The failing political strategies

The New York Times offers a detailed update of the Russian Election Interference Thing. And yes, our "deep state" public servants who won us the Cold War are trying to stymie many of the very same Kremlin masterminds from flipping their defeat back into victory over the West. 

Step one, getting the American right to dismiss our defenders as a "deep state." Study, learn. Be angry that our enemies have taken Washington, which no other hostile power ever accomplished before.

== Staring at a tree -- ignoring a burning forest ==

Alert to you economics/trade nerds!  One of my RASR (Residually Adult-Sane Republican) friends – investment guru John Mauldin – recently cited this short explanation of the Trade War threat by currency expert Taggart Murphy:

“‘Trump is doing everything he can to bring on the end of the days when the US can borrow whatever it wants in whatever amounts it wants. To be sure, there is no recipe book. The dollar is now so entrenched as the world’s money that if your assignment were to bring the curtain down on that—and thus the ability of the US to borrow whatever it wants whenever it wants—it’s not at all clear what you would do.

“‘But you’d start by doing everything that Trump is doing—pick fights with all your allies, blow the government deficit wide open at the peak of an economic recovery, abandon any notion of fiscal responsibility, threaten sanctions on anyone and everyone who seeks to honor the deal Obama struck with Iran (thereby almost begging everyone to figure out some way to bypass the US banking system in order to do business), [Which they are openly doing, comments JFM] throw spanners into the works of global trade without any clear indication of what it is precisely you want for a country that structurally consumes more than it produces and thus by the laws of accounting MUST run trade and current account deficits.”

Implicitly, Murphy and John admit the contrast – that Bill Clinton and California’s Jerry Brown and most democratic governors have done the right thing, using good times to pay down debt. And Barack Obama, even inheriting the Second Depression, decelerated the rate of change of deficits, applying brakes to the 2nd derivative of debt. Our alliances and sciences and almost every other health metric did better across the span of DP administrations. In contrast, every single strength the made the late 20th century prosperous and mighty and that won the Cold War is being systematically dismantled.

Alas, neither John nor any other RASR seems ever to draw the blatantly obvious conclusion, that either:

(1) the entire leadership clade of the GOP consists of hypocritical morons who should not be trusted with a burnt match, or worse, or else

(2) that the bottomless list of outrageous harms to the U.S. can only be deliberate.

Look at Vladimir Putin’s grin, and tell me that you understand the meaning of the term “Occam’s Razor.”

== The one tree ==

My RASRs, in their frantic state of denial, choose to desperately cling to one tree in the forest. In John's case it is debt. And yes, it is dangerous how we are plunging toward a debt cliff. Note that, as usual, the second derivative of deficit spending  -- the rate of rate of change -- has veered from negative to positive under a Republican administration, as is absolutely uniformly and perfectly-always true. Always. And those "conservatives" who ignore this brutally consistent fact are no conservatives, but something else.

Alas, John chooses to blame our debt splurge on the Federal Reserve, for maintaining low interest rates, which is like blaming a liquor store owner's low prices for drunk driving deaths. Sure, it's peripherally pertinent, but not the real cause. (Meanwhile Trump howls at the Fed for raising rates; go figure?)

Look around to where governments are operating in the black, in blue states like Jerry Brown's California, where the nation's only fiscally-prudent politicians have been paying down debt during good times, as both Adam Smith and J.M. Keynes recommended. Or Bill Clinton's 1990's surpluses. But it goes farther. In 1993, President Clinton created the Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform as part of the administration's effort to promote economic growth and control the budget deficit. The purpose of the commission, chaired by Senator J. Robert Kerrey (D-NE) and Senator John C. Danforth (R-MO), was to seek agreement across parties on long-term entitlement reform and structural changes to the tax system.

The resulting bill almost passed. It would have gradually raised retirement age and saved trillions, in exchange for cranking up Medicare for children and the poor and meaningful contributions by the rich. But the opportunity was trashed by Newt Gingrich and then by Dennis "friend-to-boys" Hastert, who worked with Fox to end all traces of adulthood in the GOP. (Oh, look up Dennis Hastert and be proud.)

Danforth-style Republicans are now entirely extinct. And the latest "supply side" tax cut again - as always - widened wealth disparities without stimulating R&D or "supply"... only asset bubbles.

== Trump's failing negotiating style ==

I've posted on Medium an expanded version of my look at the negotiation strategy always used by Donald Trump, that worked in the dark-coercive world of real estate, but that has never worked and cannot work in the worlds of diplomacy, politics and adult interaction. Except that the method has worked a couple of times... against him. The "deal-master" is clueless, disarmed and appears to be terrified.

Summarizing: what’s fundamental to this calamitous presidency is not the vulgarity or toddler tantrums or hatred of all fact-professions. It is his inability to grasp that "negotiation" is different at the adult or legislative or international levels. Those are three different things. But none of them work like real estate speculation or a TV reality show. Time and again, DT shows the same, predictable pattern: 

Break something the other side cares about. Threaten them with pain, then let them fall all over themselves to shift 90% toward what you want. It worked for Trump against Merv Griffin and dozens of development 'partners' and shivved contractors, and when he got his (very clever!) 1980s tax deals with New York City. It worked on The Apprentice.

And it hasn't worked even one time since he entered the White House. Not once. Sabotaging DACA and 2 million innocent young Americans didn't get him his wall. Trying to sabotage the ACA (Obamacare) only made people realize they like it. So far, his tariff war has accomplished zilch. Every month he takes something away from the Palestinians, never realizing that harming poor people strengthens, not weakens, Hamas. The list goes on, revealing a stunningly un-sapient inability to learn. 

(Ironically, the method DID work once, when Kim Jong Un used it on Donald Trump. And DT's unsecure cell phone (remember outrage over Hillary's email server?) allows perfect oppo profiling of this president.)

Yes, there's an alternative explanation for these actions. Or two. (1) deliberately weakening us at behest of Kremlin masters, and (2) pure evil. Sure, both of those are in play. But I believe a major factor is his inability to distinguish between obstinately repetitive, feral cunning on the one hand, and adaptably pragmatic intelligence.

The former worked well for him in the world of real estate deals, mafia coercion, falsehood-supported debt, bullying and money laundering. The latter is what you need when negotiating under the public glare, where a politician seen buckling to Trumpian pressure tactics will be finished, or where breaking something or hurting innocents doesn't shift the bargaining table.

Trump's opponents need to parse the feral-cunning from the drooling stupidity. We see the former at his Fox/KGB-supported nuremberg rallies. And his enemies under-rate this cunning at their peril. 

In turn, they display a stupidity of their own -- inability to grasp the power of polemic, ceding that territory to the Putin/Murdoch/Trumpian/fundie cabal, never realizing that these tricks can be answered... the way FDR and Churchill finally rose up and used the power of words to save civilization.

== Mueller and more ==

The day after Paul Manafort's conviction, Trump pointed to the mistrial on some counts as evidence that he was being improperly targeted by Mueller. “A large number of counts, ten, could not even be decided in the Paul Manafort case. Witch Hunt!” he tweeted.  But let’s count more truly. Across the 18 counts, there were 206 jury votes of guilty and ten jury votes to acquit. Read the article how a juror who professes to be a strong Trump supporter voted guilty 18 times.

A taste of the cyber-weapons that may be hurled against the U.S., if and when the Kremlin deems the time is right.

== Fresh Ideas ==

Folks have been thinking about how to reform various aspects of the archaic U.S. electoral process. Some notions are blatantly obvious and will happen the instant Democrats control Congress (only to be vetoed, alas.) Like ending gerrymandering, or requiring that all states use secure, easily audited voting apparatus with paper ballots or receipts, and that voter ID requirements be accompanied by generous compliance assistance, like automatic registration.  Some concepts – like those of Lawrence Lessig and his associate – would pry Big Money out of politics. (GOP Congress members spend far more time “fundraising” than on the floor or in committee, openly declaring that money buys access.)

Naturally, preferential-style elections make vastly more sense than the stupid plurality-wins system in most U.S. constituencies.

Some concepts are radical and would require a Constitutional Convention (e.g. we actually need TWO Dakotas?). Some are dumb notions that will never pass (e.g. all states agree to allocate their electors to the winner of the national popular vote - the “compact.” Yeah, that’ll happen.)

Given that even a massive Blue Wave will see its reforms blocked by Executive branch loons, Two Scoops followed by the vastly more dangerous Mike Pence, we need to look at things that are simple and might happen organically and almost instantly. Measures that small groups and individuals might take, that act with judo-like twist, that cannot easily be blocked by the forces of darkness.

Here’s one: In late November 2016 I wrote to some rich dudes suggesting they rent a luxury resort hotel somewhere and donate it for a unique and fascinating purpose — a weeklong actual, physical meeting of the newly-chosen Electoral College! 

Consider: there’s no rule that the Electors have to stay thousands of miles apart. Absolutely nothing prevents them from gathering and talking – like a “college” -- before submitting their votes to each state legislature. They could simply show up, privately (maybe with some Secret Service protection), at some secured resort.

No one else but cooks n’ such in attendance. Maybe even no phones. Should the press watch for white smoke pouring from a chimney?

Sure, the political parties may feel alarmed at the prospect. They’ll pressure their electors not to attend. Some states already have laws threatening punishment if an elector changes his/her vote from the pre-election commitment. But I’ll bet few chosen electors would stay away from their one chance in life to schmooze and, briefly, be among the most-important humans on the planet.

Officially at least. Because in fact, though members of the College might yell at each other and seek to persuade, there’s little chance anyone will reverse their partisan commitment, in any result-changing way. The one main effect would be that the elector-candidates nominated by each party, in each state, will be more closely vetted in advance, than before.

Still, what’s to complain about, if the EC decides to act like a “college”? 

No pressure or partisan posturing. Just a place for all the new electors to meet and talk.  Nine times out of ten, nothing would change; the electors would just hew to their pre-election commitments.

But on that tenth occasion, there’d be a final chance to fix something awful. I have never seen the idea anywhere else. And note, it can be done for a few million by a single donor.