Police remove peaceful
protesters at Paul Ryan's first public v.p. appearance.
Dear A,
Happily, November's election
provides well-defined presidential tickets.
People will see - in high
relief - what the upcoming choice is really about.
Stakes are so high citizens
might even do some "fact checking."
On one hand, we can choose
more favoritism for "Job Creators" (whose favored status during the
Bush era coincided with the biggest "job bust" since The
Great Depression); or, we can choose public-private collaboration as in
China and Germany, two countries whose economic performance has outstripped the
United States ever since Bush-Cheney collapsed the economy in 2007-2008.
(Consider: Not only does Germany believe in bailouts, Berlin bails out other countries!
It is opportune to mention that the original TARP bailout was Dubyah's
initiative. In 2010, Bush reaffirmed his position, saying: "I'd approve
TARP again."
As for budget cuts, I know no
liberals who do not favor cuts - and lots of them.
A good place to start cutting
would be the replacement of Medicare/Medicaid with single payer healthcare, a
move that would cut the nation's medical cost in half.
It surpasses irony that when
Obama "cut $500 billion from Medicare" --- or, at least, when the GOP
represented Obama as cutting $500 billion --- Republicans took him from pillory
to post.
I anticipate tremendous
fallout when Romney -- thus far dedicated to bafflegab and ideo-fog -- actually
proposes specific cuts instead of cleaving to the magical thinking that
we can balance the budget by cutting taxes and the government services.
Reagan Budget Director, David
Stockman, says Republicans couldn't cut more than 50 billion "under
penalty of death."
"(Extending
the Bush tax cuts is) rank demagoguery. We should call it for what it is. If
these people were all put into a room on penalty of death to come up with how
much they could cut, they couldn't come up with $50 billion, when the problem
is $1.3 trillion. So, to stand before the public and rub raw this anti-tax
sentiment, the Republican Party, as much as it pains me to say this, should be
ashamed of themselves."
"The
Republican Party has totally abdicated its job in our democracy, which is to
act as the guardian of fiscal discipline and responsibility. They're on an
anti-tax jihad -- one that benefits the prosperous classes."
Again,
I recommend Stockman’s “60 Minutes” video clip at
...
Yesterday,
Joe Biden visited Hillsborough where he met firefighters at the local pump
house. (Joe's Dad was a fireman.)
Biden's
visit reminded me of the 2008 campaign when the Washington Post set his net
worth at a $150.000.00 (yes, one hundred fifty thousand dollars).
Remarkably,
not one naysayer challenged the figure.
But
what came next was even weirder.
Instead
of attacking Joe's net worth claim as untrue -- which it wasn't -- the noise
machine attacked Biden -- personally! -- for being an economic failure. http://www.thousandaire.com/joe-bidens-net-worth-is-embarrassing/
Here
is a recent update of Biden's personal finances.
Pax on
both houses,
Alan
Paul Ryan on soapbox at Iowa State Fair
By Dana Milbank
August 13, 2012
Paul Ryan was on his soapbox — and he couldn’t get off fast enough.
The lanky lawmaker from Wisconsin made his first solo appearance as Mitt Romney’s running mate on Monday, and the Romney campaign chose to have him do it from the Iowa State Fair. This was a mistake.
Ryan spoke from what fairgoers call the soapbox — a small platform where any citizen, even a politician, can have 20 minutes to voice his or her mind. But because of the open venue, the crowd of 3,000 people could not be cleansed of Democrats, indifferent Iowans and other undesirable elements.
Ryan, in a trying-too-hard outfit of blue jeans, wide leather belt and red-and-white checked shirt, began with a painful effort to establish common ground with the locals.
“What a beautiful day to be at the state fair,” he said. “We have fairs. Do you have Wristband Day here?”
Apparently Iowans do not have Wristband Day, because the crowd was quiet.
“That’s the favorite day for my kids, because Wristband Day, you can buy a wristband and ride all the rides with just one wristband for the whole day.”
The Iowans stood like corn stalks on a still morning.
“So it’s just from a Wisconsinite to a neighboring Iowan: Have Wristband Day. Your kids will love it.”
If there were crickets at the Iowa State Fair, you would have heard them chirping.
Just about then, some in the crowd suddenly came to life. Unfortunately for the candidate, they were hecklers, and they were charging the stage.
“I heard President Obama is starting his bus tour today, and I heard he wasn’t going to come to the Iowa State Fair,” Ryan attempted, but the protesters were shouting slogans — “Are you going to cut Medicare?” “Stop the war on the poor!” “Hands off Social Security!” — too loud for him to deliver the punch line.
“I think it’s because — so — ha! You know what? It’s funny,” Ryan continued, although he did not at the moment appear to be having fun. “It’s funny, because Iowans and Wisconsinites, we like to be respectful of one another and peaceful with one another and listen to each other. These ladies must not be from Iowa or Wisconsin.”
His listeners did not see the humor. They were shouting “USA! USA!” and “Romney! Romney!” to drown out the hecklers. Ryan noticed a portly woman in a salmon T-shirt storming the stage just a few feet from him. “You guys see this one here?” he called to security agents. He took a step back as police and security guards swarmed the stage, hauling off the interloper.
Ryan didn’t get his 20 minutes on the soapbox. He proceeded through the mayhem for about 12, but even Fox News Channel pulled away from its coverage as a wrestling match between protesters and Romney supporters blocked the camera shot.
It was not exactly the kickoff Ryan and Romney wanted, but it did help to establish why Romney chose the young House Budget Committee chairman as his running mate: Ryan is almost as awkward as Romney.
Ryan has a deft touch in Washington when he speaks at think tanks or mixes it up with reporters. He has an easy manner and a confident command of policy. But he hasn’t been tested much as a retail politician. He doesn’t have to worry about close campaigns in his heavily Republican congressional district, and he hasn’t had to win over voters much beyond Racine and Kenosha.
His speech, stitched together with connectors such as “one more thing” and “another thing,” was not quite polished, and he began by waving a Green Bay Packers jersey before the Iowans, who are as likely to be Chicago Bears or Minnesota Vikings fans. After the first wave of hecklers and stage crashers was cleared, Ryan went through his five-point agenda for economic growth, mixing his beloved statistics (“Ninety-seven percent of the world’s consumers are out of this country”) with his trademark gloom (We’re “spending our children into a diminished future”) and a strained effort to portray himself as a local. “We need to grow and make things in states like Wisconsin, Iowa, the Midwest,” he said.
But the only thing being made at that moment was noise. By then, Ryan was trying to out-shout the protesters, who were vociferously demanding that he “stop the war on the middle class.” Just in front of the cameras, a man with gray hair and a beard shook his fist, shouting at Ryan as Romney supporters covered him in Romney signs and tried to pull him down. A Romney sign flew through the air, and a policeman joined the ruckus, shouting and pointing. Feedback squealed from the sound system.
“We’re used to this in Wisconsin,” Ryan claimed.
But only on Wristband Day.
***
Here's a two minute clip of Ryan at the Iowa State Fair: http://www.youtube.com/
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