Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Part 2 of Rep. Paul Ryan's Crazy "Down the Rabbit Hole" Free Market Freidman Randisms.



This is the second part of a recent Rep. Paul Ryan speech where free market lies and failures are covered up with idealistic catch phrases, platitudes and theories. Throw in a few words like "freedom" and "liberty," what's not to like if you're a real truck driven, flag waving image conscious American.

"This debate encapsulates the defining issue of our generation: should we reform and strengthen America’s free market democracy? Or, should we abandon it for a European-style social welfare state, the dream of third wave Progressives? Ultimately this is about an ideological crusade … the European Union: a welfare state society … and the spirit of risk-taking is smothered by a thick web of regulations from an all-providing central government.

“In my view, this Health Care reform plan is the vanguard of the Democratic leaders’ crusade against the American idea. That’s a pretty harsh charge, but I can see only two possibilities: either they are ignorant of the consequences of their own programs -- or they know and intend them.

“In a TV interview President Obama said: ‘If we don't pass it… the federal government will go bankrupt.’ “Our leadership’s ‘credibility gap’ has reached Grand Canyon proportions! You stop the nation from going broke by enacting a program costing $800 billion or more in the first decade? The President must know this will only accelerate the bankruptcy … there is only one way to achieve that goal under his Health Care program: the government must ration health care, deeply and comprehensively.
The hair pulling moment here is Ryan's, heck the whole Republican Partys refusal to tell the truth: reform is PAID FOR! IT SAVES MONEY THE FIRST 10 YEARS, AND LOTS OF MONEY THE NEXT 10 YEARS! Sorry for the caps, but I've had it. For Ryan, safety nets and social obligation fall under the poll tested negative term "welfare state."

The national health care exchange … together with its massive subsidies for middle income earners, will be the greatest expansion of the welfare state in a generation, and possibly in history.
Ryan is forgetting his own plan that provides a government subsidy to EVERY income earner. He doesn't count his own government handout because it's so small it will have little impact on making health care affordable. Ryan also whines about the wealthy, who no longer have to pay the 15.2 percent payroll tax once they exceed incomes over $106,800, having to pay more of the health care bill than the middle class. Give me a break.

As income rises, of course, the health care subsidies phase out. The effect is to impose a huge marginal tax penalty that will act as a massive disincentive on work.
The prosperous 50's and 60's penalized success with tax brackets over 70 percent for the wealthy. Did we see a resulting disincentive to work? No. A Ryan lie, another myth. It's at this point Ryan goes in for the kill, the fear mongering point of his philosophy.

“American citizens once took pride in being responsible for their individual well-being and for governing themselves in freedom. They are now to become passive subjects of government leaders, wheedling for hand-outs, more concerned about their security than their liberty. And when America reaches their intended goal, those of us who still cherish human freedom will be reduced to near-silence. Whatever you call the post-American regime they would force on this land, it will be no free market democracy.”
Ryan's biggest deception is slipped in at the end, when he combines "free market" with "democracy," as if he's really concerned about democracy at all. The "buyer beware" world Ryan envisions will result in legalized thievery of the American wage earner.

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