New Yorker Cartoons on Getting Things Done

Borowitz Report on State of the Union

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) – In what some critics are calling the most radial tactic ever employed in a State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama risked alienating congressional Republicans last night by repeatedly using facts.

Mr. Obama stirred controversy throughout the speech with his relentless references to facts, data, and things that have actually happened, all long considered the third rail of American politics.

As the President made reference to tax rates and unemployment numbers, as well as sixteen separate mentions of Osama bin Laden, congressional Republicans’ blood began to boil.

After the speech, a furious Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters, “It’s been a longstanding tradition in our politics not to use facts in a State of the Union Address, a tradition the President chose to ignore in an outrageous way tonight.  I won’t stand for it and the American people won’t stand for it.”

“We want to work with the President for the good of the American people,” added House Speaker John Boehner.  “But he’s going to have to take facts off the table.  That’s a deal-breaker for us.”

The President did not mention any of his GOP presidential rivals by name in his speech, but at one point said that government should be “leaner,” a blatant jab at former House Speaker Newt Gingrich

Paul Krugman on 'Taxes at the Top'

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Defenders of low taxes on the rich mainly make two arguments: that low taxes on capital gains are a time-honored principle, and that they are needed to promote economic growth and job creation. Both claims are false.

When you hear about the low, low taxes of people like Mr. Romney, what you need to know is that it wasn’t always thus — and the days when the superrich paid much higher taxes weren’t that long ago. Back in 1986, Ronald Reagan — yes, Ronald Reagan — signed a tax reform equalizing top rates on earned income and capital gains at 28 percent. The rate rose further, to more than 29 percent, during Bill Clinton’s first term.

Low capital gains taxes date only from 1997, when Mr. Clinton struck a deal with Republicans in Congress in which he cut taxes on the rich in return for creation of the Children’s Health Insurance Program. And today’s ultralow rates — the lowest since the days of Herbert Hoover — date only from 2003, when former President George W. Bush rammed both a tax cut on capital gains and a tax cut on dividends through Congress, something he achieved by exploiting the illusion of triumph in Iraq.
Correspondingly, the low-tax status of the very rich is also a recent development. During Mr. Clinton’s first term, the top 400 taxpayers paid close to 30 percent of their income in federal taxes, and even after his tax deal they paid substantially more than they have since the 2003 cut.

.....

And the economic record certainly doesn’t support the notion that superlow taxes on the superrich are the key to prosperity. During that first Clinton term, when the very rich paid much higher taxes than they do now, the economy added 11.5 million jobs, dwarfing anything achieved even during the good years of the Bush administration.

So Mr. Romney’s tax dance is doing us all a service by highlighting the unwise, unjust and expensive favors being showered on the upper-upper class. At a time when all the self-proclaimed serious people are telling us that the poor and the middle class must suffer in the name of fiscal probity, such low taxes on the very rich are indefensible.

Related articles

• Paul Krugman: Taxes at the Top (economistsview.typepad.com)

New Yorker Cartoons on the Man/Woman Thing

Bill Maher on American Exceptionalism

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"Always waving the big foam number one finger; we're not number one in most things. We're number one in military. We're number one in money. We're number one in fat toddlers, meth labs, and people we send to prison. We're not number one in literacy, money spent on education. We're not even number one in social mobility. Social mobility means basically the American dream, the ability of one generation to do better than the next. We're tenth. That's like Sweden coming in tenth in Swedish meatballs."

Good 'Late Night Jokes'

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Jimmy Fallon

• Texas Governor Rick Perry officially dropped out of the race for president. Yeah, he just couldn’t get over that one campaign hurdle — you know, talking.
• A new study found that 68 percent of Americans are overweight or obese. While the rest are both.

Jimmy Kimmel:

• Last night on "American Idol," the show lost 18 percent of its total viewers and 26 percent of its younger viewers. Of those who did tune in, more than half were just checking to see if Steven Tyler is still alive. 
• During a debate, Mitt Romney said he grew up in the real streets of America. Yes, the real streets, where people pull up next to you and ask if you have any Grey Poupon. 

Conan:

• The National Enquirer says that the father of Khloe Kardashian is O.J. Simpson. When reached for comment, O.J. said, “Man, I just cannot catch a break.”

Jay Leno:

• According to a Washington Post poll, 84 percent of Americans do not approve of the way Congress is doing its job. Sixteen percent weren't even aware Congress is doing a job.
• Rick Perry has dropped out of the presidential race. Apparently, America did not want a conservative, gun happy, intellectually challenged governor of Texas for president. At least not again.
• Scientists announced that they have detected a brand new subatomic particle. This particle is so tiny it is actually smaller than the income tax rate paid by Mitt Romney.
• The San Francisco subway system was shut down when some idiot drove an SUV into a subway tunnel. Boy, that Italian cruise ship captain is having a bad week.
• More details are coming out about the Italian cruise ship disaster. It seems the chef on board the ship says the captain ordered dinner after the crash. And here's the worst part — he ordered it to go.

David Letterman:

• They found an opossum on the subway, and not only that, but in the opossum's pouch, they found a loaded weapon.
• Here's what we know about the opossum. What they do is pretend to play dead so predators will leave them alone. Well, isn't that everybody on the subway?
• From nose to tail, it was two feet long. And it was so big, at first the transit authority thought it was a small New York City rat.

Craig Ferguson:

• Yahoo’s original founder resigned. If you want to know more about this situation, Google it.
• The first couple of episodes of "American Idol" are usually the highest rated of the season. Because there is something magical about watching people with dreams beyond their talent going on national TV and having those dreams crushed.

Nicholas D. Kristof on 'Is Banking Bad?'

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When financiers rig the system, they should remember the warning of John Maynard Keynes: “The businessman is only tolerable so long as his gains can be held to bear some relation to what, roughly and in some sense, his activities have contributed to society.”

So university students would be wrong to mock their classmates who choose Citigroup over CARE. Banking and private equity aren’t evil, and I would never urge college students to stay away. Maybe today’s young socialist sympathizers, along with healthy regulation and a loud public outcry, can help rescue capitalism from the crony capitalists.

Gnarly

Good 'Late Show Top Ten'

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Top Ten Things People Said When They Heard Jon Huntsman Was Dropping Out Of The Presidential Race
10. "Who's Jon Huntsman?"
9. "Is he the rich boring white guy, or the other rich boring white guy?"
8. "Seriously, who's Jon Huntsman?"
7. "You mean my tax attorney? Oh wait, that's Stan Huntsman"
6. "Does this mean we can bring Herman Cain back? That guy was hilarious"
5. "So that leaves only four viable candidates, plus Rick Perry"
4. "It's like Jon Huntsman said . . . Well, actually, I have no idea what he said"
3. "Hey honey, some guy I’ve never heard of is dropping out of the race"
2. "He should have Tebowed more"
1. "Now who's gonna lose to Obama in the general election?"

Borowitz Report on Mitt Romney

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MYRTLE BEACH, SC (The Borowitz Report) – Controversy swirled at the Republican debate in South Carolina last night as Mitt Romney’s rivals pressured the GOP frontrunner to prove that he was manufactured in the United States.

The other candidates for the Republican nomination repeatedly pounded the former Massachusetts governor on the issue throughout the night, demanding that he produce a label proving that he was made in the U.S.A.

The attacks came amid rumors that Mr. Romney was assembled in a plant overseas, possibly in France, where a microchip was installed enabling him to speak French.

“At a time when we are losing an increasing number of manufacturing jobs to other countries, can we really afford to have a President who wasn’t made here?” asked former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Nicholas D. Kristof on "Why Europe Is a Dirty Word"

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It’s absurd to dismiss Europe. After all, Norway is richer per capita than the United States. Moreover, according to figures from the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, per-capita G.N.P. in France was 64 percent of the American figure in 1960. That rose to 73 percent by 2010. Zut alors! The socialists gained on us!

Meanwhile, they did it without breaking a sweat. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that employed Americans averaged 1,741 hours at work in 2010. In France, the figure was 1,439 hours.

If Europe was as anticapitalist as Americans assume, its companies would be collapsing. But there are 172 European corporations among the Fortune Global 500, compared with just 133 from the United States.

Europe gets some important things right. It has addressed energy issues and climate change far more seriously than America has. It now has more economic mobility than the United States, partly because of strong public education systems. America used to have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world; now France and Britain are both ahead of us.

Back in 1960, French life expectancy was just a few months longer than in the United States, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. By 2009, the French were living almost three years longer than we were.

So it is worth acknowledging Europe’s labor rigidities and its lethargy in resolving the current economic crisis. Its problems are real. But embracing a caricature of Europe as a failure reveals our own ignorance — and chauvinism.

Related articles

• Op-Ed Columnist: Why Is Europe a Dirty Word? (nytimes.com)

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Good 'Late Night' Jokes

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David Letterman:

• The Pakistani government is tearing down the house where Osama bin Laden was living because they don't want it to become a shrine. CBS coincidentally plans to do this with the theater once I leave.
• A 99-year-old guy and his 96-year-old wife getting divorced. They never got along and people kept saying, “Why did you wait so long to get a divorce?” And they said, “We want to wait until the kids were dead.”
• According to a new survey, people who get divorced die early. People who stay married live longer. The difference is they just wish they were dead.
• I'm having trouble warming up to Mitt Romney. He looks like the guy in the restaurant that comes to your table to make sure everything's all right.

Conan:

• Mitt Romney told a crowd that he is half Mexican. Which means that half of him will not be voting for Mitt Romney.
• Home Depot just announced plans to hire 70,000 new employees. They're looking for people to work hard and never be found by a customer.

Jimmy Kimmel:

• I'm Jimmy. I'm the host of the show. I'm also the host for a deadly new virus. But let's keep that quiet, if we could.
• This GOP race is heating up with the intensity of an Easy-Bake Oven.
• McDonald’s has announced that for the next month in the United Kingdom, Happy Meals will come with a book instead of a toy. And they will be renamed “Disappointment Meals.”
• McDonald’s is apparently teaming up Harper Collins to give out an estimated 9 million books. That would never work in America. Our kids would just dip the books in ranch dressing and eat them.

Jay Leno:

• Congratulations to Mitt Romney. He won the New Hampshire primary last night. See, this is proof that even the multimillionaire son of a multimillionaire can beat the odds and run for president of the United States.
• Rick Perry was philosophical about it. He said, "Last week was Iowa. Yesterday was New Hampshire. " He said at least it's giving him a chance to learn the names of all the states.
• According to the tabloids, John Edwards is going to marry his mistress, Rielle Hunter. Which means, of course, now he has to find a new mistress, and the whole thing starts again. 
• Researchers found a frog in new guinea that is so tiny, they believe it's the smallest vertebrate on the planet. It has the tiniest backbone of any living creature, except members of Congress.
• There are now more obese people in the United States than there are overweight people. I think it's safe to say that after all these years, Diet Coke is a complete failure.

Gail Collins on the South Carolina Primary (It's a Hoot)

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What will the big issues be in the South Carolina primary?

When five of your six candidates could not be elected president if they were running against Millard Fillmore, I think you can presume there will not be much serious issue discussion.

However, there will undoubtedly be a great deal of talk about the threat of European socialism and whether or not Mitt Romney is a vulture. One of those venture capital vultures that, in the inimitable words of Rick Perry, are “sitting out there on a tree limb, waiting for the company to get sick, and then they sweep in, they eat the carcass, they leave with that, and they leave the skeleton.”

Also, whether Mitt Romney is an Obamacare-passing European socialist.
 
Has Romney figured out how to explain the nearly identical-to-Obama’s health care law that Massachusetts passed when he was governor?

Yes! This is all about each state finding its own, unique answer to its own special health care issue. Romneycare, Mitt explains, was right for Massachusetts because the state was faced with the choice of requiring everyone to have health insurance or continuing “to allow people without insurance to go to the hospital and get free care, paid for by the government, paid for by the taxpayers.”

This shows you how different the situation in each state is, since it is well known that in other parts of the country, sick and uninsured people do not go to hospitals but instead are encouraged to present themselves to the nearest local nail salon.
 
What do the Republicans have against Europe?

All the candidates in the Republican primaries seem obsessed with the idea that the United States is in danger of becoming like Europe, which would be the worst thing imaginable. (Rick Santorum: “They have nothing to fight for. They have nothing to live for.”) The Gingrich camp claimed that Mitt Romney was a fan of “European socialism” when he said something nice about the value-added tax.

However, it’s been Mitt that’s been sounding the most Europhobic. He’s been warning that the president “takes his inspiration from the capitals of Europe” and is attempting to turn the country into a “European-style social welfare state.” (Do you think he really means: Takes his orders from the capitals of Europe? Next stop: “Barack Obama, Brussels Puppet.”)

What do you think’s up with Mitt? Perhaps he’s afraid we’ll all start demanding free child care and fresh-baked bread. He did live in France for more than two years as a Mormon missionary and he didn’t make many converts. Also, he had harsh things to say about the toilets.
 
Why is Newt Gingrich still running for president? Aren’t voters fleeing from him as if he were a rabid palmetto bug?

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To understand Newt Gingrich, you have to envision a mixture of “Kill Bill” and “Carrie,” after Sissy Spacek gets hit with the bucket of blood. His only mission in life is getting even with Mitt Romney and the rich minions who paid for all those anti-Newt ads in Iowa. He is exactly like Sweeney Todd mixed with Charles Bronson in “Death Wish.” And maybe a smidge of “Shogun Assassin.”

Now Gingrich has roped in a few rich minions of his own, and you should watch the video they’ve just put out. Romney looks worse than the evil banker in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” It’s full of heart-tugging former factory workers who used to have happy homes and wonderful Christmases until ... Mitt Romney Came to Town. By the time it’s over, you will want to gather up the peasants and march on one of Romney’s mansions with flaming torches.

There is nothing Gingrich won’t do to get Mitt. At the end of the video, there’s a clip of Romney speaking French! And now Newt’s Web site has a video that basically asks whether America will elect a president who once drove to Canada with the family dog strapped to the roof of the car. Which is, of course, an excellent question.

Related articles

• Op-Ed Columnist: The Primary Primer (nytimes.com)