#Don Moynihan

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Don Moynihan at Can We Still Govern?

The Tocquevillian view that civil society, including it’s associations, are essential bulwarks to protect democracy is such well-worn truism as to be incontestable.

Or so you would have thought. But we live in an age where serious people, serious advocates of free speech mind you, are very anxious to shut down such speech they disagree with. They are not just happy to lobby government to use its power to shut down such speech, but are entirely indifferent to grotesque hypocrisies as they use their own speech rights to silence others. Trump and his supporters are already threatening civil society with investigations, lawsuits and intimidation. In the aftermath of student protests, leaders of higher education are increasingly retreating to a position of “institutional neutrality.” Studied indifference to the issues of the day makes a great deal of sense for those seeking to manage organizational reputation and avoid blame, but it is a less than inspiring vision as higher education as a set of institutions willing to speak truth to power.

The right wing wants to go further, and is now targeting professional academic associations from making public statements. The American Enterprise Institute is leading the charge. A recent report presents it as a scandalous that many academic associations have made some sort of statements about race, affirmative action, climate change, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Israel-Hamas, or immigration. To be more precise, AEI views such actions as problematic because “these statements almost uniformly reflect progressive orthodoxy” and it calls on government to not allow public funds to allow people to join professional associations.

This idea might seem outlandish, but it was featured in some of the standard right wing locations, such as The College Fix, The Washington Examiner, and The Wall Street Journal. And we are in a moment when Republican officials are looking for ideas to undermine academic freedom. So, if you are an academic, or just a citizen uncomfortable with the idea of silencing some very specific associations because of the content of their speech, you should be worried about this.

I want to address this attack on professional associations on three levels. First, the basic logic that AEI is proposing is simply false. Second, it is not based on any true defensible principle beyond “free speech for me, but not for thee.” It is a call for government to target speech by associations that AEI disagrees with. And third, it is massively hypocritical. AEI, and other organizations trying to silence professional associations are doing precisely what they say should be forbidden: taking taxpayer dollars to engage in issue advocacy.

[...] First, academic associations have professional expertise on certain topics. And because those associations are centered on scholarly values, that expertise is usually anchored in legitimate scientific values. You can find exceptions, of course, but when the American Political Science Association talks about democracy, or when environmental associations weigh in on climate change issues, you should probably listen to them. On their domains of expertise, they are more likely to be credible relative to AEI or other associations that present themselves as engaging in research, but whose activities are heavily tilted by an ideological lens. [...]

Second, academic associations are representative organizations. They are typically run by elected officers who seek to represent the views and interests of their membership. The structures of our institutions is inherently more democratic than, say, the structure of the AEI or other think tanks, which are necessarily more responsive to donors and partisans. We hear from individual members who express concerns on certain issues. It is incredibly rare for an association to engage in a public statement without prior pressure from their membership, or at least without the knowledge that the vast majority of their members share the expressed views. Again, this is perfectly Tocquevillian.

In some cases, the concerns members raise are not about abstract political values but about how public policies directly affect them. For example, members of an association might raise a concern about hosting events in states they can be prosecuted for going to the bathroom, or where they cannot count on reliable health care if their pregnancy runs into trouble. Academic associations are increasingly global, and US immigration policies can directly affect their ability to participate in their profession. For example, AEI singled out the American Statistical Association for raising concerns about President Trump’s travel bans from majority Muslim countries. Is this unreasonable? Not really if you consider that “one out of nine ASA members resides outside the U.S.” This is a straightforward case where associations are drawing attention to how a policy decision directly and negatively affects its membership. After all, what is the point of being a member of a professional association that refuses to represent you?

Don Moynihan with a banger of a piece on academic freedom.

[thatstormygeek]

First, these are examples of backlash, of a post George Floyd politics. After the outrage associated with the death of Floyd, it seemed for a passing moment that American institutions in government, business and academia were paying real attention to historical problems. The most meaningful policy result, however, has been to mobilize the right wing to both mischaracterize such efforts and go after institutional nods to fairness they previously saw as unattainable, such as DEI offices. Contrary to what you have been told about wokeness run amok on campus, it is now much more professionally risky for scholars to study topics related to race, or to be public facing scholars if they do so, than it was before 2020. Second, the goal is to feed a culture of fear within research institutions. Knowing that you are going to be placed in the crosshairs by a bad faith antagonist is intimidating. Rufo published his accusations against Gay, and then Cross, in City Journal, a media outlet of the right wing Manhattan Institute. This tactic reflects an ongoing pattern of a new right wing media seeking to intimidate and cancel scholars that do not share their views, and especially those who study race. If you do not study this topic, or are not a scholar of color, or are not critical of right wing ideas, you can stay safe in the academic cocoon. Which is what they want.

Third, the message is that the topic of race, and the Black scholars that disproportionately pursue the topic, simply do not belong in elite institutions. The mode and nature of the targeting feeds into prejudices, clearly felt by those doing the targeting. On BlueSky, Jamelle Bouie wrote “the key thing here is that "plagiarism" here means "being a black person in a prestigious position"" The mere presence of scholars of color is taken as clear evidence of a sign a decline of institutional merit (compared to the good old days, when you could get a job based on the strength of a letter of recommendation from a mentor at an elite institution).

[barbaragenova]

Musk wanted to insert himself as the hero in a story that captivated the world. When his actions were mocked, he lashed out, using the vilest smear. Angry at the public criticism that followed, he gravitated towards followers and grifters who applauded him, including a conman to whom he paid $50,000 to investigate Unsworth. Musk has been criticized for his erratic leadership at Twitter, with one conspicuous exception: right-wing conspiracy grifters praise him as a hero, perceiving a figure that will allow them to assert unfettered influence on Twitter. And Musk gravitates towards the applause, replying to them and responding their suggestions about how to run the website. We are starting to see consequences for Twitter itself.

Don Moynihan

[mourning-again-in-america]

Nixon's cabinet was absolutely wack. Elliot Richardson, known as the Richardson of Ruckelshaus and Richardson of the Saturday Night Massacre, was Secretary of Health Education and Welfare, til he got moved to SecDef for five months before becoming Attorney General before the Massacre. Oh, and he was Secretary of Commerce for Ford.

Meanwhile Caspar Weinberger, who you know from Reagan's years, was FTC chair, head of Office of Management and Budget, and Sec of HEW.

The man also had George Romney in Housing and Urban Development and HW Bush as Ambassador to the UN!

[kp777]

By Jessica Corbett

Common Dreams

Aug. 2, 2024

"If you did not believe he was maniacal or evil, before this, well now you know," said a former congresswoman.

A super political action committee connected to billionaire Elon Musk is not only working to elect Republicans including former President Donald Trump but also collecting voter information in battleground states via a method that is setting off alarm bells, CNBC reported Friday.

CNBC political finance reporter Brian Schwartz explained how an online America PAC advertisement featuring footage of the recent assassination attempt targeting Trump sends viewers to different websites depending on their location.

"If a user lives in a state that is not considered competitive in the presidential election, like California or Wyoming for example, they'll be prompted to enter their email addresses and ZIP code and then directed quickly to a voter registration page for their state, or back to the original sign up section," he reported. "But for users who enter a ZIP code that indicates they live in a battleground state, like Pennsylvania or Georgia, the process is very different."

"Rather than be directed to their state's voter registration page, they instead are directed to a highly detailed personal information form, prompted to enter their address, cell phone number, and age," according to Schwartz. "If they agree to submit all that, the system still does not steer them to a voter registration page. Instead, it shows them a 'thank you' page."

One user on X—the Musk-owned social media platform formerly called Twitter—trialed the process and shared related screenshots:

"How is this legal!?" Veni Kunche of Diversify Tech asked on X in response to the reporting. "America PAC is misleading voters."

Georgetown University professor Don Moynihan also raised legal concerns, saying, "Getting people's personal information on the promise of helping them to register to vote, and then not helping them to register to vote definitely seems like election fraud."

Retired journalist Mary Beth Schneider said: "Scamming people into thinking they registered to vote? This should be illegal."

Jodi Jacobson, founder and executive director of Healthcare Across Borders, called for a federal investigation.

"Is anyone actually working over there?" she asked the U.S. Department of Justice on X. "Because here is something you should be investigating. Now."

Ciara Torres-Spelliscy, a professor at Stetson University College of Law in Florida and fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, criticized the super PAC and offered guidance on registering to vote in the United States.

"This is so shitty," she said of the group's actions. "To avoid... a fake registration webpage problem: Google your local board of elections and register directly through them. Typically your local board of elections is the name of the county you live in and 'board of elections.'"

Former Congresswoman Marie Newman (D-Ill.) took aim at Musk, saying, "If you did not believe he was maniacal or evil, before this, well now you know."

While a spokesperson for America PAC declined to comment and Musk did not reply to Schwartz's emails, the billionaire confirmed he created the political group during a July 22 video interview on X with right-wing commentator Jordan Peterson. Musk also denied a recent Wall Street Journal report that he is putting $45 million a month toward sending Trump back to the White House.

"I am making some donations to America PAC, but at a much lower level and the key values of the PAC are supporting a meritocracy and individual freedom," Musk wrote on X the following day. "Republicans are mostly, but not entirely, on the side of merit and freedom."

Super PACs are not subject to the same legal restrictions as campaigns and traditional political committees; they can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money from individuals, corporations, and groups. There are limits for coordinating with campaigns, but they can coordinate on canvassing, thanks to a Federal Election Commission advisory opinion from earlier this year.

America PAC has already raised millions of dollars, with donations from venture capitalists and cryptocurrency investors.

Last month, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) publicly thanked Musk for doing "an exceptional job of demonstrating a point that we have made for years—and that is the fact we live in an oligarchic society in which billionaires dominate not only our economic life and the information we consume, but our politics as well."

As The New York Times detailed Thursday, America PAC is off to "a rocky start" and now "shaking up its field operation." Still, the group's potential impact on the presidential election—in which Trump is expected to face Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris—is generating concerns, particularly given the new revelations from CNBC.

[azspot]

Walz faces attack from Republicans for his support for LGBTQ policies, but that support reflects his experience as a teacher. Schools, and their teachers, communicate which students are welcome and valued, and which are not. He extended that sense of inclusion to gay and lesbian students as a teacher. He was the faculty sponsor of his school’s first gay-straight alliance in 1999. To give a sense of how much of a stretch this was, this was three years after President Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act, enshrining marriage as between women and men. Because he had seen instances of bullying of gay kids, Walz later said that it was important that the sponsor to be “the football coach, who was the soldier and was straight and was married.” (Walz also served for decades in the National Guard, and in 2006, was the highest ranking enlisted soldier to serve in Congress).

Don Moynihan

[disneybuddy]

I HAVE THIS GREAT NEW IDEA FOR A CARTOON SHOW!

I have this great new idea for a cartoon show! It's called Cereal Town! It's about a town where cereal mascots live and do CRAAAAAAAAAAZY stuff! They say out of character things! The main joke is that these iconic characters are acting like deranged out of character lunatics! But it's a total love letter to cereal mascots, trust me, it totally is!

The show will be animated in Adobe Flash, and all the characters have been redesigned. Here's some concept art I whipped up!

EVERYONE's gonna be there! Even the really obscure ones, 'cause this is a love letter to cereal mascots! Here's all the characters that'll show up:

Tony the Tiger (voiced by Paul F. Thompkins) - He's a million times dumber now! Your typical sitcom dimwitted dad, like Homer Simpson or Peter Griffin!

Mrs. Tony (voiced by some random YouTube/TikTok celebrity) - Tony's wife who's a total nag and considered way out of his league (not that you can tell with the art style)!

Tony Jr. and Antoinette (voiced by Ben Schwartz and Jenny Slate) - Tony's kids! They're basically Dipper and Mabel from Gravity Falls but they're tigers!

Trix the Rabbit (voiced by Johnny Galecki) - He's addicted to Trix! Get it? Trix = drugs! And drug addiction is HILARIOUS, right?!

Sonny the Cuckoo Bird (voiced by Will Forte) - Since we gave the "addicted to their cereal" shtick to Trix the Rabbit, he's now a neuronic Woody Allen parody who collects decorative plates!

Lucky the Leprechaun (voiced by Flula Borg) - He's not really a leprechaun now! He's just a weirdo who THINKS he's a leprechaun! He's not even Irish anymore, he's German!

Toucan Sam (voiced by Jillian Bell) - He's a girl now, because otherwise there won't be enough female characters in the show! And she's also a stereotypical valley girl obsessed with her hair and clothes and self-conscious about her big nose!

Count Chocula (voiced by Fred Armisen) - He's now a stereotypical scatterbrained geezer who complains about those dang kids and their newly-fangled contraptions or whatever!

Frankenberry (voiced by Thomas Lennon) - He's a loser who lives in his creator's basement and goes on the internet a lot! He's also obsessed with science fiction movies!

Boo Berry (voiced by Mindy Kaling) - He's a girl now, too! She's Sonny's girlfriend (or rather, GHOULfriend, aren't I so clever?) who is really smart until she suddenly isn't because the joke demands for her to not be smart!

Dig 'Em the Frog (voiced by another random YouTube/TikTok celebrity) - He's a musician! He was once part of a band, but decided to go solo! And he's obsessed with pumpkin spice lattes and drinks them even when it's not autumn!

Sugar Bear (voiced by Bobby Moynihan) - He's Dig 'Em's husband!

Snap, Crackle and Pop (voiced by Jason Mantzoukas, Kimiko Glenn, and Daveed Diggs) - They're classmates of Tony Jr. and Antoinette who are always up to some zany scheme to get out of class!

Chip the Wolf (voiced by Beck Bennett) - He's the teacher at Tony Jr. and Antoinette's school, but he's also secretly a secret agent! Because shut up, that's why!

Cap'n Crunch (voiced by David Tennant) - He's the Mayor of Cereal Town, but he's incompetent! LOL!

Wendell the Baker from Cinnamon Toast Crunch (voiced by Harvey Guillen) - He's a baker! So... basically, he's exactly the same, except he's voiced by Harvey Guillen now!

Fruity Yummy Mummy (voiced by Lizzo) - She's Frankenberry's ex-girlfriend! She's ALSO considered way out of his league!

Fruit Brute (voiced by Don Cheadle) - He's Count Chocula's pet dog! Personality-wise, he's basically Brian Griffin!

Sunny the Raisin Bran Sun (voiced by Stephanie Beatriz) - He's a girl now too! She's the sun, but she's also a citizen of Cereal Town! How WACKY!

Buzz Bee only has dialogue in one episode, where it's revealed that he's voiced by Dennis Haybert! That's funny, right?! RIGHT?!

Did I mention that this is a love letter to cereal mascots?! Because it IS!

[pscottm]

The Future is Terror - by Don Moynihan

[ramrodd]

Lawrence: Why Trump's lawyer called him the 'orange turd' during Stormy ...

COMMENTARY:

This case is about the fraud Trump presented to America to become POTUS. The point is that January 6 is a criminal conspiracy  with the objective of overthrowing the US Constitution and installing a  dictator, going back to Joe McCarthy and the John Birch Society.

  The thing is, Trump was not an agent of the Nazification Oligarchs of  Russia until he was compromised by them in the old Soviet style of honey  Trap with Clinton's analytics. Whoever those people are they are the same people who torched the 30th floor of Trump Tower to remind Trump whoever these people are. who have him by the balls. I don' know who it is, but Steve Bannon is in the mix with Merrill Lynch,

  When it comes to putting Steve Bannon in jail for 4 months, jail was Hitler's  launching pad. Trump is in great danger from the Russian Nazification Oligarch who opposes the Kremlin Oligarchs aligned with Putin, Mueller proved that Putin and Trump had no business together, And this actually goes back to  Gorbachev and the Soviets. Trump went looking for cash in Russia after Bob Dole's 1986 Tax Reform that pulled the plug on all all the equity from his properties. He was collateral damage to the Resolution Trust Corporation and the failure of the Savings and Loan industry, Supply Side econoics in action, Trump's Art of the Deal  business model was organic to the Nixon-Moynihan Affirmative Action DEI economics. It doesn't work in the white supremacist economics of Supply Side economics.

  The question is with Trump, when did the honest hyperbole of Trump Tower under Carter become the demonstrable routine fraud of the Trump Organization of 2016. A fraud against the American Experiments.

[atlantaantifascists]

Crosspost

RT Don Moynihan Re With Alt text: Musk fired the twitter teams dealing with human rights and facilitating disability access. via Atlanta Antifascists Twitter (https://twitter.com/donmoyn/status/1588613584409747456)

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Don Moynihan at Can We Still Govern?: At the Democratic National Convention, speaker after speaker sought to remind viewers of Project 2025. Jim Clyburn referred to it as “Jim Crow 2.0.” Cory Booker mocked it was “Project 1825” and “Project 1925.” Michigan Senator Mallory McMorrow was one of many speakers who brought an enlarged version of the Mandate for Leadership document published by the Heritage Foundation that serves as the backbone to Project 2025. Trump’s campaign has falsely claimed that Project 2025 is dead, and in mailers to voters he has doubled down on his efforts to distance himself from it. (Note to Forbes and other media outlets who confuse repeating Trump’s lies with reporting: this is what you get — becoming a tool in his disinformation efforts).

Of course, Project 2025 very much remains alive and the most relevant way to understand how Trump would govern. At the convention, Tim Walz invoked Project 2025 when he said that “when somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re going to use it.” The comedian Kenan Thompson gave one of best summaries of the relationship between Trump and Project 2025:

[You know how when you download an app and there are hundreds of pages there that you don’t read. Its just the terms and conditions. And you just click agree, right? Well, these are the terms and conditions of a second Trump Presidency. You vote for him, you vote for all of this.]

Trump dislikes Project 2025 as a brand because it lays out a series of specifics about right wing policy goals, which, it turns out, are unpopular. There has been some schadenfreude in how Project 2025 has become baggage for the Trump campaign, and has in some ways backfired for the Heritage Foundation, who went from energetically promoting their ties to Trump to gingerly defending their efforts from Trump’s own campaign.

We got a glimpse about the scale and nature of these plans when some British undercover journalists performed a sting operation of Russ Vought. Vought is touted as a potential Chief of Staff in a second Trump administration. As a Trump official, he helped to cover up Trump’s withholding of arms to Ukraine, and aggressively pushed Trump’s plan to fire career civil servants. Out of office, he then complains about the weaponization of federal agencies without a trace of irony.

[...]

The Heritage Foundation been portrayed as the central player in Project 2025, deservedly so. But its role reflects a certain continuity of effort — it has been publishing Mandate for Leadership guides since Reagan — that understates the dramatic nature of the change that has taken place on the right. The Conservative Partnership Institute, which has played a less visible role in Project 2025, is more emblematic of the MAGAification of the conservative movement. A recent profile of CPI by Jonathan Blitzer in the New Yorker is eye-opening. CPI was created in 2017 by Jim DeMint, the Heritage Foundation leader who was pushed out for trashing Heritage’s reputation for credible research by making it more partisan and less serious. DeMint also aligned early with Trump, which some Heritage board members never forgave him for. CPI operates less like a think tank, where former Trump officials hang their hat, and more like a venture capital firm providing seed funding for MAGA-aligned organizations, as well as connections to other donors, and physical space to get a foothold in DC. These include:

Russ Vought’s Center for Renewing America

Stephen Miller’s America First Legal

The American Accountability Foundation, which ran attack campaigns against Biden nominees, and is currently compiling an enemies list of career civil servants

Cleta Mitchell’s Election Integrity Network. CPI had been deeply involved in election denial. It helped to organize efforts to disrupt the vote to confirm Biden’s election on January 6th. Mitchell a Secretary of CPI, was the lawyer who helped Trump with his call to Georgia officials asking them to fine more votes. She is organizing a network of legal challenges to block legitimate election outcomes this year.

The State Freedom Caucus Network, whose goal is to embed state versions of the House Freedom Caucus in every state

An API official said that in a speech at Mar-A-Lago: “Trump complained about his personnel. He said he had these bad generals, bad Cabinet secretaries. That was a big signal to the people there.” This is why there is such an intense focus on Schedule F, to fire civil servants, and building a pipeline of dedicated Trumpists as political appointees. Part of the function of CPI was to alter the incentives for Trump officials. A previous generation of conservative lawyers or other appointees might worry about their long-term career prospects for engaging in a little light treason. CPI has created an ecosystem existed to defend them (they have funded legal defenses for John Eastman, Peter Navarro, Mark Meadows and Jeffery Clark), to and to find them new roles after wrongdoing.

@Don Moynihan nails it: The “next phase” of Project 2025 contains plans we don’t even know about.

[worldofwardcraft]

The plot to destroy public education.

October 10, 2022

In his 1978 book Home Style: House Members in Their Districts, political scientist Richard Fenno observed that people generally disapprove of the US Congress as a whole, but support the representatives from their own districts. Which explains why candidates for Congress often run against Congress. It's called Fenno's Paradox. Turns out Fenno's insight also applies to schools. Surveys consistently find people tending to like the particular local schools their children attend, while disapproving of the system of public schools in general.

What's the source of this contradiction? Most likely, it's because conservative Republicans have been reviling and condemning publicly funded education for decades. Actually, ever since the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka decision in 1954 that required school systems to desegregate. But rather than openly declare their racism, Republicans nowadays maintain that their love of the free market is what compels their strident insistence on "school choice," their persistent eagerness to use public tax revenue to fund private (i.e., white Christian) schools, and their sanctimonious support for home education.

Consider, for example, the People's Republic of Florida. In the 1990s, then-Governor Jeb Bush introduced high-stakes testing, which graded school districts, along with strong support for vouchers and charter schools. Then his successor, Ron DeSantis, massively increased the state's voucher program, expanding “education savings accounts” that could be used for anything from private schools to homeschooling. All of which had the effect of luring students away from public schools.

The overriding purpose, of course, is to demolish public education entirely. As Georgetown University government professor Don Moynihan points out,

The capacity of such schools to be effective is going to decline if, as has been the case, GOP educational policy is driven by radical advocates who are upfront that they view public schools as an enemy to be destroyed.

Meanwhile, with constant attacks on public education making the job less attractive, teachers are quitting in increasing numbers. US Bureau of Labor Statistics data cited by The Wall Street Journal indicate that 300,000 public school teachers and other staff left the profession from February 2020 to May 2022 — a nearly 3% drop in that workforce. Here's Moynihan again.

As GOP populists make the teaching profession impossible, removing autonomy, creating a culture of fear, intimidation and censorship, more and more talented teachers will exit, or never join the profession in the first place.

Recent polling reveals that a majority of Republicans and two-thirds of conservatives say that public schools have a negative effect on America. Apparently, the plot is proceeding as intended.

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

[disneytva]

EXCLUSIVE: GET A FIRST PREVIEW TO THE ART OF DUCKTALES BY DARK HORSE COMICS & DISNEY EDITIORIAL.

Life is like a hurricane here in Duck - burg it's a, duck - blur! 🦆💰

Get a peek at The Art Of DuckTales, an celebration of the legacy of the greatest adventure of all: family, this art book will cover EVERY DuckTales 2017 Episode Ever trought concept arts, sketches,proposed desings, props and more on the potentially only Disney Television Animation Art Book ever....

Enjoy it beacuse you will need a deal with Chernabog to get another Disney TVA Art Book and that new art book based on another Disney TVA Show probably will be out when Half-Life 3 arrives.

📚The Art Of DuckTales

Oct 4

Ken Plume

Dark Horse Comics

Disney Editiorial

Disney Publishing Worldwide

200 Pages

Scrooge McDuck and nephews Huey, Dewey, and Louie are back in the 2017 remake of the classic series from Disney Television Animation, DuckTales! Now, find out about the making of DuckTales and read stories from the developers and cast covering every episode from all three seasons! Like Scrooge into the Money Bin, dive into this beautiful, oversized coffee-table book and read tales of the making of the series from developers Matt Youngberg, Francisco Angones, Suzanna Olson, and others. Join in on the adventure with exclusive interviews with the cast including David Tennant (Scrooge McDuck), Danny Pudi (Huey), Ben Schwartz (Dewey), Bobby Moynihan (Louie), Kate Miccuci (Webby), Tony Anselmo & Don Cheadle (Donald Duck), and many more! Find out what it means to every day be out there making DuckTales! Woo-oo!

Artwork and stories from every single episode! Exclusive interviews from the cast and crew. A behind-the-scenes look at the creation of the show. Never-before-seen artwork with captions by the creators.

[jmunneytumbler]

How Mascot-errific Are the Mascots (And Everyone Else) in 'Mascots'?

CREDIT: Scott Garfield/Netflix

I’d been meaning to watch Mascots for a while ever since it arrived on Netflix in 2016. Christopher Guest’s mockumentaries represent one of the most significant trends in American comedy, after all, so I need to stay on the up-and-up. So on May 16, 2020, I decided that it would finally be the day. And then afterthat personal resolution, I heard the news of Fred…

[azspot]

ZBB might work in private industry. But doesn’t work in government because it is inconsistent with how the US political system works. First of all, Congress, not the President, decides the budget. There is no single actor who can prioritize spending priorities, which ZBB requires. Thus, budgets are a function of coalition agreements, built up over time. This might look inefficient, but it brings us to the second reason why ZBB can’t work. The political system can manage only so much conflict. Starting the budget afresh reach year massively increases conflict. Incremental budgeting focuses conflict around the change in the budget, not the base, reducing conflict. Our current Congress cannot even manage an incremental budget, routinely failing to pass appropriations bills on time. Do you really trust them to manage to start from zero, every year, and come up with sound outcomes? Third, there are some practical barriers. Many public spending projects run for multiple years, and need stability in funding if they are to be effective. Zeroing our regulatory agencies, for example, removes certainty that market actors need. And about half of federal spending is on automatic pilot as entitlements, meaning they legally cannot be cut without passing unpopular laws changing the entitlement programs.

Don Moynihan