The news outlets were excited over the choice of Paul Ryan to be Governor Romney’s VP candidate. This is a huge mistake for Mitt Romney’s hopes to become president in the November election Why?
Because of a number of things. First, Paul Ryan doesn’t bring anything to the table; he’s just a younger version of Mitt Romney. What Romney should have done is to pick a VP candidate that could bring a voting block to the election, perhaps a Hispanic mayor or similar. The idea of picking a VP as a partner in the election is to attract more votes, not to have a yes man and lose votes.
Second, Paul Ryan will actually alienate the senior citizen voting bloc, the ones who take voting very seriously, as Ryan’s Republic budget is perceived as hard on Medicare. If you’re thinking that the Ryan budget will decrease the national debt then you haven’t read the details. All it does is lessen the increase in the national debt from Obama’s proposal of $8.5 trillion (the new billion) to only $5.5 trillion over the same period!
The Congressional Budget Office states that the Ryan budget won’t balance the budget for 28 years. Even Ryan says that given a perfect world, his plan would only balance the budget (but not reduce the deficit) in 10-15 years. And all the while, our national debt will spiral upwards until we lose the dollar as the world’s reserve currency.
President Obama's budget is worse, but the seniors will focus on Medicare changes. They will be frightened by any changes. That’s the nature of getting old – fear of change.
The big voting bloc, the senior citizens will vote for Obama. Polls indicate that 80% of Americans are opposed to the Ryan budget because of Medicare cuts.
As with Senator McCain picking Sarah Palin as his VP choice, failing and helping her become very rich, so it will be with Paul Ryan. I’m sure that he and his wife are discussing the money they are going to make because of Romney’s lack of judgment.
They key thing to watch is that Paul Ryan is also running in the November General Election for his eighth term for Congress in Wisconsin. That will be sixteen years as a Congressman! Is this one of the definitions of a career politician?
He could write to the Wisconsin Secretary of State and withdraw his candidacy. If he does, he’s committed and actually thinks that Mitt Romney will win. I predict that he won’t.
He’ll hedge his bets so one way or another he’ll keep a cushy job, either as an easy reelection for the eighth term as Congressman, or first as Vice President. He can’t lose. Romney can, and unfortunately will.
I think that the next Republican President will be Rick Santorum. His challenge in this cycle was just a trial run.
Rob Zerban, who is Paul Ryan’s Democratic opponent in Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District, is considered a long shot to win the election so if Paul will win it if he stays in.
Sad to say, while my platform is to effective limit Congressional service to six years by cancelling pensions if they don’t leave voluntarily, it’s clear that Congressman Ryan is a career politician and career politicians are the reason our country is in such sad shape.
Paul Ryan is a big mistake, just another that Mitt Romney seems to make almost every week.
Do we have any more nails left?
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From FactCheck.org: Here’s a quick rundown of the latest Ryan plan: For seniors who are now in Medicare, nothing changes. They can stay with the traditional program as it is. Beginning in 2023, 65-year-olds would have their choice of insurance plans — private and traditional — on a new Medicare exchange. A premium-support payment, like a subsidy, would be sent to the plan of their choice. If the chosen plan costs more than the premium-support, the senior would pay the difference. The Medicare eligibility age would be slowly raised to 67 by 2034. All plans on the Medicare exchange would offer a base level of benefits, and they would be regulated by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The premium-support payments would be tied to the second-cheapest plan, which can’t grow more than gross domestic product plus 0.5 percentage points. If the cost does grow faster, Congress would be required to step in and take some action to keep costs down.
Florida is a swing state, full of retirees.
Your assessment is spot on w/how Ryan will be perceived. It's unfortunate though b/c even though his budget plan does not go far enough, he's the only person outside of Gary Johnson or Ron/Rand Paul willing to actually address the tough issues surrounding our fiscal mess. The best anyone else will do is talk about it, but they won't stick their neck out on the issue. Sooner or later "other people's money" is going to run out, & all our unfunded liabilities are going to crush this country...& that's not hyperbole. I will be voting Libertarian as I have for years, but as much as I'd like to see Gary Johnson elected, I would much rather take the liberal-lite ticket (Romney/Ryan) over the liberal ticket (Obama/Biden). That will never happen though b/c liberals/regressives will obfuscate the issues & demagogue the Ryan pick until the ticket is completely unelectable.
There isn’t anything wrong with working to fix the looming deficit disaster, one that will bite us with the loss of currency reserve status but pretend budgets won’t resolve anything. He knows it. His pretend budget ( one that increases the deficit slightly slower than the Obama one) is designed to enhance his political position. It worked. Mitt Romney likes to be around people who think like him (Yes men and women) so rather than picking a VP who can bring votes, chose a fellow thinker. That was his mistake… a big one. The underlying problem that this country has is that we can't get rid of career politicians. I think that six years is plenty. Many people want a Term Limits amendment. I don't think that it'll ever pass, so my platform (www.allanleveneforcongress.com) is for politicians to forfeit their pensions if they don't quit after six years. That means if you're Paul Ryan and you run again, you'll lose that ~$90,000 pension. Believe me, he'll quit. That’s exactly what the country needs… new blood, not old political hacks that are trapped by their own positions.
Hoping for a Ron Paul, who was sidelined by the press, to ride to the rescue was a dream. Note that his family is now an emerging political dynasty and a family business with Rand Paul becoming a Senator in Kentucky. You have to look at the behavior, not just believe the spoken word. Politicians are very good with words.
Only one tiny mention (by a commenter, not the blog poster) about Florida. Romney essentially handed Obama Florida, and the election on a silver platter by not taking Rubio.
You are correct. Rubio would have been a much better pick. George Bush beat Al Gore based on the Florida electorate. It will be the same for Romney. Even though a Republican candidate for the 11th District versus Gingrey, I cannot understand why he did it nor keep quiet about the consummate career politician, Ryan. It was political suicide.
He now has an energized base as is evident by the massive numbers of supporters who are showing-up at recent events. This election will not be about the Ryan Plan it will be about the Romney Plan which hasn't been fully articulated yet. If the unemployment rate is still north of 8% on election day the current administration is history.
Regarding spending, don't think for a minute that the republicans aren't as bad as democrats. They are the same thing. Republicans just want to tax and spend less whereas democrats want to hit the rich hard and spend more in stimulus. However, when it boils down to it, both the mainstream republican and mainstream democratic plans increase the deficit at approximately the same rate. The tea party is not republican. It's just "playing nice" with career republicans for now who will use tea party views - or any other views for that matter - to build their base. Before long, you may see the tea party start to eat its way into the democratic party as well. We need to vote against the republican and democrat parties by pushing hard for politicians that will end the two-party system, even if those people will in fact be members of one party or the other.
At the same time, our GDP grew by around 5-10% each year since the beginning of 2010 and tax revenue increased in 2009, 2010, and 2011. We are back to 2005 levels after the Bush-caused economic disaster. As far as spending, half the auto bailout has already been recovered with cash and equity while the Bush-initiated but Obama-completed financial bailouts have led to a - wait for it - PROFIT. Studies of the Bush-initiated but Obama-complated stimulus' multiplier was in the 100-250% range (meaning it increased GDP by that much as a percentage of money the government spent). Keep in mind that the GDP are somewhat predictive of expected tax revenues. So a multiplier is a good thing. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/did-the-stimulus-work-a-review-of-the-nine-best-studies-on-the-subject/2011/08/16/gIQAThbibJ_blog.html
To the Libertarian.....your logic is like going to a horse race with two horses and you place your wager or vote on a junked car in the parking lot. Hope I read your post wrong and you are voting for Romney/Ryan '12