What Change Is

I've been wondering what Senator Obama means when he talks about change. A couple of months ago the Senator seemed to use change to say that he was going to change the way politics happens, I guess because he was a different kind of politician. But, recently, in the last month especially, he seems to me to act like most every other politician, saying X on one day to a certain audience, and they Y on another day to a different audience. Most recently the Y is something he has to say because the X he said earlier turned into a problem for him. So, I guess that could be one meaning of the word change.

I just found a speech the Senator recently gave in Iowa in which he defines what he means when he says "change:"

I will leave it up to Senator McCain to explain to the American people whether his policies and positions represent long-held convictions or Washington calculations, but the one thing they don't represent is change.

Change is a tax code that rewards work instead of wealth by cutting taxes for middle-class families, and senior citizens, and struggling homeowners; a tax code that rewards businesses that create good jobs here in America instead of the corporations that ship them overseas. That's what change is.

Change is a health care plan that guarantees insurance to every American who wants; that brings down premiums for every family who needs it; that stops insurance companies from discriminating and denying coverage to those who need it most.

Change is an energy policy that doesn't rely on buddying up to the Saudi Royal Family and then begging them for oil - an energy policy that puts a price on pollution and makes the oil companies invest their record profits in clean, renewable sources of energy that will create five million new jobs and leave our children a safer planet. That's what change is.

Change is giving every child a world-class education by recruiting an army of new teachers with better pay and more support; by promising four years of tuition to any American willing to serve their community and their country; by realizing that the best education starts with parents who turn off the TV, and take away the video games, and read to our children once in awhile.

Change is ending a war that we never should've started and finishing a war against Al Qaeda in Afghanistan that we never should've ignored. Change is facing the threats of the twenty-first century not with bluster, or fear-mongering, or tough talk, but with tough diplomacy, and strong alliances, and confidence in the ideals that have made this nation the last, best hope of Earth. That is the legacy of Roosevelt, and Truman, and Kennedy.

That is what change is.

I would like to see change in the tax code, and I would probably like a tax code that rewards work. Unfortunately, any tax on income takes from the reward that comes from working and being productive, and I don't think Senator Obama is talking about changing so that the federal government no longer relies on an income tax.

What about taxing wealth? Well, the federal government already taxes wealth, and so do many other levels of government. I'm thinking the change the Senator wants in this case is to tax wealth more heavily. My own view is that both income and wealth are good things, at least I know them to be good things in my own life, and I think it is usually a bad idea to tax good things. It would be a better idea to tax bad things, say air pollution for example. I'm pretty sure the Senator is not going to try to accomplish a change that would stop taxing income and wealth. I think he still wants to tax these two good things.

I suspect the change he says he will provide with respect to health care insurance is mostly pie in the sky stuff. I know, it probably is possible to nationalize health care insurance, but the federal medicare program already seems to be something that present policies simply cannot pay for over many more years without significant tax increases. Economist Greg Mankiw has recently noted what he called the coming tax hike by pointing to a letter from the Congressional Budget Office to Congressman Paul Ryan. Here is the relevant portions of that letter:

Under current law, rising costs for health care and the aging of the population will cause federal spending on Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security to rise substantially as a share of the economy....In response to your letter of May 15, 2008, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has prepared the attached analysis of the potential economic effects of...using higher income tax rates alone to finance the increases in spending....

With no economic feedbacks taken into account and under an assumption that raising marginal tax rates was the only mechanism used to balance the budget, tax rates would have to more than double. The tax rate for the lowest tax bracket would have to be increased from 10 percent to 25 percent; the tax rate on incomes in the current 25 percent bracket would have to be increased to 63 percent; and the tax rate of the highest bracket would have to be raised from 35 percent to 88 percent. The top corporate income tax rate would also increase from 35 percent to 88 percent.

Such tax rates would significantly reduce economic activity and would create serious problems with tax avoidance and tax evasion.

It seems to me the changes the Senator is espousing in this case are truly pie in the sky, or they will require rather significant tax increases. And, if we all end up paying significantly greater income tax burdens over time, it will all be in order to actually have a diminished supply of health care relative to what we have today. But, maybe that's just my inner economist talking.

What about the Senator's energy policy change? This doesn't sound very good to me either. He talks about not cozying up to other countries, but he doesn't seem to be big on the idea of releasing the policy chains on more production here at home. His attention to being cozy suggests to me he may not understand, or perhaps he just chooses not to understand for the political stance he chooses to take, that oil is really a rather homogeneous product and as such supply is pretty much supply regardless the region in the world it comes from. I hate to say that I'm old enough to remember the last time Saudi Arabia and OPEC were able to exercise some monopoly power over world oil prices (around 1980 if you don't remember). But, I think maybe there was a lesson to learn from that earlier experience. Namely that the high oil prices back then meant really strong incentives for increased production by oil companies in the United States and all over the world. The result? Increased production, of course. That increased production meant that the days of higher prices back then were relatively few, and it meant many additional years of low relative prices for gasoline. So, I suspect the change he talks about here with respect to oil is in the wrong direction.

What about those record profits to the oil companies? First, and very importantly, I don't want any change that would "make the oil companies invest" in anything. That sounds like tyranny to me. Where is Patrick Henry when we need him? I hope the Senator doesn't really mean what he said (and that he takes it back to another audience in a day or two), or I will have to hope for a 21st century version of the tea party, i.e., an oil party. Second, it is those very record profits that signal to oil producers, and would be oil producers, all over the world, that people worldwide really, really want more oil produced. And it is those very record profits that will provide the funds the oil companies will use to find and to produce more oil in the future.

Well, he has more in mind when he says change, but maybe I've already written enough. I mean, really, when I move to the next change that includes parents and tvs and video games I start to suspect from the Senator's words that he is thinking again about "making" us or them or somebody do what is best, at least what the Senator thinks they should recognize is best.

I'm certainly not against change. There have been so many wonderful and useful changes in the last 100 years. Change can be good. But, Senator Obama's change just doesn't sound like something I hope to see from the next president.

Perfection

Senator Obama recently said:

I believe in our ability to perfect this union because it’s the only reason I’m standing here today.

Stephen Bainbridge comments:

Setting aside the question of whether the adverbial clause sensibly follows from the main clause, this is one of my pet peeves. I simply do not believe in anyone’s ability to perfect anything. As the NAB puts it, ”all have sinned and are deprived of the glory of God.” Or, in the classic phrasing of the King James, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God ....”

If humans are by their very nature imperfect and, moreover, imperfectible, it follows necessarily that human institutions are also inherently imperfect and, moreover, imperfectible. Even the United States of America.

The framers of the American Republic were highly conscious of this basic fact. They knew that fallen mankind was capable of great evil and that tyranny therefore was an ever present threat in human society. . .

. . . all too many people who talk about perfecting a society strive to do so through the vehicle of government. Personally, I do not believe the government can make people, institutions, or societies better—let alone perfect. After all, government is itself comprised of fallen men and women whose imperfections are precisely the reason good government is shackled with checks and balances. Unconstrained, government attempts to create a “Great Society” destroy communities, disintegrate the little platoons that inculcate virtue, atrophy both man’s ability and desire to control their own destiny, and limit choice.

As a Christian, Obama should be aware of the full implications of The Fall. He should know that government is not a vehicle for perfecting humanity or human institutions, but rather a vehicle for ensuring that the baser elements of human nature are restrained. If government does that, it has done all that we can expect of it.

I'm with Mr. Bainbridge on this. One thing people often loose sight of when they consider government and public policy is that government is inherently coercive. I don't believe people can be made better by force. I do think the basic purpose of government should be to use force and coercion in a protective role much as Mr. Bainbridge suggests.

I also have to say that I dislike the way the Senator makes reference to the preamble of the Constitution. The constitutional framers did not say they were trying to make a perfect union of 13 states. Rather, they wrote that the Constitution was an effort to improve upon an existing union of 13 states. The Articles of Confederation were seen by the framers as inadequate, so they meant to improve upon the Articles.

If Senator Obama had said that he thought today we could improve upon our union of 50 states (rather than perfect our union), then I might have agreed with such an assertion. However, I'm sure the Senator and I would disagree significantly in the way we would suggest improving the union. It seems to me we can improve the union by reducing the size of national government and by constraining the Congress and the President in ways that would move the government in the direction of a limited government as envisioned by James Madison.

The Pope & Inalienable Rights

Faith and politics seems much a part of this presidential campaign season. In the midst of this season Pope Benedict visited the United States. I'm very happy to know that his remarks with the President had much to say about freedom:

From the dawn of the Republic, America's quest for freedom has been guided by the conviction that the principles governing political and social life are intimately linked to a moral order based on the dominion of God the Creator. The framers of this nation's founding documents drew upon this conviction when they proclaimed the self-evident truth that all men are created equal and endowed with inalienable rights grounded in the laws of nature and of nature's God.

[ . . . ]

Freedom is not only a gift, but also a summons to personal responsibility. Americans know this from experience -- almost every town in this country has its monuments honoring those who sacrificed their lives in defense of freedom, both at home and abroad. The preservation of freedom calls for the cultivation of virtue, self-discipline, sacrifice for the common good, and a sense of responsibility towards the less fortunate. It also demands the courage to engage in civic life and to bring one's deepest beliefs and values to reasoned public debate.

In a word, freedom is ever new. It is a challenge held out to each generation, and it must constantly be won over for the cause of good. Few have understood this as clearly as the late Pope John Paul II. In reflecting on the spiritual victory of freedom over totalitarianism in his native Poland and in Eastern Europe, he reminded us that history shows time and again that "in a world without truth, freedom loses its foundation," and a democracy without values can lose its very soul. Those prophetic words in some sense echo the conviction of President Washington, expressed in his Farewell Address, that religion and morality represent "indispensable supports" of political prosperity.

I guess I would like to disagree with the idea that freedom is ever new and must constantly be won over for the cause of good. But, I think it does seem to be the case that as the United States ages an ever smaller proportion of "we the people" seem committed to (perhaps even to have studied) the idea of limited constitutional government, which so many of the founders of our country believed in.