Saturday, December 18, 2010
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Letter to Sen.Bernie Sanders or How I learned to Give Up on Limousine Liberals and Embrace Obama Again.
Dear Sen. Sanders
at the end of an eight-hour speech denouncing Obama’s two-year deal for extending tax cuts for the wealthy as well as the rest of us, you declared “We can do better.” Sen. Sanders, do you mean by that that you have a way to get two Republicans to vote for cloture on a deal that does not extend tax cuts for the wealthy even though they have al sworn in writing they won’t? Or a way to pass a better bill once Republicans control the House in January? Or that taxing the wealthy at a higher rate is so important that you are willing to let the long-term unemployed go into limbo again, and let taxes go up on moderate income families an average of $3000 at a time when most of them have been battered by two years recession with probably at least one member out of work for a while? Hm. You must have lost touch with the people whose cause you so passionately defend.
Let me introduce you to one of these people: myself. A two-income family of very moderate means – I teach, my wife does administrative work – with a small child, we have had one or both of us un- or under-employed continuously for the last three years. As the one who was unemployed for most of that time I can best attest to the fact that I kept looking for work by pointing to the seven different employers I had (for part time work) during that time (one of which was exempt from paying unemployment insurance premiums, cutting my benefits when I ran out of work by a quarter). For eighteen months continuously from March 2009 to September 2010 we were partly dependent on unemployment compensation for one or the other of us as well as receiving help from my mother, who herself lives on a fixed monthly pension. And for six months we were both drawing unemployment checks. During this entire period the constant looming threat of unemployment insurance ending was our biggest worry. Even as we diligently sent out job application after job application, we had to keep planning for moving out of our house, presumably in with family, if our checks ran out.
Now comes the kicker. I finally got a full-time job, starting in January. But it is thousands of miles from where we used to live forcing us to decide among three options: my going alone, declining the job or my wife giving up her job and following us. Economically, as well as personally, the last made the most sense as my job paid enough to support the family. Just. But we are going to have to add to our already high debt (recall that long spell of unemployment I described above) to pull off the move including having to buy a car or two after selling our old cars for very little . And if the current tax deal doesn’t pass not only will my marginal rates go up but my child tax credit will go down and my standard deduction will go down because the marriage tax penalty will come back into being. All of which would cost me $200 a month or more. So much for affording a second car, which would allow my wife to look for work. We might not even be able to afford a first.
Well enough about me. At least for now! What is remarkable about the story above is how unremarkable it is. The impact of this recession has been wider, but also masked by the existence of the two-earner family. Many families lose one paycheck but limp along with another and unemployment and savings or debt. Retirement accounts are eviscerated. An unusually high no. of families are affected by both unemployment insurance and middle class tax rates. More and more families will be affected by a choice between a job for one partner in one place and another elsewhere. Allowing tax rates to rise on those families right now would be a disaster. But that is what you and your fellow progressives want to do in order to expose Republicans as a party for the rich. Do that and you will be a permanent minority for a generation.
Oh I understand the political calculation informing this. “The American people,” you think, “support us. They want taxes to go up on the rich.” No. They prefer taxes to go up on the rich but not on them. They want to be sure taxes don’t go up on them, regardless of what the rich pay. “If we show the public that Republicans are willing to hold them hostage over tax cuts for the rich it will show their true colors,” some say. Unfortunately if they don’t get taxes they’ll blame the party in charge which held them hostage to tax increases for the rich. And, more importantly, the time to draw out differences is before an election, not after. The leadership are best placed to explain why they didn’t do it then. Now, it’s just silly to think you can get any traction next time, or from grassroots pressure on a Republican congress that is more scared of the tea party than anything else.
Don’t get me wrong: I’ve been as annoyed with Obama over his handling of health care, Gitmo, interrogation rules and a host of other things, right along with other progressives. But this is not the same, for two reasons: the principle you are yielding on does not cause active harm to the constituency you are trying to serve, and it is not permanent.
Compare that to the public option: the reason that was important was that with a mandate to buy insurance and no real mechanism to force premiums down, the plan threatened to force significant groups of people into buying unaffordable insurance and still threatens (after the hardship waivers and other measures weakening the mandate) to leave insurance more unaffordable for many who would like it. Not having a public mandate meant the bill might harm many of those it aimed to help. The current tax deal does no such thing. (And even in the health care case I reluctantly concluded the bill was better passed than not, as did you. So I am frankly baffled by your umbrage in this case.
The false parallel to the health care fight continue into Obama’s role. Although it now appears Obama deserves more credit for passing it than it seemed once – not only did he publicly fight to revive it when Scott Brown when Kennedy’s seat and much of the party developed cold feet, but he apparently resisted private counsel from such “liberal lions” as Schumer to do so -- I still believe that Obama’s passive, above-the-fray, leave it to Congress approach, along with his willingness to go along with Baucus’ fruitless negotiations with the Gang of Six and accept a $900 billion limit on the ten year price tag all made the bill weaker and more vulnerable politically (no real benefit until 2014, in addition to no public option, and no doc fix making that political football available to sink it) . But this time he took charge of the negotiations, stuck his neck out and made sure important breaks for the poor and middle class were also extended and won enough Republican support so that many individual Democrats could have voted against it. But you guys are trying to sink this deal because you think what he gave up is more valuable than what he got?
Sen. Sanders I never thought I’d say this to you, but you sound like a limousine liberal! That's the kind that has not really had to deal with the problems of the people they champion and can't distinguish the fights are truly important. That, and sheer political cynicism of the kind that says keep forcing many votes on short term unemployment benefit extensions to get political mileage rather than doing what is ncessary to get one long-term one, seem to account for many of your colleagues' views on this. I am sad to see you include yourself in their number. (The same goes for Sherrod Brown.)''
at the end of an eight-hour speech denouncing Obama’s two-year deal for extending tax cuts for the wealthy as well as the rest of us, you declared “We can do better.” Sen. Sanders, do you mean by that that you have a way to get two Republicans to vote for cloture on a deal that does not extend tax cuts for the wealthy even though they have al sworn in writing they won’t? Or a way to pass a better bill once Republicans control the House in January? Or that taxing the wealthy at a higher rate is so important that you are willing to let the long-term unemployed go into limbo again, and let taxes go up on moderate income families an average of $3000 at a time when most of them have been battered by two years recession with probably at least one member out of work for a while? Hm. You must have lost touch with the people whose cause you so passionately defend.
Let me introduce you to one of these people: myself. A two-income family of very moderate means – I teach, my wife does administrative work – with a small child, we have had one or both of us un- or under-employed continuously for the last three years. As the one who was unemployed for most of that time I can best attest to the fact that I kept looking for work by pointing to the seven different employers I had (for part time work) during that time (one of which was exempt from paying unemployment insurance premiums, cutting my benefits when I ran out of work by a quarter). For eighteen months continuously from March 2009 to September 2010 we were partly dependent on unemployment compensation for one or the other of us as well as receiving help from my mother, who herself lives on a fixed monthly pension. And for six months we were both drawing unemployment checks. During this entire period the constant looming threat of unemployment insurance ending was our biggest worry. Even as we diligently sent out job application after job application, we had to keep planning for moving out of our house, presumably in with family, if our checks ran out.
Now comes the kicker. I finally got a full-time job, starting in January. But it is thousands of miles from where we used to live forcing us to decide among three options: my going alone, declining the job or my wife giving up her job and following us. Economically, as well as personally, the last made the most sense as my job paid enough to support the family. Just. But we are going to have to add to our already high debt (recall that long spell of unemployment I described above) to pull off the move including having to buy a car or two after selling our old cars for very little . And if the current tax deal doesn’t pass not only will my marginal rates go up but my child tax credit will go down and my standard deduction will go down because the marriage tax penalty will come back into being. All of which would cost me $200 a month or more. So much for affording a second car, which would allow my wife to look for work. We might not even be able to afford a first.
Well enough about me. At least for now! What is remarkable about the story above is how unremarkable it is. The impact of this recession has been wider, but also masked by the existence of the two-earner family. Many families lose one paycheck but limp along with another and unemployment and savings or debt. Retirement accounts are eviscerated. An unusually high no. of families are affected by both unemployment insurance and middle class tax rates. More and more families will be affected by a choice between a job for one partner in one place and another elsewhere. Allowing tax rates to rise on those families right now would be a disaster. But that is what you and your fellow progressives want to do in order to expose Republicans as a party for the rich. Do that and you will be a permanent minority for a generation.
Oh I understand the political calculation informing this. “The American people,” you think, “support us. They want taxes to go up on the rich.” No. They prefer taxes to go up on the rich but not on them. They want to be sure taxes don’t go up on them, regardless of what the rich pay. “If we show the public that Republicans are willing to hold them hostage over tax cuts for the rich it will show their true colors,” some say. Unfortunately if they don’t get taxes they’ll blame the party in charge which held them hostage to tax increases for the rich. And, more importantly, the time to draw out differences is before an election, not after. The leadership are best placed to explain why they didn’t do it then. Now, it’s just silly to think you can get any traction next time, or from grassroots pressure on a Republican congress that is more scared of the tea party than anything else.
Don’t get me wrong: I’ve been as annoyed with Obama over his handling of health care, Gitmo, interrogation rules and a host of other things, right along with other progressives. But this is not the same, for two reasons: the principle you are yielding on does not cause active harm to the constituency you are trying to serve, and it is not permanent.
Compare that to the public option: the reason that was important was that with a mandate to buy insurance and no real mechanism to force premiums down, the plan threatened to force significant groups of people into buying unaffordable insurance and still threatens (after the hardship waivers and other measures weakening the mandate) to leave insurance more unaffordable for many who would like it. Not having a public mandate meant the bill might harm many of those it aimed to help. The current tax deal does no such thing. (And even in the health care case I reluctantly concluded the bill was better passed than not, as did you. So I am frankly baffled by your umbrage in this case.
The false parallel to the health care fight continue into Obama’s role. Although it now appears Obama deserves more credit for passing it than it seemed once – not only did he publicly fight to revive it when Scott Brown when Kennedy’s seat and much of the party developed cold feet, but he apparently resisted private counsel from such “liberal lions” as Schumer to do so -- I still believe that Obama’s passive, above-the-fray, leave it to Congress approach, along with his willingness to go along with Baucus’ fruitless negotiations with the Gang of Six and accept a $900 billion limit on the ten year price tag all made the bill weaker and more vulnerable politically (no real benefit until 2014, in addition to no public option, and no doc fix making that political football available to sink it) . But this time he took charge of the negotiations, stuck his neck out and made sure important breaks for the poor and middle class were also extended and won enough Republican support so that many individual Democrats could have voted against it. But you guys are trying to sink this deal because you think what he gave up is more valuable than what he got?
Sen. Sanders I never thought I’d say this to you, but you sound like a limousine liberal! That's the kind that has not really had to deal with the problems of the people they champion and can't distinguish the fights are truly important. That, and sheer political cynicism of the kind that says keep forcing many votes on short term unemployment benefit extensions to get political mileage rather than doing what is ncessary to get one long-term one, seem to account for many of your colleagues' views on this. I am sad to see you include yourself in their number. (The same goes for Sherrod Brown.)''
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