INDEPENDENTS ARE SQUEAMISH about harsh, personal attacks against the President. People like the guy, just not the U.S. reality.
As the New York Times reports, Karl Rove’s group is drawing from their set of facts about Obama’s record hoping to hit a chord that rings true.
The ad is the work of two of the most fearsome players in Republican politics: Larry McCarthy, the producer behind the infamous Willie Horton commercial in 1988, and Crossroads GPS, the political battle squad founded by Karl Rove.
When it makes its debut Wednesday in 10 swing states as the centerpiece of a $25 million campaign, it is expected to become one of the most heavily broadcast political commercials of this phase of the general election.
The ad pushes austerity.
It remains stunning just how little people know about economics in a rough environment, thinking that taking revenue, also known as taxes, out of the system will help things. The bookend is the Obama administration’s half measures and economic message void for most of his first term.
The best ad I’ve seen this season was for Mitt Romney during a Food TV show. It was a biographical ad, showing Mitt Romney in a purely positive light, no mention of Obama. It was the most effective ad I’ve seen, but I’m sure there will be others. We live on the Virginia side of the Beltway, which is one of the battleground states being fought over by both Obama and Romney.
That ad comes off as completely clueless. The GOP continually fails to recognize that George W. Bush was the biggest spender in the history of the country. Why didn’t the GOP cut the debt when they had the change? Why didn’t the GOP do all this when they had the chance and controlled everything for six years? The GOP inherited a balanced budget with a surplus that if we had stayed on the Clinton plan would be paid off now. If cutting taxes was a solution then we would have gained jobs during the Bush Administration instead of losing them. This ad just shows how out of touch the GOP is.
“Like getting beaten with a bag of oranges..”
Taylor
And, some just refuse to listen to the truth about what works in what economic climate and what doesn’t. They would rather remain stubborn ideologues (hello Joe Scarborough) and let the country go down the drain than admit they are deadly wrong. And, the Obama Administration’s willingness to go along with this madness in terms of not killing the bush tax cuts and not doing what was needed from the start with a higher stimulus and no tax cuts in that package aided and abetted the continued economic malpractice of an austerity “fix” in a depressed economy is chilling.
And, the continued fairy tale of who the job creators are and shoved down the gullets of a more than gullible public some of whom refuse to listen to the truth because they don’t trust the source and continue to buy into policies that do them harm by the GOP and some Dems alike.
Would those fooled by the likes of Norquist or Ryan or anyone now preaching austerity and tax and spending cuts so the so-called “job creators” can create more jobs as a solution to our economic ills have believed Henry Ford over 100 years ago who knew how to make his company grow raising all ships (his, his workers, etc) in the process? Henry Ford learned that he couldn’t only sell his cars to rich people, there weren’t that many. He knew he had to sell to the general public represented by the people whom he employed. The mass production of the Model T automobile lowered its unit price, making it affordable for the average consumer. Furthermore, Ford substantially increased his workers’ wages, giving them the means to become customers which increased demand for his product. Lack of demand and income inequality are the culprits killing economic growth especially in a depressed economy, not increased taxes on the wealthy and targeted fiscal spending.
Demand and income inequality are what is at immediate issue here and not the deficit (which does need to be addressed at a future time but not now). Right now there is a lack of consumer demand and income inequality which is why there is a lack of jobs and hence economic growth in this country. A big old capitalist like Ford knew this about income and demand over a century ago. Ford was anything but a socialist (which has lost all meaning and is being flung about now because the right has exhausted their demonizing of the word liberal and many a cowardly liberal changed their label to progressive
) but he learned how to make his business grow: mass producing his cars thereby lowering the cost so that more consumers including his workers (by increasing their wages) could buy his product. Higher consumer demand for his product enabled him to hire more in his manufacturing plants who also bought his cars and the cycle continued. Taxes had nothing to do with his hiring practices, it was consumer demand.
I don’t hold out much hope that Obama will do what needs to be done to get us out of this depression and clearly express to the public that it’s consumer demand at immediate issue not the deficit. And, to sell to the public what needs to get done to get us out of this depression: ending the Bush tax cuts, targeted fiscal spending and higher tax rates on ordinary income for those making over “X” amount. Whether by reason of who he is and what he believes and/or by reason of not being a very good negotiator or to put it more bluntly a POTUS who knows how to “twist arms” to get things he believes in done, none of these solutions will happen. I hope he proves me wrong because the surviving and thriving of my country is more important than my not trusting him to not only get done what needs doing but believing in what needs to get done in the first place.
First of all, Obama is no LBJ. To be fair, I don’t think many have what LBJ had to be a successful legislator and then POTUS who knew how to bargain and ruthlessly if need be with the Senate and House to get what he wanted done even knowing his party would never be the same. But, what trumped that was knowing that his countrymen and women would be the main benefactors of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act and the Medicare/Medicaid Act of 1965.
Hillary Clinton during the ’08 primaries
(and was excoriated for saying that by the Obama campaign, Obama bloggers and Edward Kennedy). http://tinyurl.com/2u8ny3 I do believe Mrs. Clinton would have been more LBJ-like as POTUS but unless she runs and wins in ’16, we’ll never know for sure.
I just got a copy of the 4th Volume of Robert Caro’s masterpiece about LBJ, The Passage of Power and just started reading yesterday. http://tinyurl.com/6wg3lyn I recommend Caro’s books which are even-handed towards LBJ and his legacy. And, just a great historical read.
As I’m writing this, I am remembering that classic film “Sunset Boulevard” from which this memorable piece of dialogue hails:
That how I see most members of the House and Senate now. As well as the Executive branch and the Supremes.
Just in case you haven’t seen this video, please watch, listen and learn from the mouth of one of those big, fat cat American capitalists who let’s the economic cat out of the bag of what makes him prosperous and why and just who are the job creators. He’s no idealist, he’s a realist venture capitalist with wealth-preserving instincts who knows of what he speaks and has been criticized by many in his tax bracket for telling the truth.
http://tinyurl.com/bwjgs84
I am so sick of austerity, it does not work, neither does the tax cuts for the rich. Everyone should pay their fair share, I am not beating up rich people because everyone should contribute to this country, the rich should pay alittle more, I am not asking them to pay a hugh about of taxes and neither is anyone else. Maybe there should be a fixed rate. I am not rich, but I also don’t want their hugh homes or cars or money, I just want the roads fixed, better education for kids right now we rank 17th in the world and dropping fast in education, better healthcare system, not the one Obama drew up that came from Romneycare. Most people are not beating up the rich like Fox News says, just pay a fair share thats all !!
I guess nobody cares that this add is full of lies!
Full of? Just full of? How about COMPLETELY.