- David Frum suggests that working class individuals shouldn't be so quick to embrace Obama's new Immigration Policy. Does he have a point?
- I am going to look at the healthcare systems of the top countries in the conservative Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom. How do they compare to ObamaCare? Is socialized medicine really a threat to individual freedom, as well as the free market in general?
- I am going to write a defense of what has been colorfully called "Slacktivism." Is it generally a good thing? Does it breed laziness? Or is criticism of slacktivism just pretentious?
- I am going to find out just how consistent Politifact.com is about using net job figures, verses other figures, when deciding ratings.
- I may also list some things to remember about fact checking sites (or media altogether) when trying to detect bias.
In addition to these posts, I will include a list of a few articles I think may be worth reading from the previous week. These will usually be unrelated to the post itself. It is mostly my attempt to resurrect a simplified version of my old "Weekly Roundup" articles.
Weekly Roundup
"Gun talk has been almost anathema at the White House. Obama signed a bill in 2009 that allows people to carry loaded guns into most national parks; in 2011, he largely avoided a discussion -- to the anger of many activists -- about strengthening gun laws following the shooting of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Obama received a failing grade from the nation’s preeminent gun control group, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence."
So why again is the NRA campaigning so fiercely against Obama? It can't be because he is a liberal now could it...?
FactCheck.org: Why the Truth Still Matters
"If unpleasant truths would get candidates elected, they would state them frankly. But they seldom do that, because so few of us in the public want to hear unpleasant truths. Stating such things is considered a gaffe.
Furthermore, humans naturally filter out evidence that weighs against what they want to believe. It’s called “confirmation bias,” and we all have it. So candidates tell us what we want to hear."This is exactly why we need non-partisan fact checking operations.
Another thing I noticed that is worth pointing out:
"the federal government accounted for 43.6 percent of all U.S. health care spending in 2009, before the law [ObamaCare] was signed, and government actuaries predict that in 2015, when the law [ObamaCare] is fully effective, that will rise to 47.4 percent. What’s more, much or most of that 3.8 percentage point increase would have happened anyway as the postwar baby boom generation reaches age 65 and goes on Medicare. So the law is no “takeover.” Rather, it’s a modest, incremental change in the existing system."(emphasis mine)
Tom Smerling: Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
Conservative Professor Jonathan Adler makes the case for action to combat climate change in accordance with conservative principles. This is the kind of conversation we should be getting from the right.
“This is of particular concern because these effects will be most severe in those nations that are both least able to adapt and least responsible for contributing to the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
It is a well established principle in the Anglo-American legal tradition that one does not have the right to use one’s own property in a manner that causes harm to one’s neighbor. . .
My argument is that the same general principles that lead libertarians and conservatives to call for greater protection of property rights should lead them to call for greater attention to the most likely effects of climate change.
I believe the United States should adopt a revenue-neutral carbon tax, much like that suggested by NASA’s James Hansen. . . [and] that is fully rebated to taxpayers on a per capita basis. This would, in effect, shift the incidence of federal taxes away from income and labor and onto energy consumption and offset some of the potential regressivity of a carbon tax. For conservatives who have long supported shifting from an income tax to a sales or consumption tax, and oppose increasing the federal tax burden, this should be a no brainer."The carbon tax solution has actually been embraced by more conservatives than you may realize, including Romney adviser Gregory Mankiw.
Paul Krugman: Still A Phantom Menace"
Although this recession continues to surprise Economists of all stripes, none have been more off-target than Austrians.
David Frum: Why Americans Hate Politics
"The Democratic message is shaping up as: "The Republicans/the Fed/the Europeans wrecked the recovery, and we weren't smart enough or tough enough to stop them. Vote us."
The Republican message: "Obama could not fix the mess we made. Vote us.""
Paul Krugman: Reagan, Obama, Recovery
"So, more than four years ago I predicted a very slow recovery. Why? Because recessions like those of 1990-91, 2001, and 2007-2009 have very different origins from recessions like 1974-75 or the double-dip recession of 1979-82." (emphasis mine)David Frum agrees:
"Yet in almost every way, today's economic problems are exactly the opposite of those of 30 years ago. Then we had inflation, today we are struggling against deflation. Then we had weak corporate profits, today corporations are more profitable than ever. Then we had slow productivity growth, today it is high. Then the to-individual income-tax rate was 70%. Today it is 36%. Then energy regulations produced energy shortages. Today the removal of banking regulations has produced an abundance of debt." (emphasis mine)
AP: Obama a socialist? Many scoff, but claim persists
"...to many historians and political scientists - and to actual socialists as well - the persistent claim that Obama is a socialist lacks credence."And what has been the right's latest silver bullet?
"When President Barack Obama's re-election campaign unveiled its new slogan, some conservative critics were quick to pounce. "Forward," they asserted, is a word long associated with Europe's radical left."So I'm assuming the same can be said of Republican Governor Scott Walker:
"Scott Walker: Moving Wisconsin Forward"That crazy Bolshevik!
AP: FACT CHECK: Looming tax hike not the biggest ever
"...the tax increases would pale in comparison to those imposed to help finance World War II. Before the 1940s, the individual income tax applied to only a small percentage of the population. By the end of war, the income tax was levied on most working people, with a top tax rate of 94 percent on income above $200,000." (emphasis mine)And my favorite part:
"House Republicans have passed a budget for next year - which Romney has embraced - that would raise just $7 billion less in taxes than Obama's budget in 2013. That's the equivalent of a rounding error, when you're talking about revenues of $2.7 trillion." (emphasis mine)FactCheck.org: Romney’s Solar Flareout
An ad from the Romney campaign strains facts to make its point that federal grants and loans to green-energy companies were improperly steered to Obama’s political backers, and that federal money was wasted on failing companies that are now laying off employees.
- It claims the “inspector general said contracts were steered to ‘friends and family.’ ” But that’s not exactly what the inspector general said. And in the year since he said he was investigating such alleged “schemes,” no public charges have been made, at least not yet.
- The ad highlights the struggles — company losses, nose-diving stock and layoffs — at several companies that received substantial Department of Energy loans and grants. The ad fails to note, however, that most of the layoffs at those companies were overseas, or that the projects backed by DOE are largely moving along as planned. An independent review of the DOE program says its failure rate has been better than anticipated.
- The ad uses an inflated figure from a partisan source to quantify loans and grants that went to Obama donors. (emphasis mine)
Paul Krugman: We Don’t Need No Education
Conservatives love to pretend that there are vast armies of government bureaucrats doing who knows what; in reality, a majority of government workers are employed providing either education (teachers) or public protection (police officers and firefighters). (emphasis mine)WP Fact Checker: A wrong-headed question on ‘Obamacare’
"...cutbacks in federal government spending — precisely what Republicans such as Romney have demanded — led to the closure of the Nemschoff facility in Iowa, not the health care law.
"As for that Chamber of Commerce survey, we suggest that Obama skip reading that. This is yet another one of those online surveys from which you can draw virtually no broader conclusions.
"As the American Association for Public Opinion Research warns: “Surveys based on self-selected volunteers do not have that sort of known relationship to the target population and are subject to unknown, non-measurable biases. Even if opt-in surveys are based on probability samples drawn from very large pools of volunteers, their results still suffer from unknown biases stemming from the fact that the pool has no knowable relationships with the full target population.”" (emphasis mine)John Avlon: Jeb vs. Grover: Battle for GOP's soul
"In pursuit of a reality check, take a look at this quote: "We're going to close the unproductive tax loopholes that have allowed some of the truly wealthy to avoid paying their fair share. In theory, some of those loopholes were understandable, but in practice they sometimes made it possible for millionaires to pay nothing, while a bus driver was paying 10% of his salary, and that's crazy. It's time we stopped it."
That might sound straight out of President Barack Obama "Buffett Tax" playbook -- which conservatives routinely attack as "class warfare" -- but in fact it is the sainted Reagan speaking in 1985."Bruce Bartlett: Why Ronald Reagan Would Not Lead Today’s GOP
Gavin Baker: Obama Plans to Further Harness Technology for Government Transparency
Politifact.com: In Context: 'The private sector is doing fine'
Yahoo News: Top conservative says read my lips: Don’t sign ‘no new tax’ pledge
Michael Tomasky on Obama’s Gaffe and How His Campaign Lost Its Groove
Michael Stafford: Why I Gave Up On Being a Republican David Frum: The "Wealth Creators" Are Winning
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