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Two Santa Clauses or How The Republican Party Has Conned America for Thirty Years
This weekend, House Republican leader John Boehner played out the role of Jude Wanniski on NBC's "Meet The Press."
Odds are you've never heard of Jude, but without him Reagan never would have become a "successful" president, Republicans never would have taken control of the House or Senate, Bill Clinton never would have been impeached, and neither George Bush would have been president.
When Barry Goldwater went down to ignominious defeat in 1964, most Republicans felt doomed (among them the then-28-year-old Wanniski). Goldwater himself, although uncomfortable with the rising religious right within his own party and the calls for more intrusion in people's bedrooms, was a diehard fan of Herbert Hoover's economic worldview.
In Hoover's world (and virtually all the Republicans since reconstruction with the exception of Teddy Roosevelt), market fundamentalism was a virtual religion. Economists from Ludwig von Mises to Friedrich Hayek to Milton Friedman had preached that government could only make a mess of things economic, and the world of finance should be left to the Big Boys – the Masters of the Universe, as they sometimes called themselves – who ruled Wall Street and international finance.
Hoover enthusiastically followed the advice of his Treasury Secretary, multimillionaire Andrew Mellon, who said in 1931: "Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate. Purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down... enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people."
Thus, the Republican mantra was: "Lower taxes, reduce the size of government, and balance the budget."
The only problem with this ideology from the Hooverite perspective was that the Democrats always seemed like the bestowers of gifts, while the Republicans were seen by the American people as the stingy Scrooges, bent on making the lives of working people harder all the while making richer the very richest. This, Republican strategists since 1930 knew, was no way to win elections.
Which was why the most successful Republican of the 20th century up to that time, Dwight D. Eisenhower, had been quite happy with a top income tax rate on millionaires of 91 percent. As he wrote to his brother Edgar Eisenhower in a personal letter on November 8, 1954:
"[T]o attain any success it is quite clear that the Federal government cannot avoid or escape responsibilities which the mass of the people firmly believe should be undertaken by it. The political processes of our country are such that if a rule of reason is not applied in this effort, we will lose everything--even to a possible and drastic change in the Constitution. This is what I mean by my constant insistence upon 'moderation' in government.
"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."
Goldwater, however, rejected the "liberalism" of Eisenhower, Rockefeller, and other "moderates" within his own party. Extremism in defense of liberty was no vice, he famously told the 1964 nominating convention, and moderation was no virtue. And it doomed him and his party.
And so after Goldwater's defeat, the Republicans were again lost in the wilderness just as after Hoover's disastrous presidency. Even four years later when Richard Nixon beat Hubert Humphrey in 1968, Nixon wasn't willing to embrace the economic conservatism of Goldwater and the economic true believers in the Republican Party. And Jerry Ford wasn't, in their opinions, much better. If Nixon and Ford believed in economic conservatism, they were afraid to practice it for fear of dooming their party to another forty years in the electoral wilderness.
By 1974, Jude Wanniski had had enough. The Democrats got to play Santa Claus when they passed out Social Security and Unemployment checks – both programs of the New Deal – as well as when their "big government" projects like roads, bridges, and highways were built giving a healthy union paycheck to construction workers. They kept raising taxes on businesses and rich people to pay for things, which didn't seem to have much effect at all on working people (wages were steadily going up, in fact), and that made them seem like a party of Robin Hoods, taking from the rich to fund programs for the poor and the working class. Americans loved it. And every time Republicans railed against these programs, they lost elections.
Everybody understood at the time that economies are driven by demand. People with good jobs have money in their pockets, and want to use it to buy things. The job of the business community is to either determine or drive that demand to their particular goods, and when they're successful at meeting the demand then factories get built, more people become employed to make more products, and those newly-employed people have a paycheck that further increases demand.
Wanniski decided to turn the classical world of economics – which had operated on this simple demand-driven equation for seven thousand years – on its head. In 1974 he invented a new phrase – "supply side economics" – and suggested that the reason economies grew wasn't because people had money and wanted to buy things with it but, instead, because things were available for sale, thus tantalizing people to part with their money. The more things there were, the faster the economy would grow.
At the same time, Arthur Laffer was taking that equation a step further. Not only was supply-side a rational concept, Laffer suggested, but as taxes went down, revenue to the government would go up!
Neither concept made any sense – and time has proven both to be colossal idiocies – but together they offered the Republican Party a way out of the wilderness.
Ronald Reagan was the first national Republican politician to suggest that he could cut taxes on rich people and businesses, that those tax cuts would cause them to take their surplus money and build factories or import large quantities of cheap stuff from low-labor countries, and that the more stuff there was supplying the economy the faster it would grow. George Herbert Walker Bush – like most Republicans of the time – was horrified. Ronald Reagan was suggesting "Voodoo Economics," said Bush in the primary campaign, and Wanniski's supply-side and Laffer's tax-cut theories would throw the nation into such deep debt that we'd ultimately crash into another Republican Great Depression.
But Wanniski had been doing his homework on how to sell supply-side economics. In 1976, he rolled out to the hard-right insiders in the Republican Party his "Two Santa Clauses" theory, which would enable the Republicans to take power in America for the next thirty years.
Democrats, he said, had been able to be "Santa Clauses" by giving people things from the largesse of the federal government. Republicans could do that, too – spending could actually increase. Plus, Republicans could be double Santa Clauses by cutting people's taxes! For working people it would only be a small token – a few hundred dollars a year on average – but would be heavily marketed. And for the rich it would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts. The rich, in turn, would use that money to import or build more stuff to market, thus increasing supply and stimulating the economy. And that growth in the economy would mean that the people still paying taxes would pay more because they were earning more.
There was no way, Wanniski said, that the Democrats could ever win again. They'd have to be anti-Santas by raising taxes, or anti-Santas by cutting spending. Either one would lose them elections.
When Reagan rolled out Supply Side Economics in the early 80s, dramatically cutting taxes while exploding (mostly military) spending, there was a moment when it seemed to Wanniski and Laffer that all was lost. The budget deficit exploded and the country fell into a deep recession – the worst since the Great Depression – and Republicans nationwide held their collective breath. But David Stockman came up with a great new theory about what was going on – they were "starving the beast" of government by running up such huge deficits that Democrats would never, ever in the future be able to talk again about national health care or improving Social Security – and this so pleased Alan Greenspan, the Fed Chairman, that he opened the spigots of the Fed, dropping interest rates and buying government bonds, producing a nice, healthy goose to the economy. Greenspan further counseled Reagan to dramatically increase taxes on people earning under $37,800 a year by increasing the Social Security (FICA/payroll) tax, and then let the government borrow those newfound hundreds of billions of dollars off-the-books to make the deficit look better than it was.
Reagan, Greenspan, Winniski, and Laffer took the federal budget deficit from under a trillion dollars in 1980 to almost three trillion by 1988, and back then a dollar could buy far more than it buys today. They and George HW Bush ran up more debt in eight years than every president in history, from George Washington to Jimmy Carter, combined. Surely this would both starve the beast and force the Democrats to make the politically suicidal move of becoming deficit hawks.
And that's just how it turned out. Bill Clinton, who had run on an FDR-like platform of a "new covenant" with the American people that would strengthen the institutions of the New Deal, strengthen labor, and institute a national health care system, found himself in a box. A few weeks before his inauguration, Alan Greenspan and Robert Rubin sat him down and told him the facts of life: he was going to have to raise taxes and cut the size of government. Clinton took their advice to heart, raised taxes, balanced the budget, and cut numerous programs, declaring an "end to welfare as we know it" and, in his second inaugural address, an "end to the era of big government." He was the anti-Santa Claus, and the result was an explosion of Republican wins across the country as Republican politicians campaigned on a platform of supply-side tax cuts and pork-rich spending increases.
Looking at the wreckage of the Democratic Party all around Clinton by 1999, Winniski wrote a gloating memo that said, in part: "We of course should be indebted to Art Laffer for all time for his Curve... But as the primary political theoretician of the supply-side camp, I began arguing for the 'Two Santa Claus Theory' in 1974. If the Democrats are going to play Santa Claus by promoting more spending, the Republicans can never beat them by promoting less spending. They have to promise tax cuts..."
Ed Crane, president of the Libertarian CATO Institute, noted in a memo that year: "When Jack Kemp, Newt Gingich, Vin Weber, Connie Mack and the rest discovered Jude Wanniski and Art Laffer, they thought they'd died and gone to heaven. In supply-side economics they found a philosophy that gave them a free pass out of the debate over the proper role of government. Just cut taxes and grow the economy: government will shrink as a percentage of GDP, even if you don't cut spending. That's why you rarely, if ever, heard Kemp or Gingrich call for spending cuts, much less the elimination of programs and departments."
George W. Bush embraced the Two Santa Claus Theory with gusto, ramming through huge tax cuts – particularly a cut to a maximum 15 percent income tax rate on people like himself who made their principle income from sitting around the pool waiting for their dividend or capital gains checks to arrive in the mail – and blowing out federal spending. Bush even out-spent Reagan, which nobody had ever thought would again be possible.
And it all seemed to be going so well, just as it did in the early 1920s when a series of three consecutive Republican presidents cut income taxes on the uber-rich from over 70 percent to under 30 percent. In 1929, pretty much everybody realized that instead of building factories with all that extra money, the rich had been pouring it into the stock market, inflating a bubble that – like an inexorable law of nature – would have to burst. But the people who remembered that lesson were mostly all dead by 2005, when Jude Wanniski died and George Gilder celebrated the Reagan/Bush supply-side-created bubble economies in a Wall Street Journal eulogy:
"...Jude's charismatic focus on the tax on capital gains redeemed the fiscal policies of four administrations. ... [T]he capital-gains tax has come erratically but inexorably down -- while the market capitalization of U.S. equities has risen from roughly a third of global market cap to close to half. These many trillions in new entrepreneurial wealth are a true warrant of the worth of his impact. Unbound by zero-sum economics, Jude forged the golden gift of a profound and passionate argument that the establishments of the mold must finally give way to the powers of the mind. He audaciously defied all the Buffetteers of the trade gap, the moldy figs of the Phillips Curve, the chic traders in money and principle, even the stultifying pillows of the Nobel Prize."
In reality, his tax cuts did what they have always done over the past 100 years – they initiated a bubble economy that would let the very rich skim the cream off the top just before the ceiling crashed in on working people.
The Republicans got what they wanted from Wanniski's work. They held power for thirty years, made themselves trillions of dollars, cut organized labor's representation in the workplace from around 25 percent when Reagan came into office to around 8 of the non-governmental workforce today, and left such a massive deficit that some misguided "conservative" Democrats are again clamoring to shoot Santa with working-class tax hikes and entitlement program cuts.
And now Boehner, McCain, Brooks, and the whole crowd are again clamoring to be recognized as the ones who will out-Santa Claus the Democrats. You'd think after all the damage they've done that David Gregory would have simply laughed Boehner off the program – much as the American people did to the Republicans in the last election – although Gregory is far too much a gentleman for that. Instead, he merely looked incredulous; it was enough.
The Two Santa Claus theory isn't dead, as we can see from today's Republican rhetoric. Hopefully, though, reality will continue to sink in with the American people and the massive fraud perpetrated by Wanniski, Reagan, Laffer, Graham, Bush(s), and all their "conservative" enablers will be seen for what it was and is. And the Obama administration can get about the business of repairing the damage and recovering the stolen assets of these cheap hustlers.
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98 Comments so far
Show AllPIPEDREAMS Says: "If it seems to good to be true, odds are it's not true!"
I'm not sure this theory is dead yet. Obama seems a bit confused here or is getting more bad advice from Clinton's economic team of Summers and the rest. I'm hearing tax cuts tax cuts as if that's what will revive the dying economy. This sounds like phase two of last falls robbery. The banks got trillions and have done zero with the $$ but have a party and now the crony Corps. are lining up waiting for the next Pork party of Obama's stimulus. Who else do u think will get all this $$? They already own most of the Congress critters folks! Party affiliation means nothing to the BIG $$ guys they'll buy whomever they need to to get what they want. Oh, they prefer Repubs. but that's only because it's easier for them to buy guys they play golf with and go to the same church with. But business is business and if they need to buy Barney Frank et al. so be it and don't believe Barney et al. aren't for sale, because they damn well are!
Hey, we all love supply-side economics. Keep the taxes low and spend, spend, spend. Of course the huge government deficit is like a bleading ulcer, but the vastly greater private debt makes America's consumption a disease that has the potential to kill us. Should we continue to inject liquidity and hope the bleeding will someday slow or let nature take its course and hope that in time this great consumptive body will escape the grave. I guess mostly I wonder, will this great rough beast, when its hour comes round, throw off its lethargy and be reborn or give up the ghost?
In the early 1980's at the same time all of this Reaganomics voodoo began, they also created a conservative trojan horse (deregulated media) to echo the conservative's mantras over and over again so that the dems constituents were effectually two-santa-system brainwashed beyond reason before election time began.
It worked like a charm.
This must be the elite talk they make at the trilateral commission meetings and CFR secret meetings (not the PR meetings they have with Angelina Jolie). I still see the Vietnam War and Nixon's frustration and the report "The Crisis of Democracy" as the turning point for all of this crap we are just now revealing/disclosing/figuring out.
How can we get a halfway honest media back? That one should be a priority. If Obama doesn't address this, then he is not going to change much I am afraid.
The media must promote open-minded discussions.
well said. the repubs never could have succeeded w/o lots and lots of help.
Hartmann is a student of history, an insightful and studious man, a capitalist as well, and certainly a democratic loyalist of the first order.
He was also the best and brightest voice on Air America Radio. If the democratic party could be saved ( I personally think not) it would be by such as he.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
No. Hartman has his history wrong. He writes political spin in the guise of scholarship. Read my commentary above. Challenge it. he needs to stay a student.
This is an excellent historical demonstration of the fact that economics is not a science of wealth, production and markets, but a system of calculated and self-justifying exploitation.
The term 'economics' should never be used in the same sentence as 'science' in my opinion.
Economics, as I understand it, is guessing how the future of the commercial/capitalist market will behave, based on past behavior.
It is not predictable to any degree, nor repeatable, two of the hallmarks of scientific theory. Therefore it is not 'science'.
'Economics' is a carny sideshow dressed in a three piece suit, talking a good line of patter while picking your pocket. Economics textbooks and the popular money market books you see in the Chapters stores should be in their proper place - beside Tolkien and Clark in the Fantasy and Science Fiction section.
Have any of you ever read the final lines in a stock prospectus?
EVERY SINGLE ONE reads 'past performance is not a guarantee of future returns.'
Think about it... that is a tacit admission that they have NO IDEA what the market, or the wider economy for that matter is going to do.
Walk in peace.
Agreed. If economics is a science, it is the softest of the soft sciences. But you are probably right that it is better to completely withhold the label of "science" from it. Economists are like modern witchdoctors, spewing gibberish to confuse the common people and convince them that everything will work out if they follow the witchdoctors' prescriptions, which usually amount to accepting slave wages and misery today in the hopes of a better tomorrow that never comes. To use more modern terminology, they are the highly paid sophists of the capitalist bullies who recognize that the more they weaken the resistance of the common people to their plunder, the more plunder they can get away with.
Please.
Do not call 'economists' witch-doctors.
Afterall, modern labratory research has shown that many 'witch-doctor' remedies are actually more effective than the concoctions of the drug companies, and often have a higher rate of success.
Walk in peace.
Yea, I may have been unfair to witchdoctors. Maybe a better comparison would be with witch hunters, like Sarah Palin's old buddy Thomas Muthee.
The only way economy could be made scientific is to take Adam Smith's basic notion seriously (as Karl Marx did) that the source of value is labor. Smith (and then Marx) attempted to show how the efficiency of machine production could increase profits. Unfortunately they were both wrong because if value is labor, then the laws of thermodynamics govern economy and the second law states that it is impossible to produce more labor than was input. If there are profits, then others must be providing labor with inadequate compensation. Others are, in short, victimized by transactions.
The victims include:
• Nature (overlooked by Smith, deliberately omitted by Marx)
• Workers (deliberately short-changed by Smith's system)
• Customers (who receive a less than adequate product)
• Competitors (who must produce a less than adequate product to remain in the market)
• The public (who finally gets the real thermodynamic tab on any and all failures.)
Until academia, the media, and the public get on the same page with regard to an economy of real thermodynamic throughput, all the issues will be discussed only as vague metaphors and obfuscating jargon serving no purpose but the validation of those who benefit from victimization.
Marx's contribution to the theory was his recognition that the capitalist class made its profits by appropriating surplus value. This surplus value is that value created by the labouring masses in the form of unpaid labour. In a typical 8 hour day, each produce 8 hours of labour value. However, in 4 hours of production the worker produces enough value to cover his wages. The other 4 hours of production of labour value is appropriated by the capitalist as surplus value - profit and is in essence unpaid labour. Production technology allows the worker to be more productive, so that in 3 hours of work for example, he/she produces enough labour value to cover the wages. This increases the amount that the capitalist can appropriate as surplus value.
Go and read Marx, as it's obvious that you never have. Marx and Engels spoke plenty of Nature and how that all fits into the capitalist scheme of things. It is labour applied to the nature that produces commodities of value.
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Remember the butchery in Gaza by the IDF.
I have read virtually every word written by Marx. His doctoral thesis concerned one of his favorite sayings: "Where man is not, nature is barren." He could not understand (and no one else at the time could either) that where man is not, nature is footing the bill for human existence.
Read this article. I subscribe to this journal and it is really good. The latest one is focused on just this subject. Here's a book from the editor of MR.
http://www.monthlyreview.org/books/marxecology.php
And here's the article in Nov's MR:
http://www.monthlyreview.org/081110foster.php
[quote]
“Man,” he wrote, “lives from nature, i.e. nature is his body, and he must maintain a continuing dialogue with it if he is not to die. To say that man’s physical and mental life is linked to nature simply means that nature is linked to itself, for man is a part of nature.”3
[endquote]
It makes references to what Marx had to say about nature and its role in human society. As to having "read virtually every word written by Marx" - that is some accomplishment, let me tell you! Didn't know there was enough hours in the day to accomplish such a task. I've read plenty of Marx, Engels and Lenin over the last 35 years or so, but I'd not be so silly as to suggest I've read every word. Sorry, but I just don't believe you. If you managed to do so, then that is where speed reading gets one. You missed all the important writings by Marx where he puts nature up there in the importance it has in the whole scheme of things.
-----------------------------------------
Remember the butchery in Gaza by the IDF.
Gotta love the Republicans...national suicide for a few decades of power and wealth..what a bargain!
One can not really "blame" the Republicans for this. The responsibility lies with the voter .
See California as an example of an electorate that wants everything but does not want to pay the taxes to afford it.
A recent poll was done in Canada asking Canadians if they were in favor of tax cuts along with reduced Government spending. The majority of Canadians said NO in that poll indicating they would not be in favor of tax cuts if it meant going into debt or cutting Government programs.
Now we will certainly be running a debt for the first time in 10 years with our upcoming budget. My own personal viewpoint is that it should be a direct stimulus program rather then a swathe of tax cuts. I really do not think we should try and stimulate more "Consumption". We whould invest in Social housing , Infrastructure and our Educational institutions.
See California as an example of a state that was royally screwed by deregulation and Enron. But I agree the voters need to be held responsible.
Many of today's conservatives don't like to remember the record tax increases Reagan signed into law in California. He knew then what responsibility required.
I see California as a customer of Enron who Gov. Davis was about to launch criminal investigations into Enron's price gouging...
All of a sudden Davis gets accused of something or another in the corporatist media, and they DEMAND a special election...
Where voters can choose between a porn star, Gary Coleman, or the Gubernator...
With voting machines to make sure it happens as planned...
Stealing elections is not limited to presidential election cycles...
As an employee of PGE, a company bankrupted by Enron, and a resident of California, a state which was almost bankrupted by Enron I see business as usual....
Until and unless we the people come to the understanding that Capitalism must be kept from controlling Government we will see an endless stream of Enron-like happenings.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so. Bertrand Russell
the "tax cut" mentality is foisted by so-called fiscal conservatives simply to BAIT people into supporting the idea that "you keep your money and do with it as you please...rather than let SOMEONE ELSE take it from you"....and THEN SWITCH it with the fact that RIDING on this BAIT to the general public is the REAL prize conservatives love:
the HUGE TAX CUTS that the rich and their cronies would enjoy..which WOULD include being placed on welfare BY the remaining taxes OUTSIDE of the circle of "capital gainers" as a "reward" for being "hardworking"(the word that gets the general public to pat itself on the back to getting the pitiful little amounts in tax cuts for themselves, like so much bread crumbs) ...and which further baits the ordinary people in working even HARDER to think that if only they DO SO -- they TOO could become "capital gainers" --
EXCEPT that the price to pay is -- the capital gainers , having gained the increased power through their "capital" which keeps increasing by not paying taxes but is used to leverage their "saved" money to gain more and more control of industries - LOW wages, and therefore less power for people.
it's really a very simple strategy but americans keep swallowing it up like so many idiots. they THINK that "i can be LIKE that millionaire neighbor of mine" even if they publicly won't say so..and so their actions and decisions for which policies to support bring them closer and tighter to what conservatives want..and they become enslaved to this idea of "lower taxes"...no realizing that a bigger price they pay on top of lower wages for more work and less decision in the workplace is -- HIGHER TAXES in hidden forms:
BAD public institutions that don't serve their needs but become servants of the capitalists...and indeed, BETRAY their role and purpose to protect ordinary people FROM exploitation; crumbling public schools, hospitals, infrastructures, buildings, highways , parks, polluted environments, etc....
where conservatives AGAIN come in and say:
"SEE? government DOESN"T work....we have to PRIVATIZE SOME MORE">
and on and on and on it goes....
americans - blessed with such wealth and institutions that could hav eprotected them from corporate, capitalist , private profiteering exploitation have thesmselves to blame for being such IDIOTS and STUPID citizens - with all the means and laws and processes at their disposal to ward off such things...rather than just leave it to "leaders" who sacrifice themselves,,,,such as genuine labor leaders, or politicians with truly honest or decent intents to do the "heavy work" and even DIE for it , such as Dr Martin Luther King -- before americans go back , zombie-like , hungering for more of their
PITIFUL LITTLE PRECIOUS TAX CUTS as sold to them by conservatives, telling them this is "independence and being self-responsible"
when in REALITY -- it is a strategy and tactic to MAKE americans and the general public DEPENDENT on the POWER and CAPRICE of the Rich WHILE supporting the RICHto do whatever they please in hoarding the wealth the public creates as an economy.
the conservative ideology, i always like to say, masquerading as "free market" -- is a DEAD ideology thrashing around , even in intellectual circles , as if it is alive...when its DEAD ideas are really nothing more than ENSLAVEMENT of people for the sake of a few in every community or nation ...which to THEM is the "natural order" of things.
what was it someone said ?:
"THE PRICE OF CIVILIZATION IS TAXES".
but where taxes are concerned ... the HAVE MORES - who would NOT exist as Have Mores -- without a SOCIETY in which to exist and gather their wealth -- ought to pay the PRICE of their privileges -- HIGH TAXES....
if they do not wish that -- they should DIVEST themselves and their children of such wealth and privilege and WORK like any laborer or workers...
but they should be preaching "low taxes" that would "trickle down" -- for they HAVE BEEN LIVING ON WELFARE for generations under the blessings of the general public's accumulated ECONOMIC activity -- which includes LABORING.
unless of course they want to push things more and more and end up - like Marie-Antoinette and King Louis XV?....lol.
AFTER ALL -- what conservatives SECRETLY want as a group or class or mentality or culture is
A GUILDED AGE for themselves.
that is ALL there is to them.
i have read SO MUCH of their writings....from AntiWar.com -- wich i RESPECT very much for its antiwar commitment but NOT for its "conservative ideology" which they claim as "inherently antiwar" which it is NOT....any more than liberals are "antiwar" -- to the TRULY venerable "american conservative" magazine -- and have come to the conclusion
BOTTOM LINE -- the RIGHT WING --whether they call themselves
"true conservatives or paleoconservatives" are clinging to a "purity" of idea of conservatism (small government..no taxes, individual freedom to the max) that harbors within it NOTHING MORE
than SELFISH , GREEDY, SELF-CENTERED ideology that eventually ARRIVES at a tyrannous state BECAUSE it does not wish to acknowledge that there IS something GREATER than the individual and hyperindividualism they espouse -- and that is:
SOCIETY and COMMON WELFARE....that shares a common purpose:
to meet the needs of the many and the individuals within the society by controlling the GREED of the few...towards a common destiny: HUMAN welfare as a species and a civilization.
conservatives are inherently "rulers" by nature. they love the idea of having their little kingdoms and castles and territory -- which of COURSE demands PEOPLE to be RULED over by "individuals" such as conservatives.
WHY else are their fmailies often very "disciplinarian?" or theor communities are so authoritarian - far more than any "liberal" community is?...
why ELSE do they gravitate towards dictatorial powers -- SPECIFICALLY by a few select people? why ELSE do they LOVE Corporatism and its "top down" UNdemocratic structure as any worker knows once he or she "punches in" the time clock?
why ELSE do they HATE "cooperatives"? for example and seek to destroy those as "rivals" in business?.
it's easy to pick them out. because they are the "would be kings and queens".
They are the PREDATOR Class and have convinced many that their best interest is everybody's best interest. Just listen to the millionaires and multi-millionaires on the Sunday morning gabfests and their professed love for "free markets" and globalization. It's inevitable, don't ya know.
I want to mention another aspect of recent GOP practice: the record amount of earmark spending in the George W. Bush years, which allowed the GOP to both play Santa and decry government spending.
I hope we will see real reform under Obama, not just repair. The real economy needs, once again, to be protected from the investment economy. And maybe the amount of speculation involving borrowed money should be more strictly limited.
Pension reform should be a very high priority. Is there any greater injustice than losing a hard-earned, guaranteed pension, even while CEO's of the same corporations see huge increases in bonuses and incomes?
But I am also skeptical that Democrats are up to the task. Our real hope for change may lie -- probably does lie -- with electing a more liberal Congress in two years.
Andrew W. Mellon's name should be more widely known. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, many of us saw this economic and financial disaster coming as soon as the irresponsible and unecessaary Bush tax cuts were enacted.
thom writes: "Even four years later when Richard Nixon beat LBJ in 1968" huh
sorry to alarm your fact checker but last time i looked nixon beat humphrey in '68
here is what johnson said about that election cycle: "Accordingly, I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President."
by 68 johnson was tired and defeated as a person and disillusioned as president
he had envisioned himself as being "the best one ever" but he died a death by a thousand cuts, vietnam being a big gash
he was implicated in the assassination of jfk
after he left the whitehouse he let his hair grow long as was the fashion in those more innocent days
cheers, b
This is brilliant. It is incredible that the so-called liberal media never ever ever informed the American people of any of this....
Somewhere out there are growing underground economies, that simply ignore and bypass the current established economic systems advocated by the current group of politicians and economists; like the dinosaurs and the later Romans, they don't seem to realize that all their learned debate is only important to small publishing companies and waste paper recyclers.
THomm Hartmann is also a small-business owner actually. i don't what ..but i think ceramics or somethig like that. he sometimes talks about it in his radio program ...so he does seem to put his money where his mouth is and seems to be a genuinely conscientous person who wants to see other americans and people to also prosper because they TOO have labored in their lives and should be recompensed properly for it as part of an economy.
He actually is an entrepreneur of note. He has multiple businesses and works with psychologically damaged children as well. A good man but one far too wedded to the status quo.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so. Bertrand Russell
I read an article a year ago or so -- about a businessman in connecticut maybe -- who owns a business making ceramics of related industry -- and say that he remains prosperous -- but has had very very hard times to the point of even closing shop...BUT it was said he and his family are so proud that they had NEVER laid off a single worker in all their two or 3 generations of the business and clung to paying their workers high salaries and benefits -- and that the workers -- in very difficult times understood the common loyalty they all had and voluntarily would sacrifice wages or benefits to help the business through hard times..until the bad tide is over ...and it went on like that for 3 generations now...and his mantra , he said: was that
withouth his workers his business would be nothing and it was HIS obligation to see to it that workers had decent lives.
for that -- his workers respect and love him and his family and do everything they can to give good work and good products.
i just forget the name of the company -- an AMERICAN company americans could be proud of.
I totally empathize with those in the 35% tax bracket who might soon be paying 39.5%. Especially those at the low end who earn only $357,700 per year - how could they possibly expect to survive if they have to pay an additional $16K?
Greed=good.
Yes, "the Republican Party has conned America for thirty years." But do you really believe that globalization, which is supported by both major parties, is not the biggest con job of all? Globalization is driving the typical American worker out of work. And so is automation, computerization, robotization and artificial intelligence. And almost nobody in Washington DC seems to notice.
Check out "It's Worth Two Bills" here: http://www.sillyconvalley.net/twobills.html
Thom only scratches the surface in one regard…the increase in taxes on those not so rich. When I started grad school in 1979 on a fellowship with a stipend bearing the gigantic sum of $3500 per year it was not taxed. Neither fellowships were taxed nor were those kind of puny amounts. In just a couple of years I was taxed on both counts…fellowships were examples of the elite not paying their fair share that Reagan ranted about and taxing puny amounts was sticking it to the “welfare queens in Cadillacs” (really working class poor) that he also ranted about. When I got out of graduate school the time honored ability to income average (averaging 5 years of income) so that those starting out could save more and put aside a nest egg had been eliminated. Those of us starting out in life were fairly bludgeoned by Reagan’s soak the poor tax policies…yet whose generation venerates Reagan the most? The mantra that these hardships were not the work of Republicans who instituted these policies, but of the “tax and spend liberals” is what we endlessly heard. Too many people of my generation still believe it. To my peers…PAY ATTENTION!
How many times during the last eight years was the phrase "Make the tax cuts permanent" utterted on the public's airwaves? I estimate about 10 zillion times.
How many times was the idea to raise the marginal tax on the highest income bracket back to 90%, where it was when America built the greatest middle class the world has ever known? I estimate ZERO times.
The public has been beaten into submission with the idea that tax cuts stimulate the economy.
To think or say anything else is considered heresy.
The Republicans/Corporatists won this battle because control their airwaves.
If only Thom Hartmann were given 1/100th the television time of Ann Coulter the citizens of this country might wake up from their slumber.
The war on terror isn't real.
The war on class is.
************
"Whoever controls the media controls the country. Period."
Why is anyone still listening to anything the Republicans say? It is a complete mystery to me and has been for decades.
The biggest ally Al Queda ever had in harming America is the Republican party. Its members damned near destroyed our economy, our military, our health, our environment, our relations with the rest of the world, our future and for what? Apparently solely to line the pockets of a small percentage of the already rich.
That was completely obvious from the beginning, let alone in November. Yet, nearly one out of ever two people voted to keep them in power last fall, weeks after it became clear that they not only caused the recession, but planned to make it worse with foolish unrestricted giveaways to the very people whose decisions precipitated the crisis.
Even today, after it has been revealed how badly Republicans have conned and crippled us, still more than one in four people think G. Bush did a great job. Incredible.
Even more amazing, Republicans like Rush Limbaugh openly state on the air they want and hope the new President "fails" even though that would obviously do grievous harm the US in the process. What idiocy. Why is he is still on the air? Why does he still have listeners who claim to be "patriots"? Even Democrats who hated Bush's guts with good reason did not want him to fail since it would harm us in the process. Why is anyone still listening to anyone that is as thoroughly discredited as the Republican party, its platform and "principles"? I continue to be puzzled.
Signed: Lawlessone [for more irreverence, see resistence-is-possible.blogspot.com]
WHY? because there are gullible people just as there are people who actually share the mentality of republicans or conservatives, whatever "party".
this is the same as people listening to Rush Limbaugh and then despite the facts staring them in the face, including dire ones that affect their own lives , they CLING to the precious SENTIMENTS espoused by conservatives and republicans in particular:
racist, exclusionary, paranoid, fearful, "nativist", class-oriented, scroogelike, dominating, authoritarian, thieving, ELITIST in reality, UNcooperative, COMMANDING, narrow-minded, comfortable with being ignorant, head-in-the-sand attitude no matter what, niggardly, UNgenerous, LOVES to withhold what isn't THEIRs really, BUT LOVES to TAKE what ISN't theirs, submissive to authoritarian figures while authoritarian to those they can dominate, -- and you can put in a thousand other descriptions.......
conservatives, especially in their republican garb , are a veritable case of collective INSANITY and UNETHICAL "group-think" people. sorry to say.
these are the ones COMFORTABLE with the WORST instincts in people.
if the USA was Argentina under the era of "desaperados" - they would be running the country and the world...and THEY would be the equivalent of horrific things if given free reign...such as mass graves and mass suffering and CALL IT "order" ..and STILL claim it is "in the name of god, flag, and country".
I find that as a rule of thumb that those who have to continually claim their patriotism in defending a policy or position that looked at OBJECTIVELY can not be defended are sadly misinformed , naive , poorly educated and or are trying to take advantage of the same.
Citing the red white and blue as some sort of rationale is an admission of ignorance.
Why does Limbaugh stay on the air...a little annoyance called free speech.
When one condemns the GOP solely one misses the point completely.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so. Bertrand Russell
While I like Hartman's writing, there are a few factual errors in the article:
1. "Even four years later when Richard Nixon beat LBJ in 1968, Nixon wasn't willing to embrace the economic conservatism of Goldwater and the economic true believers in the Republican Party."
(Nixon beat Humphrey, not LBJ.)
2. Reagan was not the first to try tax cuts in the manner described. Ford was, against advice. Reagan was merely the first to embrace it and take it to a new level, make it a kind of centerpiece.
Political reality is not a polarity between Democrats and Republicans. They are not and never have been opposites. Nixon was a good Democrat; Clinton a decent Republican.
DaveBronstein January 26th, 2009 11:30 am, makes this point.
Thomm Hartmann's rhetoric is only effective if we believe there are two distinct parties with opposite views. Things are just simpler that way.
Hartmann isn't talking about distinct ideologies; he's describing vote-getting strategies on the part of political operatives. The "two Santa Claus" idea is not ideology, it's the basis for an advertising campaign. Barry Goldwater was an ideologue and a principled man, as Ron Paul is today, which explains their irrelevance. Reagan was not an ideologue, he was a talented opportunist, ie, an actor. GW Bush was and is nothing more than a cunning sociopath. FDR defined all future Democrats.
The Demorepublican Party serves one constituency: the wealthy elite. The question that bedevils this party is: how can we support the wealthiest among us without inciting the great mass of people to unrest, revolution, and chaos? One wing of the party is more compassionate than the other, but they both serve the same constituency, the one that controls the money machine.
This is as true of Obama as of any other Democrat, including FDR, when he struggles with the dilemma of saving "the capital markets" at the same time he wants to save the middle class from default.
It has been possible to be a successful Demorepublican, until now.
Obama will have to invent a new party to save this country, one that serves the public interest. If he is to be a great president and lead this country out of this terminal crisis, he will have to take the money machine away from the wealthy elite and install it in the government where it will administer monetary affairs as a public utility and not the prerogative of an elite class.
I compared the Democrats and Republicans to owners of a Slave Plantation.
The Republicans whip the slaves or withold food and water if they do not comply in order to keep their Plantation running and the monies coming in.
The Democrats think they get more out of their slaves by ensuring they have food in their belly and a halfways decent roof over their heads.
Neither really CARES about the slaves. What they care about is the best and most efficient means of extracting the labor from them so that the "Owners" can grow rich.
regardless of the small differences between the parties....
article below show how COMICAL the Republican "tax cut, tax cut, tax cut" party is ...i mean -- this seems to be ALL they really are about.........Tax cut for the rich (tax cut for ordinary folks is just the BAIT -- to be paid for by non-existent or failing public infrastructure for same "ordinary folks" who'll have to shell out EXTRA money from their pockets to find comparable PRIVATE infrastructure -- at highway robbery prices -- amounting to NEW TAXES demanded by PRIVATIZED infrastructure).....
read on:
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Truthout Original
The Anti-Stimulus Crowd Blows a Gasket
Monday 26 January 2009
by: Dean Baker, t r u t h o u t | Perspective
President Barack Obama with Congressional leadership.
Republicans have responded negatively to President Obama's proposed stimulus package. (Photo: Mark Wilson / Getty Images)
The anti-stimulus crowd is getting desperate. The possibility that a young charismatic new president will push through an ambitious package that begins to set the economy right is truly terrifying to this crew. After all, if the economy begins to turn around and has largely recovered in three or four years, the Republican leadership can look forward to spending most of their careers in the political wilderness.
President Obama will cakewalk to re-election, and even his designated successor will be able to benefit from the glow of his success. If the New Deal serves as precedent, Congress will stay in Democratic hands long past the time that the current leaders of the Republican Party start collecting their pensions.
This explains the need that many Republicans feel to block the stimulus package. This desperation led them to fabricate a report from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which purportedly showed that most of the stimulus would not be spent in 2009, or even in 2010. Based on this report, they argued that President Obama's stimulus would do little to boost the economy out of recession. The Republicans managed to get a story to this effect in The Washington Post, in addition to extensive coverage in other major news outlets.
The only problem is that there was no CBO report. The CBO had done some very preliminary analysis of a package that was loosely modeled on a portion of President Obama's program. This preliminary analysis was done at the request of members of Congress to give them what was available at the time. It was not a full analysis that had gone through the CBO's normal review process, and was not posted on its web site where it could be assessed by budget analysts and the general public.
In short, this analysis was clearly not ready for prime time. But, when you're as desperate as the Republican leadership, you take what you can get. Unfortunately, many in the media got taken by this ploy and now have egg on their face as well.
The CBO will produce an analysis this week that examines the most recent version of the full stimulus bill. This analysis will provide a much more serious basis for assessing the proposals than the CBO "report" invented by the Republican leadership. It will provide a full analysis of the proposal, including an explanation of the methodology that the CBO used in its calculations.
In this respect, it is important to caution against one possible limitation of the CBO methodology. The CBO typically relies on rules of thumb in calculating spendout rates for types of projects.
For example, as a rule of thumb, the spending for highways in the first year after an appropriation may be just a small percentage of the total cost of the highway, with spending in the second year being a little bit higher. It takes time to plan a highway and to bid out contracts. Based on analysis of the time between the passage of appropriations and the actual spending, the CBO can project the time period over which a wide range of appropriations will actually be spent.
However, these rules of thumbs are likely to understate the spendout rate for the projects chosen as part of the stimulus package. These projects are being selected specifically because they are ready to go, with plans already in hand and contracts ready to be submitted for bids.
Furthermore, because of the severity of the economic downturn, contractors are likely to be able to move much more quickly than would usually be the case. Typically, contractors will have to find time to fit a government project in their queue of other work. With the sharp downturn in the construction sector, there are likely to be plenty of contractors who are ready to move almost immediately after a contract is signed.
Finally, the bill threatens state and local governments with the loss of funding if they do not move quickly to spend any money appropriated. For these reasons, the CBO's rules of thumb on spendout rates may substantially understate the amount of spending that will be carried through in the next two years.
The Republicans have raised a serious issue in questioning the rate at which the stimulus will be spent. The plan should be scrutinized to determine if there are not ways to get money into the economy more quickly. But this effort requires looking at evidence and data, not invented CBO reports.
»
Dean Baker is the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). He is the author of "Plunder and Blunder: The Rise and Fall of The Bubble Economy." He also has a blog, "Beat the Press," where he discusses the media's coverage of economic issues. You can find it at the American Prospect's web site.
Comments
DUH!!!!! It's good cop, bad cop! WE THE SHEEPLE HAVE BEEN LED TO THE SLAUGHTER.. We are now the capital of the third world, mexico with nukes, deal with that!!!!
Follow the money!
http://www.heritage.org/research/features/budgetchartbook/fed-rev-spend-2008-boc-T1-Income-Tax-Receipts-Stay-Constant.html
Before we start self-flagellating about being fooled by the Repubs, we should remember that the bastards had to cheat to get into power.
It took gigatons of media propaganda, smear campaigns, dirty tricks, voter intimidation and suppression, vote caging, gerrymandering, and vote-flipping to get these bozos in power. Mark Crispin Miller estimates that Obama's victory was cut in half by Republican cheating.
So it was all a fraud. If they had to cheat to win, they did not snooker the public. So please, my friends--put down your whips. Watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuWnw4Hkf1A&f
The Glue That Holds Chaos Together
Hello, Thom!
I have heard you present the Republican's "Two Santa" tactic, and I have learned more about our government than I have in a dozen tomes laying about my house, though I believe that there is a fundamental problem with the morality of the conservatives that appeals to desperate people. I disagree that the neo-cons will fail if they are to get rid of Social Security, not because their system is feasible (which it is not) but because they are fooling too many people into believing that they are entitled to more than the common man. As unemployment increases, and more people join the armed forces, the value that many people put on human life will decrease. As this happens, civil liberties will become less important to the conserative mindset, and the progressive community is already playing into their hands. Capitulation is not an option. Mediocrity will not bring change for good. The Obama administration, and the Democratic Party are trying everything to accomodate the conservatives who have fought so hard to ruin this nation, and that is wrong.
If they present two Santas to the public, then we have to give them their Black Peter. We have to rule over the conservatives, not with them, as even a simple act of contrition will delay the process needed for true progress. We don't have time to play nice with the Republicans and the neocons, and we should never compromise our beliefs for theirs. The end will not justify the means. We must point out that while our enemies are screaming "SOCIALISM", they are supporting fascism, and they are not American...and make no mistake, the conservatives are our enemies.
The right-wing fascists in this country do not value anything that doesn't directly benefiit their own desires, and these are desires that can never be sated. No amount of money will do it, no amount of humiliation will do it, and certainly no amount of blood.
Thanks, Thom!
I like your references concerning the antiquity of demand economics, and how a small group of greedy men tried to change the laws of economics. I think that it would be cool if you had some kind of timeline graph that would detail this for people who are little less cerebral.
In 1908, federal spending was 2.5% of GDP and total government spending was 7.8%. In 2008 federal spending is estimated to be 20.5% of GDP with government spending at federal, state and local levels totaling 35.7%. Many people do not know that the federal government has not always been as expansive as it currently is. Even some conservatives have embraced "big-government conservatism," arguing that big government is here to stay. In some ways this is an understandable position for politicians because only so much can change over the course of 2, 4, or 6 year election cycles. However understandable the position may be, what this country needs is a conservative, limited government vision.
The vision that I have for the federal government of the United States is a budget, in typical circumstances, of no more than 10% of GDP. Many people may argue that a 50% reduction in federal spending is impossible. Though there are obstacles to achieving this reduction, over time it is possible. If federal spending was frozen at 2008 levels and the GDP grew at an annual rate of 3%, after 25 years, the federal budget would be 10% of GDP. If GDP grows at a reduced rate or if the amount spent increases, the length of time that it takes to achieve the reduction would be extended, but the reduction would still be achieved. The cumulative reduction over the course of time is substantial, but it is achieved incrementally.
How would this reduction be achieved? Since the reductions happen incrementally, drastic annual cuts are not necessary, but the process will require a fundamentally different approach to government spending. Departments could no longer assume annual increases in their budgets. Wasteful spending would have to be eliminated. Redundant agencies would be combined. Departments, programs, and agencies would have to be prioritized, and eventually some would be eliminated. Evaluating the Constitutional legitimacy of the various entities could aid the process. Entitlement programs may have to be restructured to meet promised benefits over the short term while being phase out over a longer term.
How would the country function with reduced federal spending and the elimination of some government agencies? Again, the reductions happen incrementally, so there is time to plan and adjust to the changes. Some of the changes, such as reducing wasteful spending would require no adjustment (except possibly for the recipients of the wasteful spending). Other changes may require the states, local governments, religious and civic organizations, and individuals to assume the responsibilities. Not only is this a constitutional principal, but pragmatically, it moves the responsibility closer to the need.
With patience, concerted effort, and a conviction that a limited federal government is best for the country, this limited government vision can become a reality.
I believe that most people at their core desire freedom, but much of the political discussion and commentary is so issue focused that many people do not even consider freedom. I have tried to illustrate freedom and limited government in the terms that are often used in political commentary regarding a variety of issues.
Choice - An expansive federal government limits choice and personal freedom. Limiting the scope and budget of the federal government and leaving more decisions to the people and local and state governments increases personal freedom and choice.
Diversity - Giving people more freedom and leaving more decisions to the state and local levels increases the diversity of ideas and solutions that can be implemented, tested, and improved.
Unity - Having an expansive federal government causes division between those in and out of power and those who agree and disagree with what the federal government is doing. Limiting the power and scope of the federal government limits division and increases unity.
As long as we have an ever expanding federal government (regardless of party in power), our freedom and choices will be limited. A one size does not fit any federal government limits the diversity of ideas and solutions. If the government gets it wrong, as it often does, it gets it wrong for everyone. Once something is implemented at the federal level, it is difficult to get rid of it. As long as the federal government is doing as much as it currently does, the country will be extremely divided. Limiting the scope of the federal government will not eliminate division, but it offers a better chance at reducing division. (As an additional benefit, limiting the power and budget of the federal government provides natural lobby reform.)
The solution is to stop the growth of the federal government, and then gradually begin to "peel the onion" to return the decisions to the state and local governments. Limit the federal government to its Constitutional powers. Leave the rest to the states and local governments. If there is something that the federal government should be doing that is not authorized by the Constitution, then the Constitution should be amended. The citizens of each state decide how much government they desire. Those who disagree with the type of government implemented in one state would have the freedom to move to another state that has a government more aligned with their desires.
thank you for giving us a REHASH of the Classic Republican, s0-called "libertarian" , so-called "choice" mantra .
the purpose of government depends on what people believe it to be...and that includes the american dogma about "choice" .
the dogma of "limited government and leave things to the states" using fear of "big government that becomes tyrannous" has been USED to install Slavery, corporatism, the "free-market choice"
which ALL ended up in DISUNITY, DIVISIVENESS, economic class divisions, and IRONICALLY -- BIG GOVERNMENT that is a POLICE STATE that is used to protect the interets of the VERY SAME classes that fomented "small government" -- or more correctly :
small government that is NOT supposed to spend on COMMON WELFARE NOR PROTECT the individual or body politic from the exploitation by those that RISE in power THROUGH the so-called "limited government".
the real question is whether government -- BIG OR SMALL, big spending or not -- is a GOOD government - and THAT depends NOT on "limited government" dogma, or "small expenses" dogma, or so-called "fiscal conservatism" - removing any PUBLIC role and PUBLIC FUNDING for COMMON welfare -- such as health care, education, etc. -- but on a population that is well-informed and educated which can NOT be achieved by "privatization" or ""choice with limited government" nonsense
as has ALREADY been demonstrated again and again and again.
"limited government fosters UNITY?"
there is no such thing.
while no government has ever been entirely benign ..small or big....greater unity - forced or otherwise - is more achievable under a large government that has the institutional capabilities to foster it.
that is why there such a thing as Nationalism..whether it was the early americans or today...or the Nazis, or the chinese today .
let's not try to place garlands and flowers around this "unity" high-sounding rhetoric about "small government fosters unity" in that case.
the French have "big governemtn" it spends a LOT on their social welfare network and the population considers it CIVILIZED....they are no LESS united THAN the "small government" americans - be it the ones under the "small government of earlier decades compared to today or not.
what was it that DID divide the south and north through slavery?
STATES' RIGHTS! there you go.
what was it that allowed corporatism to become a maw that swallows everything and REPLACES government and becomes GOVERNMENT in the dark?
"Choice" and "individual rights" used as justification to exploit through power. ....when GOOD government is removed by the mantra of "limited government".
what DID they replace GOOD government or its vestiges and the consitutional rights with:
CORPORATE/STATE SPYING -- BIG GOVERNMENT coming out as a result of the mantra of "small government" fostered by the "small government" so-called libertarians and cosnervatives THEMSELVES!
YET - these people NEVER talk about good governance whose purpose is to PROTECT people and the commons from the EXPLOITATION of those that would USE "small government" to WEAKEN ANY PUBLIC power or COMMON power to protect ITSELF FROM exploitation by power hungry INDIVIDUALS who THEN abrogate upon themselves the power of BIG POLICE STATE government while
reducing and seeking to destroy government that sees after the interests and welfare of the commons BY SPOUTING "Small government".
this kind of creed is a TROJAN HORSE.
PRETENDING to be for "small government": as if by saying that something MAGICAL happens...like by saying "let's leave everything to the free market and individual choice" and something happens by MAGIC!
it's nonsense.
it is a TROJAN HORSE.
the real issue is informed well educated, participatory people - and a benign government of educated, decent individuals which it is people's obligation to KNOW who their leaders are and what issues ARE without being sold a "bait and switch" (same as the mantra of "small limited government") -- which is GOOD governANCE, as opposed to the discussion between "small or big" government.
a "small government" which withholds assistance to people whose needs can not be MET BY THE MARKET or "free market" and INDEED are even DESTROYED by such ideas and the "individual choice of OTHERS" whose consequences are destructive (examples.....wall street, bankers, greenspan, --- individual choicers all of them!!!) ...
is a BAD government as easily as a BIG government that spends on WAR , IN SPYING in the interests of the big powerful entities that were given life and sustenance THROUGH the mantra of "limited government" so THEY can exploit people!