McCain Is Not Bush? - The Failed Economics of Reagan, Bush and McCain

If John McCain wants us to think he's not the same as George Bush, perhaps he should stop embracing Bush's policies.

This election should be about one thing: a vision for the future of the American economy. All other issues, domestic and foreign, are dependent on this vision. For close to three decades, that vision has mostly been a Republican one and John McCain promises to continue the "trickle down" economic policy which has been a disaster for America. Barack Obama cannot repeat that sentence enough. John McCain promises to continue the "trickle down" economic policy which has been a disaster for America. That reason alone makes him enough like George Bush that all voters, rich and poor, must reject the notion of a McCain presidency.

Big spending Republicans
It all began in 1980 with Ronald Reagan. Although Reagan promised to cut spending, he never did. Instead, he cut taxes for the rich and increased spending. George W. Bush did the exact same thing. Yes, folks, as much as Republicans would like to tag Barack Obama and Democrats as big spenders, it's Republicans who have been America's biggest spenders. It's not even close.

In fact, since 1945, when Republicans have been in charge of both the White House and Congress, they have never, not once, reduced spending. To make matters worse, since Reagan, Republicans have become big borrowers. Imagine what would happen if you ran your household that way, by spending money you don't have and continually spending more. "Borrow and Spend" is a lot uglier than "Tax and Spend."

And what did they do with all of this spending? Did they help out average Americans? Do something for education or hungry people? Help with housing, rebuild inner cities, start anti-crime programs for inner city kids or help provide health insurance for poor kids in coal mine towns? Did they stabilize Social Security or Medicare? Nope. Their giveaways were aimed at the richest 1% of this country while they spent lavishly on war. They managed to bust the budget while decreasing spending on social programs.

Nothing trickles down
The basic argument for their policy is if you give tax breaks to the rich, that money will eventually "trickle down" to the middle and lower class. It doesn't. All you need to know to discount this theory is simple logic. Wealthy people already have spending cash. Any additional sums they get will not likely increase their spending by much. On the other hand, give cash to the lower classes and they will probably spend it all. If you want to revive an economy, get money into the hands of the poorer people, not the richer ones. Trickle Up. Now that's a plan.

As to the notion that corporations will hire more people when given special tax treatment, the amount of hiring is not dependent on tax breaks, it's dependent on how well the business is doing. If their business is booming, Exxon will increase spending whether or not they get tax breaks. On the other hand, if they get tax breaks and the oil business is on the rocks, they'll just stuff that cash in their CEO's mattress.

Republicans run up the debt
The failure of "trickle down" is in the numbers. Ronald Reagan ran up a bigger debt than every president before him combined. The budget deficit exploded under his leadership and the national debt tripled. In fact, despite a slight flattening of the national debt during the 8 years of Clinton's presidency (actually the debt declined as a percentage of GDP), the debt has grown from under $1 trillion before Reagan to over $10 trillion after George Bush! And, yet, with all of this spending, we still don't have national health insurance and Social Security is more endangered than ever.

At first, what Bush and Reagan's policies were really effective at was to make rich people richer and poor people poorer. But there is evidence that, in the end, the policies just make everyone poorer.

Class warfare GOP style
John McCain claims Barack Obama has some sort of ominous plan to redistribute wealth. But the real goal of Obama's tax policy is to restore fairness in a tax system that has already shifted most of the wealth in the nation to a tiny percentage of privileged people. Just as Al Gore told us it would in 2000, the result of Bush's tax cuts was that the wealthiest 1% of Americans saw their after tax income increase by 20%. It was the largest increase since, you guessed it, Ronald Reagan was president. Further, by 2005, the top 1% received its largest share of gross income since 1928, the year before the start of the Great Depression. Turns out that a tremendous imbalance between the haves and have nots is not good for anyone, including the haves. Why is this? As I stated before, the lower classes need to be spending their money to support the economy and if they don't have any money, well...

Then there's the issue of deregulation. Is it a coincidence that we had the Savings and Loan crisis on Ronald Reagan's watch and another bank crisis on Bush's? "Trickle down" doesn't work. Yet Republicans keep trying it. Why? Greed. In the short term it makes rich people richer so those rich people contribute mightily to Republican candidates. But even they suffer in the end. Too bad they can't connect the dots. But, if you do, you'll see those dots draw an outline of John McCain and it looks very much like George W. Bush.

Read what America's wealthiest man, Warren Buffett, and wealthy conservative Republican Ben Stein say about "trickle down" by clicking here

Read more reactions to the Obama-McCain Presidential Debate from HuffPost bloggers

Comments

[casmithjr]

A writer, actor and radio host, Bruce Tenenbaum is a former music industry executive who spent more than two decades working with dozens of multi-platinum recording artists including Mary J. Blige, Tom Petty, Elton John, Meat Loaf, Genesis, Yes, U2, AC/DC, Live and CSN. He has spent a great deal of his time on stage, is a veteran improviser and hosted a political talk show on KABC radio in Los Angeles.

I am glad to see he is qualified for this. People need to research and learn the true differences between Obama and McCain, and then vote on what you feel is right for your country and yourself.

[tomas0808]

This has been a constant presence in America since Nixon (aside from the brief periods when a Dem was in office, with their hands full fixing the mess) , a sense that my government really doesn't give a crap about me. Artists, educators, lower and middle income people, the list is endless. It's really a tragedy. In fact, It's a crime. I didn't understand the machinations of it at the time it was going on, but I did have a sense that the country was headed in the wrong direction. If I'd been a stronger person I might have been able to fight it. But what happened to me ( and probably millions of others) was I said, my country doesn't care about me, why should I care about it? And I went completely off the grid into the drug trade and addiction. I managed to make it out of that with some damage in 1999 but when I was young I had the benefit of living for chunks of time in Norway, and I can tell you that when there's a perception amongst the masses that your gov't cares about you,all of you, the trickle down (I know, I know) of that knowledge and confidence to society has a profound effect. I just wonder how many weren't as lucky as me, who were effected by the feeling their gov't didn't give a crap about them and never made it back. Despair can kill. it almost did me.

[juuggernaut]

The trickly down meme is very persistent. I ended up here via google after a conversation with a neighbor, a progressive engineering PhD married to a Republican with a libertarian streak. She thought trickle down was quite plausible on the face of it thinking that higher income brackets had to go somewhere with their money and would therefore be likely to feed it back into the economy. She also thought that as a nation we were constantly getting wealthier and she had somehow not noticed that wages have been in decline.
I'm referencing that to show that for many people it's apparently easy not to have a valid assessment of the state of the economy unless they're actively and critically looking for sober information among the trickle down of propaganda buzz words ever present in today's media.

[Bruce Tenenbaum - Huffpost Blogger]

You raise a valid point. Sadly, the Republicans have been winning the "trickle down" debate for a long time. People like Joe The Plumber are a good illustration of how even people who are on the short end of the economic theory, are unaware of its impact. We need to carry the argument to more folks. More importantly, we need Barack Obama to win on November 4.

[mes]

I make no apologies for my typing. I have Parkinson's and f type with my three middle digits of one hand. If my other hand even comes close to the keyboard like now, aaaaaaaaaaaaaa, well, anyway.
Two questions:
We both agree the United States a capitalist society. We both agree that from the birth of this nation we have always dabbled in socialistic ideas. I’ll even go you one better. This nation could be totally socialist. The intelligence and foresight of the founding fathers drafted two documents that enable this fact; Our Constitution and Bill of Rights, provided it can pass the required test to become law.
Capitalism is what has, for generations, made this country unique. Any individual, no matter what economic class, has available the tools to better themselves. The playing field is not, by any stretch of the imagination, level. If it was it would not be capitalism.
I admit that there have been periods in our history where times when federal oversight was extremely lacking and people with the power of money abused that power. However, the lack of oversight does not require federally mandated regulation. “Regulations” place the federal government in my pocket more than I desire. Even you stated, oversight must be controlled and it must have the ability to react with force and conviction. This fiscal conservative asks “At what point does oversight become excessive regulation?”
2. Explain the "trickle up" theory. I've never heard a definition nor ever seen it work.

[BeasleysMom]

Good article that gets at the basic philosophies of both parties. This isn't so much about Obama versus McCain as it is about Democrat vs republican. I am not sure that people understand that. An economic history of this country indicates swings between both philosphies, with recessions and the great Depression itself always coming under conservative or republican administrations

[lsucwells]

I don't understand why it's called class warfare or redistribution of wealth when the Democrats say they want to cut taxes on the middle class, but not when the Republicans want to cut taxes on the upper class? Why is that not called redistribution of wealth? Shouldn't there be a more level, more balanced playing field? The disparity of wealth in this country is obscene.

[anachoret]

Standard Hobbesian thought: Bellum omnium contra omnes ("the war of all against all").

It's social Darwinism, the only form of Darwinism the Robber Barons believe in.
Plus, because the Democrats won't fight back, much like the culture war.

[2belinda]

Yeah, trickle down economics works fabulously.

The top 1or 2% get first dibs. They (CEO's and others of their ilk) spend to support their selfish, luxurious life-styles - 8 or 9 homes, 13 cars, yachts, jets etc.

(However, according to McCain, during one of his many disjointed diatribes last night, lumped together, "cosmetic surgery and transplants". In his world both are evidently a choice. An option, like a face-lift or tummy-tuck vs disfiguring or debilitating injuries say from a fire or car accident. And transplants - (kidney and heart come to mind) - which I thought were usually a matter of life or death.
I digress...­I don't know. I have enough trouble getting my BC/BS insurance to pay a decent amount to my doctors for the medical care I use, because I need.)

What's left to trickle down to the masses?

ZERO

Vote Obama/Biden '08

[robbie44]

I wish Obama was as hard hitting on this issue as you are? would it be to complicated for someone like "Joe the plumber"to understand?cuz i get it.

[robbie44]

Its the Reagan,Bush,McCain chain,and it looks like John is the weakest link...SNA­P GOES THE WHITE HOUSE!!

[NWGuy]

Something I don't hear a lot of in this campaign is that, in spite of trying to hang on to the label of "maverick", McCain is still, first and foremost, a republican. His thinking is centered on the wealthy, i.e., give a $5000 tax credit for health insurance, this is helpful only if you are paying a lot more than $5000 in taxes. Republicans, and McCain, value profit over all else, especially short term profit, and anything that helps obtain more profit is legitimate and the preferred policy paradigm. A "trickle up" policy will, over time, increase profits for everyone, a "trickle down" policy gets profit into the rich pockets now, ergo, "trickle down" is the only policy they use. In spite of McCain's recent campaign facade of being for joe the plumber, and we're hearing about passionate conservatives (gee, where did I hear that before, oh yeah, G Bush!), a republican administration would value the wealthy 1-2% at the expense of the other 98%.

Reminds me of the fable of the woman that helped a snake, only to be bitten, the snake states, "Silly woman, you knew I was a snake before you picked me up!"

[Dionita]

I just couldn't get over Senator McCain's sneering and disdain over the idea of wealth redistribution.

[Bruce Tenenbaum - Huffpost Blogger]

After seeing the media obsess over "Joe The Plumber" this morning, I thought I would add the following.

If Joe could afford to buy a business that profits over $250,000 a year (he can't), he would never pass on the opportunity to purchase it merely because it would put him in a higher tax bracket. Years ago, when my salary increase confronted me with higher taxes, I complained to my accountant. Abe, my accountant, told me something simple. "Be happy you're paying taxes," he said. "What? Why would you say that?" I asked. "Because it means you're making money" was the answer.

NO ONE refuses to make money because they have to pay some of that in taxes. At least, no one with a brain. And, I have to assume that anyone in a position to buy a company that profits 1/4 million dollars a year (pretty good for a small business) would have a brain.

Which leads me to the deduction that "Joe The Plumber's" argument is not for real. He's either a shill or a willing stooge for the Republicans.

McCain will attempt to use this guy's false argument to obscure what "trickle down" economics is really about. Republicans always do this. They accuse Democrats of "class warfare" and "redistribution of wealth" when it's really about making the tax system more fair. While McCain wants to lower taxes for rich people, Obama wants to lower them for everyone else. That's what the economy needs.

[KovaaK]

I think the point that we need to start using more is that there is absolutely no incentive for the incredibly wealthy to actually use that money in a way such that it will trickle down to those who need it. People who have half a dozen houses, a dozen cars, and so on already are very likely not creating many jobs for people in the way that they spend their money. (This is just my guess - I'd like to see some research on this topic)

[Kindheart]

Reagan-nomics does not work and they need to let go of it. I guess the same thing happened in the Soviet Union when communism fell. There were old diehards who just could not let communism go.

[rich misty]

I 100% support an immediate spending freeze.

GOP bank accounts should be padlocked and examined.

[Georgiamomof2]

You are so right! They always talk about a spending freeze? why can't we spend money on jobs and schools, health care.how come this doesn't make since?

[Kindheart]

Because those aren't important to them--all for defense.

[BillZBubb]

So true. So sad. Yet nearly half the population is still buying the Republican Kool Aid.