Gerald Seib writes at the Wall Street Journal on how the race changed today with the pick of Rep. Paul Ryan to be Mitt Romney’s running mate:
With Mr. Ryan, Mr. Romney is getting one of his party’s fastest-rising stars, and the heir to the late Jack Kemp’s brand of sunny and optimistic conservatism. He has added a dash of youth and opened a clear play for Mr. Ryan’s state of Wisconsin, which hasn’t gone Republican in a presidential race since the days of Ronald Reagan.
He also has likely put to rest, once and for all, the lingering doubts of his party’s conservative wing. Mr. Ryan simply isn’t the pick to make if you want to take the sharp edges off your economic message.
In picking Mr. Ryan, though, Mr. Romney has chosen, quite consciously, to take some risks:
He and his party will absorb regular attacks on Medicare for the duration of the campaign. The Ryan budget envisions the transition of Medicare, over time, into a premium-support plan in which the government helps to finance rather than provide health coverage for senior citizens. The pressure now is on Mr. Romney to declare whether he embraces that vision, something he hasn’t until now. Politically, the risk is that the Medicare debate erodes Mr. Romney’s advantage with seniors, who have been one of his strongest demographics. Given his problems with young voters and Hispanics, those older voters are mighty important to him.
[...]
One of the surprises of the election so far is that Mr. Romney has defied the conventional wisdom that said he would move to the center after clinching the GOP nomination. No chance to do that now.
The question will be how comfortably Mr. Romney—a man who spent the first part of his political career as a moderate and still has people guessing what he really believe on some subjects—can stand alongside a young leader who has no doubt about what he believes.
The ground upon which the campaign was being played has shifted significantly. The election will now be about something important — two very different visions for the future of America. Will it be Romney/Ryan’s belief in an expansive, opportunity-driven economy based on free-market principles and a smaller role for government? Or will it be Obama’s “investments” in the middle class, a culture of dependency, and diminished living standards?
Take the risk; reap the reward!
The mob is howling…
There is hope! And Ryan is but one of several young rising stars in the Rep. party. Who is up and coming in Dems? Sandra Fluke?
“Who is up and coming in Dems? Sandra Fluke?”
No, I think that would be her boyfriends.
GREAT COMMENT!!!
Only if she can waddle three blocks to CVS and cough up $9.00 for some pills or maybe her partner could part with a buck for a condom oh that’s right, we’re supossed to pay for that
All right, I’m feeling slightly less gloomy about this than I was before.
One consolation is that while the media is busy portraying him as someone who want to toss little old ladies out into the street, they might slip in a picture of his six-pack abs.
Because that’s about how deep the analysis is going to go.
Take my word for it; it requires a lot of core strength to throw old ladies off cliffs. I drink my Ovaltine.
naw…… Chop them up into manageable bits with an axe and throw those over. Work efficiently here……..
Soylent Green!!
Soylent Green is the future if we don’t repeal Obamacare. ABO2012
I would remind everyone here that a whole lot of little old ladies these days are packing heat. It might be harder to toss them off the cliff that one would imagine.
And they vote.
“than”. Drat. I hate not having an edit function.
My teenage son was very surprised to see that my septuagenarian mother has a 38 S&W in her purse. His startled reply to me was “Nana packs heat”. Yes she does and so do many of her friends.
… someone who want to toss little old ladies out into the street…
Ryan didn’t toss her in the street, what he did was throw her off a cliff. When I saw Representative Ryan do that, many was I ever disgusted. Realizing what this guy is capable of makes it a lot easier, from an emotional standpoint, at least, to oppose him and what he stands for.
The old lady, after decades of paying into Social Security, had to’ve been killed or severely maimed in the fall. Disgusting.
Kool Aid drinker. I would very much enjoy a debate with a lib who actually brought facts to the table instead of name calling and baseless accusations. I guess facts are much like the Constitution to liberals–something to be avoided at all costs.
I was kidding, for crying out loud. But you’re taking my post proves a key point: there are tens of millions out there who took some truth for that ad. Sure, they knew granny being dumped over the cliff to her death was a dramatization, but their guts stirred with disgust at the act, and agreed with the idea behind it.
Modern politics has devolved from dramatizations to mass acceptance dramatized fake reality. Fictive reality drawn from the merger of fiction with fact, the former more easily marketed because it invokes emotion, whereas the latter presents the consumer with the tiresome chores of checking boring facts and thinking deductively.
They gotta take on the “pushing Grandma over the cliff” crap head-on and put a stake in it.
Perhaps part of Ryan’s evisceration of Obama, complete with the Anointed One’s facial expressions should be in some ads, followed by a line like:
“Until this meeting, the only competence President Obama was familiar with was in destroying people and institutions.”
No! They should not take on the “pushing Grandma over the cliff” head on. Let the PACs and the commentators do that. (In fact the commentators I think may be doing it a little too much –It sounds like whining.)
The Romney campaign shouldn’t spend time REACTING to the other’s obviously childish antics. You have no choice but to trust (to some extant at least) the voters’ intelligence. Instead, they should stay on message and tell the voters what they intend to do to put America back on its feet.
And the message should be de-regulation, de-regulation, de-regulation (much more than “cutting spending” especially on entitlement programs, which we know must be done; but shouldn’t be emphasized on the campaign). Then talk about opening up the vast wilderness areas (especially out here in the west), which are locked up by the federal government, to mineral, gas and oil exploitation. Also, major reform in agriculture policy will attract many independents –particularly those who resent government interference in their desire to buy raw milk, etc.
The Romney-Ryan campaign needs to emphasize IDEAS; because that’s what people desperately want: to be convinced that Obama’s opponants have real ideas to get this country to a new prosperity.
Point about PACs and others well taken. Somebody needs to speak “truth to power” and be noisy about it.
With the long lines of fans, Ryan appears to be “alienating” potential voters as much as Sarah Palin did.
The Bush (W.) Administration is eloquent testimony about what happens when you don’t fight back, no matter how ridiculous the slander. there are still folks today who think Gore won in Florida, or would have if the Republicans hadn’t blocked the roads to the polls, or something.
I wouldn’t call it a “game changer” given that Romney’s top 3 campaign topics are (1) the economy, (2) the economy, and (3) the economy. The Romney campaign message makes Ryan the logical choice.
Unfortunately, Romney needs to do a much better job during and after the convention emphasizing that none of the other issues matter if the economy is dead and the country is bankrupt. You don’t get health care if the hospitals are bankrupt, you don’t get jobs if businesses are either bankrupt or hamstrung by regulations, you won’t get your Social Security or Medicare if the country is bankrupt, you can’t retire if you’re broke, you can’t worry about the Islamic Fundamentalists if you can’t buy fuel for the Navy. Romney needs to hammer home that the single greatest threat in the world is government spending because you can’t do anything if you’re broke and the lenders won’t pony up more cash.
You are exactly right, ChrisS. Here’s hoping that the Romney-Ryan campaign can stay FOCUSED (and keep their message focused).
I wouldn’t call it a “game changer” given that Romney’s top 3 campaign topics are (1) the economy, (2) the economy, and (3) the economy.
That’s a solid lite, but couldn’t he work in legality/honesty/principle in there some way? If he were smart enough to do that, and it doesn’t look like he is, he’d gain 5% overnight.
Maybe he should use a tie-in, like the idea of seizing unconstitutional power to reward criminality on immigration affects the economy. Something along those lines.
Romney as Diogenes….finding an honest numbers man in D.C. Talk about a golden chance to end business as usual in Washington. Of course it will be labeled controversial. The change we’ve hoped for.
Every season, we have someone we can be proud of.
and then we have our presidential candidate
I’m guessing you’re a Democrat. Lifelong, most likely.
Don’t try gambling.
So far, you couldn’t be more wrong.
And btw, Romney’s move make’s absolutely no sense. He runs a slash and burn campaign that effectively purged all of the true conservatives from the race. Then, of course, he goes into a shell when facing the marxist, squandering what many were thinking could be an easy victory against the most incompetant person in Amerian history. But at least that made sense, given Romney’s lifelong history of pandering to the left while pretending to be conservative out of the other side of his mouth.
Now, the most risk averse candidate since Bob Dole, takes at least as risky a gambit as the foolish river-boat gambler McCain did with Palin, another good person put in a completely untenable position.
Don’t get me wrong, I think Ryan may be the only honest politician in the country. God bless him. But Romney? puhleeze. If the stench from financially destroying all of the candidates who had a chance to beat the monster in the White House wasn’t enough. If the ooze from his standing idly by while obama destroyed HIM wasn’t enough. Now he decides to make the campaign about the 3rd rail of Amerian politics.
Huh? What an idiot. Maybe if he had set it up for the last six months by like giving a little hint or two that he wanted to make the election about scaring grandma instead of skewering the most incompetant and vulnerable president in history then it would make some sense.
But now? Just plain stupid.
And he had Rubio, McDonnell and Pawlenty, all of whom would have made great attack dogs against the marxists. Plus Rubio and McDonell are popular in critial states.
The more I think about this, the more it looks like McCain redux…a candidate trying to lose but secure his buddies positions at the feeding trough. But this time, the loser is also making a mighty effort to take out a great and gutsy person (Ryan) by putting the burden of a failed campaign on his shoulders and seeing to it that his ideas are shelved for a generation. This is a tragedy.
Smart people are beginning to talk about a landslide….FOR THE MARXIST.
“Smart people are beginning to talk about a landslide….FOR THE MARXIST.”
If that’s what they’re saying, they’re not that “smart.” Ryan’s approval among seniors is already 52%, and the more they hear from him, the more they’re going to support this ticket. That’s what REALLY smart people are talking about.
“If the stench from financially destroying all of the candidates who had a chance to beat the monster in the White House wasn’t enough.”
Let’s go thru the list of names that at one time or another proposed to “beat the monster in the White House”. There was Johnson, Paul, Bachmann, Perry, Cain, and some billionaire’s son from Utah (such a dynamo that I can’t even remember his name). Now out of that crop you see a winner? That brings us to Gingrich and Santorum. Obama would have had the feckless Santorum for breakfast. You actually saw a winner in Ricky? Gingrich? I would crawl on hands and knees to see a debate between Newt and The One. But he bears so much baggage that he needs a personal porter to carry it all. The media would have eviscerated the poor devil and all Obama’s goons would have had to do is stand back and watch. Romney did us a favor by eliminating these sure-to-lose, but well-meaning, individuals. Not a great situation but things look much brighter with Ryan on the ticket and possibly he will head the ticket in eight years. And that’s good. Not instant success but good evolution. On the other hand, if Obama wins who gives a damn who the GOP picks next time? I’m not bettin’ on a “next time”. I may well have left the country before then. I was in New Zealand once and I liked it there.
It is not McCain redux its Carter – the last guy to run on austerity openly. Good luck.
weo, I think you talk to too many smart people. Marxists will win only if they have already won. It has nothing to do with Romney’s campaign strategy and everything to do with the size of the dependent population in our country. Obama is a terrible President, but he knows who will vote for him and he is working overtime to expand that group. If he succeeds, you won’t have to worry about your perception of any left leaning Republicans who are not pure ideologues. There will only be one party left on the ballot anyway. So, button up this chicken shit nonsense until after America gets its last best chance to remove a Communist from its White House, will you? If not, I say that you want the hammer and sickle party to win. As Captain Jack Sparrow says, “You savvy?” ABO2012
The other obvious risk is that Romney/Ryan could be attacked as being light on foreign policy. I wouldn’t rule out some sort of false flag October suprise from team Zero. Romney should quickly name who he would name SOS (John Bolton, anyone?)
Good point, but not Bolton, I think, save him for special projects.
But then who? Nobody jumps to mind.
(ps – hey I lost a previous post to the main article a few minute ago)
Well, I suppose that Mitt could make liberal heads explode and choose Pat Buchanan as SOS!
Allen West, for Sec of State or Defense. Doesn’t matter which. He knows how to deal with moslems of all stripes. And they hate him for that.
They say he’s nearly seven feet tall
And yet quite graceful… … … all in all
I’m told there are lightning bolts when he walks
And thunder when he talks
I hear he’s steely as you please
He could be Samurai Japanese
The Muslims and their supporters may think he comes from hell
But he may come from somewhere just around the dell
But he will be here and he will be there
You could see him bringing fire on Islam most any time and most anywhere
He meddles with the Islamic Devolution
Stomping them mightily throughout each week
Spoiling every Imam’s useful idiot’s lying elocution
La, what cheek!
What’s going to be very interesting is the reaction in places like Iran and Syria. I’m betting, light on foreign policy or not (or maybe because of it, therefore unpredictable), they are not so comfortable with the possibility of a Romney/Ryan administration.
You got that right!
Cut-Cap-Balance, period! Immediately!
Baloney. A game changer…for Chicago Jesus. CNN’s Crowley had it exactly right -
the campaign has a death wish.
In your bizarro world, I bet you can see Biden really tearing him up in the debates. More Kool-Aid?
Mike, I don’t think it’s much surprise that the Democrats think their welfare state is popular and that if the election is about whose goodies get cut rather than a referendum on Obama’s first term, the results may be more favorable to them. I’m concerned about that myself.
All of the counter-rhetoric aside, hell yes this is a game changer.
I also post at my local big newpaper, and the Liberals are losing their minds. They won’t admit that they’re worried, but the sheer number of them that have suddenly started posting today (and using all manners of insulting smarmy stuff) convinces me that they know, deep in their heart of hearts, Barry-O and Hairplug are toast.
Game changer? Meh. I like Ryan’s competence and work ethic, no doubt, but his budget proposals and such have really been weak tea. Further, he has supported a lot of the things in the past he shouldn’t have. He’s a Party man, albeit one of the best of the breed.
I’m not excited. I think he is invaluable right where he is. If Romney loses, will we also lose Ryan in Congress, or can he still run for Congress while running for VP? Well, I doubt Romney will lose, but he is doing all he can to try to lose.
I guess if you are a Republican, this seems like a great pick, someone whom the Party really likes. And Ryan is personally very likable. The pick will certainly win over some Conservatives, but really means little to this Conservative.
He can stay on the ballot in WI but if he wins VP they will have a special election to replace him.
Yes, Mr. Malone, it’ll be much better if we just say, “Meh!” and stay home and let Obama be re-elected. Obama’s budget proposals will be much “stronger tea” for America. It would be much better if Ryan stayed in Congress and had all of his weak tea proposals vetoed by President Obama!
Of all the choices AVAILABLE to Romney, Ryan was clearly the best.
Marc, I don’t know who you’d rather Romney would have picked.. Ryan was about the most conservative there was and is clearly more small-government conservative than Romney has shown so far.
Now… maybe you can’t stand Romney as the nominee and you’re sour on the whole thing. If so, time to get past that like many of us have, get positive and embrace our only chance to unseat a communist in the WH. We all must work hard and together. Our country cannot weather 4 more years of Barry without significant and long-term damage.
Ryan will reassure the conservatives (me for one, so I know) but the candidate shouldn’t have had to to do that. Absent that weakness he could have picked Rubio who would have given him Florida and a fighting chance to peal off some Hispanics in places where their vote is crucial.
Exactly how and why is Ryan a great choice? Besides the fact that he has some wit, what has he done? How much debt does his budget add? How much spending did his budget increase? How did he vote for the 6 years the Republicans controlled the White House and both houses of Congress? Did he support Medicare Part D, no Child Left Behind and the other massive pieces of intrusive legislation passed by the Republicans or did he fight against them? NDAA, Patriot Act, just for starters!
Obama does not want to turn America into Europe. This is a mistake to think so. He hates Europeans because they are too white anyway. His plan for a second term is to turn America into Kalifornia, then in a third term, Venezuela, and in a fourth term, North Korea. He would already have transformed America into North Korea but such change going forward will take a few more terms.
If anyone can refute the Lefty Narrative that conservatives are out to force Grandma and Grandpa to eat cat food, it is Ryan.
While Romney might have won the election, Ryan has a chance [albeit small] to change The Narrative.
Perhaps there is “Hope for Change” after all.
Romney should produce a copy of the grandma-over-cliff ad, only it is Obama behind the wheelchair, and at the last second, Ryan appears below and catches her.
… … … Obama’s “investments” in the middle class
The quotation marks should be around “middle class”. (Yes, I do understand that the “investments” are vote-buying bribes.)
In 2008, Obama aimed his Hope and Change at the traditional Middle Class, and the Middle Class suckered right in, believing what it wanted to.
Now (apart from the ideological rousing of the Left Wing elite), his envy-based populism and income redistributionism is aimed at the Lower. They are the ones most open to being “bribed.”
Ryan is open borders and supported the bankster bailouts. So long America.
Don’t worry. We’ll beat that out of him.
Just think of the way that the left wing wing will be revitalized by Ryan’s nomination! For five years, they’ve been neutered punks. Now, they’ll start “investigating” and do what they haven’t done since, well, President Bush. I bet we’ll even have an investigation to determine whether Romney is really a Kenyan by birth. My bet is that the media’s answer on this issue will be “inconclusive.”
This is a wise choice which will go a long way toward bringing the TEA Party backing that the Republican Party must have fully energize for November.
I am more of a social Conservative, more focus on Pro Life, pro militart, pro strong foreign policy. I admire governors Christie and Walker with all my heart for taking on the public unions.
However, I do believe that society should have a safety net, I cannot imagibe people like parents shopping around for their medical insurance with vouchers, The voucher as I understand it are linked to the Consumer Index which raises in much lower rate than the medical benefit rise.
I cannot have it on my conscience risking their health and life with Ryan’s new medicare, I am not going to vote for Romney-Ryan, I will not vote for Obama, that never gonna happen! I will just pass this presidential election.
Then you are for all intents and purposes voting for Obama.
yikes, the sock puppets are out in force. sure sign the left feel threatened.
Perhaps before you decide to not vote at all, you should not be listening to Obama unless you plan to vote for him. Medicare and SS reform is needed in order to be there in the future. Ryan’s proposal lets the younger, people under 55 choose a voucher plan or the traditional Medicare. If you can’t tolerate the idea of people making their own choice in that situation then I guess you need to stay home.If Obama wins and you loose your job due to continued bad economy I guess denying peoples right to choose their own plan was not so important. Romney/Ryan 2012
Leah– Ryan’s plan for Medicare would allow Grandma to stay with the original program. Or she could choose the vouchers.
So why do you have a problem allowing Grandma a choice? Seems to me that’s the American way–or it was pre-Obama.
Time to get with the program. Sitting on your hands this November will help usher in another four years of “hopeless change.” Haven’t you had enough?
Dave, let me offer a little explanation of the old fogies attitude about Medicare. It isn’t that we (“we”, pardner) don’t understand the proposal, it’s that we have been around long enough to know that once the subject is opened, no one really knows where it will go or how the program may be changed. For better or worse, we are now all dependent on it, as I doubt there is any company offering health insurance in the United States for those over 65. The mere possibility of losing that coverage without a guaranteed substitute of some kind is terrifying. The Democrats have always had better insight into that reaction to proposals to modify Medicare than have the Republicans and it has kept many of them in office long past their usefulness.
You’d be surprised that a lot of major insurers do have insurance plans for seniors. They are called Medicare Advantage plans and they already exist and have existed for several years now. Lots of people use them, like them and the coverage is not much different than traditional Medicare. Basically, it is still Medicare, the difference being that instead of the plan being administrated by a government contractor, the plan is administrated by regular insurance companies. http://www.medicare.gov/navigation/medicare-basics/medicare-benefits/part-c.aspx
I work as a hospital biller and our patients who are in these types of Medicare plans like them, but as with all insurance companies, do your research, some are better than others.
Songdog: Two points in response.
First, if you are age 55 or older, Ryan’s proposal would mean virtually no change for you. You would be exempt.
Second, no matter how much you like, or dislike, the current system, it is going broke. If changes aren’t made now, it will disappear, along with all the other entitlements we’re hooked on. It’s simple math.
How long do you suppose we can just keep borrowing 40-cents out of every dollar the government spends? A reckoning is coming as surely as day follows night. This is that infamous cliff Ryan supposedly is throwing Grandma off.
Sooner than you think, merely paying off the interest on this debt will eat up all of our resources. There won’t be anything left for national defense or Obama’s “roads and bridges.” It is this debt, made worse by Obama’s incredibly stupid policies that underlie our current economic nightmare.
And all the wishes in the world won’t change a thing. We need action and we need it now, not down the road. The piper is knocking at our door. We either pay up; or say goodbye to your children’s and grandchildren’s future.
“Second, no matter how much you like, or dislike, the current system, it is going broke. If changes aren’t made now, it will disappear, along with all the other entitlements we’re hooked on. It’s simple math.”
“republicans”–note the small “r”–like Art Chance tell us that doesn’t matter, and the way to handle everyting is to compromise.
They are dinosaurs needing a big rock. Ryan is a good start at picking up that rock.
Dave, I support the Ryan plan for all the reasons you mention. I’m simply pointing out that keeping traditional Medicare for those over 55 is no sure thing once the sausage grinder begins.
Eva, of course I am familiar with medicare Advantage plans. But you said a key thing: basically, it’s still Medicare. As for it remaining basically Medicare in several key respects –community rating and guaranteed issue being teh most important for oldsters with pre-existing conditions ( and we all have pre-existing conditions) — see my remark addressed to Dave. One never knows what comes out of the legislative mill until it is over.
I’m simply pointing out that a fear of overhauling Medicare is not irrational among seniors who depend upon it. Rather, I would again refer to my having been around this racetrack before and not being entirely confident in the political process in this country to produce a fair and rational result.
Back to the point: this will not be an easy sell for the republicans no matter how compelling the math.
Leah, Please make good on your threat (or is it a promise?) to sit out this election and posibbly those in the future. We have enough misinformed voters on the rolls already.
“I cannot imagibe people like parents shopping around for their medical insurance with vouchers…”
Where ya been? Medicare recipients have been “shopping around” for Medicare’s Part D for quite a while. In fact, recipients have to choose Part D every year because the incredible number of plans change co-pays, premiums, etc. Recipients also choose every year from various plans for medical coverage: traditional fee for service, HMO type coverages & Medicare Advantage. I haven’t heard of any problems because Seniors are too stupid. What’s the big deal about vouchers? You get a certain amount of money, now choose what fits you best…just like Part D. Of course, Obama’s eliminating Medicare Advantage soon (w/those “preventative” services Dems always tell us are so important) so they’ll be 1 less choice for medical coverage.
Definitely the best of the white guys. I would have preferred Marco or Susanna Martinez.
Leah B – If the United States goes bankrupt due to 4 more years of out of control print and spend Obamanomics then SS and Medicare WILL cease to exist.
Look at what happened to Argentina in 2001 when it’s economy collapsed due to endless Printing and Spending, mass starvation and people dying in the streets.
That’s the change Obama’s bringing.
If YOU want Medicare and SS to remain, vote Republican.
The grand irony of the Democrats’ agenda, not to say its hypocricy, is that it takes a strong economy and great national wealth to pay for the welfare state, to fix the environment, to develop alternative energy, and all the other wonderful things they want to do, but along with those notions they also seem to be genetically tuned to hate business and people of above average means. Their threats and reprisals against the wealth producers and innovators of the country will eventually result in very much reduced national wealth and no money for their pet programs. So a vote for Obama is a vote for — what? National penury, but more equally shared.
“In truth, Obama’s vision offers more security — government-sponsored security”
The question is how long Obama’s vision can be sustained. Four more years or what? Think of all those pension promises that went down the drain when they were no longer sustainable in all those failed states. In the long run, we maybe all dead as Lord Keynes famously said, but our children and grandchildren will not be and the Democratic party has somehow lost track of that point.
Look what happened in Argentina? Well, Argentina’s no “home of the brave, land of the freebie”…where we have our very own KING!
Im beginning to feel better about nov 2012. wish we had a hint of who he have in his administration.
Neither Romney nor Ryan are serious about reducing the deficit. Romney wants to increase defense spending in a time of annual trillion dollar deficits in D.C. I admire Ryan, but his budget plan had large scale deficits as far as the eye could see. Why? He left defense spending alone.
Bring back Bowles-Simpson, the only realistic set of ideas put on the table for the past 4 years.
Barack Obama here. Now that I have finished my 18 rounds of golf for the day, including 6 holes-in-one, I might add, I just thought I would drop by and see how all you wingnuts and teabaggers were doing. And just as I thought many of you are still attacking your own candidates. Although it could be some ringers that Dave or Rahm or Debbie sent over. Beats me as I’m the Big Picture Man. I don’t really need any help in defeating those two lightweights but thanks anyway for softening them up. You might as well just give up right now and save yourselves any further frustration. My grand plan is working even better than I thought with so many of you fighting amongst yourselves and fighting your own nominees. Of course, many of you are now compelled to fight against Romney after I proved he is a murderer. Soon now both Harry Reid and I will revel the names of thousand of other people Romney has murdered with cancer and Ryan has murdered by stealing their wheel chairs and leaving them out in the desert to die a slow and painful death. Those of you who are still bitter clingers should just face the new reality. America is dying. I am the reason. America is what is wrong with the world. You have to suffer. I can not believe you ever even thought I was an American. No, I am not. I am a world citizen. Borders are illegal in my eyes, which are the only ones that matter. Plus, you stole this land anyway and built it on the backs of Black men like me. You will not have your guns when I am done with you. You won’t have your Bibles either. You won’t even have a nation. I have not even begun to transform you. You will change. I will make you. Feel free to vote for me or just stay home. I hate you. I hate your children. I hate your parents for having you. See you in November–suckers–losers. I am Barack Obama and I will have at least four more years. More likely about 40 more years.
Quote:
That means taxes are going up.
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Is that something like the Federal Student Loan and Pell grants for higher education to ‘help’ students pay their college tuition? How’s that working out?
University tuition more affordable now? Who does it help more, the University, or the Student?
You’re forgetting that the number one cause of double-digit yearly inflation in both health care and college tuition is GOVERNMENT PRICE FIXING. The government provides health care and college tuition to whomever needs it as long as you meet a couple of basic requirements. In effect, they enable infinite demand.
Infinite demand drives prices up. Not everyone’s going to benefit from a college education or going to graduate. Not everyone’s going to have a useful, rewarding final few years of their life. Both experiments can incur hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Take the government out of the equation and costs would PLUMMET. That’s what Ryan will do. It’s time to face facts that not all 310,000,000 of us really are created equal. It’s time to change those expectations about life. It’s time to figure out that you have to pull your own weight, because the rest of us can’t afford it anymore.
Most of all it’s time for us to realize government can never be the solution to the problem. Ryan does. By picking him, Romney signals that he does. This election is about whether or not the federal government is the most important thing in America, controlling all aspects of our lives, or if it’s treated as a suspicious but necessary evil that must be monitored by the people.
Democrats prefer the Leviathan state. That’s a fact.
Republicans and libertarians prefer freedom.
Make your choice.
At the point of conception all humans are exactly equal, in potential of outcome. What the progressives have done is perverted the language to confuse you and dissuade you from thinking.
If it were not so, then explain the moron in the whitehouse…
Equal potential, not equal outcome
Equal justice for all, not social justice for some
One interesting thing…..Manassas is the location of 2 very important Civil War battles.
Hmmmmm…..wonder if that had anything to do with deciding on the locations of todays activities?
Trolling aside, don’t you think it more likely that Masassas was chosen because it is a swing county in a swing state? Your Civil War reference is…reaching.
“Trolling”? I plan on voting for the R/R ticket!
What I AM doing is commenting (within the section labeled “comments”) about what I found to be an interesting fact as seen from the viewpoint of this particular Southerner as it relates to the nomination of a Tea Party candidate for the office of Vice-President.
I’m sure holding the speech in front of a battleship was just a coincidence for you as well……
I hope Romney and now Ryan find it within themselves to get down and dirty with the Punk-in-Chief. The rationale for not going dirty is that this tactic might bother conservatives. As a conservative I would be delighted to see President Misfire attacked the same way he has attacked others, and now Romney, throughout his rotten political career. The MSM should also be put on the defenseive for being the slimeball enablers they are.
“Obama’s ‘investments’ in the middle class …”
Say, WHAT? Obama detests the Middle Class (the self-sufficient) even more than he detests the blue-collar Working Class (the “bitter-clingers” who just won’t let go of their liberty no matter how hard the Obama fed seeks to obliterate their livelihoods).
I hope seniors are smart enough to realize that the money that is going to go to Obamacare is coming DIRECTLY out of Medicare. The “doc fix,” which every Congress always passes, was going to have to be absolutely huge because the reduced Medicare payments after Obama’s raid on the Medicare budget would be chump change. No competent doctor would accept it and they would be dumping their Medicare patients en masse.
Here’s the key: Obamacare stole most of Medicare’s cash to provide for people Obama liked more than old white people. It was a transfer from older whites to people younger and browner. Obama, and more particularly Reid and Pelosi, knew damned well Americans would not have voted for that change. That’s why they had to do it in the dead of night by unconstitutional means.
The reality is that medical costs have been exploding for decades. Between the trial lawyers and new technology, it simply costs too much to get sick in America. We can’t continue to pay for the care we have now, much less expand it hugely by Obamacare. In order to make the costs look something less than absolutely insane, Obama, Pelosi and Reid resorted to every crooked trick in the book, plus a few they invented. 2 plus 2 doesn’t make 8. You can’t take the same pool of money, divide it among a much larger group of people, and have everyone get the same amount as before. However, that is what Obamacare does, with the intent that they will raise taxes–or cut benefits–to make up the shortfall.
Bottom line: medical spending is going to increase tremendously, the taxes they will suck from you will increase even more, and the quality of legal taxpayers’ medical care will go down. You WILL see Sarah Palin’s “death panels.” Illegals, however, will be doing quite a bit better, as will other people who didn’t do what was necessary to have medical insurance.
Obama, Pelosi and Reid lied through their teeth and performed criminal acts to get this bill passed knowing that it would probably bankrupt the country. However, they’ve got their cash and their gold-plated medical care is assured. If you have to go to crowded, filthy emergency rooms filled with “undocumented immigrants” because that is all you can afford or all that is available, they couldn’t care less. They’re the nomenklatura and you’re just a prole. That’s how it is. Any distinction you might draw between what you might feel yourself entitled to as a native-born American and some foreigner here illegally means absolutely nothing to them. A prole is a prole, no matter where they are from.
If most Americans really understood what happened with the passing of Obamacare, angry mobs would be decorating trees and lampposts with Democrat politician’s corpses. They know it, too, which is why they took very good care to make sure that most people didn’t–and won’t–know about how that happened.
The government cheese-eaters were never going to vote for Romney. It’s the seniors I’m worried about–particularly the senile ones unable to understand that just because Precious Token says 2+2=5 doesn’t make it so. Hard to say which way this will cut as Americans do not like to be told hard truths and prefer kicking the can down the road and stick our collective heads in the sand re the consequences.
Y’all might also want to remember about Ryan is, he doesn’t HAVE any magic bullets for the budget, the economy, Europe, China, social security, or medicare. Cuz there ain’t none. Any realistic discussion of any of these is immensely uncertain and full of bad news.
Ryan can be more positive and more *right* about these than anyone else, and still be subject to huge and valid attacks. The Democrats love to pretend that there are no problems, or that taxing the rich will somehow fix them (it won’t, not even close). That does not make Ryan bulletproof.
There are two huge problems with the US economy that I have not heard Ryan (nor Romney) address. Each of these is bigger than anything in Ryan’s budget. Frankly it leaves me wondering a little about Ryan that he goes on about fiscal policies while leaving these out. They are (1) the structural trade and *jobs* issues with globalization especially China, and (2) the wall street banksters who at *best* are putting the grocery money on the horses every Thursday, and are rent-seeking on virtually the entire economy at an unprecedented level.
What does Ryan have to say about the housing market, or the Fed printing money? Does he have to read Romney’s 57-point plan for his talking points? OMG. That won’t be happy if he does.
People are just silly. Picking Ryan is not a game changer. Romney is a hapless candidate, who does not know how to deal with the hard left. Like McCain in 2008, he seems to have used all his fight to beat up and out his fellow Republicans. Having beaten them, he seems to becoming just another bust against Obama.
Picking Ryan is the same as picking Palin in 2008. Romney has to get someone else to add some energy to a wimpy campaign. The problem in 2012 as in 2008 is not the second chair. It is who sits at the top of the ticket, that is the problem. Unless Romney gets some fire in the belly and take on Obama, he is doomed to second best in the upcoming election.
What’s worse in 2012 is that if anything, Romney is further to the left than McCain is. The prevailing distinction in 2012 will be, no one has any illusions about what Obama is.
So absent something unanticipated by the conventional wisdom, Romney will will by 5% of more, maybe even 10%.
The biggest risk the Republican party could take would be if Romney decided to play it safe. The biggest risk for Obama is the American people recognizing him for the con artist, miscreant he truly is.