Own It!

A Quinnipiac Poll released this week showed that a plurality of Americans now believe that President Obama is the worst president since 1945.  If I were included in the survey, I think it would go back a bit farther, but the worst in 70 years is a far drop for a president that came into office on a crest of hope and change and Roman columns in the background.

How did this happen?  The New York Times is writing this swoon off to the sour mood of America or the general staleness of the 6th year of his administration.

Despite my general opposition to the bulk of his policies, I do not believe that his drop in the polls is due solely to staleness or to our sourness.  It is mostly, I believe, due to his administration's failure to take ownership of any of the difficult issues that it faces.  Not a single one.  Even more astonishing is that no one was held responsible for any of these pratfalls.

Here is my list of items that have gone south for this administration and to whom it ascribed blame:

ISIS in Iraq - Bush's fault
Worst post war economic recovery- House Republicans [for not spending more]
Government shutdown- See above
Healthcare.gov- House Republicans again [for not approving additional funding]
Benghazi- Filmmaker's fault
Failure of Mideast peace process- Netanyahu's fault
Monster debt and deficit- Rich people's fault
NSA spying- Snowden's fault
Mexican children piling up on our border- House Republican's fault [for not doing immigration reform]
Trayvon Martin- inherent racism in America's fault
IRS scandal- Local "rogue" administrator's fault
Crimea- Putin's fault
Keystone pipeline-Climate change deniers' fault
VA scandal- Bush's fault
Resurgence of Taliban in Afghanistan- Bush's fault again
Iranian nuclear program- You guessed it--Bush's fault
North Korean nuclear program - Truman's fault
Fast and Furious- Still trying to find out whose fault it was.  In any event, it was not Holder's fault He didn't know about it.
Unwanted pregnancy of Hobby Lobby employee- Bush's fault for nominating Sam Alito
High gas prices- Oil company's fault
Destruction of Lois Lerner's emails- hard drive manufacturer's fault

I think I have it about right.  Contrast this list with Ronald Reagan's ownership of the Iran-Contra scandal.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Pa4_NBlYK8

In it, Reagan takes ownership for the scandal unfolding on his watch and blames himself for not asking the right questions.   Is it any surprise, then, that Reagan was viewed as the best president since 1945.

Policies aside, it comes from owning it.

Ghastly

I have been tempted to write about my fears that Western Civilization may have reached an inflection point.  No one wants to read Chicken Little analysis and there have always been signs of decadence to point to and they have always been overblown. Even when the West seemed to be on its heels as it was during the early days of WWII, it always was able to gather itself and mount a comeback.

I was fortunate to have William H. McNeill as a professor in college, one of the world's most preeminent historians, and author of The Rise of the West.  I was too young and too immature to fully grasp what a gift he was, but I absorbed enough to understand the miracle of Western Civilization and the victory of the Enlightenment, liberty and of the individual over the State and tyranny.  And with that victory, the superiority of the value of the individual human life over statist aims in all circumstances was established.  The obvious polar opposite was Nazi Germany where state aims grossly and horrifyingly took the lives of millions.

But a few news items recently caught my attention (but did not get much play in the mainstream media) to give me pause about the state of Western Civilization.

The first was the revelation that UK hospitals were using the remains of aborted fetuses to heat hospitals.  The issue of abortion is a difficult one....more difficult than the true believers on each side of the debate would have you believe.  I have flip flopped on that issue several times during my lifetime.  But treating these remains as fuel is ghastly and sick - even if you think a fetus is "pre-human."  It is something out of Soylent Green, demeaning to humans and too reminiscent of Auschwitz and Bergen Belsen to be tolerated in the West.

The second news item was the revelation that the US EPA has been conducting experiments humans and that subjects were not fully informed of the risks of certain pollutants.  The testing allowed researchers to pump "gaseous pollutants at precise concentrations" into enclosed chambers.  The State conducting experiments that risked the health of the subjects.  Move over, Dr. Mengele.  Again, this was barely mentioned in the mainstream media.

The third item was the murder conviction of Kermit Gosnell, who apparently hideously murdered live babies at his abortion clinic.  Of course, while he was convicted, there was no outcry for more regulation and more supervision at abortion clinics.  We have a State that regulates light bulbs, microwave ovens, toilet tanks, plastic bags, mortgages applications, gasoline content, ad infinitum.  If this "house of horrors" (prosecution's words) had occurred in any other context, there would be a hew and cry for an army of regulators and there would be an avalanche of new regulations and probably a new regulatory body.  But it is about abortion and we hear nary a peep.

Taken together, these three items are very troubling to me--troubling because of the paucity of press coverage they received; troubling because of the callousness with which life is being treated by the State and the press; troubling because they are acts that echo the acts of the most inhuman regime in modern history. And they are barely mentioned.

Are my fears that these things do not portend well for the West overblown?  Perhaps.  But these items give me a very queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Some Things to Think About

While Barack Obama has been busy apologizing for American hegemony, cutting back on our military, precipitously withdrawing from Afghanistan and Iraq, forfeiting hard earned success, Vladimir Putin has been busy trying to patch the old Soviet Union back together again.  Here are just a few things to think about.

• Russia invaded Crimea merely days after the Obama administration announced massive cuts to our military, taking our troop strength to its lowest levels since 1940.
• President Obama was firmer and more decisive in his condemnation of George Zimmerman and Cambridge police than Russia.  He clearly spoke in more personally empathic terms with respect to Trayvon Martin than the Ukrainian people.
• Obama has been harsher toward Netanyahu with respect to its settlements.  Remember, Obama called for Israel to pull back to its 1967 borders.
• We are in a place that is completely analogous to the position we were in with Jimmy Carter in 1979.  Then, the Russian bear was annexing Afghanistan and the mullahs in Tehran were defying the US.  Today, the Russian bear is attempting to annex the Ukraine and the mullahs are still defying the US, pushing forward with their nuclear program.
• One of my progressive friends accused me of not learning from history.  Really?  Does Germany and the Sudentenland ring any bells for anyone?
• Barack Obama is steeped in anti-colonialist history.  Rather than American exceptionalism, that is the lens through which he views the world.   Well, Mr. Obama, if you don't like colonialism, shield your eyes from your friend Vladimir.  You ain't seen nothin' yet.

The Russian threat to the Ukraine should not have been a surprise.  Putin has been lusting after it for years.  And just as with Iran, Obama kept silent for days while the crisis escalated.  Instead of being a champion for freedom, the integrity of nations, and international order, Obama delivered a statement that was written in pure bureaucratese, vowing only to "consult with our allies" and "communicate developments."   Just the consequences a thug fears.   Worse, his crack foreign policy team of John Kerry, Susan Rice and Samantha Power were caught more flat footed than Carter was when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan.  At least this time, they had the good manners to invade AFTER the Olympics.   

The mainstream media will never tie the loose ends.  As with Jimmy Carter, the Russian invasion is the result of persistent naivete in a Democratic administration.  This crisis, along with the Benghazi tragedy, is a direct result of the statecraft of Hillary Clinton.  Her Republican opponents should not forget to remind the voters.

Spouting Off

Not sufficiently occupied with Middle East peace, the economy, Obamacare, the Iranian nuclear program, Barack Obama had to weigh in on another matter of utmost importance to him-- pro football.

"I would not let my son play pro football," inveighed Obama, addressing the risk of head injury, and following the orchestrated propaganda of the New York Times.  First, let's put a couple of factual points to rest.  First, Obama does not have a son.  Second, only adults play pro football and Obama would be powerless to stop his theoretical son from playing.

This is not the first time President Obama has used his theoretical son to make a point.  Just like his "composite girlfriend" that showed up in his autobiography,  Obama has used a fictitious son once before--in the Trayvon Martin case, claiming that if he had a son, he'd look like Trayvon.  And, as in the Martin case, is opining in a place where he doesn't engage in weighing any of the facts.  He just spouts, and he is now spouting the liberal line against football.

I find it interesting whom Obama uses this fictitious son to identify with.  While it is tragic that Martin lost his life in the altercation with Zimmerman, Trayvon was no choirboy.   He was suspended from school multiple times and had other issues.  I wonder if President Obama would have permitted one of his daughters to date Trayvon.  But in his public statements, he positively identifies with Trayvon.

But now, he uses his theoretical son to push against football, and the implication is that it would be OK for his son to be hanging around pointlessly rather than play ball.  Forget that pro football players have had to demonstrate great discipline and training to achieve what they have to achieve.  Forget that a football field is someplace where race is absolutely no factor whatsoever in getting ahead, and, in fact, is a profession where people of color have gone from dirt poor to unimaginably rich in a few years.  Forget that the Chicago Public School coaches were in a panic last year during the teachers' strike because they were afraid that without the structure of football, they would lose hundreds of boys to gangs.  None of this matters to Obama.  He is compelled to comment on a matter over which he has no control, using a son that does not exist to advance the progressive vendetta against the sport, a topic which I will flesh out more fully in a later post.

When you take his comments together, it is clear that Obama would be not troubled by a son that is an aimless, in-and-out of trouble youth, but would be troubled if his aspirations were to work hard, train hard, and sacrifice to make it up the ladder to the NFL.

So,  you would not let your son play in the NFL?  Fair enough.  I would not let my son become a pot smoking community organizer, either.

So Long 2013

What a remarkable year it has been.  For me, personally, it has been a year of profound changes.  My oldest graduated from college and landed a great first job, stopping that cash outflow.  New passions and friendships were ignited and reconnected.  My new and revitalized passions included an increased zeal for the game of golf, culminating in a trip to Pinehurst, North Carolina, one of golf's great Meccas for a wonderful 3 day trip in November. And, alas, the year was not without great pain as I lost my longtime friend, hiking partner and mentor Jim Hopper in June.  Jim introduced me to the economics department at the University of Chicago, helped me greatly throughout my career, and encouraged my writing and my intellectual growth throughout my life.  I was honored to deliver one of his eulogies and I shall miss him greatly.

I have taken a short sabbatical from blogging and one of my New Year resolutions is to resume on a more frequent basis and there is not a better way than to resume by my annual year end summary of the best and worst of 2013.  Interestingly, the main character of both my favorite film and book of the year this year is a strong, independent woman.

Best Film
Gravity.  While it was considered by many to be overrated, and contained some factual flaws, Gravity was my favorite film of 2013.  Both Sandra Bullock and George Clooney put forward outstanding performances and the special effects were outstanding.  I am a sucker for survival movies and I thought that Bullock's character was well developed.  Other strong contenders were the comedy The Way, Way Back, Blue Jasmine and Inside Llewyn Davis.  I confess, however, that I missed The Butler and 12 Years a Slave.

Best in Fiction

Mary Coin by Marisa Silver.  Again, this novel was basically a survival story involving an independent woman.  But this was a fictionalized account of real survival of a single mom during the Great Depression.  The story revolved around the life of the woman depicted in the famous photograph, "Migrant Mother."  The uneasy intersection of the lives of the photographer and her subject was well developed and the strain of the life of this woman as she fought to survive and care for her children made for riveting reading.  Mary Coin was a close call as a choice as I also loved Canada by Richard Ford and Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walker.

Best in Nonfiction
Antifragile by Nassim Taleb. Many people disregard Taleb as not academically rigorous enough and arrogant and there is some truth to both charges, but I found Antifragile to be interesting and full of little anecdotes that caused you to pause and think a little differently.   The real message of Taleb's book is that sometimes unforeseen events occur which, on the surface, appear to be disastrous, but often turn out to be positive in the long run.  This is not necessarily a new concept, but Taleb says it in an interesting way.

Best Album
I thought this year was a little thin.  Last year, we had The Lumineers, Of Monsters and Men and Mumford & Sons.  In a weak field, I liked Night Visions by Imagine Dragons followed by a dark horse selection of Barton Hollow by The Civil Wars.

Best Live Concert
Bob Seger.  Hands down, Seger was the best.  It was with great dismay that I looked around at the crowd, and thought, "This is supposed to be a ROCK concert, not an Englebert Humperdink concert.  What are all these old people doing here?"  But Seger delivered.  Unlike some of the other old rockers that have lost a step or two or several octaves, Seger put forward an outstanding performance.  Being grey and dumpy didn't slow him down a bit as he belted out versions of "Hollywood Nights," "Against the Wind," "Like a Rock," and "Turn the Page" that were indistinguishable from albums that are over 30 years old.  And his warmup act was Joe Walsh, who, by himself, was phenomenally entertaining.

Most Interesting Figure
Pope Francis.  Within a couple of months Pope Francis both gave me hope for a renewed Catholic Church by his humility and his de-emphasizing sexuality as a centerpiece of morality of the church.  I also saw his willingness to begin to start to loosen centralized authority as a positive development.  But then he undermined his standing by his frontal attack on the "tyranny of markets" and capitalism with no corresponding criticism of the tyranny of the state.   He appeared to fully understand Christian humility but then failed utterly to understand how capitalism has lifted millions of people out of miserable and hopeless poverty worldwide.

So I am back, hopefully with some interesting things to say from time to time and I will endeavor to blog more frequently, even if they are just short and random thoughts.

A Fine Mess

In the complicated, kaliedoscopic Middle East, it is easy to make a misstep which carries unintended consequences.  The war in Iraq, for instance, appeared to be a straightforward proposition: a brutal dictator who routinely threatened our interests, violated terms of the cease fire of the Gulf War of 1990-91, and looked like he was marching down the path of acquiring WMD in a post 9/11 world.  We were faced with a threat, had a strategic interest, and the backing of our closest ally, Great Britain.  It turned out to be a messy, costly, and complicated affair, and while we removed one dictator, we enabled another tyrannical regime, Iran, to expand its influence.

Fast forward nearly a decade and we have yet another showdown with another brutal secular dictator.  And we are on the brink of pulling the trigger on yet another unforeseen set of consequences, and this time with even thinner support.  Yes, the Assad regime is brutally attempting to hold on to power.  Yes, he used WMD on his own people.  Yes, the world needs to understand that the use of WMD cannot go unpunished.  But I submit that the Obama administration has now maneuvered itself into a position where a good decision is no longer available.

Let's look at where the game board sits.  We have no UN Security Council Resolution, and no NATO support.  Russia (remember the "reset"?) is obstructing us and our closest historical ally, Great Britain has said nyet.  For all the self righteous chest thumping of Obama during his campaign against Bush, he has placed us in a position of being more out there alone on an issue than Bush ever was.  Obama finally caved last week and sought Congressional support, which he didn't bother to do before his infamous "lead from behind" intervention in Libya.  Now, there is even controversy over the death toll in the Syrian WMD attack, with independent groups claiming that the Obama administration is grossly inflating the number.

Obama failed to lead early in the Syrian civil war, before the rebels turned jihadist.  Now, as in Egypt, there are no good guys to choose from.  Do you really want to weaken the Assad regime so that Syria turns into a Muslim extremist led state (assuming Mr. Holder lets us use the term "Muslim extremist").  Do we want to risk strengthening Assad by launching a pinprick limited attack that he quickly rebounds from?  What if Syria, Iran, or Hezbollah attacks Israel?  What if Syria attacks us here?

It is hard not to feel a little schadenfreude over this.  The self righteous Obama administration has only the support of France (or as one pundit put it, the "coalition of the invisible").  Syria has not directly threatened us or our allies.  A limited attack will have no appreciable effect.  A larger attack risks toppling Assad and paving the way for the jihadists.  In other words, there are no good decisions on the table.

This box is a direct result of a president with limited experience and no leadership skills.  The Syrian situation was foreseeable and even predictable.  But Obama failed to build and cultivate close strategic alliances.  He made a "red line" pronouncement that he is now stuck with.  Then, he made matters worse by stopping in midflight to get Congressional approval.  Building a coalition with the international community and getting Congressional support are crucial.

And, as a side note, the presumptive Democratic candidate for president, Hillary Clinton, is on record saying that Assad is a reformer.  On top of the Benghazi debacle, this wrongheaded assertion should derail her candidacy.  But the MSM refuses to hold her accountable.

Syria.  Libya.  Iraq.  Iran.  Egypt.  Is there any place that the Obama foreign policy is winning?

Governments and Women

Rather than write about the sequester (which is much ado about not much), I thought I'd comment on some items that came up over the past couple of weeks on how governments treat women, and how they manage to muck things up.

Let's start with Iran.   It turns out that even the mullahs are figuring out that a key to prosperity is population growth (contrary to the claims of the eco-statists like Paul Ehrlich).  With an aging population, you need young, productive workers to support us aging folks in their dotage and Iran is beginning to suffer the same demographic issues that are plaguing Japan, Russia, and Europe.

As someone with some background in economics, I believe that people do respond to financial incentives.  And I applaud the mullahs in this regard.  They apparently have set up a series of financial incentives to induce women to have more babies, including generous time off, and a gold coin upon the birth of a child.  Maybe the mullahs are catching on a bit.

I'm not sure financial incentives alone will be sufficient to do the trick, however.  Iranian women are, in my view, among the most stunning in the world, with their dark brown eyes and hair and beautiful olive skin.  Yet, the mullahs keep them wrapped up in what amounts to black plastic hefty bags and make their brothers accompany them on trips outside their homes.  Somebody needs the explain to the mullahs what actually causes babies and that these measures are a structural impediment to, ahem, spontaneous baby generation.  If you really want more babies, boys, loosen your collars a bit.   Maybe start by introducing a more fashionable burka (see above).

But not to be outdone, public policy choices here in the good old USA toward women also appear to be somewhat schizophrenic.  Our own government is hell bent on providing women with free birth control (with the indomitable Sandra Fluke as its leading advocate), and we have heard the hew and cry of the Republican War on Women.

But while the liberals want government to provide free birth control to women, it is simultaneously launching a campaign to curtail the right of a woman to possess and carry a firearm for self protection.  Intruders and rapists will have less to fear from women if the Left is able to curtail 2nd Amendment rights.  Taken together, these policies on birth control and guns make a powerful statement about what our government intends to permit women to be empowered to do.

Oh, and by the way, it turns out that spousal coverage is being dropped by many companies because of Obamacare mandates.  So Obama's claim that "if you like your coverage, you can keep it," apparently will not be true for many women covered on their husband's policies.

Absurd government policies toward women appear to be something we have in common with Iran.  If women are to be truly free, independent, and fully empowered, the mullahs and the American Left don't quite get it yet.