David Leonhardt: For the time being, only one party is applying the lessons of history to the country's biggest economic problems.

Who? Dems? Applying the lessons of history about tax cuts? Bullshit.

Sad, yes, but the sadder thing is the sumb**ch is making progress with it, and Obama
can't seem to get back on game. The best response is Bubba Clintons's brand of populist rhetoric("I'll work for you until the last dog dies"), but its not going to work for Obama to deliver that line. Hope he chooses Biden and sets him loose sans muzzle on McCain ("This isn't the John McCain we have all known for so long - that John was an honorable man who knew that tax cuts for the wealthy were unfair and didn't work, but this one....", etc., etc.)

Nice cynicism EB, but it might help if you actually read the article, or paid attention to any of several recent articles about Obama's tax proposals.

Tax reductions, even in modest amounts, make a statement about society's values and reinforce cultural values in the long term. Their impact is barely seen in short-term economic activity effects that are measurable by an accountant, but are seen clearly in why people are working, what kind of work they're doing, for what purpose in their own minds. Higher taxes and big government has a demoralizing effect on the private sector, and lower taxes the opposite, due to the cultural climate created over what's valued by society, what's more esteemed. Tax cuts incentivize people to be more productive in the private sector in an indirect, diffuse, cultural, long-term way.

Obama is proposing tax cuts too, you know. Is that "mindless tax cut jihadism" too? It is not "mindless tax cut jihadism" to uphold the private sector as the foundation of the society.

For one who has traveled in central America, the idea that a policy of concentrating the majority of the wealth in the hands of a small oligarchy and allowing them to pass this wealth on from generation to generation will somehow lead to a vibrant economy is, well, just ludicrous (I was going to say laughable, but the resultant poverty and injustice is far from laughable).

Quite frankly, John McCain does not care enough about fiscal policy and economics to know much about it. McCain wants to be commander in chief and doesn't give a rip about the rest of the job. If he cared he would bother to be more informed. McCain would be an economic Nero.

John McCain desperately wants to be president, so he's surrendered to the flat earthers.

And it's not just in economics. You can say the same thing regarding science policy. The Republicans in general have completely surrendered any claim to rationality and enlightenment, just to sew up the endorsement from the American Taliban.

Who knows what McCain actually believes? He probably doesn't really give a shit one way or another about anything, but he does seem to know whose asses need kissing and when. Talk about raw ambition.

Well said! Good luck at Mother Jones!

parviziyi,

That explanation might have some power when you're talking about reducing top marginal rates from, say, 90% to 50%. It has virtually none when you're debating whether the top marginal rate should be 35.4% or 39.6%.

Nice cynicism EB, but it might help if you actually read the article, or paid attention to any of several recent articles about Obama's tax proposals.

I have. Same old shit. McCain says "my tax cuts will pay for themselves" and Obama says "my middle-income tax cuts will be paid for by high income tax increases."

Don't get me wrong, I like Obama's message better. But "applying the lessons of history" to taxes? Give me a break.

Leonhardt writes: "There is no great battle of new ideas, and that can't make it more likely that those problems will be solved."

Takes two to tango, Leo baby.

kd: The palpable exhaustion of conservative economic thought really is extraordinary.

republicans elected g.w. bush and he got a c- in economics..

...how'd that work out?

oh right...

Our country is built on illusion and McCain is counting on it.

After almost 20 years as a GOP voter and volunteer stints in both Reagan campaigns, it's unlikely I'll ever vote Republican again. The GOP is down to a mere handful of ideas: cut taxes, bomb and drill. Oh, and march those brazen hussies back into the kitchen where they belong while you're at it.

"reciting the talking points in a monotone..."

That's exactly right, and he's penumbra'd these tired, meaningless cliches so much they sound like lines from a particularly limp SNL parody. His dogs' tactics might be winning him a few temporary points in the polls, but the man is such an obviously empty suit that even Bushboy looks virile in comparison.

We must distinguish between economic thought and people who are just too selfish to pay taxes and are willing to gamble away the future of the country.

It helps to recall that Reagan was a lifelong Democrat and avid supporter of FDR who believed in feeding at the public trough. Later in life when he became wealthy, he developed a new way of feeding at the public trough that would benefit his rich cronies--borrowing from the Chinese to pay for tax breaks for the rich.

EB, I think the point with the statment that the Dems are paying attention to the lessons of history is that Dems see that tax cuts that throw the country into deep deficits and that it wasn't just a fluke the first time around. The supreme tax cut groupies don't really give a rat's ass about the deficits or what it does to the masses who are effected by the economy as long as they are getting to keep more of what they "earn".

"Earn" is in quotes because none of the income comes from real wages like the rest of us. Their premise is that they won't invest any more if we tax their proceeds, which is a bunch of hogwash. Who in their right minds thinks that money stuffed in a mattress earning nothing is preferable to getting a return yet having to pay more in taxes?