Tag: GOP

Who is crying now?

chasdarwinLeave a comment

That may sound like a 1950’s pop song (slow dancing…), but in this case it describes the GOP talking about spending deficits.

Bernie Horn, of The Campaign for America’s future, writes in Truthout:”Here it comes – an avalanche of misleading and mistaken “facts” about President Obama’s budget.

Last week, the House and Senate Budget Committees approved versions of the fiscal 2010 budget resolution, working from an extraordinary proposal by Barack Obama. The House version is fairly close to what the President proposed, while the Senate bill is a bit different – but still 98 percent of what the President requested. This week, the budget will come to the floor of the House and Senate, including votes on a series of amendments to slash or weaken progressive programs… The mud of fabrication and misinformation is so deep, we’ll have to peel it off in layers.

Huge Hypocrisy

First and foremost, conservatives are being supremely hypocritical about deficits and debt because their deficits caused the current national debt. Ronald Reagan’s tax cuts for the rich and profligate military spending tripled the national debt. George W. Bush’s tax cuts for the rich and war spending doubled the national debt. In fact, nearly 80 percent of the current debt – about which conservatives now bitterly complain – was caused by the three most recent conservative presidents: Reagan, Bush Senior, and Bush Junior.

Adding insult to injury, Republican budgets have been notorious for containing gimmicks designed to hide the full extent of their irresponsibility – the most egregious was funding the Iraq war with special appropriations outside of the budget.

This year, President Obama changed all that. His budget described a comprehensive plan covering 10 years. It included contingency funds that may or may not have to be spent. It was, quite simply, the most honest budget ever…three big lies about revenues. Obama is not “proposing the largest tax increase in history.” He is proposing to restore a measure of tax fairness by letting George W. Bush’s tax cuts for the rich expire next year. He is proposing to return to the tax policies that were in place during America’s great economic expansion of the late 1990s. Under the Obama program, only the rich will see their taxes increase – those with incomes over $250,000 per year. For all the rest of us, our tax rates will decline. In fact, Obama’s plan will deliver the largest middle-class tax cut in history.     Similarly, Obama’s plan is not “aimed at taxing small-business people.” This talking point is based on a fictional definition of a small businessperson invented by the Bush Administration… And I’ll bet you’re wondering, what is this “massive new national sales tax on your electric bill”? There is none. This is right-wing framing for the “cap-and-trade” system that experts insist is the only practical way to get a handle on global warming. This system forces companies to pay for their pollution, thereby encouraging clean, green technologies.

So to review the conservative tax trickery, the truth is that Obama’s budget delivers a substantial tax cut to 95 percent of Americans. The only ones who will see their taxes increase are the wealthy – and the corporate polluters!… If we spend to build the American economy, long-term deficits will go down. If we don’t spend, the recession will linger and deficits will skyrocket. It’s as simple as that.

And that brings us to the false argument that cutting the current budget is good for “our children.” If we don’t invest in our nation’s infrastructure, if we don’t restructure the pathetic economy handed down to us by George W. Bush and his conservative allies, if we don’t create a sustainable health care system, if we don’t take necessary steps to achieve energy independence and fight global warming – then we will be placing a terrible burden on our children. For them, and for us, we’ve got to change course, now….No doubt the GOP will offer one or more alternative budgets on the House and Senate floors later this week. No doubt they will be just like the alternative Republican stimulus packages in February – full of tax cuts for the rich and spending cuts for the rest of us.

The bottom line is: Conservatives caused this mess and now are running away from any responsibility for cleaning it up.”

——-

The writer is a Senior Fellow at Campaign for America’s Future and author of the recent book, “Framing the Future: How Progressive Values Can Win Elections and Influence People.”

see: http://www.truthout.org/033109R

There is a chance that the worst is over…

Today, stocks are up roughly 20 percent in the past two weeks, the biggest such short-term rally since 1938

chasdarwinLeave a comment

“In October, all three asset classes — stocks, bonds and commodities such as oil and farm products — were in freefall. Today, stocks are up roughly 20 percent in the past two weeks, the biggest such short-term rally since 1938.” 

Biggest short term rally since 1938?

From McClatchy: “WASHINGTON — With the Dow Jones Industrial Average rising around 20 percent over the past few weeks, a down Friday notwithstanding, the question on many lips is whether the stock market has hit bottom and, if so, when might the broader economy follow?

Stock prices often reflect expectations of how the economy will be faring six months or so into the future. If the recent rise in stock prices reflects that the market has bottomed out and is starting a bull run — as some prominent analysts tentatively suggest — that would point to a turnaround for the economy by late summer or early fall.

Few analysts are willing to declare that we’ve hit bottom without hedging, especially since there’s been plenty of premature speculation before about a market bottom during the past 16 months of recession. As if to mock the budding optimism, the Dow closed down Friday by 148.38 points to 7,776.18.

Most analysts now agree, however, that there are some encouraging shafts of light after months of pitch-black news.

“The best news now is that despite the worst . . . daily litany of horrible news, the strongest renewed bank fears, despite all of that, we’ve got stocks today essentially where they were in October,” said James Paulsen, chief investment strategist for Wells Capital Management, owned by the giant bank Wells Fargo.”

see: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/64992.html

It Has happened here…

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In an earlier post, I referenced the Sinclair Lewis novel: “It Can’t Happen Here”,  – see wiki:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Can%27t_Happen_Here.

In 1980, 1984, 1988, 2000, and 2004, the persons who became President had the interests of the wealthiest Americans – not the majority – as an agenda, supported by three major theories: the anti-middle class supply side economics;  the anti-welfare system illegitmacy epidemic; and the anti-public education suppossed crisis in public education – all have turned out to have been hoaxes .  (“Up From Conservatism”, by Michael Lind).  It should be emphasized that during the brief respite of the Clinton administration – in which taxes were raised slightly on the highest incomes, and 21 million new jobs were created – those positive results were not in the headlines.

1980 might be excused, as it was not then completely clear what the agenda would be, but the rest cannot .  As to the issue of the honesty of the 2000 and 2004 elections, at least 53-57% of voters should have rejected the Republican candidate, which would have made the election very difficult to steal.

The untruths propogated by the Bush 43 administration to justify the invasion of  Iraq are another example of mass deception, as was the attempt to destroy Social Security, which failed, and the near criminalization of popular issues, such as access to safe, legal abortions.

How have the wealthiest several percent succeeded in controlling the vast majority?

o By clever framing of the issues, e.g. ‘pro-life’, ‘war on terror’

o By the creation of an enemy – ‘terrorists’

o By getting out their voters with wedge issues (abortion, race)

o With the help of a supportive corporate media

How did we turn the tide in 2008?

o The neocons helped us by hurting the economy and the infrastructue, and their pursuit of the troubled adventure in Iraq

o We choose a charismatic, intelligent, empathetic candidate with wide appeal, who overcame a non-traditional background to get more votes than any other candidate in US history.

o We identified concerns of the majority, and got them out to vote

How can we avoid future disasters?

o Remain vigilant

o Reveal history

o Resolve the problems which are the most important to the greatest number of people

o Reject the false messages of biased media sources.

see also: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090323_america_is_in_need_of_a_moral_bailout/

“It can’t happen here?”

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“It Can’t Happen Here is a semi-satirical political novel by Sinclair Lewis published in 1935. It features newspaperman Doremus Jessup struggling against the fascist regime of President Berzelius “Buzz” Windrip, who resembles Gerald B. Winrod, the Kansas evangelist whose far-right views earned him the nickname “The Jayhawk Nazi“. It serves as a warning that political movements akin to Nazism can come to power in countries such as the United States when people blindly support their leaders.” (From wiki:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Can%27t_Happen_Here).

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” (George Santayana, The Life of Reason”)

It can happen here, and this concern is raised most appropriately by Robert Freeman in AlterNet March 19:

“In early 1919, Germany put in place a new government to begin rebuilding the country after its crushing defeat in World War I. But the right-wing forces that had led the country into the War and lost the War conspired even before it was over to destroy the new government, the “Weimar Republic.”

They succeeded.

The U.S. faces a similar “Weimar Moment.” The devastating collapse of the economy after eight years of Republican rule has left the leadership, policies, and ideology of the right utterly discredited. But, as was the case with Germany in 1919, Republicans Do Not Intend to Allow the New Government to Succeed (emphasis mine). They will do everything they can to undermine it. If they are successful, the U.S. may yet go the way of Weimar Germany.”

The new government that took over the collapsed country was moderate left, led by the president of the German Socialist party, and the right planned to make it fail:

” …They would do everything they could to make sure that the new government failed.

Their strategy was two-fold: first, stoke the resentment of the population about the calamitous state of its living conditions-no matter that those conditions had been created by the very right-wing oligarchs who now pretended to befriend the little guy. Rage is rage. It is glandular and unseeing. Once catalyzed it is easy to turn on any subject.

And stoking resentment was easy to do. Just before the War ended, the military concocted its most Sensational Lie: the German army hadn’t Actually been Defeated (mine). It had been “stabbed in the back” by communists, traitors, and Jews. It was an easy lie to sell. It entwined an attack on an alien political ideology — liberalism — with the latent, pervasive myth of German racial superiority.

The second strategy of the right was to prevent the new government from succeeding. To begin with, success of the left would conspicuously advertise the failure of the right. Moreover, success by the left would legitimize republican government, so hated by the oligarchs of the right. Much better for the people to be ruled by the self-aggrandizing right-wing autocracy that had governed Germany for centuries.

So the rightists set out to do everything they could to make it Impossible (mine) for the leftists to govern. They would use parliamentary maneuver, shifting coalitions, domination of the new mass media, legislative obstruction, staged public relations spectacles, relentless pressure by narrow but powerful interests, judicial intimidation and, eventually, outright murder of their political opponents.”

Does this sound familiar?

It can only happen here if we drop our guard: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” (George Santayana, The Life of Reason”)

How do we prevent this:  “There is absolutely no substitute for proper preparation.”

see: http://www.alternet.org/workplace/132155

Brooks says: “Spending freeze ‘Insane'”

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That would be David Brooks, not Mel, and he was speaking during an appearance on “This Week with George Stephanopoulos”.    “New York Times columnist David Brooks said on Sunday that it was “insane” for Republicans in Congress, including every GOP member of the House, to support a spending freeze in the middle of a recession.  “Tying such proposals to an intellectual simplicity exhibited by Rush Limbaugh, the conservative scribe also said the party was too obsessed with pursuing the legacy of Ronald Reagan in a drastically different time.  The problem with them and the problem with Limbaugh in terms of intellectual philosophy is they are stuck with Reagan,” … They are stuck with the idea that government is always the problem. A lot of Republicans up in Capitol Hill right now are calling for a spending freeze in a middle of a recession/depression. That is insane. But they are thinking the way they thought in 1982, if we can only think that way again, that is just insane. And there are a lot of Republicans like David Frum … who are trying to say Reagan was right for his era, but it is time to move on. And there are just not a lot of them on Capitol Hill right now, and I think the party is looking for that kind of Republican.”

Well said Mr. Brooks, even though I abhor seeing limp bough’s name in the same sentence with the word ‘intellectual’ –  although ‘simplicty’ did rescue the statement.  Also, having read Stockman’s “The triumph of Politics, How the Reagan Revolution Failed” (he was budget director during the early scenes of that B movie). I also cringe when I see the actor’s named linked with policy. 

Before jumping on the good ship Reagan, one must ask if  ‘Reagonomics’ worked? It certainly did: 

  o It redistributed wealth from the lower and  middle classes to the very wealthiest.

  o Increased our national debt nearly ten fold.

  o Allowed our infrastructure and education systems to deteriorate.

  o Left us unprepared for the post cold war world: enter Japan, then Korea, then China, et all.

N.B.: I am including Bush 41 & 43 with Ronald I, under supply-side slumdogs. 

see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/08/brooks-gop-spending-freez_n_172838.html

Who speaks for Them?

chasdarwinLeave a comment

I once worked with a very intelligent young woman, who grew up as a have not, and worked her way through college, which made it difficult for me to comprehend why she listened to the factually challenged fat boy. 

I very seldom purposefully listen to him, as his statements such as “You don’t have to think, we will do the thinking for you” are offensive and, as one who works hard for everything that he knows, is contradictary to me.   Having heard many accomplished speakers in my life – E. O. Wilson – most recently, RL’s self-proclaimed knowledge rings both hollow and disinenuous.  

In the early 1960’s, it was fashionable among some to say (speaking of the Luce empire): “Life is for those who can’t read; Time for those who can’t think”.   Today: “Rush Limbaugh is for those who can’t think; Fox Noise for those who don’t”. 

Bob Cesca, in HuffPost writes:

“The Democrats are going about the business of cleaning up the mess of three decades of Reaganomics, while the GOP is duct-taping themselves to the ample bosom of the most self-satirical political sideshow geek in American media history.”

see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/the-dittohead-party-how-t_b_171979.html

11% of GOP voters say Limbaugh is their leader!

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Rasmussen reports that only 11% of Republicans think he is their leader: ” …just 11% of GOP voters say the conservative radio commentator is the party’s leader.  Eighty-one percent (81%) of Republican voters disagree and 8% are undecided in a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.”

N.B.: Should ‘fuhrer’ be the operative word for leader in this case?

see:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/just_11_of_republicans_say_limbaugh_is_their_party_s_leader

The intellectual of the Grand Old party

chasdarwinLeave a comment

While it is difficult to address the question of what an intellectual is and simultaneously appear modest, I have to verify that I am still living in the same galaxy whenever I hear That word associated with Rush Limbaugh.  Having conversed with Harvard, Yale, and Case PH D’s , and some  Oxford grads, I have an established idea of what’s ‘ín’ and what’s not, and he is certainly ‘not’!  Shrewd, perhaps, but not practicing the in depth analysis required to reach the depths of an issue.

Perhaps the answer is that in a collection of room-temperature IQ’s, a 3 digit score seems lofty, but rather than appear to be an effete snob on this matter, I won’t say that, but rather, as a loyal Democrat, hope that the GOP listens to him, and no one else.

GOP Bias in the Three Major Networks 1992-2004

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From Huffpost (thanks to Jeff Coryell)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/24/self-censoring-journalist_n_169643.html

“The three major broadcast networks favored Republicans in elections from 1992 to 2004, according to a study that analyzed presidential campaign coverage.

That effect was largely due to journalists censoring their own reporting out of frustration at being accused of a liberal bias, according to Maria Elizabath Grabe, associate professor in the Department of Telecommunications at Indiana University College Of Arts and Sciences, who co-authored “Image Bite Politics: News And The Visual Framing Of Elections” (Oxford University Press) with fellow academic Erik Bucy.

Grabe and Bucy examined 62 hours of network news coverage – 178 newscasts – between Labor Day and Election Day over four elections and examined the visual coverage, including such package techniques as the “lip-flap shot – when a reporter’s voice is heard over video of the candidate, which tends to be unflattering for that candidate.

They also examined the “Goldilocks effect” – which party gets the last say in a piece and is better remembered by viewers.

According to their research, Democrats were more likely to be the subject of the unflattering “lip-flap” effect while GOP candidates had the last say in every election but 2004. In 1996, Republicans got the final say eight times as many times as Democrats.”

In my words: what we felt was indeed, what was happening.

Brave New World

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From Progress Ohio:

“The conservatives—that’s right, the very same folks who just dragged us along on an eight-year drunken binge during which they borrowed-and-spent us into the deepest financial catastrophe in nearly a century—are now standing there, faces full of moral rectitude, fingers pointing and shaking in our faces, righteously lecturing the rest of us on the topic of “fiscal responsibility.”

From the author:

Many in the GOP have not yet realized that they no longer control the three elected branches of Federal Government,  that they have lost the youth vote, much of the geographic US, and their base is narrowing to the wealthiest familes and white Southern males.  Conservatives  have a lock on talk radio, but Progressives have the Internet, and I’ll take that.