"A Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious"

This was a phrase my father used to use: a blinding glimpse of the obvious. Essentially, it meant that for anyone paying attention, the answer to whatever question being posed was right in front of you the entire time.

In light of that phrase, I present this article from The Atlantic. A few notable quotes:

The most basic criticism of the GOP’s tax cut was that the boons for corporations and their shareholders would far outweigh the benefits for ordinary workers. That’s exactly what seems to be happening. Stock buybacks announced between January 1st and February 15th reached historically high levels, totaling about $170 billion in that period. That’s 28 times larger than the total value of end-of-year bonuses that were credited to the corporate tax bill—some of which had been announced months earlier and had nothing to do with the tax cuts. Companies might be advertising new bonuses. But they’re quietly reaping the benefits of higher profits.

Well, for those who actually believed all of the noise about trickle-down economics, notwithstanding the absolute absence of any evidence to support the conservative-predicted effects of this tax cut; for those who slept through the Bush era, perhaps this is news.

I remember the Bush tax cuts; I remember the predicted wave of American awesomeness. Funny thing is, this economic BOOM that was predicted . . . I don't remember it. 

However, being the liberal I am (as they say, liberals refuse to even take their own side in an argument), it's only fair to also present this quote:

Nothing like this has happened before—a massive, deficit-busting tax cut on capital during a period of steady growth and nearly full employment.

Economic historians can’t easily predict what’s going to happen because big rich countries practically never do what Republicans just did. 

Well, in sum:

It all adds up to this: The GOP law was always an enduring corporate tax cut advertised as fast middle-class tax relief. But because it represents a novel fiscal experiment, it’s not entirely clear what the short-term or long-term implications of the plan will be. If I wrote, “The GOP tax cut is essentially a discount coupon for technology that will raise corporate profits at the expense of labor in the long run,” I’d be telling a reasonable story. If I wrote, “The GOP tax cut is an inflation machine that will raise the price of goods and labor and encourage the Fed to raise rates accordingly, thus punishing corporate profits,” I’d also be telling a reasonable story.

Maybe I've been the naive one. Perhaps the GOP repeatedly cuts taxes on the wealthy and on corporations not because they want to help the non-wealthy and actual human beings, but because they earnestly believe that the most pressing problem in America is that wealthy people and corporations are taxed too little. I guess when someone shows you who he is, you should believe him.