The stench of Republican propaganda
Yesterday I toyed briefly with the idea of writing a snarky satire on the latest manifestation of GOP speak. But it just disgusts me too much. “Job creators” is what they’re calling themselves now. Rich people, that is. “You can’t tax us! We’re job creators!” And expecting these rich people—excuse me, “job creators”—to pay at least as much in taxes as secretaries is “class warfare.” Also, the reason the economy sucks? Because the “job creators” are “on strike.” I kid you not. Apparently they’re all holed up in some mountain retreat with John Galt and Dagny Taggart, just waiting for the unwashed masses to beg them to come back.
Why didn’t the aristocrats of the ancien régime think of this? “Mais, mais, nous sommes job creators!”
By itself, Republican propaganda is hilarious in its transparency. It’s a Daily Show sketch, an Onion piece. The real Republican Party platform has exactly one plank: wealth protection for oligarchs. The past century of political propaganda has been all about tricking ordinary working Americans into voting for that shit, usually by disguising it as something else. “Job creators” is just the latest attempt.
But that’s where the fun stops. Because people really do fall for this malarkey. Somewhere out there, some poor deluded idiot making poverty wages is listening to John Boehner or Sarah Palin and going, “Oh! So that’s why I don’t have any money! If we just cut taxes on rich people and corporations, everything will be fine!”
Like the man said, you can’t fix stupid. But you can educate the ignorant, which is why Obama continues to depress the living shit out of me. Theoretically, it’s nice that he’s calling for taxes on the wealthy, à la the Buffett Rule. But there are a few problems. One: he’s also calling for increases in Medicare premiums, deductibles, and copays. You know, “shared sacrifice.” Two: None of this even matters, since the whole thing is just a campaign ploy. The tax code is not going to get revised in time for the deficit negotiations, and besides, Obama’s lying. He’s in campaign mode. The White House focus-tested some populist type crap, so that’s what we’re getting. Means nothing.
And three, the biggest problem of all: WHY THE FUCK ARE WE EVEN TALKING ABOUT THE DEFICIT? The deficit is not the problem, for chrissake. In December of 1941, FDR didn’t say, “Yeah, yeah, war—but first, we need to get our deficit under control. Then we can think about Germany and Japan.”
The very fact that we’re even talking about the deficit means the Republican propaganda terrorists have won.
11 Responses to “The stench of Republican propaganda”
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Toonces says:
I left a similar comment over at Echidne’s, but basically, where are the “job creators’” bootstraps? Maybe we could start a collection for them.
Also, rich people save their money, so you don’t stimulate anything except for rich people’s savings when you give them tax breaks: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/.....-says.html
And because we don’t have universal healthcare, we have one of the smallest small business sectors: http://www.cepr.net/documents/.....009-08.pdf
“In this report, we review internationally comparable data on the size of the small business sector in 22 rich countries.3 Across the full set of countries, for every measure we examine – including self- employment rates and the share of total employment in small enterprises – we find that the United States consistently has the lowest or among the lowest proportions of employment in small businesses.”
September 20th, 2011 at 11:34 pm EST -
dandelion says:
We’re talking about the deficit because Obama believes the deficit is the problem. It’s that simple.
Included in the segment where he yells at Romer is his stated belief that unemployment is a byproduct of productivity gains. He’s said that before, too, when he made the idiotic comment about ATMS costing jobs.
Obama is, when it comes to economics, just plain dumb, there’s no other word for it.
Unfortunately, I’m sure he thinks he’s got it all mastered. That’s what makes us doomed, and that’s what’s hinted at Romer’s heaving a big sigh and saying, “He’s got his own ideas.”
I swear, the next time some idiotic liberal Dood tells me experience is overrated, I’m going to punch him.
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Sameol says:
If they’re on strike, does that mean we can invoke Taft-Hartley?
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Toonces says:
dandelion, I don’t know if you’ve seen this:
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votermom says:
The very fact that we’re even talking about the deficit means the Republican propaganda terrorists have won.
It’s because the biggest Republican propagandist sits in the Ovaal Office. Every right-wing argument that comes to his desk, he validates.
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quixote says:
dandelion, he’s not dumb. Code for “rich” is “job creator.” Code for “way to get money out of everyone else and give it to my campaign contributors” is “ZOMG! The Deficit!.”
It really does seem to be that simple. When you assume that’s the rule, you can predict B0′s behavior. When you assume anything else, it all makes no sense.
As Violet says, he’s in campaign mode. In our brave new world, the voters aren’t really the target though.
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scott says:
This is why I can’t vote for the guy. Opinions may differ, and I respect those who believe that they have to vote for the guy as a defense against The Crazy, which is a debatable but legitimate strategy. To me, though, I just can’t enable with my vote someone whose approach to this crisis annd whose performance has been so lamentably bad. At a certain point doing that kind of thing over and over again just encourages more of the same, and I can’t stomach it any more. I’ll never vote for the other side because I am a liberal, but I’m done with fauxgressives. D-U-N-N done. I. Can’t. Do. It. Any. More.
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propertius says:
Class warfare, huh?
They’ll know we’re waging class warfare when they see “job creators” hanging from the lampposts.
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whatever says:
‘Why didn’t the aristocrats of the ancien régime think of this?’
IIRC some of the British ones did use to argue that if it wasn’t for their huge manors and masses of servants and so on, the poor would be even poorer. -
Sophie says:
The Republicans have alsways been good a framinging and bumper-sticker sloganeering. And Democrats have always adopted that deer-in-headlights reaction to it.
Just yesterday, Eric Cantor was “complaining’ that the Democrats were holding up disaster relief by obstructing a deal when he was the a$$wipte who made it contingent on paying for it to begin with. And people believe this guy!
Rank and file Republicans actually believe that people remain unemployed because the benefits have been extended! Their spin machine is ubiquitous and effective.
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Toonces says:
Hey Violet, did you see this?
