10/28/11
The problems with the “big plan” to put to rest fears of a European financial collapse are myriad, and I feel to compelled to list at least few before I get to the meat of this post:.
--The plan to expand the EFSF (which does not stand for European Fops Still Fiddling, but, rather, the European Financial Stability Facility) does not expand the EFSF at all. Instead, it effectively levers the EFSF through extending guarantees on 20% of certain debts of troubled Eurogovernments and/or taking the first losses on a larger Special Purpose Vehicle (“SPV”) to be funded by the usual suspects: the sovereign wealth funds and/or other public or quasi-public institutions of China, Brazil, India, Japan, and other countries where people still engage in the quaint practice of saving money.
Hmm….
Isn’t it leverage that got the Europeans, and us, into so much trouble in the first place? Further, a 20% guarantee doesn’t go far in the event of a sovereign default; such “credit events” are all-or-nothing, usually all, proposition. And the EFSF will be fighting with the creditors it supposedly will be saving for the remaining collateral when it attempts to collect from the sovereign defaulters the spondulicks it extended to those same rescuees. Finally, the participants in the SPV have not agreed to anything yet, and, if they do, one has to assume that their motivation, in the cases of at least some of the participants, would be at least as political as it would be financial. Is Europe selling itself into serfdom?
Other than the above, the “expansion” of the EFSF sounds like just a terrific plan.
--There appears to be nothing voluntary about the “voluntary” 50% haircut Greek creditors are expected to take. That would be fine, since those who make bad loans should suffer the consequences; however, calling such haircuts “voluntary” forecloses the holders of credit default swaps (“CDS”s) from collecting on those swaps and thus spares the writers of such insurance from having to pay up on the bad bets they made on the solvency of Greece. (See, inter alia, my 6/8/11 piece, A TRAGEDY WORTHY OF AESCHYLUS.) This throws into question the whole concept of a CDS and the viability of the entire CDS market, certainly for sovereign bonds and maybe for any bonds. A severely impaired CDS market will make it harder for sovereigns, or perhaps for anybody, to borrow money.
Further, the 50% haircut will bring Greece’s debt to GDP ratio to 120% by 2020 (2020!), which is better than the 163% that it would have reached had nothing been done. This is mostly because 40% of Greek debt is held by public and quasi-public institutions, which will be taking no haircut, but partially because Greece has to borrow 30 billion euros from the EFSF to finance guarantees of the new bonds issued to those who “agree” to take the 50% haircut, which seems curiously circular. At any rate, Greece probably cannot sustain debt levels of 120% of GDP, and won’t even get there for eight years or so. Another default thus looms.
--The proposed recapitalization of the Eurobanks is turning out to be a non-event. A 9% Tier 1 capital ratio, at least as interpreted by this deal, will require most of the banks to perhaps reduce a few dividends (or maybe just postpone a few dividend increases), cut a few bonuses (perhaps the point of the exercise), and adjust a few bad loans provisions. Will this be enough? One supposes so if the Eurogovernments and Eurocrats insist on riding to the rescue every time these financial Olympians make another of their series of boneheaded decisions.
Nothing I have said so far is new; you’ve probably read of the above deficiencies of the plan. What caught my eye, however, were two quotes from two Euroestimables that perfectly sum up the problem with the “grand plan.” The first is from Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou:
“Tens of billions of euros have been lifted from the backs of the Greek people. The banks, rather than the citizens, will pay that cost. It is a more just distribution of the burden of our debt.”
Is it just me, or is Mr. Papandreou gloating over the perception that he has just pulled something over on everyone, that he has made his creditors suffer (justifiably; you will find no arguments from yours truly over making people pay for their mistakes, but it seems like in this deal the Eurotaxpayers, rather than the banks, will ultimately pick up much of the tab), and done so as a matter of some skewed perception of economic justice? The implied message is that the party is not over; Greece can continue to party on someone else’s dime, as it has since the founding of the modern Greek state after World War I.
The second quote comes from Bundesbank president Bundesbank President Jens Weidman:
“There can’t be any impression that the haircut or public aid from partner countries is a comfortable way out of self-inflicted problems.”
The problem is not so much that these two estimables are saying two different things. The problem is that Mr. Papandreou is correct; the Greeks have escaped a bullet courtesy of the German, Finnish, Czech, French, etc. taxpayers. Mr. Weidman, who is no fool, is lying to himself. This bailout, even if it works, is indeed a comfortable way out of self-inflicted problems. So it follows, as does the night the day, that we will witness more self-inflicted problems, and not only in Greece.
Friday, October 28, 2011
YOURS TRULY’S APPEARANCE ON “WOMEN ON THE MOVE”
10/28/11
Wednesday night (i.e., 10/26/11) I appeared on “The Round Table,” an internet program that is one of the projects of Women on the Move, an organization run by my friend Leslie Harris. Other than my, for some odd reason, stating that the tenure of Richard M. Daley’s mayoralty was from 1989 to 2007 (or maybe I said 2009 or 2006; in any case, I did not, in one of my most salient brain cramps, say 2011), it was a great show in which we discussed the connections between Chicago politics and national politics. (The show is a national one, with my co-participants being stationed in south Florida, Washington, D.C., and Chicago.) The link to the show is
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/women-on-the-move/2011/10/26/women-on-the-move-presents-the-round-table
The program lasted an hour and a half, but you can listen to it in segments if you are so inclined.
Thanks.
Wednesday night (i.e., 10/26/11) I appeared on “The Round Table,” an internet program that is one of the projects of Women on the Move, an organization run by my friend Leslie Harris. Other than my, for some odd reason, stating that the tenure of Richard M. Daley’s mayoralty was from 1989 to 2007 (or maybe I said 2009 or 2006; in any case, I did not, in one of my most salient brain cramps, say 2011), it was a great show in which we discussed the connections between Chicago politics and national politics. (The show is a national one, with my co-participants being stationed in south Florida, Washington, D.C., and Chicago.) The link to the show is
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/women-on-the-move/2011/10/26/women-on-the-move-presents-the-round-table
The program lasted an hour and a half, but you can listen to it in segments if you are so inclined.
Thanks.
Thursday, October 27, 2011
"I’M GOIN’ TO (MICHIGAN) CITY, (MICHIGAN) CITY HERE I COME…"
10/27/11
I will be on Brian Brophy’s program on WIMS, AM 1420, Michigan City on Thursday, 10/27 just after the 8:00 PM (Chicago time) national news.
http://www.wimsradio.com/
We’ll be discussing national politics, Chicago politics and the latest attempt by Hollywood to portray the way things are done in the world’s greatest city, the Starz series “Boss.” See my 10/21/11 post …AND MAYBE THEY COULD HAVE COME UP WITH A MORE ORIGINAL NAME, TOO.
Thanks; I hope you can join us.
I will be on Brian Brophy’s program on WIMS, AM 1420, Michigan City on Thursday, 10/27 just after the 8:00 PM (Chicago time) national news.
http://www.wimsradio.com/
We’ll be discussing national politics, Chicago politics and the latest attempt by Hollywood to portray the way things are done in the world’s greatest city, the Starz series “Boss.” See my 10/21/11 post …AND MAYBE THEY COULD HAVE COME UP WITH A MORE ORIGINAL NAME, TOO.
Thanks; I hope you can join us.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
JUST GIVE MY CHECK TO THE GUY OUT THERE STARING THROUGH THE WINDOW AT THE REMAINS OF THAT SUMPTUOUS MEAL I JUST FINISHED
10/26/11
Today’s Wall Street Journal reports that European banks are negotiating with “euro-zone officials” over the size of the hit those banks will have to take on their Greek debt. So we are confronted with a situation in which those who are being bailed out are arguing with those who will bail them out over the size of the largesse of the latter. The financial sophisticates who run these banks are essentially saying that they don’t want to take too large a hit as a consequence of their very poor investment decisions; instead, they want the taxpayers to take the hit for them. No talk about any of those bankers suffering any consequences for those decisions that will ultimately put shareholders, but more saliently taxpayers, at risk. No, sir. These guys are smart, even when they make bad decisions, like loading up on the debt of a country that has been nearly transparently bankrupt for years, if not decades, and therefore deserve not only their jaw dropping compensation packages but also to have the hoi-polloi European taxpayers clean up the messes these masters of the universe leave after uttering the word “Whoops.”
The strange thing is that this utterly nonsensical set of circumstances was arrived at following a series of utterly logical steps, at least steps taken since those banks loaded up on the toxic assets that are somehow necessitating a bailout. The bankers know that if they take too big a hit on Greek debt, they will become at least regulatorily, if that is a word, and maybe actually insolvent. If that happens, the danger to the world financial system, of which these institutions are a lynchpin, will be sufficiently immediate and large that European (and, who knows, perhaps American and Asian) taxpayers will have to bail them out. So the taxpayers have been put in a position in a “pay me now or pay me later,” in which the “pay me later” option will, presumably, be far more expensive than the “pay me now” option. The banks have the taxpayers by the short hairs, and the banks know it.
The average person looks at this situation, sees its utter insanity, and thinks something like “Gee, it must be nice to be put in a position from which you can whine to those who are giving you a handout that the handout isn’t big enough, and do so with the desired results.” Yet, given the current rules, or lack thereof, of the world financial system, this is the rabbit hole into which we have fallen.
Unless…
Couldn’t we go back to a receivership situation, following something like the template that prevailed when we on these shores had to rescue the depositors in the S&Ls whose all-wise, all knowing executives bet recklessly, in some cases criminally, on grossly inflated real estate and junk bonds of questionable, in some cases fraudulent, credit quality? The government simply took over the banks, paid off the depositors, and sold off what assets they could. The animal spirits took over and the damage was limited to the point of being forgotten in a few years.
Yes, we are talking about institutions of a vastly different magnitude here. And we are no longer dealing only with satisfying the claims of depositors but also those of a myriad of counterparties. But something like the S&L model has to be put in place in order to make sure, or at least make a little more probable, that those who put the world financial system in such a state, and the shareholders and bondholders that looked the other way while they did so, suffer some of the consequences. Depositors could be paid and some counterparties could be made whole while others would also have to pay the piper. The system would stay up and running, and perhaps people will be more wary of excessive risk in the future.
We have to do something to make sure that it is made absolutely clear that the current system of socialized risks and privatized rewards no longer prevails. If not, we will continue to be confronted with situations in which the overly compensated and overrated miscreants can, with a straight face, demand that those whom they, in most circumstance, deem unworthy even of existence, pay for the mistakes of those who are certain that they have everything figured out. Such a situation is not only unjust but also will surely break us financially if allowed to continue.
Today’s Wall Street Journal reports that European banks are negotiating with “euro-zone officials” over the size of the hit those banks will have to take on their Greek debt. So we are confronted with a situation in which those who are being bailed out are arguing with those who will bail them out over the size of the largesse of the latter. The financial sophisticates who run these banks are essentially saying that they don’t want to take too large a hit as a consequence of their very poor investment decisions; instead, they want the taxpayers to take the hit for them. No talk about any of those bankers suffering any consequences for those decisions that will ultimately put shareholders, but more saliently taxpayers, at risk. No, sir. These guys are smart, even when they make bad decisions, like loading up on the debt of a country that has been nearly transparently bankrupt for years, if not decades, and therefore deserve not only their jaw dropping compensation packages but also to have the hoi-polloi European taxpayers clean up the messes these masters of the universe leave after uttering the word “Whoops.”
The strange thing is that this utterly nonsensical set of circumstances was arrived at following a series of utterly logical steps, at least steps taken since those banks loaded up on the toxic assets that are somehow necessitating a bailout. The bankers know that if they take too big a hit on Greek debt, they will become at least regulatorily, if that is a word, and maybe actually insolvent. If that happens, the danger to the world financial system, of which these institutions are a lynchpin, will be sufficiently immediate and large that European (and, who knows, perhaps American and Asian) taxpayers will have to bail them out. So the taxpayers have been put in a position in a “pay me now or pay me later,” in which the “pay me later” option will, presumably, be far more expensive than the “pay me now” option. The banks have the taxpayers by the short hairs, and the banks know it.
The average person looks at this situation, sees its utter insanity, and thinks something like “Gee, it must be nice to be put in a position from which you can whine to those who are giving you a handout that the handout isn’t big enough, and do so with the desired results.” Yet, given the current rules, or lack thereof, of the world financial system, this is the rabbit hole into which we have fallen.
Unless…
Couldn’t we go back to a receivership situation, following something like the template that prevailed when we on these shores had to rescue the depositors in the S&Ls whose all-wise, all knowing executives bet recklessly, in some cases criminally, on grossly inflated real estate and junk bonds of questionable, in some cases fraudulent, credit quality? The government simply took over the banks, paid off the depositors, and sold off what assets they could. The animal spirits took over and the damage was limited to the point of being forgotten in a few years.
Yes, we are talking about institutions of a vastly different magnitude here. And we are no longer dealing only with satisfying the claims of depositors but also those of a myriad of counterparties. But something like the S&L model has to be put in place in order to make sure, or at least make a little more probable, that those who put the world financial system in such a state, and the shareholders and bondholders that looked the other way while they did so, suffer some of the consequences. Depositors could be paid and some counterparties could be made whole while others would also have to pay the piper. The system would stay up and running, and perhaps people will be more wary of excessive risk in the future.
We have to do something to make sure that it is made absolutely clear that the current system of socialized risks and privatized rewards no longer prevails. If not, we will continue to be confronted with situations in which the overly compensated and overrated miscreants can, with a straight face, demand that those whom they, in most circumstance, deem unworthy even of existence, pay for the mistakes of those who are certain that they have everything figured out. Such a situation is not only unjust but also will surely break us financially if allowed to continue.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
MORE FINANCIAL HAIR OF THE DOG
10/25/11
Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal featured a page A1 story about the latest scheme concocted by the Bush/Obama administration to somehow revivify our moribund economy by facilitating refinancing of severely underwater mortgages. This latest brainstorm involves, essentially, expanding the existing HARP program to borrowers whose mortgage loans exceed the previous HARP limit of 125% of the value of the home that serves as collateral. Under this newest piece of Washington sleight-of-hand, banks will be able to refinance people, without fear that Fannie and Freddie will force those lenders to buy back the loans due to underwriting flaws, whose home loans exceed 125% of their home value if those borrowers can prove they have a job or an adequate source of passive income and that they have made their last six mortgage payment. One of the on time but upside down borrowers who stands to benefit from this program is quoted in the Journal as describing the program as a “win-win.” But this program, like most things that the Bush/Obama administration and other Washington denizens have come up with to “solve” our economic problems, is more like a “lose-lose.”
One of the problems with these easy refinancing programs was cited by Professor Anthony Sanders of George Mason University, who is quoted in the Journal article as saying
“Somebody’s going to get hit. This isn’t a free good.”
What Dr. Sanders was arguing was a point I brought up in my 9/6/11 piece “EXCUSE ME, SANDY, BUT IF I KILL ALL THE GOLFERS, THEY’RE GONNA LOCK ME UP AND THROW AWAY THE KEY”, i.e., that there is another side to this trade, the holders of the mortgage loans, that will lose from early refinancing of their asset that is paying an above market interest rate. But as the Journal reported,
“That doesn’t faze (one of the beneficiaries of such a program). ‘We’ve certainly done enough to prop the banks up. These are loans that everyone knew could prepay.’”
There are at least two things wrong with that statement. First, while it is certainly fashionable, and in some (but not nearly as many as is popularly believed) cases justifiable, to bash the banks, as I said in the aforementioned 9/6/11 piece,
One must have to assume that the mortgages are held by those evil banks to think that refinancing will be the elixir that its proponents would have us believe it will be. But the despicable banks’ holding the lion’s share of this paper is highly unlikely; these mortgages have been packaged into mortgage backed securities (“MBS”s) that serve as the collateral for collateralized mortgage obligations (“CMO”s). These CMOs are held by a whole range of investors either directly or, more likely, indirectly through mutual funds, pension funds, hedge funds, or any number of investment vehicles more or less widely available to individual and institutional investors. When the mortgages are refinanced, these investors must accept even lower yields on their investments. These are people who spend money, or invest money, too; will not their reduced incomes have an impact on the economy?
Second, “everyone knew” these loans could prepay? Well, then, why didn’t they? If “everyone knew,” and, presumably, still knows, that these loans could prepay, why are the taxpayers being asked to subsidize refinancing? But this is something of a digression. The major point is that, like any other trade, a refinancing involves two parties; one wins, another loses. This is true even if one does not like the party that loses, but, in this case, the party that loses may be at least as meritorious, financially, economically, and ethically, as the party that wins. This is not a win-win trade.
Besides the holders’ of the mortgage paper being, er, disadvantaged courtesy of the taxpayers, there is another problem with this particular easy refinancing scheme. While the current standard Republican wisdom that the financial “crisis” from which we are supposedly emerging was the exclusive fault of government intervention in the mortgage markets is overstated and self-serving, such intervention was without a doubt one of the causes of the financial problems our nation, and the world, experienced. In the interest of promoting “putting people into their own homes,” a cause for which George W. Bush was at least as dewy-eyed and sweat browed as Barney Frank, Fannie and Freddie, along with other organs of the government, put the taxpayer on the hook for some very questionable loans. (Yes, I know that Fannie and Freddie were not technically organs of the government and that their guarantees were not guarantees of the U.S. Treasury. How did it turn out, though? That’s right; the implicit guarantee turned out to be quite explicit and the taxpayers were left holding the bag for the Bush/Frank experiment in social engineering.) This was a part, but only part, of the problem.
So what does the Bush/Obama administration propose as a solution to a problem that had part of its genesis in the government guaranteeing shaky loans? Having the government guarantee more shaky loans. One might argue these won’t be shaky loans, but it’s hard to argue that having a job and making one’s mortgage payments for the last six months makes one a stellar borrower. Furthermore, one of the reasons mortgage loans are the most advantageous loans the typical borrower will find in his lifetime, besides the government’s long history of putting its thumb on the scale in favor of "home ownership," is that such loans, properly underwritten, provide the lender with plenty of security, in the form of its mortgage on the underlying property, in the event something goes wrong. The loan, underwritten properly, is well secured. But under the latest Bush/Obama scheme, these loans will not be well secured; the collateral will be worth less, in some cases, far less, than the loan. When I was first being trained in banking, we were forbidden from calling such poorly collateralized loans “secured.” We called them “supported.” But that was a long time ago at a bank (the old National Bank of Detroit) that had a reputation for carefully looking out for the interests of its depositors and shareholders. Such quaint notions are increasingly non-existent now that the sophisticates have taken over the world of finance. But I digress. I don’t know if such terminology is in place in today’s brave new financial world, but, if it were, we would call such loans not “secured,” but “supported,” if indeed we could give them that much credit.
The Bush/Obama administration’s attempting to solve a problem partially born of the government backing lousy loans by having the government back more lousy loans is not at all unusual. In the wake of this crisis, caused not so much by a collapse in housing as by too much spending and too much debt, the braintrusts in both Washington and on Wall Street, broadly defined, have counseled solving the problem by, you guessed it, encouraging people to spend and borrow more. Such is that state of financial, economic, and political thinking today.
Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal featured a page A1 story about the latest scheme concocted by the Bush/Obama administration to somehow revivify our moribund economy by facilitating refinancing of severely underwater mortgages. This latest brainstorm involves, essentially, expanding the existing HARP program to borrowers whose mortgage loans exceed the previous HARP limit of 125% of the value of the home that serves as collateral. Under this newest piece of Washington sleight-of-hand, banks will be able to refinance people, without fear that Fannie and Freddie will force those lenders to buy back the loans due to underwriting flaws, whose home loans exceed 125% of their home value if those borrowers can prove they have a job or an adequate source of passive income and that they have made their last six mortgage payment. One of the on time but upside down borrowers who stands to benefit from this program is quoted in the Journal as describing the program as a “win-win.” But this program, like most things that the Bush/Obama administration and other Washington denizens have come up with to “solve” our economic problems, is more like a “lose-lose.”
One of the problems with these easy refinancing programs was cited by Professor Anthony Sanders of George Mason University, who is quoted in the Journal article as saying
“Somebody’s going to get hit. This isn’t a free good.”
What Dr. Sanders was arguing was a point I brought up in my 9/6/11 piece “EXCUSE ME, SANDY, BUT IF I KILL ALL THE GOLFERS, THEY’RE GONNA LOCK ME UP AND THROW AWAY THE KEY”, i.e., that there is another side to this trade, the holders of the mortgage loans, that will lose from early refinancing of their asset that is paying an above market interest rate. But as the Journal reported,
“That doesn’t faze (one of the beneficiaries of such a program). ‘We’ve certainly done enough to prop the banks up. These are loans that everyone knew could prepay.’”
There are at least two things wrong with that statement. First, while it is certainly fashionable, and in some (but not nearly as many as is popularly believed) cases justifiable, to bash the banks, as I said in the aforementioned 9/6/11 piece,
One must have to assume that the mortgages are held by those evil banks to think that refinancing will be the elixir that its proponents would have us believe it will be. But the despicable banks’ holding the lion’s share of this paper is highly unlikely; these mortgages have been packaged into mortgage backed securities (“MBS”s) that serve as the collateral for collateralized mortgage obligations (“CMO”s). These CMOs are held by a whole range of investors either directly or, more likely, indirectly through mutual funds, pension funds, hedge funds, or any number of investment vehicles more or less widely available to individual and institutional investors. When the mortgages are refinanced, these investors must accept even lower yields on their investments. These are people who spend money, or invest money, too; will not their reduced incomes have an impact on the economy?
Second, “everyone knew” these loans could prepay? Well, then, why didn’t they? If “everyone knew,” and, presumably, still knows, that these loans could prepay, why are the taxpayers being asked to subsidize refinancing? But this is something of a digression. The major point is that, like any other trade, a refinancing involves two parties; one wins, another loses. This is true even if one does not like the party that loses, but, in this case, the party that loses may be at least as meritorious, financially, economically, and ethically, as the party that wins. This is not a win-win trade.
Besides the holders’ of the mortgage paper being, er, disadvantaged courtesy of the taxpayers, there is another problem with this particular easy refinancing scheme. While the current standard Republican wisdom that the financial “crisis” from which we are supposedly emerging was the exclusive fault of government intervention in the mortgage markets is overstated and self-serving, such intervention was without a doubt one of the causes of the financial problems our nation, and the world, experienced. In the interest of promoting “putting people into their own homes,” a cause for which George W. Bush was at least as dewy-eyed and sweat browed as Barney Frank, Fannie and Freddie, along with other organs of the government, put the taxpayer on the hook for some very questionable loans. (Yes, I know that Fannie and Freddie were not technically organs of the government and that their guarantees were not guarantees of the U.S. Treasury. How did it turn out, though? That’s right; the implicit guarantee turned out to be quite explicit and the taxpayers were left holding the bag for the Bush/Frank experiment in social engineering.) This was a part, but only part, of the problem.
So what does the Bush/Obama administration propose as a solution to a problem that had part of its genesis in the government guaranteeing shaky loans? Having the government guarantee more shaky loans. One might argue these won’t be shaky loans, but it’s hard to argue that having a job and making one’s mortgage payments for the last six months makes one a stellar borrower. Furthermore, one of the reasons mortgage loans are the most advantageous loans the typical borrower will find in his lifetime, besides the government’s long history of putting its thumb on the scale in favor of "home ownership," is that such loans, properly underwritten, provide the lender with plenty of security, in the form of its mortgage on the underlying property, in the event something goes wrong. The loan, underwritten properly, is well secured. But under the latest Bush/Obama scheme, these loans will not be well secured; the collateral will be worth less, in some cases, far less, than the loan. When I was first being trained in banking, we were forbidden from calling such poorly collateralized loans “secured.” We called them “supported.” But that was a long time ago at a bank (the old National Bank of Detroit) that had a reputation for carefully looking out for the interests of its depositors and shareholders. Such quaint notions are increasingly non-existent now that the sophisticates have taken over the world of finance. But I digress. I don’t know if such terminology is in place in today’s brave new financial world, but, if it were, we would call such loans not “secured,” but “supported,” if indeed we could give them that much credit.
The Bush/Obama administration’s attempting to solve a problem partially born of the government backing lousy loans by having the government back more lousy loans is not at all unusual. In the wake of this crisis, caused not so much by a collapse in housing as by too much spending and too much debt, the braintrusts in both Washington and on Wall Street, broadly defined, have counseled solving the problem by, you guessed it, encouraging people to spend and borrow more. Such is that state of financial, economic, and political thinking today.
Friday, October 21, 2011
…AND MAYBE THEY COULD HAVE COME UP WITH A MORE ORIGINAL NAME, TOO.
10/21/11
For the last several weeks, there has been much talk around town of the new Starz series “Boss,” which features Kelsey Grammer as the fictional Mayor Tom Kane of Chicago. As you might guess, people have been asking me about the series for obvious reasons. So it was with great eagerness that I awaited the premier episode of “Boss” and thus the opportunity to say something at least halfway insightful about the production. While I cannot pretend to be entirely objective in my observations, I certainly approach the series with some degree of knowledge about the purported subject matter and an appreciation for a good story well told.
The most salient and overriding observation about “Boss” is that it is hopelessly and, more importantly, needlessly over the top. The annals of Chicago politics contain enough true stories that are entertaining, compelling, and thought provoking. We don’t need to make up silly stuff like
--the mayor and his daughter buying drugs either on the street from shady dealers or in run down, pathetic drug houses or what we used to call “shooting galleries”,
--aldermanic henchmen cutting off people’s ears and the cuttee delivering the product of such butchery (The thugs gave him his ears severed back as a souvenir? Really?) to the mayor at a formal dinner, with the mayor then flushing said ears down his garbage disposal, which breaks in the process,
--the mayor’s key aide looking and dressing like she just walked off the pages of Penthouse magazine, which was gratuitous enough without said appearance making one of its consequences as predictable as a Chicago mayoral election involving an incumbent named Daley,
--the mayor physically beating up an alderman in his office (Admittedly, give the incumbent enough time in office and such behavior may not be all that far-fetched.),
--an anonymous mayoral operative administering temporarily disabling drugs to the mayor’s personal physician whom, incidentally, the mayor manages to visit in an old slaughterhouse without the city’s press crew ever noticing,
--completely closing a City Council meeting to the press to the point of seizing all of the aldermen’s personal communications devices, and
--perhaps most preposterously, a substantial bloc of opposition aldermen in the City Council.
Stories of our great city’s politics don’t need such off the charts silliness. The real stories imbedded in Chicago’s political history are sufficiently interesting, entertaining, hilarious in some instances and tragicomic in others that we don’t need to make up story lines that could have been lifted from any number of the banalities that dominate television in this country. That is why my books, The Chairman and The Chairman’s Challenge, though they are works of fiction, are based on the real stories behind, and the real history of, Chicago politics. With very few exceptions, every story that makes up the tapestries of those books is based, with varying degrees of tightness, on a true story.
So what did I like about “Boss”?
--Mayor Tom Kane’s City Hall roof top oration on Mayor Anton Cermak, the founder, if you will, of the Chicago Democratic Machine, was pretty much on the mark, though Grammer’s character underestimated Pushcart Tony’s charisma; lines like “I admit I didn’t come over on the Mayflower, but I got here as soon as I could” didn’t emanate from a stiff. The camera effect (i.e., the replacement of the city’s current skyline with the skyline as it may have appeared in 1931) was stunning and helped the Cermak oration make its point with eloquence and almost eerie effectiveness. But even this high point of the show was diminished by the realization that a deal involving the betrayal of a sitting governor would never take place on the roof of City Hall. Such a meeting might take place in the back room of a restaurant in Mt. Greenwood or Bridgeport, but not on the roof of City Hall and not in a discussion directly between the two principals involved.
--Grammer is a great actor. His facial expressions as he was told the bad news at the very beginning of the story were a masterpiece, immediately dispelling any doubt that the man can carry a dramatic role with even more aplomb than he so adroitly handled his former comedic roles. He is spectacular, if a bit over the top, in keeping with the general tone of the series, in the role of Tom Kane. Perhaps he’d like to play a far better role, that of Eamon DeValera Collins. But I digress.
--The city of Chicago looked great, as it always does. But it would be nice if the people in Hollywood (I know the series was shot at the old Ryerson Steel facility, located, perhaps ironically, around Cermak and Rockwell, not in Hollywood. But I speak here of "Hollywood” as an industry, much like one speaks of “Wall Street” not as a physical location but as an industry.) would realize that there is more to Chicago than downtown, the generic ghetto, and the generic yuppieville that are depicted as the three facets of Chicago in any movie or television show attempting to depict the world’s greatest city.
I will doubtless watch “Boss” again because it was entertaining, at least for an hour. I fear, however, that it will ultimately prove about as compelling as the last show about Chicago that was such a flop I can’t even remember its name. Maybe you can help me: It centered on a tough, bad boy cop partnered with a rookie and reporting to a young, beautiful woman police commissioner who was fighting a corrupt mayor who in turn was battling a corrupt black alderman who was consorting with an Irish street gang. The show, whatever its name was, lasted about four episodes and the above description of it explains why. The show was supposed to be about Chicago’s unique political culture but instead was a boring assortment of banausic story lines that could have fit in any of the shows that pass for dramas on network television. I hope the same thing doesn’t happen to “Boss,” but I fear my hopes may be misplaced. Then again, I’ve only seen one episode, but the snippets of next week’s episode that followed tonight’s did not offer much promise that “Boss” will indeed be different from the tawdry yawners that comprise so much of today’s television, network or otherwise. “Boss” is no “Sopranos,” at least as far as I can tell from tonight’s episode.
What would be different would be a screen version of The Chairman and/or The Chairman’s Challenge. Such a production would be far more interesting, thought provoking, and, most important from Hollywood’s perspective, entertaining than what “Boss,” at least so far, seems to be. And a film version of one or both of my books would provide the viewer with a window to the reality of Chicago politics, to the way things really work around here, a story so compelling that it needs no added nonsensical fluff to provide the “wow” factor seemingly so necessary in today’s media world.
For the last several weeks, there has been much talk around town of the new Starz series “Boss,” which features Kelsey Grammer as the fictional Mayor Tom Kane of Chicago. As you might guess, people have been asking me about the series for obvious reasons. So it was with great eagerness that I awaited the premier episode of “Boss” and thus the opportunity to say something at least halfway insightful about the production. While I cannot pretend to be entirely objective in my observations, I certainly approach the series with some degree of knowledge about the purported subject matter and an appreciation for a good story well told.
The most salient and overriding observation about “Boss” is that it is hopelessly and, more importantly, needlessly over the top. The annals of Chicago politics contain enough true stories that are entertaining, compelling, and thought provoking. We don’t need to make up silly stuff like
--the mayor and his daughter buying drugs either on the street from shady dealers or in run down, pathetic drug houses or what we used to call “shooting galleries”,
--aldermanic henchmen cutting off people’s ears and the cuttee delivering the product of such butchery (The thugs gave him his ears severed back as a souvenir? Really?) to the mayor at a formal dinner, with the mayor then flushing said ears down his garbage disposal, which breaks in the process,
--the mayor’s key aide looking and dressing like she just walked off the pages of Penthouse magazine, which was gratuitous enough without said appearance making one of its consequences as predictable as a Chicago mayoral election involving an incumbent named Daley,
--the mayor physically beating up an alderman in his office (Admittedly, give the incumbent enough time in office and such behavior may not be all that far-fetched.),
--an anonymous mayoral operative administering temporarily disabling drugs to the mayor’s personal physician whom, incidentally, the mayor manages to visit in an old slaughterhouse without the city’s press crew ever noticing,
--completely closing a City Council meeting to the press to the point of seizing all of the aldermen’s personal communications devices, and
--perhaps most preposterously, a substantial bloc of opposition aldermen in the City Council.
Stories of our great city’s politics don’t need such off the charts silliness. The real stories imbedded in Chicago’s political history are sufficiently interesting, entertaining, hilarious in some instances and tragicomic in others that we don’t need to make up story lines that could have been lifted from any number of the banalities that dominate television in this country. That is why my books, The Chairman and The Chairman’s Challenge, though they are works of fiction, are based on the real stories behind, and the real history of, Chicago politics. With very few exceptions, every story that makes up the tapestries of those books is based, with varying degrees of tightness, on a true story.
So what did I like about “Boss”?
--Mayor Tom Kane’s City Hall roof top oration on Mayor Anton Cermak, the founder, if you will, of the Chicago Democratic Machine, was pretty much on the mark, though Grammer’s character underestimated Pushcart Tony’s charisma; lines like “I admit I didn’t come over on the Mayflower, but I got here as soon as I could” didn’t emanate from a stiff. The camera effect (i.e., the replacement of the city’s current skyline with the skyline as it may have appeared in 1931) was stunning and helped the Cermak oration make its point with eloquence and almost eerie effectiveness. But even this high point of the show was diminished by the realization that a deal involving the betrayal of a sitting governor would never take place on the roof of City Hall. Such a meeting might take place in the back room of a restaurant in Mt. Greenwood or Bridgeport, but not on the roof of City Hall and not in a discussion directly between the two principals involved.
--Grammer is a great actor. His facial expressions as he was told the bad news at the very beginning of the story were a masterpiece, immediately dispelling any doubt that the man can carry a dramatic role with even more aplomb than he so adroitly handled his former comedic roles. He is spectacular, if a bit over the top, in keeping with the general tone of the series, in the role of Tom Kane. Perhaps he’d like to play a far better role, that of Eamon DeValera Collins. But I digress.
--The city of Chicago looked great, as it always does. But it would be nice if the people in Hollywood (I know the series was shot at the old Ryerson Steel facility, located, perhaps ironically, around Cermak and Rockwell, not in Hollywood. But I speak here of "Hollywood” as an industry, much like one speaks of “Wall Street” not as a physical location but as an industry.) would realize that there is more to Chicago than downtown, the generic ghetto, and the generic yuppieville that are depicted as the three facets of Chicago in any movie or television show attempting to depict the world’s greatest city.
I will doubtless watch “Boss” again because it was entertaining, at least for an hour. I fear, however, that it will ultimately prove about as compelling as the last show about Chicago that was such a flop I can’t even remember its name. Maybe you can help me: It centered on a tough, bad boy cop partnered with a rookie and reporting to a young, beautiful woman police commissioner who was fighting a corrupt mayor who in turn was battling a corrupt black alderman who was consorting with an Irish street gang. The show, whatever its name was, lasted about four episodes and the above description of it explains why. The show was supposed to be about Chicago’s unique political culture but instead was a boring assortment of banausic story lines that could have fit in any of the shows that pass for dramas on network television. I hope the same thing doesn’t happen to “Boss,” but I fear my hopes may be misplaced. Then again, I’ve only seen one episode, but the snippets of next week’s episode that followed tonight’s did not offer much promise that “Boss” will indeed be different from the tawdry yawners that comprise so much of today’s television, network or otherwise. “Boss” is no “Sopranos,” at least as far as I can tell from tonight’s episode.
What would be different would be a screen version of The Chairman and/or The Chairman’s Challenge. Such a production would be far more interesting, thought provoking, and, most important from Hollywood’s perspective, entertaining than what “Boss,” at least so far, seems to be. And a film version of one or both of my books would provide the viewer with a window to the reality of Chicago politics, to the way things really work around here, a story so compelling that it needs no added nonsensical fluff to provide the “wow” factor seemingly so necessary in today’s media world.
HEY, SOMEBODY HAS TO RUN THE PUBLIC TRANSIT SYSTEM IN TRIPOLI
10/21/11
Today’s Wall Street Journal is filled with articles about the demise of one Colonel Gadhafi, as are most papers, and some of the articles have, mirabile dictu, diverted from the usual ingenuous, dewy-eyed jubilation regarding this particular Middle Eastern madman’s demise to make such sober comments as
He leaves a nation torn by war, devoid of civic institutions, and difficult to govern
which was penned by Richard Boudreaux in his Journal news piece. This is going to be a long, hard slog not only for the Libyan people but also for the United States and the rest of the West, and let’s hope the Libyan action does not become some kind of template for further involvement of our country in conflicts which we cannot afford, in which we have no direct interest, and that will surely drain us of blood and treasure at a point in history in which our inability to afford either is especially acute.
But enough serious commentary on the demise of the crazed Colonel. Take a look at the largest picture on page A8 of today’s (i.e., Friday, 10/21/11’s) Wall Street Journal, the picture in which the late lout looks a lot like Lon Chaney, Jr. just before he turns into the Wolfman. (I have included a link at the end of this post that should take you right to the picture. Given how this system works, however, you’ll probably have to paste it onto your browser.) In the bottom left of that picture is a smaller black and white picture that, apparently, the beastly Bedouin is holding or is somehow attached to his vainglorious uniform. Who is that standing on the far right side (as you look at it) of the group of Gadhafi acolytes depicted in the picture? Is that Ralph Kramden?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203752604576643061691909524.html?mod=ITP_pageone_3
Today’s Wall Street Journal is filled with articles about the demise of one Colonel Gadhafi, as are most papers, and some of the articles have, mirabile dictu, diverted from the usual ingenuous, dewy-eyed jubilation regarding this particular Middle Eastern madman’s demise to make such sober comments as
He leaves a nation torn by war, devoid of civic institutions, and difficult to govern
which was penned by Richard Boudreaux in his Journal news piece. This is going to be a long, hard slog not only for the Libyan people but also for the United States and the rest of the West, and let’s hope the Libyan action does not become some kind of template for further involvement of our country in conflicts which we cannot afford, in which we have no direct interest, and that will surely drain us of blood and treasure at a point in history in which our inability to afford either is especially acute.
But enough serious commentary on the demise of the crazed Colonel. Take a look at the largest picture on page A8 of today’s (i.e., Friday, 10/21/11’s) Wall Street Journal, the picture in which the late lout looks a lot like Lon Chaney, Jr. just before he turns into the Wolfman. (I have included a link at the end of this post that should take you right to the picture. Given how this system works, however, you’ll probably have to paste it onto your browser.) In the bottom left of that picture is a smaller black and white picture that, apparently, the beastly Bedouin is holding or is somehow attached to his vainglorious uniform. Who is that standing on the far right side (as you look at it) of the group of Gadhafi acolytes depicted in the picture? Is that Ralph Kramden?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203752604576643061691909524.html?mod=ITP_pageone_3
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
“I’LL MAKE (HER) AN OFFER (SHE) CAN’T REFUSE.”
10/18/11
This morning, I heard a New York Times columnist on Bloomberg News (Satellite radio, by the way, might be the best invention since White Castle, but I digress.) expounding on his column in which he broached the possibility of Hillary Clinton’s becoming President Obama’s running mate in 2012. I went to the Times website (I don’t subscribe to the paper; there are only so many hours in the day and we already subscribe to four other papers.) but could not find the columnist’s article. Being in the car when hearing the report and obviously not being able to write anything down (Unlike many other drivers, I drive when I drive, but I again digress.), I didn’t even get the reporter’s name.
Note that in my 10/4/11 post, JERSEY BOY, I concluded with
Should Mr. Romney win the nomination, and should Mr. Obama, as is highly likely but not certain (See my 9/16/11 post “I WILL NOT SEEK, NOR WILL I ACCEPT, THE NOMINATION OF MY PARTY…”), be his party’s nominee, Mr. Romney will face a president with maybe $1 billion, David Axelrod, and perhaps a very interesting and appealing running mate. The latter is grist for a later mill. But, for now, suffice to say this will be no cakewalk for the Republicans.
Apparently, this unnamed reporter for the Times has forced my hand and brought his particular mill, hungry for grist, right to my front doorstep. I do wish I could read his column, rather than rely on the writer’s comments on Bloomberg. If any of you know who the writer is, and perhaps what day this column was published, please let me know so I can read it. The good news is that I am not reacting to the article but rather expounding on a topic I have wanted to visit since well before the aforementioned 10/4/11 post.
While I don’t like to make predictions, at least explicitly so, I would go further than the writer of the aforementioned column, who took pains to point out that he isn’t saying that it is likely that Hillary Clinton will be on the Democratic ticket. I will go as far, but no further, to say that the chances are very good, and getting better with each poll that shows weakening support for President Obama, that Mrs. Clinton will be the Dem’s second fiddle in 2012. The advantages for the Democratic ticket are numerous. As I said in the above quote from my 10/4/11 post, the Democrats go into 2012 with more strength than many, and most on the right, think, but this will still be a very tough election for the incumbent for all the obvious reasons: tough economy, budget catastrophe, tough economy, continuing wars of which Americans have grown very tired, tough economy, a disappointed base, tough economy, growing unpopularity among those in the middle, tough economy, etc., etc., etc. Mrs. Clinton’s presence on the ticket can’t help but be a tremendous shot in the arm for a number of reasons:
--Recent polls have shown Secretary of State Clinton to be among the most admired of currently practicing politician.
--Mrs. Clinton has done an admirable job as Secretary of State, at least from a conventional, centrist perspective, given the tough assignment running Foggy Bottom has been of late.
--She was immensely popular among her Senatorial constituents in New York and, given her performance in the Senate, understandably so.
--Many Democrats doubtless wish they had supported her, rather than the inexperienced young community organizer who purported to be from Chicago, in the race for the Democratic nomination in 2008.
--Even those of us who were among her most vociferous critics have come to, if not admire Mrs. Clinton, at least grudgingly give her credit for doing a good job in her public offices and being a very skilled politician.
--There is, understandably, a great deal of well warranted nostalgia for the Clinton era, with which she can’t help but be associated. The peace and prosperity that characterized that era stand in stark contrast to the dystopia that has characterized the Bush/Obama era, and the stature of Bill Clinton grows each day, especially when contrasted with the, to put it charitably, two clownish poseurs and insufferable lightweights who followed him in the Oval Office.
--As hard as it is for someone on my end of the political spectrum (I know, I know…Which end is that? I’m not even sure myself, but I know it isn’t Hillary’s end.), Hillary Clinton would make an outstanding president should she find herself in that office. One of a president’s, and/or presidential candidate’s, first obligations is to pick a running mate who would be a good president. Further, failure to do so can be disastrous for a candidacy for either an incumbent or non-incumbent. Ask John McCain or George H.W. Bush.
--The gender factor, as much as some overly sensitive types would like to argue otherwise, would a huge consideration. Mrs. Clinton’s presence on the ticket would energize plenty of women voters, and many men voters who want to be perceived, for whatever reason, as doing their part for the advancement of women. In a close election, this could certainly make the difference.
The better question is one my sister-in-law asked the other night when I was making the Hillary for veep argument: What is in it for Hillary? This is, as are all better questions, tougher to answer, but I see a few things that would make Hillary want to run with Mr. Obama:
--This is her last chance to get close to the big prize that she has yearned for, and fruitlessly sought, since her husband left office. Being on the upcoming ticket immediately sets her up, win or lose in 2012, as the front runner for 2016, a year in which she will be 69 years old, the same age as Ronald Reagan in 1980 (Can you believe it? Tempus fugit!), and thus facing her last chance at the brass ring.
--The job of Secretary of State has become increasingly thankless and will become more so as President Obama, should he be reelected, continues to follow his predecessor (and, at least in foreign affairs, some might legitimately believe, his mentor or idol) in further bollixing up America’s role in the world. No one who is Secretary of State will go into 2016 looking strong or smart.
--Hillary is a very smart and capable woman and is closely advised by the smartest and most capable politician of the modern era. The Clintons will doubtless cut some kind of very attractive deal, both over and under the table, as part of Hillary’s agreeing to go on the ticket. If she runs and if the Democrats win, she will be the most involved and powerful vice-president in history. Similarly, should she want the job (See below.), the Clintons have already made it politically impossible for Mr. Obama to replace Joe Biden with anyone but Hillary Clinton.
--The President will doubtless appeal to Mrs. Clinton’s patriotism and party loyalty in making his pitch. One doubts that Secretary Clinton will fail to respond favorably to those appeals; she loves her country and her party.
What about Joe Biden? He will be just short of seventy on Election Day, 2012, not too old to be Vice-President or President, but close. He will certainly be old enough to leave the office with dignity and with nothing like the appearance of being dumped. Further, while he has done a more than passable job as VP and is quite popular, he was considered in 2008 in many quarters to be a one-termer, a more experienced hand to contrast with the ingénue at the top of the ticket and to provide the public with reassurance that there would be an adult around to guide the youngster through his first term. Mr. Biden’s leaving will be no problem for him, for the Party, or for the country, or for even those who like and admire Mr. Biden. There is talk of a job swap, in which Hillary goes on the ticket and Joe goes to Foggy Bottom. That could happen, and might be very logical given Mr. Biden’s foreign policy expertise, but such a swap would not be necessary to get Mr. Biden to step aside.
Yes, I know Hillary Clinton says she wants out of politics after the 2012 election, that she will not serve as Secretary of State in a second Obama term and that she does not want to be on the ticket, though she has left a little wiggle room on the latter. But a politician will say anything, and Mrs. Clinton is nothing if not a politician, and a very good and conventional one at that. The woman’s life has been defined by a burning, unceasing, and, at least regarding the top job, unrequited desire for power. She can say all she wants about teaching and writing, but they will never satisfy her. She wants to be President, and being vice-president is a great way to become president, especially for someone with the political skills of Hillary Rodham Clinton.
This morning, I heard a New York Times columnist on Bloomberg News (Satellite radio, by the way, might be the best invention since White Castle, but I digress.) expounding on his column in which he broached the possibility of Hillary Clinton’s becoming President Obama’s running mate in 2012. I went to the Times website (I don’t subscribe to the paper; there are only so many hours in the day and we already subscribe to four other papers.) but could not find the columnist’s article. Being in the car when hearing the report and obviously not being able to write anything down (Unlike many other drivers, I drive when I drive, but I again digress.), I didn’t even get the reporter’s name.
Note that in my 10/4/11 post, JERSEY BOY, I concluded with
Should Mr. Romney win the nomination, and should Mr. Obama, as is highly likely but not certain (See my 9/16/11 post “I WILL NOT SEEK, NOR WILL I ACCEPT, THE NOMINATION OF MY PARTY…”), be his party’s nominee, Mr. Romney will face a president with maybe $1 billion, David Axelrod, and perhaps a very interesting and appealing running mate. The latter is grist for a later mill. But, for now, suffice to say this will be no cakewalk for the Republicans.
Apparently, this unnamed reporter for the Times has forced my hand and brought his particular mill, hungry for grist, right to my front doorstep. I do wish I could read his column, rather than rely on the writer’s comments on Bloomberg. If any of you know who the writer is, and perhaps what day this column was published, please let me know so I can read it. The good news is that I am not reacting to the article but rather expounding on a topic I have wanted to visit since well before the aforementioned 10/4/11 post.
While I don’t like to make predictions, at least explicitly so, I would go further than the writer of the aforementioned column, who took pains to point out that he isn’t saying that it is likely that Hillary Clinton will be on the Democratic ticket. I will go as far, but no further, to say that the chances are very good, and getting better with each poll that shows weakening support for President Obama, that Mrs. Clinton will be the Dem’s second fiddle in 2012. The advantages for the Democratic ticket are numerous. As I said in the above quote from my 10/4/11 post, the Democrats go into 2012 with more strength than many, and most on the right, think, but this will still be a very tough election for the incumbent for all the obvious reasons: tough economy, budget catastrophe, tough economy, continuing wars of which Americans have grown very tired, tough economy, a disappointed base, tough economy, growing unpopularity among those in the middle, tough economy, etc., etc., etc. Mrs. Clinton’s presence on the ticket can’t help but be a tremendous shot in the arm for a number of reasons:
--Recent polls have shown Secretary of State Clinton to be among the most admired of currently practicing politician.
--Mrs. Clinton has done an admirable job as Secretary of State, at least from a conventional, centrist perspective, given the tough assignment running Foggy Bottom has been of late.
--She was immensely popular among her Senatorial constituents in New York and, given her performance in the Senate, understandably so.
--Many Democrats doubtless wish they had supported her, rather than the inexperienced young community organizer who purported to be from Chicago, in the race for the Democratic nomination in 2008.
--Even those of us who were among her most vociferous critics have come to, if not admire Mrs. Clinton, at least grudgingly give her credit for doing a good job in her public offices and being a very skilled politician.
--There is, understandably, a great deal of well warranted nostalgia for the Clinton era, with which she can’t help but be associated. The peace and prosperity that characterized that era stand in stark contrast to the dystopia that has characterized the Bush/Obama era, and the stature of Bill Clinton grows each day, especially when contrasted with the, to put it charitably, two clownish poseurs and insufferable lightweights who followed him in the Oval Office.
--As hard as it is for someone on my end of the political spectrum (I know, I know…Which end is that? I’m not even sure myself, but I know it isn’t Hillary’s end.), Hillary Clinton would make an outstanding president should she find herself in that office. One of a president’s, and/or presidential candidate’s, first obligations is to pick a running mate who would be a good president. Further, failure to do so can be disastrous for a candidacy for either an incumbent or non-incumbent. Ask John McCain or George H.W. Bush.
--The gender factor, as much as some overly sensitive types would like to argue otherwise, would a huge consideration. Mrs. Clinton’s presence on the ticket would energize plenty of women voters, and many men voters who want to be perceived, for whatever reason, as doing their part for the advancement of women. In a close election, this could certainly make the difference.
The better question is one my sister-in-law asked the other night when I was making the Hillary for veep argument: What is in it for Hillary? This is, as are all better questions, tougher to answer, but I see a few things that would make Hillary want to run with Mr. Obama:
--This is her last chance to get close to the big prize that she has yearned for, and fruitlessly sought, since her husband left office. Being on the upcoming ticket immediately sets her up, win or lose in 2012, as the front runner for 2016, a year in which she will be 69 years old, the same age as Ronald Reagan in 1980 (Can you believe it? Tempus fugit!), and thus facing her last chance at the brass ring.
--The job of Secretary of State has become increasingly thankless and will become more so as President Obama, should he be reelected, continues to follow his predecessor (and, at least in foreign affairs, some might legitimately believe, his mentor or idol) in further bollixing up America’s role in the world. No one who is Secretary of State will go into 2016 looking strong or smart.
--Hillary is a very smart and capable woman and is closely advised by the smartest and most capable politician of the modern era. The Clintons will doubtless cut some kind of very attractive deal, both over and under the table, as part of Hillary’s agreeing to go on the ticket. If she runs and if the Democrats win, she will be the most involved and powerful vice-president in history. Similarly, should she want the job (See below.), the Clintons have already made it politically impossible for Mr. Obama to replace Joe Biden with anyone but Hillary Clinton.
--The President will doubtless appeal to Mrs. Clinton’s patriotism and party loyalty in making his pitch. One doubts that Secretary Clinton will fail to respond favorably to those appeals; she loves her country and her party.
What about Joe Biden? He will be just short of seventy on Election Day, 2012, not too old to be Vice-President or President, but close. He will certainly be old enough to leave the office with dignity and with nothing like the appearance of being dumped. Further, while he has done a more than passable job as VP and is quite popular, he was considered in 2008 in many quarters to be a one-termer, a more experienced hand to contrast with the ingénue at the top of the ticket and to provide the public with reassurance that there would be an adult around to guide the youngster through his first term. Mr. Biden’s leaving will be no problem for him, for the Party, or for the country, or for even those who like and admire Mr. Biden. There is talk of a job swap, in which Hillary goes on the ticket and Joe goes to Foggy Bottom. That could happen, and might be very logical given Mr. Biden’s foreign policy expertise, but such a swap would not be necessary to get Mr. Biden to step aside.
Yes, I know Hillary Clinton says she wants out of politics after the 2012 election, that she will not serve as Secretary of State in a second Obama term and that she does not want to be on the ticket, though she has left a little wiggle room on the latter. But a politician will say anything, and Mrs. Clinton is nothing if not a politician, and a very good and conventional one at that. The woman’s life has been defined by a burning, unceasing, and, at least regarding the top job, unrequited desire for power. She can say all she wants about teaching and writing, but they will never satisfy her. She wants to be President, and being vice-president is a great way to become president, especially for someone with the political skills of Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Friday, October 14, 2011
“…ALL HE LEFT US WAS ALONE…”
10/14/11
Earlier this week, Mayor Rahm Emanuel formally revealed his previously well leaked budget to the press. (See my 10/13/11 piece, A SPECIAL PICKUP, for some background on one aspect of the budget.) Despite all the, in most cases, justifiable talk of change in Chicago under Mayor Emanuel, at least one thing hasn’t changed around this town: The City Council will rubber stamp this budget, continuing the time-honored Chicago tradition of bleating obediently like the lambs that they are when the mayor, be his name Daley or Emanuel, demands whatever he feels necessary, or just desirable. But I digress.
The Mayor, citing the desperate budget situation his predecessor and sponsor bequeathed him, has proposed increases in water and sewer fees, “congestion fees” on downtown parking, increased city sticker fees for politically disapproved vehicles, and all manner of methods of reaching into the taxpayers’ already nearly empty pockets. Fair enough; the city has, even using the phony-baloney accounting most public entities use, a projected $600mm plus shortfall this fiscal year, and closing a yawning gap of that size will require some tax (er, sorry, fee) increases. However, in announcing these various stickups of the taxpayers, the Mayor nearly simultaneously announced a variety of uses for the money. For example, some of the revenue from the “congestion fees” will be used for a new Green Line station on Cermak Road and for express buses linking our commuter rail stations with north Michigan Avenue. Some of the money from the increased water and sewer charges will be used to dramatically pick up the pace on replacing and refurbishing water pipe and sewers. Such spending is designed to mollify taxpayers, showing them that they are actually getting something for the increased spondulicks they are forking over to the Mayor and his sycophants in the city bureaucracy and Council.
A non-politician, however, might ask how we are going to address the city’s budget problems if we are spending the new revenue generated on new projects, even spending on seemingly worthy projects. We were told we had to come up with more money because Mayor Daley (er, sorry, the woeful state of the national economy, to hear Mr. Daley tell it) left the city in such a fiscal pickle. But now we are being told that the extra money will be used to give us things like better water (Chicago water is already the best in the world, by the way.) and new and better el stops. So what gives?
Doubtless Mayor Emanuel, and his budget, says that only a portion of the increased fees will go to various improvements in the infrastructure and that most, or at least a substantial chunk, of the revenue will go to balancing the budget. But one would hope that the citizenry is not sufficiently naïve to think that things will work out as planned. Here in Chicago, or anywhere, for that matter, public spending projects almost never come in at or under budget; consider, for example, Millennium Park.
Yes, yes, I know; Mayor Emanuel is Superman, so the media tell us, and the days of cost overruns, etc., are over. Okay; let’s concede for a moment that Uber-Manager can keep these projects at or under cost. The new Green Line Station is projected to cost $50mm ($50mm!!!!! Wow! Must be a nice station, but I digress.) and the downtown express bus system is projected to cost $30mm. The “congestion fee” is supposed to bring in $28mm. Suppose a modern day version of the conversion of water into wine takes place and these numbers turn out to be right. Those two projects will account for nearly three years of revenue from the tax (sorry, fee) that’s supposed to finance them. And, yes, as a former bond guy, I understand that we are only supposed to look to the congestion fee to service the bonds necessary to pay for the aforementioned improvements and only a portion of the $28mm will be necessary for debt service. Still, we are not talking small dollars here and such a financing method involves piling more debt on an already indebted city. Yes, yes, I know, it’s capital improvement debt, not operating debt, and therefore it’s good debt. Right.
Any way you look at it, much of the new money raised by the Emanuel fees will go toward new spending, not to pay the bills Mr. Emanuel’s political Godfather has already left us. In a sense, Mr. Emanuel may be following much more closely in his sponsor’s footsteps than the new Mayor would have us believe, leaving us with plenty of debt to service, debt used to finance projects the main objective of which is to assure his continuation in office. Only, in Mr. Emanuel’s case, the ultimate objective may not be remaining in his current office but burnishing his image to the point at which he can seek higher office…and be safely out of town before the bills come due.
Earlier this week, Mayor Rahm Emanuel formally revealed his previously well leaked budget to the press. (See my 10/13/11 piece, A SPECIAL PICKUP, for some background on one aspect of the budget.) Despite all the, in most cases, justifiable talk of change in Chicago under Mayor Emanuel, at least one thing hasn’t changed around this town: The City Council will rubber stamp this budget, continuing the time-honored Chicago tradition of bleating obediently like the lambs that they are when the mayor, be his name Daley or Emanuel, demands whatever he feels necessary, or just desirable. But I digress.
The Mayor, citing the desperate budget situation his predecessor and sponsor bequeathed him, has proposed increases in water and sewer fees, “congestion fees” on downtown parking, increased city sticker fees for politically disapproved vehicles, and all manner of methods of reaching into the taxpayers’ already nearly empty pockets. Fair enough; the city has, even using the phony-baloney accounting most public entities use, a projected $600mm plus shortfall this fiscal year, and closing a yawning gap of that size will require some tax (er, sorry, fee) increases. However, in announcing these various stickups of the taxpayers, the Mayor nearly simultaneously announced a variety of uses for the money. For example, some of the revenue from the “congestion fees” will be used for a new Green Line station on Cermak Road and for express buses linking our commuter rail stations with north Michigan Avenue. Some of the money from the increased water and sewer charges will be used to dramatically pick up the pace on replacing and refurbishing water pipe and sewers. Such spending is designed to mollify taxpayers, showing them that they are actually getting something for the increased spondulicks they are forking over to the Mayor and his sycophants in the city bureaucracy and Council.
A non-politician, however, might ask how we are going to address the city’s budget problems if we are spending the new revenue generated on new projects, even spending on seemingly worthy projects. We were told we had to come up with more money because Mayor Daley (er, sorry, the woeful state of the national economy, to hear Mr. Daley tell it) left the city in such a fiscal pickle. But now we are being told that the extra money will be used to give us things like better water (Chicago water is already the best in the world, by the way.) and new and better el stops. So what gives?
Doubtless Mayor Emanuel, and his budget, says that only a portion of the increased fees will go to various improvements in the infrastructure and that most, or at least a substantial chunk, of the revenue will go to balancing the budget. But one would hope that the citizenry is not sufficiently naïve to think that things will work out as planned. Here in Chicago, or anywhere, for that matter, public spending projects almost never come in at or under budget; consider, for example, Millennium Park.
Yes, yes, I know; Mayor Emanuel is Superman, so the media tell us, and the days of cost overruns, etc., are over. Okay; let’s concede for a moment that Uber-Manager can keep these projects at or under cost. The new Green Line Station is projected to cost $50mm ($50mm!!!!! Wow! Must be a nice station, but I digress.) and the downtown express bus system is projected to cost $30mm. The “congestion fee” is supposed to bring in $28mm. Suppose a modern day version of the conversion of water into wine takes place and these numbers turn out to be right. Those two projects will account for nearly three years of revenue from the tax (sorry, fee) that’s supposed to finance them. And, yes, as a former bond guy, I understand that we are only supposed to look to the congestion fee to service the bonds necessary to pay for the aforementioned improvements and only a portion of the $28mm will be necessary for debt service. Still, we are not talking small dollars here and such a financing method involves piling more debt on an already indebted city. Yes, yes, I know, it’s capital improvement debt, not operating debt, and therefore it’s good debt. Right.
Any way you look at it, much of the new money raised by the Emanuel fees will go toward new spending, not to pay the bills Mr. Emanuel’s political Godfather has already left us. In a sense, Mr. Emanuel may be following much more closely in his sponsor’s footsteps than the new Mayor would have us believe, leaving us with plenty of debt to service, debt used to finance projects the main objective of which is to assure his continuation in office. Only, in Mr. Emanuel’s case, the ultimate objective may not be remaining in his current office but burnishing his image to the point at which he can seek higher office…and be safely out of town before the bills come due.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
A SPECIAL PICK UP
10/13/11
Today’s (i.e., Thursday, 10/13/11’s) Wall Street Journal featured a page A1 article entitled “Chicago Mayor Trashes Politics of Waste Removal.” The article describes Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s efforts to make Chicago city government more efficient (See, for background, my 7/30/11 post RAHM EMANUEL IS NOT TOM DEMPSEY.) and focuses on the Mayor’s attempts to change the byzantine ward by ward system of garbage pickup in the world’s greatest city.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203476804576612851452362670.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0
The article delves into what it implies is the archaic ward system around which delivery of city services must work. The article quotes the Mayor as saying
“The days of having trash pickup by political design only are over. It’s a culture and a mindset …of 50 years.”
Fifty years? Mayor Emanuel, having grown up in the suburbs, being a young man himself, and only becoming interested in city government and politics when the Big Job was opened up for him, perhaps doesn’t realize that the “culture and mindset” that govern how our fair city works go back a heck of a lot more than fifty years. In his defense, though, he is clearly a quick study, a good manager, and an impatient, in a good sense, man and is, so far at least, doing a great job with our city, especially for someone who parachuted in from Washington. But I digress.
My main point is that such articles, and, to a lesser extent, such television shows as the upcoming Starz series “Boss,” whet people’s interest in Chicago politics and the way things really work around here. For those who want to satisfy this curiosity, I recommend my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and its sequel, The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics. Both books use the story of Eamon DeValera Collins, a fictional old time ward heeler, to weave stories from the annals of the politics of our town into a compelling, entertaining narrative that leaves the reader with a clear sense of the way Chicago operates and an acute ability to put the hagiography of Rahm Emanuel that passes for coverage of our city in its proper context.
Both books are available at Amazon.com, various other online book sellers, and at a number of independent book stores throughout the Chicago area, most prominently Anderson’s in Naperville and Bookies’ on 103rd and Artesian in West Beverly, one of the neighborhoods that comprise Chicago’s 19th Ward.
Today’s (i.e., Thursday, 10/13/11’s) Wall Street Journal featured a page A1 article entitled “Chicago Mayor Trashes Politics of Waste Removal.” The article describes Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s efforts to make Chicago city government more efficient (See, for background, my 7/30/11 post RAHM EMANUEL IS NOT TOM DEMPSEY.) and focuses on the Mayor’s attempts to change the byzantine ward by ward system of garbage pickup in the world’s greatest city.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203476804576612851452362670.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0
The article delves into what it implies is the archaic ward system around which delivery of city services must work. The article quotes the Mayor as saying
“The days of having trash pickup by political design only are over. It’s a culture and a mindset …of 50 years.”
Fifty years? Mayor Emanuel, having grown up in the suburbs, being a young man himself, and only becoming interested in city government and politics when the Big Job was opened up for him, perhaps doesn’t realize that the “culture and mindset” that govern how our fair city works go back a heck of a lot more than fifty years. In his defense, though, he is clearly a quick study, a good manager, and an impatient, in a good sense, man and is, so far at least, doing a great job with our city, especially for someone who parachuted in from Washington. But I digress.
My main point is that such articles, and, to a lesser extent, such television shows as the upcoming Starz series “Boss,” whet people’s interest in Chicago politics and the way things really work around here. For those who want to satisfy this curiosity, I recommend my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and its sequel, The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics. Both books use the story of Eamon DeValera Collins, a fictional old time ward heeler, to weave stories from the annals of the politics of our town into a compelling, entertaining narrative that leaves the reader with a clear sense of the way Chicago operates and an acute ability to put the hagiography of Rahm Emanuel that passes for coverage of our city in its proper context.
Both books are available at Amazon.com, various other online book sellers, and at a number of independent book stores throughout the Chicago area, most prominently Anderson’s in Naperville and Bookies’ on 103rd and Artesian in West Beverly, one of the neighborhoods that comprise Chicago’s 19th Ward.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
“HUMP? WHAT HUMP?”
10/12/11
My overriding reaction to last night’s GOP debate on Bloomberg TV is the same as my reaction to the previous such affairs, perhaps going back long before this campaign season, to wit: we are dealing with a group of carnival barkers and hucksters with a few sincere, accomplished people thrown in presumably for contrast with the people who actually have a chance at the nomination in the crazy politics of latter day America.
A few specific points are worth making as well. First, for years, GOP debates have substituted group worship of Ronald Reagan for serious debate on the issues. Reagan was a decent, though vastly overrated, president, and avoiding offending anyone by getting all slobbery about the man is probably not quite as harmful as falling back on the usual pabulum that is the stuff of political “debate,” but this practice, which goes back perhaps 24 years, was getting ridiculous. Fortunately, the trend of late has been to ever so slightly tiptoe away from non-stop idolization of Reagan. However…
Has anyone but I noticed that Rick Perry has gone beyond verbally figuratively affixing his lips to Mr. Reagan’s hindquarters and has graduated to trying to look like the man? Notice the way Mr. Perry stands, with his head cocked at an angle resembling that which so endeared people to Ronnie. Take a look at Perry’s hairstyle, best defined as Reagan Brylcream, and the “above it all” grin cribbed from the nonchalant (probably excessively so) Ronald Wilson Reagan. Note these things during the next debate and tell me I’m wrong.
Second, the key moment of the debate came when Herman Cain cited Alan Greenspan as the Fed Chairman to whom he would like his selection for that post be most similar. Ron Paul’s eyes rolled. Rick Santorum, the master of substituting parroting Limbaughesque talking points for anything resembling creative thought, immediately flashed an ear to ear grin, sensing blood in the water. Even Mitt Romney, the Party’s ultimate nominee unless something goes very wrong, saw a huge gaffe in Mr. Cain’s statement. I said to my wife “He didn’t say that, did he?” But he did; Mr. Cain expressed admiration for Alan Greenspan.
Loyal readers will remember that, way before it was popular to criticize Dr. Greenspan, in fact, back when everyone in the business world and the press, financial and otherwise, was treating Greenspan with the reverence that potential GOP nominees reserve for Ronald Reagan, yours truly was referring to Alan Greenspan as the most overrated individual in the history of the world. (With the Kennedy clan in contention, that is quite a statement, but I digress.) Now that the scales have fallen from the eyes of lesser thinkers and they have joined me in assigning a large measure of the blame for our financial morass to the Mad Doctor, one would think that Herman Cain, a man of formidable substance and achievement, would be able to read the signs of the times with enough aplomb, and/or know enough economics, to realize that Greenspan was an unmitigated disaster and that citing him as one’s favorite is no way to get elected to anything. This was very disappointing to those of us who have long liked Herman Cain and are warming to the idea of his becoming the GOP standard-bearer, even if such an outcome is, to put it mildly, remote.
My overriding reaction to last night’s GOP debate on Bloomberg TV is the same as my reaction to the previous such affairs, perhaps going back long before this campaign season, to wit: we are dealing with a group of carnival barkers and hucksters with a few sincere, accomplished people thrown in presumably for contrast with the people who actually have a chance at the nomination in the crazy politics of latter day America.
A few specific points are worth making as well. First, for years, GOP debates have substituted group worship of Ronald Reagan for serious debate on the issues. Reagan was a decent, though vastly overrated, president, and avoiding offending anyone by getting all slobbery about the man is probably not quite as harmful as falling back on the usual pabulum that is the stuff of political “debate,” but this practice, which goes back perhaps 24 years, was getting ridiculous. Fortunately, the trend of late has been to ever so slightly tiptoe away from non-stop idolization of Reagan. However…
Has anyone but I noticed that Rick Perry has gone beyond verbally figuratively affixing his lips to Mr. Reagan’s hindquarters and has graduated to trying to look like the man? Notice the way Mr. Perry stands, with his head cocked at an angle resembling that which so endeared people to Ronnie. Take a look at Perry’s hairstyle, best defined as Reagan Brylcream, and the “above it all” grin cribbed from the nonchalant (probably excessively so) Ronald Wilson Reagan. Note these things during the next debate and tell me I’m wrong.
Second, the key moment of the debate came when Herman Cain cited Alan Greenspan as the Fed Chairman to whom he would like his selection for that post be most similar. Ron Paul’s eyes rolled. Rick Santorum, the master of substituting parroting Limbaughesque talking points for anything resembling creative thought, immediately flashed an ear to ear grin, sensing blood in the water. Even Mitt Romney, the Party’s ultimate nominee unless something goes very wrong, saw a huge gaffe in Mr. Cain’s statement. I said to my wife “He didn’t say that, did he?” But he did; Mr. Cain expressed admiration for Alan Greenspan.
Loyal readers will remember that, way before it was popular to criticize Dr. Greenspan, in fact, back when everyone in the business world and the press, financial and otherwise, was treating Greenspan with the reverence that potential GOP nominees reserve for Ronald Reagan, yours truly was referring to Alan Greenspan as the most overrated individual in the history of the world. (With the Kennedy clan in contention, that is quite a statement, but I digress.) Now that the scales have fallen from the eyes of lesser thinkers and they have joined me in assigning a large measure of the blame for our financial morass to the Mad Doctor, one would think that Herman Cain, a man of formidable substance and achievement, would be able to read the signs of the times with enough aplomb, and/or know enough economics, to realize that Greenspan was an unmitigated disaster and that citing him as one’s favorite is no way to get elected to anything. This was very disappointing to those of us who have long liked Herman Cain and are warming to the idea of his becoming the GOP standard-bearer, even if such an outcome is, to put it mildly, remote.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
“THIS IS A FINE MESS YOU’VE GOTTEN US INTO…”
10/8/11
This weekend’s (i.e., Saturday/Sunday, 10/8, 10/9’s, page A8) Wall Street Journal reports that former CIA chief and current Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, speaking at a Naval Air Station in southern Italy, chided early critics of NATO and U.S. (As if the two were distinguishable; see my 3/28/11 post IT’S NOT A CHICK FLICK; IT’S A ROMANTIC COMEDY.) conduct during the Libyan conflict, saying, inter alia
“There were an awful lot of questions about the mission overall and I think the critics have really been proven wrong.”
and that the 4,000 sorties western planes flew have given the Libyan people “some degree of hope,” elaborating
“They (the Libyan people) are going to have a chance, as a result of what (western militaries) did, to hopefully establish a democracy for the future.”
On the very same page, in the continuation of a page A1 story, we learn that, as the headline says, “Discord Increasingly Riddles Factions in Chaotic Tripoli.” It seems that the freedom fighters so beloved by the likes of Mr. Panetta, John McCain, and Barack Obama, are breaking into factions to see who will become the 21st century version of the Colonel they overthrew. The factions are split between regions (e.g., eastern Libya and Tripoli) and within neighborhoods in Tripoli. The factions are composed of former Gadhafi loyalist, idealistic democrats, regional xenophobes, Islamists, and dictators in the wings. Fighting is breaking out between these factions and, while others will tell you otherwise, it is probably just a matter of time between something like civil war, though the media won’t use that term, will break out in Libya. None of this is surprising, certainly not to readers of the Pontificator; see, among others, the aforementioned 3/28/11 post, my 4/23/11 post DOG BITES MAN, my 8/22/11 post I HOPE MICHELE BACHMANN WASN’T COUNTING ON LIBYA TO GET OIL TO $2, and my 10/8/11 post THICK AS A BRIC?
Yet Mr. Panetta and his colleagues in both parties whose first loyalty seems to be to the American imperial impulse and the defense contractors that impulse keeps wealthy insist that the NATO campaign that fostered the utter chaos that Libya is on the verge of becoming was a rousing success and that those of us who questioned it have been “proven wrong.” Simply amazing.
Optimism, always overrated, is sometimes okay in very measured doses unless it is blind optimism, based on nothing but good feelings and/or gormless, baseless admonitions to “be optimistic,” that leads one to do silly things. Among those silly things is destablilizing entire regions of the globe in response to such ephemeral impulses as “giving people some degree of hope,” because one likes the sounds of such increasingly meaningless words as “democracy,” or because one is enamored of the innocence of youth and so somehow believes that naiveté can somehow, this time, trump the wisdom of the ages.
This weekend’s (i.e., Saturday/Sunday, 10/8, 10/9’s, page A8) Wall Street Journal reports that former CIA chief and current Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, speaking at a Naval Air Station in southern Italy, chided early critics of NATO and U.S. (As if the two were distinguishable; see my 3/28/11 post IT’S NOT A CHICK FLICK; IT’S A ROMANTIC COMEDY.) conduct during the Libyan conflict, saying, inter alia
“There were an awful lot of questions about the mission overall and I think the critics have really been proven wrong.”
and that the 4,000 sorties western planes flew have given the Libyan people “some degree of hope,” elaborating
“They (the Libyan people) are going to have a chance, as a result of what (western militaries) did, to hopefully establish a democracy for the future.”
On the very same page, in the continuation of a page A1 story, we learn that, as the headline says, “Discord Increasingly Riddles Factions in Chaotic Tripoli.” It seems that the freedom fighters so beloved by the likes of Mr. Panetta, John McCain, and Barack Obama, are breaking into factions to see who will become the 21st century version of the Colonel they overthrew. The factions are split between regions (e.g., eastern Libya and Tripoli) and within neighborhoods in Tripoli. The factions are composed of former Gadhafi loyalist, idealistic democrats, regional xenophobes, Islamists, and dictators in the wings. Fighting is breaking out between these factions and, while others will tell you otherwise, it is probably just a matter of time between something like civil war, though the media won’t use that term, will break out in Libya. None of this is surprising, certainly not to readers of the Pontificator; see, among others, the aforementioned 3/28/11 post, my 4/23/11 post DOG BITES MAN, my 8/22/11 post I HOPE MICHELE BACHMANN WASN’T COUNTING ON LIBYA TO GET OIL TO $2, and my 10/8/11 post THICK AS A BRIC?
Yet Mr. Panetta and his colleagues in both parties whose first loyalty seems to be to the American imperial impulse and the defense contractors that impulse keeps wealthy insist that the NATO campaign that fostered the utter chaos that Libya is on the verge of becoming was a rousing success and that those of us who questioned it have been “proven wrong.” Simply amazing.
Optimism, always overrated, is sometimes okay in very measured doses unless it is blind optimism, based on nothing but good feelings and/or gormless, baseless admonitions to “be optimistic,” that leads one to do silly things. Among those silly things is destablilizing entire regions of the globe in response to such ephemeral impulses as “giving people some degree of hope,” because one likes the sounds of such increasingly meaningless words as “democracy,” or because one is enamored of the innocence of youth and so somehow believes that naiveté can somehow, this time, trump the wisdom of the ages.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
JERSEY BOY
10/4/11
Chris Christie announced today that he will not be running for president in 2012. By doing so, he increased my, and doubtless countless others’, respect for the man. He said he wouldn’t run and, instead of pulling a cutesy-pie Hamlet act, of the type to which we have become sickeningly accustomed, to draw attention to a campaign on which he intended to embark on all along, stuck by his decision not to run. Even more noble is the primary reason he gave for his reason not to run, to wit
"The deciding factor was that it did not feel right to me, in my gut, to leave (the job of governor of New Jersey) now, when the job isn't finished."
A politician actually wanting to do the job for which the taxpayers pay him rather than use it as a mere stepping stone to the next opportunity at more intense self-aggrandizement? The hell you say! See my 9/5/11 post WE WANT OUR MONEY BACK!
Given my realistic (Some mistakenly call it “cynical.”) attitude toward those who hold and seek public office, I was prepared to have Governor Christie go back on his earlier pronouncements, sincere or otherwise, and decide that he would indeed run for President in 2012. That Mr. Christie has failed to meet my expectations in this regard makes him even more honorable in my, and doubtless countless others’, opinion. Does this mean I will support him should he run in four or eight years down the line? Not yet; I’d have to take a hard look at his policies, especially his foreign policy, before I would support him for President. But at this stage at least, Governor Christie appears to be that most rare of species, a politician who says what he means and means what he says.
This also means that the Republican field is more or less set. While the prospect of a Herman Cain presidency excites yours truly (again, subject to a careful review of his foreign policy; it always pays to be leery of any Republican’s foreign policy, given most of the Party’s tendency to equate any close examination of the “defense” budget with treason), it is quite clear that, while anything could happen and I don’t like to make predictions, Mitt Romney will be the GOP nominee. This, of course, comes as no surprise to my regular readers. See my 7/19/11 post MICHELE AND SARAH, MAKE ROOM FOR THE FAT LADY.
Should Mr. Romney win the nomination, and should Mr. Obama, as is highly likely but not certain (See my 9/16/11 post “I WILL NOT SEEK, NOR WILL I ACCEPT, THE NOMINATION OF MY PARTY…”), be his party’s nominee, Mr. Romney will face a president with maybe $1 billion, David Axelrod, and perhaps a very interesting and appealing running mate. The latter is grist for a later mill. But, for now, suffice to say this will be no cakewalk for the Republicans.
Chris Christie announced today that he will not be running for president in 2012. By doing so, he increased my, and doubtless countless others’, respect for the man. He said he wouldn’t run and, instead of pulling a cutesy-pie Hamlet act, of the type to which we have become sickeningly accustomed, to draw attention to a campaign on which he intended to embark on all along, stuck by his decision not to run. Even more noble is the primary reason he gave for his reason not to run, to wit
"The deciding factor was that it did not feel right to me, in my gut, to leave (the job of governor of New Jersey) now, when the job isn't finished."
A politician actually wanting to do the job for which the taxpayers pay him rather than use it as a mere stepping stone to the next opportunity at more intense self-aggrandizement? The hell you say! See my 9/5/11 post WE WANT OUR MONEY BACK!
Given my realistic (Some mistakenly call it “cynical.”) attitude toward those who hold and seek public office, I was prepared to have Governor Christie go back on his earlier pronouncements, sincere or otherwise, and decide that he would indeed run for President in 2012. That Mr. Christie has failed to meet my expectations in this regard makes him even more honorable in my, and doubtless countless others’, opinion. Does this mean I will support him should he run in four or eight years down the line? Not yet; I’d have to take a hard look at his policies, especially his foreign policy, before I would support him for President. But at this stage at least, Governor Christie appears to be that most rare of species, a politician who says what he means and means what he says.
This also means that the Republican field is more or less set. While the prospect of a Herman Cain presidency excites yours truly (again, subject to a careful review of his foreign policy; it always pays to be leery of any Republican’s foreign policy, given most of the Party’s tendency to equate any close examination of the “defense” budget with treason), it is quite clear that, while anything could happen and I don’t like to make predictions, Mitt Romney will be the GOP nominee. This, of course, comes as no surprise to my regular readers. See my 7/19/11 post MICHELE AND SARAH, MAKE ROOM FOR THE FAT LADY.
Should Mr. Romney win the nomination, and should Mr. Obama, as is highly likely but not certain (See my 9/16/11 post “I WILL NOT SEEK, NOR WILL I ACCEPT, THE NOMINATION OF MY PARTY…”), be his party’s nominee, Mr. Romney will face a president with maybe $1 billion, David Axelrod, and perhaps a very interesting and appealing running mate. The latter is grist for a later mill. But, for now, suffice to say this will be no cakewalk for the Republicans.
IN LIFE THERE ARE NO GUARANTEES…UNLESS YOU’RE PALS WITH POLITICIANS
10/4/11
One of the big stories, and clubs with which the GOP will beat President Obama over the head in the upcoming presidential campaign, is the Solyndra deal. As readers doubtless know, Solyndra is a solar panel company, controlled by a non-profit run by an ardent, financial and otherwise, supporter of the President, that received a $500mm loan guarantee and then went bankrupt, sticking the taxpayers with substantial, though not yet quantified, losses. This could be quite a political club if the taxpayers were paying attention, but the case involves a lot of detail, and asking an American public addled with the likes of “Dancing with the Stars” and “American Idol” to pay the slightest attention to any detail is a non-starter, but I digress.
Charges are flying that the Solyndra guarantee was hurried, despite several warning flags of impending financial doom, in order to enable the Obama White House to “…secure a policy or political victory,” as Representative Cliff Sterns, R. Fla., put it. There is even talk, and not unsubstantiated talk, that review of the project was hurried in order to enable Vice-President Biden to announce the guarantee on a planned trip to a Solyndra facility. In effect, the due diligence was timed to fit the announcement rather than the announcement’s being timed to accommodate the due diligence. Such a backasswards approach makes no sense in the real world in which people actually invest their own, or their shareholders’, money but makes perfect sense in the bizzaro world of modern politics, in which pols invest your money for their benefit but, again, I digress.
That Solyndra crashed, burned, and took your money with it is no surprise. The history of industrial policy, i.e., of government picking winners and losers, is a decidedly mixed one at best. There probably is nothing incredibly profound to say about the wider aspects of this sorry, but not atypical, case. What is enlightening, or at least a bit surprising, is the response of the Democrats to charges that the decision to grant Solyndra a $500mm loan guarantee was motivated by Solyndra’s being controlled by George Kaiser Family Foundation, whose eponymous sponsor is a second generation oil man, a first generation banker, and a big time financial backer of President Obama’s excursions of self-aggrandizement. A memo drafted by Democratic congressional staffers and sent to Democratic members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is investigating Solyndra, states that newly released e-mails expressing concern in the Obama Administration about Solyndra’s viability and the ramifications of a Solyndra bankruptcy for (of course, the major concern for any pol) President Obama’s re-election chances
“…do not contain evidence that government decisions relating to Solyndra were influenced by considerations relating to campaign donations.”
You don’t say! No one actually wrote down that the Solyndra guarantee had to go through as a favor to a hefty contributor! What a surprise!
Surely if the guarantee to Solyndra were a political favor to George Kaiser, no one, certainly no one in a White House run by, at the time, Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod, would be foolish enough to write that down anywhere. Such a deal would be done with winks, nods, and, if need be, very circumspect conversations of which no records were kept.
The Democratic defense to the Solyndra cesspool, i.e., that there is no e-mail evidence that Solyndra was a political gift to George Kaiser, is surely one of the most fatuous, or the most disingenuous (Yours truly suspects the latter.), defenses ever attempted of a political fiasco.
One of the big stories, and clubs with which the GOP will beat President Obama over the head in the upcoming presidential campaign, is the Solyndra deal. As readers doubtless know, Solyndra is a solar panel company, controlled by a non-profit run by an ardent, financial and otherwise, supporter of the President, that received a $500mm loan guarantee and then went bankrupt, sticking the taxpayers with substantial, though not yet quantified, losses. This could be quite a political club if the taxpayers were paying attention, but the case involves a lot of detail, and asking an American public addled with the likes of “Dancing with the Stars” and “American Idol” to pay the slightest attention to any detail is a non-starter, but I digress.
Charges are flying that the Solyndra guarantee was hurried, despite several warning flags of impending financial doom, in order to enable the Obama White House to “…secure a policy or political victory,” as Representative Cliff Sterns, R. Fla., put it. There is even talk, and not unsubstantiated talk, that review of the project was hurried in order to enable Vice-President Biden to announce the guarantee on a planned trip to a Solyndra facility. In effect, the due diligence was timed to fit the announcement rather than the announcement’s being timed to accommodate the due diligence. Such a backasswards approach makes no sense in the real world in which people actually invest their own, or their shareholders’, money but makes perfect sense in the bizzaro world of modern politics, in which pols invest your money for their benefit but, again, I digress.
That Solyndra crashed, burned, and took your money with it is no surprise. The history of industrial policy, i.e., of government picking winners and losers, is a decidedly mixed one at best. There probably is nothing incredibly profound to say about the wider aspects of this sorry, but not atypical, case. What is enlightening, or at least a bit surprising, is the response of the Democrats to charges that the decision to grant Solyndra a $500mm loan guarantee was motivated by Solyndra’s being controlled by George Kaiser Family Foundation, whose eponymous sponsor is a second generation oil man, a first generation banker, and a big time financial backer of President Obama’s excursions of self-aggrandizement. A memo drafted by Democratic congressional staffers and sent to Democratic members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is investigating Solyndra, states that newly released e-mails expressing concern in the Obama Administration about Solyndra’s viability and the ramifications of a Solyndra bankruptcy for (of course, the major concern for any pol) President Obama’s re-election chances
“…do not contain evidence that government decisions relating to Solyndra were influenced by considerations relating to campaign donations.”
You don’t say! No one actually wrote down that the Solyndra guarantee had to go through as a favor to a hefty contributor! What a surprise!
Surely if the guarantee to Solyndra were a political favor to George Kaiser, no one, certainly no one in a White House run by, at the time, Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod, would be foolish enough to write that down anywhere. Such a deal would be done with winks, nods, and, if need be, very circumspect conversations of which no records were kept.
The Democratic defense to the Solyndra cesspool, i.e., that there is no e-mail evidence that Solyndra was a political gift to George Kaiser, is surely one of the most fatuous, or the most disingenuous (Yours truly suspects the latter.), defenses ever attempted of a political fiasco.
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