Harvey, Irma and the GOP

Irma has now developed into a category 5 hurricane and is almost certainly going to hit somewhere in the US. Hopefully, it will weaken before it gets there and won't be as devastating as Harvey was for Houston. Still, it's a worrisome weather event, which brings to mind a couple of things.  

Republicans basically have one of three approaches to climate change.  

1. It's not real. Trump himself said it was a Chinese hoax. Ergo, no need to reduce carbon emissions.  

2. It's real, but it's not man-made. In other words, we puny humans can't do anything about it. Again, no need to reduce carbon emissions.  

3. It's real, and it may be (partly) caused by human activity, but trying to reduce carbon emissions would hurt the American economy. It's better to mitigate the effects of climate change. Be re-active, not pro-active. Don't worry if it breaks -- just pay for it later.  

If increase levels of carbon start to cause more extreme weather and rising sea levels, so the GOP would say, it's better for the economy to build things like sea walls (make the hurricanes pay for it!) to protect coastal cities.  

Now, with Harvey and maybe with Irma we may start to see what that third approach looks like in practice.  

The recovery from Harvey is estimated to cost taxpayers at least $150 billion, beyond the human costs, which are heartbreaking in themselves. That's not even talking about the cost of building "mitigation" infrastructure against future storms and rising sea levels (though that could be a good works program -- put the 4% of unemployed Americans to work!).  

In any case, this hurricane season may unfortunately give Republicans a chance to put their money where their mouth is regarding climate change.  

I'm sure they'll be happy to spend the money.  

Trumpcare Obscenity

Last week occurred one of the most shameful episodes in US politics. Even more troubling than the precipitous firing of an FBI director in the midst of an investigation of people close to the president.

For seven years, Republicans have fumed and ranted over Obamacare, campaigning endlessly with the promise of repealing the groundbreaking health care law. The House of Representatives held some 60 meaningless votes to do just that (meaningless, since they knew that none of those attempts at repeal could survive a veto by President Obama).

Then, with a Republican president (so-called*) finally installed in the White House, GOP lawmakers had their chance. And they blew it. 

First of all, the GOP didn’t have a coherent plan of its own ready to go, even after seven years. At least not one they all agreed on. It’s understandable, of course. They were taken by surprise in November. No one expected Trump to win, and consequently no one expected the Republicans to be forced out of their comfortable role of the opposition party. They didn’t expect to have to step up and actually govern.

Secondly, the plan Paul Ryan, the GOP leader in the House, did slap together after Trump’s surprise win was rushed toward a vote only a month after Trump took office (and just over two weeks after the plan was unveiled). The aim was to pass the bill on the seventh anniversary of Obamacare’s launch. It was a schedule dictated by optics and symbolism, but it meant the plan was only half-baked.

(And compare this to the torturous process of passing Obamacare, which took a full year, dozens of public hearings and much political wrangling. It was a process that conservatives never tire of characterizing as “ramming” a rushed law down the throats of the American people. A year, compared to two weeks.)

Thirdly, the Trumpcare plan was instantly unpopular. A poll showed only 17% of Americans supported it. And for good reason. According the analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, the GOP’s “reform” would force some 24 million Americans off insurance. The White House’s own estimates pointed to even higher numbers of people losing their coverage.

No wonder not even House Republicans could agree on the Trumpcare plan, leaving severe doubts that it would pass, even in a House made up of a 44-seat majority of Republicans. Trump tried to force the issue by instructing a now-doubtful Paul Ryan to proceed with the vote regardless. In the end, Trump had to back down and seemingly stopped caring about the bill.

Win one for the Democrats! No vote was taken. The bill died. Except, Trump and the GOP couldn’t bear the publicity that came with the lost. And, needless to say, the bill hadn’t really died. It was only in a coma, an induced coma.

I suspect that Trumpcare was brought out of this coma because Trump started to chafe under the perception, happily foisted by the media, that things weren’t going well for him. The operation of his White House continued to be a farce, and his first 100 days had passed without any significant legislative accomplishments.

Sure, he has signed lots of documents, executive orders, some of which have real effects (for example, allowing the completion of the Dakota Access oil pipeline to proceed), while many of which just stated Trump’s intention of doing something (like repealing Obamacare or building a border wall) but didn't result in any real-world actions by themselves. And sure, he got a conservative added to the Supreme Court after the Republicans had kept the seat open for a full year.

But in terms of actual laws that move forward on some key campaign promises, such as actually building a border wall, the symbolic first 100 days surely had to be a big disappointment for Trump supporters -- if they were honest about it.

To make matters worse, the recent budget passed by the GOP-dominated house lacked many clear-cut victories for Trump, and yet was filled with concessions to Democrats, over which the Dems couldn’t help publicly gloating.

The Democratic gloating was so bad that Trump and the Republicans -- snowflakes that they are -- complained bitterly that the Democrats were “spiking the ball”. And this from the man who celebrated his narrow win in November with an endless series of victory rallies where he did nothing but gloat. What is good for the GOP goose is, apparently, not good for the Democratic gander.

So, perhaps to soothe Trump’s feelings over his lackluster first 100 days and the humiliation of his failed budget, the GOP took another stab at killing Obamacare.

By injecting some amendments to the comatose Trumpcare bill, Paul Ryan and company were able to win over the ultra-conservative “Freedom Caucus” of Republicans who had formed the biggest obstacle to the bill’s first incarnation.

It seems the Freedom Caucus’ biggest objection had been the fact that Trumpcare didn’t remove Obamacare’s requirement to cover certain “essential health benefits”. This has often been a talking point in conservative media, which argues, for example, that middle-age men, in no danger of getting pregnant themselves, shouldn’t have to pay the additional cost for maternity-care coverage. 

The new amendments essentially allow individual states to opt out of this and other provisions of Obamacare, thereby placating the Freedom Caucus, which apparently won’t rest until every person dying without health insurance can die happy in the sweet knowledge that at least they died free. And not a burden to their fellow, freedom-loving, more prosperous Americans. Amen.

With this sweetener added for the Freedom Caucus, the bill passed, but by only four votes. No Democrats voted for it, which makes me wonder about those fashionably cynical folks who love to claim that there are absolutely no differences between the two parties.

This second try at passage was also rushed, this time apparently in order to hold the vote before the House left town for a “spring break” vacation. It’s often claimed these “recesses” are an important chance for the hard-working legislators to spend time in their home districts getting in touch with “the people” and hearing their concerns. Oh boy, do I ever hope they are actually doing that this time. I’m sure those brave enough to hold town hall meetings are getting an earful. We already know that Congressman Raúl Labrador,  a Freedom Caucus member from Idaho, got lambasted by the people in one such town hall after he foolishly claimed "Nobody dies because they don't have access to health care". Obviously, he inhabits a different world than the rest of us. 

So, the House Republicans wasted no time. Pushing the vote through so quickly had the added benefit of not having to hold hearings or giving the CBO time to score the new version. It's much easier to ignore how much worse the bill will be for poor people if you conveniently vote before you find out something unpleasant like that.

And in some sense, it doesn’t matter. Every House Republican can take solace in the fact that the Senate will radically change the law. In fact, some key senators have already said they will write their own bill from scratch, potentially making the horrible House plan marginally less horrible. Even then, it’s far from certain that a kinder, gentler Trumpcare will be able to pass the Senate.

I doubt the House Republicans even care. It seems the important thing was to pass something, anything, giving voters the impression the House had finally done something, not to mention giving so-called* President Trump the appearance of a win. And he grabbed onto that appearance of a win with all the desperation and gusto that he might normally reserve for some random woman’s genitals.

After the vote, the entire GOP caucus was bused over to the White House to celebrate in the Rose Garden like a jubilant fraternity at a keg party. In light of the travesty they had just committed, putting the future of millions of sick Americans in doubt, that display of heartless self-congratulation was simply obscene. There is no other word for it. 

* A "so-called" president in my mind, since Trump applied that label to a sitting federal judge who should be granted at least as much legitimacy for the office he holds as any president who loses the popular vote by some three million.

National Bargaining Chips

One of the notions that is drilled into the head of every American practically from birth is that the United States, of all the countries on Planet Earth, is uniquely “exceptional”.

This is such as a firmly anchored article of faith that to question it in the least is to risk almost branding yourself as anti-American.

During Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, (I forget which one, since he won twice), one of the many accusations that his opponents hurled at him was that he didn’t believe in “American exceptionalism”. This is a serious charge.

American exceptionalism ranks right up there with a belief in God when it comes to the standard litany of heart-felt convictions that all American politicians must profess, loudly and often, if they hope to attain any office higher than that of dogcatcher.

As you might guess, I don’t completely buy into American exceptionalism, at least in the sense that many conservatives like to think of it. But I do agree that the US is exceptional in other ways that Americans should be proud of. One is its multicultural society. Another is its National Park System.

Now, the fact that the US is blessed with an unusual abundance of natural spots of amazing scenic beauty is something no national leader can take credit for. It’s just a lucky feature of the North American landscape.

Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon were spectacular long before any forefather, who might have been inclined to bring forth a new nation on any continent, ever set foot in the New World. And these places will remain spectacular long after the last vestige of the “United States” has faded away.

It’s not just that the US has an outstanding wealth of natural wonders, or even that it’s the only country so blessed (I’m thinking of places like Switzerland and New Zealand here). What really makes America exceptional is how, thanks to visionary men like John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt, the nation decided to protect these wonders, making open to the public immense swaths of the best scenery America has to offer.

I’m grateful and proud that the US has a National Park System that, in many ways, has set the gold standard for safekeeping natural treasures.

Growing up in North Georgia as I did, a natural treasure that we often gravitated to was the chunk of wilderness that makes up the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. As a teenager, my buddies and I spent many days exploring some of the more remote corners of the Smokies on extended hiking trips that I still remember fondly.

Over the years, National Parks have often played a big part of our family vacations from Finland. We’ve taken our kids to various parks whenever we’ve traveled somewhere in the States. This past summer, we briefly visited Mojave National Preserve in California, Dinosaur National Monument in Utah, and the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona (my third time there).

We are not unique in that regard. Every year, there are some 280 million visits to some part of the National Park System, and this out of a nation of 314 million Americans, plus of course foreign tourists who flock to sites as varied, and iconic, as the Grand Tetons and the Statue of Liberty.

It’s little wonder then that, for many average Americans, the national parks are a very visible and familiar part of the federal government, the federal government that many of those same average Americans seem to otherwise detest and think they could live much better without.

On the Bright Angel Trail, Grand Canyon National Park, 2013.

When the federal government partially shut down on October 1st, thanks to some unwise negotiating tactics by Tea Party Republicans, one of the most immediate and visible impacts was the closing of all national parks, sadly bringing places set aside for nature and recreation to the front and center of a nasty political debate.

Some conservative pundits and politicians, openly giddy over the prospect of a federal shutdown, tried their best to downplay any negative fallout from the sudden disappearance of most government services (98 percent of NASA, for example). “What? The sky didn’t fall?”

But, the closing of the parks hit a nerve and has the real potential of reminding voters that there’s one part of the national government that they actually appreciate.

You would think that the disruption, or even ruin, of family vacations by the closure of parks would be enough to spark a backlash against those Republican politicians who, out of pique, so cavalierly caused this mess.

And maybe in some ways that’s the case. But in the eyes of some people, it has also somehow made the Park Service out to be the bad guy, the face of an arrogant and manipulative government.

Media images of WWII veterans being denied access to war memorials in Washington has been exploited by conservatives to fuel criticism of the Park Service and led to civil disobedience by conservative on the Mall this past weekend, presided over by the oh-so-ardent Tea Party celebrity Sarah Palin and Ted Cruz, the shadow leader of the GOP.

The closure of open-air monuments that don’t require entrance fees seems a bit over the top, even to me. It would be like the Finnish government putting barricades around the Sibelius monument (standing alone in a city park) due to austerity measures. Unless there are some arcade legal reasons behind such closures of open spaces that I’m not aware of, it doesn’t really make sense and plays into the hands of Republicans who are all too happy for any excuse to vilify Washington.

Despite the opportunities for schmaltzy photo ops within walking distance of the Capitol, the Republicans soon realized how closing popular parks can come back to bite them. Early into the shutdown, the GOP-dominated House scrabbled to partly backpedal by passing resolutions to fund only the Park Service (along with a few other shiny objects that gained media attention, like cancer treatment trials for children).

Magnificent view of Yosemite Valley.
Photo by Eeek.

The Senate wisely didn’t go along with the piece-meal approach to governing, so the parks remained closed.

Except, not entirely. Some parks have now reopened after five states, desperate to stem the loss of tourist dollars, agreed to provide the money to keep marquee parks operating. Arizona, the Grand Canyon State, has agreed to fork over state money, to the tune of $93,000 a day, to keep part of the Grand Canyon National Park open for a week. Utah is transferring $1.67 million to the US Treasury to reopen five parks in that state for ten days.

What is interesting is that these states, bastions of the Republican Party, are two of the 28 or so that typically receive more money from the national government than they pay in federal taxes. Or, to put it in the parlance of Ayn Rand, these are “moocher states”.

I hope that having to pay out of their own pocket for services normally funded by the taxpayers of more liberal states like California and New York provides an object lesson to the good people of Arizona:  sometimes it’s beneficial to be part of a larger union of diverse states.

I dearly hope Arizona and Utah are not reimbursed, so as to drive that lesson home.

However, some people may be taking away a different lesson. I’ve seen some Internet chatter from folks who, miffed at how shutting down the hated federal government has also shut down beloved parks, have jumped to the conclusion that maybe it’s time to devolve the national parks to the individual states and let them run places like Yosemite and Yellowstone.

On National Public Radio recently there was even someone from the libertarian Cato Institute suggesting that the national parks, to me a true treasure of public heritage, should all be privatized.

I hope all Americans would agree that this would be a bad idea, an exceptionally bad idea. ¶