Day: July 19, 2010

A|B Testing

Which of these tacks do you suppose the MSM will take up?

A:

-or-

B:

Answer: Serious people know it’s always bad for the Democrat. Get ready for the Demcrat Tax Bomb of 2010! Just you try and refudiate it. True deficit hawks know that, if you’re serious about the deficit you make the tough choices: like lowering taxes.

We know this is coming. Are we busily inoculating?
Are you fucking kidding me?

Invincible Ignorance

McConnell Blasts Deficit Spending, Urges Extension of Tax Cuts.
This because, as well know, tax cuts pay for themselves:

Didn’t happen under Bush, didn’t happen under Reagan, didn’t happen under Kennedy. Those were all the result of various coincidences, though.

Next up, we have Mitch McConnell, uh, still:

The last year of the Bush administration, the deficit as a percentage of gross domestic product was 3.2 percent, well within the range of what most economists think is manageable. A year and a half later, it’s almost 10 percent.

Uh, no. In fact, most of our current deficit driver is Bush/Cheney policy:

But, by all means, let’s not get to work explaining any of this or (gasp) using it to call the GOP out as liars and/or fools. Repeatedly. No, we’ve got the facts on our side! It’s all we need.

I think the case for [repeated government shutdowns] happening is twofold. One is that conservative politics is now much more dominated by a set of overlapping, competing media figures who are more interested in ratings than in majorities. The other is that if John Boehner has the courage of my convictions, he’ll believe that a government shutdown will risk sending the economy into a double-dip recession and that ultimately Barack Obama will be blamed for the bad results regardless of what polling says in the moment.

Matthew Yglesias, with emphasis on “ratings” and “Obama will be blamed”: yep, yep, yep, a million times yep.

What, me worry?

In which Krugman and I disagree:

Republicans, by the way, seem less susceptible to this delusion. Since Mr. Obama took office, they have engaged in relentless obstruction, obviously unworried about how their actions would look or be reported. And it’s working: by blocking Democratic efforts to alleviate the economy’s woes, the G.O.P. is helping its chances of a big victory in November.

I think Krugman is being too kind by half. The GOP is unworried because they know their actions will not be reported; they therefore needn’t worry about appearances at all. There is, outside the blogoshpere, precisely zero coverage of across-the-board GOP obstruction. And, why should there be? The Democrat won’t mention it either. Obama is, even still, apparently heralding in a wonderful new day in which everyone works together.

And don’t for a second entertain the thought that, should the GOP capture the House in November, things will change because (why) they’ll have to start taking positions on policy. They certainly will take positions, but it will all be:

  1. The Tax elimination act of 2011
  2. The forced birth bill of 2011
  3. The immigration cessation bill of 2011
  4. The drill everywhere bill of 2011
  5. The Social Security “Personalization” and Welfare Elimination Act of 2011

And etc… That, of course, is ignoring (for now) all the weekly impeachment proceedings. Each of these will, of course, die a quick death in the do-nothing Senate. Well, except for that last one. Democrats will likely take it up in hopes of creating the appearance of bipartisanship. That and, we’ll see a high-minded compromise on #1; there we’ll raise taxes on the bottom 15% in exchange for deep cuts in social programs and an across the board tax decrease on the top 10% as well as elimination of capital gains and estate taxes. It’s win/win!

How do you stop it? Well, you know about it. You thus start talking about it. Now. Repeatedly. Every time a microphone is switched on and several times when one isn’t yet.

That, however, would be shrill.