Tax, lies & videotape

There is so much double-speak, exaggeration and flat-out lying going on in politics right now that it's hard to know where to begin discussing it all.

Part of the problem is that one man's truth is another man's BS. In our polarized and increasingly self-segregated society, many of us in America have started choosing what realities we wish to accept. There's one reality going on over on Fox News, for example, while another, completely different reality exists on MSNBC. The version you choose to accept as "real" will likely depend on your political party affiliation, race, socio-economic level and education, among other things.

It seems to me, however, that there could be one topic on which the right and the left should be able to find common ground: taxes. I was thinking about this after watching the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC last night.

Part of her program was dedicated to a discussion of the Bush tax cuts. She explained why those cuts are due to expire at the end of the year (answer: that was the intention all along, since there had been no provision made to pay for them when they were signed into law and so a 10-year window was stipulated as part of the plan), and she explained how it doesn't seem likely that the GOP will have enough votes to force an extension. But the main point she made was that both the Democrats' plan and the Republicans' plan will leave most Americans' tax levels the same, or nearly the same, as they are now. The only groups that will see significant changes in their tax rates, should the Bush cuts expire, will be those making upwards of $500K per year.




The chart Maddow referenced originally appeared in the Washington Post, and is the handiwork of their economic columnist, Ezra Klein. Here's a better view of it. Go ahead - don't be afraid, give it a good look.



So, it's pretty clear that the extension of the Bush tax cuts WOULD HELP NO ONE, other than the very highest earners in America. Anyone making less than $500,000 a year should have no problem with the Obama plan, which allows the cuts to expire for the top earners but keeps the cuts in place for everyone else. And, unless you are in one of those very top income brackets, I can't understand why you'd support any politician who is still fighting for the tax cuts for the top 2% to remain in place.

As for the politicians themselves, I have no clue as to how they can go out in public and say, with a straight face, that letting these cuts expire will have a negative effect on the economy. Especially after they all ran campaigns based on fiscal responsibility, and reducing the deficit, and all that good stuff. You'd think they'd understand the simple concept that the deficit can't be reduced by allowing such huge tax breaks to continue. And yet, there was Mike Pence, a Republican congressman from Indiana, yammering away on Christiane Amanpour's show this past Sunday about how raising taxes on the rich won't really help increase government revenue, anyway. In fact, Pence upped the ante by claiming that revenues actually go down when taxes go up.

Only problem is, he's completely wrong about that. As reported by PolitiFact this week, the idea that tax increases don't correlate to increased government revenue is false. Pence, and all the other conservatives beating this particular drum, are simply not reflecting the facts accurately, and those on the right who parrot their party lines are seemingly oblivious to how far off these politicians and pundits really are.

I find it amazing - stupefying, really - that the American public as a whole isn't seeing this thing the same way. I get why politicians have to peddle this baloney, but I am finding it impossible to comprehend how all the non-millionaires that make up the bulk of the GOP's base could be so supportive of what their side is trying to pull.

As I watched Rachel Maddow's show, I realized that the folks who most needed to see it wouldn't even be watching. They'd be busy seeking out their version of reality over on Fox. But I found myself wondering if it would make any difference at all for conservative voters to see that chart, and to have a clear picture of exactly what we're talking about here when we discuss these Bush tax cuts. Would what seemed so obvious to me be as apparent to them, or would they find some basis on which to reject it? Would they have their own chart, drawn up by someone who's not part of the "lamestream media", which told the opposite story about who would benefit from the tax cuts?

It can be both maddening and wearying to contemplate these things, especially in the political environment in which we find ourselves at the moment. With a newly divided balance of power in Washington and with so little incentive for either side to give ground, with polarized voters and with an overload of dueling statistics and sources of information, how can we hope to figure anything out? It has long been said that the only two sure things in life are death and taxes, but I think we've actually found a way to narrow that list down to death alone.

Tax, lies & videotape

A long time ago, at a rally far, far away...

"I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler."

So read the sign that Jon Stewart brandished from his Daily Show desk, on the day he announced the Rally to Restore Sanity. It struck a real chord with moderates and liberals everywhere, because we all recognized that, as comical as it was, it truly needed to be said. Someone needed to point out that you can disagree without demonizing, and that rabid extremism on both sides had made progress nearly impossible in this country.

Flash forward about 7 weeks. I glance over the comments section of an article I'm reading online, and I see some pretty harsh stuff. "Complete dumbass"..."lying lackey"..."unparalleled douchebag"..."he should rot for this"..."Nazi stormtrooper".

The ridiculous thing is that these comments were all made by liberals, on a left-leaning blog. What could get the left to forget about the lessons of the Rally for Sanity so quickly? Well, all these insults (and many more) were directed at Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, because he had suspended Keith Olbermann from hosting Countdown.

The saga of Keith Olbermann has had the left in a blind panic for days. With the announcement by MSNBC that he will return to his post on Countdown tomorrow night, liberals everywhere can finally unclench their asscheeks, wipe the spittle from their faces and calm down. I have to wonder, though, why they were so bent out of shape in the first place.

As I noted in an earlier post, I get why people feel that Olbermann should have been allowed to donate to the candidates of his choice without fear of punishment. However, the fact remained that NBC News did have a policy that expressly prohibited its employees from making such donations, and Olbermann did violate that policy. The policy seems unfair, in light of the many well-documented instances of both direct and indirect support provided to Republican politicians by the Fox News crew. At this point in time, it seems sensible for NBC News to allow its anchors, whose political loyalties are already abundantly clear, to spend their private money on campaigns and candidates they support. Still, the rule was in place and Olbermann broke it, so he got what amounts to a time-out, and now he may resume normal operations. This all seemed fairly reasonable to me. Even Rachel Maddow seemed to strike this same tone when she discussed Olbermann's suspension on her own MSNBC show.

According to the vast majority of liberal America, however, the 2-night suspension of Keith Olbermann was a major injustice, and it required an immediate and deafening response on Olbermann's behalf. Twitter was ablaze following the announcement that Olbermann was suspended; most tweets decried the move and promised boycotts, petitions and continued pressure on MSNBC to "Free Keith!". Phil Griffin was called every name under the sun and instantly became the left's Public Enemy #1. And liberals started exchanging information about how to protest by canceling your cable, and which sponsors to write to, and what Griffin's email address was.

I watched all of this with a combination of bemusement and mild concern. Why, I wondered, were my fellow left-wingers so enraged? Why the Chicken Little routine? Didn't they see that this was not exactly the coming of Armageddon for our side?

I feel that Keith Olbermann, as well as all other NBC News employees, should have the freedom to contribute legally to political campaigns without it being a violation of their contract. I think it made sense for viewers and fans to express their support and to let NBC know that they wanted Olbermann back. Beyond that, I thought it was more or less obvious that neither MSNBC nor Keith Olbermann wanted the suspension to go on for too long, and that the histrionics many liberals displayed were unnecessary. I know about the tensions between Griffin and Olbermann, but I didn't really believe that Griffin would let the centerpiece show in his prime-time lineup wither and die. Still, some worried that this suspension COULD BE THE FINAL STRAW that would SEND OLBERMANN OVER THE EDGE, and then WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO COUNTDOWN, and WHAT WOULD WE ALL DO???

See, this is the sort of stuff that can make me a bit uncomfortable. I am a liberal, and have been for pretty much my entire adult life, even though "liberal" has recently become a dirty word for so many people in this country. I do not consider myself an extremist, however, and I feel this is why I was so out of step with other liberals on the whole Olbermann thing.

I never felt that it was necessary to go all torches and pitchforks on Phil Griffin. That guy is not Olbermann's staunchest supporter, not by a long shot, but he does know on which side his bread is buttered. If for no other reason than pure selfishness, the dude was not going to permanently axe Olbermann, because if he did it would be the end of MSNBC as we know it, and he didn't want that when all's said and done.

Still, people on the left had no problem whatsoever in dumping on Griffin, and going immediately into full panic mode. They started throwing out the hyperbole, the insults, and the moral indignation that, more often than not, comes from the mob on the right and not from the left. It was kinda icky.

I love Keith's show. I believe he is a vital voice for the left, and that he is one of only a handful of people on television right now who are both brave and intelligent enough to get the progressives' case out there before the American public in a clear and passionate manner.

However, I was not about to blindly freak out in his defense when he got suspended, nor did I assume that it would really change things too much if I did. I knew the punishment was going to be short-lived, a token of sorts to let the public know that even though its prime-time hosts are obviously liberals, MSNBC is still trying to maintain some official semblance of impartiality. Now that the exile has ended, I am hoping the drama has ended as well, so liberals can go back to being liberals and return to more left-wing pursuits, like being reasonable and not hurling insults at people when they disagree with them.

A long time ago, at a rally far, far away...

Peek-a-boo, I see you...

Well, I was wrong, and I couldn't be happier about it. Right after the debate on Friday, I felt, as did the majority of the mainstream media, that the result was a tie. But over the past couple of days, the results of some post-debate polls have been released, and what do ya know - most Americans felt that Barack Obama won. Nearly every poll taken over this weekend showed a clear edge for Obama as a result of his debate performance, and that even includes the right-wing goobers over on Fox News. I've watched debates and debate coverage for a long time, and to me, this situation is rather remarkable. We all know how the media spins things, and how voters' opinions usually reflect whatever they've heard on TV or on the radio. But this was different. The media didn't even call a winner in this debate. And yet, without being told what to think by the pundits and talking heads, the people declared a winner. They spoke up and said that one man impressed them more than the other, and the man they preferred was Obama.

I have to tell you, folks - I am feeling pretty good about this. Better, in fact, than I've felt in a long while. On my best days I think I'm a realist; on my worst days I think of myself as a cynic. And I am particularly jaded when it comes to the subject of politics. But the numbers are showing me that things may not be as bad as I ususally assume they are. So how did people manage to come up with such a positive assessment of Obama's debate performance?  Well, I've got a theory about that, and it all has to do with visibility.

Up until the debate, the McCain campaign was doing their best to control the way the candidates were seen by the American public. In order to spin their own image to people, they repeated certain lines and catch phrases (Maverick! Reformer! POW!) at every stop and in every speech in an attempt to solidify the mythology of the McCain/Palin ticket. They cut off press access and have held virtually no interviews or press conferences on the campaign trail (on the Straight Talk Express, no less...irony, anyone?). They especially protected Sarah Palin from speaking to the press until it was impossible for them to do so any longer. To spin a negative image of Obama, the McCain campaign created a slew of attack ads, most of which were dishonest, distortional and disgusting. They attempted to control what voters saw about Obama. And based on these ads, voters could very well have believed that Obama was dangerously inexperienced, an advocate of comprehensive sex education for 5-year-olds, and that he also intended to raise taxes on working-class familes and turn our health care system into a vast federal bureaucracy.

The debate changed all that. For the fist time in this race, viewers got to see McCain and Obama side by side, without the spin of ads or media commentators. They saw John McCain refusing to look at his opponent for an hour and a half. They saw him continue his streak of distortions and half-truths as he repeatedly misrepresented Obama's positions. They saw him trot out names and dates from the past 26 years of his life in Washington, but they did NOT see him admit any responsibility for his contributions to the current downturn of the American economy, or for his errors in supporting a rushed invasion of the wrong country in the Iraq war. They saw him unable to convincingly fend off claims that his policies are direct continuations of Bush's policies. They did NOT see him mention the middle class - even once - and they did not see any evidence of the big reforms he's been talking about on the campaign trail. They saw McCain himself, separated from the cheering crowds and the red, white and blue filter of his ads, and they weren't too thrilled by what they saw.

But more importantly, they saw Obama - many of them, no doubt for the first time. Many expected to see an empty suit, an angry radical, or an overblown orator. But they saw instead a man who looked and sounded ready to lead. They saw him graciously pointing out those ideas on which he and McCain both agreed. They saw him remaining focused, confident and consistent. They saw his strong grasp of problems and solutions, people and places, and  ideas for the future of our nation. They saw someone who has the ability and the willingness to utilize both diplomacy and military action, as well as the temperament to know when each approach is appropriate. They realized that they had no reason to be afraid of him, even though he looks different and has a foreign-sounding name. Obama was no longer an unknown quantity. And this simple act of seeing Obama for themselves, rather than through the lens of McCain's campaign, made all the difference.

There is still plenty of time for things to change, and McCain has shown us how much he loves shaking things up with a curve ball every so often. Maybe in his desperate attempts to win, he'll actually hit upon a gimmick that works and win back some support. In any case the race will likely remain close, right down to the wire. But no matter what, I am delighted to know that, at least for now,  my fellow voters are looking beyond what they've been shown by the news media and by the ads, to see the possibilities that Obama is offering this country. He's not perfect. Nobody is, especially politicians. But maybe he does have the ability to undo some of the problems that have been dragging Americans through tough times. Maybe he does have the good judgment to make the right choices when we most need him to. Maybe he does understand those of us in the middle class, and maybe he does care enough about what we are going through to make helping us a bigger priority than taking care of corporations and lobbyists. Maybe he's OK after all.

And that, my friends, is what hope is all about.

[digg=http://digg.com/politics/Polls_show_Obama_won_1st_debate_why]

Peek-a-boo, I see you...