This meme has been in play for a while. My father, a senior, is always asking me about stuff like this and why Obama is attacking seniors. There are plenty of lies out there to go around. Most of the ones I see come as right wing distortions. Then Republican backers complain when the same is done to them. Unfortunately there will never be a way to legislate truth.
There’s a lot of morons in Florida who will vote Republican no matter what. However, with that said, State Senator Mike Haridopolos, blew his chance at running for US Senate just because he couldn’t answer on a conservative talk radio show how he would vote on the Ryan plan last year. The host actually hung on him and Haridopolos went from front runner to has been in that moment.
The Congressional Budget Office disagrees with you.
Now, again, why is restoring taxation on the free-riders who have failed at their task of “job creation” over the past decade not one of the options you describe as “responsible”? :dubious:
And, again, why do you think cutting benefits for those who actually *have *worked for them and *do *depend on them will be a good sell for your team?
In neither case are there lies though. $500 billion in Medicare “savings” is cuts. The defense is that it doesn’t cut Medicare, it slows its growth. yet any Republican plan to slow growth in any program is characterized as a cut. By DC definitions, it is quite fair to say that the Democrats cut Medicare. And by the Democrats’ definition of what they believe Medicare to be, it’s fair to say that Ryan is ending Medicare as we know it.
I’d prefer a more precise debate, but politics doesn’t lend itself to long-winded explanations.
That doesn’t say what you think it says. The “doing nothing” plan involves ALL the Bush tax cuts expiring and the Medicare reimbursements going down by 60%. that’s a huge Medicare cut. If that’s the Democratic plan, that’s a good plan, actually. but it’s not their plan. They oppose both middle class tax increases and Medicare provider cuts.
And I heard she was born in Jerusalem, fewer than 36 years ago.
I have no idea what effect the Ryan pick will have in Florida, but knowing how essential the state is to their chances (it is essential, isn’t it?), it seems to me the Romney campaign must have had a damn good reason for making this decision. IOW, I don’t think the decision makers in the campaign under any circumstance think Florida can just be written off, as others seem to think.
I forget which page of Letter from a Birmingham Jail has Dr. King express the view that non-Christian faiths cause the adherent to “become an abject zombie”, and I can’t seem to find the passage in The Story of My Experiments With Truth where Gandhi accuses non-Hindu religions of “running a protection racket”…
Dealing with the entitlement problem does not mean handing the over the medical needs of the elderly to the whims of the private sector. Romney has firmly made it clear with this pick that he wants to raise taxes on the working class, cut their safety nets and hand his class more money. This pick only reinforces why I see no reason to vote for him yet again.
My 77 year old father in Nevada was sort of meh on Romney before. He hates him now.
Even seniors who don’t give a crap about anybody else can recognize an obvious divide-and-conquer ploy (make targeted cuts to a program, slice off the targeted part of its constituency, strengthen your political position to impose the next round of cuts, lather-rinse-repeat). The offered “guarantee” is like Matrix’s promise in Commando to kill Sully last (and, yes, the fact that this promise was broken in the movie is an intentional component of my analogy).
Ryan’s also a devout Catholic. So, I’m guessing it’ll either be a non-issue, or the right will just deal with it with the usual cognitive dissonance they employ in these matters.
The reason for the decision is obvious – Romney is in deep trouble with the hardcore conservative base of the party, and needs to mend fences with them somehow.
Seems pretty darn essential to me. If Florida goes to Obama and Obama can pick up just one of the 10 remaining swing states, the only way Romney can win is if he picks up Ohio or PA and ALL of the remaining swing states.
Ryan’s already walked back the statement that he’s a devotee of Ayn Rand. So he’s got that covered. It was just something he got into as a kid. So nothing to see here.
Absolutely. My question was rhetorical. I’ve long thought that if Florida is called for Obama, it’s bedtime.
PollTracker shows for Florida as Obama 48.2% and Romney at 45.1%.
As much as adaher wants to turn another thread into a debate on budget plans, let me offer a political comment: Paul Ryan very much strikes me as the Jack Kemp of this decade. Lots of ideas, energetic, and smart. I think Kemp had a couple advantages in that he was somewhat more charismatic, plus he played in the NFL. People could relate to that.
But in the end, Kemp didn’t help Dole at all. I think there are remarkably few undecided voters this year, and I just have a hard time seeing this pick changing people’s minds. In fact, I’m not sure there is a VP pick that would generate a lot of momentum for Romney.
I’m going to lay out a prediction here: over the next week, polls will remain pretty much as they are (Obama up nationally by roughly 4), and by the end of the conventions, we’ll pretty much be at the same place.
Let’s see just how good a prognosticator I really am.
I don’t put much faith in the VP choice being a deciding factor. You may think Palin was damaging to McCain but I don’t think any other VP choice would have swung the election. Look at Quail.
“Look at Quayle”? It’s early, I’m nowhere near drunk enough to try to relive that…
That the blind are willing to lead the blind should is not a good slogan to live by.