A rising tide no longer raises all boats .... Krugman

[MindMover]

And so, predictably, Romney is accusing Obama of “attacking capitalism” and “dividing America” by raising questions about Bain and those hidden tax returns. This is all par for the course; many of us remember how any criticism of Bush was unpatriotic, and if I recall correctly, during the dotcom bubble the Wall Street Journal argued that any skepticism about stock market valuations showed a lack of faith in free markets.

The special Romney twist– aside from the willful misrepresentation of what Obama actually said about business success — is Mitt’s desire to have it both ways. He’s proud of his business record and his success, he says, but at the same time wants us to believe that he had nothing to do with Bain’s actions over a three-year period when he was still its CEO, and is completely unwilling to let us see the tax returns that would tell us something about exactly how he achieved his current wealth. (There are two competing theories about his tax stonewalling. One is that he had one or more years of zero taxes. The other is that he actually made a lot of money in 2009, because he shorted the market. We may never know which is true.)

Anyway, just a reminder about what’s really dividing America: the fact that a rising tide no longer raises all boats. Remember what the CBO told us:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/decoupled-and-divided/?smid=tw-NytimesKrugman&seid=auto

[ejpoeta]

1. well, when I hear this I can't help think.... it may raise all boats, but

what about those of us with no boat? We drown. See, they took away our boats and told us to swim. How long can you tread water? Even the best swimmer would drown.

[lastlib]

2. ...and the ones who can't swim are f*cked.............eom

[Warpy]

3. It never did.

In addition, it was a stupid statement that ASSumed we all had boats. We don't.

The only rising tide that raises any boats has to start at the bottom, with the rowboats. Nothing else will ever work.