Government Shutdown Averted!

I didn't look at the news much this weekend. As I matter of fact, I pretty much ignored outside events from Thursday afternoon until Sunday night. So I jumped directly from headlines about an imminent government shutdown to headlines that the crisis had been temporarily averted. The Republicans and Democrats had come up with a compromise to keep the Federal government running, at least on a short term basis. My thought was "Crisis? What crisis?" In my average day, I don't interact with the Federal government. It could have been shut down over the weekend, and I would not even have noticed. It makes me wonder: how long could I have gone without the Federal government in operation before it impinged on my life? One way to answer that question is to hope that it would be a good long time before I noticed the lack. In the week of brinkmanship leading up to the final compromise, the media was full of stories about how bad it would be if the shutdown happened. In the television coverage I saw, the unanimous position was that a shutdown would be a Very Bad Thing. But when you really examine the stories, they mostly boil down to this: the National Parks would have to close down for the duration. Oh, the humanity! I went to Yosemite National Park last summer. It was terrific. Not going back this year, though. I don't want to argue that we don't need a central government, and we need to fund the operations of that government. But in determining the level of that funding, there is some instructional value in realizing that it would take awhile to miss it if it was gone.

Politicians on the Lam

Wisconsin’s Democratic state senators are still missing in action. They fled the state a couple of weeks ago to deny a quorum, preventing the incoming Republican majority from passing legislation that would eliminate the right of state employees to bargain for fringe benefits. Since a large chunk of the union dues paid in the state flow directly into Democratic campaign coffers, The Democrats’ desperation to defend their power base, as well as the Republicans’ determination to reduce union power are both understandable.

When the Dems first bolted across the border to Illinois, I appreciated the free entertainment. I enjoy a good piece of political theater as much as the next man, and it was good of our fellow countrymen in the great white north to provide a terrific piece of grandstanding. It reminded me of professional wrestling. The same histrionics. The same larger than life conflicts. And ultimately, the same preordained conclusion. After all, the Republicans had the votes.

By going on the lam, the Democratic senators focused a lot of media attention on the issue. They also bought time to try and swing public support to their side. All well and good, and for the first few days, entertainment value aside, I thought the desertion a legitimate delaying tactic.

That changed when the Democrats realized they could stay away indefinitely, and began issuing demands for their return. They would return to the state capitol, but only if the offending legislation was removed from consideration. That is not only profoundly undemocratic, but it sets a dangerous precedent as well.

Representative democracy is primarily a matter of majority rule. If you get 50% plus one vote on an issue, the gavel comes down, and it is the law. 100% of the citizens must comply. There are two types of exceptions to the rule of the majority. First are rights that are built into the state or Federal constitution. These rights, such as freedom of speech and religion, are unalterable by a majority, no matter how large. A minority of one gets to practice his right of free speech, no matter how repellent that speech is, and 100% of the citizens must allow that. An independent judiciary acts as the safeguard of those rights.

You can also have preset procedural rules requiring a greater than 50% plus one majority for certain purposes. Three quarters of the states have to ratify an amendment to the US constitution. In the US Senate, 60% of the Senators must agree to stop debate before a measure can be voted on. California has a rule that two thirds of the legislature has to approve a tax increase before it can take effect. The key to these procedural safeguards against change are that they must be put in place before they take effect.

What the Wisconsin Democrats are doing is demanding a power be ceded to them, the power to block legislation they don’t like, even though they are in the minority. Regardless of your stand on their objections to the law in question, this tactic is a power grab, plain and simple. It goes beyond partisanship into a tribal level of identity politics.

It also provides a dangerous precedent. Until recently, Wisconsin was a majority Democrat state, with the Republicans in the minority. If, during the Republicans time of ascendency, this refusal to participate actually bears fruit for the Democrats, they will find the taste of that fruit bitter indeed, and sure to prove indigestible.

After all, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Should the current Democratic tactics work, then the Republicans will surely adopt them when next the political pendulum swings to the other party.

We will have moved from principled disagreement and potential compromise to the political equivalent of hostage taking.

The Pnedulum Swings Back

A week after the election, and the changed realities in Washington are still settling in. The electorate has decided to throw the rascals and scoundrels out, and bring in a new crew of rascals and scoundrels.

The results are not really too surprising, given the partisan overreach of the first two years of the Obama administration. After all, slapping the label “liberal” on a candidate carries significant negative connotations with the public at large. Even the liberals agree with that, which is why they’ve tried to rebrand themselves as “progressives.”

Two years ago, the picture looked quite different. There was plenty of talk about a new New Deal, the assumption that Democratic Party gains signaled a mandate for a gigantic expansion of the power and reach of the Federal government. America was finally going to take its rightful place among the nations of Europe.

It turns out that most Americans don’t want to live in France, even if they could find it on a map. If they did, Massachusetts would be a lot more crowded.

Even more shocking were the pronouncements made about the Republican party. One pundit wrote that the GOP was doomed to be a “rump party of southern white males.” Astonishingly, just two weeks ago editorial writer DeWayne Wickham wrote:
"Don't be fooled by the political gains Republicans are expected to make in the midterm elections. The GOP is on the critical list. The wins it will score, possibly enough to give it control of the House of Representatives, will be short lived. They are the dying gasp of a political party that has become too intolerant and too white in a nation whose population soon will be dominated by Hispanics, blacks and Asians."

Sure, because if you think massive expansions in government programs, along with tax rates to match, it must be because you are racist. The last time I checked, to gain a majority in the House of Representatives, the Republicans had to have more than half the voters choose their candidate in more than half the Congressional districts in this country. That seems pretty egalitarian to me.

But I think the best riposte to the claim that to be a conservative is to be exclusionary is this: New Mexico elected a new governor this week. Susana Martinez is the nation’s first female Hispanic governor. She’s a Republican.

Election Day

If the polls are correct, the Republican Party is poised to retake control of the House of Representatives. The outcome in the Senate is more in doubt. Although the Republicans will certainly pick up several seats, they will probably not gain the majority.

The most likely result will be divided government and gridlock, to which I say: Long live gridlock!

As a proponent of limited government, I am quite pleased at the prospect of a government that can’t get anything done. A government that can’t get anything done will not expand. A government that can’t get anything done will, of necessity, leave the citizens to their own devices. There is a technical term for that state of affairs. It’s called freedom.

The Republicans don’t need control of the Senate to resist the threat of encroachment into private concerns by the power of the state. Under Senate rules, they only need enough votes to prevent cloture and continue debate. The filibuster is a powerful tool for conservatism.

In the US Senate, it requires 60 votes to be an irresistible force. But it only takes 40 votes to be an immovable object.

"You can't handle the truth!"

I can’t figure out the appeal of California. As a former Floridian who has visited the Golden State several times, I thought the oranges tasted funny, the sunshine was the wrong color, and Disneyland was at best a prototype for the real theme park at Disney World.

On the down side, California suffers from earthquakes, mudslides, raging forest fires, occasional civil insurrection, and ridiculously expensive real estate. And the traffic is hellacious.

Now the state appears to be in complete meltdown. After the voters soundly rejected a mixed bag of referendums that raised taxes, redirected earmarked funds, and sold off assets, the state is announcing big cuts to try and balance the budget shortfall that approaches $24 billion. California may become the first state to declare bankruptcy.

In the middle of all this, the state’s finance director, Mike Genest, made the following extraordinary statement during a conference call with reporters last Friday:

“Government doesn’t provide services to rich people. It doesn’t even really provide services to the middle class.” He added: “You have to cut where the money is.”

Now, I’m sure Mr. Genest’s intention was to explain why the proposed budget cuts were hitting low income residents so hard. No doubt he was trying to answer a question along the lines of “Why do all of the cuts seem to target poor people?” or “Is this political payback because poor people tend to vote Democratic, and the governor is Republican?” Something like that.

As a middle class taxpayer, I interpret Mr. Genest’s statement a little differently:

“If you’re in the upper or middle class, you are not going to get your money’s worth from the state government. Never have, never will. Yeah, we’ve been screwing you out of your taxes right along. You got a problem with that?”

Kudos to Mr. Genest for his refreshing honesty, but if I was a California taxpayer I’d be a little bent right now.

Trouble in Paradise

Two of President Obama’s appointees withdrew their nominations yesterday. In both cases the reason for their withdrawal was the exposure of problems with filing and paying taxes. Tom Daschle, the former majority leader of the US Senate, pulled out of consideration to be Secretary of Health and Human Services. His tax faux pas was failing to list the use of a car and driver as compensation when he reported his income. The vehicle was provided to Mr. Daschle by one of the companies he worked for. The rule is pretty simple. If you pay for a car and driver yourself, you can use the milage driven for business purposes as a tax deduction. If you accept a car from someone else, the value of that service is compensation, the same as getting paid.

The other nominee was Nancy Killefer, who had been tapped to become the nation’s Chief Performance Officer. Ms. Killefer, a senior partner at the McKinsey management consulting firm, failed to pay the unemployment insurance premiums on her personal household staff of two assistants and a housekeeper.

This is so rich a situation that one scarcely knows where to begin, but time is short, so I’ll start by venting my spleen on the low hanging fruit.

Chief Performance Officer? What the hell kind of job is that? Apparently someone had the bright idea of creating a new position, based in the White House, tasked with finding and eliminating wasteful spending by the government. ‘Cause having Inspector Generals in every government department wasn’t enough. No, we needed a new government waste czar.

Here’s a little hint for you: the position of Chief Performance Officer is a terrific example of government waste. Criminy, the job title is it’s own punchline.

Now let’s talk about the tax issues, starting with Ms. Killefer’s. This is pretty simple. With household help, such as maids, nannies, drivers, cooks, and personal assistants, the rule is pretty simple: either you pay an independent contractor for services rendered, or you have employees. With independent contractors, they have to deal with the taxes and government paperwork on their own. With employees, you have to deal with those hassles for them. Every small business owner in America has learned that lesson.

I can only guess at why Ms. Killefer did not pay the unemployment insurance for her employees. Perhaps she believed that she did not have enough employees to fall under the requirements of the law. The District of Columbia disagreed. The funny thing is that there are employee leasing firms that will handle all of those messy details for you. Heck, any temp agency could have handled the payroll issues, for a markup of the employees’ wages. Why didn’t she just do that?

By the way, did she provide her employees health insurance? That’s a question I’d like to have answered.

Mr. Daschle apparently had the use of the car and driver for three years before he got around to talking to his accountant about it. The value of those services was about $300,000, based on the amount of taxes paid to settle the issue. By the way, this is the same sort of tax issue that fat cat corporate types run into, when they use the company jet to fly their spouses on vacation. If you use the company vehicle for personal purposes, the cost is income to you. Does that make Mr. Daschle a fat cat corporate type?

One Republican has already quipped: “No wonder the Democrats don’t mind raising taxes. They don’t intend to pay them!”

Now, these were probably unintentional violations of local and Federal laws. Both individuals have admitted they made a mistake and made restitution. But these are supposed to be the best and the brightest, and they can’t figure out how to comply with government requirements.

After all, the incoming administration is pro-government regulation. They believe that more government, not less, is the solution to the nation’s problems, yet some of the very people selected to put new programs in place are not in compliance with the existing regulatory scheme.

How will the rest of us cope, after they’ve had more time to put their agenda into place?

Throw the bums out. Just not yet.

In my last post I mentioned that Gail Collins, a New York Times columnist, had advocated George Bush resign the Presidency so that Barack Obama could start his term early. Today, Thomas Friedman, the Times' foreign affairs correspondent seconded that desire. I just found out that Lou Dobbs, the CNN anchor, had made the same suggestion, that George Bush resign.

These are supposed to be thoughtful, intelligent, well-educated people. What possesses them to say such silly things?

One of the great things about the American political system is the peaceful transfer of power. On the appointed day, the outgoing guy packs up his momentos and rides off into the sunset. No riots in the street. No power sharing deals. No cabals of senior military officers throwing their support behind one candidate or another. No flight into exile, financed by a secret Swiss bank account. On Inauguration Day, the ex-President and his team leave quietly, and the new President and his team move into the White House.

What the pundits listed above have proposed is to interfere with that process. There is a crisis, so throw the rulebook out the window. No one's in charge, and we need a strong hand at the helm to steer us through this storm!

This just another version of the end justifies the means. If, by some miricle, they did manage to hound Bush out of office prematurely, do they not realize that would set a precedent? A precedent that can cut both ways. Suppose Bush was to announce that due to the crisis in the financial markets, he was going to have to stay in office until the crisis was resolved. That would create a constitutional crisis, but no more so than trying to install Obama before Bushes term in office is over.

Once you start playing games like that, you are starting to erode away one of the supports of our democracy.

Whether they like it or not, Obama is just going to have to wait his turn.

Give the guy a break!

Sometimes the media coverage amazes me.

Take Joe the Plumber. The guy questions Barack Obama's tax plans at a campaign stop in Ohio. Based on Obama's answer to his question, the interaction gets posted to the internet, and is picked up by the McCain campaign, who used it in the last debate between McCain and Obama.

So apparently editors around the country start asking who is this Joe the Plumber, and what is his story. What seems like a hundred reporters sift through every public record on this guy, and report the following scoops:

His name isn't really Joe.
He doesn't hold a plumbing license.
At one point he was in arrears on his taxes.
The business he works for probably doesn't generate over $250,000 in earnings for the owner.

Who gives a crap.

What made the exchange newsworthy wasn't the question, or the questioner. It was the candidate's response. Barack Obama said "I think things go better when you share the wealth." What he meant was "I think things go better when I share your wealth." Barack Obama's tax plan proposes to use the government as the intermediary to transfer money from people who have it to people who don't.

Take from the rich and give to the poor.

As I have said before, Barack Obama will be the Robin Hood President.

And focusing on Joe, or Sam, or whatever his name is, distracts us from focusing on the candidate's proposals, and the implications of those proposals.

New Ideas for Spending Money

Where do they come up with this stuff?

In the face of a plunging stock market and moribund credit markets, both Presidential candidates are reaching deeper into their goodie bags to come up with new bribes, er, enticements to try and stimulate the economy. Sure, because $700 billion to buy up banks and mortgages wasn’t enough.

Last week John McCain fired off a salvo. He proposed rescinding the requirement that owners of IRA’s and 401K’s have to start taking withdrawals from retirement accounts starting at age 70 ½. Why force people to sell assets into a down market, when that just increases the downward pressure on stock values? Actually, I think this is a pretty good idea, but then again, I’ve never heard a good argument for why mandatory withdrawals from retirement accounts were necessary in the first place.

After meeting with his economic advisors over the weekend, McCain apparently felt that anything else they proposed was too gimmicky, so he hasn’t come out with anything new this week. Of course, there is one more presidential debate coming up, so maybe he’s saving up for that.

In the meantime, Barack Obama came out with multiple gimmicks, er, policy proposals this week. First, he wants to mail out a $1000 check to everyone whose household income was less than $150,000. He also wants to extend unemployment benefits for another 13 weeks. This looks like a straightforward increase in welfare to me, pure and simple.

Senator Obama wants to impose a three month moratorium on foreclosures for any bank that accepts the Federal bailout money. You have to wonder what the economic point of this is. Does he anticipate that people will start paying their mortgages again after a three month grace period? Wouldn’t an increase in the number of foreclosures in process (loans go delinquent, but none ever get resolved) put even more stress on the banks that taxpayer money is going to bail out? The political point is a little more self evident: “Vote for me, folks, and I’ll give you three months free rent!”

Then there is the idea of removing penalties for 401K withdrawals. This allows you to get the tax break for contributing to a retirement plan, without actually having to forego the immediate consumption. Americans don’t save enough for retirement now, so let’s make it easier to consume instead of invest. This is the triumph of short term gratification over long term planning. Times may be tough now, but they will be even tougher when you are too old to continue working.

My personal favorite among Senator Obama’s new proposals is the tax credit for adding employees to the payroll. He has proposed a $3000 tax credit be given to businesses for every person they hire. This is basically offering a bribe to go out and hire people, but it is not even an effective bribe. In my hiring and firing, if I need to hire people, I hire them, and $3000 from the government isn’t nearly enough to sway my opinion. A new employee costs at least $20,000 a year. Unless you have enough business to justify that expense, a $3000 dollar subsidy doesn’t begin to cover that cost.

As a conservative, I long for the days when every problem didn’t automatically become the concern of the US government. Both parties seem to be caught up in the game of seeing who can offer more tax revenue to the citizenry. I’ll be happy in three weeks when the Pander fest known as the general election campaign is over.

Sarah Palin, Take Two

One of the things that annoyed me about the press coverage on Governor Sarah Palin over the Labor Day weekend was the question posed by several news outlets, including the New York Times and Newsweek. Along with the stories about her daughter’s pregnancy and her husband’s twenty year old DUI, this question kept popping up: Was Sarah Palin properly vetted? This is kind of like asking someone if he’s stopped beating his wife yet.

The subtext of this question seems clear to me. When someone asks “Was she properly vetted,” what they really mean is “How could you have picked her without getting our seal of approval first?”

The arrogance this reveals on the part of the national media, those based in New York and Washington, is appalling.

Sarah Palin is a state governor, which is a pretty small club. She was elected after her second statewide political race, having unsuccessfully run for lieutenant governor in 2002.

She has been governor of Alaska for the last twenty months. During that time, she has been continuously vetted by her constituents, the citizens of Alaska. And they must like what they see, because Sarah Palin has an 80% approval rating.

This is the highest approval rating for any governor. It may be hard to believe, but you can have good sense, even if you don't live in Washington or New York.

Sarah Palin, Take One

As the whole world knows by now, last week John McCain announced that he had selected Alaskan governor Sarah Palin as his Vice presidential pick. Like everyone else outside of Alaska, my first thought was: Who?

After several days of 24 hour news coverage, a number of negatives, and potential negatives have come to light regarding Governor Palin. Some of the fodder for attacks against her was apparent immediately. Before being elected governor of Alaska in 2006, her total experience as an elected official was as city councilwoman and mayor of Wassila, Alaska, a small town of about 10,000.

Some of the other issues surrounding Palin are that her 17 year old daughter is pregnant, as mayor of Wassila she hired a lobbyist to get earmarked money (a practice she now opposes), and she has been accused of firing a member of her cabinet because he would not fire her ex-brother-in-law as a state trooper. Oh, yes, her husband had a DUI twenty years ago.

The fact that Sarah Palin was a relative unknown, new to the national media spotlight, combined with these revelations about her past, have made many in the media speculate that she was insufficiently vetted for the VP slot.

In spite of these concerns, I think that John McCain made a brilliant political move with this pick.

Both campaigns selected VP candidates to combat perceived weaknesses of the presidential candidate. Barack Obama picked Joe Biden to shore up the tickets foreign policy credentials. John McCain picked Sarah Palin. What does she bring to the party?
-As a pro-life, NRA lifetime member, she energizes the Republican base of social conservatives, who have never been excited about McCain.
-At 44 years old, she counterbalances the 72 year old McCain, bringing a sense of youth to the ticket.
-As a governor, she has more executive experience than the rest of both tickets combined. She is also a politician who is a complete Washington outsider. You could not get farther from Washington and stay in the continental US. This co-opts Obama’s theme of change, and reinforces McCain’s reputation as a maverick, independent of the current administration.
-Did I mention that she’s a woman? Both tickets now offer a chance to make a historic choice.

Sarah Palin also brings a stealth weapon to the campaign: her husband, Todd Palin. A large part of why Hillary Clinton was able to stay in the primary race for so long was because Barack Obama could not “close the deal” with a key demographic in big industrial states: white, blue collar men. Todd Palin is the epitome of that demographic. He works as a production operator in the oil industry, when he’s not working as a commercial salmon fisherman. In his off time, he wins long distance endurance snowmobile races. The “First Dude” of Alaska is clearly a man’s man.

Reformer, fiscal and social conservative, telegenic hockey mom with five kids. Sarah Palin is the red state answer to Carla Bruni Sarkozy.

Take from the rich...

Last spring, John McCain floated a proposal to suspend Federal gasoline taxes for the summer driving season. This was a bad idea, widely criticized. It would have taken millions out of the Federal highway fund those taxes go into, leading to shortages of money to keep roads and bridges in repair. It would have led to increased gasoline demand, keeping prices elevated. Finally, it would have saved the average family only about $3 a week.

Barack Obama opposed the gas tax holiday proposal, for all of these reasons. He got a lot of favorable press at the time for being wiling to take an unpopular stand and tell people the truth.

Now Obama has come out with some ideas of his own. He has proposed selling oil out of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. He also wants to place a windfall profits tax on large oil companies, and then provide a $1000 rebate to every American family out of that tax.

His campaign released a statement that actually said “Barack Obama will require oil companies to take a reasonable share of their record-breaking windfall profits and use it to provide direct relief worth $500 for an individual and $1,000 for a married couple.”

He might as well have said: “Vote for me, folks, and I’ll give you $500 in exchange for providing me the privilege of riding on Air Force One.”

His response to two different proposals reveals a mindset that taxes are good, and should not be lowered. Profits are bad, and should be taxed.

George W. Bush is often metaphorically referred to as a cowboy. This has both good and bad connotations. The cowboy is an icon for strength and self-reliance, admirable qualities. In the pejorative sense, calling someone a cowboy implies a lack of control and finesse. The European press has this in mind when they disparage President Bush as a cowboy.

Based on this part of his energy policy, a different mythic figure springs to mind with regard to Barack Obama. While the cowboy is an iconic American image, Obama is associated with a European figure. This is only fitting, given his wild popularity on the other side of the Atlantic.

He’s Robin Hood.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

The Democratic Party will hold their national convention in the mile high city of Denver this August. As part of the planning for this major event, rules have been issued to govern the suppliers of various items used at the convention.

A big part of the push is to apply strict environmental rules to the activities. Leading the charge is Denver’s mayor, John Hickenlooper, who calls green activities “the new patriotism.” Somehow I wasn’t aware that there was anything wrong with the old patriotism. In charge of the greening of the convention is Andrea Robinson, the first ever Director of Greening. She couldn’t do it alone (it must take a village), so she hired an Official Carbon Advisor.

To test whether the balloons were biodegradable, Ms. Robinson buried some in a compost heap to bake away into fertilizer. The initial results from this test were not promising, so she added more liquid and reburied the balloons. Maybe the biodegradable balloons were only half-baked, only needing more time to become fully baked.

Then there are the fanny packs and baseball caps to be given away to each of the delegates. They are to be made with union labor. Out of organic fabric. Apparently the official merchandiser is having a hard time locating a supplier. According to Bob DeMasse: "We have a union cap or an organic cap. But we don't have a union-organic offering." I suspect that union caps cost twice as much as other suppliers, and organic caps also cost twice as much. Combine the two, and maybe Mr. DeMasse just didn’t want offer items that cost four times the market rate. Or maybe to switch over to organic cloth would have required the union shops to renegotiate their contracts.

The best part is the catering rules. For example, no fried food. Zip, nil, nada. This, of course, makes sense from the viewpoint of the party espousing national health care. After all, is the government is going to pay for your medical care, the government should be able to control what you eat. It’s for your own good.

My personal favorite is the rule that states every meal should include "at least three of the following colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple, and white." (Garnishes don't count.) I can’t figure out whether this is supposed to be more nutritious, or if it is a way of demonstrating the Democratic Party’s commitment to diversity.

For me, these rules are a taste of what the Democratic Party would enforce on the entire country. If they win enough power in the next election.

Politicians are the same all over the world.

There was an article in the New York Times today, regarding the reaction by Indian economists and politicians to comments made by President Bush about the increase in global food prices. In a news conference in Missouri on May 2, part of the President's answer to one question was the following, referring to the growing middle class in India:

“When you start getting wealth, you start demanding better nutrition and better food, and so demand is high, and that causes the price to go up.”

This has apparently ignited a storm of criticism in India. You can read the article here. The comments cited by the Times ranged from insulting President Bush's intelligence (nothing new there) to claims that Americans are causing food shortages in Africa by overeating. This puts me in mind of those dinner time conversations growing up. You know the one:

"Billy, you clean your plate. Think of the starving children in Africa." "But ma, I already weigh 190 pounds, and I'm only 12."

That the Indians have taken umbrage with the President's remarks shows that they have collapsed the distinction between explaining an event, and placing blame for the same event. Globally, grain prices have risen significantly in the last year or so. Why?

Part of the answer is that demand for grain is up. Not from Americans. We're huge overeaters, but we've been the most obese people in the world for at least a decade now. Well, with the rapid development in China and India over the last decade, meat consumption in those countries has gone up, right along with rising incomes. Not to American levels, but higher than it has been. The increase in meat consumption helps explain why global demand for grain has increased.

The situation in India and China has changed, and knowing that helps our understanding of the situation. That's a long way from blaming them. Americans are the last people in the world to blame anyone for wanting to eat better. If anything, we're more likely to start sharing recipes. Still, the Indians are insulted, and their politicians have turned around and started blaming us for the rise in food prices.

And in an odd way, that gives me some hope for a better world. Their politicians are just as capable of knee jerk reactions that make them sound like idiots as ours are. Maybe by focusing on our similarities (even the embarassing ones) instead of our differences, we can build bridges of understanding to other parts of the world. This incident may help us to realize that despite our surface differences, we're really all the same inside.

Nah!

Shoulda, woulda, coulda...

Watching the early returns from Pennsylvania, Hillary Clinton is projected to win the Democratic primary. No big surprise there. The real question is whether she will win over Barack Obama by a big enough margin to convince Democratic Party superdelegates that they should back her instead of him at the convention later this year. At this point Hillary is extremely unlikely to catch up Barack in the number of ordinary delegates going into the convention.

We may actually see a real live political convention, complete with back room deals, before this is all over. As opposed to the 100% scripted and choreographed lovefests that have taken place every four years for the last few decades.

But tonight I actually want to shift the focus to Florida and Michigan. Last year the state Democratic party apparatus in both states decided to move up their primary without getting approval from national party headquarters. To punish the renegades, and to keep the other states in line, the national party stripped both states of their delegates to the national convention. To hold with party discipline, the candidates agreed not to campaign in either state (well, Hillary did show up in Florida, put she pulled out as soon as she came under sniper fire). Barack Obama was not even on the ballot in Michigan. So the fourth and the eighth largest states were shut out of the nominating process.

So why did both Florida and Michigan decide to move their primaries? They did it because the conventional wisdom (which is not the same thing as convention wisdom) was that Super Tuesday would sew up the nomination, back on February 5. After a candidate wins enough primaries to mathematically guarantee the nomination, any primaries after that are moot, and the winning candidate essentially coasts until the general election campaign starts after both parties have their nominating conventions. You haven't seen John McCain buying a lot of television ads in Pennsylvania this month, have you?

Both Florida and Michigan wanted to be "relevant" in the primary season. The party leadership in both states wanted the candidates to campaign (i.e. spend money) in their states, so they risked, and incurred, the wrath of the national headquarters.

The irony here, of course, is that the conventional wisdom was dead wrong. The Democratic nomination wasn't sewed up on Super Tuesday. Not even close. So if Florida and Michigan had left their primaries until March, as originally scheduled, they would have been crucial battleground states for the Democratic nomination. As such, they would have received a ton of attention, and money, from both Clinton and Obama.

Instead, that attention and money have been poured into Pennsylvania for the last month and a half.

For the state party leaders in both states, I guess that it's appropriate that the symbol of the Democratic Party is a donkey.

Caught with Her Hand in the Cookie Jar

Hilary Clinton is getting a lot of flak for making a speech were she claimed that on a trip to Bosnia, her plane landed under sniper fire, and she had to make a run for the motorcade. Unfortunately, television coverage of the event shows nothing of the kind. Hilary and Chelsea wave frm the plane, saunter down the ramp, and go through a welcoming session right there on the tarmac, complete with little girl handing over a bouquet of flowers. About the only attack taking place is possibly an allergy attack from the pollen.

Today HRC admitted that she "misspoke." To paraphrase, I guess that depends upon what the definition of "misspoke" is.

Okay, look. Yesterday my production manager and I had a disagreement about whether total employment at our company had peaked at 98 employees or 101 employees in 2007. After pulling payroll records, I had to agree that I was wrong when I claimed only 98, instead of the correct 101. That's misspeaking.

If I had claimed that the extra 3 employees didn't count, because they were actually extraterrestial aliens who had landed a flying suacer at the company picnic and applied for jobs, that would be a little more than misspeaking. That would be making up events out of whole cloth.

If Hilary had said that she came under sniper fire in Bosnia, but it was actually Dafur, that would be misspeaking. But other than the start of deer season in Arkansas, when is it even remotely possible that she was shot at? And if she hasn't been shot at, how could she have come up with the story that she had?

Also interesting is that in a later interview she claimed "Last week for the first time in twelve years or so, I misspoke." She actually knows that its her first mistake in 12 years. I can't even be sure what I had for dinner last Wednesday, but she's sure that she hasn't made a false claim in over a decade. It makes you wonder what she could have said that made such a strong impression.

"Don't worry, Bill. I forgive you."