Who IS this guy?!

'Niceguy' Eddie

Political Talk Show Host and Internet Radio Personality. My show, In My Humble Opinion, aired on RainbowRadio from 2015-2017, and has returned for 2021! Feel free to contact me at niceguy9418@usa.com. You can also friend me on Facebook.

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Thursday, January 28, 2010

WHY the Republicans will ALWAYS run up the National Debt

I'd like to think that I'm not one to buy into paranoid copnspiracy theories too easily.  I mean... I've said many times that the Skeptic's Dictionary is my bible.  I think Glenn Beck is a delusional loon in desperate need of medication.  So, yeah... I'd like to think I know crazy when I see it.  Also, I'd like to think that, at least in the long term, people tend to be rational.  (Or failing that, then at least in the short term!)  And that's what's so crazy about the insane idea I'm about to present: It's really, truly rational, from the point of view of those on the Right.

In my last post I think I clearly demonstrated that, despite their rhetoric, it's Republicans rather than Democrats that spend like drunken sailors and run up huge debts.  And at the end I said that I'd explain why this is the case, or at least has been since 1980.  And it sounds crazy, unless you're just predisposed to believe ANYTHING about Republican's, but I'm actually not one of those types.  In fact when I first read this from some poster on MMFA a year or two ago, I dismissed it as "liberal bullshit." (Which, as a liberal, I think I'm especially entitled to call out from time to time! LOL) But the more I think about the more I appreciate the genius of it.

One of the things that you always hear from the Right is that we've got to rein in (get rid of) entitlements.  It's a nice buzzword that you can throw out there if you want to sound intelligent to a conservative crowd. (Of course, sounding intelligent isn't the same as BEING intelligent, but you won't get along with these people using your fancy librul edukashun and yer fancy librul LOGIC and REASONIN'.)  ANYWAY "entitlements" is a fancy way of saying, "Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Welfare, Food Stamps, etc..." and if you REALLY but into it you can throw in Public Schools, and just about everything else that most reasonable, moderate people have come to expect their governement to provide.  You see... the Right HATES these things.  They HATE they idea that someone might get something they didn't "earn" and that someone else (on the Right) is losing an opportunity to profit from providing it to them.  You see, in their ideal world, you'd have two classes: Company Owners and the Shleps who work for them.  One group would have pretty much EVRERYTHING and the other would have whatever the HAVES felt they were worth.  So... yeah, pretty much nothing.  It's the kind of environment revolutions spring from, but most on the Right think that little more than a bluff these days, at least in this country.  Anyway, suffice to say that ANYTHING that HELPS PEOPLE has to go.  After all, if people stay poor, then the cost of labor goes down, and it's supply-side economic heaven.  (Which is to say, HELL, but I'll save that for another post!)

So they want to kill Social Security, Medicare, etc... But the pretty much know they can't actually RUN on that platform.  President Eisenhower knew this to be true:

"Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."

(What happened to these kinds of Republicans?!)

So what to do? How do we get people on board with this?  Well, one way would be to run up huge deficits every year, and get to the point where financing the National Debt (that means the annual interest payments) would end up consuming so much of the Federal Budget that we would be left with NO CHOICE but to gut or cut these programs.  Now it's not like they can do this in just one year.  People might notice.  And congress, and the public will never go along with it, right?  But this has been going on for THIRTY YEARS now! Two or three generations of Americans have grown up knowing nothing but huge federal deficits, and have come of age to the constannt drum beat of how there's a crisis in Social Security and a crisis in Medicare... And by now, we almost take for granted that these programs are doomed.  That they won't be around by the time we retire.  And the media (all of whom are corporate owned, which means all ofwhom are Right leaning) have been very complicit in driving this message home, and in helping perpetuate the narrtive that it the spending levels of the Democrats that are the problem.

And think about it... At this point how DO we fix things?  Well... the right knows that only one or two thigns will happen: Either we cut spending, which will effect these programs.  That's fine with them, that's thei rultimate goal - to get rid of these programs.  Or we raise taxes.  And WHO will raise taxes?  Well, the DEMOCRATS of course!  Because they're the only one interested in sustainable long-term governance!  There only only ones interested in reversing this trend.  Tax-cuts and higher defiicits serve the Republican cause!  But the Right, and their lap-dogs in the media will hammer home the narritive that the Democrats are the "tax-and-spenders" and not showing "fiscal discipline."  They'll never really show you that the crisis was created entirely by Republicans, specifically so they can either gut these otherwise perfectly sustainable (and popular!) programs or be able top paint the Democrats as the party of "high taxes" and use this to win elections and get right back to their agenda of bankrupting the Government... in order to get rid of these otherwise sustainable (and popular!) programs.

At least when a Liberal runs a deficit, it with a Keynsian motive in mind: They want to help the economy, save jobs and maintain people's financial security.  And running deficits by NOT raising taxes and NOT cutting speding will do just that.  But the way these Republicans act, doing this even in boom-times, I can't see any rational outcome OTHER than bankrupting the governement.  So I ask again: WHO'S the party of fiscal responsibility?  The one who taxes and spends in a effort to improve the economy, and help improve people's standard of living, or the one who wants to bankrupt the government, get rid of all social programs, and eventually pay NO TAXES so that they can keep ALL the money, and no one else can have ANYTHING?

I realize that I'm channeling Glenn  Beck at this point, but I challenge you to come up with any other explanation that can reconcile Republican fiscal rhetoric with Republican fiscal POLICY.

6 comments:

  1. You're good, as usual. (I was going to say 'as always', but I don't know you well enough to say that! LOL)

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  2. Oh, I'm ALWAYS good, babe!

    (I am SO kidding!) XD

    Thanks for your comment!

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  3. You are preaching to the choir. THIS choir anyway. I can't understand how the Republicans have managed to convince anyone except big money that they have their best interests at heart. They bed down with the Saudis and then rabble rouse in America sprinkling muslim fear like seed to pigeons. They preach pro-business but never pro-worker(read union). They rattle sabers but don't send their own childred to fight their righteous battles. They claim to be pro-life but gleefully support the death penalty. They are pro-family but don't want gay couples to adopt. Oh I know not all of them and I am making blanket statements but darn it! Sometimes I don't know what distresses me more-the GOP machine or their blinder bound base.

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  4. Jlarue,

    Welcome. It's nice to have another memeber in the choir! Yeah... I don't see how they can convince ANYONE they have ANY credability on ANYTHING. That is, until I realized just how much the media (and that's ALL of the media, not just Fox and Talk Radio) was in the tank for them. If you're not a MediaMatters poster yet, check them out. It's really astounding how they've covered for the Right all these years, and keep doing so. IMHO, THAT'S why they're able to convince people: The media never calls them out on thier BS, lies and hypocrisy.

    Thank you for your comment.

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  5. Yes the media has become weak. I feel like when I was growing up reporters interviewed people with information. Now reporters(and I use the term loosely) interview other reporters for their opinions. There is no substance, just talking points. It is like all the books got burned and they are quoting and expounding on and arguing about Cliff notes! One mans Wuthering Heights is another mans Lord of the Flies(shout out to J.D..)What the heck is a pundit and why do I care what they think? And it feels to me like our society has become less and less civil and discourse has gotten...well, rude. Hacks either yell at other hacks they disagree with or they sit in a circle gleefully cutting up their victims. It is like everyone is a mad as a hatter teabagger! I include many on the left here. Arianna Huffington has totally gone off the map in her left wingy teabaggerish zeal. Keith Olbermann looks staid and solemn in comparison. Paul Krugman has some sort of passive/aggressive love jones with the president that I will never understand. And on the right we have the added hysteria of Liz Cheney as a terrorism/national security expert,Dana Perino who just has opinions that she seems to think matter and Bill Kristol is still defending Palin. I have to google news agencies from other countries to get a balanced spin! A balanced spin! The truth is like finding gold. One precious nugget of gold in the crap pile of the blah blah blah press. I think one day I will wake up and all the Sunday morning talk shows will have turned into cartoons.George Will is Krusty the Clown and David Gregory is Jughead. Really, how can we take these people serious?

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  6. JLarue,

    This really blew me away:

    "I feel like when I was growing up reporters interviewed people with information. Now reporters(and I use the term loosely) interview other reporters for their opinions."

    Right there you've basically summed up what worng with our whole media setup. Seriously. I mean, just looked at who they talk to now: Guilliani, Rove, Gingrich... these people aren't in the game anymore! They're no longer "in the know." All they have now is opinions, based on their experience from ten years ago. WHO CARES? People leave politics and they gain life-long employment as "opinion givers." But you're absulutely right: It is very rare that they ever talk to anyone who actually MATTERS, anyone who KNOWS what's going on! These opinion shows just keep hosting washed-up, bygone, EX-politicians, and (and you so aututely pointed out)OTHER "REPORTERS"! As much as I bitch about the media, I never really noticed that before, but you're absolutely right!

    Thanks for your comment and that observation!
    NGEddie

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