“Keep Your Fingers Crossed, Mitt!”: Romney’s Truth That Tells A Lie
So, no surprise, Mitt wins big last night in Nevada. He carries 91% of the 26% of the caucus goers who are Mormons, so that helps him carry overlapping categories like “extremely conservative” and “strong tea party supporter” too. But he also carries Evangelicals, so its pretty much a clean sweep for him of the extreme right of an extremely right wing Nevada Republican electorate.
More interesting were his victory remarks. You see him trying out Pavlovian culture war phrases for the Revanchist base, e.g. references to Obama’s “colleagues in the faculty lounge.” He’s not good at that—he doesn’t have the sheer ferocity required for it.
They key move he made in the speech, however, as Jonathan Chait predicted the other day, is a doubling down on hyping bad economic news and hoping that it stays bad. Last night—knowing that a decline to 8.3% unemployment was, while not good, clearly an improvement—he shifted his gaze to what economists call the u6 employment rate. The u6 is the measure, not only of the unemployed, but of those who have stopped looking for work, and those who want full time work, but who are working part time hours. It’s certainly an important metric, and, by definition, it’s always substantially higher than the unemployment rate proper.
So Romney correctly told the crowd that the “real” unemployment rate is “over 15%.” And he’s right. It’s 15.1% which is very high. Over 15% obviously sounds a lot worse than 8.3%, and suddenly introducing it into a discussion with regular voters enables Romney to play the unlikely role of “truth teller.” And talking about a “real” anything is always a nice touch for Republicans when referencing Obama because it implies that somehow Obama and the Democrats have been giving the country cooked figures or something. “Real? The guy faked his own birth certificate—he’s going to tell the country what the “real” unemployment numbers are??!”
But, as you can see in this chart, the u6 almost always perfectly tracks the conventional (u3) unemployment measure. It’s dropped from a high of 17.4%, at the height of the recession in 2009, and, like the u3, it also declined this month from last month’s 15.2%. So, as you would expect during a slow, sluggish, but continued recovery, it just keeps going down, just like the typical unemployment rate.
And that’s shows the limits of the “hype the bad news” Romney strategy. Now that he’s told the country about the u6 and started his baseline at “over 15%”, any decline below that number is going to look, by comparison, like a hoped for improvement. Than what does he do?
Nope, even the most clever rhetoric won’t work. What Romney really needs is the the unlikely duo of Merkel and Netanyahu to really wreck the world’s economy. Keep your fingers crossed, Mitt!
By: Rich Yeselson, Washington Monthly Political Animal, February 4, 2012
“Trying To Make The Economy Worse”: Last Friday The GOP Had A Really Bad Day
Last Friday the GOP had a really bad day. It didn’t come in the form of new polling results — or some new political scandal. It was delivered to them by the economic statistics:
Private sector jobs up 243,000 — almost 100,000 more than expected.
Unemployment rate down to 8.3 percent.
Twenty-three straight months of private sector jobs growth.
But you say, this is not bad news — this is good news. Not for the GOP and its chances of ousting President Obama, seizing control of the Senate or maintaining its majority in the House.
As Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell made ever so clear early last year, the Republican Leadership — and their backers on Wall Street — have one and only one goal: to defeat President Obama next fall. To do that, the GOP is betting against the American economy.
For the last two years they have done everything in their power to slow America’s recovery from the greatest economic meltdown since the Great Depression.
They have opposed virtually every element of the president’s American Jobs Act.
They brought the economy to the brink by threatening that they wouldn’t allow America to pay its bills during the debt ceiling standoff last year.
They tried their best to prevent extension of the payroll tax holiday and unemployment benefits that are so critical to maintaining buying power momentum as the economy begins to pick up speed.
And, of course, they advocate returning to the regulatory and fiscal policies that caused the Great Recession in the first place.
But the most significant thing they have done to stall the economic recovery has been their refusal to continue federal aid to state and local government.
In the last 23 months, the economy has created 3.7 million new private sector jobs. But during the same period, it has created only 3.165 net total jobs. That is because government — mainly state and local government — laid off a net of about 535,000 people.
If the Republicans in Congress had not refused to continue providing aid to state and local governments, it is likely that unemployment would be in the mid 7 percent range and the economy as a whole would have at least another half million jobs.
And we would also be more likely to have more private sector jobs as well, since the additional teachers and firefighters and policemen who the Republicans basically fired, would have had money to spend on the products and services produced by private businesses.
As much as they like to pretend they don’t agree with “Keynesian” economics, many Republicans completely understand that by refusing to provide aid to state and local government, they are hurting the economic recovery — and that is exactly what they are trying to do.
They have been perfectly willing to allow our kids to have fewer teachers and bigger class sizes, and to allow our cities to have fewer policemen and firefighters all to advance their political goal of slowing the economic recovery.
But despite their efforts to the contrary, the economy is beginning to gain traction. That is very important to the prospects of everyday Americans — and it is critically important politically.
Anyone who has ever tried to move a car that is stuck in the snow — or in the mud — knows what I mean. As long as the car just keeps spinning its wheels, there seems to be no hope. But after you’ve shaken and pushed, and put sand under the tires and the car finally begins to get the smallest amount of traction — everyone’s spirits change. Suddenly there is hope that you’re finally going to get the car moving again.
That’s what’s beginning to happen to the economy — and it will have an enormous effect on the attitudes of voters. It begins to give them hope that the president’s policies are, in fact, moving the economy in the right direction — that it actually is beginning to build up steam — that there is hope that middle class Americans are actually going to see their prospects begin to improve.
And it gives lie to the ridiculous statements of Mitt Romney, who continued to claim as late as last Friday that Barack Obama has made the economy “worse.”
The definition of “worse” is “not as good as it was before.” The economic disaster that was caused by the policies of the Bush administration — the same policies that Romney wants to bring back to the White House — caused the destruction of 8 million jobs. In fact, George Bush was the first president in modern American history to preside over net zero private sector job growth.
As soon as President Obama took office he put into place policies that reversed those jobs losses. Monthly private sector job losses declined continuously and finally turned positive — and the economy has added private sector jobs continuously for the last 23 months. In the last two months alone, the economy has added 446,000 new jobs. That is not worse. In fact, that is commonly known as better. And that is a huge problem for the GOP political narrative this fall.
In the next several weeks, Congress will rejoin the battle over the extension of the payroll tax holiday and unemployment benefits for those who are out of work for no fault of their own. Recall that this was the fight that involved the complete surrender of GOP opposition in the week leading to the Christmas holidays. Then, they agreed to a two month extension that guaranteed that the battle would be renewed — a fight that will once more highlight just how, when it comes to jobs, President Obama and the Democrats are doing battle with a “do nothing Republican Congress.”
There will likely be ups and downs in the jobs numbers over the next eight months. But as long as the economy continues to gain traction — and as long as Democrats continue to battle for jobs legislation in Congress — there will be many more bad days ahead for the GOP’s strategy of making themselves look better by trying to make the economy worse.
By: Robert Creamer, The Huffington Post, February 5, 2012
Newt Gingrich: Romney Is The “George Soros-Approved” Candidate
While Romney spent his victory speech in Nevada last night doubling down on his ”
Obama is bad for the economy” message, Gingrich opted for a more low-key press conference where he dispelled any rumors of an imminent withdrawal and vowed: “We will go to Tampa.” The rest of his remarks, however, made it clear who his real opponent is, not Obama but Obamney. Not only has his campaign resurrected “Obamneycare” (which has got to have Romney seeing red and Tim Pawlenty kicking himself), but last night he debuted another attack-label for Mitt “the Massachusetts moderate” Romney: he is now also the “George Soros-approved candidate,” a reference to the liberal financier loathed by the right.
Gingrich was talking about an interview in Davos where George Soros made the following remarks:
If it’s between Obama and Romney there isn’t all that much different, except for the crowd that they bring with them. Romney would have to take Gingrich or Santorum as a vice president and probably have some pretty extreme candidates on the Supreme Court. So that’s the downside.
Imagine the hysterical glee when Gingrich (or one of his staffers) heard that gem coming out of George Soros’ mouth. Now he can really go all out on the I’m-the-only-true-conservative-up-against-the-mean-old-Establishment-and-all-that-money, which is exactly what he did last night.
So we stopped and said, alright, the entire Establishment will be against us, the scale of Wall Street money starting with Goldman Sachs will be amazing, and the campaign will be based on things that aren’t true, then how do you define the campaign for the average American so they get to choose do they want two George Soros-approved candidates in the general election or would they like a conservative versus one George Soros-approved candidate.
Looks like Gingrich is settling in for the long fight after all. He made clear at the press conference that he plans to wrest as many delegates out of Romney’s balled-up fists as he can (with special attention, it seems, being paid to Ohio and Arizona). And along the way, you can be sure he’ll trot out the “George Soros-approved candidate” line at least another 4,000 times.
By: Andre Tartar, Daily Intel, February 5, 2012
Republican Indiana Secretary Of State Convicted Of Voter Fraud
Though President Ronald Reagan called the right to vote the “crown jewel of American liberties,” many Republicans around the country have begun demanding increased voting restrictions in the name of fighting “voter fraud.” Though actual cases of voting fraud are so rare that a voter is much more likely to be struck by lightningthan to commit fraud at the polls, one Republican official in Indiana has proved that lightning can strike himself.
Yesterday, a jury found Indiana Secretary of State Charlie White (R) guilty on six felony counts of voter fraud, theft, and perjury. The conviction cost White his job, though he plans to ask the judge to reduce the charges to misdemeanors and hopes to perhaps regain the position.
In a statement, Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) announced White’s deputy will take over on an interim basis:
I have chosen not to make a permanent appointment today out of respect for the judge’s authority to lessen the verdict to a misdemeanor and reinstate the elected office holder… If the felony convictions are not altered, I anticipate making a permanent appointment quickly.
But a second court case could ultimately give the job to Democrat Vop Osili, who lost to White in November 2010. A judge’s December 2011 ruling — currently on hold, pending appeal — held that due to the voter fraud charges, White’s election was invalid. Should that ruling survive the appeals process, Osili would assume the office.
Ironically, White’s now-removed 2010 campaign website listed election integrity as among his top concerns, and promised he would “protect and defend Indiana’s Voter ID law to ensure our elections are fair and protect the most basic and precious right and responsibility of our democracy-voting.”
By: Josh Israel, Think Progress, February 4, 2012
“The World We Live In”: Yes, Tax Cuts Increase The Deficit
On Thursday, House Republicans unanimously rejected a resolution from Rep. Gary Peters stating, among other things, that the Bush tax cuts added to the deficit. If you read the text they were voting on, it’s pretty clear that it wasn’t built for bipartisanship: It’s phrased to suggest that Bush was a liar and Republican governance was a fraud. That kind of thing doesn’t pick up votes across the aisle.
But there’s a more important economic debate here. Republicans occasionally flirt with the idea that tax cuts don’t increase deficits. Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has said this directly. Speaker John Boehner has decreed that tax cuts don’t need to be offset, but spending proposals do. But there’s a very easy way to see that Republicans don’t really mean this: They believe that tax cuts cause deficits when Democrats are behind them.
The ongoing debate over the payroll tax is a good example. When Republicans proposed a payroll tax cut as stimulus in 2009, it wasn’t offset. When they agreed to it in the 2010 tax deal, it wasn’t offset. But since it has become the White House’s favored policy, House Republicans — the same House Republicans who passed the CUTGO rules stating that spending proposals had to be paid for but tax cuts didn’t — are insisting the payroll tax cut be offset.
Then there’s the Bush tax cuts. When Republicans tally up Obama’s deficits over the last few years, they’re adding $620 billion for the two-year extension of the Bush tax cuts. When they project his deficits for the next five years, they’re assuming the extension of the Bush tax cuts. And they’re doing so explicitly. Earlier in the week, I worked with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities on a column summing up the projected budgetary impact of every single piece of legislation Obama had signed into law. In the end, my numbers showed, Obama has passed policies adding about a trillion dollars to the deficit. But Keith Hennessey, who directed the National Economic Council under George W. Bush, responded that I had ignored the trillions of dollars in deficits “from policies President Obama proposes to enact in the future (like extending most but not all tax cuts rates beyond 2012)”.
And Hennessey is right. Not about my analysis, which was restricted to actual policies, not proposed policies (should I also have subtracted $4 trillion from the deficit because Obama favors a deficit deal of that size?). But about the Bush tax cuts, which will add trillions of dollars to the deficit if Obama extends all or most of them in 2012.
Finally, there is a particularly odd claim you occasionally hear about the Bush tax cuts: Revenue increased in their aftermath. Dan Holler, the communications director for the Heritage Action, tweeted as much at me yesterday. “revenues increased between 2003 and 2007…how does @ezraklein argue Bush policies ‘pushed revenues’ down?”
This relies on mixing up the effects of inflation, economic growth, and taxes. The normal way to measure how much revenues a given tax regime is pulling in is to look at taxes as a percentage of GDP. In 2001, taxes revenues were 19.5 percent of GDP. In 2002, they fell to 17.6 percent of GDP. In 2003, 16.2 percent of GDP. In 2004, 16.1 percent of GDP. Some of that is the 2001 recession. But at no point in Bush’s presidency, and at no point since, have taxes returned to 19 percent of GDP.
Or, to put it slightly differently, if tax cuts actually increased revenues, then it would have been absurd for George W. Bush to propose tax cuts as a way of paying down the surplus. In that world, tax cuts would have made the surplus larger, and given the government even more of the people’s money. We would end up in a fiscal paradox, with the government constantly trying to give back its surplus, but ending up with an even larger surplus as a result. But that’s not the world we live in.
By: Ezra Klein, The Washington Post, February 3, 2012
Share This Blog
Unknown Feed- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
