Just As I Expected
At the beginning of summer, the widespread speculation throughout Washington and the mainstream media was that the war in Iraq was approaching its sunset. Even Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell warned President Bush last May that Republican Senators were right on the cusp of abandoning him and favoring some sort of change of course on the war. I predicted at the time that they were bluffing....and it appears I was right. The fact that nominal military progress has apparently been made by General Petraeus following the surge probably made a change of course that much more impossible, but even if the deterioration of conditions from six months ago had continued to spiral post-surge, I still don't believe enough Republican defections would have eventuated to sustain a Bush administration veto. After the Democrats in Congress got rolled once again by setting expectations for a change of course so high for the month of September and not being able to deliver a single item on their wish list, the new conventional wisdom seems to be that we're no closer to ending this war (or even beginning to end this war) than we were at this time in 2003.
The worst part of it is that American public opinion matters not at all. Every poll taken since the "momentum-changing Petraeus report" has indicated a continued loss of confidence in the American people regarding our open-ended commitment in Iraq. Yet we will continue to stay the course for the foreseeable future. Just this morning on the Sunday gabfests, likely 2008 Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton confirmed that if elected President, she'll maintain a near-permanent U.S. troop presence in Iraq. That strikes me as Hillary lowering the expectations bar for Iraq even in 2009 and beyond.....the first of many baby steps likely to come that will ultimately equate to a post-Bush administration Iraq policy that is only cosmetically different than the Bush administration Iraq policy.
From a political standpoint, such a scenario increases the likelihood of reduced morale among the Democratic base if Hillary is elected President in 2008. If we're still in Iraq heading into the 2010 midterms, it's gonna be a Democratic bloodbath at the polls, setting the stage for impenetrable Republican Congressional majorities for the coming decade due to reapportionment following the 2010 Census. Few partisans are willing to recognize that today, but I hope listening to Hillary's gradual backsliding on Iraq policy as we heard today on "Face the Nation" and "Meet the Press" starts to plant the seeds of doubt in the minds of primary voters about the short-term and long-term merits of a Hillary Clinton candidacy next fall.
On an unrelated matter, I find myself hoping for yet another Democratic defeat this week in regards to the proposed expansion of the SCHIP program, providing government health care for children. I support the expansion on its merits, but the monstrously irresponsible and predatory funding mechanism proposed by Congress (yet another cigarette tax) is an instant dealbreaker for me. Despite conventional wisdom, the SCHIP expansion is a political land mine for Democrats because public support, while appearing to be overwhelming, is very soft, as evidenced by how little media attention the issue is receiving. On the contrary, the low-income demographic of cigarette smokers, a natural Democratic constituency on the surface, will be anything but soft in its indignation of being singled out for yet another tax increase.
It's no accident that so many Republicans have signed on for the SCHIP expansion. Not only does it allow the Democrats to proudly contradict their "party of the working man" ethos with the tripling of the most regressive tax in existence, it helps pols like Iowa's own Chuck Grassley (an ardent supporter of the SCHIP expansion) to do the bidding of the state's insurance industry barons and shift the cost of health care from Principal Financial and onto the backs of the most politically powerless taxpayers. The bottom line is that the SCHIP expansion, as currently funded, would dramatically raise the taxes of families making $30,000 per year to subsidize free health care for children (or young adults up to age 25!) in families making $75,000 per year. It's every bit as much of a reverse redistribution of income as any of Bush's past tax cuts.
Unfortunately, there's probably a 50-50 chance that the House of Representatives will have the votes to overturn Bush's promised veto. The Senate has already produced the necessary 68 votes to overturn the veto, and pressure on soft House Republicans and conservative House Democrats who previously voted against the expansion will be enormous. They need a couple dozen converts for a veto-proof majority, and I'm leaning slightly towards that threshold not being crossed. Amazing how just like this summer's horrendous McCain-Kennedy immigration bill, the Democrats in Congress have to count on opposition Republicans to keep them from digging their own political grave.
The worst part of it is that American public opinion matters not at all. Every poll taken since the "momentum-changing Petraeus report" has indicated a continued loss of confidence in the American people regarding our open-ended commitment in Iraq. Yet we will continue to stay the course for the foreseeable future. Just this morning on the Sunday gabfests, likely 2008 Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton confirmed that if elected President, she'll maintain a near-permanent U.S. troop presence in Iraq. That strikes me as Hillary lowering the expectations bar for Iraq even in 2009 and beyond.....the first of many baby steps likely to come that will ultimately equate to a post-Bush administration Iraq policy that is only cosmetically different than the Bush administration Iraq policy.
From a political standpoint, such a scenario increases the likelihood of reduced morale among the Democratic base if Hillary is elected President in 2008. If we're still in Iraq heading into the 2010 midterms, it's gonna be a Democratic bloodbath at the polls, setting the stage for impenetrable Republican Congressional majorities for the coming decade due to reapportionment following the 2010 Census. Few partisans are willing to recognize that today, but I hope listening to Hillary's gradual backsliding on Iraq policy as we heard today on "Face the Nation" and "Meet the Press" starts to plant the seeds of doubt in the minds of primary voters about the short-term and long-term merits of a Hillary Clinton candidacy next fall.
On an unrelated matter, I find myself hoping for yet another Democratic defeat this week in regards to the proposed expansion of the SCHIP program, providing government health care for children. I support the expansion on its merits, but the monstrously irresponsible and predatory funding mechanism proposed by Congress (yet another cigarette tax) is an instant dealbreaker for me. Despite conventional wisdom, the SCHIP expansion is a political land mine for Democrats because public support, while appearing to be overwhelming, is very soft, as evidenced by how little media attention the issue is receiving. On the contrary, the low-income demographic of cigarette smokers, a natural Democratic constituency on the surface, will be anything but soft in its indignation of being singled out for yet another tax increase.
It's no accident that so many Republicans have signed on for the SCHIP expansion. Not only does it allow the Democrats to proudly contradict their "party of the working man" ethos with the tripling of the most regressive tax in existence, it helps pols like Iowa's own Chuck Grassley (an ardent supporter of the SCHIP expansion) to do the bidding of the state's insurance industry barons and shift the cost of health care from Principal Financial and onto the backs of the most politically powerless taxpayers. The bottom line is that the SCHIP expansion, as currently funded, would dramatically raise the taxes of families making $30,000 per year to subsidize free health care for children (or young adults up to age 25!) in families making $75,000 per year. It's every bit as much of a reverse redistribution of income as any of Bush's past tax cuts.
Unfortunately, there's probably a 50-50 chance that the House of Representatives will have the votes to overturn Bush's promised veto. The Senate has already produced the necessary 68 votes to overturn the veto, and pressure on soft House Republicans and conservative House Democrats who previously voted against the expansion will be enormous. They need a couple dozen converts for a veto-proof majority, and I'm leaning slightly towards that threshold not being crossed. Amazing how just like this summer's horrendous McCain-Kennedy immigration bill, the Democrats in Congress have to count on opposition Republicans to keep them from digging their own political grave.
posted by Mark at 9:57 AM
6 Comments:
http://politicalstl.blogspot.com/2007/09/election-2008-upper-midwest.html
hey mark! i need you comment on this post.. mainly minnesota.. thanks
In addition please use a name other then Mark.. because I have a mark from germany on my blog.
In addition.... I agree entirely with your part..except the reapportionment part.. waves dont always extend to governorships and also all partisan tricks ALWAYS backfire.. for example, right now Martin Frost and Tom Delay are playing video games..
James, I wrote some comments on your blog regarding the Upper Midwest in 2008. Reapportionment doesn't always work, but it usually does. The Democrats should have four more House members in Michigan and Ohio but we're suffering the lingering effects of the 2000 reapportionment nightmare. A repeat performance in those states and others could present further headaches if we lose the statehouses in 2010.
This is one of the reasons that I will not vote for Hillary in the general election. Having her as President will be little different than having Bush in the White House. I hope that Democratic primary voters are smart enough to defeat her in the primaries before she does damage to the whole Democratic party.
Im sorry Mark, but $75,000 for a family is close to being poor these days. I know families that make about that and they would not be able to afford health care if their employers didnt pay for it.
Mr. Phips, perhaps that is the case in New York where you live, but in most of the country, it's a pretty small percentage of households that earn $75,000 per year. I'm not saying that households that earn $75K per year should be denied access to government health care....but I am saying that it should not be paid for by households earning $30K per year, and under the proposed funding mechanism for SCHIP, it would be.
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