Month: August 2012

He’s a white guy for Pete’s sakes!

“I love being home, where but the both of us were born,” Romney said after introducing his wife, fellow Michigan native Ann. “No one asked to see my birth certificate. They know this is where we were born and raised.”

I’ve said it before, but we’re entering some territory now that we haven’t seen since the bad old days. This isn’t even dogwhistling. It’s a primal scream.

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Prosperity for all: It’s on the menu

by digby

Either by design or ineptitude, our leaders have gotten us into a terrible situation that is likely to play out immediately after the election no matter who wins.

The CBO reported this week that the “fiscal cliff,” which is commonly defined as the expiration of the Bush tax cuts and the effects of the sequester will result in a return to recession. Greg Ip of The Economist pointed out yesterday that the fiscal “cliflett” — the expiration of the payroll tax cut, unemployment insurance , new medicare taxes on the wealthy and prior scheduled cuts is almost as bad. The IMF projects that fiscal policy will tighten more in America next year than in Spain, Italy or Portugal.

Obviously, if Romney/Ryan wins the election we have no reason to believe the Republicans will not fulfill their campaign promise to enact unprecedented spending cuts and tax cuts. But even if the president wins another term and the Democrats hang on to at least one House, we have had the Pete Peterson deficit hawks circling behind the scenes all this summer to get a consensus for a Simpson Bowles style plan to cut the safety net programs in exchange for a vague agreement to raise some sort of “revenue”. Sadly, this basically reflects the president’s “balanced approach” as well, which he characterizes in campaign ads, as being 3 trillion dollars in spending cuts while “asking the wealthy to pay a little bit more.” Two days ago he told the White House press corps that the Grand Bargain he envisioned with John Boehner remains his preferred approach:

[T]he biggest thing that Congress could do for the economy would be to come up with a sensible approach to reducing our deficit in ways that we had agreed to and talked about last year.

Last week he lamented to the New York Times that the Democrats don’t get enough credit for being willing to cut social security and medicare.

The progressive House democrats have offered a best deficit reduction plan which takes the biggest bite out of defense and raises taxes substantially on the wealthy. The administration is not interested in this approach. Needless to say, neither are the Republicans.

So, we are about to enter an economic maelstrom immediately after the election in which the choices on offer wil be between going over the fiscal cliff, a harsh austerity program from the Republicans and a “balanced approach” from the Democrats which includes unacceptable cuts to social security and health care programs along with massive cuts to government. All of these choices will lead to more sluggishness and a likely return to recession.

Up until now there has not been a coherent, progressive growth agenda on the table, which means that the likely compromise would be between the president’s mixture of cuts and “asking the wealthy to pay a little bit more” and the harsh austerity demanded by the Tea party. That is an unacceptable compromise. And it will make things worse. If Europe has shown us anything it’s that the idea of the “confidence fairies” coming to the rescue once the government enacts an austerity agenda is a fantasy.

That agenda is now in play. A new report written by Yale professor Jacob Hacker, author of the influential books

Winner-Take-All Politics

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The Great Risk Shift

and Off Center and Nathaniel Lowenthiel and it’s called Prosperity Economics: Building an Economy for All:

This report lays out an alternative to austerity economics, one based on our history, the successful experiences of other nations, and recent currents of research and theory in economics and allied fields. We call this model “prosperity economics.” Its central conclusion is that there is no inevitable trade-off between creating a strong, dynamic economy and fostering a society marked by greater health, broader security, increased equality of opportunity, and more broadly distributed growth.

To the contrary, societies that cultivate a wider distribution of the returns from increasing social wealth are the ones that flourish economically. When all members of a society share in the rewards of advancement—from better health to greater political freedom, from basic economic security to greater upward mobility—society is more likely to prosper in a sustained way. And when the government plays an active role in the economy through investments in education and scientific research, economies are more dynamic and innovative.

With all the propaganda coming from all sides, I know it’s hard to believe that progressive economics are for real, but the facts are the facts.

Considering the stakes that I laid out above, I think it’s incumbent for progressives to make this case for prosperity economics as loudly as we can and show that there is an alternative to the deficit mania that’s taken hold of everyone in Washington. If nobody ever makes the case for growth and prosperity as the alternative to austerity, the people can be forgiven for not knowing about it and the political establishment will logically see any election outcome as a mandate for more austerity, since some version of it is all that’s on the table.

But if enough people speak up for the prosperity agenda they will have to be taken into consideration. And that alone will move the dialog away from the cliffs, clifflets and disasters that are awaiting us and set us on a more sane economic path.

I urge you to read the full report. It’s written by smart people who know how to write clearly and unlike Paul Ryan’s various Very Serious plans, it actually adds up. If progressives can get this into the mix we might have a chance to stave off this Pete Peterson trainwreck that’s been hurtling out of control.

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Bucking the trend

by David Atkins

In spite of all the vote suppression happening in many Republican-controlled states, California is bucking the trend by allowing same-day registration and now a fully online voter registration process:

Beginning next month, Californians for the first time will be able to use the Internet to register to vote, giving them about six weeks of online access to register in time to participate in the Nov. 6 presidential election.

In an advisory sent late Wednesday, the office of Secretary of State Debra Bowen informed the state’s 58 county elections officers that the California Online Voter Registration System is in its final stages of testing and will become operational in early September. Software upgrades are scheduled to be electronically transmitted to the counties Friday, with online training for local officials to be conducted next week.

“It’s really huge,” said Secretary of State Debra Bowen. “I think it will be extremely popular and am very hopeful it will increase voter registration.”

California is not the first state to do this, but it shows the power of governors and state legislatures to make a huge difference in the conduct of democracy. As an activist, one of my biggest wake-up calls after the 2008 election was the gigantic degree to which state politics actually affects the lives in residents in tangible ways often more than does politics in Washington. State politics is also usually easier to influence because the districts are smaller and fewer people are frankly paying attention.

It’s not an overstatement to say that the future of progressive politics in America may depend more on California achieving 2/3 supermajorities in the legislature, than in Nancy Pelosi getting the gavel back. Digby and I have often talked with derision about the “laboratories of the states” creating worse policy than what comes out of Washington. That is true. But it can be a double-edged sword, too. If we ever get full single-payer healthcare in this country, it will be because large states with progressive legislatures implemented it first.

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Hello Yellow Brick Road

by digby

Paul Krugman notes that the GOP platform’s predictable demand to a return to the gold standard is nothing compared to Paul Ryan’s demand that we return to a time before paper money. This belief stems from his devotion to passages of Atlas Shrugged, but one can go directly to the guru’s mouth to find a straightforward explanation:

Money is the tool of men who have reached a high level of productivity and a long-range control over their lives. Money is not merely a tool of exchange: much more importantly, it is a tool of saving, which permits delayed consumption and buys time for future production. To fulfill this requirement, money has to be some material commodity which is imperishable, rare, homogeneous, easily stored, not subject to wide fluctuations of value, and always in demand among those you trade with.

This leads you to the decision to use gold as money. Gold money is a tangible value in itself and a token of wealth actually produced. When you accept a gold coin in payment for your goods, you actually deliver the goods to the buyer; the transaction is as safe as simple barter. When you store your savings in the form of gold coins, they represent the goods which you have actually produced and which have gone to buy time for other producers, who will keep the productive process going, so that you’ll be able to trade your coins for goods any time you wish. Ayn Rand –“Egalitarianism and Inflation,” Philosophy: Who Needs It, 127

Also too, the Oracle:

Gold and economic freedom are inseparable, . . . the gold standard is an instrument of laissez-faire and . . . each implies and requires the other.

What medium of exchange will be acceptable to all participants in an economy is not determined arbitrarily. Where store-of-value considerations are important, as they are in richer, more civilized societies, the medium of exchange must be a durable commodity, usually a metal. A metal is generally chosen because it is homogeneous and divisible: every unit is the same as every other and it can be blended or formed in any quantity. Precious jewels, for example, are neither homogeneous nor divisible.

More important, the commodity chosen as a medium must be a luxury. Human desires for luxuries are unlimited and, therefore, luxury goods are always in demand and will always be acceptable . . . .

The term “luxury good” implies scarcity and high unit value. Having a high unit value, such a good is easily portable; for instance, an ounce of gold is worth a half-ton of pig iron . . . .

Under the gold standard, a free banking system stands as the protector of an economy’s stability and balanced growth.

In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold . . . .

The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves.

This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists’ tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the “hidden” confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists’ antagonism toward the gold standard.

That’s from an essay by uncle Alan Greenspan in Rand’s book Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. That’s the guy, you’ll recall who was in charge of America’s monetary policy during the time of the greatest growth in income inequality since the gilded age. Somehow he made it work.

For a thoroughly enjoyable column on the nuttery of gold buggery, this piece by Krugman that Mark Thoma drew from the old Slate archives is not to be missed. Like so much else in rightwing economics, it’s another example of magical thinking.

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“I don’t want to take care of those people”

by digby

NPR did a story on this preposterous welfare reform lie the Romney campaign refuses to stop telling. The reporter attempted to explain why they would keep doing it even though it’s been rated “pants on fire” over and over again and they interviewed some voters.

I think this is the one who makes it pretty clear what’s going on:

This specific attack about welfare ties into a broader concern that many Republicans share: Romney often argues that Obama and the Democrats are making America a government-dependent society.

“I really don’t want to help somebody who just decides, ‘Oh, well, I was raised on welfare. I can raise my children on welfare,’ ” Malcolm said. “I had a cousin who, she is a registered nurse and the stories she told me about people coming in there and having babies just so they could get more on their food stamps and more on their welfare. It’s like no, I don’t want to take care of those people.”

That’s a GOP base voter for you. When in doubt go to old faithful. Obama’s taking away their health care and giving it to “those” people, too. And I think we know who those people are, don’t we?

This isn’t the first time the Republicans have played on racist tropes top win an election, but this one is worse than usual since their entire premise is built on a lie. But it does allow them to put the first black president in ads with the word “welfare” and activate that wingnut lizard brain. It’s a very sensitive lizard brain when it comes to race.

Adele Stan had this campaign pegged from the beginning for exactly what it was. Romney will be remembered as the guy who reanimated Lee Atwater’s vision for the Republican Party. It will go on his tombstone.

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Yes, it really is a war on women

by David Atkins

The DNC is hitting hard:

Democrats would likely have pursued this line of attack with or without Akin’s big mouth. But Akin’s statements have provided a crystallization of all that is wrong with social conservatism in America.

These are people who hate women because they see women as temptresses leading good men astray. These are people who don’t respect women because they see women as little more than baby-carrying vessels.

And at bottom they’re people are deeply, deeply afraid of sex and sexuality. One can pop psychoanalyze why ad infinitum, but at its heart we’re dealing with deeply repressed people who worry that all social order will collapse without keeping strict taboos on sexual behavior. These are a bunch of insecure, authoritarian men who worry that their wives will cheat and their daughters won’t respect them if those women are sexually awakened. They’re a bunch of busybody repressed women who are sexually miserable themselves, and want company in their misery.

Those sorts of views are pathetic and archaic in the 21st century, whether they’re in Saudi Arabia or rural Missouri.

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Some Florida hospitality

by digby

Haha:

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Just because it’s murder doesn’t mean they’re against it

by digby

Oh please:

The 2012 party platform crafted in Tampa this week includes an abortion ban that makes no exceptions for cases of rape, incest or to save a mother’s life.

“Faithful to the ‘self-evident’ truths enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, we assert the sanctity of human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed,” the draft platform reads. “We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children.”

But the party insists that its strict opposition to abortion doesn’t necessarily mean it objects to rape and incest exceptions. Instead, the RNC argues, it enshrined a broad set of principles that don’t delve into any policy details.

Exceptions to personhood? That’s called murder.

But don’t worry. It’s not like they’re all rigid about it or anything:

“So it’s not that we are being pro-exception or anti-exception — we are SILENT on exceptions and leave that up to the states,” the official said.

Interesting that they’d make a states’ rights argument. I’d imagine they’ll be quite a bit more viciferous in their support of fetuses to have the full protections of the 14th Amendment than they were for African Americans.

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Maddow on Ryan’s most outrageous lie yet

by digby

He’s a very, very good liar:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

“The Republican Vice Presidential candidate really did sponsor a bill that would ban hormonal birth control. And he did it just last year.”

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How can they be a hate group? They’re members of the club.

“This is a group that was founded by James Dobson and was run for many years by Gary Bauer, who was a presidential candidate, a widely respected commentator around town,” he explained. “Why would would you say that’s the same sort of thing as Stormfront?”

It’s not as if they’re wearing white sheets, after all. (He really said that too.)

If you want to know how it’s possible that extremists have taken over the Republican party with nary a peep out of the political establishment, you have your reason. The leaders are “highly respected” insiders and Very Serious People. Therefore, it’s impossible for them to be hateful. Why, what would it say about Dana Milbank’s judgment (and basic decency) if people thought he was associating with hatemongers?

The Village takes care of its own. And these hatemongers are definitely their own.

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