Raúl Grijalva vs The People Who Think The Moon Is Made Of Cheese

Raúl Grijalva will be joining us for our regular monthly live blog session at Crooks and Liars today at 1pm (PT) next week. Raúl's in his toughest reelection battle ever-- the GOP is targeting him because he stood up to the racist bullying around the SB 1070-- but he's spending most of his time, as he always does-- fighting for the interests of ordinary American working families, the ones who don't have money to hire lobbyists. Blue America has a fundraising page dedicated to his reelection. We hope you'll visit it today and visit it often between now and November.

Right now he's leading the battle against Obama's Cat Food Commission and has made it clear that the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which he chairs, will do whatever it takes to protect Social Security and make sure it isn't sacrificed on the alter of rich-people-worship and heartless right wing ideology. At the same time, he leading the battle to help President Obama let the Bush tax cuts to the wealthy sunset, like they were meant to when they were first passed.

Too many Democrats are buying into the false Republican Party rhetoric that letting the tax cuts for the rich sunset would be raising "our taxes." There are ads all over TV and radio about it, ads paid for by... rich people, of course-- rich people who hate paying taxes and who hate non-rich people. You know, long before Fox News came along to use its divisive tactics against working people on behalf of the rich, men of great wealth had been coping with how to keep the masses at bay for centuries. They even figured out -- and paid church shills to spread-- a way to discount Jesus' famous indictment of the rich (who are generally, by nature, consumed with greed and selfishness). Every word is literally true, right? Try Matthew 19:24: "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." That was Jesus talking... directly. But the wealthy needed a way around that clear, easily understood concise message. Here's what they came up with somewhere along the way: The "eye of the needle" was a narrow gate into Jerusalem through which a camel could just barely squeeze, implying that even rich people can get into Heaven, if they're nice (and who isn't?). Easy enough, right? Now we can all go back to worshipping rich people and not worry about Jesus. Robert Sheaffer, who debunks right wing propaganda, doesn't leave it at that malarkey though:

While believing this no doubt lowers the cognitive dissonance they suffer between the resentment against wealth that is integral to the Christian religion they revere, and their own desire to achieve, it is nonetheless a silly legend, like the alligators in the sewers. The Jerome Biblical Commentary is a standard reference work found in many libraries, written by Catholic scholars. Its commentary on Matthew 19:24 states bluntly, "the figure of the camel and the eye of the needle means exactly what is said; it does not refer to a cable or a small gate of Jerusalem." The Abingdon Interpreter's Bible is a major reference work compiled by Protestant scholars, and its analysis of this passage is in full agreement. Unfortunately for the fundamentalists, the consensus of New Testament scholars is that Matthew's passage barring rich people from heaven means exactly what it says. It remains to be seen how many of them are willing to give up all their wealth in accordance with the ideals they claim to profess.

All through history the wealthy, who after all pay the preachers and historians and story tellers and propagandists, et al, have been sure to inculcate into the collective unconscious that people are rich because God has blessed them and poor because God found them unworthy. It's practically a cornerstone of many Protestant churches-- but it's not Jesus' teaching, not by a long shot. "Much of Yeshua's teaching endeavored to correct the false assumption that wealth is always a blessing from GOD. The truth is more the other way. Usually the pursuit of wealth insulates us from the workings of GOD in our lives. It can choke the word sown in our hearts and rob us of eternal treasures our heavenly Father desires for us to obtain. Hence, it is difficult (not impossible) for a rich man to enter the kingdom of GOD. Many stumble at this and are sad and go away grieved, having found no answer that pleases them. A few however are willing to set aside secondary pursuits and seek with all their heart to know HIM who knew them 'before the foundation of the world' (Ephesians 1:4)." Fox viewers and fans of Hate Talk Radio, by definition, don't tend to get into too many details and fine points. In fact, I'm afraid they won't understand how Raúl is trying to save their sorry asses. I asked him about the battle to dump the budget-busting Bush tax cuts for the wealthy:

Despite how this issue has been framed so far, this isn't a debate between two competing philosophies. It's a debate between people who understand economics and people who think the moon is made of cheese. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the single best way to help the economy is to promote government spending on goods and services, which clocks in as high as a 2.5-to-1 benefit for every dollar spent. A tax cut for higher-income people gives us only a 0.6-to-1 benefit. This is simple arithmetic. There just isn't a serious debate about what the better policy really is.

Tax cuts are being sold by the same people today that were selling them 15 years ago as an answer to every problem. When the only solution you have is tax cuts, you really don't have any solutions at all. The country needs more creative, reality-based thinking than Republicans are offering right now. Democrats shouldn't fall for their rhetoric today, tomorrow or the day after - because you know it'll keep coming.

UPDATE: Press Conference In Tucson

Yesterday Raúl called together the southern Arizona press corps to lay out his agenda and priorities. He explained why the House Democratic Caucus should have followed progressives' lead and pushed harder to get better legislation instead of buckling to obstructionist Republicans and cowardly Blue Dogs. particularly in terms of a too small Stimulus and a weak healthcare reform bill.

The party should have added a public option to the health-care reform bill and focused more on job creation in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, plus other "bold initiatives that were compromised out by people in more vulnerable districts," he said.

The more "robust" parts of those laws would have made them better, he said. "What did we gain? The opposition isn't any less intense than it would have been," if those initiatives made it into the law instead of being taken out in the name of compromise, he said.

By yielding to Democrats in vulnerable congressional districts, the party was cautious yet didn't achieve bipartisan support on the big-ticket bills, didn't get better legislation out of the process, and isn't seeing less opposition in swing districts, he said.