If you do a Google search for “Romney data driven,” 2,290,000 results come up. This is supposedly one of his big selling points. You know, he looks at the data. And yet, of course, he doesn’t, not even on economic issues that are supposedly his strong-suit.
In his now infamous talk to donors, in addition to insulting half the country and vowing to just ignore the Israeli-Palestinian issue, Mitt opines on qualitative (oops) quantitative easing:
Romney: Yeah, it’s interesting…the former head of Goldman Sachs, John Whitehead, was also the former head of the New York Federal Reserve. And I met with him, and he said as soon as the Fed stops buying all the debt that we’re issuing—which they’ve been doing, the Fed’s buying like three-quarters of the debt that America issues. He said, once that’s over, he said we’re going to have a failed Treasury auction, interest rates are going to have to go up.
Except, this isn’t true. As Kevin Drum points out:
So is this true? Is the Fed really buying three-quarters of all treasury debt? The short answer is no. The longer answer is that the Fed has engaged in two rounds of quantitative easing and just recently announced a third. The first one, which started at the end of 2008, mostly involved the purchase of mortgage-backed securities. Purchase of treasury debt was fairly small. The second round, which took place in the first half of 2011, did consist mostly of treasury debt. It amounted to $600 billion, and led to a spate of horror stories about how the Fed was purchasing 61% of all treasury issues. Since then, however, the Fed has maintained a steady level of treasury debt, and the third round of quantitative easing, like the first, is mostly focused on the purchase of mortgage-backed securities.
In total, the Fed holds about 10-15% of treasury debt. And since interest rates are not just set at auction, but also through the general functioning of the bond markets, we are already in a situation where interests rates could go up if the markets were leery of U.S. debt.
Look at the following graph and, as a data driven analyst, tell me if Mitt’s analysis makes sense.
Baud
That graph is DAMNING to Mitt Romney.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
WTF does it mean?
Cacti
Mitt can’t be held responsible for his lies. He has a White Horse Prophecy to fulfill.
MonkeyBoy
If you do a Google search for “Romney data driven,” 2,290,000 results come up.
Jeeez. It would help if you knew how to do a Google search. Searching for
Romney “data driven”
gives About 198,000 results – about 10% of your number. This bodes badly for the trustworthyness of your other “facts”.
Tom Levenson
@MonkeyBoy: Laugh ‘a while you can, MonkeyBoy. I just performed the search as BF specified it and got 2,290,000 results, just as advertised.
This bodes badly for the trustworthyness of your future comments.
Southern Beale
Paul Ryan tells the Atlas Society in 2005 that Social Security and Medicare are the target because they’re collectivist” and “socialistic.”
Interesting that this was exposed at a Catholic magazine, which finds Ryan’s (and Ayn Rand’s) politics “completely at odds with the principles of Catholic Social Doctrine.”
There’s a link to the full audio at the site.
MonkeyBoy
@Tom Levenson:
Huh? 90% of the unrestricted search will not contain the phrase “data driven”. It will turn up “hits” such as “The Romney bus drove to the data warehouse”.
Comrade Mary
@Southern Beale: Not just Catholics. The [scary horror movie organ sting] JESUITS!
Charles Pierce was on this, too.
Steeplejack
@Tom Levenson:
Whoa, hoss! What MonkeyBoy meant is that a search for the two terms “Romney” and “data driven,” which is what his search gives you, is probably a better one for the purpose of this discussion than a search for the three discrete words “Romney,” “data” and “driven.” In the latter “data” and “driven” can appear anywhere in the document, not necessarily linked as “data driven.”
ETA: In other words, quotes matter in a Google search. MonkeyBoy’s search is looking for two terms, Finel’s is looking for three.
jwb
@Tom Levenson: Without quotes I got 2,290,00 as well. With full quotes, 33,000. ETA: With restricted quotes, 198,000.
Southern Beale
@Comrade Mary:
Oooh Glad Pierce was on this, hadn’t seen that. Reading Ryan’s comments is scary. He’s such a fucking radical.
And I love that he just blatantly lied about his Ayn Rand boner, called it an “urban legend” when clearly he’s a fanatic.
trollhattan
@Comrade Mary:
One Jesuit who’d rip Ryan to bits is Jerry Brown. They learned him good, and being twice Ryan’s age wouldn’t help Paulie one bit.
But holy crap, what’s with those Opus Dei hasshats like Santorum? Jesus wept, indeed.
Spaghetti Lee
@Southern Beale:
because they’re collectivist” and “socialistic.”
And Lady Ayn would not stand for that. They must be destroyed then. Simply must.
This is why I hate objectivists more than any other right-wing subgroup. They have no loyalty to anyone or anything but their cult leader.
shoutingattherain
So today the Catholics are the good guys. What will tomorrow bring? Just don’t mention the words “abortion” or “birth control” around any of ’em. Also too: “molestation”.
Ben Franklin
What a gaggle of kvetches
catclub
If Romney were data driven, then combine that with his “Obama
has the votes of the 47% who don’t pay taxes” and you get:
What fraction of the rest does Romney have to pick off to win?
about 94% He should go home and rest now, the only group that breaks that sharply
is black voters, but they break that way FOR Obama.
Now if he was just slinging numbers he heard from hard scientist Rush Limbaugh, it makes more sense. Just slinging red meat to his audience.
SatanicPanic
I don’t know what this means.
Bernard Finel
@Baud: That the total share of U.S. public debt held by the Fed is small, and that as a consequence the market is already able to affect interest rates. This undermines Romney’s claim that rates are artificially low. They are low in nominal terms because (a) inflation expectation and low, and (b) the weak economy means there are few more appealing place to park money.
catclub
@Spaghetti Lee: “They must be destroyed then.” Daleks seem rather collectivist, though.
Bernard Finel
@MonkeyBoy: Yes, your search is a more accurate one, though it does not affect the bigger point which is that Romney is often described as data driven. I’d post an update/correction if this was actually an important part of my argument, but since it was just a cutesy intro, I think I’ll leave this in the comments.
danimal
@Baud:
It means that Mitt Romney is just another slick finance con-man, selling the apocalypse to rubes using confusing, authoritative-sounding gobbledygook to unsophisticated audiences in exchange for political power and/or massive profits.
It’s really disgusting, but so commonplace we don’t really notice until the Bernie Madoffs and Ken Lays mess up and we have to pick up the pieces.
Do you trust the Social Security Trust Fund to the Wall Street financial wizards? Vote Romney if you do.
ChrisNYC
John Whitehead is 90 (ninety!) years old. At the victims fundraiser, Mitt talked about how Henry Kissinger told him that the US is seen as weak. Kissinger, age 89. Mitt may want to think about rolling forward and talking to some people who were NOT YET drawing Social Security on election day 1980.
jwb
@Bernard Finel: I was curious whether the difference had to do with google filtering results. But that didn’t seem to be an issue this time. Your point certainly stands, and MonkeyBoy is just living up to his name.
catclub
@ChrisNYC: um, 1980 was 32 years ago, right? and 32 from 90 is 58, right? while 32 from 89 is 57?
And the retirement age is 65 or thereabouts?
I think you had a point to make there but slipped up on the data driven parts ;)
danielx
Ummm….based on my observations of the past couple of decades, the Republican Party is not noted for data-driven decision making, whether on economic issues or anything else. Let’s see:
Climate change – damn the evidence, the world is not getting warmer!
Except it is – well, if we don’t talk about it it won’t happen. Besides, just think of the poor oil companies whose business model is based on fucking up the whole planet.
Supply side economics – cutting taxes does too increase government revenues and economic growth!
Except it doesn’t. But if we keeping digging there’s bound to be a pony here somewhere!
Planning for postwar governance in Iraq isn’t important!
Enough said – fuckin’ Arabs don’t know what’s good for them.
Abstinence-based sex education reduces teen pregnancies!
It doesn’t – but we think it’s a good idea anyway, can’t have those randy little bastards enjoying themselves.
The more tax cuts are targeted towards the top income bracket, the more jobs will be created!
::Crickets:: It hasn’t happened because their taxes haven’t been cut enough and they feel so unappreciated. Therefore the answer is more tax cuts, except for You People down there. You need to suffer more.
Austerity is the answer to economic depression!
What do those Yuropeens know anyway? America fuck yeah! Pain is good for you, especially if your net worth is less than six figures!
And the hits just keep right on coming. Yeah, that’s some top shelf data-driven decision making, yesiree.
Steve
I blame Bill Clinton for the commentariat’s sudden obsession with proper arithmetic.
Villago Delenda Est
@Spaghetti Lee:
“Now let’s repeat the non-conformists’ oath: I promise to be different! I promise to be unique! I promise not to repeat things other people say!”
LD50
None of this really matters. Mitt has made it clear that all he has to do to fix the economy is get elected. Everything else will just take care of itself.
MonkeyBoy
my point is that arguments from google search results are generally pretty weak even without blatant errors in search formulation indicating incompetence. For example searching for ‘Obama data driven’ turns up About 4,110,000 results while ‘Romney data driven’ gives 2,290,000. Does this mean that Obama is 1.8 times as data driven as Romney?
Steve
@MonkeyBoy: Actually, there are a ton of stories out there about Obama being data-driven, but they’re mostly about his 2008 campaign methodology as opposed to his personal style.
Villago Delenda Est
@MonkeyBoy:
Slate is over that way, contrarian MonkeyBoy.
General Stuck
I think Romney is cracking up, and could dawn panties for headgear while reciting the Gettysburg Address.
He says he is going to repeal Obamacare, pound it into sand for all time, kill it dead as Caesar. Then explains that Obama says Romney is the grandfather of Obama care. Romney muses this as an insult, but says he’ll take it anyways. Noonan says an intervention is in order. She can bring the white coats, and I’ll bring the net.
edit – Oh, and admits he was just bullshitting us in the primary. Who knew?
J. Michael Neal
@MonkeyBoy: Good job. That nit isn’t going to pick itself.
pseudonymous in nc
@MonkeyBoy:
Don’t be an asshole jerk dickbreath wanker Kate Middleton’s tits [/SEO]
catclub
@danielx: I think these facts will be used to show (after he loses) that Romney was not a real GOP conservative, too much head, not enough gut, thus his loss.
Of course, they also have to forget the last guy who decided by his gut. They also have to Forget Bush I, who broke his promise not to raise taxes. So we are back to Reagan.
me
Ryan must be a bit nervous too. I saw a Paul Ryan for Congress television ad yesterday.
Soonergrunt
@catclub:
DING, DING, DING! WE HAVE A WINNER!
Remember, if a conservative loses, it’s because he wasn’t conservative enough!
arguingwithsignposts
I think you mean quaNTitative easing.
And I agree that “searching for [phrase1] and [phrase2] on google turns up X hits is a pretty weak lede. You’d do better to actually cite some instances where someone has used the terms “data driven” and “Romney” in close proximity.
ChrisNYC
@catclub: I take it back. Kissinger should be sec of state. The Soviets are the greatest threat, after all.
Brachiator
Quantitative Easing.
Or maybe I missed a joke.
Romney appears to be quite a fraud. The Republicans are in a jam. Do they have the balls to say “vote for him anyway and Congress will be in charge and make sure that everything turns out OK”
And they still have the nerve to say that Obama doesn’t know what he is doing.
danielx
@Soonergrunt:
Right. Back to Reagan, who couldn’t get past a GOP primary these days with an endorsement from Jesus.
1..2..3…all together now!
Conservatism cannot fail, it can only be failed. True conservatism has never been tried.
It’s a lot like Marxism that way.
Tonal Crow
C’mon, just say it: Romney is bullshitting.
He couldn’t care less what he says as long as he thinks it’ll convince people to vote for him.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s true, false, unknown, or even unknowable. All that matters is whether he thinks it sounds good in voters’ ears.
Just say it: Romney is bullshitting.
Davis X. Machina
@danielx: It is a lot like Marxism that way.
Tonal Crow
BTW, Romney is “data-driven” in the same way that Republicans are good for jobs, promote liberty and keep their laws off our bodies, avoid unnecessary foreign entanglements, spend our taxes efficiently, etc. etc. etc. It is pure bullshit, having no purpose other than to sound good in voters’ ears.
Joel
I have to say, not my favorite post – I hate using google hits as a metric (especially since this post is #2 on the search results as described) and I don’t quite understand the graph.
FuriousPhil
You don’t have to be smart or have a degree in economics to be rich, apparently.
I’m a big fan of K-thug and Stiglitz, so I’m out of the loop on how Republican economics work. It’s like some kind of wingnut magic, I’m told, where they sacrifice welfare recipients on a huge altar in an art deco temple somewhere.
joes527
@Tom Levenson:
Best. Movie. Ever.
Burnspbesq
Meanwhile, investors from all over the world are continuing to pay the U.S. Treasury a fee to hold their money, and the Invisible Bond Vigilantes are too busy gang-banging the Confidence Fairy to do anything about it.
MikeJ
@Tom Levenson: The White House wants to know is everything ok with the alien space craft from Planet 10 or should we just go ahead and destroy Russia?
Emdee
@Steeplejack: Yup. I can bump it up to 42,700,000 results by searching for “Romney underwear driven,” but being underwear-driven is not a more major selling point of the Romney campaign than being data-driven.
Which is irrelevant except the post title is “Romney the Credulous,” so yeah, bad optics.
/did you know the word “gullible” is not in the dictionary?
catclub
@ChrisNYC: I’ll take MY comment back if you promise Kissinger will NOT be SOS.
Mark S.
Ezra Klein:
Be sure to check out the graphs in the article.
Soonergrunt
@joes527:
@MikeJ:
A-HA! I KNEW it was from a movie I’d seen. I was wracking my brains and couldn’t get to it.
I haven’t seen that movie in about 15 years.
Brachiator
Apparently, Romney did not make the Forbes 400 Richest Americans list.
Ann is not happy, says that someone must pay.
The 47 per cent trembles.
Steeplejack
Holy shnikeys, get your video-clip-grabbers ready for tomorrow morning. Jon Stewart just killed with a capital K in his opening segment tonight–“Chaos on Bullshit Mountain.” He reamed Romney, the Republicans and Fox News with a rage that has been sadly lacking for a while. Must-see TV. You will need a cigarette afterwards.
MattR
@Steeplejack: It was magnificent. Too bad it was followed up by that terrible Jason Jones-John Oliver both sides think the campaign is nasty and both blame the other side false equivalence BS.
Steeplejack
@Emdee:
Can you translate any of that horseshit to English?
Redshift
@Tonal Crow: I agree in general, but that theory would only explain this instance if there was anything in that word salad that would convince anyone to vote for him.
There’s a certain amount of being part of the tribe by parroting the stupid things they think are smart in the bubble, but he babbles way more than he needs to to establish that.
Burnspbesq
@Comrade Mary:
Money quote from Pierce:
Priceless. Needs to be a tag.
danielx
Currently reading The Party Is Over, by Mike Lofgren, another GOP apostate who (too late) saw the light.
For some reason, I laughed to the point of tears coming from my eyes when I read this sentence:
Am I weird?
Tonal Crow
@Redshift:
All that matters is that he thinks that it would convince someone to vote for him, not that it actually would do so. But I think it might convince a few tribal wingnuts to vote for him who might otherwise forget there’s an election.
Corner Stone
@Emdee:
It’s not?
Steeplejack
@MattR:
That was weak, but the “stop the finger-pointing” guy was hilarious.
Xenos
@ChrisNYC:
Mitt understands his audience. When speaking to authoritarians, argue from authority. This sort of anecdote is the most persuasive sort of argument with this crowd.
I worked with a fundamentalist attorney on a few cases once. He always structured oral argument around whatever culturally recognized authority he could bring to bear, like a pastor trying to spice things up a bit for his flock. It was hokey, but sometimes it worked.
Dennis SGMM
They could implement every one of the Republicans’ demands regarding taxes on the 1% and six months later they’d be blaming again. They’d demand that the gov must give every member of the 1% a cubic foot of 24 carat gold every month. Otherwise, no jobs.
danielx
@Comrade Mary:
You have no idea. Having been exposed to four years of Jesuit education in an all male high school, I can testify that the real name of the order is Psycho Brothers for Christ. Those language textbooks were serious blunt objects when hurled by an irate Irish Catholic sociopath.
Although they were a pain in the ass to Il Papa then and are even more so to that Nazi Ratzinger now because of their social concerns, god love ’em.
RaflW
I now fully grasp how W. Mitt Romney could have retroactively retired from Bain Capital. He’s such a dunderhead that he probably never actually did a damn thing, made a decision, understood a deal or otherwise contributed while he was “in charge.”
So when he left to run the Olympics (via massive gov’t subsidies), no one at Bain noticed he’d gone. Sure, his desk was empty, but his mind had been, so it didn’t matter what year he clocked out.
Mnemosyne
@Tom Levenson:
It’s pronounced Big-boo-TAY!
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: I absolutely hate it that I have to 100% love this comment from you.
It’s gold.
Dammit.
? Martin
Nate Silver:
Winning.
Villago Delenda Est
@? Martin:
Next step: taking back the House.
Mittens is leading the GOP to its doom.
Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason
@Mnemosyne: Jeez, OK, I had to look it up on the internets thingie. Buckaroo Banzai. Haven’t seen it since it came out, but wow, what a cast!
Narcissus
If I could read graphs I’d be all over this thread
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
Uh oh, Rafalca is going to be making pommes frites in Belgium, if you know what I mean.
dance around in your bones
No matter where you go, there you are.
? Martin
@Villago Delenda Est: Mitt, but none of the other Republicans are helping terribly either – Akin, Ryan, etc.
The trend in the Senate is almost certainly being repeated in the House. Nate is showing Dems coming out of November at +6 – where they are now. That’s pretty promising for taking back the House. Redistricting is the big unknown, but it should favor Dems. Redistricting gives the challenger a bit of a new advantage, and Dems have more challengers.
Anoniminous
@? Martin:
Silver has uttered the “H” word:
? Martin
@Anoniminous: Yeah, watching Rachel now – and she just quoted a GOP pollster saying that the problem is that Romney is underperforming in red districts needed to carry swing states. Now, if we subscribe to the theory that the top of the ticket drives turnout (which is conventional thinking) then, yeah, they have a big problem as those are the same districts that they need to carry the House.
And that was my thinking earlier today with that Pew poll showing Obama +8 with LV. The LV models have to be moving now toward Dems, and it sounds like that might be as much a sign that GOP turnout is hinting downward. That’s where the Dems win the House.
jl
@? Martin:
And Romney seems to be fine tuning his pitch to alienate both the base and independents. That’s nice too.
Lancelot Link
/did you know the word “gullible” is not in the dictionary?
It is too! I checked!
? Martin
Best. Message. Discipline. Ever.
Yutsano
@? Martin: I could eat a Manchin winning if we got to 60. Is it too much to ask for Kerrey and Heitkamp to pull it off in their respective states?
Anoniminous
@? Martin:
GOP won an awful lot of seats in 2010 Obama carried in 2008. Just in the normal course of things I’d expect some of them to flip back.
An interesting thing: if the GOP is losing votes in the congressional districts their gerrymandering may come back to bite them in the ass. The standard upswing in voter participation during a presidential year for Dems coupled with a small decline in GOP voter turn-out and an awful lot of House seats are going to flip. Speculation at this point, of course, but this election is so off-the-chart weird it’s something to be looking for.
? Martin
@Yutsano: That’s probably too much to ask, but we’ll see where this keeps going. Fortunately Romney and entropy are both working for us here.
Anoniminous
@Yutsano:
I know the GOP pulled out of New Mexico so they could use the money in North Dakota. I know nothing of ND politics and haven’t seen any recent polling. Berg, the GOP candidate, was the sitting Representative so he has to be considered the front runner.
Soonergrunt
@Anoniminous: The only reason Republicans would be spending more money in North Dakota than absolutely necessary is to DEFEND a seat. This is good news.
Yutsano
@Anoniminous: @Soonergrunt: Heitkamp was the State Treasurer (I think) so she has won statewide office there as well. Plus she’s tenacious and isn’t running away from supporting the President. Plus the oil boom has to be changing the demographics of the state at least somewhat, so the tailwinds all favour her.
Violet
House Republicans are throwing Romney under the bus:
Brachiator
@? Martin:
I don’t subscribe to this theory at all. And you have seen states put local issues on the Novembet ballot, e.g., same sex marriage initiatives, in the hopes that a state or local issue might help a presidential candidate.
But, whatever.
The fun thing here is that the Romney Tapes are reminding me of the takedown of Meg Whitman in the past California gubernatorial election. Whitman never really had a chance, despite her personal wealth, donor money and the efforts of the California GOP. But her amateurish response to her Latino nanny problems sealed the deal.
In a similar way, the Romney Tapes and Mitten’s lame reaction to them are demolishing any pretense that Romney understands or sympathizes with the average American. This is better than any beer test.
And despite all the efforts to depict Obama as foreign and exotic, the Romney Revelations are actually having the opposite effect. As others have noted, the current Maddow show reveals some polling which underscores this. America believes that Obama has got their back.
Unless he can pull a miracle out of his magic underwear, Romney is done.
Also, too, the Maddow show hints at something sad. Romney is a tired, worn out old man who spends more time resting and fund raising than he does campaigning. This is his comfort zone. Unfortunately for him, it is also an “unfit to serve” zone.
? Martin
@Brachiator:
What I find sad is that this is the guy who filtered to the top by choice of half-ish of the country. And I don’t see the GOP having a big regret moment here. Sure, they’re thinking he sucks at this, but nobody is out there saying “Damn, if only we had picked Newt!” Even with all of this, they still seem to think he was the best option.
I’m 100% sure if we had picked John Edwards in 2008 and the whole affair came out before the general, we’d be in near unanimous agreement that either Obama or Clinton would have been a better pick. That’s not happening here.
Xenos
@? Martin: They don,t have anyone with better than regional appeal. No-one. Not a single presidential contest-worthy candidate.
Joey Maloney
@General Stuck: I think Romney is cracking up, and could dawn panties for headgear while reciting the Gettysburg Address.
What does Dawn think about that?
Brachiator
@? Martin:
The GOP can’t say this in public. It would be conceding the election. But the way that state and local Republican candidates are running away from Mitt’s 47 percent remarks is telling.
Also, as Frank Rich indicates in his nymag story on right wing media, there is a lot of Romney buyer remorse being expressed by conservatives. You are just not hearing it on Fox News.
JoyfulA
@me: Ryan’s opponent is demanding a debate: http://hq-salsa3.salsalabs.com/o/50113/content_item/signup?signup_page_KEY=7141&tag=twitter
Another face in the crowd
It must be getting pretty bad in Florida. The Tallahassee wingnut radio talk show host spent yesterday begging Ron Paul supporters to vote for Romney and not write in for Paul, ’cause we can’t have 4 more years of a “pathological liar” “socialist” in office. “If you vote for Ron Paul, you’re casting a vote for Obama.”
Lurking Canadian
@? Martin: At this point I’m starting to half-believe the theory that Romney’s a Democratic plant and he’s throwing the election on purpose.
Brachiator
@Another face in the crowd:
Whenever I hear this stuff, I wonder what is it, exactly, that Obama is supposedly lying about?
Poor wingnuts.
On the other hand, I wouldn’t support the Paul write-in option. Some Democrats might get confused and do something stupid here.
Ben Johannson
In the technical sense, no, the Fed does not buy up most Treasurys. What it does do is supply the reserves with which the private sector buys Treasurys. Back before we had all these excess reserves from deficit spendng, prior to an auction the Fed would buy up Treasurys on the secondary market, always enought to ensure the primary dealers had sufficient cash to take down the entire auction.
Basically the Fed funds the bond market rather than the market funding the Fed.