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A Wrong Purple Moment for Obama and Boehner -by Lanny J. Davis

Posted in Lanny J. Davis, Politics, Uncategorized, tagged , , on March 23, 2013| Leave a Comment »

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Purple Nation

March 22, 2013

A Wrong Purple Moment for Obama and Boehner

By Lanny J. Davis

http://thehill.com/opinion/columnists/lanny-davis/289453-a-wrong-purple-moment-for-obama-boehner

http://www.newsmax.com/LannyDavis/Purple-Obama-Boehner-budget/2013/03/21/id/495669

http://dailycaller.com/2013/03/20/a-wrong-purple-moment-for-obama-and-boehner/

I have been writing this “Purple Nation” column for a long time, waiting for the “purple moment” when President Obama and Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) would agree on an important position on the budget and deficits. Little did I know that when it finally happened, I would be disappointed, to say the least.

“We don’t have an immediate crisis in terms of debt,” President Obama told ABC “Good Morning America” host George Stephanopoulos, in an interview that aired March 13. “In fact, in the next 10 years it’s gonna be in a sustainable place.”

Then a day or so later, Boehner said he agreed with the president!

Instead of cheering this as a magic purple moment, I could only think of this metaphor, which I believe is apt: There’s a ticking time bomb in your living room, you know the bomb will certainly explode in 10-15 years, and you choose only to reassure your family, “There is no ‘immediate’ danger.”

That is pretty much the situation we face today. Here are a few scary facts:

According to a CNN report, the nonpartisan and highly respected Congressional Budget Office projects the national debt will continue to rise over the next 10 years by a total of $7 trillion. Recently, Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles pointed out that even if we were to accept the president’s budget proposals, and experienced an optimistic rate of growth over the next 10 years, the national debt would still be above 73 percent of gross domestic product by 2023 — a danger zone for most economists. And, they add, this scenario “leaves no margin of error if the economy grows slower, no wiggle room in case politicians are fiscally irresponsible in the future [shocking thought!], and no flexibility in case of a war, recession or natural disaster.”

According to Simpson-Bowles, at the current rate of spending and revenues, there will be sufficient tax revenues to be able to finance only interest payments on the debt, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Every other federal activity — from national defense to homeland security to transportation and energy — will have to be paid for with more borrowed money. Interest on the national debt could rise to nearly $1 trillion by 2020.

Talk about ticking time bombs: given that the baby boomer generation is already coming of age at 65 and older, if we do nothing to restructure the Social Security, there will be no money at all left in the trust fund 25 years from now. That means an immediate cut in benefits of more than 20 percent, affecting everyone today who is 40 years old, and for those who are younger, the cutbacks grow more and more severe.

Add to that the increasing cost of Medicare substantially above the rate of growth in projected revenues for the next 10 years, causing further combustion power to the ticking time bomb. Simpson reminds us that ten thousand Americans each day are turning 65 and that life expectancy is 78.1 years today, and in five years will be 80. “This is madness,” he says. “Who is kidding who? This will eat a hole through America.”

I have written in this space often that the run-up of the national debt in proposals made by the president and leaders of both political parties is the moral equivalent of the following: If you travel around the world, use credit cards to pay for all your airfares, hotels and fancy restaurants, return home after the trip and dump all the credit card receipts on your children’s laps and tell them to pay, that is downright wrong. And I say that the word immoral is the right word.

Why don’t the president and Boehner also agree that assuring today’s generation that there’s no “immediate” deficit crisis, while dumping our credit card bills on our children’s and grandchildren’s laps in the next 10-15 years, is wrong — plain immoral?

And why don’t they both announce support for passage of all the Simpson-Bowles Commission recommendations, supported by a bipartisan vote of more than 60 percent, including liberal Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin (Ill.) and Kent Conrad (N.D.) and conservative Republican Sens. Tom Coburn (Okla.) and Mike Crapo (Idaho)?

That would be the right thing to do, the moral thing to do, the purple thing to do.

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Davis, a Washington attorney and principal in the firm of Lanny J. Davis & Associates, specializing in legal crisis management and dispute resolution, served as President Clinton’s special counsel from 1996-98 and as a member of President Bush’s Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board from 2006-07. He currently serves as special counsel to Dilworth Paxson and is the author of the book, Crisis Tales: Five Rules for Coping With Crises in Business, Politics, and Life, that was published by Simon & Schuster on March 5, 2013.

www.lannyjdavis.com

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Hagel Must Address ‘Jewish Lobby’ Comment – by Lanny J. Davis

Posted in Daily Caller, Fox News, Israel, Lanny J. Davis, Newsmax, Politics, Purple Nation Solutions, The Hill on January 8, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Purple Nation

January 8, 2013

Hagel Must Address ‘Jewish Lobby’ Comment

By Lanny J. Davis

http://thehill.com/opinion/columnists/lanny-davis/275895-hagel-must-address-jewish-lobby-comment

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/01/08/hagel-owes-it-to-all-americans-to-address-jewish-lobby-comment/

http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/08/hagel-must-address-jewish-lobby-comment/

http://www.newsmax.com/LannyDavis/Hagel-Jewish-Lobby-Defense/2013/01/08/id/470522

I believe a president — Republican or Democrat — almost always deserves to have the Cabinet that he wishes, with the bar very, very high to oppose his choice. Thus, there should be heavy presumption that President Obama’s reported nominee for secretary of Defense, former Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, should be confirmed by the Senate.

Whether senators agree or disagree with Hagel’s past positions — on the Iraq war (for the authorizing resolution, then turned against the war), declaring the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a “terrorist organization” (against), engaging with Iran in negotiations more aggressively (for), engaging with Hamas in seeking a peace agreement in the Middle East (for) — these positions are known to the president, and he still has decided to nominate Hagel for the post.

In any event, President Obama’s policies will be carried out by the new Secretary Hagel, not former Sen. Hagel.

But: Hagel owes it to all Americans, not just to American Jews, to do more than apologize for use of the expression “Jewish lobby” in communicating his concern about its power.

He must understand, first, that there is a difference between Jews who support Israel and the “Israel lobby.”

To suggest that there is a “Jewish lobby” is not only inaccurate, it is highly offensive to the American Jewish community.

First, as to the inaccuracy of the expression, here are a few indisputable facts:

Fact: There are many, many non-Jews who support Israel.

Fact: Most Americans, Jews and non-Jews (polls consistently show over 70 percent nationwide) support Israel because they see it as being in the U.S.’s national-security interests to do so — and because Israel is a democracy like ours, committed to the legal protection of civil rights, gay rights and human rights, including the rights of the more than 1 million Palestinian Israeli citizens.

Fact: Some of the strongest supporters of Israel are among evangelical and conservative Christians.

Fact: There are many Jewish Americans, including this writer, who are sometimes critical of the Israeli government’s policies and who strongly support a two-state solution, consistent with Israeli security interests.

As to why so many American Jews are highly offended by Hagel’s use of the expression “Jewish lobby,” if he doesn’t understand its historical association with virulent anti-Semitism and the scurrilous libel of “dual loyalty” used by anti-Semites against Jews, then I would ask him the following question:

Have you ever used the expression the “Catholic lobby” when describing pro-life lobbyists? If you did, would you understand why Catholics would be offended by that expression — because many Catholics are pro-choice and would be offended for you to invoke an expression describing their religion rather than their views on the abortion issue? Do you recall how offended John F. Kennedy was at the notion that he would have dual loyalty as president — to America and to the pope — a charge JFK vigorously denied and considered to be emblematic of anti-Catholic bigotry?

So if Hagel is confirmed as Defense secretary — and as of now, I believe he should be — I hope he does more than make an apology on the use of the “Jewish lobby” expression (as he already has regarding his anti-gays-in-the-military comments in past years). He needs to show that he understands, first, why he is factually wrong to describe a “Jewish lobby”; second, he needs to show greater sensitivity to the American Jewish community because he understands that expression evokes anti-Semitism through the ages.

On policy, he should explain why he opposed describing the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization even though it is a matter of record that they have financed terrorist operations against civilians in Israel; and why he favors Israel’s negotiating with Hamas, despite Hamas’s refusal to renounce terrorism and the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state.

I believe Hagel is a decent man, with an outstanding record of integrity as U.S. senator and military service as a patriot. He should address his use of the “Jewish lobby” expression directly and candidly — not only to reassure American Jews but also to clear up doubts that could hinder his effectiveness as secretary of Defense.

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Davis, the principal in the Washington law firm of Lanny J. Davis & Associates, which specializes in legal crisis management, served as President Clinton’s special counsel (1996-98) and as a member of President George W. Bush’s Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (2006-07). He currently serves as special counsel to Dilworth Paxson and is a partner with former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele in Purple Nation Solutions, a public affairs-strategic communications company. He is the author of the forthcoming book Crisis Tales – Five Rules for Handling Scandal in Business, Politics and Life, to be published by Simon & Schuster. He can be followed on Twitter @LannyDavis.

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