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Digby flagged this segment from this Sunday's Fareed Zakaria GPS, and as she noted, Zakaria seems to be singing a very different tune now on whether austerity is popular with the masses in Europe than he was four years ago. And as she noted, being wrong never seems to get anyone kicked out of the club once you've gained entry as one of the Very Serious People by our corporate media.

Fareed Zakaria four years ago in a post called The Center Holds: In Britain even pain is popular":

Three weeks ago the new chancellor, 39-year-old Tory George Osborne, presented a budget that promised to get Britain’s fiscal house in order with sharp cuts in spending, coupled with tax increases. It landed in the midst of a heated debate across the industrialized world about how to best get the economy back on track. Osborne and his boss, Prime Minister David Cameron, have come down firmly on one side of this debate, hoping that a major effort to reduce the deficit will reassure bond markets and investors that Britain is a safe and compelling place to put their money.

Leaving aside the economics of this, what struck me as I spent time in Britain last week was the politics of deficit reduction. Having announced major cuts in popular programs, plus hefty tax increases, the Cameron government might be expected to be losing popularity by the day. But in fact the budget was well received by the public—though attacked ferociously from the left—and the governing coalition has actually inched up a bit in the polls.

There are several possible reasons for this. Cameron has played the public role of prime minister exceedingly well, making a pitch-perfect apology for the British Army’s wrongful use of force in Northern Ireland in 1972, and handling himself on the global stage with grace and ease. It’s also true, of course, that the effect of the cuts and taxes have not yet been felt, and when that happens, the government’s poll ratings might plunge. But clearly the honesty of the budget has resonated with voters.

It’s heartening to see a government do something that it must have thought would be deeply unpopular, and then be rewarded by the public...

I love this description of how he reacted to the commentary from his guests. Potted plant indeed:

Zakaria still rails against "entitlements" (which his earlier guest Stephen Haas described as a "cancer" to no objection from anyone) but he hasn't exactly come clean about the disastrous effects of the austerity measures in Europe that "heartened him" so strongly, has he? No, today he sits there like a potted plant while the bill of indictment rolls right over him.

But then he's a card-carrying Very Serious Person which means never having to say you're sorry.

Ain't that the truth? I don't always get a chance to watch all of his show every week, but I don't recall seeing him doing much to rebut that flawed economic study by Reinhart and Rogoff which the right has used to justify austerity as well. Most of our corporate media has done their best to ignore that, even as many of them, as Zakaria was here, have finally been forced to admit that maybe that whole push for austerity isn't working out so well.

Full transcript below the fold.

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Who needs Fox when you've got hosts like NBC's David Gregory repeating Republicans' talking points for them as he did here on this Sunday's Meet the Press. Somehow I don't ever remember Karl Rove's dance partner ever complaining about out of control government spending back when George W. Bush was busting the bank with a couple of wars he left off of the books and with tax cuts for the wealthy.

GREGORY: I want to get back to the automatic spending cuts and ask a fundamental question that I think Republican critics of this president are asking. Do you not concede that there is a spending problem in Washington? Even when it comes to the 50% cuts out of the sequester that are for the Defense Department. You have said in recent interviews you could live with those. You don't like the manner in which the cuts would be made, but you could live with those cutbacks to the Pentagon. So isn't there a spending problem here that must be addressed?

DURBIN: Absolutely. And I believe, as chairman of The Defense Appropriation Subcommittee in-- in the Senate, that we can save money, cut waste in the Pentagon, and not compromise our national security. But to do this in such a haphazard way over the remaining six or seven months is going to be unfair to the military and their families.

Think about this for a second. Cutting back on psychological counseling for the members of the military and their family during the remainder of this year, when we have this grievous problem of suicides in the military and readjustment when they come home from battle? We can't do that.

GREGORY: But isn't there always a reason-- (crosstalk) Isn't there always a reason to spend the money in Washington?

Can't you always find a reason not to cut? Isn't this the Republican argument that, at least here, if worse comes to worse and the sequester passes, at least we'll get spending cuts, how else to force the President's hand?

DURBIN: But listen. Do we really want to base our spending cuts on reducing medical research in America, on eliminating 70,000 children from Head Start, that early learning program that's so important? These things don't make sense. Let's sit down and do this in a thoughtful manner. And let's include revenue. We should have half of this as revenue from tax reform and the other half in spending cuts. And I support those spending cuts.

Sadly what was not mentioned here is that the Progressive Caucus in the House has a plan for reducing the deficit without causing pain to the poor and the working class. If Sen. Durbin doesn't want to help Gregory push his right wing talking points, maybe he should consider bringing this plan up the next time he's on the air: The Balancing Act.

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This is the kind of fact free claptrap that passes for political commentary on Fox every day of the week. From this Thursday's Your World with Neil Cavuto, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal joined Cavuto's show to critique President Obama's speech in Cleveland, Ohio this Thursday.

Naturally we had Jindal running through the list of typical Republican talking points about all the evils of "big gubmint" and how we're going to end up like those evil Socialists over in Europe and the public sector just needs to "get out of the way" and allow the private sector to unleash all of that awesome job creating they're going to do if they were just free from those over burdensome regulations and taxes they're having to pay.

Never mind that they had eight years under Bush which proved those theories aren't true. And now of course you're not supposed to be allowed to talk about that, because we can't have anyone daring to ask the voters to do something like remember their recent history over the last decade. That would just be terribly irresponsible.

Note to Bobby Jindal: until Republicans take some different economic stances than they have under Bush, or most of their candidates and leaders for the last half century or so, it's going to be fair game to run against those policies. It's only too late if your party has actually changed those policies, or stances, which they have not.

Here's how Fox's blog, Fox News Insider, characterized the interview: Bobby Jindal: It Sounds Like President Obama Is Trying to Run Against President Bush; He’s 8 Years Too Late:

Jindal described Obama’s remarks as “disappointing,” because he talked about the need for even more government spending in America. “What it shows is President Obama continues to believe that government is the source of our prosperity; he couldn’t be more wrong,” he added.

He pointed out the one thing he thought the president said that was right was when he said that this election is only about two clear choices. “We can either go the European way or the American way. We can either grow the government or grow the private sector.”

“He literally can’t ask people ‘Are you better off than you were four years ago?’” Jindal said. “So, instead of talking about his record, instead he has to attack Governor Romney and instead he has to try and distract us with his class warfare.”

Cavuto couldn't be bothered to point out that these days, the "European way" means a whole lot of painful austerity measures; the same kind which are being pushed by his party and their presidential candidate Mitt Romney. And in case anyone hasn't noticed, that's not working out so well over there right now.

Jindal also seems to think that government spending and private sector spending are mutually exclusive, as though the government spending when the economy is otherwise stagnant doesn't help the private sector as well, or at least he pretended to here. I've already noted here at C&L, Jindal was more than happy to take credit for that government stimulus spending back in 2009, but wasn't willing to admit President Obama's policies were responsible for his state's recovery back then either. I guess we can at least give him an "A" for being consistent about sticking to his same lies a few years later.

Jindal was still being touted as a potential presidential contender himself until he gave his zombie-like performance after President Obama's State of the Union back in 2009. It seems he's brushed up his act on television a bit since then, but he's no less dishonest. And now he's supposedly on the short list for a spot as the vice presidential candidate on a Romney ticket.

Given Mittens' propensity to lie non-stop every time his mouth is opened, I'd say Jindal would fit right in.

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Here's the latest talking point courtesy of Frank Luntz being rolled out ad nauseum by every Republican politician I've been on the television for some time now, and unfortunately as Digby noted, being validated by our President.

Here's a rough transcript via Digby:

Frank Luntz on Fox News this morning: All the statistics that I've been testing on both sides, this one stands out: the increase in discretionary non-defense spending over the past four years is 80%. Does any family within the sound of my voice have an 80% increase in spending?

Well that's what Washington is doing. So if a family can't afford an 80% increase, surely Washington can't afford it. All the things we've looked at, that's the most powerful of all.

Anchor: Wow. What impact do you think the influence of the Tea party will have on the public going forward as we get set to tackle the debt ceiling and the 2012 budget dramas we have yet to see?

Luntz: It's very significant. In fact we did a project with Freedomworks over the last 96 hours where they asked the question about the shutdown,whether if it was provoked or not if you would be less likely to vote for your member of congress. The Tea Party is saying to the American people, enough is enough, stop!

If families have to tighten their belts, so should Washington. If the American people have to do more with less, so should Washington.

Someone let me know when households have the ability to print money, raise taxes and start wars, will you? I'm sick to death of our politicians pretending that America is broke. The upper 1% are doing just fine, thank you. Our problem is there is not the political will to ask for some "shared sacrifice" from the have-mores out there and they're completely unwilling to do anything to protect American jobs. If these corporations want their tax cuts, tie them to job creation right here in the United States. Want to fix Social Security, raise the income cap. Want to fix the deficit, start with repealing those Bush tax cuts, now. But we can't have that, can we? And we've got these propagandists like Luntz out there feeding the politicians this nonsense to justify balancing the budget off of the backs of the elderly and the poor. Just shameful.

There's more at Digby's post so go read the whole thing, but I'll share this last bit here.

It's kind of an odd family that goes into debt so mom and dad quit their jobs and bring in even less money in order to pay it off, but hey, what do I know about finances anyway? I guess in good Real American families when you bring in less money and beat the children the debt magically vanishes somehow. I suppose God provides. [...]

Meanwhile, I'm going to move into my car, empty out my bank account and give the money to a rich person so he'll win the future for me. Isn't that what all responsible families are doing right now?

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More compassionate conservatism from Mitch McConnell on CNN's State of the Union. Crowley actually does a pretty good job of pressing him for the reasons the GOP ought to be concerned about how this looks to voters but McConnell doesn't seem to care much. He wants their Bush tax cuts for the rich, which he frames as an increase to stay in place forever, end of story.

I wonder if McConnell is doing any town hall meetings during the upcoming recess. Maybe he can explain to the unemployed in his state to their face why he thinks those tax cuts are more important than making sure some of them don't end up on the street.

CROWLEY: Here with me now to discuss politics, jobless benefits and the Republican's groove is Senator Mitch McConnell. Thank you so much for being here.

MCCONNELL: Glad to be here, Candy.

CROWLEY: I want to play a little bit more about what the president had to say yesterday when he really was slamming Republicans for standing in the way of this extension of unemployment benefits. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: They say we shouldn't provide unemployment insurance because it costs money, so after years of championing policies that turned a record surplus into a massive deficit, including a tax cut for the wealthiest Americans, they finally decided to make their stand on the backs of the unemployed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: Look, we're talking about $34 billion to extend unemployment to the long term unemployed, to give them more weeks of unemployment benefits. Doesn't he have a point? I mean, why in the world would you choose to take this down? I mean, the deficit's a trillion dollars this year, so for $34 billion that's going to help people with no jobs, you all are standing in the way of it.

MCCONNELL: Well, the budget is over a trillion dollars, too, and somewhere in the course of spending a trillion dollars, we ought to be able to find enough to pay for a program for the unemployed. We're -- we're all for extending unemployment insurance. The question is when are we going to get serious, Candy, about the debt?

We recently passed a $13 trillion cumulative deficit threshold. When are we going to get serious about this? This administration has been on an incredible spending spree.

CROWLEY: I get that point and I understand what you're saying and I think the American people are concerned about the deficit spending. But you all -- when Republicans were in charge six of the eight years that President Bush was here, you were Majority Leader at times during that, you spent on a prescription drug bill that was not paid for that is far more expensive than this unemployment bill is. You had two wars, ongoing wars that were not paid for.

So for you now to stand up and say, well, we're for balancing the budget, and, by the way, you've got to pay for these unemployment benefits, it just seems dissonant to the trials of the American people, particularly those without jobs.

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Paul Krugman discussed his recent article in the New York Times with GPS's Fareed Zakaria about why the deficit hawks are dead wrong on the path our country needs to take to get the economy back on track. It's too bad Krugman isn't a member of that deficit commission instead of wingnuts like Alan Simpson. I'd feel like they were sincere in trying to get our economy out of the ditch instead of using the problems we're having as an excuse to destroy Social Security and Medicaid and what's left of our middle class.

For "balance" Zakaria followed this interview with deficit hawk Niall Ferguson. In the end even Zakaria admitted that there is a strong case for short term government spending, not that the Republicans and the Ben Nelsons of the world are going to allow it.

Myths of Austerity:

When I was young and naïve, I believed that important people took positions based on careful consideration of the options. Now I know better. Much of what Serious People believe rests on prejudices, not analysis. And these prejudices are subject to fads and fashions.

Which brings me to the subject of today’s column. For the last few months, I and others have watched, with amazement and horror, the emergence of a consensus in policy circles in favor of immediate fiscal austerity. That is, somehow it has become conventional wisdom that now is the time to slash spending, despite the fact that the world’s major economies remain deeply depressed.

This conventional wisdom isn’t based on either evidence or careful analysis. Instead, it rests on what we might charitably call sheer speculation, and less charitably call figments of the policy elite’s imagination — specifically, on belief in what I’ve come to think of as the invisible bond vigilante and the confidence fairy. Read on...

Transcript via CNN below the fold.

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It's too bad Bob Schieffer did not manage to do as good of a job as the staff at CBS news with refuting some of Michele Bachmann's nonsense during her appearance on Face the Nation.

Bachmann Offers Big Numbers, Little Proof:

In the past when talking about the health care bill that was just signed into law by President Obama, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) has referred to the bill as "tyranny."

On Sunday, she told "Face the Nation" anchor Bob Schieffer she meant it.

"[N]ow we have the federal government taking over ownership or control of 51 percent of the American economy. This is stunning. Prior to September of 2008, 100 percent of the private economy was private."

Ms. Bachmann offered no facts to back up her assertion that the government owns or controls 51 percent of the U.S. economy.

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis data since 1929, the highest percentage of government spending as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product was during World War II when government spending was 47.9 percent (in 1944). The lowest level of government spending as a percent of GDP was 9 percent in 1929 at the outset of the Great Depression.

At no time during this period was the United States' GDP 100 percent private.

The 2009 level of federal government spending was 20.6 percent.

For more information from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, click here. Read on...

Considering Bachmann is also one of the worst offenders with the over the top rhetoric coming out of the Republicans in Congress these days, Schieffer gave her a complete pass with his tepid questioning on that topic as well.

Transcript via CBS below the fold.

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From The Cafferty File:

President Obama has the chance to use tomorrow's State of the Union address to reset his agenda and refocus the attention of the American people.

It's been a rough week for the president and his party - since the Democrats lost control of Ted Kennedy's Senate seat in Massachusetts. Without their filibuster-proof majority, the president's signature issue of health care reform is on life support.

And the public doesn't appear too disappointed about that. A new poll shows 70 percent of Americans think the Democrats' loss of their super-majority is a good thing.

Meanwhile the president is expected to announce a three-year freeze on all non-security federal discretionary spending. He claims this could save $250 billion over 10 years - which is a start, but still just a drop in the bucket considering the country's $12.5 trillion debt.

And, expect some liberals - you know, the president's base - to push back hard. Already critics on the left are calling the proposed spending freeze a mistake of historic proportions. Some compare Mr. Obama to Republican Herbert Hoover, who failed to pull the U.S. out of the great depression.

Others liken this to Democrat FDR's move to cut back on government spending in 1937 - the economy tanked and so did the Democrats in the following midterm election.

There's lots more on the president's plate too, like the jobs situation - which doesn't show many signs of turning around. Unemployment is at 10 percent… up from seven percent when Mr. Obama took office.

Here’s my question to you: What should Pres. Obama emphasize in his State of the Union address tomorrow?

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Rachel Maddow feels the same way I do after listening to this pitch by the administration. Jared Bernstein did not say one thing that swayed me that this is a good idea. Listen to Evan Bayh? You've got to be kidding me. A spending freeze in the middle of an economic downturn is insane. And of course there's no freeze for defense spending or Homeland Security.

TPM has more on the proposal--Obama Administration To Propose Freezing Non-Military Discretionary Spending:

President Obama will propose freezing non-security discretionary government spending for the next three years, a sweeping plan to attempt deficit reduction that will save taxpayers $250 billion over 10 years.

When the administration releases its budget next week, the discretionary spending for government agencies from Health and Human Services to the Department of Treasury will be frozen at its 2010 level in fiscal years 2011, 2012 and 2013.

A senior administration official detailed the move, speaking on a condition of anonymity because Obama will announce his decision during his State of the Union address Wednesday night.

The cuts would target "duplicative," "ineffective" and "inefficient" spending withing government, the official said on a conference call with reporters.

"This is not a blunt, across-the-board freeze," the official said, adding that some agencies will see spending increases while some will see spending cuts as the total remains constant.

Exempted from the freeze would be Pentagon funding, and the budgets for Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security.

"We do need to reflect the fact that we remain at war," the official said, noting the president was able to win several battles on cutting Pentagon spending.

The official declined to discuss specifics but said the new plan would save taxpayers $250 billion over 10 years. Read on...

UPDATE: Jared Bernstein posted this response on The White House Blog to last night's interview. Budget Freeze-eology 101: Hatchets vs. Scalpels

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Mitt Romney cites the average wages of government workers being higher than private sector workers as a sign that our government spending is out of control. First off, I'd like to know where he is getting these numbers since David Gregory didn't ask him. Second, these Republicans only seem to be worried about deficits and spending when a)Democrats are in charge and b) when it's spending to get people to work instead of spending for war or tax cuts for the rich.

GREGORY: Governor Romney, our role in the world here. The auto companies going through bankruptcy; and yet, we find out this week that, in fact, the Chinese are buying more cars for the first time more than Americans.

ROMNEY: We can compete around the world, there's no question about that, David. We have the capacity to do that. The American workers are the best in the world, our technology is at the leading edge. America, long term, can be the, the powerful economic engine it's always been. But the real threat right here is something that Alan Greenspan just said, and that is that if we don't take action to rein in the scale of government and the growth of government spending and the compensation levels of government workers--you saw government workers, average government workers, are now making $30,000 a year more than the average private sector worker. These kinds of excesses and the massive deficits that, that, that government is putting in place, over a trillion dollars a year for these coming several years, this threatens our long-term viability, because it, it, it suggests that we could have runaway inflation. And, and the Fed and the federal government are going to have to rein in, pull back from what have been the excesses of these past years, Republican and Democrat. It's not a partisan issue, it's a growth of government issue. And it's got to stop, or America's future could be very much in jeopardy.