Brian Howey has a very interesting column on the demise of the Nunn-Lugar program for decommissioning weapons in Russia in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union. That program is coming to an end. Howey points out that the end of the program probably has more to do with the ascendancy of Putin than the fall of Lugar, but Lugar’s ouster from the Senate by Richard Mourdock’s primary victory plays a role.

Russia is no longer interested in the Nunn-Lugar program which dates back to the early 1990’s and helped decommission scores of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Without Lugar in the picture there is no one obviously in place with the influence to advocate for the continuance in the program. Indeed, Lugar took crap from Mourdock for Lugar’s desire to implement the New START treaty.

Under terms of the treaty, the number of strategic nuclear missile launchers will be reduced by half. A new inspection and verification regime will be established, replacing the SORT mechanism.

The treaty passed 71 to 26; so the content of the thing was never very objectionable. It appears that what Mourdock (and his primary supporters) really disliked was that President Obama wanted the treaty passed; and working with him on any thing — even agreeable things — was tantamount to treason against the party. That’s where the frustration over partisanship comes from — not principled stands on legitimate issues of contention, but rather reflexive opposition based on the identity of the advocate rather than on the substance of the proposal. In simpler terms, it’s like when one kid grabs a toy only because another kid wants to play with it.

So, with Lugar out and, if Mourdock wins, Nunn-Lugar dies on the vine, you’ll have a Senate less receptive to generally palatable treaties like New START, and long term global stability takes more of a back seat to political orthodoxy.

From the Howey column:

The Nunn-Lugar scorecard now totals 7,527 strategic nuclear warheads deactivated and hundreds of submarine missiles, silos and launchers destroyed, as well as providing 24 nuclear weapons storage sites, and 20 biological monitoring stations built and equipped.

There is still more to be accomplished in Russia by 2017, which would have been a year after what would have been Lugar’s final term in the Senate. Only 82 percent of Russia’s 13,300 warheads have been deactivated and only 63 percent of biological monitoring stations have been built and equipped.

It’s a shame — and I’m as guilty of this as anyone — that informed geopolitical realities don’t play more of a role in a citizen’s votes for Congress. But our public debate on foreign affairs usually consists of demagoguing the Hitler of the Day and whatever negative foreign incident is freshest. Beyond that, most citizens don’t have enough information about the rest of the world to be able to think more deeply about our relationship to it. Someone suggested that war is the way Americans learn geography.

I doubt many voters will make their Donnelly/Mourdock choice based on New START or Nunn-Lugar or on their philosophy about compromise solutions negotiated with other countries generally. I don’t actually know Donnelly’s position on such things. I suppose it’s possible that he, like Mourdock, takes a my way or the highway, cut off your nose to spite your face approach.

Eric Bradner has an excellent article in the Evansville Courier Press about Mourdock and the Chrysler deal. The one piece of new information is that Indiana, through its fund manager, had, shortly prior to Chrysler filing bankruptcy, agreed to a deal that would have given Indiana about $1.6 million more than what it received under the bankruptcy restructuring plan which Mourdock spent $2 million to fight.

Indiana invested in Chrysler when it was a distressed asset. Investing $18.3 million, Indiana bought bonds with a face value of $42.5 million – in other words, paying about $0.43 per nominal dollar of securities. Before the bankruptcy, negotiations were under way. Indiana’s fund manager agreed to a deal that would have gotten Indiana about $0.33 on the dollar or about $14 million. Other funds that were part of the pre-bankruptcy negotiation blew up the deal; holding out for something better. So, Chrysler went into bankruptcy. The offer got a little smaller with Indiana’s return shrinking to about $0.29 on the dollar or about $12.4 million.

Bradner’s article cuts Mourdock a little bit of slack. There was no evidence that the liquidation value of Chrysler was anything better than the $2 billion used by the bankruptcy court. Efforts to shop around Chrysler had been underway for a year or two prior to the bankruptcy, and there is no evidence that anyone wanted to pay anything more than the $2 billion. Saying, in retrospect, it could have been worth more is simply magical thinking.

Bradner has this to say:

The $2 billion offer was based on estimates of what Chrysler would have been worth had the company liquidated, selling off its assets with the money going to bondholders like Indiana. Though estimates at the time said the company could not be worth more than that, there will never be a way to test them.

I think it’s a mistake to, by the way this is phrased, place an additional burden on the $2 billion figure rather than point out more strongly that Mourdock’s estimate that it would be worth more has not met any burden at all, let alone one strong enough to rebut the burden already met by proponents of the settlement in court. But, that’s probably a nitpick.

So, what we have is an Indiana investment that was made for $0.43/dollar, an Indiana agreement to take $0.33/dollar, and a Treasurer spending $2 million trying to wreck an effort to save the domestic auto industry when the deal shrank by $1.6 million to $.29/dollar. Mourdock says that the acceptance of the deal by the fund manager was a mistake, that he never knew about it or sanctioned it. Donnelly’s crowd is quick to pounce on that:

“Mourdock says his fund manager went rogue by agreeing to an earlier, better offer,” Parker said. “That means one of two things is true: that Mourdock keeps such poor watch over Indiana’s money that a $14 million transaction doesn’t get his attention, or that when the manager was acting in the best interest of the retirees, Mourdock overruled him to act in the best interests of his political career.”

I also have to quibble with Bradner’s article when he suggests that Mourdock can credibly claim as a victory the Supreme Court’s order that eliminated the underlying legal opinions as future precedent. This was a Munsingwear order – based on the case having become moot; and cannot at all be regarded as commentary by the Supreme Court on the soundness (or lack thereof) of the underlying legal opinion. In fact, I believe the determination that the case was moot (and, therefore, that a Munsingwear order was appropriate) was another loss for the Indiana petitioners; as they were arguing that the case was not moot and could, therefore, that Indiana could continue to petition for relief. See my discussion here.

[The Indiana petitioners] seem to be hanging their hat on the thin reed of a Munsingwear order from the United States Supreme Court. Generally speaking, a Munsingwear order is issued when a case becomes moot before it can be subjected to appellate review. The idea is that the case is over, so the appellate courts aren’t allowed to review it, but you don’t want to have potentially bad law remain on the books simply because an appellate court doesn’t have a chance to offer correction to the lower court.

Bottom line is that Mourdock lost, and lost expensively in pursuit of a foolish, possibly destructive, cause. His argument that he was sticking up for secured creditors (you, know, “the little guys”) because the secured creditors got screwed. This argument fails right out of the gate because there is no credible evidence that there was any other available deal, including liquidation, where the secured creditors could have gotten more money. The only way secured creditors would have gotten more is if the federal government revised its own offer and spent more money bailing out secured creditors. Of course, even this bit of wishful thinking collapses as a possibility the minute Mourdock starts bellyaching about the federal government picking winners and losers.

I am always skeptical of potential clients who want to pursue a case “for the principle” of the thing. Civil litigation is a poor tool for vindicating principles. It’s about obtaining money to compensate an injured party for its losses. Assuming he’s rational, if Mourdock had been playing with his own money, he never would have pursued this litigation. Given the amounts involved, it was a lose-lose proposition. But, playing with taxpayer money for purposes of political grandstanding, I guess the move makes a certain, cynical amount of sense.

Kudos to Abdul Hakim Shabazz for breaking a national story. Being the master of self-promotion that he is, I tried to craft my headline in the appropriate spirit. The AP picked it up (linked here in the Washington Post).

The upshot is that Senator Lugar will not be campaigning for Republican Senate nominee Richard Mourdock who beat him in a primary. Some could see this as nothing more than sour grapes, but I’m not sure I see it that way. I’ve had my differences with Sen. Lugar but have generally voted for him. One of his strengths – a more or less statesmanlike approach to solving problems and not, generally, being a bridge burning bomb thrower – was used against him in the primary by Mr. Mourdock.

Mourdock, who has insisted policy-making means forcing Democrats to bend to conservative ideas, has had trouble translating his win over Lugar into a muscular general election campaign against Donnelly.

I think Mourdock’s influence on the Republican Party is as salutary as his plans for dealing with Chrysler. He’s liquidating, at a loss, the value built up by those who came before him. The Republican Party has enjoyed a good reputation, particularly in Indiana, because of guys like Lugar. Hoosiers are conservative, no doubt; but, by and large, they aren’t ideologues. Traditionally, they have valued civility, work, and problem solving.

Mourdock’s rigidity was demonstrated in his approach to the Chrysler affair. He wanted to insist on liquidation rather than a restructuring deal because he couldn’t abide a plan that gave his opponents (as I believe he sees them) – the unions – anything, even if it meant that Indiana also got more out of the deal and, long term, everyone was in a better position. Reminds me of Rorschach from the Watchmen:

No. Not even in the face of Armageddon. Never compromise.

That wasn’t Lugar’s approach. Recent history notwithstanding, that hasn’t been the Republican approach. And, it’s not an American approach. If you are a Lugar supporter and can’t abide Democrats generally or Joe Donnelly specifically, you might consider Andy Horning who is also running for the Senate.

Richard Mourdock keeps digging a bigger hole on the subject of his indefensible approach to the Chrysler Bankruptcy. I’ve written on it many times before, so I’m just going to summarize: Mourdock invested Indiana money in junk Chrysler securities. Chrysler went under. The best deal on the table for secured creditors, like Indiana, was a government funded bankruptcy restructuring. The major creditors, with serious money on the table, agreed to the restructuring rather than the only alternative, liquidation.

Mourdock decided he was going to use Indiana’s position for a bit of political grandstanding: Obama is a socialist, unions suck. That kind of thing. So, he tried to torpedo the Chrysler deal. A deal that we see today had the result of keeping some good jobs in the Midwest. But, the unions were going to get something out of the deal, and President Obama was going to look like he was doing something. So Mourdock said to the courts, in effect, “kill the deal, I want a liquidation that will give Indiana less money but will give the unions nothing and be politically harmful to President Obama.” Now, today, he’ll say vaguely that maybe some private financing was available that would’ve yielded more. But there wasn’t. Chrysler had tried for years and, when the bankruptcy happened, credit markets were tighter than ever.

Flash forward to today. Why did Mourdock do this? Why, for the little people of course:

[T]elling the conservative political action committee that he fought the Chrysler bankruptcy to stop the bankruptcy court from taking the pensions of retired teachers and state troopers. “So that someone else can be given their assets,” he said. “It is the same tyrannical principle as in 1858.”

Got that? Obama saving Chrysler is just like slavery. Thank you, Richard Mourdock! Thank you for saving us from the tyranny of a somewhat less shitty return on a foolish investment.

In his speech, Mourdock was referencing this Lincoln quote:

“That is the real issue. That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time, and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, ‘You work and toil and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.’ No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.”

Called on the b.s. comparison, Mourdock said, (I paraphrase) “Oh, dear me no. How can someone hear that quote and think I was talking about slavery?” He’s simply talking about “government actions and taking property.”

And, a final note, Mourdock’s remarks were made at a Freedomworks (Tea Party) conference in Dallas, Texas. You can’t always get what you want, but my personal preference would be that Texans not have a damn thing to do with an Indiana election.

Talking Points Memo has a story about a gaffe by the Richard Mourdock Senate campaign entitled “Mourdock Accidentally Releases Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Reaction To ‘Obamacare”. Mourdock was taped responding to a variety of potential decisions by the Supreme Court on the healthcare reform law. His campaign accidentally released them all before the decision has been handed down. Apparently all possible outcomes are indictments of Joe Donnelly and great reasons for people to vote for and give money to Richard Mourdock.

Reminds me of Krusty the Clown, “I heartily endorse this event or product.”

Maureen Groppe and Paul Barton have an article about Congressional pensions. Long time lawmakers Sen. Richard Lugar and Rep. Dan Burton will be getting pensions with the fairly eye-popping numbers of $125,000 and $117,000, respectively. These numbers are big if you go with the political fiction that these are just ordinary schmoes doing an ordinary job, and nobody I know gets a pension like that. (Nobody I know gets a pension anymore — no move to a defined contribution plan?) But, if you go the other route, and look at these folks as being more like senior vice-presidents of a $2.7 trillion company, then their benefit package is fairly small.

I get it: why should we suffering taxpayers have to pay so that these public servants can live better than we do? One rationale is that, if we don’t, then companies well-positioned to exploit their lawmaking powers will. A lawmaker will have a choice between playing ball and, when he leaves office, being taken care of by lucrative, easy private sector jobs or, standing up for the public interest and, once bounced out of office, unemployed with no obvious source of income. The public will never be in a position to offer benefits packages that are anywhere near as lucrative as those that can be offered by big businesses with an interest in having the government look the other way or providing big subsidies. But, with a house payment and basic needs taken care of, a Congressperson at least has a solid option of taking the high ground.

Still and all, it grates to see that a guy like Mike Pence – who hasn’t done a damn thing in eleven years – is entitled to $32,000 per year once he turns 62.

Scott Galupo has a column in the American Conservative whose brevity is matched by its brutality. I’m probably quoting too much, but:

[Romney] combines Bill Clinton’s mendacity with Al Gore’s charm. . . . A candidate who promises to close the deficit but whose budget plan will only make it worse? A candidate who’s pushing for yet more tax cuts for the wealthy when there’s no evidence that such cuts will spark more or faster growth than they did the last time they were tried? A candidate who compensates for ignorance on foreign policy with pointless bellicosity? A candidate whose general-election victory would at least marginally increase the chances of war with Iran?

…

The choice between Obama and Romney is no choice at all. It can be summed up in that famous two-word review of Spinal Tap’s Shark Sandwich album.

The Spinal Tap reference is perhaps more apt than he intended. A related joke is that “life is like a shit sandwich, the more bread you have, the better it tastes.” Near as I can tell, that’s Romney’s economic plan in a nutshell.

The Romney in high school story is a little bush league, but I guess if we’re going to worry about Kerry’s swiftboat and how he eats a cheese steak, or Obama’s eating dog or birth certificate or Bush’s DUI and national guard service and generally let horse race and personality coverage displace more boring, work-intensive substantive coverage about how they’d govern if elected then I guess this kind of thing is part of the landscape.

My opinion isn’t colored by whether a candidate was or was not a dick in high school. The story is that Romney, in high school, was fairly vicious in holding down an effeminate kid who had a non-conforming hair style at Romney’s prep school and forcibly cutting the kid’s hair.

Romney march[ed] out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

Some of the news reports I’ve seen following up on the Washington Post story are referring to this as “a prank.” Even in 1965, I can’t think that this constitutes a “prank.” That’s not a disqualifier for office. Teens can be vicious little assholes. Part of growing up is learning empathy. As a kid, you are necessarily self-centered and limited in your understanding of people who aren’t you.

I remember in maybe third grade, on the way home from school, an incident where I was picking on the effeminate kid in our class; the one who hung out with all the girls. Me and some other guys started pelting him with snowballs – and not in a playful way. He ran away and the incident didn’t amount to much. Not long after, I think he moved out of town. A few years ago, I saw that he was on Facebook. I recalled the incident, and just felt awful about it. Even though it had been about 30 years, I thought the right thing to do was to make contact with him to tell him I was sorry for being such a jerk. People grow up and develop a better sense of right and wrong.

Romney’s problem, as is so often with these things, is his reaction now. According to his campaign’s spokesperson, he has no memory of this incident. (“Governor Romney has no memory of participating in these incidents.”) I imagine that’s a lie. I’d be more horrified if it was true that he didn’t remember. I can’t imagine an incident like that being so unremarkable to me as to not leave a lasting impression. Then, Romney himself confirmed his lack of memory to Fox News and suggested that sometimes his “pranks” went too far. Again, of the many things this story describes, “prank” is not one of them.

His ability to apologize in a straightforward manner is limited by his purported inability to recall having held the crying boy down to forcibly cut his hair:

Back in high school, I did some dumb things, and if anybody was hurt by that or offended, obviously I apologize.

Because he can’t acknowledge remembering, he can’t say something like, “that was an awful thing to do. No one should be treated like that. Obviously I’m older now and know better, but I still regret what I did and, if he were still alive, would apologize to that boy.” Apology taken care of and recognition of wrong-doing acknowledged, he could pivot to a focus on how it’s a little ridiculous our political system focuses on events from so long ago instead of on current problems.