Login / Register
Help
22%
25 votes
Right wing attack dog Paul Ryan selected as Mitt Romney's Republican running mate
Paul Ryan is an anti-abortionist and advocate for maintaining Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.
Gage Skidmore
The Obama campaign has released a 290-page report on detailing the right-wing proclivities of Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Congressman selected as Mitt Romney's Republican running mate.
Poll
Videos
Meet Paul Ryan was distributed shortly before Romney named the Wisconsin congressman as the GOP vice presidential candidate, and opens with this description:
In every race across the country, the Ryan budget plan is the albatross that hangs around the neck of Republican candidates. So why not set the task of defending the plan to the architect himself, Paul Ryan. Because there's nothing defensible about a budget that hands out tax cuts to wealthy individuals and corporations while asking more of working class families already struggling just to get by—and still doesn't even close the budget deficit until 2040. With Ryan at his side, there's no etch-a-sketching Romney's support for a plan that would end Medicare as we know it, causing seniors to pay more out of their pocket for health care and costing America millions of jobs over the next two years.
The front page of the document features a quote from right-wing Texas Republican governor praising Ryan, chair of the House budget committee, for "having the courage" to talk about social security, which Perry characterized as a "Ponzi scheme".
Texas governor Rick Perry likes Paul Ryan.
Another video on the front page of Meet Paul Ryan shows constituents repeatedly interrupting a Ryan speech about a "debt crisis" by saying there's a "jobs crisis".
Paul Ryan faces local opposition over unemployment.
Ryan is an anti-abortionist and claims to be a hawk on debt reduction, which has endeared him to FOX News commentators and right-wing Republicans.
He has opposed allowing overseas members of the armed forces and their families getting abortions at military hospitals overseas. He has also voted to ban the use of federal funds to purchase insurance plans that cover abortion.
When it comes to global warming, he voted to prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating emissions linked to climate change. In addition, Ryan voted against a cap-and-trade policy to curb emissions.
Further proof of his right-wing ideological bent came when he voted in 2009 against expanding federal hate-crime legislation to include sexual orientation or gender.
Ryan also voted for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriages and opposed repealing the "don't ask–don't tell" policy that barred gays and lesbians from serving in the armed forces.
Bloomberg writer Margaret Carlson has written that Ryan's presence on the Republican ticket will provide a jolt of right-wing energy.
She noted that Ryan's budget plan "would give big tax cuts to the 1 percent, not-so-big ones to those in the middle, and possibly raise taxes on the working class".
"He doesn’t name which deductions he will end or which loopholes he will close," Carlson added. "But do not expect that his specifics, if they come, will shut down tax havens in the Cayman Islands. As for cuts, there are massive ones to the social-safety net, slightly obscured by having the states do the cutting. Ryan’s budget is the defining document for conservatives, Tea Partiers, the freshmen in the House of Representatives, the Club for Growth and tax pledge author Grover Norquist, who famously said earlier this year that if the brilliant Ryan were chosen for the No. 2 spot, conservatives would need a president only 'with enough working digits to hold a pen' to sign his budget."
The right wingers might approve, but the Meet Paul Ryan report maintains that the congressman's budget plan would raise taxes on the poor to pay for tax breaks for the rich—in effect, being "Robin Hood in reverse".
The document cites this statement from the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities: "Many low-income working families would actually see an increase in their tax burdens under the Ryan plan. While the Ryan budget makes permanent all of the Bush tax cuts for high-income households that are slated to expire at the end of 2012, it would not extend the tax cuts for working-poor households that were enacted under President Obama and also are scheduled to expire at the end of this year."
American Bridge Paul Ryan Research BookFollow Charlie Smith on Twitter at twitter.com/csmithstraight.
The stakes are now more clear than ever. Although Obama has wimped out far too often, he will at last have an opponent whose opinions are clear as day.
Mind you, there is an extraordinary number of idiots on the far right in the US. One of them attended a recent Tea Party rally. Perhaps 70 years old, and apparently devoid of irony, she held up a hand-made poster: "Government keep your hands off my medicare." That kind of cluelessness is everywhere apparent in the States.
The same irony sees the most drought-stricken of states populated by voters who disbelieve the science behind climate change -- and oppose anyone who would try to deal with it head on.
Let's hope we don't see the same with universal health care in Canada. The greatest legacy of Tommy Douglas, it defines us as a people, and as a caring nation. Extreme right-wingers are trying to destroy it here too.
We have our own Paul Ryans in the dark corners of Canadian politics.
As I matured, I grew puzzled by their chest thumping.
Now I'm entertained.
Geo. Bush Jr. cut Federal Taxes by $1 Trillion a year, that is he gave a $1 Million Dollar a Year tax break to the 1million wealthiest Americans.
The USA National Debt went from $3.1 Trillion when Clinton left to $11 Trillion when Bush Jr. left
So what do you think, maybe Romney and Paul are right?? Health Care, Public Education and Welfare are breaking the Financial Back of the Good-Old, Heavily-Armed, Creationist USA???????????????????????
tax cuts for the rich....tax hikes for the middle class
American politics is too important to be left just to Americans.
George W. was President for 8 years.
During the last (close to) *four years*, under Barack Obama, the U.S. debt has climbed to 16 trillion.
Five trillion in four years.
You're very selective with your fact telling.
Bush inherited a strong economy and Obama had a Global Financial Meltdown handed to him.
The most shocking thing about Obama's Presidency, is that on any given day, 30% of the Democrats in the House and Senate will vote with the Republicans.
These So-Called Democrats betray the very folks who voted them into power on a daily basis. That is why Bush's Trillion Dollar Tax cut, has not been repealed.
If the USA Congress and Senate had any BALLS they would go back to the Eisenhower (Republican Party) Federal Tax Rate and Pay off the entire USA Federal Debit in 15 years.
"Bush inherited a strong economy and Obama had a Global Financial Meltdown handed to him."
Yeah, and Bush had to deal with 9/11. At some point, a President MUST (if he wants to be taken seriously) bear the responsibility of the state of the nation under his watch. (Remember "the buck stops here"?) Obama's incompetence is glaring; he spends money as though working people don't have to PAY for it. Even now, he golfs and parties with his Hollywood pals and continues to spend taxpayers' hard earned money with careless abandon, just because he CAN. The average household is not having it so easy.
Bah.
George (The Shit Head) Bush cut Federal Taxes by One Trillion Dollars a Year, before 9-11, before the war In Afghanistan and before the Bull Shit War to find Weapons of Mass Destruction, that didn't exist.
Now, any Intelligent and Educated President, might have RAISED TAXES, to pay for 2 Wars.
No Bush Jr. aka The Shrub, went after the Poor, The Middle Class and Union Members and blamed them for the USA's financial problems.
George Bush Jr. was and always will be seen as an "Illiterate and Illegitimate" President of the USA. Had China or Russia wanted to place a "Manchurian Candidate" in the White House, to corrode the spirit and strength of America, Bush Jr. was their man.