Monday, April 9, 2012

Electricity In The Air


When I saw Bob Lutz, former GM chairman, on Bill Maher's show recently, I was surprised to see what a right-wing nutjob he is. Global warming denier, reflexive Obama hater, the usual. Obviously a smart guy, but brainless.

So this whole RWS™ thing about the Chevy Volt, Lutz' baby, is pretty weird. Or would be, if it weren't so typical: insane ranting, based completely on falsehood. There's a good opinion piece on it in the NYT:

For months, the conservative propaganda machine — including Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, and Neil Cavuto, the Fox News business editor — had been mocking the Volt, and linking it to President Obama, who has long touted the promise of electric cars...

What is the connection between President Obama and the Volt? There is none. The car was the brainchild of Bob Lutz, a legendary auto executive who is about as liberal as the Koch brothers. The tax credit — which is part of the reason conservatives hate the car — became law during the Bush administration.

“It’s nuts,” said Lutz, when I spoke to him earlier in the week. “This is a significant achievement in the auto industry. There are so many legitimate things to criticize Obama about. It is inexplicable that the right would feel the need to tell lies about the Volt to attack the president.”... Although he remains deeply conservative, Lutz told me that he has become disenchanted with the right’s willingness to spread lies to aid the cause.

So there's one guy, anyway, who finds his side's use of lies disturbing. Not quite a trend, but it does show it's possible. Now, if regular people (like PT and Seaspray?) could ever acknowledge it, I'd start to believe ("start" in the sense that a journey of a thousand miles...) that Republicans are capable of demanding better of their leaders. That the coming campaign would be a battle of actual ideas.

But that would mean that several impossibilities would have come to pass; that Rs would try to make a case that, against all evidence (including pretty damn recent stuff), tax cuts for the wealthy and deregulation of banks and corporations will finally make our economy tick; that they'd plainly state how they'd deal with the millions of Americans who'll be uninsured if they eliminate the ACA, showing their work behind their claim that using emergency rooms is a workable solution. And that they'd come up with a real plan for controlling health care costs; or that they'd show how "market forces" will suddenly apply to health care, when they never have.

It'd mean that they'd have specified what the government will look like if the Ryan budget becomes law; namely, that they'd address -- specifically, honestly, with real numbers -- the math that shows the devastated government left after their planned tax cuts, military spending increases, and why people should want it. And they'd tell us exactly which tax loopholes they plan to close and how far that will go to reduce deficits. Using, again, those pesky numbers.

And Mitt would have stopped lying about President Obama and would have begun to address his objections to his actual record, while proposing workable and actual alternatives. Then, voters would be in a position to choose between two very different, non-distorted, clearly-stated, and thoughtfully argued views of our future.

Wouldn't that be something? And, for Democrats, it oughta be like shooting fish in a duck.


7 comments:

  1. Of course the chairman of GM is going to defend his crony capitalist tax rebates and tax subsidies.

    The Volt gets the same miles per charge as a car made in 1896! HAHAHAHAHAHA! Crony capitalism at it's finest.

    http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/14/114-year-old-electric-car-gets-same-40-miles-to-the-charge-as-chevy-volt/#ixzz1amJKUV42

    Regards,
    PT

    ReplyDelete
  2. RIght. Pretty much identical cars, too. Which, of course, wasn't the point of the post.

    Geez, PT, can you ever see past the talking points? Never mind. You've made the answer pretty clear. And now you're even starting to sound (and punctuate) like Frank.

    But thanks for proving my point (and ruining my day.)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Have to give it to ya Sid...
    Insulting a mans Punctuation...
    and I've reviewed PT's comment, the only thang I see that resembles Moi', is the
    HAHAHAHAHAHA!
    but I follow the Style Book and make sure the number of "!" is equal to the number of "HA"s.
    But I finally found somethang I can agree with the Surpreme-Court-Intimidator-in-Chief.
    besides the fact that if he had a son he'd look like every other...
    The Surpremes should not strike down a law, passed by an overwhelming majority of DemoKKKrats and RepubicKKKlans.
    Thats right, the DEFENSE OF MARRIAGE ACT should remain Constitutional!!!!!!!!


    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yeah. Well, the HAHAHA, sure; and the part about missing the point entirely.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oooops..
    and have you ever heard a Surgeon say "Ooops"???
    Tell the Truth Sid, they kick you out of Surgeon School if you say "Ooops".
    I say it all the time, you know, when you accidently knock over your Cafe' Mocha on the Mayo stand.

    and I left out the most important part of the DEFENSE OF MARRIAGE ACT.

    "Signed by a DemoKKKrat President"

    who you probably voted for, twice even.

    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  6. I did vote for Clinton twice. In spite of the DOMA thing, about which I was very critical and disappointed. Unlike teabaggRs, I can recognize when people I support screw up.

    As to "oops," I've discussed it, back when I had a useful blog.

    ReplyDelete
  7. "I can recognize when people I support screw up"??
    well duh, so can I, the difference between you and Me,(Or I, Whom, Whatever, you know what I mean)is you still vote for them, or there Mini-Me's,
    OK, with Al-Gore he was more like a Maxi-Me, and dude deserves some props for bein even fatter than Bill Clinton.
    I, OTOH, didn't vote for GHWB in 92' after he broke his "no New Taxes" promise.
    OK, I didn't vote for anyone in 92' or 96', and come to think of it, I didn't vote for GHWB in 88' either which makes my whole point, pointless.
    Oh yeah, We RepubicKKKlans carry Grudges, we'd sooner suffer 20 years of FDR than vote for someone with a stupid name like "Wendel Wilky"

    Frankie "The Nose" Drackman

    ReplyDelete

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