Anything Smart

Monday, July 1, 2019

Hearing the Falconer #54 ~ 1-July-2019 ~ Jay Inslee on Building the Future

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world....
from The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats, 1919

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

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1-July-2019
Jay Inslee on Building the Future
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Welcome to Hearing the Falconer. This blog promotes independent thinking and political moderation. It also recommends good books that can help you sharpen your thinking skills and think through your own moderate political philosophy. It is smart, independent, moderates who will save the world! Let's get to work!

Washington State Governor Jay Inslee announced his run for president on March 1, 2019 from a solar power facility in Seattle, Washington.

Jay says his top priority will be climate change, which he calls “the greatest threat to our existence.”

He has a good resume:

He got a degree in economics and then a law degree.
He served in the Washington State House of Representative from 1989-1993.
He was in the US House of Representatives from 1993-1995 and then again from 1999-2012.
In 1996 he worked with the US Department of Health and Human Services under President Clinton.
Since 2013 he has been the governor of Washington State.

During his time in the House, Jay voted for the Federal Assault Weapons Ban opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq and voted for Obamacare.

As governor, Jay legalized gay marriage put a moratorium on executions and promoted apprenticeship programs.

Jay was also the first governor to oppose Trump's Muslim ban so he is used to fighting against the current president which he will be doing in 2020 if he wins the nomination.

As president Jay has promised he will

increase the minimum wage
strive for 100% clean energy by 2035
legalize marijuana
expand background checks for gun purchases
ban assault weapons
and create millions of good paying jobs based on clean energy.

As a moderate Democrat I like Jay's focus on climate change, but especially the way he ties it to creating new and good jobs and growing our economy. I think that can be a winning strategy for Democrats in 2020.

Near the the end of his speech Jay says “we do not fear the future, we BUILD it!” That's a good line. I hope all Democrats will support this message of working on climate change in a smart and responsible way that will also increase prosperity for ALL Americans.

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The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers and Political Moderates

If you want to support Hearing the Falconer please click on the book links in this post and make a purchase. These are excellent books that will help you sharpen your independent thinking skills and build your own moderate political philosophy AND, Hearing the Falconer will earn a commission. Thanks for visiting, and thanks for your support!

Washington: A Life

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

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Monday, June 24, 2019

Hearing the Falconer #53 ~ 24-Jun-2019 ~ Amy Klobuchar Starts Her Run

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

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24-June-2019
Amy Klobuchar Launches Her Campaign
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On Sunday, February 10, 2019, U.S. Senator from Minnesota Amy Klobuchar stood in swirling snow and announced she is running for President. Remarkably, she is now the fifth woman running for the White House in this 2020 campaign.

I saw an interview later where Klobuchar joked about the snow: she said it looked like she was aging during her speech as her hair got whiter and whiter.

I have heard a pundit say there should have been some sort of roof over Klobuchar, but others have said that standing in the snow showed her strength and determination. I think the latter is true, especially since she is competing for the chance to run against a man who once canceled a trip to a veteran's cemetery because of rain.

The crowd waved solid red "Amy" signs or solid blue "Amy" signs as the new candidate said she is running "for every parent who wants a better world for their kids" and promised that she is "running for every American."

One of the themes of the announcement was restoring democracy and Klobuchar called on the American people to "organize, galvanize, and take back our Democracy." She described her plans to:

Automatically register young people to vote when they turn 18,
Restore the Voting Rights Act, and
Push for a Constitutional amendment to reverse the Supreme Court's Citizen's United decision so we can get "dark money" out of politics.

Another theme of the speech was protecting the environment and Klobuchar promised that within her first 100 days in the White House she would:

Restore clean power rules,
Restore gas mileage standards, and
Invest in green jobs and infrastructure
And, she also promised that on "day 1" she would rejoin the International Climate Agreement the current President has pulled the United States out of.

On the themes of technology and jobs Klobuchar promised to:

Promote new rules to protect privacy on the internet
Promote net neutrality
Promote the training of workers for new jobs with a focus on certificates and two-year degrees
And, most dramatically, the candidate called for having every household in America connected to the internet by 2022.

Turning to health and safety Klobuchar outlined plans to:

Allow safe drugs from other countries to be sold in the United States
Lift the ban that currently prevents Medicare from negotiating cheaper drug prices
Require universal background checks for gun purchases
And, in another big move, Klobuchar called for universal healthcare.

In simultaneous nods to fiscal responsibility AND populism the candidate called for bringing down the national debt by closing tax loopholes for the wealthy while still making it easier for workers to afford childcare, housing, and education.

There was not much about foreign policy in this speech but, in a statement that also poked the current president, Klobuchar promised to respect our troops, our diplomats, and our intelligence officers by not running her foreign policy with tweets.

One of the closing remarks sounded like a very good over-arching theme for Klobuchar's campaign right at the beginning: "We all live in the same country of shared dreams."

It was a good announcement. Let's see how Senator Amy Klobuchar holds up in the political battles to come.

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The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers and Political Moderates

Washington: A Life

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

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Friday, June 21, 2019

Hearing the Falconer #52 ~ 21-Jun-2019 ~ Marianne Williamson's Announcement Speech

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

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21-June-2019:
Marianne Williamson Announces She is Running for President
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Marianne Williamson has had a very successful career as a lecturer and writer on self-development and spirituality topics. She has written 13 books, 7 were best-sellers, and 4 were #1 bestsellers.

She has also been involved in charitable work. Perhaps most notably with Project Angel Food which prepares meals for people too sick to prepare them for themselves.

In 2014 she ran unsuccessfully for Congress arguing that “humanitarian values should replace economic values as the ordering principle of our civilization.” I am not sure exactly what Williamson means by this. As a moderate Democrat, however, I believe that we need the powerful tools of free-market capitalism to create products and services and jobs and wealth, BUT we need those tools to be harnessed to the task of helping us achieve the humanitarian values that will ensure good lives and good societies all over the world. If that is what she means, I agree with her 100%.

Williamson announced her campaign for president on January 28, 2019. In her announcement speech she presents some good ideas, and she asks some important questions.

She speaks about the people we celebrate for escaping from poverty but then asks, why are there so may people who NEED to escape from poverty?

She argues that companies cannot be driven SOLELY by profit but also by ethical values and a sense of service to their employees and their communities.

Williamson supports universal healthcare and a $15 minimum wage. These proposals will help to reduce the economic despair that is leading to the authoritarian populism that is already on the rise in the United States.

She supports the Green New Deal and paying reparations for slavery. She actually promotes a version of reparations that could work: set aside $100 billion to be spent as black leaders feel will be most helpful in ameliorating the effects of slavery and racism.

Williamson wants to see “a new era of love for Democracy.”

I like Marianne Williamson. I think she is a good person who has done good things in her life and has had a successful career. I think she has good ideas about the problems America faces and about how to solve those problems.

Regretfully, I think we need a president with more political and government experience than Marianne has. But I think we also need a president who will LISTEN to Marianne, and LEARN from Marianne, and make sure Marianne is offered an important position in the next Democratic administration so she can do more to help is build a better America for the future.

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The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers and Political Moderates

Washington: A Life

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

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Monday, June 17, 2019

Hearing the Falconer #51 ~ 17-June-2019 ~ Kamala Harris's Announcement Speech

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

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17-June-2019:
Kamala Harris's Announcement Speech
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Kamala Harris's announcement speech seems to move through several themes as it progresses from section to section.

In the first section she talks about her career as a prosecutor and the theme is “No one should be left to fight alone.”

She talks about bankers who caused great economic harm as having an “arrogance of power.” She says she helped to pass one of the strongest anti-foreclosure laws in the country in California.

In the second section of the speech Kamala talks about the question “Who are we as Americans?” and her answer is “We are better than this!”

In this section she opposes some of the positions the current administration has taken such as:

bullying the free press,
separating children from their parents at the border,
attacking public schools,
working against universal healthcare,
and blaming immigrants for all our problems.

In the third section of the speech, Kamala focuses on the theme of truth. She says, “Seek truth, speak truth, fight for the truth.”

In this section she makes the very important point that we need unity, but we cannot use the word “unity” as a code word for stopping oppressed minorities from demanding their rights.

She makes the point that when we help people who have been held back, we are really helping everyone. In her most dramatic statement of this principle she says, “When we lift up the women of our country, we lift up the children of our country, we lift up the families of our country, and the whole of society benefits.”

Kamala calls for Medicare for all because healthcare is a fundamental right and also calls for debt-free college because education is a fundamental right. As a moderate Democrat I think this goes a little too far. We should aim for affordable healthcare and affordable college because that will benefit society. I don't think we should try to guarantee healthcare and college as fundamental rights, but we should try to make them affordable and help people who need help getting ahead.

Harris closes her speech with a couple of simple statements: “I will treat all people with dignity and respect” and “I will speak the truth.” It is a powerful testament to the dysfunctional times in which we live that these relatively bland promises come off sounding like a call for revolution!

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The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers and Political Moderates

Washington: A Life

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

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Friday, June 14, 2019

Hearing the Falconer #50 ~ 14-June-2019 ~ Should We Impeach Trump? **

The middle of the road is all of the usable surface.
The extremes, right and left, are in the gutters.
Dwight D. Eisenhower

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14-June-2019:
This article makes the case for impeaching Trump: should we do it?
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If we just want to impeach every president we don't like, or every president we disagree with, that is too extreme in one direction.
If we think it is NEVER right to impeach a president that is too extreme in the other direction.
How can we find a smart and moderate position on impeachment?

Strictly speaking, there is only one thing we NEED to impeach: a majority of the votes in the House of Representatives. So that is our first rule for a smart and moderate position: to impeach you need the votes in the House. That rule comes straight out of the Constitution.

But even if we have the votes in the House we should not impeach unless there is some good reason to impeach. The Constitution requires a “high crime or misdemeanor.” It is the House that decides if there is a high crime or misdemeanor but they should make this determination carefully and in good faith. Impeaching a president for trivialities would weaken our country, and it would also be unconstitutional.

Our third consideration is, do we have enough votes in the Senate to remove the president from office after he has been impeached? Obviously, the House can impeach the president even if there are no votes for removal in the Senate, but SHOULD they?

An impeachment is like an indictment and the Senate proceedings are like a trial. Should we indict someone if there is no chance they will be found guilty? Most people would say no. I think we should follow that same rule here, don't impeach unless there is a reasonable chance the president will be removed by the Senate.

Our final rule should be to have the support of the people. Just as we should not go to war without a majority of the people behind us, so, we should not attempt to impeach and remove a president without a majority of the people behind us. This is not a legal or Constitutional requirement but I think we should not do something so extreme as removing a president without showing respect for the will of the people the government is supposed to serve.

So those are the four rules I propose for a smart and moderate position on impeachment:

You must have the votes in the House.
You must have a high crime or misdemeanor.
You must have a reasonable chance the Senate will remove the president.
You must have the support of a majority of the people.

Now if we apply these rules to the current problems with Trump, what do we find?

I believe we do have a high crime and misdemeanor in the Trump case. Mueller was appointed to investigate real and serious crimes of Russian interference in the 2016 election. These crimes included hacking into American computers, and these crimes resulted in the indictments of several Russians. As the American people saw on the news almost every day during the investigation, and as Mueller documented in his final report, Trump repeatedly tried to interfere with the investigation of these real and serious Russian crimes. That interference by the president, that obstruction, is a high crime.

So we have the high crime now, but we still do not have the votes in the house to impeach, we still do not have the votes in the Senate to remove, we still do not have the support of the people for impeachment and removal.

For those of us who believe Trump's high crime SHOULD result in his removal from office what we have to do now is PERSUADE.

We have to persuade the House to vote for impeachment.
We have to persuade the Senate to vote for removal.
We have to persuade the American people to support the impeachment and removal of the president.

And if we can't do that, we have to persuade the American people to vote him out of office in 2020.

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The "Hearing the Falconer" Library

Books for Independent Thinkers and Political Moderates

Washington: A Life

Moderates: The Vital Center of American Politics, from the Founding to Today

The Three Languages of Politics: Talking Across the Political Divides

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