APRIL 17, 2021 – Shortly after the new majority took control in Congress, the cries of injustice over the filibuster began. Now a full-fledged effort to eliminate the Senate’s differentiating procedural tool is heating up.
No political issue so exposes naked hypocrisy of senators like the filibuster.
The reason? When a political party gains enough seats to earn the Senate’s majority status, their legislative wish list appears within reach, but the minority’s use of the filibuster threatens their agenda. This is the point where any pious pro-filibuster rhetoric perpetrated in years passed flies out the window.
To be clear, this criticism is party agnostic. For example, former President Trump called for an end to the filibuster in 2018 when republicans still controlled the Senate then flipped last month. But democrats are the latest culprits, so let’s examine their example while it’s fresh.
President Biden recently voiced his concern with the filibuster and hinted that he may call for ending it altogether. Yet, as early as 2005, he ardently defended it in a Senate speech that he described as “…one of the most important speeches for historical purposes that I will have given in the 32 years since I have been in the Senate”.
Back then, Mr. Biden’s former democrat colleagues in the Senate took a similar approach of defending the filibuster (See here). In fact, during the 2019-2020 congressional session, democrats wielded the filibuster 298 times* – more than in any other session in Senate history. Yet, here we are only one year later, and they’ve suddenly had a change of heart.
Stayed tune for a deeper look at the practical need for the filibuster.
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MAY 13, 2020 The federal deficit is expected to top $4.5 trillion in 2020. How did we get here, and what’s next?
Congress is right to respond to the coronavirus with economic relief. But it comes at a steep price – upwards of $3 trillion. This is extraordinary in its own right and will be challenging to overcome. But existing US debt complicates the outlook.
Prior to the coronavirus outbreak, Republican leadership missed its opportunity to materially reduce the national debt, which could have positioned the country to better absorb the economic fallout of the pandemic. Let’s take a look back…
In 2016, republicans took control of both Congress and the White House. The Party had been avidly outspoken against rising debt ($14t at the time), but quickly fell over on their principals upon taking the federal reigns.
The first major legislation came in late 2017 when Congress passed tax cuts, which is expected to add $1 trillion in debt. This put us on the wrong path in two ways.
First, it was the (mostly) right idea at the wrong time. The economy was already healthy when President Trump took office and showed no signs of changing.
While I can imagine the temptation of feeding the momentum of a strong economy, we know that economies inevitably slow and even reverse growth trajectories. It’s in these times that tax cuts can be leveraged to help a country through recession. Now cutting taxes won’t be available when economy eventually contracts.
Second, republicans abandoned their debt reduction rhetoric, failing to pair tax cuts with meaningful debt/deficit reduction. The latter is a necessary counterpart to any tax relief. In fact, the conservative premise of tax cuts is undermined when debt is allowed to accumulate. We can’t eat only candy without vegetables and expect good health.
Republican leadership should have deferred tax cuts until they were needed and focused instead on getting the country’s fiscal matters in order. Certainly less glamorous work, but our country would be on firmer economic footing for it.
When 2020 began, US debt topped $17 trillion, 26% higher than when President Trump took office in 2016. Post-coronavirus, we’ll be starting at the $4.5 trillion deficit mark (at least) rather than $3 trillion (coronavirus-only deficit spending) with few policy levers left to pull to give Americans relief.
Cutting taxes without paying for it is short-term political thinking. The next generation of politicians (and Americans) will inherit debt-related consequences of their predecessors.
Regardless of who wins the presidency in 2020, the U.S. will have to raise taxes to balance the economy.
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NOVEMBER 23, 2019 The Trump Administration announced a ‘Phase One’ agreement in its ongoing trade war with China.
China is a key trade partner, particularly for American farmers. In 2018, China imported $140 billion in US farm products, representing 25% of farm sales. So when China (and others) responded to President Trump with retaliatory tariffs, American farmers were hit hard.
The Administration proceeded to hand over $28 billion in taxpayer dollars to farmers to compensate for what amounts to a self-inflicted wound. It’s been pointed out that this is more than double the cost of the auto bailout in 2009.
This ‘band-aid’ approach has three consequences:
- Exacerbates the national debt, which already threatens our ability to deliver farm and entitlement programs for future generations.
- Damages our economy by replacing market mechanisms with centralized planning to artificially support the industry.
- Undermines the hard work of farmers who don’t typically take nicely to handouts.
We need to address trade disparities with China but not impulsively and not unilaterally. The trade war, as it’s become, is an unforced error that shoulders Americans with too much risk.
Taxpayers deserve more strategic and deliberate trade negotiations that leverage the shared interests of our global allies.
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SEPTEMBER 28, 2019 The United Nations General Assembly met this week in New York, and climate change was the topic in focus.
My experience with models makes me both accepting and skeptical of climate change forecasts, which are predicated on models. I accept that change is occurring, but the timing and severity of it deserve more scrutiny.
We have to remember that models are a guide, not gospel. They’re powerful tools for understanding complex topics. But they’re also fallible, because they require assumptions to build. Even the slightest inaccuracies of these inputs can yield results that massively skew reality. Appreciating this is critical to how we view their results.
With this in mind…
To my fellow Republicans: Acknowledging that climate change exists does not make you liberal. The theories are based on rigorous, though imperfect, scientific analysis.
To my Democrat friends: It would be appreciated if there was an acknowledgement that climate science, though compelling in a directional sense, is not conclusive in its precision or magnitude.
Both sides need to move toward scepticism of their own beliefs rather than extracting “certainties” from predictive forecasts.
Let’s work towards a simple cross-party consensus on a few basic precepts. Then we can begin work on long-term market-based solutions that don’t harm Americans economically in the near-term.
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SEPTEMBER 25, 2019 House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) opened an impeachment inquiry on President Donald Trump, following news of a controversial phone conversation with the Ukrainian president.
The Constitution is not explicitly clear on what triggers impeachment, so we can expect lots of controversy in the coming days.
In the meantime, a word of caution to my fellow republicans: Even if you don’t support impeachment, it’s important NOT to over-compensate by defending the President’s actions or deflecting legitimate criticism.
Defending any single politician at all costs exposes intellectual dishonesty and risks the credibility of your voice. The world is simply not black and white enough to believe anyone who frames every controversy as zero sum.
Congress (and voters) should be able to acknowledge wrongdoing in people they otherwise support.
I can’t think of any current or historical political figures whom I admire that I couldn’t also criticize in some way. Some are more deserving of it than others, naturally. In fact, I would think we should be rather skeptical of the views of anyone who does otherwise since we can all agree there are no perfect people.
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