Ben Carson: meet the nominee who doesn't understand how the economy works

[josephpalazzo]

Does it matter if most Americans are just as ignorant as this guy?

Ben Carson doesn't understand how the debt ceiling, the budget, or interest rates work

Ben Carson’s accomplishments in the field of medicine should be incontrovertible proof of his intelligence. But read enough of his musings on government spending and the economy, and you’ll find yourself questioning this premise, or perhaps the nature, of intelligence altogether.

The good doctor has consistently shown his lack of understanding of economic matters, and this streak culminated in a disastrous interview with Marketplace on Wednesday. Carson shows a basic misunderstanding of topics a president simply needs to know cold.

Read more here:  http://fortune.com/2015/10/08/ben-carson-economy/

Warning: may cause vomiting

[TomFoolery]

Does it matter if most Americans are just as ignorant as this guy?

Who wants a president with fancy book learning? I want a decent, grandfatherly figure to tell anecdotes from a rocking chair about how he worked over 50 years at the auto plant on just an eighth grade education, how he's tired of spending all winter shoveling the piles of "global warming" out of his driveway, and how that fella Eisenhower knew how to run things.

[Baruch]

Eisenhower did know how to run things, but he is presently unavailable ;-)

Joe - I would be careful quoting a right wing mag like Fortune or Economist ... if they are against a Republican candidate other than JEB, then they are simply trying to shoot down that non-Bush candidate.  Both mags hate to hear their paid for quislings ... do a bad policy promotion.  But their take on Trump would be interesting to read.  These same RINO supporters, didn't like Doctor Ron Paul either.

Most Americans don't understand anything, let alone the economy.  But they are allowed to vote and run for office anyway.

The Fortune article clearly backs the George W way of doing things, including the idea that deficits used to pound the ME are not a problem.

[josephpalazzo]

Fortune: Jeb Bush just disappointed the business world

[gentle_dissident]

I like Kai Ryssdal. I learned the very little I know about finance listening to him. Here's the interview.
http://www.marketplace.org/topics/elections/full-interview-dr-ben-carson-economy

It's funny to me that Ben's initials are BSC.

[JBCuzISaidSo]

OK, I'm just going to pop in here once to lay my shit and run off like all good internet posters do....:

My own kid has an actual Carson Scholarship, which is NOT fucking easy to get--look it up. He's now an IT nerd, and has employment that supersedes my own. At 16. This kid actually brought honors math programs to not one but TWO C rated Florida schools. Once we got back to VT his accolades looked like adorable finger paints.....

He is out and proud. Anyways, my entire point:

This uber-nerd child of mine is actually debating his own well earned Carson Scholarship plus early PSATs and etc, on Principal. HE doesn't want to use Ben Carson's own elitist scholarship, based on the fact that he's an out and proud gay student that earned it. Carson isn't for that. And frankly, Carson can fuck right off.

[Baruch]

Fortune: Jeb Bush just disappointed the business world

Proof that JEB is adopted ;-)  Time for the CIA first family ... to run Neil!

[josephpalazzo]

Is Carson trying to outdo Trump on the crazy scale?

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ben-carson-egyptian-pyramids-were-grain-stores-not-pharaohs-tombs/ar-BBmRLyk?li=AAa0dzB&ocid=AARDHP

Egypt’s pyramids were built by the biblical Joseph to store grain and were not, as archaeologists believe, tombs for pharaohs, Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson has said.

“My own personal theory is that Joseph built the pyramids to store grain,” Carson â€" who last week overtook Republican rival Donald Trump for the first time in a national poll â€" told graduates in his address.

“Now all the archeologists think that they were made for the pharaohs’ graves. But, you know, it would have to be something awfully big if you stop and think about it.

“And I don’t think it’d just disappear over the course of time to store that much grain.”

Asked on Wednesday if he still held these views, Carson told CBS News: “It’s still my belief, yes.”

Speaking to MSNBC’s Morning Joe on Thursday, rival Republican candidate Donald Trump said: “He’s informed me about the pyramids. I think I’ll have to put that in my repertoire about Ben. That was a strange deal.”

In his 1998 address, Carson said: “And when you look at the way that the pyramids are made, with many chambers that are hermetically sealed, they’d have to be that way for various reasons.

“And various of scientists have said, ‘Well, you know there were alien beings that came down and they have special knowledge and that’s how, you know, it doesn’t require an alien being when God is with you’.”

[Hakurei Reimu]

Carson, despite the fact that he is a neurosurgeon, is infected with the same anti-science rubbish as the rest of the Republican party. He has no idea that, yeah, we actually do know a lot about the pyramids and why they were built. He thinks that the fact that he is a neurosurgeon qualifies him to speak about anything other than neurosurgery, and furthermore has no curiosity to discover anything else about the world just for the sake of learning it.

[GSOgymrat]

I think this is a possible reason why Ben Carson feels free to express his opinions on various topics:

Is Ben Carson Running for President?
By Jonathan Chait 

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/11/ben-carson-running-for-president.html

On February 7, 2013, Ben Carson appeared at a National Prayer Breakfast, where he visibly annoyed President Obama by delivering a right-wing speech denouncing Obamacare and cultural liberalism, and calling for a flat tax based on the biblical tithe. Conservatives, still devastated by Obama’s reelection, took delight in the appearance on the scene of a surprising new presidential antagonist, who until that point had no political profile. “Finally, a self-reliant conservative decided to make this every bit as political as Obama does,” tweeted conservative pundit David Limbaugh. The Wall Street Journal celebrated Carson’s remarks in a short editorial, headlined “Ben Carson for President.” The headline was obviously hyperbolic; nothing in the text that followed proposed that Carson run for public office.

But now Carson actually is running for president. Or is he? It is hard to tell. Conservative politics are so closely intermingled with a lucrative entertainment complex that it is frequently impossible to distinguish between a political project (that is, something designed to result in policy change) and a money-making venture. Declaring yourself a presidential candidate gives you access to millions of dollars' worth of free media attention that can build a valuable brand. So the mere fact that Carson calls himself a presidential candidate does not prove he is actually running for president rather than taking advantage of the opportunity to build his brand. Indeed, it is possible to be actually leading the polls without seriously trying to win the presidency.

And the notion that Carson could be president is preposterous. The problem is not only that he has never run for elected office. He has never managed a large organization; he has not worked in and around public policy, and he lacks a competent grasp of issues. His stance on health care, the closest thing to an issue with which his professional experience has brought him into contact, is gibberish. He mostly thrills audiences by scoffing at evolution and insisting Muslims be barred from the presidency, stances he cannot even defend coherently.

It is possible that Carson has come to genuinely believe that he is qualified to serve as president. (As a follower of the conspiracy theorist W. Cleon Skousen, Carson seems to subscribe in earnest to a series of completely fantastical beliefs.) It is also possible that Carson is being manipulated by staffers who stand to profit off their association with him. But the most likely explanation for his behavior is that Carson himself is in this thing to make a lot of money. ...

[josephpalazzo]

It's getting better and better!!

Ben Carson admits fabricating West Point scholarship:


  http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/ben-carson-west-point-215598

Ben Carson’s campaign on Friday admitted, in a response to an inquiry from POLITICO, that a central point in his inspirational personal story was fabricated: his application and acceptance into the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

The academy has occupied a central place in Carson’s tale for years. According to a story told in Carson’s book, “Gifted Hands,” the then-17 year old was introduced in 1969 to Gen. William Westmoreland, who had just ended his command of U.S. forces in Vietnam, and the two dined together. That meeting, according to Carson’s telling, was followed by a “full scholarship” to the military academy.

. .

West Point, however, has no record of Carson applying, much less being extended admission.

“In 1969, those who would have completed the entire process would have received their acceptance letters from the Army Adjutant General,” said Theresa Brinkerhoff, a spokeswoman for the academy. She said West Point has no records that indicate Carson even began the application process. “If he chose to pursue (the application process), then we would have records indicating such,” she said.

When presented with these facts, Carson’s campaign conceded the story was false.

[Baruch]

It may be that there is no real Ben Carson at all.  We knew a psychopath among our fraternity brothers when I was a freshman.  He was encouraged to leave the frat and the school, since his imagination had quite run away with him and forgot the way back.  People have thought this of Barak Obama also.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I'm beginning to think Carson is just a characature of the dumbest human on the planet.  He never has stood a chance to get elected, but it's been fun playing along.  It's amazing just how easy it is to manipulate the public.  Republican voters are even easier to manipulate.  Democratic voters are too, but the rubes have gone off the deep end in falling for bullshit.

[stromboli]

The mere fact that Carson give any credence to Cleon Skousen is bad enough. Skousen was a major influence in Mormonism in the 60's, writing bogus histories that amounted to exposes of the Illuminati and himself a prominent John Bircher who influenced much of the church's politics. Skousen was one of the people who thought Martin Luther King was a commie. His niece later claimed he molested her, and the church now pretty much ignores he ever existed. Further proof Carson is an idiot.

[Hakurei Reimu]

I wonder how many brains Dr Carson expects to operate on while in the White House. You know, situations where his neurosurgery training may actually be of use.