The tele’d in guest was RNC Chairman Michael Steele, who was there to take potshots on the misinterpretation of Harry Reid’s remarks comparing the passage of revolutionary health care reform to other legislative revolutions in history, most notoriously, to the passage of emancipation legislation. Like the other Republicans, he is in high dudgeon, acting as if Reid had just called them all sadistic slave owners – though Steele did put a finer point on it. Reid’s analogy, he said, is an insult to the millions of African Americans who are descended from slaves because it compares their situation to the situation of people who don’t have health insurance. It almost makes sense viewed that way – almost – if it didn’t completely miss the point of the analogy: that medical care is a basic human right, and that legislation that recognizes that fact is as revolutionary and game-changing as legislation that outlawed the ownership of another human being.

So what did Deutsch do that made me want to kiss him? He brought the analogy back home after Steele deliberately distorted it, and said it that plainly. “When you bring it back to the basic intent of the analogy,” he said, And he laid out the analogy as it was intended, to portray the Republicans as akin to the naysayers who have tried to block every major revolution in American government by saying “It’s not time yet”.

And Steele’s response?

“I won’t even dignify that with an answer.”

Yeah. Good call when you don’t have any dignity with which to dignify a blatant mischaracterization. That’s the answer that every bluffer knows – it’s a cheesy way to avoid answering a question when you don’t have a good answer. Deutsch’s question called Steele out, and Steele’s best shot was to stand on dignity that he doesn’t have and refuse to answer. And Deutsch noted that as well.

So go Donnie. You’re the golden Ken doll today. Keep this up and I just may have to start looking beyond your hot exterior and start thinking you might have a brain.

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Lately, you’ve been musing a lot about things like why the president’s approval rating on things like health care and the economy is dropping. You’ve been asking dramatically why people are so. afraid. of. change. You wonder why the polls show that fewer and fewer people like the “president’s health care plan” or why more and more people “think the stimulus bill was a bad idea”.

Gosh, I don’t know. Do you think it might be because guys like you keep airing shit like John Boehner declaring that the stimulus was not creating jobs by putting on that unctuous voice and asking guests:

“Well, you know, Congressman Boehner says that the stimulus is not working. That not a single job has been created by stimulus money. Now why is that, do you think?”

What I would really love to see is someone on your show who would respond to a question like that with the truth. Something like:

Well, Joe, I have to think it’s because John Boehner is an incompetent ass who has no idea what’s going on in his own home state, since at the time he stated that not a single infrastructure contract had been awarded from the stimulus funds, his own state of Ohio had already awarded over $87 million in infrastructure project contracts, and several of those projects had already hired people and put them to work. I have to believe that John Boehner is an inadequate nincompoop who is out of touch with his own state, because the alternative is admitting that John Boehner is a barefaced liar.

But see, that’s just the start of the intellectual dishonesty. You and guys like you give a voice to total idiocy without ever countering it. Idiocy like:

- Virginia Foxx stating that the U.S. government is going to “put seniors to death”.

Once upon a time, news guys would have looked up that bill, found the relevant clause and responded with something like:

Now, I don’t know what the good Congresswoman has been imbibing before she steps out on the floor, but she’s got to be on something to misinterpret the language in this bill so badly. This thing in the bill that they say is all about euthanizing senior citizens actually says that IF YOU’RE ON MEDICARE and IF YOU ASK YOUR DOCTOR to talk to you about things like “what the hell does palliative care mean?” and “what if I don’t want a tube shoved down my throat the rest of my life?” and “who gets to decide if I can’t?” - that if you ask your doctor to take fifteen minutes to talk to you about these things, Medicare will pay for it. That’s it. That’s all it says. It says that the doctor must answer your questions and Medicare must pay him for his time.

But hey, it’s easier to let liars and fools assert that the health care bill will outlaw private insurance and force everyone into a public option than it is to treat the American public like adults and explain what the health care exchange is and how it works, and to explain what the requirements for a health care plan will be under the exchange.

That’s boring, though. Nowhere near as much fun as presiding like a dictatorial papa over your dysfunctional family, making pompous proclamations and out-shouting anyone who disagrees with your point of view.

But hey, I know. That’s not as much fun as stirring this fake bullshit controversy with mock solicitous questions like “Why does our government want to kill old people?”

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At that point, Watson interrupted Pence to quote the CBO’s assertion that over two-thirds of the cost of the bill would be offset by cost cutting and other measures and asked Pence if he was certain that the bill would raise money for health care reform with $1 trillion in new taxes.

Spence’s response: “Yes. I’m rounding up.”

The CBO report estimates that “new revenues” – i.e. taxes, fees and penalties – will account for $583 billion of the offset cost to the $1.04 trillion cost of the health care bill. Rep. Spence claims that the health care bill will be paid for with a $1 trillion tax increase. His figure is off by $459 billion – because he’s “rounding up”.

Most people think of rounding up as adding a few cents to the next whole dollar – that is, $1.98 might as well be $2. Rounding up $583 billion to $1 trillion is sorta like rounding up $50.01 and saying you have “about $100″. Technically, since it’s 1 cent over halfway to $100, it’s correct. Intellectually – not so much.

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And the truth is that no, most of the time most of the people really do not hear what “he” just said. Oh, we hear the words, but we don’t understand the subtext. Like when they ask, “Isn’t saying you want Obama to fail saying that you want the country to fail?” Most people don’t get the fact that the “failure of the United States” means something different to conservatives than it does to liberals.

To the true conservative mindset, capitalism – naked, greedy capitalism – has not failed us. When they say that the “fundamentals of the economy are strong”, that’s exactly what they mean. The fundamentals of capitalism DEPEND on the scenario that we are currently living. It’s all part of the cycle. A company grows until it is too large – or too stupid – to sustain itself any longer. At that point, it fails and its assets get gobbled up at bargain prices.

The only real solution to the banking crisis is to leave the banks alone, let them collapse and let new banks step in to pick up the business that the fallen banks can no longer service. The solution to the real estate boondoggle is to let housing prices fall until people can afford to buy them again. The solution to the auto makers crisis is to let them go out of business so that the plants can be bought by people who will run them “more efficiently” – read, pay workers lower wages because they’ll be happy to get a job paying -anything- by that time.

In their eyes, the success of a country is not measured by the average standard of living of ALL of its people. It is measured solely by the growth of the GDP, and if the bulk of that growth goes into just a few pockets, that’s what capitalism is all about.

Somewhere along the line, there’s a disconnect. Things got reversed. Instead of capitalism being a tool that serves the country, the country and its people became a tool that serves capitalism, a money-making machine for a privileged few.

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Right now, I’m sitting here with the window open for the chat, waiting for Mr. Welch to sign into the chat and realizing that most of my questions for him start with “Hey, idiot…”

This is the man who just said “We have to fix the housing market before we can think about fixing the economy.” That was in reference to – oh, you know – creating jobs. Green energy. Infrastructure improvements. Those things should go into buckets to be addressed AFTER we fix the banks. Give the banks more money and more assurances. And yeah, some banks are going to fail – we should let the LITTLE banks fail and save the big banks. Oreally??? Letting these banks get so big is what screwed us up so badly in the first place. I think what we just proved is that any bank too big to fail should get broken down into smaller bits. Thank you, that’s all there is to see here, move on.

I’ve never quite figured out how nominally smart people can’t wrap their heads around the idea that people who don’t have money and jobs can’t buy houses. Or groceries. Or televisions. And it starts there because when enough of them can’t buy houses or groceries or – well – put their money in the bank, yeah? And when people don’t buy from businesses, then businesses fail. And when businesses fail, more people lose their jobs. And the more people that lose their jobs, the more businesses fail. So – how do you fix it? You do things that put money to spend into the pockets of the people that fuel the engine – the people who buy the groceries and the houses and the televisions.

And the chat is starting… here goes:

Mr. Welch, do you think we have only seen the tip of the iceberg in the current economic crisis?

Jack Welch: Good morning everyone. Thomas — No, I think we’re getting our arms around it. And if we can get Congress and the government to focus on the banks and get them functioning, we’ll see a recovery within the next 18 months.

Comment From Jim Thompson]
“Buy America”, how do you feel about this?

Jack Welch: Good morning Jim. I think it’s a disaster, we went through this with Smoot-Haley in the 30s and it reduced global trade by two-thirds in 24 months

[Comment From David in Selinsgrove, Pa]
How is this stimulus package going to benefit struggling home owners with their mortgage?

Jack Welch: David, right now this package isn’t going to do a thing for them. The government treatment of the banks has to include mortgage relief in some form and I think it will.

[Comment From Josh B]
Good morning Jack…Do you feel executive pay cap is a good idea?

Jack Welch: Dear Josh — they have to do something and the president’s proposals are reasonable and if the banks perform the restricted stock that will be granted to the executives will make up for the lost compensation. I like the incentives.

[Comment From Jason Barnes]
What advice do you have for small business owners and how might we take advantage of any of the stimulus funds?

Jack Welch: Jason — business owners of any size have two areas to focus on: one is preservation, and that means getting costs in line for the tough times ahead. And secondly, innovation has to be part of every employee’s job. Every business needs new ways of doing business.

[Comment From Bob Belinke]
Jack: Why not have the Gov’t buy all home mortgages and people pay it back lke they pay taxes. The banks can lend money just to business (for the most part) and if you don’t pay your taxes/Mortgage to the gov’t, you loose what you would loose now

Jack Welch: Dear Bob, I think you’ll see something along these lines of government intervention in the mortgage market. The exact form it will take, I don’t know.

And that was that. Obtuseness, they name is business executives.

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Everyone got a chuckle out of it, and the conversation moved on. So much nicer than Bill O’Reilly’s whining and defensiveness whenever MM mentions his name. That’s why I can like Barnicle even when he’s an idiot.

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Pair of cardinals sitting on my back yard fence yesterday morning. In Massachusetts. In January. In the middle of a snowstorm.

I gotta figure that they were there to deliver a message. Cardinals where they don’t belong – is that a good omen for the Cardinals in the Super Bowl? I guess we’ll find out Sunday.

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Can we please put to rest the canard that the sub-prime crisis was caused because “we let people own houses that they couldn’t afford”? “WE” did no such thing and even if we did, those loans were not the cause of the sub-prime financial crisis. The sub-prime crisis was not caused because the Democrats forced the banks at gunpoint to lend money to blacks and irresponsible poor people. The sub-prime crisis was caused by irresponsible, criminal rich people who figured out a way to swindle the system and pay no consequences. It was caused by college-educated rich people who figured out a way to divorce their profits from any risk of loss. It was no less criminal than the S&L collapse in the early 90s or the Enron scandal at the start of the 2000s.

Barack Obama is not hiding his birth certificate. He has not refused to show his birth certificate. The “original birth certificate” debate is the most ridiculous mishmash of misunderstandings and outright lies that I’ve seen in a long time. Barack Obama has not refused to show his birth certificate to a court because no court has ordered him to show his birth certificate. Barack Obama HAS shown his birth certificate and it contains everything that is needed to show his eligibility to serve as president. There is no evidence at all that Barack Obama was born outside the United States.

A parent cannot give up the U.S. citizenship of his/her minor child. A minor child cannot give up their own citizenship, in fact. Thus, it was not possible for Barack Obama’s mother to give up his U.S. citizenship and render him ineligible to serve as president of the United States.

An economic stimulus package is more than a $500 check to everyone in the United States. This one drives me nuts. I keep hearing people argue against Obama’s economic stimulus package because “the last stimulus package didn’t do any good”. Well, DUH!! That wasn’t a stimulus package. It was pissing into a bucket. What the hell use was $500 in my pocket six months ago? A better plan? Reduce payroll taxes for a year and put an extra $25 in my pocket every single week. That $25 will get spent, trust me. That’s a spending stimulus package that will encourage me to replace my coffee maker, go to the movies, buy a few magazines, pay for a coffee at the diner — in other words, the kind of regular, sustained spending that keeps money circulating.

However — off track there. This economic stimulus package is being sold wrong. It’s not a bailout, and it’s not a “stimulus”. It’s a freaking investment. We’re not talking about sending $500 to every taxpayer. We’re talking about rebuilding crumbling roads, bridges, schools and public buildings. We’re talking about upgrading water treatment plants, repairing, rebuilding and re-tooling the energy delivery grid, increasing the reach of broadband access — and every single one of those things will improve our ability to meet challenges in the future.

Industries do not move their manufacturing and service jobs overseas because of lower taxes in other countries. They move to other countries because of the lack of regulations governing their business. They move to other countries because no one in other countries requires them to provide for worker safety. No one in other countries requires them to clean their poisons out of the water before they dump it into the rivers and oceans. They move to other countries because they can pay workers less than half what they pay them here and force them to work more hours than is good for health, safety or sanity.

“Improving infrastructure” does not mean building roads and bridges. Or, more specifically, it means MORE than building roads and bridges. It means more than giving money to states who hire people to repair roads and bridges and wastewater treatment plants, though those are all very necessary things and are part of the equation. It means investing in companies that are laying cable for broadband access – because the U.S. is so far behind other countries in providing universal broadband access, it’s not funny. It means providing government funding for startups who are working on ways to produce and deliver greener energy choices. It means things that many of us can’t even conceive because we aren’t THERE, dreaming up things that may be possible.

The vast majority of Obama’s supporters do not believe he is the Messiah, and we have not drunk anyone’s Koolaid. Frankly, Obama wasn’t serving up Koolaid. He was serving up cups of truth laced with hope. I’ve never quite got the people who think we all fell under the spell of Papa Obama promising that he’d “take care of us” when every single one of his speeches enjoined us all to work for the things we believe. We voted for empowerment, dude. We voted for a guy that said “you gotta work for the change you want, but if you work for it, I will back you every step of the way”.

As many people voted for Obama IN SPITE of his color as voted for him BECAUSE of his color. Most of us who voted for him didn’t give a fig what color his skin is. And frankly, most of those who voted for someone else didn’t give a fig what color his skin is, either. But race most certainly played a part in this election. It was the tap-dancing elephant in the room.

The story of Kaylee Anthony was a sad one, but it occupied far more media attention than it deserved. Sadly, there are thousands more little children who go missing every year and whose names no one ever has heard.

Torture does not deliver actionable intelligence most of the time. It’s a fiction promoted by some of our favorite television shows. The truth is that we get more truth through softer interrogation techniques.

The media is not liberal or left-wing biased. Sorry. It’s just not. The media has promulgated all the right-wing talking points for so long that most people have never even HEARD a real liberal agenda.

There’s more, so much more that I can’t possibly fit it into one post. There are fallacies about public health care (hint: Canada’s “socialized medicine” is far more effective than ours, and Canadians don’t want to sneak across the border to see our doctors), about economics (corporate tax cuts do not stimulate anything but higher profits for stockholders and CEOs) and about the economy (we DO need to rebuild our manufacturing base and create local economies without losing sight of the global economy). I’m holding my breath till January 20th… and we’ll see where we go from there.

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