Let them die then and decrease the surplus population
I haven't read David Brooks in years, having found I can get the gist of his inane columns by reading the critiques of others. Apparently his last one was a real corker. Anne Laurie is right. With apologies to some writer at Balloon Juice currently going by the nym Doug Hill, who has raised Bobo bashing to a fine art, this is possibly the most brilliant Bobo takedown ever.
Definitely today's must read in full, but here's the opener:
[More posts daily at the Detroit News.]
Definitely today's must read in full, but here's the opener:
"We're going to be doing a lot of deficit cutting over the next several years," David Brooks announced, plurally, in their column in today's New York Times. Little-known fact: the byline "David Brooks" is produced by five guys named "David Brook." They all get together and agree on stuff!And I especially liked this part:
Talking about the deficit is a way of cutting morality out of the discussion. Waste! Mismanagement! Incompetence! Unaccountable earmarks! These things are noise. The actual questions are: is money to be spent on people who do not have money? And where is that money going to come from?As Anne Laurie said, read it all for the context.
There are people who do not have money. Some of them do not have money because they are children. Some of them do not have money because they are old or sick or otherwise unsuited for the labor market. Some of them do not have money because the labor market has stopped paying for the work that they know how to do in the places where they live. Robots and other machines can approximate the things these people used to do.
[More posts daily at the Detroit News.]
Labels: Corporatocracy, Media, society
posted by Libby Spencer at 10:03 AM
8 Comments:
I suspect that bobo is waiting for some rightwing institute like the Liebury at SMU to put him out of his/our misery and trundle him off into the wings before he becomes any worse of an embarrassment. Of course, that may overestimate the amount of perception those institutes actually possess.
Interesting thought. Never crossed my mind but he's a perfect candidate for some good ole fashioned wingnut welfare in W's "think tank."
Libby Spencer quoted "The actual questions are: is money to be spent on people who do not have money? And where is that money going to come from?"
We spend no small amount on "people who don't have money" Some of us on the opposite side of the aisle even have the radical belief that 99 weeks of UE benefits is a tad bit excessive. We as a nation spend a ton on DoD. Too bad the current President doubled down in Afghanistan
Based on current projections, we as a nation are going to spend trillions more than we collect over the next few years.
Sooner or later our national line of credit will be reduced, or the interest rate will be sharply increased.
The "draconian" GOP cuts in the House (that the 'dems and the President oppose) represent 5% of the deficit. "Tax cuts for the rich" (assuming you believe in static economic analysis) saves less than $100B/year in "cost". Lets cut DoD. A 25% cut yields less than $200B.
So the GOP cuts, Tax cuts for only the "rich", and major DoD cuts leaves $1,000B deficit yet to eliminate...just to break even.
If you want, take a few minutes and blame it all the GOP/VRWC. Its obvious that Bush II was not any kind of fiscal conservative.
OK?
Now to today's reality
Now where is the remaining $1,000B/year going to come from?
More taxes? Less spending?
Or are you going to propose we kick the proverbial can down the road a few more years?
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BTW..is this post going to "disappear" like my post on 2/27/2011
For the record, I didn't disappear that post TDC. I saw it in my email alert but never saw on the blog. I thought you deleted it yourself.
"Its obvious that Bush II was not any kind of fiscal conservative."
So why did you support his economic and military idiocies? It's obvious that no Republican president since Eisenhower has been a conservative -- a term which suggests paying off your bills rather than borrowing from your competitors. They've all been selling the scam that we can get out of debt by cutting rich people's taxes and waging wars.
I'm satisfied that top rates under 50% almost guarantee bubbles and busts and promote economic feudalism. I don't care that you're not, nor have I noticed anyone here agreeing with you or even interested in wading through your data dumps and distractions. Why do you persist?
So, as long as we're making imperious demands, explain why we should suddenly credit the rhetoric we always hear when you're thrown out of office for your misdeeds? We know you always go right back to the same fundamentalist gang rape once you beg, borrow and wheedle your way back.
I'm interested to know just how you reacted when Cheney told us "debt doesn't matter?" Were you on that chorus line? Did you chant "Liberaliberaliberal" when I and others warned of the consequences? Did you call me a traitor when I said that this war and this president and this party would bankrupt us and was all about a deliberate fraud to steal from the American people?
It reminds me of some alcoholic claiming he's now clean and sober for two days and we should now trust him.
And no, I didn't delete your post either. You're the only one who could have. Looking for sympathy?
Mystery solved. I just figured out how to access the new spam filter thingy. Blogger decided to filter it out as spam, I assume for being too repetitive.
Capt Fogg wrote in part "I'm interested to know just how you reacted when Cheney told us "debt doesn't matter?"
I voted "not Bush" in 2004 (and 1992 for that matter)
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Capt Fogg "It reminds me of some alcoholic claiming he's now clean and sober for two days and we should now trust him."
Your comment reminds me of a person who has struggled with a problem in their past and assumes others must have had similar issues.
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Cpat Fogg "And no, I didn't delete your post either. You're the only one who could have. Looking for sympathy?"
Read Ms Spencer's last entry. Would you care to retract your last statement?
Hard to tell what the hell you're talking about, really. I'm not an addict of any kind, nor is anyone in my family, if that's what you're getting at. I'm just making analogies because you don't seem to be very objective to me and concerned more with tactics of obfuscation and blame shifting and I thought perhaps I could get back to the overall picture and away from the chess moves and the information avalanches demanding to be studied. I don't like games. I don't like what the Republicans have been advocating or doing and those, of course, are two different things. If you're not a supply-side Republican, Union basher, social Darwinian supporter of the growing gap between rich and everyone else dreaming of corporate feudalism, than I am very wrong. But I don't think so.
Why should I retract any statement about not having deleted your post? You're obviously looking for sympathy just by showing up here and of course you're not getting any. Perhaps the spam filter agrees.
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