A good point by Josh Marshall….
There’s been a lot of chatter over the last few days about whether super-wealthy candidates get a hard rap in US politics or whether Mitt Romney is being held to a higher or harder standard. Romney is probably the wealthiest man ever to run for President, even in inflation adjusted dollars. (There are some claims that Washington was wealthier but it’s based on a total misreading of the value of land during the period.) But certainly there have been many extremely wealthy men who’ve run for President and won — Roosevelts, one Kennedy, a couple Bushes, etc.
But all of this talk ignores a fact so salient and obvious that it’s hard to fathom how some are nevertheless oblivious to it. Having vast wealth and aggressively working the law and tax code to avoid taxes is a very different thing if your policy agenda is geared almost entirely to benefit the super wealthy. If you’re a gazillionaire and your main pitch is to cut taxes on gazillionaires that’s just gonna put a bit more emphasis on your wealth. This logic should not be difficult to grasp.
(bold mine)
But it’s not that hard to fathom of course: media elites are all wealthy themselves and refuse to grasp the logic of any criticism of income inequality and the super-rich. It is that simple.
There’s a million made-up reasons a wealthy person can use to justify extreme income inequality and the destruction of the American middle-class: we’re the cognitive elite, we would do better on the marshmallow test, we create jobs, we’re just benefitting from the free market. Also too, the Chinese work harder than our moochers and looters, welfare fraud, the hippies have destroyed our precious societal values and traditions.
And that’s what establishment media will do. They will take Romney’s side because they make a lot of money too.
Comrade Javamanphil
All the while explaining to us that Obama cannot connect with the average man at the Applebees’ salad bar and they know this by talking to taxi drivers. What a beautiful world…for you.
beltane
The global elite are a nation unto themselves. Mitt Romney’s sole loyalty is to that nation-the USA is merely a staging area for his money harvesting activities.
Punchy
Do I dare Googs “marshmallow test” on a work computer? Certainly cant Urban Dictionary it.
Warren Terra
In a related vein – income inequality, and social perceptions of same – Jon Ronson has a good, if unscientific article about what he learned about American ideas regarding income disparity based on visits with five people each making (roughly) 5 times as much as the previous one.
c u n d gulag
Exactly.
And, why ask tough questions of Conservatives in front of you, when you get paid by Conservative corporations and their Conservative “Job Creators,” who can ‘destroy’ your “job” and career?
It’s far easier to save the tough question for Democrats, when you have them on, and then frame those questions using Republican memes and talking points.
This way, you don’t have to work or think, and that’s what the audience has grown to expect of the last few decades.
See: ‘Fest’s, Sunday Bloviation’
Cris (without an H)
I failed that lyrics quiz.
DougJ
@Punchy:
That depends…do you consider David Brooks columns to be work safe?
Libby
Amen Doug. Too often ignored. “News” media are of the entitled class too. Tax over $250K going to hit them too.
smintheus
@Punchy: Marshmallow test, claimed to sort out the financially successful goats from the rest of us sheeple.
jl
@DougJ:
” do you consider David Brooks columns to be work safe? ”
Depends on the hazards of experiencing free floating disorientatin and general vagueness in everything at work.
If you have think or work near machinery, then Brooks definitely NSFW.
Valdivia
on the substance more in a bit but I have to say DougJ that title is FTFW. Perfect earworm for the day too.
smintheus
@Libby: That’s a large part of the reason why newspapers no longer have reporters on the labor beat, and almost never write about minimum wage jobs, but produce puff pieces on corporations and their CEOs and their latest products aplenty.
jl
i share DougJ’s expectation that the corporate media will not hold Romney to any standard at all, becuase the news media celebrities and pitch people are either the one percent or the tragically near rich.
But Marshall is right, Romney should get extra scrutiny, and it should not be hard to understand why.
LGRooney
While there are plenty of examples on the opinion pages and on news talk shows of either favoritism towards Romney or the faux-balance, both-sides-do-it, pony. I would have to say that the press’ willingness to dig into the depths on Romney has been encouraging – not for a liberal but for someone who expects the press to unveil truths.
They were rougher with Obama in the last election because he was a new entity who hadn’t been researched by the national press to a great extent. McCain had been around for years.
This year is Romney’s turn. And, it turns out that there is just a lot of digging to do especially in light of the economic arguments going on in the country and Romney’s place near the top of the economic pile. Also, his disdain towards the press means they are going to have to dig since he throws out talking points rather than substance. Substance, whether true or false, has always meant a lazy press corps could sit back. Without that, they have to earn their paychecks and earning it means pulling back the curtain on Mr. Howell III.
jibeaux
Yup. You’d hear the false equivalence sometimes about the Kochs v. an Obama fundraiser from Sarah Jessica Parker. Yes, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick presumably have scads and scads of money. But they are willing, and vote for, policies which RAISE their taxes. This is the opposite of the Hamptons fundraiser people. Nobody begrudges them their money. They begrudge them the attitude that only little people pay taxes.
NCSteve
I just flashed back to Charlie Goodson hijacking one of the 2008 presidential debates to lecture that callow liberal Obama fellow about the importance of low capital gains rates.
Roger Moore
Of course the other factor is that Romney is using his wealth as proof of what a good candidate he is. His biggest single qualification, now that he doesn’t want to talk about his time as Governor, is that he was an extremely successful and wealthy businessman. If he makes his business success an issue, it should be fair for his opponent to use questions about it as a counter-argument.
If there’s a bigger meta-issue here, it’s Mitt’s belief that he has the right to control the narrative. He wants to be able to bring up his time at Bain, at the Olympics, as Governor, etc. but only talk about the parts that make him look good. He gets terribly upset and considers it unfair when anyone else brings up part of his past that he doesn’t want to talk about. Apart from what this tells us about Mitt as a person, you really have to question how well that approach would serve him as President. Does he really think he can control the whole rest of the world and prevent them from bringing up any issue that makes him uncomfortable? Can somebody with that attitude possibly be a good President?
Valdivia
@NCSteve:
yep! and from that episode is that we got George Stephanopoulus being called Tiny Debate Failure. I loved that nickname.
hells littlest angel
But Romney’s wife has said she doesn’t feel rich. You see, he’s not cutting taxes for himself, he’s cutting them for her.
Such a beautiful, loving man, and he gets nothing but grief for the crime of having a couple of extra bucks in his pocket. Yet he somehow manages to smile through the tears.
Rommie
Parading around as a DBZ-style Fusion of Thurston Howell the III, Mr. Moneybags, Gordon Gekko, and Ken the Doll doesn’t help either. Being wealthy and Letting Every Damn Body Know You Are Wealthy are not the same things.
El Cid
When the Chinese organize (and it does happen and is happening, even in the face of repression) for better conditions and wages, they hate them too.
schrodinger's cat
DougJ@top
True, compared to you and me punditubbies have it made, but compared to Mitt Romney, they are paupers.
El Cid
@Rommie: I often think of Romney as the evil Thurston Howell IIIrd from the evil Star Trek double universe, and he shaved his beard to fit in.
Paula
So, us gov estimates that tax havens cost the treasury $100 BILLION PER YEAR.
dedc79
Note also that the wealthy do crave media attention, it just has to be on their own terms. They like it when their wealth is fawned over. They even like fluff pieces about how much power they wield, as long as the stories are done on their terms.
But the second a hint of criticism finds its way into a story, they claim they’re being persecuted.
artem1s
that and Citizens United just redirected a whole lotta cash in their direction. no way the media is going to have a serious conversation about buying political office. It’s been their wet dream since Kennedy that no one be able to get into elected office without their consent. Now that circus is running a 24/7/365 perpetual motion machine.
Violet
I think it should be a requirement for anyone running for President to have to live on minimum wage for a month. And it all has to be filmed so we get to see what it’s like for them trying to find a place to live, transportation to and from their job, and just how easy it is to afford all those medications they take because The ER Has To Treat Everybody!
Violet
@Rommie: Someone had a suggestion the other day to make an Obama campaign ad where Romney is talking and Gordon Gekko, Thurston and Lovey Howell III, Mr. Moneybags, Mr. Burns, etc. are in the audience nodding along. Perfect image. I hope someone does it.
Gin & Tonic
Is there a modern-day analogue to I.F. Stone?
Scott S.
@Warren Terra: Thanks — that’s a really great article. It needs to get passed around a lot.
Davis X. Machina
@Violet: I’m prepared to settle for someone running for president who’s cut a check every month to pay off the student loans…
Southern Beale
I already blogwhored this earlier today, but I felt like it was relevant to this dicussion … today’s NYT has an op-ed on using the metaphor of a garden to explain economic policies and I just thought, damn. Jerzy Kosinski’s estate called and they want their movie idea back…. I mean fuckitall, is this the best liberals can do? Long, tired analogies about taxes as fertilizer and gardens as an economy?
How about just saying “the Bush tax cuts were passed 12 years ago, where are the fucking jobs?”
Jesus. Why do we always have to make everything so damn hard?
SatanicPanic
@Rommie: He should just go full-on crunk and flaunt his wealth with diamond studded teeth and face tattoos- that would appear to more people than dressage horses and car elevators.
smintheus
@Warren Terra: That is a good article.
Southern Beale
Romney booed and booed and booed and booed at NAACP …
Violet
@Southern Beale: Same logic applies to discussing marginal tax rates and the extending the Bush tax cuts for the people earning under $250K. It should be framed like this: “EVERYONE who has an income gets a tax cut. That’s right, everyone! Every single person earning an income gets that tax cut. The only difference is, if you earn over $250K, you don’t get a tax cut on everything you earn over that $250K. You do get it on everything under $250K, just like every other American. Tax cuts for everyone.”
Explaining marginal tax rates isn’t that hard, and it would actually make it harder for rich people to complain they aren’t getting a tax cut. Yes they are. They’re getting one just like everyone else. Just not on the “being rich” part.
burnspbesq
OT: the Federalist Society has a podcast up featuring Randy Barnett and Neal Katyal discussing the NFIB decision. Could be quite entertaining. I’ve downloaded it, but won’t have time to listen until this evening.
http://www.fed-soc.org/publications/detail/national-federation-of-independent-business-v-sebelius-post-decision-scotuscast
trollhattan
Frank Rich in NYMag is tapdancing all over Willard. e.g.,
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/07/frank-rich-romney-has-a-tax-and-koch-problem.html
trollhattan
@Southern Beale:
“See how racist they are?!”
/Tonight’s RWspin
MikeJ
@Violet:
I emailed a reporter about this just yesterday. Got back a “you’re right, good catch email” this morning.
Yutsano
@Southern Beale: Oh wow. I wanted to smack that smug smirk he has during the boos off his face. I guess Rmoney sucks at pohker. He has way too many tells.
Brachiator
@DougJ:
It’s probably more complicated than you allow here. Very few of the media elite are as wealthy as Romney, and Romney is not even in spitting range of Rupert Murdoch’s net worth.
And while there have always been reporters willing to bite the hand that feeds them, they could do so only if their publishers had some sense of public duty.
BTW, have you seen the Louis Menand piece in the July 9 New Yorker on Douglas Brinkley’s book about Walter Conkrite?
Goddam paywall notwithstanding, Menand talks a bit about CBS owner Paley:
Paley supposedly yanked Howard K. Smith out of CBS in 1961 “because, he thought that Smith’s sympathetic coverage of the civil rights movement was too opinionated.”
And of course, Paley shut down Murrow’s See it Now because Murrow had the nerve to commit acts of journalism.
The press has probably always been more craven than crusading.
Violet
@MikeJ: GAH! That’s so infuriating. A REPORTER doesn’t understand marginal tax rates. It’s not like it’s complex math or anything. But good for you for letting them know. One step at a time.
It really is so easy to explain. Tax cuts for everyone! But rich folks get to start paying their fair share on anything they earn over $250K. Easy, easy, easy.
Villago Delenda Est
They’re oblivious to it because the vermin of the Village would benefit from it, too, and they’re greedy parasites just like the marquis.
Tumbrel rides cannot possibly come too soon for them.
Southern Beale
@trollhattan:
Sadly, you’re 100% correct.
KXB
The other night, my uncle was watching Erin Burnett on CNN. He finds her to be “very good”, which is his old-fashioned, married man way of saying, “she’s attractive.” Unfortunately, she was going on about the Obama push to let the tax cuts for the top 2%, and how much would be raised versus how much of the deficit would remain. That’s fine – I agree that removing the cuts for that 2% will not make government red ink disappear. But she repeated the hokum about how companies will be less inclined to hire if they lose those breaks, and I wanted to shout, “Well, then where have the jobs been since 2002?!” After all, that was the sales pitch 10 years ago when the cuts were implemented. Yet, from then till the fall of 2008, it was the worst performing job record since WWII – substantially worse than either Reagan or Clinton, both of whom raised taxes when necessary. Burnett then cited a report from JP Morgan Chase on additional costs. Yup, she cited as an authority the bank that cannot explain how it lost $9 billion dollars in one month!
Catsy
@LGRooney:
I think this is underappreciated as a factor in this election. McCain received months of free rides by the press not only because of his undeserved reputation as a “moderate” or the right-left double standard in the media, but because of the buddy-buddy relationship with the press that he cultivated. Remember the “Straight Talk Express”?
Romney doesn’t have that rapport. He treats the press with contempt. And it’s going to cost him.
handy
@Southern Beale:
Without clicking the link my first thought was: while trying to flash his cred did he flub one of the lines to In Da Club?
Z
Romney’s proposed tax-law changes are a tax hike on almost everyone in the bottom three quintiles even if you don’t come up with any mechanism through which his 20% rate cuts can be paid for: Romney wants the Making Work Pay/payroll tax cut to end; Obama wants to make it permanent (this was part of his policy before the financial collapse). If letting the Bush rates expire is a tax hike, so is letting Making Work Pay expire, and a ~2% payroll tax cut is worth a lot more to most people than a 20% marginal rate cut.
trollhattan
@handy:
Just a hunch: He opened with, “Who has released the Canis lupus familiaris?”
Origuy
From the Jerusalem Post :
From commenter Alouette at Little Green Footballs:
KXB
@Origuy:
Is it legal to host fundraisers for an American election in foreign countries?
trollhattan
@Catsy:
I’m guessing in contrast to McCain’s happy funtimes open bar bus, Willard is probably offering caffeine-free Pepsi and Dominos at a buck a slice.
(Semi-famous SLC Olympics story: Willard ordered six-dollar pizzas for the committee and charged them a buck a slice, netting two dollars per pizza. Yes, the same person installing a car elevator in his LaJolla mansion.)
MikeJ
@Violet: I don’t think the issue is that he doesn’t understand it, I think it’s just a shorthand way to say it that is inaccurate. Keeping your copy crisp and concise is tough and people make mistakes. And when that mistakes gets through then it just becomes the standard phrasing. I don’t think most reporters are even thinking about the meaning of those words when they type them, just taxcutsforthosemakinglessthan250000dollars.
Until a reporter has shown actual malice I’m willing to be generous with them.
Turgidson
@Roger Moore:
No.
For proof, see the Presidency of: Bush, George W.
Origuy
@KXB: There was a fundraiser in France for Obama a few days ago. As long as the contributors are American citizens (and there are a lot of Americans in both France and Israel), I believe it is ok.
Roger Moore
@Catsy:
Romney has replaced it with the “Honk, Honk Express” that he sends to Obama rallies.
Davis X. Machina
@KXB: So long as the donors are American, who cares where the event is held?
American citizens don’t all live the US. At last count, there are 5 million Americans living abroad — more Americans live abroad than in any one of half the states.
Violet
@MikeJ: Okay, I’m not going to ascribe meaning to what he said in his email. But the larger point remains. The talking point is “tax cuts for anyone making less than $250K” and that’s inaccurate. It’s tax cuts for everyone. Why do the Republicans want to deny those poor job creators their tax cuts? Huh? Huh? Huh? (You know, the tax cuts they get on the first $250K) There’s a really great talking point in there and a bunch of stuff to mix it up with if only people would take it and run.
Gretchen
@Davis X. Machina: Obama is that guy. He and Michelle only paid off their loans in their 40’s. I loved it when they said they’d get home frome work too tired to cook dinner, and wondered if they could afford takout pizza. I’ve been there, and I believe they have too. Romney can’t imagine takout pizza being a luxury.
catclub
@trollhattan: there is a reason why people who have a lot of money, have a lot of money. It is generally not they they are overly generous.
Brachiator
@Gretchen:
Fixt.
Valdivia
@Origuy:
wait he is hosting it on the night of the fast? what a fucking moron. if it is the night after the fast not a big deal. (jewish holidays start the night before and end at sunset)
ETA: he is holding it the night after the fast ends. I am assuming he didn’t hold it before because the 3 weeks previous to the fast are pretty holy for the religious crowd and attending such an event would be a no-no.
Roger Moore
@Origuy:
Since the Jewish day starts and ends at sundown, they could presumably avoid this problem by scheduling it in the late evening on July 29th, well enough after sundown that it counts as being the next day on the Jewish calendar. Not that I expect Rmoney to be sensitive enough to other people’s religious beliefs to bother. After all, this is a guy who posthumously baptized his father-in-law against his express wishes.
Steeplejack
@Origuy:
WTF?! I can’t remember any presidential candidate ever holding a fundraiser outside the United States.
ETA: Obama had one in France?
Yutsano
@Davis X. Machina: Dubya IIRC had several fundraisers in Canada. But the attendees were all American expats. I seem to recall there was some controversy there regarding some Canuckistanis showing up too but it never went anywhere.
Valdivia
@Steeplejack:
yes and he did quite a few for ex-pats the last time around. The scandal this time is that Romney is having one in London by the Banksters who brought us the LIBOR mess. Should be fun to have the press hunt that story down. If they ever get the balls.
Buck Batard
@Origuy: Supposedly, the newly deposed Barclays CEO is to host a Romney fundraiser in London this week. I assume it’s been called off because of the Libor scandal, or at least there’s a new host.
ChrisB
You’re wrong about the establishment media taking Romney’s side, Doug.
Don’t you remember how unfair Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric were to Sarah Palin?
MCA1
@Warren Terra: Thanks for that link. Interesting article. My only quibble is that, by going up the income scale so quickly, he spends only 1/3 of the article describing the lives of fully 95% of the U.S. population, but doesn’t mention this fact. I think it would have been more illuminating to, instead of covering himself at $250k/year, cover some two income family at $125k/year and show how surprisingly similar their life is to the couple in Iowa’s, in terms of overall stress. That’s a huge swath of the country, with both spouses working and worrying a lot about the bills and whether or not they can actually take a vacation that involves an airplane this year, and trying to deal with the guilt of not being as involved in their children’s lives as they’d like to be out of fiscal necessity.
schrodinger's cat
@ChrisB: Is this snark? They asked her soft ball questions which she could not answer. A 15 year old should be able to answer which newspapers she reads.
Turgidson
@Catsy:
The Obama team isn’t too fond of the press either (they justifiably see the media as a bunch of idiots standing in the way of governance), and I think the feeling is mutual.
So while Romney may not get the tongue bath that Bush got until the bitter end or McCain got until even they couldn’t gloss over the fact that he chose the biggest moron in the history of national elections to be his running mate, I don’t think the media will overtly sandbag him either, as they are so fond of doing to Democrats.
Roger Moore
@Gretchen:
Romney probably can’t imagine takeout pizza; that’s what a chef is for.
El Cid
@Roger Moore: “Pizza”? You mean the odd, round baked good in the middle of the table?
I’m, I’m not sure about those cookies. I don’t think you made them.
Keith G
As it is used at the top, I find the phrase “establishment media” a bit problematic since it is such a broad brush. There is good work being done by some. Of the faulty reporting, I don’t think that sympathy to Romney or his lifestyle is the main factor. Much of it is just physical and intellectual laziness.
Many of the folks in question do not go out to find stories. They let stories come to them. Also, I bet many of them write stories based on how many clicks they think they will get. That is probably the bottom line Darwinian truth of their craven existence.
Let’s develop a way to reward hard working and insightful journalists. How creating a regular section where we can post links and reward good journalistic work with many page views.
In other words, let’s stop bitching; let’s do something to improve the situationsituation if we can.
Jay C
@ DougJ:
I disagree: I think they grasp the logic of it quite well. Very well, which is why any serious discussion of income issues in this country’s media tends to get either sat on, or derailed into simpleminded sloganeering (“soshulism!!” Job creators!!” “punishing success!!”, etc.).
James Hulsey
@Comrade Javamanphil:
Am I the only person who caught the Devo reference?
However, I failed the lyrics test in the title. Never really listened to the lyrics in that song, though it was everywhere in 1986.
MikeJ
@James Hulsey: I love Ciccone Youth.
RP
The media and Marshall are missing another important and obvious point: Romney’s wealth is important because almost his entire campaign is based on his experience at Bain. He only served one term as governor of MA, and it’s not like he’s embracing his accomplishments there. And his only other experience is the Olympics (who cares). If he’s arguing that he should be president because he was a successful business man at Bain, then the wealth he accumlated at Bain is a major issue worthy of scrutiny.
KXB
@Origuy:
OK
Jebediah
@James Hulsey:
No – it’s been a worm in my ear all morning.
shortstop
@Roger Moore: All-around great comment.
Rafer Janders
@burnspbesq:
I used to party with Neal. How far he’s come…
Rafer Janders
@KXB:
Also, too, (and this is deliberately simplified since tax incentives are horrendously complicated) but companies only pay a tax on profits. If they have profits, then they’re successful, and they’ll want to hire to meet consumer demand. If they’re not successful, they won’t have profits, so won’t be taxed, so it’s a moot issue for them — the lack of consumer demand, not taxes, will be what depresses hiring.
pseudonymous in nc
@Steeplejack:
Though not one where he showed up for the rubber chicken.
El Cid
@Rafer Janders: Also, corporations are people, so if there’s a personal income tax, we have to tax the income of corporate persons, otherwise we’re discriminating against corporate persons and we don’t think they’re good enough to pay taxes.
When those corporate persons turn around and pay incomes to the biological persons, we tax them too, because they are persons being paid by another person (a corporate person), so that’s income.
They’re either people or they ain’t.
Thymezone
This, er, argument, fails every test. There is no evidence of cognitive ability, no evidence of causation between marshmallow test performance and wealth, jobs are clearly not being created even after 11 years of slashed taxes on your demo, and nobody is against your benefitting from the free market. We’re just against your keeping all the proceeds for yourself and taking all the capital out of the larger arena of capitalism and stuffing it into offshore accounts and factories where it is sequestered from American interests, which is to say, our interests.
So go fuck yourself. Hypothetically speaking, of course.
pluege
for those in the boomer age and older, it used to be that they raised you to think that America stood for helping the little guy, that it was noble for those of advantage to help out those not so fortunate (with actual help that is, not the ludicrous rationalization of upside downism that not helping is actually helping that today’s republicans use). And they raised you that way at least in part with good reason because there were actual events and actions of, and an outlook of an American society of generosity and magnanimity to those not as fortunate. And that is the context of former rich leaders that used their advantage, power, and influence to actually help people not so fortunate as them.
The modern republican is the complete opposite of that: they are rich people endowed with advantage and good fortune that are so twisted and deformed from head to their very soul that all they can do is obsess how to screw those not as fortunate as them while inventing a reality for themselves that has their extreme insidiousness and indecency as noble.
The modern republican is a total perversion of what it means to be a decent human being.
Bill Arnold
@Punchy:
For whatever it’s worth, there is a https://encrypted.google.com/
(I suppose a proxy could be made with a cert that looked approximately like the google cert, or alternatively collusion with Google. This would involve serious mistrust of employees, and effort.)