Style vs. Substance

Transcript of Palin, Biden debate – CNN.com:

“PALIN: People aren’t looking for more of the same. They are looking for change. And John McCain has been the consummate maverick in the Senate over all these years.
He’s taken shots left and right from the other party and from within his own party, because he’s had to take on his own party when the time was right, when he recognized it was time to put partisanship aside and just do what was right for the American people.
That’s what I’ve done as governor, also, take on my own party, when I had to, and work with both sides of the aisle, in my cabinet, appointing those who would serve regardless of party, Democrats, independents, Republicans, whatever it took to get the job done.
Also, John McCain’s maverick position that he’s in, that’s really prompt up to and indicated by the supporters that he has. Look at Lieberman, and Giuliani, and Romney, and Lingle, and all of us who come from such a diverse background of — of policy and of partisanship, all coming together at this time, recognizing he is the man that we need to leave — lead in these next four years, because these are tumultuous times.
We have got to win the wars. We have got to get our economy back on track. We have got to not allow the greed and corruption on Wall Street anymore.
And we have not got to allow the partisanship that has really been entrenched in Washington, D.C., no matter who’s been in charge. When the Republicans were in charge, I didn’t see a lot of progress there, either. When the Democrats, either, though, this last go- around for the last two years.
Change is coming. And John McCain is the leader of that reform.
IFILL: Senator…
BIDEN: I’ll be very brief. Can I respond to that?
Look, the maverick — let’s talk about the maverick John McCain is. And, again, I love him. He’s been a maverick on some issues, but he has been no maverick on the things that matter to people’s lives.
He voted four out of five times for George Bush’s budget, which put us a half a trillion dollars in debt this year and over $3 trillion in debt since he’s got there.
He has not been a maverick in providing health care for people. He has voted against — he voted including another 3.6 million children in coverage of the existing health care plan, when he voted in the United States Senate.
He’s not been a maverick when it comes to education. He has not supported tax cuts and significant changes for people being able to send their kids to college.
He’s not been a maverick on the war. He’s not been a maverick on virtually anything that genuinely affects the things that people really talk about around their kitchen table.
Can we send — can we get Mom’s MRI? Can we send Mary back to school next semester? We can’t — we can’t make it. How are we going to heat the — heat the house this winter?
He voted against even providing for what they call LIHEAP, for assistance to people, with oil prices going through the roof in the winter.
So maverick he is not on the important, critical issues that affect people at that kitchen table.”

(Via CNN.com.)

Look at the contrast in the responses of Sarah “Toothpaste Ad” Palin (friends words can’t take credit) vs. Joe “Gaffe Master” Biden. Which had style? Which had substance? Well, for my money robotic talking points are just not up to snuff. There’s too much at stake.

John McCain was a Maverick

Video – Breaking News Videos from CNN.com:

(Via CNN Video.)

McCain on the maverick party: “You don’t have to go home, but you have to get the heeeeellllll outta here!”

The Price of Disgust – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog

The Price of Disgust – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog:

“But most people do not think like economists. When offered 10 percent or 20 percent or even 30 percent of the total, they are disgusted by the inequity — and willing to pay the price for that disgust by rejecting the offer.”

(Via Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog.)

Talk about “bounded rationality!”

Economists on the Bailout – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog

Economists on the Bailout – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog:

“The only thing that seems to be moving faster than the financial crisis is the policy debate. The latest development is a statement that summarizes what I think of as the emerging consensus from academic economists; it expresses concern about various aspects of both the Paulson plan in particular, and the policy process in general.”

(Via Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog.)

Slow down. Take a breath everybody.

FactCheck.org: Who Caused the Economic Crisis?

FactCheck.org: Who Caused the Economic Crisis?:

“So who is to blame? There’s plenty of blame to go around, and it doesn’t fasten only on one party or even mainly on what Washington did or didn’t do. As The Economist magazine noted recently, the problem is one of ‘layered irresponsibility … with hard-working homeowners and billionaire villains each playing a role.’ Here’s a partial list of those alleged to be at fault:

  • The Federal Reserve, which slashed interest rates after the dot-com bubble burst, making credit cheap.
  • Home buyers, who took advantage of easy credit to bid up the prices of homes excessively.
  • Congress, which continues to support a mortgage tax deduction that gives consumers a tax incentive to buy more expensive houses.
  • Real estate agents, most of whom work for the sellers rather than the buyers and who earned higher commissions from selling more expensive homes.
  • The Clinton administration, which pushed for less stringent credit and downpayment requirements for working- and middle-class families.
  • Mortgage brokers, who offered less-credit-worthy home buyers subprime, adjustable rate loans with low initial payments, but exploding interest rates.
  • Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, who in 2004, near the peak of the housing bubble, encouraged Americans to take out adjustable rate mortgages.
  • Wall Street firms, who paid too little attention to the quality of the risky loans that they bundled into Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS), and issued bonds using those securities as collateral.
  • The Bush administration, which failed to provide needed government oversight of the increasingly dicey mortgage-backed securities market.
  • An obscure accounting rule called mark-to-market, which can have the paradoxical result of making assets be worth less on paper than they are in reality during times of panic.
  • Collective delusion, or a belief on the part of all parties that home prices would keep rising forever, no matter how high or how fast they had already gone up.”

(Via FactCheck.org.)

Competing Tax Plans: Two Perspectives – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog

Competing Tax Plans: Two Perspectives – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog:

Tax Graph

(Via Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog.)

I love freakonomics. Looking at the complete set of graphs breaks down each candidates’ tax plans. It clearly lays out the candidates’ priorities.

Fixing the Debt Crisis

Obama has come of the points I would include, equity stakes, tax cuts to middle class spenders. But I would also:

  1. Punish CEO’s and other executives. They failed. They get the boot. That’s how the market does it. We should do that here. Take a flat payout of say $2M and not a penny more and walk out the door scott free. Or they can take door #2: a shareholder lawsuit and/or a criminal investigation from the SEC and/or FBI on gross negligence of their fiduciary duty.
  2. Push board reform. These people were asleep at the wheel to get us in this position. Take the bailout and all board members associated with the CEO are out the door pending the work of a Search Committee’s efforts to replace them. Put a time clock on that. Demand that the CEO is never Chairman of the Board nor does he/she have connections to the Chairman.
  3. Push for pension and insurance reform. These speculative assets have no place in people retirement portfolios or backing insurance policies. They require prudence not greed. Period.
  4. Get rid of social engineering around mortgages. To increase home ownership of the indigent, the government should subsidize mortgage payments for the indigent, but that has to be in conjunction with other initiatives like job training to earn a better wage, etc. No more tax entitlements–I mean deductions. People should pay what they can afford. Period. Let the debt markets work as normal.
  5. Focus on how to properly price MBS’s/CDO’s/CMO’s. The government should use all the academic horsepower available in our higher ed institutions to solve this problem. Modern portfolio theory revolutionized the pension industry by redefining the “prudent man.” Theory around these financial instruments, which aren’t inherently bad, can solve this problem as well. If the theory is sound enough, we might consider them for conservative portfolios e.g. pension endowments

What would you do?

Fareed Zakaria: Palin Is Ready? Please. | Newsweek Voices – Fareed Zakaria | Newsweek.com

Fareed Zakaria: Palin Is Ready? Please. | Newsweek Voices – Fareed Zakaria | Newsweek.com:

“Palin has been given a set of talking points by campaign advisers, simple ideological mantras that she repeats and repeats as long as she can. (‘We mustn’t blink.’) But if forced off those rehearsed lines, what she has to say is often, quite frankly, gibberish.”

(Via NewsWeek.)

Ouch. I think the verdict is almost in. The upcoming debate is her last chance.

YouTube – Jack Cafferty Tells Us How He Really Feels About Sarah Palin

YouTube – Jack Cafferty Tells Us How He Really Feels About Sarah Palin:

““

(Via YouTube.)

It’s getting ugly.

McCain’s Intentional Grounding

McCain Suspends Campaign | Views | TheRoot.com:

“In the after-swirl of John McCain’s campaign-suspension gambit Wednesday, one analyst offered this assessment: ‘It’s the longest Hail Mary pass in the history of either football or Marys.’
Okay, it was just a Facebook status update from a declared liberal in Pennsylvania, but in a very real way it captures the desperation that seemed to envolope Camp McCain yesterday. Now that we know the chronology of the day’s events, it seems that a more apt football analogy for McCain’s move would have been ‘intentional grounding,’ a deliberate attempt to look like you’re making a play when in fact you’re just getting rid of the ball to avoid an imminent and costly loss of yards, known in the parlance as getting sacked.”

(Via The Root.)

More McCoward? Looks so.