Cold War’s end: No parade, but maybe a museum

By Steve Brawner

© 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

May 28, 2019

One of the United States’ greatest military successes came after it barely fired a shot at its enemy, and now the city of Blytheville has decided somebody ought to mark the occasion.

That success came in the Cold War, the defining conflict of my generation.

For more than 40 years, the United States and the Soviet Union stared across the oceans at each other, missiles at the ready. As a boy, I had nightmares about nuclear war.

We’ll never know how close it came. One example: In 1983, a Soviet computer system mistakenly detected a launch of five U.S. missiles. Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov’s skepticism (Why would the Americans fire only five missiles?) may have saved the world from accidental nuclear war.

Arkansas had its own near-nuclear accidents. As reported by historian Tom Dillard in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the state was home to 18 Titan II missile complexes. One complex near Pangburn burned in 1965 in an accident that killed 53 of the 55 contract maintenance workers inside. The missile remained unaffected. Continue reading →

Hutchinson’s new team of not-so-rivals

By Steve Brawner

© 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

May 23, 2019

The book “Team of Rivals” by historian Doris Kearns Goodwin explains how President Abraham Lincoln appointed and led an often discordant cabinet through the Civil War.

What happened in Arkansas Wednesday was not nearly so dramatic, but it’s worth a newspaper column.

That day, Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced his 15 cabinet-level secretaries as part of his transformation initiative.

The cabinet has been composed of 42 agency directors – 27 more cabinet officials than the United States president has. Plus, the state has had more than 200 boards and commissions floating around with no one above them except the governor.

It’s been an unwieldy arrangement, especially for a governor who likes things tidy. The 42-member cabinet can’t really serve as an advisory body. It only meets two or three times a year, because what could you hope to accomplish? Continue reading →

Economy slowing but growing; debt just growing

By Steve Brawner,

© 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

May 21, 2019

No one can predict the future, and that includes economists. So I’m simply going to tell you what a really smart guy said, and you can do with it what you will.

The smart guy was Bob Costello, the American Trucking Associations’ chief economist. He was in Little Rock May 16 to speak to the Arkansas Trucking Association. I should tell you I do some freelance writing for publications produced by both associations.

That stuff out of the way, here’s what he said: The economy is “slowing, but we’re still growing.” Costello does not expect a recession until 2021 or later.

If he’s right – sorry, Democrats. You can still beat President Trump, but you’ll have to do so in the face of a decent economy. No one should hope for bad economic news as a way to win an election, anyway. But if you were, you wouldn’t be the first. Continue reading →

No ‘I feel your pain’ answer from Cotton

By Steve Brawner

© 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

May 16, 2019

We don’t do politics like we used to. Exhibit A would be President Trump and his trade policies. Exhibit B would be Arkansas’ junior senator.

Trump won the presidency as a Republican despite counteracting some long-held Republican beliefs, particularly about trade.

Republican officeholders have been internationalist free-traders, even while many of their voters weren’t. In many cases, those voters stuck with Republicans, or started voting for them, because of cultural issues like guns and abortion.

But now Trump has come along and spoken to their economic anxieties as well – by initiating a trade war with China, and by making illegal immigration his primary issue.

The trade war has alarmed many Republicans and people who support Republicans. Continue reading →

Let’s talk politics – for 2022

By Steve Brawner

© 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

May 14, 2019

Next year’s politics will be dominated in Arkansas by the presidential race, despite Sen. Tom Cotton’s already contested re-election race and several interesting ballot initiatives.

It’s in 2022 that the focus will be on Arkansas races. Sen. John Boozman will be up for re-election, and the state’s most prominent statewide officials will be term-limited.

It’s early, but let’s speculate. Continue reading →