David Brooks, "Time for a Republican Conspiracy!": If Hillary Is Indicted, Could Bernie Win in November?

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"When you're young, you look at television and think, there's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want."

- Steve Jobs

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Time for a Republican Conspiracy!," David Brooks expresses his anguish over the possibility that Trump or Cruz could walk away with the Republican presidential nomination:

"Rarely has a party so passively accepted its own self-destruction. Sure, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are now riding high in some meaningless head-to-head polls against Hillary Clinton, but the odds are the nomination of either would lead to a party-decimating general election.

. . . .

Worse is the prospect that one of them might somehow win. Very few presidents are so terrible that they genuinely endanger their own nation, but Trump and Cruz would go there and beyond. Trump is a solipsistic branding genius whose 'policies' have no contact with Planet Earth and who would be incapable of organizing a coalition, domestic or foreign.

Cruz would be as universally off-putting as he has been in all his workplaces. He’s always been good at tearing things down but incompetent when it comes to putting things together."

Brooks's solution:

"What’s needed is a grass-roots movement that stands for governing conservatism, built both online and through rallies, and gets behind a single candidate sometime in mid- to late February. In politics, if A (Trump) and B (Cruz) savage each other then the benefits often go to Candidate C. But there has to be a C, not a C, D, E, F and G."

The problem is that taken together, Trump and Cruz currently have the backing of some 54 percent of Republican voters. C, D, E, F and G collectively amount to less than a majority. Moreover, support of Trump and Cruz does not come from what Brooks labels the "Republican governing class." Rather, like it or not, their support is very much Republican "grass-roots," i.e. Trump and Cruz are giving Republicans exactly what they want.

All of which leads to the unthinkable: If Hillary is indicted, Bernie Sanders could walk away with the election in November. Why am I not amused?

Paul Krugman, "The Undeserving Rich": Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and . . . Barack Obama?

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Undeserving Rich" (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/20/opinion/krugman-the-undeserving-rich.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&_r=0), Paul Krugman takes aim at America's affluent. Krugman writes:

"And who are these lucky few? Mainly they’re executives of some kind, especially, although not only, in finance. You can argue about whether these people deserve to be paid so well, but one thing is clear: They didn’t get where they are simply by being prudent, clean and sober."

That's quite an across-the-board condemnation of people such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and even . . . Barack Obama. Yes, President Obama. Already multi-millionaires before taking residence in the White House, Barack and Michelle are expected to fetch in the neighborhood of $30 million for their presidential memoirs (see: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2014/01/27/140127fa_fact_remnick?currentPage=all).

Whereas you can contend that the incomes of people such as Gates and President Obama need to be taxed at a significantly higher rate and distributed among the poor, it is hard to argue with the impact that they have had on America.

I have worked closely with more than a few extremely successful executives, whose assets and income would place them in the wealthiest 1 and even 0.1 percent of the populace. Some have been saints, others have been less saintly. Yes, these people have all been different from the general populace. But what most characterized these people was not their greed, but rather their drive, ambition and readiness to take risk. Yes, these people have all been different from the general populace.

The readiness to take risk? New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman wrote in his book "The World Is Flat" (my emphasis in red):

"America is the greatest engine of innovation that has ever existed, and it can't be duplicated anytime soon, because it is the product of a multitude of factors: extreme freedom of thought, an emphasis on independent thinking, a steady immigration of new minds, a risk-taking culture with no stigma attached to trying and failing, a noncorrupt bureaucracy, and financial markets and a venture capital system that are unrivaled at taking new ideas and turning them into global products."

In this rare instance, I agree with Friedman.

Tax these risk-takers at a higher rate? No problem.

Demean them as a group? Get real.

Thomas Friedman, "Made in the World": It's Raining Twaddle at The New York Times

It's raining twaddle at The New York Times.

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Made in the World" (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/opinion/sunday/friedman-made-in-the-world.html?ref=opinion), Thomas Friedman makes the case for global outsourcing. Friedman refers to a February 2011 meeting between Obama and Apple's Steve Jobs:

"The president, understandably, asked Jobs why almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were made overseas. Obama inquired, couldn’t that work come back home? 'Those jobs aren’t coming back,' Jobs replied."

Moreover, Friedman sees no danger in US outsourcing of manufacturing, owing to talented immigrants arriving on America's shores, IP protection, secure capital markets, high returns on innovation, government funding of new techology, and logistics jobs available to middle-class workers.

So the US should forfeit its manufacturing muscle and enjoy the cheap benefits of Chinese and Pakistani slave labor (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2012/01/thomas-friedman-average-is-over-when.html), and the middle-class should be content with finding work with FedEx and U.P.S. Sorry, but I will never accept this, even if it means doubling the price of iPhones.

Friedman concludes:

"If only — if only — we could come together on a national strategy to enhance and expand all of our natural advantages: more immigration, most post-secondary education, better infrastructure, more government research, smart incentives for spurring millions of start-ups — and a long-term plan to really fix our long-term debt problems — nobody could touch us. We’re that close."

Or in other words, Friedman would have the US spend trillions of dollars on a dozen different programs while somehow reducing long-term debt. "We're that close"? Yeah, right. For now, I would prefer to see the US provide incentives to keep manufacturing jobs in the US and to allow ordinary families, which cannot find work in hi-tech, to put food on their tables and pay their mortgages.

This is one instance where Obama is right.

[No, I haven't developed a soft spot for Obama. During the Procrastinator-in-Chief's February meeting mentioned by Dowd, Jobs, according to Ryan Lizza in an article in The New Yorker (http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/01/30/120130fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all), "was most annoyed by Obama’s pessimism—he seemed to dismiss every idea Jobs proffered. 'The president is very smart,' Jobs told his biographer, Walter Isaacson. 'But he kept explaining to us reasons why things can’t get done. It infuriates me.'"]

Maureen Dowd, "Limits of Magical Thinking"; Does Jobs Remind You of Someone in the White House?

In her New York Times op-ed of today's date, "Limits of Magical Thinking" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/26/opinion/limits-of-magical-thinking.html?hp), Maureen Dowd describes Steve Jobs as someone enamoured of himself and his powers. She begins her essay by noting:

"Steve Jobs, the mad perfectionist, even perfected his stare.

He wanted it to be hypnotic. He wanted the other person to blink first. He wanted it to be, like Dracula’s saturnine gaze, a force that could bend your will to his and subsume your reality in his."

Does this remind you of someone else, who has also long been convinced of his powers of persuasion? Who is so polished in his oratory?

Dowd also observes that Jobs "was abandoned by parents who conceived him out of wedlock at 23." Does this also remind you of America's president, who was also abandoned by both his father, first, and then his mother, who sent him to be raised by his grandmother?

Perhaps there the similarities end: Obama's life does not sound like the "darkest hell of volatility," and I have never heard stories of Obama being "capable of frightening coldness, even with his oldest collaborators and family," or that he suffers from dramatic mood swings.

Query: Did narcissism enable both Jobs and Obama to achieve at remarkably early ages what we ordinary mortals can almost never attain, but at a very steep price? Were their successes accompanied by, or the product of, myopic perceptions of self, which also belie hidden insecurity?

Paul Krugman's "The Fatal Distraction": A Nobel Solution to America's Economic Woes

A Nobel solution to the nation's economic woes? Sorry, but I'm being cynical again.

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Fatal Distraction" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/opinion/the-fatal-distraction.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss), Paul Krugman fantasizes over Obama's forthcoming speech on the economy:

"I find it useful to think in terms of three questions: What should we be doing to create jobs? What will Republicans in Congress agree to? And given that political reality, what should the president propose?

The answer to the first question is that we should have a lot of job-creating spending on the part of the federal government, largely in the form of much-needed spending to repair and upgrade the nation’s infrastructure. Oh, and we need more aid to state and local governments, so that they can stop laying off schoolteachers.

But what will Republicans agree to? That’s easy: nothing. They will oppose anything Mr. Obama proposes, even if it would clearly help the economy — or maybe I should say, especially if it would help the economy, since high unemployment helps them politically.

This reality makes the third question — what the president should propose — hard to answer, since nothing he proposes will actually happen anytime soon. So I’m personally prepared to cut Mr. Obama a lot of slack on the specifics of his proposal, as long as it’s big and bold. For what he mostly needs to do now is to change the conversation — to get Washington talking again about jobs and how the government can help create them."

Now unlike Krugman (and Obama), I have never won a Nobel prize nor will I, but Paul's three questions have set me wondering:

We need a lot of job-creating spending by the federal government? On what -- roads, bridges, railroads, airports and teachers? We've seen and heard this before, but notwithstanding China's grand infrastructure projects undertaken with slave labor, a new bullet train between New York and Washington is not going to cure the nation's ills. Ultimately, someone will have to pay the bill after it is discovered that fares alone do not cover the costs of such a boondoggle. Potholes? Sure, they can be filled, but they're not going to fire up today's economy. Money for teachers? This might win over the teachers' unions, but bankrupt states will tear through the money in less than a year and will not be able to sustain these programs on their own.

Will the Republicans try to torpedo anything the president proffers? I don't think so. Not if Republican legislators hope to retain their seats in Congress. Unlike Paul, I don't think Americans are stupid, and if Obama comes up with a sensible plan to reignite the economy, they're not going to tolerate such negativism.

Obama should propose something "big and bold"? Fabulous! While he was playing golf in Martha's Vineyard before the hurricane, I'm certain the president's White House elves were busy hammering together a proposal that will knock our socks off. I can hardly contain my excitement . . . not.

You see, I still believe in the productivity and power of American corporations. Sure, they can be mean and greedy, but they are also capable of startling innovation capable of changing lives, e.g., Apple, Intel, Microsoft and thousands more. Washington can't create by itself a sustainable recovery, whereas American corporations, if properly motivated by Washington, are capable of doing this.

Motivation? Use taxes as a carrot and a stick to allow American industry to foment growth. Obama should be meeting with the likes of Steve Jobs -- I'm confident he'll have answers that the bureaucrats and financial wizards from predatory financial institutions have yet to imagine.

Think about it: Jobs for jobs, or better still, Jobs for president. He's head and shoulders above anything else out there . . . .

Indeed, it's all about imagination, something in short supply in Washington, something that takes us far beyond a "cars, trains and planes" solution with a few teachers temporarily thrown into the bargain.