inconvenient truths

Crooks and Liars: …. House Republicans swaggered into the White House Wednesday for the latest negotiation to end their economic hostage taking. One, Rep. Jeff Landry of Louisiana, refused to attend and be “lectured to by a president whose failed policies have put our children and grandchildren in a huge burden of debt.”

Sadly for Rep. Landry, the nation’s mounting debt is largely attributable to wars, a recession and tax policies President Obama inherited from his predecessor. Worse still, the Ryan 2012 budget proposal backed by almost every Republican in both houses of Congress would not only drain another $4 trillion in tax revenue from the Treasury, but fail all of the spending and balanced budget targets they themselves propose. Nevertheless, Republicans who voted seven times to double the debt ceiling under George W. Bush would risk the national economic suicide they admit would come to pass if their demands are not met.

Here, then, are 10 Inconvenient Truths About the Debt Ceiling:

1. Republican Leaders Agree U.S. Default Would Be a “Financial Disaster”
2. Ronald Reagan Tripled the National Debt
3. George W. Bush Doubled the National Debt
4. Republicans Voted Seven Times to Raise Debt Ceiling for President Bush
5. Federal Taxes Are Now at a 60 Year Low
6. Bush Tax Cuts Didn’t Pay for Themselves or Spur “Job Creators”
7. Ryan Budget Delivers Another Tax Cut Windfall for Wealthy
8. Ryan Budget Will Require Raising Debt Ceiling – Repeatedly
9. Tax Cuts Drive the Next Decade of Debt
10. $3 Trillion Tab for Unfunded Wars Remains Unpaid

More here

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this billion dollar thing….

Crooks and Liars: You know, there are just some things that look and sound ridiculous … this is one of them. John King looks like a fool with his touchy-feely screen while fantasizing about what one billion dollars could do.

His reference to one billion dollars goes to the current meme about what the Obama campaign 2012 might end up spending. Of course, he forgets to note a few things, like the absence of corporate cash funneled through anonymous 501(c)(4) associations, and the DNC’s announcement that they won’t accept corporate funds for the convention. I also thought it was interesting that King chose red states’ deficits as his comparison point for what that billion could do. Poor red states. They won’t see much of that money.

But you know, one billion dollars is an insane amount of money to have to raise to keep ahead of the TeaBirchers’ funding paths. As I write, I’m busily tracking over $5 million funneled through one public donor-advised fund to right-wing “policy” organizations. So while the Republicos want to make a big stinking deal out of the money spent by Obama’s side of things, just remember they’ll end up spending more between their secret money tunnels, their anonymous corporate donors’ ad buys, and the inevitable stirring-up of the “angry base” by the Tea Party.

More here

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Now, it is my fervent wish that the President’s campaign will raise several billion dollars to see off the Republicans’ anonymous corporate donations (much of it from the likes of the Koch brothers and from overseas).

But, naturally, the President is being attacked – from the right and far left – for being associated with something as ‘obscene’ as a billion dollar campaign.

So, who in the President’s team boasted that his campaign would raise a billion dollars? The truth? No one. But King suggests it was David Axelrod:

King: Listen to top Obama political advisor David Axelrod telling us over lunch recently the fundraising goal could top one billion dollars.

Check the transcript:

King: What’s the ball park we’re talking about, you see people throwing around figures like a billion dollars. More than a billion dollars.

Axelrod: I’m not going to put a number on it, obviously that would be more than we spent last time, I don’t know in this economy if that’s going to be that case. But it will be a lot of money, more than anybody would like to see spent…. (CNN cuts tape)

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So, it’s King – and only King – who mentions “a billion dollars”, not Axelrod – who actually shows some sensitivity about the issue in light of the fact that these are difficult times for many Americans.

So, King distorts what Axelrod said, then, em, delights his viewers with a snarky piece based on his distortion. Quality journalism, Mr King! Can’t wait for your piece on the Koch brothers and overseas funding of the Republicans’ election efforts 😉

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Twitter: @JohnKingCNN

CNN’s contact page for John King here

John King on Facebook

digby? i think i love you.

Digby: …it started off well, calling out the Governor on his union breaking goals. But then he … proceeded to denigrate the protesters as fools….

I’m so glad we have Jon Stewart around to reduce all political activities of ordinary people into a clown show. It makes it much easier to maintain our ironic distance. Silly people making noises in public is really beneath all smart liberals … the only respectable way for people to engage in politics is to let Jon Stewart explain it all to us in our special coded hipster humor…

… he’s telling liberals that it’s more important to behave in a dignified, fair fashion than to stand up for your beliefs in a way that could be perceived as unseemly or one-sided. That makes you as bad as the other side.

Except, of course, it really doesn’t. It’s really about what you’re fighting for. Tea partiers were trying to stop the federal government from reforming our health care system so that middle class workers will not go broke or die if they get sick. The Wisconsin protesters are trying to stop the Republican governor from making it illegal for them to belong to a union so that they can live a decent middle class life …

…. I’m sorry that people are misbehaving and failing to have the Oxford style debate that Stewart seems to think we should have … calls for “civility” are usually just a way to shut people up … this is why Colbert’s satire is so much more effective and, frankly, much braver. His satire is firmly aimed at the right, so he cannot take both sides. That’s why it works – it takes a position. By contrast, I’m increasingly not finding Jon’s church-lady finger wagging all that funny….

Read the full post here (also includes clips from the Daily Show)

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I loved this post so much, I almost hugged my monitor 😳 – it summed up everything I feel about Stewart, the kid who reckons he’s cool because he sneers at anyone who shows some real passion about a cause. Of course I loved him when he targeted Bush, but that’s because I thought he actually stood for what is right. I get it now, he just sneers at everyone – it’s the cool thing to do.

Stewart would, most probably, sneer at this man’s passion too:

State Rep Gordon Hintz – from Crooks and Liars