The View from Right Field

Sammy Sosa to the Hall of Fame?

The real question in this year's Hall of Fame voting is not whether Sammy Sosa will get elected to the Hall of Fame.  He won't.  The real question is whether he will get the minimum 5% of the votes so he can stay on the ballot for next year's voting.  With seven Chicago Tribune voters  all saying that they won't vote for Sammy, you have to wonder.  

The Fiscal Cliff – A Couple of Quick Thoughts on Raising Taxes

I heard on the radio this morning that the Democrats just want the richest of the rich to pay a little more in taxes.  That’s fine, but you can’t solve our long term, medium term or even short term fiscal problems by just having the richest of the rich pay a little more.  That’s not enough money.  We have to spend less or get more in tax revenue – or more likely both. 

One more thought:  Raising tax rates will only work if it results in more tax collections.  If raising tax rates results in more tax compliance games and little additional tax collections, it might make some people think our tax system is fairer, but it won’t help our fiscal problem.

Cubs Prospects – On Other Teams

Every year Baseball America publishes a list of the ten prospects for each team in the majors.  A couple of weeks ago (I’m a little behind), they published the list for the Tampa Bay Rays.  In the first and third spots were former Cubs minor leaguers right-handed Chris Archer and shortstop Hak-Ju Lee, respectively.  In January of 2011, Jim Hendry traded both of these players, along with Sam Fuld and two other prospects, one who has already made the majors (Brandon Guyer), for Matt Garza and a couple of minor leaguers, one of whom did not even make it through a full season with the Cubs’ organization.

I appreciate the job that Theo Epstein, et al, are doing with the Cubs, especially in building a good minor league system and developing young players.  But when I read articles like this, I realize how far we have left to go.  And that the Cubs could be living with the mistakes of prior management for quite a while.  (Sigh.)

The Fiscal Cliff: What Will President Obama Do?

With President Obama back in Washington and Congress returning on Tuesday, the question is:  When, or will, the fiscal cliff be avoided?  Obviously, for the economy and consumer/business/investor confidence, the sooner the better. 

On Friday, the Chicago Tribune, which endorsed President Obama for re-election, urged the President to take the suggestion made by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Congress:

“It offers three options for raising revenue from high earners without raising rates:

• Put a dollar cap on itemized deductions. If Obama insists on $1.6 trillion in new tax revenue, that would mean nearly eliminating those deductions for top earners. But by encouraging Americans to make their financial decisions based on what's sensible economically rather than on what a loophole-riddled tax code incentivizes, this improves tax policy.

• In a twist on the first option, Congress and Obama could limit the combined value of various deductions, credits and exclusions for high earners.

• Limit the value of certain deductions to the 28-percent bracket, and then phase out that value on a progressive basis as incomes rise. It was Obama who floated the first half of this scheme — limiting the value of deductions — in his budget proposal for the fiscal year that started Oct. 1. Phasing out that value until it drops to zero for incomes of $1 million or more would increase the IRS’ haul.”

As the Tribune indicated, President Obama would get what he wants, more taxes from the rich, and House Speaker Republican John Boehner has indicated he would support cutting deductions to get more revenue.  And it could get done now, as opposed to December 31.  It seems like a neat little solution.  What could be wrong with it?

A couple of possibilities.  First, the rich (i.e., those couples making over $250,000 per year and those individuals making over $200,000 per year*) would not be paying higher tax rates.  They would be paying more in taxes, but the President campaigned on higher rates.  Would merely having the rich pay more taxes be good enough or does he need to have them pay higher rates, too?  Would he view this idea, i.e., getting more tax revenue by cutting deductions as opposed to raising rates, as giving in to the Republicans?  In 2009 he told Eric Cantor that elections have consequences – and that he won.  Does he need to have higher rates to confirm his victory? 

Tied in with this, when then-Senator Obama suggested raising capital gains tax rates in an interview with Charlie Gibson in 2008, Mr. Gibson challenged him on the grounds that history shows increases in capital gains tax rates result in a decrease in the amount of revenues actually collected by the government.  Senator Obama replied: "Well, Charlie, what I’ve said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness."**  I don’t know if anybody has ever followed up with President Obama to find out whether he really wants to have higher rates, even if they don’t produce more revenue, because he likes the fairness – and symbolism – of the higher rates.  It is an interesting question and would be an interesting answer.

An unspoken reason why limiting deductions, versus raising rates, might not acceptable to at least some Democrats, goes to the deductions that would be limited.  One of the biggest deductions is state taxes, including state income taxes.  Being able to deduct state income taxes from your income before calculating the amount of federal income tax you owe, makes state income taxes a little less painful.  And it makes a higher state income tax rate a little less objectionable.  Limiting federal income tax deductions could mean that some people wouldn’t be able to effectively deduct all of the state income taxes they pay.  This would obviously be a particular problem in states with higher state income taxes, like California and New York and many other Democratic states.  It would be less of a problem in states like Texas, which don’t have a state income tax.  In other words, while Democrats probably would not admit it, limiting deductions might not be as good for “their” rich people as for the other party’s rich people.

So, there is a solution in front of President Obama that would get the rich to pay more in taxes, but it wouldn’t raise the tax rates and it might hurt rich people in states with high state income taxes (i.e., states that tend to be Democratic) more than rich people in states with lower state income taxes.

It will be interesting to see what the President – and his party in Congress – do.

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* I wonder if President Obama’s higher rates for the rich would be linked to inflation.  They certainly haven’t been in his campaign proposals.  They are still at the same level they were four-plus years ago.

** The Wall Street Journal, August 19, 2008 (also here).

UPDATE (11/24/12 10:47 pm): Fixed a formatting mistak; (11/24/12 10:58 pm): Fixed a really egregious grammatical error in the last sentence.

Sayonara, Bryan LaHair

It is a little sad to see that Bryan LaHair was designated for assignment by the Cubs, in a move that will probably lead to him playing in Japan next year.  I like Bryan, but with Anthony Rizzo at first base, the Cubs probably did not have a place for him. 

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UPDATE (11/24/12 4:15 pm): Bryan LaHair has signed a two-year, $4.5 million contract with the Softbank Hawks of the Japanese Pacific League.  Good for Bryan.  I hope he enjoys it and does well.

The Fiscal Cliff Is Coming. Where is President Obama?

With only six weeks to go until we fall off the fiscal cliff, where is our newly re-elected President?  Is he talking with Speaker of the House John Boehner?  Is he working with his key Cabinet officials on new ideas to break the deadlock?  Is he talking with Congressional Democrats on what they may need to do to solve this problem?

Even with yesterday’s 207 point gain, the Dow is still down 450 points since the November 6.  The headline on the front page of yesterday’s Wall Street Journal was “Investment Falls Off a Cliff: U.S. Companies Cut Spending Plans Amid Fiscal and Economic Uncertainty”.  And on page 2, the headline read: “Retailers’ Wish List: Cheery Shoppers”.

And where is our President?  Burma (a/k/a Myanmar)?  Cambodia?  Why?  Back in March of 2010, President Obama cancelled a trip to Australia and Indonesia to stay in Washington to work on getting his health care plan passed because that was more important.  Then in June of 2010 he cancelled another trip to these same countries so he could stay in Washington and look like he was doing something about the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  Because looking like he was doing something about the spill was important – politically, at least.

But now he goes to Thailand, Burma, and Cambodia instead of working on our economy.  Maybe the President thinks there is still enough time.  Maybe there is, but getting it done earlier instead of later would definitely be a help.  And if things come down to the last minute, why is he wasting time touring Southeast Asia?

Something Is Not Quite Right In the David Petraeus Story

If the FBI and Attorney General Eric Holder did not need to tell President Obama about David Petraeus’s affair in September and October because there was no risk to national security, then why did Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, Jr., who was General Petraeus’s boss, tell General Petraeus in November that he needed to resign?  And why did President Obama accept his resignation?

If General Petraeus needed to resign in November, then the President needed to be told in September.  If the President did not need to be told in September, then General Petraeus did not need to resign in November.

Susan Rice for Secretary of State? Amazing.

I am amazed that President Obama appears to be considering appointing UN Ambassador Susan Rice to replace Hillary Clinton as Secretary State.  It was Susan Rice, of course, who, five days after the attack in Benghazi, said on all of the Sunday news shows that the attack was the result of protests over that silly anti-Islamic internet video.  It seemed absurd at the time (and it has since been shown to be wrong).  But Ms. Rice has been defended, by the President himself, on the ground that she was responding to questions based on the best information the Administration had at the time.

That seems absurd on its face.  By Saturday, when it is my understanding the shows were taped, there certainly were lots of indications it was a terrorist attack.  If the Administration did not know for sure what it was, why didn’t they say that, instead of saying something that looked wrong even then?

Of course, the real problem here is that during the presidential debates, President Obama (with the help of moderator Candy Crowley) tried to claim that he had called the Benghazi attack an "act of terror" the day after the attack.  But if the President was saying it was an act of terror on Wednesday, September 12*, why did Ms. Rice call it an anti-Internet film protest gone array on Saturday, September 15? 

Of course, during the late stages of the campaign, it was important to show President Obama calling it a terrorist attack as early as possible.  Now it’s important to not make Susan Rice look foolish.  It’s tricky to square that circle.

As I said above, at his press conference yesterday, President Obama came to Ms. Rice’s defense:

“As I’ve said before, she [Ambassador Rice] made an appearance at the request of the White House in which she gave her best understanding of the intelligence that had been provided to her.  Senator McCain and Senator Graham, and others want to go after somebody? They should go after me. And I’m happy to have that discussion with them.”

That’s fine.  When is the President going to the Senate to testify?  But of course, he’s not going.  The fact is that the only way an administration can be called to account in a situation like this is when an administration needs something from Congress, such as confirming a person’s nomination to a high level office.  Then the senators or representatives can ask their questions.

Given the almost certain firestorm that would occur if Ms. Rice is nominated, it is amazing to me the President would even consider it.  But as this report at CBS News says: “[T]the president feels he should be able to choose the cabinet members he wants”.  

If that is President Obama’s attitude, it may be a sign of a second term arrogance that will not be helpful to the President – or the country.

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* With respect to whether President Obama really did call the Benghazi attack an “act of terror” on September 12, take a look at the President’s remarks in the Rose Garden that day.  They are here.  When he refers to “act of terror” at the end of his comments, is he referring to Benghazi or is he talking about terrorism in general?  I know how I would interpret it.  You can interpret it yourself.

Second Chances and General David Petraeus (ret.)

With lots of people piling on David Petraeus, I would like to quote, at some length, from a dispatch that Michael Yon wrote in 2007.  (I hope it is okay.  You can find Mr. Yon’s full dispatch here.)

“A couple weeks ago, LTC Fred Johnson told me a story about General Petraeus.  Back when LTC Johnson was Captain Johnson, and General Petraeus was Colonel Petraeus, Colonel Petraeus was Captain Johnson’s new commander.  They were doing a live-fire exercise at a range at Fort Campbell when a young soldier named Specialist Terrence Jones tripped and accidentally fired his weapon while conducting a live-fire assault.  The bullet from Specialist Jones’ weapon struck Colonel Petraeus, slamming through his chest and taking a piece of his back on the way out.  Petraeus fell to the ground, bleeding out of his mouth.  He nearly died.  We could have lost one of the most important and influential military leaders in generations to a mistake.  To a professional misstep.

The best that Captain Johnson and Specialist Jones might have hoped for was a painless end to their military service.  I asked LTC Fred Johnson about the story of his own soldier shooting David Petraeus, and I asked how it could be that Johnson was still in the military.  Johnson looked me in the eye and said something like, ‘Mike. You know what Petraeus did?’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘He gave me a second chance.’

Fred Johnson actually got picked up for promotion early.

‘But what happened to the young soldier?’ I asked, thinking surely there had to be a consequence.  Conventional wisdom stipulates that for balance to be restored after accidentally shooting and nearly killing a superior officer, a sacrifice of some magnitude is necessary.  A soldier just can’t shoot a commander in the chest and walk away.  There is no such thing as an ‘accidental discharge.’  Unplanned bullet launches are called ‘negligent discharges.’  As in negligent homicide.

LTC Johnson answered something like, ‘Mike, you won’t believe how Jones was punished.  Petraeus sent Jones to Ranger School.’

I couldn’t believe my ears!  That’s a punishment that a lot of young soldiers dream about, even though Ranger School is a very difficult course.  But after thinking on it awhile, I realized it probably explains why LTC Johnson sometimes says, ‘I believe in second chances.’

Fred Johnson said it just the other day.  He said it to me, ‘When someone gives you a second chance, you should pass it along.’”

Will Signing Free Agents Be Harder If They Think You’re Going to Trade Them?

Readers (reader-?) have commented on the absence of Cubs articles lately (except for Sunday’s “Compromise On the Way To the Fiscal Cliff,” which really wasn’t a Cubs article anyway).  One reason might be that it’s the off-season; the Cubs aren’t playing.  Of course, sometimes that’s when things are most hopeful for Cubs fans.  So here’s a post.

A question:  Cubs’ management has said they are looking for a couple of mid-range free agent starting pitchers, like Paul Maholm last year.  I certainly agree the Cubs need a couple of starters, but I question how management is going about it.  Because, in addition to saying they want to sign some pitchers, management has also told fans that there could come another July when the Cubs might trade away 40% of their starting staff, if that would produce some good prospects.

I appreciate management’s honesty in telling (warning-?) fans about another July fire-sale, but I wonder what kind of message that sends to free agents considering the Cubs.  Fans probably don’t appreciate everything that ball players go through.  We see them living in fancy hotels, flying on charter flights, etc.  Living the good life.  Or so we think.

But what if players are like regular people?  Maybe they like a routine.  Maybe they like working (i.e., playing) with people they know.  They sign with a team because that is where they want to play.  What if they dislike not knowing, from day to day in late July, where they are going to play the next day?  It’s one thing to go on road trips every week or two.  But to have to pick up and move, on a day’s notice, to another town, another team, another group of guys – and it’s not in your control.  That doesn’t sound like a lot of fun.  And who’s going to close up their apartment, move their stuff?

So when a player is deciding where he wants to play, is it important to have some stability and certainty?  Obviously, players can get traded anytime.  But to sign with a team, knowing that if you do a good job, you’ll probably get traded in late July?  Even if the trade is to a playoff-bound team, some guys might not like that uncertainty, that hassle.

While I don’t know for sure, I wouldn’t be surprised if the message being sent by Cubs management (“Sign with us, but p.s. we’ll trade you if you do a good job) isn’t going to make it a little harder easier to sign the pitchers we need.

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UPDATE (11/13/12 9:00 pm):  It is sort of funny.  Within a few hours after I posted this article about the possible difficulties of signing free agent pitchers when they know you might try to trade them in July, the Cubs signed Scott Baker to a $5.5 million one-year contract.

Of course, Baker is coming off Tommy John surgery and didn’t pitch at all last year, which made him, at least, think that a trade deadline deal was “kind of a far stretch”.  Also, maybe getting $5.5 million a year after surgery makes you willing to take a chance on a late July relocation.

We will see.  And I hope I am wrong about how hard it is for the Cubs to sign some starters.