A Nobel Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste

Jude Hammerle

On October 13, 2008, it was announced that Mr. Paul Krugman would receive the Nobel Prize in Economics. Mr. Krugman is the author or editor of 20 books and more than 200 papers in professional journals and edited volumes. His professional reputation rests largely on work in international trade and finance; he is one of the founders of the “new trade theory,” a major rethinking of the theory of international trade. [1]

On November 3, 2008, one day before the most anticipated presidential election of my lifetime, the same Paul Krugman authored an op-ed article for the New York Times, in which he speculated that the representatives of the Republican party likely to remain in both Houses of Congress–the “Republican Rump”–would be even more conservative than the current composition of the party, and as a result “the G.O.P.’s long transformation into the party of the unreasonable right, a haven for racists and reactionaries, seems likely to accelerate as a result of the impending defeat.” [2]

For what it’s worth, I saw Mr. Krugman’s piece as just more partisan gibbering, another wasted page in a tiresome tale called Democrats v. Republicans.

Democrats v. Republicans is the sad melodrama that has been forced on us by our increasing failure to compete effectively on the world stage. We have a natural compulsion to compete, and when no suitable global competitive diversion exists, we compete among ourselves.

While I’m not a Nobel Prize economist, I understand that part of the job of a lawmaker is to protect the rights of his/her State and its residents, and that these rights sometimes do conflict with the rights of other States and their residents. That said, another important part of the legislator’s job is to work with colleagues from other States when the national interest calls for it. Right now, the national interest is calling at the top of its lungs, yet we continue to dwell on the small picture, the partisan picture, because it is easier to understand.

It disturbs me that a Nobel Prize winner, especially one whose specialty is exactly the international marketplace in which the United States must immediately improve its performance, is wasting his time on this glorious day of days prattling on about the comparatively petty nonsense of politics. I think even Paul Krugman would concede that he is a better man than this, and that it will be a shame if his article of today is remembered as nothing more than a first salvo in the tyranny of a new majority.

This is not an excerpt from How Sex Sells: The Persuasive Power of Identity (a work in process), but it covers the same ground: the sweeping implications of the human compulsion to compete.

                                                               

[1] This brief bio is taken verbatim from the NY Times website: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/opinion/editorialsandoped/oped/columnists/paulkrugman/index.html?inline=nyt-per

[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/03/opinion/03krugman.html?hp

Your Candidate is Not Qualified

Jude Hammerle

 

There are three types of president.

 

The first learns to be president during his term in office (Lincoln, FDR, Truman, Ike, LBJ). The second learns in office, then forgets (Nixon, Reagan, Bush 41, Clinton, Bush 43). The third never learns (Harding, Hoover, Carter).

 

No president has ever been truly qualified for the presidency at his first inauguration, and either John McCain or Barack Obama will continue this glorious tradition of first-day incompetence. How could either be prepared? There is no job comparable, and no living president who did it right to draw wisdom from.

                       

This means that Election ’08 is not about preparedness; it is about the ability to learn.

 

A smart person once told me that people don’t care how smart you are, they only care that you care about them. I’ll go a step further: there is precious little sex to be had at Mensa meetings. Barack Obama is very smart. If he persists in reminding us of this fact, he will lose Election ’08, bad economy or good.

 

A political sign or bumper sticker is like a fancy house or a tattoo or a buff bod or an “I’m with Stupid” t-shirt with the arrow pointing up. Each is a badge of identity—a means we use to brand ourselves. There are exactly four voter identities, and smart is not one of them. If a voter puts a bumper sticker on his/her car it is because he/she believes it makes him/her look Normal, Affluent, Strong or Fun.

 

In the Vice Presidential debate of 10/2/08, Governor Sarah Palin struck at Senator Barack Obama’s ability to embody Strong by suggesting that he is too young and inexperienced to govern. Senator Joe Biden struck even more mightily at Senator John McCain’s claim to Strong, by tying McCain so tightly to the weak policies of President George W. Bush that one needed a crowbar to separate the two. To his great credit, Biden did what Obama should have done in the first debate, and must do in the next debate.

 

In other words, given that Election ’08 is about the ability to learn, step one for Barack Obama is to prove that he has learned from Joe Biden.

 

 

 

 

How Your Candidate Will Win in 2008

Jude Hammerle

Election 2008 will be decided in the same manner as the Bush-Gore nailbiter of 2000. The candidates’ showings in a handful of battleground states will determine the winner, possibly by the narrowest of margins.  

In Election 2000, a Normal near-incumbent, Vice President Al Gore, squared off against a rebel challenger, Governor George Bush. The current election is a tale of two rebels. The most Normal Democrat, John Edwards, and most Normal Republican, Mitt Romney, effectively disappeared from contention by July 1, 2008.

The Republican nominee, Senator John McCain, embodies the Affluent voter identity, as every Republican candidate has since Ronald Reagan.

The Democratic nominee, Senator Barack Obama, has a hold on the Fun voter identity, by virtue of his youth and the youth of his supporters.

Obama’s tense but convincing victory in the Democratic winnowing process resulted primarily from a miscalculation by Senator Hillary Clinton. Her connection to the Strong/Affluent voter identity, a circumstance of her tenure as First Lady, limited her ability to represent change in the minds of voters, and she did too little to correct this shortcoming.

The competitive dynamics of the general election mirror those of the Clinton-Obama preliminaries, but are even more clearly cut. The Normal voter identity remains diminished by the unpopularity of the present administration. Obama controls the Fun identity, while McCain controls Affluent. Given these circumstances, the key perceptual battle in the general election will be for control of the Strong voter identity in the battleground states.

In terms of their rhetoric and command of facts, McCain and Obama are equally Strong. In terms of their resumes, McCain is considerably more Strong than Obama. The fulcrum of this election lies in the realm of physical identity. Specifically, the key fact in the campaign is that Obama’s physical identity is profoundly Strong, while McCain’s is profoundly weak.

At 72, John McCain would be our oldest first-term President, nearly a year and a half older and considerably less vigorous in demeanor than Ronald Reagan on their respective days of inauguration. By contrast, at 47 Obama would be our fourth-youngest President, just a few days older than Bill Clinton on the day he took office. 

In order to win, McCain must turn Obama’s youth and enthusiasm against him. In their debate of 9/26/2008, McCain did precisely this, repeatedly invoking images of Obama’s presumed naivete and need for on-the-job training. McCain also boasted of his world travel and frequent liaisons with modern, relevant political and military leaders, and reminded voters that Obama lacks similar esteem.

For his part, Obama’s core challenge is to invalidate McCain’s experience by asserting that he is the product of a past that is no longer relevant, a noble old soldier whose time to fade away has come. Obama can justify this assertion by linking McCain more convincingly to the disastrous outcomes of the current regime’s policies: the inefficient war, the FEMA flop, the energy crisis, the financial meltdown. In their first debate, Obama failed to accomplish this. While McCain staked a strategic claim to the Strong voter, Obama skirmished tactically, parrying facts with facts.

Given that the contest will be decided in the Strong sector of the identity battlefield, and given McCain’s appropriately Strong showing, Obama’s performance in this first debate seemed dangerously weak.