Tag Archives: Mark Cuban

He is the numerator and the denominator

Since it is now the height of fascism to call someone who lies a liar, I question whether I should refer to Paul Krugman, who calls the Romney campaign dishonest for saying it has evidence when it doesn't.  But I will anyway, because you'll see.  First, here's Krugman:

So when the campaign says that these three studies support its claims about jobs, it is, to use the technical term, lying — just as it is when it says that six independent studies support its claims about taxes (they don’t).

What do Mr. Romney’s economic advisers actually believe? As best as I can tell, they’re placing their faith in the confidence fairy, in the belief that their candidate’s victory would inspire an employment boom without the need for any real change in policy. In fact, in his infamous Boca Raton “47 percent” remarks, Mr. Romney himself asserted that he would give a big boost to the economy simply by being elected, “without actually doing anything.” And what about the overwhelming evidence that our weak economy isn’t about confidence, it’s about the hangover from a terrible financial crisis? Never mind.

To summarize, then, the true Romney plan is to create an economic boom through the sheer power of Mr. Romney’s personal awesomeness. But the campaign doesn’t dare say that, for fear that voters would (rightly) consider it ridiculous. So what we’re getting instead is an attempt to brazen it out with nakedly false claims. There’s no jobs plan; just a plan for a snow job on the American people.

Remember, Krugman sort of supports Obama.  Here is otherwise apparently smart (and therefore? unbelievably rich) guy Mark Cuban, who is a Romney supporter, on Romney's lack of specifics:

Which is the exact detail of the Romney Tax Plan that makes all the numbers add up. Governor Romney is the detail. He will take all the unsolved variables in the algorithm that is our desire to reduce the budget deficit , increase economic growth and thereby increase employment and negotiate them into the outcome that will solve this country's financial problem.

Which is exactly what Krugman said.  If you read the rest of the Cuban piece, it's a list of things he thinks Romney can or wants to do, not, as you might expect from a very large word problem, numbers and equations–or better, reference to actual specifics of Romney's plan. 

Shallow generalities

This discussion between Skip Bayless and Mark Cuban is worth watching for two main reasons.  In the first place, they have a disagreement over the significance of Bayless's Sports Punditry.  Without a lot of argument vocabulary, Cuban accuses Bayless of talking in "generalities."  This is not exactly the right term, as Bayless tends, at least according to Cuban, psychologize.  Second, no one yellls, each takes a turn without interupting the other person. 

More like this please.  Would that one of Tom Friedman or David Brooks' many critics had the time to make her or his points in this manner. 

Sad, however, that such long-form arguments take place on a sports show.