Free Lunch
Somehow I missed this gem of a quote from House Minority Leader John Boehner describing why Republicans supposedly have a harder time selling their policy ideas:
And how do they sell these cuts to the America people? They claim that they are costless. In fact, we're told that if we cut taxes, it will cause the economy to grow at such a fevered pace that at the end of the day, we'll actually have more revenue to work with. In other words, free lunch. It doesn't matter that no reputable economists (even the conservative ones) actually believe that tax cuts pay for themselves.
Over the last eight years, the Republican party has dramatically increased government expenditures (war, defense spending, prescription drug benefits, pork, etc.) while dramatically slashing government revenue in the form of massive tax cuts. A large budget surplus was quickly replaced by a large and growing deficit. When some expressed concern about this, our Republican leaders reassured us that "deficits don't matter; Reagan proved this." When their magical revenue stream didn't materialize (even when the economy--by their reckoning--was booming), they never considered restoring previous tax levels. Instead they fought tooth and nail to make the previous tax cuts permanent.
Now, as we're faced with the worst recession in 70 years -- and every reputable economist in the world is telling us to deficit spend in order to stave off disaster -- the Republican party is suddenly suggesting the Democrats are the party of free lunch. And they're doing so while still advocating for additional massive tax cuts.
There are all sorts of fair criticisms that can be leveled against the Democratic party, but the Democrats have at least attempted to grapple with the revenue side of the equation over the years. Even the classic Republican charge that Democrats are "tax and spend liberals" acknowledges this. If the Democrats were the party of free lunch, why on earth would they ever suggest raising taxes? So they can be mercilessly attacked by Republicans?
In any debate between Democratic candidates, the question of how their policy ideas will be paid for always comes up. For example, in the Democratic primary this year, Obama, Clinton, and Edwards all had to describe in detail how they would raise the revenue to pay for their various plans, and all of them acknowledged that it would require tax increases, at least on the wealthy. Maybe you can argue that they were offering "unreasonably cheap lunch," but at least there was an attempt to address the revenue issue.
The Republican party on the other hand, absolutely refuses to acknowledge mathematical reality. In the Republican primaries, every candidate promised to do all sorts of things--rebuild infrastructure, fix education, increase the size of the military, continue to prosecute several wars (and maybe more!)--but all of them pledged never to raise taxes. I remember one particularly telling exchange in a Republican primary debate where the moderator noted the recent bridge collapse in Minneapolis and asked Rudy Giuliani where he would get the money to fix our nation's crumbling infrastructure. Without even pausing, Giuliani responded that he would cut taxes. He explained that cutting taxes would increase revenue and that we could then use that revenue to fix our infrastructure. This drew hearty applause from the crowd.
If that's not the epitome of a free lunch message, I don't know what is. I honestly think that of all the things the Republican party has done over the years, the embrace of this particular message has been the most destructive to our national welfare. As things stand, raising taxes is virtually impossible to do. The last tax increase passed by Congress was in 1993. It passed with zero Republican votes. Since 1991, no Republican at the federal level has voted for a single tax increase.
And yet we will never be able to come anywhere close to balancing our federal budget through spending cuts, something every single Republican politician knows. And yet they will not even consider the only other alternative, raising taxes. And if their more responsible Democratic colleagues do consider this option, they can count on being attacked mercilessly by massive hypocrites like John Boehner.
That is a recipe for fiscal disaster. And its looming.
We have a tougher job than our friends across the aisle. They’ve been offering Americans a free lunch for the last 80 years, rather successfully.This statement reaches a level of hypocrisy almost as breathtaking as Karl Rove's op-ed yesterday. And the reason why should be pretty obvious. The Republican party, over the last 20 to 30 years has become the party of Free Lunch. When it comes to domestic policy, the modern Republican party has really only one idea: cutting taxes. No matter what problems the country faces, this is their answer. Cut income taxes. Cut the estate tax. Cut the capital gains tax. If the cut disproportionately benefits the rich, all the better.
And how do they sell these cuts to the America people? They claim that they are costless. In fact, we're told that if we cut taxes, it will cause the economy to grow at such a fevered pace that at the end of the day, we'll actually have more revenue to work with. In other words, free lunch. It doesn't matter that no reputable economists (even the conservative ones) actually believe that tax cuts pay for themselves.
Over the last eight years, the Republican party has dramatically increased government expenditures (war, defense spending, prescription drug benefits, pork, etc.) while dramatically slashing government revenue in the form of massive tax cuts. A large budget surplus was quickly replaced by a large and growing deficit. When some expressed concern about this, our Republican leaders reassured us that "deficits don't matter; Reagan proved this." When their magical revenue stream didn't materialize (even when the economy--by their reckoning--was booming), they never considered restoring previous tax levels. Instead they fought tooth and nail to make the previous tax cuts permanent.
Now, as we're faced with the worst recession in 70 years -- and every reputable economist in the world is telling us to deficit spend in order to stave off disaster -- the Republican party is suddenly suggesting the Democrats are the party of free lunch. And they're doing so while still advocating for additional massive tax cuts.
There are all sorts of fair criticisms that can be leveled against the Democratic party, but the Democrats have at least attempted to grapple with the revenue side of the equation over the years. Even the classic Republican charge that Democrats are "tax and spend liberals" acknowledges this. If the Democrats were the party of free lunch, why on earth would they ever suggest raising taxes? So they can be mercilessly attacked by Republicans?
In any debate between Democratic candidates, the question of how their policy ideas will be paid for always comes up. For example, in the Democratic primary this year, Obama, Clinton, and Edwards all had to describe in detail how they would raise the revenue to pay for their various plans, and all of them acknowledged that it would require tax increases, at least on the wealthy. Maybe you can argue that they were offering "unreasonably cheap lunch," but at least there was an attempt to address the revenue issue.
The Republican party on the other hand, absolutely refuses to acknowledge mathematical reality. In the Republican primaries, every candidate promised to do all sorts of things--rebuild infrastructure, fix education, increase the size of the military, continue to prosecute several wars (and maybe more!)--but all of them pledged never to raise taxes. I remember one particularly telling exchange in a Republican primary debate where the moderator noted the recent bridge collapse in Minneapolis and asked Rudy Giuliani where he would get the money to fix our nation's crumbling infrastructure. Without even pausing, Giuliani responded that he would cut taxes. He explained that cutting taxes would increase revenue and that we could then use that revenue to fix our infrastructure. This drew hearty applause from the crowd.
If that's not the epitome of a free lunch message, I don't know what is. I honestly think that of all the things the Republican party has done over the years, the embrace of this particular message has been the most destructive to our national welfare. As things stand, raising taxes is virtually impossible to do. The last tax increase passed by Congress was in 1993. It passed with zero Republican votes. Since 1991, no Republican at the federal level has voted for a single tax increase.
And yet we will never be able to come anywhere close to balancing our federal budget through spending cuts, something every single Republican politician knows. And yet they will not even consider the only other alternative, raising taxes. And if their more responsible Democratic colleagues do consider this option, they can count on being attacked mercilessly by massive hypocrites like John Boehner.
That is a recipe for fiscal disaster. And its looming.
posted by A.L. at 9:58 AM
11 Comments:
Speaking of taxes, federal and local.
I loved it(not the destruction, but the you get what you sow part) when all of those houses burned this past year near my Orange County, Ca. residence. We have put bond measure after bond measure on the ballot county wise, and it always defeated. Well, if they had voted yes on the bond for fire station contruction and funds, their homes might be still standing.
You want Republican values: They want their cake, but they don't want to pay for it. And when their cake is taken away, they wonder why.
WHY? Government aint easy, or CHEAP.
You don't want to pay more taxes for common good, and bonds for your neighborhoods, then don't complain when government doesn't have all the money to do the things that YOU want.
Until Republicans start putting common good ahead of their own good, we will always be lacking in what the government can do to help society.
Political scientists know that democrats are better for the economy. That is an interesting graph on that page. I hope the Republicans keep beating the same drums they have been drumming on. They'll be just as successful in 2010 as they were in 2008. Keep it up, please.
Trickle-down economics and Mr. Boehner have no credibility. We just had massive tax cuts for the wealthy, look where it got us. The highest marginal rate was 91% under Eisenhower. It was 70% during the Nixon years. We're just slowly returning to normal.
My most recent post does a very short take on your free lunch idea, but from a different perspective. It uses data, something else the Republican party can't get it's head around.
TANSTAAFL
or TANSTAAFG, either.
It's a horribly-phrased comment in the first place. What in the world's wrong with successfully providing someone a free lunch? That means you're an efficient lunch-maker!
What Boehner meant to say was that "Democrats have been fooling people by offering a free lunch for 80 years," but that would come too close to saying, "the American citizens are suckers," which is the sort of thing the GOP has had to learn to not say out loud.
OK, so tell me this: who can run against him nest year?
As the GOP "conservatives" become more and more radical, is there a Republican in Boehner's district who is at least moderate that might win a primary>
Or a Democrat who has a chance of winning?
Give us a name. Set up an account on ActBlue. Let's make a change.
Does anyone have a linke to that Giuliani quote (e.g. in a transcript)?
Every study I have seen estimates the total return on tax cuts at 15-30% so there is no rational basis for this Republican position. My guess is they cling to it because their reasoning is essentially faith-based. They believe it because they wish it were true, not because there is evidence that it is. That's why they and their evangelical base get along so well.
To say tax cuts increase revenues is like saying the world is flat, dinosaurs roamed the earth 5000 years ago, or the sun orbits the earth. All are demonstrably false, which seems to cause certain mentalities to believe them more.
When faith-based reasoning is challenged by facts, its proponents get very angry. They make threats and want to "torture" others (physically or economically) to get them to recant.
Fortunately, most of America has seen through this nonsense.
At one point in time, the GOP arguments for tax cuts were more nuanced. Some believed the cuts acted as stimulus, some simply wanted government smaller, because of their belief in government inefficiency, etc., etc.
The latter, at some point, was measured by the size of bureaucracy, not simply by dollars spent. (This is why defense spending doesn't "count" as big govt.) There is merit to this argument. Google "largest employers" for your metropolitan area. For San Diego, 8 of the top 10 employers are tax payer funded. Government agencies often have competitive salaries and extraordinary health care and pension benefits. It's expensive.
The nuanced arguments are long gone. There are a lot of 200K/year salaried Republicans who are mortgaged to the hilt like the middle class. There mantra is lower taxes, lower taxes, lower taxes.
Liberals have an opportunity to be truly fiscally conservative AND stewards of the economy.
..."When faith-based reasoning is challenged by facts, its proponents get very angry. They make threats and want to "torture" others (physically or economically) to get them to recant."
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Bravo! You make a point that I've been making to anyone who will listen--republicanism is no longer a political party: it has become a religion. Compare the Republican responses to contrary opinions with the fundamentalist responses Bill Maher elicits in "Religulous," (or that any serious attempt to challenge a pet doctrine elicits in the Faithful, for that matter.) Moreover, listen to the rhetoric:
They are "wandering in the desert" like the Hebrews did at the time of the Exodus. The corollary, of course, is that they are God's Chosen People, and if they get their act together, straighten up and fly right and prove their faithfulness to that Old Time Religion God will bless them with a return to the Promised Land. Even the reasons given for the party failure have religious connotations--they have become "too liberal," have "compromised their principles." Somebody soon is going to start talking about bowing down to idols (they're already talking about people "worshipping" President Obama).
I find it a little frightening, quite frankly, because it's an unassailable position--you can't argue with a zealot, and that's the mentality we're talking here. Every critique and check is seen as "persecution," as vindication of the rightness of their position (after all, it's "the Devil Working Hard" against them, right?)
Like fundamentalists everywhere, a challenge isn't a challenge to rethink one's position: it's blasphemy. There's no logical foundation.
BodieP ... thanks for the supporting comments with which I agree completely. Republicanism is a religion based on faith in demonstrably false conservative principles which, when deployed, lead to disastrous consequences (as the whole reason-based world now knows).
That they cling to their beliefs in tax cuts, trickle down economics, and government is the enemy is not surprising. They have faith in those concepts that facts and outcomes can never shake. They are unrepentant, unalterable, and unregenerate. In this context Boehner's comments are not a mystery - they are precisely what we should expect. The more faith-based people are rejected and their beliefs disproven, the more loudly and irrationally insistent they become ... and the more dangerous.
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