Paul O'Neill on Bush -- "A blind man in a room full of deaf people."

http://www.sports-only.com/baseball/alltimeyankees/oneill2.jpg

O'Neill wasn't fired, he resigned. His resignation was reported as having been precipitated by the failure of the economy to respond to Bush’s economic policy. However, O'Neill had been fighting with the White House as to the conduct of Operation Green Quest - a Treasury Department task force that was looking into terrorist financing. O'Neill's resignation came a couple of days after Saudi Arabia announced that it wouldn't change it's policies regarding terror financing - effectively telling the investigation to drop dead. It's arguable as to how much pressure BushCo put on O'Neill to stop or otherwise limit his investigations, but given all of Bush's Saudi connections there's a good chance that the White House told him to back off also.

Meanwhile, the FBI, Treasury, and the Customs Department had been fighting with each other over jurisdiction of terrorist financing (this was before the Dept. of Homeland Security was established). And on top of that, a couple of GOP ideologues led by Grover Norquist were gunning for O'Neill because of O'Neill's non-support for Bush's tax cut package.

O'Neill has every reason to be bitter about the whole thing and I'll be first in line to pick up his eventual book.

Has there been any movement on this after the bombings in SA last year or is everything still window dressing so far?

I don't know for a fact that O'Neil was told to quit, but it was clear for a long time that he was at odds with several major players. He wasn't going to last and he knew it--when you're at odds with both the President and VP on major aspects of the economic policy, why exactly are you there in the first place?

Which to me, says a lot more about Bush: he made a bad hiring decision. Bush's policy/legislative failures (or successes) have a lot more to do with his cabinent appointments than his inability to speak in public, steal elections, or get blown by some fat intern delivering pizzas. You can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep, let alone people they select to help them make their most important decisions. And the list is long of presidents who have made appointments that have come back to haunt them many times over.

That said, I look at a prude like John Ashcroft and can't figure out the draw. He's polarizing, he has LOTS of enemies on the Hill (conservatives included), liberals hate him, he apparently hates the sight of bare breasts. I guess I need a thread called "SOMEONE EXPLAIN TO ME THE VALUE OF JOHN ASHCROFT"

haha this is classic doublespeak, i mean this should be true with any president, but the way it's laid out when they're on the defense, hahaha

This isn't all that O'Neill is saying - check this out.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?

Actually, this is the funnier and more telling statement (implicit response: 'so why'd ya hire him to start with?')

Um yeah. I think that's exactly what I posited four posts ago Ned.

The fact that anyone finds it surprising that the US government wanted to get rid of Saddam and had contingencies for life without him--and this includes the Clinton administration, who clearly didn't like him and thought he had WMDs and was pursuing nuclear capabilities--is telling.

Yes, but without so much elan.

True.

My nominee is Glen Campbell.

“Bush asks, ‘Haven't we already given money to rich people? This second tax cut's gonna do it again,’” says Suskind.

Now, his advisers, they say, ‘Well Mr. President, the upper class, they're the entrepreneurs. That's the standard response.’ And the president kind of goes, ‘OK.’

Please explain to me how a tax break is theft.

Well, in the case of the Bush tax cut, you basically have the government spending the taxes of future generations of Americans (ie., running up the national debt) in order to give a big tax break to the richest Americans of today. It doesn't take much of a stretch to see this as theft - theft from future generations by the powerful of today.

How exactly is it theft when the "richest" Americans are the ones paying the vast majority of the federal income taxes in the first place? Are they stealing from themselves? Or, as you are intimating, does the federal government have the primary claim on all income and thus is the distributor of it i.e. deciding how much a taxpayer gets to "keep"?

Secondly, it's hardly theft when the government has discretion to SPEND. In other words, even if the Bush tax cut was not passed there was still going to be a deficit of at least $340B (and arguably much higher than that). Who is stealing from who then? Or are you implying that we should tax the rich as much as possible until the budget deficit is zero?

Calling it theft makes little sense. Perhaps you find it unjust or not progressive enough, but using the word theft is gross hyperbole.

bushco's oft-stated goal of permanently repealing the federal estate and gift tax may not be "theft" per se, but it's a damn good way to create an aristocracy based upon untaxed (and, if the repeal becomes permanent, possibly untaxable) wealth

This might be somewhat persuading if there was empirical evidence to suggest that the estate tax actually prevented an aristocracy from developing. Please direct me to a study that shows the estate tax has done this--really, if I'm wrong, find. But it is my experience that the wealthy are quite adept at perpetuating their wealth downward, and that the estate tax has done very little at all to prevent generational wealth in families.

Further, to suggest that wealth goes untaxed is a misnomer as well. The estate tax is a tax on income that has almost certainly already been taxed once before. Beyond that, wealth of a large magnitude (let's assume at the estate tax levels) will work its way into back into the economy and get taxed again via excise taxes or, more than likely, further income taxes when it is used as capital spending (i.e. you inherit $500,000; you use that to buy a house; you pay property taxes, you pay sales taxes, etc.)

We'd all be a lot better off if those bastards in DC would stop using the tax code as a hammer for social engineering--not only the estate tax but the plethora of shelters that make it such a pile of bullshit. That's the whole point--we can keep raising the estate tax higher and higher but the "richest" that you want to punish will continue avoiding it.

Also: percentwise, this can get to be problematic. An extra .5% increase in a tax can add up if you're poor. .5% to a rich person means almost nothing. To a poor person, .5% is the difference between "rolling coins to pay for gas" and "selling blood to buy ramen noodles"

Secondly, it's hardly theft when the government has discretion to SPEND.
A side issue: An alarmingly hart proportion of the spending is done "Off budget" (yes, thats their term for it) on what they call "small" (*cough*) projects in the congressmans home districts.

Calling it theft makes little sense. Perhaps you find it unjust or not progressive enough, but using the word theft is gross hyperbole.
If you ask any of my Libertarian friends, they'd say that ALL taxes are theft and extortion. You pay the gubmint money or they throw you into prison. Ho ho ho.

Where do you get your ideas from Lord? Moveon.org? Because you clearly have no idea what you are talking about. Here's a clue: go consult a federal tax receipt table and then rethink your response. Here's another clue: despite the effort of the richest 5% to avoid paying taxes, they still account for the majority of federal personal income tax revenue. How does an ex-purt like you explain that?

And please--this isn't a discussion over what a progressive income tax is.

Your Libertarian friends may indeed consider taxes theft and extortion, but they have more logic in making a case than referring to lowering the upper marginal rates by a few percentage points as theft.

The primary reason the government is running a deficit is because the stagnant economy (which began to falter in the late summer of 2000 and resulted in an official recession) resulted in lower tax revenues. The marginal tax rate on the "rich", which didn't even move downward until 2003, was irrelevant in terms of its contribution to the deficit.

And there's certainly no double taxation in our system.

It is true, to some extent, that changes in federal distribution adversely affect states (i.e. they budget for X but get less than X, which at times is unforeseen.) I would appreciate it if you could direct me to something empirical that would support your supposition--this cry about shrinking federal distribution typically comes from states whose woes can be more easily explained by poor spending decisions.

Still, your argument of theft doesn't make sense. If the rich get a tax cut and pay less, then why do the middle class (or any other lower class on the ladder) suddenly start paying more? You are asserting that the rich person's income was someone else's to begin with when you make this argument. Which, I guess, might be your intention.

(xpost)

• the Rich Guy paid 33 Zillion,
  
• the Middle Class Guy (and his friends) each paid (part of) 33 Zillion,
  
• and the Poor Unwashed Masses paid the remaining ~33.3333 Zillion.

There is no reason to refute the deficit, given the level it is projected. It is not an alarming number, and it is not necessarily the result of possibly lower tax revenues from a lowered marginal bracket. If the economy were growing and there were a surplus, would the rich still be stealing?

The idea that this is theft in any way is utterly ridiculous. Theft is stealing property from someone else. This is simply not the case. Of all the things to rag on Bush, why spend time with something so specious?

I explained why the middle class start paying more-because lowering fed taxes leads to a rise in more regressive state taxes. This process doesn't always occur, and all the exceptions you pointed out are valid. But still, Bush is indirectly raising taxes (raising taxes=stealing, right?) on the non-rich to give to the rich. Obv, the rich can afford to pay a higher percentage of their income than the non-rich (as everyone else is pointing out xpost)

cos if your idea of a better tax system is to soak a little more out of non-residential property, profit, or capital gains then what's the first word you hear?

The whole problem with this explanation of stealing is this:

You're essentially positing that since states are regressive in their taxation, lowering the individual marginal rates results in higher excise taxes/fees on a state level. I could go on and demand proof for this, but let's assume you are indeed right for the sake of argument.

If this is your argument, then what you are also positing is that without significant progressivity on every excise tax or fee, that those who pay taxes will always be "stealing" from those who don't. In effect, the higher your marginal rate, the more you are stealing from anyone who doesn't pay taxes. The richer you are, the more you steal. And maybe that's how you see it.

I think this indeed is how you see things; no one's answering my question whether or not a higher bracket is stealing from the one below it in times of budgetary surplus, but with your assertions we have to assume they are.

cos if your idea of a better tax system is to soak a little more out of non-residential property, profit, or capital gains then what's the first word you hear?

Really, when you put it this way I find it hard to believe that you give a rat's ass what my ideas about a better system would encompass.

I don't mind a progressive taxation system. That in itself seems entirely reasonable. The biggest problem are all the loopholes that have come to define the US income tax system, which are completely unwarranted. But as I posted earlier, the tax burden problem primarily lies in excise taxes, which tend to be very regressive.

Some think that conservatives are intent on lowering the federal income tax rates (which was done across the board) because reduced revenues would in effect make the government smaller. Yeah, that might actually work if guys like Bush were not inventing ways to spend money every single day of the occupation.

Except for the fact that it was their money to begin with, Tracer. It's not a common pot. It's called letting everyone keep more of what they earn. Maybe you'll remember that the lower brackets were dropped immediately in 2001--the "rich" had to wait a couple of years before their rates moved down. What was happening to the common pot then? I understand your disgust with Turd Blossom, but it's not theivery. The theivery was when we were running a surplus and the fuckers in DC were spending OUR money rather than give it back to us immediately or pay off things like the national debt.

G--ff, I do agree that ultimately all taxes will have a political component, given that the creators and enforcers of taxes are always politically motivated. And obviously, those with that power are intoxicated by it, which is why simplification will never truly occur. And until it does, the people who will suffer most from it are the less well to do.

Given that rates have been roughly the same for the last 15 years, prior to which you have to go back to 1931 to find a top rate taxed at below 50%, you don't suppose that the labor market somehow factors tax rates into salaries such that what you're really "earn"ing is your post-tax income?

(and for the record, I'm neither signing onto "theft" nor bothering to get into the public-private distinction)

I think tax burden--though not at all the federal income tax brackets--affects the labor market to some degree, but it's probably indiscernable given the complexity.

The reason for this is that your post tax income varies widely per individual--exemptions, credits, and things of this nature would make it very difficult to empirically determine the magnitude of the effect on federal income tax rate brackets and the labor market--there are simply too many variables involved.

So in the sense that labor is market driven and tax burden is an element of the market, it certainly factors into salary/compensation. But it's certainly not as simple as compensation being adjusted to reflect the tax bracket/marginal rate--it might be discernable on the very lowest of rates, but I doubt it. Maybe there's some research that would prove me wrong. Or maybe I've totally misunderstood the question.

Besides what's wrong with wrong with a system that takes money from those who have more than they need to pay for services for those who have less than they need?

(oh and by the way a country needs a national debt to keep certain kinds of financial instruments working, there was nearly a crisis in insurance in the UK because there weren't enough UK gilts to meet mandated secure investment levels by Assurance funds. Instead the equity bubble did for the insurance industry but that's by the by)

Tracer was right to call the current administration thieves. Once you steal an election there's really no going back.

I was wondering how long it would take before this showed up.

What was most bizarre and galling about the bushco tax cut that it was retrospective, it was cheque in the post.

Please explain this one to me, Ed.

Besides what's wrong with wrong with a system that takes money from those who have more than they need to pay for services for those who have less than they need?

Because a) at some point the returns are diminishing and b) the bar of "need" is sliding, subject to wild variability, and most galling of all subject to the whims of politicians.

I'm curious how you arrived at the conclusion that the rapidly expanding deficit is not alarming. I'm not a professional economist, but many of them are alarmed by the expansion of the deficit. The IMF recently issued a report in which it basically said that the US should not assume that it is always going to enjoy the unfettered confidence of the financial markets if it persists in running such large deficits. Financial confidence is a somewhat unpredictable beast. If something were to happen to change the market's view of the safety of US debt, the consequences could be devastating to the economy.

The reason I'm not alarmed by the deficit is that it's not significantly large, and it's not projected to expand rapidly. There was rapid expansion because of the recession, but that is predictable. I don't know many economists that are officially alarmed, but it certainly bothers some more than others. Anyone who says there is a consensus on the deficit among economists doesn't know what they are talking about. To be sure, there are some negative effects of a deficit, but they are often mitigated by other positive effects given other economic conditions. As for the IMF, they have a notable card in the game (as does the US), so that prejudice bears consideration.

And even if the US manages to maintain it's supreme credit rating, it's level of foreign debt, which according to the IMF is "unprecedented" for a large industrial nation

Foreign debt is not necessarily predicated by the US budget deficit, though I don't know offhand how much of the US liability can be discernably traced to budget deficits. That's a pretty complicated issue in itself. Not only that, but the effect of driving up global interest rates is well--certainly US economic activity has a pronounced effect on this but again, it isn't necessarily coined to the US budget deficit. Many other things can affect it, but it is still a notable problem.

As for the tax cuts being 25% of the source, the argument can be made that it was a legitimate stimulus when the US economy was stagnant. In other words, had the tax cuts not been enacted, what would the deficit been without the stimulus to the economy? The IMF does not address this issue (other than acknowledging the rationale for tax cuts), but it is completely relevant. So while the 25% is a significant figure, it cuts both ways. We cannot simply assume the consequences of one effect without considering the other. After all, your only choices to artificially stimulate the economy are: spend more money, cut taxes, or mess with the interest rates, all which adversely affect the deficit. Bush did all three. Some argue that doing nothing is better than increasing the deficit, but clearly, the US doesn't see that as politically palatable.

The deficit running now is completely manageable, but even if it was at zero we are in for a big problem in about 20 years.

Yes, the tax cut provided some stimulus. However, the problem with the tax cut as stimulus is the matter of timing. An effective stimulus should be short-term and stimulate consumption. The point of the stimulus is to lessen the effect of the downturn in the business cycle and speed the the arrival of the next up-turn. Unfortunately, the Bush tax cut spreads its effect out over 10 years, and Bush has made public his desire to make it permanent. As a result, the long-term negative effects of the tax cut - ie., higher interest rates - will be around long after the short-term stimulus effects have worn off. As the IMF report itself concludes:

"However, the estimates surveyed in Section II generally suggest that the short-term stimulus stemming from the FY2004 budget proposals is likely to wane in several years, with higher deficits beginning to crowd out private investment and dampen output thereafter. In one simulation, for example, the tax cuts would eventually lower U.S. productivity—in terms of labor output per hour—by ½ percent in the long run."

Also, I'm puzzled by your vague suggestion that the IMF has a "notable card" in the game? Which card is that? The IMF's interest is in maintain global economic stability. It's economic views are well known for being on the conservative, pro-markets side of the spectrum. There is no reason why it would have an anti-Bush bias.

You stated the IMF's interest in the economy--stability, an interest the US also maintains (although it can also be assumed that the US interest in stability is biased towards policies that favor the US.) But the methods of achieving stability are debatable--even, as a guy like O'Neill learned, within conservative perspectives. Thus, if the IMF has the same goals but different strategies/objectives to reach those goals, there is going to be conflict. The IMF is not the final word on economics, but merely one perspective. Indeed, the long-term lowering of productivity from tax cuts is an theorhetical position to take, and a legitimately debatable one at that. But if current US policy proves the IMF incorrect on its assumptions, the IMF loses credibility. The IMF is a political body just like any other organization with that kind of influence.

As a result, the long-term negative effects of the tax cut - ie., higher interest rates - will be around long after the short-term stimulus effects have worn off

This may be true. Then again, it may not. Or, higher interest rates may come about, but they may be relatively inconsequential. Nobody predicted the interest rates we are currently at, for example, five years ago. Some (notably Krugman, since his mouthpiece is so public) predicted things like deflation and other economic effects that have been seen in Japan and Argentina in the past decade, but they have yet to be seen. US monetary policy (which is different and often conflicting with fiscal policy) is quite averse to inflation.

And that's why the case for cutting taxes remains such a debated position among economists. Obviously, it's easy to measure things like resulting debt after a tax cut, but it's much more difficult to convincingly measure economic effect had tax cuts not been enacted.

Finally, from the IMF link:

"There is little doubt that significant macroeconomic gains could be reaped from reforms of the U.S. tax code, with the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA, 2003) citing estimates of potential gains in the range of 2–6 percent of GDP. The tax system places a disproportionate burden on personal and corporate incomes, compared with a consumption-based tax system, discourages labor market participation and saving, and is, hence, economically less efficient. The administration's 2003 proposals were viewed as a significant move toward a consumption-based tax system, because the initial package of measures announced in February would have lowered marginal income tax rates, eliminated the double taxation of dividends, and significantly expanded the extent to which income earned on saving would have been tax free.

Moreover, tax reform that simplified the system could also yield significant gains, given that the multitude of tax deductions and exemptions have imposed considerable administrative and other costs. As noted in CEA (2003), taxpayers are required to spend roughly 3 billion hours a year dealing with federal tax matters, and overall compliance costs are estimated at around 10 percent of total federal tax revenues.It remains an open question whether the tax cuts adopted since early 2001 will have significant supply-side benefits."

(my boldface, obv.)

I point out these two highlights to show that the IMF report is virtually packed with theorhetical positions and uses various statistics to support them. The first passage is virtually in lockstep with Bush's policy and refutes O'Neill (who is not an economist, though he has his undergrad degree in it). But you will find many economists who disagree with that position entirely or at least partially. The same goes for the last passage, and there has been a plethora of research on supply-side economics in the past decade. Most of it refutes the positions the Reagan administration took.

"Not significantly large"? The fact that an actual clock had to be built to track the rate the US gov't is still leaking money says something, namely that tis past time for Bush to join dad in retiring to the lecture circuit.

Crucial paragraph.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/005628.php

btw, o. nate you had a lot of thoughtful comments in this thread. thanks for those, even though I don't agree with them all.

(Sidebar: Ned, check usual space)

Mr O'Neill was prepared for the fallout from his comments.

"These people are nasty and they have a long memory," he said of Bush political operatives.

"I'm an old guy and I'm rich, and there's nothing they can do to hurt me," he added.

* = Give or take a year or two, but it was during the Great Depression.

You cannot accurately determine poverty by the marginal tax rate, so I really have no idea what you are talking about.

Returns are most certainly diminishing--see the Laffer curve and other significant discussions of high personal income tax rates (i.e. 75%).

The bar of need is indeed sliding--the poverty line you refer to has been revised over the years (and not just indexed for inflation, for example), but not fundamentally. Calculating and determining poverty for use by the federal government remains a highly debated topic. For example, for the feds poverty is based on income, household size and relationship. Income considered for determining poverty is money income before taxes. Capital gains and noncash benefits, such as food stamps or medicaid, are not counted as income. Thus, you would be considered living in poverty if you were living on a trust fund or were not otherwise paying taxes. You would be living in poverty if you were older and living in a nursing home. These issues skew the data and take focus away from the truly needy, but we are left with this situation because the politicians in DC are to busy battling turf wars to change it.

I meant to say "could"

I think this is maybe just a kind of classic "internet arguing" mode that I'm not very familiar with, but it's a sophisticated one. You are both very good at bringing together only those points and facts that support your position. But what's curious about your positions - especially, to my mind, yours, don - is that they aren't so much spelled-out ideas or agendas or whatever, but strategically placed foxholes from which to chuck things. I must admit you've dug thse foxholes very well and in virtually invulnerable spots. But I daresay you're never going to get to come out unless you come up with a different way of talking to the rest of us.

O'Neill's Book Spurs Investigation

...The Treasury Department said Monday it was launching an inspector general's investigation into how a Treasury document stamped "secret" wound up being used in O'Neill's interview Sunday night on the CBS program "60 Minutes," where O'Neill was promoting his new book, "The Price of Loyalty."

[...]

O'Neill told the "Today" show he was guilty of using some "vivid" language during his hundreds of hours of interviews with Suskind for the book. "If I could take it back, I would take it back," he said of the blind man quote...

Why does the AP not underline a booktitle?

Please direct me to my use of hearsay, Tracer.

peppered them with a little impatience and bad manners

It's nice that you say you relish having your mind changed, don, but I haven't seen it happen, nor have I seen you exhibit any particular zest for adapting your views to new or different information

So if I don't change my mind then I can't relish it actually happening? If I wasn't curious about new information, I wouldn't spend the majority of my time bothering with threads and websites that are overwhelmingly in conflict with my own political perspective. Isn't it obvious by now that I'm one of the few non-liberal perspectives on ILX?

But what's curious about your positions - especially, to my mind, yours, don - is that they aren't so much spelled-out ideas or agendas or whatever, but strategically placed foxholes from which to chuck things

This is such a bizarre charge and void of examples that I have no idea what you are talking about. The topics I choose to discuss are ones that interest me. I do not have some explicit agenda, but typically I find that in matters of politics that my view is divergent from most around ILX. Rather than just pass it off on every fucking thread, I occasionally wade in and join the fray. Are you just annoyed that I refuted your charges of "theft" or is there some other aspect of my personality that is bothering you? You accuse me of having no zest to change my mind or being open to new information, but it seems to me that you are just as close minded.

Gee, thanks for spoiling our little lovefest, Tracer. ;-(

Also, I thought the whole point of debating was bringing a different set of facts or theories than the norm. Isn't that how one draws a conclusion? And what is wrong with hearing the other side out and then still disagreeing with them in the first place?

And if I am nasty, then I hope you will point that out. As for being "superior", well, I'm not really sure what to make of that, other than I don't want to inappropriately condescend to anyone. Unless, of course, they deserve it ;)

As for Ashcroft, Bush doesn't seem too concerned about polarizing figures who are hated by "liberals" (and the odd "conservative") (I can't see these terms the same way after being in the UK for four months). I mean, he is one.

O'Neill's allegation is not just that the admin had contingencies for life without Saddam (which, according to the news today that he has about two years to live due to terminal cancer, would have come soon enough without a war, for better or worse), but that those contingencies were developed in the context of orders from the President to develop the means to go to war in Iraq, actions of questionable Constitutionality given the absence of any Congressional authorization to do so. The allegation is founded upon O'Neill's attendance at National Security Council meetings.

After a brief period in which administration figures and apologists appeared to winkingly admit the allegation, it was at least tacitly denied by Bush himself, who stated that administration policy-planning regarding Iraq prior to 9/11 was limited to issues regarding patrol of the No-Fly Zone, as under Clinton. However, a second source who attended the same NSC meetings as O'Neill has now come forward to verify O'Neill's claim, in effect stating that the President is lying.

In other news, the link Don provides above, which asserts that the docs O'Neill referred to in his 60 minutes interview are Commerce Dept docs related to global oil supplies and not plans for a post-war Iraq, incidentally reveal the disingenuousness of the claim that O'Neill exposed any secrets by discussing the docs - they were obtained in the Cheney energy lawsuit by conservative legal group Judicial Watch and have been posted on the group's website for several months.

When the admin fired O'Neill, they asked him to lie and say that he was resigning. This is dismissed by admin apologists as criticism of the admin for telling the littlest of white lies. That dismissal elides the difference between omitting to correct the lie of a former government employee, now a private individual, to allow the employee to save face, and insisting, in one's government office, that the employee lie to save the face of the administration.

Also, Rumsfeld: "I can't imagine how anyone's experience would be different from mine in this administration! Now excuse me while I bark out belligerent bad-ass orders."

If Paul O'Neill is such a righteous guy, and so frank and honest like he'd like us to believe, then why wasn't he pointing out the lies and the (alleged) misuse of Constitutional authority (i.e. war planning)? Why was it okay for him to toe the company line back in early 2001, but once he gets fired it's suddenly a noble act to blow the whistle? O'Neill has a story to tell, but his hindsight is stunninging pious. Were he an intern, or merely some sort of White House drone, it might be understandable that he was bullied around. But here's a guy who was working directly with his friends of 20-30 years, he's been at the top of American industry, he's got an unbelievable amount of power in government, and yet he keeps his big mouth shut. It takes away a person's credibility when they try to wash their hands like this, rather than stand there like an adult and take some damn responsibility.

It's people like O'Neill that enable government to get away with all this dangerous shit. His lack of courage, his lack of acumen, his lack of ethical duty allowed (allegedly bad things to happen. Where were you when the country needed you? You spent at least nine months sitting on this information while you were writing this book, let alone years in the White House watching it unfold. Why is it that these turncoat-tellall books put the author on any sort of a pedastal? Is anyone in Washington DC willing to do their duty to the country anymore?

hmm. I don't know about Terry Gross handling this one, as she's not the most pressing with important political figures.

I'd say the holy master was Roosevelt. Or maybe Andrew Jackson. Hell, Lincoln trampled the fucker, too. And no way can we compile a list without Clinton.

In other words, even though Bush doesn't listen to anyone and is blind in a roomful of deaf people, he's still the best person for the job. Or something like that.

In any case, O'Neill's statement about the administration's Iraq plans don't really break any new ground. Anyone who looked at the make-up of the Bush cabinet and the people he placed in the important Defense policy posts could see that he was favoring the neo-con crowd that had agitated for an Iraq war for years. Not too mention that Bush had a personal stake in seeing Saddam overthrown because (1) he views it as completing the job that his Poppy left unfinished and (2) he has a personal vendetta against Saddam because Saddam once authorized an assassination attempt on Bush Sr. I remember reading an article in the New Yorker right after Bush came into office in 2000 that openly speculated that his election could mean a war with Iraq.

The scandal of the Iraq war plans, which is old news but no less relevant for that, is that Bush was not open with the American people about his reasons for the war. His motivations predated Sept. 11, but like any good politician, he seized the political moment and portrayed the Iraq war as part of the War on Terrorism. And unfortunately the American people bought it. Of course, once we were in Iraq, the WMD vanished and the "intelligence" behind his State of the Union speech was shown to be faulty, but by that point is was too late to go back, and as Bush is fond of saying, it didn't really matter whether we found the WMD or not. Surprisingly (or not, given your level of cynicism) the American people yawned.

Quite plausibly read: I was threatened and am now being a pussy. Although actually, he hasn't backed down that much. For instance, he only said he "probably would" vote for Bush. Faint praise. More below.*

Even if he had said definitely, why should we believe that such a prospective and unverifiable claim trumps the issues/allegations that he knows have already been widely and effectively publicized? Isn't it rather inconsistent to cast aspersions on his reliability regarding an unfavorable set of statements because he is a "fired administration official predictably writing tell all," a "bad hiring decision," not "that much of a find," and "never in the inner circle," and then tacitly urge us to completely credit his reliability on what is read as a favorable statement?

*Not to mention that a lawyer-like (but not tortuous?) reading of his words leaves open the possibility that while he presumably credits Bush with an acceptable level of preparation and capability, his statement does not contradict any aspersions he may have cast on Bush's conduct of his office. It also leaves open the possibility that he believes that some or all of the declared candidates for President are equally prepared and capable as Bush, and that they might conduct the office better than he would.

The point (as has been reiterated) seemed to have been that Bush's tax cuts got rich/upper middle class tax cuts at the sacrifice of future budget deficits. While I'm sure this is out and out "theft", it certainly doesn't smell good either. After all poor and middle class people, for the most part, don't pay/pay virtually insignificant amounts of income tax. They pay payroll taxes (which were not represented in the Bush tax plan). So, obviously, rich people and those in the upper middle class are going to make up the majority of those who pay income and estate taxes.

The estate tax being taken away "for the benefit of all Americans" is absurd too. Its a tax that only effects 1% of households in the US, and 50% of the tax's total income comes from a mere 0.16% of American households. Its really not helping anyone anywhere to rid the tax code of it; in fact, it only adds to the national debt by erasing it (hilariously, there's a clause in the tax cuts that will bring back the estate tax in 2011. expect a sudden rash of deaths among rich elderly folks in December 2010).

>>Except for the fact that it was their money to begin with, Tracer. It's not a common pot. It's called letting everyone keep more of what they earn. Maybe you'll remember that the lower brackets were dropped immediately in 2001--the "rich" had to wait a couple of years before their rates moved down. What was happening to the common pot then? I understand your disgust with Turd Blossom, but it's not theivery. The theivery was when we were running a surplus and the fuckers in DC were spending OUR money rather than give it back to us immediately or pay off things like the national debt.<<

The vast majority of which (probably 2.5 trillion or so) dissapeared in the tax break. Then, add in a slowing economy and a rash of spending, and boom, it was gone. Besides, saying something like "let us spend our money!" is all nice and good until you realize that the surpluses were really from social security and medicare, and that their returned investment into the gov't (either to shore up the system or to pay off the national debt) is necessary for its survival. You, of course, already brought this point up (albeit briefly).

>>If Paul O'Neill is such a righteous guy, and so frank and honest like he'd like us to believe, then why wasn't he pointing out the lies and the (alleged) misuse of Constitutional authority (i.e. war planning)? Why was it okay for him to toe the company line back in early 2001, but once he gets fired it's suddenly a noble act to blow the whistle? O'Neill has a story to tell, but his hindsight is stunninging pious. Were he an intern, or merely some sort of White House drone, it might be understandable that he was bullied around. But here's a guy who was working directly with his friends of 20-30 years, he's been at the top of American industry, he's got an unbelievable amount of power in government, and yet he keeps his big mouth shut. It takes away a person's credibility when they try to wash their hands like this, rather than stand there like an adult and take some damn responsibility.

It's people like O'Neill that enable government to get away with all this dangerous shit. His lack of courage, his lack of acumen, his lack of ethical duty allowed (allegedly bad things to happen. Where were you when the country needed you? You spent at least nine months sitting on this information while you were writing this book, let alone years in the White House watching it unfold. Why is it that these turncoat-tellall books put the author on any sort of a pedastal? Is anyone in Washington DC willing to do their duty to the country anymore? <<

OTM.

-
Alan

Umm, that post of mine was meant to be extremely cynical and note that O'Neill is all over the map.

But I have to give you credit gabbneb--you book a realistic amount of wiggle room/parsability (sp?) into O'Neill's latest comments.

The vast majority of which (probably 2.5 trillion or so) dissapeared in the tax break. Then, add in a slowing economy and a rash of spending, and boom, it was gone.

What is your source on this, Alan?

Getting rid of the estate tax is not a matter of the effect on the budget--allegedly it is a principled position to take. (Obviously, principles are relative in DC but it is most certainly arguable on principle.)

Alan, your points about the deficit are notable with respect to medicare/social security, although as I've mentioned before, no one in this thread has addressed the consequences of not lowering the marginal rates. You have to one degree--you say what they "cost" the budget, but that's only part of the effect since lower taxes=economic stimulus=increased tax revenue. Not only that, but what is the effect of not raising taxes on tax revenue? In other words, what happens to buget deficits if there is no decrease in marginal tax rates but the economy continues to falter? Those two effects are obviously very, very difficult to measure but they seem relevant.

* = Rough guestimate of the percentile of slaves to overall population in the US in the mid 1800s. I don't have actual figures.
** = If this bit of insane rhetoric doesn't cause either impassioned debate or the triggering of the forum's self-destruct mechanism, then we've all become far to apathetic.

The temporary federal estate tax repeal is the second most disgraceful bill of shit that the public has been sold in recent years. I don't know a single person to whom it applies--the only people who actually pay federal estate tax are 1) the really really rich or 2) very-upper income people who have utterly failed to do any rational estate planning. The big effect the temporary repeal of the federal estate tax has had is on states. State estate taxes used to be pretty big revenue generator; however, becasuse many states statutorily tie their own estate taxes to the federal tax (albiet with lower gross estate limits), those revenues have been drying up in a real hurry.

I suspect the reference was to the FDR-engineered rise of the regulatory state, and the parallel decline of the state legislature's importance. A lot of commentators have suggested that the New Deal was unconstitutional because it started the federalization of a lot of activity that was formerly governed by the states.

I'm not sure what that has to do with martial law, though.

Of course, O'Neill isn't stupid enough to let a little incompetence spoil a good thing. Don't forget his earlier statement: "I'm rich".

Andrew Jackson - He openly defied the Indian Removal Act, among other things, that led to thousands of Indians getting killed

Roosevelt - basically, what J said. Legislating with the "emergency powers" rationale aside, no other president has empowered the federal government so much. By relieving the states of so much, the fed became a much more leveraged sow and the repercussions continue to this day.

Lincoln - Do you know anything about the guy, or were you just making assumptions on my reasoning in order to play the race card? Lincoln illegally suspended the writ of habeas corpus; imprisoned without warrant or trial some 13,000 Northern citizens who opposed his policies; arrested dozens of newspaper editors and owners and, in some cases, had federal soldiers destroy their printing presses; censored all telegraph communication; nationalized the railroads; created three new states (Kansas, Nevada, and West Virginia) without the formal consent of the citizens of those states, an act that Lincoln’s own attorney general thought was unconstitutional; ordered Federal troops to interfere with Northern elections; deported a member of Congress from Ohio after he criticized Lincoln’s unconstitutional behavior; confiscated private property; confiscated firearms in violation of the Second Amendment; and eviscerated the Ninth and Tenth Amendments. Lincoln did a lot of great things, but he trampled the constitution like a cheap whore to reach his ends. And he didn't need to.

Clinton: He neither asked for nor received legislative authorization to bomb Yugoslavia. Clinton didn't even formally notify Congress of his military actions until two days after the bombing began -- conveniently after Congress left town on Easter recess. Today Clinton's tenuous claim of authority rests on little more than two vaguely and differently worded non-binding resolutions. In this, ironically, Clinton is modeling his presidential behavior on the expansive conceptions of the Vietnam era, a war a younger Bill Clinton protested as unjust and unconstitutional. Oh yeah--like so many others, he loved the power of Executive Orders.

AND HOW

"Quietly, O'Neill and his publisher have prepared an irrefutable response. Soon they will post every one of the 19,000 documents underlying the book on the Internet. The story will not be calmed."

Maybe it's really Suskind (who also was DiIulio's mouthpiece), but O'Neill seems more of a player than I thought.

Bush: "In the initial stages of the administration, as you might remember, we were dealing with Desert Badger or flyovers and fly-betweens and looks, and we were fashioning policy along those lines."

No, actually, we don't remember.

Suskind is a good, able writer who documented what happened--in the case of O'Neill, it's safe to assume that Suskind didn't even have to beg to get him to sing. O'Neill has been a major power player with all the right friends in DC for three decades. You don't hold that kind of power by accident.

FIVE FIREPLACES?!

"He drives the meetings, tough questions, he likes dissent, he likes to see debate," he said.

Why not? In the end, he can drive the engine til it runs out of gas (ideas), then veto them after.

Curiosity: Is O'Neill backing down these days? Saw him on the Today show in my pre-OJ state yesterday morn, and he said something like, "I was [only] asked by the author to give my opinions, I personally have no problems with the Bush administration...."

Lest I'm wrong, the gov't don't bounce out those that are willing to play the game. He's been breached.

O. Nate, I agree wholeheartedly. Moreover, I think it's important in this context to distinguish between "damage to the Constitution" and "damage to constitutional rights." I think it's arguable whether FDR and Clinton (to take two examples) actually damaged the constitutional structure of government, but I don't think it's at all fair to accuse them of damaging the constitutional rights of citizens (I admit that a lot of libertarian-types accuse FDR in particular of doing just that in relation to property rights, but frankly, that's a side point). The Bush administration is presiding over major erosions of the I, IV, V, and XIV Amendments to the Constitution. That is, quite frankly, more fundamental to most Americans than issues relating to whether the FDA has the power to regulate the quality of milk or whether police actions and undeclared wars are permitted under the war powers act.

Actually, it's what makes me be a lot more vigilant about it right now. Unlike, say, certain interest groups or political parties who sit by idly unless a political opponent is trampling our Constitutional rights. Additionally, the shit that they got away with yesterday clears the way for the shit they will get away with today and tomorrow. The reason Bush is getting away with all this shit is because Clinton was allowed to, Poppy was allowed to, etc. It's not getting better. In fact, since Vietnam the War Powers Act has only been watered down further because no president was successfully held accountable. The same goes for the power of Executive Order, etc.

it's important in this context to distinguish between "damage to the Constitution" and "damage to constitutional rights."

It seems merely convenient for your argument to try to distinguish the two. I am not convinced that you have disentangled the intimate relationship between those two concepts.

Also, I'm curious why property rights are a "side point" to any discussion over the constitutional rights of citizens?

Finally, I am confused by your depiction of what is fundamental to most Americans with regards to Amendments I, IV, V, and XIV since you only refer to the Amendments and do not refer to specific erosions.

The bottom line is that the citizens of this country do not value the Constitution all that much.

Other than the dry history lessons we are force-fed during schooldays, is there any true value left in it? These lessons were supposed to teach us why it was so important. These days, tis hard to still respect a document when its purpose been watered down by (mostly) opportunistic politicians that only remember its use as a media soundbite.

People are fucking morons.

Second, I never said that property rights were a side point; my "side point" was that libertarians accuse FDR of trampling on property rights. I think it's an unfounded accusation, and one that can only really be made if you think that the drafters of the Constitution meant to incorporate whole hog John Locke's theory of property (Cf. Richard Epstein), a notion I firmly believe to be without support.

Finally, I refer to the erosion of Amendments because it's frankly more accurate to do so. I could create a laundry list of specific actions that would support the argument that, say, the V Amendment's right to indictment is being eroded, but I didn't really think that was necessary. More importantly, I don't really have the time to do the legal research necessary to quote you chapter and verse.

Or not.

To play devil's advocate, wouldn't you say times have changed enough such that maybe it makes a little sense that the Constitution has been trampled over time? (Granted, there are more ways it has been trampled that I don't like than otherwise)

Particularly in light of our current national culture, federalism doesn't really mean much. Nor should it, seeing as how technology has allowed me to travel from Ohio to New York in two hours rather than two weeks, and the television/telephone/internet allows me to have instantaneous contact with citizens of other states

I am still having difficulty understanding you, perhaps because I am a dolt. Or perhaps what I am lamenting is the pervasiveness of federalism and not making myself clear. Yes, Joe is pissed that he is arrested no matter who is cuffing him. And yes, in some ways there are more excuses for federalism to exist given technology and the vast changes in interstate commerce. But you were selective in the Amendments you listed, and by merely listing them it is hard for me to comparatively ignore the actions of previous presidents and suddenly find the erosions under Bush to be "major." My point is not that examples don't exist--and I respect you for saying you don't have time to chapter and verse me--it's that I do not find the amount of intrusion/erosion to be comparatively significant. In fact, if you did want to start listing erosions I would be happy to go tit-for-tat with items from the Clinton years. More importantly, I do not agree that what Bush is doing bothers the majority of Americans (with regards to the Constitution, as you asserted) on a fundamental level more than, say, what other presidents have done. In fact, I think it's the opposite, unfortunately.

The New Deal had more to do with (arguably) undermining the federal system than they had to do with undermining the rights of particular citizens within that system. That's the distinction between "damage to the Constitution" and "damage to Constitutional rights." The Constitution, exlcusive of amendments, is primarily concerned with the establishment of a system of government and a set of procedures for that system. Most of the discussion of the substantive rights of citizens can be found in the amendments to the Constitution.

The example you quoted earlier re: Clinton had more to do with (arguably) undermining the tripartite federal government, particularly the power of Congress. Admittedly, this is not true of Lincoln's decision to suspend Habeas or FDR's approval of the Japanese internment camps. Jackson's decision to ignore both Congress and the Supreme Court regarding the Indian Removal Act has elements of both problems, although I'm sure some would argue that because the tribes were sovereign nations the structural problems are not present.

You will note, however, that upthread I said the greatest anti-constitutionalist was John Marshall. I defy anyone to explain to me how the U.S. Supreme Court obtained the power of judicial review of statutes and executive actions with reference to the text of the Constitution. "Weakest branch" my ass!

However, what I really have a problem with is the argument that somehow strong federalism is intrinsically better than federalization. Everything in modern Western experience defies that notion, and to argue that the U.S. is a strong country because of federalism rather than other factors strikes me as nothing short of ridiculous.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2093949/

Re: "Blind man in a room full of deaf people," Kinsley didn't think. Deaf people communicate how? And what would happen to a blind man in that room?

If you set aside Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, the safety record of nuclear [power] is really very good.
-Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, June 2001

http://thepriceofloyalty.ronsuskind.com/thebushfiles/archives/000046.html

Donut Ignation Bitch, Treasury Of The Treasure Trail