Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

No Left Turns

Military

Name That Battle

In naming military operations (e.g., "Enduring Freedom"), a mixture of learning, whimsy, and political purpose takes hold.  Someone should have been so scrupulous when they launched the Department of Homeland Security and The Patriot Act.  In the battle over Obamacare, the most fitting slogan for opponents still hasn't emerged.  I'd prefer something involving the Constitution (with a play on both a healthy body and our fundamental law).  Sunday's House proceedings might give more clues.  Michelle Malkin has photos of today's crowds, with some clever signs.
Categories > Military

Courts

The Law of Unintended Consequences . . .

And the problem of good intentions.  From a review of a new biography of Louis Brandeis. In the Lochner decision:

As Justice Rufus Peckham wrote for the majority, while New York certainly possessed the power to enact health and safety regulations (as all good progressives wanted), the maximum hours provision of the Bakeshop Act "is not, within any fair meaning of the term, a health law." Not only was the baking trade "not dangerous in any degree to morals, or in any real and substantial degree to the health of the employee," but the limit on working hours involved "neither the safety, the morals, nor the welfare, of the public."

So what was the purpose of the law? As George Mason University legal historian David Bernstein has shown, the origins of the Bakeshop Act lie in an economic conflict between unionized New York bakers, who labored in large shops and lobbied for the law, and their nonunionized, mostly immigrant competitors, who tended to work longer hours in small, old-fashioned bakeries. As Bernstein observed, "a ten-hour day law would not only aid those unionized workers who had not successfully demanded that their hours be reduced, but would also help reduce competition from nonunionized workers." So Lochner not only protected a fundamental economic right, it thwarted an act of economic protectionism as well.

Something similar happened in Adkins v. Children's Hospital, where the Court struck down the District of Columbia's minimum wage law for women as a violation of liberty of contract. This was the case where Urofsky claimed Sutherland exhibited "a complete disregard for the real world." Well, here are some facts about that world. One of the figures in the case was an elevator operator named Willie Lyons, who had earned $35 per month from the Congress Hotel. Under the new minimum wage law, the hotel would have had to pay her $71.50 per month. So they fired Lyons and replaced her with a man willing to work at her old wage. That's why she sued. As the legal scholar Hadley Arkes memorably put it, "the law, in its liberal tenderness, in its concern to protect women, had brought about a situation in which women were being replaced, in their jobs, by men."

Categories > Courts

Health Care

Bringing New Ideas to Washington . . .

Today's speech from the President:

The president cited Teddy Roosevelt, Harry Truman and Edward Kennedy as forebears who paved the way for the historic moment that could be just around the corner: passage of the biggest health care measure since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965.

Teddy Roosevelt lived not long after Bismark invented the welfare state.  What's President Obama's excuse for having the same program a century later?

Categories > Health Care

Saving The Health Care Welfare State (And The People On It)

I think Richard Adams makes a good point that a system that centralizes health care spending decisions across the age spectrum will over the long run tend to shift health care resources away from the old and very sick to other groups that might get more "quality of life benefit" as determined by somebody else.  I think that concern is valid, but I come at it from another direction.  Under any likely (or even very unlikely but possible) health care policy scenario, the government will still be paying for a large portion of end of life care.  Medicare might be restructured any number of ways (including vouchers), but most old people will still be depending on government dollars for their health care.  The key is balancing government's spending obligations, and changing the health care market so that the government can give the elderly access to high quality care without crushing the economy.

My favored approach is to try to bring down the cost of health care in general by forcing providers to compete for the health care dollars of consumers.  Various versions of this approach have been described by David Goldhill, Walter Russell Mead and Paul Ryan.  Health care providers would have to find ways to provide their services more cheaply than their competitors, which if the experiences of any other industry is a guide, will lead to business model improvement that will allow them to provide a higher volume of services at a lower cost per service.  Mead's description of the walk-in Walmart clinic where the medical personnel will have instant access to your electronic medical records and a constantly updated database of best practices is just one possible example.  Maybe we will see a partial return to older ways of doing things.  Maybe semiretired doctors will hang a shingle outside their door to see people for routine ailments.  The traffic might be low, but hey, they are at home watching tv anyway.  A system in which people spend their own money for routine care (in return for higher wages and a tax credit) could make this a viable model.  He could charge less (maybe twenty five bucks for a fifteen minute visit about something like a cold or ear infection) and since the transacton would be in cash, he would have little administrative overhead.  As a (very large) participant in this market-oriented system, the government would be able to buy more health care for its elderly dependents at a lower cost and make continuing their care much less of a burden

Obamacare moves in the opposite direction.  It cuts medicare while adding a new middle-class entitlement.  It virtually outlaws HSAs and turns health care into government mandated and partially government subsidized comprehensive health care prepayment.  Since government will force people into a system of health care prepayment (people will have to pay for their health care whether they need, want, or even use the services) there will be no incentive for consumers to shop and therefor no consumer pressure on providers to control costs.  The result will be both artificially high prices and overuse of services.  At some point the government will run out of money to pay for it all.  That doesn't mean that cost won't be contained, just that it will be contained in a brutal and stupid way.  Rather than improve productivity, the government will then ration the artificial scarcity that government policy created by denying services.  Whether the denial is done by career bureaucrats or elected officials, the process will be opaque so as to deflect blame from those who are being denied care (in every sense of the word).  There is a certain sensibility that argues this is the way to go.  One might argue that centralized "expert" direction of medical resources will lead to more efficient and fair distribution than expanding the confusing, wasteful market.  The distribution of medical resources from the soon to die (well relatively soon) also has its defenders.  In one unguarded moment, Obama was one of them.   

 

Foreign Affairs

Some Kind of Miracle

Mac Owens today posts a review of two important books about Israel (The Rise of Israel: A History of a Revolutionary State by Jonathan Adelman and Israel and Its Army: From Cohesion to Confusion by Stuart A. Cohen)--just in time time to serve as an antidote to the administration's recently (and embarrassingly) demonstrated misunderstanding of and impatience with the nation.  The governing narrative of the Left regarding Israel and its remarkable successes has been an attempt to explain Israel's good fortunes and continued existence by suggesting that Israel victimizes Arabs.

Whatever one thinks of the continued Israeli/Palestinian conflict, this explanation of Israel's success is unsatisfactory and simple-minded. For it ignores basic facts and fails to answer obvious questions.  Mac points to two of these in the opening paragraphs of this review:  "Why was it that among all the minorities of the Ottoman Empire (the Palestinian Jews, Lebanese Christians, Armenians, and Kurds), only the Jews were able to obtain a powerful state, when the others seemed better situated in 1917?" and "Why did a state besieged by powerful and numerous enemies avoid becoming an authoritarian, militarist society, such as Prussia or Sparta?"

Mac thinks these two books go a long way toward providing better answers to these questions than does the ideology permeating so much of our relations with the Jewish state.
Categories > Foreign Affairs

Health Care

Collective Payment and Rationing

Much of the dicussion of rationing health care has focused on end of life issues.  We currently spend a good chunk of health spending in the last few months of life.  Hence, the argument goes, we are being unreasonable, making heroic efforts to save and prolong life, when they, as a rule, have little prospect of doing much good, particularly in comparison with what the same money could do elsewhere.  Perhaps we might also look at beginning of life issues.  If we have bureaucrats deciding how to allocate money, might they decide that fertility treatments for women over 40 or so simply are not a good use of scarce resources?  Such treatments are not inexpensive, and as women age, the odds of having babies that cost more to raise than the average baby rises.  (I also fear that there would be subtle, and perhaps not so subtle, pressure  to abort children who are likely to have problems.)  Rationing such treatment would be a tragic cost of the centralization of health care.  If this bill passes, I hope that such choices are not taken away from us.

Categories > Health Care

Politics

Barone's Numbers

Michael Barone does some House math--in mind-numbing detail--based on this afternoon's passage of the  "deem to pass" roll call, or the "Slaughter resolution."  While he admits he knows less than the Democratic leadership, it is still "This looks like the toughest challenge the House leadership has faced since Nancy Pelosi was elected Speaker in January 2007."  Here are the details from CBS News

Categories > Politics

Congress

Re-deeming the Constitution

If it is constitutional, or perhaps I should say if no one with sufficient authority is willing to say that it is not constitutional to "deem" a bill to have passed without actually voting on it, it ought not to be. Hence I propose an amendment, to be added to Article I saying roughly: "No bill shall become law unless the exact same has been passed independently by each house of Congress and then signed by the President, or, failing his signature, being subsequently approved by 2/3 of each house."
 
Whoever introduced it could say, "it is unfortunate that the Democrats have resorted to Parliamentary casuistry to pass a bill without really passing it.  That should never happen again. This amendment is designed to do that," or words to that effect.

Categories > Congress

Pop Culture

Fess Parker, RIP

He was 85 and he lived and loved to the end.  He is rightly remembered as the man who played both Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone; making coonskin caps a staple among a generation of American boys.  That is, I suppose, all well and good--but it not what accounts for my fond recollection of him.

I think, rather, of his performance as the father in Old Yeller--particularly in the closing scene where he speaks to his son about what it means to become a man.  He talks of bearing hurts and holding on to things worth loving.  And he balances his otherwise unflappable character with just the gentlest nod to tenderness--without permitting a wallowing in self-pity. 

In 2004 (I think) we took our kids to a Disney themed Independence Day extravaganza at the Hollywood Bowl.  We were surprised (because it was unannounced) when Fess Parker walked on stage for the finale to do a public reading of the Declaration of Independence.  He did it with exactly the same kind of resolve and spirit that impressed me in Old Yeller.   In short, it was utterly believable and deeply moving because you could not help but know that--in both cases--these were words with which he agreed.  They were words that resonated with and moved him.  He spoke with the kind of passion that is only understandable when it is genuine.  And one could tell that he felt obliged but happy to share those words because they were words he lived by and sought to make known to others in his own particular, and I'd say, splendid way. 

If the genre in which Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone fall into does not seem to resonate with boys today, I'd suggest that this has less to do with today's boys than it does with the inability (or is it unwillingness?) of Hollywood to find men like Parker to portray them with the same passion (but with today's production values).   When some genius in Hollywood finally figures this out, he'll make a fortune and boys will, once again, be scrambling for coonskin (faux, of course) caps. 
Categories > Pop Culture

Politics

Cranky Professor Part 2

So let me slightly revise and extend my remarks of Obama's performance on Fox News yesterday.  One reason he came off so badly was because he put himself in an indefensible position.  There is an internally consistent argument that it is fine to break some procedural eggs to make the omelet of health care reform (or conservative judges or whatever), but Obama couldn't make it.  He had boxed himself in by his earlier pious. goo goo statements about the filibuster, a transparent process (I wonder why the administration arm twisting of undecided Democrats isn't on CSPAN, it would make Jersey Shore look like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington), and his earlier demand for an up or down vote (well, before the Slaughter Solution).  There was just no talking his way out of his own hypocrisy.  So all he could do was blab and bluster and demand to keep talking ("let me finish") until time ran out.  He won't usually be in such a weak position.  I think his performance in Baltimore in front of the House Republican caucus will be closer to how we can usually expect him to perform in big situations.
Categories > Politics

Foreign Affairs

Remember Cuba?

It's still only 90 miles from Key West, and it's still a murderous dictatorship--although, as Henry Gomez writes, it never generated the sort of fury from the American left as did, say, South Africa in the 1980s.  In fact, Michael Moore suggested that Cuba's health care system might be a model for the United States.  Today Dr. Darsi Ferrer languishes in a Cuban prison for revealing that Moore was merely serving as a mouthpiece for Castro's propaganda.

Gomez would like us to remember that today--March 18--marks the seventh anniversary of "Black Spring," when Castro's goons rounded up 75 critics of the regime.  Most of them are still locked up, but one of them, Orlando Zapata Tamayo, died in prison on February 23.

Categories > Foreign Affairs

Politics

Restorationists

I've been meaning to bring your attention to this fine piece by Jonah Goldberg for a couple days but, in doing so, I wanted to take the time to explain why I think it is so fine.  But events are conspiring against me and if I wait until I can say something sensible (*insert insult here*) I may never get to it.  Let me just say, briefly, that Jonah's argument that the Tea Partiers be deemed "Restorationists" is at once brilliant, emboldening, moderating and evocative.  Lincolnian, even. 

"Restoration" you may know, was Lincoln's preferred term for what came (instead) to be known as "Reconstruction."  And, with that poor and anti-Lincolnian title (and without the benefit of Lincoln's wise hand guiding it's implementation), Reconstruction probably opened the door to all sorts of mischief and poor understanding in and of American political life.  Lincoln, like today's Tea Partiers, sought to restore America to her original and noble purposes as understood in our Revolution and Founding.  He did not imagine that he could or should transform it--and he worked mightily to prevent those laboring under that arrogant and foolish supposition (whether they were Unionists or dis-Unionists) from getting the upper hand.  Unfortunately, he did not live to see that work all the way through.

It is high time that someone did see it through.  Long live today's Restorationists! 
Categories > Politics

Education

National Standards for Confusion

If you think the prospect of having a large federal bureaucracy with the ostensible (and laughable) purpose of helping you to "manage" your health care is an ominous sign of left-wing overreach and grasping for control of our everyday lives, just wait till this bunch has its way with the "management" of your child's education.  If Congress has its way with health care "reform" and justifies its lack of concern for such "trivial" matters as procedure, consent of the governed or the Constitution by noting how "important" this legislation is for their power the American people--what sort of motivation can we expect for restraint when the potential gains (i.e., the political discipleship of generations) are so palpable? 

In today's Sacramento Bee, Ben Boychuk takes on the movement toward a standardized national curriculum through the Common Core State Standards Initiative.  These "voluntary" standards have some sharp edges for states that don't sign on--but this has not prevented two states--Texas and Alaska--from standing up and refusing to be lured with federal money. 

A perceived problem for those advocating on behalf of keeping standards at the state level has been the rancorous and, in many ways, ridiculous fight over history standards in Texas that has produced, in the words of Boychuk, "a politically correct mishmash."  Any objective observer of the outcome in Texas would have to concede that their "solution" has been less than wonderful.  As Ben says in the comment section under his piece, "including the Declaration of Independence in the social studies standards while excluding Thomas Jefferson is... confusing."  It is also stupid and deserving of all the mockery and derision it is getting--however wrong-headed and mean-spirited some of it may be.  (One way to avoid being called a fool is to avoid doing foolish things!)  But this result is in no way--as left-wing critics eager to score points against the "rubes" in red states might hope--an argument in favor of national standards.  It is an argument AGAINST them.  Why would we want to nationalize that fiasco of a fight in Texas?  For that is exactly what would happen.  At least sensible Texans know where to go and whom to blame when their kids are confused.  Where will sensible Americans across the 50 states turn to redress their grievances with the curriculum when it comes down from on high?  Where will their power to effect the intellectual development of their own children be lodged?  Talk about confusing!
Categories > Education

Politics

The Cranky Professor Is Back

Over at Postmodern Conservative Ivan Kenneally described Obama's performance at the Health Care Summit as a "cranky professor".  I just saw Obama on the 6 P.M. Fox News show and boy was the cranky professor back.  His main strategy seemed to respond to any question with a droning repetition of his stump speech regardlesss of whether it had anything to do with the question.  He also just kept talking and talking and talking long after his answer retained any coherence.  His long (and often meandering) responses to questions in press conferences can often give an impression of mastery.  You stop paying attention to what he is actually saying, but he seems to know what he is talking about, so the problem must be you.  But today he looked irritated and uncomfortable so he came off as blustering in the hopes that you won't notice that he has no real answers to the questions he is being asked and hopes that the questioners will go away.  His defense of the funny math of double counting the medicare cuts was pitiful.
Categories > Politics

Politics

Predictions I Don't Want To Believe In

But it is what I think,

1.  The Senate version of Obamacare will pass in the House.  The vast majority of undecided House Dems are either holding out for the best offer or hoping this is all just a bad dream.  But at the end of the day, they will do as they are told.  I don't know if it will be by "deem and pass" or by an up or down vote. 

2.  Obamacare will have become law without any overt changes to the filibuster rule.

3.  I think that in the short term, conservatives will try (and I believe with all sincerity) to make the most of Democratic manipulation of procedural rules and their stated willingness to manipulate those rules even further.  I think that the long term consequence will be a weakening of respect for procedural norms on the right.  Respect for rules like the filibuster are dependent on the belief that those rules will be respected by the other party when they are in power.  The majority gives up some power in the present in return for not being shut out when they are in the minority.  The willingness of Democrats to use the reconciliation process to pass Obamacare is a clear signal to Republicans that respecting the filibuster in the present will not, on the most important issues (where filibusters are most important as a moderating device), preserve the filibuster when the Democrats take over again .  So when Republicans are in such a position that only the filibuster stands in the way of achieving some major goal, the Republicans will gut the filibuster. I imagine that there will be a few liberals who cheer the loss of the filibuster as an advance in small-d democracy, but I don't think they will be very many. 

Categories > Politics

Courts

Hocus Pocus SCOTUS POTUS (update)

The often astute Jeff Rosen eggs on Obama's confrontation with the Supreme Court, outlining a Court-bashing strategy Obama can use to his advantage.  (Given Axelrod's interest in Lincoln's political savvy, I'm sure something similar has occurred to him and has put it in play.)  The trouble is, Obama's manner of unleashing his attack, at the SOTU, made him look like a schoolyard bully, not a TR with the bully pulpit. 

If the Dems use the Slaughter House Rules to get Obamacare through, this Court-confronting strategy might help delegitimize an opinion declaring the desperate tactic unconstitutional.  Hence the short as well as long-term importance of the current wave of Mrs. Clarence (Virginia) Thomas-bashing.  But the left needs to silence more than her for the proposed Rosen strategy to work.

UPDATE:  See Matt Franck's demolition of Rosen.

Categories > Courts

Politics

Dems' self-execution

Today's Wahington Post story on the Democrats' use of "deem and pass" or "self-executing rule" to get the health care bill through Congress (without actually voting on it!) is worth reading because it is clear about this weird process, as well as the mischief it is causing Democrats.  I am now of the mind that this gambit will not be used.  The uproar has been too great, even Jack Cafferty of CNN is outraged.  Given the importance of the legislation, "deem and pass" is not defensible; it is actually and irresponsible political act.  Should Nancy Pelosi and the Dems have their way in this--as of today she thinks it is necessary to get the thing passed--I predict a kind of electoral revolution in November that none of us have ever seen in our life time.  I kind'a hope they do it.  But I don't think it will happen.  I think the outrage will be evident by Saturday and enough members will say no to "deems and pass" that they will have to vote on the Senate bill, and the vote will fail.  The other possibility is that Pelosi will insist on using this gambit and even that vote will fail because enough Democratic House Members will remember that it is through elections that they are held accountable.   And even the majority can't put off the elections in November.

Categories > Politics

History

The Pacific

Mac Owens writes a positive and helpful review of the new HBO series, The Pacific.  Mac concludes that the series appears to do for the Pacific theater what Band of Brothers did for the European theater.  In other words, it seems to do justice to the story and to the men who--knowing history is not pre-ordained for American victory or for justice--still gave their all so that we might inherit a country where justice remains a possibility.  Mac notes that the men whose stories form the basis of the script for the series are widely regarded, heralded, and understood by Marines.  Now, thanks to this series, perhaps their stories will become known to the rest of us.  Perhaps in knowing and understanding these stories--not just the victories but also the desperation and defeat--we can begin to understand what it really means to preserve a Republic.  Perhaps, too, we can be inspired to comport ourselves in a way that is worthy of those sacrifices and one that considers, too, that such sacrifices might be required of us.  It sounds like Tom Hanks, whatever else he may think or say about America and American politics, understands at least that much.  For that, and for this good story well told, I am grateful.
Categories > History

Politics

On Second Thought, Maybe Anonymity Would Be Better

So Yglesias is now shilling his "You might lose your House seat but make history" line over at the Daily Beast.  But how will those Democrats who waited until the last moment to collect the final payoff or who broke under pressure from their party (or both), before they voted yes on Obamacare be remembered even by sympathetic historians?  How do we remember Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky?  She was the House Democrat who buckled to the House Democratic leadership at the last moment and voted for Clinton's tax increase in return for a promise that Clinton would go to her district for a pr show.  She lost her House seat, but I don't think that historians who stoop to notice her will see real heroism. 

My impression is that she is remembered as a case study of how congressional leadership can intimidate and bribe weak-willed caucus members into politically suicidal acts.  So perhaps the wavering House Democrats face a more complicated choice than they might assume.  If they switch at the last moment, putting aside their principles (if they have any) and the will of their constituencies, they might well get a place in history.  But it might not be the place in history that Yglesias is offering.  They might instead, get the place in history that they deserve.

Categories > Politics

Military

Competence

Robert D. Kaplan might be a bit too optimistic, yet this long piece from The Atlantic ("Man Versus Afghanistan") is worth a read because it reveals much about the way our military can adapt and learn, about the long view versus fate, and also ruminations on whether "civilization grows here like weeds" or not.

Categories > Military

Education

Edjumucation

With Obama's latest feint toward moderation, his reform of No Child Left Behind, consider Kevin Kosar's brief critique.  Here's his assessment of political science's contribution to political understanding.

See the sidebar links for book reviews, commentary, and lengthier studies on education, including his book.  Besides being an authority on federal higher education policy, Kevin also manages a website devoted to the model of all social science scholars Edward Banfield and another called AlcoholReviews.  He is the late professor's grandson-in-law--a fact evidenced by the closing line in the NCLB article "So call me grumpy, but I think much work remains to be done, and I won't be surprised if we end up sorely disappointed again."

Categories > Education

Politics

Vanity

If I had to bet, I think that the Democrats will find enough votes in the House of Representatives to pass the Senate version of Obamacare.  I suspect that status rewards will play a role in the switches.  I was thinking presidential appointments, academic sinecures, and awards ceremonies.  Matthew Yglesias suggests another status reward.  House members who vote no and lose reelection as a result will be remembered as Heroes of the Revolution and lauded by liberal historians in 2060. 

So lets break this down.  Why might these no votes be inclined to vote against Obamacare?  I can think of two major reasons.  First, because they might object to Obamacare on the merits of the policy.  Second, because they respect (or fear) the perceived wishes of their constituents who oppose Obamacare.  How many members of the House of Representatives would be willing to put aside their substantive objections and/or the will of their constituents not for rewards in this world, but in the hopes of gaining a posthumous favorable mention from some liberal-leaning historian?  My first guess is too many.

Categories > Politics

Environment

Now This Is Just Too Much Fun

Sen. James Inhofe used a blowup poster of my Weekly Standard cover story on climate change on the Senate floor a little while ago, as you can see about 1:25 in on this YouTube video.  And I hear a group of fine citizens in New Zealand are going to use the cover at a protest of a Gore appearance down there later this week.  Someday Gore is going to regret inventing the Internet.
Categories > Environment

Economy

Debt, debt, debt

This morning Bloomberg is reporting that the United States, along with Great Britain, is in danger of losing its AAA credit rating.  In addition, Social Security has announced that it has begun cashing in its Treasury bonds to make up the difference between what the SSA has been collecting in taxes and what it's been paying out in benefits.

I know what you're thinking--what a perfect time for Uncle Sam to take on a massive new entitlement program!

Categories > Economy

Men and Women

Azar Get Your Gun

At the Happy Mean, Priscilla reflects on the right of gun ownership in the Third/Fourth world and its meaning for women.  "'Tapestries are lovely, and we all want one, but [Afghan Colonel Shafiqa] Quraishi prefers that women have guns. Her immediate goal is to expand the number of women in the police force to 5,000.'"  Priscilla agrees with Mary Eberstadt that women should not serve in wars--but a policing situation is different.

Categories > Men and Women

Health Care

The Problems With Romneycare

So I bought Romney's new book .  I figure that If I'm going to oppose him, I ought to be up to date on my reasons.  I think that the combination of mandates and subsidies in Romneycare was an idea worth trying.  It must have seemed like a good way to increase coverage and reduce consumer health care costs while preserving a private health insurance market.  It hasn't worked out as well in practice.  The combination madates and subsidies has created a perverse political incentive within the Massachusetts health care market.  Providers can expand their customer base by lobbying the legislature to mandate coverage for more services rather than try to compete for customers based on price.  The cost of these mandates are hidden from consumers because it ends up as higher-than-the-national-average premium increases and ends up getting blamed on the mean old insurance companies.  To the extent that our current health care system is unsustainable, a national version of Romneycare would make it more unsustainable.

The health insurance system under a Romneycare arrangement becomes an ever more rigid and government regulated form of comprehensive medical care prepayment in which the costs are hidden from the consumer and the benefits go to organized interests.  Any attempt to reopen the market by reducing the mandate burden is easily spun as benefiting the same insurance companies that are currently overcharging you.  And there is of course no guarantee that lifitng the coverage mandates will lead to lower premiums.  For all you know, your employer might switch to a policy with less coverage but no less cost. The risks of change are obvious, the benefits of change speculative, the costs of stasis hidden.

In his book, Romney wrote that he was surprised that "every [italics in original] interest group in the state supported" Romneycare.  As well they might have.  Everybody gets a cut.  Even the insurance companies have their customer base guaranteed by the individual mandate and the coverage mandates shield them from aggressive competition.  The politicians even get to posture against the premium increases (and maybe win back some small, certain to be temporary reductions) even as the system they constructed and administer guarantees endless future premium increases.  Perversity piles upon perversity. 

It might be possible to construct a mandate and subsidy system that works better but it would have to be totally different from Romneycare.  It would mean giving consumers more control of their health care dollars (through a combination of HSA's and catastrophic coverage) and forcing providers to compete based on a transparent price system.  It would mean creating a mandate and subsidy system that fostered a competitive rather than corporatist health care market.  Mitch Daniels in Indiana has shown how such a program can bring down costs even without mandates.  

    

Categories > Health Care

Foreign Affairs

Gorby Revives His Inspector Clouseau Impression

Mikhail Gorbachev (remember him?--he's the guy who turns up in Louis Vutton magazine ads, having done Pizza Hut ads 15 years ago and having rejected lucrative offers to be a Las Vegas casino greeter--true story!) turns up today in the New York Times reflecting on perestroika 25 years later.  Now, Gorby deserves his due as an authentic reformer of the late Soviet Union, but the article makes clear why, as I put it in my book, he should be thought of less as Machiavelli than Inspector Clouseau.  

So, just to pick one example, Gorby writes, "Out main mistake was acting too late to reform the Communist Party."  Um, oh-kay.  He never did figure out that it was the one-party system itself that was at the heart of the problem he wished to fix.  Also, this howler: "In the heat of political battles we lost sight of the economy. . ."  Actually they never really had it in sight; Gorbachev made clear early on that he thought the problems of socialism required. . . more socialism.  He rejected outright the idea of instituting property rights and opening up private enterprise.  

He'd be the perfect adviser for the Democrats on health care reform right now.
Categories > Foreign Affairs

Pop Culture

Satire for a Sunday Morning

If you are a close or even casual follower of the film industry, this parody of a movie trailer is spot on (about 3 minutes).
Categories > Pop Culture