What can I say? I swore off the Dayton Daily News a long time ago, tired
of their ceaseless attempts to deceive. They pressed one of my
hot-buttons, though, so here I am once again tilting at windmills in the
vain attempt to educate their editorial staff.
I can certainly understand why the editors at the Dayton Daily News
would want to down-play tax cuts. After all, the party of JFK washed
their hands of tax cuts after President Reagan rode to victory with them
in 1980 and 1984. Since then tax cuts have been the kryptonite of the
Democrat Party. At every turn they downplay them, demonize them, equate
them to racist lynchings and totalitarian death camps...which is all the
more reason we have to expose these illogical tactics when they occur.
On this occasion it is Martin Gottlieb who is leading the charge against
tax cuts. His primary target is the Bush tax cuts; those already granted
and scheduled as well as those newly proposed. His parting shot, though,
is aimed squarely at the Reagan legacy.
Let's examine his argument, so as to more fully appreciate the irony of
his final claim. Gottlieb starts out alleging that President Bush is
telling half-truths, at best, about his tax and economic plans. In his
State of the Union speech President Bush stated:
Jobs are created when the economy grows, the economy grows when
Americans have more money to spend and invest; and the best and fairest
way to make sure Americans have that money is not to tax it away in the
first place.
Gottlieb's objection to this is that the first part is self-evident, the
middle part (the alleged half-truth) is backwards (people have money
because the grows, not the other way around) and the last part, about
tax cuts, completely wrong. Let's look at what Gottlieb says:
The part about the economy growing when people have more money is
someplace in the realm of truth. But it seems to suggest that the
economy grows because people have more money. In fact, people having
more money is more likely the effect of the economy growing than cause.
If they have more money not because the economy is growing but
because taxes have been cut, the money has simply been transferred from
someplace else. In that case, there are negative consequences to be
considered (below) if one wants to confront anything like the truth.
And as for Bush's concluding notion that the best way to make sure
people have money is not to take it away: If it's taken away, it's still
being spent, possibly on things that, themselves, spur the economy....
Well! That's quite an indictment of President Bush's statement, isn't
it? Actually, it's not. Speaking of half-truths, Mr. Gottlieb has simply
tossed out a few of his own to try and support his claims that President
Bush has told them. While that in and of itself is logically invalid,
let's pick apart his claims just for fun.
Gottlieb has a problem with stating whether people have more money is
the cause or the effect of a growing economy. That's fine, but that
doesn't make one claim a half truth and the other the whole truth.
Gottlieb's position is just as (in)valid as President Bush's. So either
Gottlieb is also telling a half truth...or he's simply of a differing
opinion. History shows that a growing economy and increasing incomes are
linked in a feedback loop. Trying to determine which comes first is like
arguing for the chicken or the egg. We can conclude, then, that
Gottlieb's claim that President Bush told a half-truth on this issue is
not supported by the facts.
Next, Gottlieb's claim when you cut taxes it amounts to a transfer "from
someplace else" is simply false. Cutting taxes means the government
doesn't take it from the taxpayer in the first place. There is no
"transfer" at all. This is simply the tired liberal attack on tax cuts:
that it's the government's money, not yours. However, the government
takes money from our paychecks, not the other way around. The claim that
government taxing your money and spending is of equal economic stimulus
isn't supported by the facts, either. To tax a dollar requires that the
government spend money. It costs money to collect taxes, to administer
the money and to spend it on items via government programs. All of this
money takes away from that dollar taxed, so it's something less than a
dollar that eventually gets spent. In addition, there are many
government programs that do not produce goods or services. Money spent
on those other programs has little, if any economic stimulus effect.
But enough of Gottlieb's hand waving about the Bush tax cuts (which goes
on to whine about deficits), what set me off was the last part of his
editorial. He told a whopper of lie:
The new debt caused by a tax cut might be a reasonable trade-off if
the tax cuts actually worked to stimulate the economy in the short term.
But the first thing that followed Ronald Reagan's tax cuts in 1981 was
the worst recession in 50 years. (Things did eventually get better.) And
the first thing that followed George W. Bush's tax cut in 2001 was nothing.
That's a part of the truth they want you to forget.
Well! Is that so? Of course it isn't. The recession started in June of
1981. Reagan's tax cuts were passed by Congress in late summer and early
fall. Taxpayers didn't receive any money until the summer of 1982, with
their 1982 tax returns. Guess when the recession ended? Yep, the fall of
1982, right after people started receiving their tax cut benefits. In
addition, the recession of 2001 ended right when the rebates for the
2001 tax cut were being received by the taxpayers, in the fall of 2001.
I guess for people like Mr. Gottlieb, a "half truth" is worthy of an
editorial, but an outright lie...well that's something to be proud of.
Four years ago in another response to the Dayton Daily News I said: "A
lie is not an editorial. An editorial is an opinion piece, and while the
DDN has all the right in the world to be wrong (one that they do
exercise frequently) they do not have the right to lie." Apparently that
statement is as necessary now as it was then.
...here I am once again tilting at windmills in the vain attempt to
educate their editorial staff.
So either Gottlieb is also telling a half truth...or he's simply of a
differing opinion.
Original: Lying About Reagan's Tax Cuts