David Frum Explains His Qualifications....

Asked, "How did you, as a native Canadian, end up working in the White House", David Frum replied,

The same papers that allow you to work at Taco Bell allow you to work at the White House.

I choose to interpret that in light of a prior question,

As a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and former speechwriter for President Bush, you’re surprisingly critical of him in your new book, claiming he has appointed “consistently mediocre people” to important jobs and made “a shambles” of the Iraq war.

He's now a "senior policy advisor" to Giuliani? Perhaps to be expected from the guy whose résumé seems to be comprised primarily of penning the phrase, "Axis of Hatred".

I Haven't Seen Him This Angry Since Clinton Was Elected....

Had Romney won in Iowa, would George Will be this angry?

Huckabee fancies himself persecuted by the Republican "establishment," a creature already negligible by 1964, when it failed to stop Barry Goldwater's nomination. The establishment's voice, the New York Herald Tribune, expired in 1966. Huckabee says that "only one explanation" fits his Iowa success "and it's not a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with two fish and five loaves feed a crowd of 5,000 people." God so loves Huckabee's politics that He worked a Midwest miracle on his behalf? Should someone so delusional control nuclear weapons?

Did Will similarly decry George W. Bush's allusions to being guided by the hand of God, or does it only matter in this case because will thinks Huckabee believes what he says, whereas G.W.... And that's the rub, isn't it?

Like Job after losing his camels and acquiring boils, the conservative movement is in distress. Mike Huckabee shreds the compact that has held the movement's two tendencies in sometimes uneasy equipoise. Social conservatives, many of whom share Huckabee's desire to "take back this nation for Christ," have collaborated with limited-government, market-oriented, capitalism-defending conservatives who want to take back the nation for James Madison. Under the doctrine that conservatives call "fusion," each faction has respected the other's agenda. Huckabee aggressively repudiates the Madisonians.

Huckabee's "faction" is supposed to bring out the voters for the wealthy elite who run the Republican Party, and gratefully accept the crumbs scattered to them following each election. There has long been the whisper that swing voters shouldn't be overly concerned about the Republican Party's overtures to the religious right, because they have no intention of carrying out their promises. The problem is, the religious right is dissatisfied with lip service. Having seen G.W. run the government with, for most of his tenure, a majority in both houses, it hasn't been lost on them that their agenda was not a priority.

I saw a chart this morning which reflected that the Republicans who are the angriest with their party are most likely to support Ron Paul. Those Republicans who are less angry with their party, but nonetheless angry, are turning to Huckabee. Why aren't they turning to Romney, who promises that (despite his record) he has been transformed into a social conservative? Could it be that they think he's a phony, and they don't see it as part of their "bargain" with the monied factions of the Republican Party to pretend that he represents their interests?

George Will has joined the efforts of the monied factions of the Republican Party to depict Huckabee as a populist liberal. This isn't a new approach, and hasn't worked very well for Romney. I guess they just don't see how, when every important battle within the party is resolved in favor of what Will deems the "Madisonian" faction, it is breaking their side to get behind the one candidate they believe will actually try to put their agenda first. Or, as David Brooks puts it,

Second, Huckabee understands much better than Mitt Romney that we have a crisis of authority in this country. People have lost faith in their leaders’ ability to respond to problems. While Romney embodies the leadership class, Huckabee went after it. He criticized Wall Street and K Street. Most importantly, he sensed that conservatives do not believe their own movement is well led. He took on Rush Limbaugh, the Club for Growth and even President Bush. The old guard threw everything they had at him, and their diminished power is now exposed.

And yes, that's enough to make George Will's head explode.

"Trust Me"

Recall with the Bush plan for the privatization of Social Security, how we wouldn't be trusted to invest our own money, but would have to choose from a selection of government-approved plans?

Because governments are really good at investing. (And that's when they're trying to invest responsibly. When they're not, it's worse.)

This can be done well - the mutual fund-type plans government employees are allowed to invest in seem to do well. But, of course, the Bush Administration took those off the table for privatized Social Security. I suspect because there's not enough profit in that type of plan for those to whom they would steer our "investment".

Finding Success in Failure, III

As if his mendacity on the Iraq War and education policy weren't enough, Gerson shares this gem:

Democratic candidates attack the Bush tax cuts as a fiscal disaster -- just as a growing economy has boosted tax revenue to its highest level in history, halving the federal deficit in three years.

Wow... here I was thinking the tax cuts were put into effect back in 2001-2003, quickly turning a sizable budget surplus into a massive deficit, yet as it turns out they didn't go into effect until 2005! Thank you so much for clearing that up, Michael....

(How long is the boost in tax revenues from corporate profits likely to last?)

So here we are, with a surplus transformed into a deficit, no end to deficit spending in sight, no Republican plan to balance the budget or spend responsibly, and growth of tax revenues far below what the Bush Administration promised, trillions in new federal debt... and a one-year upward bump in corporate profits is deemed to prove that the tax cuts should never be touched - or perhaps that we should completely eliminate taxes and run the government on pure deficit spending.

Finding Success in Failure, II

Having shared his insights on Iraq, Gerson also shares his equally valuable insights into education policy.

Attacking No Child Left Behind is a reliable campaign applause line -- Hillary Clinton promises to "end" the law, because it is "just not working." Actually, the imposition of educational standards and testing has improved math and reading scores and begun narrowing the gap between disadvantaged and affluent students.

There is an angry backlash against NCLB among some Democratic interest groups. Suburban districts resent being labeled as failures just because some minority and disabled children aren't making progress. But that is the whole purpose of the law -- to prevent districts from hiding the poor performance of minorities behind the success of other students. Such districts should feel less resentment and more shame.

If he were to inform himself of the facts, Gerson might learn that the problem is not that the "failing" schools aren't outperforming other "successful" schools, or that they didn't have far better performance by students from minority groups or with disabilities, he would find that they were "failing" due to the fact that they were not showing sufficient "improvement" over prior years. Under the silly NCLB rating system, the best school in the state can be deemed "failing" while the worst can be deemed to be "succeeding". Also, where much of the "success" in lesser schools derives from "teaching to the test", there is a legitimate question as to whether education has actually improved along with the test scores.

Teachers unions object to standardized tests, preferring more subjective, nonacademic measures of school success. And that, from one perspective, is understandable. Failing corporations do not like accurate financial disclosures. Slow runners resent those pesky stopwatches. The unions want underperforming schools and ineffective teachers to be shielded from objective scrutiny. But testing is the only way to determine when disadvantaged students are being betrayed -- and by whom.

It would be more correct to say that teachers oppose standardized testing (not all of it, but the excessive focus created by NCLB), and that the unions are reflecting the positions of their members. This has nothing to do with teachers fearing that standardized tests will demonstrate them to be poor teachers, and Gerson should know that - part of Gerson's complaint appears to be that these tests do not affect job security. And as previously noted, if Gerson knew anything about school ratings under NCLB he wouldn't be describing the school ratings it promulgates as "accurate". Whatever accuracy might be derived from raw scores, it is lost in the system of rewarding individual school "improvement" even if it means classifying the worst schools as succeeding and the best as in need of improvement. It is noteworthy that in his attack on teacher's unions, as with everything else in his column, he omits any facts to support his slur. How worthy of a Bush Administration alumnus.

Instead of attacking a successful education reform, it would be helpful to hear some practical ideas for improving teacher quality. In the real world of failing schools, the main problem is not too much accountability; it is too few effective instructors. Why should teacher pay be determined by collective bargaining instead of teacher competence, especially in low-income schools that need to reward and retain good teachers? Why not give districts more flexibility to fire teachers who would serve children better by changing professions?

And again we have Gerson demonstrating his abject ignorance. He should pick up a phone and talk to some good teachers in the public school system, and get a sense for how NCLB has demoralized the profession, discourages good teachers from entering the profession, and has a lot of good teachers considering early retirement. Gerson's silly notion that teachers will line up to teach in failing schools because they may get a raise or bonus pay if they don't "fail" by... whatever measure he wishes to impose, be it a standardized test or the subjective assessment of a school administrator... and have no job security whatsoever? What planet is he on, where there's an abundant supply of teachers, and the only constraint against firing bad teachers and replacing them with good ones is the teachers' unions? What's he smoking?

People like Gerson also embrace a fanciful notion that no matter what else is wrong in a child's life, and no matter what educational or language deficits the child experiences, any "good" teacher can find enough time in the day to bring that child up to grade level (along with the thirty or so other kids in the class), and the only person who should face consequence for a child's lower-than-grade-level achievement is the teacher. If we assume that a teacher has six hours of classroom time per day for thirty students, and manages to pour all of that time into one-on-one mentoring... that's a whopping twelve minutes per student. Add, you know, teaching to the mix, and....

Well, Gerson likes to talk up his Christianity, so maybe he believes in educational miracles.

Finding Success In Failure

Michael Gerson, the feeling man's Republican, shares a few gems:

But Gen. David Petraeus's counterinsurgency strategy has succeeded with disorienting speed. Its combination of vision and competence will fill chapters in military textbooks.

In spite of these gains, Democratic presidential candidates still insist on reckless timetables for withdrawal -- the surest way to rescue defeat from the jaws of victory. And Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid -- who declared that the surge had "failed" even before it was fully implemented -- now contends that "the surge hasn't accomplished its goals."

If Mr. Gerson would acquaint himself with the facts, even slightly, he would be aware that Harry Reid's statements are true. The surge has been a success militarily, but it has not accomplished its goals. To quote, you know, the President:

A successful strategy for Iraq goes beyond military operations. Ordinary Iraqi citizens must see that military operations are accompanied by visible improvements in their neighborhoods and communities. So America will hold the Iraqi government to the benchmarks it has announced.

To establish its authority, the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq's provinces by November. To give every Iraqi citizen a stake in the country's economy, Iraq will pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis. To show that it is committed to delivering a better life, the Iraqi government will spend $10 billion of its own money on reconstruction and infrastructure projects that will create new jobs. To empower local leaders, Iraqis plan to hold provincial elections later this year. And to allow more Iraqis to re-enter their nation's political life, the government will reform de-Baathification laws, and establish a fair process for considering amendments to Iraq's constitution.

By what measure beyond the military - something the President told us up-front was an inadequate measure - is the Surge a success?

Ethnic cleansing preceded the surge (not as part of U.S. policy, but as a consequence of ethnic warring), and part of the surge plan has involved erecting huge concrete barriers between ethnic factions so as to minimize conflict. That has helped bring about a reduction in a reduction of ethnic violence and reduced casualties, both civilian and military. What lesson should we draw from other nations, as to what is likely to happen if the authoritative hand is removed and the ethnic groups are freed to renew their conflict? (The Yugoslav "ethnic civil war" model; The Chechnya/Slovakia "split the country" model... is there another?) Even with significant federal reconciliation, it will take a great deal of effort by the Iraqi government to keep ethnic tensions under control, and I have some doubt as to their ability to do it within the... indefinite future. So does John McCain - who is prepared to commit our forces to Iraq for a century or more.

Meanwhile, we are at the crossroads between "surge" and "escalation." Gerson is ready to engrave our military success in Iraq into the history books. Yet members of the military in Iraq see it as taking six years or longer to achieve our goals. And unfortunately, no matter what our military does, it contributes nothing to the willingness of Iraq's various factions to form some form of unity government. It may in some senses encourage certain groups to be intransigent, knowing that we remain present to keep a lid on things while they hold out for more. Meanwhile, we have a growing question of what it will take to hold our military together for that six years (or for McCain's century) while we wait for the promised political progress that never seems to come.

I think the question that Gerson should be addressing is whether the U.S. and Iraq will be better served by a Bush-style "Let's see what happens in the next (and the next, and the next) six months" approach, a McCain-style "Don't worry about progress, as we'll hold your hand for as long as it takes" approach, or a Democratic-style, "You had better shape up, or you're going to have to do this without us" approach. Which approach would he deem more "conservative", if not more "compassionate"?

A McMansion In My Back Yard?

Robert Samuelson, apparently inspired by the construction of a huge house in his neighborhood, takes on the McMansion:

Down the block from my home, workmen are finishing a new house. It replaces a bungalow that had measured about 1,500 square feet. The new home has a covered front porch, two fireplaces and a finished basement. It comes in at just under 5,700 square feet. What is it with Americans and their homes?

Eugene Robinson has a passing comment in today's column, Outside the Echo Chamber, which seems germane:

We in Washington are increasingly isolated from the people in whose interest we claim to labor. The economic gap between us and most of the country is widening to a chasm. In most American cities, a $600,000 house in a leafy neighborhood would be considered an extravagance reserved for the wealthy. Here, we'd call it a bargain.

Assuming a $600,000 purchase price, the person who replaced the old bungalow with the modern "McMansion" paid probably $400,000 - $450,000 for the land under the bungalow. Samuelson, sitting in what is no doubt a very large house for the era in which it was built, should consider the economics of the redevelopment of that lot - the value of the huge house that is being built is likely commensurate with the value of the lot.

It is interesting to me that "housing lust" is only a problem if it reaches "the masses" - the "huge" house Samuelson describes is small compared to many mansions (and let's not forget castles) of the past - the difference appears to be one of prevalence and availability. If you're going to focus on our planet's limited resources, and whether this form of housing is wasteful, that's one thing. But if you're going to get moralistic and speak of "house lust", I think you should explain why it is suddenly wrong for the average (or, really, the average upper middle class) American to want the same type of self-indulgent, showy, overpriced housing that the rich have always enjoyed (even if on a smaller lot).

Worse, government subsidizes these supersize homes along with suburban sprawl and, just incidentally, global warming. In 2008, the tax deduction for mortgage interest payments will cost the federal government $89 billion. The savings go heavily to the upper-middle class and the wealthy -- the least needy people -- and encourage ever-larger homes. Even with energy-saving appliances, those homes are likely to generate more greenhouse gases than their smaller predecessors. As individuals and a society, we've overinvested in housing; we'd be better off if more of our savings went into productive investments elsewhere.

In the case of the house in Samuelson's neighborhood, the issue of "subsidy" was resolved decades ago (probably 80 or so years ago) when it went up as an upper middle class (or wealthy) suburb of Bethesda. If the home is well constructed, its heating and cooling bills may not be much different from that of neighboring houses (including Samuelson's). If it uses geothermal heating and cooling - something that I think the government should be actively encouraging and subsidizing - the cost will be substantially less - perhaps $150 per month to heat and cool an enormous house. And yes, I think it is better for a lot in an existing neighborhood to be redeveloped, than for a similar home to be built in a new subdivision. (No houses like that will be going up in my neighborhood - the lots aren't big enough, and the land's not worth enough.)

I do agree with Samuelson that indulging in an oversized house is an extravagence, and that we should be concerned about the environmental impact of new developments, as well as the cost of bringing municipal services to those developments. But those concerns are neither new nor limited to Toll Brothers-type neighborhoods. I am also of the opinion that we are not likely to suddenly put the brakes on American consumerism or a mentality of "keeping up with the Joneses", so our energies are probably better spent focusing on how to minimize the environmental footprint of our present levels of consumerism while taking a more gradual approach to the reinvention of society.