James Fallows

When I was holed up in Beijing for several months last year finishing my China book, Eamonn Fingleton was part of a virtuoso team of guest bloggers who filled in for me in this space. One of his items drew a lot of attention and generated a lot of discussion. It was called "The Myth of Japan's Lost Decade," and it argued that the Western world had been all too self-congratulatory about the utter "collapse" of Japan's economy. In fact, he argued, Japan was still very rich -- and although its political system was terminally dysfunctional (sound familiar?), its companies in fact enjoyed ever-growing world market share in a wide range of high tech goods.

This is a case I sympathize with, and have made various times -- for instance, in the Atlantic two years ago. I am sure that Fingleton has noticed that Paul Krugman, long a skeptic of the "Japan is stronger than it looks" view, now agrees. Or so a new interview with Martin Wolf in the FT suggests:

The conversation turns to the Japanese crisis of the 1990s. In retrospect, I [Wolf] suggest, the Japanese seem to have managed the aftermath of their crisis quite well.

He [Krugman] agrees. "What we thought was that Japan was a cautionary tale. It has turned into Japan as almost a role model. They never had as big a slump as we have had. They managed to have growing per capita income through most of what we call their 'lost decade'. My running joke is that the group of us who were worried about Japan a dozen years ago ought to go to Tokyo and apologise to the emperor. We've done worse than they ever did. When people ask: might we become Japan? I say: I wish we could become Japan."

Respects to Fingleton, who was one of the few making the case against exaggerated Japan-pessimism all along. (Bill Holstein is another.) And to Krugman, for acknowledging how things have evolved.

In my first few hours back in Shanghai, I am newly amazed by the scale and pace of the building, of the ambitions, of the problems, and of the range of Chinese dreams realistic and fanciful. More on that after some sleep. For now:

1) From John Berthelsen of Asia Sentinel, this "Chart of the Day," showing the role of construction outlays in China's overall investment picture. The blue line is construction investment; the red line is total fixed asset investment; and the scale appears to be rate of increase year-on-year.



As Berthelsen says (in a note to me) about the pattern shown here, "You can see how construction spiked earlier this year as the government seeks to construct its way out of the current slump. Since they announced a flock of accelerated construction projects [this week], it should spike back again." I did an Atlantic article on the previous spike, in 2009, while still in Beijing.

One of the big themes in my new book is that the Chinese development model of the past 30 years has been very heavily reliant on the "when in doubt, build something" strategy. In the short term, this approach certainly keeps people employed -- and enriches others through real-estate transactions. In the medium term, it creates infrastructure that can help the country grow (subways, ports, the 100+ airports under construction). And in the long term, even some of the apparent white elephants and "ghost cities" may eventually be grown-into as Chinese demand goes up and up.

But too great a reliance on construction and real-estate boosterism creates various follow-on distortions, as I'll spell out another time. For now, thanks to Berthelsen for the chart.

2) In case you haven't seen it, it is worth reading this article from Arthur Kroeber, at Foreign Policy, on the China trends that are really serious and those that will probably take care of themselves. Sample:

No question, China has many problems. Years of one-sided investment-driven growth have created obvious excesses and overcapacity.... Is China's legendary economy in serious trouble?

Not just yet. The odds are that China will navigate these shoals and continue to grow at a fairly rapid pace of around 7 percent a year for the remainder of the decade, overtaking the United States to become the world's biggest economy around 2020.... Considerably less certain, however, is whether China's secretive and corrupt Communist Party can make this growth equitable, inclusive, and fair. Rather than economic collapse, it's far more likely that a decade from now China will have a strong economy but a deeply flawed and unstable society.

This is a complex point (as Kroeber, who has been on-scene in China for a very long time, is well aware). For what it's worth, I think the environmental, social, and political tensions could become serious even sooner than Kroeber suggests -- that's part of the concluding argument in my book. And before anyone writes in to point it out, I am fully aware that modern America's version of the same problem -- "overall economy doing OK, most people not doing OK" -- is a first-order challenge to our national well-being. The main point is that it is worth reading Kroeber's essay.

3) Worried that the imbalances in US-Chinese trade and investment flows leave the United States helplessly at China's whim and mercy? You might want to consider how the picture looks from the perspective of a state-controlled nationalist paper in China, Global Times. Here is a translation of one of its editorials this week:

"Sino-U.S trade not equal and mutually beneficial (pg 15)

"No matter from what point of view, China is more dependent on the U.S. than vice versa.  As long as there is an asymmetric dependence, there can be no equality or mutual benefit. 

"Over the years, the United States has used dollars to exchange for China's real resources, goods and services.  However, with this greenback or electronic symbols, China is not allowed to purchase real U.S. assets but rather U.S. dollar denominated securities and treasury bonds to support the U.S. economy.  With the dollar's depreciation and inflation, China's foreign exchange reserves continue to shrink.  Is this equal and mutually beneficial? 

"The United States at every turn uses its domestic law to impose anti-dumping and countervailing duties on products made-in-China, implementing "special protection."  Is this equal and mutually beneficial?  Ford, Wal-Mart, Goldman Sachs and other U.S. companies can drive straight into Chinese market, while CNOOC, Huawei were long shut out by the U.S.  Is this equal and mutually beneficial?"

One other immediate reaction on this trip: the rediscovered annoyance of dealing with a firewalled Internet, even in the most modern hotel I have ever stayed in. (Yes, I realize that this is a country-level rather than hotel-level blocking scheme; I just am referring to the incongruous mix of hyper-advanced luxury technology and hyper-backward internet access.) Something has happened so that my old VPN provider now appears to be blocked. A project for later in the day.

Here are two quotes from two 40-ish Harvard Law School graduates back in 2005. They make for a very interesting comparison now. First, a few words of set-up:

I mentioned recently, in an item about the possible Roger Taney-ization of Chief Justice John Roberts, the fascinating time-capsule quality of a Washington Post story about the vote on Roberts's confirmation, in 2005. Roberts (who had just turned 50) was approved by a 78-22 margin, with all Republicans voting in favor and the Democrats split evenly, 22 for and 22 against.

The Post story discussed the motives and rationales of the leading Democrats in the Senate for voting the way they did, and considered the ramifications for the later ambitions of several of them, including Sens. Biden, Bayh, Clinton, etc. It also discussed the views of Sens. Chuck Schumer, Lindsey Graham, Jon Kyl, et al -- but did not even mention one of the Democrats opposed to Roberts. This was of course the 44-year-old freshman senator from Illinois whom Chief Justice Roberts would swear in as president less than three and a half years later. It is one more reminder of the out-of-nowhere quality of Barack Obama's rise. 

A reader has just sent in a link to a WSJ item from 2009, which quoted Obama's stated reasons in 2005 for opposing the Roberts choice. Given what we know about Roberts from his six-plus years on the Court, and what we have learned about Obama, it makes worthwhile reading now. Here are passages from Obama's 2005 statement of opposition to Roberts, with emphasis supplied by the reader:

"The problem I face...is that while adherence to legal precedent and rules of statutory or constitutional construction will dispose of 95% of the cases that come before a court... what matters on the Supreme Court is those 5% of cases that are truly difficult.

In those cases, adherence to precedent and rules of construction and interpretation will only get you through the 25th mile of the marathon. That last mile can only be determined on the basis of one's deepest values, one's core concerns, one's broader perspectives on how the world works, and the depth and breadth of one's empathy.

In those 5% of hard cases, the constitutional text will not be directly on point. The language of the statute will not be perfectly clear. Legal process alone will not lead you to a rule of decision.... In those difficult cases, the critical ingredient is supplied by what is in the judge's heart.

I talked to Judge Roberts about this. Judge Roberts...did say he doesn't like bullies and has always viewed the law as a way of evening out the playing field between the strong and the weak.

I was impressed with that statement because I view the law in much the same way. The problem I had is that when I examined Judge Roberts' record and history of public service, it is my personal estimation that he has far more often used his formidable skills on behalf of the strong in opposition to the weak. In his work in the White House and the Solicitor General's Office, he seemed to have consistently sided with those who were dismissive of efforts to eradicate the remnants of racial discrimination in our political process. In these same positions, he seemed dismissive of the concerns that it is harder to make it in this world and in this economy when you are a woman rather than a man.

I want to take Judge Roberts at his word that he doesn't like bullies and he sees the law and the court as a means of evening the playing field between the strong and the weak. But given the gravity of the position to which he will undoubtedly ascend and the gravity of the decisions in which he will undoubtedly participate during his tenure on the court, I ultimately have to give more weight to his deeds and the overarching political philosophy that he appears to have shared with those in power than to the assuring words that he provided me in our meeting.

Now, compare this with what John Roberts said about himself in his opening statement at his confirmation hearings. Here I've added the emphasis:

My personal appreciation that I owe a great debt to others reinforces my view that a certain humility should characterize the judicial role.

Judges and justices are servants of the law, not the other way around. Judges are like umpires. Umpires don't make the rules; they apply them.

The role of an umpire and a judge is critical. They make sure everybody plays by the rules.

But it is a limited role. Nobody ever went to a ball game to see the umpire.

Judges have to have the humility to recognize that they operate within a system of precedent, shaped by other judges equally striving to live up to the judicial oath.

I leave it to you to judge which of those statements from 2005 stands up better seven years later as a guide to John Roberts's temperament and jurisprudence. I will tip my hand in saying: whether or not you admire his role on the court, it is impossible to see how anyone could describe it as umpire-like or "reflecting a certain humility." In the Citizens United ruling, he and his allies set out to answer questions the case itself did not necessarily raise, so as to overturn precedents they considered incorrect. If you're using the umpire analogy, it would be as if someone behind home plate suddenly yelled "Foot fault!" about a tennis match he saw out of the corner of his eye, with "Pass Interference!" and "Icing" calls thrown in to boot. The potential overturn of the Obama health care law may be desirable or not, according to your own views -- but it is anything but "humble."

I mention this mainly because of the apposite pairing. We have two men who now sit atop two of the three branches of the government. They both laid down markers seven years ago on how one of those men was likely to perform once in office. One of the predictions seems a lot more prescient than the other.

I get off a connecting flight in Newark, en route to Shanghai, to see a mailbox full of notes questioning an item from last night. That item was based on a chart appearing to show that Fox News viewers overall did worse on a test of public-affairs factual knowledge than those who got their news elsewhere, or even than those who said they didn't watch the news at all.

Here's the most fully argued version of the comments I've received, from a reader in New York. All emphasis in original:

I've been following your "False Equivalence" series and have generally enjoyed and agreed with your insights, but I fear you may have jumped to a possibly unfounded conclusion on this one.  I'm a statistician by trade and have worked with various US government statistics departments the past and current work for an international organization.  Though I find these results entertaining from a media frenzy point of view, a number of alarm bells go off right away when I see this survey.  In ascending order of what bothered me most (with the relevant survey disclaimer quotes in italics):

    1.    It was conducted as a telephone survey.  "Survey results are also subject to non-sampling error. This kind of error, which cannot be measured, arises from a number of factors including, but not limited to, non-response (eligible individuals refusing to be interviewed)....." .  With caller ID these days what are chances that randomly chosen people would pick up for an unknown number?  And of those that pick up, how many are likely to agree to talk on the phone for 10 minutes to complete a survey such as this?  I would surmise that the response rate was quite low (I didn't see any documentation in the report).  A low response rate raises the possibility of nonresponse bias -  the possibility that certain demographic types would be undersampled.  The report states that responses were reweighted to account for discrepancies in race, age and gender proportions as compared to the national average, but presumable there are other factors that go into nonresponse bias. 

    2.    Only 8 questions were asked.  "Survey results are also subject to non-sampling error. This kind of error, which cannot be measured, arises from a number of factors including, but not limited to, ..... question wording, the order in which questions are asked, and variations among interviewers." This is a structural bias issue.  For example, what if Fox News reported particularly poorly on one or more of the topics included in the survey, but reported much better on some other topics not included?  While I don't see any inherent bias in the questions that doesn't mean there isn't any.  How were the questions selected?  Did both liberals, conservatives and centrists screen them for bias?  And how well the result of 8 random news questions relate to "what you know" anyway?

    3.    The deep breakdown of data in the survey.  1,185 people sounds like a lot, but when it is broken down to such a low level the sample size dwindles.  The graph that you use in your post shows the average number of questions answered correctly by respondents who reported getting their news from just this source in the past week.  So of the 1,185, how many watched Fox News and not any of the other sources listed?  MSNBC?  I would think that most people get their news from multiple sources (local news AND Fox News for example).  These people are apparently excluded from the analysis.  Presumably, the remaining sample could be quite small.  Which leads to the possibly most important issue:

    4.    Lack of standard errors on the correct answers statistic. "The margin of error for a sample of 1185 randomly selected respondents is +/- 3 percentage points. The margin of error for subgroups is larger and varies by the size of that subgroup." The size of the subgroups on which the graph is based are not mentioned.  Also +/- 3 percentage points does not apply to the number of questions answered correctly.  I do not see evidence of statistical testing to show there are significant differences by respondents reporting receiving their news from different sources (though I suppose there's a chance it may just not have been mentioned in the report).

While I'm not sure that the team at Farleigh Dickinson could have done a much better job than they did with their resources, I think this type of survey does not rise to level of "news" (nor do most soft surveys like this).  It is extremely easy to jump to conclusions based on a graph that agrees with one's inklings about news sources even when the data behind it may not lend itself to clear cut conclusions.  Another thing that should be noted is the issue of causality.  You note in your post "that NPR aspires actually to be a news organization and provide 'information', versus fitting a stream of facts into the desired political narrative"  While this could be true, it is also possible that even if the survey results were correct there may be a bit of self-selection when choosing news networks.  In that case, ignorance could be the viewer's fault rather than the fault of Fox News.

These are convincing points; I am sorry if I passed this chart along too eagerly and credulously, without reading the caveats. I have been big on the theme that reporters / commentators should not so often rush to conclusions and should instead be more aware of what they/we do not know. Conveniently and in my public-spirited way, I have now provided an illustration of this tendency myself. On the other hand, I do very much re-suggest consideration of the important  false equivalence item from masscommons I mentioned last night.

FInally a sample of another recurring theme:

I take some exception to this post, on how Fox viewers answer fewer questions correctly than NPR viewers. I'll bet that Fox viewers tend to be more conservative than NPR listeners. Conservatives tend to be less educated than liberals, and less educated people probably know less about current events.

There are any number of correlations that could be involved in driving this result, and until those are explored the only safe accusation you can make is that Fox attracted less informed viewers than NPR, not that Fox provides less information. That might be true, and your opinion, but this isn't proper evidence for it.

Some time today, please read this item by Heather Hurlburt, at Democracy Arsenal. It's about the way the professional U.S. military is increasingly at odds with (wait for it) modern GOP right-wingers, on issues ranging from containing Iran to using biofuels.

Part of her explanation for the tension:

The military-industrial complex is small-c conservative -- and I'm using both those terms in a completely value-neutral, descriptive way. It looks for fights it can win, not fights -- like a land war in Iran, or endless, bank-breaking fuel bills -- that might fatally weaken it. It looks to consolidate.  It is a status quo power seeking to preserve the status quo. And these days, preserving the status quo involves fuel made from seaweed, talks with Iranians, and getting out of the prison business.

Whatever the conservative movement in America is at the moment -- conflicted, in a battle for its soul, looking to get its groove back -- it isn't a status quo power... That just may also have something to do with the percentage of military campaign contributions reported to be going to either President Obama... or Ron Paul.

This was the subtext in the series of fascinating appearances yesterday by Colin Powell, about his new book. Several times he was asked about Obama-v-Romney endorsements, and each time he said that it was "premature" to get into such matters. But he explicitly was a fan of Obama's gay-marriage statements; almost as explicitly was suspicious of the hawks on Team Romney who had snookered him [Powell] into the Iraq war; and very obviously is not a fan of the U.S. opening a new front in Iran.  I have first-hand reason to be sure of his views on this point.

The military as Democratic Party bastion? Not imminent, but this item suggests that it is conceviable. Worth reading.

I am simply piggy-backing here on a very popular item by Alexander Abad-Santos on The Atlantic Wire. But on the off chance that you have not seen it, this really is worth a look.

It's a comparison of results on a basic factual-knowledge test for consumers of different news organizations. The Wire item (understandably) contrasted the results for Fox viewers versus those who watched no news at all. To me an even more dramatic contrast is Fox-v-NPR*.

It's Tavares, Florida, which has declared itself "America's Seaplane City."




Or maybe again it should be Mills River, North Carolina, based on a news release from the wonderful Sierra Nevada brewing company:

CHICO, Calif. -- Jan. 25, 2012 --Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. is pleased to announce that it has chosen a site in western North Carolina for the future home of an East Coast brewery. The site, approximately 90 acres in the Henderson County Town of Mills River-- along the French Broad River, 12 miles south of Asheville -- will be home to the new production facility, as well as a proposed restaurant and gift shop. "We are thrilled to have found an ideal location in western North Carolina for our second brewery," says Ken Grossman, founder of Sierra Nevada. "The beer culture, water quality and quality of life are excellent. We feel lucky to be a part of this community."

I will graft these onto my Official 'China Airborne' Info Page shortly, but at the moment and for the record:

1) A discussion on Morning Joe this morning, in which I was talking about what there is to worry about, and not, in the panoply of current Chinese high-tech ambitions. Plus, what the example of Colin Powell shows about the People's Liberation Army:
 

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

2) A similar discussion with Daniel Gross on Yahoo Finance this afternoon. More emphasis on economic and technical ramifications. 



3) I love how Knute Berger, of the estimable Crosscut in Seattle, has applied the "Happy with crappy" aspects of China's hyper-rapid development drive to its future prospects -- and those in America too. I first wrote about the "Happy with crappy" philosophy -- that is, not messing around with the fine points but just moving ahead as fast as you can -- back in 2007 in a long article about Chinese factories. The phrase came from Andy Switky of IDEO, who spent much of his time in China trying to find the sweet spot between speed and quality.

4) If you are in Louisville this evening, I'll hope to see you at the Free Public Library. Then, Shanghai. Back to non-promo discussions shortly.

You know that an analysis of modern politics is careening toward "false equivalence" territory when it says that "extremists of the right and left" are, in their symmetrical and indistinguishable way, messing things up for the rest of us.

I've kept looking for a particular data-point that would substantiate the idea that today's dysfunction really is symmetrical: the moment when "extremists on the right" would crack down on one of their own for rigid and inflexible views. There have been inklings: for instance, Newt Gingrich's line early in the campaign that "right-wing social engineering" via the Ryan Budget was as bad as the left-wing kind; also, numerous Republicans' attempts to distance themselves from pure birtherism. Or the general GOP admission that Sarah Palin was perhaps not the best possible choice for VP. Jon Huntsman's "call me crazy" Tweets and comments don't quite count, since the more such things he said, the less he seemed connected to the party itself. A similar "he's not really speaking for the party" discount must be applied to Ron Paul's consistent and admirable critique of neocon warmongering.

But now there is an illustration! The Wall Street Journal's own editorial page -- the heart of the heart of the brain of the movement -- has cautioned a freshman Republican Congressman about the know-nothingness exemplified by his attempt to gut a crucial part of Census Bureau surveys.


You also have to admire and love the way the Journal couched the point, emphasis added:

Every now and then the GOP does something that feeds the otherwise false narrative of political extremism....

Since the political class is attempting to define the GOP as insane and redefine "moderation" as anything President Obama favors, Republicans do themselves no favors by targeting a useful government purpose.[!!!]

Artfully put. Still, good for the Journal in speaking up on behalf of actual knowledge, which a government agency happens to produce. Plus, among the good items on the WSJ editorial section yesterday:

- Reprinting a properly astringent Forbes item by Rich Karlgaard (who fwiw is an experienced Cirrus SR22 pilot) on the decline of America as displayed by the Facebook IPO. Eg, as point #3 of 7:

 3. Facebook left nothing for the common investor. The insider pig pile of PE firms and celebrity Silicon Valley angels took it all...When Microsoft when public in 1986, its market value was $780 million. Microsoft's market value would rise more than 700 times in the next 13 years. Bill Gates made millionaires of thousands of ordinary public investors. When Google went public in 2004 at a $23 billion valuation, it left less on the table for you and me. Still, if you had invested in Google then and held your stock, you would be sitting atop a 9x return. Zuckerberg and his Facebook friends took it all.

- Bonus point, also from yesterday's WSJ: an editorial that is the strongest evidence yet that Chief Justice John Roberts is feeling the heat and suspecting that he will be cast as the modern Roger Taney (right -- look it up) if, after what he did with Citizens United, he overrules the health-care law. The evidence is the editorialists' entreaties that Roberts pay no attention, none at all!, to accusations "that if the Court overturns any of the law, he'll forever be defined as a partisan 'activist.'"

They're right, of course. How could anyone possibly think that John Roberts -- he of the forelock-tugging "I just call the balls and strikes, ma'am" / country-boy / Uriah Heep self-presentation at his confirmation hearings seven years ago -- would run the slightest risk of being considered a result-oriented political operative just for ensuring that big rulings always come on out in favor of his political allies. Ignore this carping, Mr. Chief Justice. Ask yourself, WWRBTD*!

[Update Just now I see on Fox News a panel whose whole subject is the threat that liberals will "blackmail" Roberts into feeling that it would be a "historical error" and overreach for him to engineer an overturn of the law. I take this as a sign that "Roberts as the next Taney?" meme is getting through. In a different way, Reagan's solicitor general, Charles Fried, has been sending a reuptational warning signal to Roberts.] [* The key to WWRBT do is that Taney's middle initial is B.]

[Update-update. The Washington Post account of the 78-22 vote on confirming Roberts has this fascinating historical note. Here's the passage explaining why some Democrats voted for Roberts and some voted against:

 The Senate Democrats' 22 to 22 split illuminated the influence that presidential politics and red-state, blue-state considerations play in a party struggling to end nearly a decade of unbroken GOP control of Congress. Among those opposing Roberts were presidential aspirants who typically veer to the center but now are eyeing the liberal activist groups that will play key roles in Iowa, New Hampshire and other early-voting states in 2008. They included Sens. Evan Bayh (Ind.), Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.). Also voting no were two senators facing potentially tough reelections next year in states with powerful left-leaning groups: Maria Cantwell of Washington and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. Maryland's Democratic senators voted against Roberts.
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Democrats voting for Roberts included several facing reelection contests next year in states that Bush carried twice: Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Bill Nelson of Florida, Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia and Kent Conrad of North Dakota.

What's interesting here? The name of freshman senator Barack Obama (Ill.) did not even appear in the story.

Let's take a trip back in time -- back a whole two weeks ago, when the Cranbrook Haircut was the dominant making-of-the-president issue, emerging as it did immediately after Barack Obama's comments about his "personal views" on same-sex marriage. Then came the rumored anti-Obama attack ad based on footage of Rev. Jeremiah "God damn America!" Wright and funded by the founder of TD Ameritrade.

In those dimly remembered pre-Cory Booker, pre-Facebook IPO days, I asked Samuel Popkin, author of The Candidate, what his student-of-history perspective told us about how the campaigns were presenting these issues and how they were likely to matter in the campaign. He, like me, has been otherwise engaged for a while, but he now sends this report.

Question
"Dear Sam:
    "In a way that almost no one would have predicted three weeks ago [ie mid April], the political news of the past weeks has been dominated by two sequences: one initiated by Barack Obama's comments on same-sex marriage, and the other initiated by a proposed Super-PAC ad about Reverend Wright.

  "What has struck you about each sequence?  

  "And -- bonus questions -- how much do you think this was a planned move by the President, as opposed to getting out of the corner in which VP Biden's comments had painted him? And, what about that Cranbrook haircut story?"

Answer
   "Dear Jim:
   "Both sequences remind us how fast the political grounds have shifted on social issues, money and media.   I was particularly struck by Republicans' attempts to say as little as possible about the issue of marriage equality after President Obama's speech.  Rather than attacking the premise of Obama's statement, Romney supporters called it a smokescreen to divert attention from the economy.  An important tipping point has been reached on gay rights.  Once Democrats were divided over crime and welfare; now Republicans are divided over gay rights.   

   "Of course the economy is a bigger issue this year than gay marriage, but if there were votes to be won on this issue with a strong national stand, you can be sure the Romney campaign would go after them.  Romney, though he adhered to his conviction that marriage is between a man and a woman, did not oppose a same-sex couple's right to adopt, or any other rights, and he was careful to avoid any outright attacks on gays in the military during the primaries.

  "After Obama's declaration, Republican pollster Jan van Lohuizen rushed out a memo to warn Republican officials that the pace of change for support of gay rights was accelerating.  Voters of every age and party are getting more supportive, and every year, new voters (who are most likely to support gay rights) are entering the electorate, while older voters (who are least likely) are leaving it.  

  "The success of North Carolina's Amendment One aside, the activist energy and commitment are clearly on the pro-marriage equality side.   If they care intensely about this issue, independent and young voters are likely to be closer to Obama than Romney.  

  "The Romney camp will have some very intense negotiations with Rick Santorum before their convention.  I am starting to think that the more orthodox elements of the religious right are in the same position within the Republican party that the unions were in with Democrats in the 70s and 80s.   Santorum's base is a dwindling portion of the country, but it is still big enough to carry a lot of caucuses and primaries and give him a shot in 2016 if he fights to keep his issue leadership alive.  How do you attack gay rights in Red states without losing votes from gay rights supporters in battleground states?

  "Now, as for the Bonus Question:

  "Whether or not Vice President Biden spoke too soon, it was clear the president had to do something before the Democratic Convention or risk being the target of embarrassing protests.  Secretary of Education Arne Duncan  had already chimed in to support gay marriage, an important reminder that incumbents simply cannot run as coherent and disciplined a campaign as challengers.

  "I cannot believe that Biden's comment was planned, or that Obama's interview would have included the subject otherwise.  This White House has not been proactive on this issue in general, and I'm sure they expected a lot more push-back than they've received."

Now you know. Previously in the Ask Dr. Popkin saga, see installments one, two, and three; and his book The Candidate; and my discussion of it in Obama Explained. Our next round will cover Cory Booker, Bain, et al.

Late in 2009, when President Obama was making his first trip to China, I did a running set of (increasingly amazed and and occasionally peeved) notes on how the traveling U.S. press corps was covering the whole thing as if it were an election-year campaign swing. Just as they had a year earlier, when candidate Obama was trying to close the sale against John McCain, many stories judged his success or failure by crowd size and enthusiasm, Obama's pep on the podium, his body language in public appearances, and so on. On those standards, overall they judged it a gigantic flop.

I argued at the time that the things that mattered about the trip, for better or worse, were not likely to be displayed in the immediate public interactions between an American president and his Chinese counterparts. And looking back on the evolution of the administration's foreign policy, I contended earlier this year in my long story about Obama that U.S. positioning toward China was actually one of the more chessmaster-like features of Obama's overall policy. That is, love the current administration or hate it, you really should consider China-handling one of the more successful parts of its record. The China section of the article went on at considerable length, but these were the beginning and ending parts:

By the time Obama made his state visit to Shanghai and Beijing, in November 2009, the press in both countries and the rest of the world was primed to present his usual low-key demeanor as servility. The Washington Post and The New York Times contrasted Obama's supposed hat-in-hand manner with the bravado of Bill Clinton, who had mentioned the Tiananmen Square protests while standing next to President Jiang Zemin.

Yet even as Obama was politely listening to lectures about China's new superiority, members of his administration were executing an elaborate pincer movement to reestablish American influence, real and perceived, among the growing economies of Asia....

Two years after Obama's "humiliating" visit to Shanghai and Beijing, U.S. relations with China were a mix of cooperation and tension, as they had been through the post-Nixon years. But American relations with most other nations in the region were better than since before the Iraq War. In a visit to Australia late in 2011, Obama startled the Chinese leadership but won compliments elsewhere with the announcement of a new permanent U.S. Marine presence in Darwin, on Australia's northern coast.

The strategy was Sun Tzu-like in its patient pursuit of an objective: reestablishing American hard and soft power while presenting a smiling "We welcome your rise!" face to the Chinese. "It was as decisive a diplomatic victory as anyone is likely to see," Walter Russell Mead, of Bard College, often a critic of the administration, wrote about the announcement of the Australian base. "In the field of foreign policy, this was a coming of age of the Obama administration and it was conceived and executed about as flawlessly as these things ever can be."

Why do I bring this up? Because we've recently had another similar example, in the influential initial coverage of American "handling" of the Chen Guangcheng case.

Obviously the road ahead for Chen and his family is rocky and uncertain. Their prospects look a lot better than when family members were being beaten and he was under house arrest, but a new set of challenges and complications is ahead. And as Orville Schell very astutely argues, today's Chinese government has shown a kind of soft-power sophistication (and cynicism) in realizing that it was better to get Chen out of the country relatively quickly and let the international spotlight move away from him, as it inevitably will.

Still, this episode has so far turned out better than it easily might have. And the State Department and White House negotiators on the U.S. side, whatever mistakes or misjudgments they may have made, appear to have been something other than the feckless clowns portrayed in the first wave of press coverage, based on the question of whether they had sold Chen Guangcheng out.

Before you mention it: yes, some accounts posted by the Atlantic were as quick to leap to this conclusion as anyone else. As mentioned at the time, I thought headlines like those at right gave the wrong impression. Maybe therefore we're in a more sincere position to use this as a reminder of how hard it is to judge negotiations immediately, and on the basis of external stage business, and especially when dealing with governments not known for transparency. We naturally crave "what does it all mean?" "who screwed up?" "who won and lost?" certainty, but there are times when the immediately available answers to those questions are likely to be wrong. In our little part of our journo-sphere we will try to do our part by taking this lesson to heart.

My tech colleagues at the Atlantic have graciously set up a special standalone page for book-related info. (Thank you: Betsy, Clarissa, Sarah, Jennie.) As of tomorrow, I will have wrangled it sufficiently to move all further such info there.

For the moment, one last book installment:

1) Monday night DC: Politics & Prose. If you are in DC on May 21, I will be at this renowned bookstore at 7pm. Last night, I saw my friend Tim Noah discuss his excellent book, The Great Divergence, there.

2) Tuesday night NYC: If you are in New York on May 22, I'll be there in the evening, with my friend and mentor Orville Schell.

3) Last night, All Things Considered. I did an interview with Guy Raz about China's overall technological ambitions, as reflected by its aerospace drive.

4) Last week, Marginal Revolution. The economist (and Atlantic author!) Tyler Cowen had a very generous note about the book on his site. I am mainly delighted that he saw the central point.

After that, headed to Louisville -- and Shanghai! But more about that tomorrow, on the new page.

The Atlantic still laments the departure/graduation/loss of our friend and colleague Joshua Green (at right), who did great work here for many years and is now at Bloomberg Businessweek. But he still is doing great work, most recently with a column for the Boston Globe on -- wait for it -- how the boring-sounding filibuster really has become a first-order distorting problem.

I turn the microphone over to Josh:

An easy way to grasp [the filibuster's] importance, and why filibuster abuse has made Washington such an angry, dysfunctional place, is to imagine what the country would look like without it.

Let's take only the Obama presidency. Had the filibuster not applied, the United States would have a market-based system to control carbon emissions, which would limit the damage from global warming, vitalize the clean technology sector, and challenge other large polluters like China and India to do the same. The new health care law would have a public option. Children of undocumented immigrants who served two years in the military or went to college could become US citizens. Women paid less than their male colleagues because of their gender would have broader legal recourse against their employers. Billionaires would not be able to manipulate the political system from behind a veil of anonymity.

Dozens of vacant judgeships would have been filled. The Federal Reserve would have operated with a full slate of governors, including Nobel Prize-winning economist Peter Diamond. Elizabeth Warren would be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, not a candidate for the Senate....

Each of these measures passed the House and received, or would have received, at least the 50 votes necessary to pass the Senate -- but lacked the 60 votes to break a filibuster.

And while of course these are all Democratic measures that have been impeded --"Let's take only the Obama presidency" -- he immediately goes on to point out that a comparable use of the filibuster when the Republicans are back in control will hog-tie them as well.

For another time, we'll go into the ways in which the filibuster and overall government dysfunction are not really symmetrical "extremists on each side make both sides suffer" situations. The Democrats overall have a greater stake in effective use of public programs -- from GI Bill and Medicare of yesteryear through financial-regulation bodies today, and even the Census Bureau, as explained in an important NYT story today. Thus a bias toward a minority-veto, paralyzed Senate has an overall right-wing effect. But any administration is hamstrung if it cannot fill judicial seats, get ambassadors in place, staff up the executive branch, etc.

For a change, here is some positive and even practical advice on what to do about a country whose private economy and culture are still highly resilient, but whose ability to address public problems is being destroyed. I have two books and one article to recommend.

1) Ten Steps to Repair American Democracy, a book by Steven Hill, with foreword by my old speechwriting comrade Hendrik Hertzberg. Practical suggestions for improving campaigns, elections, and the functioning of the legislature, without invoking the deus ex machina of a whole new Constitution.

2) The Gardens of Democracy, by Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer. Liu is another one-time speechwriter, in his case for the Clinton administration; Hanauer is the creator of the recent controversial censored-for-a-while TED speech on inequality. Their book is about the crucial role of "public stories" -- the way we talk to ourselves about the public and private life. All great political leaders, from Lincoln to FDR to Churchill to JFK and Reagan -- have understood that people respond much more powerfully to parables and narratives than to debater-style ten-point analytical briefs. From the time of FDR through Reagan, Frank Capra-style "we're all in this together" narratives dominated. Since Reagan's time, "get the goddamned bureaucrats off my back" narratives have prevailed, usually accompanied by a parallel "keep the government's hands off my Medicare" false-consciousness theme. Liu and Hanauer suggest a new narrative approach.

3) "Want to End Partisan Politics?" in the WaPo today by Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein. Mann and Ornstein have received deserved acclaim for a recent article and book on the real sources of governmental failure. Today's article suggests some things that actually could be changed.  

Enjoy the rest of the weekend.