In contentious VP debate, Biden, Ryan at odds early, often
October 12, 2012 at 12:22 am in Duluth News Tribune
At odds early and often, Joe Biden and Republican Paul Ryan squabbled over the economy, taxes, Medicare and more Thursday night in a contentious, interruption-filled debate. “That is a bunch of malarkey,” the vice president retorted after a particularly tough Ryan attack on the administration’s foreign policy. Continue Reading
Wow! That was an absolute disgrace to the office of the VP. I guess old Joe is so out of touch that he thinks 43 straight months of over 8% unemployment, the $6 trillion he and Obumma had in deficit spending over the past 4 years, $16 trillion National Debt and rising, the Middle East unraveling and the abandonment of Israel, and the murder of our embassador to Libya are just hilarious! The VP was classless and clueless. Keep laughing Joe, because no one else is.
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Can I assume you found Obama much more presidential then, with his reserved, respectful, polite demeanor?
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kayak man you are an official Obumma drone if you think Romney’s and Biden’s debate performances were even remotely similar. Obnoxious, condescending, and rude are not valuable qualities in a statesman and old Joe displayed them all last night. You’ll be disappointed if you expect a poll bump from that classless act.
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You didn’t answer the question, Mr Ryan.
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Look around Joe, what is to laugh at?
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Romney says he has a plan to create 12 million jobs. Something like that could get him elected hands down, would help the country. Why then doesn’t he reveal his plan to the nation? Because he has no plan. The man would say anything to get elected.
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Are you talking about the “Promise Man” BHO. Sorry, I was having a flashback to 2008 when our country was 6 trillion dollars less in debt.
Back to subject at hand. There is nothing in our country to laugh about, we have serious problems and the present administration has never had a budget and Biden is part of this.
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Ok what else was going on in 2008? Where was the stock market at? How many unfunded wars? Weren’t 4 or 5 million jobs lost? Housing meltdown, huge companies going broke, Wall Street running amok. Life was so much better in 2008, yeah you bet.
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Mother said never to argue with those of less intelligence so I must leave.
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I see some are trying to protect wolves on a national scale now.
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“If a wise man has an argument with a fool, the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet.” – Proverbs 29:9
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I really wanted Biden to toss a handkercheif at Ryan and say, “here you go, kid. Clean yourself up.” I was waiting for Ryan to start crying.
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That debate was not only a joke, it was a disgrace to the intelligence of the American people. It was like a free for all. I thought Martha did a completely embarrassing job of narating the debate. There is no doubt in my mind who she is voting for. Biden was nothing less than a pomous ass, sitting there with that smirk on his face was laughable. Anyone who thinks that what has happened over the last four years is OK and chose to go down that path again, deserve exactly what you get. Obama and Biden are lethal to the American people and have absolutely no respect for the Constitution. For those of you who realize this, get out spread the word and vote them out of office. Four years ago I voted for Obama because he was the less of the two evils, this year I will have to do the same…Romney you have my vote.
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What would you expect? Marth is a very close friend of Michelle Obama. So close in fact she threw a major party for Michelle, I think it was her wedding shower.
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It was more a debate between Ryan and Radditz. Biden was just a distraction.
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Name one example of Obama and Biden not respecting the Constitution.
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One was the Executive order regarding immigration with the stopping of the deportation of illiegal aliens and the authorization of issuing them green cards. Second was the signing statment with regards to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012. http://www.westernjournalism.com/obama-demands-court-uphold-his-right-to-ignore-constitution/
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Funny you mention the constitution, Ryan admitted they would ignore it to impose his religion on the rest of us. Why couldn’t Ryan answer how his plan would pay for the tax cuts? Perhaps they have a problem admitting that they want to continue with trickle down, which has resulted in our current redistribution of wealth to the rich. And Ryan lost on foreign policy in my opinion.
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Are you sure what you’re in favor of? You’re saying with a Democrat president for the past four years, we have a “current redistribution of wealth to the rich.” Then you claim that Mitt Romney wants to continue Obama’s policies, which would be bad. Pick one.
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**** Why couldn’t Ryan answer how his plan would pay for the tax cuts? ****
Because it takes more then two minutes. If it matters to you do a little research. I warn you it also requires some thinking to understand it.
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I’ve got more than two minutes. Give me a link and I’ll research it. Apparently, you are the only one who knows where it is, since even the CBO, JCT, WSJ, and others wanting to analyze the proposal are forced to guess, conclude that it is impossible for the math to add up, and then have Romney come back and say “that’s not my plan.” But still not say what the plan is.
RADDATZ: Well, let’s talk about this 20 percent. You have
refused – and, again – to offer specifics on how you pay for that 20
percent across-the-board tax cut. Do you actually have the specifics?
Or are you still working on it, and that’s why you won’t tell voters?
RYAN: Different than this administration, we actually want to
have big bipartisan agreements. You see, I understand the…
RADDATZ: Do you have the specifics? Do you have the…
* * *
RYAN: We want to work with Congress – we want to work with the
Congress on how best to achieve this. That means successful. Look…
RADDATZ: No specifics, again.
So… do you have the specifics? Take all the time you need.
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Perfect example of how this was actually a Raddatz/Ryan debate. Biden was just a silly distraction.
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David Anderson,
You mentioned that there exists some clear detailed info about the Romney/Ryan tax plan. That would be great to read. It may be helpful to those of us on the fence. I can’t seem to locate the details in existance that you are making reference too. What links will lay it out clearly for those of us who want to know how it will work? Can you please answer the question that ipsofacto asked about where to research the Romney/Ryan tax plan? Thanks.
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https://www.princeton.edu/ceps/workingpapers/228rosen.pdf
He [Rosen] said that, if anything, his paper reached the opposite conclusion about Romney’s tax plan. “The paper shows that if you look at individual taxpayers with incomes of $200,000 or more, there is sufficient revenue from base broadening and growth to make up for the revenue lost from lower tax rates. Therefore, there is no need to make up revenue from groups with below $200,000.”
The paper, he [Rosen] said, analyzed total tax revenue, not effective tax rates, from families making more than $100,000 per year and families making more than $200,000 per year, not the intersecting group of families making between $100,000 and $200,000 per year.
“I guess [the Obama campaign] didn’t read what I did very carefully,” he said.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/08/harvey-rosen-obama-campaign_n_1948615.html
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I have to answer this in twp parts ( DNT won’t post something with two links):
https://www.princeton.edu/ceps/workingpapers/228rosen.pdf
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He [Rosen] said that, if anything, his paper reached the opposite conclusion about Romney’s tax plan. “The paper shows that if you look at individual taxpayers with incomes of $200,000 or more, there is sufficient revenue from base broadening and growth to make up for the revenue lost from lower tax rates. Therefore, there is no need to make up revenue from groups with below $200,000.”
The paper, he [Rosen] said, analyzed total tax revenue, not effective tax rates, from families making more than $100,000 per year and families making more than $200,000 per year, not the intersecting group of families making between $100,000 and $200,000 per year.
“I guess [the Obama campaign] didn’t read what I did very carefully,” he said.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/08/harvey-rosen-obama-campaign_n_1948615.html
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David – I appreciate your response, but what I was looking for is the specifics on the Romney tax plan. Rosen’s paper states more than once that he doesn’t know what the specifics are, and makes assumptions that he says may not be correct or be politically feasible. The point of his paper was to show that, theoretically, the math could add up – if we assume everyone’s wages increase. That’s fine, but what I’m looking for is the actual plan, not projections based on assumptions.
For example, I’ve heard that part of Romney’s plan is to remove the tax-free status of employer-provided health insurance. Rosen’s paper appears to make that assumption too. Are you in favor of that?
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I thought I might have missed it, so I read the Rosen paper again, including some of the cited references that I was able to find on line. Not only does he assume elimination of tax-free status of employer provided health insurance, but also the complete elimination of Schedule A deductions for families earning over 100k (or 200k in the parallel analysis). He critizes others who have said the math does not add up because they don’t account for changes in behavior based on tax policy changes, but I don’t see where he accounts for it with respect to elimination of these deductions. If Romney is going to tax health benefits, and repeal Obamacare, I can’t see how that helps to bring down either the deficit or the cost or medical care for taxpayers or those who remain insured. On the contrary, it will only add to the ranks of the uninsured. I can’t see how eliminating the mortgage deduction will help bring back home values (the largest asset of most middle class families).
Is this really Romney’s plan?
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ipsofacto: He is not going to close the deficit with this tax change since he claims it is revenue neutral.
I frankly do not know now he plans to close the deficit.
It is impossible to close the deficit without massive changes to entitlements and neither candidate has the stomach for that.
I am not optimistic about the country’s financial future.
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It is clear that you *could* make the math work out assuming some significant revisions of the tax code on top of the 20 percent cut. The Rosen paper in fact makes reference to the work by Diamond, which Gov. Romney frequently mentions (he calls it the Rice paper). Diamond does in fact suggest that the numbers could work BUT Diamond (as does Rosen) assumes massive revisions to the tax code including the basic elimination of most deductions (Diamond eliminates them for everyone, Rosen only imagines eliminating them for high income folks). Given that almost every Republican has signed Grover Norquist’s pledge which preclude cutting these deductions, Gov. Romney would have to get a lot of Republicans to go back on their pledges.
So, yes, it could work.
Of course, I could make Medicare and Social Security solvent for the forseeable future by eliminating the cap on payroll taxes (so that rich people pay the same percentage as low income people instead of a much lower rate). I could also save a lot of money by changing the Medicare law to apply to everyone. But hey, those are my pipe dreams. Gov. Romney’s pipe dream is a lot more complex, but just as unlikely.
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You couldn’t make Medicare and Social Security solvent that way. The money previously deducted from peoples paychecks has already all been spent. To deduct more would just give politicians more to spend and do nothing to improve the solvency of the fund. How do you think giving more money to those, certified as incapable of managing it, is going to have a different result?
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@”smart”imus – I don’t think you understand the word solvent in this case. In any case, lifting the cap resulting in the fund being solvent is not my conclusion, it is the conclusion of the Congressional Research unit. Check out some links here including a link to the congressional report as well as links to other stories that have been done on this topic: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/businessdesk/2012/07/what-impact-would-eliminating.html
I do not get why people post notions that are simple to check and contrary to the truth. I understand that our society has evolved a counter-factual media presence (Fox, right wing talk folks, etc.) but that seems like a poor excuse for not doing one’s homework.
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I don’t care who’s conclusion it is. How can anyone argue that the program is solvent when we have to borrow or print money for 40% of our annual spending? That is beyond ridiculous.
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So, “I don’t care who’s conclusion it is. How can anyone argue that the program is solvent when we have to borrow or print money for 40% of our annual spending? That is beyond ridiculous.”
Which is basically to say that a) I can’t refute your statement (lifting that cap would make SS/Medicare solvent), so b) I am going to change the subject to something else (hey, how about that budget deficit). Spread that smokescreen.
My approach to addressing a large part of the budget deficit? 1) let the Bush tax cuts die, 2) let the sequestration of the Budget Control Act of 2011 happen (unless Congress comes up with a better plan, which the president could just agree to) and 3) end the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Of course, all of these will happen if the President basically did nothing. And this addresses most of the stuff that created the deficit (see http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/files/2012/09/Parfait-using-debt-gdp-2001-2019-5-12-11-FINAL.jpg for a graphic based on the CBO estimates). In fact, with the sequestration cuts we would likely see a drop in the deficit. But thats what happens when Democrats get elected president, they start to clean up the messes left by their Republican predecessors and the budget starts moving towards balance.
Note, Mitt Romney has a plan that creates 12 million jobs over the next 10 years — leaving out that the CBO says that 12 million is the number of jobs we will see created over the next 10 years if we do nothing. Seems like he knows that the basics for dealing with the budget deficit are already in place (and is getting himself ready to claim credit for it).
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So the last four years of Obama incompetence didn’t happen? So we’re waiting for the democrats to clean up the messes, most of which they were largely responsible for in the first place? I don’t see a good result in rewarding Obama’s incompetence with four more years of $ trillion plus deficits and continued malaise.
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“So the last four years of Obama incompetence didn’t happen?”
Leaving aside that the Republicans opposed everything Obama wanted from the start (even using the filibuster in some new, astonishing ways to prevent much legislation from getting through), something they seem immensely proud of, some things did happen (as I have noted elsewhere). BUT, Obama’s government followed what will likely be viewed historically as the worst government period of our history in the GW Bush administration. Tax cuts not paid for. Expansion to medicare not paid for. A 10 year war of choice (Iraq), a 10+ year war that was not focused on (Afghansitan) that allowed it to become a festering problem, neither of which was paid for. Continued reduction in financial regulation (though Reagan, GHW Bush and Clinton deserve plenty of blame there too). All of which led to the second worst catastrophe in our financial history (and, if the Republicans had had their way, might have been first — thank god we will never know).
“So we’re waiting for the democrats to clean up the messes, most of which they were largely responsible for in the first place?”
Classic example of a counter-factual statement. If you have any FACTS to support this please feel free to post them. Do me a favor, go look at the graphic again and explain to me how the situation Obama was handed was not catastrophic (but hey, just because it took us 8 years to dig the huge hole that was the GW Bush catastrophe doesn’t mean Obama shouldn’t have fixed it in 2 years, right)?? I do hold the President responsible for extending the Bush tax cuts, but given our financial situation, this was likely an expedient move.
“I don’t see a good result in rewarding Obama’s incompetence with four more years of $ trillion plus deficits and continued malaise.”
If you don’t, you need to get out of the bubble. Perhaps start by educating yourself on how governments are supposed to respond to financial catastrophes. Approach 1, tighten monetary policy, let things go bankrupt, let financial markets freeze up and the system will correct itself. Sounds good, right? Unfortunately, this is precisely what was tried following 1929, and we got the depression out of it. So, lots of economists analyzed and posited that the government could spend and stimulate the economy to prevent this (call this Approach 2). George W Bush certainly believed in Approach 2 as his Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 and the later TARP bill demonstrated. Obama then followed this lead. But as history shows, epic financial catastrophes take a while to pull out of (the depression took a decade and was helped by WWII, Japan is more than a decade later still struggling with its financial crisis).
Yes, nuance is hard, but truth is nuanced.
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The democrats were nowhere to be found during the Bush years I guess, even though they controlled Congress during the last two years of the Bush administration and the first two years of the Obama administration. We’ve gone over the causes of the 2008 collapse, and the causes instituted by the democrats starting with Carter a hundred times, and it’s amply evident that democrats don’t care. Democrat policies got us where we are and we’ll be here for awhile as long as democrats are in control. That sums up the Obama plan.
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Biden demonstrated the attitude of the current administration, utter arrogance. Biden used the phrase “you need to take responsibility” several times throughout the debate. Mr. VP, you won’t even take responsibility for lying to the American people about the terrorist attack that took place on American soil in Libya! Yes folks, the US Ambassy in Libya is American Soil! That’s not a matter to smirk or laugh about!
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As with the last “debate,” I don’t think you can really characterize it as a debate as there wasn’t that much challenging each other on facts or views (well, Biden did some, but the followups never really made it anywhere). In the end, I think you could say that both met their major goals.
Vice President Biden wanted to fire up the Democrat base and get in some of the things that President Obama did not. He also wanted to appear feisty. And he wanted to work in the 47% thing, the $5 trillion thing, etc. All missions accomplished.
Congressman Ryan had a lower bar to meet. He simply needed to demonstrate that he was steady, could answer questions under fire and appear at least somewhat presidential. I would say all of the bars were met. Plus Raddatz did him a massive favor in opening with the Libya thing, probably the only issue the Obama/Biden administration is truly on the defensive about. It really didn’t matter how he performed on the question, the whole line of inquiry gave him a lot of confidence going forward. Its the only foreign policy (or for that matter domestic policy) issue that is a winner for the Republican ticket right now, and she handed it to him. So, again, mission accomplished.
Given the huge shift to Governor Romney since the presidential debate to make it a close race (Gov Romney picked up close to 3 points, changing Nate Silver’s model prediction from Obama 83% likely to win all the way down to 63%) I think we are looking at a huge debate for Tuesday.
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Sorry Joey, cluelessness is not a defense:
RADDATZ: And they wanted more security there.
BIDEN: Well, we weren’t told they wanted more security there. We did not know they wanted more security again. And by the way, at the time we were told exactly — we said exactly what the intelligence community told us that they knew. That was the assessment. And as the intelligence community changed their view, we made it clear they changed their view.
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Personally, I found Biden to be rude, overbearing, arrogant and, to be honest, a bully. Good role model, there slick.
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Can I assume then, that you thought Romney was a bully when he steamrolled over Jim Lehrer in the debate last week?
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I was truly embarrassed for Biden and the United States. I was embarrassed that he is the caliber of so called leader that we have, making a mockery of the supposed civility that the democrats claim disingenuously to espouse.
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Biden was a total jerk! How many times did he call Paul Ryan a liar?
It should be clear to everyone by now that the GOP is the only party capable of respect and bipartisanship.
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I agree with your first sentence. Biden’s mouth was moving so he was lying with every word he said.
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It was admirable of Ryan not to stoop to Biden’s level and call him a liar, even if everything he said was a lie. It’s about time somone stood up for civility and decency.
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Actually I agree with your third sentence too. Democrats are incapable of bi-partisanship at this point and feel it is only the duty of republicans to abandon their principles.
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Did he call Ryan a liar as many times as he called him “my friend”. I think I read Joey called Ryan my frind 15 times.
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I’m guessing millions were grabbing for the remote once the tone was set in the first 10 minutes. I myself was totally bored and would have rather watched an old episode of mama’s place rather than sort through all the facts and lies being endlessly tossed out there. I’m neutral on this one. I think these so called independents will feel no one really gained anything, but Biden probably enfused a little more hope on the Dem side. The big dog is next week and if Obama doesn’t clearly win it then it’s all over. Prepare for ‘the big one’ that could come in any form.
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I should add that I was very displeased with many of Ryan’s answers including that one of their priorities is not adding to the deficit. I think for many of your with common sense, I was going to say Ron Paul supporters, that was like a phone book slap on the head. You’re not kidding me are you? That deficit has to come down to zero like now! I’m not Mr. Sunshine when it comes to this issue. Forget Al Qaeda, Russia, Jobs or whatever you think is the prime concern of the states. The Debt, along with the collaspe of the dollar will be the greatest equalizer of them all. I don’t even want to get in all this this morning – Just Vote For Romney to end this accelerated redistribution economic mess that Obama is pushing. Eating a fresh corndog that fell and rolled on the fair grounds is still a better decision than voting for Obama.
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Don~ If you think the deficit is that important, which it is, then why in the world would you ever recommend voting for a Republican? Let alone Rommney?
The argument for the tax breaks to wealthy and corporations is that it will stimulate the economy and create jobs therefor creating more tax revenue. The fact is that’s never happened on a Republican watch, the money isn’t reinvested in investments that spur growth and jobs are never created and so the only thing accomplished is cutting revenue which results in the only thing they create is more deficit. Republicans will defend those tax breaks though to the determent of all of us and have, and it ONLY does one thing, increase the deficit. So again it begs question, if you were well informed and really care about the deficit, why on earth would you support the Republican party?
The latest seen is the tax cuts to the wealthy since 2001 is have lost over 3.5 trillion in revenue which goes to our deficit instead of paying down our deficit.
Rommney in particular has vowed to not only keep the tax breaks to the wealthy but to make additional 20% tax revenue cut across the board. Then he promises it will also lower the deficit which is impossible, and he’s vowed to increase the DOD budget and Obama was spot on, it can’t work, it’s never worked and it’s just basic math and common sense. Cutting revenue even deeper while increasing spending won’t pay down the deficit, it’s a formula for economic armagedon at this time and will drastically increase the deficit. To quote Paul Krugman in NY Times this week…
“Republicans, however, are committed to an economic doctrine that has proved false, indeed disastrous, in other countries. Nor are they likely to change their views in the light of experience. After all, facts haven’t gotten in the way of Republican orthodoxy on any other aspect of economic policy. The party remains opposed to effective financial regulation despite the catastrophe of 2008; it remains obsessed with the dangers of inflation despite years of false alarms. So it’s not likely to give up its politically convenient views about job creation.
And here’s the thing: if Mitt Romney wins the election, the G.O.P. will surely consider its economic ideas vindicated. In other words, politically good things may be about to happen to very bad ideas. And if that’s how it plays out, the American people will pay the price. ”
>>>>>>>>>>……end quote
I just can’t for life of me understand why anyone with a brain would think let alone believe that Republicans economic policies is best for our economy….I mean seriously, exactly HOW NOT PAYING ATTENTION does one have to be … when it’s been indisputably proven that those policies are devastating to our economy, our deficit and our citizens economically…Seriously, the 2008 total collapse of our economy wasn’t good enough for conservatives and they want to totally destroy our economy because the GOP and Rommney and Ryan are promising EXACTLY that…to uphold and continue to do the same things that caused the 2008 meltdown.
The very definition of Insanity is continually doing the same thing and expecting different results…and the folks that think the Repubs have the right solutions and answers to fixing our economy are truly crazy. …forgawdsakes, those policies are what totally trashed our economy.
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You said it not me, “The very definition of Insanity is continually doing the same thing and expecting different results”. Obama’s primary deficit promise was to cut it in half, most people didn’t care that he more than tripled it first, but nontheless he didn’t even come close. As a matter of fact once he found out how easy it was to pay off his donors he left his foot on the spending pedal and jammed it through the floorboards. Is four more years of trillion dollar deficits actually acceptable to Democrat voters regardless if you’re still blaming Bush or not?
Oh well, either way we’ll get there one way or another , but at least with a Republican in there it will come much more slowly and predictable. With Obama in there I don’t know whether to buy tangible assets or ammunition.
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Don~ You are just flat wrong. Obama didn’t triple the deficit…that’s pure BS.
Secondly, Repubs continue to try to put their mess on Obama’s budget…Bush increased the deficit by 5.1 Trillion but Repubs keep trying to push some of that on Obama, it’s a Republican expense for their totally mismanaging our economy, the TARP act, a war based on lies and the disastorous prescription drug program. Bush and Paulson were hollering bloody murder that we had to come up with bailout packages or our whole economy would collapse, they were working on it MONTHS before Obama was even elected. That isn’t a charge that get’s put in Obama’s column.
Stop arguing with me using Repub talking points because they’re all lies. Go look up for yourself what Reaganomics has done to our deficit from Reagan forward. Look at which party in whitehouse has increased the deficit and which has decreased it because is completely the opposite of what the GOP, Faux News and Clear Channel is feeding you. Bush not only trashed the economy but threw us into a war that cost trillions and gave the wealthy a undeserved tax break that cost us trillions in revenue and he added over 5 trillion to the Deficit, more then any President ever.
You are responding to a post where I quoted a Nobel Prize economist btw, who stated that Republicans have always been wrong about our economy and if Rommney wins it will be very painful for all of us as will trash the economy again. And you come back with just propaganda soundbites that aren’t true?
The 5 trillion Repubs love to pin to Obama clearly is on George’s credit card…~~
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/adding-to-the-deficit-bush-vs-obama/2012/01/31/gIQAQ0kFgQ_graphic.html
Repubs have also done everything they possibly can to thwart anything Obama has tried to do to fix the economy. Faltered economy means less revenue, more expenses as creates more folks in need and Repubs have done all could to ensure that. They even got our credit rating devalued rather then remove tax breaks to their wealthy contributors. Yes, Obama’s recovery of economy has been slow, but considering handing him the biggest mess since the Great Depression, all our industries failing. record number of bankruptcies, two failed wars that are disasters, on top of that, he had a Republican Congress that made a pact to prevent him from accomplishing anything.
I’ve followed Krugman for years. He forsaw the mess George W. was creating and predicted it in 2002, because Reaganomics has NEVER worked. He led a petition drive that got 450 of the worlds economists to sign, many Nobel Prize winners, stating that George W. was heading the country to an economic catastrophe in 2005!! Over 2 years before the meltdown, but of course, George didn’t listen…or recognize it until the whole economy was within months of total collapse.
Your also wrong 180% on results on deficit between Obama and Rommney. Rommney will put us in a downward spiral and implode the economy and rack up the deficit quickly. He’s promised to keep the wealthy tax breaks, cut taxes 20% across the board and increase the DOD budget at time we should be lowering it. Krugman was being kind, it will be an economic armagedon with the shape this economy is in still.
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On the merits Joe beat Ryan, but only because he failed to follow standard debate etiquette. He continually interrupted Ryan. Had Ryan fought back like he should have, the outcome probably would have been different. Anytime someone repeatedly tells you that the don’t lie, you must assume that he’s a liar. It was like watching a gentleman(Ryan) debating a juvenile (joe). Had Ryan chosen to treat Joe like the child he was acting like, Ryan would have been pilloried by the media for picking on a guy who we all know has a elevator that doesn’t quite go to the top.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Just like the Obama/Romeny debate.
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For some reason when Biden speaks I think of diarrhea.
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Ironically is more meaningful metaphor for your post though
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The only word that comes to mind is buffoon. It’s hard to believe people buy into this crap they are spreading. The one concept that kept creeping into my mind during the debate is…why do each party keep talking about maintaining the middle class? Shouldn’t they be talking about the Amnerican Dream of a person coming from nothing and achieving unlimited success? Where is the power of the individual anymore, and why are we striving to keep people in the middle class?
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Crazy old Joe must have downed a few shots of Wild Turkey before the debate…wow.
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I was left wondering why Obama picked Biden to be VP. What qualities did he see in Joe?
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Joe is the insurance policy.
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Biden was a complete and utter disgrace to the office of the Vice President. What has happened to decorum and manners? When you have no record to run on then you use words like liar, mularky, boloney and “my friend”. Let’s also note Biden got smacked down by the Catholic Conference of Bishops today. He used his own religion to distort the social justice of the church and give statements that are not true. Hopefully after he gets the smirk off his face he will go to confession.
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That would require repentence so I don’t think that’s going to happen. Joe calls himself a Catholic but you wouldn’t know it otherwise.
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and exactly what constitutes a “real catholic”….please do tell….and who cares what some catholic league/orginization thinks about one of them lol especially when Romney is mormon and obama is muslim o wait nm he practiced extremist southern baptist o wait hes a socialist/communist they are all atheists…o God please send us a sign—o yeah thats right you told bachmann and Perry to run for president so i guess God is 0 for 2 so far in the election.
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are the real catholics at church right now instead of replying? and be wary of anyone who thinks they are more/better of anything let alone at adhering to some religion.
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Joe Biden in no way represents anything to do with the Catholic Church. He repudiates everything the Catholic Church stands for. I have no idea why he claims to be a Catholic. The same goes for Nancy Pelosi.
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what exactly does the catholic church stand for?? besides molestation of young boy??
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Do you really think that’s why Joe Biden claims to be Catholic? I wouldn’t make that claim.
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The Catholic Church has a specific set of doctrines and beliefs. I personally don’t care what Joe Biden is but he is Catholic in name only.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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So fastone, what do you think Biden thought was the most hilarious situation over the past four years? Was it a massive increase in people needing to go on welfare? Was it the second reduction in the US credit rating? Was it the $16 trillion National Debt or the $6 trillion they’ve added to it in the past 4 years? Was it the complete ignorance of his administration regarding Benghazi? Was it the trillion dollar plus in deficit spending for the fourth year in a row? Was it the 43 straight months of over 8% unemployment? Was it the $4-5+ gas prices? Tell me, for the love of God, just a few things this community organizer and his 40 year career politician VP have done in the past four years to improve the lives of Americans, our economy, or our standing in the world? As during the Carter administration, our enemies smell weakness and appeasement with Obumma and they are on the rise. Back to the debate…drones like you confuse Bidens arogance with strength, condescention as intelligence, and lack of etiquette with wisdom. Obumma will be one and done.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Taking Right Wing Ryan seriously as second in line to the presidency would only lend credibility he doesn’t deserve. Clearly Biden considers him and Romney and their lies a very BAD joke, as do at least 47+% of the public. Biden’s demeanor was entirely appropriate.
Republicans would have learned something from Biden’s debate performance, if they weren’t so closed and narrow minded. He has something nobody else on either ticket has. I wasn’t a Biden fan before, but I am now.
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Fox~ I’ve responded twice to you with lengthy line by line rebuttal because everything you’ve said is basically wrong. The mods took down the first one, refused to post the second one and now everything I say is on moderation…
So will just try to tackle a few points. Biden was agitated with Lyan Ryan over the hypocrisy of Benghazi when Ryan and the Repubs refused to allow Obama’s recommended increase in security budget then try to blame him for not increasing security! It also takes some gall as clearly Repubs have the attention span and memory of a nat, that Bush and Condi Rice had months of warnings and intel that said Bin Laden had Al-Queada in our country and were going to use planes as weapons and that the twin towers was known past target.
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To Fox..part II
The President has no control over gas prices and gas was $4 a gallon several times under Bush…so trying to blame current gas prices on Obama just shows how uninformed and manipulated the GOP base is.
Speaking of blaming Obama for things not responsible for…that includes Bush’s TARP and Auto Bailouts. The GOP keeps trying to stick Obama with Bush’s tab he ran up. Technically the deficit was over 15 Trillion is attributed to Bush. The Tarp and Auto bailouts were Bush legislation but the GOP keeps trying to put those charges in Obama’s column. Bush and Paulson were hollering that economy was on verge of total collapse and that we had to bail out the Brokerage firms, Banks, Insurance industry, Mortgage lenders and Auto Industry and they were pleading with Congress to pass the legislation and were writing the legislation and all of that, every bit of it…all happened BEFORE Obama was even elected.
Obama not only handed worst economic meltdown in lifetimes and two mismanaged and expensive wars but had the most toxic and traitorous Congress anyone has had to deal with. The Repubs took a pact to make sure Obama could accomplish nothing to even fix the problems. The first two years of his presidency set new all time record for fillibusters and so regarding you comment on credit rating, our credit rating got devalued because of the Republicans. It didn’t get devalued because of Obama, it wasn’t even because Repubs refusal to cooperate on budget to where the almost had Government shut down, the S&P were very specific, the devalued our credit rating because Congress had become dysfunctional.
So the problem with Repubs and your whole post is everything is some rewritten untrue history or totally fabricated nonsense and all trying to pin everything on Obama including all the Repubs messes they made. Biden was spot on, the GOP acts as if the total collapse of our economy just fell out of the sky into Obama’s lap the day he was sworn into office and that they had nothing to do with it. The fact is the Repubs are not only responsible for the total meltdown of our economy, the largest increase in deficit in history by one President, record numbers of middle class sinking below poverty line, the average American losing 39% of their wealth, but they’re also responsible for lowering our credit rating and throwing us all under the bus on top of it because their priority became their political agenda ahead of the needs of Americans in a time of crises.
I can’t for life of me figure how anyone in right mind could support this party and it’s agenda anymore, let alone vote for a sociopathic Gordon Gekko for President and not see that the plan is to do exactly the same things that destroyed our economy in first place. But the answer is simple of course, it’s in you posts and the other conservatives. None of you have any idea of current events, don’t know fact from fiction, let alone complex issues or historical events. All you know is what have told to believe by Faux News and the Clear Channel….
Examples in point~ You claim Obama is a socialist, without a clue what that even means. You act as if the economic meltdown happened in some vacuum after Bush and no Repubs were involved. You think that after 10 years of lost revenue that the tax breaks to wealthy creates jobs, despite the fact that has never worked to spur economy or create jobs, not for Reagan or Bush Sr. either and George W. had worst job creation record of any modern President. You holler about the deficit, then overlook that those tax breaks always increase the deficit. Your all supporting a party and ideology that not only totally destroyed our economy and our Constitution but is vowing to do the exact same things and more of EXACTLY what destroyed economy in first place.
So when I’ve said that Repubs all live in a fantasyland, that’s pretty much a given. It sure isn’t reality.
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Obumma’s poll numbers are falling faster than our credit rating! Keep laughing all of you socialist drone supporters because your ticket is about to get a pink slip. LOL.
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Questions for all. 1. Why is it you need all the details for Romney plans, when the current administration hasn’t passed a budget in what, 3 years? 2. Why don’t you press the President for answers on why his budget hasn’t passed? (Notice the deficit still climbing?) Finally, Mr. Obama claimed he would bring Hope and Change 4 years ago…. 3. Well, define to me, where are these changes??? He promised to cut deficit and create jobs, I don’t see it happening. Still Hoping for change?????? I wouldn’t give any one of these Politicians (R or D) another shot. Vote them all out and lets start over!
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Answers to 1 and 2. As anyone who has bothered to do even a little research (and not simply parroted back a Fox talking point), the statement that they “haven’t passed a budget” is as many fact checking organizations indicate true, but one needs to have perspective on what that means. A “budget” is an outline of how they plan to spend money, the actual spending is done through appropriations bills. The fact that they could not agree on a budget reflects the fact that the houses have not been able to come to an agreement. To perhaps put this in perspective, in 2005 and in 2007 the Congress was unable to “pass a budget” despite having majorities in *both* houses as well as controlling the presidency. Its a FOX talking point (which by definition means you should assume that it is, on its face, misleading). Read, for example, http://www.politifact.com/ohio/statements/2012/apr/26/john-boehner/john-boehner-says-senate-dems-havent-passed-budget/.
3. Obama administration accomplishments:
- Passed comprehensive medical care reform that will save money over time and force freeloaders who get care for free to pay their share of the costs (I would like to have see medicare for all which would have saved more money, but the insurance companies got their way)
- Expanded CHIP
- As part of medical care reform got the “preexisting conditions” part taken out and included care for students, both of which Gov. Romney says he plans to keep even if he gets rid of Obamacare
- Kept us from going into a Depression (where unemployment could have easily ended up at 20% or more) with moderate spending bills
- Tried to increase regulation on the financial industry (Dodd-Frank, credit card reform, created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau)
- Defended women’s rights in the work place and regarding health care
- Ended Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, stopped defending DOMA
- Made the capture/death of Osama Bin Laden a priority (and has killed a lot of other Al Qaeda leaders)
- Is ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan on the Bush timetable
- Supported opposition forces in Libya, Egypt despite our government’s traditional connection with Egypt’s dictatorship
Funny thing is, I honestly think that if he had an (R) after his name on ballots, Republicans would consider him the second coming of Reagan. He is a somewhat right-leaning centrist in how he has governed. Sure, maybe he is a secret socialist and is going to do something in that direction at some point (he has been holding off in the first four years, but is going to do in the next four), but he hasn’t actually shown it yet. Even his healthcare plan was the one based on the Mitt Romney/Bob Dole approach (two ardent socialists). But why let facts get in the way of a good set of talking points.
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RickM – “Funny thing is, I honestly think that if he had an (R) after his name on ballots, Republicans would consider him the second coming of Reagan.” That almost made coffee come out of my nose! In all seriousness there could not be two people on the planet more ideologically opposed than Obumma and Reagan. I do like that you put out some details on Obumma’s record so I’ll reply to some of them.
- ObummaCare: you name a government program and I’ll show you red ink and mismanagement. ObummaCare will not save money over time, will lead to a drastic reduction in quality of medical care, and he can’t say he’s not taxing the middle class and below if you claim “freeloaders will be forced to pay their fair share of the costs”
- The overwhelming majority of combat soldiers did not support repealing don’t ask don’t tell
- I like CHIP
- I like covering preexisting conditions but a government takeover of health care is NOT the way to get that
- “Kept us from going into a Depression”…that is laughable and unprovable. Take a look at how Reagan handled a tougher economy than was handed Obumma for the answer on how to handle it.
- Opposed DOMA and one reason conservatives oppose him
- Providing free condoms to Sandra Fluke is NOT considered defending women’s healthcare rights
- Your last three points on the military and the Middle East would take so long for me to discuss properly. Yes he was in office when SEAL Team 6 killed UBL but the fact I even know who pulled the trigger is an unconscionable act against our special operators – thank Joe Biden for that! Obumma was opposed to GTMO and the techniques used there and without them we wouldn’t have a clue as to where UBL was. Why didn’t he close GTMO immediately upon taking office like he promised? Timetables for wars: they are idiotic and shouldn’t be supported by either side. When diplomacy fails and forces you into war you unleash the military with all of its might until your “objectives” are complete. If you are not prepared to do that then leave our troops home! You don’t apologize to your enemy and you sure as heck don’t give them a timetable.
Lastly, and this is a peach, “He is a somewhat right-leaning centrist in how he has governed. ” ROFLMAO. I’m not sure what planet you live on but Obumma is as big of a socialist as fastone and quagmire and his pendulum is nowhere near the center.
In all seriousness though RickM I appreciate the discussion with you and we will probably just have to agree to disagree with each other.
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@fox3 – man, you have aptly named yourself. You buy the notions pushed by the Ignorance Peddlers hook, line and sinker.
So, lets think about these assertions, “ObummaCare: you name a government program and I’ll show you red ink and mismanagement. ObummaCare will not save money over time, will lead to a drastic reduction in quality of medical care” – sounds good, any stats to support this assertion? (PS, they don’t exist.) Public healthcare already covers half of all the money spent on healthcare in this country, and you would be VERY hard put to find actual sources suggesting that medicare or the VA (the two big forms of healthcare we have out there right now) are inefficient as compared to private insurance. The general estimates suggest that Medicare would cost roughly $100 billion more a year if administered by private industry. This is a classic example of this problem with living in the bubble. During the hearings on Obamacare the insurance industry people never asserted that they could do thing more efficiently, they only complained that the government would have unfair advantages making private insurance uncompetitive (lots and lots of video on this at CSPAN).
Put another way, if you check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:International_Comparison_-_Healthcare_spending_as_%25_GDP.png you see that the US *already* spends the highest percentage of its GDP on healthcare, and while we have some of the most advanced facilities, taken as a whole we do not have the best healthcare system (in terms of how long we live, overall health of our population, etc.)
Lets see, let me guess your likely responses, “who ever heard of the government doing anything efficiently,” — they don’t particularly, of course, by the same token, show me one insurance company that does things efficiently either. People in country XX hate their healthcare program based on some story I read about a few cases or because I have heard about people waiting for care. This evidence is almost always anecdotal. Even worse, when people talk about waiting for care they never mention that in the US 40,000 people die each year from lack of health care (we just never count them as in line as they don’t have healthcare). Yes, I have heard all of the silliness counterarguments.
Do me a favor, before responding, do some research on your own, maybe watch “Sick Around the World,” a very solid documentary on the topic, and also review Governor Romney’s position on this from his 60 minutes interview. We *already* have national healthcare, for uninsured people we (as Gov. Romney asserts) rely on these people going to ERs and the rest of us end up paying. So, we have the worst possible healthcare for these people and we pay for it in the stupidest way possible.
But why let ugly facts slay a beautiful (though obviously wrong) theory?
- Then there is “The overwhelming majority of combat soldiers did not support repealing don’t ask don’t tell.” Gotta get out of that bubble. The military’s report http://www.defense.gov/home/features/2010/0610_dadt/DADTReport_FINAL_20101130%28secure-hires%29.pdf including a survey of over 100,000 active duty military members “revealed a large group of around 50–55% of Service members who thought that repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell would have mixed or no effect; another 15–20% who said repeal would have a positive effect; and about 30% who said it would have a negative effect.” So, your statement is clearly, obviously false (and again, easy to check). Not that I am sure asking the soldiers is relevant. I suspect you would have found a lot of resistance regarding racial integration of the forces too. So, lets see, another case of counter-factual thinking.
Here’s my problem fox3. I am a centrist, not terribly happy with Obama, but the Republicans have been taken over by the counter-factual people. You are an excellent example, almost everything you assert is provably wrong with very little checking. I understand, in this country we have rather amazingly evolved our own version of the USSR Pravda news service (Pravda meaning the Truth by the way). Pravda was the spokesorgan for the conservative party of the USSR (the communists) and regularly reported distortions of the truth that nevertheless fit the viewpoint of their believers. They often maintained they were the only ones telling the truth and that every other media source was biased (one of the reasons they called themselves the Truth). Having lived in Europe at the height of the cold war I found people’s willingness to believe some of the outlandish claims curious (though perhaps understandable given the repressive nature of their governments). But we have evolved just such a news organ in Fox and related services and have a large number of people who believe it. Why people would buy into the thoughts of our country’s Ignorance Peddlers I have no idea. Perhaps you could explain this to me fox3, I never really understood the Red Queen’s ease in believing impossible things either. How do you believe so many impossible things??
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Excellent reply Rick, just a few things this morning. Fox3 has nothing to do with Fox News. Service member and combat soldier are not the same. Lastly, “Republicans have been taken over by the counter-factual people” – you shouldn’t just label the Repubs this way because both sides are counter-factual. We need a BSmeter on the TV when politicians talk because they use the 10% rule (10% truth, 90% bullschlitz) way too much.
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“Excellent reply Rick, just a few things this morning. Fox3 has nothing to do with Fox News.”
Doesn’t matter where the name came from, it still fits wonderfully. I have to admit though, I listen to Rush Limbaugh a lot, so I probably shouldn’t throw stones.
“Service member and combat soldier are not the same.”
The report included those numbers as well. 48% of Army combat units and 58% of Marine combat units were opposed (not exactly overwhelming). Further the section discussing these numbers noted that these attitudes are poor predictors of future behavior (experiences matter much more — indeed as the country has become more accepting of homosexuality many people who started out with strong opposition no longer care). The survey also looked at the responses of members of those combat units who believed they had served with someone who is gay, and the numbers of those who believe they could work with someone who is gay among these folks is very high mid 80s to 90s (so, exposure seems to work in the military just as it works in the rest of the world).
“Lastly, “Republicans have been taken over by the counter-factual people” – you shouldn’t just label the Repubs this way because both sides are counter-factual. We need a BSmeter on the TV when politicians talk because they use the 10% rule (10% truth, 90% bullschlitz) way too much.”
I hear variations on this comment a lot. I see numerous problems with this assertion. First, while there is a small liberal media, it is tiny and does not get a lot of air play (ratings for MSNBC are very low, and how many people read periodicals like Mother Jones). Fox News and other things of this ilk are quite pervasive. The Fox world people try to suggest that *all* of the rest of the media is biased. I by and large agree, but only in the sense that most of the rest of the media at this point is corporate owned and tends to lean towards news as entertainment rather than hard news.
I would argue that Fox and its ilk are in fact our version of USSR’s Pravda news service. It is conservative and serves the interest of the conservatives in the country. It presents a deliberately biased point of view and then claims that it is merely trying to balance the viewpoint of all of the rest of the media (which is clearly biased). They present stories that make their constituents comfortable and fit those viewpoints by cherrypicking the news. And Pravda, like Fox, claims to be the only one presenting the truth (thus Pravda’s choice of name — Pravda, meaning truth and justice). So, yes, I think, despite the fact that there is some misstating on both sides, America’s Pravda does much more damage than folks on the other end of the spectrum.
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RickM – I left you a nice reply with nothing against the rules but apparently the political officer at the DNT is waiting to moderate it. I guess the DNT is all for free speech as long as it aligns with their views. Good Luck.
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I have had problems with DNT too. I think it is simply a function of how many links you put into your posts, as anytime I include more than one it says it has to await moderation. This has changed how I post, I would have loved to include a link to a Wall Street Journal article supporting each of my assertions about the Obama administration above, but that would have guaranteed that it would wait quite a while.
I assume they are moderating articles with a lot of links to prevent people from trying to post ads on the site. Probably not the best way to go. Their approach of like/dislike is also pretty ineffective. It actually lets the uninformed suppress facts they don’t like. It would be much better if they moved to a like/dislike mode with a report abuse link. The nice thing about report abuse is that you can moderate those reports and if an account simply reports views opposed to theirs as abuse that account can be ignored or in extreme cases deleted.
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We are blaming the wrong people for our country’s decline. It is congress. Vote out the incumbents. Don’t allow them to serve for thirty years. Let them know that we expect them to be productive.
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It’s funny how Paul Ryan can spew nothing but lies and ideology, and nobody says a word. But when Biden laughs at what he says, he’s the one being unprofessional. As always, the right will judge someone’s character to no end while conveniently ignoring any points they make.
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We didn’t judge him just because he laughed merv, we judged him on lack. Lack of character, integrity, tact, statesmanship, and a clue. 40 years in government is enough so time to go.
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Exactly. You’re judging his character. Not any of the substance he’s actually running on. That seems to be the right-wing’s #1 tactic. You judge the character of anti-war protesters but ignore what they were protesting. You judged the character of the Occupy group but again ignored their message. You can only judge people for so long before you have to face the facts being presented. I think it’s about time people start ignoring the right.
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Obama’s promises failed. He said he would cut the deficit and didn’t. It’s worse. If you want to place facts into this, the fact is, Most Americans are not better off now and neither is the country. We need a new direction. If Obama gets four more years, as well as most of the incubents, we are in deep deep trouble. The people need to take control and send a strong message to both parties!
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Eureka, and “smart”imus is finally starting to grasp nuance.
“The democrats were nowhere to be found during the Bush years I guess, even though they controlled Congress during the last two years of the Bush administration and the first two years of the Obama administration.”
Leaving aside that we can’t call the first two years of the Obama administration “the Bush years” the democrats did control congress in the last two years of the Bush presidency. But, everything I mentioned (Bush tax cuts, optional wars, Medicare drug benefits, etc.) happened BEFORE 2006. And lets not forget that a lot of this stuff was done in very shady ways. Bush put the tax cuts through by the budget resolution process where they can basically do anything on a simple majority vote in the Senate as long as it is (at least in the long term) revenue neutral. Haven’t you ever wondered why the Bush tax cuts fade out?? Because they were backdoored and thus had to have a time limit (he knew that the Democrats would have filibustered them otherwise). And its funny, lots of the more liberal folks get on Obama for not pulling these kind of shady tricks — that is by far Obama’s biggest weakness — he has bent over backwards to try to achieve bipartisanship with people who would rather see the US economy fail than his administration have success.
“We’ve gone over the causes of the 2008 collapse, and the causes instituted by the democrats starting with Carter a hundred times, and it’s amply evident that democrats don’t care.”
*We* have gone over, got a mouse in your pocket?? Not sure how you can figure Carter in there (he was many things, but not particularly adept at fiscal policy), so if you have gone over it 100 times, you might want to do about 100 more (and ask anyone trying to put it on Carter to pipe down). I have already conceded that Reagan, Bush H, Clinton all had a significant part in things as did George W, and you are right in a sense, those folks were really driven to where they got by a congress being lobbied heavily by the financial world (though I believe I can make the case that most of the influential congressfolk were Republicans or Reagan Democrats). In any case, if you have gone over the problem many times and really researched you would by now have to have realized that its not a problem that can be fixed in just a few years. But, again, we did not see a depression, and thats something lots of folks *were* worried about.
“Democrat policies got us where we are and we’ll be here for awhile as long as democrats are in control. That sums up the Obama plan.”
A wonderful counter-factual. Again, might want to look again at the graphic. Our debt, absent the Bush tax cuts, the Iraq war and a shorter Afghanistan war would be much lower, only a slight increase over what Bush inherited. All of those things are largely due to the most inept administration in our history (by far). Throw in some push for fiscal regulation and we might not have seen any of the problems of nowadays.
The astonishing thing to me is that there are still people who are hoping that this time (unlike all the other times we’ve tried it), trickle down economics will just work. We just need to try it one more time.
Hmmm … I should admit that George W did do a lot for AIDS in Africa (really). And many seniors appreciate the prescription drug plan, which was accomplished in a bipartisan way (even if they didn’t actually pay for it). It somehow just doesn’t make up for all of the rest.
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This is a perfect illustration of Clint Eastwoods “empty chair” only there is an empty chair for every democrat in Congress as well. Their policies fail and they are nowhere to be found. They just blame it on someone else. Everything they goof up is the fault of George Bush and the republicans.
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Not sure you wanna tout grampa Clint’s rant at a chair, but in any case, I think we’ve reached the end of what we can discuss as you are not even noting the things I actually wrote. I do apportion a share of the blame for what is going on to the Democrats and have repeatedly said so. As with a lot of the bubble dwellers, these statements just don’t seem to penetrate into your counter-factual world (by the way, what color is the sky in there?). So, lets wrap this up. Feel free to take the last word.
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I’m aware the democrat mantra is “repeat a lie many times and it will become the truth” and “The truth is what you want it to be”.
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Blame game. How long do we blame Bush? Obama promised the deficit reduction. Has that happened? Obama promised lower unemployment, has that happened? Gas? Well that’s not lower is it? College education has increased in cost by 25% in last four years. How can you blame Bush for that? More folks on food stamps now than four years ago. Forget Saying Bush forced taxed cuts, no different than how Obama forced Obama care. And don’t bore us with the petty special interest enhancements Obama gets credit for. That doesn’t pay my bills. And the average household income has been reduced by nearly $5000.00, so evidently I’m not the only person with less in my pocket.
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Bush get’s brought up because it’s Republicans that repeatedly are lying about their responsibility in creating the utter disaster of our economy and continually, as you have done, try to pin the blame on Obama for the mess Repubs made. Repubs also behaved in time of great economic crises as traitors making a pack to do all they could to stonewall and cripple Obama so could blame him for not accomplishing his goals because then they’d even look worse. The Repubs have screwed everything up, from our economy to throwing us all under the bus in time of need and then are turning around and whinning that it’s all Obama’s fault so Pleeeeze don’t talk about whose out of line with the blame game. So we can stop bringing up Bush and Repubs failed and disasterous policies that destroyed the economy when Repubs stop trying to blame Obama for what they did.
Kinda hypocritical to whine about a blame game then try to blame Obama for gas prices…Hint~ The President has no control over gas prices and gas was $4 a gallon a couple times under Bush..HELLO?…pssst…turn off Faux News and Clear Channel that keep feeding you lies and btw…and catch up…unemployment is now at record 4 year low.
So you have less in pocket and you will continue to have less because the Repubs will continue to increase the deficit and if Rommney is elected he has vowed to do exactly what Bush did to destroy the economy in first place. Your supporting a party that’s economic policies have created the two worst recessions in lifetime and the latest almost rivaling the Great Depression. The economy and our whole banking industry and stock market where on verge of sheer collapse BEFORE Obama elected. Forgawdsakes, Obama was handed an economy on verge of total collapse, two totally mismanaged wars, a record 15 trillion in deficit, record unemployment, record job losses, record bankruptcies and foreclosures and record numbers of those sinking below poverty line and a GOP set to do all in their power to ensure he didn’t succeed….on DAY ONE. It’s not so much blame as trying to keep Repubs facts straight from the garabage they’re fed by Faux News and Clear Channel.
The Republican economic policies of reward the wealthy and corporation, increase government spending and size of government and deregulation has never worked, not here nor in any country…it’s always proven disasterous…it’s a given…it’s why the average American lost 39% of their net worth..it’s why the wealthy have though increased their wealth at a time Americans are suffering. Yet this is the party you are supporting?
If you can’t cover your bills for the year and have to take advance on credit card to make ends meet. How do you solve that problem? The GOP’s policy is to take a pay cut and buy a new car with higher payments. Would that work in your household? Of course not, because that’s insane. Yet Rommney’s solution he’s promoted is to take a bigger pay cut by vowing to uphold the tax breaks to wealthy, which is huge loss of revenue, then take an additional 20% tax cut across the board and increase the DOD budget. It’s going to be a disaster that will make 2008 meltdown look like we had it easy.
The biggest lie of our time is that the GOP is better with economy and shrinks the size of Government and deficit. The facts are since Reagan, they have always increased the size of Government, the greatest contributors to our deficit are all Republicans and their policies of deregulation and tax cuts to wealthy have created our two greatest economic recessions of our lifetimes.
BTW…if there is someone to blame, it’s really all the folks that continue to support a party that appears out to destroy our country, destroy our economy and trash our constitution. It’s like watching Germans in 30′s saying..yeah, this will be much better now…these guys really have my best interests at heart….SMH!!
“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened. ”
Sir Winston Churchill
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The only reason unemployment is below 8%, or even 9% for that matter, is the Obama administration juggled the numbers to reduce the number of people looking for work. It isn’t because more people are employed. If Obama wins the election we can look to four more years of blaming Bush and the republicans for the continued failure of Obama and the democrats.
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Fastone,
Youre as hypocrytical as they come. Psst, News flash, part time jobs don’t cut it! And the deficit still climbing. And if the President has nothing to do with gas prices, “News FLash” you need to wake up. All politicians have something to do with it. Where do you think some of their biggest contributions come from? And take a closer look and really read my posts. I clearly mentioned all politicians. And by the way Bush gets brought up just as often from Dems when questioned about current economy , so stop twisting and pointing the finger. And do us all a favor, try keeping your posts inside the size of the first chapter of War and Peace!
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ctcnn~ ” And if the President has nothing to do with gas prices, “News FLash” you need to wake up. All politicians have something to do with it. Where do you think some of their biggest contributions come from?”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/obama-sets-gas-prices-just-another-gop-myth.html?ref=opinion&_r=1&
Suggest you read whole article…which debunks that Obama has anything to do with gas prices and is just another GOP spun myth, but the conclusion is…
“Despite this progress, ending dependence on foreign oil seems as remote as when President Richard Nixon proposed it. With developing countries like China and India demanding more petroleum, prices are likely to stay high. That’s reality — no matter what the Republican spinners say. Only a rounded policy mix of greater fuel efficiency, steady production and the aggressive development of alternative fuels can protect American consumers against what could be even greater price shocks in the years ahead.”
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
So our best defense against higher gas prices is better fuel mileage and one of Bush’s very first acts as President was to get rid of Clinton’s CAFÉ rating requirement which would have done that, and in turn had all three automakers in US who had ongoing electric vehicle research programs dump them immediately. Also gas was on average $4.11 the summer of 2008 and higher then ever been under Obama. So again, the GOP is playing the blame game and it’s a spin of lies on multiple fronts.
On unemployment. You were barking about the unemployment numbers and the fact is that practically every single month for two years now the unemployment number has come down 1/10th of a percent every month to now 7.8% and Obama has created about twice as many new jobs in half the time as Bush.
It’s not as much blaming Bush btw as keeping the GOP spinners and neocons in check from acting as if everything just happened in a vacuum. I agree with btw that our whole political system is corrupt and we need to redo it, toss everyone out of Congress, get rid of citizen one, corporate super pacs etc., have term limits, but as that isn’t going to happen in next 30 days, then see if Repubs feel their failed economic policies are vindicated by winning Whitehouse and so they implement yet again those failed policies that it will only mean the total collapse of our economy at this time, in shape still in, it would bring about an economic Armageddon. Then again, maybe then the American public can take back their country from the corporations….but I expect instead a lot of neocons complaining that it's just all Obama's fault…
"Let's be blunt and acknowledge the biggest threat to the world's biggest economy are the cranks and crazies that have taken over the Republican Party," Australian Deputy PM. Wayne Swan, one of few world leaders able to boast his country had avoided recession during the global financial crisis
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I have posted this elsewhere but is worth a repeat. For those that do know, Paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize winning Economist who teaches economics at Princeton Universtiy. I’ve followed him closely since 2002 when he acurately predicted our economic recession coming. In 2005 he spearheaded a petition that 450 world economists signed including other Nobel prize winners and sent it to Bush which was predicting that he had to change course because the economy was headed to a virtual collapse. Of course, Bush ignored that until Paulson told him that our economy would implode within months in 2008. I’ve only included the opening and closing of article and would suggest that if you care about the economy, your money and investments and our future, you should read it as he not just considered a leader in economics but he’s batting 1,000 so far in his prediciting what will happen to economy…
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/opinion/krugman-triumph-of-the-wrong.html?_r=1&
“In these closing weeks of the campaign, each side wants you to believe that it has the right ideas to fix a still-ailing economy. So here’s what you need to know: If you look at the track record, the Obama administration has been wrong about some things, mainly because it was too optimistic about the prospects for a quick recovery. But Republicans have been wrong about everything.”
“Republicans, on the other hand, insist that the path to prosperity involves sharp cuts in government spending. And Republicans are dead wrong.”
Conclusion~ “And here’s the thing: if Mitt Romney wins the election, the G.O.P. will surely consider its economic ideas vindicated. In other words, politically good things may be about to happen to very bad ideas. And if that’s how it plays out, the American people will pay the price.”
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Wonder why Obama didn’t answer the question last night regarding $4.00 a gal for gas? He deflected his answer towards alternatives. Why? We ALL know the answer. And both parties do it! But they don’t have an interest in those profits eh? And the Nobel Prize winning professor, I’m certain he’s an Independant right? haha We could save alot of economic issues by dropping the prices of gas, because that clearly effects alot of other costs we face day to day. It’s outrageous these costs are controlled by “Speculation”, these days. Quick to raise slow to drop. It’s totally corrupt, and It starts right from the top of the Leadership in our country.
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ctcmm~ Interesting that regarless of how many times and ways are informed that the President doesn’t control the gas prices you keep pinning it on Obama. Doesn’t matter that gas was higher the summer of 2008 under Bush then ever been under Obama, it’s just all his fault.
Actually if read the article posted which you clearly didn’t, the way to lower the gas prices is to lower demand. Again, Clintion had right idea with cafe ratings for MPG for automakers, Bush repealed that immediately upon taking office and gave business owners a 50% tax right off if bought a Hummer. Again, the key is less consumption if want to lower price. Supply and demand is what drives gas prices, NOT the president. So actually contrary to Repub policies, Obama’s pursuit of alternate energy and more effiienct cars is the right approach to lower gas prices…Clinton had right idea to lower consumption and Bush’s actions increased consumption…so in that way President can control the price of gas years down the road, pun intended, but then if want to lay the blame on higher gas prices at feet of a President…then that would be Bush…not Obama who’s pursuing alternate energy…which conservatives want to blame Obama for that also….
The real key to fixing the economy is simple, we need to make things and support a manufacturing base, the root of almost all our economic woes started when Repubs decided to ignore manufacturing and Reagans failed, we’re going to be a service based economy BS…
Paul Krugman got a Nobel Prize for economics and is Professor of Economics at Princeton, that should tell you regardless of political leanings that he probably knows just a little bit more about the economy then you do. He’s actually predicted everything with about 100% accuracy in last ten years…so typical Repub response…embrace the ignorance and dismiss the truth by labeling the messenger a liberal…don’t let the truth guide your reasoning, let a failed ideology dictate to you what your reasoning should be…how someone could choose to live like that escapes me….
Well, I’ll continue to trust in Paul Krugman over someone that can’t recognize the truth when is slapped with it repeatedly …my bad…
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Fastone,
Clearly it is you who failed to read or comprehend my earlier post. I mentioned ALL parties! For the record, the Dems used gas prices against Bush as well as during the last Presidential Election. True that supply and demand will effect cost. Don’t need a Nobel prize for that. Also we don’t need a Nobel prize to understand that the system is totally corrupt. When they raise the price due to “speculation” that does NOT include supply or demand. That to most people, would be corruption or price fixing. Americans should be completely insulted when these big oil companies wave those record quarterly profits in our face. Now there is a saying, “Don’t bite the hand that feeds ya”. pssst, this is where you want to insert (politicians and big oil companies). And that is exactly why Obama didn’t directly answer the question. That is why previously candidates don’t either. This has been going on longer than Clinton, Bush, or recent times. So, go ahead and spew whatever quotes you hear, or post any documentation you desire. You won’t find too many sources on what I’m telling you because obviously the corrupt don’t want this cat outta the bag!
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