James Carville Unplugged

9 responses to “James Carville Unplugged”

1. 

   born1945

   Dec 4, 2009 at 4:24 am

   An insightful summary of some of our biggest problems… Thanks for posting this.

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2. 

   -fCh-

   Dec 4, 2009 at 4:37 am

   On the 3rd party, I think he sounds purposefully intriguing. Between Sarah Palin and Ron Paul we can imagine how the Reps get all the votes otherwise associated with some 3rd party.

   The best statement: (A) "If there is an answer, it is in this room. We have to become more productive. The real credit for the Clinton economic boom goes to an an enormous productivity spike. (B) If we are going to have another, it will come from you guys. Deep down inside, we have great young people, and we are the best in the world at innovation."
   I only wish politicos took the latter part (B) of such statements to heart, yet all the signs point to the fact that they do not. I would argue that Mr. Carville is not making most sense when talking about productivity (A). The concept itself is as old as capitalism, yet when we stopped increasing productivity organically we started off-shoring. Good short term fix, not so good anymore.

   What happened during Clinton had been premised by colossal investments in ages prior. In other words, I’d contrast systemic productivity problems to one-off type of events.

   At a more fundamental level, we’d have to answer something like: Do we look for one-time fixes, or try for more?

   Carville’s suggestion to better organize (following some singular example) shows again that politicians in DC don’t know/care about VCs. Otherwise, they’d have done something by now to, say, alleviate the effects of SOX on exit strategies and such.

   Last but not least, Mr. Carville’s takes on China and Afghanistan are rather indicative for how far he is from the center of power. We could figure all those on our own, the real question is why do actors behave as they do in spite of such considerations?

   Thank you for sharing!

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3. 

   Jonathan Ruff

   Dec 4, 2009 at 6:21 am

   Interesting to apply Carville’s flawed argument on health insurance to life insurance. Force those who don’t need life insurance, to pay for the life insurance of those who do need it. You see, at 24, you don’t need life insurance; at 50, or at 65 you "need" life insurance, but it’s a lot more expensive to acquire it at that point. Clearly the solution is to force everyone under the age of 50 to pay for the life insurance for those over the age of 50. IE Those under 50 should have been forced to pay for my now deceased mother’s non-existent life insurance policy circa 2002. That concept is called slavery and it’s pure evil: it’s the idea of enslaving one person to another person’s life context, choices, circumstances, and "needs." The USSR tried that, but hey, we’ll just try it in a less extreme form, it won’t evolve into anything more evil than the initial, supposed, good intentions. I think pretty much all Americans realize we’ve been gradually melting down for decades as a society, slowly ripping apart and going bankrupt; it’s not a coincidence that that has coincided with the move from Capitalism to Socialism. The melting pot only worked because of the freedom courtesy of Capitalism (which is why Europe can’t integrate its Muslim populations; they’re feeding off the welfare state, rather than integrating). It’ll accelerate the further we get away from the free market. It’s a moot point anyway, this is all a joke: the country is bankrupt already, the debate is just about momentary plunder of the remaining scraps.

   There’s no stronger moral argument for health insurance than there is for life insurance. Having lost both of my parents at a relatively young age I know this for a fact. Try selling the premise however, of forcing people who don’t need life insurance to pay for other people’s life insurance, it’s hyper illogical and will fail financially regardless as socialism / statism always does ultimately.

   How about we apply the concept to other supposed needs. I need car insurance, others must be forced at gun point to pay for my car insurance. How else can I hold a job or be successful in life without a vehicle? It’s a clear necessity.

   Public works, statism and entitlements have rotted every great civilization, we’ll be no different given the current trajectory. It’s a simple extrapolated calculation. Global statism has pushed debt to GDP ratios off the charts in the first world, while countries like China and India with little to no ‘social net,’ are rapidly accelerating past the dying old world that has become filled with lazy entitlement monsters.

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4. 

   ideastoday

   Dec 4, 2009 at 10:22 am

   The Congress is having to raise the the debt limit to what, $13 trillion? We have a federal government that expands almost without limit regardless of the condition of the overall economy. Economy showing healthy growth? Government grows faster. Economy grows slowly? Government grows faster. Economy contracting? Government expands anyway, faster than ever. Debt be damned, we’ll pay for it another day. We now just assume that the debt will grow endlessly. How is that possible?

   "If there is an answer…we have to become more productive." I’d say so, to pay for federal spending, present and past. We’re already very productive. What if a productivity spike to rival the internet boom doesn’t come around anytime soon? Carville’s only answer to the problem of unsustainable federal spending is to raise taxes. Ok. But to what level would you have to raise taxes to cover spending at current levels and $13 trillion in debt? And what sort of economy do you have left at that point?

   Increasingly, it looks like our big plan is to spend all we can get our hands on, kick the can down the road, and hope for a miracle that will save us from ourselves. This is the best leadership we can come up with?

   To paraphrase Carville, it’s the spending, stupid!

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5. 

   born1945

   Dec 4, 2009 at 4:30 pm

   Jonathan Ruff, I hate to throw cold water on your ranting about insurance, but your level of under standing of insurance does not even come up to sophomoric. Statistical evidence shows that we can predict quite closely the number of "losses" that will occur within a large sample of "risks."

   Take automobile insurance for example. We know that younger drivers have more accidents than older people. The risks associated with insuring young drivers is higher than those associated with insuring older drivers. Therefore insurance companies charge more for the premiums for younger drivers. Because of the social consequences of automobile accidents we as a society have chosen to require all drivers to have auto insurance. And auto insurance requirements have become more complicated over the years. Now we insure not just the physical vehicle; but we provide liability coverage, personal medical coverage, un-insured and under-insured coverage.

   Compare this to home-owners insurance. Here, if you have a mortgage, your lender requires you to provide insurance on the building that is your home. This is to protect their interest. And, like auto insurance, homeowner’s insurance has grown in complexity. When you buy a policy, you get coverage for the building, detached buildings (a shop or a garage), and for your contents. You also get coverage for the extra expenses incurred as a result of a loss (a hotel room while your home is being repaired). Coverage has gone from “named perils” to “all risk” give very broad coverage.

   Now compare your auto premium to your homeowner premium. I think that you find it costs the average person the same to cover one car as it does to insure a home.

   Life insurance has many uses. The most common is for your survivors to receive money in the event you die. But there are many other persons and entities that could suffer a loss, a financial loss, if you were to die. Actors doing a movie; business partners, especially in small firms; etc. Also, farmers and others use life insurance for their descendants to pay for estate taxes. The older you get the more likely you are to die. So certain kinds of life insurance increase their premiums as you get older. If you buy “Whole Life” as a young person, however, your premium generally will remain the same throughout your life. The statistically tables governing life insurance premiums are Very accurate, so life companies can set their premiums with a great deal of confidence.

   Now to Health Insurance. Once upon a time, health insurance operated like life insurance, that is, the underwriters could set premiums with confidence. This is no longer the case. Health maintenance has become very expensive for a myriad of reasons. The entire industry has become so politicized as respects insurance coverage and premiums that a whole new set of rules must be created. That is what our politicians are trying to do. And because it is a political issue, there is controversy, lots of it. The House Bill that was recently passed had about 1900 pages. Much of it had nothing to do with insurance.

   I feel as though I have no control over this process other than the officials I help to elect. You don’t either, so you are frustrated. Let’s hope our elected officials can put together a package and that it will be better than what we have now. I think it has be come a “right,” like many other of our daily things, to have access to medical treatment and a way to pay for it. No one wants any person or family to suffer financial loss because of cost associated with medical issues. Let’s hope our officials keep this in mind as they do their work.

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6. 

   Ned Trifle

   Dec 4, 2009 at 6:41 pm

   But if unemployment is over 10%, the incumbent will not win.

   What happens if it’s not?

   Obviously a long time between then and now, but let’s look on the bright side, eh?

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7. 

   ideastoday

   Dec 4, 2009 at 9:18 pm

   Anyone feeling optimistic about health care would have to disregard the federal government’s most recent attempt at reform. Look at Medicare Part D, one of the unsung debacles of the Bush administration, passed in 2003. Here was a plan that was supposed to cost $400 billion. But the cost estimate was revised to $1.2 trillion within 12 months of passage. Yes, that would be a 300% increase. No one knows what it will actually cost, of course.

   The bill set up a system that is the worst of government intervention coupled with the worst of free enterprise. Drug companies get to charge whatever they like for medications, the government has no power to negotiate price, and the American taxpayer is on the hook for the grand total.

   Keep those experiences in mind next time some one throws out numbers on the cost of the new legislation. The truth is, no one knows what reforming the whole system will cost. What we do know is that whatever it is, the American taxpayer will once again be on the hook. Most likely, the cost of rebooting the whole system will make the billions spent on Medicare Part D look like a rounding error.

   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9328-2005Feb8.html

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8. 

   jurvetson

   Dec 4, 2009 at 10:33 pm

   Ned – Yes, that was his point actually….. We have to hope if isn’t 10+%

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9. 

   sbove

   Dec 5, 2009 at 2:07 am

   Thanks so much for posting these comments. Carville is a badass. And you are wise to know and learn from him.

   Reply