Taking Sides

It's pretty obvious who is going to pay for the California budget crisis by class: the rich and near rich reap the benefits of intact programs and corporate subsidies, while programs for the poor and the working middle class are cut or killed.

The winners and especially the biggest losers are divided by age: the very young whose nutrition and health programs are cut, the young whose education is shortchanged, and the elderly who may see home health care killed entirely.

But the losers are also visible by race, that most obvious and ugly remnant of how America apportions its bounty. This is not only because the social and health programs being cut and killed disproportionately affect blacks, Latinos and Native Americans. It's because cuts to education also deprive them most directly. Education is their path to a better life, that the well off already have.

But in taking sides, the Terminator is deeply wounding the state of California, and the country's future. Every layoff by the state is lost revenue as well as lost talent. California cannot prosper without good schools and an educated population. But schools from primary through college are in state-caused chaos, as well as suffering from decades of neglect. That California is close to becoming a majority non-white state, a mainly black and brown state, makes these decisions destructive to education all the more racist.

As for the national economy and the nation's future, President Obama made this point in his stirring address on the 100th anniversary of the NAACP:

"The state of our schools is not an African American problem; it is an American problem. Because if black and brown children cannot compete, then America cannot compete... We used to rank number one in college graduates. Now we are in the middle of the pack. And since we are seeing more and more African American and Latino youth in our population, if we are leaving them behind we cannot achieve our goal, and America will fall further behind -- and that is not a future that I accept and that is not a future that the NAACP is willing to accept."

But it a future that the Terminator's California is not only willing to accept, but a future it invites.

Hell Freezes Over

It must have, because the American Medical Association has endorsed the House version of the healthcare bill, which not only provides a public plan option but finances it partly by taxing the wealthy, especially those making above a million bucks.

The AMA has been a notorious foe of any reform, going back to their opposition to Medicare in the 1960s. Everything was "socialized medicine" with them. But as insurance companies soaked up all the bucks, doctors lost out, and lost their autonomy not to government bureaucrats but--wait for it--corporate bureaucrats.

Further evidence of the temperature change in hell is that the infamous Harry and Louise are back--but this time supporting comprehensive healthcare reform. Their ads were famous for attacking the Clinton healthcare plan, and though they weren't likely to have been decisive, they became a symbol of that defeat. Click to see the ad.

Tuesday's Notes

If you're looking for a site that is tracking the ins and outs of healthcare legislation in brief summaries, you're looking for TMP/DC.

TG's Political Wire notes a lovely bit of theatre at the Sotomayor hearings. When GOPer windbag Sen. Sessions sententiously quoted the philosophy of another woman jurist to counter the caricature of S's approach he was trying to create, S. noted that the jurist he quoted was a friend, and in fact was in the audience at the hearing supporting her. Sessions is not considered the brightest bulb in the Senate, so maybe this one was too easy, but it was a nice piece of one-up-showmanship.

A couple of Kos diarists, Blue Texan and Turkana, have made the point that I've suggested before, but with Sarah Palin as the proof. Here's how Turkana put it, referencing a Peggy Noonan column deriding Palin: "Noonan herself played right along, pretending the ultimate elitist Bush was a man of the people, pretending his lack of intellect or intellectual curiosity was somehow laudable, pretending that she herself gives a whit about anyone living outside her own income bracket or social circle. Had it not become possible for someone as manifestly unqualified and incapable as George W. Bush to become president, it would not now be possible for Sarah Palin to be taken seriously as a national political figure. Had Bush been dismissed as the caricature he was, no one outside of Alaska would know Sarah Palin's name."

It's been a long time since I paid attention to the baseball All-Star game, but I found myself watching both the home run derby and the old timers/celebrity softball game yesterday, so I expect to watch at least the first few innings of the game tonight. I remember watching the home run derby as a kid, although I'm not sure it was associated with the All Star game yet. But those All Star games I watched, black and white images from one camera high above home plate, featured Mantle and Mays, Maris and Musial, and other famous players whose names didn't start with M. The idea of putting young celebrities in with the old timers helped the entertainment value of that game, but at my age the most fun was watching gray-bearded Ozzie Smith playing shortstop with style.

Terminator Lies

Pushing his suddenly rabid right agenda, the Terminator (who is currently governor of California) is lying about fraud and abuse, demonizing a program to help the elderly and confined by asserting that a quarter of its funding is wasted. His own administration's study says it's more like 1%.

Rabid Right shock doctrinaires are trying to scare investors etc. by claiming that California's businesses are leaving in droves. It's not true. Neither are the rich. And why would they? What is true is that the rich are avoiding any responsibility or payment for the budget crisis, while the poor and the middle class state employees are paying everything, including their health.

The poor can't do anything about it, although some courts are defending them and state employees. But the middle class state employees can at least strike.

Today's Notes


Andrew Sullivan's blog continues to be an excellent source of news on the continuing protests in Iran.


And thus it must follow as the day the night... A day after several stories on the ramping up of lobbying mega bucks by insurers etc. on health care, there are stories about how the House or Senate proposals are in trouble. With remarkably little substance. Meanwhile, the Senate Health committee Kennedy/Dodd plan cuts costs and includes more people than earlier plans, and Speaker Pelosi promises a bill in August with public option passed by the House. She delivered on cap and trade.


Speaking of which, an excellent, precise analysis of the cap and trade bill by a Harvard economist in an oddly titled interview in Salon.

Memorial

The Michael Jackson mania has mostly passed me by. Although I thought his moment in the 80s--"Billie Jean," the moonwalk and his other moves, "We Are the World"--was brilliant and energizing, those were the last years that I followed what's new in pop music. He would have meant more to those who were younger and starting to pay attention then.

Mostly I felt the response was inflated and overwrought, with such patently false claims as, his was the only music shared by several generations, children to grandparents. That's been true of a lot of popular music going way back, but the most obvious case in point is the Beatles. And I guess that's my generation's point of reference. The Beatles had many more memorable songs and a series of breakthrough albums that dominated popular culture for a decade, etc.

So I was prepared to just wait this media circus out. But I did hear some words from the memorial in Los Angeles today that made me take notice. Those words came from black people--musicians but also sports stars Magic Johnson and Kobie Bryant--paying tribute to Jackson as a breakthrough artist for all black entertainers, paving the way for global stardom. They would know that history better than I, though I do remember that black artists didn't get on MTV until Michael Jackson broke that barrier. So for that, and for his charity work, I make my peace with Rest in Peace, Michael Jackson.

The Delusional Enabled

Here are two examples of two trends. The trends are: the Republican congressionals' increasing detachment from reality, and the latest Internet/blogosphere/Twitter/instant messaging technologies tendency to enable and propel their delusional politics, wasting everybody's time, energy and public money.

The two examples are in one dispatch on Tuesday's congressional follies by TPM: first, the GOPer noise machine amping the volume on a Congressional Budget Office report that by the end of the day was proven not to exist, and an equally delusional panic button Twitter-storm on a vote that was never scheduled and never happened.

The Terminator

As California continues to sink financially, economically and with social consequences accruing for a long time to come, it's clear who is responsible now: Governor Arnold.

The legislature, the voters, the system, are all culprits in the larger problems, but on this specific budget crisis, it is the Terminator's recalcitrance and attempts to shock doctrine the situation that's the sole reason California doesn't have a budget.

It could have happened weeks ago, but the Terminator refused to consider any new revenue streams, which legislators proposed along with cuts, to avoid the Terminator's catastrophic cuts.

Then Democratic legislators gave up their revenue additions, and the governor appeared to give a little on cuts. But since then he has demanded additions to the deal that he couldn't get passed otherwise, and that have little or no bearing on the current budget.

His destructive stubborness finally led to Assembly Speaker Karen Bass shutting her door to his blather. Until the Terminator actually negotiates, there's no point in holding negotiations. So far the governor has apparently been winning the perception game, but maybe now the truth of it is clear: he is single-handedly terminating California, and dismantling the lives of countless Californians.

Palintology

Sarah Palin picked Friday July 3 to announce she's stepping down as governor of Alaska after 2 and a half years of her first term. Her logic was completely bogus: she's not going to run in 2010, so she's a lame duck, and a lame duck governor does nothing but travel a lot. First of all, a lame duck is an officeholder who can't legally run again. She can. And she wouldn't be even perceived as a lame duck unless she announced she wasn't running, which there was absolutely no reason to do. She made herself a lame duck, and then used that as an excuse to quit.

The pundocracy is somewhat divided: she's committed political suicide, or she's freed herself up to build a national base to run for the presidency in 2012. I think she wants a national profile, but as a media celebrity. She's got some sort of deal in her pocket. She made sure she had her $7 million book deal signed before she made this announcement. She can make a lot of money catering to the Rabid Right: book sales, speeches, some sort of Rush Limbaugh type media presence. It became clear, with the Vanity Fair article, that she has no future within the Republican Party. And it's a long time to 2012. Who knows what can happen. This is just the first shoe to drop, though. Another is coming.

Lakers

Phil Jackson will be back as coach, which is good. But the Lakers signed Ron Artest from the Rockets and let Trevor Ariza go to the Rockets, which is bad. I tried to say so on a Lakers blog yesterday, but my post apparently didn't make some sort of cut. So it was left to a LA Times regular columnist to make precisely the points I did, with the same memory: the attempt of a championship team to augment with Big Names past their prime (Karl Malone, Gary Payton). Besides which Payton was an asshole, and so is Artest.

The rationale might be buttressing the "physical" element (i.e. the muscling, pushing around, flying elbows, etc.) for the finals next year. The Eastern contenders have strengthened themselves since the end of the season: Cleveland, Orlando and Boston. The Lakers may not even be tested much in the West, but it's going to be very competitive among these three teams in the East. The Lakers will have to be plenty tough to beat the winner, because the winner from the East is going to be plenty tested.

It also looks like either the Lakers management screwed up, or Ariza's manager is an asshole, or most likely both. So this past year's Lakers may be its team for the ages, particularly with its team play and various players rising to the occasion. Ariza thrived as a Laker and was likely a big star in their future. In the NBA anything can happen, and he could wind up back in LA, though he has a three year contract in Houston. Artest may be popular with a certain segment of the Lakers fan base. But not with me.

The Terminator's California Shock Doctrine

Governor Terminator and his Republican minions are ignoring the efforts of the Democratic majority in the California legislature to address the state budget with a mix of cuts and new revenue, which is just simple sanity. The Terminator is trying to force deeper and more extensive cuts, with no new revenue. Today he is succeeding a little more.

At least one writer at Caltics is now using "shock doctrine" as a verb, as in the Governor is shock doctrining the budget. And it's all too apt. Naomi Klein's book, The Shock Doctrine, shows how the political forces of predatory capitalism used economic and other major shocks in one country after another--causing some, taking advantage of others--to institute severe measures that benefit them, but that the people would not allow under ordinary circumstances. We saw the Bushites institute their own Shock Doctrine after 9-11, leaving us with a legacy of torture, the Patriot Act, a wrecked economy after billions returned to the rich, and billions more flowed to the contractors who profited from Iraq and the war on terror.

The Terminator is bringing the Shock Doctrine to California. And the message he and the Republicans are sending is clear: when times are tough, take it out on the poor. The Terminator wants to balance the budget on the backs of the poor, the sick and the working middle class.

Like other shock doctrine changes, it is self-defeating and massively destructive in the long run. In this case, the state will be pissing away billions in federal funds, and tying the state up in court cases for years, many of which it will lose, as it has already. There are laws against penalizing the poor and the sick to such an extent. Everyone loses from deteriorating public health and education, part of the community's basic infrastructure.

These are days of shame for California, in uncountable ways. Self-destruction, which began slowly with Prop 13 a generation ago, is accelerating. There is no solution in sight.

60

After all these months, it got settled in a day: the MN Supreme Court's unanimous verdict on all counts, the Governor ready to certify, Coleman's concession and so: Senator Al Franken.

Though in his victory speech, Franken made a point of saying that he views himself not as the 60th Senator in the Dem caucus (enough to stop a GOPer filibuster), but the second Senator for Minnesota, he did begin his list of priorities with health care and clean energy. So this 60th Dem could not have arrived at a better time. It changes the calculus on healthcare and climate/energy legislation, just as they both are being hammered out.

It doesn't guarantee anything really, but it's a lot bigger than just one more vote. This could turn out to be one of those pivot points of history.

Where's the White House Channel?

We have, at the very least, an interesting President. He's doing and saying a lot. At his press conference today, he made compelling points on a number of issues, and showed again how superficial the media coverage is, not to mention the White House press corps. ( It's not always pretty, evidenced by the sight of ABC's Jake Tapper barely suppressing his hostility while being overmatched by Obama's intelligence and wit.)

But we must depend on those superficial and witless outlets to transmit these press conferences, speeches and events. And they don't always do it. They almost never present events other than press conferences and major speeches in full.

Meanwhile, the House and the Senate each have their own channel of C-Span. It's only when they aren't bloviating to empty chambers that the President gets on.

So why doesn't the White House have a channel? Just on equity grounds, it makes sense. But maybe Obama is just too interesting, and his dynamic and serious concentration on the real needs and opportunities for people in this country might put the rest of the programming to shame. As if shame wasn't pretty self-evident.

I'd sure watch it. I don't agree with everything he does and especially isn't doing, but every time I see him in action, as in today's press conference, I know there isn't another person I know of--not in the whole of my lifetime, in fact--who I would rather see as President of the United States right now. I'd not only watch it. It would be my favorite channel. I realize, given what's available, that isn't really high praise. But it's reason enough to demand: why isn't there a White House channel?

California Nightmaring

Update: Caltics uses--gasp!--facts to show that "the May 19 special [election] was not a tax revolt and that people will actually vote to raise revenues for services." The evidence is several recent ballot measures in which SOUTHERN CALIFORNIANS (the supposedly most rabid anti-tax place) voted for tax increases to fund services such as education.


The Nightmare continues. Voters rejected the recent ballot propositions purporting to fix the California state budget for all kinds of reasons--some of them specific (universities would be locked in to inadequate spending levels long after the current crisis) and some general (agreeing on a sensible budget and running the state is the least of what we elected the gov and the legislature to do--why don't they do their jobs?) But Governor Terminator sees only one message: no tax increases, and so he rejects a budget compromise that includes some new revenue instead of just draconian cuts that hit the poor the hardest.

Meanwhile, the macro arguments go on. Sacramento Bee commentator Dan Walters insists all the economic arguments are flawed: "The entire deficit on which they are working, $24.3 billion including Schwarzenegger's desired reserve, is well under 2 percent of the state's economy. The lesser cuts and taxes they are debating would merely shift relatively small amounts of money from one form of spending to another, all within the state's economy, so the macro economic impact would probably be nil, no matter what they do.
The greater threat to our economic future would be a prolonged political stalemate, followed by enactment of another dysfunctional, gimmick-laden budget, thus providing more proof of our chronic inability to govern ourselves."

But others see more impact. Describing the findings of a new report: “These health and human service cuts are the worst of both worlds: they not only directly deny people the services that California families need, the cuts cripple our ability to get out of this economic downturn,” said Anthony Wright, executive director, Health Access California, the statewide health care consumer advocacy coalition. “The Governor’s cuts make no sense, since in order to save a few state dollars, California gives up a lot of federal dollars, for our health system, and our economy.”

The impact on education, and then on the California economy, and then on the U.S. economy, could be equally profound, both now and getting worse in the future. That is, these relatively few dollars can cause losses in both financial and human terms of much greater proportions, and much harder to fix when they become apparent.

But the most frustrating aspect of this crisis is the lack of balance. Those already suffering because of low income will suffer more. Those with higher income will not even be inconvenienced in the short term, although they and their children will be hurt by all of this in the future.

That's partly because the Terminator is insisting on only cuts and no new revenue, to the extent that he has promised to veto any tax increases proposed by the legislature. That's the way to come to agreements to deal with this crisis? Much of the problem is because the state's politicians are polarized and can't come together for the good of the state. You'd think that after at least a year of political posturing, and up against the wall of a very serious crisis, these bozos could come up with a package of cuts and revenue increases to deal with the budget in a more balanced and sane way. But apparently not. The Terminator is going to continue the insanity, and make it worse. And unfortunately, at present, the Democrats don't have a leader to stand up to him.

Economic Notes



Soaking up information and talk on my Pittsburgh/western PA visit, I can report that some real estate activity has picked up, but largely due to refinancing when rates bottomed out. Now people are starting to worry about inflation, due to the influx of federal money.


But Paul Krugman makes a persuasive case that stimulus must continue in his ironically titled column "Stay the Course" (think Bush and Iraq.) The column, which appeared Monday, says that inflation isn't going to rise a lot, because the influx of federal government money simply replaced the private money that wasn't there. And indeed, today's news is that inflation in May was below expectations. He also warns that stopping stimulus too soon is exactly why the Great Depression didn't end sooner, and Japan had such a dismal 90s.

Back in CA, things are grim. State government went begging to Washington and for now, got turned down, but this article sets out some of the stakes. Meanwhile, faculty at HSU were told to expect what amounts to a 12% pay cut. Twelve percent! And that's just the beginning.

City of Champions (and Lakers) Continued

Pittsburgh continue to celebrate, with an especially close bond between the Penguins hockey players and their most devoted fans on the South Side, where players and coaches partied and once again shut down Carson Street when fans gathered to be part of it. Penguin stars also appeared at the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball game, sharing in the celebration of the first Pirates World Series win in 1906 against the Detroit Tigers, who were in town. (I wouldn't want to be from Detroit today, since Detroit lost the Cup, they lost that 1906 World Series, and today they lost the game.)

Tomorrow the craziness reaches its apex, as the official parade for the Penguins is held downtown. Some streets will be closed as earlly as 2:30 am for the parade at noon. Anyone going to Pittsburgh tomorrow for any other purpose may well never get there.

But tonight, Pittsburgh is ignoring what I was watching, which was the fifth and final game of the NBA Finals. A 16-0 run in the second quarter pretty much decided it, as the Lakers won with a dominant team performance, including some highlight reel shots--probably one that makes his all-time highlight reel--by Kobe Bryant. Bryant is by all accounts still clearly the best player in the game, and this accomplishment added to his status in basketball. After the Lakers lost in the finals last year, Bryant kept playing, leading the U.S. team to an Olympic gold medal, and then right into this championship season. He won the MVP for the finals.

Update 6/16: The victory parade for the Penguins in Pittsburgh drew an estimated 375,000 people on a sunny day. The local media is chortling over the efficiency and lack of real trouble over the celebratory events of the past few days, in contrast to the destruction and looting in Los Angeles after the Lakers win.

City of Champions

Though I'm not much of a hockey fan, I lived in Pittsburgh when the Penguins won their Stanley Cup championships in 1991 and 1992, and by happenstance, I'm in Pittsburgh the day they win it again, in 2009. It's the first time teams from the same city have won the Super Bowl and the Stanley Cup in the same year, so Pittsburgh is the City of Champions again. They were the City of Champions in 1979 when the Steelers won the Super Bowl and the Pittsburgh Pirates won the World Series. That World Series win was also the last time that a team in any major pro sport won the deciding 7th game of a championship series in the other team's city. The Pirates won in Baltimore--a night I remember well--and tonight the Penguins won in Detroit.

The local TV news is showing the celebrating crowds on the South Side and in the student quarter of Oakland. The police are out in force, trying to keep control. Out where I am, there were local fireworks and screams in the street. In a way it's too bad that it's a long weekend because the grownups have their fun when they go back to work.

Pittsburgh is surging in other ways at the moment. The downtown is full of construction projects, the city has been named the Most Livable again, and President Obama is sending the G 20 summit here in September, which will give the city an international spotlight. I saw the newly expanded convention center and it's pretty impressive. The North Side has the two new ballparks, restaurants, the Carnegie Science Center and children's museum. The downtown cultural district is pretty solid. As the hockey game began in Detroit, the Pittsburgh Symphony was playing its final concert of a successful season.

There are some not so wonderful things about this area. There is quite a bit of recessive racism that comes to the surface now and then. But the emphasis on family is not entirely fictional. The Steelers clearly draft for character as well as talent. The young star of the Penguins, Stanley Crosby, actually lives with the team's owner and his family--who happens to be Mario Lemieux, the star of those two Stanley Cups champions in 91 and 92. That's part of what Pittsburgh is about.

As for that other series--in a sport I actually understand--the Lakers took game 4 in overtime, in a kind of classic comeback. The Orlando Magic didn't distinguish themselves late in regulation and in overtime, leading to one of their key players issuing what has to be the quote of the year, when he said that one reason they lost was "our stupidness."

Kobe

I am currently in the land of the Penguins, and while I cheer for any Pittsburgh team, I know very little about hockey and can't get interested in watching it. So tonight I watched the first game of the NBA finals, and it's clear already that whatever some idiots have suggested (just don't look back too many posts in the past), the LeBron era isn't ready yet. This is still the Age of Kobe.

The Lakers used their height and a strategy based on it, that was successful in the last two games against Denver, to dominate the Orlando Magic, especially defensively. But it was the one superstar wrecking crew named Kobe Bryant who destroyed Orlando, leading the Lakers to a 25 point victory.

He played as if it was game 7, and strategically it was almost as important-- when Phil Jackson coached teams win the first game, they win the series. The Lakers took the Orlando energy and the surprise insertion of a great player who has been injured nearly all season, and absorbed all those punches. They maintained their own energy, getting defensive stops to match their offensive output in the second quarter, and then Kobe just took over the third quarter, scoring from everywhere and in every way. It was a classic performance.
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The Terminator vs. the Helpless:With this photo of a demonstration against health care cuts in Los Angeles by health care workers and patients, the New York Times story about the California budget cuts: "The cuts Mr. Schwarzenegger has proposed to make up the difference, if enacted by the Legislature, would turn California into a place that in some ways would be unrecognizable in modern America: poor children would have no health insurance, prisoners would be released by the thousands and state parks would be closed. Nearly all of the billions of dollars in cuts the administration has proposed would affect programs for poor Californians, although prisons and schools would take hits, as well."

NBA Dream--or Nightmare?

It was all set up to be Kobe vs. LeBron. The Lakers were the best team, the Cavs had the best record. But when Cleveland went undefeated through their first two rounds and the Lakers were taken to seven in the second, it seemed like it would be just the LeBron show in the finals.

And now...The Lakers go into game 6 against Denver 3 games to 2. It's at Denver, so a Nugget home win is more or less expected, unless.. the Lakers actually figured out in game 5 how to capitalize on their height advantage, and how to defend Denver. While Denver doubled Kobe, he and others found the big men inside, with some good 3 point shooting outside. Odum had a monster game but Bynum played well in his minutes, too. Now the adjustment for Denver would be to keep the ball from going inside, which would mean letting Kobe create and shoot. Can the Lakers still dominate with their big men? Will Kobe carry them in the fourth quarter? If not, it's back to L.A. on Sunday.

Meanwhile, the Cavs were down 3-1, lost most of a 20 point lead (again) and held off elimination with a major fourth quarter from LeBron. But they go to Orlando for game six.

So the NBA dream finals is still possible, and so is the nightmare: Denver vs. Orlando. A couple of emerging stars there, but not the likely audience. What's likely at this point? Half and half. I don't think the Cavs can beat Orlando twice more, or three games in a row. It's a good sign that LeBron hadn't exhausted himself by the fourth quarter, but he can't carry them against this level of competition. I think maybe the Lakers turned the corner in the fourth quarter of game 5. I like them in game 6, and if not, in game 7. So by next week, when I'll be "on the road," I expect LA-Orlando for the championship.

Update: Lakers dominated game six and will be in the Finals. They will likely be favored against either possible opponent. If it's Orlando, the Lakers will have home court advantage, which could be key. If the Cavs win two games they will have risen to another level and could be formidable, but they will also have more fatigue problems. The Lakers were incredibly sharp in the sixth game, and they had figured Denver out, so it's unlikely the finals will be as easy as this game suggests. But I like the Lakers in six against either the Magic or the Cavs.

Update 5/30: All the very well paid analysts at ESPN were sure Cleveland would push their series to a seventh game, but this unpaid analyst picked Orlando, and so it was. They were as dominant in their game 6 as the Lakers were in theirs, and that should get the Lakers attention. The matchups in the finals won't be easy. But even if the others play to a draw, the Lakers still have Kobe. And the Lakers have home court. If they get game 1, they're on their way. Anyway, it is a Lakers-Orlando series (already billed as Disneyland vs. Disney World), beginning late next week.