This process while firming up support for parties and candidates is contrary to approaches which are used for interest based problem solving. For instance, the President had a choice when he delivered his speech at American University. He chose the staging, the words used and the audience. The format the President used set him above others and communicated that he held the high ground. The President chose to harshly critique the Republican position with its crafters present. This signaled an aggressive posture rather than an invocation or request for a more collaborative approach. The signals imparted had institutional, interpersonal and personal messages.

Standard & Poor’s, and many others, picked up on these signals, and the signals probably contributed to the shifting of its outlook for U. S. sovereign debt from stable to “negative,” a move which may ultimately contribute to a downgrade. S&P stated according to Bloomberg news service, “We believe there is a risk that U. S. policy makers might not reach an agreement on how to address medium-and long-term budgetary challenges by 2013. If an agreement is not reached and meaningful implementation does not begin by then, this would in our view render the U. S. fiscal profile meaningfully weaker than that of peer ‘AAA’ sovereigns.” The consequences on the U. S. cost and ability to borrow might be substantial. Moody’s sent signals that this could happen in January of this year.
Here are a few views that are more factual in nature about problems that are well known yet resist acknowledgement.

On Social Security, the American Academy of Actuaries wrote in a January 2007 Monograph entitled “Social Security Reform Options,” “The American Academy of Actuaries’ Social Insurance Committee believes that Congress should act soon to make changes to the program and bring Social Security back into long-range actuarial balance over the next 75 years and beyond. Enacting such changes soon is desirable, because doing so would provide significant advance notice to those affected, allowing recipients to plan accordingly.”

On Medicare, the American Academy of Actuaries in its November 2010 Issue Brief wrote, “Even with the successful implementation of ACA (The Affordable Care Act), however, long-term challenges remain. The HI trust fund is projected to be depleted in 2029, and Medicare spending will continue to grow faster than the economy — increasing the pressure on beneficiary household budgets and the federal budget and threatening the program’s sustainability. Policymakers need to take further action to address these problems.” In a February 2010 call to action, the Academy wrote, “It is critical that President Obama and Congress work now to achieve consensus on those decisions. Deferring action will only ensure that the changes necessary are more extreme and likely more burdensome to future generations.”

On Medicaid, the 2010 Actuarial Report on the Financial Outlook for Medicaid” issued by the Office of the Actuary for the Centers of Medicare & Medicaid Services of the U. S. Department of Health & Human Services addressed aspects of this program. Medicaid’s financial operations are not financed through trust funds and supported by Federal and State sources (taxation or borrowing). The magnitude of the challenge is apparent to anyone who reads the report, “Total Medicaid expenditures (Federal and State expenditures combined) for medical assistance payments and administration are projected to grow 6.9 percent in FY 2010 to $404.9 billion and to reach $840.4 billion by 2019, increasing at an average rate of 8.3 percent per year over the next ten years.” In 1966, the historical data shows $.4 billion. The trajectory and magnitude of the problem are clear.

Instead of shifting into campaigning mode, it is time for the parties to reverse directions and shift to interest based problem solving in my opinion.