Category Archives: Politics

Fiddling around, ignoring problems

Uncle Sam hangs on for webBy Steve Brawner
© 2016 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

You know the story about Nero fiddling while Rome burned? It didn’t actually happen, but it illustrates a point about leaders crazily ignoring a problem.

These days, no illustration is needed. The government’s largest programs, Social Security and Medicare, are not burning up, but their problems are being ignored.

On Wednesday, the Social Security trustees and Medicare trustees each released their annual reports.

Social Security’s trustees wrote that the trust fund that supposedly finances the program – but actually has been raided to pay for other programs and then filled with IOUs – will be empty by 2034. That’s when today’s 49-year-olds (I’m 47) reach the normal retirement age. When that happens, benefits for all recipients, including 85-year-olds, theoretically would be cut 21 percent.

But of course that probably wouldn’t happen. The American people wouldn’t stand for it, and too many seniors vote. If tomorrow’s elected officials play the fiddle as well as today’s do (and they will probably be some of the same people), they’ll transfer money from the rest of the budget to Social Security and add to the national debt. As of June 21, that debt is $19,265,744,770,778.65, or more than $59,000 for every American.

Medicare’s due date is approaching faster. The trustees say the trust fund that pays for hospitals will be depleted by 2028, which is two years sooner than was projected last year. When the assets are depleted, revenues would cover 87 percent of the costs. Today, the program covers 55.3 million people.

All of this is occurring in the context of huge budget challenges. The government will already spend $534 billion more this year than it will collect, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Social Security, Medicare and interest on the debt already comprise 45 percent of the federal budget. Social Security and Medicare are growing, and the CBO says interest costs will rise from 6 percent of the budget this year to 13 percent by 2026.

In other words, if you neither touch Social Security and Medicare nor raise taxes, everything else, including defense, has to be cut quite a bit.

The American democratic experiment has faced bigger challenges than this one: creating a Constitution, ending slavery, reconstructing the union, winning World War II. Social Security and Medicare previously have faced insolvency, but at various times policymakers have figured out ways to push the due dates into the future. Social Security doesn’t require some Einsteinian policy fix – just spend less and/or collect more tax revenues. Medicare is harder because it’s based on paying into a health care system that keeps getting more costly, but it can be done.

Still, solving these problems is difficult because of changing demographics – we’re getting older and living longer – and because Americans now expect expensive government services for which they’re unwilling to pay the full cost. They believe the money can be found elsewhere, and some can be found, but not enough.

So elected officials not only must put down their fiddles, but they must also come down into the city and convince a majority of people to help put out a fire that, for now, is hard to see. All the while, they must overcome the many special interests who want to feed the fire.

Somebody must lead. Unfortunately, that probably won’t happen this election year. Sen. Bernie Sanders has led the Democratic Party, including President Obama and Hillary Clinton, to calling for increasing Social Security benefits. Clinton says she’ll pay for her increases by raising taxes on the wealthy – but remember, she gets a lot of money from wealthy people. The Republican nominee, Donald Trump, says there will be no need for changing the programs because America will be so rich because of his better trade deals and Mexico-built wall.

If it were up to me, we’d raise Social Security’s retirement age, reduce or end benefits for the wealthy, increase payments to older and infirm recipients, and increase the payroll tax. I’m not sure what to do about Medicare. I’d also cut other things and slowly pay back the money we’ve already spent.

But for now, I’ve lost that debate in every direction. Americans don’t want to cut spending, and they don’t want to raise any taxes.

So at this point, I really don’t care which direction we go. Just stop increasing the debt we’re passing on to my kids. They’re going to have enough on their hands taking care of me someday.

Related: Red ink rising.

Governor a Trump supporter, not surrogate

Gov. Asa Hutchinson

Gov. Asa Hutchinson

By Steve Brawner
© 2016 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson on Wednesday was in “a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do” mode, and seemed comfortable with it.

The day before, he and five other Republican governors had a private meeting with their party’s presumptive nominee in Trump Tower.

Donald Trump is not Hutchinson’s ideal choice. He endorsed Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Earlier this year, he told National Public Radio, “I do not see (Trump’s) discussion of issues as serious. The words are frightening – how you’re going to build a wall, how you’re going to have Mexico pay for it. What does this mean?” When Trump said a judge should step down from a lawsuit against Trump University partly because his parents are from Mexico, Hutchinson issued a statement saying, “Criticizing and trying to disqualify a judge because of the judge’s ethnic heritage is antithetical to everything that is true and good about America.”

But now he’s supporting him. Why? Because they’re both Republicans, and because he’s better than the alternative, Hutchinson said.

“The framework that will take place under Mr. Trump is totally different than the framework that will take place under a President Clinton,” he said. “Elections are team efforts, and just because you don’t agree with the last play called by a quarterback doesn’t mean you’re going to stop blocking. …

“I have no doubt but that the team that I’ve aligned myself with for multiple decades is the one that I feel most comfortable with and will provide the best direction and security for the United States of America.”

Hutchinson did not seem torn about supporting Trump. When he started in politics, Republicans in this state were rare breeds and, occasionally, odd ducks, so this is not the first time he’s had to cast a less than enthusiastic vote. Believing your party is best for the country is not putting party over country.

Still, there are limits. Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant said after the Trump Tower meeting that the governors would be “surrogates” for Trump.

“He was speaking for himself there,” Hutchinson said. Asked if he would campaign for Trump, he said, “In a serious vein, there’s a lot to be done here in Arkansas in the fall, but this election’s important, so we’re just going to take that a step at a time.”

Other Arkansas Republican officials? During the campaign, some legislators held a press conference endorsing Rubio, while others did the same for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. There was no group photo op for Trump. But, like Hutchinson, they’re part of a team, and they don’t want Hillary Clinton to be president, so, whether they like Trump or not, most will get in line.

But most is not all, and we still have a secret ballot. Most Republican officials picked that party because they want to shrink government and defend certain traditional values. Trump doesn’t talk much about shrinking government. He also once wrote in “The Art of the Comeback”: “If I told the real stories of my experiences with women, often seemingly very happily married and important women, this book would be a guaranteed best-seller.”

So some members of the party of family values may leave that race blank in the voting booth. Or they might cast their secret ballot for the Libertarians, who have nominated two credible former Republican governors, New Mexico’s Gary Johnson for president and Massachusetts’ William Weld for vice president.

It’s not only Republicans who are divided. Clinton only recently clinched the Democratic nomination campaigning against Bernie Sanders. She must try to unite her party, too.

But Republicans have more to lose. Of the 34 U.S. Senate seats in play this year, 24 are occupied by Republicans. While both Trump and Clinton have historically high unfavorable numbers, Trump’s are in the stratosphere. In a recent ABC News poll, 71 percent don’t like him and 55 percent don’t like her. So one of two things seems most likely to happen. First, Trump inspires millions of new voters, and the math works out in his favor, just as it did in the primaries. Or, it’s possible that Republicans as a party suffer a historic defeat up and down the ballot.

Unless something weird happens – and, boy, this would be the year – Trump will win Arkansas. Hutchinson and most Republican elected officials will support him with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Whether they like him or not, they’ll decide they’ve gotta do what they’ve gotta do.

Related: Trump played checkers and they played chess – in a checkers year

Casinos among best bets to make the ballot

By Steve Brawner
© 2016 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Where Arkansans practice pure democracy – we make the laws rather than elected officials doing it – is in the ballot issues. This year, those led by citizens could be a lot more interesting than those referred by the Legislature.

Here are some of the issues being proposed by citizens: casinos, medical marijuana, gay/transgender rights, term limits, limiting damages in medical lawsuits, campaign finance reform.

Here’s what you’ll be voting on courtesy of lawmakers: letting the governor retain his or her powers when out of state; increasing the terms of county officials to four years; and expanding the ability of local governments to fund economic development projects. Those are important, but no one ever got into a fight over the governor’s out-of-state powers. Well, maybe they did on Facebook.

When citizens try to place a measure on the ballot, the important first hurdle they must overcome isn’t gaining popular support. It’s having enough money to collect signatures and fight potential lawsuits. A proposed constitutional amendment requires 84,859 signatures. An initiated act, which creates a law, requires 67,887. To reach those kinds of numbers, it really helps if you can pay people to walk the streets with clipboards. So if you want to know which of those issues actually will make the ballot, look at the ones where backers who already have money are trying to make more of it.

At first glance, that would include the casino initiative. A group of investors wants to build three casinos, one each in Washington County (Fayetteville-Springdale); Miller County (Texarkana); and Boone County (next door to Branson). Attorney General Leslie Rutledge has certified the amendment’s popular name and title, so now it’s in the signature-collecting phase.

This will be the latest of many efforts to bring casinos to Arkansas. Most if not all of the backers of this amendment have been involved in one or more of those previous efforts. So far, those have always failed, either by not gathering enough signatures or not withstanding a legal challenge of some sort. Asa Hutchinson, then a private attorney representing the secretary of state’s office, helped keep one such effort off the ballot in 2012.

The arguments have been the same since Mississippi rolled the dice with its first casino in Tunica in 1992. Opponents point to the human and societal costs that casinos cause – the lost money, the addiction, the broken marriages. They call it “gambling.” Supporters say casinos already exist across the state border, so Arkansas may as well have some fun and create the jobs and tax revenue. They call it “gaming.”

And on the third side are Oaklawn and Southland, which race horses and dogs on the side while operating their own casinos. Thanks to a 2005 law, these feature “electronic games of skill” with digital versions of playing cards and dice. They don’t want competition and will spend their own money to fight it – on lawyers to try to keep it off the ballot, and on a political campaign if they can’t. In a good example of “politics makes strange bedfellows,” they work in parallel with family values groups to defeat the casino initiatives. So far, they’re all undefeated.

As usual, this year’s casino proposal would bestow on its backers a permanent monopoly enshrined in the Arkansas Constitution, which is a pretty good deal if you can get it. They and only they, or their designees, could operate these three casinos forever, with no one allowed to compete with them unless they also pass a constitutional amendment.

What else? A proposal limiting medical lawsuit damages has a good chance of making the ballot for the same reason that the casino gambling measure does: People with money would be able to make more money. Under that standard, the term limits measure – it would tighten legislative terms to 10 years – faces an uphill climb, but it does have a passionate group of supporters who’ve been working for a while. Medical marijuana has some momentum as a concept but not the financial muscle, and supporters are divided into competing camps.

What ultimately will make the ballot? The three referred by the Legislature are the only sure bet, but you could roll the dice on the casinos and a couple of others.

Maybe we should just turn it into a museum

By Steve Brawner
© 2016 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Some things in government are hard, such as providing health care to 250,000 poor Arkansans, maintaining the state’s highways without raising taxes, or taking care of 4,900 foster kids. What should not be hard is maintaining a house.

Yet here we are again, spending more than a million dollars on that old place where the state’s chief executive lives – the Governor’s “Mansion.”

The house is once again making headlines after a law passed in the recent special session turned the Mansion Commission from a governing body that makes decisions into merely a consultant, and gave the governor the ability to dismiss any commission member. He already appoints them.

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette began asking questions and was given a tour of the Mansion. It leaks, there are plumbing and wiring issues, and the reporter could smell the remains of rat urine in the governor’s private office. There’s been some disagreement between the first lady and the Mansion Commission about the condition of the house, about the decor, and about the number of public events in the adjoining Great Hall, by far the nicest structure on the grounds.

So now the state will spend $1.1 million next year for maintenance and remodeling as well as expenses that are less than necessary. The original grant application of $1.4 million included a sculpture on the grounds that first lady Susan Hutchinson wants to hang at a cost of $128,000, as well as a 72-inch television and a private washer and dryer for the first family. They currently use the same ones the staff use. Because the grant was for less than what was requested, the list will be pared.

Does all this sound familiar? You might recall that, in 2000, then-Gov. Mike Huckabee and wife Janet moved a triple-wide onto the grounds while $1.4 million in upgrades were done to the house. That triple-wide produced a lot of jokes as well as an invitation for the Huckabees to appear on “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno.

There’s some he-said, she-said to this latest story, and I’m leaving out a lot of details that you can find elsewhere. Reasonable people can disagree, especially when they don’t have all the information.

What’s pretty clear is that, over less than two decades, the state is spending $2.5 million on a house that has been a problem since it was built – in 1950, which makes it not much older than many houses in Arkansas. It looks big from the outside, but the actual upstairs living quarters are not, and there’s not much privacy when events are occurring in the Great Hall. Other governors before the Hutchinsons have complained about problems with basic maintenance such as wiring and water leakage. My wife worked there in 1998 and recalls her downstairs computer flickering followed by a frustrated Janet Huckabee exclaiming from upstairs that she was just tying to blow-dry her hair.

So if this were a car, we’d call it a lemon.

Maybe we should challenge the assumption that the first family should live in a house funded by the taxpayers, maintained by the government, beset with politics, and shared with everyone. Until 1950, governors were responsible for their own dwellings. The state doesn’t provide free living quarters for other officials; some congressmen have slept in their offices in Washington, D.C. Some states don’t even have a governor’s mansion.

It’s tempting to write that perhaps the state should knock down the house and keep the Great Hall. The Governor’s Mansion isn’t the White House. It’s not that old, it’s not an office building, and it’s not the center of Arkansas politics. That would be the Capitol, which despite being twice as old, works just fine.

Two other solutions are probably better options: Gut the thing and fix it up right, or turn it into a museum like another public building that outlived its original purpose, the Old State House. Maybe the governor should work hard during the day and then come home to, well, a home.

It’s proving unnecessarily challenging to maintain a public building of which the occupants are temporary while respecting those occupants’ privacy and well-being. This is a problem that can be solved without a special legislative session. Arkansas is not wealthy, but also not destitute. The governor and his/her family should not live like royalty, but they should have a nice house – if necessary, their own.

Donald Trump and Dale Bumpers

By Steve Brawner
© 2016 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

The late Arkansas Sen. Dale Bumpers and Donald Trump have had two things in common: similar names, and their skillful use of a similar communication technique when running for their first major offices.

After starting the 1970 governor’s race in obscurity, Bumpers defeated the old guard in his own party, including former Gov. Orval Faubus, and then beat his obviously well-financed opposing party candidate, Republican Gov. Winthrop Rockefeller. The charismatic Bumpers frustrated his opponents with his issues-free, platitude-heavy campaign, leading Vice President Spiro Agnew to say in Fort Smith that he offered little more than “a smile and a shoeshine,” as recounted by the Arkansas Times’ Ernie Dumas.

Bumpers is hardly the only elected official to rely on broad themes rather than specific policy proposals, and this is not a criticism of him. The American people look for big ideas and shared values knowing that political candidates can’t or won’t keep their campaign promises, anyway.

And that brings us to Trump. The other night, Scott Adams, the creator of the “Dilbert” comic strip, told TV host Bill Maher that, far from being the shoot-from-the-hip buffoon that a lot of intellectuals think he is, Trump is actually a master persuader who will beat Hillary Clinton in the fall.

Adams, a trained hypnotist and student of persuasion, recognizes some of the communication techniques Trump is using.

One of those techniques D-Trump is using is the same one used by D-Bump in that 1970 race: vagueness. Like Bumpers then, Trump speaks often in generalities – we’re going to start winning at these trade deals, we’re going to make America great again – which gives opponents fewer targets. As Adams earlier told Reason magazine, “Sometimes you want to tell the story in a way that lets people fill in the blanks with whatever would make them the happiest.”

Why put so much stock in Adams, a comic strip artist? Because he first predicted Trump would win on Aug. 13, 2015. That’s back when the other 16 Republican candidates and their high-paid political consultants either were expecting Trump to flame out, or they were building their strategies around being the last candidate standing against him. It’s back when Nate Silver, who everybody in the political world thought was some kind of data-driven prophet because he correctly predicted all 50 states in 2012, was saying Trump had little mathematical chance.

And it’s about the time when, after Trump insulted Sen. John McCain and other prisoners of war by saying he likes people who weren’t captured, I wrote dismissively, “So that’s probably enough about Donald Trump.”

Before a mob of Arkansas Democrats attack, let’s be clear that “vagueness” may be the only similarity between the early Bumpers candidacies and Trump’s current one. For example, Bumpers avoided insulting his opponents, at which Trump is quite good. Adams says that when Trump started calling Jeb Bush “low energy,” it effectively stuck to him partly because that’s a new insult in the political world. Now he’s helping shape public opinion by referring to Clinton again and again as “crooked Hillary.”

Adams isn’t just saying Trump, who wrote, “The Art of the Deal,” is good at this persuasion stuff. He told Maher that Trump is “taking a flamethrower to a stick fight. There’s nobody using the same tools he’s using.” Among those tools is “anchoring,” or presenting something big and visual to give his audience something to think about. While others debate fuzzy illegal immigration policy, Trump describes a big wall. And when asked in a debate about his previous demeaning comments about women, Trump replied that he was referring to “only Rosie O’Donnell,” which made his audience see her and her personality, not him and his.

In the same way Nate Silver’s data-driven analysis was proven to be imperfect, so too can Scott Adams’ skills-based one. Clinton enters the race with advantages, including the fact that states with 242 electoral votes have voted for the Democrat in six straight elections, leaving her needing only 28 more to win. Every election cycle, the country’s demographics move in a direction more favorable to Democrats. And voters, after electing the country’s first African-American president, may still be in a history-making frame of mind and ready to choose a woman.

On the other hand, that’s the same kind of analysis that led people, including me, to dismiss Trump before, until he closed the deal on the Republican nomination.

Related:
Trump played checkers and they played chess – in a checkers year
What Dale Bumpers was