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John McCain Attempts Economics |
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From the Economist’s View, a little commentary on John McCain’s “confused talk express” -style statements on taxes, social security, and consumer confidence:
What will McCain do when the “red phone” rings with bad new about the economy? From the WSJ:
With the U.S. economy softening, he said he might have “a couple of fireside chats with the American people because of what we see in the [consumer] confidence barometers.” But he added that the most potent economic stimulus would be to assure Americans that taxes won’t go up in the future and to “call for a meaningful  and I mean meaningful  approach to simplifying the tax code so that it’s fairer and flatter.”
So, he will sit by the fire, assure us everything is okay, and that will cause us to become confident and start spending more. Too bad he can’t do that now.
As the article mentions, McCain has already conceded his understanding of economics is not up to snuff. He has wavered on whether or not he can promise no new taxes, as well as on whether he supports privately-managed social security funds. Now he says he wants a tax system that is “fairer and flatter,” except that to those of us who quite like the progressive tax system “flatter” inherently does not equal “fairer.”
Moreover, McCain boils the country’s health care crisis down to “inflation:”
To me, this demonstrates a lack of understanding of both health care and inflation, if for no other reason than the costs of health care rise at twice the rate of inflation. McCain frequently mentions the rising costs of Medicare and Medicaid, but fails to acknowledge that these programs are “unsustainably” expensive not because of inflation, but because of the fact that there are greater numbers of elderly and poor people who qualify for them. I’m no genius, but under these circumstances won’t reducing the costs of Medicare and Medicaid necessarily require cutting quality, cutting coverage, or raising taxes?
Seminal readers, what are your thoughts?
McCain is clearly out of his depth, and what’s more, his advisors are unlikely to offer the right advice. I’m ok with Presidents not being experts in everything. That’s why they have a Cabinet. But McCain is likely to get the same bullshit neocon advice - cut taxes, cut spending, trickle-down economics works.
Of course, that’s not the right solution for our economy right now. We need to end the war, cut back military spending, and put people to work building our domestic infrastructure.
Its only march jason, im waiting for nov. then i’ll git in the fray..see who’s left standing..i really cant see the repubs cutting lose with all the nazi powers the puppet head and chaney put together..can you??..it will be a putin transition..whacth and see.
“I’m no genius, but under these circumstances won’t reducing the costs of Medicare and Medicaid necessarily require cutting quality, cutting coverage, or raising taxes?”
See, that’s what we call K-5 math skills. 2-1 = 1 type stuff. But there’s a new type of math that every politician - and really anyone who has something they want you to eat/buy/back/invest in - has developed. It’s a system of math where 2-1 = 17.64391. And they can back it up! ‘Just look at my graph. Not convincing? Hang on. I’ll open Powerpoint.’
Does anyone here think we’ll ever get to the point where the general populace cries out for HIGHER taxes? Where the people finally realize that nomatter how much the tax lowers, the government always manages to take the same amount of funds out of them from other angles, anyway? That, since the federal tax isn’t going to vanish in the night, and so long as we’re paying the Fed that $2T per year, maybe we should get something meaningful back?
Like maybe a system of education whose quality isn’t rated somewhere between that of Bosnia and Zimbabwe. Like a system of national SOCIALIZED healthcare that might begin to catch us up to the rest of the developed Western world.
Any chance Americans will demand they get something for their dollar, as opposed to this fevered, meaningless opposition to the rising of the sun? Is there any hope that Americans might someday cease their selfish, egocentric attempts to withhold that extra one or two hundred dollars per year and instead freely relinquish, but with the uncompromising demand that their “representatives” spend it to the whole and common benefit?
I think you know the answer to those questions. And I think you know the route to Canada. (Hint: It’s to the north.)
One of the more interesting theories in “The Shock Doctrine” - probably not original, but anyway - held that the only reason European countries ended up with moderate socialism was because they had the Russian form of extreme communism so close. Because they were caught directly between extreme communism (Russia) and extreme capitalism (America), they ended up with a happy medium.
Which means to me that we won’t get what you’re suggesting until we enter a political climate where it seems “reasonable,” not extreme.
Maybe we’ll get lucky and China will exponentially continue it’s growth into a viciously capitalistic state; suck our resources dry; import flammable, dangerous, and chemically destructive retail products; and foster such an inviting locale for American corporations to flee to that we’ll finally see our own reflection in the mirror and make the move toward sanity.
Because I find it quite insane that the majority should chase after politicians who promise lowered taxes while their own first-hand experience tells them that if one tax drops a point, another raises. And when state taxes lower the local courts step up fines, the police and prosecutors more fervently pursue civil infractions, and that little sticker you have to buy for your license plate each year - which costs the state $.0003 per sheet - retails at the DMV for $86.00.
Is it not mass madness that the people should champion those who talk of lowered taxes in lieu of these realities? And is it not madness that anyone should propose health care solutions - like those of the front-running democrats - which suggest the problems can be solved if more health care purchasers are found… Yet, excludes the notion of doing that with a tax, wherein EVERY working American would become an implicit purchaser simply by paying their federal income tax?
No. Instead we should set up a private monopoly-industry like that of car insurance, where the populace is required by law to buy a product over which the government has little to no oversight concerning the product’s quality or it’s reasonable administration; and must, when faced with issues and concerns, fight the free-market doctrinal leanings of the courts, in order to intervene or place any necessary or beneficial mandates upon the industry.
I’ve long been asking this question, and have yet to receive any satisfactory answer: What is it the American people, en masse, (having payed en masse) receive in return of their $2,000,000,000,000.00 remitted per annum?
I see the FBI, CIA, NSA, Army, Navy, Airforce, Marines, the Pentagon and their associated functions. What I fail to see is ANYTHING non-war oriented, that the states themselves wouldn’t be capable of doing if they were to collect what is presently the Fed’s allotment.
Now, being a semi-reasonable individual, I know that the federal income tax - illegal and unconstitutional as it is - isn’t going to be repealed or otherwise disappear. (With or without Ron Paul at the helm.) So aren’t we justified to demand these things: When you’re sick, injured, or in pain, fair and equal medical evaluation and treatment is guaranteed - paid by the state; After twelve long years of public education, America’s children should either be ready and able to enter the workforce, or the public funding of their education be extended into secondary schooling until they are?
It’s pretty telling - the quality of America’s public schools - that after more than a decade of attendance, and spending around 250 days of each year engaged in the sole act of learning what is taught, that America’s employers should look at an eighteen year old high school graduate and see a janitor and/or burger-flipper. But just two years of private, secondary schooling later, that same erstwhile groundskeeper is now worth $20k per year… to start.
So I’ll ask again. What does America get for it’s $2T? Where is it all going that Social Security should be ‘doomed,’ welfare programs ‘are a drain,’ disability claims are held back for years, universal health care is unattainable, and America’s education ranking lie somewhere in the low 30’s?
Where the fuck is our money? Or rather… Where the fuck is -your- money. I don’t pay and I don’t claim. ‘Cause I’m not a John, and I don’t pay people to fuck me.
Great comment and great question. I wish I had an answer.
It’s simply amazing to me that most Americans are willing to spend gobs of money to destroy other countries, to project our military power abroad, but not one cent to help their fellow citizen. It’s amazing that people can’t see that the idea of collective good, when managed effectively, can make everyone better off.
Abroad, we have no problem projecting the image of a united, aggressive America, but at home, it’s every man for himself.
It’s simply amazing.