Sunday, September 2, 2012
Less Government
Here's a quote I'll bet you've heard:
"That government is best which governs least."
It's the philosophy our nation's founding fathers had. Or is it?
The quote is usually attributed to Thomas Jefferson. But no specific source document can be found where he is shown to have said it. Nor can any record be found where Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, or anyone else said it. In fact, the phrase seems to have originated 50 years after the United States came into existence. If you want the details about it, I recommend you read the book, Not So!: Popular Myths About America From Columbus to Clinton by Paul F. Boller.
In fact, the phrase first originated from a journalist named John Louis O'Sullivan. In 1837, he wrote, "The best government is that which governs least," and used it as the official motto of his periodical, The United States Magazine and Democratic Review. Every issue of that magazine had that phrase printed on its cover until it ceased publication in 1859. This, not the founding fathers, is where the phrase actually came from.
It received further popularity when Ralph Waldo Emerson used it in his 1844 essay, Politics. He wrote, "The less government we have, the better." Emerson's friend and ideological disciple, Henry David Thoreau, finally wrote the phrase in its final form in his landmark 1849 essay, Civil Disobedience. He wrote, "I heartily accept the motto, -- 'That government is best which governs least.'"
Unfortunately, this phrase has a fatal flaw, because, if taken to its logical conclusion, the best government is the one which does not govern at all! Interestingly, that's exactly what Thoreau went on to argue in his essay! Not even the most extremist of Republicans preaching less government will dare advocate that!
Now, I like Thoreau. His book, Walden, enthralled me when I was in high school. But he was only human, after all. Perhaps, in an age where the most advanced weapon was a musket, that sort of system could work. In today's world, where everything is wired for video and weapons are easily obtained, the least possible amount of government is a sure-fire recipe for disaster!
I am not the first to argue this. Franklin Delano Roosevelt argued it following the Great Depression. In a speech given on Halloween night, 1936, he said, "For twelve years this nation was afflicted with hear-nothing, see-nothing, do-nothing Government... Powerful influences strive today to restore that kind of government with its doctrine: 'That government is best which is most indifferent.'"
So the question must be rephrased: How much government is too much? In order to maintain the maximum amount of prosperity for all, it is certainly necessary to regulate things like banking, corporations, stock exchanges, international trade, and natural resources like fishing and logging. It is also necessary to provide support systems for citizens whose livelihoods are subject to environmental whims, such as farming, or for upgrading the labor force to be able to compete with growing technology, such as welfare and education. These, of course, are "entitlements," as they are often called, and some are in favor of slashing such spending. But this cannot be done without severe damage being done to a nation's economy. So what can be done?
What nearly all democratic nations do is apply a progressive income tax system, where the rich pay more, and the poor pay less, or none at all. Is this fair? Does it punish success? Is this, finally, too much government?
I argue no. Why? Because for every successful businessman, there are at least a hundred others who worked just as hard, and just as smart, but were not as lucky. Yes, successful tycoons such as Mitt Romney and Ron Johnson did work hard and earned their keep, but they were also fortunate. This is the difference between billionaire and pauper: one lucky break. And this is why taxing the successful more makes so much sense. It offsets the "luck factor." It's not punishing success. It is the mandatory thanks offering to the goddess of luck. It is acknowledging that their success was due as much to privilege as to performance.
So, with all that in mind, I am now ready to re-phrase this popular expression. Here goes:
"That government is best which lets its citizens live the most."
In other words, government has an obligation to butt out of its citizens' personal choices, but has an equally strong obligation to ensure maximum opportunity for all. No one is to be left without a fair chance. And if one person's chances make that person successful, if America has been good to him/her, then he/she is required to be good right back in the form of a fair tax rate. This, in turn, gets used to ensure other people have the same chance at success, thus creating a positive feedback loop where the maximum number can prosper.
I'm also not the first to attempt a re-phrase. Robert M. Hutchins (1899 - 1977) who was Dean of Yale Law School, rephrased it this way:
"That government is best which governs best."
Ditto.
It's a good idea, neither Democratic nor Republican.
But for whatever reason, it's currently against GOP policy.
Eric
*
Saturday, September 1, 2012
The Reagan Question
Some of us remember back this far: It's 32 years ago, I'm way too young to vote, and there's a debate on TV between Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter. All I care about at the time is that this means I can't watch The Dukes of Hazzard or Buck Rodgers in the 25th Century. Darned politicians!
It was only later, I'll admit, when I learned that this was the golden moment where Reagan asked his audience, "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?"
This question has since been referred to as "The Reagan Question," and it has been strongly used by every winning candidate for president since. The only recent president who didn't use it was George W. Bush, and neither of his electoral victories were anything other than squeakers. Also, the economy was not as prominent an issue in both those elections. And its fair to say that the candidate who relies on that question is a sure-fire winner. No presidential candidate has dared to utter it if it will work against him.
Until now.
It was perhaps the most amazing moment of the Republican National Convention. Certainly it was the most amazing moment of Mitt Romney's acceptance speech. I daresay it even trumped Clint Eastwood's croaking and stammering attempt at stand-up comedy.
It was the moment where he dared invoke The Reagan Question.
After trumpeting his own success as a businessman, and insisting that this is the most important qualification for President, the then went on to say, "That's why every president since the Great Depression who
came before the American people asking for a second term could look back at the last four years and say with satisfaction, 'You're are better off than you were four years ago.' Except Jimmy Carter."
Here, the audience laughs at the dig on Carter. Then he adds:
"And except this President."
Now, here is where the extraordinary thing happens! If you were watching on TV instead of just listening to the audio, you saw the camera pan to the audience starting to get to its feet for a standing ovation...
But they stopped!
Oh, you heard rousing applause! That was just part of the natural cadence of Mitt's speech. But it was as if the audience had been socked to the gut! They saw what you and I see. In fact, what we all see and already know. You don't need me to say it, but I'll say it anyway:
The honest answer to The Reagan Question, is YES! We ARE better off now than we were four years ago!
Okay, maybe not by a lot more, but we definitely are! And as slow as the economic recovery has been, the economy has been growing!
This, despite Republican attempts to submarine Obama's efforts at helping it at every turn, particularly since 2010.
Mitt stepped in it once. But he wasn't content to leave it there. Why his speech writers didn't catch this early on, examining draft after draft, I'll never know. But he stepped in it again! He said:
"This president can ask us to be patient. This president can tell us it was someone else's fault. This president can tell us that the next four years will get it right. But this president cannot tell us that you're better off today than when he took office."
Golf clap! Yes, Mitt Romney's audience gave him a GOLF CLAP in response!
Holy shit!
Like I said earlier, they saw it, and so do you! Everyone in the entire room saw the lie, and how dangerous it was. But just in case I need to draw a picture for anybody else out there, here's what's been happening with the economy since Barack Obama took office:
You've probably seen this before. In 2009, when Obama took the reigns, the economy was in bad shape. Then things began to improve. The stimulus turned things right back around. Since then, economic growth has been slow, but consistent. Jobs have been added, growth has been maintained. We ARE better off than we were four years ago!
And here's where I have to destroy a popular myth. People in Mitt Romney's camp insist that Obama has had four years. Bullshit! He's had two. Republicans have cock-blocked him permanently ever since the 2010 elections - a moment more defined by hatred and division than any other.
You know, given that fact, the consistently recovering economy is not half bad!
Look at the numbers in January of '10 and January of '11, and you can understand why New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, decided to stay out of the 2012 elections! Who wants to run against a Titan like Obama with economic numbers like that! So, the only folks left parading around the Iowa Caucuses were the crazy-ass morons who actually thought they had a shot. Mitt Romney was one of them. Obama's success is the main reason Republicans are stuck with a lousy candidate like him.
The one thing that makes Mitt Romney's campaign a little realistic is that little up-tick in unemployment numbers at the end. Unemployment has risen by two tenths of a percent over the summer of 2012. And that's the only thing that is giving Romney life. That's the one thing that lets him claim the economy is lousy. The unemployment percentage is 8.3%, or half a point higher than when Obama first took office. Half a fucking point. And only one-tenth of a percentage up in June and July.
Two tenths of a percent. That's what Mitt Romney calls a horrible economy.
You see, Mitt has placed all his eggs in one basket (something no smart investor should do). And that basket has a hole in it. He's bet the entire thing on one issue: the economy. He can't win on women's issues, ethics, likability, social justice issues, civil rights, gay marriage -- in ALL of them, he's a total loss. He can't even really compete against Romneycare II, a.k.a. "Obamacare." The current state of the economy, as middle-fair as it is, is all he has left.
If that unemployment percentage number goes down between now and November, Mitt is so very fucked!
And, I predict, it will go down. How do I know? Here are my excellent reasons:
1. Back to school! Summer jobs will come to an end, and more jobs will become available to everyone else as a result. Parents who have been saving up for it all summer will be buying supplies. The economy will have an up-tick during this time.
2. Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. The holiday season starts earlier and earlier. Retail stores are hiring on extra workers. Seasonal employees crop up everywhere. Halloween Express stores begin taking over every vacant storefront they can find. And all of it starts in late September and early October.
3. Summer-mix gasoline season will come to an end, bringing prices down with it. Obama will also release some of the Strategic Oil Reserves (as nearly every recent sitting president running for re-election has done), thus bringing gasoline prices down even further.
4. Hurricane relief. Hurricane Isaac, while tragic, will free up Federal Disaster Relief funds, which will act as a de facto stimulus. Construction workers, repairmen, and employment of all sort will be needed to help in the Gulf Coast.
There is one, and only one, negative factor. Obama granted what amounted to amnesty for many undocumented immigrant children living in the U.S., thus adding hundreds of thousands to the labor force at exactly a critical time. But if the unemployment numbers go down anyway, that's an even bigger victory for Obama than was previously thought! It will mean that unemployment is falling far more rapidly than was anticipated.
It's a game of inches, now. A tenth of a percent improvement in unemployment means an Obama victory. If the unemployment percentage falls below 7.7% Romney has nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Romney himself agreed with this, unwittingly. Before the above gaffs were uttered by him, he made this remark during his acceptance speech:
"Is it any wonder that a President who has attacked success has led the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression?"
Aha! So it IS a recovery, then!
Told you.
This confirms something I've been saying for a long time, now. Yes, Mitt Romney is a good businessman. But he's a lousy politician!
There were other great moments where Republicans all but admitted that they're in trouble. Mike Huckabee, for example, when he addressed his objections to Romney's Mormon beliefs, said, "I'm less concerned where Mitt Romney takes his family to church than I am about where our President takes this nation!" Ah, so he IS concerned, then! Besides, what he was saying, essentially, is that he hates Obama more than he hates Mormonism. That's hardly a ringing endorsement.
Or then there was Governor Chris Christie devoting 75% of his speech towards his own campaign four years from now before finally mentioning Mitt Romney's name once. It was as though Christie knows, intrinsically, that Romney won't be there in 2016.
There was Ron Paul, who held back his endorsement of Romney. That's a lot of anger from someone supposedly on your own side!
And finally, there was Clint Eastwood, stealing all the thunder that was supposed to have been for Romney's speech with his lame attempt at making Obama into his ventriloquist dummy. Way to provide the distraction that hurricane Isaac failed to provide, you old goat! I'm SO going to see your new movie!
Two economic numbers are due before the November election. One is due in a few days. It would not surprise me if that number went either way. But the other is due in early October. That number, I predict, will show unemployment numbers down. And with those sinking numbers, will go Mitt Romney's campaign.
Along with the October surprise Mitt gift-wrapped for Obama in the form of announcing his 2011 tax-returns being released on the 15th.
Yeah, it's early, but I'll say it anyway: Nice try, Mitt. Maybe Republicans will win next time.
Eric
*
It was only later, I'll admit, when I learned that this was the golden moment where Reagan asked his audience, "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?"
This question has since been referred to as "The Reagan Question," and it has been strongly used by every winning candidate for president since. The only recent president who didn't use it was George W. Bush, and neither of his electoral victories were anything other than squeakers. Also, the economy was not as prominent an issue in both those elections. And its fair to say that the candidate who relies on that question is a sure-fire winner. No presidential candidate has dared to utter it if it will work against him.
Until now.
It was perhaps the most amazing moment of the Republican National Convention. Certainly it was the most amazing moment of Mitt Romney's acceptance speech. I daresay it even trumped Clint Eastwood's croaking and stammering attempt at stand-up comedy.
It was the moment where he dared invoke The Reagan Question.
After trumpeting his own success as a businessman, and insisting that this is the most important qualification for President, the then went on to say, "That's why every president since the Great Depression who
came before the American people asking for a second term could look back at the last four years and say with satisfaction, 'You're are better off than you were four years ago.' Except Jimmy Carter."
Here, the audience laughs at the dig on Carter. Then he adds:
"And except this President."
Now, here is where the extraordinary thing happens! If you were watching on TV instead of just listening to the audio, you saw the camera pan to the audience starting to get to its feet for a standing ovation...
But they stopped!
Oh, you heard rousing applause! That was just part of the natural cadence of Mitt's speech. But it was as if the audience had been socked to the gut! They saw what you and I see. In fact, what we all see and already know. You don't need me to say it, but I'll say it anyway:
The honest answer to The Reagan Question, is YES! We ARE better off now than we were four years ago!
Okay, maybe not by a lot more, but we definitely are! And as slow as the economic recovery has been, the economy has been growing!
This, despite Republican attempts to submarine Obama's efforts at helping it at every turn, particularly since 2010.
Mitt stepped in it once. But he wasn't content to leave it there. Why his speech writers didn't catch this early on, examining draft after draft, I'll never know. But he stepped in it again! He said:
"This president can ask us to be patient. This president can tell us it was someone else's fault. This president can tell us that the next four years will get it right. But this president cannot tell us that you're better off today than when he took office."
Golf clap! Yes, Mitt Romney's audience gave him a GOLF CLAP in response!
Holy shit!
Like I said earlier, they saw it, and so do you! Everyone in the entire room saw the lie, and how dangerous it was. But just in case I need to draw a picture for anybody else out there, here's what's been happening with the economy since Barack Obama took office:
You've probably seen this before. In 2009, when Obama took the reigns, the economy was in bad shape. Then things began to improve. The stimulus turned things right back around. Since then, economic growth has been slow, but consistent. Jobs have been added, growth has been maintained. We ARE better off than we were four years ago!
And here's where I have to destroy a popular myth. People in Mitt Romney's camp insist that Obama has had four years. Bullshit! He's had two. Republicans have cock-blocked him permanently ever since the 2010 elections - a moment more defined by hatred and division than any other.
You know, given that fact, the consistently recovering economy is not half bad!
Look at the numbers in January of '10 and January of '11, and you can understand why New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, decided to stay out of the 2012 elections! Who wants to run against a Titan like Obama with economic numbers like that! So, the only folks left parading around the Iowa Caucuses were the crazy-ass morons who actually thought they had a shot. Mitt Romney was one of them. Obama's success is the main reason Republicans are stuck with a lousy candidate like him.
The one thing that makes Mitt Romney's campaign a little realistic is that little up-tick in unemployment numbers at the end. Unemployment has risen by two tenths of a percent over the summer of 2012. And that's the only thing that is giving Romney life. That's the one thing that lets him claim the economy is lousy. The unemployment percentage is 8.3%, or half a point higher than when Obama first took office. Half a fucking point. And only one-tenth of a percentage up in June and July.
Two tenths of a percent. That's what Mitt Romney calls a horrible economy.
You see, Mitt has placed all his eggs in one basket (something no smart investor should do). And that basket has a hole in it. He's bet the entire thing on one issue: the economy. He can't win on women's issues, ethics, likability, social justice issues, civil rights, gay marriage -- in ALL of them, he's a total loss. He can't even really compete against Romneycare II, a.k.a. "Obamacare." The current state of the economy, as middle-fair as it is, is all he has left.
If that unemployment percentage number goes down between now and November, Mitt is so very fucked!
And, I predict, it will go down. How do I know? Here are my excellent reasons:
1. Back to school! Summer jobs will come to an end, and more jobs will become available to everyone else as a result. Parents who have been saving up for it all summer will be buying supplies. The economy will have an up-tick during this time.
2. Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. The holiday season starts earlier and earlier. Retail stores are hiring on extra workers. Seasonal employees crop up everywhere. Halloween Express stores begin taking over every vacant storefront they can find. And all of it starts in late September and early October.
3. Summer-mix gasoline season will come to an end, bringing prices down with it. Obama will also release some of the Strategic Oil Reserves (as nearly every recent sitting president running for re-election has done), thus bringing gasoline prices down even further.
4. Hurricane relief. Hurricane Isaac, while tragic, will free up Federal Disaster Relief funds, which will act as a de facto stimulus. Construction workers, repairmen, and employment of all sort will be needed to help in the Gulf Coast.
There is one, and only one, negative factor. Obama granted what amounted to amnesty for many undocumented immigrant children living in the U.S., thus adding hundreds of thousands to the labor force at exactly a critical time. But if the unemployment numbers go down anyway, that's an even bigger victory for Obama than was previously thought! It will mean that unemployment is falling far more rapidly than was anticipated.
It's a game of inches, now. A tenth of a percent improvement in unemployment means an Obama victory. If the unemployment percentage falls below 7.7% Romney has nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Romney himself agreed with this, unwittingly. Before the above gaffs were uttered by him, he made this remark during his acceptance speech:
"Is it any wonder that a President who has attacked success has led the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression?"
Aha! So it IS a recovery, then!
Told you.
This confirms something I've been saying for a long time, now. Yes, Mitt Romney is a good businessman. But he's a lousy politician!
There were other great moments where Republicans all but admitted that they're in trouble. Mike Huckabee, for example, when he addressed his objections to Romney's Mormon beliefs, said, "I'm less concerned where Mitt Romney takes his family to church than I am about where our President takes this nation!" Ah, so he IS concerned, then! Besides, what he was saying, essentially, is that he hates Obama more than he hates Mormonism. That's hardly a ringing endorsement.
Or then there was Governor Chris Christie devoting 75% of his speech towards his own campaign four years from now before finally mentioning Mitt Romney's name once. It was as though Christie knows, intrinsically, that Romney won't be there in 2016.
There was Ron Paul, who held back his endorsement of Romney. That's a lot of anger from someone supposedly on your own side!
And finally, there was Clint Eastwood, stealing all the thunder that was supposed to have been for Romney's speech with his lame attempt at making Obama into his ventriloquist dummy. Way to provide the distraction that hurricane Isaac failed to provide, you old goat! I'm SO going to see your new movie!
Two economic numbers are due before the November election. One is due in a few days. It would not surprise me if that number went either way. But the other is due in early October. That number, I predict, will show unemployment numbers down. And with those sinking numbers, will go Mitt Romney's campaign.
Along with the October surprise Mitt gift-wrapped for Obama in the form of announcing his 2011 tax-returns being released on the 15th.
Yeah, it's early, but I'll say it anyway: Nice try, Mitt. Maybe Republicans will win next time.
Eric
*
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Dinesh D'Souza is D'elusional!
In the interest of keeping well informed, I recently went to see Dinesh D'Souza's movie, 2016. I would much rather have not given him any of my money and waited for the movie to come out in the bargain bin at my local Walgreen's, or surface in some suburban rummage sale, but by then, it would be too late to comment on it. I hope my readers out there appreciate the financial sacrifices I make for this blog.
SPOILER ALERT! The boat sinks at the end!
The film itself lasts for about an hour and a half. One full hour into the movie, Dinesh still hadn't said anything damning about Barack Obama, and I was wondering what the point was that he was trying to make. Then, he finally came out with it: Barack Obama is espousing an anti-colonial, socialistic mentality, based on a misguided image of his father and the failed communist attitudes of Kenyans and other third-world economies.
We've seen this approach from D'Souza before. In his books 'What's So Great About Christianity?' (total claptrap), 'What's So Great About America?' (flawed premise, but not half bad), and 'The End Of Racism' (the first book of his I read, and is rather good), he gives his characteristic approach, which is to nearly lull his audience to sleep before finally coming forth with a major point. His movie follows that same approach, weaving artfully the interesting but silly notion that he and Obama have similar backgrounds, and that therefore he has an intimate understanding of how Obama thinks. He talks extensively about his own family history, and we learn a lot about Dinesh as a boy, how he grew up, where he went to college, how he made friends... In fact, it's fair to say that I learned more about Dinesh D'Souza watching this movie than I did about Barack Obama!
Some of the background is interesting. Dinesh and Barack were born in the same year, attended and graduated ivy league colleges at the same time, got married the same year, and spent some of their childhoods in impoverished, yet growing, foreign economies. But these facts, while interesting, come nowhere close to being able to give D'Sousa much insight into Obama. Just for an example, the above facts are also true of both myself and Vice Presidential candidate, Paul Ryan, right down to growing up in the same area of Wisconsin. Yet I could no more have any insight into his mentality than he could have of mine! What hubris D'Sousa must have, to presume that because both he and Barack Obama have roughly the same dates on their milestones that he must have taken a similar path!
At the heart of D'Souza's argument is the claim that Obama has an anti-colonial mindset. This comes, oddly, from an image of Obama's father which Barack himself is directly quoted from as saying that he no longer believed! (This betrays how poorly knotted that particular tie-in is.) But D’Souza himself also admits that anti-colonialism is generally a good thing. Didn't Jefferson, Hamilton and Franklin espouse anti-colonial attitudes toward Great Britain? Didn't Gandhi himself advocate the same thing in D'Souza's native India, and against the exact same colonial empire? What on earth could be wrong with wanting other nations to keep more of their indigenous wealth? This is hardly a radical position. So what if Obama holds to it?
The "so what" part comes from Dinesh's insistence that Obama's anti-colonialism is also anti-Americanism. To Obama, says D'Souza, America became great not through hard work and technological innovation, but through exploitation of third world resources. Obama wants to end the exploitation and help foreign nations, but he also wants to help level the playing field by tearing down America.
This last part is completely illogical. Obama tearing down America would no more help the status of foreign nations any more than cutting his own feet off at the ankles would make everyone else in the world two inches taller. Yet Dinesh seems to think so! This baffling brain-fart is woven so casually into his other points that people who hate Obama to begin with are likely to miss it, mostly because they believe such silliness already and are blind to the lack of evidence. But any objective analysis sees this as obvious bullshit. Yes, America has exploited foreign nations for resources in the past, particularly aboriginal land and Middle Eastern crude oil. And yes, Obama wants to build a future for America where it takes the high road, doesn't exploit the wealth of other nations, and allows their impoverished state to improve. But America was also built with hard work and technological innovation, as Obama himself has always said! Besides, if he wants better equity of wealth for poor nations, what on earth is wrong with that? Why shouldn't Africa, for example, keep the wealth of its own resources? Why shouldn't its people reap the benefits of the natural resources in their own back yard? But Obama wants America to prosper as well! Of course he does! Why would he want anything else as a citizen of the United States, much less its President? The very notion that Obama wants to tear down America from within is delusional to the point of embarrassment. The flaccidity of D'Souza's argument is dangling outside of his mental zipper, tiny, pink and shriveled, for all the world to see!
But even this is not even his silliest point. This wholly imagined goal of American detriment will be achieved, D'Souza says, by Obama using debt as a weapon! By spending the United States to death, he helps ensure that other nations will have more while the United States will have less!
This is what is technically referred to as a “switcheroo.” The people who have actually used this tactic are not liberals like Obama, but conservatives like D’Souza! They’ve called it “starving the beast.” It works like this: Cut taxes, explode the deficit, and then watch with gleeful delight as government has no choice but to slash entitlement spending and let welfare mothers starve. This tactic, long condemned even by Ayn Rand disciples like Milton Friedman and Alan Greenspan, doesn't work, because the "beast" doesn't starve. It goes so deeply into debt that it destroys the dollar! Nevertheless, this is probably exactly what Bush had in mind when he began spending America to death with not one but two needless wars, and leaving his successor to pick up the pieces. D'Souza deserves a limited amount of credit in admitting bluntly that Bush is somewhat to blame for starting that spending trend.
But did Obama deliberately try to make it worse by spending even more? NO! He fought tooth and toenail to let the tax breaks for the upper 2% of income earners, the wealthy, expire! This would have severely reduced the deficit! Possibly even gotten us started on the road towards paying down the debt!
But Republicans blocked him!
Of all the ridiculous, topsy-turvy bullshit! D'Souza's argument is exactly inside out and backwards! How illogical is it to be a deficit hawk and yet deny the government the means to eliminate that deficit!
D'Souza's most breathtaking naivety comes from his absolute ignorance of economics, especially regarding the differences between a nation like Kenya, which has remained mired in poverty, and other nations which have climbed out of the economic slums into prosperity, such as Indonesia, South Korea, South Africa, and his own native India. He says that these newly prosperous nations have embraced free market economics, and are prosperous as a direct result, as opposed to Kenya, whose communistic anti-colonial ideas keep it impoverished. But he’s not even half right. These nations, especially India and Indonesia, have all become prosperous due to a combination of protectionist tariffs, strong government spending programs, AND a free market economy. State-owned businesses were only privatized after the government had built them, and then they became strong enough to compete in the global marketplace. Strong government-paid programs to provide electricity, roads, and clean water are firmly in place in newly prosperous nations. Indonesia, especially, spends billions every year to spray chemicals to control the mosquito population and keep malaria at bay. Kenya, by contrast, has few such programs, and the ones it has are weak at best. Malaria and other diseases limit its economic growth prospects, and the lack of government-supported programs for electricity and water prevent businesses from being able to build in the area. And if communist anti-colonialism is so terrible for an economy, how does D'Souza explain China? Yes, China has embraced a kind of tolerance toward free-market capitalism, but nearly all of its raw materials industries are government subsidized in order to undercut the natural prices that are set for steel and textiles in the global market. Meanwhile, China also maintains anti free trade in its use of protectionist tariffs and utter disregard for Western copyright laws. Communism and anti-colonialism is apparently not enough to explain Kenya’s poverty, and D'Souza's argument is a not-so-red herring.
All this would be bad enough. But Dinesh doesn't even stop there. Next he takes a serious leap off the deep end, and cites college professors and colleagues of Obama’s who are known communists and communist sympathizers. He even tosses the famous anti-Israel scholar, Edward W. Said, the author of 'Orientalism,' into the mix. But let’s be fair here. Haven’t we all had college professors who were a little bit wacky? And didn't they help us immensely by challenging our pre-set ideas and forcing us to explore new avenues? But in the end, we formed our own ideas, and left our zany college professor behind. Maybe we admired that teacher. Maybe we even retained a great deal of respect for him/her. But we maintained our independence and formed our own values. So did Barack Obama. So did everyone else – mostly.
Mostly? Oh, yes. You see, Dinesh D’Souza didn’t. We know, because he was kind enough to tell us. In the extensive autobiographical background he gives us in his movie, he tells the story about how he met his conservative professors at Dartmouth College. He was greatly challenged by their ideas, and they took his thinking in new directions, leading him to embrace American exceptionalism, free-market capitalism, and Christianity. Nothing wrong with these, per se, but unlike most of us, he let his radical college professors shape him entirely in these matters! They literally led him by the nose! So it’s understandable why he might assume that Barack Obama’s radical college professors did the same thing to him. It’s unfathomable for a man like D'Souza to think that maybe students might be challenged by a radical professor in college, but then go off to form their own ideas. He didn't, so why should he think Barack Obama did? After all, doesn’t he have such a deep connection with Obama? Doesn't having been born, graduated and married at the same time, and even spending some of their childhoods in third world slums, make them simpatico?
Oh, Dinesh. Do you believe in the zodiac signs too?
In fact, I must go on to conclude that this delusion, this dream-fantasy, that D'Souza has about there being such a close connection between himself and Obama, is the root cause of all his erroneous conclusions about him. He thinks he understands Obama so well, that he is able to rationalize onto Obama all his worst fears, not realizing that those fears actually come from within his own imagination!
This is reflected by what he does next. It’s the same old guilt-by-association game we saw during the 2008 campaign. In under five minutes he tries to re-hash the old arguments about spending time with shady people who ended up in something called the Weather Underground. He points out how his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, went off the deep end in his elder years. But if D'Souza is truly a Christian, then he should remember that a man named Jesus Christ, who was presumably without sin, constantly associated with sinful people, from Roman collaborators to prostitutes. Besides, we all have some shady friends, don’t we? Why should we hold Obama to a higher standard than we hold ourselves, or even Jesus Christ?
Let’s give credit where credit is due: D’Souza is smart enough to not use a land deal where Obama swindled a total skunk named Tony Rezko. He clearly knows that claims about conflict of interest through ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) are false. He even permanently destroys the “birther” debate by highlighting the fact that Barack Obama was definitely born in Hawaii. But he still endorses enough wing-nut conspiracy theories to make these slights forgivable to the insanity which is the Tea Party movement. Perhaps because of this, he will be seen as that much more reliable by seeming to meet the other side half way. But half-extremist is still extremist, and the sugar is only there to hide the bitterness of the poison.
Such poison comes in the form of an even bigger blunder, as he attempts to say how Obama's foreign policy involves the elimination of nuclear weapons at home and abroad, but how nations abroad are not disarming as rapidly as the United States. In particular, Iran and North Korea are cited as places where nuclear armament is being encouraged, or at least not actively opposed, by Obama. This is coupled with a deliberately terrifying-looking map showing the numbers of nuclear warheads in the U.S. vs. other countries. Reductions in these numbers are seen in Europe and Russia, but not nearly as much as America. The number of nukes in the U.S. is shown as 300, and, says Dinesh, this leaves America vulnerable.
Vulnerable to what, exactly?
He doesn't tell us, and that’s hardly a shock. There are simply no immediate threats out there! But he leaves out the fact that our nuclear weapons, while smaller in number, are ten times more powerful than most nuclear arsenals out there, and only a small fraction of the 300 which we have could reduce China to a series of smoldering craters. When one nuke can destroy three major cities at a time, how many nukes do you need? Probably less than 300. Even so, the ominous-looking map shows the number of nukes in the United States dropping all the way down to the frightening number of zero. I am doing a severe kindness to D'Souza in merely calling this a deliberately misleading and unrealistic exaggeration. He deserves far worse!
As for Iran, Obama is wise enough to know that its population looks upon its government unfavorably. Giving Iran’s government a palpable adversary to focus its anger upon, like a meddling United States, for example, would be the surest way to ensure that Iran will develop a nuclear arsenal. After all, the Iranian people would unite behind a nuclear program to oppose their fears regarding the U.S. On the other hand, a hands-off approach helps the Iranian people to feel more secure internationally, and less secure locally. In other words, without a big, bad U.S. to fight, all of Iran’s angst can be focused upon its oppressive government. That’s what we want. But D'Souza, Romney, and all their ilk, would rather upset that delicate balance which is Iran’s only realistic shot at democracy.
As a latent Hindu, perhaps D’Souza also feels some of the same Islamophobia that most Americans born into Christianity do. India, after all, fought a long and bloody war that resulted in the separate states of India and Pakistan. Unsurprisingly, he has fears regarding the uprising known the Arab Spring. As such, he strongly criticizes Obama for letting Islamic dictatorships fall to democracy. He notes that many of these, including Libya and Egypt, have elected pro-Islamic, Sharia-friendly governments. He is critical of Obama staging a military campaign during the genocide in Libya while turning a blind eye to the genocide in Syria. (Nice try, but Libya was a NATO action, not an American one. And Syria was to also have had the U.N. support Obama sought for a multinational effort, but Russia and China vetoed.) The frightening picture he then paints of the future, in the year 2016 (hence the name of the movie), is one which includes a frightening entity which he calls “The United States of Arabia.”
Look, I share the same anti-Islamist views D'Souza does. So I can understand his fears. But Obama has the wisdom to know that the road to democracy is hard, and that democracies cannot be imposed from the outside. This often means that revolutions win freedom, but then collapse into new oppressive regimes, which must then fall until the nation finally gets it right. It’s hard to watch, but interference only makes it worse. D'Souza would like to force America into those areas where Islam, that old enemy of the free Hindus in India, will be held in check. It’s a kind of anti-free-market ideal, which is at complete odds with his naïve outlook on economic issues. America has made its mistakes in achieving democracy. We have had our moments of mass genocide against the Indians (aborigines, that is) and had a civil war over slavery. We've also struggled maintaining democratic freedom against religious oppression (and D'Souza unwittingly fails to realize that he’s batting for the pro-religious-oppression team in the form of Christianity!). Now it’s the Arab world's turn. They will pay the price in blood, but they will cherish their freedom that much more afterward. Obama knows this. D'Souza doesn’t.
I had heard stories about people standing up and cheering at the end of the movie. Sure enough, there was applause at the end! But it was subdued, almost embarrassed. That surprised me. (I don’t flatter myself by thinking that this was because I was sitting near the front, and turned around to give these people a dirty look.) I'm sure earlier showings over this past weekend were more crowded, and the applause was therefore much louder. But I also noticed that the number of people in the theater was somewhat less than the number of people I remember seeing when I went to see Michael Moore’s movie, ‘Fahrenheit 9/11.’ (I don’t remember applause at the end of that one, though.) Some people got up and walked out of Moore’s film. This time, I was the one tempted to do so. But I stayed, both out of simple respect, and out of open-mindedness. Refusing to hear the other side is a poor way to stand up for one’s principles!
I also noticed that this was also a much more geriatric audience, with lots of grey hairs, facial wrinkles and canes, as opposed to the 20 and 30 somethings I saw at Moore’s film in 2004. This is both encouraging and bothersome. It’s encouraging because we can rest assured that these silly views will soon die off. But it’s also bothersome because older people should know better than to be hoodwinked like this. It’s also bothersome because these older people are largely a part of the generation that enjoyed the “Summer of love” and were universally behind the anti-Vietnam pro-cannabis hippie movement. What the hell happened? How could these same people now be sitting in Ridge Cinema in New Berlin and actually be applauding the lynching of a black man?
It can only be because yet another of D'Souza's premises is flawed. He insists that the younger Obama, the one which had radical professors and who idolized his absent father, is somehow the same man who is now President. He makes no allowance that the man of 45 might be a different man than the one of 25. He quotes extensively from “Dreams From My Father,” Obama’s earlier autobiographical book, but completely ignores “The Audacity of Hope,” where the older, more mature Obama is more accurately represented.
Just as D'Souza's audience is not the same one that would have rejected his arguments wholesale only 30 years ago, so also is Obama not the same man D'Souza thinks he is based on his youth.
In the meantime, Dinesh D’Souza is not only D'elusional, he is also a D'ipshit, a D’underhead, a D’ingbat, and a D’unce. So are the sheep who will believe the bile he spews. He’s spent millions making an artful and well-traveled movie which ultimately does nothing more than make the viewer 90-minutes older, and no more wiser.
Wait for the bargain DVD.
Eric
*
SPOILER ALERT! The boat sinks at the end!
The film itself lasts for about an hour and a half. One full hour into the movie, Dinesh still hadn't said anything damning about Barack Obama, and I was wondering what the point was that he was trying to make. Then, he finally came out with it: Barack Obama is espousing an anti-colonial, socialistic mentality, based on a misguided image of his father and the failed communist attitudes of Kenyans and other third-world economies.
We've seen this approach from D'Souza before. In his books 'What's So Great About Christianity?' (total claptrap), 'What's So Great About America?' (flawed premise, but not half bad), and 'The End Of Racism' (the first book of his I read, and is rather good), he gives his characteristic approach, which is to nearly lull his audience to sleep before finally coming forth with a major point. His movie follows that same approach, weaving artfully the interesting but silly notion that he and Obama have similar backgrounds, and that therefore he has an intimate understanding of how Obama thinks. He talks extensively about his own family history, and we learn a lot about Dinesh as a boy, how he grew up, where he went to college, how he made friends... In fact, it's fair to say that I learned more about Dinesh D'Souza watching this movie than I did about Barack Obama!
Some of the background is interesting. Dinesh and Barack were born in the same year, attended and graduated ivy league colleges at the same time, got married the same year, and spent some of their childhoods in impoverished, yet growing, foreign economies. But these facts, while interesting, come nowhere close to being able to give D'Sousa much insight into Obama. Just for an example, the above facts are also true of both myself and Vice Presidential candidate, Paul Ryan, right down to growing up in the same area of Wisconsin. Yet I could no more have any insight into his mentality than he could have of mine! What hubris D'Sousa must have, to presume that because both he and Barack Obama have roughly the same dates on their milestones that he must have taken a similar path!
At the heart of D'Souza's argument is the claim that Obama has an anti-colonial mindset. This comes, oddly, from an image of Obama's father which Barack himself is directly quoted from as saying that he no longer believed! (This betrays how poorly knotted that particular tie-in is.) But D’Souza himself also admits that anti-colonialism is generally a good thing. Didn't Jefferson, Hamilton and Franklin espouse anti-colonial attitudes toward Great Britain? Didn't Gandhi himself advocate the same thing in D'Souza's native India, and against the exact same colonial empire? What on earth could be wrong with wanting other nations to keep more of their indigenous wealth? This is hardly a radical position. So what if Obama holds to it?
The "so what" part comes from Dinesh's insistence that Obama's anti-colonialism is also anti-Americanism. To Obama, says D'Souza, America became great not through hard work and technological innovation, but through exploitation of third world resources. Obama wants to end the exploitation and help foreign nations, but he also wants to help level the playing field by tearing down America.
This last part is completely illogical. Obama tearing down America would no more help the status of foreign nations any more than cutting his own feet off at the ankles would make everyone else in the world two inches taller. Yet Dinesh seems to think so! This baffling brain-fart is woven so casually into his other points that people who hate Obama to begin with are likely to miss it, mostly because they believe such silliness already and are blind to the lack of evidence. But any objective analysis sees this as obvious bullshit. Yes, America has exploited foreign nations for resources in the past, particularly aboriginal land and Middle Eastern crude oil. And yes, Obama wants to build a future for America where it takes the high road, doesn't exploit the wealth of other nations, and allows their impoverished state to improve. But America was also built with hard work and technological innovation, as Obama himself has always said! Besides, if he wants better equity of wealth for poor nations, what on earth is wrong with that? Why shouldn't Africa, for example, keep the wealth of its own resources? Why shouldn't its people reap the benefits of the natural resources in their own back yard? But Obama wants America to prosper as well! Of course he does! Why would he want anything else as a citizen of the United States, much less its President? The very notion that Obama wants to tear down America from within is delusional to the point of embarrassment. The flaccidity of D'Souza's argument is dangling outside of his mental zipper, tiny, pink and shriveled, for all the world to see!
But even this is not even his silliest point. This wholly imagined goal of American detriment will be achieved, D'Souza says, by Obama using debt as a weapon! By spending the United States to death, he helps ensure that other nations will have more while the United States will have less!
This is what is technically referred to as a “switcheroo.” The people who have actually used this tactic are not liberals like Obama, but conservatives like D’Souza! They’ve called it “starving the beast.” It works like this: Cut taxes, explode the deficit, and then watch with gleeful delight as government has no choice but to slash entitlement spending and let welfare mothers starve. This tactic, long condemned even by Ayn Rand disciples like Milton Friedman and Alan Greenspan, doesn't work, because the "beast" doesn't starve. It goes so deeply into debt that it destroys the dollar! Nevertheless, this is probably exactly what Bush had in mind when he began spending America to death with not one but two needless wars, and leaving his successor to pick up the pieces. D'Souza deserves a limited amount of credit in admitting bluntly that Bush is somewhat to blame for starting that spending trend.
But did Obama deliberately try to make it worse by spending even more? NO! He fought tooth and toenail to let the tax breaks for the upper 2% of income earners, the wealthy, expire! This would have severely reduced the deficit! Possibly even gotten us started on the road towards paying down the debt!
But Republicans blocked him!
Of all the ridiculous, topsy-turvy bullshit! D'Souza's argument is exactly inside out and backwards! How illogical is it to be a deficit hawk and yet deny the government the means to eliminate that deficit!
D'Souza's most breathtaking naivety comes from his absolute ignorance of economics, especially regarding the differences between a nation like Kenya, which has remained mired in poverty, and other nations which have climbed out of the economic slums into prosperity, such as Indonesia, South Korea, South Africa, and his own native India. He says that these newly prosperous nations have embraced free market economics, and are prosperous as a direct result, as opposed to Kenya, whose communistic anti-colonial ideas keep it impoverished. But he’s not even half right. These nations, especially India and Indonesia, have all become prosperous due to a combination of protectionist tariffs, strong government spending programs, AND a free market economy. State-owned businesses were only privatized after the government had built them, and then they became strong enough to compete in the global marketplace. Strong government-paid programs to provide electricity, roads, and clean water are firmly in place in newly prosperous nations. Indonesia, especially, spends billions every year to spray chemicals to control the mosquito population and keep malaria at bay. Kenya, by contrast, has few such programs, and the ones it has are weak at best. Malaria and other diseases limit its economic growth prospects, and the lack of government-supported programs for electricity and water prevent businesses from being able to build in the area. And if communist anti-colonialism is so terrible for an economy, how does D'Souza explain China? Yes, China has embraced a kind of tolerance toward free-market capitalism, but nearly all of its raw materials industries are government subsidized in order to undercut the natural prices that are set for steel and textiles in the global market. Meanwhile, China also maintains anti free trade in its use of protectionist tariffs and utter disregard for Western copyright laws. Communism and anti-colonialism is apparently not enough to explain Kenya’s poverty, and D'Souza's argument is a not-so-red herring.
All this would be bad enough. But Dinesh doesn't even stop there. Next he takes a serious leap off the deep end, and cites college professors and colleagues of Obama’s who are known communists and communist sympathizers. He even tosses the famous anti-Israel scholar, Edward W. Said, the author of 'Orientalism,' into the mix. But let’s be fair here. Haven’t we all had college professors who were a little bit wacky? And didn't they help us immensely by challenging our pre-set ideas and forcing us to explore new avenues? But in the end, we formed our own ideas, and left our zany college professor behind. Maybe we admired that teacher. Maybe we even retained a great deal of respect for him/her. But we maintained our independence and formed our own values. So did Barack Obama. So did everyone else – mostly.
Mostly? Oh, yes. You see, Dinesh D’Souza didn’t. We know, because he was kind enough to tell us. In the extensive autobiographical background he gives us in his movie, he tells the story about how he met his conservative professors at Dartmouth College. He was greatly challenged by their ideas, and they took his thinking in new directions, leading him to embrace American exceptionalism, free-market capitalism, and Christianity. Nothing wrong with these, per se, but unlike most of us, he let his radical college professors shape him entirely in these matters! They literally led him by the nose! So it’s understandable why he might assume that Barack Obama’s radical college professors did the same thing to him. It’s unfathomable for a man like D'Souza to think that maybe students might be challenged by a radical professor in college, but then go off to form their own ideas. He didn't, so why should he think Barack Obama did? After all, doesn’t he have such a deep connection with Obama? Doesn't having been born, graduated and married at the same time, and even spending some of their childhoods in third world slums, make them simpatico?
Oh, Dinesh. Do you believe in the zodiac signs too?
In fact, I must go on to conclude that this delusion, this dream-fantasy, that D'Souza has about there being such a close connection between himself and Obama, is the root cause of all his erroneous conclusions about him. He thinks he understands Obama so well, that he is able to rationalize onto Obama all his worst fears, not realizing that those fears actually come from within his own imagination!
This is reflected by what he does next. It’s the same old guilt-by-association game we saw during the 2008 campaign. In under five minutes he tries to re-hash the old arguments about spending time with shady people who ended up in something called the Weather Underground. He points out how his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, went off the deep end in his elder years. But if D'Souza is truly a Christian, then he should remember that a man named Jesus Christ, who was presumably without sin, constantly associated with sinful people, from Roman collaborators to prostitutes. Besides, we all have some shady friends, don’t we? Why should we hold Obama to a higher standard than we hold ourselves, or even Jesus Christ?
Let’s give credit where credit is due: D’Souza is smart enough to not use a land deal where Obama swindled a total skunk named Tony Rezko. He clearly knows that claims about conflict of interest through ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) are false. He even permanently destroys the “birther” debate by highlighting the fact that Barack Obama was definitely born in Hawaii. But he still endorses enough wing-nut conspiracy theories to make these slights forgivable to the insanity which is the Tea Party movement. Perhaps because of this, he will be seen as that much more reliable by seeming to meet the other side half way. But half-extremist is still extremist, and the sugar is only there to hide the bitterness of the poison.
Such poison comes in the form of an even bigger blunder, as he attempts to say how Obama's foreign policy involves the elimination of nuclear weapons at home and abroad, but how nations abroad are not disarming as rapidly as the United States. In particular, Iran and North Korea are cited as places where nuclear armament is being encouraged, or at least not actively opposed, by Obama. This is coupled with a deliberately terrifying-looking map showing the numbers of nuclear warheads in the U.S. vs. other countries. Reductions in these numbers are seen in Europe and Russia, but not nearly as much as America. The number of nukes in the U.S. is shown as 300, and, says Dinesh, this leaves America vulnerable.
Vulnerable to what, exactly?
He doesn't tell us, and that’s hardly a shock. There are simply no immediate threats out there! But he leaves out the fact that our nuclear weapons, while smaller in number, are ten times more powerful than most nuclear arsenals out there, and only a small fraction of the 300 which we have could reduce China to a series of smoldering craters. When one nuke can destroy three major cities at a time, how many nukes do you need? Probably less than 300. Even so, the ominous-looking map shows the number of nukes in the United States dropping all the way down to the frightening number of zero. I am doing a severe kindness to D'Souza in merely calling this a deliberately misleading and unrealistic exaggeration. He deserves far worse!
As for Iran, Obama is wise enough to know that its population looks upon its government unfavorably. Giving Iran’s government a palpable adversary to focus its anger upon, like a meddling United States, for example, would be the surest way to ensure that Iran will develop a nuclear arsenal. After all, the Iranian people would unite behind a nuclear program to oppose their fears regarding the U.S. On the other hand, a hands-off approach helps the Iranian people to feel more secure internationally, and less secure locally. In other words, without a big, bad U.S. to fight, all of Iran’s angst can be focused upon its oppressive government. That’s what we want. But D'Souza, Romney, and all their ilk, would rather upset that delicate balance which is Iran’s only realistic shot at democracy.
As a latent Hindu, perhaps D’Souza also feels some of the same Islamophobia that most Americans born into Christianity do. India, after all, fought a long and bloody war that resulted in the separate states of India and Pakistan. Unsurprisingly, he has fears regarding the uprising known the Arab Spring. As such, he strongly criticizes Obama for letting Islamic dictatorships fall to democracy. He notes that many of these, including Libya and Egypt, have elected pro-Islamic, Sharia-friendly governments. He is critical of Obama staging a military campaign during the genocide in Libya while turning a blind eye to the genocide in Syria. (Nice try, but Libya was a NATO action, not an American one. And Syria was to also have had the U.N. support Obama sought for a multinational effort, but Russia and China vetoed.) The frightening picture he then paints of the future, in the year 2016 (hence the name of the movie), is one which includes a frightening entity which he calls “The United States of Arabia.”
Look, I share the same anti-Islamist views D'Souza does. So I can understand his fears. But Obama has the wisdom to know that the road to democracy is hard, and that democracies cannot be imposed from the outside. This often means that revolutions win freedom, but then collapse into new oppressive regimes, which must then fall until the nation finally gets it right. It’s hard to watch, but interference only makes it worse. D'Souza would like to force America into those areas where Islam, that old enemy of the free Hindus in India, will be held in check. It’s a kind of anti-free-market ideal, which is at complete odds with his naïve outlook on economic issues. America has made its mistakes in achieving democracy. We have had our moments of mass genocide against the Indians (aborigines, that is) and had a civil war over slavery. We've also struggled maintaining democratic freedom against religious oppression (and D'Souza unwittingly fails to realize that he’s batting for the pro-religious-oppression team in the form of Christianity!). Now it’s the Arab world's turn. They will pay the price in blood, but they will cherish their freedom that much more afterward. Obama knows this. D'Souza doesn’t.
I had heard stories about people standing up and cheering at the end of the movie. Sure enough, there was applause at the end! But it was subdued, almost embarrassed. That surprised me. (I don’t flatter myself by thinking that this was because I was sitting near the front, and turned around to give these people a dirty look.) I'm sure earlier showings over this past weekend were more crowded, and the applause was therefore much louder. But I also noticed that the number of people in the theater was somewhat less than the number of people I remember seeing when I went to see Michael Moore’s movie, ‘Fahrenheit 9/11.’ (I don’t remember applause at the end of that one, though.) Some people got up and walked out of Moore’s film. This time, I was the one tempted to do so. But I stayed, both out of simple respect, and out of open-mindedness. Refusing to hear the other side is a poor way to stand up for one’s principles!
I also noticed that this was also a much more geriatric audience, with lots of grey hairs, facial wrinkles and canes, as opposed to the 20 and 30 somethings I saw at Moore’s film in 2004. This is both encouraging and bothersome. It’s encouraging because we can rest assured that these silly views will soon die off. But it’s also bothersome because older people should know better than to be hoodwinked like this. It’s also bothersome because these older people are largely a part of the generation that enjoyed the “Summer of love” and were universally behind the anti-Vietnam pro-cannabis hippie movement. What the hell happened? How could these same people now be sitting in Ridge Cinema in New Berlin and actually be applauding the lynching of a black man?
It can only be because yet another of D'Souza's premises is flawed. He insists that the younger Obama, the one which had radical professors and who idolized his absent father, is somehow the same man who is now President. He makes no allowance that the man of 45 might be a different man than the one of 25. He quotes extensively from “Dreams From My Father,” Obama’s earlier autobiographical book, but completely ignores “The Audacity of Hope,” where the older, more mature Obama is more accurately represented.
Just as D'Souza's audience is not the same one that would have rejected his arguments wholesale only 30 years ago, so also is Obama not the same man D'Souza thinks he is based on his youth.
In the meantime, Dinesh D’Souza is not only D'elusional, he is also a D'ipshit, a D’underhead, a D’ingbat, and a D’unce. So are the sheep who will believe the bile he spews. He’s spent millions making an artful and well-traveled movie which ultimately does nothing more than make the viewer 90-minutes older, and no more wiser.
Wait for the bargain DVD.
Eric
*
Sunday, August 26, 2012
6 Reasons Mitt Romney Is The Antichrist
Holy shit! Mitt Romney is the Antichrist!
Okay, cheap shot? Yes. Spurious? Absolutely. Based solely on partisan divisiveness? I freely admit it. But is it complete bullshit?
Oddly, no.
Once again, a presidential candidate is being tagged as the fulfillment of Bible Prophecy. This has happened before. The difference this time is that we have much better reasons for thinking that someone is the Antichrist than simply an Islamic-sounding middle name. You'll see in a moment that Mitt is not only Satan's tool, but he is rather obviously so.
Disclaimer: I am, of course an atheist. I no more believe that Mitt Romney is the Antichrist than I believe that there can actually be such a thing. So my reason for outlining this claim isn't based on my own personal creed. Rather, it is done out of a sense of "See? How do YOU like it?" Hey, fair's fair: Fundie Christians got to spew their bullshit about Obama being Satan Incarnate. Now it's our turn! But that being said, let me just add that I really think I may be on to something, here! Just because I'm an evil, atheistic member of the pinko-communist axis of evil doesn't mean I can't have a legitimate point about Bible prophecy!
So, without further ado, here are my 6 reasons Mitt Romney is the Antichrist! (It would have sounded cooler if there were seven, but oh, well!)
1. We know that the Antichrist has one, overriding feature, and that' that his name adds up to the number 666. If one uses a simple alphanumeric cypher for the name Mitt Romney, one ends up with a number of 231. But it makes sense that a modern-day Antichrist would have a modern-day standard for calculating the number of the name. If one takes the ASCII codes for the name Romney, one makes an amazing find!
- R - O - M - N - E - Y -
114 + 111+ 109 + 110 + 101 + 121 = 666!
Holy shit! Somebody quick! Call Hal Lindsey! Call Tim LaHaye! Call Jack Van Impe! Call Creflo Dollar!
2. This has been pointed out before, but the Number of the Beast is also tied to Joseph Smith, the founder of Mitt Romney's religion. If one evaluates his name using the ancient Hebrew alphanumeric system, one also gets 666:
J O SE PH S M I TH
yodh, vav, samek, phey samek, mem, yodh, tav
10 + 6 + 60 + 80 + 60 + 40 + 10 + 400 = 666
(Note: There are some technical problems with this one, but it's still a cool item.)
3. The dragon of the book of Revelation is depicted as having seven heads and ten horns. The seven heads are seven hills upon which the dragon sits, and the ten horns are ten kingdoms which the dragon unites. This has always been understood to be Rome, with its seven hills and ten provinces during New Testament times. But Bible scholars also think this is a prophetic telescoping event, where seven and ten might again re-emerge. When the European Union reached ten members, Bible prophecy experts went ape! Until three more nations joined the EU only a few weeks later, that is. So, is there a seven-hilled, ten-kingdomed monster out there today?
There is! The Mormon church had seven founding prophets during the special dispensation of polygamy within that religion. They were: Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, Lorenzo Snow, Joseph F. Smith, and Heber J. Grant. Seven founders, seven hills. And ten kingdoms refers to the ten districts which the Mormon religion has divided North America into: Salt Lake City, Utah North, Utah South, Idaho, Northeast (roughly everything between Newfoundland, Ohio and Washington, DC), Northwest (basically Oregon up to Alaska), Central (the Midwest and the high plains states), Southeast (the Old Confederate states), Southwest (Texas, Oklahoma the desert states) and West (California and Hawaii).
4. Bible scholars insist that the Antichrist will blaspheme God and show utter disregard for the Almighty. This, according to Daniel 11:36-37. That may yet happen, but for now, he's playing things rather close to the vest. But two other aspects from that description stand out. He will be 1. prosperous and 2. he will show utter disregard for the desires of women. Bingo!
Okay, the 'disregarding women's desires' thing has always been interpreted as meaning that the Antichrist is either gay or asexual. But the misreading reflects itself in both the Greek and the English of the text. Couldn't disregard for women's desires also mean that the Antichrist will be opposed to women's rights?
5. One of the four horses of the apocalypse is the white horse, whose rider carries a bow and is bent on conquest. Interestingly, one of the symbols of the Mormon church is a white horse! And a special prophecy pertaining to that image is known as the white horse prophecy, where it is predicted that, one day, when the Constitution "hangs by a thread," a Mormon will become President and save America.
6. The Bible clearly warns us that Satan masquerades as an "angel of light." (2 Corinthians 11:14) I'm not sure what an angel of light might look like, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't look like a 51 year-old black man! He'd more likely show up as a handsome, white man with a powerful persona and a fat checkbook. (Hint, hint!)
Okay, enough of that. If you're an evangelical Christian, you should be worried. For everybody else, please enjoy a hearty laugh at their expense.
Eric
*
Friday, August 24, 2012
Mitt Romney's Tax Returns: EXPOSED!
I know what's in Mitt Romney's missing tax returns!
At least, I think I do. But I've got some damned good evidence to back me up.
Why is this important? I know some of you out there think that Mitt's tax returns don't really matter. But since tax rates of the rich are a central issue in this presidential election, concealing the amount paid in recent years is a pretty brazen disregard of common sense on Romney's part! So yes, his tax returns DO matter, and matter a great deal. Since he's campaigning on the platform of looking under the hood of our taxes in order to fix them, then we get to look under the hood of his. It's only fair.
I show you mine, you show me yours.
Do I actually have the returns? Well, no. Of course not. If I had something that big, I'd have gone straight to Wikileaks with it. (We love you, Julien Assange!) But when I'm done detailing the reasons for my free-wheeling speculation, I think you'll agree with me. I therefore ask that you decide for yourself if I'm on to something, or if I'm as full of shit as Harry Reid.
What I do have, and indeed what we all have, are some excellent clues which have been circulating around in the media, and if reporters would only stop chasing their news stories to catch their breath and reflect a moment about what they were reporting, they might just figure out the same thing about them that I did. But that takes quiet contemplation, something which I'm good at and they're clearly not. So here are the clues themselves. They're quite revealing!
1. Mitt's returns violate no tax laws. How do we know? Because Mitt has openly admitted that he's been "audited several times." During an IRS audit, up to three years prior may be investigated. (Any earlier than that, and taxpayers are protected by statutes of limitations.) Those three years are nearly always looked at. Now, "several" could mean anything from four to eleven, unless you're a politician, in which case "several" means a dozen or more. (Standard operational bullshit, you see.) This would be an understandable fib, as Romney does not want to commit a gaff by saying, "The IRS has been breathing down my neck for years," or something to that effect, because that would send the message that the feds are suspicious of him (which perhaps they are). But it's safe to say that he's been audited frequently enough for the IRS to have gone through every year of his tax returns with a fine-toothed comb. They've found no malfeasance so far, and that's good enough evidence that he has not broken any laws in terms of what he's owed. Oh, Mitt has lied his ass of to the general public! Make no mistake! But he has not lied overtly to Uncle Sam.
2. Mitt has paid taxes every year. We certainly don't know this just because he said so! We know this because not paying taxes in a given year is simply not very damaging. Take Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, for example. He went most years without paying any taxes. But this didn't hurt him politically, because he gave so much money to charity that it drove his taxes down to zero. All Mitt would have to say is, "Sure, I paid no taxes in 20-whenever, but that's because I gave umpteen million dollars to Charity X that year!" Instead of being demonized for paying no taxes, he would be praised for being generous in privilege. It worked for Abele, and it would work for Mitt. So, if paying zero dollars in taxes isn't politically damaging, that can't be the big scandal lurking in them. Harry Reid's bullshit claim that Mitt paid zero taxes is therefore nothing more than an obvious attempt at forcing Mitt to release his taxes with a wild accusation (which didn't work).
3. Whatever Mitt is hiding, it would cause more political damage than not releasing them. This is the one clue that everybody, no matter how dim, has been able to figure out. Every politician has "the conversation" with his legal advisers, detailing all the dirty, little secrets which might leak out during a political campaign. Whatever is in those tax returns, they decided a long time ago that fallout from keeping them private was far less damaging than the fallout from releasing them. Whatever it is, it's big!
4. Mitt has admitted his baseline tax rate: 13%. After accusations were made that he might have paid less than that in a given recent year, he said he went back and looked, and paid at least 13% every year. We can believe this, not because Mitt is trustworthy, but because that was committing a huge gaff in tacitly admitting that he paid roughly that low amount year after year!
5. Mitt has accidentally indicated the amount he pays to charity: about 10%. In the same speech in which he admitted to paying no less than 13% every year, he made the off-the-cuff remark, "If you include what I pay to charity, it's more than 20%. Well, more than 20%, let's say 21, would mean 8% at least. But 10% is a nice, round figure, and is the standard amount for tithing. (We'll get back to that, later.)
6. Mitt has released his 2010 tax return. His 2011 return is coming in mid-October (which is a HUGE mistake, because it provides President Obama with an October surprise). What's in them is damaging enough, particularly his having a tax-deferred IRA which is worth at least $21 million, and may be worth as much as $100 million. With tax laws which prevent contributions of more than $6,000 per year, how on earth did he get an IRA that big?
Well, with these six clues, we've gone a long way in establishing what sort of things might be in those tax returns. By using the simple logic of elimination, there are only a few other things left which they might be. My contention is that it is all of them. Here they are:
1. Mitt Romney's returns give the appearance that he used his IRA to shield millions in gains from insider trading. Remember that I pointed out that the IRS did not find anything contrary to tax law in Mitt's tax returns and audits. I also don't think that Mitt necessarily broke any laws. But just how did he get an IRA worth at least $21 million? Here's the thing: the IRS and the SEC are different entities. And the SEC has no three-year statute of limitations! What the IRS might have missed might get noticed by the SEC, if the tax returns were made public. You see, Bain Capital used a different kind of IRA, known as an SEP IRA, which allows a maximum contribution of $30,000 instead of the usual $6,000. That would have given Mitt $450,000 over the time he spent at Bain. Invest that money only in big-winning stocks, and you might just get an Individual Retirement Account as high as $21 million or more. Maybe Mitt might have been a smart enough investment guru to pull that off. But boy, it would sure look suspicious! If the SEC saw this in Mitt Romney's tax returns and decided to launch an investigation during his presidential run, it would absolutely guarantee a double-digit defeat. It would not matter if he actually engaged in insider trading or not! The suspicion alone would destroy him. And remember, the SEC put the collar on Martha Stewart for far less! Small wonder that Romney is concealing his tax returns!
2. Mitt's tax returns show that he was paid by Bain Capital as its CEO and Board Chairman between 2001 and 2003. Remember the media hoopla that resulted when it was revealed that Bain Capital's records showed Mitt Romney was still heading Bain Capital while he was busy running the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City? He claimed that he was not running Bain during that time, and so was not responsible for the large number of jobs it shipped overseas in that period. Mitt's retirement from Bain was retroactive to 2001, this is true. But Mitt's tax returns would prove that he was also paid by Bain Capital during '02 and '03. If Mitt took the money, then he took at least some of the responsibility for the lost jobs! Period! He may still claim that he wasn't running things at that time, but that excuse wouldn't hold water. It simply doesn't matter if the plane was on auto-pilot when it crashed. The captain is still responsible!
3. Mitt's tax returns show extensive use of tax havens and loopholes. We already know this. But Mitt is campaigning on the platform of low taxes and a balanced budget. How will he balance the budget without raising taxes? Why, by closing loopholes, of course! Mitt's earlier tax returns will show such extensive use of such loopholes that it will make his wealthy donors balk. "Let's get this straight," they might say. "You get to have used all these tax loopholes yourself, but WE don't get to?!" Mitt might understandably not want to throw a spotlight onto that aspect of his campaign.
4. His tax returns show that all his charitable contributions go to the Mormon Church. On several occasions, Mitt and his wife have proudly declared that they regularly tithe their 10%. That may sound good to an evangelical Christian, until they see, written clearly in those infamous tax returns, that all that money went to Salt Lake City. Mitt doesn't hide his Mormonism, but he certainly doesn't advertise it, either. And it doesn't help him that his Mormon tithes are probably his only charitable donations, either. Remember the gaff from #5 above? That indicates how much charity he gives. And it's ALL Mormon!
Well, that's it. Of the four things listed, I really think all four are hiding in Mitt's returns, but #1 and #2 are most likely. Certainly, if I'm right, there's no way in heaven or hell that Mitt Romney will ever release his tax returns. Not a chance!
But if I'm wrong, then what the hell is Mitt waiting for? He should release those returns!
Eric
*
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Top Ten Economic Myths
When it comes right down to it, we Americans don't know jack about economics, even though our very future depends upon understanding it and then voting for the guy with the right economic plan. Part of this has to do with the fact that even expert economists often don't know what they're talking about, being too blinded by partisan politics to do an objective analysis about what works.
Am I unbiased? No, because nobody is. But I daresay I'm as objective as any slightly-left-of-center person can get. So, for the benefit of all, I'm listing here the top ten economic myths which plague our understanding of how to build jobs and move an economy forward. Here they are:
10.) Lower taxes means economic growth. Not necessarily. Lower taxes on the middle class (the poor often pay no tax, so that can't be lowered), means more money for consumers to spend, and this stimulates an economy every time. But what about the rich? As I pointed out in a previous blog post, lower taxes on the rich will work, but only if the rich are being over-taxed to begin with. Cut taxes on the wealthy when they are over-taxed, and they will feel free to spend more on goods and jobs. (This is the "trickle down" hypothesis.) But if the rich are being under-taxed, then a tax cut means that they can keep more, but don't feel a pressing need to spend more. This leaves less money for everything and everyone else. As we saw under Clinton, taxes upon the rich were higher, and economic growth was also higher. That should tell us all we need to know. We need a balance between over-taxing and under-taxing the rich. Right now, with the rich being under-taxed while our nation simultaneously faces a large deficit and looming debt, holding the line on taxes on the upper 2% of income-earners, or worse, lowering those taxes, would mean certain disaster.
9.) Higher taxes on the upper 2% will hurt small businesses. I also dealt with this one in a previous blog post. The problem here is the definition of "small business." A small business is defined as less than 500 employees, but almost no businesses have between 100 and 5000 employees in them. There are many "small businesses" with fewer than 100 employees who make six figures or more each. So the definition of a "small business" should be defined by dollars earned, not employees retained.
Still, there are some "small businesses," where the proprietor earns more than $250,000 per year with only a handful of employees, which would be hurt slightly.
8.) Obama promised to cut the deficit in half. But our national debt is higher than ever! This common mistake is based on people not knowing the difference between a deficit and a debt. It's amazing to me just how many people are ignorant of this! Every fifth-grader should know this one! But sadly, many high-school graduates can't even find Iraq on a map, much less can name these definitions. So, here's what you need to know:
Let's say you start with $0 dollars. If you make $1000 this year, but spend $2000, you have a $1000 deficit. You also have a $1000 debt. At this point, the deficit and debt are the same. But let's say the following year, you also make $1000 and spend $2000 again. Now, your deficit is still $1000, but your debt is $2000. Do the same thing the next year and your deficit will be $1000, and your debt $3000. The year following, and your deficit will be $1000 and your debt $4000, and so forth.
Of course, your debt will incur interest, and that adds to your debt, but that's beside the point I'm trying to make, which is this: If you cut your deficit in half, your debt will still grow!
Okay, so how is Obama doing? Did he lower the deficit by half? Well, he inherited a deficit of $1413 billion per year in January 2009. By January 2013, the deficit will be down to $901 billion, according to federal budget office projections. Not quite reduced by half, but definitely reduced. But let's remember that Obama wanted to remove the Bush tax cuts on the upper 2% back in 2010, but Republicans blocked him. Had Republicans not done this, the budget deficit would have been reduced much more than half. There may even have been a surplus drawn by 2013 or 2014!
7.) Government spending doesn't help an economy. Private industry creates jobs, not government. This claim is empirically false. Every time government spending has increased, the economy has grown, whether it be during a war, or during a federal program like FDR's New Deal. There has not been a single instance where federal spending has increased where the economy has not improved. As for private industry creating jobs, it's true that private industry creates most jobs, but not all. Ask a policeman. Ask a fireman. Ask a teacher or a soldier. There are countless jobs, from park rangers to NASA scientists, who earn a respectable living from a government paycheck. The tricky part for government spending comes in how to pay for government jobs in a way which avoids the job being dependent upon the government's continued support. Government can do this by building a business with new technology and then privatizing it after it has become sustainable.
6.) The welfare state weakens the economy. Also empirically false. An economy thrives only when it has workers which are trained for the jobs of both today and tomorrow. But when there is global competition for employment, some jobs may go overseas if workers are under-trained. A solid welfare state is necessary to sustain workers long enough to allow them to make the transition from yesterday's job skills into tomorrow's job skills. Take this welfare system away, and the economy is guaranteed to go nowhere but down! Workers will be trained only for yesterday's jobs, and will remain unemployed!
5.) Strict environmental legislation hurts business and the economy. Yes, businesses may have to pay more when an environmental protection is required of them, but look how that plays out: These businesses must hire more workers to make the upgrades necessary to comply with the new regulations. They must also retain more employees to maintain compliance. Businesses may complain and grumble about it, but environmental legislation creates jobs, and this helps, not hurts, an economy.
4.) Protectionist tariffs don't work. Not necessarily true. The claim we have often heard in school is that the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act led to the Great Depression because it stifled free trade in the marketplace. This is both true and misleading. Smoot-Hawley ignited a tariff war among all industrialized nations, and it was that tariff war which brought global economies down. Prior to that, protectionism worked for all concerned, and worked fairly well. But too much of anything is always bad. Make other countries feel slighted with your tariffs, and you will hurt trade.
Look at South Korea. It benefited from tariffs for decades before privatizing its government owned company, Samsung, which once did little else but trade in rice and beef cattle. Now, Samsung is one of the best privately-owned electronics manufacturers, and you probably have one of their products in your home right now! Look at India. It benefited from protectionism as well. And, of course, there's China, which refuses to play fair-trade with us while we insist on free-market rules with them -- and they're kicking our ass because of it!
China, India and South Korea had economic ministers who were untrained in economics. In the case of South Korea, its chief government economist was trained as a mathematician. These people engaged in non-lasses-faire economics because they were not trained in the accepted dogma. And it worked!
Maybe, instead of playing fair with a Chinese government which refuses to play fair with us, why don't we enact a few protections of our own? Maybe we could ignore their copyright laws for a change? Certainly, government projects should at least be barred to Chinese interests who are trying to under-bid American contractors with government-subsidized labor!
3.) Inflation is bad for an economy. Not necessarily! Inflation hurts savings accounts and makes retaining money difficult, but it also reduces debt rapidly. Since debt, especially housing and credit card debt, is a huge ball and chain on our economy right now, a little inflation would solve a lot of problems! That having been said, inflation is only likely when unemployment is low. With unemployment at barely over 8%, you are likelier to see an alien landing in your back yard than inflation within the next few years.
2.) Obama's economic stimulus in 2009 failed. No. The economic stimulus stopped a sinking economy cold, and GDP has been steadily growing ever since (albeit too slowly). On the other hand, it didn't significantly reduce unemployment, either, as that figure still remains too high. On balance, it's safe to say that the stimulus stopped the downfall, but wasn't enough to induce an outright recovery. In other words, it didn't fail, but it wasn't a 100% success, either. It should have been bigger -- but a bigger stimulus bill wouldn't have passed, even with a super-majority in the House and Senate.
1.) Deregulation helps grow an economy. This is flatly wrong. Certain areas of the economy, especially banking, need strict regulations for a stable economy.
They tried deregulation of "soft" banking in the 80's under Reagan, freeing up Savings & Loan establishments to invest their money as they saw fit, while keeping FSLIC insurance guarantees. The result was that S&L's took on risky investments on purpose, because if their investments bottomed out, the FSLIC would guarantee them. It was a "heads we win, tails taxpayers lose" arrangement. The Savings & Loan scandals that resulted taught us all a lesson to never deregulate banks too much.
Or so we thought! Under Bush II, deregulation was tried again. Several times Alan Greenspan had to pool the largest banks together to "voluntarily" bail out one of their other banks, while stubbornly maintaining that the market can "police itself." Eventually, it didn't work. When Godman Sachs and Bank of America both met dire straits, it was too late. Even Alan Greenspan himself admitted that he was wrong.
Regulation also has benefits in areas where an economy depends upon the environment. Take fishing or logging, for example. Without strict regulations curtailing the amount harvested, the resulting scarcity will drive the price of the commodity up. Rather than correcting itself, the free market will make the problem even worse as deregulated businesses strive with each other to fight over the remaining precious commodity left! When it's all gone, the market completely collapses, and everyone loses. No, better to have laws which limit the amount taken in, thus preserving the most possible output for everyone!
Well, that's all for now. Hopefully, some of you out there will know a little bit more now.
Neither Obama nor Romney promise to use the perfect approach based on the above, but Obama comes much, much closer. And Romney? Well, that would be a disaster and a half. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Eric
*
Am I unbiased? No, because nobody is. But I daresay I'm as objective as any slightly-left-of-center person can get. So, for the benefit of all, I'm listing here the top ten economic myths which plague our understanding of how to build jobs and move an economy forward. Here they are:
10.) Lower taxes means economic growth. Not necessarily. Lower taxes on the middle class (the poor often pay no tax, so that can't be lowered), means more money for consumers to spend, and this stimulates an economy every time. But what about the rich? As I pointed out in a previous blog post, lower taxes on the rich will work, but only if the rich are being over-taxed to begin with. Cut taxes on the wealthy when they are over-taxed, and they will feel free to spend more on goods and jobs. (This is the "trickle down" hypothesis.) But if the rich are being under-taxed, then a tax cut means that they can keep more, but don't feel a pressing need to spend more. This leaves less money for everything and everyone else. As we saw under Clinton, taxes upon the rich were higher, and economic growth was also higher. That should tell us all we need to know. We need a balance between over-taxing and under-taxing the rich. Right now, with the rich being under-taxed while our nation simultaneously faces a large deficit and looming debt, holding the line on taxes on the upper 2% of income-earners, or worse, lowering those taxes, would mean certain disaster.
9.) Higher taxes on the upper 2% will hurt small businesses. I also dealt with this one in a previous blog post. The problem here is the definition of "small business." A small business is defined as less than 500 employees, but almost no businesses have between 100 and 5000 employees in them. There are many "small businesses" with fewer than 100 employees who make six figures or more each. So the definition of a "small business" should be defined by dollars earned, not employees retained.
Still, there are some "small businesses," where the proprietor earns more than $250,000 per year with only a handful of employees, which would be hurt slightly.
8.) Obama promised to cut the deficit in half. But our national debt is higher than ever! This common mistake is based on people not knowing the difference between a deficit and a debt. It's amazing to me just how many people are ignorant of this! Every fifth-grader should know this one! But sadly, many high-school graduates can't even find Iraq on a map, much less can name these definitions. So, here's what you need to know:
Let's say you start with $0 dollars. If you make $1000 this year, but spend $2000, you have a $1000 deficit. You also have a $1000 debt. At this point, the deficit and debt are the same. But let's say the following year, you also make $1000 and spend $2000 again. Now, your deficit is still $1000, but your debt is $2000. Do the same thing the next year and your deficit will be $1000, and your debt $3000. The year following, and your deficit will be $1000 and your debt $4000, and so forth.
Of course, your debt will incur interest, and that adds to your debt, but that's beside the point I'm trying to make, which is this: If you cut your deficit in half, your debt will still grow!
Okay, so how is Obama doing? Did he lower the deficit by half? Well, he inherited a deficit of $1413 billion per year in January 2009. By January 2013, the deficit will be down to $901 billion, according to federal budget office projections. Not quite reduced by half, but definitely reduced. But let's remember that Obama wanted to remove the Bush tax cuts on the upper 2% back in 2010, but Republicans blocked him. Had Republicans not done this, the budget deficit would have been reduced much more than half. There may even have been a surplus drawn by 2013 or 2014!
7.) Government spending doesn't help an economy. Private industry creates jobs, not government. This claim is empirically false. Every time government spending has increased, the economy has grown, whether it be during a war, or during a federal program like FDR's New Deal. There has not been a single instance where federal spending has increased where the economy has not improved. As for private industry creating jobs, it's true that private industry creates most jobs, but not all. Ask a policeman. Ask a fireman. Ask a teacher or a soldier. There are countless jobs, from park rangers to NASA scientists, who earn a respectable living from a government paycheck. The tricky part for government spending comes in how to pay for government jobs in a way which avoids the job being dependent upon the government's continued support. Government can do this by building a business with new technology and then privatizing it after it has become sustainable.
6.) The welfare state weakens the economy. Also empirically false. An economy thrives only when it has workers which are trained for the jobs of both today and tomorrow. But when there is global competition for employment, some jobs may go overseas if workers are under-trained. A solid welfare state is necessary to sustain workers long enough to allow them to make the transition from yesterday's job skills into tomorrow's job skills. Take this welfare system away, and the economy is guaranteed to go nowhere but down! Workers will be trained only for yesterday's jobs, and will remain unemployed!
5.) Strict environmental legislation hurts business and the economy. Yes, businesses may have to pay more when an environmental protection is required of them, but look how that plays out: These businesses must hire more workers to make the upgrades necessary to comply with the new regulations. They must also retain more employees to maintain compliance. Businesses may complain and grumble about it, but environmental legislation creates jobs, and this helps, not hurts, an economy.
4.) Protectionist tariffs don't work. Not necessarily true. The claim we have often heard in school is that the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act led to the Great Depression because it stifled free trade in the marketplace. This is both true and misleading. Smoot-Hawley ignited a tariff war among all industrialized nations, and it was that tariff war which brought global economies down. Prior to that, protectionism worked for all concerned, and worked fairly well. But too much of anything is always bad. Make other countries feel slighted with your tariffs, and you will hurt trade.
Look at South Korea. It benefited from tariffs for decades before privatizing its government owned company, Samsung, which once did little else but trade in rice and beef cattle. Now, Samsung is one of the best privately-owned electronics manufacturers, and you probably have one of their products in your home right now! Look at India. It benefited from protectionism as well. And, of course, there's China, which refuses to play fair-trade with us while we insist on free-market rules with them -- and they're kicking our ass because of it!
China, India and South Korea had economic ministers who were untrained in economics. In the case of South Korea, its chief government economist was trained as a mathematician. These people engaged in non-lasses-faire economics because they were not trained in the accepted dogma. And it worked!
Maybe, instead of playing fair with a Chinese government which refuses to play fair with us, why don't we enact a few protections of our own? Maybe we could ignore their copyright laws for a change? Certainly, government projects should at least be barred to Chinese interests who are trying to under-bid American contractors with government-subsidized labor!
3.) Inflation is bad for an economy. Not necessarily! Inflation hurts savings accounts and makes retaining money difficult, but it also reduces debt rapidly. Since debt, especially housing and credit card debt, is a huge ball and chain on our economy right now, a little inflation would solve a lot of problems! That having been said, inflation is only likely when unemployment is low. With unemployment at barely over 8%, you are likelier to see an alien landing in your back yard than inflation within the next few years.
2.) Obama's economic stimulus in 2009 failed. No. The economic stimulus stopped a sinking economy cold, and GDP has been steadily growing ever since (albeit too slowly). On the other hand, it didn't significantly reduce unemployment, either, as that figure still remains too high. On balance, it's safe to say that the stimulus stopped the downfall, but wasn't enough to induce an outright recovery. In other words, it didn't fail, but it wasn't a 100% success, either. It should have been bigger -- but a bigger stimulus bill wouldn't have passed, even with a super-majority in the House and Senate.
1.) Deregulation helps grow an economy. This is flatly wrong. Certain areas of the economy, especially banking, need strict regulations for a stable economy.
They tried deregulation of "soft" banking in the 80's under Reagan, freeing up Savings & Loan establishments to invest their money as they saw fit, while keeping FSLIC insurance guarantees. The result was that S&L's took on risky investments on purpose, because if their investments bottomed out, the FSLIC would guarantee them. It was a "heads we win, tails taxpayers lose" arrangement. The Savings & Loan scandals that resulted taught us all a lesson to never deregulate banks too much.
Or so we thought! Under Bush II, deregulation was tried again. Several times Alan Greenspan had to pool the largest banks together to "voluntarily" bail out one of their other banks, while stubbornly maintaining that the market can "police itself." Eventually, it didn't work. When Godman Sachs and Bank of America both met dire straits, it was too late. Even Alan Greenspan himself admitted that he was wrong.
Regulation also has benefits in areas where an economy depends upon the environment. Take fishing or logging, for example. Without strict regulations curtailing the amount harvested, the resulting scarcity will drive the price of the commodity up. Rather than correcting itself, the free market will make the problem even worse as deregulated businesses strive with each other to fight over the remaining precious commodity left! When it's all gone, the market completely collapses, and everyone loses. No, better to have laws which limit the amount taken in, thus preserving the most possible output for everyone!
Well, that's all for now. Hopefully, some of you out there will know a little bit more now.
Neither Obama nor Romney promise to use the perfect approach based on the above, but Obama comes much, much closer. And Romney? Well, that would be a disaster and a half. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Eric
*
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Campaign Finance Reform is Needed!
Holy underwear! Have you seen Mitt Romney's latest campaign finance numbers? He's leading Obama by more than double. Team Obama has cash on hand of a little less than $88 million. Team Romney has $186 million.
And that's against a sitting incumbent president! Do you recall that little "Do you want $3 to go to the presidential election campaign fund?" check-box on your tax return? Complete with the "this will not decrease the amount of your refund" reminder? Well, Romney has outpaced even that!
Not that Romney needs it. Any more money raised, and he'll have finally matched only ONE of his off-shore bank accounts.
It's not difficult to see what's going on, if you're paying attention to who owns the media outlets. You see, a very few people, who have a whole lot of money and own a lot of media outlets, are very pissed at Our Trophy President, and can afford trying to buy the election. So to protect the mansions they own, they're using the television stations they own, and the radio stations they own, to speak through the talk-show hosts they own, which results in lots of ads being sold on the networks they own, and they make a boatload of even more cash as a result!
Why the hell are they so mad at Obama? He's been the best thing to ever happen to their bottom line!
It's true. Look what Bill Clinton did for the careers of Rush Limbaugh and Rupert Murdoch!
Of course the Mitt Romney campaign finances are just the tip of the iceberg. Imagine all the Superpacs who are getting even more money! We're talking trillions wasted!
This is proof of something I've said for a long time. Democracy has a fundamental incompatibility with capitalism. The two are not synonymous. In democracy, you see, it's one man, one vote. In capitalism, it's one dollar, one vote. This election, more than any other, pits oligarchy vs. democracy, with Team Obama batting for democracy.
Now, here's my main point: Think of all the jobs those trillions of wasted campaign finance dollars could have bought. Think of all the economic growth that's been simply thrown away on Obama-hatred. That's a lot of money for you, me and our children that's been lost! And all for what? Why, to blame Obama for the jobs that they, the ultra-rich, are deliberately not spending their money on. They're wasting that money on "long-shot" Romney.
The fucking hubris!
(Hey! That's a really cool nickname for Holy-Underwear-Mitt! "Long-Shot!" Yeah. Ol' Long-Shot Romney. It has a nice ring to it!)
All this is based on a phony premise. Simple supply and demand economics works like this: If demand rises (as it does during an election season) while supply stays the same (there are only so many TV and radio stations to go around) then price goes up. So what happens in an election season like this one, where more cash is there to buy ad time than any other before? Why the price of the ad time goes up even further! In other words, the notion that more money results in a louder economic voice is an illusion! It's a mirage in a desert, and every politician is running towards it, their parched throats aching with imagined thirst, believing that if only they could just get a few more donors, the election will be theirs.
And it's all a lie.
Every election only needs a certain amount of money to get its message out. After that point, all the extra money does is artificially drive up the price of ad time. Great news if you happen to own a TV or radio station. Bad news for the rest of us.
All that money could have been part of your next paycheck.
Some of this is off-set by the fact that Obama has the ability to buy airtime in advance. Romney cannot buy in advance until he is officially named the Republican candidate, and that won't happen until the end of this month. (That's part of why he has so much more money right now. Obama's spending, and he's not.) So, no matter how much Romney outspends Obama, he cannot keep Our Trophy President from having his voice heard. But to try in vain, he'll end up paying a premium price in comparison to the bargain price for ad time Obama was able to buy. Har, har!
Of course, the Superpacs know how to play this same game. Tip of the iceberg, again.
This is why we need campaign finance reform now! If lower taxes on the rich will result in economic growth (the "trickle down" notion, you see), then just imagine what a windfall there will be for jobs if the rich are barred from throwing their money away on a sure-fire loser like Romney? Curtailing all this ridiculous spending will hurt the TV networks, but so what if it brings this nation's unemployment down to reasonable levels? We need John McCain and Russ Feingold to... no, wait, we were dumb enough to lose Feingold. Never mind. Well, we need somebody to put a lid on all this!
Campaign finance reform is the ultimate economic stimulus bill! A de facto tax-cut for the rich!
And if the NFL can have a spending cap, then so can our political process!
Eric
*
And that's against a sitting incumbent president! Do you recall that little "Do you want $3 to go to the presidential election campaign fund?" check-box on your tax return? Complete with the "this will not decrease the amount of your refund" reminder? Well, Romney has outpaced even that!
Not that Romney needs it. Any more money raised, and he'll have finally matched only ONE of his off-shore bank accounts.
It's not difficult to see what's going on, if you're paying attention to who owns the media outlets. You see, a very few people, who have a whole lot of money and own a lot of media outlets, are very pissed at Our Trophy President, and can afford trying to buy the election. So to protect the mansions they own, they're using the television stations they own, and the radio stations they own, to speak through the talk-show hosts they own, which results in lots of ads being sold on the networks they own, and they make a boatload of even more cash as a result!
Why the hell are they so mad at Obama? He's been the best thing to ever happen to their bottom line!
It's true. Look what Bill Clinton did for the careers of Rush Limbaugh and Rupert Murdoch!
Of course the Mitt Romney campaign finances are just the tip of the iceberg. Imagine all the Superpacs who are getting even more money! We're talking trillions wasted!
This is proof of something I've said for a long time. Democracy has a fundamental incompatibility with capitalism. The two are not synonymous. In democracy, you see, it's one man, one vote. In capitalism, it's one dollar, one vote. This election, more than any other, pits oligarchy vs. democracy, with Team Obama batting for democracy.
Now, here's my main point: Think of all the jobs those trillions of wasted campaign finance dollars could have bought. Think of all the economic growth that's been simply thrown away on Obama-hatred. That's a lot of money for you, me and our children that's been lost! And all for what? Why, to blame Obama for the jobs that they, the ultra-rich, are deliberately not spending their money on. They're wasting that money on "long-shot" Romney.
The fucking hubris!
(Hey! That's a really cool nickname for Holy-Underwear-Mitt! "Long-Shot!" Yeah. Ol' Long-Shot Romney. It has a nice ring to it!)
All this is based on a phony premise. Simple supply and demand economics works like this: If demand rises (as it does during an election season) while supply stays the same (there are only so many TV and radio stations to go around) then price goes up. So what happens in an election season like this one, where more cash is there to buy ad time than any other before? Why the price of the ad time goes up even further! In other words, the notion that more money results in a louder economic voice is an illusion! It's a mirage in a desert, and every politician is running towards it, their parched throats aching with imagined thirst, believing that if only they could just get a few more donors, the election will be theirs.
And it's all a lie.
Every election only needs a certain amount of money to get its message out. After that point, all the extra money does is artificially drive up the price of ad time. Great news if you happen to own a TV or radio station. Bad news for the rest of us.
All that money could have been part of your next paycheck.
Some of this is off-set by the fact that Obama has the ability to buy airtime in advance. Romney cannot buy in advance until he is officially named the Republican candidate, and that won't happen until the end of this month. (That's part of why he has so much more money right now. Obama's spending, and he's not.) So, no matter how much Romney outspends Obama, he cannot keep Our Trophy President from having his voice heard. But to try in vain, he'll end up paying a premium price in comparison to the bargain price for ad time Obama was able to buy. Har, har!
Of course, the Superpacs know how to play this same game. Tip of the iceberg, again.
This is why we need campaign finance reform now! If lower taxes on the rich will result in economic growth (the "trickle down" notion, you see), then just imagine what a windfall there will be for jobs if the rich are barred from throwing their money away on a sure-fire loser like Romney? Curtailing all this ridiculous spending will hurt the TV networks, but so what if it brings this nation's unemployment down to reasonable levels? We need John McCain and Russ Feingold to... no, wait, we were dumb enough to lose Feingold. Never mind. Well, we need somebody to put a lid on all this!
Campaign finance reform is the ultimate economic stimulus bill! A de facto tax-cut for the rich!
And if the NFL can have a spending cap, then so can our political process!
Eric
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