RIGHT-WING CROOKS & LIARS ARE EVERYWHERE

...Billionaire owner of the right-wing Washington Examiner, Philip Anshutz.

It’s important to follow the lies as reported by the far right, just to see what they are trying to falsely sell.

Most Americans are not aware of the right-wing billionaire Philip Anshutz, who just happens to be the owner of the very right-wing newspaper, the Washington Examiner. A senior editorial writer for the Examiner, Mr. Philip Klein, recently wrote an essay for the paper that demonstrates just how the conservative publications continue trying to brainwash their readers with their vast amounts of misinformation.

In order to show just how much of a Fantasyland these people live in, and to show just how dishonest they really are, here are some itemized areas of Mr. klein’s essay titled, “The Welfare State Is Destroying America”. (It’s amazing that Klein actually has the nerve to put these comments in writing.)

Per Klein’s essay:

>>> Klein says that America was under the sinister leadership of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, when he presided over the establishment of the disaster called, “Social Security”. Klein incorrectly says, “Roosevelt was dead wrong that the program would help the nation avoid deep debt. Social Security and the entitlement programs that followed its legacy of seeking to protect citizens from the ‘hazards of living,’ turned out to be a fiscal disaster.” Really? In the real world, today’s national debt has nothing to do with Social Security, whose trust fund currently has a surplus that will last for decades. With some minor changes, Social Security as we know it, will last through the twenty-first century.

>>> Klein also falsely implies that “the growing national debt burden” of the United States is primarily caused by Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. This misstatement totally ignores the real causes of the debt burden which were the Reagan and Bush tax cuts, two unnecessary foreign wars, an un-paid for prescription drug plan and the negative effects of a near-depression due to Wall Street and bank deregulation.

>>> The conservative readers of the Washington Examiner must therefore be incorrectly assuming that FDR and Lyndon Baines Johnson deliberately designed Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to be paid for by federal borrowing. Why shouldn’t Klein’s audience leap to those false conclusions? After all, Klein has not mentioned the funding streams that pay for these programs. Payroll taxes pay for Social Security, payroll taxes and general revenues pay for Medicare and general revenues pay for Medicaid. No borrowing is required when there is a balance between government spending and tax revenues. But with the exception of the Clinton years, under the mismanagement of the Republican party, that fiscal balance has not been achieved for almost three decades.

>>> Klein’s essay says that spending on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare alone currently account for nearly half of federal spending, excluding interest payments. He states that over the next 25 years, that percentage will explode to 66%, or close to two-thirds, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).
Ooh, doesn’t that sounds scary! These numbers may frighten conservative readers, but they are totally meaningless. The overall federal-state-local spending as a share of GDP, which in the U.S. is well below the average for other industrial democracies. And these countries are also just as competitive and prosperous as the US. Saying that the share of federal spending that is devoted to Social Security and healthcare spending will grow over 25 years from 46 to 66% does not support Klein’s case that the welfare state will “destroy” America. These are just irrelevant numbers, thrown out by Klein to impress those ignorant conservative readers of the Washington Examiner.

>>> Klein states that, “The numbers associated with the nation’s debt crisis are almost too staggering to comprehend.” He states that “An analysis by Boston University economics professor Laurence Kotlikoff found that when long-term entitlement obligations are considered, the true fiscal gap is $211 trillion.”
What Klein fails to point out is that Kotlikoff’s calculation for unfunded entitlement obligations is for the period between now and infinity. If Kotlikoff and Klein used a time span of, 2012 to 2100, there would be no cause for alarm. In other words, saying the U.S. has a “fiscal gap” is like saying that you are in danger of bankruptcy from a “personal fiscal gap,” because you could not pay off your entire house or car mortgage today. In reality, as long as you, or the nation, can make its installment loan payments on time and at a reasonable interest rate, everything is fine. But does Klein tell his readers this? Of course not. He’s just throwing out scary-sounding statistics to stampede the yahoos.

>>> The signature Affordable Health Care Act reform of Obama and the Democratic Congress, which is modeled on Mitt Romney’s insurance-friendly Massachusetts healthcare program, which also closely resembles a long-time proposal by the right-wing Heritage Foundation, is described by Klein as “socialist” or “fascist”, (and it can't be both). This is his claim even though Hitler the “fascist” came to power with his goal of providing all Germans a health care program by giving subsidies to private German health insurance companies. (Sounds like an idea from a capitalist to me!)

It may seem cruel to only pick on Mr. Philip Klein, who is, after all, simply one of many minor political hacks in the right-wing media machine controlled by billionaires like Anshutz and the gangster Koch brothers. However, it is worth reading the far right’s propaganda now and then, just to find out how it is that so many of our conservative fellow citizens can and have been so totally deceived.

As we are seeing with the Republican primaries, the GOP candidates have shown no shame about lying through their teeth to all Americans. This essay by Philip Klein is just another example. But since the Citizens-United, US Supreme Court decision, you can expect to see and hear more of what those like the billionaire Anchutz and his lackey Klein are going to be offering up for their gullible readers to digest.

Yes, it is totally disgusting, but that’s how they are, and what they stand for in their politics. You’d better just get use to it.

Copyright G.Ater

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