Goo Goo's and Mugwumps

Picture taken from the Financial Times online at http://www.ft.com/

Goo Goo's and Mugwumps. What does that mean? Are those groups of people? Is that even English? Yes. Yes. and...Yes (well kind of). For starters a Goo Goo was a politician in the late 1800's that ran on the platform of working towards the reform of "Machine Politics". Goo Goo's pushed the idea of "Good Governance" (Goo Goo) and picked up the slang nick name for trying to be nice guys, or what we would call Bi-Partisan today; they often closely followed the Democrat platform.

Mugwumps (Algonquian roots not English) also existed in the late 1800's and ran on a similar platform of political reform. They were Republicans but sided with Democrats to support Grover Cleveland and stop "Financial Corruption" that was running rampant at the time.

Does this sound familiar to you? The Goo Goo's and the Mugwumps are back and they're badder than ever! The problem is however that the reason you don't know about Goo Goo's or Mugwumps is because bi-partisan behavior, historically, never works. According to author David Tucker:

"The fact that Mugwumps embodied the liberalism of the 19th century, and their rejection by 20th century historians, who embraced the government intervention of the New Deal and the Great Society, is not surprising. Mugwumps tended to come from old Protestant families of New York and New England, and often from inherited wealth. They belonged to or identified with the emerging business and professional elite, and were often members of the most exclusive clubs. Yet they felt threatened by the rise of machine politics, one aspect of which was the spoils system, and by the rising power of immigrants in American society. They excelled as authors and essayists, yet their writings indicated their social position and class loyalties. In politics, they tended to be ineffectual and unsuccessful, unable and unwilling to operate effectively in a political environment where patronage was the norm."

As I touched on earlier this week in Excuse Me You Forgot To Give Me My Change the Obama plan clearly falls short of it's promises for economic development. It will not create 3.5 million jobs, will not jump start the economy, will not save our banks, and doesn't even properly address the problems in our economy. What is most appalling about this though is that most everyone knows it won't work! I've written countless times about our banks being insolvent, and on how lending and more credit are not the solution. I've also stated that our banks need to fail and that our economy needs to bottom out before it will ever go forward, and I'm not the only one saying this. So why then is the current Chief of the Goo Goo's pushing for more Mugwumps to join him?

The reason is deeper than his economic plan working or not working. The reason is that whenever the Democratic party has run on the platform of political reform they use the ideals of bi-partisan governance to get elected. They do this to capitalize on the short comings of a strongly unified power in the political system ahead of them and to work around it rather than through it. Then once elected they try to shift general sentiment, as well as ideals, from where they always naturally head anyway; towards greed and corruption. This plan of action on it's face is a good thing, however history shows us it doesn't stick and it doesn't work inside a Democracy no matter how much we'd like it to or believe that it will.

To put it bluntly now that President Obama is in office his plans are idealistic, not realistic, and I don't think he or his people care; very Goo Gooey. Evidence of him not caring can be seen by his non-response to investors and economists throughout the world laughing at him over his stimulus bill. I believe however that the ultimate reason for his silence and his lack of care is that he actually knows what the right response to solving the economic crisis is (to do nothing and let it collapse). Even though he is smart enough to recognize this, he also knows that he can't do "nothing." If he did nothing, he would be committing political suicide by allowing the collapse of the US economy. This would be much worse than what he will be subjected to if a vauge economic stimulus package doesn't work. So now that he is faced with a choice of two evils, Obama is making the best out of it and pushing social reform behind an economic mask. Ironically though, as clever as this plan may be, when Goo Goo and Mugwump ideals appear in politics, shortly thereafter, the political system becomes more divided than ever before. After this, overtime and historically of course, governance becomes more of a power grab than anything else and returns back to that which had been in place prior to the Goo and the Wump.

Let's hope that history doesn't repeat itself and President Obama shocks the world by delivering on his now infamous "CHANGE!". If not we're all in for a rude awakening and I for one certainly don't want to end up with any mugwump on my shoes.