2012 Presidential Election - The Ups and Downs

[JAD_333]

Of course, Hamilton probably would have suggested the two candidate to simply grab a pistol and head down to Weehawken :P ... that would certainly be.... entertaining?

Except he was already dead. Glocks at 30 paces.

[Red Team]

Romney Tax Plan Helps Rich-Most Tax Group - Reuters

Ammunition for the Obama Campaign? The plan does echo Trickle-Down...

[astralis]

good when zakaria puts his old academic foreign policy hat back on. this question of culture vs capitalism was a hot topic among IR academics in the late 80s early 90s, which was largely put to rest by 1997.

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Fareed Zakaria: Capitalism, not culture, drives economies - The Washington Post

Fareed Zakaria
Capitalism, not culture, drives economies

By Fareed Zakaria, Published: August 1
The Washington Post

Mitt Romney has explained that his comments abroad were simply truth-telling. “I tend to tell people what I actually believe,” he said. With regard to one much-debated comment — on the cultural differences between Israelis and Palestinians — many agree with him. The Wall Street Journal editorial page and columnists including Marc A. Thiessen and John Podhoretz all applauded. Podhoretz wrote: “Anyone who publicizes his remark is helping Romney win the election.”

“Culture makes all the difference,” Romney said at a fundraiser in Israel, comparing the country’s economic vitality to Palestinian poverty. Certainly there is a pedigree for this idea. Romney cited David Landes, an economics historian. He could have cited Max Weber, the great German scholar who first made this claim 100 years ago in his book “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,” which argued that Protestant values were the most important fuel for economic progress.

The problem is that Weber singled out two cultures as being particularly prone to poverty and stagnation, those of China and Japan. But these have been the world’s fastest-growing large economies over the past five decades. Over the past two decades, the other powerhouse has been India, which was also described for years as having a culture incompatible with economic success — hence the phrase “the Hindu rate of growth,” to describe the country’s once-moribund state.

China was stagnant for centuries and then suddenly and seemingly miraculously, in the 1980s, began to industrialize three times faster than the West. What changed was not China’s culture, which presumably was the same in the 1970s as it was in the 1980s. What changed, starting in 1979, were China’s economic policies.

The same is true for Japan and India. Had Romney spent more time reading Milton Friedman, he would have realized that historically the key driver for economic growth has been the adoption of capitalism and its related institutions and policies across diverse cultures.

The link between economic policies and performance can be seen even in the country on which Romney was lavishing praise. Israel had many admirable traits in its early decades, but no one would have called it an economic miracle. Its economy was highly statist. Things changed in the 1990s with market-oriented reforms — initiated by Benyamin Netanyahu — and sound monetary policies. As a result, Israel’s economy grew much faster than it had in the 1980s. The miracle Romney was praising had to do with new policies rather than deep culture.

Ironically, the argument that culture is central to a country’s success has been used most frequently by Asian strongmen to argue that their countries need not adopt Western-style democracy. Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew has made this case passionately for decades. It is an odd claim, because Singapore’s own success would seem to contradict it. It is not so different from neighboring Malaysia. The crucial difference is that Singapore had extremely good leadership that pursued good economic policies with relentless discipline.

Despite all this evidence, most people still believe that two cultures in particular, African and Islamic, inhibit economic development. But the two countries that will next achieve a gross domestic product of $1 trillion are both Muslim democracies — Turkey and Indonesia. Of the 10 fastest-growing economies in the world today, seven are African. The world is changing, and holding on to fixed views of culture means you will miss its changing dynamics.

When societies or people succeed, we search in their cultures for seeds of success. Culture being a large grab bag, you can usually find what you want. We observe the success of Jewish, Lebanese, Chinese and Indian people in various societies and attribute it to culture. But it may really stem from the traits of diaspora populations — small groups of entrepreneurial immigrants forced to live by their wits in alien cultures. Interestingly, Palestinians have a reputation around the Middle East for being savvy merchants and traders and have been successful in the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Culture is important. It is the shared historical experience of people that is reflected in institutions and practices. But culture changes. German culture in 1935 was different from 1955. Europe was once a hotbed of violent nationalism; today it is postmodern and almost pacifist. The United States was once an isolationist, agrarian republic with a deep suspicion of a standing army. Today it has half of the world’s military power.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan once observed: “The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society. The central liberal truth is that politics can change culture and save it from itself.” That remains the wisest statement made about this complicated problem, probably too wise to ever be uttered in an American political campaign.

[TopHatter]

Top:

You're no fun. You're supposed to have a tinge of doubt about which way the election will go.:)

No doubt whatsoever. The GOP has managed, fairly or not, to fit neatly into the mold that the Democrats have cast them in: The "party of no", whose only concern is the defeat of Obama(insert bill here) legislation and Obama as a 2nd term president. Their circus freak show primary showed a party drastically disunited and fractured. Their candidate is wealthy out-of-touch big-businessman with a slim political portfolio.

And the comparison to Reagan is valid, up to a point. That point is where it's glaringly obvious that Mitt Romney is no Ronald Reagan.

Jeff Greenfield's op ed disappoints me. He cites all the metrics that point to an Obama loss, and at that point he abruptly ends his analysis and goes into denial, (an affliction that seems to have hit many liberal columnists these days). But not to worry; Obama will win anyway, he says, because "...The Republicans have nominated a bad candidate." What makes Romney a bad candidate? "At root, Romney is a candidate in the grip of performance anxiety. And whether on the tennis court or in more intimate settings performance anxiety is a near-guarantee of poor performance. Really?

That was a bit jarring, definitely. It could've been written much better.

His line of reasoning is sound though: In spite of historical precedent, the Democrats will win, thanks to the GOP.

[JAD_333]

No doubt whatsoever.

To be honest I am not ready to make a prediction. The only time I predicted a race before the conventions was Reagan's second time around. Won $20 from an AP reporter on that one. What's interesting in looking back is that he sounded just like you do now.

The GOP has managed, fairly or not, to fit neatly into the mold that the Democrats have cast them in: The "party of no", whose only concern is the defeat of Obama(insert bill here) legislation and Obama as a 2nd term president.

Well, that's going to be a problem for the Democrats; the mold is barely sustainable upon closer examination and their attack on Romney as some rich guy out of touch with reality isn't going to sit easy with many voters. The campaign is a tapestry, and it ain't done yet.

Their circus freak show primary showed a party drastically disunited and fractured. Their candidate is wealthy out-of-touch big-businessman with a slim political portfolio.

The freak show, as you called it, was a struggle between different intensities of conservatism within the GOP. Pawlenty bowed out early because he didn't have the chops to draw far right conservatives. The others lost out because their brand of conservatism was too much for mainstream Republicans. Romney played it beautifully--right down the middle. But now he has to pay the piper, because to win he had to put on a conservative mantle that didn't fit him. Can he overcome that while staying on message. We'll see.

[dalem]

As long as Obama's campaign continues to be as bad as it is, and Romney continues to look like a better alternative, we're fine. I still say a clear blowout for Romney.

That dog bed is going to be in real trouble.

-dale

[gunnut]

good when zakaria puts his old academic foreign policy hat back on. this question of culture vs capitalism was a hot topic among IR academics in the late 80s early 90s, which was largely put to rest by 1997.

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Fareed Zakaria: Capitalism, not culture, drives economies - The Washington Post

Fareed Zakaria
Capitalism, not culture, drives economies

By Fareed Zakaria, Published: August 1
The Washington Post

What if the culture is against capitalism?

[gunnut]

As long as Obama's campaign continues to be as bad as it is, and Romney continues to look like a better alternative, we're fine. I still say a clear blowout for Romney.

That dog bed is going to be in real trouble.

-dale

Obama will win even if he loses. The old Chicago voting machine will make sure he wins.

[TopHatter]

To be honest I am not ready to make a prediction. The only time I predicted a race before the conventions was Reagan's second time around. Won $20 from an AP reporter on that one. What's interesting in looking back is that he sounded just like you do now.

Honestly I'll be happy to be wrong. But that's not going to happen.

Well, that's going to be a problem for the Democrats; the mold is barely sustainable upon closer examination and their attack on Romney as some rich guy out of touch with reality isn't going to sit easy with many voters.

You're asking the public to make a closer examination (not likely, this is after all the public we're talking about) and that attack is helped along in no small measure by Romney and his wife.

The campaign is a tapestry, and it ain't done yet.

No question about that. It ain't over until one or the other concedes.

The freak show, as you called it, was a struggle between different intensities of conservatism within the GOP.

And to the undecided portion of the electorate, it was a freak show.

[dalem]

Obama will win even if he loses. The old Chicago voting machine will make sure he wins.

Wow, even I'm not THAT cynical. They'll cheat, for sure, but it won't be close enough to matter.

-dale

[dalem]

And to the undecided portion of the electorate, it was a freak show.

So someone's uninterested enough in politics to call themselves "undecided" but they were interested enough to watch the primary process (which IMO wasn't that weird anyway)?

That doesn't wash for me.

-dale

[gunnut]

Wow, even I'm not THAT cynical. They'll cheat, for sure, but it won't be close enough to matter.

-dale

I hope you're right.

Again, I have to say "be careful what you wish for."

Last time it was "anyone but Hillary." Look what we got.

Romney won't fix anything, especially the systemic fiscal problems in this country from the federal government down to local government. The scary thing will be if it comes crashing down and the republicans are in office, then the public will REALLY blame the conservatives. They will demand a fix that pushes this country ever deeper into socialism.

Socialists have always had a good propaganda machine. They can turn night into day, black into white, wrong into right...etc. The difference between socialists and Nazis is that the socialists can make people walk into an oven at their own free will.

[tbm3fan]

Well, that's going to be a problem for the Democrats; the mold is barely sustainable upon closer examination and their attack on Romney as some rich guy out of touch with reality isn't going to sit easy with many voters. The campaign is a tapestry, and it ain't done yet.

Actually it just might. I for one, and many others who are all but extinct marginalized moderate republicans I know feel the same way, will never vote for a multimillionaire Wall Street insider. Bad enough that corporations have heavily weighted things in their favor much less give them the top seat.

By the way just saw a poll recently taken concerning Bill Clinton who I think is nominating (?) Obama again. His popularity is way up among the population and even among republicans he had a 50% to 44% in pro vs. con. Like, wow is that???

[TopHatter]

So someone's uninterested enough in politics to call themselves "undecided" but they were interested enough to watch the primary process (which IMO wasn't that weird anyway)?

That doesn't wash for me.

-dale

I would hardly call someone who is undecided as to who to vote for as being uninterested in politics.
And you didn't have to watch anything, the media provided all the coverage one could swill so even glancing at the headlines was enough. Speaking of which....

Santorum, Perry, Gingrich, Cain, Bachman...I'm hardly a GOP-hating Democrat and I found that merely glancing at the headlines made me feel disgusting (and disgusted)

[Bigfella]

....on the other hand, mitt could just indulge his comic streak some more. Given that he has spent months explaining to GOP voters why he no longer believes a bunch of stuff he once held dear this is sorta funny (from asty's article): “I tend to tell people what I actually believe”.

Not saying he is Robinson Crusoe in changing his mind when it suits - politician's perogative, but its fair to say he has spent an awful lot of time doing anything but.