Baby Spittle

This graphic comes from the Center for American Progress, by way of think progress.

Thinkprogress has a list of 30 major corporation who accomplished this dubious feat.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/12/07/383779/30-big-corporations-taxes-lobbying/

Those corporations made a profit of $163 billion and received a REFUND of more than 10 million dollars, while spending nearly 500 million on lobbying efforts.

Demint spent his interview whining about “spending”.

Lets examine his record, compared to Obama’s.
Obama we know, has added approximately 1.25 trillion dollars to the debt.
Much of that was the stimulus.
In total, Obama’s policies are 20% of the debt added during his presidency.

The rest is the recessions under bush, the bush tax cuts, the bush ware and the bush medicare expansion (none of that paid for).

Demint himself was not in office for the major deficit builders under bush, but the deficit remains vastly republican-created.
This pile of poop Demint trying to blame democrats is simply deceptive bullcrap.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/wed-january-11-2012-jim-demint?xrs=share_copy

Rick Santorum has made a habit of crazy statements.
He’s a republican – what else is new.

He recently said:

SANTORUM: Am I going to go after Mitt Romney on Romneycare? You bet I will, because it was the basis for Obamacare. Why? Because it’s top-down, government-run medicine. Does the state of Massachusetts have the right to do it, as you said? Yes they do, states have the right to do that. That doesn’t make it the right thing to do. I’m going to go out and piece by piece talk about how his approach is wrong, how it will destroy this country to have someone up against, who is not going to be willing to take on Obamacare, and has a track record of supporting that kind of statist government.

How accurate is Santorum?

“Because it’s top-down, government-run medicine.”
False.

“Yes they do, states have the right to do that. That doesn’t make it the right thing to do.”
What makes it “the right thing to do” is more people being insured and living longer, healthier lives.
That and Obamacare extending medicare solvency by 12 years.
And that Obamacare lowers the deficit (last year’s HUGE CONCERN from the right, before they took the house).

“how it will destroy this country”
HAHAHAHA, republicans are all nutty drama queens.

Scan through the list of misleading articles mediamatters counts from washington times.

Kuhner: Obama’s Tucson Memorial Address “Was A Surreal Spectacle In Narcissistic Self-Congratulation” That “Dishonored The Victims.”
(this was a speech that even many conservatives appreciated)

Wash. Times: Bin Laden “Outmaneuvered” Obama With Taped Message.
(OBL dead – but wash times claims OBL won, lol)

how freaking stupid do you have to be to NOT BE ABLE TO TELL THESE GUYS ARE LYING?
No wonder republicans get votes despite doing everything they can to make life harder on everyone.

Here’s a guy singing a version of Katy Perry’s California Girls, with autotune.

Without auto-tune.

This is the singer. Everyone likes this guy.

Katy Perry’s video, for reference – can be found here.

Paul Krugman discusses the economics of GOP candidate Ron Paul.

Now, it’s still very unlikely that Ron Paul will become president. But, as I said, his economic doctrine has, in effect, become the official G.O.P. line, despite having been proved utterly wrong by events. And what will happen if that doctrine actually ends up being put into action? Great Depression, here we come.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/16/opinion/gop-monetary-madness.html?_r=3&ref=opinion

ThinkProgress has explored Newt Gingrich’s claim that he was involved in 4 balanced budgets.

“If you look at my record, the only Speaker in your lifetime to get to four balanced budgets,”
Newt Gingrich

ThinkProgress writes:

However, this talking point is much more fiction than fact. For starters, as USA Today noted, “Gingrich was in office for only two of those budget years (fiscal 1998 and 1999). But he continues to claim credit for two balanced budgets that were passed after he left office (fiscal 2000 and 2001).” Furthermore, as Citizens for Tax Justice’s Bob McIntyre wrote, it was actually the 1993 budget, which all Republicans opposed, that laid the groundwork for the balanced budgets that occurred under President Bill Clinton:

Further:

“Center for American Progress Director for Tax and Budget Policy Michael Linden has actually found that legislation passed by Gingrich’s House Republicans made the budget picture worse in the 90s, not better. “Gingrich and his Republican Congress had nothing at all to do with balancing the budget in 1998. In fact, the net effect of their efforts was to make the fiscal situation slightly worse,” Linden noted. “

Republicans, such as Karl Rove have questioned the right of the Occupy wall street movement to call themselves the 99%.

Note to Karl: Its basic math

Mathematically, the 99% have been getting screwed slowly over the course of decades.
While the financial industry has grown to be 30% of our GDP.
While our richest got massive tax breaks and loopholes.
While income has stagnated for workers.

The 99% is my people.
And mathematically, they are very likely your people as well.

Karl?
He might be in the 1%, which says a lot about how fucked up our system is – that a weasel like Rove is well rewarded for his deceit.

She’s getting early buzz for president in 2016 by the progressive community.
This is someone who would fight for the majority, as she’s already been doing.

Warren gets some credit for occupy wall street, though I’m not entirely sure where that connection comes from.
This video does make use of some warren quotes.

Again I have to highlight an occasion where a republican makes sense. Again its Buddy.

“The Mayor of New York City is standing on the wrong side of history. His actions in the midnight hours against the Occupy Wall Street protestors are unjust, uncalled for, and unconstitutional. The First Amendment right of assembly and speech exists to protect America from this kind of government power abuse.”

more: http://thinkprogress.org/special/2011/11/15/369037/gop-presidential-candidate-buddy-roemer-slams-bloombergs-cowardice-in-ows-raid/

Republicans have been beating the “too much regulation” drum since they were elected in 2010 (can’t whine about the deficit as much when you control the purse strings).

Is there any validity to it?
Here’s a fact, from bloomberg.

“Obama’s White House has approved fewer regulations than his predecessor George W. Bush at this same point in their tenures, and the estimated costs of those rules haven’t reached the annual peak set in fiscal 1992 under Bush’s father, according to government data reviewed by Bloomberg News.”

And, further down:

“U.S. Labor Department statistics show the impact of regulations on layoffs has been small.
Of the 7,247 mass layoffs last year — those involving at least 50 workers — 18 were the result of government regulation, according to department data. Of the 3,114 mass layoffs in the first half of this year, 11 were related to government regulation. By comparison, 1,053 mass layoffs were attributed to business demand.”

I’ve never challenged this long running lie much, because I didn’t bother to learn the causes of the financial crisis.

The GOP/Fox/Koch brothers has convinced their moronic followers that Fannie and Freddie, and Barney Frank, Chris Dodd are to blame for the crisis. That, or a 30-year old law and some poor people that got taken advantage of.

Its a problem when the subject isn’t obvious enough that conservatives end up believing Fox “news” lies.

Think progress
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/09/27/329760/santorum-wasnt-deregulation/

“Fannie and Freddie, which didn’t make subprime loans but did buy subprime loans made by others, were part of the problem. Poor Congressional oversight was part of the problem. Banks that sought to meet CRA requirements by indiscriminately doling out loans to minorities may have been part of the problem. But none of these issues is the cause of the problem. Not by a long shot. From the beginning, subprime has been a symptom, not a cause. And the notion that the Community Reinvestment Act is somehow responsible for poor lending decisions is absurd.”

Dan Gross
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2008/10/subprime_suspects.html

“There are so many economic ‘misstatements’ being made,” said Jonathan Lanning, a professor at Bryn Mawr who is teaching two introductory economics classes this semester. “And it isn’t confined to any one candidate.”

Salemi called Ron Paul’s rationale for returning to the gold standard “one of the most dangerous ideas put forward by a politician in recent years.”

More at CNN.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/09/news/economy/presidential_candidates_economics/index.htm?hpt=hp_t3

The media valiantly hosts a bunch of ideologues, and avoids the experts.
Bravo.

No wonder america’s conservatives are so stupid.

http://mediamatters.org/research/201109210016