The View from Right Field

The Best Chicago Cubs Broadcast Team – Ever

Last Friday, Ed Sherman had an article in the Chicago Tribune about the 90-year relationship between WGN radio and the Cubs.  (You can find a copy of the article here.)  In mentioning some of the people who have broadcast Cubs games on WGN radio, Mr. Sherman included “the highly underrated Vince Lloyd, who formed a memorable longtime team with ‘The Good Kid,’ Lou Boudreau.”

Being a long-time fan of Vince Lloyd and Lou Boudreau, I wrote Mr. Sherman a note about my memories of “Vince and Lou.”  He asked if he could put it on his blog, the Sherman Report.  I said yes.  You can find it here. 

Chicago Cubs: A Review of 2014. The Promise of 2015?

The Ricketts are finally starting on their four-year renovation of Wrigley Field.  Theo Epstein, et al, have already been at their renovation for three years.  2015 will be their fourth.  Are they done?  No, they’re not.  But are they far enough along?

First, though, a quick look at 2014.  There is in life, and baseball, a concept called “reversion to the mean”.  The idea is that if a player, or anybody or anything else, is way above or way below their long-term average in one year, the next year they will most likely move closer to their long-term average.  Two good examples of this concept are Stalin Castro and Anthony Rizzo this past year.  Both of them performed way below their long-term average in 2013.  (That was factually true in Castro’s case, and we hoped it was true in Rizzo’s case.)  Both of them bounced back in 2014, getting closer to what we think is their long-term average.

What does this say about 2015?  A couple of things.  First, according to ESPN’s expanded standings for the 2014 season, the Cubs finished three games above their “expected W-L” totals, based on things like run differentials, etc.  “Reversion to the mean” means that this positive difference is likely to disappear next year.

Spirit of America: America at Its Best

I have talked about Spirit of America before.  I recently received a couple of e-mails* from Jim Hake, founder of Spirit of America, which made me this it was time to talk about it again – because it is a great organization.

This time I wanted to talk not only about what Spirit of America does, but also why I like giving to it so much.  First, to explain what Spirit of America does, let me cut and paste from the two e-mails from Jim Hake (I am sure he won’t mind my editorial license; you can also look at their website here):

“Thirteen years ago, after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, I committed myself to doing something to help. That motivation led me to start Spirit of America. …

In retrospect, it was a fairly naïve idea that regular citizens like me – with no government or military background – could help our troops and diplomats advance America's freedoms and ideals.  It turns out that it was an important idea.  As a result, thirteen years later we're still at it.  We've learned a lot but the idea is still the same: provide private assistance to support the safety and success of Americans serving abroad. …

Sunni Sheikhs In Iraq Don’t Fully Trust Us. I Wonder Why.

According to The New York Times, six weeks of U.S. airstrikes in Iraq have barely budged Islamic State (also known as ISIS and ISIL) forces from the areas they control in Iraq, which include over 25% of the country.  While Islamic State forces have been forced from the towns of Barwana and Haditha by a combination of the Iraqi army, certain Sunni tribes and U.S. airstrikes and were also pushed away from the Mosul Dam by Kurdish forces and U.S. airstrikes, Islamic State forces just this week captured the Iraqi town of Sichar.

As to why this is happening, the article goes on:

“Behind the [Iraqi] government’s struggles on the battlefield is the absence or resistance of many of the Sunni Muslim tribes that officials in Baghdad and Washington hope will play the decisive role in the course of the fight – a slow start for the centerpiece of President Obama’s plan to drive out the militants.

The Sunni tribes of Anbar and other areas drove Qaeda-linked militants out of the area seven years ago with American military help, in what became known as the Sunni Awakening.  But the tribes’ alienation from the subsequent authoritarian and Shiite-led government in Baghdad opened the door for the extremists of the Islamic State to return this year.

Are We Cutting the Army Too Much?

The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday that Army Chief of Staff General Ray Odierno has called for a reevaluation of scheduled cuts in the Army:

“The Army's highest-ranking officer on Friday said the rapid spread of threats around the world and growing demands on the U.S. military should prompt a review of deep cuts scheduled in the size of America's ground forces.

Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army chief of staff, said he had ‘grave concern about the size of the military,’ particularly in light of a wave of new international problems, including Russian aggression in Europe, the rise of militancy in Iraq and the Ebola threat in Africa.

‘Threats are increasing – they aren't decreasing – and we have to make sure we are making the right decisions,’ Gen. Odierno said. …

The active-duty Army still has 510,000 service members.  But the Army is due to shrink to 490,000 by the end of next year.  Pentagon leaders are planning to cut the Army further, to 450,000 by the end of 2017 and potentially to 420,000 by the end of the decade.”

I couldn’t agree more.  The cuts in the Army are a result of the lock-step application of the sequester rules.  President Obama won’t revisit Defense Department cuts (assuming he even wants to) unless Republicans agree to more spending throughout the government.  Republicans have been willing to allow the defense cuts to happen to avoid spending increases elsewhere in government.

President Obama Is Finally Managing Our Efforts in Iraq. Is That Good?

The Wall Street Journal reported this morning that President Obama is going to retain strict control of any bombing done in Syria as part of our efforts of “degrade and destroy” ISIS (also called the Islamic State or ISIL):

“The U.S. military campaign against Islamist militants in Syria is being designed to allow President Barack Obama to exert a high degree of personal control, going so far as to require that the military obtain presidential signoff for strikes in Syrian territory, officials said. …

Through tight control over airstrikes in Syria and limits on U.S. action in Iraq, Mr. Obama is closely managing the new war in the Middle East in a way he hasn't done with previous conflicts, such as the troop surge in Afghanistan announced in 2009 or the last years of the Iraq war before the 2011 U.S. pullout.”

As the article in the Journal says, this degree of involvement is different from how President Obama has proceeded in the past with respect to Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.

David Rothkopf, CEO and editor of the FP Group, noted the difference between the way President Obama has handled Iraq and Afghanistan and how President George W. Bush proceeded in his second term:

“Noticeably, Bush changed course on key issues.  Not only did he show courage on some of those changes – adding troops for the surge was hugely unpopular, for example – but he also showed a willingness to get personally involved to try to make things work.  In some ways, this meant that he simply rolled up his sleeves and did the work of a manager.  For example, he instituted weekly videoconferences with his team in Iraq, as well as regular exchanges with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

With benefit of hindsight, of course, the world now knows that the stabilization that occurred during the surge – and as a result of this period of attention – would not last and that Maliki was a slippery, dangerous character.  But it is also clear that for the last two years of Bush's tenure, Iraq perhaps achieved its post-invasion high point.  It is telling to note that when asked whether Obama would maintain regular interactions with Maliki, one of his aides reportedly suggested the president was disinclined to engage in that kind of ‘micromanagement’ of such situations.”

One wonders whether, if President Obama had given the attention to Iraq and Afghanistan that he is now giving to potential targets in Syria, things might be better in those countries.

But actually, probably not.  President Bush got involved and started managing our war in Iraq on a hands-on basis because he wanted to win.  He wanted the United States to succeed.

Unfortunately, I’m not sure that is the reason why President Obama is getting involved in the targeting of bombs in Syria.  Back to The Wall Street Journal:

“By demanding the Pentagon gets his signoff on any strikes in Syria, Mr. Obama can better ensure the operation remain focused on his main goal for that part of the campaign: weakening the militants' hold on territory in neighboring Iraq.

Officials also said Mr. Obama wants to make sure the military actions in Syria are more like the counterterrorism operations in Somalia or Yemen.”

In other words, it almost seems that President Obama is getting involved, micro-managing so to speak, the targets we bomb in Syria not because he wants to make sure we win, but because he doesn’t trust our military to do what he wants.  It is almost as if he is afraid that, if he does not approve the targets personally, the military will do more than he wants.

I hope I am wrong.  Because otherwise: (1) the President has a degree of mistrust of our military that is not conducive to success in what we are trying to do in the Middle East; and (2) I don’t see how we will succeed in those efforts.

Balancing Budgets. Paying Off Debt. It Can Be Done.

New Zealand has an election coming up this Saturday.  Given the way the United States (and Illinois) spends money, I thought this political ad from the National Party* was interesting:

  

Look again at the first two promises in National’s economic plan: 

“One, we’ll live within our means.
Two, we’ll start paying off debt.”

And the amazing thing is they mean it.  In the early 1990s New Zealand’s gross government debt as a percentage of GDP was around 60%, slightly less than the United States.  By 2007, under both National and Labour-led governments, the level was cut to 20%.  Due to the global economic crisis, debt levels increased back above 30% since 2008** (here and here), but the government is projecting a slight surplus in the current fiscal year and actually paying down debt thereafter (here and here).

It’s amazing.  It shows what a country can do when it wants to, both its voters and its politicians.  Unfortunately, it seems that the United States (and Illinois) has neither the politicians nor the voters who care about this.

One final point:  New Zealand is a small country.  (It has slightly fewer people than Louisiana)  If it needs money, it has to borrow it.  It can’t just print money.  Actually, I suppose it could print money, but after a very short while who would take New Zealand’s money to buy things from overseas?  A small country in a global economy has to run a sound economic policy and a sound budget.  At some point, it will be necessary for the United States (and Illinois) to do the same.  The longer we wait to start to get our budgets in shape, the harder – and more painful – it will be when we finally have to do it.
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* The National Party is currently heading up a center-right coalition in New Zealand.  New Zealand has a mixed-member proportional representation system very similar to Germany’s.  The result is that almost all governments are coalitions.

** Comparable figures for the United Sates would be a little over 60% in 2007 and 100% today (here and here).

How Do Leaders Get Followers to Follow?

Three and one-half years ago, the U.S. policy in the bombing of Moammar Gaddafi’s Libya was famously said to be “leading from behind.”  The label stuck in part because it seemed to fit President Obama’s style in foreign affairs so well.

A variation of this theme is now showing up in President Obama’s call for action against ISIS (or Islamic State or ISIL).  President Obama last week said, “We will degrade, and ultimately destroy ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counterterrorism strategy.”  But while he set this as a goal, he spent much of the speech saying what the United States was not going to do to accomplish this goal.  We will not send in ground troops.  Additional action against ISIS was apparently delayed until Iraq formed an “inclusive government”.  The speech seemed to focus as much on what other countries (not named in the speech) would be doing as what the United States would be doing.

As Ron Fournier said in National Journal: “Obama is signally to potential allies in the region that it’s finally time for them to start spilling blood, because the United States won’t.”  Peter Feaver, a former George W. Bush National Security Council official, said it this way:  “The administration believes that the way to get the others to do more is you make clear all the things the U.S. is not going to do.”

While we should not do it all, and sometimes volunteering to do too much will let others comfortably do less, the question remains:  How do you get others to do join in the fight and to do their share?  Do you publicly state (to both your hoped-for allies and your enemies) what you will not be doing?  Or do you focus on what you will do, while working behind the scenes to get others to do their share?

According to 1 Corinthians 14:8 (King James Version): “For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?”  With his emphasis on what we will not do, and the strict limits he puts on actions even when he does undertake them,* President Obama could be viewed by some potential allies as sounding an uncertain trumpet.

What will be the result of this uncertain trumpet?  Will it encourage other countries to do more?  Or will it tell them that they need to accommodate with the other side because the U.S. won’t be there to help?

In delaying Ukraine’s implementation of its agreement with the European Union because of Russian objections, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko seems to be choosing the latter course of action.
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* Such as sending additional troops into Afghanistan and at the same time announcing the date they would leave, regardless of what happened in the meantime (see here).

A Vladimir Putin-Led Russia Is Our Biggest Foreign Policy Problem

Now that President Obama has given his speech on ISIS (or ISIL or Islamic State, whatever you want to call it), let me say, once again, the United States’ number one foreign policy problem is Ukraine and Russian aggression there.  Or, more accurately, the United States’ number one foreign policy problem is Vladimir Putin and his attempt to recreate, as much as he can, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and its sphere of influence.  ISIS is dangerous, and we need to do something about it, but the danger being caused by Vladimir Putin is bigger and, I believe, more immediate.

It seems possible (maybe even probable) that both these problems, i.e., ISIS and Vladimir Putin, have been acerbated by the way the U.S. (and others) have responded to them.  With respect to Iraq, we left when many think we did not have to (see here), and we basically threw our hands up, saying it was not our problem anymore.  Tied in with this, we did not try to help groups trying to overthrow Bashar al-Assad when we said Bashar al-Assad had to go or when he used chemical weapons in spite of our redline.  I am not saying ISIS only happened because of things we did.  We don’t control the world in that way.  But what we did do (or, more accurately, what we didn’t do), made it easier for them and encouraged them to think we were weak and/or passive.

As for Vladimir Putin, I find it hard to believe that our failure to follow through on the redline we set for Syria did not affect his evaluation of what the United States would do when he invaded Crimea.  Similarly, the lack of significant response to Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea has to have encouraged President Putin to move into eastern Ukraine.  I am not suggesting that we should have sent, or should send, troops to Ukraine (though I do not see why President Obama has to keep saying, over and over, that we won’t send troops; why make it so easy for the other side to know what we might do?), but why couldn’t we at least sell them weapons?  (See here.)

President Obama was worried, with respect to providing arms to groups fighting Bashar al-Assad, that the weapons might in get in the hands of Islamic extremists/terrorists.  Is he worried that weapons we might sell/provide to the Ukrainians are going to wind up in the hands of Islamic terrorists?  Actually, the story is that President Obama doesn’t want to provide weapons to Ukraine because he is worried that Russia would consider it a provocation.  What?  Russia invaded and annexed Crimea and then invaded eastern Ukraine, and we worrying about provoking them?  What is worse, getting the Russians upset that we sold weapons to Ukraine when Ukraine was attacked or letting the Russians think we are so concerned (scared?) about provoking them that we won’t sell weapons to countries like Ukraine?

I know that President Obama has been adamant about defending countries that are members of NATO, such as the Baltic countries.  I was very happy about President Obama’s statements in that regard, but I worry.  Will President Obama follow through on his statements?  Perhaps even more worrying, will other countries join us in defending places such as the Baltics?  Or, worst of all, will President Obama’s not infrequent hesitancy in actually doing something in areas such as this, make other countries hesitate, too?

Secretary of State Kerry is touring the Middle East seeking support for action against ISIS, but what are we doing about Ukraine?  Or are we outsourcing that to Chancellor Merkel?  The problem is that leadership, and following through on your promises and commitments can’t be outsourced.  It also can’t be done from behind.  We need to do more now to stop President Putin so we don’t have to do even more later.

One final thought.  According to Ukraine, Russia is pulling its troops out of eastern Ukraine.  We need to be clear, however, that this is not a solution to the problem and that this does not mean we don’t need to impose more sanctions, and we can start to ease the sanctions already in place.  The solution is not just for Russia to pull out its troops (which it denies were ever there).  Russia needs to stop aiding the rebels in eastern Ukraine, and Russia has to stop threatening Ukraine with coming back in.  At this point, Ukraine has to assume, and act as if, Russia will invade again if Ukraine does not give in to what the Ukrainian rebels (spelled P-u-t-i-n) want.  Easing/Ending the sanctions against Russia should only happen when Russia stops interfering in Ukraine and there is no threat of them returning in the future.

Gender Gaps: Where Are They and What Does a Party Do About Them?

Polls are out showing that Democrats’ support among “women” is down.  The recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows it is down from 51% to 47%.*  This is important, according to the article reporting the poll, because Democrats need women’s votes since Democrats do better among women than men (which means, depending on how you look at it, the “gender gap” either favors the Democrats {if you look at the fact more women vote Democratic than the population as a whole} or the  Republicans {if you look at the fact that more men vote Republican than the population as a whole}).

But the real point, which does not seem to be covered by this poll, is not that women vote Democratic.  It’s that single women vote Democratic.  Married women vote Republican.  (See here and here.)  Which is a different point.

But the conclusion, in any case, is not that Republicans (or Democrats, from their point of view) should change their views to get more single women (in the case of Republicans – or married women, in the case of Democrats) to vote for them.  Your principles are your principles (and if they aren’t, I’m not a big fan of yours).  If you believe in your principles, what you can do (actually, all you can do) is to explain why your principles help single women.  I think they do.  It is a matter of explaining your principles better and trusting in the intelligence of the voters.  And accepting that if people don’t believe in your principles, they won’t vote for you.  And further accepting that, if somebody else is willing to “buy” votes by abandoning their principles, that’s the choice they make.
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* The question was: Which party do you prefer to control Congress.  In August, the response among “women” favored Democrats 51% to 37%.  The September result was down to 47% to 40%.