Semi-Tough

Maybe it’s me, but it feels like the years 2002 – 2005  all over again.  Just like those years, it feels like I should be angry (again) at the Republicans, and the American people who were duped into putting them in power, and the voters were duped. There were no weapons of mass destruction back then, and now the blame for the recession and high debt is being laid at the democrats feet, even though the Republicans put us in that debt, and made the recession inevitable with the fiscal irresponsibility those of us on the left know they regularly practice. 

From the relaxation of the net capital rule, to Chuck Hagel and his cronies letting legislation that would have reformed Fannie and Freddie die in committee, they made oodles of mistakes, and yet somehow it all gets laid on the backs of the Democrats who have, for the last 2 years, dug us out of the recession that Paulson, Bush, Hastert, Lott, Frist and Chris Cox got us into. 

Go fig.  Yes the Dems have spent a ton of money.  So what? It needed to be done.  Without that spending the recession would have been significantly worse than it was, and the aftereffects we are feeling now would be much greater than what we are feeling now.  What is a 9.7% unemployment rate could have easily have been 15% without the money spent on stimulus, and on GM and Chrysler.

The right wing of the American political landscape should not speak of fiscal responsibility until they can show they know what it means, and they have yet to do that once over the past 40 years.

Much as America dislikes it, the truth of the matter is that without the spending President Obama and the Democrats did, we as a nation, would really be in the shitter.  And that is saying something, because things are far from great.  But how much of that is actually because of the weak hearts and shallow minds of those who won’t listen to what the left has to say, simply because it is the left, because they have been told that the left is “socialist” and are somehow evil? 

Please.

The right wing media machine is powerful enough a mechanism to shut out all reality and truth, and pass onto it’s constituents what it wants, without fear of it being sullied by reality. Former house speaker Pelosi and Harry Reid could have found a cure for cancer and the right would never have known, so little they tell of the actual actions of these two, and so skewed was the coverage they received.  And they are but one example.

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Viddy of the day:  A viddy showcasing the book decision points, by Former President George W. Bush.  It actually sounds like a decent read.  I dunno if I’ll be buying it, but I might get a sample chapter or two from kindle if I can, just to see what he’s got to say. 

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Words ought to be a little wild for they are the assault of thoughts on the unthinking.

John Maynard Keynes

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And George Bush is back.  The book tour makes it almost surreal.   Waterboarding is legal, the man says.  Americans have been prosecuted by military commissions for this act, and yet he says it is legal.  Says he agonized over WMD, and yet he joked about it.  That would be like General Eisenhower joking about D-day.  inconceivable is one word that comes to mind.  And one cannot forget Katrina, and the thousands of people he left for dead there. 

Say what you will about President Obama, he never let the BP created crisis get away from him, no matter what you think, he had the backs of the people in the Area affected, as much as it was possible.  And he didn’t just fly over the area.

American freedom, from my vantage point, has an enemy within the gates, and that enemy is the American right wing.  Americans will figure it out, eventually.  They are good hard working honest people, they just get blinded by right wing propaganda sometimes.  That can be overcome with a healthy dose of truth.

Like this.  People will tell you the President is spending money and raising the debt like never before.  In the two years before President Obama took control of the White House, the American debt went up  2 trillion dollars. 

But you never hear that, do you?

This portion of the debt had a great deal to do with the Bush tax cuts undermining the tax base of the nation.  You never hear that either.  Why?  Because the right won’t tell you they created much of the debt we are now saddled with, and will only speak of that which has happened under this President watch, as if somehow that debt is somehow worse than the debt built up before President Obama came to power.

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Words realize nothing, vivify nothing to you, unless you have suffered in your own person the thing which the words try to describe.

Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court

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That’s it for tonight, America.   I’ll be talking to you more tomorrow, if I have the time. Tomorrow’s gonna be a  busy day for Das Rhino.  G’night.

We Haven’t Forgotten Ya, Dubya

The great thing about being the only species that makes a distinction between right and wrong is that we can make up the rules for ourselves as we go along.  

Douglas Adams, Last chance to see  

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I was actually thinking about doing a Debunking Propaganda III, and attacking the Hitler references that are so prevalent in society today.  I decided against, at least for tonight, because there is a lot of minutiae to that particular logical fallacy that needs to be looked at, and probably needs either it’s own series of articles, or at the very least more time to put the article together than I have at hand right now.  Arguments about fallacies of irrelevance and petitio principii, and talk of attempting to place guilt by association upon other people takes time, time I will take.  

Just not now.  

The “Debunking” series will continue soon.  But tonight I go elsewhere with this day’s article, about an interesting poll result I read about.  

Links and a viddy first.  

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Friday’s links:  

Republicans fundraising rivals democrats for midterm congressional races  

Rubio spent most of what he raised  

U.S. Senate race: Reid takes lead on Angle; new poll shows republican losing support among every voter group  

How to go from sedentary to running in five easy steps  

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Viddy of the day, from the fine people at TED; with Dan Ariely, talking about cheating and stealing, from March 9, 2009.  Good stuff.  You can ignore the last two minutes of the video, those last 2 minutes are a long commercial.  

  

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What can we know? What are we all? Poor silly half-brained things peering out at the infinite, with the aspirations of angels and the instincts of beasts.  

Arthur Conan Doyle, The Stark Munro Letters  

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IT’S STILL DUBYA’S FAULT.  Ok, now that I have your attention, let me make a statement to you.  In a news article out in bloomberg today there was a story that referenced a poll that basically said IT’S STILL DUBYA’S FAULT.  

We haven't forgotten

 

The poll out early today said that Americans find that Dubya is more to blame for unemployment, illegal immigration, Afghanistan and even the budget deficit. Fifty one percent of people said that President Obama has handled The Gulf oil spill better than Dubya handled hurricane Katrina.  The percentage of blame assigned in this poll as far as the deficit goes is actually fairly close, 32% of the respondents said that Bush was to blame for it, with 24% saying it’s Obama’s fault.  President Obama gets the credit for the increases in the stock market, by 15 percentage points.  

There are a great many more numbers in the article, click here to read it.  The article implies a number of things.  One, the most obvious, is that people have not forgotten what happened in the previous administration.  Two, President Obama, while he is not necessarily the scapegoat for all of America’s problems, clearly does not have that much more leeway as far as some of these issues go.   

The reason should be self evident, nearly 1 in 4 Americans blaming him for the deficit despite the fact that he walked into office with an over $10,000,000,000,000 deficit.  The stimulus, while effective, has been unpopular, due largely to (ahem) the negative propaganda about it, because too many people have argued that the jobs created, and the things done, are simply not enough. Saved over 3 million jobs, but it hasn’t been enough.  

Go fig.  

The other takeaway is that the President really is doing  pretty damn well.  With a war that most people think of as a lost cause in Afghanistan, with a deficit that we have had to run through the roof just to keep pace with all the economic issues surrounding the recession, which still isn’t over(not that anyone was expecting it to be over by now, no one credible has ever said that), with the single greatest environmental disaster ever unfolding before our eyes, we still think our President is better than the last guy to hold office.  

Which is frankly, pretty damned incredible.   

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Don’t buy the negative hype, things are going to get better. Catch ya later, America.

On with the crap!

     I have no idea what to write.  I had one before.  Seriously, I did, but through the intervening moments, hours really, the thoughts, all of them, have one by one disappeared.  It is an annoyance, truth be told, to have forgotten everything that I was going to write about.  But then again if I forgot it that easily, maybe it just wasn’t all that good to begin with.  After all if it wasn’t riveting enough to stay in mind in one form or another for a few hours it could not really have been all that much of a thought, now could it?

  I know what I wasn’t going to write about.  I wasn’t going to write more about the latest developments on the idiot hijacker who tried to blow up that airliner on Christmas morning.   I wasn’t going to write about the New York Giants imploding against the Carolina Panthers, and turning in  one of the worst performances in the history of Giants Stadium in their final game at that stadium.  I wasn’t going to write about the Colts throwing today’s game against the Jets, just so they could rest their players.   I wasn’t going to write about the Health care bill again, at least not today, that subject is one I’ll cover at great length when it gets to conference later. 

    Dammit, what was I going to write about?  A year end, or even decade end retrospective covering my life?  Politics? The world in general?  A scathing expose of SPAM and other types of luncheon meat? NO!

   Well, the meat thing, obviously not, but I am now thinking I will write a few things on life in the aughts.  And yes the decade ends next Thursday, I don’t want to hear it.  Cry to someone else if you think differently.

      On with the crap!

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    Most important event of the decade:  The first election of George W. Bush to the White House (and by extension the decision of Justice Kennedy ruling on the side of Dubya).  That is a “no brainer”. 

     

     What, what WHAT, you say?  What about 9/11?  The invasion of Iraq? The economic collapse of 2007/2008?  The election of Barack Obama?  I tell you that all of these things would either not have happened, or happened vastly differently had Al Gore won that election in 2000.  Iraq never gets invaded.  9/11 happens (perhaps) but the reaction would have been different.  The Bush tax cuts never would have come into effect, meaning smaller deficit and less owed by the government, less money owed to china, the crash of 2007/8 would have had less of an impact, and that recession may well have been over by now. 

    Maybe there would not have been a Barack Obama Presidency without a Bush Administration.  President Obama only came to power after the abuses and horribly unprofessional job done by the Bush White House came to pass made America so unhappy with their leadership that it became job one to toss the bums out and replace them with someone with a new vision.

    President Obama IS President because of George Bush.  Hate Obama? Bush is the reason he’s there.  All roads point to Dubya. And just because he is part of the most important event of the decade, doesn’t make it the best one.

     I think we can talk about other “Best of Decade” events later on.  

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     That’s about it from here.  Later!

Today’s nuggets, By George W. Bush, Via wikiquote:   If you want to kill the bill, if you don’t want to do what’s right for America, you can pick one little aspect out of it, you can use it to frighten people. Or you can show leadership and solve this problem once and for all…

We do not torture.

Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.

I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we’re really talking about peace.

Anagram: Anti Government/ Removing Tenant

The Joy of Bill Hicks (w/puppets), before I get to my main point.

All through the 2008 Presidential campaign, I was, if anything, anti-government.  If you read some of the things I write now, you may be of

What its supposed to be about

the opinion that that has changed.  It has not.  I am still as anti-authoritarian as ever, if anything I bristle even more now than I did then at government in general.  If anything has changed it is my perception of what is wrong with the world.  And trust me when I say that even though I voted in our current government, with a little help, of course,  I am not entirely pleased with what I see there now.

Part of what was wrong last year, or so I surmised, was the fact that our government had tried to take right away from the common man and woman.  Clear breeches of the 4th and 9th Amendment, and the equal protection clause of the 14th at the very least. Some would argue, that the entire bill of rights and constitution had been breached.  Those things were all important in ousting the republicans, you may say, but many point to the economy as being the driving force behind their ouster. That was the tipping point, not the main one.

Some of those breeches are ongoing.  Last years Fisa revision, still in place, is a stunningly evil piece of legislation that gives the FISA courts, the antithesis of Transparent, BTW, the right to invade your privacy and order taps your phones and search what they want when they want without a warrant if they so chose, should they think a danger of any type, including things outside the purview of the Fisa court.  And if you work for a large organization, that has clients who work overseas, who may have had any contact with someone they believe is involved with a terrorist in any way, you can be spied on by your own government, despite being innocent yourself.

Why you say has there been no outcry? There was, when the legislation first came out.  28 senators, the ACLU, and numerous citizen organizations decried this bill and it’s clear breech of the 4th amendment.  Time has diluted it.  People forget, get caught up in the drama that is everyday life.  There’s a game on, Michael Jackson is still dead, the bills need to be paid, the job sucks.  There are a million distractions.

I have heard those on the right claim that the takeover of GM, or the bailout of AIG, or the Stimulus, is a breech of our freedom in some way, and they may well be right, I don’t know everything on this subject, and cannot claim to, very few can.  There may be in some fashion an ethical breech of some type, but it is nothing in comparison to what went on the last few years, In the name of  freedom(FISA, Patriot act).  Economic Freedom has seemed to me the freedom of the haves to do what they wish to the have nots, not the freedom to do what you want with what is yours.  The Tax burden America is and will be under is not an attack on freedom to my mind, but paying a debt we have never fully paid down in our history, ever…

Ya know, that gives me an Idea.  Why don’t YOU tell me what you think the worst government offenses, past and present are.  Rather than have ME pontificate and tell YOU what the hell is going on, why don’t YOU tell me? I may disagree with you, but together we can both hone our sense of outrage at the world into a sharp and finely honed instrument with which to make war upon the wrongs of the world.

DAMN that sounds like fun!

That’s it for me.  Later!

Today’s nuggets, via wikiquote:  Every four years the naive half who vote are encouraged to believe that if we can elect a really nice man or woman President everything will be all right. But it won’t be. Any individual who is able to raise $25 million to be considered presidential is not going to be much use to the people at large. He will represent oil, or aerospace, or banking, or whatever moneyed entities are paying for him. Certainly he will never represent the people of the country, and they know it. Hence, the sense of despair throughout the land as incomes fall, businesses fail and there is no redress.   Gore Vidal

It’s a great country, but it’s a strange culture. … This has got to be the only country in the world that could ever come up with a disease like bulimia; gotta be the only country in the world where some people have no food at all, and other people eat a nourishing meal and puke it up intentionally. This is a country where tobacco kills four hundred thousand people a year, so they ban artificial sweetners! Because a rat died! You know what I mean? This is a place where gun store owners are given a list of stolen credit cards, but not a list of criminals and maniacs! And now, they’re thinking about banning toy guns – and they’re gonna keep the fucking real ones!   George Carlin

Anagram: The Whole Nine Yards?/ Why Not Sheer Denial?

       A Happy Video, showing the birth of, at least a portion of, modern Republican economic philosophy.

  

        The congressional budget office in 2005 did a study, headed up by former head of John McCain’s presidential economic team Douglas

Federal deficits and surpluses in millions of dollars from 1900 - 2006.

Holtz-Eakin.  That study pointed out the inefficiency of an across the board tax cut of 10% of all income ranges. It did have some positive effects, but those effects were more than countered by the debt it created.  The tax cuts would be on all income, AMT, capital gains, dividend income, the whole nine yards.  the study…ummm.. studied the “supply side effects of the tax cut”.  The Laffer curve is a core component to supply side economics and republican economic philosophy, and as such is a centerpiece of this study. 

       The positive effect of tax cuts would be in increased work done, and increased efficiency in labor.  People work harder when they are paid more(or think they are paid more), and are therefore more willing to work more hours.  The opposite effect does also exist, when people are too onerously taxed, they are getting less for the amount of work they do, and as a consequence they work less. 

    However, The 10% across the board tax cut ends up costing, after 10 years with debt service added to it, a total of:  One Trillion five hundred and fifty seven billion dollars.  Over a trillion and a half dollars in lost revenue.  There were a few variations in the model though.  The negativity of the number there goes down somewhat… if the people know that there will be an inevitable and permanent tax increase, and work harder and save money (called maximum foresight in the paper), the number drops to: One trillion two hundred and twelve billion dollars.

        To sum up.  Supply side economic policy and across the board tax cuts actually costs over a trillion dollars long term at least in this circumstance.  The Bush tax cuts were based on this economic principle, and helped to put us in the hole we are in today.  When those tax cuts were put out, they were criticized by some as being a “reverse distribution of wealth”  taking from the poor and middle class and giving to the rich. 

    The Laffer curve is a nice classroom tool, but isn’t something you should necessarily base a national economic policy on. 

       I do understand that there is a point of diminishing returns in taxation, where too much taxation from the government actually gets them less money percentage wise, and is therefore self defeating, just like the laffer curve lesson shows.  But the question is exactly where that line of diminishing return resides and that is an area of debate that is, from what i gather, a hot topic of debate amongst economists.  I’ve heard numbers as small as 15 percent(very nice, but services are cut to nothing and millions of jobs are lost), and as large as  65+%(ARE YOU INSANE!!??!! TOO MUCH,  WAY TOO MUCH!!!!AAAAAAAA!!!!).   But this study does fairly well prove that too low a taxation rate hinders the nations ability to pay for itself.  The author of the study did in fact defend the Bush tax cuts when he was #1 economic adviser for John McCain’s failed presidential bid.

          The study does say that shrinking government would have a positive effect on the amount we would owe out.  And for obvious reasons, less people working for the government, less infrastructure to pay for, less services rendered, the less it costs to actually do business.   But that would have a very negative effect on the economy.  That of greatly increased unemployment.   Think about this.   If you cut hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes, and hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure, you will also have to cut hundreds of billions of dollars worth of local, state and federal jobs to accommodate this paradigm shift.  Even in the best of times, tossing at the very least a few million people out of work will have an amazingly negative effect (DUH!) Which is why supply side economics, and large scale tax cuts at this point in time make no sense whatsoever. 

      And since government has never shrunk, not in my life, and I guarantee it hasn’t shrunk in yours either, talk of cutting government programs to cut costs is ridiculous.  In these times, thanks in no small part to the effect of the Bush tax cuts, we unfortunately need MORE government services, not less.  The republicans, with their insistence that wholesale tax cuts is the way to go looks from here like sheer denial.  Reality says it doesn’t work, but they just don’t seem to care about that. 

      Ya know what? I have something for you to read, an article from the brookings institute on the Bush tax cuts that speaks to the errors in endless tax cuts, and speaks with much more in the way of Clarity than I can.  This article is from may 2003. BTW, this article is from then Brookings Institute senior fellow and current director of the office of management and Budget, Peter Orszag.   Watch Pete here, in an interview with Rachel Maddow.

         

     That’s it for me.  Later!

Today’s Nuggets, by Adam Smith, Via wikiquote:  When national debts have once been accumulated to a certain degree, there is scarce, I believe, a single instance of their having been fairly and completely paid. The liberation of the public revenue, if it has ever been brought about at all, has always been brought about by a bankruptcy; sometimes by an avowed one, but always by a real one, though frequently by a pretended payment. The raising of the denomination of the coin has been the most usual expedient by which a real public bankruptcy has been disguised under the appearance of a pretended payment.  

What improves the circumstances of the greater part can never be regarded as an inconvenience to the whole. No society can be flourishing and happy if the greater part of the members are poor and miserable.