Barone Seeks the Omphalos

Tim Cavanaugh | June 1, 2009

Don't go into the center, stay away from the center, Michael Barone warns:

I think Republicans today should be less interested in moving toward the center and more interested in running against the center. Here I mean a different "center" -- not a midpoint on an opinion spectrum, but rather the centralized government institutions being created and strengthened every day. This is a center that is taking over functions fulfilled in a decentralized way by private individuals, firms and markets.

Maybe a pun should not be unpacked, but I wonder whether the government-institution center might in time become the opinion center. I've never had a gig writing a textbook, so as far as I know, nobody is writing up the Bush-Obama Bailout for the permanent records as a hugely controversial and unpopular movement. I'd doubt the White House histories of either president or the personal finance works of the future will record it that way either. And I consider all those issues, of race, gender, life, war, private affairs, etc., in which once controversial interventions by activist judges, presumptuous legislatures, callow presidents and others eventually assumed the mantle of Conventional Wisdom.

Now it may be the case that Conventional Wisdom ain't worth what it once was, and I think in general I'd agree. But I've counted up the Republicans and the Democrats with both hands, and it still looks like they're only giving two choices.

So how can they avoid the center? It's like advising the Moon to get away from the Earth.

Comments

Alan Vanneman|6.1.09 @ 5:02PM|#

But, dude, the moon is getting away from the Earth! At two fucking inches a year!

DHS Thinks I\'m a Terrorists|6.1.09 @ 5:19PM|#

I might start trusting the Republicans if they repudiate their nominated candidates for President of the United States for the years 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008.

Tim Cavanaugh|6.1.09 @ 5:24PM|#

I have a soft spot for Bob Dole, DHS. Which Repub do you think should have turned trix in ninety-six?

|6.1.09 @ 5:28PM|#

Centralization is OK, now that The Right People are in charge:

The 31-Year-Old in Charge of Dismantling G.M.
It is not every 31-year-old who, in a first government job, finds himself dismantling General Motors and rewriting the rules of American capitalism.

But that, in short, is the job description for Brian Deese, a not-quite graduate of Yale Law School who had never set foot in an automotive assembly plant until he took on his nearly unseen role in remaking the American automotive industry....

|6.1.09 @ 5:32PM|#

As a result of the conservation of angular momentum, the slowing of Earth's rotation is accompanied by an increase of the mean Earth-Moon distance of about 3.8 m per century, or 3.8 cm per year.

What Alan said.

Tim Cavanaugh|6.1.09 @ 5:37PM|#

Well thank goddess we've finally got some Ivy League people managing this economy.

|6.1.09 @ 5:42PM|#

Tim, he's a "not-quite" Ivy Leaguer (depending on where his undergrad was, I guess).

When he's done w/ GM, he can replace the new college grads we had running Iraq. Remember when that was a bad thing?

|6.1.09 @ 5:46PM|#

I've never had a gig writing a textbook, so as far as I know, nobody is writing up the Bush-Obama Bailout for the permanent records as a hugely controversial and unpopular movement.

Depends on whether it works or not, is my guess. If it flops, the economy stays in a perma-recession, and we get hammered with higher taxes and inflation because of the gargantuan Bushama spending spree, I'm guessing (hoping?) that the people of this country turn on Our Masters in DC like rabid dogs.

|6.1.09 @ 6:03PM|#

If it flops, the economy stays in a perma-recession, and we get hammered with higher taxes and inflation because of the gargantuan Bushama spending spree, I'm guessing (hoping?) that the people of this country turn on Our Masters in DC like rabid dogs.

Like they did to FDR?

Hammered Head|6.1.09 @ 6:23PM|#

The 31-Year-Old in Charge of Dismantling G.M. Why is it that lawyers think they are experts in every other field? No wonder why this administration seems so moronic. At least there is one career that lawers can't do: Software engineering. Computers cant be bullshit like people can be.

robc|6.1.09 @ 7:03PM|#

Tim,

I still have my hypothetical (its easy to keep around when it isnt real) Gramm-Keyes '96 bumper sticker.

Syd|6.1.09 @ 9:12PM|#

Do women grab their children and look at you funny when they see that?

Syd|6.1.09 @ 9:15PM|#

Hypothetically, of course.

Mike|6.2.09 @ 12:27AM|#

"So how can they avoid the center? It's like advising the Moon to get away from the Earth."

It's easy. Public opinion is a gaussian distribution with mean A and standard deviation B. In a two party system, where party X has a position C on the curve, and party Y has a position D on the curve, the odds of party X winning the election is ((A-D)/(C-A)) / B * E where E = the adjustment factor arising from random events. Since the benefit of party X winning over party Y (from the perspective of party X) is (C-D), the expected utility value is ((C-D) * (A-D)/(C-A)) / B * E) - ((D-C) * (C-A)/(A-D)) / B * E)). Take the derivative to find the maximum of the function, and you've got it. No problem!

|6.2.09 @ 11:51AM|#

If it flops, the economy stays in a perma-recession, and we get hammered with higher taxes and inflation because of the gargantuan Bushama spending spree, I'm guessing (hoping?) that the people of this country turn on Our Masters in DC like rabid dogs.

Like they did to FDR?

FDR was saved by the war. I'm hoping that we don't get into another global conflict costing millions of lives that will provide a solution of sorts to our economic malaise.

Tim Cavanaugh|6.3.09 @ 1:36PM|#

I hope you're right, RC, but Roosevelt was re-elected handily before the war started, and re-elected for an unprecedented (and thankfully unrepeated) third term a full year before Pearl Harbor -- while popular opinion was still heavily against joining the war.

It's in Machiavelli: The king benefits from engineering the destruction of his subjects' property. The more they suffer the more they look to him for guidance.