Chris Hayes on Romney Rules

I have for some months been compiling a set of Romney Rules for electoral competition, all of which boil down, essentially, to "rule x applies to my opponent, but not to me."

I am currently about one third through Chris Hayes', Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy, which argues that the very nature of the meritocracy ethos to which almost all Americans subscribe leads inevitably to corruption: unmediated competition drives winners to game the system and cement their advantages. It's through that prism that Hayes, focusing on Romney's violation of the negotiated ground rules (e.g, by posing direct questions to Obama), viewed last night's debate -- and by extension, Romney himself. Kos diarist Iarxphd transcribes (I've fixed apparent typos):

The theme of the last 10 years of this country is that the people at the top don't think the rules apply to them.  And you send your people to sit down and negotiate a set of rules, and 20 minutes into it you throw it out the window. Everything we've seen, from the financial crisis to everything else that's happened to this country has been about the Oligarchs and the ruling class, and the people at the top, feeling like they are not a party to the social contract. So some stupid little contract that was negotiated by your people, you don't worry about it 20 minutes into it.

Obama: Republican budgeting = Wall Street risk management

As Republicans scream "socialist" at Obama, he is outflanking them by tying Republican stewardship of the economy to Wall Street's reckless mismanagement -- and dramatically contrasting his own budgeting practices and priorities.

While Obama spent two years as a candidate contrasting his proposed menu of investments and tax hikes on the wealthy with "the failed policies of the last eight [seven, six] years," his own budget enables a new level of sophistication in the contrast. Now, the Republicans in his telling are poor risk managers -- while Obama is a long-range planner and investor. From today's weekly address:

My administration inherited a $1.3 trillion budget deficit, the largest in history. And we've inherited a budgeting process as irresponsible as it is unsustainable. For years, as Wall Street used accounting tricks to conceal costs and avoid responsibility, Washington did, too.

These kinds of irresponsible budgets -- and inexcusable practices -- are now in the past. For the first time in many years, my administration has produced a budget that represents an honest reckoning of where we are and where we need to go.

It's also a budget that begins to make the hard choices that we've avoided for far too long -- a strategy that cuts where we must and invests where we need. That's why it includes $2 trillion in deficit reduction, while making historic investments in America's future. That's why it reduces discretionary spending for non-defense programs as a share of the economy by more than 10 percent over the next decade -- to the lowest level since they began keeping these records nearly half a century ago. And that's why on Wednesday, I signed a presidential memorandum to end unnecessary no-bid contracts and dramatically reform the way contracts are awarded -- reforms that will save the American people up to $40 billion each year.

While the budget itself proposes huge outlays for stimulus, health care reform, education, alternative energy and infrastructure, Obama here emphasizes so far rather theoretical and distant planned spending cuts and spending-as-percentage-of-gdp projections dependent on optimistic growth predictions. He has skillfully hedged ambitious spending plans with commitments -- and rhetorical emphases --on long-range budget planning. If promises of future frugality seem a bit easy, it's also true that Obama has laid down a marker, imposing ambitious deficit reduction targets on himself by which he will be measured before his term is out.

Meanwhile, he is only too happy to help Republicans tie themselves to the crony capitalism that enabled the bubblenomics of recent years.

Three-point shot: Obama hits McCain on healthcare, social security, Wall Street

Obama sank a three-point shot against McCain's claim to be an effective economic reformer today. Speaking first at Bethune-Cookman University and then at an outdoor rally in Jacksonville, he simultaneously hit McCain on three closely linked fronts - wanting to privatize social security, being a longtime advocate of bank deregulation, and proposing further deregulation of our chaotic health insurance system. He exposed as completely bogus McCain's newfound zeal for tough regulation.

Here's ABC's account of the healthcare-banking connection:

At the end of a week of Wall Street bailouts and government negotiations to take over hundreds of billions in bad loans, Obama contends McCain is a newcomer to government regulation of Wall Street.

Speaking before a crowd of 2,500 at an event focused on women’s issues – Obama called McCain out for once suggesting deregulation of the health care industry like the banking industry.

Obama used McCain’s words – and the financial crisis against him – reading a quote from McCain which was published in "Contingencies" magazine last year.

"Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation, McCain said in the magazine in their September/.October 2007 issue.

Today, Obama read back the quote to the crowd and in astonishment said, “So let me get this straight – he wants to run health care like they’ve been running Wall Street. Well, Senator, I know some folks on Main Street who aren’t going to think that’s such a good idea.”

And here is Reuters on the banking-social security connection:

[Obama] attacked McCain for supporting some privatization of Social Security retirement funds, a proposal President George W. Bush made a centerpiece of his 2004 White House campaign but was unable to push through Congress.

"I know Senator McCain is talking about a 'casino culture' on Wall Street -- but the fact is, he's the one who wants to gamble with your life savings," Obama said at a rally in Daytona Beach in Florida, a state with a large population of seniors and retired workers.

"That is not going to happen when I'm president," the Illinois senator said, asking the crowd to imagine the fears of retirees who found their Social Security funds tied to the current market.

The common thread, of course, was deregulatory zeal:

"There's only one candidate who's called himself 'fundamentally a deregulator' when deregulation is part of the problem," Obama said.

These thrusts are going to sink deep into McCain's reformer posture. Democrats have long run on claims that Republicans want to destroy Medicare and Social Security, and sometimes those claims have had a demagogic edge. But Obama's claim that McCain wants to do to healthcare and social security what Phil Gramm (a.k.a. Dereg) and his wrecking crew did to banking has the advantage of being true. McCain was zealous for bank deregulation; McCain himself has drawn the analogy between bank deregulation and unfettering insurers from state healthcare mandates; McCain's ridiculous healthcare plan would indeed free insurers to riddle health insurance with ever more coverage restrictions and exclusions. As for Social Security, McCain has been pushing privatization since the late '90's; he supported Bush's privatization proposal; and as recently as March he disavowed the plan on his own website to establish private accounts separately from the existing system, insisting that the privatization should be built into a portion of each person's current social security set-aside.

At the darkest hour of McCain's post-Convention bump, I confess to worrying that McCain might win -- as I still do. But I never lost my faith that Obama and his chief campaign architects understood better than all his critics -- better than anyone -- how to conduct an effective campaign. That faith is redoubled now. Obama has brilliantly, patiently, meticulously positioned himself for full frontal attack -- now, when the nation's attention is riveted. He has seized and held the high moral ground, nurturing the meme that the McCain campaign has set new standards for viciousness and dishonesty and letting it take hold before concentrating his fiercest fire.

Now, as he binds McCain ever-tighter to discredited policies (more tax cuts for the wealthy) and bankrupt ideas ("I'm always for more deregulation"), he maintains the moral contrast by continuing to make clear that he is faulting McCain on policy and outlook rather than on character. At the convention, Obama's keynote was, "it's not because John McCain doesn't care, it's because John McCain doesn't get it." This fleshed out his months-old claim that McCain would continue the failed policies of the last eight years. It also contrasted pointedly with McCain's scurrilous character attacks on Obama. The party heavies followed his lead, collectively killing McCain with kindness.

As the market tsunami broke last week, Obama continued the two-step, making the gesture of fairness before launching a pinpoint strike on McCain's approach to economics:

I certainly don’t fault Senator McCain for these problems, but I do fault the economic philosophy he subscribes to. It’s a philosophy we’ve had for the last eight years – one that says we should give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else. It’s a philosophy that says even common-sense regulations are unnecessary and unwise, and one that says we should just stick our heads in the sand and ignore economic problems until they spiral into crises. Well now, instead of prosperity trickling down, the pain has trickled up – from the struggles of hardworking Americans on Main Street to the largest firms of Wall Street.

Again, the attack has the supreme virtue of being true -- and giving the lie to McCain's vociferous promises to reform Wall Street. These calm, precise charges contrast beautifully with McCain's ridiculous charges that Obama was closely tied to former Fannie Mae CEOs Johnson and Raines and somehow personally responsible for the market meltdown.

McCain's chickens are coming home to roost. The more he flails at Obama with charges of being vapid, all talk, unpatriotic, and motivated solely by ambition, the more gravitas he lends to Obama's attacks on McCain's governing philosophy and support of Bush policies. The debate that Obama has always said he's eager to have -- over policy -- will play out on his terms.

Related posts:
Killing McCain with Kindness
Obama does it with integrity

Obamanomics: rebalancing the national portfolio

One of Obama's favorite words is 'balance.' It's been a central premise of his campaign that moving economic policy to the left is a matter of restoring balance after a generation of deregulation, tax cuts, widening income inequality, and risk shift from institutions to individuals.

Given this recurring theme, it's amusing to look at how Obama, in his speech devoted to the housing crisis delivered at Cooper Union in New York City today, tacks back and forth between Hamilton and Jefferson to establish a framework for his proposed policies.

First, Obama enlists Hamilton in support of government providing 'prudent aids and encouragement' to economic growth, extrapolating from Hamilton's activism "weaving together the economies of the states and creating an American system of credit and capital markets" an implied support for government as rulemaker, i.e. regulator. He implicitly acknowledges that Hamilton's vision of an economy based on manufacturing enterprise better describes the path of American development than Jefferson's agrarian vision.

But then he tacks over to Jefferson's fear that Hamiltonian capitalism "would favor the interests of the few over the many." Finally, with a bit of sleight of hand, he implies that Hamilton shared this concern, by segueing from the rivals' different attitudes about concentration of power to their alleged agreement that "opportunity had to remain open to all." In effect he coopts Hamilton's authority for a strong Federal role in the economy, and Jefferson's mandate to work against the concentration of power and wealth.

Having yoked the rivals to support his own advocacy for free markets, strong government regulation, and reduced concentration of wealth, Obama goes on to frame strong if measured doses of re-regulation and government aid to distressed homeowners as a matter of redressing imbalances created in the Clinton era.

But the frame is not finished at this point. Before moving on to specific policies, Obama introduces these paired principles:

Prosperity is only sustainable if it's shared: "there is no dividing line between Main Street and Wall Street. The decisions made in New York's high-rises have consequences for Americans across the country. And whether those Americans can make their house payments; whether they keep their jobs; or spend confidently without falling into debt – that has consequences for the entire market." In the current crisis, "What was bad for Main Street was bad for Wall Street. Pain trickled up (my emphasis).

Concentration of power distorts policymaking and undermines shared prosperity: specifically, bank deregulation was botched in the 1990s because of unchecked lobbying. Characteristically, Obama begins here by acknowledging that "the other side may have a point": "The evolution of industries often warrants regulatory reform...There were good arguments for changing the rules of the road in the 1990s." But a broken political system distorted reform: "Unfortunately, instead of establishing a 21st century regulatory framework, we simply dismantled the old one – aided by a legal but corrupt bargain in which campaign money all too often shaped policy and watered down oversight. In doing so, we encouraged a winner take all, anything goes environment that helped foster devastating dislocations in our economy."

Within this context, Obama positions individual policy prescriptions -- as he always does -- as means of restoring balance and fairness. Let's look at one proposal aimed at distressed homeowners, and one at regulation of lenders. First, Obama's defense of the Dodd-Frank FHA Housing Security Program:

Senator McCain argues that government should do nothing to protect borrowers and lenders who've made bad decisions, or taken on excessive risk. On this point, I agree. But the Dodd-Frank package is not a bailout for lenders or investors who gambled recklessly, as they will take losses. It is not a windfall for borrowers, as they will have to share any capital gain. Instead, it offers a responsible and fair way to help bring an end to the foreclosure crisis. It asks both sides to sacrifice, while preventing a long-term collapse that could have enormous ramifications for the most responsible lenders and borrowers, as well as the American people as a whole. That is what Senator McCain ignores.

Asking both sides to sacrifice is a classic Obama trope. This 'balance' is matched by his acknowledgement of McCain's moral concern. But in Obama's moral universe, McCain's got just one hand clapping.

The proposal to subject mortgage brokers to the same lending guidelines to which commercial banks are subject is presented as a a restoration of government's historic oversight function:

we need to regulate institutions for what they do, not what they are. Over the last few years, commercial banks and thrift institutions were subject to guidelines on subprime mortgages that did not apply to mortgage brokers and companies. It makes no sense for the Fed to tighten mortgage guidelines for banks when two-thirds of subprime mortgages don't originate from banks. This regulatory framework has failed to protect homeowners, and it is now clear that it made no sense for our financial system. When it comes to protecting the American people, it should make no difference what kind of institution they are dealing with.

Having placed his measures to deal with the current crisis in this framework, Obama broadens it, articulating principles that he has emphasized throughout his campaign:

Good policy reform requires systemic political reform:

the American people must be able to trust that their government is looking out for all of us – not just those who donate to political campaigns. I fought in the Senate for the most extensive ethics reform since Watergate. I have refused contributions from federal lobbyists and PACs. And I have laid out far-reaching plans that I intend to sign into law as President to bring transparency to government, and to end the revolving door between industries and the federal agencies that oversee them.

To move left today is to restore the center:

today, for far too many Americans, [the American] dream is slipping away. Wall Street has been gripped by increasing gloom over the last nine months. But for many American families, the economy has effectively been in recession for the past seven years. We have just come through the first sustained period of economic growth since World War II that was not accompanied by a growth in incomes for typical families. Americans are working harder for less. Costs are rising, and it's not clear that we'll leave a legacy of opportunity to our children and grandchildren. That's why, throughout this campaign, I've put forward a series of proposals that will foster economic growth from the bottom up, and not just from the top down....we need to pursue policies that once again recognize that we are in this together.

Those who dismiss Obama's calls for unity as empty rhetoric miss his relentless efforts to create unity by force of argument -- to convince Americans that our true national center is well left of where we are now. His rhetoric is powerful because his thinking is powerful. He is unmatched by any living American politician in his ability to develop and articulate policy proposals in a clear historical and theoretical context.

Hillary's policy proposals are a laundry list. McCain's are a morality play. Obama's are new chapters in an historical narrative.

Related Posts:
Breaking the Commander-in-Chief Chokehold
Audacity of Obama: Embracing Wright and Grandma
Audacity of Respect: What Obama Owes to Reagan II
Obama's Metapolitics
Obama gets down to tax brass
Obama brings it back to earth in Virginia
Feb. 5: Hillary's Speech was Better than Obama's
Truth and Transformation
Obama Praises Clinton, and Buries Him
Obama: Man, those Clinton Kids are Something