President Pence, POTUS 46

When President Pence is sworn in we can feel confident there will be no debate over the size of the crowd.  That’s a relief all by itself.

This week Donald Trump Tweeted his suggestion that the 2020 elections on November 3^rd be postponed and it turned the American news streams into various levels of dither. Fox News et al, along with most Republican legislators, just tried to dodge the comment or “laugh” it off. This is something they’ve learned to be quite good at.

Some respected Republicans took issue with it publicly. Democrats, left and center, went ballistic, calling out terms like dictator, autocrat, or destroyer of the Constitution…something they’ve learned to be quite good at.

I think they all may be missing the point.

Since 2016 I have been writing in this blog several times my conclusions that Donald Trump suffers from a Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) and that this condition explains all his actions, short of those he has felt compelled to act on to protect himself. Not to argue this point further, my opinion is leading me inescapably to a final speculation:

Donald Trump will likely resign the Presidency before the November election.

The importance of his Tweet is not the suggestion of a postponed election, something he has no power to do. It is with his reasoning…points he has repeatedly raised. Attaching those points to his absurd suggestion magnifies their importance in his mind.

He has proclaimed that this election will (not might or could) be “the most inaccurate and fraudulent election in history”. He neither reflects on the fact there has previously been no inaccurate and fraudulent election in US history or that he assigns all the fraud and inaccuracies to benefit only his opponent. He really doesn’t care a fig about how the election is run.

If Trump truly has a NPD, a major loss would painfully conflict with his self-perception. Intuitively his knowing that a post-election analysis would later deem the contest accurate may be a bridge he is unwilling to cross.  His only out would be to resign. In his mind, the “fraud” in the election makes it impossible for him to win, and that the resulting landslide loss (the election cannot be stopped) will be primarily due to his resignation.

Someone with an NPD faces an imperfect world with subjective perfection. It’s as if he lives his life on reality TV.  His niece, a PhD psychologist, in her book “Too Much and Never Enough” discounts the idea that her uncle has a Narcissistic Personality Disorder, even as she admits that every characteristic of that disorder applies to him. She essentially claims he is too complex to be labeled in that fashion. Having read her book I can understand how she would find it difficult to not include the impact of such a dysfunctional family. However for the rest of us, he is simply a dysfunctional President and NPD fits the bill.

Sure, it’s not inevitable. After all, Trump has to deal with his cowardice and there is no telling for sure in the end. He also could delude himself into thinking he could magically win, delusion and paranoia are later characteristics of NPD. Of course it didn’t work well for him in figuring the Corona Virus was just going to suddenly disappear, and that memory may linger.

I’d give better than even money that come late September or early October Trump will throw up his arms in “disgust” and walk off the set, not waiting to hear the words you’re fired. Ol’Mikey will become the shortest office holder in US history, beating out the previous record holder, Warren Harding, by 27 months. I’m sure they’ll get his picture up in at least one little Post Office in Indianapolis.

Don't Know Modern Monetary Theory? Buckle Your Seat Belt.

When I was born in 1950 the National Debt was $257 billion. Adjusted for inflation that amount in today’s dollars would be about $2.7 Trillion. Today that debt is nearly $27 Trillion (watch it run at Debt Clock ) almost exactly ten times the size.

I’ve spent nearly my entire life listening to politicians extol the value of balanced budgets, warn against debt passed onto future generations, and condemn social expenses deemed “welfare”.  Usually these efforts came from those considered “fiscally conservative” and they were a mantra for the Republican Party.

Liberal leaning Democrats have fumed over unpaid wars, special interest pork, and reductions in taxes for the very wealthy.

We have learned, and should know, that it’s never made a difference which political party had power in Washington. Only in 5 of my 70 years have there been budget surpluses (all under Democratic Administrations). Dealing with the “Great Recession” in 2009 the Obama Administration almost doubled the National Debt during his 8 years in office. Trump is getting ready to nearly double it again in his first 4 years, even though he and the Republicans were given a relatively healthy economy.

Given the erratic, embarrassing, upside down world of the Trump Administration, the Covid19 Pandemic, and the explosion of racial awareness you might think enough news is on your plate, and you’d generally be right. Still, have you stopped to think for a second that the trillions of dollars thrown at every problem that has surfaced seem a little different…a little unusual?

Your familiar Republicans, a’la Paul Ryan, who would rail against excess spending and fight to reduce revenues have been deafening in their silence, have they not? If you weren’t paying attention, this disappearing act has been going on since Obama left office, not just since the Pandemic hit. They’ll attack Democratic proposals for spending, which seem endless in their presentation, but go mute regarding the spin of the Debt Clock.

Actually the whole gang, Republicans and Democrats, have quietly entered us into a new era. They have for some time now adopted a new economic reality that embraces a new discipline known as Modern Monetary Theory. Our economic dingy has been launch on to virgin waters and there’s no telling where it’s going to end up.

To give a detailed explanation Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) would be no easier for the average citizen then to explain Keynes’ General Theory (1930s-70s) which focused on Government spending or the Monetarist Theories of Milton Friedman (free market determination of money supply) that followed Keynes. It is easiest just to present the practical application of MMT.

Both Keynes and Friedman argued that excessive increases in money relative to the supply of goods and services ultimately produced inflation.  MMT takes a different tact. MMT argues that there is no limit to the increase in money into the economy as long as the economy has excess capacity and inflation is at bay. Excess capacity is often referred as unemployment.

MMT claims taxes are not used to pay for government expenses; rather they are a tool for government to regulate the money supply.

The supply of money, as you may have been noticing, certainly since 2008 or before, is simply accomplished by the Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) creating instruments of debt (bonds). It is simply the way we have for decades printed up money without the necessity of paper. The accounting for this increase in money is what we fondly call the National Debt.

Andrew Yang knew this when he proposed his $1000 a month for every American. The left side of the Democratic Party (Bernie Sanders et al) have also embraced MMT with all their proposals. In neither case was the Theory presented along with their plans.  The Republicans have been no better with unfettered military spending and reductions in revenue.

Bottom line is that there is now no real ceiling to the National Debt nor any reason to reduce it. Perhaps when it is more than twice the Nation’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product), in another $20 Trillion or so, they might start to take a look at it.  As long as inflation is cool the spending in Washington will remain hot.

There is good thinking behind MMT, and in an economic petri dish it offers Government extraordinary fiscal power.  Fix the infrastructure, provide health care, or educate the populous, on the short list. However, there are so many variables (foreign currency markets, corruption, natural and manmade disasters, international conflicts and competition, and shortages to name a few) that our Economy seems to resemble the Starship Enterprise now that we’ve been freed from what we thought was gravity.

The takeaway I always come back to from my Econ education is that Economics is not an exact science, it’s a social science. Therefore, it is subject to the behavior of the people that lead and inhabit it. Science can eventually provide reasonable predictability about things like Pandemics and Climate Change, but Economic Theory can take us on a wild ride. I have some suspicion we’re one right now. All Economic theories work…until they don’t. Buckle up.

Sorry “Patriots”, the World Is About To Change…Again

Maybe I shouldn’t think what I do when I see a “Don’t Tread on Me” license plate or flag… probably not healthy…mentally speaking.

It’s not the historical misuse of the Gadsten Flag of 1775 that bothers me, given that flag had nothing to do with individualism or civil liberty. Not even that the symbol and phrase glorify aggression as a means to deal with irrational fears of insecurity, inferiority, and impotence (among others).

That it’s embraced nearly exclusively by Conservative, white men in America is somewhat troubling since it has been picked up, in many parts of the Country, like a baton from those who have had to let go of their “Stars and Bars”. The sound of dog whistles is deafening.

No, what truly bothers me the most when I see that license plate or the little flags attached to automobile side windows, or the banner proudly hanging from a front porch are my thoughts of the children of these “patriots” who are encouraged to have a world view of intractable inertia.

Hopefully, with a dollop of education, a spoonful of experience, and a squirt of empathy those children might live long enough to chuckle at their father’s paranoid antagonism, while simultaneously shaking their heads, possibly uttering the words “poor mom”.

65 percent of Americans today are under the age of 44. None of them have any idea what the world is like without packaging that has one or more levels of security and, I believe, don’t think anything of it. I, on the other hand, occasionally muse over those days when I could just unscrew a bottle of ketchup and pour it out, instead of surgically removing a band of hard plastic around the neck and then ever so slowly pry a sticky tag off the mouth of the bottle.

How long ago did that change take place…the 1960s, 1950s? No, it was actually in the 1980s, beginning September 1982 to be exact. One event, the unsolved “Tylenol Murders”, led to changes that impact every person in this Country, maybe the world.  Seven people died as a result of intentional product tampering. So do you think your Conservative-Libertarian lives are not going to be involuntarily adjusted after the deaths of more than a quarter-million people?

Everyone can speculate on what those changes will be, from access to healthcare to chest bumps, however let me suggest one thing that isn’t going away.

From now on you will never be able to enter a hospital without a face covering. That will probably also be true of clinics, doctor’s offices, physical therapy workplaces, and maybe even dental offices. Essentially anyplace that deals with health services. No telling where else masks might be mandatory, movie theaters, pharmacies, indoor school events…who knows?

Hopefully, it will become common practice for anyone who knows they are sick with a communicable illness, albeit minor (a cold, e.g.), to wear a mask where ever they go, as is already being done in much of the world.

So if you think that wearing a face covering labels you as a Socialist Liberal and violates your inalienable civil liberties…get over it, and get used to it. Just get ready to be carrying a mask around with you 24/7. Your fidelity to “individual patriotism” doesn’t work in a world that includes other people.

Your children or grandchildren will probably never think twice about putting on a face covering when and where appropriate, anymore than they question the security of their food or medicine. They may also never know how uninformed and thoughtless members of a free society could be. Now wouldn’t that be nice.