Associated Press
Sens. Mitch McConnell (R) and Chuck Schumer (D)
In mid-September, the non-partisan Congressional Research Service published a detailed report, documenting the fact that reducing taxes on the wealthy does not, in fact, generate economic growth. Instead, the CRS found, the trickle-down model appears to be "associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top."
The report was no small development. After all, as David Leonhardt noted when it was published, the CRS analysis undermines a "defining economic policy" of modern Republican thought. Indeed, the entire Romney/Ryan economic plan is predicated on the assumption that supply-side theory works, and here was the CRS saying it doesn't.
As of today, the CRS report is no more.
The Congressional Research Service has withdrawn an economic report that found no correlation between top tax rates and economic growth after Senate Republicans -- including the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell -- raised a litany of concerns with the paper's findings and wording.
The decision, made in late September against the advice of the agency's economic team leadership, drew almost no notice at the time.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has referenced the CRS report, told the Times, "This has hues of a banana republic. They didn't like a report, and instead of rebutting it, they had them take it down."
This is more important than may even be apparent at first blush.
For those unfamiliar with the Congressional Research Service, this is effectively Congress' own think tank. It's non-partisan, and it's generally counted on to provide lawmakers with the most reliable and accurate information available.
Critical to the work CRS researchers and scholars do is the understanding that their scholarship is free of partisan influence -- they provide accurate reports and leave it to policymakers to act as they see fit.
But in this case, the CRS presented Republicans with inconvenient truths. A spokesperson for Mitch McConnell said the officials at the research service "decided, on their own, to pull the study pending further review." While that may be true, the question then becomes how much pressure the CRS officials were under to make this decision "on their own."
And what is it that Republicans didn't like about the CRS analysis? McConnell aides offered a series of complaints, including the report's use of the phrase "Bush tax cuts."
Apparently, in Republicans' minds, to say "Bush tax cuts" is to use an inappropriate "tone."
But putting all of that aside, we simply cannot have a functioning federal system in which neutral, independent offices are ignored, pressured, and/or censored when Republicans don't like what they have to say. We've now seen this recently with the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Congressional Budget Office, and democratic norms dictate that GOP officials cut this out.
Really, just stop it. If objective truths bother you, don't blame the messenger, blame your bogus assumptions.
For what it's worth, the CRS pulled the report from its website, but Senate Democrats have liberated it, republishing the analysis on their own site.
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i'll say it again.. if trickle-down was the path to a vibrant and balanced economy, it would have worked by now, years ago..
There is no point too low for the Republicans to stoop to, they are absolutely astonishing in their blatant lying and denying of facts. They cannot handle the truth and so invent their own. When confronted with facts and lies they will quickly change the subject without blinking an eye. In a back-&-forth with a former high school classmate who now lives in the South, the facts I present are met with "well, if you want to believe Obama's lies" and spouting of Fox News talking points. I believe it all boils down to a lack of objectivity and critical thinking as well as basic stupidity. Anyone that accepts anything Limbaugh, Coulter, Beck, Bachman, et. al., says is someone who cannot think for themself...pity the fools.
Sad thing is these media can take relatively smart people and actually convert them into stupid people, what I guess you would call ideologues.
Like magic the truth disappears when it disagrees with the republican fantasy. Time to oust the republicans and face reality.
Data also have a well known liberal bias.
Maybe what the US Constitution needs is an amendment saying, like in Japan, if the Congress is showing an inability to pass meaningful legislations, then, they should all be subject to an 'immediate recall' vote, mid-term or not. Both House and Senate are subject to such an action. No more 'obstructionist' behavior.
I don't understand how something run by Congress, tasked with providing Congress with information, can possibly be non-partisan. Perhaps there are operational safeguards in place, or perhaps "Congress' own think-tank" does not imply "run by Congress," but I find it hard to believe. If a member of Congress can suppress a report, I don't see what's stopping a member of Congress from exerting influence on the contents of reports.
Duplicity is Romney, Duplicity is GOP.
http://tv.msnbc.com/2012/11/01/pressured-by-gop-agency-pulls-report-finding-tax-cuts-for-rich-dont-boost-growth/
GOP kills official report finding tax cuts for rich don’t boost growth, Zachary Roth, 5:27 pm on 11/01/2012
If you can Double Down on Mitts Duplicity, you'd have to use four synonyms, to cover them all.
Just how many duplicities can a Mitt keep track of? Since he cannot remember anything, it’s the very definition of Romnesia.
Main Entry: duplicity [doo-plis-i-tee, dyoo-]
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: deception
Synonyms: Judas kiss, artifice, chicanery, cunning, deceit, dirty dealing, dirty pool, dirty trick, dirty work, dishonesty, dissemblance, dissimulation, double-dealing, dualism, duality, faithlessness, falsehood, fraud, guile, hypocrisy, one-upmanship, perfidiousness, perfidy, skullduggery, stab in back, treacherousness, treachery, two-facedness, twoness
Notes: duplicity implies double-dealing while chicanery suggests trickery and wiliness
Antonyms: forthrightness, honesty, trustworthiness
Since there are more ways to tell lies Synonyms win over Antonyms 10 to 1.
Had this ever been true we would be worshiping a Golden Calf (Colt?)
Supply Slide/Trickle down? Works, but do not stand too close to the horse. Reagan was fond of horses, but when he was born, the United States had not yet reached the peak of the horse population. Reagan knew very well the horse trickle down effect. Even G.H.W. Bush knew a bit about horses enough to call the Reagan economics a Trojan horse. G.W. Bush was mentally inclined to associate Trojan with birth control.
The one article says "The Congressional Research Service does such reports at the request of lawmakers, and the research is considered private. Although the reports are posted on the service’s Web site, they are available only to members and staff. Their public release is subject to lawmakers’ discretion."
So if one party can make the service pull it from its site but the opposing party can just go off and publish it another way at its discretion, then the situation doesn't seem quite so dire. I'd be more upset if the rule was that once it was pulled from the service it couldn't be made public. The information might still get out in that instance, but it would be second-hand and refer to a report that no one could actually read, thus limiting its impact.
Too bad this particular report's liberation didn't happen a few weeks ago so we could have watched how the candidates' addressed the findings.
Four Americans dead in Libya.
I offer the following list from the Bush years:
Now what were you saying hypocrite...er...troll?
The desire to throw away anything that contradicts your worldview and ideology is very very dangerous if you're trying to run a country. But Supply Side is GOSPEL for the Reps. But I gotta tell you, being on the bottom half of the median, what trickles down may be golden, but it sure ain't GOLD, and smells a lot worse.
Vote the GOTP dictatorship out of office on November 6th.
Trickle Down, Supply Side Economics has failed as the country's production capacity goes to waste over 30 years.
Summary
Income tax rates have been at the center of recent policy debates over taxes. Some policymakers have argued that raising tax rates, especially on higher income taxpayers, to increase tax revenues is part of the solution for long-term debt reduction. For example, the Senate recently passed the Middle Class Tax Cut (S. 3412), which would allow the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts to expire for taxpayers with income over $250,000 ($200,000 for single taxpayers). The Senate recently considered legislation, the Paying a Fair Share Act of 2012 (S. 2230), that would implement the “Buffett rule” by raising the tax rate on millionaires.
Other recent budget and deficit reduction proposals would reduce tax rates. The President’s 2010 Fiscal Commission recommended reducing the budget deficit and tax rates by broadening the tax base—the additional revenues from broadening the tax base would be used for deficit reduction and tax rate reductions. The plan advocated by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan that is embodied in the House Budget Resolution (H.Con.Res. 112), the Path to Prosperity, also proposes to reduce income tax rates by broadening the tax base. Both plans would broaden the tax base by reducing or eliminating tax expenditures.
Advocates of lower tax rates argue that reduced rates would increase economic growth, increase saving and investment, and boost productivity (increase the economic pie). Proponents of higher tax rates argue that higher tax revenues are necessary for debt reduction, that tax rates on the rich are too low (i.e., they violate the Buffett rule), and that higher tax rates on the rich would moderate increasing income inequality (change how the economic pie is distributed). This report attempts to clarify whether or not there is an association between the tax rates of the highest income taxpayers and economic growth. Data is analyzed to illustrate the association between the tax rates of the highest income taxpayers and measures of economic growth. For an overview of the broader issues of these relationships see CRS Report R42111, Tax Rates and Economic Growth, by Jane G. Gravelle and Donald J. Marples.
Throughout the late-1940s and 1950s, the top marginal tax rate was typically above 90%; today it is 35%. Additionally, the top capital gains tax rate was 25% in the 1950s and 1960s, 35% in the 1970s; today it is 15%. The real GDP growth rate averaged 4.2% and real per capita GDP increased annually by 2.4% in the 1950s. In the 2000s, the average real GDP growth rate was 1.7% and real per capita GDP increased annually by less than 1%. There is not conclusive evidence, however, to substantiate a clear relationship between the 65-year steady reduction in the top tax rates and economic growth. Analysis of such data suggests the reduction in the top tax rates have had little association with saving, investment, or productivity growth. However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution. The share of income accruing to the top 0.1% of U.S. families increased from 4.2% in 1945 to 12.3% by 2007 before falling to 9.2% due to the 2007-2009 recession. The evidence does not suggest necessarily a relationship between tax policy with regard to the top tax rates and the size of the economic pie, but there may be a relationship to how the economic pie is sliced.
Bananas in Cayman Islands?
WAKE UP!
McConnell acts like he is in power because he BELIEVES he is in power. The Democrats need to stop whining and put their man pants on!
This is all just a distraction to keep us from paying attention to what is really happening. Control of the States where TRUE power lies!
HORRORS! Please read this article. This isn't what's taught in US history, or what's in our Constitution!
"Today the path to total dictatorship in the United States can be laid by strictly legal means, unseen and unheard by the Congress, the President, or the people ...., " Senator William Jenner in a speech, February 23, 1954.
Is this article (thankfully condensed from a book) a glimpse of why we just don't make progress as humanity? Ok, one of many reasons? Does it give texture to doctrines of fascism being incorporated in our political system, events driven to shape our nation, and push our very world to the brink? The '29 stock market crash?, US funding the Nazi war machine?, Pearl Harbor rigged by our very own?, the Great Depression orchestrated, Hoover/Republicans set up/blamed for it?, FDR (D)'s New (bad?) Deal, (JFK?), ongoing wars where we first fund and weaponize the enemy?, create WMD's?, international crises where corporations/banks swoop in “to help,” yet enslave and harvest the assets? Death, destruction, poverty, hunger. HORROR! The HORROR!
Could this be? Where's the documentary? The movie? Why isn't this being furiously discussed? Is this a tip of an iceberg (which are melting fast by the way), or is it false facts with erroneous deductions?
It begs for light, whatever it is. I feel we've been torn asunder and are being shaken to and fro by an evil. “Have we got them right where they want us?” Is it plausible humanity has been deceived and fleeced by a plutocracy of money changers: the Illuminati, the New or One World Order, Federal Reserve, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, United Nations, whatever. For me, these have been vague in isolation. Any connections more obscure, until this article.
Thanks to this election, I'm just trying to better understand the (Bain Capital) World. But if this was a plan, why the heck did they string it out? Are we already in Hell?
Can or will a global plutocracy be used for good, if that's where we're headed?
"Awaken the sleeper" – Dune. The Matrix. The Bible.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/New_World_Order/Part1_Shado
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/New_World_Order/Part1_Shado
www.thirdworldtraveler.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatocracy
Corporatocracy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org
Corporatocracy(pronunciation:/ˌkɔrpərəˈtɒkrəsi/) is a term used to suggest an economic and political system controlled by corporations or corporate interests.[1]It is a generally pejorative term often used by critics of the current economic situation in a particular country, especially the United St...
Is this a fictional alternative history?
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Book_Excerpts/Book_Excerpts.html
Excerpted Books page (alphabetical)
www.thirdworldtraveler.com
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/Wound_Outside_BAI.html
The Wound Outside Burning All Illusions
www.thirdworldtraveler.com
It should be enough just to point out how CANADA refused to allow Fox News to do ANYthing on THEIR side of the border -- because their Constitution prohibits the broadcasting of fake, false, and misleading news. In their judgment, Fox News is typically LYING and/or/equal-to propagandizing.
The problem Fox News has is that Comedy Central has already FILLED the available niche. Which seems to have made Fox people grumpy, too.