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This morning, Jim DeMint feebly trotted out the same old same old tax-cuts-fix-everything plan, and was promptly beat down by Barney Frank and those notorious socialists, the CEOs of Google and FedEx.
DEMINT: There are two ways to do [the stimulus], George. One is for the government to take it out of the private sector through taxes and then decide where it’s gonna go through political manipulation as they’ve done in the House. The other is just to leave more money in the private sector for consumers to spend and businesses to invest, that’s the American way, and that’s the approach we’re pushing.
SNUFFLEUPAGUS: All tax cuts, no increases in spending of any kind, yet most economists say that investments, the right kind of investments, create more jobs.
DEMINT: Well, I’m not sure what economists you’re talking to … We have to decide if we want to be a free market economy and let the money stay there or be a government-directed economy which is where we’re headed with this plan.
FRANK: …Let’s agree that we’re all Americans here, Jim. Nobody’s got the "American way" versus presumably the "non-American way." And as far as spending versus tax cuts, I think we need to fix some highway and bridges. I never saw a tax cut fix a bridge. I never saw a tax cut give us more public transportation…
…
SMITH, CEO FEDEX: No question about it, the infrastructure of the country has been underfunded for a long time, uh, it certainly would be a wise thing to invest in all kinds of infrastructure…
…
SCHMIDT, CEO GOOGLE: The business community needs action now. There’s a sense that things are getting worse…It’s time for government action…to get people going again.
…
DEMINT: It really comes down to a basic argument. Do you want a government-directed plan or do you want the free markets to work?
FRANK: Yes, I do want highways. I want better medical care for people laid off…This notion, the one thing I’d most disagree with, you say we’re over-regulated…the notion that everything is solved by a tax cut…there are public needs that we have in this society that cannot be accomplished by a tax cut. No tax cut built a road. No tax cut puts a cop on the street…
…
DEMINT: We can take a trillion dollars out of the economy and we’re saying we might create 3 million jobs. If we leave it in the economy the economists at the Heritage Foundation say we create 18 million jobs, this is something we know…
SCHMIDT: I’m worried that tax cuts alone won’t work because people are not paying any taxes because they’re not making any money.
Suck on that, Jimbo.
You really should watch the whole thing because Frank was masterful, running circles around DeMint while directly engaging the concerns of the CEOs.
The stark contrast between the two parties was on full display this morning.
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The Heritage Foundation said it’s true, so it must be that if it were all tax cuts, 18 million jobs would be created…
Tax cuts for the rich do absolutely diddly-squat for the folks without jobs.
DeMint can go tap his feet.
You’d think that a guy who used to run a market-research firm before getting into politics would understand something about how to market a position. Then again, he may well be nothing but hot air, something Barney Frank was well-suited to expose.
Shorter Jim DeMint: “We Repugs want ya’ll to fail. And I’m just the person for the job. Fail is all I know how to do.”
More of this please!
i loved that the the CEO of Google said that tax cuts don’t work if people aren’t paying taxes because they don’t make enough money. Ha! DeMint looked gobsmacked.
Thanks BT
I get the biggest kick out of hearing Barney Frank allow idiots to expose their worst gaming practices in the glare of the public eye.
How zat working for ya, Dumint?
Digg is open
Great stuff BT
I have had my issues with Barney in the past but he has gotten his mojo back. There was a great article about him in the
New Yorker about his recently.
A fitting casualty of the Bush era is the idea that tax-cuts-fix-everything. Of course, Bush created the current bad economy by fixing a good one with tax cuts for himself, his family, and their cronies. Perhaps when Republics use the term ‘fix’, we should ask them to define what they mean.
My Senator. I’m so proud. *Headdesk*
That’s what hit me in the face first also….the great god Heritage has spoken…..thus, it is true. :-(
I can commiserate. I have Box Turtle Cornyn and Kay Bailey Cheerleader where you have DeMint Graham Crackers.
Jim DeMint is without a hint!
Barney doesn’t suffer fools gladly; too bad we don’t have more dims with his ability to cut ‘em off at the knees.
Mebbe he’s too arrogant to see straight?
Mebbe he’s peevish and thick enough to think he’ll get back at his fellow hacks who made him go on teevee this weekend by shuffling through the gig in his bunny slippers?
Sooner or later, you’d think it would dawn on these dolts that their schtick is no longer sticking, except in the craws of a whole country’s worth of very very angry voters on both sides of the aisle.
here ya go:
http://i16.photobucket.com/alb…..T00035.gif
The difference between the Democrats and the Republicans is this.
The Republicans want to put the pedal to the metal and drive the economy over the cliff at 100 mph.
The Democrats say wait, let’s stop for a moment, and then we’ll compromise and drive the economy over the cliff at 50 mph.
I’m next door; we had jesse helms but, praise Dog, *had* is past tense. You have my sincerest sympathies.
BT
Are you saying that you want someone that has a greater ability to put lipstick on the pig when it is impossible to make the pig into something other than a pig.
Funny, Hugh. Succinctly put.
Maybe that sort of linkage might help sour the public on the Foundering Heritage Funderation. So it’s not all bad.
Trickle down, trickle down, trickle down! Give all the money to the elites and they magnanimously give us the scraps from their plates.
-G
is he serious?
the correct respone would have been…
,these are the IDIOTS who’s, ideas CAUSEDcauuused this problem, you are NOTT saying you want to lisen to them for he solution, are you?,
You probably know that the airlines have stopped serving food in coach, but did you know they’re now allowing you to beg in first class?
I think Jim DeMint should change the spelling of his last name to “Dement(ia)”.
People who lose their homes (or commercial properties) don’t pay property taxes.
People who have no money don’t pay sales or excise taxes.
People without jobs don’t pay income taxes.
So tax cut what, exactly? Well…tax cuts for individuals who neither need the extra cash nor will do anything with it to benefit the greater good.
I am so F-in sick of these idiot rightwingers (in DC and in the MSM) and their shopworn, bullshit positions on…well…pretty much everything.
sorry about the spelling am writing from my cell phone
One can only hope it founders itself right into the ditch…..and takes AEI with it.
Our Republican friends can’t seem to distinguish their cover story from real policy options.
It’s inedible in first class too. I had to fly first after Hurricane Gus disrupted travel plans…thought it might be different, but NOOOO.
They have no real policy options. They are optionless. No ability for abstract thinking or complex thinking. Dufi. (plural for dufus)
Wow! I’m impressed.
How much longer on the Franken/Coleman kerfuffle before Franken is sworn in?
“Suck on that, Jimbo.”
Amen, Sistah Blue Texan!
Back in the early ’80s I got a reasonably edible steak in coach on American Airlines flight from Dallas to San Francisco. It was far better than the sandwich I got in First Class on US Airways around ‘03 on a flight from Denver to Philadelphia
The people who really matter have their own jets. The first class folks are the flotsam left behind by the upper middle class.
Depending on the flight, time of day/week, and the markets involved, the odds are pretty good that most of the folks sitting in First Class are road warriors who have gotten an upgrade due to their status level on that particular airline.
You say Snuffleupagus,
I say Stepinawfulmess;
Stepin, Snuffle, upagus, awfulmess,
Let’s call the whole thing off!
Well said!
The beauty of This Week this morning was DeMented had his a s s handed to him by all three of the guests, not just Barney Frank.
Collateral benefit, indeed.
GOP: “Tax cuts are the answer. What was the question?”
It’s idiocy, and it will ruin this country. If it hasn’t already.
So Demints’ economic backup is the Heritage Foundation??? Really?? Another NeoCon group-grope organization that STILL believes that the economics of the 1950’s works?? Really?
No wonder he gets his ass handed to him…He’s just downright stupid!
Clever!
“DEMINT: Well, I’m not sure what economists you’re talking to …”
LOL. You know DeMint talks to those Nobel winning economists: Limbaugh, Hannity, and some little old lady from Alabama on Cspan call-in.
You have to love it when DeMint cites a Heritage Foundation report as a credible basis for his opposition to the stimulus plan. Because we all know what great information Heritage, the American Enterprise Institute and the other right-wing think tanks produce. If there’s anyone I trust to determine my economic future and look out for my best interests, it’s the fucking Heritage Foundation.
And I’m sure the CEO of google appreciates a lecture from DeMint on how best to make the economy work. Go, J Minty, go!
Funny how supply-side theorists never actually explain the specific processes by which wealth “trickles down” to us at the bottom. Is it new manufacturing plants? Hardly, given that since Reagan our manufacturing base has been hollowed out to near-nothing. Services? Maybe, given all the new restaurants that our moneyed classes will be supporting–at least, until they go out of business following changing tastes in dining. It must also be in yacht sales and new-home construction, except that construction is now in the tank as well.
Supply-side economics is a faith-based system if ever there was one, requiring belief without evidence–in fact, requiring belief given evidence to the contrary. No wonder you can sell it so easily to the born-again set.
The last comment made sense to me “BIG TIME”.If you have no job tax cuts won’t help you anyway.
I thought it was only me,that heard that.For I couldn’t believe that he was putting his eggs into the heritage basket,for conformation of his statement.
Look, Dimmy. A business tax cut isn’t going to induce a decent manager to hire more people or buy more equipment because there isn’t any market for the product. People don’t have money. Until people have money to spend, they aren’t going to “spend” it. And tax cuts for the wealthy aren’t going to work because they already have all the money they can spend so the rest goes into savings where it just sits. Tax cuts for the poor and middle class aren’t going to work either because the piddly amount that they would get barely fills the gas tank. The only source of money at the moment is the federal government, and the best way that they can get it into circulation is to pay people for doing something, hence the stimulus bill.
So we win two ways. One, we get money into people’s pockets. Two, we get something of value that will help our economy in the future. This last point is why your and the other regressive’s complaint that part of the stimulus bill doesn’t immediately create jobs is ludicrous. The stimulus is also designed to create an environment for future economic well-being to be possible.
That would be “Brother” Blue Texan, fyi…
Bush cut taxes. “W”here are the jobs?
Where was the CEO of Google before the current crisis? Was he calling for higher wages for all employees before it hurt HIS company?
It was stated the Fed EX CEO that many of our good paying jobs are in the global trade economy.
How many compared to the loss of decent middle class paying jobs?
De minet citing Heritage Foundation as his God’s factual promise.
Demint would sit and watch a fire burn down a forest or a building saying it is the free market. Unless it is a Wall Street Bankers house or forest, of course.
Demint can save American tax payers Approx $170,000.00 per year and what expense of perks and health care tax payers pay him as a Congressman if he would resign from his seat in Congress.
There is no such beast as a FREE MARKET.
And thank you Congressman Franks for countering the American way! Congressman DeMint atttempts to impose as his Rusbo trump card, that all who disagree with him are “UNAMERICAN”.
Very nice summary. You must be almost one of a kind among Aggies.
the senate repuglitards think they’re gonna play obstructionists
cept even PRINCESS PANDORA supports the stimulus
the quickest way to be a none-existent political party is to keep obeying the will of 20% of the population
cuz the other 80% of the population is GONNA WANT A PIECE OF YOUR ASS COME ELECTION TIME
go ahead and obstruct America, you fucking repuglitards
and when America leaves you bleeding on the floor of the election precincts in 2010, YOU KNOW WHY
“Can someone clarify DeMint’s statement on leaving a trillion dollars in the economy which would create 18 million jobs?” Isn’t the money for this plan going to end up essentially being borrowed to begin with?