Two plus Two equals Seventy-nine When Your Name is Rudy

I'm no economist. I struggled through 102 my Freshman year and as I recall ended with a B maybe, baffled as to what the hell these people were thinking and saying while seemingly waddling through some of the same techniques used by real scientists. The concept of "elasticity" resonated with me, and just last week I remember reading an article of significance where, w/o using the term, the concept was evoked in talking about how the projected petroleum reserve quantity fluctuates wildly depending on the barrel price.

Econ 102 was a more than a few years ago. I'm number than that now. Well, and younger too, Bob!

But here's the thing. I've never actually been able to endorse this idea that we can radically and persistently cut tax rates and yet increase the incoming monetary stream to fund vital government programs. Like, say, repairing dike, bridge, and viaduct structures (Crescent City, Minnesota, Seattle, etc., etc.). I guess the working, unproven (or, frankly, disproven) theory is basically that reduced tax rates so encourage enterprise that the economy automatically flourishes and all boats float. The fans no doubt have a multitude of spokes-ers who can botox it better than that, but that I suspect is the entire tuna right there.

Need I point out that there's a lot of folks who do not own boats?

But it doesn't even work for the folks with 35' fishing boats. These government-starving tax breaks only help those who are so embarrassingly wealthy already that none of us actually ever encounter them.

I don't believe any of us support the idea of expensive bureaucracy that accomplishes nothing other than paying the salaries of the bureaucrats. Especially when our "elected" officials are devoted to flushing government and its functions down the drain - those folks are obviously expendable. Numerous vulnerable republs come to mind.

But it is also vital to remember that when the subject of cutting taxes comes up, it rarely if ever has any bottom-line relevance for any but the richest, most-indulged and greedy members of our "society."

And yet there's this abject clown the Repubs have apparently trotted out to do a little bad tapdancing while they desperately search for a real candidate or try to subborn a democrat (no, wait - what about Joe!) who obviously missed 102 (and some know the vacuousness to be far larger):

It doesn't take much for a Democrat to be labeled "naive" or "unserious," something Barack Obama has been finding out the hard way of late. But Republicans can say the darnedest things without causing anyone to so much as raise an eyebrow. Consider this exchange between David Yepsen of the Des Moines Register and Rudy Giuliani in the Republican debate on Sunday:

YEPSEN: Mayor Giuliani, how do you answer -- in Minnesota, Governor
Pawlenty, who vetoed an increase in his state gas tax said now he may consider
one. Is this Republican dogma against taxes now precluding the ability of you
and your party to come up with the revenues that the country needs to fix its
bridges?

GIULIANI: David, there’s an assumption in your question that is not
necessarily correct, sort of the Democratic, liberal assumption: “I need money;
I raise taxes.”

YEPSEN: Then what are you going to cut, sir?

GIULIANI: But wait, wait, wait. Let me explain it.

YEPSEN: What do you cut?

GIULIANI: The way to do it sometimes is to reduce taxes and raise more
money. For example...(APPLAUSE) ... I ran the city -- I ran a city with 759
bridges; probably the most used bridges in the nation, some of the most used in
the world. I was able to acquire more money to fund capital programs. I reduced
the number of poor bridges from 5 percent to 1.7 percent. I was able to raise
more money to fix those bridges by lowering taxes. I lowered income taxes by 25
percent. I was collecting 40 percent more from the lower income tax than from
the higher income tax.

Just shoot me. Is it even possible to a give a dumber, less serious answer to a legitimate question? How would Giuliani come up with the money to fix the nation's aging infrastructure? Why he'd cut taxes, that's how. Good grief.

Giuliani suggests that when he cut taxes by 25% in New York City, he ended up collecting 40% more revenue. Nevermind that this happened to coincide with the stock market boom of the late 90s. I'm sure this principle works across the board. The more you cut taxes, the more money comes flowing in. Maybe we should cut taxes to zero and use the inevitable revenue windfall to pay off the national debt, fund Medicare and Social Security indefinitely, and give every American a pony. Yippee.

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