Commentary from Dave Durenberger

February 3, 2010

STATE OF THE UNION
.....and the presidency. President Barack Obama met the test of his presidency in his State of the Union speech with this: "I will never accept second place for the United States of America." The speech was built around what has been accomplished since he took over, what remains to be done and his belief that the American people expect Congress to measure up to their own efforts to meet adversity by working together. To Republicans he said, implicitly, we tried your way for eight years and it didn't work. So why can't we work together? Just saying "no" is not leadership, working together is. We can differ on the role of government - we always have - but Washington was never meant to be "every day is an election day."

GETTING LOST IN THE LAW
The U.S. Supreme Court shook up Washington D.C. with its decision in Citizens United vs. The Federal Elections Commission. In his State of the Union message President Obama mentioned the 5-4 decision to overrule Congress on its election spending restrictions and to allow corporations and unions to urge the election or defeat of candidates through advertising. Justice Samuel Alito objected to Obama's characterization of the decision by mouthing "not true." That's the difference between being steeped in the "law" and in the reality of participatory democracy today.

Republicans and libertarians loved the decision. Prior to the decision, they argue, corporations and unions could not give money directly to candidates. Nor could they in any way coordinate their advertising with candidate advertising. This decision, they say, will prohibit Congress from "flooding campaigns, corporations, unions, single issue advocacy organizations and their lawyers with arcane, burdensome and convoluted campaign laws that discourage political participation."

Here's why McCain, Feingold and lots of others want to limit the money that goes into influencing elections.

1. Corporations do fund candidates, especially incumbents. They do it through officers, directors and major shareholders. Why else would we spend so much time courting these guys and their political action committees? They give money to "leadership PACs" run by incumbents who then turn around and give it to candidates for caucus leadership and to candidate committees. Our Governor Pawlenty (R-MN) announced last week he's raised $1.3 million for his non-campaign for president, so he could "support candidates" up in 2010.

2. Independent expenditures are not. Washington is full of GOP and Democratic political consultants who all can read what a campaign is doing to win. Corporations and other groups hire them to do their advertising and the result is the same as hiring the candidate's consultants. But it gives both sides deniability.

3. Corporations, unions and advocacy groups have all the access to office holders you and I don't have. When we voters go to D.C. to visit our congressperson, we may see him/her at a meeting with 50 others like us, or we get time with a 23-year old staffer. George Buckley at 3M, Bill Hawkins at Medtronic, and Richard Anderson at Delta get face time and their lobbyists don't get form letter responses.

4. Members, once elected, are fund-raising the next day with the Washington, D.C., permanent establishment of lobbyists for corporations, unions, and issue advocacy groups. I knew a senator who kept a list of large contributors in his desk drawer. He didn't have to pull it out very often before everyone got the message. If you're not a big donor you may not be worth his time.

5. Election advertising does not provide information. It provides sustenance to the television industry and is the kind of advertising that obscures public inquiry and good judgment. The First Amendment protects the rights of citizens to influence their government. To do so, we need to understand the facts. Recall the special interest TV advertising around the debate on health reform, or the last minute corporate advertising in the MA Senate election. Not so many facts.

6. Wise old political journalists and analysts will tell you that the decline in the number of Congressional "statesmen and women" runs parallel with the increase in the amount of special interest spending. The timeliness and the quality of policy responses decline likewise. The volume of "earmarked appropriations" as a substitute for bringing home real bacon has risen exponentially.

Finally, good judgment depends on good and balanced information. As members of Congress spend less time in Washington and more time in fund-raising and spending, to whom do they have time to listen, to get "the facts?" Those who have the money with which to influence both public policy and elections.

I KNOW SCOTT BROWN
Not really. Never met him. But...I know exactly what he's going through. Same thing happened to me in November 1978. Unlike Brown, a state senator, I'd never held elected political office. But, at a time when people were "madder than hell and won't take it anymore," to quote the 1977 movie Network's Howard Beale, I went from 45 points down to win 61% of the general election vote. Because I was a Republican and I was being used to throw out the Democratic majority. Every national network covered an election in which two Republicans (me and Rudy Boschwitz) were elected from Hubert Humphrey and Fritz Mondale's home state. People cheered me on the plane to D.C. and cameras followed me around for weeks, while famous reporters I'd only heard of asked my opinion on the world issues that presumably I had come to address, and seemed to hang on my every word.

Within two years, the same unhappy (or angry) electorate replaced Jimmy Carter with Ronald Reagan, and all the rest is history. I ended up being the only Minnesota Republican ever to serve three terms in the U.S. Senate and retired to teach and to smile a lot when I've the opportunity to live through the dramatic political events of the last two years. Scott Brown will be 41 - the Republican senator who will make it impossible for the president and the Democratic majority to get anything through the Congress of the United States.

Brown says he goes to Washington to do what the people of Massachusetts want done. Like Sarah Palin, he will be the poster child (striped suit, red tie and pick-up truck) of a movement without parallel in recent American political history. The famous pundits and the famous leaders of new grassroots "take back our government or our Constitution" organizations will tell him what people are thinking and shape his role. It will not be leaders of the Senate, on either side of the aisle, who made their reputations shaping the foreign and domestic policies of this nation that will be his teachers. He talks about Ted Kennedy's "big shoes." But he never had a chance to learn what it was that made Kennedy a force, because the forces of undefined change and of hypercritical opposition to Kennedy or Obama or Clinton leadership today, will make it impossible for him to learn.

NOT ANOTHER COMMISSION!!
Congress welcomes the appointment of bi-partisan commissions when policy consensus is required by Congress that cannot find consensus. But it rarely acts on commission recommendations. The exception is the so-called base-closing commission to decide the priority of closing down excess military installations so money can be saved for real wars. To insulate the decision from -politics, the commission's recommendations become law within a period of time after they are submitted to Congress unless Congress votes to turn them down. Up or down vote.

For a long time it was believed that the so-called Bi-partisan Commission on Social Security headed by Alan Greenspan to save Social Security from bankruptcy in 1983 was the exception. Those of us who were on the Senate Finance Committee at the time recall the compromise between GOP Senate and Democrat House was not achieved until President Ronald Reagan and Speaker Tip O'Neill cut a deal to extend the age of eligibility plus increase taxes.

With that in mind, Republicans in the current Congress say they want to have a Commission on Entitlements or a Commission on the Federal Deficit, but they fear it might do as Reagan did - cut a deal to raise taxes. So on the one hand we blame President Obama and the Democrats for increasing the national debt (to $14.3 trillion) and the current deficit ($1.3 trillion), but we don't want to put the income tax code on the table with all the other entitlement programs for fear we will lose our Tea Party support and our "No New Taxes" momentum that is bringing state and local government and state and local services to near bankruptcy.

ANOTHER BI-PARTISAN COMMISSION ON REDUCING THE NATIONAL DEBT
Retired Republican Senate Budget Chair Pete Domenici (R-NM) and former CBO and Clinton OMB Director Alice Rivlin will chair a new commission of wise old budget experts who plan to make recommendations by the end of 2010. Since Pete comes from the old school of conservative Republicans, he wants taxes and spending all on the table. Knowing as he does that there is almost as much tax spending going on as appropriated spending.

Like the home mortgage interest deduction ($573 B); Exclusion of employer health care premium contributions ($568 B); Exclusion of pension contributions and earnings ($533 B); Reduced rates on dividends and capital gains (419 B); Exclusion of Medicare benefits ($317 B); Earned income credit ($261 B); State and local tax deduction ($250 B); Charitable contributions ($184 B); Exclusion of capital gains at death ($159 B). These are FY 2009-13 figures. They do not include $1 trillion in business investment tax spending much of which offer certain business advantages over other businesses and, occasionally, over competitors in the same business.

by Jimmy Margulies

HEALTH POLICY REFORM IS POSSIBLE BUT NOT LIKELY
It's too late for Democrats to find middle ground on any scaled-back or start-from-scratch health reform policy, even if they tried. The Republicans are captives of their definition of reform and have been too successful in demonizing either reform plan in Congress. GOP House leader John Boehner said it all the day after the election in MA: "We're working with our members to ensure they (Democrats) cannot pick off individuals." A nobody Republican wins the Senate seat of the man in America who stood for universal coverage and health reform in a state that had accomplished universal coverage with a GOP Governor. Today anything seems possible in the politics of change. Opposition to health reform, Obamacare whatever you call it, is the election parade every candidate wants to lead.

Two months ago it was possible to believe that Democrats could pass a reform bill without Republican votes or the approval of a majority of Americans, and still hold their own in the 2010 elections. Then game the coup de grace in the Senate, and Scott Brown's election. The nail is in the coffin. So is a lot of pretty good health policy that, at any other time in history, some Republicans and most Democrats could have supported. Dave Leonhardt, economics columnist for the New York Times, says the bill's policy was good and its politics bad.

HEALTH CARE COMMISSIONS
The GOP and the medical industry are fighting hard to stop the president from establishing a Medicare Payment Commission that could develop the insurance payment reform policy we desperately need to bring real value to health care services. Even though the commission's recommendations, like base closing, would have to go to the Congress to be turned down or go into effect. The industry fears that most members of Congress are inclined to let a commission take the heat for payment changes than take it themselves.

IT'S POSSIBLE TO REDUCE UNNECESSARY PATIENT DEATHS FROM HOSPITALIZATION
Health Grades, Inc. claims to be the leading assessor of quality ratings for the nation's hospitals and other care providers. Many hospitals proudly post their top ratings from the company. In its eighth annual Hospital Quality and Clinical Excellence Study, Health Grades determined that 150,132 patient deaths among Medicare patients may have been avoided if all of America's 5,000 plus hospitals performed at the level of the best 5% of the hospitals. Minnesota has the third highest percentage of hospitals in the top 5%. See: http://www.healthgrades.com.

What's it take to get to zero unnecessary deaths?

HOSPITALS ARE NOT ALWAYS UNDERPAID BY MEDICARE AND OVERPAID BY PRIVATE HEALTH PLANS
Remember Dr. Denis Cortese leading the battle for Medicare payment reform because Medicare pays the Mayo Clinic "just 70% of what they should pay"? Now comes a study by Rhode Island Health Insurance Commissioner showing how Medicare cost-shifting varies in that state with the hospitals. Commercial payment at Roger Williams Medical Center in Providence was 79% of Medicare payments and at Kent Hospital in Warwick it was 167% of Medicare. Turns out hospitals with system affiliation have more leverage on insurers by far than hospitals that are unaffiliated. Meaning they can demand higher payments for all patients and so the cost shift appears much higher.

HCA HOSPITALS HAVE LITTLE TROUBLE PROFITING THEIR PRIVATE EQUITY OWNERS
The largest for-profit hospital system in the country, founded by the Frist family in Tennessee, was sold in a leveraged buy-out in 2006 to a group of private equity firms, including the family, for $21.3 billion. It made enough in 2009 to pay its new owners a dividend of $1.75 billion or one/third of the $5.5 billion cash they invested. HCA expects 2009 net income of $1.05 billion vs. a 2008 profit of $678 million. Not too bad in a down economic year for America's hospitals.

UNLOADING THE ALBATROSS
It took a year to do it, but House Financial Services Committee Chair Barney Frank (D-MA) has decided it's no longer worth fighting the GOP on what caused the too-big-to-fail financial calamity that triggered the Great Recession. Rather than accepting responsibility for financial systems deregulation and the home-ownership-at-any-cost society of the Bush years, the GOP blamed the secondary housing market makers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So Frank proposes getting rid of both. This follows the near-death of another secondary marketer, Sallie Mae, which has been peddling guaranteed student loans for banks so the latter could make no-risk loans to students. Democrats want to use direct lending and by-pass the costly intermediaries....now we're getting somewhere.

POLITICAL POLARIZATION
It exists. It's not a temporary phenomenon. It lasts until the angry-outs are the accountable-ins. Only then does it become obvious that we need reasonable people to tap into our values, principles, moral and civic courage. The greater the degree of polarity today, the greater the risk we run that reasonable persons stop speaking out because at least half of us don't want them to have a voice.

Americans are polarized over issues involving their government and their lives. I read the punditry sent me from my friends on the Right and on the Left and sense the "edginess" in the way pundits I know and bloggers I don't treat their new president and anyone with whom they do not agree. I read about smart and successful people who are creating grass-roots organizations of people who think like they do to "take back their country, or their rights, or their lives."

A SMALL GOP
Even the Wall Street Journal editors suggested that the Republican National Committee not adopt a litmus test for its candidates as proposed by the Tea Party types who have accompanied the GOP leaders to their winter meeting in Hawaii. "The party will be wasting money and credibility if it intends to make candidates in Illinois and Oregon meet a test crafted by Republicans who can win in South Carolina". . . Ah yes. Therein lies the problem for a party that will do anything to broaden the base of its electorate and narrow the eligibility of its candidates for endorsement. A party whose national spokespersons and media outlets shape the way that base thinks and its primaries and caucuses react.

by Chris Weyant

A NEW "CONTRACT WITH AMERICA" for REPUBLICANS
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich recently published his latest Republican contract as follows: Jobs; Balanced Budget; American Energy Plan; Congress Appropriations Reform, Litigation Reform; Real Health Reform; Every Child Gets Ahead; Protect Religious Liberty; Protect Americans not Terrorists Rights; Defending America = Job #1.

Meanwhile the Republican National Committee met in Hawaii to consider efforts by right wingers to establish a 10-point "purity test" which every candidate must pass before getting on a ballot as a Republican. The RNC instead will "urge every candidate to endorse all of the Party's platform."Purity" proponent, Indiana NCCL lawyer James Bopp, declared victory for a "stronger" position. Others disagreed, arguing the party platform is a "suggestion."

CHARLES McC MATHIAS
Represented Maryland in the House of Representatives from 1961 to 1969 and in the Senate from 1969 to 1987. He was a Republican in a state that elected Democrats. He was a skilled lawyer, a leader in civil rights legislation and a pretty good judge of character. My first office on the third floor of the Russell Building was across from his, next to Birch Bayh (D-IN), and around the corner from my classmates Nancy Kassebaum (R-KS) and Paul Laxalt (R-NV). So we walked together to vote frequently and became good friends. As a first rate lawyer he was in line to become Chairman of the Senate Judiciary when Republicans became the majority in the Senate in 1981. But the more conservative Republicans, with an eye on Reagan and the judiciary, maneuvered him out of the chair and into chair of the Rules Committee. In all those walks and all those talks I never once heard Mac Mathias show any anger towards Strom Thurmond, Orrin Hatch and other colleagues for denying what any fine lawyer-Senator would consider the chance of a lifetime.

LABOR UNIONS GO PUBLIC
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that only 7.2% of private sector workers were union members and that the 7.9 million union workers in public employment exceeds the 7.4 million in private for the first time since 1900. Just over 37% of public employees belong to unions. Median weekly earnings for full-time unionized employees was $908 last year and $710 for non-union workers. One suspects that the decline in manufacturing, trade and construction had a lot to do with the private drop. While the continued public and elected official concern for public safety has empowered unions of police and fire fighters, especially at the local government level.

SOME LOCAL GOVERNMENTS HAVE GUTS
City management types will tell you that the quality of local government office-seekers has fallen off over the years. That people run for city council for the pay or the publicity. That they are unprepared to deal with the tough decisions necessary to balance spending decisions against declining revenues. And that the police and fire departments get whatever they want because the public safety union endorsements count more at election time than doing a tough job well.

Is it any wonder that police and fire benefits, especially given early retirements, far exceed those of most other employed Americans? That public funding of these benefits is becoming the most serious fiscal issue in America. And that changing any provision - no matter if made 30-40 years ago - is impossible. So Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak discovered when his gubernatorial campaign was rocked by a letter to delegates to the Feb. 2nd DFL precinct caucuses urging votes against him.

In the Minneapolis Star Tribune Lori Sturdevant tells us the letter was authorized by widows of five city fire and police officers killed in the line of duty complaining that they were entitled to extra pension benefits which the city council, the mayor and a district court judge unanimously agreed were improperly paid to pension funds at taxpayer expense. Obviously the letters were drafted by the police and firefighters pension funds that weren't honest enough to own up to their earlier mistakes and the city's inadvertent over-payment and decided to make it a campaign issue.

THE NEW JERSEY WAY
With Republican Chris Christie's inauguration as the new Governor of New Jersey, former Wall Street CEO and U.S. Senator Governor John Corzine left the state for a ski vacation in Switzerland. Said the GOP Senate minority leader, Tom Kean Jr, son of a former Governor: "I think he's a decent man with good intentions." Others credited Corzine for avoiding the unethical conduct of so many NJ Democrats, one of whom was heard to remark, "I think John did the best he could with the economic situation and personality tools he had to work with." Any wonder The GOP candidate won?

THE SOUTH CAROLINA WAY
Republican Governor Mark Sanford will be without a political office or a wife at the end of this year. A suitable replacement is running for governor already. At a town hall meeting in rural S.C. last week, Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer laid out his views on public assistance, "My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed. You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person an ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that."

THE INDIANA WAY
The Colts are in the Super Bowl again, the NCAA Basketball Final Four is in Indianapolis again and again, Governor Mitch Daniels is a front runner among GOP presidential candidates and Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN) - a potential Democratic presidential candidate - is running behind conservative Congressman Mike Pence by 44-47 in a recent poll. Bayh has worked hard to find a centrist policy position on health reform and may be as responsible as any for the anger of liberals in Congress.

On the other hand, unlike Senators Nelson, Landrieu and Lieberman, he took on a lot of policy baggage he didn't wholeheartedly agree with to make sure the Senate reported a bill. That will hurt him in polls, but won't hurt his re-election. Lately he persuaded President Obama to use the State of the Union to demand Congress halt all new spending except defense and Medicare for the next three years. "The only way Democrats can govern in this country," says the son of another great Indiana Senator, Birch Bayh, "is by making common cause with moderates and independents."

The problem for Democrats in Congress, especially in the House, is that recently elected members have changed the ideological makeup of the caucus, but the policy shots are still being called by the aging liberals from big city districts who control some of the more powerful committee chairs. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Majority Leader Steney Hoyer (D-MD) have to be master jugglers to keep the train on the tracks.

OUR OWN MICHELE BACHMANN'S
considerable talents were on display recently in Pennsylvania where she took on Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA) with this exchange, "What legislation have you supported?" Bachmann: "Prosperity." Specter: "Prosperity wasn't a bill." Bachmann: "Then why don't we make it one?"

QUOTABLES

"The Obama Administration is so overstocked with Goldman-Sachs-Robert Rubin alumni and so tainted by its back-room health care deals with pharmaceutical and insurance companies that conservative politicians can masquerade shamelessly as the populist alternatives." . . . Frank Rich, columnist for the New York Times.

"No doubt, this is a lousy season to be the leader of any institution. We are in the midst of a long period of austerity, where all that most leaders will be able to do is cut, fire, and trim. It is so easy to play populism and run against them. But this time it is different. When our government is this deeply involved in propping up our economy, and the economy is this fragile, politics as usual will kill us. We badly need leaders inspired by sustainable values, not situational ones. Without that we'll just be digging our hole deeper and making the reckoning, when it comes, that much more ferocious."....Tom Friedman, columnist for The New York Times.

"My favorite idea: Requiring CEOs to appear in ads their corporation's sponsor, exactly as politicians have to. ('I'm Joe Smith, the CEO of Acme Consolidated Megacorporation, and I approve this message.')." . . . E. J. Dionne, columnist for the Washington Post.

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