GOP Candidates in Denial
November 7, 2011
By Tom Maertens
Mankato Free Press
Herman Cain, the leading Republican candidate for president, told the Values Voter Summit in early October that “we are up against a lot of stupid people in America who do not have a clue.”
Recent events suggest Cain should look in the mirror. Among other things, he wants to put an electrified fence on the southern border to kill illegal immigrants from Mexico. He’s the guy who mocked Uzbekistan as “Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan,” apparently unaware that NATO and the U.S. depend on bases in Uzbekistan to supply our troops in Afghanistan. More recently, it has become clear that he doesn’t know China has nuclear weapons. We better hope he never gets that hypothetical 3:00 a.m. call.
His cluelessness doesn’t end there: Cain and his party are in denial over anything that involves facts or science unless there’s a payoff involved.
According to the National Academy of Sciences 97 percent to 98 percent of climate researchers support the scientific consensus about man-made global warming. Herman Cain’s party, on the other hand, rejects climate science. According to Public Policy Polling, only 21 percent of Republican voters in Iowa believe in global warming. Rick Perry for example has called climate science a “contrived phony mess.” Mark Lynas, author of “The God Species,” has pointed out that the Republican Party is unique: no other major political party in the world denies anthropogenic (man-made) global warming.
Then there is the Republican view of evolution: Rick Perry calls evolution a “theory that is out there,” perhaps like the theory that the moon is made of green cheese. According to PPP again, only 35 percent of Iowa Republicans believe in evolution.
These bizarre anti-science, anti-intellectual positions are given credibility because Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and the rest of the right-wing media use endless fear-mongering and misinformation to mobilize the ignorantsia in support of their corporatist agenda: global warming denial, lower taxes for the plutocrats, more corporate welfare, union-busting, and destroying environmental protections. As of October, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives had voted 168 times this year to undercut clean air and water laws, according to a New York Times editorial of October 14.
With 14 million Americans out of work, you would think that Republicans would have a jobs program. But the Republican leader of the Senate says that their number one goal is to defeat Obama, so they are obstructing economic recovery by doubling down on the policies that caused the disaster: lower taxes and more deregulation. Bruce Bartlett, a Treasury official in two Republican administrations, stated the obvious: lower taxes didn’t stimulate the economy under Bush 43 and there is no reason to think they would now.
As for deregulation, the AP reported October 30 that surveys show employers cite slack consumer demand as a far bigger impediment to increased hiring. The Bureau of Labor Statistics supports those conclusions. It found that 144,746 layoffs in the first half of this year were attributed to poor business demand while only 1,119 were attributed to government regulations.
Recent CBO figures show that from 1979 to 2007, average inflation-adjusted after-tax income for the top 1 percent grew by 275 percent; in contrast, after-tax income for the poorest fifth rose only 18 percent. The richest paid a top marginal rate of 91% under Eisenhower, yet the right screams "socialism!" at the very mention of returning the top tax bracket to 39.6%, as it was under Clinton.
Republicans are opposing a 5% tax on millionaires despite opinion polls that show even millionaires believe they should pay more taxes. But the middle class is being told that it must sacrifice, that its future is going to have to be put on hold in the name of austerity.
Republican policy for the last 30 years has been to redistribute wealth upward. That means tax cuts for the wealthy, austerity for the schlubs.
Graydon Carter, Vanity Fair editor, wrote that, “…The chain of catastrophic bets made over the past decade by a few hundred bankers may well turn out to be the greatest non-violent crime against humanity in history” involving losses that may reach $197 trillion. Yet Republicans oppose the financial reform bill and are attempting to demonize the authors, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank.
The Occupy-Wall-Street protesters understand what happened; Wall Street insiders made out like bandits because many of them are bandits who produce nothing, destroy value, create more poor and homeless, and pay themselves huge salaries and bonuses in the process with other people's money.
There is no shortage of stupid and clueless people – including criminals -- but it’s unlikely Cain will figure it out.
By Tom Maertens
Mankato Free Press
Herman Cain, the leading Republican candidate for president, told the Values Voter Summit in early October that “we are up against a lot of stupid people in America who do not have a clue.”
Recent events suggest Cain should look in the mirror. Among other things, he wants to put an electrified fence on the southern border to kill illegal immigrants from Mexico. He’s the guy who mocked Uzbekistan as “Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan,” apparently unaware that NATO and the U.S. depend on bases in Uzbekistan to supply our troops in Afghanistan. More recently, it has become clear that he doesn’t know China has nuclear weapons. We better hope he never gets that hypothetical 3:00 a.m. call.
His cluelessness doesn’t end there: Cain and his party are in denial over anything that involves facts or science unless there’s a payoff involved.
According to the National Academy of Sciences 97 percent to 98 percent of climate researchers support the scientific consensus about man-made global warming. Herman Cain’s party, on the other hand, rejects climate science. According to Public Policy Polling, only 21 percent of Republican voters in Iowa believe in global warming. Rick Perry for example has called climate science a “contrived phony mess.” Mark Lynas, author of “The God Species,” has pointed out that the Republican Party is unique: no other major political party in the world denies anthropogenic (man-made) global warming.
Then there is the Republican view of evolution: Rick Perry calls evolution a “theory that is out there,” perhaps like the theory that the moon is made of green cheese. According to PPP again, only 35 percent of Iowa Republicans believe in evolution.
These bizarre anti-science, anti-intellectual positions are given credibility because Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and the rest of the right-wing media use endless fear-mongering and misinformation to mobilize the ignorantsia in support of their corporatist agenda: global warming denial, lower taxes for the plutocrats, more corporate welfare, union-busting, and destroying environmental protections. As of October, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives had voted 168 times this year to undercut clean air and water laws, according to a New York Times editorial of October 14.
With 14 million Americans out of work, you would think that Republicans would have a jobs program. But the Republican leader of the Senate says that their number one goal is to defeat Obama, so they are obstructing economic recovery by doubling down on the policies that caused the disaster: lower taxes and more deregulation. Bruce Bartlett, a Treasury official in two Republican administrations, stated the obvious: lower taxes didn’t stimulate the economy under Bush 43 and there is no reason to think they would now.
As for deregulation, the AP reported October 30 that surveys show employers cite slack consumer demand as a far bigger impediment to increased hiring. The Bureau of Labor Statistics supports those conclusions. It found that 144,746 layoffs in the first half of this year were attributed to poor business demand while only 1,119 were attributed to government regulations.
Recent CBO figures show that from 1979 to 2007, average inflation-adjusted after-tax income for the top 1 percent grew by 275 percent; in contrast, after-tax income for the poorest fifth rose only 18 percent. The richest paid a top marginal rate of 91% under Eisenhower, yet the right screams "socialism!" at the very mention of returning the top tax bracket to 39.6%, as it was under Clinton.
Republicans are opposing a 5% tax on millionaires despite opinion polls that show even millionaires believe they should pay more taxes. But the middle class is being told that it must sacrifice, that its future is going to have to be put on hold in the name of austerity.
Republican policy for the last 30 years has been to redistribute wealth upward. That means tax cuts for the wealthy, austerity for the schlubs.
Graydon Carter, Vanity Fair editor, wrote that, “…The chain of catastrophic bets made over the past decade by a few hundred bankers may well turn out to be the greatest non-violent crime against humanity in history” involving losses that may reach $197 trillion. Yet Republicans oppose the financial reform bill and are attempting to demonize the authors, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank.
The Occupy-Wall-Street protesters understand what happened; Wall Street insiders made out like bandits because many of them are bandits who produce nothing, destroy value, create more poor and homeless, and pay themselves huge salaries and bonuses in the process with other people's money.
There is no shortage of stupid and clueless people – including criminals -- but it’s unlikely Cain will figure it out.
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1 Comments:
I commend Mr. Maertens for pointing out some of the short-comings of current candidates and wonder why he would bring up Barney Frank in a positive light with no mention Frank's entanglement with Fannie Mae. Obtaining a job at Fannie Mae for a lover is questionable at best, defending Fannie Mae and refusing to examine the stability of the program is worse (for a nice overview, Bing will take you to a Boston Globe article "Stance on Fannie and Freddie Dogs Frank"). Vox Verax could increase their credibility by telling the entire truth on both sides of the aisle.
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