In today's New York Times, Nobel laureate Paul Krugman highlights the differences between the radical and selfish budget proposal developed by the Rethuglicans' newest shiny object, Rep. Paul "Lyin'" Ryan, and the President's balanced view. It's well worth reading. Krugman quotes Obama's rejection of the Beltway conventional wisdom that Lyin' Ryan's proposal was somehow "courageous" and "serious":
"On Wednesday, as I said, the president called Mr. Ryan’s bluff: after offering a spirited (and reassuring) defense of social insurance, he declared, 'There’s nothing serious about a plan that claims to reduce the deficit by spending a trillion dollars on tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires. And I don’t think there’s anything courageous about asking for sacrifice from those who can least afford it and don’t have any clout on Capitol Hill.' Actually, the Ryan plan calls for $2.9 trillion in tax cuts, but who’s counting?"Several Rethugs, in response to the President's speech, used code words like "job creators" for the wealthiest 2%, and implied that this was Dems using "class warfare." As billionaire investor Warren Buffett noted a few years ago, “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” The Rethuglican right serves as the shock troops for the very rich in that war, as Obama made very clear on Wednesday. Now it's time to keep pressing that message over and over.
