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There are a number things the public "knows" as we head into the election that are just false. If people elect leaders based on false information, the things those leaders do in office will not be what the public expects or needs.
Here are eight of the biggest myths that are out there:
1) President Obama tripled the deficit.
Reality: Bush's last budget had a $1.416 trillion deficit. Obama's first budget reduced that to $1.29 trillion.
2) President Obama raised taxes, which hurt the economy.
Reality: Obama cut taxes. 40% of the "stimulus" was wasted on tax cuts which only create debt, which is why it was so much less effective than it could have been.
3) President Obama bailed out the banks.
Reality: While many people conflate the "stimulus" with the bank bailouts, the bank bailouts were requested by President Bush and his Treasury Secretary, former Goldman Sachs CEO Henry Paulson. (Paulson also wanted the bailouts to be "non-reviewable by any court or any agency.") The bailouts passed and began before the 2008 election of President Obama.
4) The stimulus didn't work.
Reality: The stimulus worked, but was not enough. In fact, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the stimulus raised employment by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million jobs.
5) Businesses will hire if they get tax cuts.
Reality: A business hires the right number of employees to meet demand. Having extra cash does not cause a business to hire, but a business that has a demand for what it does will find the money to hire. Businesses want customers, not tax cuts.
6) Health care reform costs $1 trillion.
Reality: The health care reform reduces government deficits by $138 billion.
7) Social Security is a Ponzi scheme, is "going broke," people live longer, fewer workers per retiree, etc.
Reality: Social Security has run a surplus since it began, has a trust fund in the trillions, is completely sound for at least 25 more years and cannot legally borrow so cannot contribute to the deficit (compare that to the military budget!) Life expectancy is only longer because fewer babies die; people who reach 65 live about the same number of years as they used to.
8) Government spending takes money out of the economy.
Reality: Government is We, the People and the money it spends is on We, the People. Many people do not know that it is government that builds the roads, airports, ports, courts, schools and other things that are the soil in which business thrives. Many people think that all government spending is on "welfare" and "foreign aid" when that is only a small part of the government's budget.
This stuff really matters.
If the public votes in a new Congress because a majority of voters think this one tripled the deficit, and as a result the new people follow the policies that actually tripled the deficit, the country could go broke.
If the public votes in a new Congress that rejects the idea of helping to create demand in the economy because they think it didn't work, then the new Congress could do things that cause a depression.
If the public votes in a new Congress because they think the health care reform will increase the deficit when it is actually projected to reduce the deficit, then the new Congress could repeal health care reform and thereby make the deficit worse. And on it goes.
This post originally appeared at Campaign for America's Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture I am a Fellow with CAF.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dave-johnson/eight-false-things-the-pu_b_772643.html
Social Security Broke: That's Bullsh*t
http://www.youtube.com/user/SamSeder#p/u/8/nn-O9bf01b4
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28193-2005Jan22.html
The massive deficits that Reagan caused were the fault of Democrats. Zero job creation in the entire Bush presidency was because Democrats, too.
So was the Iraq War.
And don't forget 9/11. That happened when Bill Clinton was President.
So they got the Lehman Bros of the world to leverage themselves 30 to 1 or more. They got financial houses to buy up terribly risky debt, repackage that debt, and sell it in pieces, insure the sale, sell the insurance, package all of that again and again, thus ensuring they would make their commissions but others would lose trillions.
It was all the government's fault. The government forced billionaires to risk trillions around the world.
It's never the fault of the private sector. It's never the fault of billionaires. Those poor, poor martyrs everyone is always picking on. They're just the victims in all of this!!!
;>)
How can the public KNOW anything?
What source of information is totally unbiased, totally accurate, totally irreproachable?
Another article in HP complains about cynicism. With the media as reliable as a broken clock (even a broken clock tells the right time, twice a day) what choice do we have?
The Big Lie works.............. it works so well, that no one can believe anyone. How do voters make an informed decision without reliable truthful information?
Garbage in, Garbage out.
1) Either major party supports peace
Military spending increased, conflict escalated, all the false war policies continued to support despots and secure resources
2) Tarp was the only bailout
Multi-trillions have bent loaned to the TBTF banks at near zero interest or overpaid for near worthless bank-held securities.
3) SocSec hasn't been a ponzi scheme
Social Security has been used as a regressive income tax with the excess collected misused to fund wars and corporate subsidies. Future SS shortfalls have to be paid by added tax collections because government IOUs (bonds) are not true investments but promises to pay with future taxes.
4) Either party will protect civil liberties
Both are complicit in war crimes and coverups, renditions, torture and assassinations, and supported all the legislation underpinning a Homeland police state.
5) Either party wants Financial Reform
The reforms enacted are widely acknowledged as superficial, and fail to correct financial racketeering.
6) Either party supports meaningful (single-payer) Health Reform
So-called Obamacare did nothing to curtail the overall (GDP) cost of medical care or medicines.
What was done secured profits for the insurance and big pharma industries under the cover of benefits given to a token few.
7) That the economy will be fixed, the environment preserved, or civil liberties protected without ending global militarism and financial racketeering.
8) That either Democrats or Republicans will cease being corporate lobbyist pawns,
and will end, or even oppose, global militarism and financial racketeering.
This includes the Fed's assistance.
good link
This is probably the one I hear the most and is the most ridiculous. The myth of the benevolent rich man who would hire more people, if only he had enough money, is so ludicrous and obviously not real, yet continues to live on as fact in many minds. As you rightly point out, businesses hire the number of people necessary to make the largest profit. If they pay less in taxes, that will only translate to more jobs if there is more profit to be made. But, with tax cuts at the top, money is then taken out of the economy at the bottom and so may actually make it less likely that they will hire because there will be less disposable income at the bottom.
The GAO told us that most corporations pay no taxes. None. Zip. Zero. Citi, Bank of America and GE all paid zero this last year. They're not hiring.
Tax rates have plummeted for the rich from 1964 on. The tax rate for the wealthiest Americans was 91% until 1964, when it was lowered to 70%. Our economy had its greatest middle class expansion from 1947-1973, when the top rate never fell below 70% and was 91% for most of the time.
Clinton raised taxes and the economy boomed. His total net jobs came to 22 million.
All of the evidence tells us that low tax rates have nothing to do with job growth or GDP growth. The evidence also tells us that the economy performs far better when Dems are in power, and even better when the Dems in power are actual liberals.
Best single presidential performance in the last 80 years was LBJ's.
What we've seen is that they've taken the tax cuts and pocketed them and raised their own salaries. That works in tandem, too. With individual rates so low, they have an incentive to invest in their own executive salaries. When rates were 91%, there was less incentive to pay obscene executive compensation, and they were more likely to put money back into the company.
The ratio of executive pay to rank and file tells us that.
In 1965, it was roughly 26 to 1.
It's grown steadily for decades and now tops 400 to 1.
As taxes have gone down, executive pay has gone up, and rank and file wages have stagnated or fallen.
If the conservatives were right, the opposite would have occurred. With falling tax rates for the top, wages would have risen for the bottom. They didn't. They stagnated or fell from 1973 on.
And another key: No tax cut can have the same impact on the bottom line as shipping jobs overseas. The government could cut the corporate rate to zero, and if you asked corporations to make a choice between that zero rate or shipping jobs overseas, they would choose the latter. Because paying pennies on the dollar for labor beats even zero taxes.
That dynamic has to change.
To place limits on corporate profiteering places limits on American Freedom.
Really, who gives a hoot about what those unamerican people say or think.
They may be able to defund health care, however.
In a sobering report on CBS' "60 Minutes", the unemployment picture is shown to be much bleaker than the federal statistics suggest.
VOTE DEMOCRAT!
VOTE FOR THE PEOPLE
VOTE FOR WHAT MAKES AMERICA GREAT
VOTE DEMOCRATIC!!!!
"DO NOT VOTE DEMOCRAT OR DEMOCRATIC"
DEMOCRATS ARE SERIAL LIARS AND CRIMINAL FRAUDS
DEMOCRATS HATE AMERICANS, OUR CONSTITUTION AND OUR COUNTRY
DEMOCRATS DON'T MAKE THIS COUNTRY GREAT, AMERICANS DO
DEMOCRATIC? NO!
DO NOT VOTE DEMOCRATIC!!!!
THERE IS NOTHING DEMOCRATIC ABOUT THE PARTY OF DEMOCRATS
DEMOCRATS ARE THE ENEMY OF AMERICANS, OUR CONSTITUTION AND OUR COUNTRY.
I AM A REGISTERED DEMOCRATIC AMERICAN
I BLINDLY AND IGNORANTLY VOTED STRAIGHT DEMOCRATIC FOR 16 YEARS
I NEVER CALLED MYSELF A DEMOCRAT AND NEVER WILL
DEMOCRATS FIEND FOR POWER AND I'LL NEVER VOTE FOR THEM FOR AS LONG AS I LIVE
THIS IS ABOUT DEMOCRATS VS. AMERICANS
I KNOW WHO I AM
DO YOU?