Why is Pres Obama's favorite economist Paul Krugman calling for middle class tax increases & death panels?

[Obama hood - Spread the Wealth]

We almost never agree with President Obama's favorite economist Paul Krugman, but he recently spoke the truth about where Obama's policies are taking the country. It should scare anyone with a pulse.

Krugman, after speaking at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue in Washington, D.C., was asked about the debt crisis. After arguing it's no big deal in the near term, Krugman admitted that "Eventually we do have a problem. The population is getting older, health care costs are rising ... . Something is going to have to give."

What's that something? According to Krugman, it's middle-class pocketbooks.

"We won't be able to pay for the kind of society we want without some increases in taxes," he said, "and surely in the end it will require some middle-class taxes as well, maybe a value added tax."
That's not all. We're also "going to have to ... really make decisions about health care, (and) not pay for health care that has no demonstrated medical benefits."

In case anyone failed to get what he was talking about, Krugman made it clear, saying the snarky version is:

"Death panels and sales taxes is how we do this."

This wasn't the first time Krugman has used this line — a couple years ago he said pretty much the same thing on NBC's "This Week." And to his credit, Krugman is at least being honest about the miserable end to which liberalism leads. If the government continues on its current course, the nation's debt will climb inexorably higher.

But Krugman's bleak future is hardly set in stone.

Remember, Krugman says that it's the inevitable future that results from creating "the kind of society we want," meaning the kind of society Krugman and his fellow liberal elitists want.
There is a far better alternative.

We just need to get control of entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, for which Republicans have offered numerous workable cost-saving reforms. We need to kill ObamaCare, which if allowed to take effect will turbocharge federal spending.

And we need to boost economic growth by unleashing the private sector through a sustained campaign of deregulation and tax reform.

Do those things, and we can easily close the budget gap without ever resorting to death panels or a VAT tax.

That might not be the kind of society Krugman or Obama wants, but it certainly leads to a far better place than theirs.


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[Vince]

Krugman has been a far Left kook for years, I dont care what hes been awarded.

[Elmer]

That's WHY he's Obama's favorite economist.

[Chip]

because the ultimate goal is to get rid of the middle class, the very same middle class that keeps this country going

[dieter b]

I was under the impression that the death panel issue has gone away since the strange people on the Republican side drop ed the issue.

[Mike M NUMBER 5]

krugman is a good little communist

[Andy F]

Krugman is "NOT" Obama's favorite economist, AFAIK. Krugman bitterly criticized Obama & Co. for not stimulting the economy vigorously enough in 2009, and Obama didn't rely on his advice then.

He relied on more "moderate" if probably less honest economists like Larry Summers and Robert Rubin & Tim Geither, instead.

Aside from that, you offer what would be a crushing critique of Krugman's economic liberalism - IF the Republican Party had any kind of a reasonable and humane alternative.

It doesn't.

A few years ago Paul Ryan, poster child for the conservative Republican right, proposed a hugely costly system to "save" Social Security by privatizing it.

Remember that, friends?

Romney in 2012 proposed to make an economic miracle through unspecified "tax reforms" that were supposed to cure the budget problems magically, and ultimately create 12 million new jobs.

It turned out that some smart journalist caught Romney admitting that the 12 million new jobs would be created over the extreme long term -- years and years into the future.

Meaning that while he wasn't technically lying to the voters, Romney was flagrantly misrepresenting what his tax reform would do & how long it would take to do it -- effectively telling the voters that he had an almost instant fix for the economy's woes, when he had little more than his own version of "death panels."

The same Republican voices who are now promising a tasty & nutritious & logical way to fix Social Security and "trim" or "reform" entitlement programs are the same BLESSED politicians who collaborated in raising the US national debt to ungodly levels -- first under Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, then under George W. "What, me worry?" Bush between 2001 and 2009.

These same fine Republican leaders are also now loudly complaining -- surprise! surprise! -- about the large size of the debt. The same debt they did their best to increase.

I'll believe that the Republican Party has a "far better place" to lead us when Donald Trump suddenly becomes a born again, takes up his cross for Jesus & gives all of his money away to the poor - while in the meantime showing "good family values."

Until then, you guys have all the credibility of a Las Vegas card sharp. ONe thing that does distinguish you from Paul Krugman: nobody has ever given you credit for "at least being honest" about anything.

[Jas B]

Alan B. Krueger is the Chairman of President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers and a member of the Cabinet. Below is a full list of his economic advisers

Jack Lew is President Obama's pick to replace Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner as US Treasury Secretary. .

So where do you get the idea that Paul Krugman is President Obama's favourite economist???, or did you just hear the name of the chairman of his economic advisers (Krueger) and jump to the conclusion this was Paul Krugman. not Alan Krueger, even though they are two different if similiar names???

Another example of Republicans not even checking their facts before going off on a rant.