College Hillel, Censorship. and the Jewish Community

I've been following the recent Hillel controversy kicked off by the local Hillel at Swarthmore College, at which the student group is locked in a struggle with the international organization over who can be sponsored to speak on campus by the Hillel.

My first response to this was that Hillel is a Jewish organization, funded by Jews nationally, and has a right to stop its organizations from sponsoring anti-Semitic and anti-Israel speakers on campus.  And in fact I continue to believe that Swarthmore's Hillel is wrong to declare that they are open to any voices in its space, including "anti-Zionists".  Don't get me wrong- I think anti-Zionists should be free to speak on campus, and in fact I would encourage Jews and other Israel supporters to attend such talks and engage the arguments.  But with plenty of organizations on campus, there's no need for Hillel to be the one sponsoring such a talk.  Let the committee for Palestinian Solidarity sponsor it.

As I've thought more about it, though, it gets more complicated.  Hillel has a national policy of support for Zionism.  I'm a Zionist, so that fits me well, but at the same time Hillel is a Jewish religious organization, not a political one.  I wonder if Zionism should be part of Hillel's mission.  More to the point, Hillel isn't just associated with Zionism, but with AIPAC and the mainstream Jewish community's perception of Zionism.  The liberal Zionist organization, J Street, is considered by some conservatives to be insufficiently supportive of Israel because it stands in opposition to Israel's settlement pollicy on the West Bank.  After some struggles, J Street was essentially "let in" and is permitted to be sponsored by Hillel.

But it occurs to me that the real problem is that I don't trust Hillel International to set the parameters of debate on Israel.  It seems that their tolerance for J Street, for example, is only grudging.  I don't see any reason why they couldn't ban groups in the future that I support and that are still Zionist, because they're not sufficiently right wing in their outlook.

So I don't want Hillel supporting speakers who are explicitly in favor of the Jews in Israel being killed or deported, or in favor of a one-state solution to the Middle East.  But I do want Hillel to allow liberals to speak at their events, and to be highly critical of Israel policies in the West Bank.  But who am I to set the parameters of debate that are acceptable?  I doubt anyone would trust me to do it.  And I don't trust the mainstream AIPAC types to do it.  I'm not entirely comfortable with Open Hillel's plans either- why should a Jewish organization be sponsoring people who support full boycotts of Israel?

So drawing the lines are tough but I think Hillel International, while it has the right to direct its money any way it wishes, needs to keep its guidelines as inclusive as possible, and count on the exchange of free ideas to convince open-minded people of the rightness of our positions.  A position that speakers who "set a double standard" with respect to Israel is too vague.

The Budget Deal and the Triumph of Conservatives

The Ryan-Murray budget deal is generally a positive development for America, I guess.  It apparently means that we won't have endless budget showdowns and brinksmanship for a while.  No threats to shut down the government.  Hopefully (though I don't think this is part of the deal) no more Debt Ceiling hostage taking.

I find a few things notable about the deal:

• For the first time, Republicans have accepted some increased revenues as part of a deal.  This really is shocking, as it seemed so impossible.  The fig leaf they used is that they raised "fees" on air carriers, not "taxes".  Of course, that's a distinction without a difference. Of course, I'd like to see a broad-based tax hike instead, but this is still something.  I was sure that Democrats had accepted that tax hikes were never going to happen, and were going to start making concessions to Republicans without getting anything in return.  But they got something, even if it wasn't much.
• Make no mistake, though.  Republicans have won. Yes, there's a de facto tiny tax hike.  But this locks in spending at essentially Sequester levels going forward.  Federal government spending will continue its downward trajectory, just as conservatives have demanded.  It's now clear that Democrats miscalculated horribly in 2011 when they figured that making defense cuts a prominent part of the Sequester would give Republicans a reason to come to the table.  It turns out that there aren't as many Republicans hawks as we thought there were.
• On the bright side, though, we actually did get a reduction in Pentagon spending, at least in comparison to what it would have been.  That seemed like a far-left pipe dream a few years ago, and it's a really good thing.

Given that we now have a Republican victory and an essentially austerian policy, let's keep that in mind when we see the results of the economy in the next few years.  If the economy takes off soon, conservatives get a lot of credit.  If it stays in the doldrums, they get a lot of the blame.

Explaining ObamaCare

I wrote the below explanation in an email correspondence, and figured taht after spending so much time on it, I ought to share it with all of my fans.  I was asked to explain the ACA to a conservative who keeps complaining about pieces of the law, and also complains that the bill is too long and complicated.

So here goes:

1. We want to make it possible for anyone to get health insurance, even those with pre-existing conditions who have been shut out by insurance companies.
2. Americans don't want the government to take control of the system any more than they already have- they want private insurance companies to continue to operate.
3. So the law tells insurance companies that they must take people in their plans whom they previously rejected or charged crazy rates to- cancer survivors, old people, diabetics, etc.  They also have to charge the same to everyone, so they couldn't say: "Sure, we're offering you insurance, but it will cost you $10,000 a month".
4. But now that we're forcing insurance companies to take everyone, their costs are going to go up- after all, the reason they rejected people with pre-existing conditions is because they're expensive to insure.  So we need to make sure that young healthy people sign up too, so the risk pool is diversified and ins cos are still viable.  That's why we have the individual mandate, so young healthy people must sign up.
5. Because anyone can get insurance now, we can't allow people to not get health insurance, and then sign up as soon as they get sick- they'd be freeloading on the system- another reason for the mandate.
6. To make it possible for people to shop for plans intelligently, the government standardized the plans so people will know what they're buying.  That way a company can't get people with a really low premium for a policy that doesn't cover hardly anything, as a lot of them used to do a lot.
7. Also, if you allow a plan that covers practically nothing, more of the young healthy people would sign up for it because it would be cheap, and that would screw up the risk pools for the rest of us.
8. So if you force everyone to sign up for health insurance (or get fined), then you have to subsidize poor and lower middle class people- we obviously can't tell people they must get insurance, if they can't afford it. So that's why the law includes subsidies for middle class, and expanded Medicaid for the poor.
9. Some employers don't provide health insurance to their employees, leaving those people stuck.  The law mandates that employers provide it to FT employees.  That will keep some people off the exchanges.
10. So the costs: many people are still paying for their own insurance, but now it's more affordable because of the reasons above.  But the expanded Medicaid and subsidies are expensive.  Those were paid for with various taxes, like the one on medical devices and on "cadillac plans".  The bean counters did the Math, and calculated how much revenue they'd need for the plan, and set up the taxes to cover it.

So as you can see, it's complicated!  But each piece flows from the previous one.  It won't work without the individual mandate.  It won't work without employers covering their employees.  It won't without subsidies and Medicaid expansion.  It won't work if insurance companies can offer bare bones plans to siphon off the young healthies.

 

As I've said a bunch of times, if you want a simple plan, we could do that.  Make Medicare available to everyone.  You'd have to have way more taxes of course, but we'd be getting something back for it.  That's what Canada does.  Or you could have government do even more, paying the doctors and hospitals directly- socialized medicine.  That's what England does.

 

But if you want to keep the current system of insurance companies and employer-based health insurance, and you want to make insurance available to those who currently can't get it, then you have to get complicated. 

All conservative alternatives might improve some things around the edges, but they wouldn't solve the BIG problem, which is how people with pre-existing conditions would get insurance through the individual market, and how poorer people (including the working poor) would get insurance if their employer doesn't offer it.  I guess Republicans think this isn't a very important problem- I think it obviously is.

Killin' Time

So I was planning to surf the intertubes while I had some time between jobs today, but I find that the internet is down here and I have time to kill.  So I’ll write a totally unresearched and de-linked blog post about what’s been on my mind and post it when I get access to the web.  Aren’t you lucky?

The ObamaCare Crap Show

 It’s really disappointing and infuriating to see the ACA website start off as such a disaster.  Now I’m not a techie and I have no experience with government procurement, so I don’t really understand why this was rolled out so poorly.  Was it due to crazy government procurement rules that make it really hard to do such a project?  Was it terrible decisions by managers or by Kathleen Sibelius?  Graft and corruption?  Just a really complex program that would inevitably have lots of bugs?

I don’t know, but the meta-message is bad.  Democrats have been trying to say that government can be a force for good in our lives, and specifically that it can do health insurance better than the private sector can.  Republicans have been saying that everything the government touches turns immediately into a crap sandwich.  Now I think conservatives have set up a Straw Man with respect to ObamaCare, accusing liberals of promising that it would improve prices for everyone and lead to a golden age of medicine.  Obviously that’s setting the bar pretty high, and liberals haven’t made that claim.  We’re just saying this will be a significant improvement over the status quo.  That should be an easy target to hit, since the ACA basically leaves the health insurance and health care delivery systems intact, while funding insurance for more people and solving the problem of pre-existing conditions in the private market.  My health insurance isn’t going to change; ditto for nearly everyone I know.

So the only way this could go wrong is if the new law doesn’t work… and that seems to be happening! A technical problem with a website doesn’t mean that the whole law was folly, but it sure fits the Republican narrative- that government can’t do anything right.  And hey, it’s true that the private sector is way better at things like launching websites, and I didn’t expect the feds to do as well as Google.  But we have a functioning Medicare system and a functioning Social Security system and a functioning Department of Defense, so I know we can do this.  The administration needs to prove it; I hope people are panicking and getting on the move.

That said, I’m still confident that they’ll do so and the ACA will be fine.  By the next election, Democrats will be able to point to a functioning system and say “why all the hysteria from our opponents last year?  What’s the big deal?”

 

OK Now Can We Put to Rest the “Both Sides are Extreme” Headlines?

I think I’m tapped out on the government shutdown and debt ceiling fight story, which has been beaten to death by every commentator out there.  As you might expect, I side with the Democrats, and am happy to see Republicans getting blamed, as they should.

So I wonder how long it will take for the mainstream media to start writing stories again about how both sides are to blame for the gridlock.  I’ve been arguing for years that this false equivalency is just wrong.  Republicans have moved wwwaaaaayyyyyy over to the right, and really plunged off the cliff this month with their extreme positions and tactics.  But Democrats have NOT done the same, and really shouldn’t be accused of doing so.  Elizabeth Warren, in Ted Kennedy’s old seat, is defining the left end of the Democratic caucus, and she doesn’t have much company over there.  Michael Moore is irrelevant.  Liberals wanted a Single Payer health care bill, and it was never even considered.  Taxes remain historically low, and Democrats are not talking seriously about changing that.  “Card Check” pro-union legislation is a non-starter even in the Democratic party.  Barack Obama is to the right of Lyndon Johnson on every economic issue.  Barack Obama is to the right of Richard Nixon on many issues!  Meanwhile, Ronald Reagan would be considered a liberal by today’s party (remember he supported tax hikes in his second term).

So please don’t try to tell me that “both sides” are getting too extreme.  One side is getting extreme. I want to see them make an honest argument about that, something like this:

Yes, it’s true, we have moved the position of the Republican party to a more pure position than it used to be. We know taxes are historically low now, but we want to roll them back to an even lower level, lower than they’ve been in 100 years.  We want government to stop funding Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, or to scale them way back, because we believe economic freedom is more important than economic security.

Et cetera.  Instead we hear them talk about how the country is falling apart because of a massively expanding government and welfare state, when in fact the government has contracted in recent years.

The Budget Issue is Just So Simple

Amidst all the sound and fury in Washington, and talk of a bargain between Republicans and Democrats on the budget, I think we keep losing sight of the fact that there is a fundamental issue that's just not going to be solved through negotiations:

1. Democrats will not agree to any more spending cuts unless they're paired with revenue increases.
2. Republicans will not agree to any revenue increase, under any circumstances

So we can criticize the politicians for "kicking the can down the road", but really, what else can they do?  There's no changing these fundamental positions.  There's just no deal to be had!

These are honest positions held by the parties, not cynical lies.  The only way the budget is going to get back on a normal footing is if one side wins and election handily and puts in their program.  This already happened in California- the state was stuck in budget gridlock and seemingly endless disaster, until Democrats took full control recently, put in their plan of spending cuts and tax increases, and balanced the budget. 

I know we all like the fantasy that divided government and "reaching across the aisle" is good for the country.  And maybe it used to be.  But not any more.

Syria

I'm having a busy Summer, so blogging has been nonexistent (sorry fans!), but the lurking Syria debacle, along with a slow day, has lured me back for a post.

This is outrageous.  President Obama drew a line in the sand, saying that use of chemical weapons was a "red line" that could not be crossed without consequences.  But it appears he didn't think about what consequences the US was prepared to mete out, and now Syrian President Assad has crossed the line and is thumbing his nose at the US.

Oops.  It turns out that a US bombing campaign would have no effect on the regime, which is already locked in a civil war.  And ground troops are out of the question, as very few Americans are willing to risk US lives for Syria.  We also saw how ground troops worked out in Iraq next door (wow, it turns out that Arabs hate us when we come in and occupy our country!)  Bombing hasn't worked out very well in the Muslim world (huh! Seems like Afghans don't like it when we bomb villages and kill women and children along with a few terrorists in the shack next door!)

But the President drew a line in the sand!  We have to do something or we'll appear weak! Think this through: in order to save face after an ill-advised statement months ago, the US should go on a bombing campaign, which will necessarily kill and maim hundreds or thousands of non-combatants, all for the ostensible purpose of protecting the Syrian people from their own government.  Meanwhile, that same Syrian government will barely feel the affects, and continue on their own killing spree.  Our "humanitarian mission" will very likely lead to more innocent Syrian deaths than doing nothing would.

But what about the flaunting of international law? Well, it turns out that Syria never signed the treaty banning chemical weapons, so technically they haven't broken any treaty obligation.  And few have pointed out that enormous irony that is the US punishing Syria for breaking international law by... breaking international law itself! There is simply no justification for attacking a country that has made no threats against us, when all the relevant world bodies (UN, NATO) have refused to approve any action.

The President is in a tough spot.  He promised to do something about Syria, and now it turns out that there's nothing he can do except make empty gestures.  He is indeed going to look weak.

But that's not a reason to bomb.  You don't save face at the expense of killing hundreds of innocent people.  A president who does that has crossed a very serious ethical line.

Some other thoughts:

• What's the moral difference between chemical weapons and conventional weapons?  Cluster bombs kill just as many people at the target, with shrapnel instead of sarin.  The victims are just as dead.  Yes, we're appalled by chemical weapons, but they're not the same as nukes, which potentially can kill many many more people.  The issue is the targeting of civilians, which Assad was already doing before this attack, and which other tyrants are doing all over the world.
• Asking for congressional approval is a much better solution than just bombing away, and I like forcing the legislative branch to go on record rather than just carp from the sidelines.  But in the end they're probably going to vote in favor of a campaign, and the administration still will bear responsibility for leading us into another mess.

Musings on Economics from a non-Economist

I never studied economics in school, but I guess you could call me an amateur macro-economist now.  Or perhaps a pretend economist.  Anyway, the study of large economies interests me, and I'm particularly struck by the challenge of evaluating a particular government action or policy in light of the fact that so many things are happening at the same time.  How can we say that government stimulus worked in 2008-2009, when at the exact same time the Fed was doing all kinds of stuff, and taxes were being cut, and a new president was being elected, etc etc?

Compounding this, as my friend "N" keeps reminding me in our email correspondence, is the reality of confirmation bias.  It is built into our nature to look for evidence to support our preconceptions, rather than to follow the evidence wherever it leads.  When I'm surfing the net looking for politics articles to read, I am much quicker to click on headlines that confirm something I already believe than on a headline that challenges that belief.  Now I believe some people are more hung up on confirmation bias than others, and as a seeker of Truth it is the duty of all of us to fight against our tendencies in this area.

Anyway, when it comes to macroeconomics during modern times, the questions that are asked are these:

• Does Keynesian stimulus work?
• Do tax cuts make a significant difference in growth?
• When a central bank can't reduce interest rates any more, will "printing money" help the economy or will it cause inflation?

There are lots more of course, but I want to take the first two of these.

Does Stimulus Work?

We had a recent financial crisis and bad recession, which turned out to be worldwide.  In response in the US, the Obama administration pushed through stimulus measures in 2009 to save the economy from a bigger collapse.  Conservatives, who had previously loved stimulus, have grown much more conservative of late, and now pushed hard for Hooverite budget balance in the face of the recession.  As a result, a stimulus package (including spending hikes as well as tax cuts- both of those are stimulus measures) was passed in 2009, but it was smaller than liberal economists calculated was needed.  We then proceeded to get out of the recession in due time, but haven't had the kind of job growth we need to return to previous trends.  In other words, we've had a recovery (so it worked!) but the recovery has been disappoining (so it failed!).  We did stimulus (we tried it and it failed!), but that stimulus was too small to get us back to speed (we never really tried it!).

So how to measure whether stimulus worked? I think what makes the most sense, since the crisis was worldwide, is to look at similar places to ours and compare policy and outcomes.  That makes a good case for stimulus: in Europe they did much less stimulus than we did in the US and their continent-wide problems are much worse than the US right now.  Of course, those problems are really bad in particular countries (Greece, Spain, Ireland, Italy), while in Germany things are going much better even though not much stimulus happened.  I think this is still a good case for stimulus though, as looking at Germany in isolation is kind of like looking at Massachusetts in isolation- they're part of a large monetary union, with stronger parts and weaker parts.  But others will point out that Euro area countries set lots of their own policies, and are separate entities much more than US states are, which is certainly true.

So there's still enough doubt about stimulus that sceptics won't be convinced.  BUT there's one thing I think you can say: US-style stimulus did not do any harm.  Interest rates remain low so borrowing is easy.  The stimulus program is over now, so there are not ongoing costs.  There was no double-dip recession.  European countries that stopped stimulus and tried to balance budgets earlier than us (like the UK) are doing much worse.  Maybe we can't prove the positive value of stimlus to a scepic's liking, but we certainly proved that their forecasts of doom from overspending was wrong.

Are high taxes stifling the economy?

I find the Republican fetish for tax cuts almost comical at this point.  It seems like their answer to any question is "tax cuts!".  But look at recent history:

• Taxes were cut way back by Reagan in his first term.  The economy did well, perhaps as a result of this, but the federal deficit ballooned. 
• In his second term and in the term of George HW Bush, taxes were increased (though never to the level they were in the 1970s).  The economy boomed in the 1990s.
• Under Clinton taxes were increased again; the economy boomed and the federal budget was in surplus by 2000.
• Under George W Bush, taxes were cut precipitously.  The economy performed sort-of OK from 2002 to 2007, growing but producing fewer jobs than most recoveries in the modern era. Then a financial crisis completely destroyed what little growth there had been (I blame the financial crisis on banking policy, not on tax rates; but those low taxes obviously didn't do much to push back against the crisis).
• In 2013 taxes were finally increased again, after a five year period of historically low taxes (the Bush tax cuts plus the stimulus tax cuts including social security tax cuts, passed by Obama).  So far in '13, the economy as a whole seems unaffected, continuing its recent growth.  Still growing, but not really fast enough.

Does this prove that higher taxes, particularly on the wealthy, are great for the economy?  No- Federal Reserve policy matters a lot, and I guess regulatory policy matters too.  But what is proved pretty clearly is that tax cuts are not the magic answer to all our economic questions.  Tax cuts probably goose the economy somewhat- but the Bush tax cuts definitely did not bring us the benefits that we were told it would.


So I guess in economics it's easier to prove negatives than positives.