Amitai Etzioni Notes

The Democrats' Failing Micro Politics

Jeffrey Toobin's thorough profile of Sen. Chuck Schumer in a recent issue of the New Yorker provides valuable insights into the micro politics that the Democrats practice these days.

Schumer worked with Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) to advance a bill that would provide $15 billion to exempt private-sector employers from paying the 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax in 2010 for any new hires who had been unemployed for at least 60 days. However, the bill -- known as the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act or the Schumer-Hatch Bill -- is so small in a $14 rillion economy that it hardly can be expected to do any good.

Moreover, Toobin quotes Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, who correctly observes, "the Schumer-Hatch tax credit will probably create almost no jobs." Firms hire so many new workers every month -- upwards of 4 million -- that employers are getting a tax credit for employees they would have hired anyway. The tax credit is too small -- amounting to $1,000 per new hire -- to incentivize additional hiring. "It truly is money for nothing," says Baker.

Schumer argues that the bill will have semi-magical, psychological effects. "When I got to Washington, I used to think, Oh, you know, politics, it's a lot of hype and fluff. But you go to the markets and they are immutable and you can't fool them. And, the longer I'm around, I think it's the market's psychology that matters dramatically. So if the local businessman thinks, hey, they've got a good plan here, and over the next two or three years the economy is going to get going, he is likely to spend more -- all because of the little Schumer-Hatch proposal." 

And Schumer hopes that the Democrats will be rewarded for such maneuvers. In his words, "The Republicans vote no, we win -- and, if the Republicans vote yes, we win." All this shows how unreal politicians have become and why such large segments of the American electorate holds that Washington is not working for them.

Give Them an Out

The U.S. Department of Justice should draft a contract for every American who opposes "big government" and wishes to cut it down and have their taxes slashed. The contract should stipulate that those who sign it will have to pay only a third of the regular tax rate (to cover the costs of our military and homeland security). However, in exchange they will not be entitled to any government services. 

They will not be able to obtain passports, enter public parks, or use the highway system paid for by the federal government. They will all go on the no-fly list because they have not paid for the air control system. They will have to take their children out of public schools. Above all, if they grow ill, they will have to pay the doctors a fee that will help cover the costs of training these physicians which is now largely covered by the federal government. If they are hospitalized, they will have to pay their share of the building costs, also often largely covered by the federal government, including of the so called "private" hospitals.

The contract will of course have to be much longer. In effect, I suspect that it will extend to at least 20 single-spaced pages. However, you get the point. We shall never be able to gain a hearing from the millions who have been brainwashed by the libertarian nonsense and its laissez-faire conservative accompaniments until we find a dramatic way to drive home the point that although there is great room -- in effect, urgent need -- to reform our government, nobody really wants to live without most of the services it does provide. And if a bunch of libertarians want to sign the contract and move to some mountaintop and take care of each other, so be it. Just remind them not to call 911 in an emergency.

Return of the Hooverites

The Republicans are willing to put the brakes on now despite the fact that the economy has not gained enough lift to take off. Indeed, their deficit-mongering is already causing a drag, which is slowing down the economy, and may well make it crash again. It is precisely the policy that Hoover notoriously embraced.

More surprising is that many Democrats do not dare point out the ill effects of this GOP maneuver. Privately they acknowledge that more stimulus is now needed and that deficits will become a problem only later, but they claim this sounds like "political double speak." For that reason they, too, tend to at least make Hooverite noises.

However, when I asked a bunch of primary school kids if they understood that the need for heating in the winter does not deny the need for air conditioning in the summer, sure to follow, they had no difficulties in coping with such a 'complex' thought.

Neither did Ben Bernanke, who testified before a House committee early in June this year that, in the succinct words of The Wall Street Journal, "if Congress pursued more fiscal stimulus to sustain the recovery, it should be accompanied by a concrete plan to bring the deficit back into line in the long run. But he [Bernanke] indicated the economy is too fragile to begin reducing the gap now."

Moreover, only a very untutored reading of public opinion polls will lead one to conclude that the public favors deficit reduction now. Thus, asked if they are concerned about the federal debt, a large majority expressed concern -- but only because this is a so-called "no costs" question. It is like asking if you like to have a free dinner. Much more revealing is that when Americans were asked what they would rather spend money on -- cutting the deficit or creating jobs -- more people favored jobs over deficit reduction (by 50 percent to 42%). Another poll shows only 30 percent willing to make cuts in government spending on health care or education to reduce the deficit, versus 62 percent who are opposed! More are willing to cut the military budget, but not as many as those who would rather not reduce the deficit.

President Truman once remarked that if you run a Republican (meaning a Democrat who acts like a Republican) against a Republican, a Republican will win every time. The same holds here. If Democrats try to compete as to who is the holier deficit cutter, expect the Republicans to win. This is not merely bad news for the Democrats, but for the country. The economy now needs more lift, not more drag.

* * *

The very framing of the debate whether now is the time to focus on generating jobs or reducing deficits plays into the hands of the deficit hawks. Deficits supposedly are going to devastate us all, including our children and grandchildren. Jobs are missing for a minority. Dedicating funds to "them" is a form of transfer payment. This wording makes one lose sight of the fact that when more people work, we all benefit. Let's hence put it in terms of what we do now need - more or less business?

Shameless

If you believe that corporations would be willing to make a little less money in order not to put the nation - their nation - at risk, you should read Richard Clarke’s excellent, just-issued book, Cyber War.

As Clarke reports, prior to the 1990s, the Pentagon made extensive use of specialized software designed by in-house programmers and a few defense contractors. But under pressure from libertarian ideologues and business’s lobbyists, the Pentagon began to use commercial software instead – in particular, Microsoft software.  However, it turned out that Microsoft had built a low-cost brand and based a principle of “one format for all” –  rather than software that was tailored to special security needs. Problems soon arose, including, as Clarke recounts, a 1997 incident when the USS Yorktown, a Ticonderoga-class cruiser whose ship operations were administered on computers running Windows NT, was rendered inoperable after Windows crashed. “When the Windows system crashed, as Windows often does,” Clarke writes, “the cruiser became a floating i-brick, dead in the water.” After this and a “legion of other failures of Windows-based systems,” the Pentagon considered a shift to free, open-source operating systems like Linux. The code of open-source software can be altered by the user, and so the government would be free to change the software without interference from companies jealously guarding their design. It is also free.  

Such a switch, though, would have been disastrous for Microsoft’s lucrative dealings with the government. The company was already fiercely opposed to regulation of its products’ security; it did not want the added delay and cost of improving its software in order to decrease its vulnerability. If the government switched to open-source software, it could make the improvements itself – but doing so would deal a major blow to Microsoft’s profits. So Microsoft moved to prevent the government from exploring any alternatives. It “went on the warpath,” writes Clarke, threatening to “stop cooperating” with the government if it adopted an open-source platform. It made major campaign contributions and hired a small army of lobbyists. Clarke outlines their purpose as: “don’t regulate security in the software industry, don’t let the Pentagon stop using our software no matter how many security flaws it has, and don’t say anything about software production overseas or deals with China." (China security experts feared, could plant logic bombs and malware into the software.)

Clarke reports that Microsoft insiders admitted that the company “really did not take security seriously,” because “there was no real alternative to its software, and they were swimming in money from their profits."

Nothing has changed since these lines were written last year – and a sitting-duck Navy cruiser is just one example of security risks caused by private corporations’ consistent practice of preferring profits over protecting the nation.

In 2007 an unknown intruder infiltrated the networks of the Departments of State, Defense, and Commerce, and all of the military agencies. The intruder stole an amount of information roughly equal to the entire Library of Congress.

In addition to the theft of sensitive information, a successful cyber attack could dismantle America’s power supply for extended periods of time. Conducting a test, the Department of Energy found that it could hack into a 27-ton power generator control, and remotely causing it to destroy itself. (The generators are run by private companies who are not subject to regulation forcing them to secure their sites – sites which can be accessed and directed using a normal Internet connection.)  The utility companies’ resistance to cyber security regulation echoes the position of Microsoft, which has stymied the government’s efforts even while expanding its business into government activities.

When it comes to cyber attacks, the bottom line for the public is increased defense. But again and again, private corporations have demonstrated that they have a very different bottom line in mind.

Needed: A Progressive Story

In preparing for the 2010 midterm election, we need a progressive summit to prepare a shared narrative and shared positions. Currently, progressive groups are each pulling in a different direction, favoring distinct tactics, promoting their own rationales. True, despite all the talk about a "progressive movement," there is no way to cobble the various progressive groups into one coherent force. However, one can find what political philosophers call "overlapping consensuses." That is, instead of seeking one agreed-upon platform and strategy, progressives should identify major points all can agree to promote.

The Missing Narrative
Successful political movements have a narrative that usually takes an historical form. The narrative provides an account of the forces that got us into our current predicament and the rising forces that will save us, and an image of the more perfect union that we are going to reach once we put our shoulders to the wheel.

The most effective narratives follow the same pattern, one which is found in the Bible and in Marx. Once, we were in a state of grace (the Garden of Eden, the early commune); we sinned (took a bite from the forbidden apple, technological developments advanced a new ruling class); we must atone for our sins (pray, organize); and we will return to nirvana (the Garden of Eden, a stateless commune). Call it the U-turn of the human narrative.

When I recently scoured the major progressive publications and interviewed a few progressive leaders, I could not find a progressive narrative.

Hence, the first task of the progressive movement is to compose a shared narrative. It must include a characterization of who bedevils us: Is it the military-industrial complex? Wall Street? Capitalism? The Christian Right? Or...? Who will save us: A rainbow coalition of minorities, feminists and labor unions? A new third party, à la Nader? A youth movement of the kind that served as the core of the Obama election? Or...? And last but not least: What is the end-state we are aspiring to bring about? What is our shining city?

The preceding are excerpts from an article that first appeared in The Nation.

Should Cool Obama Warm Up?

The political mavens who argue that President Obama has to be more expressive are barking up the wrong tree. The real question is if Obama has deep feelings (other than for his family) -- or is a cold fish. If his blood does not boil when Republicans and conservative Democrats, in the same breath, refuse to extend unemployment benefits but further cut taxes for business; when he finds out that mine owners and oil companies bribe regulators rather than protect the lives of their employees; if he cannot feel the pain unemployment still inflicts on us rather than deficits -- then he should not fake it and suddenly turn demonstrative.

President Reagan got it right when he responded to a suggestion by image maker Michael Deaver. Deaver urged the president take off the jacket of his suit, swing it over his soldiers, and walk into a press conference much more informally then he had up to that point. Reagan responded saying that "this is not me," that such moves would make him uncomfortable, and that voters would sense it -- even if they could not verbalize their unease.

Ditto for Obama. If he suddenly started shedding tears, say, for the hundred of miles of beaches that are about to be devastated, he will not gain support but lose one of the few things that he has going for him -- the people's sense that this is a man who has integrity. Cool but honest; restrained but thoughtful.

All this holds only if Obama's heart is as cold as he comes across. However, if deep in his chest there are buried some strong emotions, if he is holding back because he believes it is uncouth to voice one's feeling; if he keeps these feelings under the hood because he long ago learned not to fall prey to them -- then the time has come for some quick lessons by one of his many method-acting friends. Then he can learn to reach into his inner self and draw on these well-concealed emotions and air them. We (and he) would all be better for it.

In short, all those mavens -- from the Washington Post's David Broder to Maureen Dowd at the New York Times -- who insist that Obama should wear his feelings on his sleeves, must first find out: does he have any? I believe such emotions are to be found -- though the president has worked long and hard to convince us otherwise.

The NPT Test

Today the representatives of 188 nations (give or take a few) assembled in New York City to debate ways to revise the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The issue could not be more important. As President Obama's new Nuclear Posture Review declares, the greatest threats to global security are not the old Cold War adversaries but rogue states armed with nukes and terrorists with access to such bombs or the materials from which they can be made. Moreover, the NPT is severely challenged by Iran, which, the IAEA has repeatedly reported, is not living up to its obligations under the treaty. Other nations with nuclear ambitions are watching to see how the international community will react to Iran's violations, as they figure out their own military futures.

If one examines previous meetings of the NPT signatories, one does not find them very reassuring, to put it mildly. During the last meeting of this group -- which includes representatives of most nations of the world -- those present debated the agenda for two weeks, and then went home.

This time the meeting is viewed with special interest because President Obama is seeking to garner support from many nations that in the past were very critical of the U.S. and other nations that already have nukes for not living up to their commitment under the NPT, namely to give up their nukes. President Obama thus declared that indeed zero nukes is the goal, and showed that he means business by working out a treaty with Russia that would scale back the number deployed on the top of launchers. He also obtained a measure of new support from a recent meeting of 47 nations in Washington, to better secure the remaining nukes and blend down the materials from which they can be made.

How is one to assess the achievements of the NPT conference? I predict that much attention will be focused on the posturing of various nations (Iran is a member), criticisms of the members of the nuclear club (who still have enough nukes to kill most everyone three times over) and the nations that did not join the NPT (Pakistan, India, and Israel). Possibly some progress will be made in passing a resolution that urges the member nations to endorse the so-called "Additional Protocol," which widens the scope of IAEA inspections. However, the true test of the 2010 NPT conference lies elsewhere.

The NPT has one major, debilitating flaw. It has a loophole so large that aircraft carriers can sail through it unnoticed. The NPT allows a nation to build nuclear reactors using highly enriched uranium, which is weapons-grade material, as well as to build the facilities needed to enrich additional uranium to this level -- as long as the nation claims that these materials are to be used for peaceful purposes. The nation is then entitled to send a notice that it is quitting the treaty and three months later do so, taking with it all these facilities, and legally begin making bombs. A nation hence need not cheat, hide its bomb making from inspectors, or face criticism and possible UN sanctions. All it takes is basically a postcard.

Thus when one evaluates whether the NPT review conference is truly succeeding, or mainly dealing with atmospherics and debating points and possibly some secondary issue, ask whether this loophole is closed. My expectation? Do not hold your breath, lest you turn very blue.

J Street: In the Wrong Corner

Finally, there is a new Jewish lobby, said to be dedicated to the security of Israel, called J-Street. Sadly, from day one it defined Israel’s number one enemy as —another pro Israel lobby, another group of American Jews, namely, AIPAC. Jews have excelled in many areas, but in none have they done nearly as well as in hating each other and in generating factions and sub factions that fight one another, even when the enemy is at the gate. (There are already fights within J-Street).

Let Them Wear Scarves

Can you explain to me why thoughtful people, including several renowned public intellectuals, oppose the right of women to choose to wear headscarves--on campuses out of all places? The same people,  commentators, editors, and other talking heads who strongly hold that a woman has a right to do with her body whatever she pleases—third trimester abortions, abortions without notifying her husband, piercing everything that sticks out and a lot that does not—but not to cover her hair with a piece of cloth.

The Limits of Internationalism

In reaction to the busted unilateralism of the Bush Administration, internationalism is again in vogue. Watch out, lest you get what you are praying for. For a reminder of what the United Nations, the premier international body, is often like, see its recent treatment of hate speech.