U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
English: Official White House photo of President Bill Clinton, President of the United States. Русский: Президент США Билл Клинтон,официальное фото Белого Дома. Ελληνικά: Επίσημη φωτογραφία Λευκού Οίκου του Προέδρου Μπιλ Κλίντον, Προέδρου των ΗΠΑ (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Clintons came to power in 1992 selling what was known as the New Democrat philosophy. It was about moving to the center. It was ditching some of what was called the liberal baggage, both socially and on economic matters. Dems were also going to be tough on crime, Dems were also going to cut taxes. The Democrats had been out of power for so long, so consistently that a desperate party went for it. And Bill Clinton won two elections. It is true the black community also was lifted as the rising tide seemed to be lifting all boats.
But now that necessity is not there. The Dems will win in November no matter who the Republican nominee is and no matter who the Dem nominee is. The New Democrat compulsion like in 1992 is not there.
Bernie Sanders was a Liberal before, during and after 1992. He stayed a Liberal all along. He is a conviction Liberal. He is so Liberal, he refused to be a Democrat that entire time.
Is this a fight to finish where one philosophy wins and another loses but lives to see perhaps another day? Or is there a fusion possible? Could the New Democrat philosophy and the Liberal philosophy melded into one? Will an attempt be made?
Bill Clinton's outburst at the Black Lives Matter protesters was partly a calculated move to try and grab the liberal white voters, especially in his age group. But it might primarily have been a New Democrat knowing no other way. And it was partly also Bill Clinton liking some attention.
But at some level Bill Clinton fundamentally missed the point. The BLM movement is pointing at a structural problem in the country's criminal justice system.
In purely academic terms, three strikes and you are out is not bad if applied to violent crimes, but a fundamentally racist criminal justice system applying that to minor drug offenses is obviously racist and obviously wrong. One dollar can safely be leveraged to 1,000, done right, forget 30, which is where the market crashed in 2008, and ultimately all money everywhere and all monetary transactions will reside on one single, global blockchain, just like there is but one internet, but right now Bill Clinton's mixing up the banks in, I believe, 1999 gets blamed for 2008. W spending a trillion on tax cuts, another three trillion or so on Iraq and Afghanistan, and sending all sorts of wrong signals to Wall Street on greed (how do you outlaw the sin of greed?) is not talked about. But right now even a gifted politician like Bill Clinton comes across as tone deaf on these two issues. In 1992 the Sister Souljah comments was designed to grab the white votes. It might be a similar attempt now, but the ground has shifted. White liberals are not too keen on subtle racial messages that point the other way.
This move might have been a mistake. Or perhaps Bill Clinton is reading the writing on the wall, and is not liking it. The race was not supposed to be neck and neck. A New York primary was not supposed to ever matter. But this time the New York primary might decide who the next president is. Stranger things are known to happen.
But Black Lives Matter is not about Bill Clinton. Well, maybe now it is. Bill Clinton ran as a New Democrat, which basically was elbowing the Liberal, and it worked, but now that Liberal seems to be in vogue.
Bill Clinton is no doubt his wife’s double-edged sword: Though he is among the most charismatic politicians of his era, he’s also prone to saying things that make campaign life rather awkward. The big problem, however, isn’t just that Bill Clinton can’t keep his mouth shut. It’s that his right-leaning New Democrat policy record is a bad fit for today’s liberal politics. ...... Yesterday, speaking in Philadelphia, Clinton responded to protesters by defending two now-very-controversial bills that he signed into law: The 1994 Crime Bill, widely criticized for fueling mass incarceration, and so-called welfare reform, which dramatically reduced poor families’ access to cash aid. ..... At the same time, he insisted that Hillary Clinton had nothing to do with either. And that gets at one of her campaign’s unshakeable dilemmas: They are running on what’s still popular about the Clinton years and trying run away from what’s not. That, of course, is impossible. And in Philadelphia, the balancing act tripped as a frustrated Bill Clinton lashed out at protesters with a full-throated recourse to throwback war-on-crime rhetoric. ..... what’s most remarkable is that Clinton made a case for the laws that just doesn’t add up. On the Crime Bill, he blamed Republicans for the the “increased sentencing provisions,” and said that the law created “a 25-year low in crime” and a 33-year low in the “murder rate.”..........Protesters, he said, were “afraid of the truth” for not letting him speak. But the truth is not what Clinton was speaking...... The number of those living in extreme poverty has skyrocketed since 1996. .....
Hillary Clinton can’t get around running as the Clinton Administration’s second coming.
Though her camp likes to protest that holding her to account for anything she endorsed during the Clinton presidency is unfair, it’s actually appropriate in a purported democracy that has proven itself prone to the allure of political dynasty. Times have changed, and many Democratic voters don’t want to go back to the 1990s. And Hillary Clinton has to answer for it. ....... Bernie Sanders’ insurgent campaign has been so shockingly successfully precisely because he’s been able to exploit this dissonance.
On welfare cuts, which he voted against and described as a bigoted assault on the poor
, that’s easy. ...... Sanders, however, has said that he did so because it included the Violence Against Women Act, and he did vocally criticize incarceration as a policy solution: “We can either educate or electrocute,” he said. “We can create meaningful jobs, rebuilding our society, or we can build more jails.” He also criticized the unsuccessful 1991 Crime Bill, which he voted against, as “not a crime prevention bill” but “a punishment bill, a retribution bill, a vengeance bill.” ......
Sanders on many issues provides a decisive contrast. And many people like what they see.
......... On welfare, Bill Clinton was just plain wrong. On crime, he rightly pointed out that the bulk of the nation’s prison population reside in state facilities; that there was very real public outcry over crime and that people demanded action; and that there was support even from black leaders for the bill. But it was politicians like Clinton who weaponized those public fears for political gain. And today, voters are beginning to understand the costs. And that continues to be a hard square to circle for Hillary.
I am not a Democrat. I am not a card carrying member of any political party on earth. But I do believe in the onward march of human progress. The democratic process, the political process is key to that. The most important thing the democratic process perhaps does is it moves the conversation. The work primarily gets done in the private sector, although government work is also very important.
The Republican side has been so irrational, so far away from what might be called the basics of the scientific process, I think the White House part of the race is over, the Senate part is also over, and now we are moving to the Republicans possibly even losing the House, and the Democrats don't even have a nominee yet. Hillary is perhaps to benefit immensely from this amazing act of self destruction on the part of the Republicans.
But the political benefit will not be lasting. Currently the American political system is designed to swing like a pendulum. The Dems and Hillary might sweep in 2016 but two years later the pendulum will swing even if the basic political landscape has not changed and the Republicans are still as irrational as ever. Why would that happen? It's in the design itself.
America is a one person one vote democracy, but only half so. It is not a system designed to try to get as many people as possible to vote. And it is not a one person, one vote, one voice democracy. What has most boggled my mind in this race is, not only Hillary has not replicated the grassroots organizational structures of an Obama 2008, she has not made it 10 times better, because now that is an option due to advances in technology. She has had the option to make it 10 times better and make that structure integral to governance itself beyond victory. An attempt at one person, one vote, one voice democracy might bring lasting benefits to the Democratic Party. Instead of being a 52-48 slide between the two parties, the Republicans would keep losing ground and stay at lost ground unless they do what they are supposed to do. They are supposed to apply their core conservative principles to new set of data to come up with new policies and programs. As to what that might mean I don't know. But an utter unwillingness to face the data is something that is not the scientific process. The ideological masturbation is in full view.
One person, one vote, one voice 24/7 democracy taken to its logical local to global conclusions: that is the goal. That also means structural reforms. For example, why is there only one day when you can vote? Why not an entire week? Why do you have to go to a voting booth? Why can't you vote from your phone? You press your thumb and you vote. Why do you have to register to vote? Does not the American state know you exist? They seem to know when you have to pay taxes. Every citizen should be automatically registered, for all elections ever after. Congressional district boundaries should be decided by a federal non partisan commission. Kill gerrymandering if you want a healthy, robust democracy in America. Voters are supposed to choose politicians, not the other way round. In the current system there is no end to gridlock. So you end up with a small government for the price of a huge government. A paralyzed government is a small government, which means those who want a small government want it so bad, they don't want even the people's approval for the idea, they don't want to have to make a case. They don't want a mandate, they just want to impose the idea. Last of all, every town where non citizens are more than 10% of the population should allow all residents to vote at least in the city elections. Ideally you would want not all citizens but all residents everywhere in the country to be able to vote at all levels. A country that wants to spread democracy should bring in people from all over the world, and get them to vote, so they know what it feels like. You do that and you don't have to invade countries. Democracy spreads itself. It is like fragrance.
Talking about immigrants, not only America needs to legalize the 12 million who are already here, America needs to actively bring in 20 million more. How else are you going to pay for your ageing population's retirement? The social security thing is kind of like the blockchain. On the blockchain you can do business with people you don't even trust. The social security thing is so beautifully designed that young immigrants pay for the retirement of people who are not even their blood relatives. It is a good system.
I am beginning to think maybe it was not Hillary who was reading the emails in Westchester. Maybe it was Bill Clinton, and there is nothing wrong with that. As both a husband, and a former president, I guess he could do that. Hillary was reading the emails in DC, Bill Clinton was reading the same emails in Westchester, and they were talking long distance on the phone. I am guessing.
The law of term limits has been a Republican conspiracy to make sure the best of Democrats don't make it too far. Don't laugh. Look at the facts. Bill Clinton outside the White House has been fish without water. Another one is about to feel the same way. And on many counts this one is even better.
So why does Bill Clinton simply not own up to it and put the matter to rest? As in, lay your hands off, it was not her, it was me.
Because both the media and Bill Clinton know. So far that guy has been very disciplined. He knows he is being goaded, but so far he has resisted. Because he knows he can't hog the limelight like the media wants him to. If he were to drink the email fiasco poison, a whole bunch of dead newspapers will come back from the dead. He still has that kind of wattage. Hillary and Trump and Bernie could move to page A2.
English: Oval Office ceiling medallion. Français : Le médaillon représentant le sceau présidentiel sur le plafond du bureau ovale. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The year long US presidential campaign is not just about electing a man or woman for the Oval Office. That it is. But it is primarily about moving the conversation along on various issues. America is a democracy. The people have to want it before change can happen. And the conversation moves much faster during an election year than during regular congressional years. Except when there is a major event, the year long campaign is when the American people thrash it out. Eventually there is a winner, but everybody who wants to speak is heard along the way.
It is quite a spectacle. And for America being what is it, for good or ill the number one country right now, I think mostly for good, I'd compare the presidential election to World Cup Soccer. Well, not quite. World Cup is World Cup. But you know what I mean.
The handover of power to the most powerful political office on the planet is so peaceful, it is mind blowing.
You see colorful characters. But every candidate is trying to resonate with somebody, with this or that group. The talk is not in a vacuum.
There is a robust debate going on in the Democratic Party. The Republicans tend to be more obedient. They collect around a leader pretty fast. On the Republican side I can't think of one earth shaking idea that has been proposed. It is more about this vague feeling.
Bernie, on the other hand, is looking at some major proposals. And Hillary is a policy wonk. To Donald's credit though, he did challenge the Pope and George W Bush. The guy is a bull in a china shop.
The guy who gave America its longest peacetime economic expansion took three years to show he was up to something. 1993 was dud, 1994 was dud, 1995 was a dud. But US in 1992 is not India in 2014. The US was already a First World Country at the time. There was no fundamental infrastructure to build. The Indian democracy is so much more complex, one of the smartest Americans ever to become ambassador to India simply referred to it as "the imponderables of Indian politics," JFK's John Kenneth Galbraith.
Narendra Modi has been doing excellent work. At a fundamental level. The GST bill alone will give India another two points in terms of growth. And with everything else he has been doing, I see the economy going past a 10% growth rate before he has to go to the people again in 2019. If the growth rate is past 10%, he will see re-election. I have no doubts in my mind. Right now I don't see how the growth rate will not go past 10%. It has to. He has been doing excellent work. But India is such a big country, so complex, so democratic, the work will take some time to show visible bounce. The challenge is not to get it past 10%, the challenge is to keep it past 10% for 30 years. Modi doing 20 years would make sense.
I will give the guy two more years before I start judging him. People who can't see the people gave him a five year mandate last year don't know the ABC of politics. Bihari voters are smart. They had zero doubts about whether Modi was going to shift from Delhi to Patna. So they picked the guy who is the best man for the job. Nitish Kumar is every bit as skillful a politician.
Bill Clinton is not a good comparison for Narendra Modi. Clinton had it easy by Modi's standards. A more appropriate comparison would be Deng Xiaoping. Deng took much longer, and his work really started showing visible results only after he was dead and gone. At least Indians don't need to wait that long. 2019 will have been long enough for Modi.
The BJP is slated to lose almost all, quite possibly all, state elections next year. And that is nothing to do with Modi. That is to do with state dynamics in each case. The media should take lessons in democracy from the sophisticated Bihari voters who seem to know the difference between a national election and a state election.
The only time Modi matters again at the booth is in 2019.
If 2014 was the year that saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity soar to an all-time high, events in 2015 underscored rising voter disillusionment. While Modi is still India’s most popular political leader, his government’s disappointing performance over the past year has impacted the electoral fortunes of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Eighteen months after the BJP’s spectacular victory, Modi and the BJP no longer appear invincible....... Two important reform bills – one to streamline India’s federal and state sales tax and the other to facilitate land acquisition – hang in limbo. The government has blamed opposition obstructionism in parliament for blocking the legislation. But it has only itself to blame. Not only did it subject the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government (2004-2014) to similar obstructionism, it has also arrogantly attempted at pushing legislation down the opposition’s throat. ...... the party was routed in the Bihar assembly election........ Close on the heels of that crushing defeat was a setback in elections to local bodies in Gujarat. Here the BJP lost control over rural bodies and the iron-grip it once enjoyed over municipalities weakened. This setback was all the more painful for the party as Gujarat has been its impregnable fortress, with the party having won every election in the state since 2000. Importantly, this is Modi’s home state. ........ and another to provide a bank account for every household to end “financial untouchability.” ........ Economist Rajiv Kumar exulted over India finally having “a ‘real’ prime minister with his hand firmly on the steering wheel.” Modi’s “leading from the front and laying down the behavioral norms, targets and programs, has shored up sagging morale and ostensibly brought new purpose to the government machinery,” he said. ....... Modi’s decisive image stems from the fact that he makes decisions quickly and that is because he makes them on his own, a retired bureaucrat based in Delhi said, adding that Modi is the undisputed boss of the government and the BJP. All decisions related to policy and programs are made by him. Rarely are his ministers consulted or even kept in the loop. Meetings with ministers and BJP parliamentarians are monologues with Modi doing all the talking. Nobody disagrees with him. Or rather they don’t dare air their differences with him. ..... Critics like historian Ramachandra Guha have described the Modi government as “anti-intellectual,” having “absolute contempt for scholars, literature and the arts. It is not contribution to the field but proximity to the Sangh Parivar, a family of Hindu right-wing organizations of which the BJP is a part, that determines appointments to key posts. ....... Most alarming is the Modi government’s failure or rather reluctance to address mounting communal violence being unleashed by members of the Parivar. Churches have been attacked and violence against Muslims has increased. .......
Those inciting communal hatred are not fringe elements but governors, union ministers, chief ministers, parliamentarians – all belonging to the BJP or subscribing to its Hindutva ideology. Their hateful speeches are made in the chambers of the Lok Sabha, in front of television cameras, and at public rallies. Yet they have gone unchecked.
.... Modi’s grand plans for the economy. .... his party’s electoral debacles signal that the Indian voter cannot be taken for granted. The “rock-star” receptions that the Parivar organized for Modi during his visits abroad may have impressed his die-hard fans at home and his cheerleaders among the Indian diaspora, but for millions of voters, mere pledges aren’t enough. ..... Political commentator Shekhar Gupta says that he needs to get out of campaign mode and get down to “calmer, old-fashioned governance.”
He has been compared to FDR, I am offering him an opportunity to become George Washington!
Terrorism and Climate Change are two intractable problems that no government has an answer to. And Climate Change is a much, much bigger threat. Our very survival as a species is at stake. And a genuine world government is the only solution.
In his person we find the confluence between America's original sin, race, and America's original mission: a total spread of democracy. America's first black president is in a unique position to offer something great in retirement.
A genuine world government is nothing but a global extrapolation of the basic arithmetic of democracy: one person, one vote. Rule of law within nations, rule of law between nations. And as the person holding the most powerful office on the planet, he is best positioned to make the bold moves that are needed. His presidency has been full of bold moves that have cleared up half century old cobwebs. He could do it. He should do it. He is still young.
English: Baton Rouge, LA, September 3, 2008 -- President George W. Bush and Governor Bobby Jindal greeting EOC employees, during disaster recovery efforts for Hurricane Gustav. Jacinta Quesada/FEMA (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I get the impression Bobby Jindal has been too ideologically pure. The Left "accuses" Hillary of not being pure. Note that. This guy should be running a think tank, not a state or country. Makes you wonder about think tanks though. What are they preaching? Louisiana is starting at the bottom. Bill Clinton's Arkansas was like that. And after Bill Clinton was done with it, Arkansas was still at the bottom, with slight improvements. There is just something about Louisiana. Maybe it is too close to Haiti.
Governing is a dynamic situation like sailing. You are supposed to respond to the winds, something Bill Clinton got accused of. Why is the boat not steady? Well, the wind be blowing left and right.
Tax cuts funded by swiped credit cards might make rich people happy, but I don't see how that contributes to economic growth. Raising the minimum wage, on the other hand, is instant stimulus.
Bobby not making sense to me is probably good for him. Even Dems start out on the Left before the primaries, and should they get past them, then conveniently move to the center. But Bobby is starting with really low numbers. It will be interesting to see how he plays out with the voters. How many primaries before he is out! Bust!
The guy won two elections in a row. Can't say he is a bad politician.
here in the Louisiana capital, there is mostly one topic on everyone’s mind these days, and it is quite distressingly close to home: the fiscal reckoning the state is facing for next year and perhaps for multiple budgets to come. ...... “Since I’ve been in Louisiana I’ve never seen a budget cycle as desperate as this one” ..... Louisiana’s budget shortfall is projected to reach $1.6 billion next year and to remain in that ballpark for a while. ..... culprit: the fiscal policy pushed by the Jindal administration and backed by the State Legislature. ..... In a state the size of Louisiana, the shortfall is huge. But it is all the more daunting considering that the governor has unequivocally ruled out any plans for new revenue, bone-deep cuts have already been made to health care and higher education, ad hoc revenue sources have been all but drained and robust economic growth has yet to materialize. ...... Mr. Jindal’s first term began in 2008 with a heady surplus of around $1 billion, high oil prices and a stream of federal disaster recovery money after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. He threw his support behind the largest tax cut in the state’s history and, for a time, had reason to boast about an economy that outperformed the nation’s. But oil prices are fickle, and the recovery money dried up and the recession arrived, if late and in a milder strain than in other states. Since 2010, here as elsewhere, middling has been the new normal. ..... a slower-than-ideal recovery is not unique to Louisiana. How the state has dealt with it is the root of the problem ..... “the vast majority” of the shortfall to the downturn in oil prices and insisting that a shrunken state government was the goal, not an unfortunate side effect. .... per capita income in the state is at its highest ....... next year Louisiana State University, the state’s flagship institution, is facing a potential 40 percent cut in its operating budget. Possible cuts to health care for next year, when compounded by the loss of matching federal dollars, could approach $1 billion. ..... Trust funds for infrastructure and low-income older adults have been sapped, buildings sold, tax amnesties repeatedly declared, legal settlements spent and reserves drained. ..... the plunge in oil prices, “muted job growth” and “a structural deficit.” .... how “fiscally irresponsible” the state had been for the last seven years.
Jindal said, "The Obama economy is now the minimum wage economy. I think we can do better than that." ..... the per capita income of Louisiana, you were 47th lowest in the United States, not all under your watch. ..... In Louisiana, we now have more people working, highest incomes in our state's history. Larger population than ever before. And the president can't say all those things about the country. Our economy has grown 50 percent faster than the national GDP, even since the national recession.......... Between 2007 and 2012 (the last year for which data is available), inflation-adjusted GDP grew by 2.5 percent nationally, but by 6.4 percent in Louisiana. ...... For 2008-12, Jindal would also be correct. During that period, Louisiana growth (7.9 percent) easily outpaced United States growth (3.2 percent). ..... But he’d be wrong for 2009-12, when United States growth (6.7 percent) exceeded Louisiana growth (4.6 percent)..... And he’d also be wrong for 2010-12, when the United States economy grew (4.1 percent) and the Louisiana economy actually shrank (by 1.2 percent)...... United States growth also exceeded Louisiana growth between 2011 and 2012 -- 2.5 percent to 1.5 percent....... "Louisiana's economy is highly dependent on the energy sector which, no matter where in the business cycle we lie, is always in demand," he said. "So, when the economy is in a recession, we tend to do better than average. When the economy is doing better, energy demand is somewhat higher, but not dramatically so. So when the economy is doing well, we lag behind the U.S. average. I suspect that we were doing better when the economy was in the heart of the Great Recession, but we have fallen behind as the overall economy has rebounded."
Jindal is quick to say, private-sector job growth and the economy in Louisiana have outpaced the national average during his tenure as governor...... here’s what Jindal doesn’t say: Louisiana’s budget is hemorrhaging red ink, and it’s getting worse. He inherited a $900 million surplus when he became governor seven years ago, and his administration’s own budget documents now show the state is facing deficits of more than $1 billion for as far as the eye can see. There are no easy solutions today because Jindal has increasingly balanced the budget by resorting to one-time fixes, depleting the state’s reserve funds and taking money meant for other purposes....... Meanwhile, the state’s unemployment rate has risen from 3.8 percent when Jindal took office, a point below the national average then, to 6.7 percent today—nearly a full point higher than today’s national average. ..... As the son of Indian immigrants who was a Rhodes scholar, Jindal, 43, has stood out as a national GOP star since his 2007 election as chief executive of Louisiana, with an image invariably described as wonky. In 2009, he was chosen to give the GOP response to Obama’s State of the Union address, but his unnatural singsong delivery was mocked. Since then, he’s back to fast talking and reeling off numbers while he courts Republicans outside of Louisiana. A year before the Iowa Republican primary, he has shifted his political emphasis by making an obvious pitch for religious conservatives, highlighting his faith ...... We have serious, serious problems with our budget. For seven years, we have spent more than we’ve taken in ..... (A governor in Louisiana has so much power that he appoints the speaker of the House and the president of the Senate, along with committee chairmen.) ...... Jindal blamed the state’s budget woes on factors beyond his control. “The oil price drop has been good for consumers, but it’s had a big impact on our revenue” ..... Jindal’s aversion to tackling politically tough issues and his tendency to resort to ploys to paper over the problems. .... In 2003, as a private citizen running for governor (he narrowly lost), Jindal promised to “oppose and veto all efforts to increase taxes.” ..... As governor, he has taken the “no tax” commitment to such lengths that in 2011 he vetoed legislation supported by dozens of Republicans that sought renewal of a 4-cent portion of the state’s 36-cent-per-pack cigarette tax, the country’s third lowest. “His only reason is that he’d taken the crazy position that if you renew a tax or suspend an exemption it was a tax increase,” said state Rep. Harold Ritchie, a Democrat and smoker who sponsored the measure. Lawmakers found a way to approve it without Jindal being able to exercise a veto..... Louisiana has 33,000 fewer state workers than when he took office, in large part because he got the legislature to privatize the public hospitals. ..... The conservative Tax Foundation ranked Louisiana as having the 46th lowest tax burden as a share of state income. Louisiana also scores at the bottom in education and health care....... The state legislature cut income taxes for higher-end earners by a total of about $700 million per year...... He then shaved another $341 million in the middle of the 2009 budget cycle to avoid ending the year with a deficit. Jindal—buoyed by the tax cuts, his anti-government rhetoric, a growing state economy and his opposition to abortion—won reelection in 2011 with 65 percent of the vote.
Jindal is polling in the low single digits in early Republican primary polls. ..... none of them, not one, can match our record of actually shrinking the size of government. .... He's a candidate who can hold his intellectual ground with anyone, and he has dominated Louisiana politics for the better part of a decade. Yes, it's a crowded field. And yes, it would take a momentum-kindling moment on par with then-Sen. Obama's legendary "Blue America-Red America" speech. But Jindal has been preparing for this moment for years, and he may yet have a second wind.
Jindal took office in January of 2008, and 2015 will be his last year in office. He has scored well on the Cato Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors earning an “A” in 2010, and a “B” in both 2012 and 2014. All three report cards commend Jindal’s resolve to cut Louisiana state spending. ..... Since fiscal year 2009, the first full fiscal year of Jindal’s term, state general fund spending has decreased by 7 percent. Per capita state spending has fallen from $2,089 in 2009 to $1,883 in 2015, a decrease of 10 percent. This spending restraint is quite remarkable. For comparison, per capita state spending grew nationally by 8.5 percent during the same time period. ..... Total state spending, which includes money from the federal government for programs like Medicaid, stayed constant while Jindal was in office. It was $28.9 billion in 2008 compared to $29.1 billion in 2014. ...... State government employment has decreased 26 percent since he’s been governor ...... State higher education spending fell from $1.1 billion a year in 2009 to $535 million in 2015. His 2016 budget includes further cuts to the state higher education system ....... Jindal’s strong fiscal record is partly undercut by Louisiana’s generous economic development programs, i.e., corporate welfare. Jindal helped expand the state’s wasteful film tax credit program. In 2013, the state wasted $250 million on the program, which is one of the largest film giveaways in the nation. The state offsets 30 percent of the cost of film production expenses. An episode of Duck Dynasty, the popular television show, represents $330,000 in tax credits to its production company. His administration also gave $36.5 million to the New Orleans Hornets, the professional basketball franchise, to encourage them to stay in New Orleans through the 2024 season. ...... Louisiana general fund spending has fallen during Bobby Jindal’s tenure as governor. At a time when states were increasing spending, Jindal instituted reforms that cut the state workforce and lowered per capita spending. This feat makes Jindal unique among Republican contenders for the presidency.
The Jindal administration is talking about cutting up to $300 million from state support to colleges and universities — that calculates to about $1 billion in higher ed reductions since Gov. Bobby Jindal took office in 2008 — and hacking another $200 million or so from health care. State agencies are looking at 15 percent to 20 percent removed from their budgets, which could translate into furloughs and reduced services. ..... “We’re going to end up placing fees and all kinds of things on ordinary citizens, just so” Jindal can say on the presidential campaign trail that he didn’t raise taxes ...... Jindal is sacking his own state to preserve his viability as a Republican presidential candidate — specifically, so he can say that he never raised taxes, but rather cut them. Even Quin Hillyer, the conservative columnist for the Advocate, thinks the state’s tax policy, under which the poor pay a greater percentage of their income in taxes than the rich, is a “moral abomination.” ........ Since taking office, Governor Bobby Jindal has cut taxes a total of six times, which included the largest income tax cut in the state’s history – giving back $1.1 billion over five years to the hard working tax payers across the state, along with accelerating the elimination of the tax on business investment, making Louisiana no longer one of only three states in the country that taxes manufacturing machinery. ........ when the state faced a $341 million budget shortfall, Governor Jindal chose to make state government more lean by finding strategic costs savings in the budget, rather than making across the board cuts or passing the bill on to taxpayers. ........ The cut was a giveaway to the rich, and Jindal, a reform Republican, was against it. But it was popular with the GOP legislature, so he embraced it — and it blew a massive hole in the state budget ....... What he won’t tell you about is his refusal to cut corporate welfare, which costs that state treasury a fortune every year ....... “Duck Dynasty” is the most popular show in the history of A&E. Wal-Mart is the world’s largest retailer. Valero is America’s biggest independent refiner, earning $6 billion in profits last year.... But despite all that success, they’re all receiving generous subsidies from the taxpayers of Louisiana, through programs that funnel more than a billion dollars every year to coveted industries. ...... During Kathleen Blanco’s four years as governor, the value of some of Louisiana’s largest tax breaks doubled. Since Bobby Jindal took the reins in 2008, the cost has more than doubled again ....... In his first year in office, the only year he did not have to resort to such tactics, Jindal himself deplored such bookkeeping, comparing it to “using your credit card to pay your mortgage.” ...... The state is facing a projected $1.6 billion budget shortfall next year, and higher education institutions have been told to prepare for $300 million to $400 million in reduced funding in the coming academic year. If that happens, LSU could be on the hook for more than $60 million, roughly 40 percent of the university’s operating budget. ........ LSU (and other state universities) will be getting only 25 percent of the state funding it received when Jindal took office. Think about that. It’s a disaster. Gov. Jindal and the GOP legislature have been a catastrophe for higher ed in this state. ...... that has meant that lawmakers only have room to maneuver within the higher ed and health care budgets. Last year, voters protected Medicaid from further state cuts, which leaves higher ed as the only target left. ......... But Jindal has done a number on health care for the poor too. He has largely privatized the state’s public hospitals, and refused as a matter of principle to take the federal Medicaid money due the state because of Obamacare. So now he can tell GOP primary voters nationwide that he stood up to Obamacare. ....... Services are now closed. There is now no emergency room in north Baton Rouge, where the majority of the city’s poor, uninsured people live. .......... We have serious, serious problems with our budget. For seven years, we have spent more than we’ve taken in. ...... governing not as a commonsense manager, but as an ideologue ....... He was first elected as a conservative, clean-government technocrat, and brought a lot of hope to many Louisianians. .... Yes, I’m fully aware that Louisiana is bound to break your heart. … [But] I think [Jindal’s] going to write the next great Louisiana story. Maybe just this once, it’s not going to be a farce. ....... The higher ed funding crisis does NOT exist because of a lack of willingness to spend on education. Louisiana actually ranks 18th in higher ed spending per capita. The problem exists because we have way too many four-year universities. In New Orleans, UNO and SUNO literally sit right next to each other. In the sparsely populated northeast part of the state, we have LA Tech, ULM and Grambling. This is, again, a structural problem that isn’t Bobby Jindal’s fault. What is needed is not cuts to LSU, but the bravery in the legislature to change a couple of lower-tier 4-year institutions into community colleges, killing duplicative programs that accomplish little and graduate almost no one. ........ Tuition at Louisiana’s public universities is also the 4th lowest in the nation, meaning that the cuts could probably be ameliorated by raising tuition, which is something that is almost guaranteed to happen...... he’s certainly right about the unsustainability of the state university system — a problem that was there before Jindal, and will remain long after he’s gone. The problem is that all the pols are standing together on this, because those universities are very important to their towns. But this can’t go on forever. The state needs something like the federal base-closing commissions, to give political cover to closing down institutions that ought not be kept open.
From New Jersey to Wisconsin to Louisiana, GOP governors with their eyes on the White House have presided over unbalanced budgets, unfunded pension liabilities, credit downgrades and sluggish job growth. .... That comes in contrast to an increasingly rosy economic picture nationally, with a strong December jobs report that capped off the best year in terms of economic growth for the nation since 1999. Unemployment, at 5.8 percent, was below predictions, and job growth has continued for month after month. ........ "In my judgment, they are so tied to an extreme ideology that they don't want to be confronted by the facts and the truth about what their approach, their trickle-down approach leads to: Greater deficits, a weaker economy, and greater inequality" ....... Louisiana has become more business-friendly under Jindal's watch, according to a number of nonpartisan rankings ...... Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, whose promised conservative "experiment" of implementing steep tax and spending cuts has crippled the state's economy, as evidence the conservative vision of governance doesn't work.
Louisiana State University President and Chancellor F. King Alexander said that the state’s flagship university, which could lose 80 percent of state funding after years of already deep cuts, was developing a worst-case scenario plan for financial exigency—basically, the academic equivalent of bankruptcy. ....... Jindal, a hard-charging former Rhodes scholar, has always nursed grander ambitions, and voters generally gave him a pass. ....... While he was popular and powerful enough to avoid a reelection fight in 2011, by 2015 his approval rating had sunk to 27 percent, according to one poll; a friendly survey by his own consulting firm pegged the number at 46 percent, hardly a resounding vote of confidence. ........ He spent 165 days out of state in 2014 ...... Jindal chalks up the current budget shortfall to the drop in oil prices, and that’s definitely contributed. A larger piece of the puzzle has been his determination to maintain a pure record on taxes. ....... These days it’s hard to think of anyone who has as much influence over what Jindal’s willing to do than Norquist, whose rigid rules for what constitutes a tax increase line up perfectly with Jindal’s. In practice, that means the governor has insisted that the budget be balanced without tax increases, despite the prospect of devastating cuts to higher education and health care, the two main areas that don’t enjoy constitutional or statutory protection. ....... there’s not much left. Gone are $800 million from the Medicaid Trust Fund for the Elderly and $450 million for providing development incentives, and the rainy day fund has dropped from $730 million to $460 million on his watch. ....... the Republicans running to replace Jindal in this fall’s election. All three .. say they will look for a way to accept the Medicaid money and take an open-minded approach to examining tax exemptions. ..... in a clear swipe at Norquist, he added that, “I represent the people of Louisiana; I don’t represent someone who lives in D.C.”
Gov. Bobby Jindal refused to roll back income tax cuts or ever-increasing corporate tax breaks. Instead, he raided reserve funds and sold off state property. ..... "They've used all the smoke that was in the can and all the mirrors that they could buy and now they're out of tricks. Their solution is to gut higher education like a fish," said Republican state Treasurer John Kennedy. ....... "Our budget has been full of sleights of hand -- it's almost a Ponzi scheme of moving moneys around, one-time money around, to serve recurring needs," Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne, one of the Republicans vying to be Louisiana's next governor, said at a recent forum. .... national credit rating agency Moody's Investors Service described Louisiana'sbudget as having a "structural deficit" ...... The governor has successfully trimmed some spending by cutting more than 30,000 full-time state employees. He's reduced the state's vehicle fleet, privatized much of the Medicaid program, turned over the state's charity hospitals to outside managers and looked for ways to make state government more efficient. ...... The state owes $190 million to federal officials for improper Medicaid spending in hospital privatization deals, an order being appealed, and a $270 million repayment to the state "rainy day" fund in 2017 as part of a legal settlement. Economic development deals will cost the next governor at least $340 million over his first four years..... Far fewer savings accounts will be left to pay those liabilities because Jindal drained or reduced trust funds. ....... When he talks of his record in national appearances, Jindal doesn't mention the budget troubles. He describes cutting Louisiana's budget from $34 billion in 2008 to $25 billion -- but doesn't explain much of that drop comes from spending down one-time federal recovery dollars after hurricanes Katrina and Rita. ..... New money hasn't rolled in, despite promises that tax revenue would increase from multibillion-dollar manufacturing and petrochemical projects announced by the Jindal administration in the last few years. ...... In his first year in office, Jindal signed off on the largest individual income tax cut in Louisiana history, stripping hundreds of millions from the state treasury at the same time the national recession hit. ....... The Legislature's chief economist, Greg Albrecht, has described Louisiana's tax break programs as spending with no annual oversight from state lawmakers before the money goes out the door. ...... As they ran into Jindal's resistance to tax break changes, lawmakers who voted for budgets packed with the governor's patchwork funding say removing the dollars would force harmful cuts to colleges, public safety and health care. For the upcoming session that begins in April, lawmakers are scrambling to find loopholes to generate new money but allow Jindal to call the plans "revenue neutral." ..... "Everybody says, 'Oh, you're using one-time money.' I tell people that say that, 'Well, tell me what you want to cut,'" said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Jack Donahue, a Republican. "'Is it higher education? Or is it health care? What university do you want to close?' The truth is, from a political standpoint, that's not possible."
English: Barack Obama delivers a speech at the University of Southern California (Video of the speech) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I have no advice for how Hillary should run for president, but I do have advice on how Barack Obama could retire. I think he should launch, wait. There was speculation somewhere that he could become Supreme Court Justice. I don't believe that rumor. There was a similar rumor in Bill Clinton's final year in office. So I don't believe. But I would like to believe. I think Barack Obama becoming Supreme Court Justice would be awesome, for the black community. The constant reminder that this dude was in the White House might impact an entire generation. Heck, he might even become Chief Justice some day.
But he should do what would make him happy. And, perhaps, just like Billie Clinton, Barack Obama is a little too kinetic to sit on the Supreme Court.
My advice is, he should launch a Barack Obama Africa Foundation. Africa is the last continent. There is still so much political chaos on that continent. Much of the poverty and disease emanates from that chaos. As a former POTUS he might have both the stature and the distance to be able to bring people together. The foundation would be dedicated to (1) a total spread of democracy on the continent through peaceful means, (2) strengthening of democracies, (3) rooting out corruption, (4) attracting large scale FDI into the emerging economies, and to (5) eventually bring about an economic union of the continent.
That is my advice for Barack Obama.
I said very early on, the best thing Barack Obama can do as president for the black people, is to do the very best he can do as president. Just do your job. Now I am saying, in retirement he should perhaps consider giving himself fully to the continent of Africa.
When Karl Rove attacked Hillary for being too old, something like that, Bill Clinton went on TV and suggested that if you were to listen to Rove you would think Hillary was a member of the “walking dead.” This was months ago. And his use of that phrase struck me. Because I had used that precise phrase only a few weeks before that. There is this politician Hridayesh Tripathy in Nepal. I have admired him over the years. He wrote me a recommendation letter when I was applying for colleges in America. I was actually one rank below him in a political party with two MPs right before I came to America for college, too young to be running for anything.
Hridayesh had just lost a parliamentary election, actually elections to Nepal’s constituent assembly, its second constituent assembly. (Yes, you read that right. He was a MP back when he wrote the recommendation letter. In the years that followed Nepal ended up with an ultra left group that outshone the Shining Path of Peru. Time warps, political wormholes etc.) He reached out to me on Facebook. He was new to Facebook. Then we got talking on Viber. He was feeling crestfallen. He said he was getting old, and he was thinking of retiring from politics. This was his first electoral defeat.
To console him I said, if he was old, Sushil has to be considered a Walking Dead. Sushil is the current Prime Minister of Nepal, in his 70s, a short, thin Ronald Reagan, if you will, talking strictly of age. Hridayesh is barely past 50.
I preceded Bill Clinton by a few weeks in use of that particular phrase. And it was eery to me because this was probably the fourth or fifth time something like that had happened to me, where I had preceded Bill Clinton. They say serial killers can communicate with each other, even when they are not even aware of each others’ existence. I must be a pretty good student of the US presidency, and my political instincts must be sound.
When Hillary Clinton's email "scandal" took over the proverbial airwaves, I chuckled. I had to restrain myself from sending out a blog post missive, Saturday Night Live style, making fun of the fact that no, I don't think Hillary Clinton has sent out 30,000 emails in her lifetime ("Deleter In Chief," one tabloid headline screamed), the number of emails she is "accused" of deleting. I truly don't think Hillary Clinton has written and sent out 30,000 emails in her lifetime. But then when did facts get in the way of fiction in the Clinton "scandals!" Why will they start now?
When the dude Clinton launched his foundation, I feared even his disease trips to Africa might be spun into sex scandals. I am glad it did not happen, at least not to my knowledge. Whereas there are still big chunks of the country that think the Clintons murdered Vince Foster, and "Whitewatergate" (a small, failed land deal in a part of Arkansas, the remotest American state, that was remote even by Arkansas standards) was the Clinton Enron. Some black folks called Bill Clinton the first black president because the criminal justice system failed him so monumentally. How can Ken Starr do so much damage and get away with it! He is still walking around free!
Pretty much every detail of Hillary Clinton's life is out there. And I still do not underestimate the vast right wing conspiracy's (yes, such a thing exists) ability to stay fascinated by The Hillary. Her candidacy and presidency for that reason will stay interesting to even those who routinely err on the side of thinking she is better than she is.
It truly is about gender. And gender is all around you. Your mother, your grandmother, and her mother, your sister, cousin, daughter, friends, colleagues. There are a lot of women, look around, to paraphrase Larry Summers. The thing about sex is that is how you were born, Hillary once chided a young something reporter.
For me personally, Hillary 2016 only gets interesting after she puts a second woman on the ticket. A minority woman would be perfect. If you think gender is awkward, try race plus gender. I do not expect any of her policy positions to surprise me. I don't expect to "stay glued to the screen." I don't expect to follow closely. I read tech news mostly.
But you can not be the first woman to occupy the most powerful office on the planet, political and otherwise, and pretend you only owe it to those who voted for you. As soon as an American president is sworn in, she is no longer just president of those who voted for her, but also of those who might have voted against her. In this case, Hillary is going to belong to women across the world in ways the German Chancellor simply can not. Her having been Secretary of State and traveled the world so very extensively helps me relate to her. I am a Third World Guy. That is who I am for this lifetime.
And just like Barack Obama to me was about 500 years of world history, Hillary to me is about three and a half billion women. She needs a woman running mate because a woman running for and being president should no longer be news, not after her. It should feel normal. We should enter an era where half the time the best candidate on merits just so happens to be some woman.
FDR won a fourth time. Hillary doing two terms will be Barack Obama pulling a FDR. They are comrades.
On issues for me Hillary 2016 is all about Third World women. Nixon went to China, Hillary went to Burma. I was so impressed by what she was able to do for Burma. Especially because I was not even following the developments until the Big Splash showed up in the news. And I grew up practically next door to Burma.
The basics are pretty simple. Slavery should long have been extinct. But it still exists. Sex slavery should be so past tense, but it exists in huge numbers. There are more women sex slaves today than there were black slaves in Abraham Lincoln's time. Poverty is hard knocks, and micofinance is known to work, and Hillary bought into it a long time ago. Gender violence is cut and dry. It is no grey zone. Policing globally has to reorganize itself to bring an end to gender violence. Violence is violence, inside the home, outside the home, does not matter. Women face it both inside and outside.
And if a capable woman who by now knows the government machineries like the back of her hand (I think she will prove why she got better grades than Bill Clinton at Yale) can not put a firm stamp on these issues, then the world will be waiting a long, long time. I think that wait unnecessary.
