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By Root 553 0

1 percent of GDP in the latter years of this decade, but paying for this through tax increases on higher incomes was very unpopular with politically powerful groups. Eventually a hodgepodge financing package was cobbled together, including some planned future cutbacks in Medicare spending that are unlikely to be implemented when the time comes, as well as some modest increases in payroll taxes on high-income households and excise taxes on high-premium private insurance plans held mainly by high-income households. (Revenues from the latter two sources are expected to raise around 0.1 percent of GDP in fiscal year 2015, 0.2 percent of GDP in fiscal year 2018, and 0.3 percent of GDP in fiscal year 2021.)14

In the middle of the health care debate I asked a leading congress-woman about the miserable state of the health care legislation. She literally put her head in her hands and declared “The lobbies, the lobbies.” It felt to me like the final scene of Heart of Darkness, in which Kurtz mutters, “The horror! The horror!”

The health care debate, indeed, exposed once again that U.S. politics are narrowly channeled in a very deep groove of special interests.15 Lost throughout the fifteen months of debate were the public’s trust and a coherent reform effort. By failing to put forward a coherent plan during the entire process, Obama left the public on the sidelines. He stumped energetically for “health care reform,” but few people (including myself) were able to keep track from week to week of what was actually in the reform legislation of the moment. Nor was the public honestly apprised of the merits and likelihood of key changes, such as a public option, systemic change for cost controls, or the various potential means of financing expanded coverage. The administration and Congress turned to their favorite experts along the way, but America lost the chance to hear systematically from the expert community about the merits and demerits of various alternative proposals. In short, we were told to avert our eyes to the “sausage making” on Capitol Hill but then forced to eat the sausage, like it or not.

Case 3: The Energy Policy Stalemate

America desperately needs a coherent energy strategy, since the country is being hemmed in on three sides: the global scarcity of oil; the intensifying competition over supplies in unstable regions of the world; and the environmental risks of a continued rapid rise in fossil fuel use. The president came into office promising to break the logjam on climate change and to set a new course for U.S. energy security. Yet after more than two years in office, his progress on creating a new overall framework has been minimal. Bits and pieces of policies are coming into place—such as R&D for renewable energy, new funding for nuclear power, and modest funds for intercity fast rail—but there is no overarching strategy or clarity. When I asked Larry Summers to explain the administration’s plan to reduce carbon emissions by 17 percent as of 2020, as Obama announced in late 2009, he responded, “We don’t plan in America.” That may be true, but we also don’t achieve our energy and environmental objectives either.

Why don’t we plan an energy policy when it is so manifestly evident that we need one? Here, too, corporate power is the key reason. I witnessed this during another meeting at the White House, this time with the former energy “czar” Carol Browner. I thought that perhaps she would be interested in promulgating an energy plan. That did seem, after all, to be her assignment. Our conversation made it clear that she had a quite different role, almost purely dedicated to managing the corporatocracy. Rather than discuss energy policy with me, Browner went through a long list of senators, noting the special demands that each senator was making in return for a promised vote for anti–climate change legislation. One senator wanted special provisions for the auto industry; the next wanted more favorable benefits for states involved in offshore drilling; the third wanted special provisions for nuclear power; and on