit more of a national profile over that time. So I figure we could easily be wrong here, too.

Arlen Specter is a waste of space

A United State Senator getting involved in a scandal in football about some coach breaking a rule that shouldn't exist in the first place*? Yeah, because it's not like we have any real problems to solve that he might be pertinent to. Maybe it's for the best considering how utterly useless he was as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, where he blew a lot of hot air about illegal wiretapping. If he got involved in any real issues, what little progress we might expect the Senator to make would get reversed.

* You can use a video camera on the field, and you can look at signals, and you can write things down, but you can't record signals? The genius who thought of that is probably the same guy who thought up DRM.

Florida and Michigan

Even though Obama will win the Democratic nomination, he won't win by much. On the other hand, Hillary Clinton's attempt to count delegates from Florida and Michigan is clearly a non-starter. I'm guessing that's just a strategy.

What would be fairest would be to run the primaries in Florida and Michigan again, on the grounds that the race is too close to give a clear mandate, so every state's Democrats should have their say, while also recognizing that the primaries that already happened were invalidated for a good reason. I don't know how hard it is to have a snap primary, though, logistically speaking.

It would be unfortunate to have the nominee with such a scant majority of the support of Democratic voters, but that is not at all something one can blame Hillary Clinton. She has many faults and weaknesses as a candidate, but the West Virginia results clearly show that a significant number of voters want her.

A destructive primary battle?

I don't think the extended primary battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama is destructive. Yeah, maybe it would be nice to have a candidate now, but is it really that bad? Maybe it's because I'm not particularly impressed or inspired by either one of them, but this campaign isn't making me think any less of them. We've seen that Obama can be nasty; that's no surprise because he's human.

Look at how it's benefited them: McCain is hardly in the news. Clinton and Obama have developed organizations in states they would have ignored until later, maybe forever. That's going to make the Democrats more competitive in November, no matter who the candidate is. And they're still getting lots of money, which means they're getting lots of donors whom the eventual nominee will be able to tap for the election. I just don't see it as being that much of a negative for them.

In fact, this is how the system is supposed to work; most people seem to have forgotten that. Do we really want most states' primaries to be exercises in rubber-stamping an already-established nomination? The Democratic establishment needs to stop attacking Hillary because that accepts the premise that an early nominee is better.

Instead, they need to turn this around and proclaim that the system is working. The candidates have been forced to develop sooner, so they're better for it. All the people are getting a say, not just the ones in New Hampshire or Iowa.

They ought to go out and say that this extended contest is the result of having two great candidates, and that the relatively easy contest on the Republican side reflects the paucity of qualified candidates. I don't believe either one Clinton or Obama is a great candidate, but that's what the Democrats should say.

Weasel words from Obama

Re: Jeremiah Wright:

"His comments were not only divisive and destructive, but I believe that they end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate, and I believe that they do not portray accurately the perspective of the black church," Mr. Obama said, his voice welling with anger. "They certainly don't portray accurately my values and beliefs."

Divisive, destructive, and the succeeding clause all refer to the effects of what he said, not its contents. I don't think he shares Wright's beliefs, but he needs to say that they are wrong and/or stupid. He wants to sound like he's condemning them, but if you read closely, you'll realize he's not.

Later:

"I'm outraged by the comments that were made and saddened over the spectacle that we saw yesterday," Mr. Obama said. He added: "I find these comments appalling. It contradicts everything that I'm about and who I am."

The strongest thing he says is that he's appalled, but that's a reaction, not a judgment.

And then:

"Whatever relationship I had with Reverend Wright has changed as a consequence of this," Mr. Obama said Tuesday. "I don't think that he showed much concern for me. More importantly, I don't think he showed much concern for what we're trying to do in this campaign and what we're trying to do for the American people."

In other words, whether he's wrong doesn't matter; the problem is that unwilling to shut up for the greater good. That's hardly inspiring.