Thursday is the new Monday

Now that I'm back from vacation...

This is why I like David Frum. I don't agree with him completely, but his views on how conservatives current state of being are dead-on. Mr Frum stands by his principles and isn't afraid to speak out against his party when they betray his principles. How can you bash that?

We lost in 2008 in large part because we had not governed successfully over the previous eight years. More than political tactics, more even than media, what matters in politics is results. If national incomes had grown by 1% a year under George Bush instead of stagnating, Al Franken would have lost in a landslide. Populists like Sarah Palin may excite a TV audience, but they cannot govern. They don’t like it and are not good at it. (That’s why Sarah Palin did not even complete one term in office, let alone run for a second.) Limbaugh and Beck style politics can gain ratings. It will not win re-elections.

If BOTH parties were willing to do this kind of instrospection, I think we would all be better off. I think that Al Franken is just fine as a Senator. The guy put his money where his mouth is and ran for Senate and won. Yes, the election was very close and it could have gone either way. But what is done is done. At least he is a talk radio host who doesn't just bitch and moan about everything (like anti-establishment Glenn Beck), but actually is doing something to help change things. Let's see how he does.

On an aside here, I consider myself a centrist, but I cannot align myself with the current Republican party simply because they aren't conservatives. I think George Bush was a disaster. I don't agree with gay marriage, but they should have the same rights as married couples, because they AREN'T threatening my marriage. I don't like big government, but I detest big business even worse. I am pro market, not pro business (there is a a huge difference there, by they way). Some Republicans would consider what I say to mean I am a crazy liberal. My response is that they are so fart to the right that they consider centrists liberals. Anyways, that's where I stand.

Now onto other things.

Lots of talk about the new book from Matt Latimer. Here's the link to the GQ excerpt, and now Bruce Bartlett has his comments. This is extremely entertaining and interesting to read. Mr. Bartlett also has a great piece in Forbes.com about why we can't just cut Federal spending.

Over at the Vanguard Blog, Steve Utkus tells us not to worry too much about health care spending, as it's on an unsustainable arc and will self-correct (my interpretation, not his). This leaves me wanting a little bit, as you could argue that last year's market crash was self-correcting, and I don't want to go through something like that with healthcare, as lives do depend on that even more than financial markets. Maybe I'm interpreting what he is saying incorrectly, but I think a little more involvement is necessary here.

Ezra Klein has been very busy, with a look at how the CBO works, an awesome interview with my senator hero Ron Wyden of Oregon, and an interview with Jay Rockefeller.

Ron Wyden has a great op-ed piece in last week's NYT.

Paul Volker is going rogue against the Obama Administration is speaking out against preserving 'too big to fail' financial organizations. Maybe Obama will finally listen.