Running On Empty

A few Republican memes need to be squashed. Most specifically, the idea that government is growing, taxes are increasing, and spending is out of control.

As Andrew O' Willike found, government employment at all levels combined, as a percentage of the nation's population, has remained essentially constant, at just under 10 percent, since the 1970s.

Total federal, state, and local taxes in the U.S. rank among the lowest in the world. Dennis Cauchon discovered, "Federal, state, and local income taxes consumed 9.2 percent of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950."

As the Wisconsin Budget Project (WBP) calculated, Wisconsin is below the national average in total direct spending and Wisconsin spending has been decreasing compared to other states. WBP also revealed that the number of Wisconsin public employees is 8 percent lower than the national average.

So, basically, everything the Tea Party and conservatives are campaigning on - government size and spending, high taxes, and spoiled and numerous public workers - is mythological.

The ideology and the paradigm Republicans operate from continually produces the opposite outcome than claimed. The only thing conservatives have to run on are lies and smears. The facts are not on their side, so they're trying to change the definition of what a fact is.