Priorities, Priorities

April 18 2009, 09:47 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 3 comments , 371 views
Tags: obama, political cunning

As I watch critics flailing away at Obama from both left and right, I take comfort from the latest Research2000 poll for dailyKos. It currently has the President's favorability rating at 69%, compared to

Democratic Party 52% (-17%)

Congressional Dems 44% (-25%)

Pelosi 37% (-32%)

Reid 35% (-34%)

Not to mention the poor GOP

Republican Party 24% (-45%)

Congressional Reps 16% (-53%)

Boehner 17% (-47%)

McConnell 22% (-52%)

The figures in parentheses are the difference between the other scores and Obama's current rating.

I see a lot of people running around like chickens with their heads chopped off, all in a panic because this superbly political President isn't doing exactly what they want him to being doing--right now! Immediately! Instead the man has his priorities straight, health care, energy independence, education, restructuring the economy. He's picking his battles and refusing to be distracted. Adjusting plans as necessary and playing an occasional card, e.g., releasing the torture memos, to keep the opposition off balance. Smart. Very smart.

I am in love with Elizabeth Warren

April 09 2009, 05:35 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 0 comments , 197 views
Categories: Economy

Professor Warren heads the Congressional Oversight Committee for the TARP program. Her calm and clarity are utterly refreshing.

Fight Club? No. Let's make a deal? Yes.

March 23 2009, 18:53 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 0 comments , 272 views
Tags: bailout, obama, geithner, political cunning

Seeing how the markets reacted this morning to the Geithner bailout plan, I find myself speculating that Obama and company are much smarter than their critics give them credit for. While critics left and right are caught up in fight club rhetoric, looking for people to blame or call stupid, O&Co. have cleverly created a situation in which the wealthy elite face a clear choice. They can respond like this,

"This is perhaps the first win/win/win policy to be put on the table and it should be welcomed enthusiastically," said Bill Gross, the co-chief investment officer of PIMCO. "We intend to participate and do our part to serve clients as well as promote economic recovery."

Or, alternatively, they will be cornered into accepting the Swedish solution, as the White House, with a carefully crafted face of sorrow rather than anger, accepts full nationalization...

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Summing it up

March 04 2009, 20:05 0 comments , 19 views Tags : economic crisis, asia, consensual illusion, saft, gibson, thomas

Reuters columnist James Saft gets my quote of the day award for his summing up of the global economic crisis.

Asia banking on consumption at home replacing that from the U.S. is a bit like Las Vegas trying to make up for plunging gambling revenue by charging more for prime rib dinners; it might help a bit but it’s not a serious business model. In the meantime, economies across the region are seeing really stunning falls in activity and exports.

What we are learning day after day is that the best description for the financial gains of the Bush years is William Gibson's description of cyberspace, "a consensual illusion." That it seemed to work reflects W.I.Thomas's sociological maxim that "What men believe to be true is real in its consequences." When, oh when, will we see faith restored?

The Upside-Down Anthropologist

March 04 2009, 03:09 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 1 comment , 137 views
Tags: anthropology, fieldwork, what a funny world this is

Anthropology is a funny business. A few of us who go to graduate school get to spend a year or two at other people's expense living in a place very different from home, with no demands on our time but to do what our research proposals suggested and wander around looking at things and asking questions about whatever interests us. We call this fieldwork, and when we write about it the result is called ethnography.

Early in the 20th century when modern anthropology was just getting started, anthropology was part of the white man's burden, the colonial enterprise, good old-fashioned imperialism. Add the fact that, to this day, most of the people whose lives anthropologists share while doing fieldwork are considerably less privileged than the anthropologists who study their lives, and you have a sure-fire recipe for massive liberal guilt. That's not a bad thing per se; but it does make problems for an anthropologist like me.

My first fieldwork was in Taiwan, and I've never felt so privileged in my life. My wife and I had US$300 a month to spend in an economy where, in 1969-71, $20 a month paid the rent on our apartment in Puli, the market town we chose as our field site. We could pay an...

Four Possible Futures (Barring Ecological Collapse)

February 06 2009, 21:07 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 3 comments , 273 views
Tags: davos, scenarios, international finance, ecology, collapse

Charles Lemos posts a video from Davos on MyDD. It presents four possible scenarios for the future of the global financial system in an effort to provoke fresh thinking. The scenarios are provocative and well worth thinking about. One can't help noticing, however, that all assume that the world and humanity are still around in pretty much their current shape. Global warming and other signs of ecological collapse are not considered.

Tom Peters Says...

February 05 2009, 07:19 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 2 comments , 288 views
Tags: ceos, pay cuts, bailout, stimulus

Yes, that Tom Peters, management guru and author of In Pursuit of Excellence as well as several other books. What he says couldn't be clearer or more precisely to the point.

(1) I support the Obama pay cap for CEOs of companies on the dole.
(2) My choice would be to cap them at the rate of a 4-star general or admiral, with max seniority.
(3) If you sent all F500 CEOs and their #2s to St Elba, performance of their companies would not on average deteriorate. The "myth of the irreplaceable CEO" is just that—myth.

Turning Point

February 04 2009, 18:47 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 2 comments , 177 views
Tags: china, u.s., auto sales, economy, growth

All eyes are on the Senate, all ears waiting to hear if the stimulus package will pass. But a moment that historians may point to was reported below the fold on the front page of this morning's Japan Times. Picked up from the LA Times. The headline reads,

China passes U.S. in car sales as industry slumps

In January, Americans bought 656,976 new cars. Chinese bought 790,000, nearly a 100,000 more, and World Bank estimates for China's economic growth in 2009 have fallen to "only" 7.5%. And, according to the Wall Street Journal, China holds US$1.7 trillion of U.S. debt, a figure twice the size of the stimulus package now being debated in the Senate.

Time to brush up your Mandarin?

Obama Credibility Rises

February 03 2009, 17:49 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 1 comment , 100 views

In his MSNBC interview with Brian Williams, the President said,

“I appointed these folks. I think they are outstanding people. I think Tom Daschle, as an example, could have led this health care effort, a difficult effort, better than just about anybody. But as he acknowledged, it was a mistake. I don’t think it was intentional on his part, but it was a serious mistake. He owned up to it and ultimately made a decision that we couldn’t afford the distraction.”

“I’ve got to own up to my mistake. Ultimately, it’s important for this administration to send a message that there aren’t two sets of rules, one for prominent people and one for ordinary folks who have to pay their taxes.”

Can anyone here imagine this course of action on the part of the former Resident? A President who acknowledges mistakes? That's positively refreshing.

Hear, Hear

January 31 2009, 19:41 Posted in Best of the Blogs | 0 comments , 1 views

Reuter's columnist James Saft offers one of the clearest statements of what the global economy needs that I have read to date. The authors of The Federalist Papers are smiling.

Frankly, a new emphasis on ethics is a sideshow, and among some who propose it, a diversionary tactic.
While I agree that mankind is perfectible, as an investor, a citizen and hopefully some day a retiree, I am not willing to bet my future or the future of my children on it.
I want some guarantees.
I want some better safeguards.
And that means no schemes of ethical codes and self-regulation, but schemes of tighter regulation, greater oversight and dire consequences for those who breach them.
The problem is not (just) that people were greedy or self-interested. Greed and self-interest seem to occur pretty regularly, in my experience. It is true that they got a bit more reinforcement in the past decade then usual, and so might have grown, but I really do think we are on a hiding to nothing if we try to solve the problems in the financial markets and economics and avoid future bubbles by more emphasis on ethics. The problem was that the rules under which everyone operated did not do enough to limit and channel gree...

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