Raser’s Edge:  Reactionary reactions and logical fallacies

One recent Sunday on Meet the Press, Chuck Todd asked Kellyanne Conway about the White House position on the Russian collusion investigation.   She replied something like, “Why are you asking that?  What you should really be focusing on are the Hillary Clinton emails.”  Of course, one has nothing to do with the other and the Hillary investigation was exhaustive and concluded quite some time ago.

 What Conway used is a logical fallacy called “misdirection” or sometimes,  a “red herring.”  Kellyanne is a master of that technique.  She shifted the attention from the real subject under discussion—Russian collusion in the Trump election—to something old, irrelevant and totally unrelated but still a visceral topic with Trump’s base supporters.

This happens a lot with my blogs and facebook posts.   One facebook friend in particular, no matter what the subject is, he will bring up Hillary.  I posted a recent blog suggesting the Republican tax bill was open to many interpretations and that you could find a tax calculator on line and try to figure out what effect the new tax law would have on you.

   

His reaction to my post was:  “Right, Bill, and all the polls said the Hillarysaurus would win. How did that work out?”  (Note the cutesy way he refers to Hillary as “Hillarysaurus.”)

The only reference I made to polls in my post was: “Rather than just look at the polls which say as many as 65 percent of Americans think the Republican bill stinks, I thought I would do some research on what the bill would actually do for me.”   So my only reference to polls was a suggestion to IGNORE them and do some real research with the tax calculators available on line.  Rather than address my basic premise--research the bill’s consequences--he chose to address the irrelevant (but true) observation that the polls showed the bill is unfavorable to a majority of the public.

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Here’s another Republican logical fallacy reaction to my blogs which happens often.  If I am critical of Trump the response is:  There is something wrong with you.  A facebook friend’s recent post called for throwing the bums out of Washington referring to congressional politicians in general.  I suggested we start with Trump.  I was immediately accused of having an “obsession” with Trump and that I am “childish.”  The conclusion that I am “childish” is an example of the logical fallacy called “ad hominem”-- if you don’t have a good counter argument or you don’t like your opponent’s viewpoint, you attack the person.

 

Interestingly, if I post things critical of Trump, my Republican facebook friends do not hesitate to go on the attack, e.g. I’m “childish.”  But, if I share a column by an arch conservative pundit such as the recent one by George Will stating Trump is the worst American president ever do my Republican facebook friends respond that George Will is obsessively childish?   No, of course not.  In this case, another logical fallacy applies.  It’s called “avoiding the issue.”

Raser’s Edge:  Do you believe in Santa Claus?

When considering the Republican Tax Bill, it comes down to ones basic question:  Do you believe in Santa Claus or not?  The Republicans, in this analogy, are Santa Claus.  They tell you all Americans will bask in the beautiful glow of tax cuts, “hard working Americans will have more money in their pockets,” big corporations and small business will have more money to create gazillions of jobs, the economy will boom and everything will start coming up roses.   Our Moron Don President claims this is the “greatest Christmas gift Americans will receive in the history of the world.”

Rather than just look at the polls which say as many as 65 percent of Americans think the Republican bill stinks, I thought I would do some research on what the bill would actually do for me.  If you google something like “republican tax bill calculator” you will find a number of sites where you can plug in your data and see what effect the Republican largess will do for you.  I used the real data from my 2016 tax return.  Full disclosure:  l probably qualify as legitimate ‘Midddle Class.”  I file married-joint, we live on my wife’s teachers pension, my Social Security, my small business pension, income from my very small photography business and we are reasonably financially secure as senior citizens.

So here are the figures:  The New York Times calculator says we will reduce our taxes by $930. That is the best result I found and comes from what Trump calls the fake liberal news media.  But let’s try the Market Watch calculator (Market Watch is owned by Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal so it’s hardy liberal.)  Market Watch is much more detailed so I could enter actual deductions from my last year’s tax return.  According to this calculator, I would owe $534 MORE in income tax by itemizing, but WOW! If I take the new generous standard deduction I would pay $47 less! I really don't think that is an impressive tax cut!

I watched a video in which Trump declared at a cabinet meeting that a family earning $75,000 would cut its taxes by $2,000.  However, when I applied the Market Watch calculator and entered a family filing jointly, with two children, taking the standard deduction they would OWE $1,739 in taxes.

Let’s try a single person, head of household with two children making $25,000.  That person, according to Market Watch, would have $700 withheld from wages and get no tax refund.

What’s the point?  This is a huge tax break for corporations and the wealthy which, interestingly, the Republicans do not dispute.  They tell you that giving all that extra money to the wealthy will make them invest,  create jobs and boost the economy. This has not worked in the past and will most likely not work now. 

As you can see from the above calculations, individuals will not be getting meaningful tax cuts and in some cases none at all. Also, the whole thing is so confusing that different calculators, presumably using the same information on the bill, produce vastly different results.  However, none that I tried produce the tax cut bonanza for the middle class that Trump and Company are promising.

 Another disturbing element of the Republican tax plan is that corporate tax cuts remain in the future. However, individual cuts expire, but, according to Republicans, some phantom congress in the future will extend them and if the bill really does increase the deficit by $1.5 trillion we can easily pay for it by cutting Social Security and Medicare.

By almost all analysis, this tax bill is terrible and very unpopular with the American public, but for the conservatives, big corporations, the wealthy and Donald Trump, here comes Santa Claus!