The Jon Stewart/FOX News Tit-for-Tat That Just Won't End

It's been nine days since diminuitive Jewish comedian Jon Stewart appeared on FOX News Sunday w/ Chris Wallace. If you haven't seen the whole interview, then I highly recommend you watch it here.
As much as FOX News hyped this interview, the pre-interview hype was nothing compared to the flurry of analysis that permeated the blogoshpere and TV airwaves, especially on cable, in the immediate aftermath. I would very much like to do a play-by-play breakdown of every pertinent segment on FOX News and The Daily Show since the interview, but that would be far too time-consuming to hold most people's attention. Instead, suffice it to say that, on the day after the interview aired, Stewart led his program with it. Apparently, he felt that the lead take-away from the interview was Chris Wallace's "admission" of FOX News's "bias." Stewart played a clip from the interview in which he asked Wallace if he thought "that FOX News is exactly the ideological equivalent of NBC News," and Chris responded that he thought FOX News was "the counterweight," saying, "I think that they have a liberal agenda, and I think we tell the other side of the story, but, since this is my show, I'm asking the questions."
In a hypertechnical and not-at-all funny critique of Wallace, Stewart tried to argue that by saying that FOX News tells "the other side of the story," C.W. had implicitly confessed that FOX News tells only one side of the story. According to Jon, "FOX News isn't fair and balanced. It's balancing the system, man!"
I should pause for a moment here and reveal a little bit about where I'm coming from. I started watching The Daily Show and The Colbert Report at almost exactly the same time that I started watching FOX News regularly (late 2006). When I want to get the left-wing viewpoint, I prefer Stewart and Colbert to MSNBC (because they're not as visceral and vitriolic) and CNN (because they're more interesting). Frankly, I think Stewart is really funny when he wants to be, but like a lot of comedians, he falls flat when he lets his ideology infect his humor. He has a very creative staff of writers; the only cheap shot I'll take at him is that I think he's more dependent on his writers than Colbert, but I could be wrong. (He did all right during the writers' strike of '07-'08.)
As for FOX, I personally do not believe that FOX News has a right-wing bias, and no sane person can believe that it's a propaganda outfit (like MSNBC). However, I do think it would be good if FOX News had one hour-long opinion/news analysis program hosted by a left-winger. (Juan Williams occasionally hosting The O'Reilly Factor doesn't count.) I must also admit that I don't mind MSNBC operating as a propaganda network; I don't even mind its anchors' stubborn and at times laughable insistence that they work for a serious news organization. I watch MSNBC periodically for much the same reason(s) that people like to go to the zoo and watch lesser-evolved primates hurl their feces at one another.
Now, then, back to Stewart's latest pique with FNC. After the interview and Stewart's subsequent send-up, PolitiFact got involved. For those of you who aren't familiar with this organization, it's a non-partisan web site known for its "Truth-O-Meter"®, which it uses to rate the accuracy of political claims. PolitiFact National is run by editors and reporters from the St. Petersburg Times, a newspaper I read whenever I'm in St. Petersburg. The PolitiFact state sites are run by news organizations that have partnered with the Times. Their purported mission is "sorting out the truth in politics." I'm not prepared to assert that the site has a political bias, but several of its ratings have given me reason to doubt its credibility. (For example, on the June 26, 2011, edition of ABC’s This Week with Christiane Amanpour, Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) said that Democrats "do not want to raise anybody's tax rates. That's never been on the table." PolitiFact rated Clyburn's blatantly false claim "Barely True," which, according to the Principles of PolitiFact and the Truth-O-Meter, means "an element of truth mixed with a lot of misinformation." Yet, this is the same rating it gave Congresswoman Michele Bachmann's demonstrably true claim that, "under Barack Obama, the last two years, the number of federal limousines for bureaucrats has increased 73 percent.") See, in his interview on FOX News Sunday, Jon stated emphatically that "FOX viewers" are "the most consistently misinformed media viewers," according to "every poll." PolitiFact rated Stewart's claim "False." Then, on last Tuesday's Daily Show, Jon Stewart accepted PolitiFact's "False" verdict and said, "I defer to their judgment, and I apologize for my mistake. To not do so would be irresponsible, and if I were to continue to [bla bla bla]." But alas, he just couldn't let it go. Stewart needed some sour grapes to wash the taste of crow out of his mouth, so he proceeded to fire off what he dubbed a "21-Lie Salute" to FOX News, rattling off a long list of claims seen/made on/by FOX News that received a "False" rating or worse. I spotted several issues with the items Stewart featured on his show, so I went to the PolitiFact web site to see how they explained their various classifications of what seemed to me to be either at least partially true statements or opinions that can't technically be assigned a truth value. There's a lot of material to go over, so I'll publish my criticism in a separate piece.
Anywho, Chris Wallace closed out his show this past Sunday by calling attention to Stewart's specious spin on his remark about telling "the other side of the story." Predictably, he told his viewers that "I wish I had said, 'the full story.'" (Stewart interpreted this as Wallace saying, "I accidentally told the truth and wish I could take it back.") He then proceeded to give a specific example of how FOX News tells both sides of the story when other networks don't, citing FOX News's coverage of the astonishingly poor response of the federal, state and local governments to the devastated Mississippi River Delta region in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. While the mainstream media was busy highlighting how FEMA dropped the ball (in what I'm sure was a bona fide attempt at hard-hitting journalism and not at all a cynical hit job on the Bush Administration), FOX News made sure its viewers were informed about who all bore responsibility for the abysmal response, including the bumbling mayor of New Orleans, Ray Nagin (D), and the administration of Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D). Stewart did not seem to care for that. The following night on The Daily Show, he played a few short clips of Wallace's comments and supplemented them with his own brand of derisive mockery. He tried to somehow bolster his by now thoroughly discredited claims that FOX News is not "fair & balanced" by playing a clip of William LaJeunesse reporting on the "Operation Fast and Furious" fiasco. Apparently, Jon took issue with LaJeunesse's remark that some say the operation was an innocent mistake. "Others believe it was allowed to happen to justify tougher gun laws in the U.S." Jon cut the clip off right after that last syllable. He was very excited. "Did you see that?" he exclaimed with childish delight. "He just threw it right in there. President Obama is either incompetent, making an innocent mistake, or the architect of an evil conspiracy to wreak violent carnage in Mexico as a way to take away Americans' guns." Flashing a cheesy grin, he added, "You know, both sides of the story." Then, feigning exasperation, he said, "Who said that America was involved in the type of conspiracy that, if true, could ultimately lead to the impeachment of a president? Who said it? [dumb voice] Others."
Yes, Jon, “others,” like NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre. (Seriously, who told you to use that as an example? Do you know how easy it was for me to find someone who suggested that this could be part of an sinister plot by the Obama Administration to push a political agenda? I just typed "ATF agent fired" into a search engine. I wasn't even looking for someone who made that claim; I was just trying to get the name of the operation right. This was one of the first videos that popped up!)
Stewart took some more shots at Wallace and FOX News in general, but at this point, I'm actually feeling sorry for the little guy (despite him having nearly everything I want out of life but haven't attained yet, viz. a great job, his own TV show, an adoring fan base, a wife & kids). So, I'll close this out with his parting shot at the man he actually called "a friend of mine" as he insulted the man's employer. Said Stewart, "you know what this whole victim thing makes FOX? Well, perhaps this term a friend of mine used once to describe our current presidential administration is most apt."
Cut to: clip of Wallace telling Bill O'Reilly, "They are the biggest bunch of crybabies I have dealt with in my 30 years in Washington."
Tomorrow: the back-and-forth continues as Bernie Goldberg calls Jon Stewart a racist, and Stewart ... well, he does something to himself "with his own mouth." That's all I'll tell you for now. I'll also have some boring commentary on economics or some crap.

Remains of the Day: 6/27/2011

इ've picked up on a lot of interesting stories इन थे न्यूज़ of late, and I'd like to comment on a few of them really quickly. First off, Republican dynamo Chris Christie appeared on "Meet the Press" yesterday. Here's the video:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Now, David Gregory is not a good interviewer, but this was a terrific performance by Christie. His answers were direct and to-the-point; the only dodge I caught was his answer to the Afghanistan question. Basically, Gregory asked Christie if he thought that the president was "pulling troops out too fast," and the Gov said:

You know, David, as the governor of New Jersey, I got to tell you, I'm not going
to put my judgment in place of the president of the United States who is
briefed on this much more extensively than I am. And so I'm just not going
to go there with that.

He also said that Obama "knows a lot more about this than I do. I'm not going to go down that road." Am I the only one who thought he did that on purpose? Surely an astute guy like Christie has formed an opinion about our ongoing operations in Afghanistan. Not sharing it when prompted sure seems like a clever way to further convince skeptics that he has no interest in running for president.

Also, I must express my frustration with FOX News's excessive coverage of the Casey Anthony trial. I actually turned to MSNBC multiple times this week to quench my thirst for news and analysis of topics I want to see/hear more about. Get it together, FOX!

Lastly, in a follow-up to something I wrote about earlier this month, the Generic Congressional Ballot continues to provide comfort to Republicans. Every Generic Ballot poll I’ve seen in recent weeks has the GOP tied with or leading the Dems. The only exception was a Democracy Corps survey that gave the Democrats a statistically insignificant one-point lead (46%-45%). Now, the latest Democracy Corps poll finds the GOP leading the Democrats by three points, 47%-44%. This is further evidence that the Democrats’ cowardly, cynical attempts to demagogue the Republicans on entitlement reform and other issues are not working.

In other news:

• Much to my dismay, former Texas Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams has abandoned his bid for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. Williams will instead run for the House of Representatives in the newly created 33rd Congressional District, which actually includes my hometown of Arlington.


• A poll by the Des Moines Register finds Michele Bachmann रुन्निंग नेक्क-एंड-नेक्क with Mitt Romney in Iowa.


• Former Illinois governor and Big Boy model Rod Blagojevich was found guilty on 17 of 20 counts Monday, including trying to auction off Barack Obama's vacated U.S. Senate seat in 2008.


• GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain tells FOX News's Juan Williams that he was "not offended" by Jon Stewart's ignorant, borderline racist impression of him but insists that Stewart doesn't like him because he's "an American black conservative."


• Speaking of ignorant bigots, David Carr.

The Margin-of-Error Guy

Take Mitt Romney, subtract the curate’s egg that is Romneycare, replace it with a few successful conservative reforms, add some serious foreign policy credentials, take away most of his name recognition and positive/negative press, and what do you get?

Answer: Jon Huntsman, Jr.

Okay, that’s a little too simplistic. Huntsman never rescued an Olympiad, and he doesn’t have near as much private-sector experience as Romney does. And, while Jon Huntsman, Sr.’s net worth dwarfs that of Romney, his eldest son is barely a tycoon by Republican standards. Then again, Huntsman’s background as a corporate executive isn’t nearly as ripe for distortion and attack. He’s also 13 years younger than Mitt and, in my opinion, is more charismatic. Maybe the better description would be: imagine a taller, younger Mitch Daniels with foreign policy experience.

Look, I’ll level with y’all. I normally avoid selling people on someone I don’t know personally, but the more I learn about Huntsman, the more bullish on him I become. I started touting him as a great potential candidate for president two years ago, which is why I was so mystified/disappointed when he accepted Obama’s appointment to be Ambassador to China. I remember thinking, What is that job going to consist of for the next four years, other than begging them to buy up more of our T-bills? On the plus side, it bolstered the former Utah governor’s already-impressive foreign policy creds. (In addition to running his family business's overseas operations in the Pacific Rim, he served as U.S. Ambassador to Singapore under the first President Bush and Deputy U.S. Trade Representative in the last administration.)

So, in a situation where I don’t know any of the candidates personally, I evaluate them on their records first, then on other factors, such as each one’s viability as the potential nominee. Huntsman clearly stood out from the rest of the pack on that first criterion, but should he decide to enter the race (as he is widely expected to do), he’ll have a lot of catching up to do before he attains "top-tier" status. He’s registering very little support (anywhere from 1 to 4 percent) in all of the polls I’ve seen. This is almost entirely due to his low name recognition, so we’ll have to see how well he does at introducing himself to most of the American public.

Of course, most of those polls have Sarah Palin, who I’ve repeatedly said will not run for president in 2012, and Rudy Giuliani, who isn’t even close to running, rounding out the top tier. Newt Gingrich and Herman Cain are the only other candidates to draw double-digit support. Once the Republican primary electorate knows that Palin is out, there will be a wide opening for somebody to move up in the polls and rival Romney’s frontrunner status. Trouble is, that opening is already pretty wide, and the “Palin void” – as I’m going to call it – is likely to get jammed up with several candidates making an incremental rise in the polls, rather than one contender who breaks away from the rest and surges into the lead, or at least a statistical dead heat, to close out the year. There’s also the chance that Romney could see a sharp drop in his support, like Giuliani did in '07. Recall that the early 2008 primaries actually turned out better for the GOP than many where expecting, with the race quickly boiling down to a three-way tie between Huckabee, Romney and McCain, while Obama quickly caught up to and overtook Hillary on the Democratic side, throwing what was supposed to be a cakewalk into a prolonged, increasingly nasty fight that lasted until June. (I don’t want to get too far off topic, so let me just cut off this tangent by saying that I don’t expect Gingrich to mount a comeback like McCain did, and that means Romney will become the heir apparent to the Republican presidential nomination in short order.)

A few people on the right are already speaking out against a Huntsman candidacy. Last month on Hannity, Michelle Malkin said she was “not looking for McCain-Lites, like Jon Huntsman,” the folks over at Verum Serum produced this video mocking Huntsman as a RINO ... with an actual rhinoceros. The Conservapedia article on Jon Huntsman, Jr. describes him as “a RINO who was born into an extremely wealthy family in Utah.” When last I checked, that entry had gone unedited since June 4th.

Still, you have to admit that, on paper, Huntsman looks to be a formidable contender. He has a more conservative record than any of the ex-governors currently running. (It helped that he had a cooperative, overwhelmingly Republican state legislature to work with, but so did Tim Pawlenty during his first term, and I defy anyone to compare Pawlenty’s record with Huntsman’s.) He flattened the state’s income tax, taking it from one of the most steeply graduated progressive rate schedules in the country to a flat rate of 5%. He signed legislation protecting unborn children from abortion, red meat for social conservatives. Maybe the most impressive achievement during his governorship was the establishment of the first statewide school voucher system in the U.S. Nothing drives the Left crazy like wildly successful Republican policies that Democrats and their union cronies fought tooth-and-nail. During his tenure, Pew Research Center dubbed Utah the "Best Managed State in America", and last year Forbes Magazine recognized the Beehive State as having the "Best Financial Situation in the Country" and being "America's Best State to Live In." Also, he averred his unequivocal support for the Path to Prosperity before any of the declared Republican candidates did the same. (In fairness, Gary Johnson has advocated some arguably more austere entitlement reforms, as has Michele Bachmann, who voted for the plan when it came before the House, but she was not yet a candidate at that time.)

If Huntsman joins the fray, then I will probably vote for him, but I’ll vote for the Republican in the general election no matter who it is. As for those of you who aren’t sold, let me ask you this: who else can you think of that has Mitt Romney’s managerial finesse, Newt Gingrich’s intellect, Michele Bachmann’s conservative bona fides and Tim Pawlenty’s disarming, down-to-earth demeanor? Before you answer, consider that this should be someone willing to run, with a comparable degree of foreign policy experience. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

A Reply to Someone Far More Well-Versed Than Austan Goolsbee

Yesterday, I was delighted to discover that someone had posted a lengthy reply to one of my recent columns. Because the commenter, identified as “GladYouWrote”, sounded much more informed, erudite and honest than Austan Goolsbee did in last week’s interview on The Colbert Report, I felt I could do no less in the way of a response than a new article on my home page.

First of all, I did not mean to attribute the growth in tax revenues under George W. Bush “singularly to lowering the top income tax rate,” but the federal income tax is the government’s main source of revenue; in any given year, individual income taxes alone account for between 45 and 50% of the government’s haul. Also, consider that, because some other major sources of revenue–such as payroll taxes–are (supposed to be) set aside for specified purposes, when the gov’t thinks we need more revenue, it’s only logical to focus first and foremost on the income tax.

GladYouWrote also took issue with my statement that “clearly, the government took in more revenue per annum under George W. Bush than it did under Bill Clinton,” saying, “without context that claim is disingenuous. As a proportion of GDP, 1992-1999 saw 18.7% return in the form of federal revenues, contrasted with only 17.6% return during the years 2001-2008.”

As the graph I displayed in one of my posts shows, tax revenues as a percentage of gross domestic product did hit a historic a historic high in 2000, while the old income tax rates were still in place, but this was obviously an unsustainable level of tax revenues, no matter what the rate structure. Notice that, even before the first round of tax cuts (EGTRRA) was enacted, revenues started to decline because of the recession. Perhaps this graph from OMB, which shows revenues and spending as a percentage of GDP over the past 60 years, may shed some more light on the historical levels.

GladYouWrote also says that I should “include significantly more analysis” to validate their success of the Bush tax rate cuts “than general unemployment and GDP growth.” I think that’s fair, but this suggestion was followed by somewhat of a non-sequitur: a series of references to a report by the CBO entitled “Policies for Increasing Economic Growth and Employment in 2010 and 2011.” I checked out this report, and, I have to say, I almost ended up forgoing this blurb in favor of a much more in-depth article critiquing the CBO’s report. (I have a tendency to get sucked down rabbit holes, which is one reason I prefer this to an in-person debate where one’s opportunities to make effective arguments & counter-arguments are undermined by cumbrous time restraints.) Thankfully, I was able to control myself, and at the risk of interrupting the flow of this column, let me make 3 quick remarks before I resume my reply to what GladYouWrote actually said:

• The report was mostly well-written, and I realize that the CBO is meant to provide objective analysis and not to author normative policy statements, but as I was reading this, I couldn’t help but wonder who, if anyone, edited it? For example, it began “After the most severe recession since the 1930s, the U.S. economy appears to be recovering.” What? Look, I’m not going to claim that an entire report is worthless just because the author made a few mistakes, but this particular report contained several highly suspect obiter dicta that could just as easily have been typos as evidence that whoever wrote the report is a very poor student of history.



• In the report’s Introduction and Summary, the CBO states that it is measuring the cost-effectiveness of the analyzed policies “by the cumulative effects on GDP and employment per dollar of budgetary cost and in the time patterns of those effects,” so it seems odd that that GladYouWrote would suggest that I use more ”than general unemployment and GDP growth” to evaluate the success of fiscal policies and then cite to a report that does just that.



• I can’t remember the last time I heard/saw someone who wasn’t an economics professor, gov’t-employed bean counter or policy analyst @ a think tank refer to the tax acts of 2001 and 2003 as EGTRRA and JGTRRA, respectively. I stopped using the terms myself years ago in favor of the commonly understood, if technically inaccurate, “Bush tax cuts.” Most people don’t seem to care about the distinction(s) between “tax cuts”/”tax rate cuts”/”tax relief”/”tax reform”/etc. This is a really minor point, but I think I’m glad to see there’s someone out there who is familiar with the correct names of the legislation.

Now then, back to the matter at hand: I could not find anything in the entire report stating that “EGTRRA and JGTRRA tax decreases produce less than 40 cents of economic output over five years for every dollar spent, as opposed to increased aid to the unemployed and low-income earners and direct government investment in short-term infrastructure and job creation, both of which produce an average of 75 cents more than straight-up tax relief.” The closest thing I could find to such a conclusion anywhere in the report was this statement: “CBO estimates that a two-year AMT patch and one-year deferral of the EGTRRA and JGTRRA tax increases would raise output cumulatively between 2010 and 2015 by $0.10 to $0.40 per dollar of total budgetary cost.” As for the part about “increased aid to the unemployed and low-income earners and direct government investment in short-term infrastructure and job creation” (which some of us prefer to refer to sardonically as “welfare & waste”), the CBO analyzed what the impact might be of, inter alia, “increasing aid to the unemployed” (from March 2010 until July 2011), “providing additional refundable tax credits for lower- and middle-income households in 2011,” and “investing in infrastructure.” In addition to “cost-effectiveness,” the CBO identified “timing” and “consistency with long-term fiscal objectives” as the key criteria for judging policy options. Before I go any further, I should just point out that the post GladYouWrote replied to was meant to be a repudiation of what Goolsbee said on Colbert, not a pitch for any particular policy going forward. I supplemented it with historical facts to prove that many of Goolsbee’s arguments lacked merit, and in doing so I suppose I ended up defending the soundness of EGTRRA and JGTRRA.

As I said, I don’t want this to become a deconstruction of the CBO report, so for now, let’s just remember that, like many other CBO reports, this was a policy analysis based on predictions/projections of what it thinks will happen if certain policies are implemented. My previous posts on this subject concerned the actual effects of past and current policies. To what extent the economic circumstances, as indicated by the various facts and figures I included, are/were attributable to those policies is not something I profess to know. Finally, I’ve never been one to begrudge wealthy individuals for their (legally compliant) success, which I suppose explains my political affiliation. It’s fair to say that many of these individuals don’t care to distribute the fruits of their labors to people who don’t need/deserve it, but GladYouWrote’s assertion that “the rich (despite what conservatives want desperately to believe) care little about distributing their acquired wealth to the overall economy” is too dubious to simply stand by itself, unsupported by any stated premises. Before I rebut that assertion, I’d like to know what the author meant by that.

Austan Goolsbee: Leading the Charge in the Obama Administration’s War on Reality

Okay, so I watched what Colbert billed as his “unedited, extended interview” with Austan Goolsbee online, and not surprisingly, he continued to make specious claims, this time focusing much of his time on deceiving the audience about Republican policies. He pitched that favorite old saw of the Left: that high-income tax cuts don’t work. Let me make this about as clear as I possibly can while still relying on specific, objectively verifiable facts: under the rate structure that was in place from 1993-2001, we never collected more than $2.03 trillion in one fiscal year. Under George W. Bush, the top income tax rate was lowered from 39.6% to 38.6% in 2001, then to 35% in 2003. In 2007, federal receipts totaled $2.6 trillion. The government actually saw an increase in revenues in 2008, but it made the ill-advised decision to give about $150 billion back as part of the first misbegotten stimulus. So, clearly, the government took in more revenue per annum under George W. Bush than it did under Bill Clinton. That is beyond dispute. So, when Austan Goolsbee says “the high-income tax cuts did not work the first time we passed them,” I wondered what he was thinking. I wish I could ask him what he meant by that. Unfortunately, it’s not as much fun refuting someone when I’m not sure what he means. If he’s talking about the Bush tax cuts, then let’s remember that there were actually 2 separate tax acts passed and signed into law by President Bush. Ostensibly the purpose of these tax cuts was to stimulate an economy that was reeling from the impact of a dot-com bust, the 9/11 attacks and a series of corporate scandals. In that regard, the tax cuts were an enormous success: the unemployment rate never went above 6½%, our GDP increased from $10.1 trillion in 2001 to $14.4 trillion in 2008, and federal revenues increased by 44% (from a low of $1.78 trillion in 2003 to nearly $2.6 trillion in 2007). Now, as for jobs, there are different ways to measure employment, and the Labor Department changes the controls with some frequency. (You can see ten years’ worth of raw data on the BLS’s web site here.) The standard measure–the figure you usually hear people refer to when they say the economy added/lost so many jobs–is what the Bureau of Labor Statistics calls the “seasonally-adjusted” employment level. By that standard, not only did the economy add 10 million jobs after the end of the recession; it added jobs every month for 52 consecutive months, a first in recorded history. By contrast, using the same metric, our economy has lost a net of 2.5 million jobs since Obama took office. This is important because when Goolsbee boasted about the “2.1 million jobs” that he claims were created in the “last 14 months,” he’s neglecting to mention the 4.2 million jobs that were lost during Obama’s first year in office. Now, is it fair to blame Obama or his policies for the loss of all those jobs? Of course not. But nor is it fair to blame George W. Bush or his policies. Like Bush, Obama inherited a bad economy, but unlike Bush, Obama has made things worse.
I also heard Goolsbee say that, during the last decade, “middle-class incomes fell by $2,000.” I’m not sure what, if anything, he’s basing that claim on or how he defines “middle-class,” but nearly everyone I know who was gainfully employed (and is willing to discuss their salary openly) saw their incomes increase from 2001 to 2008. Also, this is another example of Goolsbee using vague, ambiguous language so that it’s difficult to prove or disprove his claims. Is he talking about household income or per capita income? Is he going by the mean or the median? Stay tuned; I have more to say on this matter.

Austan Space (Sorry, I couldn’t think of a better pun.)

Last night, I saw Austan Goolsbee on The Colbert Report. If you don’t know who Austan Goolsbee is, then he’s the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. As far as I can tell, his job consists primarily of explaining this administration’s economic policies to the American public in a way that disguises how destructive and ideological these policies are. I’ve read some of his writings and watched several of his media appearances, and not surprisingly, he attempts to sell his policies the way most people on the Left do—by lying about them. He also misleads his audience when talking about Republican ideas and policies. Lest anyone think I’m just attacking someone with whom I disagree and not providing any evidence to back up my assertions, here is the video of the interview as it appeared on TV:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Apparently, the full interview lasted sixteen minutes, according to Colbert, and had to be edited down to the video embedded above, which is just under seven minutes. I’ve included the link to it in this post because I want to call attention to three specific things he said during the interview I saw, and this way, no one can fairly accuse me of taking his words out of context.

1. “The high-income tax rates are the lowest they’ve been in some 60 years.”

First of all, that’s not true. Second … well, there really is no need for a second point; just look at the facts. Right now, the highest federal individual income tax rate is 35%. 60 years ago, the highest federal income tax rate was 94%. That rate stayed in effect until 1954, when it was dropped to 91%. Since then, the federal tax rate on the highest individual income bracket was changed several times and ultimately dropped to 28% under the Tax Reform Act of 1986 (TRA86). One novel feature of TRA86 was the so-called “bubble rate.” The rate structure included four individual income tax brackets, and the rates were 15%/28%/33%/28%. The Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990, which was passed by a Democratic Congress and signed into law by Pres. George Bush, did away with this “bubble rate” and established a new surtax on the highest-income-earners, effectively raising the top tax rate on individual income to 31%. Maybe Austan misspoke, or maybe he just flat-out lied. Either way, there’s no disputing that what he said was false.

2. “The president has said he doesn’t think we can afford to keep rates at these historically low levels, and I think he’s totally right.”

OK, if Mr. Goolsbee had said that we can’t afford to keep taxes at these historically low levels, then I would agree, but he didn’t say “taxes;” he said “rates.” Look, I’m not prepared to admit that Austan Goolsbee is a smart guy, but I believe he’s the sort of person who chooses his words carefully. Of course, I don’t know what measure he has in mind when he says “levels,” but the rest of his statement sounds pretty clear. We already know that tax rates are not at a historical low, but what could be an objective measure of tax “levels”? How about total tax revenues as a share of the nation’s economy? According to the Congressional Budget Office, as a share of the nation’s GDP, the government’s take this year will be the lowest since 1950. Now the CBO projects that “total federal revenues will be about $2.2 trillion in 2010, a 3.3 percent increase from 2009,” when tax receipts were only 14.8% of GDP, but “total federal revenues will rebound sharply from the current historically low amounts relative to GDP starting in 2011.” (See this.) I’d just like to point out that an AP article I saw in February said that, in George W. Bush’s “last year in office, tax receipts were 17.5 percent of GDP, just below their 40-year average.” What this all boils down to is that taxes are too low, but the problem is that the people who aren’t paying their fair share are not the same people who Obama and the Democrats want to pay more taxes. The AP’s Stephen Ohlemacher explains the problem thusly:

Income tax rates remain unchanged. But many taxpayers are seeing their bills drop under Obama because of more generous tax credits for college students, working families, homebuyers and the working poor. Many of the changes were enacted as part of the big economic stimulus package passed in 2009.

So even if we can afford to maintain the current schedule of tax rates, I doubt a majority of the electorate will accept the kind of budget cutbacks that will be needed to balance the budget if we do that. Look, I’m a conservative (Actually, I prefer to call myself a classical liberal, but whatever.), but I’m also a pragmatist, and there’s no good reason why so many people pay little or nothing in federal taxes. If you’re making $50,000 a year, then I don’t care what your personal situation is: you should be feeding the kitty, even if you’re only paying $1,000 in income taxes. So, let’s keep the current rates where they are and get rid of a bunch of these costly deductions and tax credits. That would mean a higher effective tax rate for some people, but if Goolsbee is serious about deficit reduction, then he has to concede that those individuals should pay more.

3. “Let’s return to tax revenues from high-income people that are more like the historic norms.”

That line got a big round of applause. Once again, I believe that Austan Goolsbee choose the words he used here carefully and deliberately, so when he said, “Let’s return to tax revenues from high-income people that are more like the historic norms,” I thought, Yes, let’s. I don’t know how he defines “high-income people,” but this graph shows total tax revenues as a percentage of gross domestic product over the last four decades: As you can see, the CBO pegs the federal government’s average annual tax collection at just above 18% of GDP for the period shown in the graph above, so let’s call that the historic norm. So, what would a return to the historic norm mean, and what would it accomplish? According to the most recent numbers available, current-dollar GDP just topped $15 trillion in the first quarter of 2011. (You can read the “advance” estimate on the BEA’s website here.) Of course, that’s going to be revised, but for now, let’s just say that if real GDP totals $15 trillion for 2011, then based on “the historic norms” as shown, we should be collecting about $2.7 trillion in tax revenues, but Austan just said he wants to “return to tax revenues from high-income people that are more like the historic norms.” So, using Austan’s benchmark, that sounds like he’s content with the current levels of tax revenue the government is collecting from all other individuals, which would mean running the government on less than $2.7 trillion. (For the record, we haven’t done that since FY2006.) Now, if you’re the sort of person (as I am) who’s not content to deal with this in the abstract, then let’sat least agree that, for the budget to balance, total revenues must match or exceed total spending. So, assuming we can all agree on that point, it must follow that, to get our fiscal house in order, if we can somehow get tax revenues back up to a level that’s ”more like the historic norms,” then we must necessarily reduce federal spending to equal or lower levels. The problem with returning to “the historic norms” is that, historically, the U.S. government has run huge budget deficits. Thus, if we want to “return to tax revenues … that are more like the historic norms” and still balance the budget, then we should cap spending at a level below the historic norm. (Nick Gillespie & Veronique de Rugy of Reason Magazine have written extensively about this; they call it The 19 Percent Solution.)

As to these ”high-income people,” look, I don’t know what Austan’s thinking; I can only listen to what he’s saying and compare it to objectively verifiable facts. So, for simplicity’s sake, let’s talk about the top 5% of wage earners (since Obama’s fond of saying he “cut taxes for 95% of Americans”). What share of federal tax revenues, historically, has the government collected from the top 5%? Well, according to the CBO, in 2001, the last year we had a budget surplus, the share of the total federal tax burden shouldered by the Top 5% of households was 38.5%. That share hit a record high of 44.7% in 2006. Perhaps even more impressively, the Top 5%’s share of individual income tax liabilities increased from 55.2% to 60.9% during the same time period, and it hit an even 61.0% for 2007, the most recent fiscal year for which the CBO provides this data. (My source on the CBO web site can be seen here.) Bottom line: returning “to tax revenues from high-income people that are more like the historic norms” would likely mean collecting less tax revenue that one would think Mr. Goolsbee wants to see the government collect.

Tying all this together, if Austan truly believes that we can balance the budget just by raising taxes on a small minority of income earners and accomplish the rest through spending cuts, then he should explain: (1) what incomes are “high” enough to warrant an increase in the marginal rate; (2) how will you cut the budget down to a level that does not exceed total revenues; and (3) given that individuals in the highest income tax brackets are making more money, paying more in taxes and paying a larger share of the total tax bill than they were when the higher tax rates were in place, why should we return to the old rate schedule? I’d also like to hear him explain why he only thinks people at a certain income level should pay more taxes, but that’s more a question of fairness and not crucial to the policy goals he’s laid out.

The ten most important House races of 2010 : SFGate: Politics Blog

The ten most important House races of 2010 : SFGate: Politics Blog: "Kristi Noem returns from a hunting trip with a pickup full of dead birds"

The TOP 10 Reasons Tonight's Primaries Matter

Tuesday is Primary Election Day in Florida and Arizona (also in Alaska and Vermont, but who cares?). That’s right people! Some states still haven’t held their primaries yet! Anyway, none of us live in either of those states, so what should we care? Well, elections in these two states should be of national interest for many reasons, so before I returned to law school, I collected some information on what I considered the most intriguing campaigns in what have become refuges for New Yorkers and Californians, respectively, but first, a little background:

Arizona and Florida are two of the fastest-growing states in the country. They are also two of the most gerrymandered states in the country, and, of course, both states have large Latino populations. As a result of the 2000 Census, each state gained two congressional districts, and the GOP-controlled legislatures who redrew the boundaries wanted to make them as beneficial to Republicans as the Constitution allows. In Arizona, that meant splitting up the Democratic bastions of Phoenix and Tucson, and in Florida, then-House Majority Leader Mario Diaz-Balart (R) made sure the new 25th congressional district included his state House district, allowing him to run for the seat, which he won and still holds.

In the last two election cycles, however, Democrats have gained three districts from Republicans in each state. (An additional district in Florida was won by a Democrat in 2006 and flipped back to the GOP in 2008.) Now the GOP is targeting those districts—and one or two more—in a year that promises to be much better for Republicans. Over the past week or so, I compiled the following list of what I’m calling the top ten reasons tonight’s primary results are worth checking out. However, I’m only going to list eight of them. Why only eight? SHUT THE HELL UP, THAT’S WHY!!!

10. Will conservative insurgent Joe Miller defeat Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) in the Republican primary? Miller has attracted a lot of grassroots support and endorsements from conservative rock stars such as Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee, but Murkowski is not as vulnerable as some may think. “Palin's decision to wade into the primary race in her home state was always somewhat puzzling,” Chris Cillizza opined on his blog. “Murkowski is not beloved among all Alaska conservatives but neither did she create the sort of animosity within the base that a Sen. Bob Bennett, for example, did in Utah.”
7. Arizona’s 8th congressional district provides an excellent example of the kind of seats Republicans must win if they’re to take back the House this November. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) should be ripe for the pickin's. She won a Republican seat in 2006 and was narrowly re-elected in 2008. Over the past year-and-a-half, she has cast several votes that put her at odds with her constituency, supporting the President on TARP, health care, cap-&-trade and the $787 billion "stimulus" package. However, Giffords has been careful to attend to the issues her constituents care most about, foremost amongst them immigration. She’s also amassed a massive war chest that dwarfs the campaign account of any other House candidate in Arizona. This race also evinces the importance of party unity: Republicans have a top-tier candidate in former State Sen. Jonathan Paton, an Iraq War veteran and native of Tucson. Paton’s raised enough money to get on TV with campaign ads (This one is my favorite.), but he faces a tough primary challenge from another vet, Jesse Kelly. Kelly, an 29-year-old businessman and Marine Corps veteran, has proven himself an effective campaigner and fundraiser. Conventional wisdom says that Paton would be the stronger candidate against Giffords, but in this political climate, it may not matter.
6. Who will take on freshman Rep. and 1st-class a**hole Alan Grayson (D) in Florida's 8th congressional district? The bombastic multi-millionaire narrowly won his seat in 2008, and Republicans attracted a political heavyweight when former state House Speaker Daniel Webster (Yes, that’s his real name.) joined the race, but Orlando businessman Bruce O'Donoghue may be the only one who can compete with Grayson’s money. If you’re a fan of racial profiling, then you may be rooting for Dan Fanelli, a retired Naval officer and commercial airline pilot who was a piloting Boeing 727 on September 11, 2001. However, don’t count out Cuban-American banker and political activist Armando Gutierrez. Considering the political environment, it may not matter how much money Grayson spends, but the diverse cast of characters vying for the GOP nomination is something worth checking out.
5. See how badly Sen. John McCain (R) crushes J.D. Hayworth in the Arizona Senate primary. McCain is an American hero, and Hayworth is one of the few people who makes conservatives look bad. His boneheaded decision to challenge Arizona’s most popular public official makes Pat Buchanan’s quixotic quest for the presidency in 1992 look like a ... oh, forget it. I just wanted to use the phrase "quixotic quest."
4. The free-for-all in Florida's 2nd congressional district is nothing to scoff at. Since being elected to Congress in 1996, Rep. F. Allen Boyd (D) has never had a terribly difficult time getting re-elected. This year may be different, however; Boyd has all but abandoned his “Blue Dog” status, voting for TARP, the "stimulus" package, Cap-&-Trade and the health care overhaul. Five candidates are seeking the Republican nomination in Boyd's district, but the congressman’s biggest challenge is within his own party. Despite voting the party line on every major piece of legislation this session, Boyd is still facing a tough primary against Florida Senate Minority Leader Al Lawson, and the recent indictment of a Washington lobbyist with ties to Boyd has given his opponent "a fresh line of attack." To make things even more bizarre, earlier this month a group of mayors endorsed Lawson, then withdrew their endorsement on the eve of the primary. Even though none of the Republicans has been able to raise or spend much money, There’s little doubt the primary battle has weakened Boyd for the fall election; as of this month, he’s already spent a whopping $2.2 million on his campaign. Bottom line: an underfunded Republican dark horse w/ no political experience will take on a career politician in a moderately conservative district. Who wins is anybody’s guess. John McCain received 54% of the vote in this district, and The Cook Political Report, the Rothenberg Political Report and RealClearPolitics are all calling the race a tossup.
3. I forgot that I didn’t have time to write a piece on the Republican gubernatorial primary in Florida between state Attorney Gen. Bill McCollum and unscrupulous rich dude Rick Scott, a venture capitalist & former CEO of Columbia/HCA, but the next race on the list is really more interesting.
2. For the 4th time in nine years, Florida will get a new Attorney General. Former Hillsborough county prosecutor and FOX News analyst Pam Bondi is seeking the GOP nomination. Ordinarily I, being a very important person, wouldn’t care about these types of races, and I wouldn’t expect you to, either, but that doesn’t change the fact that Pamela Bondi is really, really good-looking. Also, she got a bum rap in most reports of a recent controversy involving a St. Bernard she rescued from a shelter after Hurricane Katrina. Apparently, the vet told her that the dog had serious health problems even before the Hurricane struck, and after the original owners tried to take him back, Pam had serious reservations about returning the dog, so of course she got portrayed as this horrible person who wouldn’t give a dog back to its loving family. What a crock. As St. Petersburg Times Columnist Sue Carlton explains, "the ugly mess ended peacefully, though not without tears. Bondi would send medication and food. The dog would go home." Worse still is that the infectious opprobrium that emanated from the drive-by media has pricked the ears of many canine-loving conservatives, who have posted comments all over the web that include copious references to Pam Bondi as a term that, ironically, is only appropriately used to describe a female dog.
1. Arguably the most interesting primary in a race for the U.S. House of Reps. is taking place in Arizona's 3rd congressional district, where the retirement of Rep. John Shadegg (R) set off a frenzy of Republican campaigns for his House seat. The identity of Shadegg’s successor is anybody’s guess. Will it be Ben Quayle, the son of former Vice Pres. Dan Quayle who’s taken up residence in Scottsdale? I’m not going to talk about Quayle’s fundraising or the recent scandal threatening to derail his campaign, in part because I wrote extensively about this race but seemed to have lost that file, so I’ll just copy and paste this excerpt from CQ Politics:

A good number have now jumped into the race, including ... entrepreneur Steve Moak. Former Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker, who switched from the gubernatorial contest to the House race in February, also had a good quarter.

Well behind were former state Rep. Sam Crump; former state Sens. Pamela Gorman and Jim Waring; and attorney Paulina Morris, though they are still considered possible contenders.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, responding to the Shadegg’s retirement decision, elevated this race to its list of top challenges for Republican House seats in November.

But the seat will be a tough one for Democrats to pick up, given its Republican registration advantage and the political climate. While Shadegg slipped a bit to a 54 percent to 42 percent win over Democratic tax lawyer Bob Lord, Arizona Sen. John McCain carried the district’s presidential vote by 56 percent to 42 percent vote over Democrat Barack Obama. President George W. Bush, at the top of the 2004 Republican ticket, topped Democrat John Kerry by 58 percent to 41 percent in the 3rd District.

My personal favorite in the race is Parker. He hasn’t raised as much as Quayle or Moak, and he’s only run two ads so far, but they’re good 'uns. He’s also scored a litany of endorsements from prominent local political figures, including his successor as Mayor of Paradise Valley, Scott P. LeMarr, as well as the mayors of Tempe and Scottsdale, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, former Congressman and state GOP chairman Matt Salmon, and Rep. Trent Franks (R). Waring has been endorsed by McCain, and the Phoenix Republic threw its support behind Morris.

Okay, there y’all go. I’ve got work to do.

Rasmussen: Republicans Widen Lead Over Democrats on Generic Ballot

Check out this latest story from Rasmussen Reports:

Generic Congressional Ballot

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Continuing a trend that began in late April, Republicans have widened their lead over Democrats in the Generic Ballot poll to seven points. This is a stunning turnaround from less than 8 months ago, when congressional Democrats had the same 7-point advantage over the GOP. One can only guess what the polls will show in April.

57% Would Like to Replace Entire Congress

57% Would Like to Replace Entire Congress

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