Huckster at the Helm

[Moses]

Last update: February 2, 2005 at 9:40 PM[/color]

Editorial: State of the Union/A masterly salesman's pitch

Published February 3, 2005

George W. Bush may turn out to be the finest salesman who ever occupied the White House, a leader who sold a war in Iraq using bad intelligence, who enacted three big tax cuts the government could not afford and who won re-election even though a majority of voters had grave doubts about the policies he actually stands for.

In his State of the Union address Wednesday night Bush was at his motivational best, delivering a brisk summation of achievements past and a wide-ranging list of goals ahead. There is much to admire in the ideals that Bush enumerated -- the responsibility that each generation owes to the next, the optimism and pluck that Americans cherish, the confidence in America's role as an instrument of history.

But a good salesman wants customers to fall in love with the product before they see the price tag, and so it was with major elements of Bush's speech. Sketching his plan to overhaul Social Security, he played on the obvious appeal for young workers of retirement accounts they can call their own. Yet he did not say the government will have to borrow billions of dollars and cut future Social Security benefits dramatically to finance those accounts -- never mind that such accounts do nothing to solve Social Security's current financial gap.

Bush also promised permanent new tax relief without telling voters that, when the government is running massive budget deficits, a tax cut today is merely a tax increase passed on to other taxpayers in future generations.

On foreign policy, Bush took time to bask in the warm afterglow of Sunday's election in Iraq. He was more than entitled; the election was an impressive success. But it's just plain wrong for Bush to use the prospect of democracy in Iraq to justify the invasion. That's not why the United States went to war.

Just this week the CIA said it had erred seriously in its pre-war analysis of the threat that Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction posed to the United States. That threat was the reason America went to war, and it turns out to have been entirely bogus.

Bush also used the speech to reprise his inaugural pledge to "seek and support the growth of democracy movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in the world." In the context of celebrating the Iraqi election, is Bush suggesting that bringing democracy to other oppressed lands will also involve military occupation? We doubt Americans will be eager to sign on.

Moreover, there's a big gap between what Bush said and what U.S. policy is. World over, many of our closest allies are anything but democratic. To his credit, Bush named Saudi Arabia and Egypt as two friends that need to move toward democracy, but if the United States wants truly to become the chief purveyor of freedom, it must better match its actions to its rhetoric.

This was a brilliant speech, a credit to the president and his speech writers. But the details of Bush's budget, his Social Security reform proposals and his foreign policy may be much tougher to swallow than his words last night.

[Moses]

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
Wednesday, February 2, 2005 · Last updated 8:28 p.m. PT

Only one side told in Bush Soc. Sec. pitch
By CALVIN WOODWARD
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

WASHINGTON -- The devil was in the missing details Wednesday night when President Bush showcased his Social Security plan and claimed advances on jobs and against terrorism that don't tell the full story.

Bush explained in detail how, under his proposal, younger workers would be able to divert some of their Social Security payroll taxes into private accounts "so you can build a nest egg for your own future."

Nowhere in his State of the Union speech did he give the other side of the equation - that Social Security benefits for those workers would be reduced as a result. He stated "your account will provide money for retirement over and above the check you will receive from Social Security," without explaining that check would be smaller.

Moreover, he seemed to issue a guaranteed return on investment for people putting some of their retirement money in the market, saying: "Your money will grow, over time, at a greater rate than anything the current system can deliver."

Although his plan promises checks and balances to ensure such money isn't frittered away on risky investments, it does not come with a guarantee of performance exceeding benefits of the current system.

Declaring Social Security will go broke if nothing is done, Bush said that by 2042, "the entire system would be exhausted and bankrupt."

In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office forecasts Social Security as it is would be able to pay 73 percent of benefits in 2042 and stay solvent for 10 years beyond that.

In a portion of his speech dealing with economic progress in the last four years, Bush trumpeted the addition of 2.3 million jobs "in the last year alone," as if he's delivered a succession of job gains.

His number was correct for the year in question, but he left out that there was an overall job loss in those four years. He remains about 300,000 jobs short of closing that jobs deficit.

Even in a policy-packed address like a State of the Union, nuances are lost and Wednesday's speech was no exception.

Bush called Iraq "free and sovereign," an arguably premature definition in light of the relentless violence from insurgents and the overwhelming presence of U.S. troops.

He also said Iraq was "a vital front on the war on terror" and Americans "are fighting terrorists in Iraq so we do not have to face them here at home."

The terrorist link that the United States most worried about when it invaded Iraq - an alleged relationship with the al-Qaida network behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks - came to little.

Close to home, Bush credited the No Child Left Behind law with improving school achievement and test scores, but many educators say they are struggling to meet the law's requirements because of a lack of money and because some requirements are inflexible.

The law demands yearly progress from all groups of students and penalizes many schools that fall short. Bush also talked about increasing Pell grants; the administration has not explained in detail how it will find the money to make that happen.

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Associated Press writer Sam Hananel contributed to this report.

[Moses]

Analysis: More skeptics this term than last

Thursday, February 03, 2005
By Michael McGough, Post-Gazette National Bureau



WASHINGTON -- President Bush last night offered a staggering wish list -- from partial privatizing Social Security to reforming the legal system, from rearranging immigration law to controlling federal spending, from creating a stable democracy in Iraq to building peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

These proposals all fall into the president's overall theme of personal liberty and responsibility. But they share one other theme as well: Their success will depend on his ability to persuade skeptical members of Congress, most of whom do have to run for re-election, to see things his way.

That was less of a problem in the president's first term: routing the Taliban and al Qaida in Afghanistan after Sept. 11, 2001, toppling Saddam Hussein on evidence that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction, and winning enactment of the USA Patriot Act to bolster defenses against terrorist attack. Even Bush's most prominent domestic initiatives, the No Child Left Behind Act and Medicare coverage for prescription drugs, involved preaching to the converted. Many Democrats supported both national educational standards and a prescription drug benefit for the elderly.

By contrast, Bush's second-term priorities of spending restraint, Social Security privatization and tort reform have little appeal to most Democrats and make even some Republicans nervous.

While fewer in number in both the House and the Senate than they were in the last Congress, Democrats make up for that deficiency with a new resolve to resist what they see as a stealth campaign by the president to repeal the New Deal of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

They will battle a Republican caucus on both sides of Capitol Hill that is resurgent, confident and increasingly identified with Bush's vision of the Republican Party as champion of the "Ownership Society." With majorities in both houses of Congress, the president has an advantage that the last three re-elected presidents lacked.

Even so, he faces the burden of proof on many of his priorities, particularly on his plan to "reform" Social Security -- even though, as he indicated last night, workers 55 and older would not be affected by the change and payroll taxes could be directed only to a handful of safe investments.

The Democrats are readying a similar critique of proposed economies in discretionary spending, and watch for Democrats to protest that Bush got religion on the perfidiousness of pork-barrel spending only after he was safely re-elected. They'll also likely complain that rolling back Bush's first-term tax cuts instead of making them permanent, as the president hopes to do, would provide more resources for everything from deficit reduction to propping up the finances of Social Security.

Senate Democrats, in particular, seem to be spoiling for a fight, stalling the confirmation of Attorney General-designate Alberto R. Gonzales and threatening, in the words of Senate leader Harry Reid, to "screw things up" in the Senate if the Republicans detonate the "nuclear option" of banning filibusters of judicial nominations. Even if judicial filibusters were abolished, Republicans still would need 60 votes to cut off debate on legislation -- and there are only 55 of them in the Senate.

But it isn't just truculent Democrats who threaten the agenda of this second-term president, underlining the difficulties re-elected presidents have in prevailing with increasingly independent Congresses as their own power inevitably begins to dim. That's especially so because, politically if not philosophically, many Republicans are ambivalent about Bush's plans for tinkering with the immensely popular Social Security system and his more overarching commitment to an entrepreneurial "Ownership Society." They fear that following the president's lead would strike moderate voters as ideological overreaching of the kind associated with former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.

When it comes to legal reform, on the other hand, the problem for some Republicans is philosophical. Most of the courts that entertain what Bush calls frivolous lawsuits against doctors and manufacturers are state courts, and conservative Republicans are conflicted about whether Congress should trespass on states' right, even it means reductions in insurance premiums.

Immigration is another issue on which the president is likely to face opposition from within his own party. For Bush, it is self-evident that supporters of freedom would endorse a guest-worker program that would allow immigrants from Mexico to work legally in this country and eventually earn their way to citizenship. But many conservative Republicans are opposed to any proposal that, in their view, would legitimize immigrants who broke the law to get here.

Presidents traditionally have a freer hand in foreign affairs, but promoting democracy in Iraq and elsewhere comes with a price in both lives and resources. Notwithstanding the president's celebration of last weekend's elections in Iraq, an open-ended U.S. presence in that country remains unpopular across party lines. Vietnam analogies will continue to be dusted off if the new Iraqi government cannot quell the insurgency and Americans continue to die.

As for other parts of the world, even a cash-strapped Congress likely would be willing to help underwrite an agreement between Israel and a democratic Palestinian state. It might not be so willing to invest in democracy elsewhere, especially if the president hews to his new-found austerity on domestic spending.

Finally, the president could squander second-term congressional goodwill in ways that have nothing to do with money -- for example, with a divisive Supreme Court nominee or a renewed push for a constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage.

Compromise with Congress is a relatively prosaic aspect of presidential leadership, but an important one.

Former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo once observed that politicians campaign in poetry but must govern in prose. A similar contrast can be drawn between Bush's expansive inaugural address -- a poetic paean to "freedom" at home and abroad -- and the State of the Union speech he delivered last night, in which he offered a litany of policy particulars.

Last night's speech was a reminder that poetry can get a president only so far.

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(Michael McGough can be reached at 1-202-662-7025 or [e-mail].)

[Moses]

February 3, 2005
EDITORIAL

Mr. Bush's Two Big Ideas

The State of the Union speech has come in recent years to be a laundry list of everything the president would do if he had the power to do everything. Bill Clinton was a particular fan of that approach, and polls have always shown that Americans like it. Last night, George W. Bush delivered a modified version, with a raft of initiatives that included some things new but a great deal that was very familiar. We were pleased to hear the call for better defense in death-penalty cases and more community health centers in poor areas, and the mention of $350 million in aid for Palestinians to promote the peace process with Israel. But we were disheartened by the renewed call for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and the failure to mention development aid to Africa or virtually any other country that is not identified as a prime source of terrorism.

Mr. Bush is going to be judged on the way he delivers on his biggest thoughts, and the first State of the Union speech of his second term is almost certainly going to be remembered for his call to stay the course in Iraq and change the course of Social Security. [My calculations: he spent 50% of his speech promoting the neocon new world order/Iraq agenda, and 20% on Social Security = 70% on these two agendas]

On both counts, Mr. Bush fudged the most critical points. When it comes to the invasion of Iraq, everyone has already agreed that the turnout for last weekend's election was very encouraging - though we can't really fault the president for wanting to go over it one more time. The voting, however, was only a first step. It made the journey to establishing a stable and reasonably democratic government appear possible, but not necessarily likely. The election did not bridge over the fact that a vast majority of Iraq's people think of themselves as Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds or members of smaller ethnic groups rather than as part of an Iraqi nation.

While Mr. Bush rightly pointed to the training of "more capable Iraqi security forces" as crucial for an American military withdrawal, it is absolutely not enough. All the indigenous police and soldiers Iraq can muster will be useless unless members of the new government are prepared to work - and risk their own political capital - to create a state that recognizes the rights and needs of all its citizens. Mr. Bush's argument that this is a bad time to set a timetable for withdrawal obscures the very immediate need to set goals, and to make it clear to the Iraqis that the continued presence of American forces depends on their meeting those goals. His speech was yet another feel-good paean to freedom and democracy that did little to show the American people an exit strategy for United States troops, or to show the Iraqis what we expect from them next.

On the domestic front, Mr. Bush talked a lot last night about Social Security without ever saying much beyond the fact that he wants to see it privatized - a word the president no longer uses because polls showed that the American people reacted badly to the concept. Mr. Bush now likes the term "wise and effective reform." Like his rhetoric, his proposals for Social Security continue to stress the vague and glossy.

The "reform" described by the president last night addressed the major criticisms that have been showered on the privatization plan by promising that none of the bad things would happen: no big fees, no risk from market swings, no risk that retirees would outlive their money and no fiscally irresponsible borrowing. He offered little explanation, however, of how he would accomplish all these fixes, and the new information that he did provide was unconvincing. The hostile - and unusually vocal - reaction from parts of his audience suggested the problems he will have when the program comes to Congress.

[Moses]

Imus this morning urged his viewers to watch it with the sound off to "see the gestures of someone who looks like a mental patient."

[Moses]

startribune.com


Last update: March 8, 2005 at 7:09 AM

Editorial: Social Security/Mis-leadership from Bush



Published March 8, 2005

A truly astonishing exchange took place last Friday at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, where President Bush held a forum to discuss the future of Social Security. A local resident named Debbie Johnson, a mother and credit-union employee, took the microphone and told the audience, "I don't believe Social Security will be around by the time I retire."

The president, who has studied the issue for more than 20 years and received briefings from the nation's top experts, stopped her practically in midsentence. Did he point out that, even under conservative assumptions, Social Security's trustees say the system will be fully solvent until the year 2042? Did he observe that, even without any action by Congress today, Social Security will have sufficient funds to pay most of its promised benefits indefinitely? Did he remind her that, by the estimates of its own actuaries, Social Security is stronger today than it was in 1994?

No. The president said Johnson was right to doubt the system and added: "I don't blame you."

And so it goes with the White House two-step on Social Security. When briefing lawmakers or answering questions from journalists, the president's aides speak carefully about Social Security and acknowledge the many nuances of reform. Then the president takes the stage at heavily publicized events in front of sympathetic audiences and indulges voters in their worst fears and misconceptions about Social Security's future.

Voters deserve better leadership on this complicated and sobering issue.

By now Americans understand that Social Security has a serious solvency problem. It will run short of funds to pay full benefits, starting about midcentury. Before that, it will begin drawing down the Treasury bonds in its trust fund, which will impose new strains on federal finances. But they also understand that Bush's proposal for private retirement accounts would do nothing to address the solvency problem, and they are beginning to understand that there are lots of other ways to shore up the nation's saving for retirement.

Responsible leaders in Washington would address Social Security's solvency problem first, preferably with a balanced package of revenue increases and future benefit cuts. There are at least two proposals in Congress to do this, and many more proposals floating around Washington. Then they would explore whether the nation wants to add to the existing battery of private retirement accounts, and how such a step might be financed.

In short, voters deserve an honest summary of the problem and a fair description of the options before them, not the hokey hucksterism they saw in Indiana last week.

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