Liz and the Tea Party

In February, 2009, President Obama announced a program to help home owners who were over-extended. This included potentially forgiving part of their mortgage debt. The following day CNBC news editor Rick Santelli complained that this was subsidizing bad behavior and that we needed a new Boston Tea Party. The following weekend the Tea Party was born as a political movement. People were outraged that President Obama would reward people who had borrowed irresponsibly while doing nothing for people who lived within their means.

A few days ago Senator Elizabeth Warren hit her own version of this outrage. Someone approached her and said that he had worked two jobs to pay for his daughter's college while his neighbor had taken out student loans. Since Warren was planning on paying off his neighbor's loans, was she going to pay him back for the money he had spent on his daughter's college. "Of course not," Warren told him.

A video of this exchange went viral forcing Warren to respond. She explained that she is "looking forward" and that all programs have a starting point where only people going forward were rewarded. Warren didn't really help herself much with her explanation. This is not only a matter of going forward, it is also a matter of perceived fairness.

As with Obama's mortgage program, Warren is proposing to reward bad behavior. People who planned ahead and managed their debt get no benefit from her proposal while people who assumed more debt than they could afford are rewarded.

Remember the fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant? The grasshopper spent his Summer enjoying life and doing nothing while the ant stored food for the Winter. When the Winter comes, the ant is comfortable but the grasshopper starves. In Warren's version, when Winter comes the government takes half of the ant's stores and gives them to the grasshopper.

Warren's problem is that debt forgiveness is not a forward-looking program. It is backward-looking. The people with the student debt agreed to it. They also got something for it - a college degree or at least some college. This was a voluntary exchange where the student agreed on future debt in exchange for increased future earnings. They were not required to assume this debt. They could have gone into another field.

This also rewards people who assumed a large student debt while pursuing a degree with no value whatsoever (a masters in puppetry comes to mind).

This is also totally separate from Warren's proposal for government funding for college. That is forward-looking. The government already funds K-12 so a case can be made for funding post-high school education. A better case can be made if the funding only includes employable fields. You can make the argument that we have to start somewhere going forward because it affects everyone the same. People who already saved will have a windfall. People who did not save will be spared a future burden. The important thing is that it would not reward bad behavior.

But Warren has a poor feel for politics. She also seems to think that people have a right to be debt-free regardless of how they accumulated the debt in the first place. This overrides any sense of fairness she has towards people who manage their finances responsibly.

Should Warren get elected and try to implement her debt forgiveness plan she will be met with a new version of the Tea Party.

Liz Plays Hardball

Before the campaign began Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders agreed to be polite to each other. Liz lied and it came to a head last week.

First there were two stories leaked to the press. One was that Sanders's campaign staff were presenting her as the candidate who mainly appealed to elitists and could not expand the party while Bernie was attracting first-time voters. The story may or may not be true. It sounds like how Bernie's supporters think. I did not see any attribution for the story but I'm betting it came from the Warren campaign as a way of signaling that Bernie attacked first so any counter-attacks by Liz are fair.

The second story is that at a private dinner in 2018 Bernie told Liz that a woman could not win the 2020 election. This was the same dinner that Warren told Sanders that she was running. CNN broke the story and, by coincidence, they also hosted the February debate.

Part-way through the debate Sanders was asked why he told Warren that a woman could not win in 2020. He denied saying it and pointed to his long record of supporting women candidates. He was asked again if he denied saying it and he stated that he uncategorically denied it. The moderator then asked Warren how she felt when Sanders asked that question. That caused a stir in the audience since the moderator just called Sanders a liar. CNN piled on by asking Amy Klobuchar what she thought when someone said that a woman could not win in 2020.

At the end of the debate Warren walked over to Sanders. He reached out to shake her hand and she pulled her hand back, making a fist then holding it with the other hand. She was caught on a hot mic saying that Sanders had called her a liar on nation-wide TV. He was incredulous so she repeated it. He threw up his hands, said something about "Don't do this" followed by "Do you want to do this?" and ended up walking away.

I'm sure that Warren orchestrated all of this with the help of CNN. Or maybe CNN orchestrated it with Warren's help. Either way, Warren realized that her support was shrinking and Bernie's was growing and she had to do something. CNN has a record of being establishment Democrat and Warren is much closer to the establishment than Sanders. There's no doubt that the moderators set Bernie up, asking him something they knew he would deny then asking follow-up questions in a way to show that they did not believe Bernie's denials.

Later CNN tried to insist that this was not a he said/she said situation because it had been reported on. But the only confirmation for the story came from four of Warren's staff who said that she told them about it. We don't really know if Bernie said it, if Warren made it up, or if Bernie said something about how difficult it would be for a woman to run against Trump and she took it the wrong way. What we do know is that CNN took sides, believing Warren's version and rejecting anything Bernie said.

Warren's reaction was interesting. CNN called Sanders a liar but she attacked him for calling HER a liar. Yes, if he'd thought about it he'd have realized the original story came from her but CNN never expressed it that way. They never said, "Elizabeth Warren says you told her this, how do you respond?" So was Warren's outrage rehearsed? And why was CNN still recording what was said? Why hadn't they cut the mics when the debate ended? Did a director say, "Look, Warren's going over to Sanders. Turn the mic back on?" or did Warren know ahead of time that the conversation would be recorded and was the whole thing staged?

We don't know. We do know that CNN was fanning the flames by releasing the post-debate conversation.

This would not be the first time something was staged during a presidential debate. Remember, in 2016 Hillary Clinton walked across the stage and stood in front of Donald Trump then complained that he was following her around. And CNN fed at least one question to Hillary Clinton before one of her debates with Sanders.

Chances are that all of this will be wasted effort on CNN's part to revive Warren's candidacy and may be a factor in Trump's reelection. Sanders' supporters were correct that he brings in new voters to the Democratic party but they are there for him. If they feel that he was treated badly by the party then they will stay home on election day or vote for the Green candidate in protest.

The Candidates and the Iran Nuclear Deal

During the final Democratic debate before the primaries, the candidates were asked about President Trump's statement that he will not allow Iran to possess nuclear weapons. Each of the candidates praised the nuclear deal that was negotiated under President Obama and condemned President Trump for pulling out if it. That shows that either a) they are stupid, b) they think that everyone else is stupid or c) they have no idea what was in the agreement but they are sure it must have been good if Trump opposed it.

The agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or the JCPOA did not stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power. It did just the opposite - it allowed Iran to be a nuclear power as long as they did it slowly. Validated in 2015, the JCPOA required Iran to wait 15 years before finishing nuclear weapons. The hope was that after 15 years the Iranian theocracy would give up its desire to spread it's version of Islam and become a more moderate country. Five years into the agreement, that looks like a bad bet. Iran used the funds freed up by Obama and the lifting of sanctions to organize militias in multiple countries, carving out whole sections that functioned as Iranian-controlled mini-states. It also continued the civil war in Syria.

Iran started cheating on the treaty before it was even signed. It did not disclose all of it's enrichment facilities as required. It also violated agreements on developing nuclear-capable missiles.

So why did the candidates support the treaty and act as if it was stopping Iran from having nuclear weapons? Even Obama's Vice President, Joe Biden, acted as if the JCPOA was keeping Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

I suspect that they don't want to come out and say that they would allow Iran to become a nuclear power by 2030. That would admit that Trump is right which is the worst thing a candidate could say on that stage. So they had to pretend that the JCPOA was keeping Iran from making nuclear weapons.

World War III?

Last week the US Embassy in Iraq was attacked. In response President Trump ordered a drone attack on a high-ranking Iranian who was implicated in organizing the attack. Now the Left is going crazy insisting that World War III is about to start. This is beyond silly. Iran is no superpower with allies across the world ready to declare war on the US in retaliation for us threatening Iran. At most it is a regional power with militias in several neighboring countries forming states within a state.

Is war even likely? No. Neither side wants it.

Let's be honest about war between the US and Iran. We'd win. There's no question about that. We overthrew the Taliban in days. Iraq only lasted a few weeks. And when we fought those wars we hadn't been in a real war in decades (Desert Storm barely counts). Since then we've been in constant warfare. Our troops are battle-hardened. Our equipment is battle-tested. Iran wouldn't stand a chance.

Iran isn't united, either. They had major protests a few months ago. They were brutality put down. The entire country was cut off from the Internet for weeks to keep images of the protests from getting out. In suppressing the protests, nearly 150 were killed and thousands detained. In addition, Iran's economy is collapsing because of American sanctions. This is not a united country ready to take on a super-power.

But, as Afghanistan and Iraq proved, occupying a country after you overthrow the leadership is difficult. If we overthrew Iran, we would be stuck with another unpopular occupation but the Iranian leaders would probably be dead. There are no winners there.

Of course Trump could follow Obama's example in Libya and overthrow the government then let it turn into a failed state and blame the "international community" for not doing more. But Iran isn't Libya and Trump would get a lot worse press than Obama.

So neither side has anything to gain from war. In fact it was Iran's desire to avoid war that led us to this place. Iran wants nuclear weapons and a delivery system capable of reaching all of Europe. Once they are a nuclear power then they will be safe from attack. No one wants to risk a nuclear exchange. But no one wants a Nuclear Iran, either. They want to be a regional power and were building their empire until Trump hit them with sanctions over their violations of the treaty Obama signed with them.

So Iran will stall for time, hoping they can survive the sanctions until they can build some working nuclear weapons or a more favorable president is in the White House. Trump will continue the sanctions hoping for some real concessions instead of the weak treaty Obama signed (and which Iran had violated before it was even written).

In the meantime Iran is testing Trump to see what they can get away with and he's projecting strength in an effort to get them to back down. But it won't lead to war because neither side wants it.

The Impeachment Game-Changer (but not the one you think)

Earlier this week the New York Times reported that the hold on funds for Ukraine began much earlier than previously reported and was opposed by high-ranking officials including the Secretary of State and the Chief of Staff. Democrats immediately pounced (yes, they can pounce, too) and announced that this was a "game changer" and proved the need for additional witnesses to testify before the Senate. It is a game-changer but not the way they think.

First, this proves that they rushed the impeachment. If the New York Times can uncover this information then how did the House miss it? After all, the House has the power of subpoena. What else have they missed in their rush to impeach?

But what is more important is what this does to their case. The original whistle-blower report claimed that President Trump demanded that Ukraine open an investigation into the Bidens and withheld an aid package that was meant to pay for armaments in order to force compliance. The main proof was that Trump did suggest that the investigation be reopened and there was a hold placed on the aid.

Here's how their new timeline looks:

President Trump is obsessed with Joe Biden. In April the President learned about the aid package for Ukraine and saw an opening to embarrass Biden so he ordered a hold put on the aid. Then he waited the rest of April. And May. And June. Finally, 84 days later he had his phone call with the Ukraine. But he didn't mention the Bidens until half-way through the call and he never mentioned the hold. In fact, according to witnesses sworn testimony and statements from Ukraine, no one told them about it. The hold was released in mid-September with no investigation started.

The fact that Ukraine was never told about the hold was always a problem for the impeachment but now we have a second problem - the 84 day gap between Trump's order to hold the aid package and his suggestion that Ukraine look into the Bidens. It's really hard to reconcile the claim that Trump was obsessed with Biden with the leisurely pace. In fact, give the nearly three-month gap between the two actions and the low priority that Trump gave the Bidens in the phone call, it's not very likely the two events were connected at all.