November 10, 2009 – 11:21 am
Does Goldman Sachs have a God problem? A God complex? An ungodly headache?
Goldman, once a venerable institution known for keeping close counsel, is now a lightning rod for populist criticism of the financial sector. And its latest public relations efforts don’t seem to be helping.
The bank’s very success – turning a profit in excess of $3 billion last quarter – is exacerbating the problem. Americans are in no mood to celebrate Wall Street success. With deepening bonus pools and bulked up compensation packages, Goldman isn’t winning any friends.
Goldman is also facing scrutiny over its neighborly relations with US officials. Revelations that former Treasury Secretary and Goldman chief Hank Paulson met with his former colleagues last year in Moscow didn’t ease anyone’s concern that the Treasury-led financial sector bailout was a little too convenient for Goldman.
Even though Goldman Sachs has paid back its TARP funds with interest – and professes to never having needed the money in the first place – the perception is taking hold that even when Goldman Sachs doesn’t get direct help from the government, it benefits tangentially from other federal action, for instance the AIG bailout or the Federal Reserve’s asset stabilization policies.
Given the increased scrutiny, Goldman has been on a bit of a media blitz, with CEO Lloyd Blankfein talking up the bank’s positive social benefits and his own working-class roots. For a while, Blankfein was doing a decent job of it in an interview with John Arlidge of the Times of London, printed Sunday. Read More »
November 6, 2009 – 11:15 am
John Mashek, who has died at age 77, set himself apart from the journalistic pack by taking a deep and deliberative approach to the White House beat at U.S. News & World Report. I first encountered him as a student at the University of Texas at Austin, where John gave talks that, with dry humor, illustrated the practical dilemmas of reporting on national stories. I later dealt with him in a professional capacity in Washington, D.C. I wasn’t always pleased with John’s reporting, but I always came away knowing that he was fair and one of the best.
November 5, 2009 – 10:03 am
The latest in the General Motors saga appears to be a case of either embarrassingly bungled communications or wretched diplomacy by the Obama Administration.
In brief: GM had announced plans to sell Opel, the German car manufacturer. The German government spent months brokering a deal with a Canadian-Russian venture to buy Opel and preserve jobs in Germany. Two days ago, GM decided that it won’t sell Opel; instead, it will keep the company and seek German government aid to restructure its operations — effectively scuttling all the work the German government has done to balance its sensitive business-labor environment.
The kicker is that, according to the Wall Street Journal, no one in the Obama Administration bothered to inform German Chancellor Angela Merkel that GM was about to drop its bombshell.
What’s more, Chancellor Merkel was in Washington meeting with the president and Congressional leaders at the time the decision was made.
As the Journal explains, “Throughout her meetings, Ms. Merkel had no indication that GM, which is majority owned by the U.S. government, was about to back out of the Opel sale. GM’s chief executive, Frederick ‘Fritz’ Henderson, notified the chancellor’s delegation that the … deal was dead shortly before Ms. Merkel was due to board a plane home.”
This is blatant amateurism on the Administration’s part. And their excuse, according to spokesman Robert Gibbs? “Business decisions by GM are made by the corporate leadership at GM and not by anybody at the White House.” Read More »
November 4, 2009 – 5:51 pm
REMAIN CALM!
Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post argues that the New Jersey and Virginia elections predict nothing for President Obama and the Democratic Congress.
Her case is superficially convincing. She does a good job of showing how these two races, historically, have not been good predictors of how the next election will turn out. Two things about this year, however, stand out–and they are not good omens for the Democrats in the 2010 mid-term, or for President Obama’s agenda.
One: Virginia was a 60-40 blowout for all three statewide races. This cannot be blamed, as Marcus argues, on a purple state with a decidedly red tinge. Nor can it be blamed on the lackluster Deeds campaign, as the White House would have it. To go from where Virginia was in 2008 to where it is today can only be explained by voters animated by a passionate desire to send a message. Whom do you think that message is aimed at?
And to handily win the governorship in New Jersey against a savvy incumbent who spent millions of his own cash as if they were stimulus dollars–that is real a sign of change a-brewin’. Somehow, all the discussion is about Virginia–as if the loss of New Jersey, one of the bluest of blue states was just an anomaly.
If there is no adjustment in the Democrats’ agenda–if the Congress succeeds in overriding all opposition and imposes its vision of health care, cap-and-trade, and heavy regulation–these two races will be seen as the first rumblings of the next political Vesuvius.
November 4, 2009 – 12:23 pm
Time for President Obama to move the smiley face upside down after the only two governorships up for grabs yesterday – both currently held by Democrats – went over to the dark side.
Chris Christie, proving that only Republicans named Christie can win in New Jersey, knocked off both incumbent governor Jon Corzine and an independent challenger. He still managed 49% of the vote.
Bob McDonnell, who once used the word “fornicators” unironically and academically, beat the rather dull Creigh Deeds in a Virginia race that even the White House grew bored with over the last few weeks.
The Administration today put its best spin on things, as the AP reports:
The White House says that Republican wins in two governors’ races were not referendums on the president. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters Wednesday that voters went to the polls in Virginia and New Jersey to work through “very local issues that didn’t involve the president.” The presidential spokesman said voters were concerned about the economy.
I’m not sure if that’s just sloppy editing by the AP, or if Robert Gibbs really doesn’t see the economy as a presidential-level issue. I will unfairly assume the latter because it’s more fun. But even if we give Gibbs the benefit of the doubt, why would President Obama campaign for Deeds and Corzine if the voters were simply working through issues “that didn’t involve the president”? Read More »
November 1, 2009 – 11:33 am
Funny people, people who appreciate funny people, people who wonder how funny people got so funny — check out my colleague Jeff Nussbaum’s review of “And Here’s the Kicker” in today’s Washington Post.
A preview:
“When Al Gore was vice president and saw on his schedule that he would have to speak at an event that required humor, he would announce, with mock solemnity, that it was time to assemble the humor cabinet. This proclamation might well have been delivered by shofar, given that in practice it served as a call for most of the Jews on the staff. Perhaps the circumstances of my birth did qualify me to write jokes, although I think the vice president was more taken with the fact that my dad’s family had actually run a hotel in the Catskills — the real, live Borscht Belt.
Either way, I ended up writing jokes for the vice president and others. I’ve found myself in the awkward situation of telling a former senator that the word “feces” is funnier than any of the synonyms he’s considering. Or that a roomful of male septuagenarians will get the punch line “If it lasts longer than four hours, consult a physician.”
But when asked why, I always wished I had a better answer than “Because it’s funny.” Someone, I thought, should assemble a compendium of insights and techniques from actual humor writers.
That’s exactly what Mike Sacks did in putting together “And Here’s The Kicker.” Read More »
October 30, 2009 – 10:07 am
Former president George W. Bush deployed his down-to-earth charm and humor to wow a crowd gathered for a speech in Fort Worth the other day. According to the Washington Post, “Bush did not appear to have an overarching theme, but strung anecdotes and jokes together and frequently mentioned his faith in God.”
No overarching theme? That’s enough to make a speechwriter cringe. But it’s further proof that the messenger often has much more to do with a speech’s success than the quality of the message. Speeches are, when done well, a blend of art, entertainment, and education. And we all know which is the least interesting of those three things.
The highlight of Mr. Bush’s material:
Mindful of his new neighbors, who have had to endure as many as 650 people a day gawking at his new house in a cul-de-sac, Bush said he took Barney for a neighborhood stroll with “plastic bag on his hand” to scoop poop. That was a moment, he said, when he realized “Man, my life has changed!”
And Barack Obama thinks he’s got messes to clean up! Hey-oh!
But even quirkier than the former president’s dog-poo story is the event at which he was speaking. Read More »
October 27, 2009 – 7:58 am
Former vice president Dick Cheney continues to be the most effective opponent of the Obama Administration’s foreign policy.
Last week, receiving the “Keeper of the Flame” award from the Center for Security Policy, he again laid out a case for why President Obama is misguided on Iran, relations with Russia, missile defense and our allies in Eastern Europe, and the mysteriously slow-moving Afghanistan strategy process.
As for Iraq, the defining policy issue of his own Administration, Cheney implied that President Obama’s only real responsibility is to keep from speeding up the measured pace of the drawdown put in place by President Bush.
To conservatives, Cheney’s calling out Obama is a soothing balm. No one else these days is as effective saying things like: Read More »
October 25, 2009 – 1:25 pm
One of West Wing Writers’ founders, Tom Rosshirt, has a thoughtful piece in the San Francisco Chronicle this weekend, entitled “Making Hatred a Virtue.” Tom argues that the spread of hatred is the greatest danger to society, and that the most alarming development today is not the rise of hateful ideas, but the silence, acquiescence, and even vocal endorsement of people who ought to know better.
The lead below; for more, here.
When President Obama and former President George H.W. Bush made a joint appearance at Texas A&M University last week, Bush used the opportunity to call for greater civility in public discourse.
He identified the right problem but called it by the wrong name. When people say, “Obama wasn’t born in the United States” or “Obama is instituting death panels” or “W knew about 911” – that is not incivility, that’s hatred.
October 22, 2009 – 11:48 am
I think it’s refreshing when someone in Washington who has some skin in the game — a politician, an Administration official — tells a basic truth plainly. The latest example is Larry Summers, President Obama’s top economic policy adviser, who addressed economic recovery, debt, and stimulus at yesterday’s Reuters Washington Summit.
Asked whether stimulus measures to support first-time homebuyers should be extended to existing homeowners,
He said there was a case to be made for extending the credit “in terms of supporting the housing market.” But he added: “At the same time, we can’t afford everything for which there is a case.”
Congress and the White House should adopt that mantra as they navigate the rocky shoals of budget and policy priorities in the coming years.
Sometimes we just can’t afford even good ideas (whether you think a wider homebuyer tax credit is a good idea is a separate question). Yet members of both parties rarely exhibit that level of fiscal restraint, preferring to tell constituents that we can have whatever we want and someone else will foot the bill.
Kudos to Larry Summers for making a case for reality.
For another take on the idea of only buying what you can afford, check out this clip from Saturday Night Live.
October 19, 2009 – 11:20 am
In his weekly address Saturday, President Obama reminded Americans that last November we “went to the polls in historic numbers and demanded change.” We “sought a change in our politics: a politics that too often has … fostered division.”
Oddly enough, he said this mere seconds after claiming that America’s health insurance industry is “deceptive and dishonest,” “mislead[ing] the American people” with “smoke and mirrors” and “bogus” reports about the likely impact of the Democratic Party’s health reform proposals on insurance premiums.
The industry’s sin, of course, is that it spoke an obvious truth: If you force insurance companies to cover all people regardless of pre-existing condition, don’t allow flexibility in pricing, and let people opt out of buying insurance until they get sick, costs will go up.
This isn’t even controversial. It’s basic 2+2=4 math. Yet in President Obama’s view, it amounts to “bend[ing] the truth – or break[ing] it,” something the president “will not abide.”
On Sunday, the White House further advanced its effort to change “a politics that too often has fostered division” by amplifying its attacks on Fox News.
In what has to be the most ill-considered media strategy to emerge from a White House since the Fillmore Administration, the Obama team is determined to let people know that Fox News is “not really a news station” (David Axelrod) and “not a news organization so much as it has a perspective” (Rahm Emanuel). Read More »
October 16, 2009 – 12:05 pm
British Conservative leader David Cameron delivered the capstone address at last week’s party conference in Manchester. The speech was designed to reassure British voters, who seem ready to vote out Gordon Brown and his Labour majority next year, that Mr. Cameron – a rather youthful 43 – is ready to lead.
He also, of course, laid out why Labour has run off the rails, a case predicated largely on the idea that the British government is just too big and intrusive, enervating the British sense of personal responsibility and enterprise.
But what I found most interesting is that Cameron took a second to offer outright praise to the Labour Party:
Why are our politics broken? Because government got too big, promised too much and pretended it had all the answers. Of course it was done with the best intentions. And let’s be clear: not everything Labour did was wrong. Devolution; the minimum wage; civil partnerships, these are good things that we will we keep.
It’s hard to recall the last time a presidential candidate of one party fessed up to liking some of the ideas of the other. (Though I do remember after the 2008 State of the Union Speech one of the network anchors asking then-Senator Obama if he could find anything praiseworthy in President Bush’s agenda. He responded that Bush deserved credit for launching PEPFAR, the effort to treat and defeat AIDS in Africa. And I liked him for saying it.)
Cameron is already viewed a bit suspiciously by conservatives Read More »
October 11, 2009 – 4:17 pm
My colleague Jeff Nussbaum was quoted in a piece in this morning’s New York Times, regarding late night comics’ increasing willingness to poke fun at the president. Exhibit A: Jay Leno calls Obama’s Nobel Preace Prize his biggest accomplishment as president so far.
Key passages below:
…from the outset, Mr. Obama has been praised as someone who “gets late night,” whose ironic and self-deprecating humor is well-suited to the genre’s sensibilities. He was the first sitting president to appear as a guest of Jay Leno’s and David Letterman’s. “You ignore their influence at your peril,” said Dan Pfeiffer, the White House’s deputy communications director. “They are often leading indicators of where the narrative is headed.”…
Jeff Nussbaum, a Democratic speech and joke writer, disagrees that late-night comedy is a leading indicator of a cultural zeitgeist. “To use an economic term, it is more of a lagging indicator,” he said, something that responds to perceptions that are already entrenched. In practical terms, President Obama has now been in office almost nine months, Mr. Nussbaum said, and “comedians now have a greater body of work to go after, for better or worse.”
You can read the whole piece here.
October 9, 2009 – 12:52 pm
NEW YORK — Responding to this morning’s stunning announcement that U.S. President Barack Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig announced that Mr. Obama has also won the 2009 World Series. The remainder of baseball’s playoffs will be canceled.
“I think we all saw when the president threw out the first pitch at this year’s All-Star Game that he has significant potential not just to play professional baseball, but to lead a team to a world championship,” Selig said. “This is a recognition of what would have been a foregone conclusion had President Obama chosen to bring his considerable talents to the ballpark.”
Reaction around the league was mixed. Chase Utley, second baseman for the defending World Series Champion Philadelphia Phillies appeared confused. “Obama is the world f-ing champion?” he asked. “I thought the White Sox missed the playoffs?”
New York Yankees co-owner Hank Steinbrenner praised Selig’s decision and looked to the future. “Obama’s the top guy, no question. Nobody competes the way Obama competes. He’s a winner, pure and simple.”
Steinbrenner then offered the president a $27 million contract to play in pinstripes next season. Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs refused comment on the offer, though a representative of the White House Counsel’s office could be seen furrowing her brow.
Political commentary fell along predictable lines. Read More »
October 9, 2009 – 9:47 am
Apparently I underestimated the power of President Obama’s speeches. They just won him a Nobel Peace Prize.
You may recall that Barack Obama was elected president of the United States less than a year ago and since then, well, it’s been tough. Economy’s been roughed up; automakers needed bailouts; he can’t figure out what to do with inmates at Guantanamo (so he’s going to keep them there, regardless of what he may have said last year); Afghanistan, it turns out, is not the slam dunk short-sighted Democrats hoped it would be; health care reform is about as popular as Sarah Palin in the Castro; and even the French and British can’t quite figure out what Obama plans to do (if anything) about Iran developing nuclear weapons.
That last part is especially germane because the Nobel Committee lauded Obama’s commitment to a nuclear-free world. Other than sitting in the captain’s chair for a useless United Nations photo-op, it’s hard to identify how this commitment has been made manifest.
Another reason the Committee selected Obama? His commitment to democracy and human rights. Yet just this week we learned that Obama refuses to meet with the 1989 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, the Dalai Lama, until a time more conducive to the Chinese.
(The Chinese, you may recall, are now suffering under a tire tariff imposed by the Administration last month. Just another example of Obama’s commitment to hugging out the world’s problems.)
And then there’s the president’s commitment to ending global warming. Again, no substantial action, but some real good rhetoric about working together to solve international challenges. At least Al Gore had a PowerPoint presentation to justify his Nobel.
To be fair, we can’t expect President Obama to have accomplished very much by October 2009; Read More »
