‘Don’t like the data? Get rid of the data’

[Qtec]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">On Friday night’s edition of “The Rachel Maddow Show,” host Rachel Maddow discussed the Republicans on Capitol Hill’s attempt to bury a report by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) that thoroughly debunked one of the Republican Party’s most sacred tenets, that tax cuts for the wealthy create jobs and are good for the economy.

That belief, known as “trickle down economics” could be called the central pillar of Republican economic policy, and yet, the non-partisan CRS study’s results have been pulled from the organization’s website at Republicans’ behest.

One of the reasons Americans are glad the Bush years are over, Maddow said, is not just the war in Iraq, warrantless wiretapping or torture, but also the Bush administration’s tendency to just “disappear” information that did not support its assertions.

<span style='font-size: 14pt'>In 2003, the State Department issued its annual report on global terrorism. When it was time to issue another report for 2004, the State Department had in fact found that Bush administration policies not only hadn’t reduced terror attacks in the world but had driven them up to their highest point in two decades, the Bush administration’s answer was to stop publishing an annual terrorism report at all.</span>

<span style='font-size: 14pt'>“<span style="color: #3333FF">The Bush administration had a habit of this,” she said. “Don’t like the data? Get rid of the data.</span>”</span>

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link (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/11/03/maddow-on-republicans-burying-tax-report-dont-like-the-data-get-rid-of-the-data/)


Maddow lists a number of times when they have done this.

Here is one she missed.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Bush-era EPA document on climate change released
The 2007 draft suppressed until now calls for regulation of greenhouse gases, citing global warming as a serious risk to the U.S. A finding by the Obama administration is nearly identical.
October 14, 2009

WASHINGTON — The Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday released a <span style='font-size: 14pt'>long-suppressed</span> report by George W. Bush administration officials who had concluded -- based on science -- that the government should begin regulating greenhouse gas emissions because global warming posed serious risks to the country.

The report, known as an "endangerment finding," was done in 2007. <span style='font-size: 14pt'>The Bush White House refused to make it public because it opposed new government efforts to regulate the gases most scientists see as the major cause of global warming.</span> </div></div>

Q

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">
Bush administration accused of doctoring scientists' reports on climate change

· Inconvenient conclusions censored, hearing told
· Researchers warned not to talk about global warming



The Bush administration was yesterday accused of systemic tampering with the work of government climate scientists to eliminate politically inconvenient material about global warming.

At a hearing of Congress, scientists and advocacy groups described a campaign by the White House to remove references to global warming from scientific reports and limit public mention of the topic to avoid pressure on an administration opposed to mandatory controls on greenhouse gas emissions.

Such pressure extended even to the use of the words "global warming" or "climate change", said a report released yesterday by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Government Accountability Project. The report said nearly half of climate scientists at government agencies had been advised against using those terms.

Yesterday's hearings, overseen by the new Democratic chair of the House committee on oversight and government reform, Congressman Henry Waxman, follow years of complaints by scientists that the Bush administration was seeking to put its own spin on scientific research at government agencies. </div></div>

[Gayle in MD]

There were a number of times when people testified that Bush redacted their reports.

We pay for the studies, and then Repiglicans deep six the important results.

Same thing Bush did regarding the 9/11 report, much of it to protect his Saudi business friends.

Bush/Cheney/Rice should all have been hung!

[Gayle in MD]

It's a Repiglican thingie.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Congressional Research Service Report On Tax Cuts For Wealthy Suppressed By GOP



The New York Times reported on Thursday that Senate Republicans applied pressure to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service (CRS) in September, successfully persuading it to withdraw a report finding that lowering marginal tax rates for the wealthiest Americans had no effect on economic growth or job creation.

"The pressure applied to the research service comes amid a broader Republican effort to raise questions about research and statistics that were once trusted as nonpartisan and apolitical," the Times reported. Democrats in Congress, however, have resurfaced the report and published it in full. It can be read below.

Republicans told the Times they had issues with the tone, wording and scope of the report, but they clearly objected most strongly to its findings, which undermine the governing fiscal philosophy of the party, that tax cuts for the wealthy will spur growth and benefit everybody.

GOP officials told The Times that the decision by the CRS came after a cooperative discussion, but Democrats have suggested that the move is part of a broader effort by Republicans to squelch legitimate research that runs counter to their economic principles.

The CRS concluded:


<span style='font-size: 14pt'>The results of the analysis suggest that changes over the past 65 years in the top marginal tax rate and the top capital gains tax rate do not appear correlated with economic growth. The reduction in the top tax rates appears to be uncorrelated with saving, investment, and productivity growth. The top tax rates appear to have little or no relation to the size of the economic pie. However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution. As measured by IRS data, the share of income accruing to the top 0.1% of U.S. families increased from 4.2% in 1945 to 12.3% by 2007 before falling to 9.2% due to the 2007-2009 recession. At the same time, the average tax rate paid by the top 0.1% fell from over 50% in 1945 to about 25% in 2009. Tax policy could have a relation to how the economic pie is sliced—lower top tax rates may be associated with greater income disparities. </span>
Rep. Sandy Levin of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, demanded the CRS explain its decision. "The impartial research and advice provided by CRS experts informs and strengthens the work of Congress. However, this valuable role hinges on the impartiality of CRS analysts and their freedom from political pressure. As with other non-partisan institutions, subjecting CRS analysts to political considerations undermines the legislative process and the American people’s trust in it," Levin wrote in a letter to CRS. "Therefore I was deeply disturbed to hear that Mr. Hungerford’s report was taken down in response to political pressure from Congressional Republicans who had ideological objections to the report’s factual findings and conclusion."
The report is extensive, but the reasoning behind its conclusion is fairly straightforward. The richest Americans are the least likely to spend extra money they get as a result of a tax cut, and are more likely to save it or invest it offshore. Those on the lower end of the economic spectrum, meanwhile, are the most likely to spend transfer payments they receive from the government.
A release by the Democratic Policy & Communications Center on Wednesday accused Republicans of attempting to bury the report because its "findings undermine a central tenet of Republican party orthodoxy on taxes." They included a copy of the original report, which is available below:
THIS POST IS DEDICATED TO ALL OF THE IDIOTIC CLIMATE CHANGE DENIERS, WHO ALSO THINK THEY HAVE A CLUE ABOUT ECONOMICS!

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