Let's take a quick inventory of Mort Zuckerman's beliefs -
1. Democrat - Check
2. Voted for Obama in 2008 - Check
3. Worried about high unemployment - Check
4. Now convinced that Obama has no clue about what he is doing - BIG CHECK
When the President is now regarded by some of his most ardent supporters as failing catastrophically, then you know that those who oppose the President's agenda aren't just about politics, but rather about getting us back on track.
Obama needs to be sent packing in the 2012 election and likely the votes to do so will come from people like Mort Zuckerman, a long-time DEM supporter who sees the utter failure of a out-of-touch and clueless President.
THE WEEKEND INTERVIEW
OCTOBER 15, 2011
The Exasperation of the Democratic Billionaire Wall Street Journal
Real-estate and newspaper mogul Mortimer Zuckerman voted for Obama but began seeing trouble as soon as the stimulus went into the pockets of municipal unions.
By JAMES FREEMAN
'It's as if he doesn't like people," says real-estate mogul and New York Daily News owner Mortimer Zuckerman of the president of the United States. Barack Obama doesn't seem to care for individuals, elaborates Mr. Zuckerman, though the president enjoys addressing millions of them on television.
The Boston Properties CEO is trying to understand why Mr. Obama has made little effort to build relationships on Capitol Hill or negotiate a bipartisan economic plan. A longtime supporter of the Democratic Party, Mr. Zuckerman wrote in these pages two months ago that the entire business community was "pleading for some kind of adult supervision" in Washington and "desperate for strong leadership." Writing soon after the historic downgrade of U.S. Treasury debt by Standard & Poor's, he wrote, "I long for a triple-A president to run a triple-A country."
His words struck a chord. When I visit Mr. Zuckerman this week in his midtown Manhattan office, he reports that three people approached him at dinner the previous evening to discuss his August op-ed. Among business executives who supported Barack Obama in 2008, he says, "there is enormously widespread anxiety over the political leadership of the country." Mr. Zuckerman reports that among Democrats, "The sense is that the policies of this government have failed. . . . What they say about [Mr. Obama] when he's not in the room, so to speak, is astonishing."
We are sitting on the 18th floor of a skyscraper the day after protesters have marched on the homes of other Manhattan billionaires. It may seem odd that most of the targeted rich people had nothing to do with creating the financial crisis. But as Mr. Zuckerman ponders the Occupy Wall Street movement, he concludes that "the door to it was opened by the Obama administration, going after the 'millionaires and billionaires' as if everybody is a millionaire and a billionaire and they didn't earn it. . . . To fan that flame of populist anger I think is very divisive and very dangerous for this country."
This doesn't mean that Mr. Zuckerman opposes the protesters or questions their motives. When pressed, he concedes that the crowd in Lower Manhattan may include some full-time radicals, but he argues that the protesters are people with a legitimate grievance, as the country suffers high unemployment and stagnant middle-class incomes.
It is a subject he has obviously studied at length, and he explains how the real unemployment rate is actually well above the official level of 9.1%, which only measures people who have applied for a job within the previous four weeks. In fact, he says, unemployment has even surged beyond the Department of Labor's "U-6" number of 16.5% that has received increasing attention lately because it includes people who have given up looking for work within the past year, plus people who have been cut back from full-time employees to part-timers.
Mr. Zuckerman says that when you also consider the labor-force participation rate and the so-called "birth-death series" that measures business starts and failures, the real U.S. unemployment rate is now 20%. His voice rising with equal parts anger and sadness, he exclaims, "That's not America!"
It certainly isn't the America that Mr. Zuckerman discovered when he moved south from Canada to study at Wharton and Harvard Law School, graduating from both in the early 1960s. He reports feeling immediately at home and says he never considered returning "because of the sheer openness and energy of life in America."
The U.S. "has fundamentally great qualities," he says. "It's a society that welcomes talent, nourishes talent, admires talent . . . and rewards talent." But he sees "potentially catastrophic" political and fiscal problems. Mr. Zuckerman reports that when he was a young man, 50% of the top quartile of graduates from Canadian universities moved to the U.S. Now, he says, "I don't want my daughter telling me, 'Dad, I want to move back to Canada because that's the land of opportunity.'"
Mr. Zuckerman's bearish outlook since 2006 has been good for his business. That's when he decided that there was a bubble in commercial real estate and his publicly traded real estate investment trust needed to sell some of its office buildings.
'We've had a strategy in our business of trying to have 'A' assets in 'A' locations. I think we had 126 buildings at that point and we came to the conclusion that 16 of them were either A assets in B locations or B assets in A locations, like 280 Park [Avenue in New York]—it was a great address but not a good building. So we sold. We got through 15 of the 16 and we raised in the range of four and a half billion dollars," he says.
Once the downturn began, that cash pile helped him buy some famous properties at depressed prices, such as the General Motors building in New York and the John Hancock Tower in Boston. But he says his firm is still prepared for possible rough economic times ahead. "We're keeping it very liquid," he says, "because I don't know where this is going."
Mr. Zuckerman maintains that America will solve its problems over the long haul—"I am not somebody who's pessimistic about this country. I have had a life that's been better than my fantasies," he says—but he's certainly pessimistic about the current administration. That began shortly after inauguration day in 2009.
At that time he supported Mr. Obama's call for heavy spending on infrastructure. "But if you look at the make-up of the stimulus program," says Mr. Zuckerman, "roughly half of it went to state and local municipalities, which is in effect to the municipal unions which are at the core of the Democratic Party." He adds that "the Republicans understood this" and it diminished the chances for bipartisan legislating.
Then there was health-care reform: "Eighty percent of the country wanted them to get costs under control, not to extend the coverage. They used all their political capital to extend the coverage. I always had the feeling the country looked at that bill and said, 'Well, he may be doing it because he wants to be a transformational president, but I want to get my costs down!'"
Mr. Zuckerman recalls reports of Mr. Obama consulting various historians on the qualities of a transformational president. "But remember, transformations can go up and they can go down."
Now comes the latest fight over Mr. Obama's jobs plan, which has as its centerpiece a tax increase on the wealthy with obvious populist appeal. Mr. Zuckerman supports raising taxes on the rich but says such a proposal cannot be taken seriously unless it's paired with other measures to grow the economy and restrain deficit spending. He also wonders why, if the president wanted to get a plan enacted, he didn't begin with private bipartisan discussions with House and Senate leaders, instead of another address to a joint session of Congress.
"Even if you want to do this to revive your support in the base, to revive your credibility on the issues of the economy and jobs, which has fallen off the table, this isn't going to accomplish it. Another speech from this guy? The country knows this is just another speech. They understand it almost instantaneously, and his numbers have continued to go down for that reason. What the country wanted was some way of coming up with a solution."
The only solution Mr. Zuckerman sees now to juice the economy "is to broaden the tax base and simplify and lower tax [rates]. To me that will be as close to revenue-neutral as you're going to have so it isn't going to be seen as a budget buster." He views GOP candidate Herman Cain's "9-9-9 plan" as a "little bit simple-minded," but he says that a reform that closes loopholes and reduces compliance costs will stimulate both business and consumer spending.
Mr. Zuckerman sees a need for a cooperative effort like that of President Ronald Reagan and House Speaker Thomas "Tip" O'Neill when they reformed Social Security in 1983. That wasn't a permanent solution, of course, as Social Security needs more significant changes now, but Mr. Zuckerman sees it as a model of bipartisan progress.
Unprompted, he spends much of our discussion reminiscing about the Reagan presidency. Mr. Zuckerman has for years owned U.S. News and World Report, and in 1986 its Moscow correspondent Nicholas Daniloff was seized without warning by the KGB.
Mr. Zuckerman immediately flew to Russia but returned home when Soviet officials refused to release their new prisoner. "I worked in the White House for the next four weeks virtually every day and through that I met Reagan," says Mr. Zuckerman. Reagan secured Mr. Daniloff's release in a swap that included a Soviet spy held in the U.S.
"Reagan surprised me," says Mr. Zuckerman. "He got the point of every argument. . . . He was very decisive. And everybody loved working for him. They followed his lead because they really respected his decisiveness and his instincts."
'I was not a Republican and I was not an admirer of his before I knew him," continues Mr. Zuckerman. "And you know, Harry Truman had a wonderful definition for the presidency. He said the president has to be someone who can persuade the American people to do what they don't want to do and to like it. And that's what you have to do. Somebody like Reagan had that authority. He was liked so much and he had a kind of moral authority. That's what this president has lost."
"Democracy does not work without the right leadership," he says later, "and you can't play politics." The smile inspired by Reagan memories is gone now and Mr. Zuckerman is pounding his circular conference table. "The country has got to come to the conclusion at some point that what you're doing is not just because of an ideology or politics but for the interests of the country."
Mr. Freeman is assistant editor of the Journal's editorial page.
Posting diverse opinions can encourage thoughtful debate.....
Looks like the empty-suit-in-residence at the White House is losing his base...rapidly.
To Mr. Robintte, I say, " What took you so long??" - Most of us saw this coming more than four years ago when we recognized that a Community Organizer from Chicago was NOT the person the country needed as a Senator from Illinois, let alone the Chief Executive for our Nation.....Now, we need to find a suitable replacement, and that is also becoming a difficult task.
We need true leadership and we need it yesterday.
Posted: Monday, 14 March 2011 10:55AM
“Pres. Obama, I too am exhausted defending you.”
Garland Robinette Reporting - 870am, 105.3fm, WWL.com.
“President Obama, quite frankly, I’m exhausted defending you. Mr. President, is this my new reality?” Those words were spoken to President Obama on September 20th, 2010 during a town hall meeting in Washington. The speaker identified herself as a CFO of a large national organization, a mother, a wife, and an American veteran.
Mr. President, I'm Garland Robinette...me too. I’m totally exhausted. I'm one of the few (possibly the only) radio talk show hosts in the south who admits that I like and admire you. I've liked and disliked all of our Presidents for various reasons. I've admired your intelligence, calm and reasoned communication skills. Some of your programs I like a lot, parts of others still work for me, and others I find much to disagree with. I'm one of the few remaining "journalists" who really does try to see all sides. I don't join “fear clubs” (Republicans and Democrats.) I don't need to be told what to think and how to vote. I think you need people like me, but for me it's too late...you can put me in the “minus one” category. Aside from being exhausted defending you, I'm now doubting my daughter and wife's security…their future in this country. Your energy policies are incredibly contradictory, uneducated, and extremely dangerous. Either you are not the Harvard-backed brain I thought you were, or you're getting unbelievably bad information from your advisors.
What finally knocked me out of your camp was your speech last Friday…the one about energy. Let's break it down into specifics.
1. You admitted that oil and gas prices affect everybody, "For Americans already facing a tough time it's an added burden." You emphasized the middle class.
Question: If a lack of it (oil) is an "added burden for Americans facing tough times,” why don't we go everywhere that we can to find it? I wrote a blog yesterday about you and T-Boone Pickens (famous oil man) saying "we can't drill our way out of this problem" (lack of energy). I think the blog pointed out the lunacy of that statement. Switch that belief to food. Use the hypothetical of a looming food shortage. Use corn as the oil analogy. It’s finite; we have to use it as bio-fuel. We can't "corn raise" our way out of the problem? So we quit growing more corn, because it will one day run out as a food source? We don't continue eating and growing more of it as a bridge while we're using science and research to find a substitute? I know you don't agree, but this makes me look at a Harvard graduate and say…contradictory, uneducated and increasingly dangerous.
2. You said, "Now the hard truth is, that as long as our economy depends on foreign oil we’re subject to price spikes.” Let me be more specific. First we need to continue to boost domestic production of oil."
Question: The figures I read say 86 billion barrels offshore in the Outer Continental Shelf, 10 billion barrels in the Arctic and 800 billion barrels in oil shale in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado and even more in Canada. These holdings are reportedly three times larger than Saudi Arabia reserves. Mr. President, have your energy advisors told you we are swimming in low cost, high quality fuel in Cushing, Oklahoma? Cushing is a main trading hub for oil. But there is a problem; we can't get any of that cheaper oil here in the south and much of the east. We have to buy expensive oil from other parts of the world. Why? I'm sure your experts told you Cushing doesn't have enough pipelines coming to us or the east, and there’s so much oil that America doesn’t have enough trains and tankers to get it to us. So, again the question…you said, "First we need to continue to boost domestic production of oil"...but not with any of the above current availabilities? Feeling my exhaustion?
3. You said, "Our oil production reached its highest level in 7 years. Oil production from the Gulf and Mexico reached an all-time high. We've approved more than 35 new offshore drilling permits."
Question: But it takes 7-10 years to gear up to bring oil to the surface after it's found, so other administrations are responsible for the additional oil, not yours. In particular, the new technology that takes out oil shale in the Dakotas. The Energy Information Administration (you know the one under your Department of Energy) projects there will be a decline in production of 220,000 barrels of domestic oil per day this year. The EIA says the number is 150 million fewer barrels in the Gulf of Mexico. Seven major rigs have left the Gulf to sign multi-year contracts in other countries. Do you just not know this? Do you think just because the media is a sad pile reflected conservative and liberal dogma that no one fact checks anymore? All time high Gulf oil production? Here are numbers I've found. 55 rigs in the Gulf drilling four days before the Deepwater Horizon explosion. May 2010, your six month moratorium was announced, then there were 46. Last week (3-11-11) the count was 25. Here comes that exhaustion again.
4. You've "directed the Department of the Interior to determine (in two weeks) why the oil companies aren't developing federal leases they currently hold.”
Question: How can I find these answers? Your experts apparently don't know why…and now only have two weeks to find out. Let's see, well…oil companies won't drill unless there is oil under the lease. Not all have oil. To find out if one does, it takes years of geological surveying, testing, and many, many, many of your environmental studies before drilling can even begin...like...7-10 years. Plus, after spending tens of millions of dollars and finding oil, they need to lease not just the spot where they drill, but tens of thousands of surrounding acres. If oil companies don't lease the land, competitors could simply drill nearby without spending millions and suck out the other guys oil just like a straw in a milk-shake. So what company would be so stupid as to not buy the surrounding leases that they’re not going to drill on? Surely, President Obama you must have someone who tells you this? Does anybody understand my exhaustion with this? Oops, almost forgot, as of June 2008 The New York Times reported that "almost 100 percent of the oil companies are constrained in their investment program, because there are no rigs available.”
5. "We're taking steps that will enable us to gather data on potential gas and oil resources of the mid-and south Atlantic". #^$%#&WAIT-WAIT-WAIT!!
Question: What? Where did that come from, Mr. President? You couldn't have gotten permission from Robert Kennedy Jr., or Al Gore, or John Kerry, Greenpeace…they're all too busy fighting windmills off the east coast (see Sunday edition New York Times -- "NOT IN MY LIBERAL BACKYARD.” They’re referring to any alternative energy…oil drilling would be obviously out of the question. You couldn't have meant any other east coast state, they’re all against oil exploration. But I'm sure you heard...didn't you?
6. "We're looking at potential new development in Alaska both onshore and offshore.” #(_#&@#*#)#*$-WAIT-WAIT-WAIT!!!
Question: You are, Mr. President? Since when? But you said there was barely enough there to sustain a 3 to 5 years supply, so why muck up the moose trails? You said we're not going to drill our way out of this problem?
7. "We're working to diversify our entire portfolio with historic developments in clean energy. I set a goal for 80% clean energy by 2035, with wind, solar, natural gas, clean coal, and gas and nuclear power.” LOL nuclear power. LOL. NYMBY. Japan…the best device-quake proof plants ever? Raise your hand if you want one in your backyard. If you don't believe that industry is dead, simply google “geothermal plays in San Francisco, cause earthquakes, efforts abandoned.” Then google “geothermal plays in Switzerland (check this Ambian) caused earthquakes and the process was shutdown. “ Google “multi-earthquakes in Arkansas caused by natural gas drilling.” Read all about earthquake fears along the Mississippi river.
Question: Actually not a question…just a low moan like the Titanic in the movie (on the way down). This is where I pass out because I fear you're getting dizzy. Have you even introduced yourself to your head of the department of energy, Steven Chu? He got a big old Nobel Prize on his mantel for his work in physics, biology, and alternative energy…little old schools like Stanford, Lawrence Berkley National labs, and Bell Labs. He must not have seen you mention in your SOTU speech about a certain professor at Cal-Tech and others at Stanford who have mastered the art of photosynthesis to the power of the sun times ten. But Mr. Chu must know that Professor Nathan Lewis agrees that we have the capability to meet the President's goal, we just have no way to implement that capability. Whadayasay we look at the alternatives?
8. Mr. President, you said, "We’ve got to make sure we have sufficient supplies, an example would be during Hurricane Katrina when you've got a whole bunch of refineries that have been impacted all along the Gulf."
Question: Sufficient supplies? Right. You do know we haven't built a refinery in this country in over 30 years, right? So, how do you maintain our supplies during a category 5 hurricane, when you have no alternative refineries? The polls should have educated you a long time ago; the country doesn't like or believe in “Big Oil” and often scream NRIMBY (no refineries in my back yard).
9. Mr. President, you even admit that China, India, and Brazil will need more oil as their economies improve. Have your advisors given you the numbers? Try 22 billion new barrels per day. The world consumes 85-86 billion per day. The oil industry has never produced more than 88 million barrels a day. Out of that 88, the U.S. is demanding 20 million barrels a day. Can you tell me again, why we wouldn't drill for every little drop of oil in this country? Plus, do you really think everything will go back to the "quiet ole days" in the Middle East?
10. Mr. President, you even admitted, "In fact, a lot of folks who are having the toughest times, who are either unemployed or have low-wage jobs, they're the ones that are most severely affected because they're using a higher portion of their income just to fill up their tanks.”
Question: Isn’t that every reason to drill everything we can find, until we find the magic elixir to replace oil?
And, one final question, Mr. President: For those west and east coast communities who don't want oil drilling…can we arrange a legal agreement by which they vote NOT to use any more gas than they do at this time? You know, like a rationing card? It's what they say they want? We take all the risks here on the Gulf Coast, yet receive virtually no royalties. Isn't it only fair that we not send them what they don't want? We're getting a little tired of their lack and knowledge or hypocrisy; they seem to reflect the same in you.
It’s really exhausting…
(and it has been so for most Americans for the better part of the last two years.)
Let's take a quick inventory of Mort Zuckerman's beliefs -
