Rove Explained

How many billions and billions and billions and billions of unlimited and unregulated dollars are spent each year promoting/campaigning for members of the Democrat party by the brainless useful idiots at hardline leftist political advocacy and lobbying groups like Time magazine, ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN, A-Mess-NBC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN News, ESPN Classic, ESPN U, ESPN Deportes, ESPN Radio, ESPN360.com, National Peoples Radio, ABC Radio, CBS Radio, Univision, Telemundo, Telefutura, Galavision, Mun2 (“mun dos”), HBO, Showtime, Oprah, Extra, Entertainment Tonight, the Insider, the New York Times-Democrat, the Washington Post-Democrat, the Associated (with terrorists) Press, al Reuters, al Jazeera, al McClatchy, Rolling Stoned, High Times, GQ, Hustler, Ladies Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, Sports Illustrated, et al.?

“But this election cycle has exposed Rove for what he is:”
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Gosh Joe, where have you been?

Teasies? Teasies. Yes, Joe, Yes. Excellent.

You must have them memorized.

and Rove shall not wander

After the election, there will be several internal GOP battles that will be fun watching–one will involve the economic populists versus the oligarchs, another will set the neoconservative military interventionists against the libertarian isolationists (whether to stay in Afghanistan is the likely battlefield). Republicans tend not to fight amongst themselves with the joy and bloodlust that marks the Democratic tong wars; but these battles should be fascinating, especially as the GOP struggles to find a presidential candidate in 2012.

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WTF?
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What economic populists? Which isolationists? Which libertarians? I suppose the pre-nomination Rand Paul might fit this, and he has a good chance to win, but, err, he has already signed on with the oligarchs.
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Politico link
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These are Republicans, not populists. They will line up, as the Ladies from Maine ultimately have, with the plutocrats. It’s not like any of these candidates have demonstrated any commitment to any principle. It’s the same set of Big Lies, and the same set of suckers buying them, both in the precincts of middle America and, as always, in the Village.

Jay–just watch how some of the libertarian-oriented new people vote on Afghanistan and on anything resembling a Wall Street bailout. I saw these new trends, especially on foreign policy, manifest themselves pretty clearly on my cross-country trip. Your monolithic sense of the Republican party is historically accurate–but maybe not so unrelentingly so anymore.

“It’s not every day that I see things from a Tea Party point of view”
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Is this the same ham-handed analysis from the left that claimed after the 2008 elections that Republicans as a party would be banished for 40 years? And the same insight that thought the tidal wave in the summer of 2009 of the Tea Party was just kooks and extremists.
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Liberal have enough trouble connecting from point A to point B on any “principle” of that bankrupt philosophy now known as progressives.
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The next time you are right on conservatives — will be your first.

Joe has once again shown that he has never met a real American before. He has lived his entire life in a cocoon of left wing extremists who have no business living in the United States. He is the perfect fit for Time.

Toadblossom Rove has been disavowed & disowned by the amphibian community; that’s how repulsive & ridiculous he has rendered himself. When she finds the time, Super Sarah will swat him down on Facebook.

You forget Mr Klein that the momentum is clearly in the hands of the Tea Party movement.
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Here are three things you can count on from those of us who are part of this movement. You may want to memorize them for future reference.
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1. Limited Government – This means to downsize the Federal Government and bring the powers once held by each of the States back to those States. For example, the Department of Education. We simply do not need a “Department of Education” at the Federal level.
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2. Fiscal Responsibility – To make our Federal government more efficient, less wasteful of our tax dollars, and to reduce if not eliminate deficits. Pay as you go, as Nancy Pelosi promised will be realized. If you do not have the money, then you can’t continue to borrow into the future. Period. No more PORK, no more pet projects to get re-elected. We shall elect people who are frugal with our tax dollars, and understand the value of being efficient and know how operate within the confines of a budget just like the rest of us do everyday.
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3. Free Markets – Promote the free market principles which have made this country into the greatest country ever in our planets history. To promote less regulations, and more opportunities for people to open businesses. This will create jobs. Governments do not create jobs, people do. Get out of the way and let the business men and women produce. Create jobs. Create wealth. If you want to sit by and let the government take care of your every need, move to China or one of the other neo-socialist countries of the world.

“real American”
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What’s that? you? me? Joe? Not Joe? “Real American” is the dumbest political phrase to emerge from the last presidential campaign because it means nothing and offends everyone equally.

“Get out of the way and let the business men and women produce.”
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BTDT. A recession followed.
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“Create jobs. Create wealth.”
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One out of two (and only for a few).

Joe, I certainly agree that we will see. But the monolith is recent, not historic; I grew up (Republican) in Maine, where Olympia Snowe used to follow in the footsteps of statesmen like Bill Cohen. She no longer does. if they can turn Snowe into part of the monolith that the Civil Rights Act created, then someone as unprincipled as Paul will sign on as well.
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The issue that CAN divide them is immigration, where the plutocrats of the party want downward wage pressure from not quite citizen workers who don’t quite get treated under the same labor laws vs the rank and file who will suffer from that downward wage pressure (and “want their country back”). But I will be very surprised to see Republicans who will vote against the endless wars that fuel the baseless fears they depend on.
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I’ll grant you Ron Paul though. His Christmas week MTP performance during primary season showed his remarkably cogent isolationist views exposed Russert’s Village myopia.

“Joe has once again shown that he has never met a real American before”
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So the folks he met on his road trip are actually insurgents??? On which planet do you spend most of your time, sir?

That post included a link to the MTP transcript with Ron Paul. Excerpt:

MR. RUSSERT: Let’s talk about some of the ways you recommend. “I’d start bringing our troops home, not only from the Middle East but from Korea, Japan and Europe and save enough money to slash the deficit.”
How much money would that save?
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REP. PAUL: To operate our total foreign policy, when you add up everything, there’s been a good study on this, it’s nearly a trillion dollars a year. So I would think if you brought our troops home, you could save hundreds of billions of dollars. It’s, you know, it’s six months or one year or two year, but you can start saving immediately by changing the foreign policy and not be the policeman over the world. We should have the foreign policy that George Bush ran on. You know, no nation building, no policing of the world, a humble foreign policy. We don’t need to be starting wars. That’s my argument.
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MR. RUSSERT: How many troops do we have overseas right now?
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REP. PAUL: I don’t know the exact number, but more than we need. We don’t need any.
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MR. RUSSERT: It’s 572,000. And you’d bring them all home?
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REP. PAUL: As quickly as possible. We–they will not serve our interests to be overseas. They get us into trouble. And we can defend this country without troops in Germany, troops in Japan. How do they help our national defense? Doesn’t make any sense to me. Troops in Korea since I’ve been in high school?
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MR. RUSSERT: What…
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REP. PAUL: You know, it doesn’t make any sense.
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MR. RUSSERT: Under President Paul, if North Korea invaded South Korea, would we respond?
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REP. PAUL: I don’t–why should we unless the Congress declared war? I mean, why are we there? Could–South Korea, they’re begging and pleading to unify their country, and we get in their way. They want to build bridges and go back and forth. Vietnam, we left under the worst of circumstances. The country is unified. They have become Westernized. We trade with them. Their president comes here. And Korea, we stayed there and look at the mess. I mean, the problem still exists, and it’s drained trillion dollars over these last, you know, 50 years. So stop–we can’t afford it anymore. We’re going bankrupt. All empires end because the countries go bankrupt, and the, and the currency crashes. That’s what happening. And we need to come out of this sensibly rather than waiting for a financial crisis.
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MR. RUSSERT: So if Iran invaded Israel, what do we do?
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REP. PAUL: Well, they’re not going to. That is like saying “Iran is about to invade Mars.” I mean, they have nothing. They don’t have an army or navy or air force. And Israelis have 300 nuclear weapons. Nobody would touch them. But, no, if, if it were in our national security interests and Congress says, “You know, this is very, very important, we have to declare war.” But presidents don’t have the authority to go to war.
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MR. RUSSERT: You…
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REP. PAUL: You go to the Congress and find out if they want a war, do the people want the war. But it’s totally unnecessary. I mean, that, that, to me, is an impossible situation…
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MR. RUSSERT: If…
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REP. PAUL: …for the Iranians to invade Israel.
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MR. RUSSERT: This is what you said about Israel. “Israel’s dependent on us, you know, for economic means. We send them” “billions of dollars and they,” then they “depend on us. They say, `Well, you know, we don’t like Iran. You go fight our battles. You bomb Iran for us.’ And they become dependent on us.”
Who in Israel is saying “Go bomb Iran for us”?
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REP. PAUL: Well, I don’t know the individuals, but we know that their leaderships–you read it in the papers on a daily–a daily, you know, about Israel, the government of Israel encourages Americans to go into Iran, and the people–I don’t think that’s a–I don’t think that’s top secret that the government of Israel…
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MR. RUSSERT: That the government of Israel wants us to bomb Iran?
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REP. PAUL: I, I don’t think there’s a doubt about that, that they’ve encouraged us to do that. And of course the neoconservatives have been anxious to do that for a long time.
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MR. RUSSERT: Would you cut off all foreign aid to Israel?
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REP. PAUL: Absolutely. But remember, the Arabs would get cut off, too, and the Arabs get three times as much aid altogether than Israel. But why, why make Israel so dependent? Why do we–they give up their sovereignty. They can’t defend their borders without coming to us. If they want a peace treaty, they have to ask us permission. They can’t–we interfere when the Arab leagues make overtures to them. So I would say that we’ve made them second class citizens. I, I think they would take much better care of themselves. They would have their national sovereignty back, and I think they would be required then to have a stronger economy because they would have to pay their own bills.

Which brings up another point: Factlesss opinions like Huseien’s are what the media should be fighting against vis-a-vis telling us “polls indicate a mass Swing of Stupid.”

While I was at a conference earlier this week, I talked with a friend who was in Haiti not long after the earthquake with a group from the Catholic university where she works to evaluate what they could do to help restore education, etc. She talked about the conditions and what the conditions obviously were prior to the earthquake.

There was basically no government, so there was no infrastructure. The lack of good roads to begin with made delivery of relief supplies vastly more difficult. The lack of a governmental structure meant there was no group in place who could oversee a rational plan for helping the populace. Listening to her, I thought of the cries for no government except for defense, etc. I have seen people comment that they didn’t care if there were no roads if repairs meant raising taxes. This no-tax mantra is nonsense.

I don’t consider spending 10 minutes with someone who you happen to run across on the road for business purposes “meeting” someone ma’am. He grew up in NY with other extremist liberal America haters and when he got older he moved to D.C. to live with other extremist liberal America haters. He has never met any other type of person.

You keep forgetting Cat Fancy, textee.

Also too: “oiligarchs.” Maybe even better than “Teasies.”

Joe Klein as explained by Bill Maher. Maher explains exactly what it is elitists like Joe Klein and Bill Maher think about average Americans.
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“They are just as stupid dogs”

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http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=hdSUnz4zDk

Thank you Jay, and thank you Mr. Klein for responding.
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I think what many of us dislike about the teapartiers is we see it as little more than establishment-republicans masquerading as patriotic conservatives. (This is why I liked your link to Paul, Jay. Libertarians are conservatives and originators of the tea-party movement. Unfortunately, once Obama and the dems were elected, we witnessed a Fox-led hijacking of it by republicans.) Reality is, the Libertarian platform (representative of conservativism) and the Republican party are at odds. Take some time to look at the Libertarian Party Platform: link, it is incompatable with popular Republican “Tea-party” figures.
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What “conservatives” don’t realize is that to be against big gov’t and unnecessary gov’t spending means that you are against denial of habaeus corpus, unwarranted wire taps, Fed involvement in gay marriage and abortion; you would want to end the wars, slash the military budget, bring home our troops, end indefinite detention, prosecute US officials for war crimes, etc.
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My hope is that professional republicans and their media cohorts lose control of the TP movemnent and the people choose an actual conservative (libertarian) to represent the Republican party. It would be nice for one party to value the things I mention above.

I saw these new trends, especially on foreign policy, manifest themselves pretty clearly on my cross-country trip.
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The sentiment exists in the public, Joe, I’ll grant you that.
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But how will it ever get onto the agenda?
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When it’s Koch/Rove/Boehner/Limbaugh controlling the party, the GOP/Tea Party will never offer anything beyond “Obamasux” and “enrich our pals.” That’s what Boehner’s promising at his Wall Street fundraisers, isn’t it?
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I heard a self-identified Tea Partier call into a radio show to criticize health insurance reform. The host asked, “what do you think about some of the problems that it’s supposed to address, like dropping people when serious health problems surface?” He said something like, “we should prevent that from happening, and cap the salaries of health insurance executives. No one needs to get rich doing that.”
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So the sentiment exists. But foremost in Tea Partier/GOP minds is opposing liberalsocialisticfascist-o-Islam, and at the end of the day, the oiligarchs are pulling the strings. You’re not gonna have Glenn Beck up there 100 days in a row complaining about health executives’ salaries, or pretextual dropping of insured folks who get sick, are you?
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Even if the sentiment you’re describing is widespread, it will never, ever impact the policies the GOP, or its Tea subsidiary, will pursue.

The lunacy of the left comes down to explaining everything away as those on the right want to take us back to a time period before 1776 in America, which is totally absurd.
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Poor little IvyB. We are not advocating for you to ride the old grey mare to the market to buy groceries, or even get one of those big-wheeled carts for your A$$ to haul you around on the cobbled streets of Philadelphia. We are simply saying our Government with all of the various liberal entitlement programs have created a monster which is unsustainable.
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We need certain aspects of our government to be down-sized, not bloated bigger and bigger to be ineffective and inefficient like the Post Office.
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We do not need our government to create regulations to tell us what we can and cannot do either. We are able to make those decisions on our own.
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I firmly believe that our Federal Government can be down-sized to a point of less than 1/2 of what it is now, and we will not see any major difference in our daily lives with the exception we would pay 1/2 of the taxes we currently now pay so that goons like you can keep on telling us what is and isn’t good for us.
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Tax and spend like drunken sailors has never worked as a government program. The current mess we are in only proves my point.

What no-tax manta?

Libs lose the argument when they try and counter the conservative argument for fiscal sanity with claims fiscal sanity = no govt. You can’t win a debate when you create a false opponent and then start arguing. Barak Obama tried to move the country left and it didn’t want to go. His vaunted communications skills area joke. He didn’t move the needle on a single issue and the more he talked on healthcare the less popular it became. The model is Reagan. It took him 6 years to move rates from 70% to 28% via a series of bills because he was constantly selling the value of low marginal tax rates. Obama by contrast can’t even raise them back to Clinton levels. Reagan, 22 years removed from offce, still out debates Barak Obama.

Keep at it libs!!!

PS: Keep with the tea party = racist nazi’s. That’s working real well.

Questions -

When none of these happen because they never have under Republican leadership what will you do?

Joe, Jay

You are going to have a very hard decade ahead because the Tea Party is for real and they’re going to control at least the next 6 years. By far the driving, uniting force is spending and size of govt and they are getting republicans elected who will do just that. The actual tea party fringe will be large enough to keep the candidates who promised religion when elected from becoming moderates. The great victory now will ensure the next Senate class up in 2012 will behave accordingly. Ben Nelson and Mary won’t be supporting any tax increases.

The real trick is to roll back much of the new spending Obama initiated and just the end of the stimulus will help there. Then freeze spending allowing inflation adjustments where warranted. The economy is better than people think with very healthy corporate profits and this win will be a boon for investor and consumer confidence. With 3% GDP growth the govt can expect 5%-7% revenue increases from booming corporate and capital gains taxes. Two years of this and the deficit is under control. Four years and we have a surplus.

I give up. How many?

The inclusion of Ladies’ Home Journal cracks me up, every single time.

Pay as you go, as Nancy Pelosi promised will be realized.
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Pay as you go has already been realized, you idiot, and it was realized when overwhelming numbers of Democrats in both houses of Congress overcame the united resistance of the Republicans.
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In the House, the vote was 266-166, with only 40 Republicans voting for it. In the Senate, the vote was 60-40, with no Republicans voting for it.
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http://www.ombwatch.org/node/10259
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http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/78533-senate-passes-paygo-rule-in-party-lines-vote
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I don’t know what’s more impressive — the stupidity you show in not realizing pay-as-you-go has already been enacted, or the stupidity you show in thinking Republicans who’ve been fighting it tooth and nail would be the ones to enact it.
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What a f*cking moron.

To promote less regulations, and more opportunities for people to open businesses. This will create jobs. Governments do not create jobs, people do. Get out of the way and let the business men and women produce. Create jobs. Create wealth.
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If this is true, then why did the prime years of deregulation under George w. Bush and the Republican Congress of the 2000s lead to the worst job creation record of any presidency in the last hundred years?
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Only 1 million private sector jobs created between 2000-2008, which is one fourth the amount of private sector jobs created in 2009-2010.
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You act like we haven’t tried it the Republican way and seen the results. Actually, you act like the rest of us are as gullible and stupid as you are.
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Go ahead, believe that this is the election that the Republicans will finally do away with the Department of Education. I’m sure the sixth time is the charm.

Republicans tend not to fight amongst themselves with the joy and bloodlust that marks the Democratic tong wars.

Not sure that I agree with that, Joe:

But the significance of the CRNC goes beyond that. The Committee is the place where Republican strategists learn their craft and acquire their knack for making their Democratic opponents look like disorganized children. Many of the biggest-brand Republican operatives–from Karl Rove and Lee Atwater, to Charlie Black and Roger Stone, to Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed, and Grover Norquist–got their starts this way. Walking through the halls of the convention, it is easy to see the genesis of tactics deployed in the Florida recount and by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Republicans learn how to fight hard against Democrats by practicing on one another first. “There are no rules in a knife fight,” Norquist instructed the young conventioneers in a speech.

Maybe the GOPers of twenty, thirty years ago. Not so much anymore.

The model is Reagan. It took him 6 years to move rates from 70% to 28% via a series of bills because he was constantly selling the value of low marginal tax rates.
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No he didn’t. Reagan slashed the top marginal tax rate in 1981 with ERTA, and when that caused unemployment to jump from the 7% rate it had been at for three years all the way to 10%+, Bob Dole and other actual fiscal conservatives convinced him to roll back much of it.
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It wasn’t incremental at all. It was a big move followed by a series of retreats. In fact, in seven of his eight years in office — all after that first year — Ronald Reagan raised taxes.
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Jesus Christ, why is it that the people who adore Reagan the most seem to know absolutely nothing about the man?

wait, sports illustrated? really? wow. extra crazy today.

For the F*cking Moron, yes that IS you little kevie
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http://www.prisonplanet.com/debt-has-increased-5-trillion-since-speaker-pelosi-vowed-%E2%80%98no-new-deficit-spending%E2%80%99.html
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When Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) gave her inaugural address as speaker of the House in 2007, she vowed there would be “no new deficit spending.” Since that day, the national debt has increased by $5 trillion, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.
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“After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending,” Pelosi said in her speech from the speaker’s podium. “Our new America will provide unlimited opportunity for future generations, not burden them with mountains of debt.”
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Pelosi has served as speaker in the 110th and 111th Congresses.
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At the close of business on Jan. 4, 2007, Pelosi’s first day as speaker, the national debt was $8,670,596,242,973.04 (8.67 trillion), according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, a division of the U.S.
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Treasury Department. At the close of business on Oct. 22, it stood at $13,667,983,325,978.31 (13.67 trillion), an increase of 4,997,387,083,005.27 (or approximately $5 trillion).

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Can we get better liberal trolls please? The stupid ones on here are really getting more stupid as each day goes by.

Rusty -

When I actually see some evidence of this being true

”We do not need our government to create regulations to tell us what we can and cannot do either. We are able to make those decisions on our own.”

I will buy the argument.

Did Wall Street behave responsible with fewer and fewer regulations? Do coal mine operators behave responsibly with fewer safety regs? Do oil producers behave more responsibly with less over-site and regs?

So far most of the evidence says no.

Yes, Sean DeCoursey, Sports Illustrated. Read it some time.

American sportswriters and television sports announcers are every bit as militantly leftist and as virulently stupid as those in the American press corps who write/speak about politics, food, movies, scrap-booking, music, automobiles, “art”, gardening, toilets, etc.

Yeah, Sean, Sports Illustrated has made the list a few times now. I keep thinking there must’ve been some Politburo Swimsuit edition I must’ve missed to account for SI’s inclusion.

Jesus Christ, why is it that the people who adore Reagan the most seem to know absolutely nothing about the man?

Good question. I suppose that to know more of Reagan is to loathe him, that’s why.

Perhaps your ever growing list of anti-American leftists is not so much anti-American or left-leaning. Maybe you’re just an ultra right-wing nutter. I think that better explains the phenomena.

Kevin,

Let’s not be dense.

This isn’t debatable.

The marginal tax rates in 1980 were 70% at the top. Kennedy lowered them from 90%. IN the 1986 Tax bill Reagan lowered the top rate to 28%.

That’s just one reason why he’s ranked in the top 10. Even if you think it was a bad move it was still a considerable legislative achievement. Obama can’t raise them even 1%

Boy, oh, boy. The anti-government rant and the “inefficient postal service” a-gain.

I LIKE the US Postal Service. UPS & FedEx don’t let me mail pictures to my family members at 88 cents apiece. USPS delivers everywhere–even to small islands. No extra charge for this type of delivery service.

No taxpayer dollars are used to fund the USPS’ work, but they have begun to operate at a deficit because of increased use of email instead of “snail mail.” (Think of THAT next time you decide to e-card your mom instead of sending her a real-hold-in-your-hand Mother’s Day card.)

And during these terrible times of unemployment and layoffs, the USPS employs hundreds of thousands of people.

And while we’re on the inefficiency in government rap, I would like to note that my DMV works fine, especially when I make an appointment ahead of time. I’m in & out in minutes—more efficient than when I go to the doctor.

textee: Please tell us what you read to keep yourself informed?

Walking through the halls of the convention, it is easy to see the genesis of tactics deployed in the Florida recount and by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

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Be honest, wasn’t that also a neat grass roots thing? That was just citizen-activist operating in the best sense of Democracy. Kerry tried to portray himself as a hero after slimming Vietnam Vets for years. It was his own words and deed that did him in.

Isn’t that amazing that JK has just had an epiphany about Rove?

You are living in a fiscal fantasy land.

The Republicans have never ever controlled spending and they aren’t about to start. They say these same old things when out of power and immediately proceed to increase the size of government and the debt when in. Every single time including under Reagen.

So far all I have heard from any tea party candidate is rhetoric not a single concrete idea. Not one. Just saying cut spending, reduce the size of government is not policy it is sizzle with out the steak. Explain to me how and what and I will pay attention.

And four years debt is under control? Even under the best of circumstances with a tax raise, medicare, SS, Defense being cut – the things that actually eat up the budget, best case scenario is 10 to 15.

If you want to be taken seriously you have to get serious

“Gardening”? “Every bit as left-leaning”?
Heck, I just read the gardening columns in my local paper to learn how to properly dead head my chrysanthemums…(Ohhh, I get it….”dead head.” Like the Grateful Dead.)
But, wait, I also want to learn how to compost, encourage good insects in my vegetable garden and not use as many chemicals on my home-grown food. (Well, yeah. That’s obviously a conspiracy against the chemical companies who produce fertilizer, herbicide, and insecticide, not to mention their biggest supporters, agribusiness.)
And if I have a beautiful garden, then I can cut my own bouquets and take them to my friends (thus cutting into the free market of florists, their delivery trucks, and the profits of big oil who need to keep fueling those trucks…
Allllrighty then. I guess I do understand how literature about gardening does promote militant leftism.

The Republican Party has already taken over the tea party candidates. Once they were nominated, the party operatives rushed in and scrubbed web sites, took over their pr, and controlled their purse strings.
Boehner and McConnell are already busy figuring out their committee assignments and their staffing.
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They are going to find the TPers very useful for their stop everything agenda.

Rusty: “I firmly believe that our Federal Government can be down-sized to a point of less than 1/2 of what it is now, and we will not see any major difference in our daily lives with the exception we would pay 1/2 of the taxes we currently now pay so that goons like you can keep on telling us what is and isn’t good for us.”
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Rusty, I ask you in all sincerity — Have you any idea what most of the money spent by the Federal Govt is spent for? If you were to eliminate everything but defense, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and interest on the national debt, you’d have gotten rid of less than 25 percent of federal spending. If you got rid of that same spending and didn’t raise taxes, you’d still be running a deficit. Eliminate that spending and cut taxes in half and you’d have a bigger deficit than you have now. Not that you could get more than one or two percent into that so-called “discretionary spending” without screams of bloody murder on all sides.
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So what would you have the Republicans do to bring us to tax-cut Nirvana? Elimininate Medicare? I thought you were furious at the Medicare cuts in Obamacare. Eliminate Social Security? Sure, let the old folks starve. Or maybe you’d like to privatize Social Security for the future? Great idea, except that if the youngsters put their money into the market instead of SS taxes, the govt would face paying a couple of trillion bucks to the people now drawing SS with no revenue to offset the expenditures. Wait! I’ve got it. Let’s abolish the Defense Department. No more defense. But even that won’t eliminate the annual deficit, let alone allow a tax cut. Unless, of course, you’re willing to tolerate huge deficits ad infinitum. Yeah, that’s the ticket. Hey, it worked for Reagan and Dubya. And look where it got us. And if all else fails, we can always default on the national debt or print a few trillion dollars more in hundred dollar bills. A great jobs program for printers.
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Opposition to anything constructive isn’t really a coherent world view, Rusty. Reagan notwithstanding, you can’t cut taxes, increase defense, and balance the budget. You can’t do it in times of prosperity, and you sure as he11 can’t do it in the middle of a deep recession. Rustynomics is pure fantasy. Could it be that deep down in the most secret recesses of your brain, one reasonable synapse is screaming to get out? Listen to it, Rusty. You might yet get a grasp on reality.

Newrusty: I can be very snarky and I understand your responses to me. However, Ivy_B is always respectful in her tone and simply brings information to the forum. Why do you find it necessary to be condescending to her comments and use intemperate language?

Thanks apr. I admit to a moment of temper, but realized it is Thursday in addition to my personal pledge!

rdw56,

Let me ask you this question. What were the top tax rates from 1981 to 1986? Clearly they did not go from 70% to 28% as late as 1986.

Second, what about the fact that Reagan raised taxes at least 5 times in his presidency if not more? The FICA taxes, which hits wage earners and business (but not wealthy individuals) skyrocketed during the Reagan years.

And didn’t Reagan promise to balance the budget. What happened to the annual deficit during the Reagan presidency? How does this compare to the deficits of Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton?

In fact, Clinton raised Reagan’s marginal tax rates for the highest tax payers, and I believe the economy was stronger during the Clinton years than the Reagan years.

Reagan ranks high because he restored American’s faith in the presidency. After the Nixon and Carter years, people had lost faith in the executive branch.

Ironically, the people whose faith was restored were Conservatives, the same people who now claim not to trust the government.

Because, at some point in the past, they were belittled and have taken it personally. Combined with the tendency to attribute beliefs and actions of one or a few people to the entirety of a group, he will just insult anyone he thinks is in opposition to his views.
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It’s fully justified for him, since ‘we’ do it too. Despite the fact that for all the claims of superiority, they cannot be the better person and refrain from the insults.

Rusty, if you believe that debt accrued from 2007-2010 is evidence that PAYGO was not signed into law in 2010, you’re even stupider than I thought.
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PAYGO is law. Democrats passed it, Obama signed it into law.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61B4AU20100212
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Can we get some smart conservatives in here to argue with? Or did Rusty and the Teatards have them all killed off?

I was just wondering, but isn’t today the anniversary of when President Bush signed the Patriot Act? Am I wrong?

I hear the Tea Party talk about limited government and personal freedom, yet I have not heard one representative of any Tea Party movement mention the Patriot Act, the biggest grab of power ever passed in the United States? Tea Party people, where are you?

And do you wonder why some people don’t take the Tea Party seriously. They talk all about Obama’s grab for power, yet none of them mention Bush. By not challenging the Patriot Act, they give the impression they are stooges for the Republican party.

Dick Armey and another Tea Party operative recently wrote a manifesto of what the Tea Party movement stands for. Clearly Armey is out of sinc with much of the Tea Party. The premise of his statement was that “PEOPLE SHOULD HAVE THE FREEDOM TO DO WHAT THEY WANT, AS LONG AS IT DOES NOT HURT THE RIGHTS OF OTHERS.” In an unscientific survey of whether one agreed with Mr. Armey’s remarks. The highest approval came from LIBERTARIANS, followed closely by LIBERALS, coming far behind were Tea Party supporters.

Thus, it would appear that statements about “freedom” would be out of place at a Tea Party gathering.

What does “Tea” party stand for? Does it mean “Taxed Enough Already”? Some studies show that 40% of us pay no income taxes. Thus if the Tea Party stands for “Taxed Enough Already”: either the Tea Party stands for rich folks who pay the vast majority of income taxes, or, 40% of Tea Partiers are not very intelligent because they don’t pay any federal income taxes at all. If you don’t pay any income taxes, how can you say you been “Taxed Enough Already”?

Is the Tea Party about limited goverhment and limited federal spending? That might explain why in one interview with a Tea Party participant, the husband was complaining about people living off the government while his wife was sitting in a motorized car paid for by Medicare. I read about another anti-government type who lived on his disability check for the federal government.

We already have the model for debt reduction from the 90′s when for a time we had spending under control due to a series of deals between GHWB and his Congress and then Clinton and Newt helped by the peace dividend created by Reagan. with the end of the cold war we reduced defense spending.

When you have a strong economy of above 3.5% GDP growth you often get tax revenue growth of 5% to 10% because Corporate earnings grow >10% a do capital gains. When you have inflation of 2% you should be able to hold the spending side to 2%. In 1995-1996 NO ONE expected the surplus to come because tax revenues surged so unexpectedly.

We have another model, the states. Right now VA and a dozen other red states are seeing higher than budgeted revenue growth. Texas in the year ended Aug 2010 added 119,000 job, half of those created in the USA. CA lost 112,000 jobs. The state and local tax burden in TX is near 17% and in CA 24%. In the next two years a dozen red states are going to pay down debt and/or cut taxes while a dozen blue states will continue to run deficits and lost jobs.

Don’t we pay for medicare and SS? Is it anti-govt or anti-big-govt.

BTW jsfox, when the economy turns positive it tends to stay positive for a long time. The stimulus failed but the economy is still repairing. The biggest problem is confidence and that’s because Obama knows little about economics and what he knows is wrong. Confidence will spike now that he and Nancy are not writing legislation. It will take a while but Cap and Trade and other issues of concern will be removed overnight. Others will take longer. Corporations have repaired their balances sheets and the layoffs have restored high profits. They are growing earnings solidly and will get close to 10%. The GOPs timing will be pretty good. We may get back to 3.5% GDP growth and stay there with Obama frozen and the liberals gone.

Paygo is a scam. They’ve ‘granted’ paygo waivers to over 30 spending bills such as the stimulus.

the Tea Party is for real and they’re going to control at least the next 6 years.
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They will be popular as long as there is a Democrat in the WH and a Dem majority. If the Republicans win, the Tea Party will go into obscurity because Fox and the professional Rs will drop them. The pattern is, and will continue to be, when Dems win, Rs say they are conservative and have respect for Libertarians. When Rs win, they spend (military) and expand the size of government while a non-critical media scoffs at the silly Libertarians.

textee: Please tell us what you wipe with to keep yourself informed?
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More to the point.

Why would they have to take them over? Aren’t they running as Republicans? It’s not a 3rd political party. It’s a grass roots organization advocating a platform and candidates for either party. Democrats don’t like them but they’re getting religion. They’re going to say goodbye to at least 60 of their pals and have an opportunity to adjust to life in a tea party world knowing if the don’t control spending they will face a well funded competitor in their own primary and if they survive that another well funded competitor in the general election. Think what it must be like to be a Ben Nelson or Mary Landrieu and know if they vote for tax and spending increases they will lose their jobs. I think there are 37 Senators up for re-election in 2012. You think you hate the tea party. They’re not coming after you. How must they feel?

Huseien, you’ve convinced yourself to the point where you don’t even acknowledge what you’re saying is false. You’re hopeless.

Is it anti-govt or anti-big-govt.
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Well, if you’re not repulsed by our $1 trillion defense budget or the Patriot Act (or the government trying to outlaw abortions, say who can get married or enter the military, deny habeas corpus, indefinite detention, military commissions, warrantless wiretaps, non-trial of officials for war crimes…) than you’re not either. So “it” becomes empty rhetoric for votes.

The biggest problem is confidence and that’s because Obama knows little about economics and what he knows is wrong.

Oh really? The President’s knowledge, or lack thereof, is the cause of dwindling consumer confidence? That may just be the dumbest thing you’ve written yet. Your posts are so much warmed over tripe.
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Your revisionist history of Reagan is also typical of so-called conservatives. From Newsweek:

It’s doubtful, for example, that a contemporary Reagan figure would seek to solve every problem by cutting taxes. In 1981, the former California governor swept into office promising to slash taxes to their lowest-ever levels–and with the Economic Recovery Tax Act, that’s exactly what he did. When Reagan arrived in the White House, the top marginal tax rate was 70 percent; by 1987 it was 38.5 percent (roughly the same as the rate under Bill Clinton). But while today’s conservatives continue to call for lower taxes in the name of the Gipper–Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, for example, pressures Republicans to sign a “no new tax” pledge every election cycle–there’s simply no evidence in Reagan’s record to suggest that he would’ve followed his signature achievement by pushing for ever lower rates.
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In fact, much the opposite. In 1982, Reagan agreed to restore a third of the previous year’s massive cut. It was the largest tax increase in U.S. history. In 1983, he raised the gasoline tax by five cents a gallon and instituted a payroll-tax hike that helped fund Medicare and Social Security. In 1984, he eliminated loopholes worth $50 billion over three years. And in 1986, he supported the progressive Tax Reform Act, which hit businesses with a record-breaking $420 billion in new fees. When it came to taxation, there were two Reagans: the pre-1982 version, who did more than any other president to lighten America’s tax burden, and his post-1982 doppelgänger, who was willing (if not always happy) to compensate for gaps in the government’s revenue stream by raising rates. Today, a truly Reaganesque leader would recognize (like Reagan) that the heavy lifting was finished long ago; last year, for instance, taxes fell to their lowest level as a percentage of personal income since 1950. And he would dial back the antitax dogma as a result.

http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/09/what-would-reagan-really-do.html

I think you’re way over on defense spending and I am not repulsed by it. I’m fine with the Patriot act as is Obama and the Democrat Congress because they extended it as well as everything Obama pretended to be against when he ran for office.

The liberal problem is you can’t win debates because you never state the facts. Obama hasn’t moved the needle on a single issue in part because he’s never once states the opposition correctly. Conservatives are not anarchists. There is a role for Govt and a legitimate debate. One of the ideas of the tea party that might take hold is to hold tax revenues to a percent of GDP and force balanced budgets. Probably near 18%. Spending is now 24%

Our Trillion Dollar Defense

…that’s a link btw, it didn’t turn red…

Way late, as usual. Great thread
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“These are Republicans, not populists. They will line up, as the Ladies from Maine ultimately have, with the plutocrats. It’s not like any of these candidates have demonstrated any commitment to any principle”
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Sadly, if we sub dems in for repub’s, this still stands up fairly well.
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“just watch how some of the libertarian-oriented new people vote on Afghanistan and on anything resembling a Wall Street bailout.”
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As if their opposition revolves around principle and not the party affiliation of the current WH occupant. If it were Bush sitting there, they’d support anything he was down with. At least that’ll be my contention until they prove they have the convictions of Rand’s dad.

I was referring to the classic definition which is the allocation to the Dept of Defense not the entire National Security apparatus. $1T is too much and it should be reduced substantially but over time. But my point still stands about honest debate being pointless when you frame GOP goals of modest govt to anarchy. I thing you are going to find the Tea party smart and lucky. Smart because they will focus on spending and force discipline and lucky because capitalist societies don’t stay down long when Govt is held in check. Most corporations have repaired and are poised for growth. Revenue growth from the corporate sector will riise in excess of 5% at leas the next 3 years.

The 1986 Tax reconciliation act, (not sure of the exact name) lowered the highest marginal tax rate to 28%. It was a revenue neutral bill designed to increase the incentives to work and invest by reducing marginal RATES. It also eliminated a ton of loopholes. The type that build up year by year as congressmen take care of special customers.

Reagan wasn’t anti-gov he was for limited govt and he wasn’t trying to reduce revenues to the govt but to remove the perverse incentives.in an overly complicated tax code. From the 30′s to the 60′s rates were a crushing 90%. As a star actor he was only making 3 films a year. Why on earth work for 5 cents on a dollar? Reagan wanted the rich to pay more in taxes and that’s exactly what happened. Every time we cut marginal rates the proportion of income taxes collected from the top 5% increases.

BTW: Newsweek is a rag. That’s why they sold for $1. Believe nothing in Newsweek. Even Carville knocked their polling last week. They’re cartoonish.

honest debate being pointless when you frame GOP goals of modest govt to anarchy
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This not how I would frame the GOP goals. I believe that the GOP has no desire for modest government- they will expand presidential powers and increase government spending– they are for big government, increased spending. I am saying that you and the current GOP are not conservatives.

Ok, so why is every GOP candidate running on fiscal discipline. I thought it was because the head of their conservative and independent voters were about to explode in rage at the out of control spending. Apparently you think differently?

So they’re promising to cut spending but in reality are going to increase spending. So all of those new congressmen just want to serve one term? Or do you think we’re so stupid we won’t know and we’ll vote for them again anyway?

so why is every GOP candidate running on fiscal discipline.
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Rhetoric to get votes. Bumper-sticker candidacy.
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I thought it was because the head of their conservative and independent voters were about to explode in rage at the out of control spending.
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The “heads” want to get elected. Rage plays well on TV. The rage happens because a Dem is proposing spending to fix the problems of past fiscal irresponsibility and servitude of the elite (granted, the “fix” we got is not optimal and open to legitimate criticism). They (those we watch on TV) didn’t rage at Bush while he gave billions to the banks, before and after the crash, because the elites prefer republicans. The “voters” are trusting their favorite personalities.
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So they’re promising to cut spending but in reality are going to increase spending.
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Yes. And increase size of government. As per usual.
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So all of those new congressmen just want to serve one term?
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Not if Fox can help it.
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Or do you think we’re so stupid we won’t know and we’ll vote for them again anyway?
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You haven’t seen the pattern yet, why should now be different. And it isn’t stupidity, it’s an unhealthy trust of your favorite personalities.
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In fairness, I’ll say the Dems aren’t liberals and not mush different than the Rs– it’s like choosing between Coke or Pepsi. The difference, come campaign time, is that elites prefer Rs. Rs are for the 2% of Americans at the top (mostly because money wins elections, this will remain until campaign finance is reformed). Ds are too, but they will throw a bone to the rest of us occasionally.
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We would do well to have a Conservative party and a Liberal party come to prominance. That is why I said above that I hope that the media and Rs lose control of the Teaparty and voters select an actual conservative or libertarian to oppose Obama (#5.3, click the link to see how actual conservatives would govern). I’d have to vote for that candidate.

(oops, comment and link @ 5.6)

But Democrats don’t have any problems…Like PUMAS. Who helped get Scott Brown (R) elected in Massachusetts?

But Republicans have a Tea Party problem.

It’s an old trick, don’t look here – look over there.

Rove Explained

Not by the likes of Joe Kline