What she is proposing are military cuts of $800b and huge tax increases on businesses and wealthy Americans to help cover her price tab of $20.5 trillion in new federal spending. Look, this is pure poppycock and bull pockey. Warren ought to be ashamed to believe that this math mockery (not to mention abandonment of reality) could pass the most remote smell test for any rational person.
First, there is no way in hell she is going to be able to finagle $800 billion in cuts to the military. We know ever since the military-industrial complex emerged (after WW II) it has been the devil's own job to try and tame it as it just sucks up more and more $$$ each year. Much of that is plowed into localities (like here in Colorado Springs) that have multiple military bases, or have a defense contractor making planes, bombs or tanks. That is the new mode of job creation and there is absolutely no way that those special interests will cede that money to Warren. Does she "have a plan" that will work? Sure. Possibly in an alternative universe where austerity freaks - not to mention Repugs - disappeared like the Whigs in this universe.
Second, anyone who does the math knows there is simply not the money in corporations and the wealthy alone to support her far- fetched plan. Even if a massive new tax on both could be passed which it won't (so long as Moscow Mitch runs the Senate) it will still fall far short of the funds needed to support Medicare for all - which most honest brokers and spokespersons estimate is more in the realm of $30 trillion over ten years. Even Sen. Bernie Sanders admitted this, e.g. in the last Dem debate:
"At the end of the day the overwhelming majority of people will save money on their health care bills. But I do think it is appropriate to acknowledge that taxes will go up."
To which Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a moderate Dem, replied: "At least Bernie’s being honest here.".
As The Times observes, her plan "represents a significant bet that enough voters will favor an approach that dismantles the current system and replaces it with Medicare for all, a government-run health insurance program. And it comes after decades in which Democrats have largely tiptoed around policy proposals that relied on major tax increases and Republicans ran on tax cuts."
Hmmm... seems that I recall even in the early days of Obama's administration and when the Dems had a filibuster- proof majority of 60 in the Senate they couldn't even get the most modest public option passed. So riddle me this: How would a President Warren manage a feat that will cost twenty times more- and through a Senate likely to still be in Reepo hands?
Folks, this is the stuff of fairy tales, no lie. (Hey, I know Reeptards also called it a 'fairy tale" but even a broken clock is right twice a day!)
The Times piece also notes:
"While the proposal allows Ms. Warren to say she is not raising taxes on the middle class, it opened her to renewed charges that her plan is too radical to pass through Congress. "
Doh! Of course it is too radical! Has Warren done a head count of the deficit hawks and austerity cheerleaders still in congress? Does she believe they will magically vanish if she's elected? She needs to stop chomping on that special Astra Ultra MJ candy methinks.
Confirming her ingestion of new higher punch candies we then read:
"It represents an extraordinary embrace of the tax system to redistribute wealth and re-engineer one of the pillars of the American economy, with measures that would double her proposed wealth tax on billionaires and impose new levies on investment gains and even stock trades. "
And it possibly could work-- in Canada or Denmark. But I can tell her right now it will never work here, not if Barack Obama and a Senate with 60 Dems couldn't even get a public option in 2010.
Warren needs to come back to reality, cease imbibing those high buzz candies, and once that's done, stop babbling nonsense - when most Americans with any sense will see right through it as errant codswallop.
Those who are honest - like Bernie, a fellow DSA member - know that middle class taxes being raised 15-20 % will be the most pragmatic way to pay for any new health program.
As I've shown with other large scale liberal Dem plans, such as the Green New Deal, the bugbear or deal breaker in all of them is the failure or avoidance to reckon in the math, E.g.
Applying Physics (And Some Math) To The Green Ne...
Where I pointed out that omitting nuclear energy from the mix would be a non-starter. As I put it, "Leave out nuclear and the time needed to get to a preponderance of renewables, even using Germany's high standard of adding 0.7 trillion kwh of clean energy per year, would take close to 150 years - by which time this planet would be on the verge of being another Venus. "
The same retreat from reality is evident in Warren's "plans" and defense of Medicare for all. She seems unable or unwilling to tell voters straight that the choice is one between more taxes or less health care.
As I've shown with other large scale liberal Dem plans, such as the Green New Deal, the bugbear or deal breaker in all of them is the failure or avoidance to reckon in the math, E.g.
Applying Physics (And Some Math) To The Green Ne...
Where I pointed out that omitting nuclear energy from the mix would be a non-starter. As I put it, "Leave out nuclear and the time needed to get to a preponderance of renewables, even using Germany's high standard of adding 0.7 trillion kwh of clean energy per year, would take close to 150 years - by which time this planet would be on the verge of being another Venus. "
The same retreat from reality is evident in Warren's "plans" and defense of Medicare for all. She seems unable or unwilling to tell voters straight that the choice is one between more taxes or less health care.
Kate Bedingfield, a deputy campaign manager for Joe Biden summed up my own take on Warren's plan when she said:
“The mathematical gymnastics in this plan are all geared towards hiding a simple truth from voters: It’s impossible to pay for Medicare for all without middle-class tax increases,”
“The mathematical gymnastics in this plan are all geared towards hiding a simple truth from voters: It’s impossible to pay for Medicare for all without middle-class tax increases,”
If Warren fails to 'come clean' she may pay a huge price in the primaries if enough D voters get wise to her unworkable math and impossible dreams. In the meantime, progressive pundits on Left blogs also need to come clean after trying to assert Warren actually does have a plan ...but it will be "attacked" (and 'lied about') by those nasty, revolting scum from the medical insurance industry. See e.g.
No, it will also be firmly questioned by anyone with sense and an IQ over room temperature who grasps political reality and can do the math!
As an antidote to the preceding B.S. see the following spot-on take dealing with Warren's dishonest mumbo-jumbo:
No, it will also be firmly questioned by anyone with sense and an IQ over room temperature who grasps political reality and can do the math!
As an antidote to the preceding B.S. see the following spot-on take dealing with Warren's dishonest mumbo-jumbo:
Excerpt:
"The Massachusetts senator is adamant that her plan would not impose any taxes on the middle class. According to Tim Higginbotham, a Democratic Socialists of America organizer writing in Jacobin, her plan is “an impossible premise.”
Higginbotham believes Warren’s no-middle-class-taxes claim is dishonest: First, because any Medicare for All plan “will require some form of taxation, direct or indirect, on the broad ‘middle class.’” Second, because her premise ignores the possibility that even with a modest tax increase, Medicare for All will still provide overall health care cost savings in the long run for low- and middle-income families."
And:
No comments:
Post a Comment