Category Archives: Obama

Turn Out the Lights, the Revolution’s Over

03 Thursday Mar 2016

Posted by in Bernie Sanders, Democrats, Election 2016, Hillary Clinton, Obama, Politics

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Stick a fork in the Revolution!™, it’s done. Not that it had much of a chance from the get go. To illustrate this point, in Vermont, which by virtue of being Bernie’s home state should be the perfect proving ground for said revolution, turnout in the Democratic primary was down 13% over 2008. In Vermont. Where is that army of millennials and anti-Establishment types who will sweep Sanders into the White House and march in the streets of D.C. until Congress bends to his/their will? Must have taken a wrong turn at Burlington.

So the revolution was destined to be short-lived anyhoo, but Tuesday night killed it. History, finito, Dandy Don is singing, even Yogi Berra sez it’s over. The Sanders faithful probably won’t admit it, but if you look hard enough there’s probably a 90-year-old Japanese soldier on some remote island in the Pacific still fighting for the Emperor. Lord knows there are people in certain parts of this country who are still contesting the outcome of the Civil War. Those who fight for lost causes are always the last to know they’re lost.

After Super Tuesday the delegate count stands at somewhere in the neighborhood of 1005 for Hillary and 373 for Bernie. 2383 are needed to win the nomination, so it doesn’t take a rocket surgeon or a brain scientist to figure this one out.

And yes, I count the evil superdelegates. I know they are party leaders and elected officials of the Democratic Party, aka the (shudder) Establishment, and they overwhelmingly support Hillary. Why wouldn’t they? Hillary has spent decades in the Party fighting for Party candidates and Party causes. She is not some Bernie-come-lately who never wanted anything to do with Democrats until he wanted to run for president.

What killed the revolution? For one thing, the Sanders campaign’s great misunderestimation of the abiding strength and cohesion of the Obama coalition. You know, the one that decisively won the last two presidential elections. According to exit polls on Tuesday, 51% of Democratic voters said they want a continuation of Obama’s policies, 31% want a more liberal direction. So in hindsight it probably wasn’t a good idea to adopt a platform of running away from the Obama legacy and overturning his major accomplishments. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to call for Obama to be primaried in 2012, either. Ya think, Bern?

The Obama coalition? The voters without which no Democrat can win the nomination and without which no Democrat can win the General. Women, Latinos, Blacks. Women voted for Hillary in every state except Vermont. As was the case in South Carolina last Saturday, the Black vote went in the neighborhood of 85% for Hillary. In Texas, the Super Tuesday state with the largest Latino representation, 2/3 voted Clinton. Hillary also did well among White voters 45 and over. You know, the people who tend to show up on Election Day.

By contrast, Super Tuesday one again exposed Sanders’ greatest shortcoming—he doesn’t get minority support. It appears that he’s even stopped trying. Bernie put his major effort into and pinned his hopes on 5 Super Tuesday states—Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Colorado, Minnesota, and of course Vermont. Coincidentally, or maybe not, the 5 whitest states on the board. He won 4 of those.

The latest rationalization from the Sanders diehards just cracks me up. ‘Well, yeah….. Hillary won all those states, but she has no chance to get any of them in November, so there.’ So what? It’s called the Democratic Primary. Check out the list of states where Obama won primaries and caucuses in 2008. Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming. How many of those did he win in the General? How about zero.

It. Is. Over. And I could hear it in Hillary’s victory speech Tuesday night. She’s moved past Bernie and on to going after the presumptive Republican nominee, The Donald. Sanders has promised to keep going until the convention and I’m sure his faithful will follow. Why I don’t know. Better ask that Japanese soldier and the ‘South shall rise again’ crowd, I suppose.

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Climbing Aboard the Hillary Train

20 Saturday Feb 2016

Posted by in Bernie Sanders, Democrats, Election 2016, health care, Hillary Clinton, Obama, Politics, Wall Street

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I have an admission to make. It isn’t the popular or trendy one (but if you took a look in my closet you would see these are not words that affect my decisions) and it will almost certainly deny me a seat at the cool kid’s table in the cafeteria, but here goes.

Hi, my name is Craig and I’m a Hillary Clinton supporter.

There, I said it. Whew! This was not an easy destination for me. In 2008 I was the furthest thing you could get from a Clintonite. But times change, circumstances change, this isn’t 2008, and despite what the ardent Sandernistas would have us believe, Bernie Sanders ain’t no Barack Obama. And if my support for Hillary makes me a shill for corporations, a tool of Wall Street, a supporter of the oligarchy, a defender of The Establishment, and a lackey for the 1%, so be it. I’ve been called worse. What I do support and defend is reality, arithmetic, facts, and truth. However un-revolutionary that may be.

Unfortunately, I bear a few burdens and carry more than a few battle scars and subsequent lessons learned from this long, strange, trip we call life that lands me in the Clinton camp this time around. In no particular order:

There ain’t no free lunch, and anybody who tells me there is gets a great big ol’ sideways look and an “Unh huh, what’s the catch?” from me. It sounds good to an idealistic, innocent twenty-something—it would have to me many moons ago when I was that age and a babe in the woods of life. Not so much anymore. Everything costs something. And ‘somebody else will pay for it’ smells like 8-day-old road kill. Along this line, simple solutions get a wary eye from me, too. We have problems to be dealt with in this country, for sure. The undue influence of money in politics, access to health care, income inequality, the cost of a college education, to name a few. These are complex issues with many moving parts and the answers aren’t as easy as overturn Citizen’s United, Medicare for All, break up the banks, tax the rich, and free tuition. The fixes also aren’t quick. They will take time and commitment, not just a momentary Revolution!

I have a deep admiration and respect for President Obama. What this man has accomplished in the face of political adversity and opposition has been nothing short of remarkable. That opposition has come from both his enemies and his supposed friends, by the way. From the right because…well, just because that’s what they do, and from the left because of a good case of unrealistic expectations and unicorn hunting. As Democrats are wont to do, they show up for the presidential election and then check out. ‘OK, we elected you, now wave your magic wand and go do everything you promised. Mid-terms? What’s that? We’ll see you in 4 years.’ In spite of that, the list of Obama’s accomplishments is looooooooong. Saving the economy, health care reform, saving the auto industry…..it would take too much space for the entire roll call.

Now if my 2 choices to succeed Obama are one who embraces his accomplishments and his legacy, and promises to build on the foundation he has laid, or one who seldom misses an opportunity to take a shot at Obama, who called for Obama to be primaried in 2012, and who wants to risk tossing away 8 years of progress for a wish list of half-baked, pie-in -the-sky foolishness, that choice would be a no-brainer in my book.

I also carry the burden of having a pretty good civics education in my younger days, and a pretty good knowledge of how politics works from a few decades of observing and participating in the process. Promise all you want, what can you get done? And getting things done in our system requires the ability to form consensus and reach common ground with friend and foe alike. Which generally means first and foremost being a member of, and having a solid base of support in, one of one of the 2 major parties. Hillary Clinton is a Democrat, has been a Democrat, has worked with Democrats currently in the Congress, and has the confidence of her fellow Democrats in her ability to not only work with them but with Republicans as well. She knows from experience how the process works because as First Lady she watched her husband get things done despite a Republican Congress, and she was a Cabinet member when President Obama got things done despite a Republican Congress. Hillary also cares about, and has a proven commitment to, Democratic candidates other than herself. So far she has raised over $18 million for the DNC to assist in the down ballot races. Bernie? Zero.

Bernie Sanders never wanted to be affiliated with the Democratic Party until he decided to run for president. Who are the people in the Senate he works with? Here’s a little barometer. Bernie’s 3 big ideas are Medicare for All, free college tuition, and a tax on financial transactions which will (allegedly) cover the cost of not only tuition but his trillion-dollar infrastructure plan as well. He has introduced legislation in the Senate over the last 3 years dealing with all three of these issues. So far those three pieces of legislation have a combined total of one co-sponsor. One. Add that to the number of Sanders’ colleagues in the Senate who have endorsed his run for the nomination and you get—-still one.

I also know this about the average American voter. Socialist Democrat ain’t gonna play in Peoria. Try and explain it the Sanders people can do all they want, the American voter, the vast majority who aren’t political junkies and who begin to pay attention sometime after Labor Day, will hear “socialist” and no further. The Republican nominee and the GOP attack machine will beat that drum from nomination ‘til November and have Americans convinced that Bernie Sanders is a cross between Marx and Mao. What also won’t sell is higher taxes. The last presidential candidate to proudly run on that promise was a guy named Mondale. I believe he carried 1 state in the election of 1984. Want some more buzz words that the average voter doesn’t give two flying figs about? The Establishment, the 1%, Wall Street, oligarchy. These all mean something to political wonks and those of us who follow this stuff daily. The great majority, the people who ultimately decide the outcome of presidential elections…Do. Not. Care.

I also suffer from a working knowledge of arithmetic. Whether on taxes, health care, college tuition, infrastructure, or any other plank of the Sanders platform, the numbers just flat don’t add up. Across the board it is nothing more than the left’s version of voodoo economics. No different than ‘cutting taxes will bring in more revenue, create jobs, and spur economic growth for everyone’, aka trickle-down. We all know how that worked out. Just because the snake oil is being peddled by a salesman on the left instead of the right doesn’t make it any less snake oil.

Age and maturity have also tempered the need for everything to be exciting. “Single payer” gets the adrenaline pumping more than incrementally improving the ACA, “break up the banks” is more sexy than improving Dodd-Frank, and “free college tuition” has much more eye and ear appeal than making college more affordable and reducing student debt. Some have described what Hillary Clinton is proposing as boring and unambitious. One person’s boring and unambitious is another person’s real and achievable. I’ll take 70% of something over 100% of nothing six days a week and twice on Sunday.

Sometimes things just work out right. Hillary Clinton wasn’t meant to be the president to precede Barack Obama. After the Bush years Obama was the right person for the job. The country needed a major shift of historic proportions and we got it. However, Hillary is exactly the right person to be the president who succeeds Obama. The right policies, the right temperament, and a firm grip on reality and what is achievable under the circumstances. We don’t need no stinkin’ revolution.

Feckless? I Don’t Think So, Mitt

07 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by in Iran, Obama, Politics, Romney

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As I was reading Mitt Romney’s saber-rattling, tough talking, op-ed on Iran in the Washington Post yesterday, what jumped out at me was where Romney called President Obama “America’s most feckless president since Carter,” Feckless. Unsure of the meaning I did what any self-respecting 21st century American would do–I Googled it. Here’s what I found:

feck·less
adj.
1. Lacking purpose or vitality; feeble or ineffective.
2. Careless and irresponsible.

Careless and irresponsible. Maybe it’s just me, but I would consider the epitome of carelessness and irresponsibility in an American president to be rushing headlong into another war. Another war based on dubious claims from the usual suspects that if we don’t act immediately we face the imminent threat of seeing mushroom clouds over American cities. Haven’t we been here before?

President Obama properly addressed Romney, and the other Republican presidential candidates who have pretty much echoed Romney’s hawkishness, at his press conference yesterday:

“What’s said on the campaign trail, you know, those folks don’t have a lot of responsibilities,” Obama said. “They’re not commander in chief. And when I see the casualness with which some of these folks talk about war, I’m reminded of the costs involved in war. I’m reminded of the decision that I have to make, in terms of sending our young men and women into battle, and the impacts that has on their lives, the impact it has on our national security, the impact it has on our economy…“This is not a game,” Obama continued. “And there’s nothing casual about it.”

Careless and irresponsible. I don’t think so, Mitt.

One more thing about Romney’s op-ed. He closes with this:

“We can’t afford to wait much longer, and we certainly can’t afford to wait through four more years of an Obama administration. By then it will be far too late.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said much the same thing in his speech at AIPAC:

“Israel has patiently waited for the international community to resolve this issue. We’ve waited for diplomacy to work, we’ve waited for sanctions to work. None of us can afford to wait much longer,” he said.”

One thing to keep in mind when listening to the ‘we can’t wait’ crowd in Israel and in America. This ain’t the first time these boys have cried wolf:

1984: West German intelligence sources [say] that Iran’s production of a bomb “is entering its final stages.” US Senator Alan Cranston claims Iran is seven years away from making a weapon.

1992: Israeli parliamentarian Benjamin Netanyahu tells his colleagues that Iran is 3 to 5 years from being able to produce a nuclear weapon – and that the threat had to be “uprooted by an international front headed by the US.”

1992: Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres tells French TV that Iran was set to have nuclear warheads by 1999.

[I]n early 1992 a task force of the House Republican Research Committee claimed that there was a “98 percent certainty that Iran already had all (or virtually all) of the components required for two or three operational nuclear weapons.”

1995: The New York Times conveys the fears of senior US and Israeli officials that “Iran is much closer to producing nuclear weapons than previously thought” – about five years away – and that Iran’s nuclear bomb is “at the top of the list” of dangers in the coming decade.

1998:..Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld reports to Congress that Iran could build an intercontinental ballistic missile – one that could hit the US – within five years.

‘Nuff said.

Who Said It? Barack Obama or Herbert Hoover?

24 Sunday Jul 2011

Posted by in budget, economy, Obama

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Two presidents, two budget messages. One is Herbert Hoover in 1932, the other is President Obama yesterday. Guess which president made which statement. Here’s one:

“For years, the government has spent more money than it takes in.  The result is a lot of debt on our nation’s credit card – debt that unless we act will weaken our economy, cause higher interest rates for families, and force us to scale back things like education…

Now, folks in Washington like to blame one another for this problem.  But the truth is, neither party is blameless.  And both parties have a responsibility to do something about it.  Every day, families are figuring out how stretch their paychecks – struggling to cut what they can’t afford so they can pay for what’s really important.  It’s time for Washington to do the same thing.  But for that to happen, it means that Democrats and Republicans have to work together.  It means we need to put aside our differences to do what’s right for the country.  Everyone is going to have to be willing to compromise.  Otherwise, we’ll never get anything done.

That’s why we need a balanced approach to cutting the deficit.  We need an approach that goes after waste in the budget and gets rid of pet projects that cost billions of dollars.  We need an approach that makes some serious cuts to worthy programs – cuts I wouldn’t make under normal circumstances.  And we need an approach that asks everybody to do their part.”

Here’s the other:

“In framing this Budget, I have proceeded on the basis that the estimates for [the fiscal year] should ask for only the minimum amounts which are absolutely essential for the operation of the Government under existing law, after making due allowance for continuing appropriations. The appropriation estimates…reflect a drastic curtailment of the expenses of Federal activities in all directions where a consideration of the public welfare would permit it…. The welfare of the country demands that the financial integrity of the Federal Government be maintained…. [W]e are now in a period where Federal finances will not permit of the assumption of any obligations which will enlarge the expenditures to be met from the ordinary receipts of the Government…. To those individuals or groups who normally would importune the Congress to enact measures in which they are interested, I wish to say that the most patriotic duty which they can perform at this time is to themselves refrain and to discourage others from seeking any increase in the drain upon public finances…”

Which one was from President Hoover and which from President Obama? Does it matter? Is there any significant differentiation between the two? Scarecrow at Firedoglake:

“What we now face is a President who insists we are in a debt crisis that reputable economists say is phony, a product of deficit hysteria, political cynicism, and economic ignorance.. And he insists the debt crisis requires we take economically damaging steps that will harm the public by undermining popular and beneficial programs to preserve our future. He’s told us we must do this to achieve economic prosperity and that we can’t even have a meaningful conversation about the jobless until this is done so the debt problem is not just a distraction; solving it is a prerequisite to economic recovery. Eat your peas.

[…]

So take your pick. The White House is now occupied by a man who agrees with Herbert Hoover’s economics and is clueless about everything we learned about macroeconomics during or since the Great Depression, and he can’t be trusted with the family jewels . . . Or he should be supported because he’s a cynical liar who is willing to misinform the public, negotiate in bad faith, and mouth economic gibberish just to fool people.”

FYI, the first one is Obama, the second, Hoover.

All the Bad News That Fits

23 Saturday Jul 2011

Posted by in Afghanistan, budget, Congress, economy, Iraq, Medicaid, Medicare, Obama, Politics, Social Security, Unemployment, Wall Street

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“I met a girl who sang the blues, and I asked her for some happy news. She just smiled and turned away.”

In the latest episode of “As the Debt Ceiling Turns”; Boehner walks, Obama has a hissy fit, and Pelosi throws yet another plan into the mix:

“House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi acknowledged Friday that Democrats may reluctantly accept a last-minute compromise to avoid a default that involves up to $2.5 trillion in spending cuts — without agreed-upon new tax revenues — if Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security are protected from the debt limit brinksmanship.”

Yes, by all means, let’s cut spending. Never mind this:

“Companies are laying off employees at a level not seen in nearly a year, hobbling the job market and intensifying fears about the pace of the economic recovery.

Cisco Systems Inc., Lockheed Martin Corp. and troubled bookstore chain Borders Group Inc. are among those that have recently announced hefty cuts, while recent government numbers underscore how companies have shifted toward cutting jobs.

The increase in layoffs is a key reason why the U.S. recorded an average of only 21,500 new jobs over the past two months, far below the level needed to bring down unemployment, which now stands at 9.2%.”

Or this:

“Initial weekly unemployment claims increased to 418,000. The 4 week moving average is 421,250. A weekly average above 400,000 does not indicate job growth and we now have a pattern of perpetual disaster for U.S. citizens trying to earn a living.”

About that default deadline, is it August 2, August 10, or August 15? Nobody seems to know for sure.

The Money Party has some questions and answers on Obama’s handling of the budget never let a good crisis go to waste. Here’s just one:

“Question:  Why did President Obama put Social Security and Medicare on the table in the budget negotiations when 80% of the people oppose cuts to these programs?

Answer:  The president is not in office to represent those people.  He was selected, funded and carried over the finish line by corporate America.  Look at the appointment of Wall Streeter Timothy Geithner, the bailouts, and the failure to prosecute any of the crooks who caused the current recession. He’s serving the people who put him in office.  Those people don’t need Social Security and Medicare.”

Not only serving the people who put him in office, but serving those who he is depending on to keep him there:

“Among big fundraisers, Obama has drawn close to a third of his money from people in the finance industry, up from 20% during his 2008 campaign, according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics.

The amount raised so far is more than two-thirds what Wall Street elites helped Obama raise in his entire 2008 campaign. And it is enough to make the finance world the single largest source of big-ticket donations for Obama.”

While we cut the social safety net out from under our most vulnerable at home, billions are going unaccounted for in Afghanistan:

“SIGAR [Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction] found that U.S. agencies have limited visibility over U.S. cash that enters the Afghan economy — leaving it vulnerable to fraud and diversion to the insurgency…”SIGAR auditors found that U.S. agencies have not done all they can to safeguard U.S. funds, and the Afghan government has not provided the cooperation needed to build a strong, secure financial system.”

Also on the Endless War front, the State Department is telling the Special Inspector General in Iraq to mind his own business when it comes to State’s mercenary army in that country:

“By January 2012, the State Department will do something it’s never done before: command a mercenary army the size of a heavy combat brigade. That’s the plan to provide security for its diplomats in Iraq once the U.S. military withdraws. And no one outside State knows anything more, as the department has gone to war with its independent government watchdog to keep its plan a secret.

Stuart Bowen, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR), is essentially in the dark about one of the most complex and dangerous endeavors the State Department has ever undertaken, one with huge implications for the future of the United States in Iraq. “Our audit of the program is making no progress,” Bowen tells Danger Room.

For months, Bowen’s team has tried to get basic information out of the State Department about how it will command its assembled army of about 5,500 private security contractors. How many State contracting officials will oversee how many hired guns? What are the rules of engagement for the guards? What’s the system for reporting a security danger, and for directing the guards’ response?

And for months, the State Department’s management chief, former Ambassador Patrick Kennedy, has given Bowen a clear response: That’s not your jurisdiction. You just deal with reconstruction, not security. Never mind that Bowen has audited over $1.2 billion worth of security contracts over seven years.”

To be continued…unfortunately.

Greenwald: Obama Gutting Core Democratic Principles

22 Friday Jul 2011

Posted by in Democrats, drone strikes, George W. Bush, Libya, Medicare, Obama, Social Security, Wall Street

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Yet another gem from Glenn Greenwald in today’s Guardian:

“[I]n 2009, clear signs emerged that President Obama was eager to achieve what his right-predecessor could not: cut social security. Before he was even inaugurated, Obama echoed the right’s manipulative rhetorical tactic: that (along with Medicare) the program was in crisis and producing “red ink as far as the eye can see.” President-elect Obama thus vowed that these crown jewels of his party since the New Deal would be, as Politico reported, a “central part” of his efforts to reduce the deficit.

The next month, his top economic adviser, the Wall Street-friendly Larry Summers, also vowed specific benefit cuts to Time magazine. He then stacked his “deficit commission” with long-time advocates of social security cuts.

Many progressives, ebullient over the election of a Democratic president, chose to ignore these preliminary signs, unwilling to believe that their own party’s leader was as devoted as he claimed to attacking the social safety net. But some were more realistic. The popular liberal blogger and economist Duncan “Atrios” Black, who was one of the leaders of the campaign against Bush’s privatization scheme, vowed in response to these early reports:

The left … will create an epic 360-degree shitstorm if Obama and the Dems decide that cutting social security benefits is a good idea.

Fast forward to 2011: it is now beyond dispute that President Obama not only favours, but is the leading force in Washington pushing for, serious benefit cuts to both social security and Medicare.

[…]

The same Democratic president who supported the transfer of $700bn to bail out Wall Street banks, who earlier this year signed an extension of Bush’s massive tax cuts for the wealthy, and who has escalated America’s bankruptcy-inducing posture of Endless War, is now trying to reduce the debt by cutting benefits for America’s most vulnerable – at the exact time that economic insecurity and income inequality are at all-time highs.

Where is the “epic shitstorm” from the left which Black predicted? With a few exceptions – the liberal blog FiredogLake has assembled 50,000 Obama supporters vowing to withhold re-election support if he follows through, and a few other groups have begun organizing as well – it’s nowhere to be found.

Therein lies one of the most enduring attributes of Obama’s legacy: in many crucial areas, he has done more to subvert and weaken the left’s political agenda than a GOP president could have dreamed of achieving. So potent, so overarching, are tribal loyalties in American politics that partisans will support, or at least tolerate, any and all policies their party’s leader endorses – even if those policies are ones they long claimed to loathe.

[…]

He has gone further than his predecessor by waging an unprecedented war on whistleblowers, seizing the power to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process far from any battlefield, massively escalating drone attacks in multiple nations, and asserting the authority to unilaterally prosecute a war (in Libya) even in defiance of a Congressional vote against authorizing the war.

And now he is devoting all of his presidential power to cutting the entitlement programs that have been the defining hallmark of the Democratic party since Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. The silence from progressive partisans is deafening – and depressing, though sadly predictable.

[…]

Obama is now on the verge of injecting what until recently was the politically toxic and unattainable dream of Wall Street and the American right – attacks on the nation’s social safety net – into the heart and soul of the Democratic party’s platform. Those progressives who are guided more by party loyalty than actual belief will seamlessly transform from virulent opponents of such cuts into their primary defenders.

And thus will Obama succeed – yet again – in gutting not only core Democratic policies, but also the identity and power of the American Left.”

Remember the Public Option

22 Friday Jul 2011

Posted by in budget, Deficit, health care, Obama, Politics

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Shortly after the New York Times broke the story yesterday that a so-called “grand bargain” (which if reports are accurate is neither grand nor much of a bargain) had been reached between President Obama and Speaker Boehner, White House spokesmen immediately sprang into action. Press Secretary Jay Carney said “there is no deal, we’re not close to a deal” and Dan Pfeiffer tweeted:

“Anyone reporting a $3 trillion deal without revenues is incorrect. POTUS believes we need a balanced approach that includes revenues.”

The Times account may or may not be true, we shall see in the next few days I suspect, but reading a post at AMERICAblog this morning reminded me of previous occasions when the White House kinda sorta fudged a bit on the truth, to be generous.

Like when the same Dan Pfeiffer said in October of 2009 that the rumors about President Obama abandoning the public option as part of health care reform were “absolutely false” and that:

“In his September 9th address to Congress, President Obama made clear that he supports the public option because it has the potential to play an essential role in holding insurance companies accountable through choice and competition.  That continues to be the President’s position.”  

It was later revealed that in July the president had made a secret deal with hospital lobbyists that a public option would not be included in the final legislation. In March of 2010 Paul Hogarth at Huffington Post wrote:

“In other words, while Obama was still saying in September that he supports the public option (which kept us hopeful) – the President knew all along that it would never make it in the final bill. He never said he’d fight to include the public option, and repeatedly said he was “open” to other ways to achieve the same goal. But little did we know, the fix was in.”

I also recall that there was a similar situation with the pharmaceutical industry. The president continued to voice support for drug importation after another secret deal had already been cut with lobbyists that it wouldn’t be in the final legislation either.

FWIW.

Obama Hearts the “Gang of Six” Plan

20 Wednesday Jul 2011

Posted by in budget, Congress, economy, health care, Medicaid, Medicare, Obama, Politics, Social Security, Taxes, Unemployment

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President Obama was quick to endorse the latest deficit reduction plan, the one from the so-called “Gang of Six” released yesterday, calling it a “very significant step” and “broadly consistent with the approach he has advocated.” This without knowing the details. But the details weren’t really important, because all the major elements are indeed consistent with what the president wants in this deficit reduction shell game.

* Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security cuts.
* Further cuts in the top marginal income tax rates. (So much for that pledge to let the Bush tax cuts expire).
* Corporate tax cuts.
* The continuation of Reaganomics and Bushonomics. That would be the supply-side, tax cuts equals increased revenue and economic growth nonsense that we all know works so well.

The broad strokes of the “Gang of Six” plan (and just as an aside I wonder why Sen. Sanders is never included in any of these gangs? Not bi-partisany enough, I assume) are as follows:

An immediate $500 billion “down payment” on deficit reduction. All spending cuts, all from unnamed programs. A brilliant idea in a recession. The other $3.2 trillion in savings would be decided by various committees at some later date, enforced by spending caps. Congress would be required to get a 2/3 vote to exceed those caps. IOW, when the next recession hits, anybody looking for any assistance is SOL. David Dayen at Firedoglake:

“Simply put, this is a recipe for depression. When the economy suffered and stimulus would be required to increase aggregate demand, the 2/3 vote needed would simply put a stop to it. The New Deal would have been out of order under this regime. Same with the Recovery Act. Any spending from the federal government would be restricted as much as it is in the states. So there could only be the status quo or contraction in fiscal policy in the event of a recession, which is a perfect way to create a depression.”

Also in the down payment would be the institution of chained CPI, aka a cut in SS benefits, and repeal of the CLASS Act, which was a part of health care reform that the insurance lobby fought tooth and nail. From the New York Times, December of 2009:

“The Class Act, which the late Sen. Ted Kennedy considered his legacy, would allow people to buy long-term care insurance through payroll deductions and to receive cash if they’re later disabled, regardless of their age or of a previous health condition. “This is the best chance the baby boomers have to protect themselves from impoverishment if they need long-term care,” Mr. [Jim] Firman [president of the National Coalition on Aging] said.”

That is Part One. Part Two calls for an additional $200 billion in “healthcare savings,” aka Medicare and Medicaid cuts, and an $80 billion cut in the defense budget. That’s $80 billion over ten years, pocket change for the Pentagon. Gotta love that shared sacrifice.

In Part Two, the Finance Committee…

“…would be required to reduce tax rates to three tax brackets of rates: of 8-12 percent, 14-22 percent and 23-29 percent. The current top marginal rate is 35 percent. The corporate tax rate would be between 23 percent and 29 percent…”

And this little goodie for corporations as well:

“…tax reform would cease taxation of overseas profits.”

The corporate behemoths had been lobbying to get the tax on overseas profits reduced, allegedly under the guise of returning these profits for use in job creation, but that’s not how it worked before:

“Congress and the Bush administration gave companies a similar tax incentive, in 2005, in hopes of spurring domestic hiring and investment.

While the tax break lured 800 companies into bringing $312 billion back to the United States, 92 percent of that was used for dividends and stock buybacks, according to the nonpartisan National Bureau of Economic Research. The study concluded the program “did not increase domestic investment, employment or research and development.”

Indeed, 60 percent of the benefits went to 15 of the largest U.S. multinational companies — many of which laid off domestic workers, closed plants and shifted even more profits and resources abroad in hopes of cashing in on the next repatriation holiday.”

So let’s just eliminate the tax entirely. Nice.

More on the tax “reform” aspects of this plan:

“Coburn said the plan would reduce the deficit by $3.7 trillion over the next 10 years and increase tax revenues by $1 trillion by closing a variety of special tax breaks and havens. He also noted, however, that the Congressional Budget Office would score the plan as a $1.5 trillion tax cut because it would eliminate the Alternative Minimum Tax.”

I’m not sure how that works. How is $1 trillion in revenue increases scored as a $1.5 trillion tax cut? But I know for sure how this works, it doesn’t:

“It would generate a significant amount of revenue out of tax reform and reduction of tax rates, which authors believe would spur economic growth.”

And I believe in the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny.