Never let a good crisis go to waste

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer suddenly has national recognition! This Sunday’s Detroit Free Press has a big story on the Whitmer moment (which I haven’t read yet). She is now famous enough that Saturday Night Live did a skit in which “Whitmer” has a few things to say. Such as: “Stay home. I promise you can call me a bitch from your couch. It’s called Twitter.” And if outside, stay six feet apart, so “if the tip of your AK-47 can touch the tip of your buddy’s AK, back up.”

So, yeah, SNL is airing fresh material while keeping social distancing. Which looks like it might be a lot of one person skits.



I’ve mentioned that Moscow Mitch didn’t want to do a blue state bailout, that he would rather let blue states go bankrupt than to approve any more rescue money.

David Frum of The Atlantic reviews what Mitch said and why the choice of the word “bankrupt” is important.

States, unlike cities, can default. The state can decide which payments they will honor, which they will pay in part, and which they will not pay. It has happened, though Frum lists only a couple cases in our national history.

But bankruptcy happens in federal court with federal laws. And it is a way for federal officials to have their way with pension debt, meaning “shift hardship onto pensioners while protecting bondholders.” That’s another attempt to bring more hardship to the less well off while protecting the rich. That “pension” debt is mostly because of rapid increases in healthcare costs.

Frum then talked about another aspect of fiscal federalism.

United States senators from smaller, poorer red states do not only represent their states. Often, they do not even primarily represent their states. They represent, more often, the richest people in bigger, richer blue States who find it more economical to invest in less expensive small-state races.

Frum then reviews Moscow Mitch’s top campaign contributors. None of them are from Kentucky.

A federal bankruptcy process for state finances could thus enable wealthy individuals and interest groups in rich states to leverage their clout in the anti-majoritarian federal system to reverse political defeats in the more majoritarian political systems of big, rich states like California, New York, and Illinois.

Anti-majoritarian federal system? As in Hillary Clinton is not president even though she got nearly 3 million more votes. As in two-thirds of the states combined have one-third of the population. So two-thirds of the senators are elected by one-third of the population.

Frum concludes:

But McConnell seems to be following the rule “Never let a good crisis go to waste.” He’s realistic enough to recognize that the pandemic probably means the end not only of the Trump presidency, but of his own majority leadership. He’s got until January to refashion the federal government in ways that will constrain his successors. That’s what the state-bankruptcy plan is all about.