Seems like Standard & Poors has amplified what it meant by the “political dysfunction” that led it to downgrade the U.S. bond rating from AAA to AA status. From the beginning S&P was pretty specific that much of the problem was the GOP speech impediment that prohibits the use of the words “revenue” or “taxes.” Today, a S&P spokesperson added:

[P]eople in the political arena were even talking about a potential default,” said Joydeep Mukherji, senior directior at S&P. “That a country even has such voices, albeit a minority, is something notable,” he added. “This kind of rhetoric is not common amongst AAA sovereigns.

In other words, all that blather about how default would be no big thing spooked the ratings agency – which, in turn, seems to have spooked the stock market. With this in mind, I ask you to stroll down memory lane and take a look at what some of Missouri’s GOP political leaders were saying at the height of the furor.

Todd Akin (R-2) wagged his metaphorical finger in our faces and declared that default “would shock us as a nation into saying that we really have to deal with this problem,” and “experience what it is like to live within our means.”  I guess we now know that it wouldn’t have been that spiffy after all, but at least Akin got part of his wish. He and his buddies did manage to inflict some wounds on our financial well-being.

Billy Long, that profound financial prognosticator, dismissed the whole issue of default as so much ado about nothing:

Let the date come and go, … That’s going to be on the president,” Long said. “There is money there. He can pay what he wants to pay, and if he doesn’t pay, that’s his bluff.

Based on this tweet, which Michael Bersin has dissected here at SMP, one has to believe that Vicky Hartzler just didn’t read S&P’s statement about why they downgraded the our bond rating or that she missed the good parts:

S&P’s decision to downgrade our credit rating is no surprise: the debt ceiling package wasn’t big enough–one reason I voted ‘no’.

Now what I want to know is who among these folks will conveniently forget what he or she said about default and/or the causes of the S&P downgrade, and who will keep on pretending that S&P has validated the GOP narrative à la Vicky Hartzler?

ADDENDUM:  In regard to the those who welcomed default (via Steve Benen):

A senior administration official said those who simply choose not to believe any of the warnings, “These are the kinds of people who get eaten by bears.

Eaten by bears? We should be so lucky. Here in Missouri we send them to Washington D.C. to make laws.

Yesterday I was chatting with a nurse who was setting me up for a minor procedure at a local hospital.  She said she was originally from Oklahoma and still had family there.  So I used that opening to mention the drought, the heat wave and climate change.  Every chance I get I bring up the odd coincidence that Texas and Oklahoma are getting the worst climate related damage since the dust bowl days and, as it happens, the Congressmen from Oklahoma and Texas are the ones who do the bidding of the “global warming hoax” beneficiaries.  Of course, they owe their political careers to oil barons, so what else can they say about the polar ice cap melting other than it’s a “hoax”?

I generalized that the men in Congress have done a lot of damage to all of us hoping the nurse would agree.  And she did.

Then she said, “And how about that president of ours?  He won’t even say the pledge of allegiance, and, when he does, he uses the wrong hand.”

OMG, how do we counteract simplistic thinking like that?  And this is an RN who had to have some post high school education.  She seemed bright and alert, good at her job and someone who would NOT be taken in by the lies generated by American Crossroads, ALEC, Americans for Prosperity and all the “defeat Obama whatever the cost” crowd.

Yet here she was – miss middle America. Totally convinced that the President of the United States won’t say the pledge of allegiance to the United States of America.   How can anyone juggle those two things cognitively?

I took a deep breath and told her that the photo online a few months ago was a fake.  I explained that nowadays anyone clever enough can make a fake photo or video.  She agreed that that was possible but didn’t seem to apply that piece of information to the Obama Left Hand Pledge photo.

Not being sure if she was even open for information that might mess up her hard core dislike of the President, I explained that photos like that are made up by people who hate Obama because he is trying to protect programs like Social Security and Medicare, and those people want to destroy those programs.  HELLO?  Medicare?  Hospital?  Nurse?   Income?

I don’t know what else to do but keep telling the truth about the Obama haters and sharing facts about what is going on.  Truth? Facts? No thanks, it’s time for my coffee break.  Have a nice day.  

I was struck by an article in today’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch, describing the imminent closure of a campground for people displaced by the Joplin tornadoes earlier this year. Among the few remaining inhabitants of the camp are some who claim to have come to Joplin in hopes of finding work when the rebuilding starts. That’s what 9%+ national unemployment numbers get you – people so desperate they hope to turn disaster into a job.

Economist Jared Bernstein helps put our current situation into perspective with this chart from the Bureau of Labor Standards, which shows the components that make up the unemployment picture during the period from 2007-2011:

We’re not losing jobs, but we are failing to create new jobs, condemning millions to literally years of unemployment  The truly pathetic aspect of this situation, however, is the performance of the politicians we send to Jefferson City and Washington to watch out for our interests. There are some brave Democrats in Jefferson City, but too many of our state and federal legislators are refusing to deal with our urgent jobs crisis, preferring instead to quibble about spending cuts and to fight over which parts of an already decimated budget carcass they get to pick over.

The GOP response is worse than useless. On one end of the spectrum we have Roy Blunt’s obsequious concern for his corporate benefactors, or “job creators,” to use the GOP designation for the very wealthy, in spite of the absolute failure of these putative job machines to produce more than a minimal up-tick in employment when, as during the Bush years, their needs were tended so assiduously. On the other hand, we have the outright contempt for the unemployed evinced by GOP State Senator Jim Lembke who filibustered to prevent the use of federal funds to extend unemployment benefits, asserting that beneficiaries of the benefits were “stealing from their neighbors.”

But the totally unsurprising GOP fecklessness doesn’t mean that our Missouri Democrats are doing much better. Whether it’s Senator McCaskill dithering about what she really meant when she was talking about not extending unemployment benefits, or Governor Nixon, who, in the words of a Post-Dispatch editorial last May, was “too worried about making a campaign misstep or flying around the state announcing government handouts with dubious job-creation ability to provide the leadership that was needed,” the impression they create is one of timidity and weakness.

It isn’t as if there aren’t Democrats who know just what to do. Take, for instance, Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky, whose “Emergency Jobs to Restore the American Dream Act,” would put more than 2 million people to work, with particular emphasis on the long-term unemployed, the 99ers, whose joblessness has exceeded the 99 weeks of unemployment insurance our mostly millionaire congress-people are willing to grant them. But that’s not all – remember we also need to address revenue and debt issues – the act would be:

… financed by separate legislation introduced by Schakowsky called the “Fairness in Taxation Act,” which would raise taxes for Americans who earn more than $1 million and $1 billion. It would also eliminate subsidies for big oil companies while closing loopholes for corporations that send American jobs overseas.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we’ve got Roy Blunt responding to a negative jobs report that reflected mostly federal jobs lost due to GOP inflicted spending cuts with the following bit of predigested GOP pablum:

Missourians are looking for jobs, but today’s latest unemployment report indicates yet again that there just aren’t enough jobs out there for people who are looking to get back to work. Washington Democrats are ignoring their pleas to cut taxes, quit spending so much, and help the private sector create real, permanent jobs.

Or there’s McCaskill, claiming that we can’t do much to create jobs, but maybe, just maybe we can fiddle around a little and:

… look at patent reform, we can look at trade agreements as long as they’re fair and don’t hurt American middle-class workers even more than they’ve already been hurt. We can look at regulations — what regulations are absolutely necessary and what regulations are getting in the way of businesses.

And while our Missourians are busy percolating this type of hot air, everybody agrees that the excellent, commonsense proposals put forward by Representative Schakowsky, proposals that would actually address our endemic joblessness, are DOA, victim to ideological warfare, greed, and cowardice.

On a vehicle in west central Missouri:

Wingularity, the – the point at which the insanity from the far right and those controlling the Republican Party [continues] to grow exponentially until it reaches an unsustainable weight and collapses upon itself. This is also known as the Purity Spiral, wherein the density of wingnut increases compared to mainstream conservatives to the point of pure wingnut. As the ratio rises, this creates a phenomenon wherein no logic or sanity can penetrate or escape. When rightwing argument has become completely inaccessible to the uninitiated, it has reached the Wingularity.

How’s that teabagger thing workin’ out for ya?

Previously: Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r): town halls in Clinton and Warrensburg (August 10, 2011)

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) held a series of town halls on Wednesday in the 4th Congressional District. We attended the afternoon town halls in Clinton and Warrensburg. There were dissenting views and push back at both town halls, but the one in Warrensburg was by far the more raucous.

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) at the Community Center in Warrensburg, Missouri on August 10, 2011.

The transcript:

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r): Hello everyone. Good afternoon. How are you? [applause] Thank you, guys, for coming out. It’s a beautiful day. Isn’t this beautiful? Ah, I think we all were sick and tired of this hundred degree heat and, uh, it’s been fabulous. But I appreciate so much you coming out today and spending a little time, uh, together so that we can get to know each, about each other a little better. Uh, you know, it is such a privilege and an honor to represent you and work for you in Washington, D.C.  And I know I’ve just been there since January and I’m, I’m new and so I haven’t had a chance to get to know all of you yet and so, thank you for coming. Uh, this is very important. Obviously it shows that you guys are patriots, you care about your country and you want to see us move forward and be as strong as possible, not only for now, but for future generations. And that’s what this is all about, it’s keeping America strong and, and even brighter in the future.

Uh, what I would like to do today, uh, in this hour we have, and I wish I had more time, but, is to maybe start off with some information that I put together in a little PowerPoint. Uh, some facts that I’ve learned since I’ve been in Washington, uh, these past seven months on the budget and kind of where we’re at, where our money goes, some of the discussions we’ve been having on the debt ceiling, things like that and that’ll take about twenty minutes. And then, uh, spend the rest of the time just answering questions hearing your ideas, listening to you, uh, because I believe the best ideas come from you guys, from the heartland. The ideas for our country, the solutions, do not come from Washington, D.C. There’s, uh, enough people with ideas been running things for too long and so we need some new ideas. So, I thought maybe we would do that, if that’s okay with you [crosstalk].

Voice: No, actually, actually…

…Representative Hartzler: First, wait, I wanted to introduce state senator David Pearce (r) here. Thank you for coming. [applause] David is doing a fabulous job for, for all of us down in Jefferson City and appreciate his leadership and the good work he’s doing. Thanks, thanks for coming out today as well. So, anyway, uh, I’ll answer your question and then, uh, we’ll get started if you want to.

Voice: I can look at your, uh, PowerPoint online. I think there’s a lot of people here that got a lot of questions instead of looking at a PowerPoint we can watch online. [applause]

Representative Hartzler: Well. Unfortunately [crosstalk]…

Voice: It’s, it’s here, right? [handout] This is the PowerPoint, right?

Representative Hartzler: Yeah. Yeah. It’s not [crosstalk]…

Voice: Okay, so we have it.

Representative Hartzler: It’s not online, but, and there’s more information, so we’ll run through it quick. I can understand. I want to get to everybody’s questions and hear your comments and we’ll have time for that, so, let’s just move, move quickly and you might, hopefully, find some information that’s helpful to you.

This is the first slide that I found that I thought was very interesting. Uh, this shows where our money goes. And how much goes to different categories. This is, uh, last year’s, well, two years ago budget, if you consider it was voted on two years ago, it was twenty-ten. Basically, uh, three and a half trillion dollars. The red part is what we call non-defense discretionary, that’s what Congress spends a lot of time discussing because that’s the area where we can change the funds fairly easily just by an up or down vote. We can cut spending or raise spending. This is what I would consider all of Washington, your, all your departments, Department of Education, transportation, Congress, foreign aid, everything would be in the red category there. This is how much for national defense. By the way, I don’t think I said that I feel  very honored to get to sit on the House Agriculture Committee and the House Armed Services Committee. Uh, and that is very much an honor. I appreciate that opportunity to stand strong for Whiteman Air Force Base, Ft. Leonard Wood, and all our veterans, and our men and women in uniform. Uh, but, I will just say a little quick thing about the defense, the budget, the amount of money we’re spending now per GDP is less than it was back in, uh, nineteen sixty-four. And so every year by percentage GDP it keeps going down and I have concerns with that. I think according to Constitution there’s only a few things Congress should be doing and one of them is to provide for the common defense. So, I don’t believe we need to, especially when we’re fighting wars on two fronts, or, if you count Libya, three, uh, it, it’s time if we need to be cutting our spending on national defense. So I just want to share that with you.

Uh, Social Security, of course, money comes in for that. So, we got that. Medicare, Medicaid, net interest, and, as you can see, it’s rather small right now, that’s the interest on the debt. I have some concerns with that though if our interest rates go up, what that could do to our national budget. It could eat up a lot more of it. And the other mandatory program, uh, they lumped a bunch of programs there where Congress has approved in years past and we don’t vote on every year. They just say if you qualify for xyz then you get x dollar benefit. So, they put in there everything from Pell Grants to unemployment, uh, food stamps, welfare programs, farm subsidies, all of those type of programs that  are mandatory they lumped them together. So, you can kind of see where the money is going. Now, here’s the problem, though. The next slide shows here’s how much is coming in. The green is our total amount of tax revenue that you and I send in every April fifteenth and businesses send in. Only makes up part of what we’re spending so the rest is borrowed. That’s why we’re now borrowing forty-two cents on the dollar at the federal level just to keep all those programs going that you just saw. That’s why we’re in the problem that we are, I mean, you and I don’t do that at home. I mean, we can’t keep borrowing forty-two cents out of every dollar. It’s unsustainable [crosstalk] and…

Voice: Is Social Security in that two point two trillion?

Representative Hartzler: Uh, that’s a good question. I’ll have to check on that. I think it is.  [crosstalk] Anyway, no.

Voice: I don’t think so. You said [inaudible] our tax money by April fifteenth.

Representative Hartzler: Anyway. Well [crosstalk], yeah…

Voice: Taxes are April fifteenth [crosstalk]. Social Security’s not a tax, right. But it is our money. So, where’s that flow in the flow?

Representative Hartzler: It is part of the revenue that’s in there. So, I may have misspoke as far as April fifteenth. But, anyway, you can see we got a deficit. That’s the bottom line, bottom line.

We have a debt crisis. It’s fourteen point three trillion dollars now. Uh, it’s a non-partisan or, problem in that we had Republican Congresses, we’ve had Democratic Congresses for
years that have spent more money than has come in. And so, that’s where we’re at today. It’s taken us a while to get there, but, uh, we gotta little spending problem here and there’s at least two areas of concern with that. Having that much debt is hurting jobs. I talk to a lot of small business owners and they’ll say this uncertainty, they’re not sure what’s going to happen, uh, if there’s gonna be a huge influx, uh, in the stock market that’s gonna hurt them. Whether there’s, you know, not gonna be able to get credit. Just having this much debt is causing them to not hire people. We need that. So, that’s a [crosstalk] concern. [crosstalk] Well…[crosstalk] There’s a lot of…

Voice: It’s not uncertainty about the economy, it’s a lack of con [crosstalk], consumer demand. [crosstalk] [voice: “Yeah.”][applause][voice: “Yeah, all right.”]

Voice: Consumer demand is lacking because people do not have jobs. They don’t have the money to [crosstalk]…

Voice: People don’t have money.

Representative Hartzler: Okay, let me [crosstalk]…

Voice: You all were supposed to [inaudible] [crosstalk]on jobs when you came in office. [voice: “Yeah.”]

Representative Hartzler: Wait, wait, wait [crosstalk] just a minute.

Voice: Jobs!

Voice: That’s what you said.

Voice: You said you were jobs, you didn’t [crosstalk] say anything about fighting the President.

Representative Hartzler: All right [crosstalk]. Listen, listen [crosstalk]…

Voice: When, when you ran your campaign [crosstalk] the only thing we heard was jobs, jobs, jobs [crosttalk], jobs, jobs. [crosstalk] You get into office and the only thing we hear out of you now is abortion [inaudible].

Voice: We were gonna fix it, that’s what you said.

Voice: You said you were a teabagger and that you were gonna fight the President. Why?

Voice: Quiet down and listen.

Voice: [crosstalk] …farm subsidies.

Representative Hartzler: Uh, we are gonna have [crosstalk][inaudible] conversation and then there’ll be time for any of the comments. But I’m gonna say this, we’re gonna have a respectful town hall here [crosstalk] [voice: “You don’t like (inaudible)”] and we’re gonna listen. I want you to have lis, respect everybody. Listen. And then I’m gonna listen to you. [voice: “You’re not doing a very good job”] And that’s the way this town hall’s gonna be run. If you don’t feel comfortable with that you’re welcome to not participate. But I want to hear your ideas and [crosstalk]… [multiple voices, some inaudible]

Voice: Well then good, then let’s begin. [crosstalk] Then let’s begin, let’s begin.

Voice: Let’s let her talk first.

Voice: [crosstalk]…our ideas.

Voice: Who owns our debt? [crosstalk]

Representative Hartzler: We have forty-seven percent [crosstalk] of our foreign debt [crosstalk] is caused, held by the [inaudible]. Okay.

Voice: She’s our representative in Congress [crosstalk] isn’t she?

Voice: And she’ll let you talk in a minute.

Representative Hartzler: Shh. All right. China owns twenty-nine percent of our foreign debt. That is a real concern to me. I said I’m on the Armed Services Committee and I’ve got to sit in a lot of hearings and I can tell you, I don’t know what China’s doing, but it’s concerning. They are building fourteen nuclear submarines right now. We’re building one. They have been devoting over twelve percent of their budget to national defense. Uh, they just introduced their version of a stealth aircraft fighter plane recently. And they just unveiled a twelve hundred mile aircraft carrier busting bomb. So, it’s a little concerning that they hold this much of our debt. In fact, with the interest that we pay China we would be able to buy three, or they could buy, three joint strike fighters and still have fifty million dollars left over. So, um, there’s a lot of reasons I think that we need to get out of debt. But certainly this obligation, um, to China is a concerning one. In fact, Admiral Mike Mullen, who’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he just went off I should say, uh, but he, last summer, this time, he said, I think the biggest threat we have to our national security is the national debt. And when you think about it that’s, that’s a pretty important statement. So, there’s several reasons that we need to get control of this huge debt crisis, one it’s hurting jobs, but also, I think it hurts our national security.

Okay, how many would agree with this statement? We have a debt crisis because Washington spends too much, not because Washington taxes too little. Raise your hand if you agree with that.

Voice: Both.

Representative Hartzler: Um [crosstalk][inaudible]…

Voice: Hey, there’s people in the room that disagree, who disagrees with that. [crosstalk] There are people who disagree with that.

Voices: Yeah.

Voice: You gotta be fair, you gotta be fair. No, no, no, you didn’t ask that question, Representative Hartzler. You didn’t ask that question.

[multiple inaudible voices]

Voice: I gotta right to speak.

Voice: And you gotta right to shut up.

Representative Hartzler: Shhh. Guys. We’re in the fourth district.

Voice: Yeah, we are.

Representative Hartzler:  C’mon [crosstalk] we’re good people, we’re good people,  so let’s get along here, all right. Okay.

Now, here’s a, a slide that kind of shows the tax revenue since nineteen forty-seven, that’s in the green, historically about eighteen percent of the GDP. And you see the spending that’s been going on. This is this year, but projected, if we don’t make some changes, it’s expected to go off the charts. So, that is what is concerning and in order to keep pace to balance the budget we would have to raise taxes on everybody sixty percent. And even if you taxed all the millionaires and billionaires that you hear about in the news everybody likes to pick on, nobody’s millionaire billionaire, um, that would not balance the budget it is that far out of whack. We are. You could, you know, take all their money. So, we definitely have a spending, uh, problem. Just so you know, ’cause there’s a lot of, uh, class warfare going on, lot of rhetoric. The top ten percent, whether you like ’em or not, think they ought to be taxed more, just so you know, uh, they right now pay seventy percent of all the taxes that come into the country, so. [crosstalk][inaudible]

Voice: But they pay a lower [crosstalk], a lower tax rate. They pay a lower tax rate than I do.

Representative Hartzler:  No, no, [crosstalk] no, out of the total amount of money that comes in, uh, tax revenue, seventy percent of it comes from them. So, what, anyway, we’re not gonna get into whether that’s good or bad, but just [crosstalk]…

Voice: You’re saying it’s bad, though.

Representative Hartzler: Federal, let’s move on…

The transcript of the town hall will continue in subsequent posts.

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) held a series of town halls today in the 4th Congressional District. We attended the afternoon town halls in Clinton and Warrensburg. There were approximately eighty-five to ninety people attending in Clinton and near one hundred in Warrensburg. There were dissenting views and push back at both town halls, but the one in Warrensburg was by far the more raucous.

Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) in Clinton, Missouri.

At the Warrensburg event, via Twitter:

@MBersin Michael Bersin

At Rep.Vicky Hartzler (r) town hall in Warrensburg. Was in Clinton at 3 pm. Around 90 in crowd there. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Around 90 in audience for Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r) town hall in Warrensburg. man in audience asks to pass up powerpoint and going to Q and A. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r) town hall – Warrensburg: no go on passing up powerpoint. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg; challenge from audience on Social Security as part of the general budget revenue. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: audience is getting raucus. One asked people to raise hands in favor of raising taxes. Many did.

2 hours ago

Yeah, yeah, we know, it’s spelled raucous.

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall: Audience members challenging her on almost every point. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Audience member – why don’t you raise taxes? Other asks why don’t you pay more? Responds, I would 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: pushing balanced budget amendment. Cites State of Missouri. 2 hours ago

@SharkFu SharkFu

Cause it works so well here? Christ. MT @MBersin Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: pushing balanced budget amend. Cites Missouri. 2 hours ago

@BroceliandF Broce

@SharkFu @MBersin My head hurts. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: turns to jobs (sarcastic comments from audience). 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: pushing regulatory reform so smal business will create jobs. Nothing about a lack of demand. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Oh, no. She pushed the light bulb issue. And the true believers applauded. Others groaned. 2 hours ago

@geekdetails Amanda Roberts

@MBersin light bulb issue? 2 hours ago

@SharkFu SharkFu

groans MT @MBersin Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: She pushed the light bulb issue. True believers applauded. Others groaned. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

@geekdetails Light bulbs. bit.ly/q1rvo5 Seriously. Our political discourse is driven by whack jobs. 48 minutes ago

@geekdetails Amanda Roberts

@MBersin … wow 6 minutes ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Challenged on corporate taxes. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Agrees that some corporate loopholes are bad. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Audience member disappointed in Congress Cantor (r) should not have walked away from Pres. Obama. 2 hours ago

MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Wbg: supporter criticizes those who spoke out as rude. Forgot about teabaggers and health care town halls? 2 hours ago

Yep? Or, *IOKIYAR?

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: People forgetting about the Clinton years. Higher marginal tax rates and budget surplus. Whoops. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: People demagogue on Social Security? 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: When I go to Wal-Mart to shop it costs more. Non-union shop. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Audience member advocating tariff war and stop illegal immigration. Forgetting Georgia crops, 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Q on Jobs – Answer criticizes stimulus and regulations.And advocates trade agreements. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Q what have republicans done? Ans created jobs. Audience members laugh. 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: Q Why did you sign the Grover Norquist pledge? 2 hours ago

@MBersin Michael Bersin

Rep. Hartzler (r) townhall in Warrensburg: finished on a conspiracy theory Q about the Iraqi Dinar (currency). I kid you not. 2 hours ago

Some true believer bumper stickers in Clinton, Missouri:

Projection.

Oh, we get it. It’s some sort of pun. Two thirds of one. PU.

Confusion or cognitive dissonance?  Obama’s no liberal.

* it’s okay if you’re a republican

Wanna see how Senator McCaskill’s doing as she tries to dance the red state/blue state tango?  If so, take a look at Joan McCarter’s reportage on DailyKos. Hint: it has to do with spending and jobs creation, specifically why McCaskill thinks we have to worry about the former and don’t dare discuss the latter, and it involves statements like:

Setting realistic expectations is one thing. Shooting your own party in the foot is quite another, and it sure seems like in trying to do the former, Sen. Claire McCaskill achieves the latter.

After you read McCarter’s piece, also consider the fact that McCaskill is touting her co-sponsorship of a “Democratic” Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) – or, as I call it, BBA Lite, since it is a little milder than the drop-dead dumb BBA proposals put forward by the GOP:

The amendment supported by McCaskill requires balanced budgets to begin in five years, aims to protect entitlements, and  allows congress to opt-out in times of war.

Additionally, the Democrat’s version prevents congress from passing tax cuts for individuals earning more than $1 million a year unless the country maintains a surplus, a provision that could face opposition from Republicans.

McCaskill may attempt to cut out the really ugly parts, but a BBA is still a very bad idea all by itself, as commentators from the left, along with a few honest, half-way intelligent folks from the right, agree. It’s not just a bad idea, though, it’s the lazy politician’s way to build rigidity into a system that requires flexibility, all just so that they can avoid having to do what we elect them to do – govern.

But the worst of it is the rhetorical trope McCaskill uses to justify this particular walk on the red side. She dredges up the incessant and dishonest GOP metaphor that misleadingly compares family and government finances, and declares “Congress ought to do what families in Missouri do every day: live within their means.” Actually, even though governments are very different types of entities than families, families themselves do take out mortgages to buy houses, and secure loans to send their children to college and make large purchases. Even in Missouri. Responsibly managed debt gives us greater flexibility and the option is absolutely essential for the government as well.

I am sure that McCaskill thinks that she is cleverly stealing GOP thunder, cutting the rug out from under the other guys by calling for a BBA that doesn’t exactly go after the same targets and then calling them out when they object. I am sure she thinks that using their own language makes it all just that much more insidious.

Unfortunately, all McCaskill’s really doing, besides trying to save her backside in a conservative state, is helping to legitimate right wing positions. If even Democrats talk the GOP talk and refuse to question the basis of GOP claims about the need to cut spending, even as we are potentially sliding into another recession, the dialogue will go no further. We will continue to talk about spending when we should be talking about jobs. It would take courage to try to change the terms of discourse, to go on the offensive in order to throw the GOP steam-roller off-track and, sadly, courage so often seems to fall victim to a misguided, purely political pragmatism.

I do believe that the best way to insure that we eventually arrive in progressive Nirvana is to vote as left as you can given your options, and in Missouri right now, the only option, the putative “left” political establishment, is staking out territory on the center-right side of the room. Since I don’t foresee a primary challenge to Senator McCaskill, I’ll continue to support her, but I do wish she wouldn’t go out of her way to make it so hard, especially since I’m not sure it’s going to do her much good in the long run. She won’t win the Tea Partiers, and, in the meanwhile, she sure has pissed off lots of progressives. I  hope those legendary independents the “moderate” Democrats all claim to be courting are worth it.

Addendum: Guess who else thinks that a balanced budget amendment is a bad idea?  As per Steve Benen, none other than Standard & Poors. Hear that Claire?

* Edited slight for clarity.

Hereford and Deaf Smith County, Texas, the beef capitol of the known universe, or so they say….

@RepHartzler Rep. Vicky Hartzler

S&P’s decision to downgrade our credit rating is no surprise: the debt ceiling package wasn’t big enough–one reason I voted ‘no’. 21 hours ago

So much for having experience in agriculture.

From Standard and Poor’s:

United States of America Long-Term Rating Lowered To ‘AA+’ On Political Risks And Rising Debt Burden; Outlook Negative

….The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy. Despite this year’s wide-ranging debate, in our view, the differences between political parties have proven to be extraordinarily difficult to bridge, and, as we see it, the resulting agreement fell well short of the comprehensive fiscal consolidation program that some proponents had envisaged until quite recently. Republicans and Democrats have only been able to agree to relatively modest savings on discretionary spending while delegating to the Select Committee decisions on more comprehensive measures. It appears that for now, new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options….

[emphasis added]

Dow tumbles 634 points on recession fears

The sell-off comes in reaction to the downgrade on U.S. debt by Standard & Poor’s.

….The massive stampede out of stocks, the second plunge in three trading days, was fueled partly by reaction to the U.S. credit rating downgrade. The sell-off threatened to further sap confidence in the faltering U.S. economy, giving businesses and consumers another reason to cut back on spending….

Now what, teabaggers?

A high end cabin in Summerhaven, Arizona close to 8500 feet in the Coronado National Forest.

Photo by TG.

Think about that for a moment.

Photo by TG.

A large portion of Summerhaven was devastated almost a decade ago by a massive fire. Who put it out? Conservative Libertarians who don’t want the federal government to do anything? Rugged individualists with a large amount of accumulated wealth? Our Galtian overlords? You wonder.