"Even a stopped clock" etc. etc.

Uber-conservative "Red State" blogger Erik Erickson spills the beans on his party:

 "I’m just not sure what the Republican Party really stands for any more other than telling Obama no and telling our own corporate interests yes. That’s not much of a platform."

John Stewart takes down Obamacare's critics - must see!

The Daily Show
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Joe Sarborough out of his "stunningly superficial" depth

Joe Scarborough, once again, proves that sidekick Mika's dad, Zbigniew Brzezinski, was spot on with his observation that the Morning Joe host was "stunningly superficial."

 Greg Sargent @ Plumline:

Joe Scarborough and Paul Krugman are having a very interesting argument that offers a useful peek into Beltway deficit mania. It’s a reminder that even as the deficit as a share of GDP has begun to come down, and even as President Obama is trying to refocus the conversation (to some degree) on a more progressive second term agenda, the Beltway Deficit Feedback Loop is alive and well.

To summarize, Krugman went on Morning Joe the other day and reiterated his view that the deficit is mostly a function of the bad economy, and that it isn’t the long term menace to American civilization that the deficit hysterics — who are really motivated by a desire to shrink government — would have you believe. Scarborough responded with this:

Paul Krugman vs. the world

Of course, Krugman isn’t really isolated in this view. Joe Weisenthal responded this morning to Scarborough with a list of 10 prominent economists and public officials who largely agree with Krugman that deficit hysteria is misguided and overblown. As Weisenthal puts it: “there are plenty of economists and economically-literate minds who think that, to varying degrees, the deficit is not what we should be worrying about.”

"The Right's Latest Tax Lie"

 Michael Lind @ Salon:

The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., has always had a special place in my heart. In the late 1980s, during the presidency of George Herbert Walker Bush, the right-wing think tank provided me with my first job as a young conservative intellectual. My first assignment was to write a policy brief about presidential war powers. I was removed from the project after I wrote a draft that began with the observation that the U.S. Constitution divides war powers between Congress and the president, and gives the most important war powers — the power to declare war and to fund it — to Congress. The higher-ups at Heritage reassigned the paper to a Wall Street Journal staffer, who provided them with what they wanted: a brief arguing that the president has absolute, uncontrollable power in foreign affairs.

One of my next assignments was to write a policy paper justifying a forthcoming bill from the late Sen. Jesse Helms, a belligerent reactionary from North Carolina. When I met with the senator’s staff, I was told to wait because Helms wasn’t sure what he was going to put in the bill. After I failed to turn in the policy brief on time, I received an official reprimand from my supervisor, which I treasured until I lost it during a move. The reprimand said, in effect, that at Heritage we write policy papers first and add the facts later.

Things went downhill. I soon left Heritage and, a few years later, the conservative movement altogether. When several colleagues and I founded the New America Foundation in the late 1990s, I held up Heritage as a model of what a genuine think tank ought not to be.

I am amused to report that my former colleagues at the Heritage Foundation have lost none of their willingness to sacrifice truth to propaganda. The Heritage Foundation has published an “Index of Dependence on Government” by William W. Beach and Patrick Tyrrell that seeks to bolster Mitt Romney’s theme that at least 47 percent of Americans are parasitic, government-dependent “takers” rather than “makers” (hat tip to Thomas B. Edsall):

Paul Ryan's crackpot 2005 Social Security Privatization scheme would have brought the entire economy under state control

Wonkblog turned up this "believe it or not" moment in the history of crackpot "Ryan Plans":

Ryan’s Social Security privatization proposal,  the Social Security Personal Savings Guarantee and Prosperity Act of 2005, which he sponsored along with then-Sen. John Sununu (whose father has been a prominent Romney surrogate), would have allowed workers to funnel an average of 6.4 percent of their 12.4 percent payroll-tax contribution to a private account. Lower-income workers would be able to divert more of their wages, as the plan allows 10 percent of income up to $10,000 and 5 percent of income up to the payroll tax cap to be diverted. By default, the private account would be invested in a portfolio set by the Social Security Administration of 65 percent stocks and 35 percent bonds. Workers could choose an 80/20 stock-bond portfolio, or a 50-50 portfolio, but would not be able to pick individual stocks or bonds. At retirement, all participants in the plan would be required to buy an annuity.

Tell it to Paul Ryan

The Social Security Administration concluded that the Ryan-Sununu plan would require huge increases in general budget revenue to make up the shortfall left in payroll tax revenue. Specifically, revenue would have to increase by 1.5 percent of GDP every year, an analysis by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities found, or about $225 billion at current GDP. That’s a big honking tax hike. What’s more, under the plan, investments in the stock and bond markets would skyrocket such that by 2050, every single stock or bond in the United States would be owned by a Social Security account. This would mean that the portfolio managers at the Social Security Administration would more or less control the entire means of production in the United States.

Government Spending in Recessions Under Reagan vs. Obama

As preface to this post, let's remind ourselves of Keynesian guru Dick Cheney's cogent observation, "Reagan taught us deficits don't matter."

Here's Paul Krugman, ensconced as usual at The New York Times, with data on government spending in a recession under Iconic Fiscal Conservative St. Ronald "Gipper" Reagan compared to government spending under Radical Kenyan Socialist Barack Hussein Obama:

This is just current government expenditures divided by the GDP deflator, starting from 1982 (Quarter)IV and 2009 (Quarter)II; no attempt to separate out unemployment benefits, other transfers, etc.. Slightly weaker than the purchases-only comparison, mainly because unemployment benefits fell faster under Reagan, but the story remains the same:

The Man from Bain

The expose of Willard Mitt Romney's role as a job-killer with Bain Capital, currently being circulated - in the most ironic electoral gambit in my memory - by a pro-Gingrich "SuperPAC," funded to the tune of $5 million by a right-wing casino magnate and friend of Newt's.