David Sirota has penned an important piece of investigative journalism over at International Business Times.
I think it is safe to say that many of the readers here at Daily Kos are politically aware. An intelligent group of well informed voters who really wish to end the Age of Reagan and make America a better place. As such, many of you are following a debate ranging within the Democratic party over the feasibility of Bernie Sanders’ economic plans. Hillary Rodham Clinton, after leading by huge amounts in the polls, has seen her lead evaporate into a tie in Iowa and a loss of historic proportions in New Hampshire. No one really knows what is going to happen in Nevada. So it wasn’t really all that surprising that Clinton would characterize Sanders’ plans to have a universal single payer healthcare plan and tuition free college as budget busters. So in a debate on February 11th, Clinton stated that Sanders plan would increase the size of government by “40 percent.”
The New York Times quickly produced a piece written by Jackie Calmes entitled, "Left-Leaning Economists Question the Cost of Sanders's Plans" Based upon the analysis of some very serious economic analysts, including four former chairs of the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, Calmes discovered that Hillary Rodham Clinton actually underestimated the effects of the Sanders’ plans. It would actually entail a mobilization larger than the nation undertook during World War II!
The increase could exceed 50 percent, some experts suggest, based on an analysis by a respected health economist that Mr. Sanders’s single-payer health plan could cost twice what the senator, who represents Vermont, asserts, and on critics’ belief that his economic assumptions are overly optimistic.
It wasn’t enough for the experts to explode Bernie’s plans, Jackie Calmes crafts a delicious metaphor positively dripping with sarcasm and contemptuous scorn.
Alluding to one progressive analyst’s criticism of the Sanders agenda as “puppies and rainbows,” Mr. Goolsbee said that after his and others’ further study, “they’ve evolved into magic flying puppies with winning Lotto tickets tied to their collars.”
This scorn toward Progressives’ plan to achieve something that the rest of the industrialized world does on a regular basis was amplified by “Very Serious Person” and Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman in a piece entitled, "My Unicorm Problem.” Doug Henwood noted that Krugman used the term unicorn “six times (not counting the headline) . By the way, Henwood’s entire piece is worth a read!
The issue has been debated here at this site. In the past few days, there have appeared several excellent diaries. I recommend that you take the time to read them.
Pollwatcher penned a piece http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/02/17/1486500/-Vast-Conspiracy-Of-Democratic-Economists-Questioning-Senator-Sanders-Economic-Plan-Grows
First Amendment produced this piece http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/02/18/1486965/-Past-CEA-Chairs-To-Sanders-Friedman-Economic-Facts-Do-Not-Support-These-Fantastical-Claims
Lastly, Dolphin99 pushes back against the economists’ claims in this piece http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/02/18/1486666/-Sanders-and-the-Economists
I must apologize for taking so long to get to the meat of the story. I teach history. I’ve taught at the high school level and as an adjunct since the early 1990s. One of the skills I emphasize is critical thinking skills. I believe in reading widely from a variety of source materials. I especially emphasize the ability to evaluate sources. People have agendas and biases. Historians make no bones about being “objective.” Economists fervently want you to believe they are objective and without bias. This is what make Sirota’s latest piece entitled, “Bernie Sanders Economic Plans Questioned By Critics With Ties To Wall Street, Hillary Clinton” such an explosive piece of investigative journalism.
In this piece he does something quite taboo, he follows the money trail. An “independent economist” sounds more trustworthy in a headline than “paid Wall St. hacks’ blast Sanders’ plan.” Sirota focuses on two of the former White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, Laura Tyson and Austan Goolsbee and their ties to Wall St. Are they paragons of virtue and disinterested experts, or have they been compromised by an industry whose business plan is fraud?
Sirota notes:
Goolsbee and Tyson — the latter of whom was a Bill Clinton appointee — both work for a financial industry that has faced withering attacks from Sanders. Tyson has held a lucrative seat on the board of directors at Morgan Stanley since 1997, shortly after she completed her time leading the Council of Economic Advisers. In 2013, Morgan Stanley paid Hillary Clinton $225,000 for a speech. The Wall Street mega-bank has been one of Clinton’s top sources of donations throughout her political career. The same bank employed Clinton’s top deputy at the U.S. State Department, both before and after his trip through Washington’s proverbial “revolving door.”
Sirota also notes that Tyson works as a “senior advisor at the Rock Creek Group, a private investment firm that directed California’s public pension money to a hedge fund run by Clinton’s son-in-law, according to the New York Times. (Emphasis Mine)
Sirota then turns his attention to Austan Goolsbee:
Goolsbee, who led the Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama, is currently a partner at 32 Advisors — a corporate consulting firm run by Clinton supporter Robert Wolf, a former top executive at UBS, which was a Clinton foundation donor and which was aided by Clinton’s intervention in an international tax dispute. According to CNBC, Goolsbee’s work at the firm has included hosting weekly phone calls with executives at hedge funds, banks and big corporations to discuss economic issues and policymaking in Washington. The financial news channel described Goolsbee as “hedge funds’ secret weapon.”
Last month, Goolsbee blasted Sanders’ proposal to break up big banks, which Sanders says will help prevent future financial crises. Goolsbee said his plan “doesn't really help reduce risk to the financial system.” In 2007, just prior to the housing market collapse that cratered the global economy, Goolsbee defended the subprime mortgage industry. “When contemplating ways to prevent excessive mortgages for the 13 percent of subprime borrowers whose loans go sour, regulators must be careful that they do not wreck the ability of the other 87 percent to obtain mortgages,” Goolsbee wrote in an op-ed.
Lastly Sirota examines New Jersey Senate Cory Booker who has come forward in the last few days to defend Wall St. and to pronounce that Hillary Rodham Clinton’s plan to reform Wall St. is adequate.
For those who may have forgotten. Cory Booker blasted Barack Obama in 2012 and defended Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital and its business practices.
So Laura Tyson, Austan Goolsbee, and Cory Booker, whose side are you on?
Do you think we need a new Democratic party, or are you satisfied with being the only nation that can’t provide free higher education? Are you satisfied with having 33 million Americans without health care? These are “puppies, unicorns, and budget breakers,” but bank bailouts that is necessary. We can either fix America or accept the status quo.