Historically liberal presidents have kept social programs afloat while lowering deficits. President Obama had the hardest time, for obvious Reagans, but it’s finally working (sorry, couldn’t work Bush into that one). The GOP, on the other hand, is forever shifting all resources to a handful of people while turning our country into a deficit-ridden slum. The fact none of them have deciphered their own mission statement, not to mention their own historical record, is a testament to the Matt Drudge’s of the world.

The facts are in. We’re all Keynesians now. An austerity-only approach failed over in the UK and everywhere else:

“What is being done here in the UK and also in much of the eurozone is worse than a crime, it is a blunder.”

 – Martin Wolf, Financial Times, lamenting about having not listened to Zano.

And, it was an avoidable blunder, covered on The Discord in 2011 here. Now we also see Japan finally emerging from their fifteen year GOP-style, austerity-only slump. Let’s give Japan some credit; it took a lot of courage to recover from both Fukushima and Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.

As soon as Japan switched to the Keynesian-stimulus model, Japan’s economy started pulling out of its tailspin. Kamikaze anyone? They are now amidst a rather robust recovery, or, as the GOP calls it liberal propaganda.

“Japan is simply faking a recovery to further embarrass the GOP.”

—John Q Republican

I still support a balanced approach of spending cuts to fake money, but the GOP’s brilliant plan was to create the great recession—through lowering taxes during a couple of unnecessary and poorly managed land wars—and then shut off the Federal Reserve spigot amidst the inevitable collapse. Had we listened to them…well, it’s kind of like reaching the end of those old economic maps where blank areas are simply labeled Here Be Bachmanns.

Stephen Moore was on Real Time with Bill Maher awhile back, and he started off his rant, “We have the highest corporate tax rates in the world at 35%.”

Then Bernie Sanders said, “We have the highest nominal, not effective, that’s the difference. What people really pay is the lowest. It’s 12%.”

Sanders then goes on to say most large corporation don’t pay anything at all.

So Moore counters by saying, “That’s why we need to overhaul the entire tax code.”

Because corporation don’t pay enough taxes? Huh? When confronted with reality he goes for the total reversal. He’s not this stupid; he’s just a foxeconomist. It’s like when you take the Fibonacci sequence, which occurs everywhere throughout nature, and then stuff it up the ass of Newt Gingrich during the mid-terms.

Remember when the GOP said, “Well, we can’t really explain it, but Paul Ryan is our brain-trust and his budget makes sense”?

Then we look at his proposal and it has nothing to do with western civilization’s understanding of mathematics. They have no real plan, or numbers, or facts…ever. When you peel away layer after layer of this onion, there’s less in the center than a Michael Bloomberg approved jelly donut (MBAJD).

No matter how much evidence surfaces to indicate their economic cluelessness, the GOP will forever cling to their false narrative (guns and Bible joke omitted).

“The world is in deflationary spiral, not an inflationary one. Just as Keynesian economists predicted, and as conservative economists insisted could never happen.”

—Paul Krugman

Meanwhile, here’s what Obama is doing with the deficit. Sorry, the facts are in from govtspending.com:

Deficit under George W. Bush

Deficit under Barack Obama

The rest of the world isn’t fairing so well. I think I only gave Obama a 15% chance of pulling this shit off. Wow! Kudos. I still say my estimate was accurate, our recovery post-Bush was a long shot, aka, Ask your doctor if Facts are right for you

What’s worse about our disparaging political zeitgeist is the distance between parties is actually growing. This rightward drift is accelerating out of control like a meth-fiend’s Toyota. The GOP’s dysfunction is scary; their inability to identify their own dysfunction is scarier still.

Ezra weighs in on this troubling drift:

“If you imagine a policy spectrum that that goes from 1-10 in which 1 is the most liberal policy, 10 is the most conservative policy, and 5 is that middle zone that used to hold both moderate Democrats and Republicans, the basic shape of American politics today is that the Obama administration can and will get Democrats to agree to anything ranging from 1 to 7.5 and Republicans will reject anything that’s not an 8, 9, or 10. The result, as I’ve written before, is that President Obama’s record makes him look like a moderate Republicans from the late-90s.”

—Ezra Kline

This is why nothing will pass. Today’s GOP will not allow Obama to govern. Our president is doing surprisingly well, considering. There’s a consensus that Reagan wouldn’t make it in today’s GOP. Hell, anyone with a normal EEG isn’t going to make it in today’s GOP, or the Bachmann Effect as it is known to neuropsychologists.  Sorry, I have to get in my last Bachmann jokes (there’s a shelf life).

The GOP always works from the same playbook:

When real evidence emerges = change the subject

This has been their modus Foxerandi, and this stunt continues to work on about 40% of our population. It makes you want to Google Map your nearest clock tower.  Fox of the world, mom!

Could you imagine a McCainian land war in Syria, just as we started implementing the Ryan Plan? Who am I kidding, we would already be at war with Iran, during a depression. I can’t think of a worse scenario for this country…well, aside from Bachmann/Palin 2016.

Any topic the GOP touches turns to shit (the Bias Touch?). If Obama does avoid a double dip, the Republicans are finished as a species and they know it. It’s one of the few things they’ve figured out thus far. Well, they got the NSA thing right…er, after supporting such practices for nearly a decade. 

Reform or disband. There is no try.”

—Yoda