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Moreover, the premise of the graoh assumes that the starting point for the three countries were comparable.  Japan, while performing poorly looks even worse in comparison because the money supply pre-cursors of their asset boom were already in place in 1981.  The US was mired in recession and so was France which got hammered even harder than the US did so their performance is overstated.

As is common for socialist apologists, facts are cherry-picked without context.  That is, when they are not making statistics up to tell a bogus story (HDI?  WHO rankings?).

Okay, I'll be the first to concede that virtually every politician belongs in this category so the bar has to be set very high but Obama ("80% support a balanced approach to deficit reduction" - only off by about 50%) and his speach last night deserve special recognition.

When he stated "This is not class warfare" it got the only response possible - stunned laughter:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/09/08/obama_jobs_speech_this_is_not_class_warfare.html

The whopper-meter went off the scale so many times, I - trying to find roads in central PA that weren't underwater - nearly drove of the road:

"But for decades now, Americans have watched that compact [If you did the right thing, you could make it in America] erode." repeating the canard that the middle class has stagnated since the 1970s (Econbrowser did an excellent debunking of that all the way back in 2005 ( http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2005/12/declining_real.html)

"There should be nothing controversial about this piece of legislation." when, in fact, everything is the same old failed stimulus nonsense.

"And everything in this bill will be paid for. Everything." - CBO math anyone?

"The purpose of the American Jobs Act is simple: to put more people back to work..." - an impossibility on a net basis.

"Pass this jobs bill, and thousands of teachers in every state will go back to work." - until the stimulus money dries up, which is why they were laid off the last time.

"Pass this bill, and hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged young people will have the hope and dignity of a summer job next year. And their parents, low-income Americans who desperately want to work, will have more ladders out of poverty." - except I saw a repeal of the minimum wage nowhere in his proposed legislation.

"If the millions of unemployed Americans stopped getting this insurance, and stopped using that money for basic necessities, it would be a devastating blow to this economy." - except, of course, unemplyment insurance keeps unemployment higher and thus harms the economy.

"If we allow that tax cut to expire — if we refuse to act — middle-class families will get hit with a tax increase at the worst possible time."  Is this the same guy who vehemently denied that letting the Bush tax cuts expire was a tax increase?!?!

"The agreement we passed in July will cut government spending by about $1 trillion over the next ten years." - spending continues to increase.  Only growth in CBO math grown was tweaked.

"This approach [stabilizing the debt level] is basically the one I've been advocating for months." - Fortunately, I was at a stop light.

"...and by reforming our tax code in a way that asks the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations to pay their fair share." - largest corporate taxes in the industrialized world (paid for by consumers; percentage of taxes paid by high income groups well documented.

"Right now, Warren Buffet pays a lower tax rate than his secretary – an outrage he has asked us to fix."  - not THAT canard again!

"This isn't political grandstanding. This isn't class warfare." 'nuf said

"I reject the idea that we need to ask people to choose between their jobs and their safety."  False dichotomy anyone?

"Ask yourselves — where would we be right now if the people who sat here before us decided not to build our highways and our bridges; our dams and our airports? What would this country be like if we had chosen not to spend money on public high schools, or research universities, or community colleges?"  Uh, examples of the private sector meeting these needs (of consumers) in a manner far superior to government abound.  Just how ignorant is this guy.  Wait, rhetorical question.

"How many jobs would it have cost us if past Congresses decided not to support the basic research that led to the Internet and the computer chip?"  Al Gore was lying and basic computer technology was developed privately.

"What kind of country would this be if this Chamber had voted down Social Security or Medicare just because it violated some rigid idea about what government could or could not do?"  A significantly stronger economy and less susceptibility to financial shocks, why?  The lie is in the premise of the question.

Okay, I'm sure that an analysis of the speech is already in the offing.  Just wanted to add my two cents worth.

I second the nomination.  This is by no means the first time that Buffet has demonstrated significant deliberate bogosity.  One may recall his "principled" stand against stock options as a means of compensation, neglecting in his editorials on the  matter to place any emphasis on the fact that his "principles" and self-interest co-incided.  As the country's most famous stockholder, his stance against stock value dillusion is hardly surprising (think T. Boone Pickens' "principled" stand in favor of gas and wind energy).

It should also be noted that a huge percentage of Buffet's earnings are sheltered in foundations protecting him from income and estate taxes (which he also wants raised).

First off, thanks Virgil for preserving my words for posterity (maybe I should include you in the other encyclopedic discussions goin on with the left).  And thanks very much for the critiques on my commentary from any and all who have expressed the desire.  At this juncture, I'd like to respond to the list of points that might hurt me:

1.  Point conceded (when I say that to socialists they get all confused but it happens rarely enough that it is not problematic).  I accept the distinction and have specifically argued against the concept of corporate personhood in various forums over the years.  I will keep that valuable warning in mind in the future.

2.  In my defense, the response to louie was massive enough.  The point is valid but is a further refutation of louie's position.  A detailed analysis of why governmental intervention has retarded wages, reduced prosperity and given us all lower living standards than we might otherwise enjoy is certainly valuable but beyond the scope (for simple space I kept out the minimum wage, child labor, etc. points and offered them separately as supplements).  I thought louie looked bad enough with a simple point that could be easily referenced.

3 & 4.  In this case I plead contextual justification.  In a discussion with like minds I would go into particular detail.  In discussions with laymen (and socialists with the usual dime store level of understanding of these issues), it is generally accepted to refer to countries as capitalist or socialist with the implication of predomination.  The US is arguably a predominantly capitalist country (and most European countries are predominantly socialist - long before the governmental portion of GDP is more than half, but that threshold at least should end debate) but is, of course, as indicated a HYBRID containing elements of both capitalism and socialism (with examples going back to the 1790s at least and the implications Rothbard pointed out of the activities that precipitated the panic of 1819.  Again, in that context, the distinction is not the the US was ever perfectly capitalist (or even close) but a bemoaning of the fact that the charge to the statist position has, in my view, accelerated.  That different countries should be treated on their own merits or lack thereof is certainly true and I usually do so on a case by case basis (Norway and the countries of Scandinavia get brought up most frequently).  Here again, I can only plead scope and space concerns.  It was never my intention to argue that Europe is homogeneous.

Please don't think that any of my justifications are criticisms of you.  In each case, as I hope I've made clear, they are all valid and I will keep them in mind.  Hopefully, more poor justifications will at least give you the reassurance that I do not, as a rule, fall into all of the traps you mention.

Fletch