What follows are some ideas I had for setting the tone of the debate on financial reform. Just as with health reform, conservatives have already got their financial reform talking points from Frank Luntz, propagandist-in-chief. Following his format, I decided to put together a few talking points of our own, which coincidentally, happen to be grounded in truth, a word Luntz really doesn’t understand. (Full memo here (PDF))

When addressing the financial crisis, never forget it happened while on President Bush’s watch.

Yes, feel the pain. We’re all feeling pain. But never, ever forget that it was President George W. Bush who was in charge when it happened. Never forget that “deer in the headlights” look on his face when he announced the need for TARP, and by all means, remind voters of that every time you discuss the need for financial reform.

Conservatives used the meltdown to redistribute wealth

Conservatives think government policies caused the bubble and the crash. They want to blame Fannie and Freddie for the meltdown.

Key terms:

• Greedy gamblers
• Conservative corporate cronyism
• Bush Bailout

Conservatives ruin government regulatory agencies, then blame government for the crisis.

Nowhere is this more obvious than with the financial meltdown. Despite the Savings and Loan debacle during the Reagan years, despite Michael Milken’s criminal wrongdoing, despite ignoring the earliest indicators of the toxicity of derivatives and securitized debt, despite the Orange County meltdown and bankruptcy in 1994 attributabe to derivatives, the SEC still adopted standards in 2004 which allowed for only 10% underlying capitalization and erroneous risk formulas. This was not accidental. Conservatives created the crisis in order to shift money from the middle class to the upper class, and then tried to turn the argument on its head by blaming the victims via the demonization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Key terms

• Toxic traders
• Market mayhem
• Bush banking buddies

Consumers count

Financial reform isn’t needed to protect the banks and Wall Street; it’s needed to protect consumers and small investors on Main Street. Conservatives used taxpayers’ funds to bail out Goldman Sachs and AIG. Liberals want financial reforms to protect consumers from ever having to do such a thing again, and will prevent the market abuses that caused the Bush bailouts.

Key terms

• Consumer protections
• Wall Street accountability
• No more back-office deals
• Kill the goose laying Goldman-Sachs’ golden eggs

Conservatives don’t care

Handing bankers the keys to the Federal Reserve is not the answer. Even though some banks have paid back their Bush bailout money, AIG has not, but that doesn’t stop them from paying their executives huge bonuses while taxpayers’ money funds their bonus pool. Not only that, but their bonuses are not even tied to performance.

Key terms

• Bailout bonanza
• Big Bonus Bingo
• Main Street before Wall Street

Got more? Add them in the comments.

There’s all sorts of little interesting stories swimming in the Twitter stream today that will likely be big stories tomorrow. Remember, you heard it here first:

• Scott Brown wants to move up his swearing-in ceremony by a week. He’s requested that the Massachusetts certification of his election be hand-delivered to him so he can be sworn in tomorrow. Why? Because the Senate is scheduled to confirm Dawn Johnsen Craig Becker as Assistant Attorney General overseeing the Office of Legal Counsel. to the NLRB. Becker is qualified, but a union guy, and Republicans really, really hate unions. Republicans have blocked this confirmation for a year. Sending Scott Brown to the Senate a week early means a cloture vote can be blocked, and her nomination stalled some more.
• President Obama once again highlighted GOP obstructionist tactics in his Q&A session with Senate Democrats this morning. This time he used the same description he gave to terrorists: “We hold out a hand, receive a fist in return.” Perhaps the subtlety was lost to the average viewer, but it should have resonated with them. His message to Democrats? Don’t let the terrorists win. My message? Grow a pair.
• Senator Orrin Hatch confirms that accepted GOP policy under George W. Bush was to spend without regard to the deficit. Seems like that message should get wider play, don’t you think?
• GOP needs women. So did Mars, back in the 60s.
• Virginia’s State Legislature stomps its feet and says NO to any mandate for buying health insurance. California’s State Legislature says Single Payer, FTW. Congress says we’re working on it. I say, pass. the. damn. bill.
• In Illinois, the primary race for Governor is still in doubt, GOP guns are already aimed at Democrats in the Senatorial race, and tea partiers are throwing the silverware at each other. The lesser-reported story of Illinois is that it shattered the media narratives about an apathetic Democratic base. Not that you’d know from reading the papers, since they cling to it like a pacifier. Yet, turnout among Dems was 2:1 compared to GOP turnout in a mid-term primary.

  For all the talk about the Democrats, the Republican results in Illinois are a hot mess. The real story is the division within their party. That purity test might come in handy yet.

Got any other tidbits? Leave them in the comments, or just leave a comment.

Tobias Higbie on Flickr/ CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

It’s easy to call for filibuster death when one backs the party in the majority; less so when in the minority. In legislation, the filibuster is one of the few means the minority party has to be heard. The problem isn’t the filibuster; it’s the Republicans.

If Republicans were acting in good faith, the filibuster would be reserved for those issues where deep divisions in policy were at stake. This list of notable filibusters is worth looking at. Democrats filibustered bills that would have been a disaster, if passed. Had the filibuster not been in effect, Robert Bork would be a Supreme Court justice. Had the filibuster not been in effect, our National Parks would have oil derricks decorating their landscape.

Is it really the filibuster that needs to die, or the way it’s used? Shouldn’t a filibuster be used to extend a debate, rather than debating whether there should be a debate? As health care reform progressed through the Senate, it underwent a cloture vote to open debate, a cloture vote to close debate, a cloture vote on procedure, and a cloture vote to proceed to an up-or-down vote. (Record)

It’s ridiculous to have 4 votes, any of which can stop the presses at any point. If the intent of a filibuster is to extend debate, then it should only apply to a motion to close debate. Not a motion to open debate. Not a motion on procedure. Just one motion to end debate.

As the public discussion over the filibuster continues, it would be great to see some public education take place, since it’s clear that the general public has no clue what it means to filibuster. In fact, far too many of them have no clue about how Congress works. Maybe we should redirect abstinence funding to a stronger education in American government.

Part of the magic of yesterday’s 90-minute real-time conversation with the Republicans in Baltimore was the spontaneous rise of attention. Within minutes, Twitter is abuzz. Everyone is transfixed. Everyone. It was some of the best political theater I’ve seen, ever. I call it theater because all of the drama, timing, dialogue and personalities were there, but it was more than that. This was a substantive discussion between the President and representatives of the minority party about far more than policy. Policy was the foundation for a far more meaningful exchange about personal conduct in public discourse.

Melissa Harris-Lacewell has a wonderful post over at the Nation illuminating the dynamic in play:

During the years that I was on faculty at the University of Chicago, my graduate students in political science often took courses with Professor Obama. They universally reported that he was a fair, but exceedingly tough practitioner of the Socratic method. He was willing to entertain any idea, question or observation, no matter how outrageous. But he always subjected the students to a series of logical interventions and arguments that often left students exhausted and sometimes a bit embarrassed. They quickly learned to challenge Professor Obama only if they had fully considered the implications of their arguments and prepared significant evidence in support of their case.

That Barack Obama showed up today. The President put on a clinic in public discourse, political argument, intellectual dexterity and moral courage. It was a reminder of what democracy could be if we engaged our opponents with substance, patience and civility rather than invectives, gamesmanship and boorishness.

Indeed, he did. That certainly explains the President’s demeanor, mastery of the facts, and control of the conversation, but there was more to it, something that takes hold only if you watch the entire exchange start to finish without listening to any analysis or external noise.

In the absence of commentary, an astonishing energy emerged — the energy of independent thought without a scripted response. Nearly every instance where the President appears on television is preceded and followed by someone telling us what to think, what he should do, what he’s expected to say, and how we’re expected to react to it. The spontaneity of this exchange shifted the dynamic in real time so the only voices in the room were the President’s and the person asking the question. No quarterbacking. No pre-conceived notion of how he would answer the question. No teleprompters. Just people having a straightforward debate about important things, like national debt, health care reform, financial reform, and the unbearable din of rhetorical shrieking that inhabits our daily discourse.

Synergy. Real-time connection.

Fellow Newsgang cohort and friend Cliff Gerrish wrote this one year and 8 days ago on Inauguration Day, dubbing the President “Microcaster in Chief“:

Obama relied on the strong connections of the small group instead of the weak connections created by mass media. Small world theory was writ large. And it’s an approach that will move naturally from the campaign to governing.

…

When a great player improvises he’s not making things up out of thin air. He knows the scales, the changes, the modes, the melody, the rhythm and the audience. And from those raw materials he makes something both familiar and new.

When we were doing News Gang Live, Steve Gillmor tried more than once to explain what he meant by the “fifth guy”, the unseen Firesign Theatre writer who only shows up when the other four are in the room:

All the Firesigns agree, however, that a mysterious synergy took place whenever the four of them got together. “It’s like, suddenly there is this fifth guy that actually does the writing,” Austin says. “We all vaguely sort of know him, and a lot of the time take credit for him.”

Cliff, in his usual ahead-of-me-by-light-years fashion, wrote this:

Layering the digital on top of the digital, mashing up a new media venue reveals a real time moment that has an originality at the point of contact. Live radio broadcast over the real time web creates a moment of danger, imperfection and improvisation. I’m not talking about commercial radio stuffed down another channel, but the kind of stuff that is emerging from micro-communities within the social web.

Cliff wrote that piece when NewsGang Live was an audio-only show. The Baltimore episode brought video into the mashup, broadcast it across multi-band airwaves–  the Internet, broadcast TV, cable channels, and mobile broadcast (via CNN’s live feed)– creating originality at the point of contact, and a one-time collectively-experienced opportunity to step into the shoes of the fifth guy, no matter our party affiliation, no matter our politics.

Over the politics, there was another lesson: To hear what the fifth guy is saying, tune out the commentary, be part of the performance.

What a remarkable hour and a half. The President addressed House Republicans at their retreat in Baltimore, then took questions for about an hour. His goal? To try and ratchet down the tone, address concerns head-on. Did he succeed? You decide.

Here’s the video via YouTube:

I’m seeing a revival of undead themes again. This weeks’ winner comes from the left, claiming there’s danger ahead for 401k plans and retirement savings. I’ve written extensively on the right-wing version of this theme before; namely, that the government will take over your 401k (NOT!). Before that post, I wrote about the same topic, pre-election here, here, and even linked up some facts here.

Like the bogeyman that never dies, it’s baaaaaack. This time it goes like this, courtesy of James Ridgeway at Mother Jones:

Under the automatic IRA plan, the government would help set up a system of individual retirement accounts in which workers would be automatically enrolled if their employers don’t offer their own 401Ks. A minimum amount of pre-tax earnings–under current proposals, 3 percent–would automatically be deducted from employees’ pay and direct-deposited into their accounts. Individuals could increase the amount of the automatic deposits, or they could opt-out altogether. They would also have some choice about where to place their investments; otherwise, it would automatically be placed in what planners are calling a “diversified portfolio.”

The author goes on to speculate that this would be a ‘gift to Wall Street’ and possibly open the door to privatized Social Security down the line.

Disclaimer: I’ve been a third-party pension and 401k administrator for nearly 30 years. I am not, nor have I been affiliated with any product-related company that handles 401k investments. With that out of the way, can we possibly step back the “every corporation is bad and we’re all screwed” rhetoric? Thank you.

What is the “automatic IRA”?

It is a retirement savings plan for employees whose employers do not offer a 401k plan. The intent is to encourage retirement savings by having a small percentage of pre-tax earnings deducted from employees’ paychecks and set apart for their retirement. If you’re really the wonky type, you can read a version of it here that did not pass in 2007.

Instead of opt-in triggers, it is opt-out, meaning that enrollment is automatic unless the employee chooses to opt out. But opting out is maybe not such a great idea, because participation in an automatic IRA as proposed by this administration comes with a 50% match from the government on the first $1,000 of employee savings. Simple enough: save $1,000, receive a 50% return on that investment, courtesy of the US government.

How is this a gift to Wall Street?

Like any gift, it’s only a gift if it’s given with one’s own free will. If you choose to invest these IRAs in equities traded by Wall Street, or by banks, or whatever, that’s your choice. No one is forcing you to.

The objection stems from a provision that says in the absence of any direction from the employee, funds will be invested automatically into some form of life cycle fund. This would be, I think, where the idea of gifting Wall Street comes from.

As I said, the only way you give Wall Street a gift is to hand it over. If you’re an employee and you’re given disclosures which explain exactly what your options are, and you choose not to act, that’s an affirmative act in itself, right?

Why mutual funds as default?

Here’s the thing: It would be criminal for an employer to withhold funds for your retirement and not deposit them somewhere. If you don’t designate investment choices, they’ve got to do something with that money or they’ll go to jail. Here are the choices:

• If the default were some sort of cash or money market account, the complaint would be that the rate of return prospects were so small that it was negligible.
• If the default were government bonds, conservatives would shout about government takeovers and mandatory investments.
• Defaulting to a blend of equities that follows an asset allocation model tracked to the age and average number of years until retirement is probably the very safest default there is. Investment in a mutual fund instead of an individual stock already drops the risk, and a conservative blend of fund makeup further reduces the risk. (although, honestly? I don’t like life cycle funds and would probably spend a good deal of time writing about other alternatives that are better)

Saving for retirement is good. All market investments are not the height of evil, folks.

Despite the somewhat hysterical tone in Ridgeway’s article, there are some facts that come into play here.

• Saving for retirement is a sound and prudent thing to do, no matter who you are. It can make the difference between poverty and comfort, push families toward financial security. It is by no means the only answer, but with that government match, it’s a pretty darn good answer to some daunting problems that may or may not arise later in life.
• All investments are not evil. Progressives should embrace the idea of investment in companies innovating in the areas of clean energy, for example. Without investment in industries that drive innovation, there won’t be innovation. Government cannot and should not be the sole investor in our future or the future of industry. This is where I take issue with the anti-corporatist banner progressives carry. Corporations are not all evil, especially the corporations you own. Stock ownership is ownership. It’s investment in industries you believe in.
• 401k plans are the single most popular retirement plan there is. They’re easy to understand, flexible, employees can access information in near-real time about their accounts on the telephone or the internet, and the employer match makes them extremely attractive to mid-level employees.
• Entry level and younger employees lack incentive to save. This is partly a function of where priorities are for younger people, partly how hard it is to stretch lower salaries across a greater spectrum of expenses, and partly because there is very high turnover in that employee group.The problem is, we’re not saving enough for retirement and we’re not putting enough in the bank for emergencies. Part of the reason this last crisis is as bad as it was? No one had any money in the bank and those of us that did were watching the values drop like a stone. Even though they’ve recovered some of their value, there’s still a long way back to the middle.When retirement savings happen later, there’s a whole lot less saved for retirement. Just like anything else, the younger you are when you start saving, the better off you are later.

If you truly object, invest in our country

I have long believed there should be a movement amongst progressives to take ownership over that which we believe is good. Conservatives win big when they decry big government and deficit reduction initiatives, because they’ve framed both as terrible horrible things, particularly government.

Yet, I don’t see a big movement on the part of progressives to make a reinvestment in a government they believe in, and that plays right into the ‘government is bad’ conservative chorus. Why aren’t we buying debt instead of letting China suck it up at a record pace? Why aren’t we investing in US bonds instead of Enron stocks?

The argument goes like this: Rates of return on government bonds barely keep pace with inflation, so it’s better to invest in public companies’ stocks and debt instruments in order to accumulate more at the end.

So….how’d that work for everyone in 2008? Not so great, eh? If we had invested in US bonds, we’d be earning very little, but we wouldn’t have lost anything either.

Why aren’t we making those bond investments? Why aren’t we all working together to take back ownership of our country and in the process, keep our money safe? If you were saving for retirement and didn’t want to give even one small dime to ‘corporatists’, I would argue directing your money into US debt instruments would be an expression of your belief in this country and desire to free it from financial bondage to the Chinese, Japanese, and oil barons.

All it would take is one checkbox on the election form and a signature on the dotted line. Don’t want to give any gifts to Wall Street? Fine. Invest in the USA instead. Government bonds are always a legal, available investment option.

Evil is what you make it

I understand the distrust of Wall Street. I understand distrusting banks. I do, too. I understand distrusting a proposal that appears to have been hatched by a Heritage Foundation fellow under the watchful eye of Robert Rubin (who sits on the oversight board of the Retirement Security Project).

Even so, with a little bit of research and careful consideration, Ridgeway could certainly have discovered that the very, very progressive (to the point where they even made me cringe a bit) ideas of Dr. Theresa Ghilarducci are married to the whole idea as it stands today. In 2008 she testified before Congress about the loss Americans had suffered to their retirement plans due to the market crash. She proposed the very same plan (except her plan was mandatory minimum retirement savings), but augmented and expanded it to require that all Americans invest funds in a Guaranteed Retirement Account (GRA) that would provide an annuity at retirement in addition to any 401k savings. Her testimony nearly gave the right-wing a heart attack,  sending echoes of government-run pension plans all over the blogosphere.

It seems to me the version on the table right now strikes a nice balance between one extreme and the other. I might even go as far as to call it…bipartisan. Just don’t say that too loud, because if you do, it’s likely to fail in the Senate, 59-41.

And it damn well ought to be. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that quitting is failure. Not quitting, not giving up, not handing it over, that’s a win even when it’s not all the win you hoped it would be.

“We Don’t Quit” is why I keep sending resumes out even when I get no response 90% of the time.

“We Don’t Quit” is why I keep calling my Senators and Congresspeople even though I live in a Republican district where the odds of getting a Yes vote on much of anything is slim to none.

“We Don’t Quit” is why we are somehow able to keep our heads just above water and manage Sticks’ medical bills without putting the house at risk.

“We Don’t Quit” is why I get out of bed and start it all over again even though it feels overwhelming.

If you watched the State of the Union Address and saw the last 10 minutes, you couldn’t help but see that despite the rancor, despite the partisanship, despite the outright disrespect (and yes, I know George Bush was treated badly by Democrats, too)…there was silence in that chamber. Utter silence. No matter what the spin, there should have been shame among that crowd (on both sides of the aisle).

President Obama: (full transcript on MOMocrats)

Those of us in public office can respond to this reality by playing it safe and avoid telling hard truths. We can do what’s necessary to keep our poll numbers high, and get through the next election instead of doing what’s best for the next generation.

But I also know this: if people had made that decision fifty years ago or one hundred years ago or two hundred years ago, we wouldn’t be here tonight. The only reason we are is because generations of Americans were unafraid to do what was hard; to do what was needed even when success was uncertain; to do what it took to keep the dream of this nation alive for their children and grandchildren.

One of my most favorite moments in the speech was during the segment on health care reform:

But if anyone from either party has a better approach that will bring down premiums, bring down the deficit, cover the uninsured, strengthen Medicare for seniors, and stop insurance company abuses, let me know. Here’s what I ask of Congress, though: Do not walk away from reform. Not now. Not when we are so close. Let us find a way to come together and finish the job for the American people.

Single payer advocates, I’d make that appointment with the White House right now. I think he forgot a part of the challenge, though. Because part of bringing a better approach would be not only to bring it, but to get it passed, which is of course why single payer has not advanced.

And of course, this:

We have finished a difficult year. We have come through a difficult decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don’t quit. I don’t quit. Let’s seize this moment – to start anew, to carry the dream forward, and to strengthen our union once more.

I received a predictably snappy reply on Twitter to my affirmation that “we don’t quit” is the theme of his speech, saying “well, he quit on the public option pretty easily.” In the spirit of reconciliation, I offer this: After 100 years of trying, losing a battle to win the war does not indicate surrender. It is a signal to get done what can be done now, and pick up the battle anew when the time is right. Losing the war is quitting. Giving up strategic ground to win the war is wise.

With that in mind, I once again renew my plea to the House: Pass. the. damn. bill.

Here’s an argument for a strategy to pass the bill, then reconciliation for the public option. I think it has some real value.

In the meantime, I don’t plan to quit.

Bonus: EJ Dionne says “Consider the battle joined.“

Despite the small nuclear explosion that left fallout all over the blogosphere, the President’s plan to freeze spending for three years is a sound one. The more I read, the more sense it makes to do it. More importantly, not doing it carries far more risk of damage to the economy than the reverse, not because it saves a ton of money, but because it sends a signal to those to whom we owe.

Bond holders want to know we can pay our debts

Let’s stop right here. I can already hear heads exploding with the accusation that Wall Street is turning us all into Republicans. Not so much. The major investors in the United States are China and Japan with the UK running a distant third. They need reassurance that we’re going to be able to pay our debts and the interest we owe on it.¹

The Senate is currently debating yet another increase in our debt ceiling, after just voting to raise it on Christmas Eve. The new ceiling will be $14.3 trillion if the Senate approves the increase, which they will likely do.

Think of it in terms most of us are familiar with: home mortgages. The subprime fiasco notwithstanding, if you want to refinance your home and take cash out as part of the deal, a responsible lender will want to see your cash flow and measure the debt against the value of the house. If you can show that the new, higher payment is manageable and still gives the lender equity recourse if you stop making payments, they make the loan.

Conversely, if circumstances change and lenders have evidence that after making the loan, you are having trouble making payments, they get nervous. Bad things happen. When you’re a country and you do that, really bad things happen. Markets get shaky, and not corporate markets. I hope that we all agree on this: The US is too big to fail.

So step one is making sure bond holders feel very confident that we’re not just running up unlimited debt on the card without a plan for how to keep to a budget that includes prompt, timely payments on what we owe.

How does it work? What gets frozen?

It’s easier to answer this by saying what doesn’t get frozen. Social Security, Medicare, and defense spending aren’t subject to the freeze, nor is spending for the VA, international affairs or Homeland Security. All other budget items are frozen, but as a group. In other words, the bottom line for those items cannot add up to more than what it was in 2010, adjusted for inflation. That means funds could be trimmed from one part of the budget and allocated to other parts, but overall, the total cannot increase. Education funding could receive funds, but only if they were taken from some other program. Overall, the estimated reduction to the deficit is about $250 billion, which is a very small chunk out of the whole.

We’re operating on a thin margin

In President Obama’s first year, he was forced to spend money to turn around the downward spiral and keep us on track. The economic stimulus package was the pathway out of that tight spot, and it’s working for the most part. Still, it was a lot of money. We have the war in Afghanistan at the same time we’re completing our troop withdrawal in Iraq. The world economy is still shaky and devastating natural disasters aren’t helping that much. (Not only Haiti’s tragedy, but other earthquakes, weather catastrophes, famines and droughts)

All of this leaves us with a problem: How do we continue to work on stimulating the economy without driving up the debt ceiling any farther? Also, what impact will stabilizing the national debt and our national cash flow have on the economy?

These are questions I’m not qualified to answer on my own. However, we know from past experience that when President Clinton turned around the national balance sheet leaving a surplus on the books and the prospect of $5 trillion in debt reduction, the economy grew. Conversely, eight years of spending binges on the part of the Bush administration resulted in net-zero growth for a full decade, alongside a full-blown recession bordering on depression.

To give a flavor of what economists think, see Paul Krugman for the contrarian opinion (“It’s appalling…”) and David Brooks’ comments on a spending freeze when John Boehner proposed it (“That is insane”). Overall, the reaction has been, well, a bit cold.

So maybe this is less about freezing spending, more of a signal?

Maybe. One of the biggest criticisms of the freeze as we understand it, anyway, is the small impact it has on the bottom line. It does, however, send the required signal to  bondholders that we are acting in a prudent manner while leaving some room to maneuver on more pressing items.

Truthfully, there’s more savings to be had by passing health care reform. The Senate bill alone (before any modifications made by the House bill or a future reconciliation effort) has much-needed Medicare reforms and other cost-saving measures that also reduce the deficit. Since CBO only projects 10 years out, the savings feels small until you consider the number of baby boomers coming into Medicare eligibility in 15 years. We’re likely to see savings just out of this reform bill that are double what this freeze would save.

What other options are there?

One area that hasn’t even been touched or discussed widely is what the expiration of the Bush tax cuts will do in terms of deficit reduction. It’s hard to argue that allowing them to expire isn’t truly the most fiscally responsible, deficit-reducing move there is. CBPP estimates show that an extension to those tax cuts through 2014 would add $3.4 trillion to the current debt, plus another $1.9 trillion in costs to service that debt. Those numbers even allow for an adjustment to the Alternative Minimum Tax so that it doesn’t hit middle class taxpayers. If ever anyone wanted evidence of how irresponsible Bush was, just look at the cost of those tax cuts.

The real deficit reduction act is no act at all. Just let the Bush tax cuts expire. The CBPP report I linked above is a real eye-opener. I highly recommend reading the footnotes, too.

Is this spending freeze a good thing, a bad thing, or something else?

It feels like “something else” to me. I realize we can’t just stop the war in Afghanistan or accelerate the withdrawal from Iraq, that we have obligations around the world and need the flexibility to continue those, but the savings from the expiring Bush tax cuts alone are staggering. Compared to those, a paltry $250 billion (did I just say that?) is nothing. Truly.

All I can think of is that it’s a gesture of some sort, a gesture that sends a signal to those who need one, and waves a big weird red flag in front of those who want another reason to criticize the President. I think his messaging on this has not been clear, but I also don’t see it as the end of the world horrible disaster either. All in all, it sends a message to Mom and Pop Independent Voter out there that Big Government is not alive and well in the Obama administration. I imagine it’s one way of at least baiting the attention of the blue dogs and moderate Republicans (if there are any) into listening to the State of the Union address.

All fine and well, I suppose, as long as he’s also willing to take on the task of telling Johnny and Susie Middle Class that it’s fine to let those Bush tax cuts expire. Bowing to the Blue Dogs on both of these points would be a fiscal and public relations disaster (and they’re already trying to angle for it). While he’s at it, he should also make sure to let us know how much of a fiscal disaster it will be if Congress doesn’t make a move (and a fast one) on health care reform.

Less heat, more light

When this news broke yesterday the blue Internet burned. I’ve never seen such a deep echo of anger and fist-shaking, except possibly the day of the Citizens United ruling, when blogs, Twitter and Facebook lit up with some really funny quips alongside a barrage of outrage and frustration. Yesterday felt like last week all over again without the funny. Even Rachel Maddow was ballistic.

I’m concerned that liberals are feeling so disillusioned that they’re willing to make everything 2004 all over again. Obama is not the new Bush. They’re two completely different people with different approaches (and morals, ethics, priorities and beliefs…).

We also don’t have two parties in this country anymore. We have one party that covers a pretty wide gamut when it comes to fiscal and social policy, and the rest of them out there that call themselves Republicans, but have no idea of how to play nice on the same playground. After seeing how ineffective ‘all or nothing’ is when Republicans play, it’s disheartening to see liberals and progressives play the same game with the same tone. It seems to me someone has to be the grownup, turn on the Mom voice and behave like the adult. Turn down the heat, turn up the light, and let’s have a look at what’s really going on here.

¹ I have long believed that we should be investing in this country rather than foreign investors. If we truly believe in the power of our representative government, we’d also believe in making an investment. But that’s a rant for another day.

It’s me again, Mr. President. I’m really happy David Plouffe is back in the mix full-time. I think he’s an asset and if nothing else, will start to sort out all of the weirdly mixed messages we’re receiving via rumor, press release, and speeches. Still, I’ve got a couple of ideas for you to consider.

I really wish you’d defy convention and embargo the bullet points of your State of the Union address. Look at what’s happening with the Apple announcement. Yes, there are some leaks. There has been speculation for months. All true. But Steve Jobs did not invite tech bloggers and the press into his office and give them a full preview of what he plans to unveil on Wednesday. This is a good thing. As a general rule, Apple new product announcements deliver more than the rumors promise. When the iPhone was announced 3 years ago, we all knew there would be a phone announced. None of us had a clue as to how cool it was or what a game changer it would be until the announcement was made and the product demo’d.

There’s a lesson there. Jobs seems to have mastered the art of the build without giving away the pitch, and when he delivers the actual product, it is innovative, beautiful, and everyone wants one, even the contrarians who snort in public and confess behind closed doors that it really, really is innovative.

Sure, the iPhone had problems when it was finally available. But the problems were absolutely nothing compared to the joy on Robert Scoble’s face when he walked out of the Apple Store with a brand-spanking new iPhone after waiting all night in line. The negatives were far outweighed by the positives, which were much more intangible than the fact of the phone itself. That all-night wait for the long-awaited iPhone was a moment of shared anticipation.

Here are some takeaways from that event and the lead-in to this week’s announcements, which apply as much to policy announcements as they do to product announcements:

• Apple fans are loyal fans. They anticipate Apple innovation and Steve Jobs’ product announcements like children wait for Santa Claus. They’re eager to be pleased.
• Much of Apple’s loyal base stems from their ability to innovate, to improve something, even products which are already available. Lots of people have Kindles. Lots of people have tablets with Windows operating systems. Lots of people have iPhones. But no one has a device that is elegant, useful, stimulates creativity and breaks new ground. That’s where Apple excels.
• Apple makes no apology for higher-priced products than their competition. They stand by their product as being innovative and game-changing. They’re uncompromising about details and decisions. Making the iPhone exclusive to AT&T isn’t the most popular decision they’ve made, but hey — it certainly didn’t kill sales by any stretch.
• Even when Apple fans are critical of certain product features, they’re willing to wait for a second release, or a software update, or whatever tweaks may be in the pipeline, and they’re willing to sacrifice perfection for innovation.

This is worth your attention, Mr. President. Frankly, pulling in the White House press pool to brief them on a budget freeze policy for 2011 when the economy is still rocky, everyone loves to hate Ben Bernanke, and health care reform is on the ropes is not really a gesture of confidence. Following the Apple analogy, it feels a little bit like Apple PR sending around a preview of the Apple tablet with only the Windows operating system on it and leaking the fact that users will have to pay Microsoft a monthly fee to only use Bing for search. Counter-intuitive and backwards.

Keep in mind, I’m not criticizing the policy itself, mostly because I can’t even start bending my head around where you’re going with it or how it changes the game. It feels like something I’d hear in a Republican’s State of the Union address with John Boehner leading the ovation. Maybe it’s not, but my point is, you’re not giving me anything to stand up and cheer about.

Let me try this another way. Those of us who have spilled blood, sweat and tears over health care reform felt completely betrayed by the blue dogs and Evan Bayh’s willingness to toss the baby out with the bathwater more than once. Many of us view their behavior as disloyal and undercutting to a fresh, innovative, progressive effort to reform health care. The public option was as symbolic as the backlit Apple on my laptop. When Lieberman and the Blue Dogs killed it, they sent a message that my pretty MacBook was just another boring PC, not worth much extra effort.

Bottom line: I don’t want you to cater to Evan Bayh. I want some bold, game-changing innovation and that means you’ve got to sell it. Do you understand why the public option was popular, even in its final anemic, ineffective form? Because it was an innovation, it was a gesture to your base that they weren’t going to have to be slaves to insurance companies. It was, in many ways, a game-changer instead of the same old thing wrapped up in a shinier case.

Your campaign was bold. It innovated. But that innovation is now so 2008. Shoot, the teapeople are all over that social media thing. They can roll out a teaparty site in an hour, a community in two, resplendent with a couple of hundred electro-members from a created list and a bot on Twitter.

To progress, you need to innovate. To move this economy ahead, you need to innovate. We need you to put your broadband hat on and ditch the dialup. This is a time to lead with gamechangers, not repackaging old stuff in new boxes. So can we get some of that, please?

I represent your loyal base. I believe in you. I believe in what you want to do, and I want to sell it for you just like Robert Scoble sold a zillion iPhones with his enthusiasm and appreciation for what Apple did.

Give me that much, ok?

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If I were the President, and I wanted to make sure a budget reconciliation initiative with agreed-upon changes to health care reform got 51 votes, maybe introducing some mild tax relief to middle class families is just the ticket.

Because I wouldn’t want to be the politician running for office who voted against giving those families a much-needed tax cut, would you?