Matt Yglesias

Right-Wing Echo Chamber Fomenting Panic About Fake Sino-Russian Global Currency Plan

Zhou Xiaochuan, head of China’s central bank, suggested earlier this week that we might need to transition away from exclusive reliance on the US dollar as a global reserve currency through the creation of a “super-sovereign reserve currency.”

I couldn’t possibly speak in detail about the merits of that proposal. But in a broad sense, the creation of the Euro, the integration of Russia into the global economic system, and the rising economic significance of China, India, and Brazil all argue toward the long-term adjustment of global economic institutions to a less dollar-centric dynamic. When these things were put into place, a large swathe of the world was Communist and not participating in its mechanisms, Europe was a land of many currencies, and the poor world was much poorer. Over time, things change. Meanwhile, a phrase like “super-sovereign reserve currency” is going to be confusing to most people. One thing political media and political leaders could do is try to explain it to people. Instead, as Ali Frick observes, Matt Drudge teamed up with Rep Michelle Bachman (R-MN), Glenn Beck, and Major Garrett to generate a massive freak-out about a U.N. conspiracy to create a “global currency” and “tie the entire globe together into one big government.” Check out TP’s video montage:

For any given insane freak-out, a majority of conservatives don’t happen to participate. But the non-participants don’t do anything to disavow their confrères doing the freaking-out. Some fuel anxiety about a mythical mag-lev train to Las Vegas. Others are now scaring people about a global currency. The other day, I saw Judd Gregg (R-NH) saying the United States was going to go bankrupt*, a hugely irresponsible step that no doubt isn’t making the Chinese feel any better. And almost nobody in the conservative media seems to feel that actually calming and informing their audience is part of their job.

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Judd Gregg’s Reconciliation Hypocrisy

Jon Cohn notes that Judd Gregg, recently seen whining that passing bills by majority vote is dictatorial, was all for the Bush administration’s efforts to use the reconciliation process to open the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge to exploitation by oil companies.

Of course, there’s only so outraged one can get about Gregg’s fake outrage. I argued back during the “nuclear option” fight that Democrats should try to use the moment to abolish the filibuster altogether. But it’s normal for partisans to flip-flop on the merits of minoritarian obstructionism when control of the Senate switches hands. Gregg is being a hypocrite and deserves to be called on it; media outlets who quote him complaining without noting that he’s a hypocrite are being irresponsible. But I save my personal outrage for the members of the majority party who are already hard at work finding ways to block a popular new president’s progressive agenda.

Gregg Slams Democracy as “Strong-Arm Tactics”

The country faces some large problems. Some of these problems the U.S. Senate may, but also may not, address through the budget reconciliation process that allows for majority rule. Since the congress is afflicted by a minority that seems dedicated to not working on these problems, there’s growing interest in using the reconciliation process. Judd Gregg is displeased:

Republicans are howling about the proposal to expand health coverage and tax greenhouse gas emissions without their input, warning that it could irrevocably damage relations with the new president.

“That would be the Chicago approach to governing: Strong-arm it through,” said Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), who briefly considered joining the Obama administration as commerce secretary. “You’re talking about the exact opposite of bipartisan. You’re talking about running over the minority, putting them in cement and throwing them in the Chicago River.”

Two things. One is that it’s not at all clear how “irrevocably damage[d] relations” would differ from the status quo. This is one reason, perhaps, why it’s not customary for a defeated minority to immediately move to a posture of relentless obstruction. By adopting such a posture, you give away a bargaining chip.

Second, the idea that passing legislation my majority rule is some kind of mafia stunt is absurd. This is how bills pass in the House of Representatives, in the parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada, in the state legislatures of the vast majority of American states. It’s how student council worked in my high school. It’s how New Hampshire town councils make decisions. You’re not talking about “running over” the minority, you’re talking about taking a vote in which the majority wins and the minority loses. That’s how we pick Senators! Judd Gregg doesn’t need 60 percent of the vote to stay in office.

Judd Gregg Thinks The Essence of America Is Wasteful Giveaways to Corporate Lenders

Judd Gregg (R-NH) hopes on the ignorant Francophobia bandwagon rather than dealing with the administration’s budget proposals on their merits:

The president’s budget also proposes to set us on a path to nationalize the health-care system at a huge cost, and, for good measure, it throws in nationalizing the ability of people to borrow to send their kids to college. It suggests that the best way to address climate change is to create a new national sales tax on everyone’s electric bills. And, at a time when millions of Americans are struggling to find jobs, it proposes taxing small businesses, our nation’s engine of job growth, at rate that could be seen as confiscatory.

In other words, the president’s proposal is a massive and breathtaking document, and it should not be called a budget. Rather, it should be called a blueprint for the France-ification of America, a notebook for nationalization, or a memo for massive debt creation. But a budget, by any sense of the word, it is not.

I’ve dealt with France comparisons in general elsewhere. On the specifics of student loans it should of course be noted that this isn’t really a policy concern in France since instead the universities receive more generous direct funding from the state and charge dramatically lower fees. And of course this is the typical system throughout the world, and hardly a unique aspect of the French social model. More broadly, Gregg’s being coy about his own policy preferences. Obama wants to have the government spend a certain amount of money doing direct loans to students. Gregg, by contrast, wants to preserve the status quo in which the same total amount of lending takes place, but the government spends more money because the government is spending it on subsidies to private lenders. I think it would be fine to have an honest debate between proponents of a truly free market approach to student loans, which would save the taxpayers money at the cost of worse-educated and more class-bound society, and between proponents of direct lending. It would even be fine to have an honest debate between proponents of direct lending and proponents of Gregg-style crony capitalism, in which costly subsidies are doled out to favored firms. But Gregg is trying to claim the mantle of the free market while also raking in the support from business that comes from a substantive position in favor of crony capitalism. It’s nonsense.

On the rest:

– What Obama thinks is that since carbon emissions are causing climate change, the best way to curb climate change is to charge the emitters for their emissions and use the funds to cut taxes on working- and middle-class people and on subsidies for clean energy. Does Gregg have a better idea?

– There’s no plan to “nationalize the health-care system at a huge cost” in Obama’s budget. There’s a plan to spend more money in the short-run on creating a more integrated, universally affordable system in which nobody will be forced out of private sector provision of either care or insurance, in order to better control costs in the long-run.

– Gregg is not enough of a liar to actually call Obama’s tax plans “confiscatory.” But he’s way too much of a liar to describe them honestly. There’s a plan to tax the richest Americans, including those very rich Americans who are very rich because of their small business income, but not including the overwhelming majority of small businessmen who aren’t rich, at the levels they were taxed at before George W. Bush came into office.

Long story short, he could have been a heck of a Commerce Secretary.

Judd Gregg Fail

It seems like the whole idea of appointing a Commerce Secretary who doesn’t support the President’s agenda didn’t work out so well.

A majority of the American public voted for Barack Obama and an even larger majority approves of the job he’s doing as President. That creates a pool of well over 100 million Americans from whose ranks Obama could reasonably appoint a Secretary of Commerce.

Judd Gregg

By Matthew Yglesias

Just a quick point on this. If I were a Republican United States Senator who was supportive of Barack Obama’s economic recovery agenda at a time when the vast majority of my colleagues seem inclined to obstruct it, I would feel that the U.S. Senate was a promising venue from which to advance that agenda. And if I wasn’t supportive of said agenda, I don’t think I would be inclined to serve in Obama’s cabinet.

Judd Gregg for Commerce?

Roll Call reports that Barack Obama might appoint Judd Gregg (R-NH) to be Secretary of Commerce. If that were to come to pass, I’m sure Senator Gregg’s unique qualifications for this crucial post would be the sole consideration. The fact that Gregg joining the cabinet would lead to Gregg being replaced by a Democratic Senator is surely something nobody in the White House would give even a moment’s consideration to.

If this scenario were to come to pass, it would sort of make me wonder why Gregg would want to make the switch. Being a United States Senator seems like a pretty good job to me. Commerce Secretary—eh? But tastes differ.