Between Hell and High Water

Deterioration in Political Discourse Leads to Deteriorated Thinking

By Mike Koetting July 7, 2026

A recent Pew Center poll found Republicans were much more skeptical of emerging climate problems than Democrats. I wasn’t at all surprised—and I’ll bet you’re not either.

My second thought was to wonder why this should be. After all, if I asked a random sample of Chicagoans whether the White Sox will make the playoffs this year, I would not expect to see a marked difference in response by political parties. And while there are no end of uncertainties, the factual bases for arguments about environmental predictions are much stronger than predicting baseball outcomes. But here we are with political leaning outstripping other considerations.

Wasn’t Always So

In the 1970’s, as we first started to understand the problems we had unleased, the environment was a totally bi-partisan concern. Richard Nixon enthusiastically presided over the creation of the EPA. By 1997, there was starting to be a spread between Democrats and Republicans on core climate issues—whether climate warming was happening and whether it was caused by humans—but it was only a modest 8%. By 2024, that gap had climbed to 35%.

It’s hard to imagine a completely rational explanation for this sea change. It’s not like there has been news of substantially improving conditions.

It is true that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN-sponsored collection of scientists for assessing the climate situation, eliminated the worst scenario that previous projection models had included. But if there is any celebration there, it should be extremely modest. The “worst scenario” was exactly that. It assumed everything went as bad as could possibly be imagined. It was never considered particularly likely and even scientists who were concerned about where we are going have been pointing to its irrelevance for a number of years now. That is not to say, as Donald Trump has claimed, that the “IPCC admitted its own projections were WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!” Rather, in the context of updating model parameters, that are part of all sensible predictions, they acknowledged that not all the bad things that could possibly be imagined were happening. (They also acknowledged that not all the good things they had hoped for happened either.) Their overall conclusion remains quite troubling, and the most likely projected outcome is not far from the most likely outcome in the last model. In short, exactly opposite Trump’s assertion, they argue we are still on a path to a warmer world than can currently be imagined as sustainable.

More specific evidence of problems continues to mount. Icebergs are melting more quickly than predicted, ocean temperatures are rising, and heat waves are killing more and more people. These are measurements, not subjective opinions.

But that information seems less likely to reach Republicans. Take one of the most fundamentally objective measures—the actual temperature. The ten warmest years in the historic record are the last ten years. Only one year prior to 2004 was warmer than the coolest year in the following twenty-one years. There is an indisputable, steady climb in temperatures since 1850 and the rate of warming since 1982 is three times as fast as the previous 130 years.

The majority of Republicans simply deny this. In one 2024 poll, only 43% of people who identified themselves as Republican believed the world’s temperature has been increasing over the last 100 years. This is a decline from 76% of Republicans who in 2006 believed that temperatures were rising, despite the intervening twenty years including the largest rise in temperatures since we’ve been keeping detailed records.

How Does This Happen

The simple answer is the increased nature of tribalism in American politics, both in the general sense and as it specifically relates to environmental issues. On an issue-by-issue basis, there are specific factors that can be identified. In environmental issues, the fact that the non-elite media provide virtually no coverage of environmental issues, the fact that that the major media provide dramatically different coverage by general political leaning, or the fact that more than half of Americans get some or all of their news from social media, which is subject to no meaningful standard of accuracy, all make it easier for Republicans to tout memes removed from reality.

It is also the case that as a business decision, extractive industries have put their support behind the Republican party, Republicans, in turn, have reciprocated by obfuscating or simply denying scientific evidence. Republicans have also contributed significantly to the bottom lines of these companies by supporting policies to enrich them—either directly through various mechanisms or by weakening or eliminating regulations that would impact their business.

It is hard to overstate the role Donald Trump has played in accelerating this tribalism. It is particularly true for environmental issues—his ranting that climate change is a hoax, his open willingness to tailor policies to oil (even coal) for contributions and his relentless attack on instruments of government meant to address environmental issues.

But, as awful as he has been, I think it would be a mistake to blame it all on Trump. These issues are also structural. The increase in tribalism started much earlier. For instance, Republican desertion of climate issues has been a long, continual decline since Reagan removed the solar panels from the White House after defeating Carter. The direction became obvious in the 90’s when Newt Gingrich replaced substantive legislative staff with people devoted to the party and to “messaging”. Parties became national in scope and the cost of running for office virtually required more fealty to the central party brand, which in turn sharpened the divide between the two parties. All this is amplified by the Internet, making each party appear more extreme to their rivals. Leaders find it harder and harder to have discussions on complex issues. Polling suggests strongly that on the fundamentals of most issues, there is typically a core sentiment around some non-extreme solution. It has become too hard to get to that because statesmanship has been abandoned in favor of ever louder attempts to engage the base by demonizing the other side and carefully crafted messages to get a few more swing voters.

Consequences Are Serious

In the realm of environment, the most obvious causality of this retreat from reality is climate action itself. With half the country opposing environmental action as unnecessary, it is virtually impossible to pass legislation that addresses the issue. It’s even worse than that. The issue has become so divisive that Democrats have become reticent to even mention environmental issues, what one advocacy group calls “climate hushing”. There is abundant evidence of widespread concern about environmental issues, even among Republicans. But they don’t want to engage on this concern. As a think tank founded by centrist Democratic strategist Adam Jentleson put it, voters all think it is someone else’s problem, and, correspondingly, anything that impinges on them—or might impinge on them–is anathema. Their advice to candidates is to never mention climate change.

This is deleterious not simply because refusing to address an issue of this magnitude is a dereliction of representative government, but also because discussing issues is an essential part of resolving them. No one—and I mean no one—has a complete answer on this one. Democrats have some specific policy solutions. I have great sympathy for these, particularly as opposed to the corrupt and stupid Republican policies. But the Democratic policies are incomplete, frequently inconsistent, and typically overstate how much impact their solution will have. In effectively removing one of the greatest crises facing our society from the list of issues we can discuss, we are stoking the locomotive straight to hell. Literally.

Even more fatal, if such an expression is even possible, deciding that facts don’t matter and that honest discussion is impossible completely undercuts the idea of democracy as a way to run a government that will optimize the common good. It is probably true that the electorate has always been inclined toward simplistic answers. But the idea of representative democracy is that those who actually make decisions will foster an Enlightenment approach to problem solving, not throw that over for pandering. If facts, discussion, negotiation and compromise aren’t the basis of our government, then we are little better than primitive tribes yelling insults at each other across a big river.

This is not what the Founders risked lives and fortunes for.

The Impact of Government Is in the Details

By Mike Koetting June 23, 2026

As we approach the Fourth of July, there will be a great deal of celebration of the best ideals of democracy and the government that has sprung forth from our initial documents. Important as they are—particularly in these times when they are so severely threatened—I figure enough other people are writing about those. Instead, I use a particular case to illustrate how the broad policy visions of our democratic process get incorporated into specific policy choices and concrete decisions. The themes set direction; the specifics of these decisions determine the actual impact of government on people’s lives.

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Disposing of Coal Ash

Coal ash is the highly toxic residual product from burning lots of coal, mostly at the site of coal-burning utilities. I didn’t know what it was before an article in last week’s Chicago Tribune on the local impacts caught my attention. I assume most Americans know as little as I do. Turns out, coal ash is really nasty stuff. For a long time, no one paid any particular attention to it. Mostly it was simply spread around near where it was burned but a large amount was placed in specific dumps, often in pools to mitigate the toxicity. This came to public attention in 2008 when a retaining levee in Tennessee collapsed, releasing over one billion gallons of toxic sludge into nearby rivers.

Although regulations to address this issue were drafted within the year, numerous legal (and political) challenges delayed the actual adoption until 2015. However, within months of Trump taking office in 2017, the EPA moved to delay the enforcement of those rules. The pendulum swung the other way when Biden took office and, despite a blizzard of law suits, the EPA reversed the Trump 1-initiated delays in new rules–issued in April, 2024. Within the year, the EPA, now back under Trump, began backpedaling and, recently, proposed a substantial roll-back.

So what is the average citizen to make of this? On the one hand, concerns over high utility costs are widespread. It is true that requirements for remediation of coal ash dumps would require material costs and, in themselves, would add nothing to electric output. On the other hand, while I am by no means an expert on such things, I have not seen a single comment to the effect that coal ash is not as dangerous as described.

Who is best suited to determine what set of trade-offs yields the optimum results?

One theoretical construct is that within the administrative branch of government there are a core of experts relatively insulated from pollical influence who make such decisions. But that’s a very hard sell. In the first place, it is hard to get experts who understand the full set of implications and trade-offs. Environmental scientists who are well suited to decide how various levels of toxins in groundwater impact the surrounding population, may not be so good at determining the economic consequences of requiring various levels of clean-up. This leads to a sense, sometimes deserved, that the experts are so narrowly focused they can’t see the bigger picture.

From there, it is an easy hop to believe that elected officials, who have broader purviews, should make more of the decisions. The more democratic nature of such a process has appeal. Citizens don’t typically understand the pointillismic nature of governmental impacts on their lives and want elected officials to deal with broad sentiments. If they are feeling oppressed by rising costs, they want leaders to fix it. The details are not particularly important when they are casting votes.

However, in focusing on the “big picture,” political leaders can overlook details. But details are important. How concentrations of toxins from coal ash in the water supply impact the people using that water does make a difference. There is no way of avoiding the sisyphusian task of finding the best balance among competing goods, one policy at a time. At least in good faith efforts. If someone has decided that one goal or another should be allowed to run rough-shod over other goals, consequences be damned, decisions become easier, though rarely better in the long run.

The issue is further complicated in America by the role of the courts in determining administrative actions. The number and complexity of lawsuits on coal ash disposal is head spinning. Literally dozens of different courts have been involved in looking at one aspect or another of these regulations. It’s not at all clear whether courts are the best place to hash out such issues—most of the cases apparently get resolved on procedural issues (which are things lawyers and judges know a lot about) rather than substantive issues. And that’s before even considering the astounding amount of money involved—which leads to suspicions this approach tilts the process in the direction of those with more resources. With a large enough war chest you can keep most regulations at bay indefinitely, certainly long enough to get to a more friendly administration

What Is the Solution?

As usually the case, it’s easier to describe the problem than solve it.

In virtually every situation there will be competition among differing goals—in this case, safety for one group of people versus higher cost for a larger group. (There are those who like to skirt the zero-sumness by focusing on the earnings of the corporate owners. Fair enough, as far as it goes. Even in a perfectly socialist world, there would still be tension between production and safety. The entire history of industrialization provides graphic evidence.)

We like to think these issues are better settled “democratically”. But that is excruciatingly hard to put into practice. The idea of representative democracy gets strained when the number of technical decisions become so large—an inevitable consequence of greater population density and technological complexity. Elected representatives cannot be experts on the range of issues facing society, nor are their constituents particularly tolerant of complexities. Moreover, capital has apparently limitless funds for lobbying and we have allowed special interest groups to have an outsized role in elections. The voice of big money tends to paper over more nuanced technical expertise.

That said, there are two things that clearly help protect our society—a relatively independent civil service and a free, and local, media.

The Role of Civil Service

There is a strain of thought that wants to freely replace people administrating rules after elections. Their argument is that the election expressed the will of the people and therefore the elected should be allowed to put people in charge of all these rules who will carry out the promises they made in the campaign.

The argument is not without merit. As noted above, it is not uncommon for the unelected experts to become too narrowly focused or to become too entrenched in their ideas of how their particular piece of government should operate. Or they may have, consciously or unconsciously, become captured by special interests.

Nevertheless, I am of the strong opinion that the existence of an independent and largely permanent civil service is essential for a society to navigate, however imperfectly, between competing goals. It is appropriate that there are changes at the top of agencies after elections. But this will work better over the longer haul if supported by professionals who do not change with every election. Their experience and knowledge base will help avoid painful mistakes that someone with more ideology and less experience might make. (If DOGE had asked anyone, they might have known that cutting the portion of the Department of Agriculture devoted to preventing screwworms in our cattle wasn’t a great idea.)

I concede that creates a bias toward people who are more disposed to government intervention. Those who are more concerned about excess government interventions are less likely to choose a career in government. So be it. I believe in free enterprise and recognize that excessive regulation can impede good ideas. But I also know that capitalism trends toward common good only in the broadest sense…and only if is saved from its own impulses to maximize return at the expense of others. Politicizing civil service is a dangerous idea.

An Independent Media

It is equally important that there be an independent media to spotlight where the conflict of goals has gotten too far out of balance. This is more than a series of slogans and the consolidation of the media under the control of a few very wealthy families raises many alarm bells. The nation will be much worse off if those in power are no longer terrified to hear that crews from” Sixty Minutes” are in their lobby.

Local media is where issues that are impacting specific situations or groups of people get identified. It was an article in The Chicago Tribune on coal ash disposal in a local community that got me looking at the entire issue. Without that, I would never have given coal ash a thought. In that context, the serious loss of local media is particularly concerning. Perhaps local blogs will pick up some of the burden. For instance A City that Works in Chicago and the Political Peach in Atlanta are local blogs that provide detailed news on specific policies and, as such, contribute to focusing government on the real needs of citizens. But these are both products of urban areas that still have decent local media. I don’t know if there are similar efforts outside urban areas, where the loss of local media is the greatest.

Conclusion

While it is obvious that the actual impact of government on our lives is expressed through a series of incremental decisions, in the rhetorical windstorms around elections it is easily forgotten that each of these decisions involves specific trade-offs among divergent goals. As society becomes ever more densely integrated, these choices have ripple effects beyond the most obvious consequences. It takes conscious effort to develop mechanisms for addressing these concrete decisions in a way that best serves the entire population, not merely the loudest.

Taxes: The Elite Aren’t Paying Their Share

By Mike Koetting June 9,2026

This post is the second of two on the American tax structure. The previous one focused on payroll taxes; today’s post addresses other taxes. Again, the material draws heavily from The Second Estate, a superb book by Ray Madoff, a law professor at Boston College. I highly recommend it if the topic interests you. It is short and a surprisingly easy read. An even shorter version of her thinking is available in an interview with Erza Klein. Today’s post is not trying to summarize what she said but to focus on the macro implications.

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The title of Ray Madoff’s book, The Second Estate, refers to the official distinctions in prerevolutionary France between the three strata of society—clergy, nobles and commoners. Members of the Second Estate, the nobility, enjoyed special privileges, which included freedom from taxes. She suggests that the wealthiest people in America have created a new form of the Second Estate.

It is common knowledge that today’s economy features an economic distribution as extreme, probably more extreme, than the Gilded Age at the end of the 19^th Century. However, the difference between the top and the bottom is so large and the labels thrown around so much that it is easy to lose track of how great those differences are.

Madoff places it in perspective by using a time metaphor to help understand how wealthy today’s wealthy are. One million seems like a big number. One million seconds takes about 12 days. One billion seconds, however, takes 31 years and one trillion seconds requires 31,688 years. Today there are about 900 billionaires in the United States and their wealth grew by about 18% in 2025. There is currently one trillionaire and about half a dozen who could achieve that status in the near future. The difference between even the millionaires and the billionaires is almost unfathomable.

Like most people, I believe we are not taxing the richest sufficiently. Embodied in that statement are two suppositions. First, the current level of governmental deficits does not generally result from profligate spending but from insufficient taxes to meet the full range of the country’s needs. (Of course there is some inefficient spending and it should be addressed; but contrary to the palaver generated by the likes of Musk and Heritage Foundation, those issues are not at the root of the problem.)

Second, this shortfall in revenue should primarily be made up by those with the most resources. In part because their resources are so astounding as to cease making human sense and in part because doing so improves social cohesion. None of this suggests a complete flattening of the income distribution—which attempt would be deeply counterproductive. As is shown in an instructive infographic, the American people have a widespread sense that there should be demonstrable differences in the distribution of wealth. They recognize both that it creates incentives that can benefit all and that there is an underlying fairness in greater rewards for great contributions. However, there is wide and deep opposition to the extremes of the current distribution. Too much of a useful difference is too much.

We All Know How We Got Here

During the middle of the 20^th Century, America had a social ethic that promoted sharing the benefits of productivity growth with the entire population. This included a broadly redistributive tax structure. But the titans of capital wanted more. (One should never forget John D. Rockefeller who, when asked “How much is enough?” said “Just a little more.”) From Ronald Reagan on, there has been a persistent, and largely successful, effort to reduce the relative burdens of taxation on the richest. At the same time, shifts in production functions have resulted in ever greater shares of the nation’s economic growth winding up in the hands of the owner of capital.

Madoff’s book outlines how the American tax system—despite its generally progressive structure–has pockets of inequity so great as to change the nature of the country. To oversimplify her story, what has happened is that Congress lost its nerve and allowed, in the fog of the tax code, the nature of income to be redefined in so many ways that if you have enough money, your income for tax purposes shrinks.

The below chart from the Brookings Institution on sources of income across the total distribution gives a flavor of the issue. As is readily apparent, for the bottom 98% of the income distribution, about 90% of income is from wages or retirement income and is subject to regular income taxes, which are progressive. But at the very top of the income distribution, wage income is a relatively negligible portion of income. To be clear: income not in the form of wages is not necessarily tax free. But it is subject to a variety of different taxes, almost all of them with lower impact than if the tax had been calculated at the nominal income tax rate.

And if a graph doesn’t make the point, how about a lurid ad hominem anecdote. Since the 1990’s, Jeff Bezos salary has been capped at $82,000. This salary is low enough to make him eligible to claim the child tax credit, which in fact he has. But from 2014 to 2018 his net worth climbed by $99 billion. (Remember, in time terms this is equivalent to about 3000 years when one million is only 12 days.) However, he paid less than one billion in taxes, or about 1%. Now a billion dollars is undoubtably a lot of money. But this percent is considerably lower than most middle-class families pay. Moreover, it is inconceivable that two, five, or even twenty times that amount would make any difference in his lifestyle. Nor would taxes at higher rates have any appreciable impact on the incentive to make lots of money…err…I meant, grow the economy.

Corporate Taxes

The literature on corporate taxes is particularly contentious. Many respectable economists are willing to consider the possibility that raising corporate taxes is a drag on business, particularly those that compete in global markets where other countries have lower corporate taxes.

Indisputable, however, is that American corporate tax rates have declined materially, most recently as a result of the reduction in the 2017 Trump tax cuts. From a mathematical perspective, that appears to have had a large adverse impact on the deficit. The question is whether giving corporations more money improves employment by greater than offsetting amounts, as apologists for the cuts contend.

Recent research suggests this did not happen for the 2017 cuts. While there was some positive business growth, it was not nearly enough to offset the increase in the deficit. Note, part of the issue is there were also a number of detailed changes in the tax code that, on balance, also gave more money to corporations. Nor did it stop in 2017. By executive order, Trump made it easier to attribute earnings to low tax countries, resulting in at least a $40 billion windfall for American multi-nationals.

Inheritance Taxes

Madoff has special scorn for the spinelessness Congress has shown in allowing the inheritance tax to be whittled down to the point that for many of the richest families, it is negligible. For years rich people sought loopholes to the inheritance tax. And, of course, loopholes were found. But Congress would periodically review the taxes and close loopholes. Now Congress has not only stopped closing loopholes, it has systematically lowered thresholds and created new loopholes.

I can’t imagine a policy rationale for this course of action. Some degree of leaving resources for your family is something a society should protect. But how much? In the 2023 Forbes list of the 400 richest people in America, more than 30% were on that list not because they started a business that benefited society, but because they had the good fortune to be born extremely rich. And, while surely many of these are using their wealth in beneficial ways, given the competing needs of society, how much headstart do we want to give to the offspring of the wealthiest? What evidence is there American society thinks creation of a class of virtual nobility is a good idea?

Where From Here

It is unlikely there is a bumper-sticker solution. The simplest ideas often have the greatest number of hidden effects. Madoff, for instance, is not a fan of wealth taxes—difficult to administer and potentially unfair because of fluctuating value of investments. But she is fully in favor of some mix of provisions that put investment income on a more equitable footing with other income and, particularly, that removes many of the tax benefits of inheritance. (One high priority for her would be removing the “step-up“ provision, which she calls the “Angel of Death Loophole.” This currently allows accumulated holdings to be transferred to heirs tax free. She argues that, as Canada does, wealth at a person’s death should be treated as realized gains and taxed accordingly before being passed on. According to the Congressional Budget Office, adopting something like the Canadian approach would generate about $200 billion over the next decade.)

Whether or not it gets adopted, the discussion of a “wealth tax’’ has put the issue squarely on the table. From my perspective, the issue now is to get beyond this as a slogan and have an honest discussion as a country as to what we want from our tax system and then how best to get there. There are plenty of specific provisions that would get us closer to where the vast majority of Americans think we should be—and which, cries and hysterics not withstanding, will not cripple the economy. It is certain that any specifics will have some drawbacks, but perfection is not necessary. What is necessary is a tax system that the bulk of Americans think is fair and that produces enough revenue for the things those same citizens want the government to provide.

Historically, we approximated that because the adult members of Congress would periodically dampen their partisan differences and hash out something that would work. At least for a while. Rinse and repeat. But for a variety of well-known reasons, that’s stopped working. The result has been general capitulation to the rich.

It has always been the case that the richest have the loudest voice. Surveying the damage of the Wall Street crash of 1929, 95 years ago, Drew Pearson, describing the leaders of Wall Street, said: “For them, the door of the White House, of every Cabinet member, is always open. But it is exactly this that makes their influence so powerful, their position so dangerous.” Citizens United has solidified the sway of the richest in a way that no historical precedent could have predicted. In the 2024 presidential election, 44% of the donations to Trump came from 10 people. Democrats also benefited from megadonors, just not as much. As Brooke Harrington, a Dartmouth professor has said, today’s billionaires have become noblesse without the oblige.

The results, however, are unstainable. If Congress does not find its missing backbone, either the rising deficit strangles the economy or we wind up, one way or the other, where the French Second Estate eventually ended.

Taxes: The Looming Social Security Mess

By Mike Koetting May 26, 2026

This and my next post are on the American tax structure. The material draws heavily from The Second Estate, a superb book by Ray Madoff, a law professor at Boston College. I highly recommend it if the topic interests you. It is short and a surprisingly easy read. Her discussion covers much more than the items I am highlighting.

Payroll Taxes

Today’s post focuses on payroll taxes, specifically Social Security and Medicare. I chose to start here because the problems of the income tax system often overshadow the issues around payroll taxes. To be honest, I had never given the matter more than a passing thought before reading her observations on the topic. I was surprised, for instance, that 67% of taxpayers pay more in payroll taxes than income taxes. All told, payroll taxes are the second largest source of federal revenue, comprising more than a third of federal revenue.

Still, people get confused as to whether payroll taxes are “real” taxes. In 2012, candidate Romney described the 47% of the population who pay no income taxes as freeloaders. But that isn’t the case. Most of these pay payroll taxes. When you include payroll taxes, the number of people not paying some federal tax drops to 16%–and most of those are still paying state and local taxes of one sort or another. (Since 2012, the percentage of people not paying any income tax has dropped from 47% to 40%.)

Payroll tax is 15.3% of the wages or payment in lieu of wages. This amount is subdivided between support for Social Security (12.4%) and parts of Medicare (2.9%). The amount of payroll taxes rises directly with wages, sort of. Employed individuals pay only half this amount (7.65%) in the form of a deduction from their salary; the other half is paid by the employer. However, economists broadly agree that employer payment of these taxes holds wages down, so it’s not exactly “free”.

Self-employed people pay all 15.3% themselves. For gig workers and independent contractors, this means that, for example, of the first $60,000 they earn, more than $9000 will go for payroll taxes. Additionally, payroll taxes are calculated on the full amount of the earnings, even though some of those earnings will most likely be paid to the Federal government in the form of income tax.

Social Security taxes only apply to the first $168,600 of earnings. While $168,600 is a healthy income, about 6% of the population earn more and, since, by definition, those are high earners, about 17% of the nation’s wage earnings fall outside this limit and are, therefore, not subject to Social Security taxes. It is also the case that some types of income fall outside payroll taxes. For instance, limited partners and owners of S-corporations largely avoid payroll taxes on a significant share of their income. These exclusions are in addition to the 17% of wages that are not subject to Social Security taxes. To add insult to injury, many of the nation’s richest people do not get compensated by wages and do not even hit the $168,600 cap. Elon Musk and Bill Gates, for example, do not receive compensation through wages and pay nothing toward Social Security or Medicare, two of the nation’s top three expenditures. I doubt they are worried they will not be eligible for those benefits.

Moreover, because payroll taxes are less obvious to the public, Congress has been able to raise them with less outcry. Since 1970, payroll taxes have more than doubled while the top income tax rate has fallen from 70% to 40% and estate taxes, once 77%, have become immaterial in many cases because of lower rates and various loopholes that exempt funds from taxation. (More on that in the next post.)

Problems Ahead

On the other side of the equation, at any given time, about one in five Americans receive some form of Social Security benefits. These benefits help stabilize the economy by providing support for the retired and for people not capable of working. Without these benefits, not only would the recipients be hurt, but the decrease in expenditures made by or on behalf of recipients would adversely impact various sectors of the economy.

Unfortunately, the Social Security Trust Fund is steaming towards insolvency. This is currently projected to happen in the early 2030’s, just six or seven years from now. Under current law, this will require a material reduction of benefit levels for everyone. Although people are often confused on the point, there is no accounting link between money an individual puts into the fund and the benefits paid out. Social Security is a “pay-as-you-go” bucket. Each year taxes are paid in and benefits are paid out. Historically, this has worked well because increasing wages and population growth, the latter partially fueled by immigration, meant the fund has always been able to cover benefits and, typically, leave a surplus for future years.

But the world is changing. Older people are living longer and population has stopped growing—fewer children and kicking out immigrants. In 1960, there were 5.1 workers for every beneficiary. Today, it is 2.7 and that ratio will continue to decline. Without other changes, the surplus that has sustained the fund will be exhausted. The total pay-in is estimated to be about 83% of current benefit levels. Existing law mandates that if the pay-in sum falls short of the pay-out rate, all benefits should be reduced on a pro-rata basis to equal the pay-in sum. Reductions could, therefore, be larger if revenues decline faster than anticipated or additional benefits are paid out. (Trump’s Budget Bill, for instance, reduced revenues for the Trust Fund because in giving a tax break to some seniors, it curtailed revenue to the Trust Fund. This is not the biggest issue but is estimated to accelerate the insolvency of the Trust Fund by six or so months.)

One would think Congress would be all over this issue. More than 80 percent of Americans oppose any benefit cuts. Even among high income groups, those most likely to believe benefits should be cut, 73 percent oppose cuts. The current lack of serious Congressional discussion is huge cause for concern. This issue needs to be addressed much sooner than later. Any fix will require some time to negotiate and implement. As the American Academy of Actuaries points out, if reforms are left until the last moment, they might well require more drastic actions.

The lack of action is not from lack of alternatives. The problem is a lack of will in our constipated Congress. It is highly likely that whatever happens will cause someone to be unhappy. Generally, Democrats want more revenue and Republicans want to cut benefits. For better and worse, neither side has enough votes to impose its vision on the other side. The overall toxicity of the environment makes the kind of compromises necessary hard to the point of impossible. The problem is further acerbated by the fact there is a material group of Republicans who keep trying to find ways to privatize Social Security, despite an amazingly broad opposition to the idea.

Most likely solutions—if any can be reached– will impose some mix of greater revenue and changes in benefits. The Brookings Institution has circulated a thoughtful proposal that in normal times could be the basis of a bipartisan appeal. As would be expected on issues this major, the proposal is complicated and resists easy summary. It includes about 15 separate elements and has proposals that raise revenue, including raising both the tax rate and the taxable ceiling, and working to increase legal immigration, but also increasing some benefits and shaving others. The specifics of this proposal aren’t necessary for this essay—not only are they very wonky, but there are surely other proposals with equally plausible specifics. The important point is that there are solutions that could avoid a catastrophe, should Congress choose to accept its role.

The situation with Medicare is similar to the problems in Social Security. Medicare’s financing structure is actually more varied than Social Security. Medicare has several different sources and funds. But the Medicare portion of the payroll taxes that supports Medicare inpatient care is heading for the same rocky shore as Social Security. It will also be broke in the early 2030’s for the same reasons, fewer people paying in and people living longer. It is further fighting a headwind of healthcare costs rising faster than overall wages, thereby making it harder for payroll taxes to keep up. A similar set of solutions is required on roughly the same timetable.

Inevitable Conclusion

There is little market in today’s American political scene for proposals with complicated moving parts. But any proposal that isn’t multifaceted is going to increase material problems elsewhere in society. Time is running out. Without Congressional leadership and a Chief Executive willing to support the kind of negotiation necessary, this problem will not be solved. In other words, we’re stuck till at least 2029. Those who depend on Social Security should be worried, very worried.

Deal, No Deal or Wimpy Deal

By Mike Koetting April 28, 2026 (Amended)

In a relatively recent post, I suggested that if Democrats won a majority in both houses in November, it might be possible to pass a bi-partisan immigration agreement. The Trumplicans have so badly overplayed their hand that the time might be ripe.

However, as I tried to sort through what such a deal might actually look like, I realized how many pockets of interest benefited from the ambiguity that had existed before Trump launched his crusade. His lizard brain could only see the electoral advantages. He didn’t recognize–or didn’t care–that upsetting this ambiguity would spin into a chaos of unanticipated consequences. (You would think he would have a better feel for the issue, since as a businessman, he benefited from hiring illegal workers. Of course, no one ever accused Trump of an overabundance of self-awareness.)

Benefits from Immigration Ambiguity

Most of these benefits were clear to all involved but, in the nature of deals that can exist only because of their ambiguity, could not be publicly acknowledged.

Probably the biggest benefit was that it allowed for a significant number of people willing to work at wages below what native born workers would demand or at jobs that the native born just didn’t want. Whole industries—farming and meat processing, for instance–are completely reliant on immigrants, many of dubious legal status. Healthcare, food service and construction are also heavily reliant, not to mention home service and childcare workers. Ending illegal immigration would have materially inflationary effects. It is not clear, in fact, it would be possible to find native workers for all these positions at any plausible wage.

In theory, all employers were already required to check the immigration status of workers. However, enforcement was lax and many of the dealings operated in cash transactions outside of usual channels. (The strenuous opposition of employers to recent attempts to actually enforce these rules underlines the reality.) Far and away, the most efficient way for society was to wink at the rules, with occasional enforcement for the most flagrant abuses, and let legal and illegal immigration run their course. That only works if the rules remain relatively stable, including vigorous and visible enforcement of border security. Biden’s change of asylum rules at the border was a different sort of destabilizing move. The resulting spike in border crossings exceeded the bounds of ambiguity and was decisively rejected at the polls. I do not expect that kind of overt change in the foreseeable future.

The immigrants themselves were often exploited relative to native workers, but that was not necessarily their frame of reference. They were better off than wherever they would have been. Or at least they could imagine a trajectory that was better. This was probably not universally true. Some people surely found conditions much worse than they anticipated and were bitter at the choice they made. But not enough to materially dampen the tide of immigration. I doubt we have reliable information, but I suspect that more people in other countries would prefer a world where immigration to America was theoretically possible, even if not certain, to one where the opportunities to get to America were virtually zero.

Both political parties were able to use the ambiguity to their advantage. For Republicans, whipping up anti-immigrant fever was a potent tool. This was obvious when Trump scuttled the bipartisan deal worked out in the spring of 2024 because he didn’t want to lose it as a campaign issue. Beyond the 2024 elections, Republican have such an active portion of their base obsessed about immigration, that making compromises on key issues, is politically treacherous, even though material parts of their constituency relies on immigration, legal or otherwise.

Democrats have a milder version of the same problem, just in the opposite direction. Key portions of their base are deeply committed to pro-immigrant provisions and would object to many of the concrete steps within the scope of what might realistically be negotiated.

Take a key example. Any comprehensive resolution around immigration should include establishing a road to citizenship for people who have been in the country for some time. There is strong public support for such a provision. But I don’t expect either party to agree on this because the consequences of actually making a decision would anger a significant number of activists in both parties. Some people would be furious that “illegals are getting away with it” and others that “we are turning our back on those good people outside the pathway.” Not to mention the practical problems of figuring out what to do with people in the country who haven’t met the threshold.

Immigration Issues Are Insoluble

Another factor against a clear deal is that it is not possible to actually “resolve” the immigration issue.

Given a world in which some places are demonstrably better places to live than others, people will want to move from the worse places to the better places. And as the worse places get even worse, the pressure to move will get greater. These are virtually laws of physics. Since all available evidence suggests a world that will continue to be starkly unequal with many uprooted by violence or increasingly unfavorable environmental conditions, people will continue coming, to some extent regardless of obstacles.

On the other hand, people in better off countries will want to put limits on sharing their own good fortune with others. If demand is virtually unlimited, even the best-intentioned country will eventually draw lines as to how much of their economy they will share with immigrants. As David Frum put it, even before Trump-2, “If liberals won’t control borders, fascists will.”

Moreover, in “receiving” countries, immigrants will remain a potent cultural issue. It’s easy for people like me to dismiss this as “xenophobia,” particularly since they have a racial overtone. For me, immigrants mean a budget analyst from Nigeria or a physician from Egypt or a cleaning lady from Poland. This a different situation from that experienced by close contact with a concentration of immigrants from one place sufficiently large enough to highlight the differences between their culture and more mainstream American culture. A Mexican community in Texas or a Haitian community in Ohio or an Arab community in Michigan should not be automatically alienating. But it is worth acknowledging this is a qualitatively different experience than mine, particularly once it starts to impact the schools.

There is also the economics of the matter. In general, it is pretty well beyond arguing that under current conditions, immigrants are a net contributor to the nation’s economy. Conversely, the kind of mass deportation that the Trumplicans have been implementing is a drag on the overall economy. The problem, however, is that what is true on average is not necessarily true in every particular circumstance. When a community gets a major influx of immigrants, it will experience disproportionate costs addressing the situation. The evidence also suggests that immigration by relatively low skill workers can adversely affect low skill native born workers. (But, as noted above, the very adverse effect on native-born workers, typically lower wages, is seen as a good thing by employers who may be more than willing to turn a blind eye.)

In all events, there will be portions of the electorate who have tangible reasons to be unhappy about immigration.

To further complicate matters, all this is played out in a situation of broader cultural/demographic uncertainty. Shrinking fertility rates are causing population declines among the native born. In recent years, these have been largely offset by immigration. But without immigration, American population will shrink. Historically, declining populations have created all manner of problems. The most immediate is the shifting balance between current workers and the nonworkers, mostly elderly, who need support. Maybe in the future if AI really does reduce the requirement for workers, absolute population size won’t be such a problem. This will create a host of other thorny problems, not least of which will be creating a functional system for connecting AI generated profits with nonworkers–without destroying the social fabric of the society. Demographic tends will continue to roil the conversation around immigration, even if people don’t acknowledge the connection.

Not with a Bang, but a Wimper

In short, I doubt a truly substantial deal is possible. I suspect there will be some deal. At this point, all but the hardcore MAGA want a détente. Anything that rebukes the Trump overt attack on immigration will be welcome, but I suspect what does emerge will leave a lot unresolved. Too much specificity, let alone purity, is impossible on this issue. That might, however, not be the worst thing. In some circumstances, an imperfect deal is better than the alternatives. Maybe a lot better.

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Note: This updated post clarifies that the benefits of ambiguity require maintaining consistency in rules around the implicitly agreed upon status quo. I left that out of the earlier version.

Voting Miasmas and Ranked Choice Alternatives

By Mike Koetting April 14, 2026

I’ve written before about how I think the American voting systems are deeply flawed. Current events provide new data to strengthen the case.

The Illinois Primary

The Illinois primary election was held last month. In two of the Representative races that I was watching, the winners had 24 percent and 29 percent respectively. As it happened, my preferred candidate won each, but still the results were not entirely satisfying. These are both districts with overwhelmingly Democratic majorities, so these two candidates are virtually assured of going to Congress. As much as I was happy it was these two, I am uncomfortable with the idea that someone can get elected with less than thirty percent of the primary voters of one party, particularly given that primary participation is lower than in the general election.

This happened because there were large numbers of candidates in both districts. There was a candidate with roughly any shade of nuance a voter might want. The rub is that if a preferred candidate lost, any “information” carried in that vote was also lost. Thus, voters had to consider whether a vote for their favored position opened the door to someone they really didn’t want. A run-off election among the top two finishers would probably be an improvement, but this is extra expense and, in all likelihood, have an even smaller turnout.

The California Quandary

This same dynamic is playing out in California in a different, and possibly even more distorting, way.

In an effort to avoid the kind of situation described above, in 2011 California adopted a different approach to primaries for state office. All candidates run against each other, not just against people in their own party. (Colloquially known as a “jungle primary.”) The top two candidates proceed to the final; those are the only candidates who can run in the final. This guarantees that the eventual winner will have a majority.

While this solves one problem, there is now a real chance it could have a very unexpected outcome in the June election, just six weeks away. Going into last week, there were ten candidates in the race for governor, eight of them Democrats and only two Republicans. With the Democrats splitting up the vote so many ways, last week’s poll showed the two Republicans were the leaders, each with a projected 14% of the vote. The leading Democrat polled only 11% of the vote—although the top three Democrats together had 29%. Altogether, Democratic candidates in this poll were favored by 70% of the respondents, but the Democrats could hypothetically have been shut out of November’s election.

Reality, of course, remains in flux. Since that poll was taken, Eric Swalwell, one of the previously leading candidates, was forced to drop out. It remains to see how this reverberates. A California analyst who has run several thousand simulations says his model estimates the odds of two Republicans in the final at something like 1 in 5, and that was before Swalwell’s exit. While this is not a high likelihood, the reality is still a bit disconcerting. Some people might be cheered by a situation in which any Democrat was barred from being in the election for governor, but this could hardly be considered a blow for democracy. It seems that the desire to weaken the power of parties in the primary process has been so effective there are fewer gatekeepers and no effective way for “the Party” to avoid a train wreck.

One Way Out

Both these situations would be ameliorated with the use of Ranked Choice Voting (RCV).

I assume, by now, most readers of this blog know what is meant by RCV. Voters rank candidates in order of preference. If no one garners a majority by means of highest rank votes, the lowest scoring candidate is eliminated and the second choice of voters for the eliminated candidate are added to the vote totals of the remaining candidates. And so on, until one candidate gets a majority.

RVC, while not widely used, is also not unknown. Fifteen states use it or allow it in some circumstances. Forty-seven cities use it for municipal elections, most notably New York City, but also Seattle and Salt Lake City. Almost all of the states where RVC is used are Blue states. On the other hand, 19 states have banned its use, virtually all of which are Red states.

There have been some studies of the impact of RVC, although, since the actual number of elections using it is relatively small, all results to date are tentative. It appears that voters generally like it and there is a modest increase in turnout. On the other hand, it is not clear how many of the assumed benefits will play out longer term. Importantly, there is no strong evidence it reduces polarization.

But neither are there any clear warning signs. While it is more complicated, voters seem to adapt relatively easily, especially younger voters. It takes somewhat more time to compute results this way, but as systems for making these calculations get more familiar, this should be a smaller factor, particularly when compared to other factors (e.g. how a given entity handles mail-in ballots).

I find the antipathy to RVC in Red states interesting. One theory is that whichever party is winning assumes the existing systems are fair and, therefore, are reluctant to change the status quo. I note there seems to be a preference for maintaining the status quo among the current political leadership of both parties. Here in Illinois, for instance, several suburban communities are trying to enact RVC and are being opposed by the Cook County Clerk.

Impact on Polarization

Advocates of RVC stress its ability to reduce polarization. I certainly agree with Lee Drutman, a major advocate for RVC, that America is now snared in a “two party doom loop.” I am hopeful RVS will be able to help break out, but we will need more evidence.

Americans have come to take for granted that the country is immutably divided between two parties, each with profoundly different agendas. While this is nominally correct–America has been separated into Republicans and Democrats since the Civil War— it misses the extent to which each of these parties were, for most of this period, more a coalition of groups who agreed on some things and differed on others. This allowed for a fair amount of latitude on positions by any given politician, regardless of what overall label they wore.

In more recent times, however, the two parties sharpened their differences into two “national parties”—each with a distinct, and mutually exclusive, identity. The rise of social media and the coalescence of each party around different attitudes to civil rights cemented these distinctions and greased the way for a more rigorous separation of parties. As the differences hardened, party identities became increasingly existential. People were encouraged to believe that members of the other party were immoral. Which further reinforces the polarization, the essence of a doom-loop.

The question now facing the country is how can we back off this polarization. I don’t see an easy answer. We need to reverse the direction of economic concentration and create cultural moderation in social media. These are big lifts. RCV might be more doable.

Advocates suggest it would create an opportunity for moderate Republicans to have a lane for themselves that breaks out of the stranglehold MAGA extremists have on their party. This might be particularly useful in districts with overwhelming majorities of Republicans (although the dynamic could be the same in Democratic districts). At present, more than half of the Republican Congressional representatives were elected in districts with margins greater than 25%. This means that for all practical purposes, the only meaningful election is the primary which is often dominated by the more extreme elements of the party. Moreover, in most cases this completely shuts out Democrats, who could compose as much as a third of the electorate. Making the primary and the final the same election would increase turnout and potentially open the door for more moderate candidates.

Support RCV

It’s hard to be optimistic about major changes in the American voting system. There is marked lack of support among the established political order for changes such as RCV and they would be vigorously opposed in those places where its advocates suggest it might have the biggest impact.

All that being said, more adoption of RCV would address problems such as described in the Illinois and California primaries and might mitigate some of the polarization. If nothing else, the jolt to the status quo might unleash some different energy. I hope there will be more experimentation with this and similar systems going forward.

People Over Corporate Excess and Excessive Wealth (Seriously)

By Mike Koetting March 31, 2026

In my last blog, I argued that people voted for Donald Trump because they despaired the mainstream of either party were effectively addressing the devolving life situation of the bottom two-thirds of the economy.

There is no surprise about the traditional Republican Party. For the last century or so, it has made the primacy of capital as its raison d’etre. Trump disguised that with populist talk that sounded different from traditional Republicans and tapped into the voter resentment about both economic and cultural issues. Democrats, on the other hand, have talked more about looking out for the middle class and have passed some useful measures, but they have been unable to project a coherent and sustained strategy for changing the fundamentals of the economic structure. Wealth has continued to concentrate and big corporations are running roughshod over the bottom two-thirds of the economy.

The Path Forward

I believe Democrats can break through the fog of division created by the Trumplicans and solidify for themselves the kind of mandate that FDR created with a concerted strategy that unapologetically commits to reining in excesses by corporations and billionaires and to promoting the welfare of the entire economy, not just the 1% on whom the Republicans are currently showering give-aways.

The New Deal and its successors worked because it actively insured that the economy shared productivity increases with the rest of society. Over the last 45 years, corporations and their owners have eroded these protections. Following Reagan, it became gospel that corporations only responsibility is to the shareholders, which has meant that all decisions are seen through the lens of what enriched their owners.

Oren Cass, a traditionally conservative economist, has argued this has led to the “financialization” of the economy, which is the single largest cause of the soaring inequity. He shows how this has infected every corner of our society.

Neither Clinton nor Obama, unfortunately, directly confronted the fact that maintaining the economic well-being of the entire society requires robust government oversight and instead focused on what would grow the overall economy. They missed that while “a rising tide might lift all boats” that it would not lift them equally—or even close to that. In the absence of countervailing efforts, the economic elite will consolidate power to increase its advantages. And then the advantages of economic growth go almost solely to those who already have wealth.

Almost a century ago, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis warned “We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can’t have both.” The current political situation bears this out.

Addressing this will require specific measures to lessen the concentration of wealth in individuals and to narrow the power of corporations to write their own rules for the benefit of their stockholders.

This Is Not an Easy Path

Democrats like to think of themselves as the defenders of the lower two-thirds of the economy. But the growing income and wealth divides make it clear that they have not been able to do so effectively.

As I suggested above, the biggest problem is that Democratic leaders have been as concerned about maintaining overall economic growth as they have been about the distribution of that wealth. On the one hand, trying to change distribution without continuing economic growth has rarely been a recipe for a successful society. On the other hand, distribution of resources will never become equitable on its own. People who have advantages use them. In many ways this is good for society. But unless limits are created and maintained, a society winds up with the kind of economic distribution shown above.

The tension between overall growth and distribution is regularly played out in debates about how progressive the Democratic agenda should be on economic issues. While this is a real issue, it is apparent that to date, Democrats have not had the right formula. As the distribution of wealth has gotten more extreme, the lack of enthusiasm for the Democratic Party has gotten worse.

While one can (and probably should) be skeptical of any single poll, the number of polls that show the voting public is significantly unhappy with the Democratic Party are so numerous and consistent, it is delusional to pretend this is not a problem. Yes, voters do not like Donald Trump. But unhappiness with Trump is not the same as support for the Democrats. By itself, it is unlikely to lead to a lasting majority, particularly once Trump is gone. An economic reset is going to be a long-term project. Without a big House majority and a veto-proof Senate, it is hard to see how this happens. Neither of these is likely by 2028. Which is why there needs to deep support behind a party that is trying to do this.

But, for instance, a recent NBC poll shows that as much as Trump is “underwater,” the Democratic Party fares worse.

I think this is a function of two things.

First, disappointment that the Democrats have failed to fix the economic situation. Voters don’t expect Republicans to address distribution of income issues. That’s the job of Democrats. And when they don’t do it, they are disproportionately rejected.

Second, there is a sense among many voters (for one example, see this discussion of a focus group in Pennsylvania) that the Democratic Party has become too focused on meeting the needs of various groups at the expense of supporting the broader middle class. The position of once Democratic Ruy Teixeira may be a bit extreme, but clearly reflects a broader sentiment.

Neither of these criticisms are entirely fair but neither are they entirely without basis. And, whether fair or not, these are clearly sentiments about the Democratic Party held by many voters. While one might argue that the success of Democratic Party per se is not important, the problem is that with our current (kind of stupid) political structure, voters need to choose one of two groups. When they turn on the Democratic Party, they wind up supporting a Republican Party—not only against their best interests, but against the interests of the entire society, as is being played out daily.

The Obstacles Ahead

Democrats first obstacle is to achieve some consensus around taking on corporations and the wealthy, something they have not been able to do for generations.

Part of their problem stems from a real understanding of the beneficial effects on society from overall economic growth. But there is also reliance on the wealthy for campaign funds. Republicans are probably more reliant, but this doesn’t cause a problem for them since their core mission is to protect these people. I don’t know how willing Democrats outside certain districts will be to risk support by buying into a campaign against concentrated wealth. Nor do I know how, if they took that risk, it would play out.

Related, Democratic candidates are often psychically and culturally more at home with the top third of the economy in their daily life. The days of Democratic ward bosses and union leaders who were closer to the working class in social terms are gone; the Democratic base has grown to include a large portion of college educated professionals. While these folks hate many parts of the Trumplican agenda, their overall position in society is comfortable and they are wary of radical changes. They rationally recognize the problems that corporate financialization have brought to the country, but they have many reasons to question what might come next.

All of this can become somewhat self-fulfilling. If candidates and would-be candidates fear that there would be pushback from financial supporters and friends, they might hedge their willingness to commit to an economic reset. Same with voters who fear, despite their own analysis of the facts, that coming across as “too far left” on economic issues would cause them to be seen as “fringe.”

What Is the Alternative?

I assume Democrats would continue their juggling act of supporting cultural progress and being sort of progressive on the economy. In the short term, given the Trump backlash, this should be enough to do well this November and might even lead to a Democratic president in 2028. While those are good things, it is hard to see that leading to major changes in our society. Those require a fundamental break with the status quo.

In the absence of that, the two parties will probably continue splitting up small margins and we will lurch from one party to the other as the voters keep thrashing about looking for someone to address the core problem of American society—the growing inequality that is destroying our democracy. Letting that happen seems morally irresponsible.

Closing Note

Getting a party to unite around a high-level strategy is a sine non qua for achieving a meaningful majority. But it is not sufficient. Voters, even the strongest supporters, also need to believe you have defensible ideas behind the grand strategy and the ability to execute those ideas. And you need a candidate who can carry the message. I hope to address these in subsequent posts. But for the time being, Democrats should start by demonstrating a clear commitment to people over excessive wealth and corporate excess.

Donald Trump Is an Act of Desperation

By Mike Koetting March 17, 2026

It’s hardly a newsflash that Donald Trump is so singularly focused on his own interests that anything, or anyone, outside those exists only as a potential obstacle.

This is not normal. I can think of no religion or system of philosophy that doesn’t recognize that humans have something in common, have some universal decency and have certain responsibilities to one another. Donald Trump reflects not a shred of these. He over and over reminds us his world is irreconcilably divided between people who are of use to him and people who are “trash.”

At no point in the history of this country has a man so devoid of common decency—or at least so unwilling to even pretend– been elected to the presidency. Maybe it’s worth spending a minute or so thinking about what it tells us about our society.

I reject the idea that there has always been this great, brooding indifference to humanity lurking specifically in our society. I readily acknowledge that Americans have often in the past defined the category of “fellow human” more narrowly than we do today. But this is true of virtually the entire world. I know of no historical record that reflects a society that sprang into existence with a fully extensive notion of who is indeed a fellow human, and, accordingly, demanded some basic respect. Everywhere this has been a gradual evolution. At some points the US led this struggle, at other times was kicking and screaming to avoid such an expansion. But the complete rejection of the idea of a larger human community is an aberration. Period.

So why have so many people come to accept this behavior from the President of the United States?

My own thinking is that it is a desperate response to both the steady loss of personal agency, primarily due to corporate elites, and to the thinning out of social threads that hold people together. This combination of anger and alienation leads people to lash out on an emotional basis, unrelated to any values or policy.

Loss of Personal Agency

Our lives can be viewed through multiple lenses but perhaps the most pervasive is the economic structures of our day-to-day lives. When we find the economy working for us, life seems manageable. But when that turns every day into a struggle, all the other things in our life are impacted. Riffing a bit off a blog by Dick Dowdell, the underlying machinery of our society has changed over the last fifty years. Three key elements in particular have changed in adverse ways—the richest (and their corporations) exercise more power in individual lives by significantly increasing their role in political life; opportunities for meaningful economic and social mobility have diminished; and individual economic life has become less secure. Whether or not people would articulate these concerns in the same way, a large portion of the society feels the room closing in.

Twelve years ago, political scientists showed empirically what most people feel intuitively: the affluent wield outsize power in determining political outcomes. Citizens United actually went so far as to make this a principle and there is every reason to believe their sway has gotten more powerful since. It is less which party rules and much more that the wealthy are able to maintain the fundamental rule that whatever happens, the rich keep reaping a bigger share.

Again, there has been considerable academic work showing that in the middle of the last century, economic mobility was common. As the century went on, mobility declined. Now it’s a coin flip as to whether you will do as well financially as your parents and, insult to injury, the odds are greater that you will if you start relatively affluent. And, in some sense, the issue is even more blunt than whether you make more or less than your parents; the issue is whether you can afford to have your own home

Underlying economic security is similar. If you feel you’re only one accident away from the whole game spinning out of control, you’re much less inclined to think that the existing political order is worth endorsing. Here again, academics provide documentation that when economic uncertainty overwhelms, political values erode. As the authors of one study put it:

“When respondents were financially secure, support for liberal democratic principles increased. When respondents were economically disadvantaged, they became more tolerant of illiberal conditions, including biased media, weakened checks on leaders and unequal treatment under the law.“

As all three of the conditions referenced above—elite control of public life, lack of social mobility and persistent economic insecurity—became worse over many years, those most impacted stop trusting mainstream parties because things keep getting worse regardless of which is in charge. People intuitively understand that these trends are a result of policy choices that could have been made differently, indeed, used to be made differently. Republicans have done more to impact these dynamics but Democrats have contributed—and certainly failed to prevent them. Should we be surprised, then, if people are willing to take a chance on anyone who looks like he will break the existing consensus, particularly if he reflects their own sense of grievance.

Weakening the Ties that Bind

These concerns are even greater when paired with the overall weakening of the social ties that should hold a society together.

America has never been a cohesive social whole because, unlike many other countries that grew organically over a long period of time, it was an “assembled” country with pieces from all over. But, generally, there have been various veins of coherence that made it possible for people to see their common elements, or at least to find a way to work together. The last fifty years have been hard on that.

Part of what has happened is in fact the broadening of who deserves to get full respect as a human. This is a good and necessary thing. But like any other major change, it produces secondary effects. The assaults by those who make profit from stoking division, which includes Donald Trump, are designed specifically to narrow the bonds among people, to draw lines between some group and the “unworthies.” Hate can be used to generate money and profits.

The declining communal nature of our lives makes these divisions easier. The metaphor of Robert Putnam’s book, Bowling Alone, remains powerful—there has been a retreat from activities that bring people together. From civic organizations to bowling leagues, people do fewer things with other people. And this retreat from communal action has gotten worse in the 25 years since Putnam’s book. The decline in church and unions—organizations with specific communal values—has been particularly steep. Also, this disconnectedness affects the working class more significantly.

These Get Us a Psychopath

The growing anger at the powerless of daily life and the loss of personal connection to the broader society deadens people sensitivities to what seem like the most basic requirement to be president of the United States—to be a discernibly normal human being.

For some Trump voters, Trump’s indifference to the norms of the broader society was a positive attraction. But I believe these were the minority. More Trump voters were aware of this and accepted it as a downside of his opposition to Democrats–economically, cultural, or both. With various degrees of awareness, they hoped that his pathologies would not go so far as to completely upset the apple cart. Another large group was people who are disappointed at their lives and Donald Trump was apparently offering quick fixes. At the very least he seemed to reflect their visceral sense that something was robbing them. Whether he had correctly identified the people responsible, let alone whether he had either the requisite psychological underpinnings or motivation to successfully change America in their favor, didn’t seem important.

Only the first group got what they bargained for. Oops.

It’s Ugly but the Answer Is Still “No”

By Mike Koetting March 3, 2026

It’s a well-known legal adage that hard cases make bad law. The current situation of Iran is a classic case.

The existing regime in Iran is a bad actor. Very bad. They are a menace to their own people—never on fuller display than killing thousands of Iranians in the last few weeks—and are a major destabilizing force in the Middle East. It is hard to imagine the world wouldn’t be improved by their removal from power.

On the other side of the equation is the idea that one country should not interfere in the affairs of another country. This idea has much more currency if there is evidence that the affairs of the country reflect some version of the common will. The evidence in Iran runs counter.

So how should we feel about the intervention in Iran?

My answer: potentially favorable consequences aside, this is a bad thing.

A Modest Strategy of Great Ambition

By Mike Koetting February 17, 2026

While the mid-term elections are ten months off, and ten months is a political eternity, polling suggests it is very likely Democrats will gain a majority in the House and might even eke out a tiny Senate margin. Inshallah.

One hopes this would allow the Democrats to serve as a somewhat greater brake on Donald Trump’s worst impulses. The degree to which that will happen is unclear since so much of what he does is, to be generous, extra-legal. Thus, the ability to slow him will play out in real time when we get there.

Still, having a plan might be good. Here are a broad set of strategies that Democrats might use as a framework for the following two years—if they are willing and able to do so. I think the difficulty of following these strategies will be less a function of Trumplican opposition and more a function of the party’s internal workings, which, by the way, are not unique to Dems but are inherent in the way we allowed our pollical and cultural environments to evolve.