Today President Joe Biden has an op-ed in the New York Times in which he outlines what he says the United States will do and won’t do in support of Ukraine:

We have moved quickly to send Ukraine a significant amount of weaponry and ammunition so it can fight on the battlefield and be in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.

That’s why I’ve decided that we will provide the Ukrainians with more advanced rocket systems and munitions that will enable them to more precisely strike key targets on the battlefield in Ukraine.

We will continue cooperating with our allies and partners on Russian sanctions, the toughest ever imposed on a major economy. We will continue providing Ukraine with advanced weaponry, including Javelin anti-tank missiles, Stinger antiaircraft missiles, powerful artillery and precision rocket systems, radars, unmanned aerial vehicles, Mi-17 helicopters and ammunition. We will also send billions more in financial assistance, as authorized by Congress. We will work with our allies and partners to address the global food crisis that Russia’s aggression is worsening. And we will help our European allies and others reduce their dependence on Russian fossil fuels, and speed our transition to a clean energy future.

We will also continue reinforcing NATO’s eastern flank with forces and capabilities from the United States and other allies. And just recently, I welcomed Finland’s and Sweden’s applications to join NATO, a move that will strengthen overall U.S. and trans-Atlantic security by adding two democratic and highly capable military partners.

I presume the following is intended to be reassuring, both to the American people and the Russians:

We do not seek a war between NATO and Russia. As much as I disagree with Mr. Putin, and find his actions an outrage, the United States will not try to bring about his ouster in Moscow. So long as the United States or our allies are not attacked, we will not be directly engaged in this conflict, either by sending American troops to fight in Ukraine or by attacking Russian forces. We are not encouraging or enabling Ukraine to strike beyond its borders. We do not want to prolong the war just to inflict pain on Russia.

concluding:

Standing by Ukraine in its hour of need is not just the right thing to do. It is in our vital national interests to ensure a peaceful and stable Europe and to make it clear that might does not make right. If Russia does not pay a heavy price for its actions, it will send a message to other would-be aggressors that they too can seize territory and subjugate other countries. It will put the survival of other peaceful democracies at risk. And it could mark the end of the rules-based international order and open the door to aggression elsewhere, with catastrophic consequences the world over.

I know many people around the world are concerned about the use of nuclear weapons. We currently see no indication that Russia has intent to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, though Russia’s occasional rhetoric to rattle the nuclear saber is itself dangerous and extremely irresponsible. Let me be clear: Any use of nuclear weapons in this conflict on any scale would be completely unacceptable to us as well as the rest of the world and would entail severe consequences.

Americans will stay the course with the Ukrainian people because we understand that freedom is not free. That’s what we have always done whenever the enemies of freedom seek to bully and oppress innocent people, and it is what we are doing now. Vladimir Putin did not expect this degree of unity or the strength of our response. He was mistaken. If he expects that we will waver or fracture in the months to come, he is equally mistaken.

I also assume that the president’s op-ed was intended to clear up some areas in which the president had previously raised some ambiguities. The op-ed makes a pretty bookend to this op-ed by Christopher Caldwell which appeared in the New York Times yesterday. After making it clear that he holds Russia “directly to blame for the present conflict in Ukraine” he explains the actions by the United States antecedent to the invasion of Ukraine which convinced the Russians that they were threatened:

In 2014 the United States backed an uprising — in its final stages a violent uprising — against the legitimately elected Ukrainian government of Viktor Yanukovych, which was pro-Russian. (The corruption of Mr. Yanukovych’s government has been much adduced by the rebellion’s defenders, but corruption is a perennial Ukrainian problem, even today.) Russia, in turn, annexed Crimea, a historically Russian-speaking part of Ukraine that since the 18th century had been home to Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

One can argue about Russian claims to Crimea, but Russians take them seriously. Hundreds of thousands of Russian and Soviet fighters died defending the Crimean city of Sevastopol from European forces during two sieges — one during the Crimean War and one during World War II. In recent years, Russian control of Crimea has seemed to provide a stable regional arrangement: Russia’s European neighbors, at least, have let sleeping dogs lie.

But the United States never accepted the arrangement. On Nov. 10, 2021, the United States and Ukraine signed a “charter on strategic partnership” that called for Ukraine to join NATO, condemned “ongoing Russian aggression” and affirmed an “unwavering commitment” to the reintegration of Crimea into Ukraine.

That charter “convinced Russia that it must attack or be attacked,” Mr. Guaino wrote. “It is the ineluctable process of 1914 in all its terrifying purity.”

This is a faithful account of the war that President Vladimir Putin has claimed to be fighting. “There were constant supplies of the most modern military equipment,” Mr. Putin said at Russia’s annual Victory Parade on May 9, referring to the foreign arming of Ukraine. “The danger was growing every day.”

He goes on to criticize President Biden for saying things which President Putin presumably interprets as threats, e.g. “Putin cannot remain in power” or suggestions that he be tried for war crimes. I think that places the president’s op-ed in context. It is to some degree a response to Mr. Caldwell’s op-ed or to the op-ed in Le Figaro which is Mr. Caldwell’s jumping off point. Mr. Caldwell concludes:

The United States is making no concessions. That would be to lose face. There’s an election coming. So the administration is closing off avenues of negotiation and working to intensify the war. We’re in it to win it. With time, the huge import of deadly weaponry, including that from the newly authorized $40 billion allocation, could take the war to a different level. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine warned in an address to students this month that the bloodiest days of the war were coming.

I conclude this post with some questions. What was President Biden trying to accomplish with his op-ed? Did he succeed? Will the American people find his words reassuring? Will the Russians? Does it matter?

In anticipation of the primary elections which will be held next month in Illinois we are being deluged with political spots. They are becoming increasingly harsh and combative.

While it’s interesting to see how these spots are edited over time (frequently to remove stupid counter-productive statements), I sincerely wish primary season were over here.

Unfortunately, the late Mayor Daley was correct in his observation that however things look now somebody will be elected. For some offices I wish that all of the candidates could lose.

Oh, well. I guess the political spots are better than the Depp-Heard trial. Not by a lot, though.

In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today President Joe Biden outlines his plan for easing inflation:

First, the Federal Reserve has a primary responsibility to control inflation. My predecessor demeaned the Fed, and past presidents have sought to influence its decisions inappropriately during periods of elevated inflation. I won’t do this. I have appointed highly qualified people from both parties to lead that institution. I agree with their assessment that fighting inflation is our top economic challenge right now.

Second, we need to take every practical step to make things more affordable for families during this moment of economic uncertainty—and to boost the productive capacity of our economy over time. The price at the pump is elevated in large part because Russian oil, gas and refining capacity are off the market. We can’t let up on our global effort to punish Mr. Putin for what he’s done, and we must mitigate these effects for American consumers. That is why I led the largest release from global oil reserves in history. Congress could help right away by passing clean energy tax credits and investments that I have proposed. A dozen CEOs of America’s largest utility companies told me earlier this year that my plan would reduce the average family’s annual utility bills by $500 and accelerate our transition from energy produced by autocrats.

We can also reduce the cost of everyday goods by fixing broken supply chains, improving infrastructure, and cracking down on the exorbitant fees that foreign ocean freight companies charge to move products. My Housing Supply Action Plan will make housing more affordable by building more than a million more units, closing the housing shortfall in the next five years. We can reduce the price of prescription drugs by giving Medicare the power to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies and capping the cost of insulin. And we can lower the cost of child and elder care to help parents get back to work. I’ve done what I can on my own to help working families during this challenging time—and will keep acting to lower costs where I can—but now Congress needs to act too.

Third, we need to keep reducing the federal deficit, which will help ease price pressures. Last week the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected that the deficit will fall by $1.7 trillion this year—the largest reduction in history. That will leave the deficit as a share of the economy lower than prepandemic levels and lower than CBO projected for this year before the American Rescue Plan passed. This deficit progress wasn’t preordained. In addition to winding down emergency programs responsibly, about half the reduction is driven by an increase in revenue—as my economic policies powered a rapid recovery.

We’ll see. I don’t believe the evidence supports the claim that the run-up in oil prices is largely due to taking Russian oil and gas off the market for two reasons. First, a considerable portion of the price increases took place before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine but, second, most of Russia’s customers continue to buy its oil and gas and the reduction in purchases by some customers have largely been offset by increases on the part of others.

I’m glad he made a hat tip to increasing production but I wish it were more than a hat tip. Will his “Housing Supply Action Plan” actually result in the building of more houses or is it more likely just to subsidize the construction of houses that would have been built in any case? Will whatever increased supply is realized outweigh the inflationary effects of the additional spending under the plan? It seems to me that a considerable portion of the increase in housing prices is due to constraints on building imposed by jurisdictions with high demand. I don’t think his plan will do much to increase the supply in those places.

In her Washington Post column Megan McArdle argues that the consequences of throwing the economy into recession would be worse than allowing inflation to increase:

This story is usually told triumphantly — brave Volcker, taking the painful but necessary steps! Yet now that our own Fed chair may face a similarly ugly trade-off, I confess I’m thinking more about the deep pain that recession caused. It is, of course, bad to lose 8 percent of your purchasing power to inflation. But it’s even worse to lose a hundred percent of it to unemployment — and the collective suffering of those who lose their jobs is arguably much greater than the pains of households strained by inflation.

So I asked John Huizinga, who taught me macroeconomics 20 years ago at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business: Why is a recession better than high inflation? His answer, in brief: It isn’t. “If it were me and I was in charge of monetary policy, would I cause a big recession to keep inflation low? No. But I would try to get to a stable inflation rate, and then gradually lower the rate of inflation over time.”

from which I conclude that she is too young to remember the adverse consequences of the inflation of the 1970s and early 1980s. High inflation hurts the poor and benefits the rich. It contributed to the financialization of the economy. And worst of all persistent high inflation runs the risk of a catastrophic loss of confidence in the currency, i.e. hyperinflation.

Where I believe that Ms. McArdle and Dr. Huizinga err the most is in believing that fine-tuning is possible. It isn’t. Economists simply don’t know how to accomplish it. That’s why there is a choice: inflation or recession and IMO the risks that accompany persistent high inflation cannot be mitigated and are worth avoiding.

Update

In response to criticisms in comments, let me explain how those with the highest incomes actually benefit from higher inflation. I think we can all agree that the poor are hurt by high inflation. It’s less obvious that those with higher incomes benefit.

Can we all agree that borrowers benefit from higher inflation? They service and pay off debts with cheaper dollars than they originally borrowed. Who borrows the most?

The answer is that the higher your income, the more you borrow:

Source: J. W. Mason, “Income Distribution, Household Debt, and Aggregate Demand: A Critical Assessment”

That was a lesson I learned when I was a kid. The richest guy I’ve ever met (he would be a billionaire by today’s standards) also held more debt than anybody I’ve ever known. He was proud of it; bragged about it. The secret to riches isn’t avoiding debt; it’s managing debt.

Consequently, those in the top decile of income earners actually benefit from higher inflation. Not only are they more likely to be able to command raises than those in the lower deciles, their significantly higher debt is inflated away.

The most comprehensive and succinct consideration of the character of the Uvalde shooter I have run across has been in this piece in the Spanish newspaper El País. He has more things in common with other perpetrators of previous school shootings than that he used a gun.

Over the past more than 200 years the United States has invaded the following countries, in some cases occupying them or annexing portions of them outright:

Bolivia
Cuba (multiple times)
Dominican Republic (multiple times)
Grenada
Haiti (multiple times)
Mexico (multiple times)
Nicaragua
Paraguay
Panama

That doesn’t include some CIA interventions or meddling in the elections of our neighbors. Draw your own conclusions over whether the U. S. believes that the countries of the Western Hemisphere are within its sphere of influence.

In his Washington Post column George Will, assessing the first 500 days of the Biden presidency, takes note of something I have mentioned before—the administration is experiencing something that is the common experience of every president. However focused on domestic matters a president may be events have a way of turning a president’s attention towards foreign policy:

Biden has had the experience common to presidents: Presidents do not control their agendas; the world gets a vote. When Harold Macmillan, Britain’s prime minister, 1957-1963, was asked what most troubled him, he reportedly replied, “Events, my dear boy, events.”

Pesky things, those. George W. Bush began by aiming to be a bipartisan education president, collaborating with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy on “No Child Left Behind” to banish “the soft bigotry of low expectations,” etc. Things went swimmingly through his 234th day as president, which was Sept. 10, 2001.

Perhaps the most important of Biden’s 500 days was Feb. 24, when Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, setting in motion momentous events, substantially influenced by Biden’s deft diplomacy. These events are pulling Germany toward a world role commensurate with its geopolitical potential, and they are bringing NATO, through Finland’s coming membership, to about 833 miles of Russia’s border.

Unfortunately for Biden, what Americans usually want in foreign policy is as little of it as possible, so his stunning achievement in the Ukraine crisis — reviving the concept of “the West” — will pay scant dividends. Similarly, a tight labor market is the best anti-poverty program, and a downward distributor of wealth — but not when inflation more than erases wage gains.

Mr. Will goes on to present President Biden’s greatest hope should he choose to seek re-election in 2024:

When you’re hot, you’re hot, and when you’re not, infant formula disappears. Panicked parents, deprived babies? What next? The Wall Street Journal reports: “During the past 80 years, the Fed has never lowered inflation as much as it is setting out to do now — by 4 percentage points — without causing recession.”

Four consecutive presidents while in office have experienced their parties’ losses of the Senate and House. Biden could become the fifth, and could manage this in just 24 months.

If he seeks reelection, he will need an opponent so ghastly that voters can respond as the New York Sun did with its five-word 1904 endorsement of President Theodore Roosevelt’s reelection: “THEODORE! With all thy faults.”

To all appearances the Republicans appear very eager to furnish such a candidate which could mean that in 2024 we’ll be treated to the spectacle of two octogenarians running against each other for the presidency.

Update

Add this from political reporter Peter Roff at Newsweek:

The next election, as much as the mainstream media won’t like it, isn’t going to be a referendum on Trump. It’s going to be about President Joe Biden and how the Democrats have run the country for the last two years, even though—and this is something else that’s been overlooked—the GOP is in charge of more states now that at almost any time in history.

The Biden presidency is failing. At least that’s the perception people have. His approval rating, which started in the low- to mid-60s when he took office, has now sunk below 40. That’s not good for him, and it’s not good for his party. Democrats are getting the blame for things that are happening as a result of policies Biden has put in place, as well as for things harmful to the interests of the United States over which he has no direct control. That’s created a positive political environment for the GOP, which has amassed a nearly double-digit lead on the crucial polling question of which party voters want to control Congress after the next election.

How people feel, and why, is what ties all this together. The environment drives turnout and, right now, GOP voters are energized and engaged.

Let me be very clear. I don’t want Joe Biden and Donald Trump to face off again in 2024. I didn’t want them to be the candidates in 2020—I thought they were both too old to be president. In 2024 Joe Biden will be 81 and Donald Trump will be 77. Neither one of these men is the person we need to be president in 2025.

The editors of the Wall Street Journal warn of the prospect of a “summer of rolling blackouts” in most of the country:

Last week the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) warned that two-thirds of the U.S. could experience blackouts this summer. Welcome to the “green energy transition.”

We’ve been warning for years that climate policies would make the grid more vulnerable to vacillations in supply and demand. And here we are. Some of the mainstream press are belatedly catching on that blackouts are coming, but they still don’t grasp the real problem: The forced transition to green energy is distorting energy markets and destabilizing the grid.

Progressives blame the grid problems on climate change. There’s no doubt that drought in the western U.S. is a contributing factor. NERC’s report notes that hydropower generators in the western U.S. are running at lower levels, and output from thermal (i.e., nuclear and fossil fuel) generators that use the Missouri River for cooling may be affected this summer.

But the U.S. has experienced bad droughts in the past. The problem now is the loss of baseload generators that can provide reliable power 24/7. Solar and wind are rapidly increasing, but they’re as erratic as the weather and can’t be commanded to ramp up when electricity demand surges.

They go on to explain how the market distortions created by subsidies for wind and solar energy discourage the maintenance of baseload production.

Chicago is unlikely to share in that experience since the majority of our electricity is baseload power provided by nuclear reactors. It is the only major city in the United States for which that is true. That should be a warning to at the very least keep our nuclear reactors in production so we don’t share in Germany’s experience. I don’t have my hopes up.

The first part of John Kass’s Memorial Day post is mostly a lament for decaying values. I’ll spare you that part and focus on the most apt part:

It involves us taking time out to think hard and long about a soldier’s poem and the poppies, row on row.

“In Flanders Fields” is that soldier’s poem, written in World War I by Col. John McCrae, a man who’d seen the devastation of war, and hopelessness. Yet with clear eyes and a clean heart he wrote of poppy blossoms as rebirth of hope, those bright orange/red papery thin blossoms, as delicate as dreams, waving in the breeze over the freshly dug graves of the dead.

The scene was Ypres, Belgium at a farm converted to a military hospital, where McCrae was an Army doctor, doctor, dealing with pain and death and disease. Flanders Fields is particularly tragic. The political leadership had led their citizens into hell, and still the citizen soldiers marched toward death and the trenches and the barbed wire, and the gas.

My mother, 92 years old and born of the United Kingdom, hasn’t forgotten. She was born in Guelph, Ontario, the town where Col. McCrae is from. She knew his family. They all knew of the McCraes, but they did not treat them as celebrities. Instead, they respected them.

My mom would put a book of his poetry on the breakfast table when my sons were little boys, so that we’d remember as we taught the boys. And that is how traditions are maintained.

Unlike most of the countries of the world the people of the United States are united by values and our distinctive traditions. The teaching of those values and traditions don’t happen by accident but are passed from generation to generation. They cannot be delegated to the schools at least not if we expect them to be our values. The schools have enough to do without shouldering that responsibility as well.

So, by all means take a day off today and celebrate it with barbecues (or pizza since meat is so expensive) and ball games. But take some time, too, to teach your children the values and traditions you wish to see maintained. They won’t be maintained otherwise.