Pew has a report out on the media coverage of the four presidential and vice-presidential candidates, and discovers that John McCain has received the most negative coverage of the lot. 

Liberal media bias?  More like bandwagoning behavior, according to Pew: 

One question likely to be posed is whether these findings provide evidence that the news media are pro-Obama. Is there some element in these numbers that reflects a rooting by journalists for Obama and against McCain, unconscious or otherwise? The data do not provide conclusive answers. They do offer a strong suggestion that winning in politics begets winning coverage, thanks in part to the relentless tendency of the press to frame its coverage of national elections as running narratives about the relative position of the candidates in the polls and internal tactical maneuvering to alter those positions. Obama’s coverage was negative in tone when he was dropping in the polls, and became positive when he began to rise, and it was just so for McCain as well. Nor are these numbers different than those we have seen before. Obama’s numbers are similar to what we saw for John Kerry four years ago as he began rising in the polls, and McCain’s numbers are almost identical to those recorded eight years ago for Democrat Al Gore.

What the findings also reveal is the reinforcing — rather than press-generated — effects of media. We see a repeating pattern here in which the press first offers a stenographic account of candidate rhetoric and behavior, while also on the watch for misstatements and gaffes. Then, in a secondary reaction, it measures the political impact of what it has reported. This is magnified in particular during presidential races by the prevalence of polling and especially daily tracking polls. While this echo effect exists in all press coverage, it is far more intense in presidential elections, with the explosion of daily tracking polls, state polls, poll aggregation websites and the 24-hour cable debate over their implications. Even coverage of the candidate’s policy positions and rhetoric, our reading of these stories suggests, took on the cast of horse race coverage.

Tagged as: Mediasphere, politics

Posted by Dan     7 Comments »

Megan McArdle alerts us to the doings down Buenos Aires way: 

Hemmed in by the global financial squeeze and commodities slump, Argentina’s leftist government has seemingly found a novel way to find the money to stay afloat: cracking open the piggybank of the nation’s private pension system.

The government proposed to nationalize the private pensions, which would provide it with much of the cash it needs to meet debt payments and avoid a second default this decade….

Argentine President Cristina Kirchner said the move to take over the private pension system was aimed at protecting investors from losses resulting from global market turmoil. Funds in the system, which is parallel to a government pension system, are administered by financial firms. The private system has about $30 billion in assets and generates about $5 billion in new contributions each year.

While no one knows for sure what the government would do with the private system, economists said nationalization would let the government raid new pension contributions to cover short-term debts due in coming years.

Argentina’s financing needs are growing quickly as the global financial squeeze pushes down prices of its commodity exports, such as soybeans. Coupled with unchecked government spending, the commodity downturn has carved a gap of around $10 billion to $11 billion in what Argentina must pay on its debt between now and the end of 2009, according to economists. The payments are from debt restructured after a 2001 default and new debt issued locally….

President Kirchner painted the move as an attempt to help workers weather the financial crisis. The value of private retirement accounts in Argentina has probably fallen in recent months due to a declining stock market, economists say. President Kirchner said in a speech: “The main member countries of the [Group of Eight] are adopting a policy of protection of the banks and, in our case, we are protecting the workers and retirees.”

Buenos Aires economist Aldo Abram, among many other economists, wasn’t buying that argument. “They were in a tight situation and this was an accessible source of funds,” he said.

The United States government is very, very fortunate to be borrowing in its own currency. 

Tagged as: economics

Posted by Dan     5 Comments »

Bloomberg’s Jeff Bliss has a story about Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff warning that, “Terrorists may see the change to a new U.S. president over the next six months as a prime chance to attack.” 

That’s unsurprising but important news.  I think Bliss buried his lede, however: 

[H]e’s concerned about the effect of rhetoric from some hate groups or individuals during the campaign.

“There’s a general level of intemperateness in the discussion as we approach the election,” he said. “Do I worry that it could trigger in a disturbed individual a desire to do something? Absolutely, I worry about it.” (emphasis added). 

Gee, whichever campaign could Chertoff be talking about?  [UPDATE:  Ross Douthat points out that Chertoff should also be concerned about campaign artwork.]

And before all the Obama supporters get all giddy about this, let me add that I have some decidedly mixed feelings about this statement comming from the head of DHS.  Here’s my question:  in what way is Chertoff’s statement here different from the much-lambasted Ari Fleischer statement that, “Americans… need to watch what they say, watch what they do. This is not a time for remarks like that; there never is.”?  (on the disputed meaning of Fleischer’s remarks, click here and here.) 

To be fair to Chertoff, this is a quote from a reporter — I’d like to know everything he said on this question.  I guess my point is, that Chertoff might want to follow Fleischer’s advice. 

UPDATE:  Via Andrew Sullivan, this video suggests how the McCain campaign should be handling this sort of problem. 

Tagged as: Mediasphere, homeland security, politics

Posted by Dan     9 Comments »

Michael Crowley has a great analysis of the current state of play on polls and polling in The New Republic:  The most interesting detail is how SurveyUSA’s Jay Leve chooses who to record the firm’s automated poll questions: 

While most pollsters employ real people–sitting in call centers, wearing headsets–to gather data for them, Leve relies on these machines. His innovation is to get news anchors from local television affiliates in the areas he’s sampling to record scripts for him. A trusted anchor’s voice conveys that the call is “legitimate, authentic, civic-minded, and not a scam,” Leve says, and people are less likely to hang up on the call. (In return for their anchors’ services, the affiliates get to make use of Leve’s findings.) A SurveyUSA poll is like an airline’s automated customer-assistance system–press one if you support John McCain, press two for Barack Obama–except that you receive the call instead of placing it. With the raw results in hand, Leve will make some technical adjustments and write an analysis, which he will send to one of the more than 50 media outlets that commission his work and feature it in their print and television news stories. This sort of computerized polling is controversial–but also increasingly popular, thanks to its lightning speed and low cost. “Gallup might charge $10,000 and take four to five days,” Leve boasts. “We can do that in one night, for maybe a thousand dollars.”

Meanwhile Nate Silver provides a fair and balanced analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of all of the national tracking polls floating around. 

UPDATE:  Kevin Drum provides the most accurate prediction about exit polls you will ever read. 

ANOTHER UPDATE:  Sam Wang has an interesting post on the incentives of pollsters and media outlets who use them — but I think he’s exaggerating the phenomenon he describes. 

Tagged as: politics

Posted by Dan     5 Comments »

I have short essay up at TNI online that considers whether the United States is losing its leadership position in the global political economy.  Go check it out. 

Tagged as: U.S. foreign policy, international relations

Posted by Dan     5 Comments »

In the spring I wrote in The National Interest online about the GOP split between realists and neocons. 

Now, Ilan Goldenberg argues that the split is complete – because the realists have endorsed Barack Obama or endorsed his policies:

Consider this list:

• Colin Powell has endorsed Barack Obama.
• Richard Lugar, Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has endorsed Obama’s approach to diplomacy over that of McCain.
• Brent Scowcroft refuses to endorse either way.  Pretty telling for a former Republican national security advisor, especially since he was opposed to the war in Iraq.
• James Baker continues to support direct talks with Iran and has for the past two years. (Actually just read the entire five secretaries of state even transcript from CNN.  It’s one big endorsement of Obama’s foreign policy)
• Kissinger and Schultz are op-eds in the Washington Post and Financial Times calling for a more moderate approach towards Russia.
• Kissinger has also called for direct talks with Iran (At the Secretary of State level).
• Chuck Hagel has traveled to Iraq with Obama and while not publicly endorsing looks to be pretty clearly in favor of Obama.
• Secretary of Defense Bob Gates is giving speeches that sound a lot more like an Obama foreign policy than a McCain foreign policy.

The dirty little secret is that all of these pragmatic conservatives have more in common with Obama’s world view and that of the progressive community as a whole than they do with McCain and Neoconservatism.  Right now most of them are sticking with McCain because of old friendships and loyalties, a desire to stay out of politics, or because they are social and economic conservatives. 

But don’t be surprised if Powell’s endorsement will encourage more of these pragmatic foreign policy conservatives to come over to the Democrats over the next few years.  

But don’t be surprised if Powell’s endorsement will encourage more of these pragmatic foreign policy conservatives to come over to the Democrats over the next few years.  

Well…. the thing about that list is that everyone on it is pretty old.  And I’m not sure how many yonger realists there are on the GOP side. 

Hence the title to this post. 

Tagged as: U.S. foreign policy, politics

Posted by Dan     20 Comments »

Foreign Policy asked ten names who had time to answer “10 of the world’s top thinkers” to pick their dream foreign policy cabinet for the next administration.  A lot of the names are pretty silly, but what’s fascinating is that five of them recommended keeping Robert Gates on as Secretary of Defense. 

Not that anyone asked, but here would be my dream team for the next administration, based on all of five minutes of pondering:

• Secretary of State:  Bob Zoellick
• Secretary of Defense:  Robert Gates
• Secretary of the Treasury:  Tim Geithner
• National Security Advisor:  James Steinberg
• Director of National Intelligence:  Amy Zegart
• U.N. Ambassador:  Francis Fukuyama  Dennis Ross (dammit, forgot about him; hat tip to Pejman Yousefzadeh). 

Readers are invited to submit their dream team cabinets as well. 

Tagged as: U.S. foreign policy

Posted by Dan     29 Comments »

The principle of beggar-thy-neighbor is a pretty simple one in studying the international political economy.  The basic idea is that when times are tough, a national government chooses to enact policies that might boost its own domestic rate of growth — but it does so through policies that negatively affect other countries (yes, perhaps it should be called bilking-thy-neighbor instead, but there it is).  Examples include hiking up import tariffs or other trade restrictions, devaluing currencies, imposing controls on the outward flow of capital, and subsidizing exports. 

It’s generally accepted that a partial cause of the Great Depression — and a big reason why it persisted — was that the major economies of the day pursued beggar-thy-neighbor policies for most of the 1930’s.  It would be very, very, very, very, very bad if we saw a replay of such policies today. 

Why am I bringing this up?  Keith Bradsher’s story in today’s New York Times: 

The Chinese government has begun drafting tax and spending policies to stimulate the economy after third-quarter growth of 9 percent, the slowest pace since an outbreak of Sars in 2003….

As part of the new policy, the State Council announced that it would increase export tax rebates for everything from labor-intensive products like garments and textile to high-value products like mechanical and electrical products. Banks will be encouraged to lend more money to small and medium-size enterprises and support programs will be drafted to help farmers, the government said….

Increased export tax rebates will make Chinese exports even more competitive in the United States and Europe, particularly as China has intervened heavily in currency markets to halt any further appreciation of China’s currency since mid-June. But with the United States heavily dependent on China to buy the Treasury bonds needed to finance a bailout of the American financial system, the Bush administration has stopped criticizing China’s trade and currency policies.

To be fair to Beijing, other expansionary policies are being pursued.  Still, given the country’s strong fiscal position, and given China’s overreliance on export growth to fuel its job creation, I’m not sure that export tax rebates are the way to go here. 

I strongly encourage China-watchers to let me know if I’m overreacting. 

Tagged as: Uncategorized, economics, globalization, international relations

Posted by Dan     1 Comment »

I think Jane Mayer’s New Yorker essay on Sarah Palin was intended to be the shiv that finally does her in, but it had the reverse effect on me — and I’m no fan of the current Sarah Palin.  Compared to Noam Scheiber’s TNR essay, which showed Palin as someone hostile to elites and elite-y things like policy expertise, Mayer’s essay actually made me like Palin much more. 

Mayer reveals that Palin courted DC concervatives by hiring DC lobbyists and talking to Weekly Standard and National Review types when they came on Alaska cruises.  So, in other words — gasp! — Palin was ambitious and good at power-schmoozing. 

Meh. Ambitious politicians are not exactly unusual, and Palin’s ambition has never been a concern.   Her utter conviction that she already knows enough to become the leader of the free world, however, scares the living bejeezus out of me. 

Mayer’s article is a damning indictment, but not of Sarah Palin.  It’s the DC conservative cocktail circuit and John McCain who come off worse for wear.  Fred Barnes, William Kristol, Jay Nordlinger and Dick Morris come off as besotted teenagers suffering from Rich Lowry’s Syndrome.  They’re the ones who believed her to be ready to lead, and are now blaming McCain’s handlers and a hostile media for her crash and burn on the national stage.*

McCain, meanwhile, comes off as a follower and not a leader in his own campaign: 

By the spring, the McCain campaign had reportedly sent scouts to Alaska to start vetting Palin as a possible running mate. A week or so before McCain named her, however, sources close to the campaign say, McCain was intent on naming his fellow-senator Joe Lieberman, an independent, who left the Democratic Party in 2006. David Keene, the chairman of the American Conservative Union, who is close to a number of McCain’s top aides, told me that “McCain and Lindsey Graham”—the South Carolina senator, who has been McCain’s closest campaign companion—“really wanted Joe.” But Keene believed that “McCain was scared off” in the final days, after warnings from his advisers that choosing Lieberman would ignite a contentious floor fight at the Convention, as social conservatives revolted against Lieberman for being, among other things, pro-choice.

“They took it away from him,” a longtime friend of McCain—who asked not to be identified, since the campaign has declined to discuss its selection process—said of the advisers. “He was furious. He was pissed. It wasn’t what he wanted.” Another friend disputed this, characterizing McCain’s mood as one of “understanding resignation.”

With just days to go before the Convention, the choices were slim. Karl Rove favored McCain’s former rival Mitt Romney, but enough animus lingered from the primaries that McCain rejected the pairing. “I told Romney not to wait by the phone, because ‘he doesn’t like you,’ ” Keene, who favored the choice, said. “With John McCain, all politics is personal.” Other possible choices—such as former Representative Rob Portman, of Ohio, or Governor Tim Pawlenty, of Minnesota—seemed too conventional. They did not transmit McCain’s core message that he was a “maverick.” Finally, McCain’s top aides, including Steve Schmidt and Rick Davis, converged on Palin. Ed Rogers, the chairman of B.G.R., a well-connected, largely Republican lobbying firm, said, “Her criteria kept popping out. She was a governor—that’s good. The shorter the Washington résumé the better. A female is better still. And then there was her story.” He admitted, “There was concern that she was a novice.” In addition to Schmidt and Davis, Charles R. Black, Jr., the lobbyist and political operative who is McCain’s chief campaign adviser, reportedly favored Palin. Keene said, “I’m told that Charlie Black told McCain, ‘If you pick anyone else, you’re going to lose. But if you pick Palin you may win.’ ” (Black did not return calls for comment.) Meanwhile, McCain’s longtime friend said, “Kristol was out there shaking the pom-poms.”

I actually think Black’s assessment was correct, but surely someone as obsessed with honor as John McCain might have cared just a little bit about post-election governing, no? 

*One meme that I’ve seen forming in the past month is that Palin has done fine except for the Katie Couric interview, and that was only because Couric asked follow-up questions.  With all due respect, that’s a load of bull.  Her interviews with Gibson and Hannity were almost as bad as her Couric interactions.  Her debate performance wore thin after the first 15 minutes.  She’s committed a variety of smaller gaffes at her campaign rallies.  Between her convention speech and her Saturday Night Live appearance, almost every Palin action that a camera has recorded has not treated her favorably.  She’s been listed as a key reason for a string of conservative editorial board endorsements of Obama.  This cannot be chalked up to a few miscues.  Palin’s campaign performance has been an abject disaster. 

Tagged as: politics

Posted by Dan     11 Comments »

Some disturbing signs regarding the decline of American hegemony. 

On the one hand, it appears that George W. Bush is actually listening to European suggestions for holding a Big Conference.  The FT’s Demetri Sevastopulo explains:

President George W. Bush on Saturday announced his intention to host a summit of world leaders to deal with the financial crisis that has surged across the globe this year.

While the US has not been as convinced as European leaders for the need for a global summit, Mr Bush said he looked forward to convening a meeting in the “near future”.

Speaking at Camp David, where he was hosting Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, and Jose Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, Mr Bush stressed that while regulatory and institutional changes were necessary, it was “essential that we preserve the foundations of democratic capitalism”.

“We must resist the dangerous temptation of economic isolationism and continue the policies of open markets that have lifted standards of living and helped millions of people escape poverty around the world.”

The White House did not announce any details about when or where the summit would be held. One senior official said Mr Bush “wants participation and ideas from both developed and developing nations”.

Mr Sarkozy and Mr Barroso have been pushing for a global summit to tackle the financial crisis, and the French president has also called for a complete overhaul of the international financial system….

Before arriving in the US, the European leaders won backing from Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations’ secretary general. Mr Ban suggested the UN headquarters in New York as a possible venue for the summit, but the White House was also considering other locations.

Knowing what I know about the administration, my guess is that if the other locations being considered at the same level as the U.N. headquarters would be here, here, and here. 

Seriously, as I blogged last week, in the good ol’ days the U.S. would have completely stiff-armed this kind of suggesion from the French.  The fact that the administration is entertaining the idea means one of three things:

1. The U.S. is in a considerably weaker position than it was a decade ago;
2. The Bush administration is desperately trying to maintain its relevance;
3. The Bush administration is genuinely concerned that the financial slowdown will lead to a replay of beggar-thy-neighbor policies on trade and finance. 

I think it’s about 65% of (a), 25% of (b), and 10% of (c). 

Meanwhile, following up on last week’s canary, it appears that China has rebuffed Pakistan’s request fo a few billion: 

The thin results from the China trip were of little surprise to Western donors.

Asked about the likelihood of Pakistan winning the direct cash infusion it was seeking, a senior Chinese diplomat was reported by Western officials to have said, “We have done our due diligence, and it isn’t happening.”

So it looks like Pakistan will have to go to the IMF after all. 

Now you might think this is a sign that China is not as strong as people think.  I see it as a disturbing sign that China really seems to want to play the role of the United States during the early 1930’s.  I don’t think China’s is incapable of pitching in — I think they’re unwilling to do so. 

A declining hegemon with the willingness but not the capability to act as the global leader, combined with a rising power with the capability but not the willingness to act as a global leader, is a very scary combination. 

I suspect that the situation is not quite as dire as the 1930’s power transition, but it bothers me that I even have to go there.

Developing….

Tagged as: economics, globalization, international relations

Posted by Dan     14 Comments »