Update on GOP Debt Limit Strategy

I put a short post on Wednesday that the Republicans ought to get a little something out of the debt limit rise.  Keith Hennessey has an Op-Ed at the WSJ that lays out an even better strategy.  The whole thing is worth a read, but the gist of goes like this:

1. Obama can have a choice of real spending cuts and he gets a long term debt limit rise.  Alternatively, he can have a three month debt limit increase, if he doesn’t want to get serious.
2. Republicans would only guarantee enough votes to allow the measure to pass, making Democrats responsible for raising the ceiling.  To date, House Democrats have been shielded from this bit of unpleasantness.

Keeping the focus on the debt every three months will suck the air out of any other Obama agenda item.  So will meaningful spending reductions.  Both options are great.  I doubt the GOP will be that smart.

Weekend Music Chill

My sources for new music come from all over. Fellow blogger Aaron at Magic Blue Smoke tweeted a link to music by Parov Stelar an electro-swing artist.  Liking it and especially the music videos, with cuts from the kinds of movie musicals my Mom loves.

Booty Swing

Chambermaid Swing

Filner’s Start in Office

. . . is not that great.  I was happy he is stopping medical marijuana outlet harassment by the city, but is that really a burning issue?  Beyond that Filner’s start in office has not made me optimistic.

1. He cancelled new managed competition actions, claiming that more study is needed and that service levels have suffered.  The Miramar landfill competition and street sweeping services were won by city workers, but at lower cost to the city; why is Filner complaining?  There is no evidence of correlation between over paying for a service and better levels of service. Kudos to Kevin Faulconer for seeking to push ahead anyway.
2. He “plans to reorganize land use and redevelopment functions under a new Department of Healthy, Safe and Livability Neighborhoods.”  Stand by for any new construction to become more difficult.  Just what a struggling economy needs. 
3. He has called for scaling back a state water project that will bring badly needed water to Southern California.  My water bill is very high already, despite cutting back, why doesn’t the mayor care about that?
4. I haven’t seen any proposals on how to keep spending under control or what his plan is for dealing with a projected deficit.

I am skeptical of his promise in his state of the city address to freeze pensionable pay for city workers.  It would be great if he did, but I am willing to bet that doesn’t happen.  Any takers?

On a side note, his comments that the Chargers weren’t leaving were welcome, but why is that the headline in the U-T?  Didn’t the mayor talk about more important items.  

GOP Strategy on the Debt Ceiling

Based on past experience and Obama’s better political position, it is clear that the Republicans are ultimately going to pass some debt ceiling rise.  Since this is foregone, they should get something out of it.  Going for something small but symbolic, like gutting a death panel, or some cost saving measure as part of the package where Obama would be hard pressed to explain a veto seems best.  Maybe something arcane, like directing a change to the way that CPI is calculated, but which will help reduce the growth of entitlements.

Second, they should pass the law at the last possible minute, to give the Senate and Obama little chance to deal with the result.  By making small progress, they can claim some victory while forcing Obama’s hand and preventing a public relations disaster.

Obama’s posturing about the debt ceiling is a hint that he knows he is in a weak position with respect to the timing that GOP House could use.

However, given their track record, I expect bellicose threats and promises by the Republicans followed by a humiliating collapse with little accomplished.  Somebody needs to remind me why I registered Republican in 2008.

Some Useful Statistics in the Gun Control Debate

From the FBI’s Uniform Crimes Reporting Database (click to enlarge):  (H/T Magic Blue Smoke)

1 Populations are U.S. Census Bureau provisional estimates as of July 1 for each year except 2000 and 2010, which are decennial census counts.
2 The murder and nonnegligent homicides that occurred as a result of the events of September 11, 2001, are not included in this table.
3 The crime figures have been adjusted.

Emotionalism is the friend of politicians pushing an agenda.  If you view the entire table, no category of crime is increasing, including murder.  What national crisis needs to be solved with bold new action?  Aren’t we solving it already, with slow steady progress?  The murder rate dropped from 9.3 per 100,000 to 4.7 per 100,000 during this period.

More on Demography

I posted last week about trends in world depopulation, and how America needs immigrants as a result.  In a review of a book by Jonathan V. Last, Heather Wilhelm argues that even having a high immigration rate won’t necessarily hold off the impacts of low birth rates forever, because it is a global trend.  Further, because the causes of low birth rates (i.e. below replacement levels)  are cultural, and immigrant women assimilate the culture, their birth rates drop as well.  Near the end of the review, she gives us this food for thought:

The best arguments for having children, unfortunately, run opposed to modern, secular American culture. Good reasons to have kids tend to be about delayed gratification, prioritizing family, putting others first, transmitting serious values and beliefs, focusing on something larger than yourself, and understanding the difference between joy and fun. Perhaps this is why, as Last notes, “American pets now outnumber American children by more than four to one.” It’s also why, if American fertility continues to slide — and, as the author notes, that’s still an “if” at this point — there’s little the government can do.

Indeed there is not.  Just one more area where culture has its consequences.  The falling birth rate is going to wreck the welfare state, and world wide, not just in America.  We are already getting a taste of it now, as the demographic bulge of baby boomers starts to enter retirement and medicare costs continue to ramp skyward.  Immigration could hold off the trend for a while, but eventually birth rates must return to sustainment levels for modern humanity to survive.

Brown Planning Pay Raises for State Workers

At least that’s my take on these comments, as quoted in the U-T article headlined “NOT ALL PROP. 30 TAX HIKE MONEY GOING TO SCHOOLS.”

Brown’s proposed $97.7 billion general fund budget assumes no state employee raises beyond those already required in union contracts. But contracts for all but two of the state’s 21 bargaining units are set to expire by July 2, and the Legislature now has a supermajority of labor-friendly Democrats.
At a news conference, Brown said he didn’t budget raises for fear that it could set an expectation for any specified amount.
“Collective bargaining means you got to meet in good faith, listen to the other side, and you go back and forth,” he said. “We have to enter those negotiations with an open mind, though we have to live within our means. So, I don’t want to put too many of my cards on the table.”

The Governor is signaling that he is ready to grant pay raises by these comments.  How could anyone with a shred of common sense think otherwise?  His comments about a specific amount remind me of an old and bad joke about an older profession than politician.  The only question we are debating now is how much; how much will the governor pay back the unions for their support of him.

Meanwhile all those commercials about strict accountability to ensure that Prop 30 cash went to the schools are swept into the dustbin  like so much election day confetti.

Towards the end of the article Brown equates government spending with investing and argues that government is how a free people act together.  He claims that he will spend the increased tax revenue wisely.  Unfortunately, the budgeting process in this state is largely illegitimate.  Big chunks go to education, but the state continues to rank low in educational attainment.  Further, huge amounts of education spending never makes it to the classroom, only 61% in fact.  Higher education spending has the effect of perpetuating a left wing ideology and to stifle dissent.  How is that legitimate?

The state has made the cities and counties its vassals, providing insufficient funding for required programs, loading another $5.3 billion on them, another source of illegitimacy.  Health and Human Services is the second highest category, behind K-12, yet California never participated in the welfare reform that the rest of the nation underwent in the Clinton years.  How is unreformed welfare spending legitimate?

Here is the actual budget summary, note all the hikes in spending: