Monthly Archives: April 2020

A New Nation-State

Apologies for yesterday’s accidental post-that-wasn’t. I clearly don’t do stir-crazy very well….

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Should the GOP manage to manipulate–rig– the 2020 election and somehow re-elect Trump–maybe I won’t have to move into my son’s house in Amsterdam, or go to Canada, which have been my choices so far.

Maybe I can just move to California. which Governor Gavin Newsom has begun referring to  as a “Nation-State.”

California this week declared its independence from the federal government’s feeble efforts to fight Covid-19 — and perhaps from a bit more. The consequences for the fight against the pandemic are almost certainly positive. The implications for the brewing civil war between Trumpism and America’s budding 21st-century majority, embodied by California’s multiracial liberal electorate, are less clear.

 Speaking on MSNBC, Governor Gavin Newsom said that he would use the bulk purchasing power of California “as a nation-state” to acquire the hospital supplies that the federal government has failed to provide. If all goes according to plan, Newsom said, California might even “export some of those supplies to states in need.”

 “Nation-state.” “Export.”

(Newsom’s “Nation-State” differs from what Mike Bloomberg and others have referred to as “the rise of City-States” in response to climate change.)

In what the quoted article calls “civil war by other means,” Newsom is sending a message, not to Trump (who lacks the intellect to decode communications in any event), but to both political parties.

The GOP has been waging war on democratic values, institutions and laws for a number of years. The Democrats have been playing defense (and arguably not very well).

The GOP’s politicization of the Supreme Court most recently led to the unconscionable ruling requiring Wisconsin voters to risk their lives in order to cast a vote. Despite the fact that Wisconsin voters took that risk, that should have been a wake-up call.

Perhaps it was.

It’s clearly past time for Democrats to go on the offensive. Newsom is Governor of the nation’s largest state; he’s in a position to put Republicans on notice. California’s  taxpayers account for 15% of individual contributions to the U.S. Treasury, and the article suggests the state is is “now toning up at muscle beach.”

Democratic state Senator Scott Wiener, a leader in California’s cumbersome efforts to produce more housing, said soon after Newsom took office in 2019 that reorienting the state’s relationship to Washington is a necessity, not a choice.

“The federal government is no longer a reliable partner in delivering health care, in supporting immigrants, supporting LGBT people, in protecting the environment, so we need to forge our own path,” Wiener said. “We can do everything in our power to protect our state, but we need a reliable federal partner. And right now we don’t have that.”

And that quote  was from before the federal government’s multiple failures to respond adequately to the pandemic.

Federalism has a number of virtues; as we saw in the 50s and 60s, however, “state’s rights” can also facilitate gross injustices. Its current operation is among the many governing structures we need to rethink and reorient–but that reorientation, along with all the other institutional “fixes” we need–will have to await the installation of a competent federal administration.

Meanwhile, states like California are increasingly at odds with the Republican playbook: California is a sanctuary state while Trump’s GOP is demonizing immigrants; its approach to marijuana is much more permissive than that of the feds; its position on guns is diametrically opposed to that of an administration co-opted by the NRA.  Etc. Now, Trump’s dangerous mismanagement of pandemic response has essentially left California and other states to manage on their own.

One conflict, however, encompasses all others, and could galvanize Californians into new ways of thinking about their state and its relationship to Washington. The GOP war on democracy is inspired by a drive for racial and cultural supremacy that jeopardizes the democratic aspirations and human rights of California’s multiracial citizenry.

It isn’t only California. The majority of citizens in our diverse nation live in urban areas and urbanized states, while the White Supremacy Party–aka GOP–is increasingly a rural phenomenon. The states with a majority of the country’s population are under-represented in the Senate; their citizens’ votes are minimized by the Electoral College and gerrymandering.  There’s no reason to believe that these continuing inequities of minority rule won’t trigger a counterattack–and good reason to believe they will.

As the editorial concludes:

John C. Calhoun, who used the theory of states’ rights to defend the institution of slavery, is not generally a philosophical lodestar for liberal Democrats such as Newsom. But if Republicans (or foreign friends) succeed in sabotaging democracy in November, Calhoun’s theory of nullification, which posited that states have the power to defy federal law, could be ripe for a comeback on the left coast. With the heirs of the Confederacy now reigning in Washington, turnabout might be very fair play.

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Apres Le Deluge…What?

Thanks to the pandemic, millions of jobs have been disappearing–many of them, hopefully, just on hiatus, but many probably for good.

What will America and the world look like when this pandemic has played out? What lessons will we have learned, and how will those lessons change us?

The New York Times has introduced an entire series devoted to the question. Daily Kos recently predicted eleven ways America will change in the wake of the coronavirus. Like many of you, I’ve been discussing with my children and grandchildren the likely reasons for the deadly incompetence of America’s federal governance and the likely consequences for the future.

We have a son who lives  in Amsterdam and a granddaughter who lives in England, so we have an international context within which to evaluate successes and failures; of the two, the Netherlands has clearly (in my view, at least) exhibited the better approach: in addition to the country’s already-robust social safety net, the government has imposed a moratorium on firing people and is subsidizing payrolls for the duration. The Netherlands is predicting an unemployment rate just under ten percent when the pandemic is gone; here, of course, joblessness predictions are far, far higher.

The real question for Americans, of course, is: what cultural attitudes will the pandemic experience change? And how?

Every news show, every advertisement, currently ends with “We are all in this together.” True. Will that recognition outlast the crisis? We are all on this planet together, too, but the threat of climate catastrophe hasn’t notably affected the fossil fuel predators and others more concerned with their bottom lines than with global survival.

Will the pandemic–and its incredible mismanagement–finally awaken Americans to the importance of competent government? To an appreciation of the people conspiracy nuts call “the deep state,” and rational people recognize as committed civil servants?

What about the escalating reports of corruption–reports about  how this despicable administration’s “best people” are enabling looting and polluting while the pandemic provides a distraction? Will American voters and the American media finally understand that character–defined as honesty and “servant leadership”–matter?

Will we finally join the rest of the world, and provide access to health care to all of our citizens, or will America’s “original sin” and continued tribalism prevent us from supporting universal programs that help all people, including black and brown people?  For that matter, will we respond the way we did after the Great Depression, with a new “New Deal” that recognizes that we really are all in this together—and that the pursuit of rational self-interest requires that we build a society that works for everyone?

Will we at least recognize that government’s obligation to protect its citizens extends far–far–beyond maintaining “law and order,” anti-terrorrism efforts and foreign wars (justified and unjustified)? One of the most unforgivable acts by this unforgivable administration was dismantling the efforts put in place by the Obama administration to plan for pandemics–can’t you just see Trump thinking, who will notice, right? That task force is just sucking up resources that we can use to reward donors with subsidies and tax cuts.

When I look at this very incomplete list, and think about other lessons we should learn, they all require a renewed appreciation of the importance of an appropriately structured and constrained government.  Once this election is over, and voters have (hopefully!!) ejected this utterly unfit administration, Americans need to engage in a national conversation about what government is for–what government should and should not do.

That conversation will be critical–and we absolutely cannot allow it to be hijacked by the ideologues and conspiracy theorists and looters.

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The Problem With Ideologues

It isn’t that ideologues are stupid. Most are really very bright–if we define “bright” to mean that they have high IQs. They just can’t deal with ambiguity, and we live in an ambiguous world.

Politicians aren’t all ideologues: although many members of Congress–both Democratic and Republican (albeit more Republicans these days)–doggedly adhere to relatively simple “black versus white, wrong versus right” world-views, many others do not. The current administration is far, far from ideological. (True, Trumpers play to their fanatic base of True Believers, but from cynicism, not agreement.) Con artists are the antithesis of ideologues, and as I’ve previously noted, we have an administration composed of none-too-bright Keystone Kops and people who would be right at home in the Mafia.

We should also distinguish between “True Believers” and ideologues. True Believers tend to be people who uncritically adopt world-views generated by others. They find those “ready made” explanations (white nationalism comes to mind) appealing because they provide answers/excuses: why is it that my life isn’t going the way I wanted/expected? Whose fault is it? Who can I blame?

Ideologues, on the other hand, tend to be high IQ people who have worked out a coherent, orderly explanatory model that they proceed to apply to a world that is anything but coherent and orderly.

And that brings me to Richard Epstein.

I met Epstein briefly some twenty-five years ago, when he was teaching at the University of Chicago Law School. (You don’t teach at U.C. unless you are really, really smart–of course, “smart” and “wise” aren’t the same thing–not even close.) He made a speech which I have since forgotten, and had just written a book which I read and which is still buried somewhere in my library.

I would describe Epstein as a radical libertarian, and what I remember most about that just-written book was one chapter’s insistence that we don’t need a government agency to award or monitor air lanes–that once two planes had collided midair, and the airlines had been held liable for the immense damages (he does believe in legal liability, evidently–it’s been a long time since I read the book), the airlines would be motivated to get together and agree on the distribution of air lanes, because it would be in their financial interests to avoid such collisions in the future.

Cold comfort to those on one of the first planes…

At any rate, Epstein is now, apparently, affiliated with both NYU Law School and the Hoover Institution, and according to the New Yorker,  his approach to the way the world should work significantly influenced early White House pandemic policy.

According to the Washington Post, “Conservatives close to Trump and numerous administration officials have been circulating an article by Richard A. Epstein of the Hoover Institution, titled ‘Coronavirus Perspective,’ which plays down the extent of the spread and the threat.

Epstein, a professor at New York University School of Law, published the article on the Web site of the Hoover Institution, on March 16th. In it, he questioned the World Health Organization’s decision to declare the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic, said that “public officials have gone overboard,” and suggested that about five hundred people would die from COVID-19 in the U.S. Epstein later updated his estimate to five thousand, saying that the previous number had been an error. So far, there have been more than two thousand coronavirus-related fatalities in America; epidemiologists’ projections of the total deaths range widely, depending on the success of social distancing and the availability of medical resources, but they tend to be much higher than Epstein’s.

According to the article, Epstein is known for his “libertarian-minded reading of the Constitution.”  He continues to advocate for what he calls a “restrained” federal government, and last year published an article on Hoover’s web site arguing that “The professional skeptics are right: there is today no compelling evidence of an impending climate emergency.”

Well, when pesky evidence threatens your carefully-constructed worldview, the evidence must be wrong.(What are you going to believe? Your lying eyes, or your elegant theoretical model?)

The linked New Yorker article has a verbatim interview. If you want a glimpse of just how far afield a rigid ideology can take even a really smart person, click through.

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WOW…

I used to glance at the New England Journal of Medicine many years ago, when I was married to a doctor (let’s just say I found neither the Journal nor the doctor very exciting.) Exciting or not, the Journal is a longtime, highly respected source of medical research–and to the best of my knowledge, has always been entirely apolitical.

Until now.

A tip of my hat goes to Juanita Jean at the World’s Most Dangerous Beauty Shop for the link to this unprecedented column–the apology the Journal believes Donald Trump owes  America.

I am giving over the rest of today’s post to that column– asking readers to consider how outraged the editors had to be to run it, and how comforting it would be if the buffoon-in-chief had a vocabulary sufficient to deliver it.

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Dear Nation — A Series of Apologies on COVID-19
(What I’m sincerely hoping we’ll be hearing in an upcoming press conference, and soon.)

Dear Fellow Americans,

I’d like to take a brief moment in today’s press briefing to say something that is long overdue.

I’m sorry.

In a moment, I’ll cite the specifics of what I’ll be apologizing about.

But first, I want to acknowledge the sadness of this spring. I see our parks, fields, and forests coming alive with beautiful flowers and trees in bloom, but see none of the exciting vitality, diversity, and spirit that characterizes our great country.

Here in your nation’s capital, the cherry blossoms bear witness only to a sad silence. I imagine they are in mourning for the terrible losses already inflicted by this cruel virus. No doubt many of you have experienced losses yourself — I offer you my deepest, and most heartfelt condolences in your grief.

Now it’s time for me to apologize. By doing so now, I hope to chart a path forward so we can work together to end this devastating threat.

Let me apologize for dismantling programs put in place to deal with global infectious threats.

Acting like a reality TV host instead of a leader, I fired Tom Bossert — he was Homeland Security Adviser and coordinated the response to pandemics. I also let Tim Ziemer go — he was the head of global health security on the White House’s National Security Council. I then shut down the entire global health security unit.

Then Dr. Luciana Borio, the National Security Council’s director for medical and biodefense preparedness, left as well. Like Ziemer and Bossert, my administration never replaced these talented individuals — I confess these moves greatly weakened our ability to respond to infectious threats.

Dr. Borio tried to warn us in late January what was coming. I’m sorry for not heeding that warning.

I also apologize to the reporter who asked me about these actions, and I called her questions “nasty” — that was an inappropriate and disrespectful response. You were correct to challenge me on these moves, as have many others in these exchanges. Going forward, I promise to engage in productive dialogue with an understandably interested press corp.

I have repeatedly proposed funding cuts to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), where many positions also remain unfilled. I even did this after COVID-19 had already appeared in our country. I’m sorry about that.

In addition, I have taken away the CDC’s lead role in navigating and monitoring a response to the outbreak, silencing their regular briefs during infectious threats. The CDC workers are dedicated public health professionals who deserve our respect, and our thanks. They tried to issue a broad warning in late February, one we should have heeded.

Instead, I downplayed their warnings. I’m sorry to them, and to you, for this misdirection.

I apologize for all the times I’ve mentioned that media coverage of COVID-19 is politically motivated. Such comments only serve to drive us further apart at a time when we need to be working together.

In other words, from now on, no more of this:

Low Ratings Fake News MSDNC (Comcast) & @CNN are doing everything possible to make the Caronavirus look as bad as possible, including panicking markets, if possible. Likewise their incompetent Do Nothing Democrat comrades are all talk, no action. USA in great shape! @CDCgov…..

I’m sorry for not accepting the WHO COVID-19 test when first offered to the United States, for not moving more quickly to remedy our initially flawed tests, and for the ongoing struggles you experience even today with testing.

I did not help matters by saying in mid-March that COVID-19 testing could be obtained easily by any doctor, and that the tests were perfect. This clearly misled the public, causing more confusion — I apologize for that.

I’m sorry for calling the virus that causes COVID-19, which is SARS-CoV-2, the “Chinese virus”. Such medically inaccurate comments only encourage racism.

I’m sorry for saying to those working at overrun and beleaguered hospitals that they are exaggerating their need for lifesaving equipment such as ventilators. To the Governor of New York, I admire the selfless leadership you are displaying as our country’s largest city grapples with this terrible health threat.

To those of you on the front lines, putting your health and your family’s health at risk to care for people with COVID-19, I apologize for not doing enough to protect you. Despite what you have heard from our administration thus far, the federal stockpile should be there for all of us.

I also am sorry for the patchwork system in place for distributing these materials, which does not appear to be equitable.

Moreover, I apologize for implying that we already have an effective treatment for COVID-19, when such statements need the support of carefully done clinical studies.

Mostly, I’m sorry for the lies, half-truths, impulsive attacks, and bullying I’ve been responsible for ever since this horrible pandemic spread around the world. At times I confess financial and market forces, along with politics, motivated my actions more than personal and public health. I deeply apologize for that.

Many, including myself, have said we’re at war right now. Indeed, some aspects of this struggle are similar to war, when all a nation’s resources must be mobilized against a common enemy.

But wars pit people against people, so the comparison doesn’t quite fit, especially in a time when human kindness and caring are so important. In the fight against this infection, it isn’t other people who are enemies — it’s the virus.

Let’s work together to fight it.

Thank you.

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Vote By Mail

I’ve been banging the drum for vote-by-mail for a long time. What just happened in Wisconsin demonstrates its importance, as a recent op-ed by John Hickenlooper–former Governor of Colorado–emphasizes.

The election chaos in Wisconsin on Tuesday sent a clear message: The nation can’t afford a repeat in November. Poll workers, many of them vulnerable senior citizens, and voters were forced to risk covid-19 infection to participate in American democracy, with scandalously long lines at the few polling places that were open in some areas. Gov. Tony Evers (D) had issued an executive order to reschedule the election, but Republicans fought against it and the state’s Supreme Court blocked it.

Republicans also attacked a sensible proposal by Evers to essentially turn the election into one conducted by mail, with absentee ballots sent to every registered voter. President Trump has lately chimed in with criticism that mail-in balloting is “horrible,” “corrupt” and invites “fraud.”

As Hickenlooper says, Colorado’s experience rebuts the GOP’s hysterical pushback.  Colorado wasn’t the first state to go to vote by mail (Oregon and Washington were first), but its citizens have been voting from home for six years. Eligible Colorado voters receive a ballot in the mail roughly three weeks before Election Day, giving them time to do research on candidates and ballot initiatives. They complete the ballot from the comfort of their own homes, and either mail the ballot in or deposit it at one of hundreds of drop-off locations around the state.

Denver city and county voters even have the ability to track the status of their ballots, with email or text notifications, as they travel through the postal system. The “Ballot TRACE” software ensures that every mailed ballot is accounted for.

So what about those predictions of fraud?

The states that vote by mail have devised numerous safeguards against fraud. Colorado conducts rigorous risk-limiting audits; it also maintains a centralized database with voter signatures, and it tracks ballot returns. And as Hickenlooper points out, a big advantage of using mailed ballots is that paper can’t be hacked.

Other advantages? Higher turnouts (Oregon’s turnout puts Indiana’s to shame and in Colorado, the increase was particularly noticeable for “low propensity” populations) and significantly lower costs–Hickenlooper says Colorado saved $6 per voter.

It isn’t just Oregon, Washington and Colorado; other states have been moving in this direction. Voters in 28 of Utah’s 29 counties automatically get ballots at home. Nebraska and North Dakota also use vote by mail to varying degrees. Nearly half of the states allow some elections to be conducted by mail, and many allow voters to cast no-excuse absentee ballots.

The reason the GOP is so adamantly opposed to vote-by-mail is obvious: it increases turnout, and Democrats win when turnout increases. Turnout this November will be especially important. As I wrote in the wake of the Supreme Court’s shameful decision allowing gerrymandering to continue, we will need a citizen tsunami sufficient to overcome the blatantly rigged districts the Supreme Court has declined to rule unconstitutional.

Huge turnouts would be likely to do more than just eject the corrupt and unfit Trump Administration. A large enough turnout could wrest control of the Senate from McConnell, and clean out large numbers of the GOP’s state and local enablers. If that tsunami is big enough, it might even allow old-fashioned Republicans appalled and dispirited by what the GOP has become to retake their party from the white nationalists who have captured it.

If that doesn’t happen…history will record Mitch McConnell’s capture of the Supreme Court  and the GOP’s unhindered voter suppression as a successful coup d’etat.

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