Who Makes Policy Campaign 2016 Edition

The simultaneously great and unfortunate factor about climate change is that it occurs slowly. Great, because though the earth’s temperature has greatly increased and all can feel it, the fallout has been rather bearable for most. Unfortunately, without a sense of urgency, the government tends to delay policies and regulations on the contributing factors. Well, ::Cue in Michael Jackson’s “We Are the World” song:: Kids, well adults making use of  those angelic faces, have decided to take matter into their own hands as they will be around for the increased wildfires, extremely high sea levels, and intensely smoggy air.

These “kids” hope to get their case to the Supreme court in hopes of the atmosphere being ruled a “public trust” which means it is property that the government must care for the welfare of the public good. If the suit advances to the Supreme Court, Winning will require the federal government to address climate change more aggressively through laws and regulations.

This article written by Laurence Kotlikoff, economist and current presidential hopeful, examines the climate change policies of his far more known presidential opponents Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump.

Mr. Kotlikoff first debates his opponents plan, when one exists, Donald Trump doesn’t have one as he does not believe climate change is a concern. Trump’s stance is that climate change is a “hoax” and that humans play little role in carbon emissions. When addressing Clinton’s climate change policy or policies because there are plenty proposals -Mr. Kotlikoff deems them all as essentially unfeasible. However, Mr. Kotlikoff has developed a plan that I (kind of) support…TAXES!! Tax the emissions and the culprits (energy suppliers) mainly will develop their own mechanism by which to decrease emissions so that they wouldn’t have to pay absorbent amounts in taxes.

“Having a high, but declining carbon tax rates gives dirty-energy producers the right incentives to burn dirty energy slowly.” … “The short-run tax rate needs to be very high and fall substantially through time to give dirty energy suppliers real pause in conducting a fast, rather than slow burn.”

1. What if the energy companies raise their consumer prices to combat these taxes? (Usually the quickest fix)
2. What if the population was tasked with decreasing emissions? Would the sale and productions of cars be limited? Would the amount of daily flights an airline can provide be decreased?
3. What if the next president really likes Mr. Kotlikoff’s plan and puts it in place- Are there rules for payment for implementing an idea of your opponents during your presidency?

Okay, so a few interesting things have happened this week so let’s dive right in.

The first thing that I think is interesting is what is happening in the Philipines. The talking point is that the Philipines is hoping to ingratiate arms sales from China by declining to partner with the US on sea patrols.

For me, this is concerning. Does this mean that some nations may see a partnership with China as more beneficial than one with the US. I am not the only person to think this either.

Moving on to Russia. The negotiated cease-fire in Syria has held in the early days with minor infractions. In light of this, the State Department has said that in concert with Russia it will allow Assad and the Syrian government to engage in targeted bombing if the calm holds through the cease-fire expiration on Sunday.

For me, I don’t know how I feel about propping up the Assad regime but at least for now, and possibly through Sunday the fighting has stopped.

Amidst starkly different portrayals of the state of the economy by the presidential candidates, here is a quick look at what the data tells us.

The latest National Income and Products Account report by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Department of commerce shows that Gross Domestic Product, the broadest measure of goods and services produced across the U.S., grew at an annual rate of 1.1% in the second quarter of the year. This is well below the pace economists expected.

Analysis of this report by FocusEconomics tells us that this result was above the 0.8% increase in the first quarter of the year. “This marks the third consecutive quarter of near 1% growth as opposed to the historical long-term average of 3%,” says Lawrence Yun of the National Association of Realtors.

On a brighter note, job availability and income growth seem to be unaffected with the recent Employment Situation Report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showing that unemployment rate remained at 4.9% with a total of 151,000 jobs added in August. Hourly wages is slowly growing with a 2.4 percent increase over the past year. Also, a new report by the Census Bureau at the Department of Commerce shows that “Real Median household income increased 5.2 percent between 2014 and 2015. A first annual increase in median household income since 2007”

According to Economists at FocusEconomics, “the weakness in GDP growth in the second quarter highlighted what was a disappointing first half of 2016 for the U.S. economy. Nonetheless, many analysts believe that the economy will pick up momentum in the second half of the year, supported by strong growth in private consumption, an improvement in investment and a rebuilding of inventories.”

While the economy might not be the first thing on people’s mind this campaign period as illustrated by this Pew Research Center survey which shows that the issue voters want to hear about most in the presidential debate is “keeping the US safe from terrorism.” The state of the economy is still a crucial issue and is likely to play a significant role in the upcoming elections.

According to a survey on the views of the economy, carried out by the Pew Research Center in July, sampling 2,245 adults, 18 years of age or older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. “The public continues to have mixed ratings of the nation’s economy. Currently, 44% say conditions are only fair while a roughly equal share views them as excellent or good (27%) or poor (28%).”

According to this survey “Most Americans (53%) say their family’s income is falling behind the cost of living. About a third (36%) say they are staying about even while just 8% say their incomes are rising fast than the cost of living.”

Interestingly there is a difference in the views of the economy amongst registered voters depending on which presidential candidate they support with “a majority of Trump supporters (61%) saying their incomes are not keeping pace with the cost of living compared with 47% of Clinton supporters.”

As with views of the economy, the public’s perceptions of job availability are almost the same, with “nearly half of the public (49%) saying jobs are difficult to find in their community, while slightly fewer (43%) say there are plenty of jobs available.”

An important question is, are people’s views of the economy congruent with the state of the economy and where should attention be focused, on the numbers or people’s perceptions?

As the presidential election fast approaches, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, pushed fast forward on the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, a legally binding climate deal. Ki-moon is in a panic over the impact Trump could potentially have on the success of this international treaty. Trump has publicly commented on global warming stating,”It’s a hoax. I mean, it’s a money-making industry, okay? It’s a hoax, a lot of it.” Ki-moon worries if Trump becomes president he will withdraw the U.S. from the agreement. American presence is of great significance given that we are the world’s largest economy and second-largest greenhouse gas polluter. Ki-moon has begun a campaign to ensure the treaty will enter full force before the next American Presidential inauguration, which requires the ratification of at least 55 countries. He has since planned a ceremony at the United Nations for September 21, 2016 to announce completing this goal – he already has 40 countries. The pace at which Ki-moon is pushing this treaty (putting it into force in less than a year) is highly unusual for international agreements. This proves the urgency and fear of the United Nations regarding Trump.

Climate change should be a growing concern of every country, and an American absence from the efforts to fight the dangers of climate change would be detrimental. Mr. Trump’s insistence that global warming is a hoax reminds me of a comment a previous professor of mine made. He said, “98% of the scientific community acknowledges global warming and state human beings are to blame for its alarming rate. If 98 out of 100 doctors suggested you remove a kidney in order to survive, would you listen to the other 2 insisting you were fine? And these two scientists are being paid off by companies who have a vested interest in you thinking you were okay.” Why do citizens listen to politicians instead of scientists when it comes to climate change? I can only hope the next president will be aware of the tremendous burden the U.S. has in this global issue.

Hopefully, the Wall Street Journal will not put this article behind a paywall if it does I can post the text in a comment. This is an interesting piece, a story I have not followed, but it seems important enough to put it out there for comment and discussion. Essentially the piece states that the Obama administration is going to let the US contract with ICANN (the organization that has control over the root of all internet addresses (e.g. the www part of a web address).

This is concerning for a number of reasons. Right now ICANN has monopoly protection because it has direct oversight from the US government. With that gone, as the piece points out, there may be a challenge by authoritarian states to ICANN’s legitimacy.

Could this spell the end of a free (not cost wise but content wise) and open internet? I have to say it, but this is one situation where I think I may actually agree with Sen. John Thune and Rep. Fred Upton (Commerce) and Sen. Chuck Grassley and Rep. Bob Goodlatte (Judiciary), and let’s be honest, I do not agree with these four very often.

Michael Hirsh, the national editor of Politico Magazine, came out with a piece over this past weekend taking stock of where things stand in terms of the United State’s “Global War on Terrorism.”  He states the obvious on the total, unmitigated quagmire that the war has become, and spends a good fraction of the piece tearing apart the Bush Administration’s decisions in this respect.

He tells us here that our nation’s battle against terrorism could have been one wrapped up in roughly six months, a sentiment expressed by people such as CIA officer in charge of the Tora Bora operation in Afghanistan that once cornered Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, Gary Berntsen.  Of course, instead, beginning with that very moment, when then-President George W. Bush turned down Berntsen’s request to go after Bin Laden, disastrous foreign policy mistake after disastrous foreign policy mistake was made, leading to the current messy situation in Iraq and Syria, facing a viscous, brutal enemy in ISIS with no end in sight.

One obvious area where the Bush administration has blundered significantly in is when it comes to civil liberties.  We now know about the renditions, the waterboarding (along with the other enhanced interrogation techniques), the indefinite detentions, etc.  Barack Obama was elected president in part to repudiate these violations and to leave the US with a better “code” to combating terrorism while still respecting civil rights and liberties under the Constitution.

However, as Hirsh points out:

“Sadly, rather than developing a ‘code’ for future presidents, as he’s said he wants to do, the president’s policy of dramatically stepped-up and secretly targeted drone killings and special-ops raids—for which there is no real public accountability—could well end up leaving a less principled successor an open-ended license to conduct permanent drone warfare, or to place American boots on the ground anywhere in the world.

Obama has in fact stretched the laws of war—never that clear to begin with—past their intended breaking point in the effort to continue his secret global war without new authorization. There may be no better example than the concept of ‘elongated imminence’—a new, quasi-Orwellian term for a tactic the Obama administration is using to justify more strikes under Article II of the Constitution, under which the president has the power to respond on his own to ‘imminent’ threats. Under this new interpretation, according to an account in Daniel Klaidman’s 2012 book, Kill Or Capture, terrorists no longer have to be on the verge of pulling the trigger or boarding a plane, or for an attack to be about to happen. They just have to be in the first stages of planning an attack for the president to order them killed. ‘It would be enough if they were designing the suicide vests,’ Klaidman wrote.”

Twenty years after NAFTA the consensus outside of the Chamber of Commerce has been that it was an expensive agreement to the American worker. About 700,000 jobs were lost with many of those being in the automotive, electronics and apparel industries. Even back in 1992 free-trade and globalization were at the forefront of the Presidential campaign. The third-party candidate a the time, Ross Perot, gave the American people a warning regarding NAFTA. During a presidential debate, the told the audience that should NAFTA be adopted, there would be a “giant sucking sound going south”. The sucking would be the sound of jobs leaving the U.S. and going south of the border. However, back then, the idea that free trade would create jobs was generally more accepted. Bill Clinton supported NAFTA during the campaign and would eventually go on to win the presidency. This is no longer the case. Current U.S. Congressional nominees are keeping their distance from anything having to do with globalization. It is so toxic that “Trump and Sanders argue that policies celebrated 16 years ago no longer work for most Americans, a message that is resonating widely among those who have most suffered the consequences.” This agreement between two candidates that couldn’t be more apart is telling of the current mood of the nation on free-trade.

Politicians tend to tout the benefits of free trade without realizing that sometimes the cost of globalization are far more visible and felt by the American worker than the more general benefits that are achieved by corporations,commerce and security. It is this feeling that big corporations are the only ones that will benefit that has perhaps killed the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership), a free trade agreement between the U.S. and its European allies. Several nations opposed it for various reasons. Some believe that “Instead of delivering prosperity, TTIP is perceived by many as a deal that will open the floodgates to cheap, pesticide-pumped foreign produce, usher in lower standards and destroy jobs rather than create them.” Globalization is in trouble and as mentioned in an earlier post, it’s affecting Congressional races. Some feel the topic is so toxic that President Obama will not be able to pass it in the lame-duck session of Congress since many will be up for reelection in two years. “The backlash against free trade is growing – on both sides of the Atlantic. Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, and Hillary Clinton, his Democrat rival, oppose the TTIP deal.” At least in public they do.

Gallup has tremendous polls on a variety of different topics. Their section on the Middle East is particularly comprehensive. You could spend hours on their site but one poll I found interesting was their US Global Leadership Poll. This poll, “presents U.S. leadership approval research from 132 countries and areas that Gallup surveyed in 2015. The report includes detailed data for all 132 countries, including approval differences from 2014 to 2015 and regional medians not available in Gallup Analytics or anywhere else.”

Some interesting finds:

45% of people globally approve of US leadership on the world stage (compared with just 34% in 2008).

In 2008, 58% of Europeans disapproved of US leadership while only 18% approved. In 2009, the numbers flipped, 47% approved while 22% disapproved. 46% approve today while 35% disapprove.

1% of Russians approve of US leadership (you read that right, 1%)

US approval ratings are low in Eastern Europe (28% in Latvia, 16% in Serbia, 34% in Estonia).

It’s clear that America’s perception on the world stage has improved dramatically under Obama, but I’d be curious to see these numbers next year with a new president in the Oval Office.