Wonkette has a new columnist, Cord Jefferson, a reporter who deserves attention for such accomplishments as getting an actual interview with South Carolina’s Democratic candidate for the Senate, Alvin Greene. Jefferson’s first Wonkette column discusses the recent culmination of the Slave Labor Task Force:
… The backstory for this incident is slavery, which we shouldn’t get into very deeply because it takes from the laffs. But trust: slavery was fucked! So fucked, in fact, that, in the year 2000, some congresspeople whose decency hadn’t yet wholly rotted were like, “Hey, let’s maybe do something to credit the black people our early iterations ordered to build the Capitol, under punishment of death.” Everyone agreed this was a good idea, because politicians are constantly looking for ways to sate minorities enough to not have their tires slashed, which is what should happen, constantly.
__
Anyway, a thing with the menacing name The Slave Labor Task Force was convened, and 10 years later, this collective had an idea. No, not reparations — what are you, a militant Muslin? — something much better: plaques! TWO plaques.
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Yes, in May of 2010, an entire decade after it decided to do something to honor the slaves who built the Capitol Building, The Slave Labor Task Force had a ceremony to unveil a couple of bronze plaques…
[…] __
Maryland doofus Michael Steele got the day off from his normal job — making balloon animals at the Romano’s Macaroni Grill in Chevy Chase — to sit in the second row at this laughable sham. He and JC Watts giggled when Harry Reid bragged during his speech about how he shared a last name with a very famous slave named Philip Reid, whose smarts you should read about here. It was weird how everyone thought that was funny, because what Reid was basically saying was, “My ancestors very well may have owned such a smart black man and forced him to do a whole lot of shit he didn’t want to do.” Funny stuff.
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All the rest of the speeches were also grindingly terrible, as was the coffee, but nothing compared to when Blanche Lincoln got up and described her fantasy of what the slaves who built the Capitol must have been thinking while toiling in rock quarries: “Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God.”
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YES, Blanche! The slaves weren’t thinking anything like, “I wish these evil bastards would let me go find my wife and daughter, who they sold away to be raped, instead of beating me up and forcing me to build their hollow towers of freedom.” That would’ve been unpatriotic, so they were obviously thinking about loving the Arkansas Jeebus.
__
The moral of this story is that Barack Obama’s presidency has answered all of Black America’s dreams and that everything is fine. The plaques are very, very shiny.
Helpful Wonkette commentor Mumblyjoe points out that one representative chose to vote against the resolution to recognize slaves’ role in building the Capitol: Steve King, R – Iowa. “So, guys, I’m just saying, if you want to slash someone’s tires, you know who to go for, first.”
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Happy Fourth Anne Laurie!!
Corner Stone
Looks like Brad DeLong is inching his way toward catching a clue:
Kiss SocSec buh~bye.
fucen tarmal
its the attention whore’s dilemma, some times an issue is so easy to be on the right side of,(meaning correct, in this case) there is no way to stand out as being more on the right side of it, therefore, all the speachifying and analogizing, and loftification one might try to apply, can only have the inverse effect.
Corner Stone
I, for one, am just glad that this 4th the TV show This Week has an exclusive interview with John McCain.
It kind of exemplifies the freedoms we cherish here in the US.
Especially since he’s followed by DNC spokesperson Dan Senor.
fucen tarmal
@Corner Stone:
so in short, all the government bonds social security invested in, the government is going to turn around and say they are worthless?
that is some fancy stepping there…
TaMara (BHF)
Happy 4th Anne Laurie!! How were those fireworks last night?
cleek
@Corner Stone:
nah.
Simpson has no actual law-making authority here. he’s just a guy on a panel.
Corner Stone
@fucen tarmal:
That’s my reading of it. The original funds have been spent so that means the bonds held in trust are also now somehow disappeared, or hold no faith and credit.
Brien Jackson
In other news, the Times certainly has its priorities in the right place; protecting their right to defraud customers if they like.
I’m trying to think of a more embarrassing editorial I’ve seen recently (or ever), but I’m drawing a blank.
Corner Stone
@cleek:
The commission itself doesn’t make law.
But thanks to the budget enforcement resolution just passed, any recommendation the Catfood Commission passes through the Senate MUST receive an up or down vote in the House.
And with possible R gains in the House, and Conservadems being unreliable, what do you think will happen?
It’s also my understanding that tax increases can only be originated in the House, so anything that comes through the commission will be reductions.
I’m open to hearing a different take on this.
Davis X. Machina
Like this?
Brien Jackson
@Corner Stone:
The problem is that a lot of people in Washington are slinging bullshit, and reasonably frightened progressives are buying far too much of it. How, exactly, would Harry Reid go about forcing an up or down vote, for example?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
There will be comprehensive reform of SS, there has to be. Some benefits cuts with some tax increases. But it will never be defunded, due to the fact that a Million Granny Army is a fearsome sight to behold, that strikes fear and turns to jelly the legs of even the orneriest deficit hawk congresscritter.
Brien Jackson
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
I think progressives are missing another opportunity here by acting as though there aren’t any problems with social security, rather than mounting a concerted argument for raising the cap.
Linda Featheringill
1. Slavery was a bitch. And it still is.
2. A little recognition of the contributions of slaves to our institutions is nice.
3. Plaques are nice but don’t make up for much.
4. Reparations might indeed be justified but it isn’t going to happen.
We might want to remember that slave labor is an economic system that developed a long time ago and dominated the civilized world for a long, long time. It was not some sadistic game dreamed up in the US.
People should have just abandoned slavery. True.
But look at us. We live in a world where big corporations rule just about everything and most of us have very damn little power. We should abandon that type of political structure. But we haven’t.
What I am saying is that it is difficult to change big and long-standing and well-entrenched systems.
[Yes, I know that none of this justifies slavery.]
PurpleGirl
http://www.berkshireeagle.com/ci_15436940
Essay about the Declaration of Independence and the Founders. I found the link in comments at Slactivist and thought to pass it on to BJers.
Malron
Wonkette is the place I hang out in between John “MC J-Rock” Cole’s epic rants here at BalloonJuice.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Brien Jackson: While I agree in principle, I think a few months before a dem unfriendly election is likely not the best time to even mention SS reform, nor raising taxes in a bad economy that seems to be slowing down it’s recovery a bit. Dems when asked, should complement the weather, or something.
Corner Stone
@Davis X. Machina: That’s an interesting take. ISTM he’s relying on a couple naive assumptions along this line:
Because to me, IMO, the people who are making this play do not give a damn about revealing their true colors, and anyone who thinks public opinion waits for a CBO scoring is a little curious.
Corner Stone
@Brien Jackson:
And my problem is that IMO, SS should have never been put on the table. Because once it’s on the table all bets are off.
JenJen
Yay! Open thread!
So, I just finished watching “Funny People” and I just wanted to see if I am alone in thinking that might quite possibly be the worst movie I’ve ever seen…
Corner Stone
@Davis X. Machina: And I also just skimmed through the info provided to the commission by James K. Galbraith (it was linked to in the comments section of your link), where JKG says:
”
You are plainly not equipped by disposition or resources to take on the true cause of deficits now and in the future: the financial crisis. Recommendations based on CBO’s unrealistic budget and economic outlooks are destined to collapse in failure. Specifically, if cuts are proposed and enacted in Social Security and Medicare, they will hurt millions, weaken the economy, and the deficits will not decline. It’s a lose-lose proposition, with no gainers except a few predatory funds, insurance companies and such who would profit, for some time, from a chaotic private marketplace.
Thus the interesting twist in your situation is that the Republic would be better served by advancing no proposals at all.”
Galbraith link
Hunter Gathers
This so-called “catfood commission” will die in the Senate, if it even gets that far. The members of the commission have to get a majority of members to vote for it, which won’t happen. It will contain tax increases that no GOPer will vote for. Grover Norquist will not allow it. It will get filibustered by every GOPer in the Senate, should it get that far, where it will die. Then Obama gets to say “I tried, and these GOPers are totally full of shit when it comes to the deficit.” Liberal handwringing over this is a waste of energy. Obama gets to call their bluff.
Corner Stone
@Hunter Gathers: I hope so.
But IMO, we’re about to see an interesting couple years.
Hunter Gathers
@Corner Stone: We were going to see an interesting couple of years anyway, with the rise of the Affluent Middle Aged White Bigot, aka teabaggers. Unemployment could be at 5% and these fuckers would still be getting the same coverage they are now, seeing as our MSM betters fall into the teabagger demo. The GOPers won’t re-take either chamber, but their modest gains will lead to total gridlock and even more racial animosity. As long as the country doesn’t go completely apeshit between now and 2012, the GOPers are doomed. Queen Sarah the Chosen Conservative, Boss Hogg, Mittens, or whoever else the GOpers run will get crushed in 2012, and long term demographics show that the GOP will no longer exist as a national political entity after 2012 or 2016. Demographics are a bitch.
Hunter Gathers
I also have a sneaking suspicion that the commission will recommend that the Bush tax cuts be allowed to fully expire, which will cause every conservatard’s head to explode.
phoebes-in-santa fe
Did everybody see today’s Doonesbury? If not, please read and ask your selves why we’re expecting Obama to do what our fellow Dems have asked in so short of time.
http://wpcomics.washingtonpost.com/client/wpc/db/
It’s a classic.
phoebes-in-santa fe
@Corner Stone: I think Dan Senor is with the RNC – not the DNC, thank god.
Corner Stone
@Hunter Gathers: Ahh, but unemployment is not at 5%, but closer to twice that. And U6 is somewhere just short of 20%.
The GOP won’t retake either chamber and they don’t need to, although they’d really like the House.
Systemic long term unemployment leads to many outcomes I just don’t think our betters in Congress actually understand.
And as far as:
“Then Obama gets to say “I tried, and these GOPers are totally full of shit when it comes to the deficit.” Liberal handwringing over this is a waste of energy. Obama gets to call their bluff.”
I wonder when this is going to utterly collapse. How long until people just straight up say that they are tired of the relentless attempts to revive the Republican Party into relevance? The mushy middle aren’t the people who are unemployed in some states at a rate of 20% or more.
cleek
@Corner Stone:
from where did you get that number?
Corner Stone
@cleek:
You’re right, that may have been over the top according to official numbers.
The BLS has MI at 13.6 and NV at 14 and another 14 states with official reported unemployment at 10% or higher.
That’s as of May at bls.gov
It would’ve been more accurate to say several states have counties with unemployment at 20% or more, which is not the same thing.
Henry Bayer
Re: Steve King voting against the slavery plaques: If there were justice in the world, he would be kidnapped from his home and held in primitive slavery until, under grueling working conditions, he been forced to learn to cast bronze. Then only when he had created the plaques with his own hands would he be set free from his slavery, and hopefully set free from his bigotry.
Roger Moore
@Brien Jackson:
Wow. Just wow. It’s hard to see how anyone could not see that what they’re doing is wrong. By offering a stock tip that they claim is based on insider information, they’re wrong no matter what. If it really is based on insider information, they and their customers are guilty of insider trading. If it isn’t, they’re guilty of fraud. Helpful hint, guys: don’t advertise your willingness to participate in illegal trading and expect the SEC to ignore it.
Hunter Gathers
@Corner Stone:
The closer we get to election day, the GOP is going to have to answer the “What are you going to do about unemployment?” question. They don’t have an answer, and aren’t going to formulate one either. Their strategy of “nigger, nigger, deficits, spic, spic” doesn’t address that. They are counting on cultural resentment among Baby Boomers toward the Black POTUS to sweep them to power. If they don’t take either chamber, that may give Obama and the Dems a bit of breathing room to do something about high unemployment, as the MSM has been telling us that the GOP will take both chambers for about a year now.
OFA is going to spend a decent chunk of money on the ground, which won’t show up in the polls until about a month out from election day.
I pray to FSM that I am right.
lol
@Brien Jackson:
It’s that Netroots “negotiating strategy” at work where they think if you initially advance a rediculous position, people on the other side will be forced to compromise to a point that’s pretty close to what you want…. when in reality, you’ll simply be dismissed for not negotiating in good faith.
Uloborus
I think the odds of our having to kiss SocSec goodbye here are minute.
Bush couldn’t do it, with a plan that made it sound like he was expanding Social Security and a congress that licked his feet – and he wanted to annihilate it. Obama, Reid, and Pelosi don’t. I find it hard pressed to think that they rigged a congressional system that they thought had a real chance to screw over SS.
So, what are the obstacles to this happening? The committee has to like the plan. There, I grant you, I don’t know who’s on the committee (but note the three above approved it, and it’s silly to think they want to sell out SS). It has to be rated budget neutral, and as mentioned above any attempt to slash SS benefits is going to make the CBO declare that you’re tanking the economy further and reducing revenue – not budget neutral. Then it has to pass the Senate and the House unamended. A controversial law that the Democratic leadership are against doing that? Not likely.
This sounds more like an attempt to raise taxes to support SS to me, but most like kabuki. Definitely not a short track to slashing Social Security.
Mnemosyne
I would worry more about the vote in the House if we didn’t already know what Pelosi’s answer was to previous attempts to “reform” Social Security by privatizing it: “How about ‘never.’ Does never work for you?”
And if you look at her recent statements, it doesn’t look like she’s changed her mind. Unless something huge happens between now and that vote — like Republicans taking control of the House entirely — it ain’t gonna get past Nancy SMASH!
asiangrrlMN
@Henry Bayer: That’s a similar fantasy to my own which is that every freaking Republican (and Blue Dawg) who talks about how lazy unemployed people are or why we shouldn’t raise the minimum wage or how the emergency room is a grand health insurance plan should have to live that life for one month. No health insurance. Minimum wage job. No car or a car that is constantly breaking. House mortgage that is more than the house is worth. See how the hell they would survive in those situations. I doubt very many of them would last a week.
jwb
@Corner Stone: That Galbraith link was fun—especially after listening to Bobo pout about the deficit on Friday’s All Things Considered.
Cain
@Henry Bayer:
That’s not what will happen. Instead he will feel like just like how blacks feel today with no sense of irony.
cain
Cain
@Henry Bayer:
That’s not what will happen. Instead he will feel like just like how blacks feel today with no sense of irony.
cain
jwb
@Hunter Gathers: No, with the dim economic news from the past couple of weeks, I’m now pretty sure the Goopers will retake the House. The economic conditions remain so bad and the Dems have not shown they have any sort of workable plan to deal with it (it may well be due to Gooper intransigence, but that doesn’t alter the fact that nothing is going to get done on addressing it), the only hope I see for the Dems is that Goopers shoot themselves in the foot by doubling down on crazy yet again before the election. Even then, I’m guessing We, the People will vote against the status quo, even if that means handing government power back to the very folks who got us into this situation and so ensuring the continuation of the status quo. I’m quite sure We, the People will be rewarded for our votes by a fine media circus for the next two years…
Cain
I seem to be posting double for no apparent reason. Must be something special with me as I only clicked on the submit once.
cain
Hunter Gathers
@jwb: What’s the GOPer plan for fixing the problem of high unemployment? Have you heard it? I sure haven’t. In their weekly address, given by Saxby ‘Cracker Ass Cracker’ Chambliss, he didn’t mention unemployment once. Just deficit word salad. They have no plan. They have to answer the unemployment question. They have 4 months.
Mnemosyne
@jwb:
I’m actually not that worried about the House. In order to take control, the Republicans would have to retain every single one of their current seats and pick up a minimum of an additional 40 seats. There just aren’t that many real pickup opportunities this year, especially with the teabaggers dominating everything.
The Democrats will probably also nominally keep control of the Senate even if they lose seats, but if they can’t get anything done with 59 votes now, they sure as hell aren’t going to get anything done with a simple majority.
Davis X. Machina
’60 years’ suggests RPG.Wrong thread….
eemom
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
indeed. Similar to how a “Million Man March” in favor of gun rights would cause the most Second Amendment-loving, “cold dead hands” bleating congresscritters to shit their pants.
jwb
@Hunter Gathers: They don’t need a plan—that’s the problem. They just need to say that things suck, the Dems haven’t fixed it, and sound suitably concerned about the awful deficit caused by all this “out of control spending that’s doing nothing” the Dems have engaged in. Folks will vote against the Dems because they don’t like where things are and the Dems are in power.
jwb
@Mnemosyne: I sincerely hope you are right, but historically parties that are in power when the economy looks like this in the July before an election get clobbered.
QuaintIrene
More wingnut heads to explode?
The NRA is considering endorsing Harry Reid. Mainly cause they’re afraid his replacement would be more anti-gun.
Hunter Gathers
@jwb:
If the entire electorate consisted of white people over the age of 50, you’d be right. But last time I checked, african americans, hispanics, and whites under 50 still get to vote. And a vote by someone who is super excited still counts as much as a vote by someone only sorta excited. Just because Charlie Cook and George Will and their ilk say that November is going to be a bloodbath doesn’t make it so. Obama and the Dems beat their polling in 2008. They will again in 2010. Unless ‘dissaffected’ Dems decide to sit on their hands like whining little bastards. But then again, I think the firebaggers WANT a GOPer led Congress. They are only happy when they complain.
Corner Stone
@Hunter Gathers:
Obama is not on the ballot this time around.
Lots of people are unhappy about a myriad of outcomes and results. And this comes out when they are asked.
Even if the mythical “firebagger” exists, not all of these people and groups can be dismissed by calling them one.
Corner Stone
@Brien Jackson:
It’s not the same as “forcing”, but if you believe them:
FlipYrWhig
@Hunter Gathers:
I think they think it does. I think they’ve been talking amongst themselves to blame “the deficit” on shiftless poor/dark-skinned/Spanish-speaking people. That’s the difference between their sentiments about the Bush deficit (mostly unobjectionable because it was driven by tax cuts and necessary ass-kicking wars) and the Obama deficit (objectionable because it is driven by free goodies to undeserving people). That’s their grand unified theory: the economy is bad because Obama took your stuff, gave it to colored people, and stuck you with the bill. Ending that pattern both solves “the deficit” and fixes “the economy.” I’m like 95% certain that’s the connection between deficit-hawkery, panic about “socializm,” and the “take our country back” rhetoric.
Uloborus
@Corner Stone:
Alright, but those lots of people are not the 80% of the liberal Democrats who *are* happy.
FlipYrWhig
@Hunter Gathers: But, in general, I agree that the Republican plan for dealing with unemployment is probably something like “tax cuts for businesses” or “getting government off the back of business.”
I also wish that Democrats made more of a comparison between stimulus and small-business loans. If you have a great idea and you’re confident you can make money from it, but you don’t have enough cash to start, you talk to a bank and use their money to get up and running, then pay them back. You owe more money than you would if you didn’t get a loan, but that’s money that makes more money, and over time it works out for the best. This really isn’t a sophisticated concept. Republican voters do it all the time.
Brien Jackson
@Corner Stone:
Perhaps, but I don’t see what the alternative is. It’s going to have to be on the table at some point, because its current projections really are unsustainable. Considering that raising taxes on the rich is popular, and I’d imagine that the cap on taxable income would strike most people unfair, I think it would be best to get out in front of the curve making the argument for plugging the hole with more revenue from higher wage earners. Especially since much of the gap is caused by having more income concentrated at levels above the cap anyway.
Uloborus
@Brien Jackson:
I would think that was wise policy and a good selling point, except traditionally the people who are terrified of taxes seem to assume that they are in the top income brackets even though they’re actually pretty poor.
Brien Jackson
@Corner Stone:
The commission has a basically insurmountable set of hurdles to get anything done. For starters, it has to get an extreme super-majority of votes from the commission itself, which makes it highly unlikely to touch any sort of major item. If they manage to clear that, they won’t be able to get past the filibuster in the Senate, and if it involves Social Security in any form they can’t use reconciliation at all. If it involves any tax increases, no Republicans will support it.
Brien Jackson
@Uloborus:
The social security tax isn’t bracketed though.
FlipYrWhig
@Uloborus: It annoys me to no end that people fall for things like “the largest tax increase in history,” a phrase from the Clinton era, which was true insofar as you counted the increase in total raw dollars. But huge numbers of people who don’t make much money seem to _feel like_ tax increases on upper-income people also affect them, even when they demonstrably don’t.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I am perversely satisfied to know my gut hatred of this morally rotten half-wit is justified.
Uloborus
@Brien Jackson:
Doesn’t matter. Like Flip said, people just believe that if you increase taxes you must be increasing their personal taxes. It could drive you to drink if you weren’t already a Balloon Juice reader.
Brien Jackson
@Corner Stone:
RIght, but how is he going to accomplish that? That’s what I mean when I say a lot of bullshit is being slung.
Brien Jackson
@Uloborus:
Pretty sure that doesn’t stand up to the scrutiny of numerous polls showing majorities in support of raising taxes on rich people.
Uloborus
@Brien Jackson:
Oh, sure it does. People do want to raise taxes on rich people. But when you actually propose to raise taxes on rich people, they believe you’re raising taxes on everyone. They’re not related issues. I mean, they should be, but they’re not. People aren’t logical, they believe what they want to believe, and they don’t really care whether things are contradictory or not.
Brien Jackson
@Uloborus:
Not sure about that. If you’re raising the cap, it’s not at all hard to repeat “no effect on people making less than $x at all.” Moreover, the real point of that would be to get your foot in the door of a comprehensive set of tweaks that, done right, would barely be perceptible to anyone.
Uloborus
@Brien Jackson:
Yes? Did that work particularly well with the Health Care Reform bill that raised taxes on practically no one? Or letting Bush’s tax cuts expire, tax cuts that were only for the super-rich? Again, the problem isn’t that people mind you raising taxes on the rich. It’s that if you tell them you’re raising taxes on the rich, they magically believe their own taxes will go up. And specific explanations will either make their eyes glaze, or make them sure you’re trying to cheat them.
Brien Jackson
@Uloborus:
Who are these people? I mean, we’re getting pretty deep in the weeds now. HCR was it’s own monster, and the last polling I saw on letting the “Bush tax cuts for the wealthy” expire was pretty strong.
Uloborus
@Brien Jackson:
Wouldn’t these people be the plurality of people who think their taxes have gone up under Obama? I will grant you, we hear a lot of screaming and very few accurate studies, but you’ve just pointed out exactly why it’s hard to get numbers on. ‘Tax cuts on the wealthy’ people would love to get rid of. Convincing them that it’s the rich you’re taxing isn’t them. What percentage of people is it who think they’re vulnerable to the estate tax? 40%?
I ain’t good at looking up these things, so if you can come up with some good numbers yourself I will bow to them, but bear in mind my point: Asking someone what they’d theoretically support in terms of changing taxes on the rich is not going to give you a reliable answer. When the time comes, they won’t believe it’s a tax increase for the rich.
kdaug
@Uloborus: Oh, no no no, amigo. The people who really don’t want higher top marginal taxes are the very wealthy. They also happen to have a lot of power (read: money to donate to candidates).
The hanger’s-on at the lower end may not want higher taxes, but their wants and needs are irrelevant – they have no power.
Tonal Crow
@Corner Stone:
It’s incorrect. Any bill that modifies how the federal government obtains general revenues must originate in the House, whether it involves tax increases or tax decreases. See, e.g., Armstrong v. U.S., 759 F.2d 1378 (1985).
FlipYrWhig
@Uloborus:
Or, to put it another way, asking people if they’d support raising taxes on the rich will always poll well… in isolation. People know they’re not rich. They know they don’t make $200K or whatever.
But after those same people hear the same policy described repeatedly as “a $X billion tax increase,” a lot of them will oppose it. You can continue to say, “No, it doesn’t affect you, only the rich people,” but they’ll also hear other people saying that it’s a massive tax increase, and they’ll fear that the promise that only the rich will be affected is a lie.
FlipYrWhig
@Uloborus: What percentage of people do you think actually compare how much they paid in income tax from one year to the next? I would guess it’s very small.
I would also guess that very few people even keep track of how their _refund_ (if they get one) compares from year to year.
If you never go back and look at the raw data, you’ll easily default to believing what you’ve always believed, or the loudest voices around, which tell you that your taxes have gone up even when they haven’t.
Brien Jackson
@FlipYrWhig:
So what’s your idea?
Bill Murray
@Brien Jackson: The current projections are generally based on the US economy being worse than it’s been in the last 100 years except for the depression and the current downturn.
So the issue can likely be resolved with better general economic policies. Average growth would result in never even touching the surplus
FlipYrWhig
@Brien Jackson: Hmm. I don’t know if there’s a good rhetorical solution to the impasse, but I’m kind of partial to being preemptive about it. Instead of just saying “We’ll make sure that your tax bill won’t increase unless you make more than $250,000” (or whatever the threshold is), add something like “Now, you’re going to hear a lot of people trying to trick you into thinking that your taxes are going up. That’s because they don’t think you’re smart enough to save your tax return and compare it to next year’s,” or something like that. “Rich Republicans are slippery and they’ll try to play you for a fool. But you know better. We know better. And we know you won’t put up with that!”
During the campaign Obama and Biden were pretty effective at insisting that only $200-$250K incomes were being targeted. But that still leaves an opening for propagandists like Limbaugh and Hannity and Luntz to raise doubts. I think pointing out that rich Republicans think we’re gullible does some decent us-vs.-them action that can be backed by actual facts.
jake the snake
Per Greene’s comments. People who have a habit of telling the truth, especially in a snarky way, should not get in politics. Franken is somewhat of an exception, but he has a serious side, which I am not sure Greene does.
bago
Two whole plaques, 200 years too late, and this bitch-hole thinks that is too much? F this King. Just F him.
General JAFO Willibro
@Hunter Gathers:
Oh, the GOP doesn’t lead Congress now?
You offer a seemingly endless parade of clueless, spineless, anti-union, pro-corporate whores and lickspittles, all of whom are pleased to call themselves Democrats, and you want to blame voters for not creaming their jeans at the prospect of voting for more of same? Here: Console yourself with the 2010 Darwin Award, Dem Division, you witless wad of DNC bumroll.