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Sunday, November 16, 2014

In which I compare, Rand Paul, Jay Ackroyd, and David Dayan

Jay Ackroyd notes DDay's excellent policy proposals. I comment That is indeed an excellent list. I especially like point 3 (I think it is useful to ask people how much money Medicare Advantage saved the government if they object). It is petty picky and silly to quibble and I am that petty picky silly quibbler. In point 4 you followed acqua buddha. "Adding good jobs with proper pensions in the public sector — which employs the fewest workers since 1966 — could help. " The claim "the public sector — which employs the fewest workers since 1966" is absolutely false. The link evidence is an observation about the Federal Government. Federal Government employment is a small fraction of public sector employment (about one sixth of it). I invoke acqua buddha from the watery shallows, because this is exactly the dodge used by Rand Paul to hide his ignorance In an interview, he was visibly astounded by Paul Krugman's claim that government employment had declined during a period when it had in fact declined (hint the period was not "since 1966"). After the data were shown to him or, more likely, an aid -- he claimed he thought that Krugman had made a claim about Federal Government employment. http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/09/09/816761/flabbergasted-rand-paul-learns-public-employment-decreased-under-obama/ http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/09/the-zombie-that-ate-rand-pauls-brain/

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