Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger
Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin claims he has a “knack for numbers.” Not long ago, he unveiled his GOP budget proposal titled “Path to Prosperity.” Rachel Maddow criticized members of the media for their fawning coverage of Ryan and his
financial “magnum opus.” Said Maddow: “If the Beltway media could stop making out with Paul Ryan for long enough to look at what’s actually in his budget proposal, they might notice that some of the important numbers in it appear to be made up.” She added: “I doubt that actual numerically based fact based information will penetrate the smoochy smoochy love bubble surrounding Paul Ryan right now…there’s this cult of him being brave and bold and doing this difficult workout every morning. What he’s just introduced is not a feature on grit versus glamour in today’s GOP. It is not a pinup. It is not the brave story of a strong boy in a tough environment. It’s the official Republican Party budget for 2012, and the numbers in it are so wrong they are occasionally funny.”
Anne Lowrey summarizes Ryan’s proposal in an article in Slate titled Model Misbehavior: Why Paul Ryan’s budget numbers don’t add up: “Tax cuts to wealthy Americans foster prosperity that moves millions of (less wealthy) Americans back to work, with increasing wages. High earnings and employment bolster tax revenue. When combined with huge cuts in domestic spending and radical changes to Medicaid and Medicare, the budget balances out in about 20 years.” Lowrey goes on to explain, however, that Ryan’s plan relied on numbers provided by the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis—which have been exposed “as a bit fantastical.”
Harold Meyerson wrote the following about Ryan’s budget proposal: “The cover under which Ryan and other Republicans operate is their concern for the deficit and national debt. But Ryan blows that cover by proposing to reduce the top income tax rate to just 25 percent. He imposes the burden for reducing our debt not on the bankers who forced our government to spend trillions averting a collapse but on seniors and the poor. The reductions in aid to the poor, says the budget blueprint that Ryan released, will be made ‘to ensure that America’s safety net does not become a hammock that lulls able-bodied citizens into lives of complacency and dependency.’ That’s a pretty good description of America’s top bankers, but Ryan’s budget showers them with tax cuts.”
Ryan claims his budget proposal is a “compassionate” one—but Pat Garofalo begs to differ. Garofalo says that the “Path to Prosperity” would “double health care costs for seniors, endanger vital Medicaid services, and likely increase taxes on the middle-class to finance tax cuts for the rich.”
E. D. Kain thinks that Ryan’s budget is not serious one. He says that it’s ideological—and suspects “that its intention is to shift the debate and make the Ryan budget the leaping off point for further budgets.”
There are many who would agree that Ryan’s “Path to Prosperity” is indeed based on ideology. One might ask what the ideological foundation of his thinking was when he prepared the 2012 GOP budget.
Jonathan Chait provides us with an explanation of why Ryan’s budget helps those at the very top while hurting the middle class and the less fortunate in his Newsweek article titled War on the Weak: How the GOP came to view the poor as parasites—and the rich as our rightful rulers. In the article, Chait wrote about what has motivated both Paul Ryan and the Tea Party:
“In fact, the two streams—the furious Tea Party rebels and Ryan the earnest budget geek—both spring from the same source. And it is to that source that you must look if you want to understand what Ryan is really after, and what makes these activists so angry.
“The Tea Party began early in 2009 after an improvised rant by Rick Santelli, a CNBC commentator who called for an uprising to protest the Obama administration’s subsidizing the “losers’ mortgages.” Video of his diatribe rocketed around the country, and protesters quickly adopted both his call for a tea party and his general abhorrence of government that took from the virtuous and the successful and gave to the poor, the uninsured, the bankrupt—in short, the losers. It sounded harsh, Santelli quickly conceded, but “at the end of the day I’m an Ayn Rander.”
“Ayn Rand, of course, was a kind of politicized L. Ron Hubbard—a novelist-philosopher who inspired a cult of acolytes who deem her the greatest human being who ever lived. The enduring heart of Rand’s totalistic philosophy was Marxism flipped upside down. Rand viewed the capitalists, not the workers, as the producers of all wealth, and the workers, not the capitalists, as useless parasites.”
A couple of weeks ago, Tom Ashbrook moderated a discusson about Ayn Rand and Paul Ryan on his radio program On Point with Jonathan Chait, senior editor at The New Republic, Anne C. Heller, journalist and author of “Ayn Rand and the World She Made,” and Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks. The program was titled Ayn Rand’s Resurgence. In his summary of the program, Ashbrook wrote: “The American budget battle so far is really a battle of ideals. And at the back of a vocal chorus on the Republican/Tea Party right sits the philosopher-novelist Ayn Rand.” Ashbrook and his guests talked about “what it means to have “Atlas Shrugged” in the middle of the budget debate.”
Click here to listen to the program.
In an article for The New Republic, Jonathan Chait wrote more about Ryan, his budget, and Ayn Rand:
Ryan would retain some bare-bones subsidies for the poorest, but the overwhelming thrust in every way is to liberate the lucky and successful to enjoy their good fortune without burdening them with any responsibility for the welfare of their fellow citizens. This is the core of Ryan’s moral philosophy:
“The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand,” Ryan said at a D.C. gathering four years ago honoring the author of “Atlas Shrugged” and “The Fountainhead.” …
At the Rand celebration he spoke at in 2005, Ryan invoked the central theme of Rand’s writings when he told his audience that, “Almost every fight we are involved in here on Capitol Hill … is a fight that usually comes down to one conflict–individualism versus collectivism.”
The core of the Randian worldview, as absorbed by the modern GOP, is a belief that the natural market distribution of income is inherently moral, and the central struggle of politics is to free the successful from having the fruits of their superiority redistributed by looters and moochers.
There is no doubt that Ryan has been impressed by the words and works of novelist/philosopher Rand. He declared his admiration for her in Facebook videos that he posted in 2009.
Facebook Videos Posted by Paul Ryan
Ayn Rand’s Relevance in 2009
Ayn Rand & 2009 America, Part 2
The Truth about GOP Hero Ayn Rand (Think Progress)
So there you have it—a GOP budget proposal for 2012 brought to you by Rep. Paul Ryan, acolyte and admirer of Ayn Rand. It’s a “path to prosperity” for those who are already prosperous.
SOURCES
War on the Weak: How the GOP came to view the poor as parasites—and the rich as our rightful rulers. (Newsweek)
Paul Ryan And Ayn Rand (The New Republic)
Rachel Maddow Tears Into Beltway Media For Paul Ryan Budget Coverage (Huffington Post)
Who’s hurt by Paul Ryan’s budget proposal (Washington Post)
Model Misbehavior: Why Paul Ryan’s budget numbers don’t add up (Slate)
Paul Ryan’s ‘Compassionate’ Budget Would Gut The Food Safety Net (Think Progress)
Paul Ryan And The Republican Vision (The New Republic)
The Man Behind Paul Ryan’s Budget Plan Got the Tax Cuts Wrong, Too (The Atlantic)
Paul Ryan’s Budget Proposal Would Increase Public Debt Relative To Extending Current Law (Think Progress)
Paul Ryan’s Multiple Unicorns (New York Times)
What’s wrong with Paul Ryan’s budget? (Washington Examiner)
Tea Party Embraces Ayn Rand (Frum Forum)
Buddha Is Blabbering –
Very long reply, up above. Somehow, that was the one you missed.
You were saying?
You and Elaine “Miss it twice” M. belong together.
When either of you prove able to correct or win, it’ll be quite a day.
There is no reply to this post: Buddha Is Laughing 1, May 10, 2011 at 7:04 pm
The one where I tear your initial “detailed reply” into tiny lil’ pieces, Ms. Can’t Read for Shit.
You’re kinda hard of understanding too.
fuguewriter,
I don’t suppose you respect the views of of Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz any more than you do those of Paul Krugman.
*****
Listen to the IMF, America
Even the International Monetary Fund now admits that total deregulation of financial markets was a mistake. The U.S. should take heed.
By Joseph E. Stiglitz
Posted Thursday, May 5, 2011
http://www.slate.com/id/2293114/
Excerpt:
Slightly more than 13 years ago, at the IMF’s 1997 Hong Kong meeting, the fund had attempted to amend its charter in order to gain more leeway to push countries toward capital-market liberalization. The timing could not have been worse: The East Asia crisis was just brewing—a crisis that was largely the result of capital-market liberalization in a region that, given its high savings rate, had no need for it.
That 1997 push had been advocated by Western financial markets—and the Western finance ministries that serve them so loyally. Financial deregulation in the United States was a prime cause of the global crisis that erupted in 2008, and financial and capital-market liberalization elsewhere helped spread that “made in the USA” trauma around the world.
The crisis showed that free and unfettered markets are neither efficient nor stable. They also did not necessarily do a good job at setting prices (witness the real-estate bubble), including exchange rates (which are merely the price of one currency in terms of another).
**********
The Most Misunderstood Man in America
Joseph Stiglitz predicted the global financial meltdown. So why can’t he get any respect here at home?
http://www.newsweek.com/2009/07/17/the-most-misunderstood-man-in-america.html
Excerpt:
Slightly more than 13 years ago, at the IMF’s 1997 Hong Kong meeting, the fund had attempted to amend its charter in order to gain more leeway to push countries toward capital-market liberalization. The timing could not have been worse: The East Asia crisis was just brewing—a crisis that was largely the result of capital-market liberalization in a region that, given its high savings rate, had no need for it.
That 1997 push had been advocated by Western financial markets—and the Western finance ministries that serve them so loyally. Financial deregulation in the United States was a prime cause of the global crisis that erupted in 2008, and financial and capital-market liberalization elsewhere helped spread that “made in the USA” trauma around the world.
The crisis showed that free and unfettered markets are neither efficient nor stable. They also did not necessarily do a good job at setting prices (witness the real-estate bubble), including exchange rates (which are merely the price of one currency in terms of another).
Buddha Doesn’t Read Carefully –
I wrote a very and detailed reply to you. It shows up above – and, curiously, no reply from you. Another in a fleet of fails commanded by Commodore FailBuddha.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8E_zMLCRNg
Facts got your tongue?
Yeah.
That’s a common affliction that develops among objectivists.
Come on.
Evade some more when you can’t win on the facts.
You’ve done it with me and with Elaine.
It seems to be the only thing you can do when cornered.
Well you still haven’t refuted any thing I said in my rebuttal, sunshite. If you want to talk about seriousness and a devotion to the truth. Not that you can, but it would be funny to watch you try and fail some more.
Buddha Is Typing Not So Much –
A sadly typical response, showing the level of actual seriousness and devotion to truth. You’re interested in personality insults, while I’m interested in the facts of the case. You know, then, about F minuses …
What’s that noise?
Sounds just like . . . a Fugue in F Minus, er, Minor.
Elaine M. –
I’ll not repeat myself a third time. Scroll up and look for the term “Ireland.” Note how I cite the savings glut, post Cold War, and its effects on interest rates and the various bubbles.
rafflaw –
That’s an unfortunate piece of argument from authority. Or dependence on one. As a Chinese master put it, “Imitate the master not by imitating the master, but by seeking what he sought.” If Krugman has good reasons, you should be able to find and defend them on their own merits.
Also, beware false dichotomies.
FW,
I think I will side with Krugman over your opinion.
fuguewriter,
“I have cited facts that show that your analysis is fatally flawed.”
Please…what were those facts again?????
Do provide us with your empiric evidence that covers a course of decades that will show what caused the bubbles and financial problems in the US–as well as Ireland and Greece and Iceland and other countries in Europe. Enlighten poor benighted souls like me.
We’re ready to hear what you have to say.
rafflaw –
Take a look in economics textbooks and you will see next to no citation of “greed” as an explanation of economic phenomena. Why do you think that is?
Paul Krugman doesn’t like Rand. So? Lots of economists don’t like Paul Krugman – anymore, especially now that he is trying to be a pundit and contradicting his prior positions wildly. His Nobel-winning work from a long time ago was very good; it’s too bad he’s not like that anymore. He’s become a shill for the madness of further currency inflation and deficit-increases.
Elaine M. –
You don’t understand onus. I claimed that you did not prove your case, and gave reasons. You still have not addressed them. (And a link is not an argument.) I know the primary and secondary literature on this author well. I’m curious to see how long you will avoid doing any research to verify your claim. (You won’t be able to. It’s invalid. Again: this is what comes from copying/pasting from attack websites.)
> I had written the following:
Yes. And – ? Please make your conclusions explicitly. Merely copying text is about on the level of pasting a link.
> I believe that the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act via the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act–aka the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999–led to a number of financial abuses. Those abuses helped to bring about the near financial meltdown in this country.
“Helped,” without further amplification, is a subjective term. How *much* did it help? What *other* factors were involved? I have cited facts that show that your analysis is fatally flawed. Instead of addressing my answer, you repeat yourself. Not persuasive.
You are treating the U.S. bubble-and-recession as if it happened in some magically isolated box. If your analysis were true, then Ireland and Europe etc. would not have bubbled and receded, and certainly not in time with us. This is a fatal objection to your claim. The bubble-and-recession was transnational. It wasn’t even heralded in the U.S. – it was the British troubles at Northern Rock.
The reason you do this is to ride the deregulation-is-bad hobbyhorse. [The financial industry, again, was most certainly not deregulated.] The fact is, that with the savings glut post-Cold War, as Greenspan indicated in his memoirs, interest rates became decoupled from central bank control. Short of assuming command over the banking sector, central banks could not affect interest rates as they once had. We were dealing with a new world, which had no historical precedent. Greenspan certainly should have known that things were bubbling, and he tried in the late 1990s to mildly indicate the “irrational exuberance” in the equity markets – and was roundly criticized for it. This is the level at which economic phenomena of the magnitude we’re talking about has to be approached: macroeconomically and over a course of decades. Single legislative acts and “greed” don’t explain it. They never can. They’re not empirically sufficient.
FW,
I don’t need a Nobel prize to understand garbage greed when I see it. I don’t think Paul Krugman s a big Rand fan either.
rafflaw –
Win a Nobel’ish economics prize for yourself, then, and demonstrate how you can sustain a credit bubble on a gold standard. Alchemy, perhaps?
Elaine,
Don’t confuse fuguewriter with facts about the savior of the Right Wing.
fuguewriter,
You claimed that what I posted was incorrect. The onus is on YOU to prove that it’s incorrect.
*****
You wrote: “I did not put words in your mouth. You claimed that the bubble happened due to greed and provided no mechanism for its happening on such a purportedly epic scale.”
I had written the following: “I think you need to read more about “bubbles” and deregulation and mortgage-backed securities and Credit Default Swaps and Collateralized Debt Obligations and the shenanigans on Wall Street and what the real causes of the near meltdown of our financial system were.
“P.S. The government doesn’t force people to be greedy. They choose to be greedy of their own volition.”
**********
You wrote: “As for ‘greed’ – same situation. Why did greed magically appear just then and at no other time?
I wrote the following:
“I understand that there were bubbles in the 1990s–including the ‘.com’ bubble.
“Did I say that greed magically appeared? Don’t put words in my mouth. The repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act via the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act–aka the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999–led to a number of financial abuses. Another thing: The ratings agencies rated certain securities as AAA–even though they weren’t AAA.”
I’ll state it more clearly for you. I believe that the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act via the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act–aka the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999–led to a number of financial abuses. Those abuses helped to bring about the near financial meltdown in this country.
Elaine M. –
The onus of proof is on you to verify what you posted. Or do you wish to concede that you post things that confirm your biases without checking them? Let us know what your research turns up.
Rand was in her early twenties, yes – about age 23.
“Examining” is not what’s being done. Nonsensical psychological pseudo-diagnoses by non-psychologists is what’s being done.
I did not put words in your mouth. You claimed that the bubble happened due to greed and provided no mechanism for its happening on such a purportedly epic scale. You also entirely fail to address the bubble happening throughout most of the developed world, including in highly regulated Europe. This disproves your point of view. Once again: it could not have happened without fiat currency.