bad science in canvassing

[waider]

It's election season over here: the longest running Dáil in Irish history is shutting down and being replaced on May 24th. Various parties are, as expected, promising to do more and more for less and less: more police, more hospital beds, more investment in education, all with lower taxes and increased tax relief for various things. The Progressive Democrats, the current "junior" party in the incumbent coalition, are claiming in their election manifesto that every time they've been in power, tax rates have gone down dramatically, and therefore the right thing to do for lower taxes is to put them back in power again. They've even got a nice graph to illustrate their point. Of couse, what they're not mentioning is that they've never actually held the Finance portfolio at any point.

Comments

[mopti.livejournal.com]

I actually think they can claim some "credit" for this one. Well, Charlie McCreevy was a PD in all but name. But seriously, the tax rates are too big an issue for them to be left to the finance minister in the way that other ministers might be let do what they will with their portfolio. The change in tax rates in the last decade was very much driven by the PDs presence in government.

(Personally, I would prefer to see higher taxes and both effective services and less inequality in incomes. But I am perverted int hat way.)

[waider.livejournal.com]

Duly noted, but they don't actually claim to have driven it, just that it went down in their presence. You'd expect if they could claim the former in good conscience (when was the last time you heard of a politician with one of those?) they'd be broadcasting it from the mountaintops, instead of using weaselly spin.

[waider.livejournal.com]

Also, agreed on the "higher taxes, better whatever" angle. It's no good giving me more cash if there isn't a decent hospital bed for me to spend it on, etc.