BLACK A21
DAILY 03-11-10 MD RE A21 BLACK
THURSDAY, MARCH 11, 2010
KLMNO R A21
POST PARTISAN
DAVID IGNATIUS
Excerpts from The Post’s opinion blog, updated daily at washingtonpost.com/postpartisan
China’s
JO-ANN ARMAO ently depending on his mood) include us- wrong about a lot of things — most things, not a hint of reaction. It’s not as if Justice
ing inappropriate language, groping a actually — but he may be right when he Samuel A. Alito Jr. did the full Joe Wilson
t get over this suggests that he and his black-robed col- and yelled “You lie!” or even “You misin-
bubble
Steny Hoyer’s
male staffer and (I still can’
one) tickling a staffer to the point of leagues should give the State of the Union terpret the equal protection clause!” He
breathlessness. Kudos to Ron Hikel, Mas- address a pass. Their presence looks like a shook his head and muttered — and even
honorable call
sa’s former deputy chief of staff, for speak- tradition whose time has come and gone. in a setting of such high ceremony, some trouble
ing up, and kudos to Hoyer for making “To the extent the State of the Union has allowance has to be made for muttering.
Sadly, Americans aren’t that surprised clear that if Massa didn’t bring the matter degenerated into a political pep rally, I’m But what are the justices doing there
when their elected officials behave badly. to the House ethics committee, he would. not sure why we’re there,” Roberts said anyway? The State of the Union is an occa-
Such shenanigans as frequenting prosti- The committee has ended its inquiry, since Tuesday at the University of Alabama, elu- sion for the president to lay out his agenda. T
he bubbly enthusiasm that many
analysts express about the Chi-
nese economy reminds me of the
tutes, ignoring tax codes or dissembling Massa resigned, but it’s particularly heart- cidating the obvious. “The image of having The Supremes’ work shouldn’t be affected old-time variety show host Lawrence
extramarital affairs have inured us to the ening that Hoyer didn’t let party consider- the members of one branch of government by anything the president says. Their pres- Welk, who banished worries each week
misconduct of people who are supposed to ations enter into his calculation of what’s standing up, literally surrounding the Su- ence is a reminder that our government with soothing sounds from his Cham-
do the public good. So when a politician right and what’s wrong. preme Court, cheering and hollering while has a third, less visible branch. A better pagne Music Makers.
actually does the right thing, it’s an occa- the court — according to the requirements way to bring home this civics lesson would China watchers should turn off the
sion to take note.
EUGENE ROBINSON
of protocol — has to sit there expression- be for the court to allow oral arguments music and listen to Premier Wen Jia-
Case in point is House Majority Leader less, I think is very troubling,” Roberts and other proceedings to be televised. bao, who has been surprisingly frank
Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and his deft handling in warning that overinvestment and
of complaints about former New York con- Why is the high
said. Then the nation would learn something.
He’s got a point. President Obama had On State of the Union night, the justices lack of domestic demand are produc-
gressman Eric Massa. Hoyer is the person every right to call the justices out for a de- should get together at the courthouse, ing an economic bubble in his country.
to whom a top Massa aide took complaints
court at SOTU?
cision that he believes was wrong. But it’s order takeout and watch the whole thing “The biggest problem with China’s
about the congressman’s conduct. Massa’s unrealistic to expect the targets of presi- on the tube. They’ll be free to cheer and economy is that the growth is unstable,
acknowledgements (which change appar- Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. is dential wrath to sit like cyborgs, betraying boo all they want, just like the rest of us. unbalanced, uncoordinated and un-
sustainable,” Wen cautioned at a
March 2007 news conference during
DAVID S. BRODER
the National People’s Congress. That
comment had about as much effect as
States of discipline
then-Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan’s
1996 concern about the stock market’s
“irrational exuberance.”
Wen again voiced concern last week
T
here is a great divide in American politics. rolls swelled and other recession-related ex- to the National People’s Congress. “We
It’s not between Democrats and Repub- penses climbed. still face a very complex situation,” he
licans. It’s between the president and Con- But the governors and legislators did not stop said, given the twin dangers of over-
gress in Washington, on one side, and governors there. Two-thirds of the states, 33 of 50, also heating at home and the global reces-
and legislators around the country on the other. raised taxes last year, adding more than $30 bil- sion abroad. He pointed to a “precipi-
The record of the Washington politicians is lion in revenue. tous rise” in housing prices in some
summarized in the report that came out of the Ten states raised taxes enough to increase Chinese cities and said that because of
Congressional Budget Office last week. That revenue by more than 5 percent over the previ- the danger of overinvestment, “the
nonpartisan scorekeeper announced that it pro- ous year’s collections. This happened in Califor- launching of new projects must be
jects the cumulative national debt to increase in nia, Florida, Indiana and Nevada, which have strictly controlled.”
the next decade by $9.8 trillion. Republican governors, as well as in Delaware, The rise of China is one of the
That unimaginable (and indigestible) sum is Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, blessed miracles of modern economic
more than a trillion dollars higher than the North Carolina and Oregon, all governed by history. But Chinese leaders know they
Obama administration’s estimate. It means a Democrats. cannot repeal the economic laws of
lower future standard of living for Americans While the federal government was handing gravity. As the economist Herbert Stein
because of vastly increased debt. out tax rebates and is preparing to extend many observed decades ago, “If something is
As Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the senior of the Bush-era tax cuts, 13 states were raising ‘unsustainable,’ that means it won’t be
Republican on the House Budget Committee, personal income taxes; 17 were passing sales tax sustained.” That is surely true with the
pointed out in his commentary on the CBO re- and various business tax increases; and 22 were unbalanced, export-led growth that
port, it projects the annual cost of interest on increasing excise taxes on tobacco, alcohol or has powered China’s ascent.
the debt to rise from $209 billion this year to gasoline. “China’s dependence on export-led
$916 billion by 2020. California, with chronic budget problems, a
CHARLES DHARAPAK/ASSOCIATED PRESS
growth . . . is unsustainable over time,”
Most of that debt is held overseas by nations Democratic-controlled legislature and a Repub- President Obama touts health reform in Pennsylvania on Monday. Robert Zoellick, president of the World
such as China and Japan, so we are draining lican governor, bit the bullet and temporarily Bank, says in a forthcoming article in
huge sums from ourselves and handing them to raised its income tax rate across the board and
GEORGE F. WILL
the journal the International Econo-
others to use in buying us up — or competing its sales tax by 1 percent and also lifted its my. He cites a recent International
against us. vehicle tax. Monetary Fund analysis saying that for
That is the story that has been written and is All the states except Vermont operate with a China to maintain its trend of 8 per-
still unfolding in Washington, with budgets constitutional requirement that they balance
Wilsonian folly
cent annual growth with the current
shaped by both Democrats and Republicans. It their budgets. But I was reminded again during pattern of trade, it would have to dou-
is a saga of national ruin. the governors’ conference how different the ble its share of world exports by 2020.
The state side of the story is told most clearly psychology is in the state capitals than it is in
Health-reform errors by Prof. Obama
That isn’t going to happen.
in another report this week, this one from the Washington. So the question isn’t whether the
private Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Governors live in the real world, where
T
here are legislative miles to and to be as disinterested as the Chinese economy will change, but how.
Staff members Nicholas Johnson, Catherine budgets mean something more than a formula go before the government dickens. The optimistic view is that Chinese
Collins and Ashali Singham summarized sys- for shifting burdens to the next generation and will be emancipated from How gripped was Wilson by leaders will slow their investment and
tematically what I had heard anecdotally from where there is much less room for partisan its health-care myopia, but it is what Beinart calls “the hubris of credit boom, and at the same time
many of the governors when they were here in games. not too soon for a summing-up. reason”? Beinart writes: transition to a consumer-led economy
Washington last month for their annual winter Once again this year, Congress has passed a Whether all or nothing of the leg- “He even recommended to his that doesn’t depend so much on
conference. “pay-as-you-go” bill, requiring lawmakers to islation becomes law, Barack wife that they draft a constitution exports.
The Great Recession knocked state tax rev- make compensatory cuts whenever they in- Obama has refuted critics who for their marriage. Let’s write The scale of China’s growth is so
enue down by $87 billion in the fiscal year that crease appropriations for some worthy purpose. call him a radical. He has shown down the basic rules, he sugges- overwhelming it can make analysts
ended last September — an 11 percent decline Then Congress turned right around and began himself to be a timid progressive. ted; ‘then we can make bylaws at giddy: A compilation of “15 facts about
that was the steepest on record. waiving the requirement when circumstances His timidity was displayed our leisure as they become neces- China that will blow your mind” by the
In response, the first thing the states did was pinched. when he flinched from fighting sary.’ It was an early warning Web site Business Insider enthuses:
cut spending. General fund outlays were re- Discipline is visible in the states. It is still a for the boldness the nation needs sign, a hint that perhaps the “By 2025, China will build TEN New
duced by 4 percent in fiscal 2009 and by an ad- stranger to Washington. — a transition from the irra- earnest young rationalizer did York-sized cities.” It’s a vision of a per-
ditional 4.8 percent in 2010 — even as Medicaid davidbroder@washpost.com tionality of employer-provided not understand that there were petual cash machine.
health insurance. His progressiv- spheres where abstract principles The problem with these straight-line
ism is an attitude of genteel re- didn’t get you very far, where extrapolations is that they are notori-
E.J. DIONNE JR.
gret about the persistence of reason could never be king.” ously unreliable in predicting the fu-
politics. Professor Obama, who will ture. Recall the forecasts about the So-
Smart debt, dumb debt
Employer-paid insurance is seek reelection on the 100th anni- viet Union in the 1960s or Japan in
central to what David Gratzer of versary of Wilson’s 1912 election, 1990.
the Manhattan Institute calls “the understands, which makes him My favorite analyst of bubble econo-
12 cent problem.” That is how melancholy. Speaking to Katie mies is David M. Smick, who predicted
B
ecause we never face up to how much we So reforming Medicare and Social Security much of every health-care dollar Couric on Feb. 7, Obama said: the U.S. financial mess in his book
need government to do, there is a pathet- can never be a simple matter of cutting spend- is spent by the person receiving “I would have loved nothing “The World Is Curved.” He notes some
ic quality to our discussion of big def- ing. We have to look at the entire health-care the care. Hence Americans’ buffet better than to simply come up worrying statistics: Until the global fi-
icits. picture and rethink our whole retirement mentality: We paid at the door to with some very elegant, academi- nancial crisis, Chinese exports repre-
It’s a debate also characterized by a politi- system. the health-care feast, so let’s cally approved approach to sented 43 percent of its gross domestic
cally convenient amnesia. Just a decade ago, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has gotten credit for consume all we can. health care, and didn’t have any product. To make up for collapsing for-
we were running surpluses so big that Alan doing a version of this in his “Roadmap for John McCain had the correct kinds of legislative fingerprints eign demand once the recession hit in
Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Re- America’s Future.” He proposes to balance the prescription for health care on it, and just go ahead and have 2009, China launched a $1.8 trillion
serve, worried about what would happen once budget by, among other things, turning Medi- during the 2008 campaign. He that passed. But that’s not how it stimulus and lending program —
our national debt was liquidated. We had this care into a voucher program and partially priv- proposed serious change — works in our democracy. Unfortu- amounting to about 38 percent of its
problem well in hand until we started waging atizing Social Security. taxing employer-provided health nately, what we end up having to GDP. This money was supposed to
wars and cutting taxes at the same time. Ryan gets points for being a genuinely nice care as what it indisputably is, do is to do a lot of negotiations reach consumers, but Smick estimates
What would a rational approach to the person (no small thing in our mean moment) compensation, and giving tax with a lot of different people.” that 85 percent of the subsidized loans
budget look like? It would begin by accepting and for saying outright what many other Re- credits, including refundable Note his aesthetic criterion of went to state-run companies and
that running deficits at a time of high un- publicans only mumble. But the path he sug- ones, for individuals to purchase elegance, by which he probably banks — pumping the investment bub-
employment is a good thing. We would cel- gests is exactly wrong. Weakening social insur- insurance. Instead, as the legis- means sublime complexity. ble even larger.
ebrate the fact that the world’s governments ance is the opposite of what the country needs, lative endgame plods toward us During the yearlong health-care Not to worry, say China enthusiasts:
were far wiser in this downturn than their and it doesn’t even get us to fiscal nirvana. on leaden feet, the sprawling bills debate, Republicans such as Sen. A country with more than $2 trillion in
counterparts were during the Great Ryan’s plan, according to the Congressional would subsidize insurance pur- Lamar Alexander of Tennessee foreign reserves doesn’t have to worry
Depression. Budget Office, would still leave a deficit of 5 chases for families of four have consistently cautioned about debt problems. But those re-
It is a hugely underrated achievement of percent of gross domestic product in 2034 earning almost $100,000 a year, a against the conceit that govern- serves (mostly in dollars) aren’t quite
international cooperation that the world’s 20 (partly because of the tax cuts he also propos- redundant reminder of unser- ment is good at “comprehensive” the safety net some imagine, because
leading economic powers pumped trillions of es) and would only start shrinking after that. iousness about the nation’s fiscal solutions to the complex prob- China couldn’t liquidate them without
dollars into the global economy to prevent col- Nor does our current debate address what mismanagement. lems of a continental nation. hurting itself badly, as economist Mi-
lapse. Catastrophe was averted, and growth, government must do to keep our country com- Of course, there now is a Obama has consistently argued, chael Pettis argues in his blog, China
although sluggish, has resumed. petitive. Our schools, roads, bridges and air- commission of experts to recom- in effect, that the health-care Financial Markets.
True, unemployment in our country is still ports are crumbling. This calls for new in- mend cures for this. It should be system is like a Calder mobile — China has a larger problem of ques-
too high. But the lesson here is not that Presi- vestments in transit and energy, in higher edu- called the Philip Dru Memorial touch it here and things will tionable loans on its domestic balance
dent Obama’s economic stimulus failed but cation, and new technologies and research. We Commission. jiggle here, there and sheet. Smick notes that $1.2 trillion of
that it was too small to do all that was needed. have forgotten the Dwight Eisenhower lesson: In a scintillating book coming everywhere. Because everything the Chinese stimulus package last year
Those who would repeal stimulus spending — that government investment is essential to in June (“The Icarus Syndrome: A is connected to everything else, came in soft, subsidized loans. And
the bright idea of the House Republican Study private-sector growth. History of American Hubris”), merely piecemeal change is Victor Shih, a professor at Northwest-
Committee — would take us backward. So how should the various deficit-reduction Peter Beinart dissects the pro- impossible. ern University, has been gathering in-
Yet no one should doubt that we must put commissions, including the one Obama creat- gressivism of Woodrow Wilson. So note also Obama’s yearning formation about murky, off-books bor-
our long-term fiscal house in order. The dis- ed, proceed? Here are three suggestions. Edward House, Wilson’s closest for something “academically rowing by local investment companies
cussion should not be confined to Medicare, First, start not with “entitlements” but with adviser, wrote an awful but indi- approved” rather than something that he reckons could amount to as
Medicaid and Social Security. We need to ask a a broader assessment of what we will ask gov- cative novel, “Philip Dru: Admin- resulting from “a lot of negotia- much as $1.7 trillion, or about 34 per-
basic question: What do we want government ernment to do over the next two generations. istrator.” With the nation in crisis, tions with a lot of different cent of China’s GDP.
to do, and, yes, how much will taxes have to go Be candid about priorities. This includes enti- Dru seizes power, declares him- people,” a.k.a. politics. Here, too, The most reassuring fact about Chi-
up so we can pay our bills? tlements and what we should spend on nation- self “Administrator of the Repub- Obama is in the spirit of the U.S. na is that the country’s leaders see the
Like it or not, government must grow in the al defense. lic” and replaces Congress with a president who first was president problem and are trying to put on the
coming decades because the private economy Second, offer a menu of the fairest and most commission of five experts who of the American Political Science brakes, ever so gently. For a reminder
will not offer the same security it once did economically efficient ways of raising the decree reforms that selfish Association. of the dimensions of the overcapacity
through employer-provided health and pen- needed revenue. interests had prevented. Wilson was the first president problem they’re facing, consider that
sion plans. Third, propose a capital budget for the fed- Wilson, once a professor of to criticize the Founding Fathers. China has enough steel-making capac-
On health care, the status quo means that eral government so debt can be used the way political science, said that the He faulted them for designing a ity to meet the demands of the United
more Americans will find themselves without it’s supposed to be used. Except in bad eco- Princeton he led as its president government too susceptible to States, Russia, Japan and Europe
insurance because an ever-growing number of nomic times, we shouldn’t borrow to cover was dedicated to unbiased exper- factions that impede disinter- combined.
employers simply won’t be able to afford the government’s day-to-day costs. But govern- tise, and he thought government ested experts from getting on For a country addicted to export-led
expense. This is unsustainable. Enacting ment activities that enhance the prospects of could be “reduced to science.” with government undistracted. growth, transitioning to a sustainable
health reform now will allow us to plan how future generations should be financed over Progressives are forever longing Like Princeton’s former pres- economy won’t be easy. People who
government can take on these costs gradually. time, much as successful companies use debt to replace the governance of ident, Obama’s grievance is with assume that an ever-expanding China
As for retirement security, most Americans for long-term investments. There’s smart debt people by the administration of the greatest Princetonian, the will inexorably replace America as the
know their private pensions will be nothing and there’s stupid debt. We need to recognize things. Because they are entirely “father of the Constitution,” world economic superpower should
like those enjoyed by their parents or the difference. public-spirited, progressives vol- James Madison, Class of 1771. take a close look at the numbers.
grandparents. ejdionne@washpost.com unteer to be the administrators, georgewill@washpost.com davidignatius@washpost.com
BLACK A21
Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76