Will "Obama's U.S." work?
I take "Obama's U.S." to be a reformulated United States that operates on something close to the European model of social democracy, with huge outlays for a comprehensive package of Government-provided and -guaranteed social programs.
Question is, can this work? If not at current levels of U.S. productivity, can it work at some lower, but still satisfactory level? After all, when you travel to various European countries, you see what seem to be functional, affluent societies with a generally satisfied citizenry. Would that also describe "Obama's U.S."?
Maybe, but two things seem to me to converge in the United States' case to make that highly unlikely:
(1) Those European societies have accomplished what they have by running up enormous national debts that now overhang their economies and are unlikely to be paid off, ever. In other words, (a) social welfare spending has grown at a faster rate than national income, and (b) social welfare programs have become absolute entitlements, so no government can reduce, or even freeze, social welfare spending. That mentality has already become common, if not prevalent, in the U.S. as well.
(2) European societies have, so far, been able to avoid financial collapse by off-loading to the U.S. the large expenditures they would otherwise be making for what should be Europe's regional/global military responsibilities, including the defense of their own countries. Europe has prospered under a defense umbrella provided by two generations of American taxpayers. That the U.S. has, for various reasons of our own, encouraged and enabled this dependency does not change the resulting numbers. The European social welfare state could not have developed, and it could not be maintained at anything like its present level, if Europe had to pay for its own military needs, and for what should be its proper international military responsibilities.
In other words, Europe cannot afford to do both things, and they're smart enough not to try. But, in fact, it's far from clear that European countries can even afford the social democratic welfare state, all by itself.
The U.S. cannot afford to do both things any more than Europe can, so the obvious question about "Obama's U.S." is this one: "In order to free up the funds to create and maintain a European-style social welfare state, to whom does the U.S. off-load the costs of its enormous military commitments?"
What are the possible answers? On any reasonable accounting Europe can't step up in any significant respect, and it never will be able to, given its combination of economic and demographic problems. The beleaguered Euro, and perhaps the EU itself, will be lucky to survive the worsening financial crises in its four PIGS, Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Spain. No European government can survive any attempt to divert social welfare spending to military purposes; opposition parties would call for immediate elections, and that government would be quickly driven from office. Direct financial support of the U.S. military by Europeans is the non-starter of non-starters. Doing anything effective to improve their own forces would require the diversion of huge sums. European militaries are small and lack the transport capability necessary to project force over any distance, so European troops have to be ferried by U.S. aircraft. Only France has even one aircraft carrier, and it's never in working order. The vicious war/slaughter in the Balkans, in Europe's own territory, had to be quelled by the U.S., with the Europeans standing by in the role of coat-holders. British Royal Marines allowed themselves to be captured by Iranians, who put them on TV where they smiled for the cameras. Put to a referendum, a majority of Europeans would probably vote to restrict their militaries to domestic police operations or to eliminate their militaries altogether.
Japan's problems mirror those of Europe, with even less of a military, and a demographic collapse that can only be described as catastrophic, and which for cultural reasons will not be mitigated by immigration. China is also not a possibility for a host of reasons. And that leaves exactly nobody. The U.S. itself could shift large amounts of military spending to domestic social programs, but nobody with even a minimally realist view of the world could think that's a good idea, the Europeans and Japanese least of all. (Clinton used the military as a cash cow; we are still trying to dig out from that abominable experiment.)
If all that's more or less true, and I think it is, then I don't see how the European social welfare state can be replicated in the U.S. It seems to me that Obama is attempting the impossible, and the attempt will (a) bankrupt the country as we try to vastly increase social welfare spending and also maintain our military capabilities; or (b) greatly down-size our military, creating a vacuum in Eastern and Southern Asia, in the Mid-East and North Africa, and in Eastern and Southern Europe; or (c) both a and b. The U.S. keeps the lid on in those regions of the globe, at great expense, and our absence will quickly result in regional arms races, local wars, much-expanded Russian, Chinese, and Radical Islamist spheres of influence, and an array of unforeseeable genies that can't be put back in the bottle, because there will be no U.S. military around to put them back.
If that's true, and I think it is, then how can Obama's domestic policies be explained? Three possibilities come to mind: (1) Obama does not understand much of anything about international relations, especially about the role the U.S. military plays in those. He came into office expressing the view that the job of the Commander-in-Chief is to reason and cajole adversaries out of being adversaries. That has turned out to be a fiasco, of course, but Obama appears to maintain the illusory hope that military commitments can be replaced by a cost-free era of international good feeling, which will release all those funds for his social welfare agenda. (2) Obama does not understand much of anything about economics, especially about the role of markets as opposed to Government command. So he views the U.S. economy as a black-box, an mysterious engine of unlimited horsepower, a system so unconditionally productive that cannot be seriously or permanently impaired no matter how it is abused. This view is very common on the left, going back at least to Lenin. It's a strange, backhanded naive faith in capitalism that far surpasses anything found among capitalists themselves, who are very aware of how sensitive and reactive the system of market incentives is. (3) Both 1 and 2.
I think it's (3): Obama thinks he can establish a European-style social welfare state in the U.S. because he understands neither the military component of international relations nor the economics of wealth creation. Add Obama's ability to make impressive speeches and his control of Congress, and we have a president who is The Perfect Storm.
Byron
Question is, can this work? If not at current levels of U.S. productivity, can it work at some lower, but still satisfactory level? After all, when you travel to various European countries, you see what seem to be functional, affluent societies with a generally satisfied citizenry. Would that also describe "Obama's U.S."?
Maybe, but two things seem to me to converge in the United States' case to make that highly unlikely:
(1) Those European societies have accomplished what they have by running up enormous national debts that now overhang their economies and are unlikely to be paid off, ever. In other words, (a) social welfare spending has grown at a faster rate than national income, and (b) social welfare programs have become absolute entitlements, so no government can reduce, or even freeze, social welfare spending. That mentality has already become common, if not prevalent, in the U.S. as well.
(2) European societies have, so far, been able to avoid financial collapse by off-loading to the U.S. the large expenditures they would otherwise be making for what should be Europe's regional/global military responsibilities, including the defense of their own countries. Europe has prospered under a defense umbrella provided by two generations of American taxpayers. That the U.S. has, for various reasons of our own, encouraged and enabled this dependency does not change the resulting numbers. The European social welfare state could not have developed, and it could not be maintained at anything like its present level, if Europe had to pay for its own military needs, and for what should be its proper international military responsibilities.
In other words, Europe cannot afford to do both things, and they're smart enough not to try. But, in fact, it's far from clear that European countries can even afford the social democratic welfare state, all by itself.
The U.S. cannot afford to do both things any more than Europe can, so the obvious question about "Obama's U.S." is this one: "In order to free up the funds to create and maintain a European-style social welfare state, to whom does the U.S. off-load the costs of its enormous military commitments?"
What are the possible answers? On any reasonable accounting Europe can't step up in any significant respect, and it never will be able to, given its combination of economic and demographic problems. The beleaguered Euro, and perhaps the EU itself, will be lucky to survive the worsening financial crises in its four PIGS, Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Spain. No European government can survive any attempt to divert social welfare spending to military purposes; opposition parties would call for immediate elections, and that government would be quickly driven from office. Direct financial support of the U.S. military by Europeans is the non-starter of non-starters. Doing anything effective to improve their own forces would require the diversion of huge sums. European militaries are small and lack the transport capability necessary to project force over any distance, so European troops have to be ferried by U.S. aircraft. Only France has even one aircraft carrier, and it's never in working order. The vicious war/slaughter in the Balkans, in Europe's own territory, had to be quelled by the U.S., with the Europeans standing by in the role of coat-holders. British Royal Marines allowed themselves to be captured by Iranians, who put them on TV where they smiled for the cameras. Put to a referendum, a majority of Europeans would probably vote to restrict their militaries to domestic police operations or to eliminate their militaries altogether.
Japan's problems mirror those of Europe, with even less of a military, and a demographic collapse that can only be described as catastrophic, and which for cultural reasons will not be mitigated by immigration. China is also not a possibility for a host of reasons. And that leaves exactly nobody. The U.S. itself could shift large amounts of military spending to domestic social programs, but nobody with even a minimally realist view of the world could think that's a good idea, the Europeans and Japanese least of all. (Clinton used the military as a cash cow; we are still trying to dig out from that abominable experiment.)
If all that's more or less true, and I think it is, then I don't see how the European social welfare state can be replicated in the U.S. It seems to me that Obama is attempting the impossible, and the attempt will (a) bankrupt the country as we try to vastly increase social welfare spending and also maintain our military capabilities; or (b) greatly down-size our military, creating a vacuum in Eastern and Southern Asia, in the Mid-East and North Africa, and in Eastern and Southern Europe; or (c) both a and b. The U.S. keeps the lid on in those regions of the globe, at great expense, and our absence will quickly result in regional arms races, local wars, much-expanded Russian, Chinese, and Radical Islamist spheres of influence, and an array of unforeseeable genies that can't be put back in the bottle, because there will be no U.S. military around to put them back.
If that's true, and I think it is, then how can Obama's domestic policies be explained? Three possibilities come to mind: (1) Obama does not understand much of anything about international relations, especially about the role the U.S. military plays in those. He came into office expressing the view that the job of the Commander-in-Chief is to reason and cajole adversaries out of being adversaries. That has turned out to be a fiasco, of course, but Obama appears to maintain the illusory hope that military commitments can be replaced by a cost-free era of international good feeling, which will release all those funds for his social welfare agenda. (2) Obama does not understand much of anything about economics, especially about the role of markets as opposed to Government command. So he views the U.S. economy as a black-box, an mysterious engine of unlimited horsepower, a system so unconditionally productive that cannot be seriously or permanently impaired no matter how it is abused. This view is very common on the left, going back at least to Lenin. It's a strange, backhanded naive faith in capitalism that far surpasses anything found among capitalists themselves, who are very aware of how sensitive and reactive the system of market incentives is. (3) Both 1 and 2.
I think it's (3): Obama thinks he can establish a European-style social welfare state in the U.S. because he understands neither the military component of international relations nor the economics of wealth creation. Add Obama's ability to make impressive speeches and his control of Congress, and we have a president who is The Perfect Storm.
Byron
posted by Byron | Saturday, March 20, 2010
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