Entries Tagged 'Politics' ↓

My friend Paul and did some polling last night, and we uncovered some surprising results! See who the public thinks will win the election: http://www.pkgraham.com/popular_vote/.

Gov. Sarah Palin’s speech to the Republican convention yesterday was focused on the promise of ethics reform. Never mind that the Republicans have been at the center of nearly all of the ethical lapses in Washington. In the last 8 years, the GOP has featured such distinguished congressmen as David Vitter, who admitted to soliciting a prostitute while in office; Sen. Larry Craig, who pled guilty to solicitation last year; Tom DeLay, indicted on campaign finance improprieties; and Bob Ney and Sen. Ted Stevens, respectively convicted and indicted of accepting bribes and lying about it. Vitter and DeLay even had the nerve to show up in Saint Paul this week!

But these issues are minor compared to the larger ethical issues facing our executive branch. George W. Bush spearheaded the invasion a sovereign nation and his top officials made 935 false statements in the process — is that not a lapse in ethical judgment? Bush authorized and encouraged the U.S. military to torture its prisoners, and John McCain has repeatedly endorsed Bush’s use of torture. In February, McCain even encouraged Bush to veto legislation which would have prohibited waterboarding. When the executive branch sanctions prisoner abuse, isn’t that an ethical issue too?

Sen. Barack Obama’s ethics record stands in stark contrast to John McCain and the GOP. Obama worked to pass significant ethics reform in early 2007 and worked hard to keep it from being watered down by the rest of the Senate. Last year Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus said that Obama “leads the pack” in his record on lobbying reform. And Obama has a four-pronged plan to restore ethical integrity to the executive branch.

If Sarah Palin was serious about restoring good judgment to the White House, she would know that a vote for John McCain is an endorsement of the ethical judgment we’ve seen from the GOP over the last 8 years. Barack Obama stands up for his ethical principles and has true credentials as an ethical reformer. If Sarah Palin truly wanted to promote ethics reform, this is what she would have told the Republican convention.

Megan McArdle, a.k.a. Jane Galt, suggested a very interesting and smart tax reform plan about five years ago. I don’t agree with everything she’s suggesting, but I agree with most of it, and her rationale is quite sound. It’s a much more nuanced and smarter approach than the “tax simplification” plans proposed by our politicians.

Entrepreneur Marc Andreessen, the founder of Netscape, sat down with Barack Obama last spring for an hour and a half. He’s finally published his impressions from that meeting. This is a great read — very interesting and inspirational.

Are you in Texas, Ohio, Vermont or Rhode Island? Then be sure to vote in tomorrow’s primary!

So, the next nominee is Harriet Miers. Or as Joel Achenbach put it: Bush Nominates Totally Random Person for Court.

I’m really disappointed in this choice. She’s like the Anti-Roberts. Miers has no significant legal background. Her chief qualification seems to be her loyalty to Bush, which would automatically someone a poor justice. (The whole reason we give lifetime appointments to federal judges is to prevent undue influence from politicians.) But she certainly doesn’t appear to be an intellectual heavyweight. John Roberts went to Harvard Law School, Harriet Miers went to Southern Methodist. And while SMU may be a decent law school, it makes her look like a lightweight when combined with the lack of experience on her resume. (She ran the Texas Lottery Commission?!? That’s the best Bush can come up with?!?)

I’m also disappointed in the Democratic leadership. They opposed Roberts and now they support Miers? Apparently they want the least qualified Supreme Court possible. Oh well, Miers is the least of their problems…

Update: Harriet has her own blog! This is the funniest thing I’ve seen all day!! (Thanks to Jeremy Blachman for the link.)

Update #2: Andrew Sullivan’s coverage of Ms. Miers has been particularly strong. Follow the link to hear what some conservatives and Republicans have to say about the nomination (they seem to be pissed).

I wonder if John Roberts was Judith Miller’s secret source.

Chavez May Try to Extradite Robertson

From Reuters, via the New York Times. If this were in The Onion, I’d find it really funny. Being in a real newspaper, I find it kinda disturbing.

I’d buy a FOXBlocker for my TV, but I’ve already done a pretty good job of removing Fox News from all of my televisions. These days, televisions all allow us to pick which channels appear in the lineup. They did this in 1995. And some even did this in 1985. So I’ve already deprogrammed Fox News from my televisions. Besides, wouldn’t the FOXBlocker degrade your cable TV signal a little bit, since it’s another device that the signal has to pass through? My signal’s already pretty weak; I wouldn’t want to try adding another device into the mix.

My friend Cristian emailed me with a comment about property taxes here in Washington:

so, we, the District, hae a projected 395 million $ surplus for this fiscal year! that’s about $700 per resident.

the crazy mayor will look first into axing property taxes. wrong idea if you ask me!! can’t wait for him to get out. i have plenty of other ideas…

The problem is, property taxes are rising way too quickly. I got my new assessment yesterday actually. My assessment went up 26%, but because of “tax cuts” in the property tax rate, my taxes are only going to rise by 15%. The first year, that was expected. The second year, it was nice to see some kind of written confirmation that my property was appreciating. This year, it’s not a BIG deal, but in a couple years it could become difficult to afford. My salary’s not rising by 15%!

I’d love for my county initiatives to be fully-funded, but if the tax base rises by ~25% every year, it leaves little incentive to keep your costs down or to prioritize your projects. Remember, in Fairfax County, it’s not like there are 25% more people needing services… it’s not that our schools are in dire need of repair… instead we’re getting ice skating rinks and arboretums and county-sponsored bus trips to New York City.

Of course, Washington D.C.’s schools are in dire need of repair. But that’s also a management issue. Even with unlimited funding, no existing city administrator seems likely to fix that.

There are a lot of states that cap how fast property taxes can rise. Basically, it works like rent control: they limit your assessment increases as long as you own the property. When you sell the property, it’s reset to the current market value for the next owner. If DC doesn’t have a cap like that, then I’d endorse that first and foremost. If that’s in place, then I’d endorse property tax relief programs for low-income homeowners and fixed-income retirees. I’m ambivalent about cutting property taxes beyond that; I’d want to know more about what the mayor was proposing.

Schroeder’s a law student in Fort Worth, TX. One of his law school professors didn’t know that Ulysses S. Grant was a president. Schroeder had to argue about it with him and the rest of the class! Unbelievable story, which really is a great metaphor to the kinds of “debate” going on in the public policy arena these days.

In the last few days, there’s been some talk of a “reality-based community” that’s supposedly separate from some kind of non-reality-based community. The “reality-based community” uses facts and logic, whereas the others uses emotion and faith. Basically, a Blue vs. Red thing. The lingo sounds so elitist that it seems like something lying liars would have made up to make the left look bad.

But there’s a valid point in all that: these days in public discourse, non-facts are given the same weight as facts. Kerry said he earned his medals and some Vietnam vets said he didn’t, so the media reported on both without trying to conclusively determine whose argument was true and whose was false. One of them’s gotta be wrong!

If the media won’t analyze arguments anymore, we need to o it ourselves. Look at the original source material. Contact the authors — journalists are always willing to talk. Don’t believe a factual claim just because someone says it’s true. Otherwise, have no right to bitch when a law school professor teaches his class that Ulysses S. Grant wasn’t a president.