Decision ‘08

Dean Unveils The Democrats’ Six-Point Plan

From the spring meeting of the Democratic National Comittee in New Orleans:

Dean said that Democrats will fight for a six-point plan that includes raising the minimum wage, tax “fairness” for the middle class, “a complete ban on gifts and travel from lobbyists,” the inspection of all cargo coming into U.S. ports, fixing the Medicare drug plan and “transition” in Iraq.

Let’s translate and analyze the list, shall we?

(1) Raising the minimum wage. Want a good plan to raise the minimum wage? Support economic growth and hammer down on illegal immigration. Interfering with the market by imposing a minimum wage from on high does nothing but increase unemployment among those who can least afford to be without work.

(2) Tax ‘fairness’ for the middle class. Hold on to your wallets. Under the guise of ‘fairness’, what Dean is really talking about is tax increases. We can expect the rescission of most, if not all, of Bush’s tax cuts under Democratic leadership because, we will be told, they only benefit the rich unfairly. Forget the fact that large tax hikes will decrease ecomic activity, and, coupled with the minimum wage hike referred to above, result in widespread unemployment - wouldn’t want anyone holding onto productive money, now, would we?

(3) A complete ban on gifts and travel from lobbyists. Sounds like a great idea…why don’t we also, while we’re at it, take away the ability of unions to spend mandatory levees on their membership for politicial causes those members may not support? Then maybe the Democrats will start showing a backbone on issues like school choice.

(4) The inspection of all cargo coming into the United States. So, we’re to increase our inspection rate from 5% to 100%. Sounds expensive. Sounds like another way to cripple economic activity. Sounds like more unemployment and a decisive decrease in trade. Sounds like pandering.

UPDATE 4/23/06 10:32 a.m.: Glenn Greenwald has this to say:

Mark Coffey of Decision 08 says that he is opposed to Howard Dean’s plan to inspect all of the cargo that enters the United States. Why are so many Bush supporters against programs to prevent Al Qaeda from shipping bombs and other dangerous materials into our country? In a Time of War, they want to leave our ports unprotected and help Al Qaeda smuggle bombs — perhaps even dirty bombs — into the U.S. They have a lot to answer for with their actions that impede the War on Terror.

Well, I hope Glenn’s tongue is well in-cheek because them’s fighting words. My reply:

Glenn, I’m not ‘opposed’ to inspecting all cargo. I’m also not opposed to giving every American $10 million in cash every Friday. It’s not realistic - it would take far too much money and time. I’ll put my support for the War on Terror up against anyone’s, save the tooth fairy.

UPDATE 2 4/23/06 10:39 a.m.: AJ points out that the UAE was going to pay for advanced cargo inspection equipment on their own dime in that deal that the Democrats were so quick to oppose for no good reason. I’ll adopt the tone of Glenn Greenwald: why are so many Democrats anxious to avoid a free gift that would keep ‘dirty bombs’ and other al-Qaeda materials out of our ports. Someone has a lot of explaining to do or else I’ll smear them with implications of being traitors…

UPDATE 3 4/23/06 7:02 p.m.: emptywheel at the Next Hurrah has a response that is, well, clueless at a level rarely achieved:

You see, one of the ways our country subsidizes globalization (and therefore the offshoring of American manufacturing jobs) is we do what we can to keep shipping costs low. Someone just dumps those t-shirts or sneakers or auto parts into a container, someone else drops those containers on a ship, they wait a few weeks, and voila, their cheaply produced goods are in Long Beach, all for a remarkably low fee. It’s that remarkably low fee that makes the whole arrangement possible. Because if it cost a lot of money to ship t-shirts from China, then we wouldn’t be buying our t-shirts in China, we’d be buying them in South Carolina. American t-shirt makers would be able to compete, even in spite of the much cheaper wages those Chinese t-shirt workers make.

The policy that says it’s adequate to inspect only 5% of the shipping containers coming into this country is one of the key factors keeping that shipping inexpensive. We know it’s not adequate. People have used shipping containers to smuggle people, nuclear material, and Russian jets. But big business and the right complain that they can’t inspect any more of the containers–if they did, it would be too expensive. (Should I point out the hypocrisy that some of the same people who want to build a fence across the entire border with Mexico refuse to put the equivalent between us and Asia?)

But what they’re really saying when they say that inspecting more of the containers would be too expensive, is that it would raise the cost of shipping. Which would, in turn, make globalized production less competitive. And would, in turn, make it easier for American workers to compete against lower-paid workers on the other side of the world. So when they say inspecting the shipping containers would be too expensive, they’re really saying that it would make it too difficult to offshore American jobs.

Sure, inspecting shipping containers would raise the price of unnecessary plastic items. But it would also give a big boost to American manufacturing.

Which is why I think Dean’s call for 100% inspection is good politics. It’s good politics because it would make us safer from terrorism–as well as a range of other illict smuggling. But it’s also good politics because it’s going to elicit a lot of responses like Coffey’s, making claims that it would be too expensive.

You see, I’d be happy to get into a debate on these terms. The right is basically saying we can’t protect ourselves against terrorism because if we did, we wouldn’t be able to outsource so many jobs. That’s a case I’d like to see them explain to out-of-work laborers in this country.

Really, the lack of economic knowledge that goes into this post is amusing. That’s a great Marxist argument and it would play well in the academy; here in the real world, however, we’re concerned about growing the economy, not shrinking it behind a protectionist wall.

(5) Fixing the Medicare drug plan. Not repealing, you understand, but ‘fixing’. Why fixing? Because the dirty little secret is that Bush’s prescription drug benefit, while prohibitively costly in my view, has become a rare domestic success story for the administration. Enrollment has exceeded expectations, and it appears that politically, it’s here to stay.

(6) “Transition” in Iraq. If you really want transition in Iraq, the Bush administration has been giving it to you. The Iraqi forces increasingly take the fight to the insurgents, and U.S. casualties are way, way down. As Bush often says, as the Iraqis stand up, we’ll stand down. Recent political movement and the long-delayed convening of parliament increase the momentum for positive change. Of course, that’s not what Dean means by ‘transition’; you know and I know that he means withdrawal. Some Americans may be prepared to declare a loss; many won’t be. Dean should be honest about his intentions, though; under the Democratic plan, Iraq is lost for lack of effort.

Quite a plan, then, when you look at it with a discriminating eye; 2006 may yet go the Republican way. For what seems ages now, the kick on the Democrats has been they didn’t have a plan; having seen the plan, their lack of one may have been their greatest advantage…

81 Responses to “Dean Unveils The Democrats’ Six-Point Plan”

1 Ryan Bonneville Says:
April 22nd, 2006 at 11:59 pm
Your points on the minimum wage are pretty typical rhetoric for free-marketers, but there isn’t a lot of data to support the position. The facts are that a lot of states have a higher minimum wage than the federal government imposes, a lot of people making minimum wage are teenagers, and the market equilibrium wage is probably well above the minimum wage in most fields anyway. I suspect the real effects of a minimum wage increase would be slightly higher teen unemployment in most areas, some improvement in standard of living for a small number of people, and mostly no effect on anything. It’s an attractive thing to promise because the average American doesn’t really get the economics and because it’s virtually costless to the economy.

As for the “tax fairness” part, again I think you’re operating with a lack of data. I don’t think it’s clearly to anyone that repealing Bush’s tax cuts would decrease economic activity or increase unemployment. I’m not saying that’s a good reason to repeal them; I’m just saying I doubt they’ve done all that much economic good (or harm) and I doubt getting rid of them would do much economic harm (or good). The real problem is that, if you stick to the moral argument, you’ll lose every time. The average American just doesn’t agree with the tax-cutting ideology, so we come up with clever explanations about how reducing America’s already minuscule income taxes is going to spur the economy. Oh well.
2 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 7:03 am
The budget deficits which were caused in large part by the Bush tax cuts impede economic activity in three ways. First, they lead to increases in interest rates as the government has to compete with private industry for capital. Secondly, they force the treasury to be reliant on foreign central banks to buy government paper, which in turn forces a strong dollar policy which makes American exports less competitive. Finally, both the interest and the principal ultimately have to be repaid, causing a drag in future years.
3 The Strata-Sphere » Blog Archive » Forget The Plan Stan Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 7:24 am
[…] Good friend Mark Coffey notes that the Democrats, who have been pounded for not providing tangible alternatives to the Republican policies, have finally come out with a plan. Mark is suggesting it may be better to go back to the ‘no plan’ plan. I’ll take issue with one item right off the back - since when did the middle class in this country live of a minimum wage? Is Dean’s plan to go out and say all us middle class need a bigger minimum wage? There’s an insult in there somewhere, I am pretty sure. […]
4 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 9:27 am
Ryan, Bush’s tax cuts have undoubtedly spurred economic activity. Have you looked at the low inflation, high employment macro statistics lately? This is a nice economy we’ve got going here….
5 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 9:28 am
peter, I agree the deficit is too high and that impedes economic activity. However, the tax cuts didn’t cause the deficit - the combination of 9/11, the switch to war-time defense spending, and a complete lack of fiscal discipline in Congress led to the deficits.
6 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 10:34 am
The tax cuts contributed to the deficit to the extent that they deprived the treasury of tax revenues it would otherwise have collected. I don’t know the exact figure, but I recall reading that had the tax cuts not been implemented, the deficit would be 70% less.

“The switch to war-time defense spending” was, of course, an option that the Bush administration chose. If we had not invaded Iraq, the deficit woult be far less.

Finally, “a complete lack of fiscal discipline in Congress” is a non-starter. It is a GOP controlled Congress which has (at least until recently) marched in lockstep with the administration. The President has never vetoed a budget bill. I saw a report that the Bush administration has borrowed more oney than all previous administrations combined. Although Confress has also been profligate, the truth of the matter is that they have all been drunken sailors.
7 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 10:35 am
Sorry, more money. Maybe more honey too, I just don’t know.
8 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 10:49 am
peter, you won’t find me defending the record of the Republican Congress on spending; far from it. I don’t think the solution is for more of the same, however.

But the president chose the war-time footing? peter, you’re a good friend of this blog, but I find that unbelievably offensive. Who flew those planes into the World Trade Centers? Even without Iraq, we would have still had Afghanistan. You know better, so I’m going to chalk this up to ill-chosen words that don’t reflect your real sentiments…
9 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 11:21 am
Iraq certainly didn’t fly the planes into the World Trade Center — and the cost of the Afghanistan war is far less —

Iraq was a war of choice. Why do you find it offensive if I point this out?
10 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 11:35 am
A BS argument that I won’t respond to - I challenge anyone to read my comment and then yours and see if you address my central challenge. Enough…I won’t justify the War on Terror - if you think it’s hunky-dory to sit back and continue the failed policies of the past, you’re welcome to your viewpoint…
11 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 11:48 am
Or to put it another way - if you think Iraq was a war of choice, do you also think Saddam Hussein should still be in power, reconstituting his weapons programs under his newfound freedom from sanctions thanks to the corrupt support of France and Russia? You can’t have your cake and eat it, too..
12 Alfredo Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 11:53 am
You argue that government should not interfere with market forces and, therefore, not impose a minimum wage. A better plan, according to you, is to hammer down on illegal immigration.

If I may respectfully point out, your argument appears inherently inconsistent. A free market prescribes free flow of capital, free flow of goods, and free flow of labor. You are for the former yet against the latter. Could you kindly clarify this for me?
13 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:00 pm
Sure - have an internally consistent immigration policy. Our current “we’ll make it illegal but allow it anyway” policy distorts the employment market by introducing workers who (a) work for employers who are paying them ‘day laborer’, ‘off the books’ wages that are outside of the legal and regulatory framework of our nation, and (b) work for less money than they’re probably worth because they are, after all, here illegally, and thus can’t find work with employers who are scrupulous about actually obeying the law.

We don’t have a true free market in this country, as you know - nor has any nation ever. It’s a debate for another time whether laissez-faire is preferable to the protections of a system that combines capitalism and socialism in an uneasy mix.

However, what I think is not debatable is that we should not have laws on the books that we don’t intend to enforce. Repeal the law, or enforce it…
14 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:07 pm
Of course I think we should fight a war on terror. However, Iraq was tangential to the war on terror. You fight terrorists by finding bin Laden, dead or alive. You don’t fight terrorists by attacking someone else.

And yes, I do think that it would be preferable to have Hussein in power than to have lost everything we and the Iraqis have lost over the past three years. We are now learning that Hussein was a paranoid and somewhat enfeebled leader, more like King Lear than Joseph Stalin. His sons were unstable and unpredictable. His regime pretended to have WMD but the cupboard was bare. The regime would ultimately have fallen of its own weight. The more we learn about Iraq, the more we realize that the any threat they posed to us was insignificant compared to Al Qaeda, Iran, or North Korea. So to answer your question: I think it would be far preferable to have kept our powder dry so we can protect ourselves against those who have attacked us or those who are developing (or already have) nuclear weapons.
15 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:08 pm
“We don’t have a true free market in this country, as you know - nor has any nation ever.” Not so: Hong Kong has been a truly free market for years.
16 too many steves Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:13 pm
The deficit is caused by spending that exceeds revenue receipts (in the current case by a Republican Congress and President) not by too few taxes collected. But, then, I’m a Milton Freidman acolyte and libertarian sort who believes taxes are theft. I would, however, foresake my goal of eliminating taxes in return for a perpetual, non-repealable agreement to fix the tax structure (as it is or some other mutually agreed to scheme) and prohibit deficit spending. But it has to be forever or no deal.

The minimum wage is a political issue, not an economic one .

Inspect 100% of the cargo? Sounds a lot like Kyoto - marginal benefit, huge cost.
17 Alfredo Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:19 pm
“[W]hat I think is not debatable is that we should not have laws on the books that we don’t intend to enforce”

I couldn’t agree with you more. Which is why I am very concerned about the Administration’s warrantless eavesdropping in violation of the existing FISA laws — a matter outside the current thread and to be debated another time, but relevant to your laws-on-the-book comment.

Thank you for clarifying for me your argument.
18 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:24 pm
“so I’m going to chalk this up to ill-chosen words that don’t reflect your real sentiments…”

No, those do indeed reflect his sentiments - Peter’s visceral hatred of this President and his administration are all too clear, and makes one wonder why on earth he frequents this blog in the first place.

“Not so: Hong Kong has been a truly free market for years.”

That would certainly come as quite a big surprise to the actual people who have to live under Chinese rule, Peter. Hong Kong has lost a substantial base of business since the takeover became official - witness the many corporations who moved to Vancouver as a result. Are you not aware of this circumstance?
19 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:34 pm
This is a bit dated, but since the Chinese now subsume Hong Kong’s economic data within the mainland now, it’s quite difficult to get an accurate picture of the macro - economics here:

http://www.asiarisk.com/library2.html
20 Alfredo Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:39 pm
too many steves says: “I’m a […] libertarian sort who believes taxes are theft.”

The corollary: Do you consider yourself a thief when driving on our highways? A burglar when walking on our streets or taking a leisurely walk along our parks? A shoplifter when calling 911 or the police for assistance?

To be sure, I am not for high taxes: I’ll take lower taxes over higher taxes anytime of the day. But at the same time, I do not think taxes are wholly or inherently bad.

I agree with what you imply — overspending is bad. But we must also be intellectually honest: cutting taxes during times of high expenditures (war) is fiscally irresponsible and morally bankrupt.
21 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:43 pm
Alfredo, we appreciate your input - one of the things I like the most about this blog is that we can have a left - right spectrum of opinions in the comments without descending into name-calling (most of the time, anyway). Don’t know if you’re familiar with my work, but we have covered the NSA story extensively - some might surprise you, some would no doubt disappoint you, but there are a lot of posts - just use the search box in the upper left with the term ‘NSA’ and you’ll find more than you ever wanted…
22 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:44 pm
I don’t hate the President, as noted elsewhere, and if I did it would not be relevant. I have fired people from time to time because they were not capable of doing their job. I didn’t hate them — but they could not perform their job and so they were dismissed. Same with Bush: I have no personal animosity to him, but he is clearly incapable of doing his job.

Moreover, as noted elsewhere, whether I hate him or not has no relevance to the validity of what I have written. If you think I am wrong, then tell me where — but dismissing what I say because of purported “visceral hatred” does not refute anything I have said.

As for Hong Kong: it certainly was free market when I lived there. I haven’t been there since 1989 (TienAnMen Square ended my business — I am not a big fan of mainland China). I am sure things have changed quite a bit since then, but my (limited) understanding is that the free market policies are more or less the same. Hong Kong Chinese have been migrating to Vancouver for years (including when I lived there) to get the dual citizenship and to shield assets in the event of a change in China’s policies towards Hong Kong.

I would also consider Singapore, Taiwan, and (to a lesser extent) South Korea to be free market economies.
23 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:56 pm
“what I say because of purported “visceral hatred” does not refute anything I have said.”

Of course - how could I have mistook all of the bile and venting of spleen you’ve been spewing as really just calm reasoning and logic? From now on, we’ll be sure to address you as Mr. Spock.

But you haven’t answered my original question - why do you keep on posting here, when it’s abundantly clear that you not only disagree with most of the views expressed, but vehemently so? Is it a masochistic tendency, or something else we’re missing?
24 fishbane Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 12:57 pm
However, the tax cuts didn’t cause the deficit - the combination of 9/11, the switch to war-time defense spending, and a complete lack of fiscal discipline in Congress led to the deficits.

Why, yes! My wife will love that - making less money didn’t harm our income - the combination of having kids and a complete lack of restraint in spending did.
25 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:07 pm
Why do I post here? Well, I enjoy it. It is a generally congenial place to opine about a wide variety of thngs.

I also find it enjoyable to match wits with other people. I also play Internet chess for the same reason.

Moreover, I’m uninterested in posting on sites of like-minded people. What’s the point? I’m not going to gain much from an echo chamber. I am a faithful reader of the Economist and the Wall Street Journal (and an occasional viewer of Brit Hume) because I am far more interested in the opinions of people who think differently than me.

Finally, when I can advance an argument which cannot be credibly refuted, I have a high degree of confidence that I am right. I can’t get that from a left wing website.
26 Decision ‘08 » Blog Archive » Dean’s Middle Wage Hike - Or, How To Screw Your Own Constituency Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:09 pm
[…] It’s a bit perplexing, then, and unexplainable on many levels beyond pure pandering, that Democrats constantly reach for the rhetoric of the minimum wage. We owe the popularity of this old saw to economic illiteracy, no doubt, for the minimum wage is no friend to the poor. […]
27 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:13 pm
Well, we like having you here, peter (I bet even our friend dmac enjoys the give and take on some level) - it’s good to be exposed to other viewpoints, as you say. I won’t pretend that you don’t infuriate me at times - but then, I’m a politicial person with strong beliefs, and when those beliefs are challenged, particulary when I think that it’s done with unfair arguments, then I get my hackles up, at times.

However, I much prefer a comments section with left and right - my God, when you read the comments on some of the most popular blogs (left and right), it’s enough to make you gag…one big circle je…er, mutual admiration society, that is, at some of these places…
28 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:14 pm
fishbane, of course, in a static model, tax cuts decrease revenue to the government - but in a dynamic model, they often increase revenue. That’s only a paradox if you don’t understand the multiplier effect…
29 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:23 pm
“Finally, when I can advance an argument which cannot be credibly refuted, I have a high degree of confidence that I am right…”

A high degree of confidence? Come now, don’t get bashful on us all of a sudden - how about your metaphysical certainty that all of your points are correct, 24/7? You rarely offer cites for the vast majority of your opinions (except the NYT), so how can anyone refute them (at least in your own mind), since you have no facts to back them up? Also, your responses clearly indicate that you rarely click and actually read other’s cites, thereby rendering your debating skills suspect.

Have you ever admitted, just once here, that you’ve been wrong about anything, anytime, anywhere at all - heck, it could even be about the time of day, the subject matter is irrelevant.
The answer should be quite illuminating.
30 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 1:56 pm
MarK: thanks for your post, and I am truly grateful that you take the time and effort to run this site. I also realize that I do exasperate you from time to time. However, you gotta admit, I’m good for business: the threads I get involved with typically get a lot more posts than the ones I pass by. (Come one, come all, as Peter takes on all comers).

However, I don’t think that I make unfair arguments. I never attack other posters or question their motivation. It is true that I don’t back down and I don’t give an inch unless I have to — but what would you prefer, a wimpy liberal like Alan Colmes?

dmac: cites are relevant only when there are factual issues which are in dispute. I think that I have been fairly thorough in these instances — and yes, I do think the New York Times reporting is very credible. I don’t think there is a more credible source for news reporting in this country. They get things wrong from time to time, as any medium would, but I challenge anyone to give me a better news organization in the US. The editorial page has a very definite liberal slant — but that is something else.

However, I do not think cites are relevant for most of what I am arguing. Let’s use today’s other thread as an example (Mary McCarthy). When I was a kid, every day after school I watched in black and white as George Reeves as Superman fought for truth, justice, and the American way. I know what the American way is, and it ain’t sending people overseas to be tortured. A statement like this is self-evident, and any cite is superfluous.

I thought I made a mistake here once, but I was wrong. Seriously, folks, there have been instances when I was wrong on the facts and admitted it. The only example which comes to mind was an exchange with Clint, but I forget what the issue was. There were others. However, on the broad themes — Bush is unfit for office, violating FISA laws is wrong, and so forth — I think I’ve been right on the money.
31 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:08 pm
“I’m not going to gain much from an echo chamber…”

But you live in a virtual echo chamber, Peter. SF is the epicenter of radical liberalism, while the cities where yours truly (Chicago) and Mark lives (Austin) are just about to the left of Trotsky at times. We have to defend our beliefs on a daily basis, for the simple reason that there aren’t a lot of fellow travelers where we live.

Believe it or not, I’m a registered Democrat, and have voted more often than not on that side of the ledger (Daley for mayor, Paul Simon for Senator, etc). But I believe that cognitive dissonance is a healthy thing for everyone to experience on a regular basis, and have no problem with the inherent predilections of living in a state that’s gone for the Democratic side (on the national level) for over 15 years at present. I don’t believe you experience a lot of this in your own world, and that tends to color your opinions in a stark black and white viewpoint.
32 peter Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:17 pm
True, but we currently have a Republican governor, and I am just down the road from the Hoover Institute. Most of the people at my office are foreign born, so I’m exposed to a lot of viewpoints which are not of the crunchy granola variety.

Also, I have voted for Republicans (Rudy Giuliani and Jacob Javots) and I would happily vote for Arnold if he runs again. I think he is doing a first rate job, and I also think the Democratic legislature is awful.
33 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Well, there you go - I’m with you, man! Seriously, I do appreciate your participation here. Most of my friends (save for one) are fairly close to anarchists, so you actually come across as reasonable by comparison.
34 Alfredo Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:31 pm
Let’s focus for a moment on the multiplier effect and agree to assume away, for now, the following two issues:

(i) Have Bush’s tax cuts indeed helped the middle class? And,
(ii) Is it prudent to maintain tax-cutting policies in the face of growing government expenditures (even within the context of a dynamic model)?

A key precept of the multiplier effect is the marginal propensity to consume (mpc) — i.e., the induced increase in consumer spending due to an increase in (post-tax) income.

For a variety of structural and behavioral issues, mpc will always be less than one. The question is, how much less than one? Or, in other words, how much larger than zero? (If mpc = 0, then, by defnition, there will be no multiplier effect. Thus, if mpc = 0, the increase in government revenue due to tax cuts will also be zero.)

It would appear to me that there would be a direct relationship between the level of confidence people have in the overall economy and the mpc: the more certain people feel about the future, the more disposed they’d be to spending each marginal dollar. The inverse should also be true, the higher the uncertainty in the future, the lower the mpc.

War, or the threat of war, raises the overall anxiety level and decreases our certainty of the future. The mpc nears zero (or falls to zero in the case of some families or communities). The efficacy of tax cuts as a way of inducing higher government revenue therefore falls considerably and, in many instances, may become null. In the meantime, war spending continues unabated.

The obvious question then becomes: Why is Bush (and his followers) insisting on making his tax cuts permanent in times of war? It appears to me, by looking at the multiplier effect theory, that during extraordinary times (i.e., war) tax cuts are ineffective, at best, and outright damaging, at worst.

Bush and the GOP-controlled Congress have not only failed on this score, but even more troubling, have continued to spend liberally.
35 T.W.L. Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:32 pm
Getting back to the topics of the post:

1) is dumb for the reasons Ryan outlined - it won’t do anything. Talking up the minimum wage is the Democrats’ version of Republican obsession with an FMA: a sop to the base that has no chance of alleviating poverty in the first case or even getting passed in the second.

2) is dumb because of the Orwellian use of the word “fair.” Tax policy is specifically designed to be unfair.

3) is dumb because it won’t work. Lobbyists will find a way to funnel goodies to their supporters in Congress. The only way to limit lobbying is to limit the power Congress has to help those lobbies.

4) is dumb because its effect will be to increase prices of imports, and nothing else. If I wanted to smuggle a bomb into the U.S. I wouldn’t do it by having it shipped in anyway.

5) is an assumption on my part, but I assume that it will be dumb because “fixing” means “price controls.”

6) is dumb because it’s not a plan, it’s a hope.

I have to agree with Peter on one point: Bush is not fit for the office. The last three major party nominees for President have defined “empty suit.” Just look at the way these clowns act when surrounded by political handlers vs. when not surrpunded: Bush, your goofy next-door-neighbor who hosts a nice 4th of July BBQ but would burn his own house down if his wife weren’t around; Gore, the college sophomore who thinks that he’s smarter than he is, and acts even more pompous than that; and Kerry, who before being discovered as a potential nominee was basically the Senate mannequin. For this reason alone I’m looking forward to a McCain/Clinton contest; at least the debates will be heavyweight title bouts rather than drunken stong-man slug fests.
36 Alfredo Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 2:39 pm
I’d like to go back to the multiplier effect argument supporting the rationale for tax cuts, if I may.

A key precept of the multiplier effect is the marginal propensity to consume (mpc) — i.e., the induced increase in consumer spending due to an increase in (post-tax) income.

For a variety of structural and behavioral issues, mpc will always be less than one. The question is, by how much less than one? Or, in other words, how much larger than zero? (If mpc = 0, then, by definition, there will be no multiplier effect. Thus, if mpc = 0, the increase in government revenue due to tax cuts will also be zero.)

It would appear to me that there would be a direct relationship between the level of confidence people have in the overall economy and the mpc: the more certain people feel about the future, the more disposed they’d be to spending each marginal dollar. The inverse should also be true, the higher the uncertainty in the future, the lower the mpc.

War, or the threat of war, raises the overall anxiety level and decreases our certainty of the future. The mpc nears zero (or falls to zero in the case of some families or communities). The efficacy of tax cuts as a way of inducing higher government revenue therefore falls considerably and, in many instances, may become null. In the meantime, war spending continues unabated.

The obvious question then becomes: Why is Bush (and his followers) insisting on making his tax cuts permanent in times of war? It appears to me, by looking at the multiplier effect theory, that during extraordinary times (i.e., war) tax cuts are ineffective, at best, and outright damaging, at worst.
37 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 3:29 pm
Well, that’s an interesting argument, and I don’t intend to ridicule it by pointing out what I think is a huge flaw - consumer confidence remains quite high, despite the overwhelming unpopularity of the Iraq War. That suggest to me that, rightly or wrongly, people feel the U.S. economy is big enough to absorb these obscene (yes, even for a Bush supporter like myself) deficits we are currently running…
38 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 3:49 pm
“The last three major party nominees for President have defined “empty suit.”

If you’ve been reading this blog for a few months at this point, you may be aware that many of us (including myself) are quite tired of the Bush/Clinton dynastic impulses currently on display. If McCain is the eventual GOP nominee, then I would fervently hope that someone else but Hillary! would be the opponent. We need new faces and new ideas for the next election, not retreads from the same bloodlines.
39 T.W.L. Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 3:59 pm
Well, dmac, I don’t particularly like Senator Clinton’s politics (McCain’s either, for that matter), but is there another Democrat with a functioning brain and a chance at the nomination? I was only referencing her smarts - and I’d really like to see two competent candidates, even if I do disagree with them.
40 T.W.L. Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 4:08 pm
Alfredo-

Mark makes a good point, and one that people ignore all to often. Theory is fine, but in fact consumer confidence is very high. Of course you don’t even need this indirect evidence. The savings rate is remarkably low, which directly implies that mpc is rather high.

Not that this implies higher tax revenues (and again, who cares about theory? Tax revenues are real world numbers). On the other hand, I don’t consider increasing the government’s gross revenues to be a primary goal of fiscal policy.
41 dmac Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 4:19 pm
It should be interesting to see if the consumer confidence index stays at this level if the price of gasoline hits $3.50/Gal. this summer. Of course, this will bring in extra revenue from the assorted taxes, but at what point does the hockey stick level off here? BTW, my level of economic theory is akin to what I learned in business courses in college - which basically means not very comprehensive.

Perhaps that’s why they call it “the dismal science?”
42 jpe Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 6:41 pm
The tax cuts contributed to the deficit to the extent that they deprived the treasury of tax revenues it would otherwise have collected.

I think the bigger factor in the rise in revenue was the temporary & partial tax holiday on repatriation of foreign-source dividends. This accounts for most of the revenue, and has nothing to do with the Laffer curve (and was easily predicted).
43 T.W.L. Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 6:51 pm
I guess Mr. Wheel (update three, above) has not considered the possibility (likely, I think) that the increase in import prices due to inspections would not be enough to make American labor competitive. The only economic effect would be higher prices for imported goods - but prices still well lower than they would be without trade.
44 fatman Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 6:52 pm
In response to peter’s comment @ 12:07 PM (peter’s comments in quotation marks because I haven’t figured out how to italicize yet):

“Of course I think we should fight a war on terror. However, Iraq was tangential to the war on terror. You fight terrorists by finding bin Laden, dead or alive. You don’t fight terrorists by attacking someone else.”

We know that there were at least two major terrorist training camps in pre-war Iraq (at Salman Pak and in the mountains of NE Iraq, near the Iranian border). We know that major terrorist leaders such as Carlos the Jackel, Abu Abbas, Abu Nidal and Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi were provided with safe haven in Iraq (al-Zarqawi after he was wounded in the fighting in Afghanistan). We know that Saddam was funneling money to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers through Abu Nidal’s organization. And we believed, as everyone else did, that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons and was attempting to aquire nuclear weapons as well. This is tangential?

“And yes, I do think that it would be preferable to have Hussein in power than to have lost everything we and the Iraqis have lost over the past three years.”

What have the Iraqis lost over the last three years? They’ve lost a brutal dictator who was responsible for deaths of tens or even hundreds of thousands of Shi’ites and Kurds. Who diverted funds from the Oil-For-Food program to clandestinely buy weapons from the Russians, Chinese and maybe even the French and Germans and to build more palaces for himself. As for us, we’ve spent a lot of blood and treasure to do what Bush the Elder should have done in 1991. And (hopefully) learned a bitter lesson in the folly of leaving a task half finished

“We are now learning that Hussein was a paranoid and somewhat enfeebled leader, more like King Lear than Joseph Stalin.”

Paranoid I won’t argue with, but enfeebled? I’d seriously like to know what you’re basing that assesment on.

“His sons were unstable and unpredictable.”

You’re right about Uday (sp?), especially after the attempt on his life, but Qusay (sp?) seemed perfectly capable of taking over from his father when the time came, unless you know something I don’t. And even if you’re right, do you really want a couple of psycopaths ruling a country with enough money to buy its way into the nuclear club?

“His regime pretended to have WMD but the cupboard was bare.”

And just how do you know that? We know he HAD chemical weapons; he used them against the Kurds and the Iranians. So what happened to them? Did he move them to Syria? Did he bury them in the desert? Or do you believe he finally got religion (pun intended) and destroyed them?

“The regime would ultimately have fallen of its own weight.”

Again, how do you know that? Between the money diverted from Oil-For-Food and the increasingly ineffective sanctions, it didn’t look to me as if Saddam or his brats were going anywhere anytime soon.

“The more we learn about Iraq, the more we realize that the any threat they posed to us was insignificant compared to Al Qaeda, Iran, or North Korea.”

We apparently didn’t invade Iran at the time because of the belief Iraq was further along in it’s development and stockpiling of WMDs than Iran was (I’ll concede that that’s debatable). We didn’t invade North Korea at the time because they apparently already possessed nuclear weapons and no country in possession of nukes has ever been invaded (three guesses as to why). As for Al Qaeda, you seem to be making the same mistake that a lot of people (both liberal and conservative) make: terrorist=Al Qaeda. Terrorist organizations may work together against a shared enemy, but that doesn’t mean that they all take their marching orders from a single leader. I suspect that it’s far more like the Mafia in the thirties, forties and fifties; each “family” doing it’s own thing and coming together to oppose common enemies, work out territorial disputes, share information, etc. The way to deal with Al Qaeda, Ansar al-Islam or any other terrorist organization is to cut off their funding and bring down the regimes that provide them with safe haven. We’re doing at least one (and I strongly suspect both) of those things now in Iraq.

“So to answer your question: I think it would be far preferable to have kept our powder dry so we can protect ourselves against those who have attacked us or those who are developing (or already have) nuclear weapons.”

In other words, wait until terrorists attack us again and inflict thousands more deaths. Or wait until nations that sponsor terrorism have achieved their goal of developing and manufacturing WMDs and share those weapons with their terrorist clients. Sorry peter, that’s way too late.
45 r4d20 Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 8:40 pm
Another one who loves the war on terro so long as he doesn’t have to sacrifice a thing..

Go back to jerking your meat while thinking of naked arab men getting sodomized by broomsticks.
46 america hating lefty Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 8:54 pm
Congressional Investigations commense in January ‘08. The GOP is screwed. They are all going to jail.
47 Mark Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 9:25 pm
r4d20, that’s just brilliant. Thanks for the nice addition to the debate…
48 dave Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 10:59 pm
Instead of knocking yourself out by retyping that whole list of talking points Unka Karl faxed you, next time, why not just post a picture of you with Bush’s **** in your mouth? It’ll save you time, and it says the same thing…
49 Aaron Says:
April 23rd, 2006 at 11:39 pm
Wow! As if one wasn’t enough already, dave further proves that liberals are incapable not only of forming a cohesive argument, but of adhering to polite conversation etiquette altogether.
50 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 12:41 am
Dave, I censored you. Listen, you can call me anything you want, but you will keep it clean, or you won’t comment here. Fair warning - maybe you didn’t know we were adults. But come round here with that trash again and you will be banned…
51 too many steves Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 4:47 am
Alfredo: taxes are theft in that the government is taking the property of individuals by force (threat of jail). You say this is okay because we need the money for services such as roads and defense and such. I say ‘okay’ but it still is theft.

I agree with you that we should pay for the services we use. I pay for the roads via the portion of the price of gasoline for my car that goes to the government. Or a least that’s what is supposed to happen but my local government uses gasoline fees for other stuff.

We agree on this much though: there are few serious fiscal conservatives (deficit hawks) left in our national government.
52 peter Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 7:48 am
I think that fatman’s points are well-taken, and I would respond as follows. (And by the way, how does that italics thing work?)

1) Iraq was one of several countries which have supported terrorists. Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Syria, Libya, the UAE,, Iran, and Indonesia have all supported or turned a blind eye to terrorists. However, we did invade any of them. US foreign policy has never been to declare war because a country harbors terrorists. Moreover, as far as I am aware, Iraq was not harboring any of the terrorists you mentioned at the time we attacked him.

The fact is that we were attacked by Al Qaeda. Bin Laden and many of his top people are still alive and well. (Could you imagine what we would hear from Republicans if there was a Democratic administration and bin Laden was free nearly five years after 9/11?). Not only have we been unable to capture him, but we gave him the best recruiting tool he could ever hope for. I’m all for fighting terrorist, but when you do so, you should shoot the other guy and not your own foot.

2) “What have the Iraqis lost over the last three years?” If you take Bush’s estimate of 30,000 dead, you have the equivalent of one hundred 9/11’s for a country of Iraq’s size. I’m amazed anyone could ask this question.

3) Re the Hussein family: of course it’s pure speculation what would have happened had we not invaded Iraq, but reporting from the trial and elsewhere shows Hussein to be a man who was indecisive, paranoid, and always fearful that each day would be his last because he apparently didn’t even trust those in his inner circle. It also seems that his kids were universally detested. I read these reports in the paper editions of the Times and the Economist – I’ll see if I can dig up something online.

4) What happened to Saddam’s WMD? My guess is that, like everything else, the magnitude of his stockpiles was vastly exaggerated. What we do know is that there were no WMD to be found, and no evidence of recent activity to acquire them. (The meeting in Niger, which the administration seized upon to justify the invasion, happened four years before we invaded).

5) You implicitly agree with my statement (Iran and North Korea are far greater threats), and I am sure you are correct that Al Qaeda is more of a loose confederation than something with a corporate structure (for lack of a better phrase). However, we did not invade Iraq to cut off Al Qaeda funding and safe havens. I am not aware of any reports that Iraq funded Al Qaeda, and any haven provided to its members was transitory and well before we attacked them.

6) The issue of a pre-emptive war is complex, and I think there are times when it can be justified, but only when there is a clear and immediate danger. The Cuban missile crisis may fall in this category. However, the danger from Iraq was neither clear nor immediate – in fact, it was minimal and distant. Iraq did not have any weapons to threaten us, nor did they have the means to deliver them. If they decided to restart WMD programs, it would have been years before they could do anything. There are a lot of Iraqi kids who will grow up without parents because of an American policy mistake. To me, that is a very shameful thing.
53 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 8:09 am
To do italics put “< i>” (without the quotes) at the start of what you want to italicize, and “< /i>” (without the quotes) at the end…
54 tom Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 8:12 am
Yep, Iraq is turning into a real picnic. Why can’t those idiotic democrates see what a paradise we are creating? One that is the envy of all the other Arab nations. Why I bet they cannot wait to see the American bombers!

Sarcasm of course-though I doubt many of the Bush cult members can see it.
55 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 8:13 am
Yes, and there are millions of Iraqi kids who will grow up with a chance at real freedom that they would never have otherwise had…to me, not to acknowledge that is a very shameful thing…
56 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 8:20 am
Thanks for pointing out the sarcasm - if you find any Bush cult members, let us know!…
57 peter Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 8:52 am
Mark: if Iraq turns into a democracy — a big if — then certainly the Iraqis will benefit. However, at this point it seems at least equally likely that Iraq will spin off into an ungovernable mess where one group fights another for the next one hundred years. We simply don’t know. I don’t think we should invade countries based on what might happen in the future.

Is your argument that American military force should be used to invade other countries to impose our form of government on them?

And if so, who gave us the right to do that?
58 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:11 am
No, my argument is that it’s more intellectually honest to use a moral calculus that acknowledges the brutality of the Hussein regime as well as the unfortunate Iraqis murdered by terrorists (keep in mind U.S. troops don’t intentionally target civilians, unless you happen to get your information from the Huffington Post or Daily Kos). You speak of the Iraqi children who have lost parents in this war, and that’s indeed sad. How about the Iraqi children and husbands sent videotapes of their mothers and other relatives being raped by the Baathists? And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

How about this story from the same link?

A woman known as ”Um Haydar” was beheaded reportedly without charge or trial at the end of December 2000. She was 25 years’ old and married with three children. Her husband was sought by the security authorities reportedly because of his involvement in Islamist armed activities against the state. He managed to flee the country. Men belonging to Feda’iyye Saddam came to the house in al-Karrada district and found his wife, children and his mother. Um Haydar was taken to the street and two men held her by the arms and a third pulled her head from behind and beheaded her in front of the residents. The beheading was also witnessed by members of the Ba’ath Party in the area. The security men took the body and the head in a plastic bag, and took away the children and the mother-in-law. The body of Um Haydar was later buried in al-Najaf. The fate of the children and the mother-in-law remains unknown.

In another post you put the crime of torture on the heads of Americans - well, what happened at Abu Ghraib was a disgrace - but it was punished, and it involved nothing like the brutality that was a part of life under Saddam.

Just because the war hasn’t been as smooth as we hope doesn’t mean it wasn’t a moral net plus…
59 matt Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:20 am
Of course Bush’s plan is here to stay. It’s an entitlement program, and entitlement programs are impossible to repeal.

I am chuckling at your transparent hypocrisy in cheering the ’success’ of this program.
60 matt Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:24 am
Mark-

That’s not moral calculus, it’s emotionalism. You do a disservice to the terms of mathematics by associating them with your fuzzy-headed irrational litany of atrocities that serves only to bury rational cost benefit analysis in a torrent of glycerine tears.
61 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:35 am
matt, take the log out of your own eye…I didn’t cheer the success of the program, I said it was prohibitively costly in my view.

As to your contemptible reference to the must brutal, sadistic acts of torture (taken directly from Amnesty International), and referring to that as emotionalism, I can only say shame on you; you should pray you never have to worry about such ‘emotionalism’.

Moral calculus is a different thing from mathematics, and you can educate yourself with any search engine. I don’t have the time or the inclination to teach you basic philosophy.
62 matt Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:43 am
Mark-

As a non-idiot I am aware that ‘moral calculus’ is a term in common use - I was simply noting that in ordinary usage the term implies some kind of actual calculation, not the sort of emotional drivel you are purveying whose purpose is transparently to shut off all reasoning and calculation. I note that you immediately stoop to the ad hominem, making the typical fallacious implication that by my noting the emotionalism of your post, I am somehow belittling the fate of the victims. This is a very precise demonstration of the way this sort of argument is used to shut off rationality; hence my objection to the use of mathematical terms in the vicinity.
63 matt Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:46 am
Let me close with this - foreign policy is always a matter of balancing considerations and dealing with the law of unintended consequences. States are not compelled to action by every statement of harm because there are limits to power. Rational discussions can only proceed with these basic ‘reality rules’ in place. Those who choose to discuss foreign policy without acknowledging this reality-based intellectual framework are nonserious, basically at the level of ’some drunk guy at the bar’…
64 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 9:47 am
Again, the fact that you can refer to an accounting of truly abominable atrocities as ‘emotional drivel’ says volumes about yourself. You’re right, I don’t care to have a discussion of such nonsense…
65 peter Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 10:11 am
Geez, I pack a lunch for my daughter, pick up some coffee, get to the office, and it’s turned into the Jerry Springer Show.

In answer to post 58 (64 posts? Is that a record?):

1) It is absolutely true that the bulk of the deaths are caused by Iraqis, and that the military takes utmost care to prevent the loss of civilian life. However, I think we bear a large share of the moral responsibility for innocent deaths, even if Iraqis planted the bombs, because it was our act of toppling the government and destabilizing the country which led to the insurgency and the sectarian violence. These things would not have happened if we chose not to invade Iraq.

Now, you can argue that Hussein’s regime was worse, that there may be a brighter day ahead, etc., which makes the war a “moral net plus.” Based on what we have seen thus far, I don’t think you can make that case. Based on what may happen, we can’t tell. However, I think the important distinction is that we had no responsibility for the heinous things which Saddam did, but we are very culpable for the misery which the country has seen since we went in. There have always been sadistic and brutal leaders, and there always will be. Regime change for the purpose of deposing a hated dictator has never been American foreign policy, and for both moral and practical reasons. It is not our responsibility to be judge, jury, and executioner.

However, I would ask this: if, as you imply above, you do not agree that “American military force should be used to invade other countries to impose our form of government on them,” then what is the justification for us to be in Iraq?
66 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 10:28 am
peter, we’ve covered this ground before. There were many reasons to invade Iraq, but the most pressing was that it was a long-term security threat to the United States. I still believe that to be 100% true, despite the poor intelligence that resulted in the WMD embarrassment. Let’s remember that we can’t retroactively apply our current knowledge to the decision at the time, however, and that the ENTIRE WORLD, more or less, took it as a given that Saddam had WMDs, even if there was widespread disagreement about what to do about it…
67 Alfredo Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
I’ve gotten EPU’d.

Mark, I appreciate your reply to my “theoretical” arguments on the multiplier effect. You did not ridicule it at all.

You’re right: consumer spending does remain high in spite of the Iraqi war. The flipside of this is that the savings rate is troublingly low.

A direct effect of the current dissavings can be seen in the large (excessive) debt that has been piled up by consumers during the past few years.

Another (less obvious) source of funding, I’d argue, is the following:

The equity (i.e., wealth) that consumers have been able to build during the unprecedent U.S. economic expansion of the Clinton years.

Anecdotally, I can tell you that many of the people I know — family, friends, colleagues, and former colleagues — have been digging into their savings in a material way over the last five years. And not because of life-cycle reasons; rather, because of a combination of job losses and shrinking wages that have characterized the Bush administration.

I’d gladly discuss this in a separate discussion thread. Thanks for your input.
68 Alfredo Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 2:55 pm
peter says: “However, I think the important distinction is that we had no responsibility for the heinous things which Saddam did”

Whilst it’s true that we had no direct responsibility, we did have some indirect responsibility. Lest we forget:

1. Saddam was our chief ally in the 1980s.
2. We supported Saddam with intelligence and weaponry during his decade-long war against Iran.
3. Most recently — after Saddam went from being our ally to being the “Hitler” of the mid-East in the 1990s –, the first Bush administration stood idly by whilst Saddam supressed, and brutally murdered, the Kurds and other opposition forces following the first Iraqi war.
69 Alfredo Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 3:10 pm
Mark says: “the most pressing [reason for invading Iraq] was that it was a long-term security threat to the United States.”

Let me play devil’s advocate for a moment:

If, as you suggest, Iraq was a long-term threat – not an immediate or short-term threat, but a long-term threat –, then isn’t this the right war in the wrong time?
70 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 3:59 pm
Well, implicit in your query is the idea that there was no reason to do what we did ‘now’ (with now being March 2003). But we had a Saddam Hussein who had been violating the terms of the ceasefire following Gulf War I for 12 years by the point, and a sanctions regime that was crumbling and threatening to fall apart all together under French and Russian corruption with Oil-For-Food. So ‘now’ was a decade overdue, already.

The other way I would respond to ‘right war, wrong time’ is to ask when the right time would have been…explicit in the National Security strategy adopted in the wake of 9/11 was preemption, with the interpretation that we need not wait until you attack to fight back - not a new concept, but one that was singled out for stress. Saddam was a threat to his neighbors, a source of funding for Palestinian terrorism, and an inhuman tryant. None of these things depending on stockpiles of WMDs to be true.

Add to that recent revelations revealing a more cozy relationship between al-Qaeda and Saddam than we have previously known or suspected (I’m not saying involvement in 9/11 - I don’t believe Saddam was involved, period; I’m talking about communication channels and the harboring of fugitives, things of that nature), and you have a pretty solid case for believing the choice was the correct one, despite the painfully sorrowful casualties we and the Iraqis have suffered…
71 Alfredo Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 5:29 pm
Mark,

I think we’ll have to agree to disagree. But before resting my argument, I’d like to use an analytical tool that you’ve alluded to rather frequently in your blog: cost-benefit.

A cost-benefit analysis of the war in Iraq would summarily reveal that the costs incurred to date far outstrip the benefits — with no improvement in site.

Our actions have significantly de-stabilized the region; strengthened our most vociferous enemy, Iran; radicalized a large and growing number of otherwise secular Muslims; made friends of former natural enemies – Osama’s jihadists and non-radical Muslims – against a common enemy, the U.S., etc., etc., etc.

I have not even mentioned the thousands and thousands of lives that have been lost or permanently crippled in this war.

Now, one could argue whether these losses are due to poor execution or dubious war rationale. I’d reply by saying, Both.

That which starts poorly, ends poorly.
72 Alfredo Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 5:36 pm
Mark,

I think we’ll have to agree to disagree. But before resting my argument, I’d like to use an analytical tool that you’ve alluded to rather frequently in your blog: cost-benefit.

A cost-benefit analysis of the war in Iraq would summarily reveal that the costs incurred to date far outstrip the benefits — with no improvement in sight.

Our actions have significantly de-stabilized the region; strengthened our most vociferous enemy, Iran; radicalized a large and growing number of otherwise secular Muslims; made friends of former natural enemies – Osama’s jihadists and non-radical Muslims – against a common enemy, the U.S., etc., etc., etc.

I have not even mentioned the thousands and thousands of lives that have been lost or permanently crippled in this war.

Now, one could argue whether these losses are due to poor execution or dubious war rationale. I’d reply by saying, Both.

That which starts poorly, ends poorly.
73 Aaron Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 5:49 pm
Wait a minute! There were seventy posts a minute ago. Now only 67 (or 68 now I suppose). What happened?
74 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 5:50 pm
That IS strange…maybe my spam filter went and zapped a couple? I noticed it, too…
75 Mark Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 5:55 pm
Yep, it was the spam filter - it doesn’t like you, Alfredo! Sorry it keeps eating your comments - I do check it regularly to make sure I try to recover real posts that get inadvertently marked as spam…in any event, we’ve enjoyed your contribution, so sorry for the frustration…
76 Ryan Bonneville Says:
April 24th, 2006 at 10:23 pm
Wow, this thing has gotten huge. I just want to post again so I can be at the beginning and the end.

Also, on the Iraq War, I was a supporter from the beginning. In fact, long before the war began I was a vocal advocate of using American military power to spread freedom. Peter, you claim that we were not responsible for Saddam’s atrocities but are responsible for those that have happened since he was deposed, and that’s moral cowardice at its greatest. We are human beings and our country possesses the greatest forces for freedom on this Earth - diplomatic, military, and economic. For us to stand idly by while people are oppressed and slaughtered because it isn’t our problem is reprehensible. Who else is going to fix it? The Iraqi dissenters were too busy being raped and shot, if I recall correctly.

That said, to claim that we’ve actually made the world better by removing Saddam is a long shot in the extreme. My position that the U.S. military should be used to make people more free rests on the assumption that that’s what we’re actually doing with it. In very few senses are the people of Iraq more free now than they were with Saddam around and, on top of that, we’ve put Iran in a position to be a whole lot worse for a whole lot longer. This war has been a near-total disaster and I sincerely doubt that I would advocate so forcefully for it if given another chance.

I join TWL in agreeing with Peter: Bush is clearly unfit for office. Those who continue to defend him are either lying or delusional. Mark, I apologize for saying that to you, but I can’t see how you can stand by this man. His presidency is a failure.
77 peter Says:
April 25th, 2006 at 7:46 am
I have no problem using diplomatic or economic leverage against corrupt regimes. I also have no problem using military force to end ethnic cleansing (e.g., Bosnia), to defeat an invader (the first gulf war), or to defend allies (World War II). I do have a problem using military force to invade a sovereign state which has not attacked us.

I do not think we should have invaded Pol Pot’s Cambodia, Idi Amin’s Uganda, Mao’s China, Stalin’s Russia, or today’s Burma, all of which are as bad or worse than Hussein’s Iraq. It has never been American foreign policy to topple unsavory regimes, and (in my opinion) for good reason.
78 fatman Says:
April 26th, 2006 at 1:34 am
In very tardy reply (sorry about that) to peter’s post (#52):

I think that fatman’s points are well-taken, and I would respond as follows. (And by the way, how does that italics thing work?)

1) Iraq was one of several countries which have supported terrorists. Saudi Arabia, North Korea, Syria, Libya, the UAE,, Iran, and Indonesia have all supported or turned a blind eye to terrorists. However, we did invade any of them. US foreign policy has never been to declare war because a country harbors terrorists. Moreover, as far as I am aware, Iraq was not harboring any of the terrorists you mentioned at the time we attacked him.

The fact is that we were attacked by Al Qaeda. Bin Laden and many of his top people are still alive and well. (Could you imagine what we would hear from Republicans if there was a Democratic administration and bin Laden was free nearly five years after 9/11?). Not only have we been unable to capture him, but we gave him the best recruiting tool he could ever hope for. I’m all for fighting terrorist, but when you do so, you should shoot the other guy and not your own foot.

It’s true that the countries you named did and/or do support terrorism or look the other way. However, only two of those countries–North Korea and Iraq–were believed to have WMD. And since North Korea had nuclear weapons and was testing intermediate-range missiles, we couldn’t invade without the risk of getting our troops vaporised (and maybe the cities of Seoul, Manilla, and Tokyo as well). Thus it made more sense to deal with North Korea diplomatically, which we’re trying to do. Of the rest, Iraq, based on what we thought we knew at the time, seemed to be the biggest threat, and thus was dealt with militarily. As for Al Qaeda, while Bin Laden is still on the loose, I was under the impression that we had rounded up or killed a good many of his lieutenants. Correct me if I’m wrong.

Of the terrorists I named, 1) Abu Nidal was openly in Iraq when he either committed suicide or (more likely) was murdered by Saddam’s security forces in 2002. 2) Abu Abbas (of Achille Lauro infamy) was captured just south of Bagdhad by U.S. forces in 2003 and ended up dying while in custody. 3) Abu Moussab al-Zarqawi went to Iraq after he was wounded in the fighting in Afghanistan. There he founded Ansar al-Islam (now known as Al Qaeda in Iraq), a terrorist group that operated the training camp in NE Iraq and launched attacks against the Kurds. And whom Saddam refused to extradite to Jordan when King Abdullah personally requested it (al Zarqawi is a Jordanian national). Only Carlos the Jackal was arrested elswhere

2) “What have the Iraqis lost over the last three years?” If you take Bush’s estimate of 30,000 dead, you have the equivalent of one hundred 9/11’s for a country of Iraq’s size. I’m amazed anyone could ask this question.

While I agree that 30,000 innocent civilians killed is a horrible price to pay, compare that to the estimated one million Kuwaitis, Kurds, Iraqi Shi’ites and Iranians who died during the twenty-four years of Saddams’s regime. Many of them after Bush the Elder left the Shi’ites hanging out to dry in 1991.

3) Re the Hussein family: of course it’s pure speculation what would have happened had we not invaded Iraq, but reporting from the trial and elsewhere shows Hussein to be a man who was indecisive, paranoid, and always fearful that each day would be his last because he apparently didn’t even trust those in his inner circle. It also seems that his kids were universally detested. I read these reports in the paper editions of the Times and the Economist – I’ll see if I can dig up something online.

As you say, pure speculation. Paranoia is the lot brutal dictators. And Iraq under Saddam sounds a lot like late Imperial Rome, where the army controlled the people, the Praetorian Guard controlled the rest of the army, and Ceasar worried about how to control the Praetorian Guard. But even if you’re right, how long would it have taken? How many more people would have died in Saddam’s torture chambers? And what other mischief would he and his brats have gotten up to?

4) What happened to Saddam’s WMD? My guess is that, like everything else, the magnitude of his stockpiles was vastly exaggerated. What we do know is that there were no WMD to be found, and no evidence of recent activity to acquire them. (The meeting in Niger, which the administration seized upon to justify the invasion, happened four years before we invaded).

Maybe so, but I seem to recall Hans Blix reporting that there were some 600 to 1,000 tons of materials from Saddam’s WMD program unaccounted for (No, I can’t remember where I read it and every time I try a Google search, I end in sensory overload). I also recall that troops found 500 tons of unrefined uranium and 1.8 metric tons of yellowcake at a place called Tuwaitha (BBC, 21 June, 2003). And we have found equipment that could have been used to produce chemical and biological weapons.

5) You implicitly agree with my statement (Iran and North Korea are far greater threats), and I am sure you are correct that Al Qaeda is more of a loose confederation than something with a corporate structure (for lack of a better phrase). However, we did not invade Iraq to cut off Al Qaeda funding and safe havens. I am not aware of any reports that Iraq funded Al Qaeda, and any haven provided to its members was transitory and well before we attacked them.

North Korea was then, and is now a greater threat than Iraq, but as I said before, one best handled diplomatically if possible. And while Iran may now be greater threat than Iraq was then, at the time nobody that I know of thought that. Which is why we invaded Iraq first. There also appears to be a much larger and better organized oppostion to Iran’s theocracy then there was to Hussein’s dictatorship, which gives us hope that the Iranians may institute regime change on their own.

6) The issue of a pre-emptive war is complex, and I think there are times when it can be justified, but only when there is a clear and immediate danger. The Cuban missile crisis may fall in this category. However, the danger from Iraq was neither clear nor immediate – in fact, it was minimal and distant. Iraq did not have any weapons to threaten us, nor did they have the means to deliver them. If they decided to restart WMD programs, it would have been years before they could do anything. There are a lot of Iraqi kids who will grow up without parents because of an American policy mistake. To me, that is a very shameful thing.

peter, you and I are going to have to agree to disagree on this point. To wait until your enemy has marshalled all of his forces and weapons and is ready to attack is sheer lunacy when those weapons include WMD. That way lies far higher casualty counts, military and civilian, than we’ve seen in Iraq so far. Far better to take him before he’s ready and (hopefully) minimize the loss of life.

As for shameful policy mistakes, Bush the Elder’s encouraging the Iraqi Shi’ites to rise up against Saddam and then abandoning them was far more shameful and (I suspect) cost far more innocent civilians their lives than anything Bush the Younger has done. What Bush the Younger is doing now is correcting that very shameful policy mistake.
79 fatman Says:
April 26th, 2006 at 1:35 am
Sorry about the long-winded rants, Mark.
80 Mark Says:
April 26th, 2006 at 6:24 am
Hey, rant away anytime!…
81 Pink Floyd Says:
August 20th, 2006 at 9:53 pm
Dittos to Mark and his pointed questions of the Dem’s “6 Point Plan”. Strangely, the Plan does not address the war on terrorism and illegal immigration. Another “point” the Dem’s should (but dare not until in office) is “gun control” or as they put it - “gun safety”. Remember what Sen. Feinstein said on “60 Minutes” in reference to Clinton’s “assault weapons” ban. She said if she knew she had the votes she’d would have said it’s time to turn them (guns) in Mr. and Mrs. America.
I guess the Dem’s want what Great Britain has an escalating violent crime rate even with a ban on handguns since 1997 and very strict controls on long arms. Even with a Cambridge U study “Firearms Control” by Colin Greenwood back in ‘71 concluded there was no connection between gun control laws and violent crime. Back early this century, Britain was a benevolent society with very low crime rate when there was NO GUN CONTROL LAWS. The study showed that social and cultural mores affected crime rates. And again the King’s College of London released their study “Illegal Firearms in the UK” in 2002 stated the same.
But don’t take my word for it on this issue. Here’s a challenge to the skeptics. Log onto any of Britain’s papers - The Times, The Telegraph, The Guardian, etc. and do a subject search and see what articles pop up. You might even come across a call to ban knives as another insane bureaucratic answer to their violent crime.