Frank [the Crank] of the NYT Moans in Agony about the Massachusetts Massacre. The End is in Sight.

Abstract: Frank Rich is nearly hysterical as he gropes for reasons to show us that the loss of the revered Kennedy seat is not Obama’s fault.  The Crank cranks out brats in all directions as he convinces himself that this anti-liberal contagion will not spread beyond Massachusetts although he fails to mention that this is strike three against the White House after Virginia and New Jersey. He sees Obama descending into the political and economic maelstroms that consumed LBJ and Jimmy Carter. Socialism is at stake here along with other phony debacles such as global warming and ‘affordable housing.’ Rich grants and grabs all he can in an episode of sound and fury signifying noting but terror for Democrats in November. The economy sinks and Obama is stuck with the next economic dip and the aftermath.

We are always rewarded when we elect to study and digest the political facts as presented (and frequently misrepresented) by Frank [the Crank] Rich[1][2][3] of the New York Times. Frank Rich is well known for his unsurpassed facility to crank out sophomoric and keyhole dogmatic leftist brats with sausage-machine precision even when they apply to nothing in particular, but this one today is a big one for him and he shows off his skills. He is an artist. Without exception, as always, we are compelled to read about how the right wingers have bungled the job of government in the last few decades and the valiant acts of self-denial and heroism by liberals have preserved our freedoms. Something has changed here.

As we start to peruse the instant egalitarian minutiae that define the latest political proclamations from the New York Times—aka the Walter Duranty Papers[4], we sometimes are treated to a tirade-based detonation of anger and fear, probably rooted in self-loathing and now incorporating impending doom, and this current episode is ignited from the recent desecration of the Sacred Kennedy Seat in the US Senate. Teddy can no longer vote from the grave.[5]

Propaganda pieces usually initiate with some highlighted banner that signals the central message and then begins to weave a web that is supposed to instill doubt in the reader along with some sadness to jerk some tears from the toughest roughneck and then to slip in some confounding information and opinions that are used to close up the argument in the accustomed circular manner of the sophist. Not this time! Frank uploads in the first line!

The Crank unloads:

“It was not a referendum on Barack Obama, who in every poll remains one of the most popular politicians in America. It was not a rejection of universal health care, which Massachusetts mandated (with Scott Brown’s State Senate vote) in 2006. It was not a harbinger of a resurgent G.O.P., whose numbers remain in the toilet. Brown had the good sense not to identify himself as a Republican in either his campaign advertising or his victory speech.”[6]—After the Massachusetts Massacre By Frank Rich Op-Ed Columnist Published: January 23, 2010 [Emphasis is mine in all quotes.]

This is like some tent revival preacher launching off with the bottom-line mandate that there are no sinners in the audience and then explaining that forgiveness is a phantasm conjured up in Disneyland we are will be fine. It is written in the rare form of a stumbling triple negative narrative and is a masterpiece of denial.

Conditional prophecy unfolds before our very eyes:

“And yet Tuesday’s special election was a dire omen for this White House. If the administration sticks to this trajectory, all bets are off for the political future of a president who rode into office blessed with more high hopes, good will and serious promise than any in modern memory. It’s time for him to stop deluding himself.”—After the Massachusetts Massacre

This is a stunning piece of psuedohyperbole.  Obama is a disciple of Saul Alinsky. We now are persuaded to understand all the input parameters that failed to tarnish our wonderful president and will be given the names of the culprits in the next few paragraphs. Obama’s glass slippers are in pieces all over the ballroom floor and we are not permitted to surmise that this event was a rejection of Obama’s primary campaign platform plank healthcare.  What else could it be?

Nobody is mad at Obama?

“Obama’s plight has been unchanged for months. Neither in action nor in message is he in front of the anger roiling a country where high unemployment remains unchecked and spiraling foreclosures are demolishing the bedrock American dream of home ownership. The president is no longer seen as a savior but as a captive of the interests who ginned up the mess and still profit, hugely, from it.”—After the Massachusetts Massacre

This fish is more difficult to unwrap. What ‘interests?’ The unions? ACORN? The polls say otherwise: Gallop reports that “The 65 percentage-point gap between Democrats' (88%) and Republicans' (23%) average job approval ratings for Barack Obama is easily the largest for any president in his first year in office, greatly exceeding the prior high of 52 points for Bill Clinton.”[7] Obama is seen to be slowing down things such as his State of the Union Message.[8] Obama has failed in everything he has attempted except to infuriate the voters with his Marxian cram-down politics as his lackeys squirrel away in dark corners and plot to create sweeping laws that most of us do not want.  He is a loser, but, lest we stray from the central thrust of the NYT—the prime objective is to rescue losers like this.  So, we need to read further before archiving this article in one of the lower layers of your parrot cage and see if we can get a sense of the direction of the way for Democrats to extricate themselves from this wreckage.

Frank then constructs an imaginary cabal of angry voters who have a common cause: Dump on the banks!

“If the tea party right and populist left agree on anything, it’s that big bailed-out banks have and will get away with murder while we pay the bill on credit cards — with ever-rising fees.”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

We must assume that some common contempt for the banking system exists among the restless masses  and will lead to some joint bipartisan adventure to micromanage the banks and thus satisfy and sooth the voters and thus excuse Obama for his failures. This is laughable. I suggested we let the banks go down like we did for Bear Stearns and Lehman. Why subsidize failure like we do Amtrak and the post office? The Fed could have wired emergency reserve funds in less than a minute so we didn’t need week of cronyizing and bumbling.

Old news rehabilitated and dressed up as the new finding:

“Politically, no other issue counts. In last weekend’s Washington Post/ABC News poll, 42 percent of Americans chose the economy as the country’s most pressing concern. Only 5 percent picked terrorism, and 2 percent Afghanistan.”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

This is a diversion. What could the banks have to do with the economy if they are open for business and, incidentally, they pay high wages and some very large bonuses? They don’t set interest and credit rates. Businesses do not want to borrow and banks will not lend to deadbeats with lousy credit ratings any more. The economic recovery depends on a good business climate and that means that small businesses will have to be encouraged to borrow and hire new employees. But, this pathway is scattered with numerous concerns such as unknown tax levels, fees, punitive measures for doing certain kinds of business or avoiding government mandates, the notion that we must go ‘green’ despite the higher costs and energy inefficiencies of this direction.  Small business, those who produce 65% of the jobs have received no help whatsoever. Money was wasted in the GM and Chrysler Circuses where unions were given power and bondholders told to take a haircut. This is a good business climate? Apparently Obama thought so.

What is Cranking Up here is the urgent bleat for the banks to further subsidize subprime mortgage wreckages[9] that were the heart of the far leftist nostrum of ‘affordable housing’ and most of the reason the banks collapsed was due to toxic assets  undermining their balance sheets.[10] They are greedy capitalists so they can just eat the losses. We are awash in debt so deep that the average taxpayer who makes more than the median of $32,000 now has a tax liability of $192,000 and rising toward $220,000 if the debt limit is raised. If you consider some test case like California[11][12][13] you find a bigger mess when you add in the massive state costs of the greens and their phony global warming follies.[14][15] This ‘affordable housing’ was some obvious social mandate and Congress passed the CRA [Community Reinvestment Act][16][17] that resulted in AAA rated 2007 subprime mortgage bundles descending only 28 cents on the dollar.[18] Lower rated bundles are less than 5 cents on the dollar. We want more of this? Yes, if you are a Marxist or a socialist. Those levels are more than just ‘toxic.’ They signal a long-term bank crisis that may be with us for a decade or two.

But, Frank needs to make his little case:

“Does health care matter? Not as much as you’d think after this yearlong crusade. In the Post/ABC poll, the issue was second-tier — at 24 percent. Obama has blundered, not by positioning himself too far to the left but by landing nowhere — frittering away his political capital by being too vague, too slow and too deferential to Congress. The smartest thing said as the Massachusetts returns came in Tuesday night was by Howard Fineman on MSNBC: “Obama took all his winnings and turned them over to Max Baucus.””— After the Massachusetts Massacre

Apparently, we are to now to embrace the soggy belief that Obama’s prime political theme was detected as having major holes in it so he passed off the wreckage to some potentially expendable Senator and let him take the heat. Obama did not, we are instructed, go too far to the left in terms of socialized medicine with eternal government micromanaging hence bungling the health and deaths or our citizens who are satisfied with their current system. Rich fails to tell us that socialized medicine and public transportation are the crown fungi in the rotting mass we call socialism. They are a must and the people rejected this stuff and Frank must slither around these political rocks and grope for some middle case where Obama is not directly blamed for this.

Obama is messageless? That IS news.

“Worse, the master communicator in the White House has still not delivered a coherent message on his signature policy. He not only refused to signal his health care imperatives early on but even now he, like Congressional Democrats, has failed to explain clearly why and how reform relates to economic recovery — or, for that matter, what he wants the final bill to contain. Sure, a president needs political wiggle room as legislative sausage is made, but Scott Brown could and did drive his truck through the wide, wobbly parameters set by Obama.”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

Here Rich zooms out into the vapors on gossamer wings waving flags and spreading confetti and misstates history. Obama promised and promised that his new HC scheme would save money and that it had to be deficit neutral so they taxed the early years and then decided to let the full weight of this gorilla come crashing down after 2014—a very convenient time course in politics.  He has jabbered about little else. Given the history of government in construction  of such metastatic diseases can we suggest, for discussion,  an analysis of the  infected  string of social programs that failed like: The Great Society, HUD, War on Poverty, Social Security, Medicare, WW1, WW2, federal welfare and Amtrak to suggest a  very few? What is the Social Security liability now? Oh we must add an additional $141,000 to the almost $200,000 dollars the persons above the income median must now be liable for.[19] Is it time to mention that CA, NJ, MA, MD, MI and NY may default soon and add some more debt to the pile?

“Ask yourself this: All these months later, do you yet know what the health care plan means for your family’s bottom line, your taxes, your insurance?”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

No, Frank and neither do you.

“Obama needs more independent economists like Paul Volcker, who was hastily retrieved from exile last week after the Massachusetts massacre prompted the White House to tardily embrace his strictures on big banks.”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

Does The Crank tell us that Volcker was the guy who instituted 18% interest rates in the 70s and forced high unemployment to sweep up after the Jimmy Carter mess? No. Volcker’s financial policies were ignored by people who thought that we could spend our way back to prosperity such as Romer:

History flashback: The Christine Romer Prophecy:

“…, even with the large prototypical package, the unemployment rate in 2010Q4 is predicted to be approximately 7.0%, which is well below the approximately 8.8% that would result in the absence of a plan.”[20][21]--CNSNews.com Monday, July 06, 2009

The Christine Romer Un-Prophecy: Did Romer recant?

“Most analysts predict that the fiscal stimulus will have its greatest impact on growth in the second and third quarters of 2009,” Romer said. “By mid-2010, fiscal stimulus will likely be contributing little to growth.”[22]— Christine Romer Oct. 22

The final Crankling:

“J.F.K. threatened to sic his brother’s Justice Department on corporate records and then held firm as his opponents likened his flex of muscle to the power grabs of Hitler and Mussolini. (Sound familiar?) U.S. Steel capitulated in two days. The Times soon reported on its front page that Kennedy was at “a high point in popular support.”

Can anyone picture Obama exerting such take-no-prisoners leadership to challenge those who threaten our own economic recovery and stability at a time of deep recession and war? That we can’t is a powerful indicator of why what happened in Massachusetts will not stay in Massachusetts if this White House fails to reboot.”— After the Massachusetts Massacre

A clarion call for more government! How about a Marxist Revolution so we can have Power to the People? Harry Truman tried this too and was swatted down by the Supreme Court.

We expect such fluff and hokum from the NYT as they grope for any solution to ‘save ‘ the presidency and keep the fires burning on socialized medicine, EcoNazism[23] and other wasteful projects. The Crank’s plate is overloaded with maudlin rescue notes and other scribblings as he recoils from the biggest act of desecration of the Kennedy Image the world has ever seen.

The voters were very angry at Bush and now their anger is redoubled at Obama so let Frank make all the excuses he can but November 2010 will probably be equivalent to the French Revolution in political terms. Weave some fresh baskets.

rycK

Comments: ryckki@gmail.com