It just completely boggles the mind how Republicans can continue recommending with such conviction the same shit they always do, and do it with cause and effect so completely inverted.
Larry Kudlow, in an article entitled Without Deep Spending Cuts, the Republicans Lose the House in 2014 is clearly very, very dismayed about something.
In his words:
During President Obama’s first term, the federal debt rose by roughly $6 trillion.
Never mind the
fact that most of that $6 trillion came as a result of the last Republican who occupied the White House: George W. Bush.
To borrow a chart from that last link:
It just so happens that short-term memory is very accommodating for Republican propaganda purposes, especially when the
bold new proposals being offered are validated by one of the
Most Trusted Names in Republican Polling:
[...] Bold means bold spending cuts, as in cut spending like there’s no tomorrow. Bold means implementing the $1.2 trillion spending sequester. Bold means an absolute rock-solid commitment to spending cuts. A new Rasmussen survey shows that 62 percent of Americans favor across-the-board spending cuts. That includes every program of the federal government, according to the survey.
Until, of course, that 62 percent of voters discover the things near-and-dear to them are also, in fact, on that chopping block — Social Security benefits, Medicare, Police/Fire Departments, that bridge they use everyday to get to work, etc. Besides, it's easy to take a poll affirming a decision to cut
other people's stuff.
So what does Mr. Kudlow suggest?
So Republicans can persuade the public about bold spending cuts. They can make it their key message and central marketing strategy. If they don’t, they risk losing the House in 2014.
Got that? Turn that same old GOP message a
new same old GOP message.
OR ELSE !
One Rasmussen poll is enough to convince him that Republicans can kiss the House goodbye if people don't get the massive spending cuts they're DEMANDING.
My guess is that if they do end-up losing the House, their patriotic Tea Party friends, after having loyally taken Mr. Kudlow's advice, will be more to blame than anything else.
To further reinforce this fantasy of his, he again looks to Rasmussen:
Voters are smart. Another Rasmussen poll shows that 68 percent of Americans say cutting government spending is the solution to our economic problems.
Right. Because asking questions like
these...
1) In reacting to the nation’s current economic problems, what worries you more…that the federal government will do too much or that the federal government will not do enough?
2) In reacting to the nation’s current economic problems, should government increase spending or cut spending?
...will surely produce answers confirming a smart and well-informed electorate is on your side.
The obligatory shout-out to the real “smart and well-informed” electorate behind all of these populist austerity demands:
Unlike the recent fiscal-cliff tax-hike deal, we need to let successful earners, investors, and risk-takers keep more of what they earn as an incentive to remain the activists who drive the economy.
Billionaires are now “activists,” of all things, and “risk-taking” apparently only refers to those
entrepreneurs investing their life savings on a bold, innovative idea, not Wall Street's binge gambling that blew up the economy not too long ago.
As an extension to this hard-line spending message, the GOP must make it clear that spending cuts equal economic growth. Think Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman, and James Buchanan -- all Nobel prize winners who argued that less spending means more growth.
Meanwhile, back in the 21st Century, there's a different reality, courtesy of
Mother Jones:
A number of leading economists are now busy explaining why the deficit this year actually ought to be a lot larger, not smaller; why there should be more government spending, including aid to state and local governments, which would create new jobs and prevent layoffs in areas like education and law enforcement. Such efforts, working in tandem with slow but positive job growth in the private sector, might indeed mean genuine recovery. Government budget cuts, on the other hand, offset private-sector gains with the huge and depressing effect of public-sector layoffs, and have damaging ripple effects on the rest of the economy as well.
And what better way to appeal to those hurting largely as the result of failed conservative economic policy than to...shit on them, of course:
And the GOP should stop paying people not to work as part of their spending-cut campaign.
[right-wing food stamp/unemployment/disability statistical bullshit]
And for all of us slacker-moocher-drug-addicted-welfare queens in the studio audience, he dumbs it down:
It’s this simple: If you pay people not to work, they won’t work. And if they won’t work, the economy won’t grow.
No, it's
this simple: When Republicans make a good faith effort to work with Democrats to actually create jobs, people will work. Same tired right-wing bullshit, new for 2013.
Meet your new and improved Republican party, my ass.
Out comes his inner robot:
This is part of the spending-cut message. The GOP has to repeat this message again and again.
That'll help.
Drone the same thing over and over and over until people are even more sick of it than they already are. I'm sure the Karl Rove Message Saturation Machine that overwhelmed the airwaves last election will be more than happy to help people reach even quicker for that remote control next time around.
Deftly switching to victim mode, Mr. Kudlow continues:
Now, we know President Obama is against spending cuts. In his debt-ceiling speech this week, all he did was demonize the Republican party, saying the GOP is making America a deadbeat nation. Obama continues to blame Republicans for throwing old folks, young people, military troops, and others under the bus. Sheer demagoguery. Awful, divisive, non-compromising, non-leadership rhetoric.
He thinks the President just pulled this shit out of thin air or something, I guess. He probably also expects tears to be streaming down our faces as we comfort
poor, poor Republicans. So mistreated, they are. Another classic example of heartless pricks victimizing everything around them and then suddenly becoming the victim when they're called out on it. As usual, Republicans think everyone else is the fucking problem, not them.
Still, Mr. Kudlow thinks they have a winning formula:
But the GOP can make hay on this with a strong spending-cut, shrink-the-government message. With no gimmicks, please.
Ha. Ha. Ha. This guy wants to abstain from gimmicks? A member of this party:
Gimmick Obfuscation Propaganda
That's rich. Mr.Kudlow's very serious article itself proves that gimmickry is alive and well, along with all the rest of the rebranding, remessaging, repackaging, outreaching, reframing — all euphemisms representing Republican deception — that are also, in essence, nothing but gimmicks.
Alas, even after their policies fail spectacularly and as national awakening to their bullshit tactics happens around them, there's always some pundit ready to play the Wise Sage:
But the moral of this story is that congressional Republicans must develop an effective spending-cut message. And that message should be linked to economic growth and job creation. If they do that, they will help the economy and their political futures. If they don’t, they’re going to lose the House and undermine the economy.
I think it’s that simple.
What do you mean, you
think it's that simple?
Not the closing sentence I expected from someone as confident about the advice he's dispensing as Mr. Kudlow surely is.
..........
(emphasis mine in all quotes)