The Paul Ryan Watch

Song: Paul Ryan's Lies

2012-02-24T11:34:00.005-06:00

For your enjoyment, the song Paul Ryan's Lies, discovered bythe folks at Sly in the Morning. Originally just an audio track with noartist credit, the video here is something I basically threw together, with abunch of Ryan pictures, so I could post it.

Absolutely no production value whatsoever. I just liked the song.

Krugman to Ryan on moochers: It takes one to know one

2012-02-21T15:51:00.001-06:00

Republican talk radio's Charlie "Fireworks" Sykes is promoting a blurb from Paul Ryan on his new book:

Charlie Sykes’ A Nation of Moochers provides a much-needed wakeup call for a nation approaching two perilous tipping points: a moral one and a fiscal one. With our country facing unprecedented challenges and stark political choices, principled leaders will benefit from Sykes’ clear vision, keen insight and intellect. If we’re serious about getting our nation back on track, then we would be wise to follow the lessons laid out in A Nation of Moochers.” -- Congressman Paul Ryan.

Mentioning Paul Ryan and moochers in the same breath brought this to mind, from economist Paul Krugman:

Rick Santorum declares that President Barack Obama is getting America hooked on “the narcotic of dependency.” Romney warns that government programs “foster passivity and sloth.”

Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, requires that staff members read Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged,” in which heroic capitalists struggle against the “moochers” trying to steal their totally deserved wealth, a struggle the heroes win by withdrawing their productive effort and giving interminable speeches. (Ha!)

Many readers of The Times were, therefore, surprised to learn, from an excellent article published earlier this month, that the regions of America most hooked on Santorum’s narcotic -- the regions in which government programs account for the largest share of personal income -- are precisely the regions electing those severe conservatives. Wasn’t Red America supposed to be the land of traditional values, where people don’t eat Thai food and don’t rely on handouts?

Krugman's column: Moochers against welfare.

Ryan votes to allow oil drilling in Great Lakes

2012-02-20T13:52:00.004-06:00

Paul Ryan voted last week against banning drilling in the Great Lakes, as part of a House-passed energy bill. Rob Zerban, his Democratic opponent, has some thoughts about Ryan's sellout of his home state, which borders two of the lakes in question:

The House defeated, 176-241, a bid by Democrats to bar energy drilling within five miles of the Florida Everglades or the Great Lakes. The Wisconsin delegation split along party lines, with Republicans all voting against the ban. Roll call.

No wonder oil and gas interests have given Ryan nearly $250,000 in campaign money since he's been in Congress.

The GOP majority, and Ryan, also voted to build the Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL oil pipeline, open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling and start oil-shale extraction on federal land in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah.

Fortunately, there is still a Democratic majority in the Senate and a Democratic president in the White House.

Paul Ryan Steps In It On Meet The Press

2012-02-20T13:00:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, the NBC corporate message machine presented one of their top-paid corporate shills, Rep. Paul Ryan, on one of their top Sunday shows, Meet the Press which was last useful and relevant several decades ago, to pound home their carefully crafted, thoroughly misleading message pushing-- what else?-- Austerity. Ryan was waving the specter of Greece in front of the viewers, some of whom don't have the good sense to ignore him as a propaganda agent for the one percent and an admitted follower of the childish nonsense of Greed and Selfishness guru Ayn Rand.

On of Ryan's primary claims is that the payroll tax reduction for ordinary working families doesn't do any good. He and his ilk-- i.e., the Republican Party and their plutocratic financiers-- would much prefer more massive tax breaks for the already woefully undertaxed multimillionaires. The pompous little ignoramus, propped up by the entire right-wing think tank industry whined that he doesn't "think this works to grow our economy” and compared the payroll tax cut to “sugar-high economics.” He may be Budget Chairman-- a decision made by John Boehner-- but that doesn't mean he knows squat about budgets. As Nobel economist Paul Krugman explained, Ryan is nothing but a tawdry flimflam man who "don't know much about economics. Professionals at the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office found that extending the payroll tax cut is more cost effective to promote economic growth and employment than the tax breaks for millionaires that Ryan and his zombie colleagues continue to insist on.

In January 2010, the CBO wrote that reducing payroll taxes for firms was among the policies “that would have the largest effect on output and employment per dollar on budgetary cost in 2010 and 2011. By contrast, policies that would temporarily increase the after-tax income of people with relatively high income, such as an across-the-board reduction in income taxes […] would have a smaller effects because such tax cuts would probably not affect the recipients’ spending significantly.”

And last November they tried reminding Ryan and his single-minded cronies that they weren't kidding. “Policies that would have the largest effects on output and employment per dollar of budgetary cost in 2012 and 2013 are ones that would reduce the marginal cost to businesses of adding employees or that would be targeted toward people who would be most likely to spend the additional income. Such policies include reducing employers’ payroll taxes (especially if limited to firms that increase their payroll), increasing aid to the unemployed, and providing additional refundable tax credits in 2012 for lower- and middle-income households.” That's what Ryan's been calling “sugar-high economics" for the sake of his benefactors from GE-TV.

DWT readers probably know by now that we're pitching in, in the nationwide effort to replace Paul Ryan with Kenosha County Supervisor Rob Zerban, someone whose vision for America is as diametrically opposed to Ryan's dark, dystopian views as possible. I spoke with him right after GE inflicted Ryan on us. He had a lot to say:

Paul Ryan's performance on Meet the Press today underscores how desperate Republicans are to shift the conversation away from the recovering economy. Instead of talking about proactive steps and investments we can make to accelerate growth, Ryan wants to implement an austerity plan that would be detrimental to our society and our economy.

Ryan's argument is that the President's budget is not serious enough. He prefers his own paln. Ryan is continuing to advocate for the radical ideas he first wrote in the "Path to Prosperity" 2011 House GOP Budget. He insists we need huge cuts to the social safety net, including making Medicaid a block grant program and phasing out Medicare. This approach will reverse our current trajectory of recovery.

His attack on the President's budget is a mischaracterization of what the President is proposing. President Obama has proposed a budget that makes hard choices, and hard cuts, and reduces the debt responsibly. I believe, as our President does, that we must end the tax loopholes that allow the wealthiest Americans, like Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney, to pay a lower tax rate than everyone else. I also support using the funds we are saving from our drawing down of forces in Iraq and Afghanistan to reduce our deficit and continue to grow our economy. This is a much more realistic plan for our economic future as opposed to just cutting programs for students, seniors, and the middle class.

Not only was Paul Ryan wrong today about the economy, he was wrong on women's rights. Ryan's attempt to divide Americans by attacking affordable contraception to women is not going to work.

Denying contraception, by funding or by provision, is not a "religious freedom" issue. No one is denying a religious person's right to believe anything they want. What is wrong is when someone uses the government to force their morality upon others. That is what is happenging. Paul Ryan's attempt to defund and regulate women's personal choices is a great example of how far-right Republicans are alienating women.

Paul Ryan has once again shown how rigidly ideological his approach is to our nation's problems. This will contiunue to make him a darling to conservatives like Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh, but he will continue to lose the support of the American people.

But we don't have to be in an election battle with Paul Ryan to know his phony medicine show is toxic for America. Norman Solomon comes from a district that doesn't spawn Republicans that anyone takes seriously. So the business power structure up in northern California tries holding onto power by pushing conservative Democrats who would be Republicans if they lived in other parts of the country. If Norman wins the primary, he'll, in effect, be the next congressman from Marin, Sonoma and Mendocino. And he's as aware as Rob Zerban of the dangers inherent in Paul Ryan's approach. Yesterday after he watched Ryan on Meet the Press he shook his head sadly that there are still people being hoodwinked by this prepackaged crap:

As a high-ranking cleric for the political faith of austerity, Ryan used his appearance on Meet the Press to sprinkle some holy water and whine about the supposed failure of federal stimulus efforts. In fact, tax-cutting dogmas-- combined with huge military spending, loopholes for the wealthy and Wall Street impunity-- have thrown the U.S. economy into a very deep ditch. We know that the Republican leadership is hellbent on deepening that ditch for most people while large corporations reap massive gains from enormous human pain. What remains to be seen-- and, more to the point, determined by our actions-- is how effectively we can fight for a present-day Green New Deal, providing sufficient public investment to overcome the vast obstacles to social equity and economic fairness. As an independent progressive Democrat, I'm running for Congress to occupy a seat for the 99 percent. It's not enough to pooh-pooh the likes of Paul Ryan. We need to create viable, long-term alternatives for the future.

Norman Solomon and Rob Zerban are on the same page-- a page I hope you'll visit right now and contribute what you can. Today's my birthday and I've been getting a slew of beautiful e-cards and well-wishes on Facebook. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, thank you. And if you'd like to make me smile on my birthday, give what you can to the Blue America candidates-- even if it's just a dollar. Grassroots campaigns aren't funded by $5,000 checks; they're funded by small contributions from people who believe in the future of the country. Again, here's the place: Blue America.

Ryan: Why are we wasting time talking about gay marriage?

2012-02-20T09:42:00.001-06:00

Paul Ryan's mind is made up: Marriage should only between a man and a woman. So why, he wondered on Meet the Press, are we wasting so much time talking about marriage equality. Ryan wanted to talk about the budget.

Unfortunately, his Dem counterpart of the House Budget Committee, Chris Van Hollen of Massachusetts, also complained he was there to talk about the budget, but he did at least support the gay marriage law passed by Maryland's legislature but vetoed by Gov. Chris Christie.

More, and video, at Raw Story.

Ryan's false arguments on payroll tax break exposed

2012-02-18T12:17:00.002-06:00

Paul Ryan spoke out against and voted against extending the payroll tax cuts -- a position on which his House Republican colleagues finally faced reality and folded. Ryan says the long impasse over the issue caused the GOP some political damage, but he doesn't take any responsibility for that, of course.

Ryan says the problem is that the debate muddied the differences between the parties, but the real damage is from people seeing the real differences between them, and understanding which party -- the Democratic Psrty -- is willing to fight for the middle class and low-income families.
Think Progress says:

Last year, when Democrats and Republicans were negotiating a short-term extension of the payroll tax holiday, multiple Republicans pushed the false idea that extending the payroll tax cut would undermine Social Security by robbing its trust fund of vital revenue. Those claims were repeatedly debunked by media outlets, members of Congress, and even the Social Security Trust Fund’s chief actuary...

And while Ryan now claims to have “a problem” with diverting funds out of the Social Security Trust Fund and worries about “what happens” if such a plan is followed, he didn’t have the same concerns last year, when he proposed a privatization plan that would divert $1.2 trillion — a whopping 1,200 times the size of the payroll tax cut extension — out of the Social Security Trust Fund, and would only restore that money over the next quarter of a century through deep benefit cuts.

The Maddow Blog chimes in:

Ryan is somehow concerned about the integrity of Social Security. Remember Ryan's "Roadmap" budget plan? It had quite a few interesting ideas related to Social Security.
The Ryan plan proposes large cuts in Social Security benefits -- roughly 16 percent for the average new retiree in 2050 and 28 percent in 2080 from price indexing alone -- and initially diverts most of these savings to help fund private accounts rather than to restore Social Security solvency.
{T]hose who oppose Social Security shouldn't pretend to be its champions. If Paul Ryan opposes the middle-class tax cut, he should say so, and not behind a transparent fig leaf.

How Wisconsin members voted: Democrats — Baldwin, Y; Kind, N; Moore, Y. Republicans — Duffy, Y; Petri, N; Ribble, Y; Ryan, N; Sensenbrenner, N. In the Senate, Herb Kohl voted yes and Ron Johnson no.

There's Exactly One Way To Protect America From Paul Ryan's Extremism-- Replace Him With Rob Zerban

2012-02-12T20:00:00.000-06:00

Tuesday Blue America will be officially endorsing Rob Zerban for Congress-- looks like I let the cat out of the bag-- and he'll be our special Valentine's Day live guest over at C&L (1pm, CST). When I spoke to him earlier today I reminded him that to the Netroots and to progressive activists outside of the district, Paul Ryan is known to be one of the most extreme and dangerous members of the conservative movement. This view is shared by many in Wisconsin, of course, including in the First Congressional District, but there is a still a great deal of work to be done convincing undecided and independents. I wanted to know what Rob is doing to make sure voters in Janesville, Kenosha, Racine, the southern Milwaukee 'burbs and even Waukesha get that. He says "there are 3 main factors why people are energized about this race and fed up with Ryan-- Ryan's ideas, his behavior, and the movement in Wisconsin. My campaign is focusing on harnessing these opportunities, drawing clear contrasts, and delivering that message to voters." When I asked for details, they came out like a gusher:

The privatization of Medicare and Social Security is an awful idea. Let’s start there. That is something the vast majority of people understand in this district, and across the nation. Supporters of Paul Ryan’s plans have admitted it does not save money. These proposals open these programs to huge risk and cuts, and are clearly just a ploy to take money away from seniors and put it into the hands of Wall Street and private health insurance companies. (Of course, these are the same special interests funding Ryan’s political career).

Paul Ryan’s agenda is not just cuts and privatization, but also wasteful spending on big tax cuts for the wealthy. Everyone is furious that Mitt Romney is paying only 13.9% on his millions while many in the middle class are paying tax rates in the 30%s. I point out to people that Paul Ryan makes this possible. He has pushed for every tax cut for millionaires and billionaires possible including the Bush tax cuts, capital gains, carried interest, and many other loopholes. Ryan wants to protect these loopholes for Mitt Romney instead of funding our students, seniors, and economic recovery efforts.

Paul Ryan likes to sell himself as a big thinker similar to the way Newt Gingrich has done. I realized early on that his grandiose and self-promoting plans, including the Path to Prosperity, are little more than the reheated and repackaged extremism of past eras.

The second problem many Wisconsinites have with Ryan is his behavior. He is cavorting with the ultra-wealthy at every opportunity and only occasionally returns to the district. His “listening sessions” with constituents compromise of him delivering a PowerPoint presentation on topics including why students don’t need Pell Grants and why seniors programs should be privatized. He routinely kicks out anyone who disagrees with him. He behaves like people’s boss- not their representative. In my opinion, he acts like someone who does not feel he owes his district or his constituents any consideration. He is a man with a philosophy and everyone else can take his way or the highway. This makes people mad!

The third and final factor I think is playing a big role in why people are so energized is the movement in Wisconsin. Wisconsin is the epicenter of the movement by the middle class to stand up for themselves and for their futures. The Recall effort of the Governor is an inspiring grassroots effort to get rid of someone who has stepped far outside of the lines to attack the middle class. The crushing and coordinated political attack on working families that happened in Wisconsin was outrageous. The attack was orchestrated by outside money networks and secret coalitions, including the Koch Brothers and ALEC, which allowed for radical legislation to be quickly rammed through Wisconsin state government. It was clear to everyone that our legislators and Governor were acting as puppets for outside interests and had little understanding what they were doing.

This all-out assault on the middle class woke a lot of people up. We saw great things in Madison. The Recall has also spread to my district and had a great impact. Formerly Republican-leaning areas of the district, including Waukesha County, had record participation in the Recall.

In short, things have changed here in Wisconsin! People have woken up and blue collar retirees are remembering just how unacceptable the Republican agenda is. Seniors and students are realizing the deep cuts Ryan is ramming through will hurt them and will force many in the middle class to fall into poverty.

It doesn’t take a weatherman to know which way the wind blows! Paul Ryan has the wrong ideas for America and we just need to keep promoting the simple truth.

Good answer! Come meet Rob Tuesday, right at CrooksandLiars.com-- 1pm (CST)-- and help us kiss Paul Ryan good-bye. And if you'd like to help his campaign before then... be our guest, over at the Blue America ActBlue page.

Charles Pierce executes a perfect Ryan take-down

2012-02-11T13:28:00.003-06:00

Charles Pierce, Esquire magazine columnist and general observer of all things horrific and decayed in America, takes but a few words to demolish Paul Ryan after the congresscritter's latest opus. The choice beginning:

Make no mistake. You can have your Bachmanns and your Cains. You can have your Coulters and your Malkins and - what the hell - your Breitbarts. You can certainly have your Marco Rubios, who gained 100 CPAC points for making the conference's first teleprompter joke, though there may be several more amongst the murmuring when Willard Romney takes the stage here this afternoon. You can even have your your Santorums and your Ron Pauls. But that zombie-eyed granny-starver Paul Ryan is the wonk every wingnut woman wants and every wingnut man wants to be. He thinks Serious Thoughts about The Big Issues Facing The Nation, and they truly dig him the most. If Ayn Rand, that randy old crackpot, were still alive, she'd whack him over the head, stuff him in a sack, and drag him off to her apartment, where they would make hot Objectivist monkey-love until the rafters knocked and the angels wept.

Paul Ryan is also a remarkably accomplished bullshit artist.

His speech on Thursday night was chock-full of the usual goodies: praise for the brave Republicans who voted for his "budget" last year, the one that would have eviscerated Medicare to the point where Newt Fking Gingrich called it "right-wing social engineering," and that was before Willard had driven Newt around the bend

'

More here.

GOP Sen. Tom Coburn says Paul Ryan's a liar on Medicare

2012-02-06T11:37:00.001-06:00

Think Progress reports:

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) inadvertently referred to prominent Republicans like Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney, and Eric Cantor as liars during an interview with Oklahoma’s News on 6 Thusday night.

“Any politicians that stands up and says, ‘We’re not going to touch your Medicare’ is a liar,” Coburn said, apparently forgetting that the GOP has used the talking point as a center piece in their campaign to sell Medicare premium support to the public. Watch Coburn’s remarks:

More here.

Groundhog Day in Congress: Dems again target GOP over Medicare

2012-02-03T13:19:00.001-06:00

Greg Sargent in Plum Line blog on Washington Post:

Over the weekend, GOP Rep. Paul Ryan confirmed that the House Republican budget would again contain key elements of his plan to transform Medicare — even though some polls have shown the idea to be deeply unpopular and Dems have vowed to run on it in 2012.The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is set to go on the offensive on the issue in the increasingly close battle for the House — and it’s very possible the issue could have a real impact on the presidential race.

The DCCC went out Thursday, Groundhog Day,(that's a Green Bay groundhog pictured) with what it called a “Groundhog Day Alert” in the districts of some 70 vulnerable House Republicans, reminding voters of their last vote on Medicare and warning of the next one to come. [That presumably included at least three Wisconsin districts now held by Reid Ribble, Sean Duffy, and Ryan.] Here’s what the alert in the district of Rep. Dan Benishek of Michigan says:

“Michigan voters don’t need a groundhog to come out of the hole in order to tell them how this will end: Voters will reject Dan Benishek putting the ultra wealthy ahead of seniors once again. Even though voters already rejected House Republicans plan to end Medicare, this Groundhog Day Republicans like Benishek are resurrecting their plan to protect billionaires and Big Oil, while leaving seniors out in the cold. It’s the same thing again from Dan Benishek — double health care costs for Michigan seniors, more tax breaks for the ultra wealthy.”

DCCC chair Steve Israel has reportedly instructed House Dem candidates to be relentless in stressing the GOP position on Medicare, to make it a “defining issue in the 2012 elections.” A recent poll by the Dem firm Democracy Corps found that the Dem message — that House Republicans voted to “end Medicare as we know it” — tests well, with 77 percent in 60 House GOP districts saying it raises serious doubts about incumbents.

Read the rest here/

Ryan to Fed: Why are you trying to lower unemployment?

2012-02-03T08:56:00.002-06:00

The "let them eat cake" congressman from southern Wisconsin is at it again.

At a House Budget Committee hearing yesterday, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-You Kidding) chastised Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke for simultaneously trying to lower inflation and stimulate job growth, even questioning whether it's the Fed's proper mission to worry about jobs (it is, actually).

Ryan's puerile stance boiled down to: Why is the Fed trying to stimulate job growth when inflation is up? Gee, congressman, why would anyone from your party want to focus on jobs?

The Associated Press summarized the meeting this way:

Ryan criticized the Fed's decision to establish an annual inflation target of 2 percent. He said Bernanke seemed willing to accept higher inflation in order to get lower unemployment.

Yup. The chair of the powerful House Budget Committee is far more worried about inflation than about helping tens of millions of Americans get back to work. Never mind that if you don't have a job, inflation is the least of your problems. Nothing times nothing is still nothing.

Throughout the hearing, Ryan and his fellow Republicans on the budget committee seemed to be channeling presidential candidate Mitt Romney's statement this week that he simply didn't care about the poorest Americans. Of course the underlying ideology remains: Fix the economy for rich folks and hep will trickle down.

The dripping faucet theory of the economy began under Reagan and we're still waiting for the drips to come through.

UPDATE: John Nichols of The Nation has more. And the Capital Times editorializes on Paul Ryan's cruelest ploy.

Ryan's constant complaints about no budget exposed as phony

2012-01-31T11:23:00.001-06:00

Paul Ryan complains, almost on a daily basis, that it is now more than 1,000 days since the U.S. Senate passed a federal budget. He makes it sound like dereliction of duty, and it plays pretty well with Fox News and other media outlets.

He must have been surprised when the Eau Claire Leader Telegram, covering his recent visit to its city, did some homework and included this in its story by McLean Bennett:

Senate Democrats have contested Ryan's and other Republicans' claims they haven't approved a budget in so long.
"That is just absolutely wrong," Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., said in a recent speech, refuting claims the Senate hasn't passed a budget in more than 2½ years. (A video of Conrad's speech is posted to the Senate Budget Committee's website, budget.senate.gov. Conrad chairs that committee.)
In his speech, Conrad noted senators in August approved what was known as the Budget Control Act.
"The Budget Control Act contains the budget for this year and for next year," Conrad said.

Bennett committed an act of journalism, actually doing some reporting instead of just stenography. Perhaps it will inspire others to do likewise.

Ryan: If it's legal, whatever corporations do is moral

2012-01-30T09:15:00.001-06:00

Crooks and Liars writes:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) suggested on Sunday that anything corporations do is moral as long as they follow the law.
Fox News host Chris Wallace asked the House Budget Committee chairman if Republican presidential candidates should be criticizing each other over the way they made their money and handled their personal finances.

"I don't think so," Ryan replied. "We need to defend the morality of the free enterprise system and upward mobility. We need to defend the morality of a system in American that says you are free to take risks, to make money, to create jobs and to do it however you want to so long as it's legal. That's something we should be proud of."

More, and video, here.

Fox News + Paul Ryan + Dollar Bill Birthday Cake = Unforgettable Rich Boy Image

2012-01-29T23:10:00.002-06:00

My jaw dropped when Chris Wallace presented a cake adornedwith a green dollar sign to Rep. Paul Ryan. How unbelievably appropriate, and what a Kodak moment for his Democratic opponent Rob Zerban.

What in gods name were they thinking? Let them eat cake.

Here's another take on it, from Mediaite site: Chris Wallace terrifies Paul Ryan with a birthday cake.

Here's the screen capture for those who want to pass thismind searing image along to others.

Ryan, Republicans ready to stake election on Medicare. Yahoo!

2012-01-28T15:51:00.000-06:00

More good news for Democrats:

The NY Times reports that Medicare will be a big issue in this fall's Congressional races, and Paul Ryan and House Republicans are ready to pass another budget that ends Medicare as we know it for coming generations.

It is an unpopular idea, despite some tweaks by Ryan in his original plan, but he isn't shying away from it:

..But in an interview, Mr. Ryan said that Republicans would try to push a similar budget plan through the House this spring. Asked if it would include similar changes in Medicare, Mr. Ryan said, “Yes, absolutely.”

“Not one member thinks we should backtrack on these ideas,” Mr. Ryan said after listening to his colleagues at the annual retreat of House Republicans in Baltimore last week.

Democrats see the Ryan plan as a political gift. They relish the opportunity to bash it again on the House floor and at campaign events.

As well they should.

Read the whole story here.

Paul Ryan Pushing For Tax Hikes On The Middle-Class

2012-01-27T15:43:00.001-06:00

Politiscoop Excerpt: (Sept. 2011)
MADISON-Paul Ryan, author of the plan to end Medicare, went on Fox News this weekend to advocate for tax hikes on the middle class.

Ryan, proponent of tax cuts for billionaires, opposes payroll tax cuts for middle class workers and told his Fox News cheerleaders that it was "class warfare" to suggest his advocacy for only the richest Americans was unfair.

Huff Post Excerpt:
(Sept. 2011)
He also said he opposes the president's proposal to require millionaires to pay the same tax rate as the middle class, known as the Buffett plan. "Class warfare might make for good politics, but it makes for rotten economics," Ryan said.

Quote
"If Paul Ryan wants to claim class warfare, we certainly know which class he's signed up to serve." -- Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Mike Tate

Paul ($350 a bottle) Ryan hosting fundraiser -- at Racine wine shop!

2012-01-25T16:49:00.000-06:00

You'd think that Paul Ryan, after being embarrassed last year to be caught drinking $350 bottles of wine in a DC watering hole with a couple of "economists," would stay away from the stuff.

But he's hosting a fundraiser for State Sen. Van Wangaard, who's facing a recall election -- at a Racine wine shop.

Tickets are only $125, which should leave a slight profit if you get four glasses out of a bottle. Or maybe they won't be serving the good stuff.

Root River Siren has the details.

Paul Ryan Gets one well deserved Cold Shoulder for attending MLK Awards at Gateway College..

2012-01-25T00:24:00.000-06:00

The title of the YouTube video read, “Al Levie refuses awardfrom Paul Ryan.

Al Levie walked away from Paul Ryan. Levie refused to go along with Ryan'shypocritical side show on stage, after he received the MLK Humanitarian Award.

Al Levie is one of three recipients of Gateway TechnicalCollege's Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Awards bestowed Monday andmade these remarks in his acceptance speech. Levie is a social studies teacherat Horlick High School and is on the state executive board of Voces de laFrontera and the Racine chapter of the NAACP. He is an advisor to the studentyouth group Youth Empowered in the Struggle.

Here's a part of Levie's speech:

Lincoln saw the rights of workers superseding the rights ofcapital. He said labor is prior to, and independent of capital. Capital is onlythe fruit of labor and could never have existed if labor had not first existed.Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

The struggle for equality is not only a civil rights struggle; it is aneconomic justice struggle. There is no wealth problem in this country only adistribution problem. Our society needs to reorder its priorities and meethuman need instead of fostering individual human greed.

As a recipient of Gateway Technical College's Humanitarian Award, I pledge toredouble my efforts in the struggle for social and economic justice.Concretely, that means fighting to roll back the power of the corporate elitein our society, making the ultra-rich pay their fair share in taxes, fightingfor adequate funding for our public schools, restoring collective bargainingfor public employees, fair and humane immigration reform, and restoring thevoting rights for all people living within our state and country. That is whatdemocracy looks like.

Ryan And Boehner Want A Second Shot At Destroying Medicare And Medicaid

2012-01-24T16:42:00.000-06:00

Not a day goes by on Twitter when the GOP noise machine doesn't puke out something like this (these are all from yesterday morning):

The biggest problem with passing the budget, of course, is that the GOP is using it to push forward their dangerous and radical right-wing social agenda (as even Newt Gingrich readily admitted, calling Ryan's budget "right-wing social engineering"; see video above). The Republicans seem convinced this is a winning issue for them-- ending Medicare and Medicaid. In fact, Boehner and Ryan are threatening to insert it into this year's budget again. Boehner was on Fox News Sunday citing how Ryan and Democrat Ron Wyden have a "bipartisan" idea of how to push forward the Republican Party's dangerous right-wing social agenda.

At a GOP strategy session on Friday, Ryan told the Republican House Members, many of whom are scared to death that trying to destroy Medicare may not prove to be a good idea in an election year, “We’re not backing off on the kinds of reforms that we’ve advocated, but we have to write it... We’ve done more to normalize the idea of premium support than anything at all. We’re confident that these are the right policies. There’s an emerging bipartisan consensus that’s occurring on doing premium support reform to Medicare is the best way to save Medicare." By bipartisan he means Wyden and a motley crew of reactionary and despised Blue Dogs.

Rob Zerban, Ryan's Democratic opponent, is far more in touch with what the American people are looking for than Ron Wyden and the mangy Blue Dogs. "Paul Ryan just announced he is taking a second swing at Medicare," writes Zerban. "His 'new' plan is devastating to Medicare as we know it, but the big difference is that he found one Democrat to help him!"

Here is what has been happening-- Paul Ryan has introduced a new plan to start the privatization of Medicare. He convinced a "Democrat," Ron Wyden, to join in this effort. Ron Wyden, like Paul Ryan, has raked in an alarming amount of lobbyist money from the health insurance industry.

Make no mistake-- this is no bipartisan effort! Almost all Democrats, including President Obama, are strongly opposed to this plan.

Here is what the White House Communications Director had to say: [this scheme could] "cause the traditional Medicare program to "wither on the vine" because it would raise premiums, forcing many seniors to leave traditional Medicare and join private plans. It would shift costs from the government to seniors. At the end of the day, this plan would end Medicare as we know if for millions of seniors."

It is clear what this plan is designed to do. Both Paul Ryan and Wyden admit that it will likely not save anyone any money! The only upside is a big giveaway to private insurance companies at the expense of our seniors. This is sham bipartisanship and the voters of Wisconsin are not fooled!

Ryan has to be stopped. Wall Street has every intention of making him president someday. The DCCC has studiously ignored him-- if not protected him-- for a decade. Rob Zerban is taking him on with zero help from "ex"-Blue Dog Steve Israel, the chair of the DCCC. Zerban just forced Ryan to switch his position and back away from supporting SOPA. He deserves our help, and you can give him some right here at the ActBlue Stop Paul Ryan page. (I should add that Ryan has probably taken more sleazy, corporate cash than any other Member of the House and currently has $4.6 million sitting in his campaign warchest, virtually all of it from corporate special interests.)

Ryan chided for watching idly as Newt makes gains

2012-01-23T13:42:00.001-06:00

Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post's Right Turn blog writes to Paul Ryan and other prominent Republicans who have been watching the presidential race from the sidelines. She can understand them not running she says; that's hard to do and likely to fail, since only one person can win.

...And endorsing? Why that requires an expenditure of political capital, some risk taking. Your guy could lose, and there where would you be?

But here’s the thing: The voters in their infinite wisdom have just given a huge boost to perhaps the only GOP candidate who could shift the spotlight from President Obama to himself, alienate virtually all independent voters, lose more than 40 states and put the House majority in jeopardy...

It seems, gentlemen, it’s time to get off your . . . er . . . time to get off the bench and into the game

It's especially hard to understand Ryan not speaking up about Gingrich (who is, of course, the candidate she was talking about, since it was the Newtster who trashed Ryan's pet plan to end Medicare, calling it "right-wing social engineering" before being forced to recant.

Read the rest of Rubin's letter here.

Good news for Dems: Ryan, GOP sticking with unpopular Medicare plan

2012-01-21T11:13:00.002-06:00

Democrats should be happy to hear that House Republicans, led by Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan, are committed to trying to end Medicare as we know it again in their 2012 budget. ABC News:

House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin says Republicans have no plans to shy away from controversial efforts to reform entitlements when the House GOP drafts its budget this year, including transforming Medicare into a premium-support system.

“We’re not backing off on the kinds of reforms that we’ve advocated, but we have to write it,” Paul said during a break at the GOP’s issues conference in Baltimore today. “We’ve done more to normalize the idea of premium support than anything at all. We’re confident that these are the right policies. There’s an emerging bipartisan consensus that’s occurring on doing premium support reform to Medicare is the best way to save Medicare.”

There is, of course, no such emerging consensus. Ryan got one Democrat to fall for his latest version of the plan and co-sponsor it with him. But Democrats would be nuts to support Ryan's plan, which is political poison.

More from Reuters:

Ryan said he wanted his budget plan to offer voters an alternative vision to the "cradle-to-grave welfare state" that he says Democratic President Barack Obama is promoting.

The House Republican budget resolution will contain reforms to Medicare, the healthcare program for Americans 62 and over, such as providing subsidies to help recipients pay for private insurance, based on their wealth and medical needs.

"We haven't written it yet, but we're not backing off on the kinds of reforms we've advocated," Ryan told reporters at a retreat for House Republicans in Baltimore.

The Obama White House must be celebrating.

"Romney co-signs Ryan's suicide note'

2012-01-20T13:11:00.004-06:00

David Frum, former Bush speechwriter, on The Daily Beast:

President Obama would dearly like to do it again [accuse Republicans of wanting to get rid of Medicare] in 2012. But this time, Republicans made it easy for him. Obama does not have to accuse them of having a secret plan to eliminate Medicare. In 2011, all but four House Republicans and all but five Senate Republicans voted for a very public plan to withdraw the Medicare guarantee from Americans younger than age 55.

The Paul Ryan plan would instead offer future retirees support to buy a private insurance plan—with the amount of the support rising at the rate of general inflation. If health care costs continue to rise during the next three decades at the same pace as in the past three decades, then—under this proposal—today’s 30-somethings would receive support sufficient to cover about 25 percent of their Medicare costs, leaving them to find the other 75 percent themselves. The money saved would be applied to balance the budget and finance a big tax cut, reducing the top income-tax rate to 28 percent from the otherwise scheduled 39.6 percent.

Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer at the time expressed worry that the Ryan plan might prove a “suicide note.

And at first Mitt Romney shrewdly kept his distance. “I appreciate what Paul Ryan has done,” Romney said on May 27, 2011, and cautiously added, “I’m going to have my own plan.” Asked whether he’d sign the plan, Romney demurred: “That’s the kind of speculation that is getting the cart ahead of the horse.

A week later, Romney’s resistance was weakening. Asked June 2, 2011, whether he would sign the Ryan plan if it comes to him, he said yes, but added again, “I’m going to have my own plan.”

Voters don’t care if politicians are rich. What they want to know is, what will this rich politician do for me? Or to me?

Through the fall, Romney yielded more and more ground to pressure from congressional Republicans entranced by Ryan’s vision.

In November, Romney did at last release that Medicare plan of his own. Structurally, the Romney plan resembled Ryan’s. But it remained vague on the key feature: how much premium support would future seniors get?

Then Gingrich began to rise in the polls, the first adversary to seriously worry the Romney campaign. To protect his right flank, Romney in December for the first time expressed unequivocal support for the Ryan plan—and the end of the Medicare guarantee for those now under 55.

Would a President Romney do such a thing? Would Congress really ultimately go along with it? Probably not and certainly not. But can President Obama credibly allege that a President Romney might do it? And will those allegations exact an electoral cost?

If the answers to those questions prove to be “yes,” conservative critics will blame Romney for his “weakness” as a candidate. But the real weakness will be that Romney acceded to those conservatives’ pressure to co-sign Paul Ryan’s suicide note.

'The Bloodying of PolitiFact' -- and the facts

2012-01-08T13:46:00.001-06:00

Trudy Lieberman, in a piece entitled, "The Bloodying of PolitiFact" on the Columbia Journalism Review website, looks at the controversy over PolitiFact's decision to make Democrats claims that Paul Ryan's plan would end Medicare as the "lie of the year."

Let's cut to the chase. Lieberman writes:

The fact is Republicans by supporting Ryan’s voucher plan did essentially vote to end Medicare.

You can read the analysis here.

She also has a bad word for "snarky little blog posts" on the subject, so we'll leave it at that.

Who loves ya more, Paulie? Romney or Santorum?

2012-01-06T20:24:00.000-06:00

Mitt Romney worships Paul Ryan. Can Rick Santorum possibly love Ryan more?

Ezra Klein in the Washington Post:

Santorum, the former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania has, for months now, aggressively backed the Medicare changes that House budget chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R) rolled out in April. That would be the plan that proposed privatizing the program and giving qualified recipients federal money to purchase health coverage. The plan was a political flop. Polls found that voters weren’t exactly keen to scrap the entitlement program as it exists now.

Most Republican candidates approached the Ryan plan with caution, if not outright criticism. Former House speaker Newt Gingrich didn’t mince words when he described it as right-wing social engineering.” Mitt Romney, while praising the principles of the Ryan plan, ultimately proposed another version of Medicare reform, which would have a government-run plan compete against private options. And that looks a lot like the plan that Ryan, partnered with Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), rolled out last month.

But all along, Santorum has stood out in the GOP field as the Ryan plan’s biggest cheerleader. The day after Ryan rolled out his original plan, Santorum praised the House budget chairman’s ideas.

“I commend Chairman Ryan’s long-term budget proposal that tackles entitlement programs, particularly his proposed reforms of the Medicaid program,” Santorum said in a statement. “I also believe the Republicans’ approach to reforming Medicare is right on target to streamline the program, reduce waste and allow future Medicare beneficiaries to have more of a say in the needs of their benefits with a market driven approach.”

Santorum has endorsed the Ryan-Wyden plan, too. But he has also argued against the exact policy feature that makes the plan politically palatable: the guarantee that the government-run Medicare of today will still be around tomorrow. The day before the Iowa caucus, Santorum criticized the idea of public option in the Medicare program during a town hall speech. “I have a problem with the public option part that Ron Wyden has insisted on,” Santorum told Iowa voters.

Democrats can only hope that a Ryan lover is the nominee. In fact, Ryan himself in the second spot on the ticket would really spotlight his discredited plan. Dems would be happy to hear him explain it for a couple of months next fall.

' Romney Worships 2011's False Idol: Paul Ryan'

2012-01-04T19:09:00.000-06:00

John Nichols in The Nation:

Paul Ryan’s ideas reached their sell-by date in 2011, as tens of millions of Americans recognized that his proposals would permanently damage and ultimate destroy Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

The centerpiece of Mitt Romney’s advertising in Iowa (and New Hampshire) is an attempt to associate the candidate’s economic agenda with House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan’s “Roadmap for America’s Future.” (AP Photos) But as the year came to a close and his rancid schemes were starting to putrefy, Ryan suddenly found a new buyer: Mitt Romney.

Paul Ryan-- A Career Built On A Tissue Of Lies By And For The One Percent

2012-01-04T17:16:00.004-06:00

Let them eat cake pops

I'm not sure if it was Abby Melamed or Bonnie Simmons, but one of them told me when I was working at KSAN that the reason for playlists is because on the very day that a dj got completely sick of hearing a song he had played a gazillion times... well, on that day, the audience was hearing it for the very first time. The Republicans "get" that much better than the Democrats and they repeat their mindless and simplistic talking points ad nauseum, while progressives would rather debate complex, lofty principles... that don't fit on bumper stickers. We've been writing about the danger of Paul Ryan for 4 long years. Yesterday, though, Paul Rosenberg, did a searing essay on the role of lies in Ryan's career that every DWT reader should take a look at. Like any competent look at Ryan, it starts with the premise that he's a robotic pawn of the one percent and that without an ability to manipulate a lazy media with almost no ability for critical thought he would have no career. Rosenberg writes that "Last week, in an act of profound deception, the American 'fact-checking' organisation, PolitiFact, chose a true statement as its 'Lie of the Year.'" He goes on to show how misguided PolitFact is with this assertion that "Ryan's plan 'is necessary because of the programme's soaring costs.' In fact, the problem isn't Medicare per se, it's the entire cost structure of American medicine as a whole, which is roughly twice the per capita cost of healthcare spending in other advanced countries-- even those that have 50 per cent more people aged 65+ than the US has."

Indeed, as Thomas Ferguson and Robert Johnson explained just over a year ago, in their paper "A World Upside Down? Deficit Fantasies in the Great Recession," all of the US long-term federal debt is due to just three oligopoly sectors: the military-industrial complex (the backbone of empire, with bases all around the world and almost half the world's military spending), the medical-industrial complex (with twice the per capita costs of other systems), and the financial sector (which has recently cost trillions of dollars in lost wealth and economic activity).

All three of these are enormous cash cows for the one per cent, and equally enormous cost-centres for the 99 per cent. Without the costs imposed by lack of competition, regulation and accountability in these sectors, the US would have no long-term debt problem. We would be paying it down, rather than running it up.

This connects with yet another Paul Ryan "pants on fire" lie: that his budget plan is what it claims to be-- a deficit reduction plan. It's not. In the next decade-- the maximum time-frame in which budget projections are normally done-- the Ryan Plan produces just $55bn in deficit reduction over the next 10 years, according to an analysis from the Centre on Budget and Policy Priorities. This is because $4.2tn in tax cuts (heavily tilted toward the rich) almost entirely offsets $4.3tn in spending cuts (largely targeting low- and middle-income Americans).

Reductions in healthcare spending from ending Medicare kick in just after that, and-- as Nobel Prize-winning economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman noted on his blog last April, "spending on everything other than healthcare and Social Security… is projected to fall in half as a share of GDP in just 10 years, and eventually to fall to levels comparable to those during the Coolidge administration-- even as the US presumably maintains a post-isolationism-level military force."

In short, the Ryan Plan is really an extreme (and extremely unrealistic) government-slashing plan. That is its goal and purpose. Calling it a deficit-reduction plan is a pants-on-fire lie, which PolitiFact would surely recognise as such, if it were actually in the fact-checking business, as it misleadingly claims to be. In sharp contrast, it should be noted, the Congressional Progressive Caucus "People's Budget" plan would balance the budget by 2022, with a $31bn surplus. But there's a bipartisan one per cent consensus to utterly ignore it, as if it did not even exist as a possibility, much less a publicly offered plan.

Instead of Ferguson and Johnson's realistic analysis of special interest waste, the bipartisan one per cent conventional wisdom in Washington is exactly the opposite: the problem is "wasteful government spending" on programmes that benefit the vast majority of the American people: Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, not to mention investments in infrastructure, education, developing green energy, etc. This basic obfuscation and inversion of the politics of public debt is best thought of not as a lie-- a discrete, isolated speech act-- but as a fraud-- a continuous, ongoing practice to deceive, which is all about misleading people with half-truths, rather than outright lying to them. After all, outright lies can attract unwanted, sharply-focused negative attention. Far better to keep things far blurrier, with half-truths that take forever to analyse and argue.

PolitiFact's "lie of the year" this year is just one more part of that fraud. Drastic cuts to Medicare are not needed. A drastic expansion, to include all Americans of all ages, would be far more cost-effective for bringing the US' healthcare costs in line with the rest of the advanced industrial world. But that's the last thing that the one per cent special interests in Washington want. They don't even want you to consider that possibility. And PolitiFact is here to help them with that, presenting broadly-shared one per cent opinions as if they were facts, and not even realising what it is doing in the process.

...If Americans cannot cast off lies that directly steal money from their own pockets, and steal their children's future from them, what chance is there confronting lies that only harm them indirectly? What chance is there with lies told in their name? With lies purportedly told in their interest? Lies told for their own benefit? What chance is there to stop being, at bottom, a people of the lie? What chance to once more become a people of the dream?

Welcome to Paul Ryan's crabbed little world-- a world he wants to impose on your children, whose role is serfdom or indentured servitude. It's Mitt Romney's world as well, of course. A lot needs to be done to stop that-- starting this year with replacing Ryan with Rob Zerban. You can help do that by contributing $5 or $10 to Zerban's campaign at that link. To read the rest of this post-- it's pretty long-- go to the original at DownWithTyranny.

Another award for Ryan: Most discredited budget plan of the year

2012-01-04T14:25:00.001-06:00

Paul Ryan continues to rack up the awards for worst of 2011. On the heels of Scam Artist of the Year, the latest, from credit.com on the most discredited ideas of the year:

Most disCredited Budget Reform Plan

Paul Ryan’s budget takes the cake in this category, and eats it too. “We need to get rid of all these accounting tricks, all these budget gimmicks, and we’ve got to attack the drivers of our debt,” said Ryan very earnestly, reminiscent of Our Gang’s Alfalfa without the cowlick. However, upon a not very close examination it became completely obvious that Ryan’s budget was itself filled with accounting tricks and budget gimmicks, some supplied by the conservative Heritage Foundation and others resulting from blatant mischaracterization of Congressional Budget Office assessments.

Worse, instead of attacking the drivers of the debt, it seemed to mostly attack drivers of postal trucks, by more or less eliminating Social Security and Medicare, as they have been understood for generations, for people who are today under 55 years of age. Ryan’s budget became laughable, like the 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact (which purported to outlaw war as an instrument of national policy), only faster. Even Newt Gingrich, in a rare burst of candor, referred to it as “right-wing social engineering.” In any case by the end of the year, the Ryan being talked about most was an NFL quarterback, not a congressman from Wisconsin.

More here.

Ryan Challenger Rob Zerban gets Noticed...Big Time!!!

2011-12-31T17:38:00.000-06:00

UPDATE: Ryan now says he opposes SOPA

Good news for Rob Zerban, a serious candidate to aggressively challenge and unseat Rep. Paul Ryan, the world is now watching and contributing.

International Business Times: Less than two days ago, Rob Zerban was a relatively unknown Wisconsin Democrat running for Congress with little financial backing ($200,000 or so in campaign cash on hand as of Sept. 30). Now, his odds have at least marginally improved, though how good can the chances of beating one of the most powerful Republicans in the nation get? "Who is Rob Zerban???" An understandable response. The guy is, after all, running as the Democratic alternative to (Ryan).

But the incumbent also faces the ire of an emboldened online community set on using the blunt force of an Election Day loss to change the Congressman's mind on key legislation (SOPA).

Zerban walked into his campaign office on Thursday morning to find emails and phone calls, volunteers and donors coming out of the woodwork. All he did was host a Q&A session on the online aggregating site Reddit. But the hive-like online community can be easily riled, quick to make up its mind. Just look at Rob Zerban. Following OWS, Congress served up two bills that drew an online backlash: the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The pushback led to calls for a boycott of GoDaddy to punish its advocacy of SOPA. GoDaddy eventually blinked and withdrew its support … online activists to switch to the political realm … and landed on Ryan.

Reddit took to Ryan like a termite swarm to a rotting log. In less than 24 hours, they managed to: break down Ryan's campaign contributions; dig up a HuffPo post of a man getting arrested after protesting at a Ryan event; request submissions for a logo; have a Q&A session with his opponent; cultivate a list of his donors for possible boycott; and cull together his voting record. They even adopted a name: Operation Pull Ryan (OPR). Ryan's camp scrambled to dispel the notion that the Congressman supports SOPA … Too late.

To be clear, Ryan does not say one way or the other whether he supports SOPA, which for me means he does. If he didn’t, he would have said so.

Zerban casually responded to a Reddit user's email regarding SOPA. The discussion, and speed with which he responded, led to a surprise bump in interest and suggestions he take a look at Reddit. The candidate hosted an Ask Me Anything (colloquially known as AMA) … Yes, he's against SOPA and parts of NDAA. End the prohibition of marijuana? Yup. He supports publicly-funded elections. Bingo.

Never mind whether or not he actually stood a chance, they'll give him a chance. He went on to join the anti-GoDaddy cause, pulling his own site from the company. For now, Zerban is as much the hero in the story as Ryan is the nemesis … said a Reddit moderator … "Our interest in Rob Zerban is solely this: If Paul Ryan is not ready to agree with us on these issues, we're ready to help him find a new job," the moderator said.

Paul Ryan wins well-deserved award: Scam Artist of the Year

2011-12-28T17:19:00.000-06:00

Madison's Capital Times does the honors:

Paul Ryan is a hustler. The Republican congressman from Janesville has gotten very good at fooling political and media elites into thinking that his schemes to steer federal money into the accounts of Wall Street speculators (by taking steps to privatize Social Security) and for-profit insurance companies (by turning Medicare and Medicaid into voucher programs) would balance budgets or in some other way improve the circumstances of working families.
But Ryan’s having a harder time fooling Americans who take fiscal matters and the future of the republic seriously.
...The fact is that millions of Americans are actively protesting against the political corruption that floods corporate cash into the campaign accounts of pliable congressmen like Paul Ryan. The American people are furious with the pay-to-play politics that has tipped the balance in Washington away from the best interests of people in communities such as Janesville and toward the special interests on Wall Street.
Paul Ryan embodies this corruption of America’s promise. He may still be able to fool the editors at Time. He may still be able to scam a headline out of the PolitiFact folks. But he is having a harder time fooling the American people. That is some of the best news to come out of 2011. But the even better news could come in 2012 — if Ryan is finally rejected by voters who have tired of being “represented” by a political scam artist who serves Wall Street rather than Main Street.
Read more here.

Wyden Isn't The Only Democrat Who Wants To Help Paul Ryan Kill Medicare-- Blue Dogs Are Salivating

2011-12-25T22:30:00.001-06:00

Last week we saw how Wisconsin Democrat Rob Zerban pushed back against Ron Wyden's harebrained scheme of working with Paul Ryan to destroy Medicare. Obviously Wyden isn't the only bad Democrat in Congress. Many of the worst conservative handmaidens of the 1%-- the Blue Dogs and the New Dems (essentially Blue Dogs without the KKK robes and the anti-gay/anti-Choice fanaticism)-- are quietly lining up behind Wyden and Ryan in the push for a transpartisan death blow against the New Deal and the middle class.

Shamus Cooke guessed Christmas Day would be as good a time as any to expose this unholy alliance.

Politicians are attacking Medicare and Medicaid on all sides--Democrats and Republicans alike. Obama's national health care bill will slash hundreds of billions from Medicare over the next decade, an act supported by so-called "progressive" Democrats. Soon after this "victory" Obama created the Super Committee to balance the budget, which included automatic "triggers"-- if no decision was reached-- that are now slated to cut $600 billion more from Medicare.   

On a state-by-state basis, Medicaid-- a program that provides health care to the poor-- is being cut in virtually every state, where they are using their manufactured budget crises as an excuse. This under-funding of Medicaid has created a lack of doctors for patients, according to USAToday:   

"With a shortage of doctors...[Medicaid] patients have little choice but to use hospital emergency rooms for more routine care." (July 5th, 2011).  

But it gets worse. Now, "long term solutions" are being sought. After critically wounding the system with disfiguring cuts, Medicare's plug is about to be pulled. Different privatization plans have been put forth that would instantly kill Medicare. One such plan was recently announced by Democratic Senator Ron Wyden and Republican Congressman Paul Ryan, which, if enacted, would deliver a deathblow to Medicare as we know it. Some commentators have wrongly dismissed Wyden as a "crackpot" risking political suicide; in fact, Wyden is a cautious, "pragmatic" politician, i.e. he blindly follows party leaders and their corporate bosses.

  The Wyden-Ryan plan has deep roots not only amongst Republicans, but also Blue Dog Democrats and the New Democrat Coalition-- the powerful congressional caucuses that actually run the Democratic Party. These are the people that create the right-wing economic policies that President Obama has been pursuing since his election victory-- thus Obama's ability to work in a bi-partisan manner with the Republican Party. The Wall Street Journal commented on Obama's right-wing health care plan:

  “To listen to President Obama and his closest Democratic allies, you’d think John McCain had won the election and their bill had been drafted by Paul Ryan, Tom Coburn and the scholars at the American Enterprise Institute [a right wing think tank].” (February 26, 2010).  

By attaching his name to Paul Ryan (the anti-Medicare crusader), Wyden is now revealing the ultra-right, pro-corporate trajectory of the Democratic Party leadership. And although the White House has spoken against the bill, Obama's own health care reform bill created the framework now copied by the Wyden-Paul plan.

  Why does the Wyden-Ryan plan amount to privatization? A brief glance at the recent history of Medicare is necessary to explain.   

Medicare was once dominated by the federal government, where, as a result, administrative costs were low and quality was high. In the 1990's Medicare patients were given an option to have their Medicare services performed by private providers, who were now able to profit off Medicare by charging extra fees for extra services, which they added to the basic amount of funds received via Medicare.

  The reason that people often chose private providers was that Medicare funding was being cut and consequently, less services were being offered under traditional Medicare. For those who could afford it, private providers became preferred, since people could then purchase the services they needed but were not offered under traditional Medicare. This "option" created the beginning of a two-tier system of Medicare, opening the door for the systems fracturing.

  The Wyden-Ryan plan would crack the nut wide open. But instead of saying privatization, a dirty word, "premium support" is used instead, a sterile sounding term with nasty consequences. It essentially means that each Medicare patient will receive a set amount of money for their Medicare that they can use to "shop" for their insurance. This would be the first time that Medicare spending would be capped, and the rate of growth of this capped fund would not match the rate of growth of health care prices. Once you've accepted the cap, the cap can be continually lowered by Congress or not raised to keep pace with inflation.

  Instead of reducing Medicare costs by going after profit-hungry pharmaceutical corporations, patients will have their services curtailed via the cap.

  The "choices" offered under the Wyden-Ryan will fully insert the profit motive into the national health care program: Medicare patients with poor health or chronic conditions would find that most private plans are closed to them, since it's unprofitable to actually offer the necessary, varied treatments for these patients. Thus, Medicare participants in poor health would remain in traditional Medicare, where costs would rise as more chronic patients joined and healthier patients fled to cheaper plans that allowed only healthy people. Richer patients would also flee to private plans for another reason: Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals are being continually lowered, doctors would naturally refuse to take Medicare patients as they now refuse to take Medicaid patients.

  The subsequent higher costs of traditional Medicare would then push up premium prices, co-payments, and deductibles, where very soon the "public option" of Medicare would be unrecognizable to its ancestor. The poor and those with chronic conditions would be legally discriminated against, since private companies are allowed to do so; a once proud public program will have been mutilated and rendered unusable, i.e. it will have been privatized.   

Medicare was first hijacked by the health care corporations in the 90's with the introduction of Medicare Part C, the original "option" to have privately run Medicare; and because Part C was privately controlled, it received 14 percent more money in inflated payments than did traditional Medicare patients (so that patients would be pushed into the program while corporations could turn a profit).

  Later, Medicare Part D was designed and implemented by these same health care corporations to boost profits (a gift from President Bush Jr.). It thus became common for private companies to have their hand in the Medicare honey jar.  

How is profit made in the health care business from Medicare? These companies get a set amount of money from the federal government, and if they provide less health care service than what they are paid, they turn a profit. They also profit by providing additional, unneeded services at inflated costs. The Government Accountability Office reported that in 2006, the private plans earned profits of 6.6 percent while having much higher administrative costs than traditional Medicare.   

By 2030 Medicare is expected to enroll 78 million people. Medicaid already provides health care to over 50 million Americans. The number of uninsured Americans stands at 50 million and is rising fast. Tens of millions of more Americans cannot afford the health care plans they are currently in, and millions more would prefer quality health care plans, not the ones they actually have.   

Hundreds of millions of Americans thus have a common interest in health care, yet the above attacks on health care continue while costs continue to rise.

  It makes sense that Americans should unite in a single health care constituency. Medicare cannot be defended by only current Medicare recipients; nor can Medicaid be saved by current benefactors. In order to unite all working Americans into a powerful coalition, Medicare for All should be demanded, so that all Americans will see their interests reflected in the fight. Few issues so directly affect so many people, but to expand the fight still further, a coalition could be formed that demands jobs, peace, and education, the other "big" issues that-- when put together-- directly affect nearly every single working person.

  The raw material for such a coalition already exists. If the labor and Occupy Movements unite to organize massive, ongoing demonstrations for these basic demands, the potential for a mass movement will have been realized. The majority of Americans would find common cause with such a movement, and after seeing masses of people in the streets, will believe that the fight can be won.

Like Social Security, Medicare is a self-funding program that can be easily preserved by raising taxes on the richest Americans and corporations. Taxing the rich can also help create a national jobs program, save public education and other vital social services, while also helping to galvanize such a movement.

Politicians are using the national and state budget crises to implement drastic austerity measures-- destroying public jobs and services from libraries and health care to roads and education. In Europe the fight against austerity has aroused the entire working populations of several countries, including Greece, England, Italy and Spain. The working people of the U.S. are facing the same austerity crisis and need to unite in the European fashion.

Want to fight back? You can help retire Paul Ryan here and help make the Blue Dog coalition extinct here; and you can send a message to the Democratic Party here. The DCCC and the Democratic Party establishment is in a quiet but deadly war against actual progressives and fully supporting conservative candidates who buy into the Wyden-Ryan plan. If you're not seeing Democratic candidates vowing to join the Progressive Caucus, you're seeing Democrats unwilling to stand up and fight for the New Deal. This week old-line Democratic establishment hack Walter Mondale endorsed anti-labor, reactionary and corrupt ex-Albuquerque Mayor Marty Chavez for Congress against progressive state Senator Eric Griego, something we've been warning about since last spring. The DCCC is quietly lining up conservative candidates to run against the best progressives working to represent working families in Congress. Is the DCCC as toxic for America as the Republicans? I'll leave that for you to decide.

Stuffing the ballot box fails, but Ryan still buffaloes PolitiFact on "lie of the year"

2011-12-21T18:46:00.000-06:00

Paul Ryan's attempt to stuff the PolitiFact ballot box failed; his pet nomination ended up in third place. But PolitiFact changed the rules and picked Ryan's favorite anyway. Go figure.

Adam Serwer at Mother Jones thinks he knows why:

Previously, PolitiFact's system for deciding the "Lie of the Year" was through popular vote, which in all honestly seems like a strange way to decide something like this. Nevertheless, while in 2009 and 2010 the lies of the year reflected choices made by readers, as Steve Benen points out, this year PolitFact decided to go with the third-place choice.
Explaining this decision, PolitiFact's Bill Adair wrote that "We discussed each of the other finalists and concluded that while clearly false, they failed to be as significant as the Medicare claim." So when Republicans were set to come up with a "Lie of the Year" hat trick, the good people at PolitiFact intervened on an entirely arbitrary basis. How exactly is it a "fact" that the Medicare claim is "more significant" than Senator Jon Kyl's (R-Ariz.) claim that abortion is "well over 90 percent of what Planned Parenthood does," or that "zero jobs" were created by the 2009 stimlus bill? It's not a fact at all. It falls in the realm of "defensible argument," a fact-checking nether region that, as Jonathan Chait points out, at the very least includes the Democrats' claim that privatizing Medicare changes the program so as to effectively "end it."
It seems rather clear that the point here was to avoid another avalanche of conservative criticism that would undermine PolitiFact's credibility as an unbiased source....

PolitiFact calls Dems' true claim on Medicare 'lie of the year'

2011-12-20T18:20:00.005-06:00

PolitiFact, the St. Petersburg Times newspaper operation that rates the veracity of political statements, gave Paul Ryan a little boost today when it listed as "the lie of the year" the assertion by numerous Democrats that Ryan's plan kills Medicare. Nope, says Politifact, which came to its conclusion even though a public survey on the question did not win out. That was a survey that Ryan tried to stuff.

Politifact's decision was a call by the national operation, not the Wisconsin Politifact franchise run by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The ruling gives Ryan some wiggle room to reinvigorate his image, if not his proposed legislation. The measure, which won passage in the GOP House, isn't going anywhere in this Congress under this White House, but could come back to haunt Americans after 2012's elections.

Politifact's analysis -- which basically mirrors Ryan's own rhetoric -- is that if you keep calling it Medicare but change most of its functions and greatly privatize it, that doesn't mean it will die. But many experts think otherwise, and when Democrats echo that analysis, Politifact takes them to task. Never mind that Ryan's proposal is specifically designed to give Republicans cover, bending over backwards to assure voters that Medicare will be stronger as a result. But it's just that: political camouflage, and nothing more.

Here's a more detailed analysis of Politifact's misguided ruling on DailyKos.
[And here's Thom Hartmann on the subject. -- Xoff]:

Republicans credit Paul Ryan with George Watts' phrase, 'The right to rise,' then distort its meaning

2011-12-19T16:06:00.000-06:00

Paul Ryan, the media darling, is getting a lot of mileage out of a simple phrase he used in a speech to the Heritage Foundation in Ocrober: "All Americans have the right to rise."

Republicans have begun to trumpet the phrase, since Jeb Bush, in an op ed in the Wall Street Journal, credited Ryan as the author, expanded on and twisted the idea. Bush called his piece "Capitalism and the right to rise," and said:

Congressman Paul Ryan recently coined a smart phrase to describe the core concept of economic freedom: "The right to rise."

Think about it. We talk about the right to free speech, the right to bear arms, the right to assembly. The right to rise doesn't seem like something we should have to protect. But we do.

We have to make it easier for people to do the things that allow them to rise. We have to let them compete. We need to let people fight for business. We need to let people take risks. We need to let people fail. We need to let people suffer the consequences of bad decisions. And we need to let people enjoy the fruits of good decisions, even good luck.

First off, Ryan didn't coin the phrase, although no one seems to be disputing the claim that he did.

I knew I'd heard it before; it had a familiar ring. Was it Jesse Jackson who said it? Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.?

The answer was much closer to home. Milwaukee's George Watts, a moderate Republican businessman who supported the civil rights movement, titled his autobiography, "Insurrection in Milwaukee: The Right to Rise." Watts died in 2005.

Watts, who ran unsuccessfully for Milwaukee mayor in 2000, was talking about the rights of minorities to rise from poverty and discrimination and take their rightful places in society.

Ryan, in fact, in his speech, said:

... let's lower the hurdles to upward mobiity ...Throughout human history, the American idea has done more to help the poor than any other economic system ever designed... Here in America, unlike most places on earth, all citizens have the right to rise.

Jeb Bush managed to turn that into a call for an end to regulation, so that millionaires and corporations can rise even higher.

George Watts might be pleased that he's being quoted, although he's probably prefer to have it attributed. But he would undoubtedly be appalled by the way "the right to rise" is being twisted as an argument to deregulate those at the top, when he was trying to help those at the bottom.

Paul Ryan Runs from his own Medicare Plan, Worried about Challenge from Rob Zerban!!

2011-12-14T23:18:00.000-06:00

Rep. Paul Ryan appears to be vulnerable in 2012, and he's showing it. His Democratic challenger Rob Zerban started early and campaigned often. And while Ryan has turned off constituents with fewer and fewer town halls and unwavering support of ending to Medicare, Zerban has moved within 6 points of overtaking Ryan. Get a load of this report from The Hill earlier today:

A prominent Democratic pollster is making the case that the party should invest in a challenge to Rep. Paul Ryan, the architect of the conservative House budget plan. Pollster Paul Maslin's survey of 405 likely voters "shows that challenger Rob Zerban is well-positioned to give incumbent Paul Ryan the toughest fight of his career, with a very good chance to upset him," Maslin wrote in a memo.

The survey found the district, the Wisconsin First, evenly divided on partisan issues … And, after respondents hear one additional paragraph description linking Ryan to the Republican leadership describing his authorship of the House budget plan, his support falls below 50% and his favorable rating becomes like Obama’s and Walker’s—dead even at 46% positive and 46% negative. And... Rob Zerban trails Ryan by only six points after this very brief exposition of Ryan’s signature idea, 49-43%.

Which has produced an amazing Ryan transformation…COMPROMISE on Medicare? Yes, Ryan is doing this all for the cameras. Paul Ryan is a snake, a sneaky con man willing to sell our seniors so the free market can profit from their medical needs. Ryan’s trying to diffuse his Medicare debacle, taking it out as an issue. But Ryan’s original intent can’t be erased. But he’ll try…:

jsonline: Republican House budget chair Paul Ryan has teamed up with Senate Democrat Ron Wyden of Oregon to offer what they're billing as a bipartisan approach to overhauling Medicare … Like the Ryan plan it would shift the fundamental structure of Medicare from a "defined benefit" program to a "defined contribution" program, and those seniors would use the subsidy to purchase health insurance from a menu of government-approved private plans.

But a traditional Medicare fee-for-service plan would be among the options seniors can choose from. Private plans would be competing with traditional Medicare to cover seniors, according to the plan.

Yes, its much like the vilified “public option” Democrats wanted to include in the Affordable Care Act, where private plans would have to compete with the lower government rates.

The new proposal also takes a different approach in how it sets the premium subsidies for seniors, and the rate at which those subsidies could grow over time, as medical costs rise. One of the chief criticisms of the Ryan plan … health costs rising much faster than inflation, beneficiaries over time would be forced to pay the difference … the premium subsidy would steadily erode.

Here’s where things get weird, confusing and problematic:

Under the new plan, the size of the premium subsidies would be tied to the costs of the insurance plans being offered to seniors. Increases in the subsidies would be capped at the growth rate of the overall economy plus one percent. And Wyden said that if health care costs grow at a higher rate, beneficiaries wouldn't necessarily be the ones absorbing the costs under their proposal. "We are rejecting that," said Wyden. "If that happens (if costs go up at a higher rate) Congress has to do its job and look at all other options: lower reimbursement (to providers), higher premiums for the wealthy."

Right, like that’ll happen.

Whether this new plan would in theory save as much money is not clear. Ryan said the new plan would also include consumer protections sought by Wyden.

Ryan can try to hide behind the misguided support of Ron Wyden, but he can’t run from his original plan no matter how hard he tries.

Nightmare of the year: Ryan runnerup for person of the year?

2011-12-14T16:38:00.001-06:00

Protesters are Time magazine's people of the year.

But the runnersup include just the sort of person many of them in the US were protesting against -- Paul Ryan, champion of the richest 1%, enemy of the poor and the elderly.

Ryan, again, gets a tremendous amount of credit for accomplishing nothing in the way of policy change.

Go figure.

Zerban poll says he has a shot at beating Ryan

2011-12-14T11:08:00.000-06:00

Rob Zerban, (pictured) the Democrat challenging Paul Ryan, has a shot at beating Ryan in November, the first poll done for Zerban's campaign shows.

One of the hurdles for a challenger in a Republican district is to demonstrate that there's a real chance for victory. There is a lot of competition for campaign financing, to put it mildly, and decisions made in Washington, DC about which races to target can turn the contribution spigot on or off.

Zerban's pollster, Paul Maslin, says in a memo that Zerban "is well-positioned to give incumbent Paul Ryan the toughest fight of his career, with a very good chance to upset him."

From Maslin's memo:

Ryan’s favorable rating has declined to 54% positive, his job rating is 55% and his reelect is 54%—all this before the beginning of an active campaign against Ryan. When voters hear positive information about Rob Zerban and Paul Ryan, Ryan’s support weakens further to 52%. Rob Zerban’s description receives a better than 3 to 1 positive reaction.
And, after respondents hear one additional paragraph description linking Ryan to the Republican leadership in Congress and describing his authorship of the House budget plan, his support falls below 50% and his favorable rating becomes like Obama’s and Walker’s—dead even at 46% positive and 46% negative. And... Rob Zerban trails Ryan by only six points after this very brief exposition of Ryan’s signature idea, 49-43%, with undecideds holding nearly unanimously negative views of Congress in general and more than 80% saying they have either a negative or neutral feeling toward Ryan at the end of the poll.

The memo, of course, puts things in the most favorable light for Zerban. The poll doesn't reflect the fact, for example, that Ryan has millions of dollars in the bank, so people will hear his message many more times than Zerban's, unless this race becomes a cause celebre among Dems.

That's the challenge for Zerban's campaign. He's clearly the most serious challenger Ryan has had in years, and Ryan's plan to get rid of Medicare and replace it with a voucher system may make him vulnerable. Then there's the national climate; people are fed up with a do-nothing Congress. Are voters in the 1st Congressional District fed up with Ryan?

This will be a race to watch, and Zerban's doing what he needs to do now to get people to pay attention. It's not too close to call yet, but it is too early to tell.

Politico has more.

Lyin' Paul Ryan and the end of Medicare

2011-12-13T10:01:00.001-06:00

Esquire's politics blog doesn't pull any punches:

Zombie-eyed granny-starver Paul Ryan of Wisconsin is having a tough year. First, he comes out with a plan to "reform" Medicare in the same way that an iceberg once "reformed" the White Star shipping line. Many people including (at the time) Newt Gingrich laughed at his mighty brain. (Why do they all laugh at my mighty brain?) Then bad things happened to some people who thought Paul Ryan had a good idea. Then, everyone in the world who could work an abacus looked at his plan and noticed that, yes, the plan added up to an actual elimination of Medicare even though Ryan planned to spray-paint "Medicare" on an old railroad bridge in Janesville and point to it and say, "See? Medicare is still there."
...Here's the thing, kids. Paul Ryan wants to end Medicare. Period. He has a philosophical objection to it. He doesn't think it's the government's job. However, he can't go for an up-or-down vote on this because he would lose about eleventy-bajillion-to-one. So, he's put together a plan to let Medicare "die on the vine," the strategy proposed by current GOP frontrunner Newt Gingrich so pithily back in 1995.

After Criticizing Ryan's Proposals - Gingrich Surges In Polls

2011-12-10T00:01:00.008-06:00

Remember when Newt Gingrich let his guard down and called Paul Ryan’s budget proposal and plan to end Medicare exactly what it is - "right-wing social engineering?"

Union Leader Excerpt:
Sununu told reporters that when Gingrich earlier this year called U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan's entitlement reform provisions of the Republican budget plan “right-wing social engineering,” it was “an effort of self-aggrandizement” that undercut Ryan and was “the most self-serving, anti-conservative thing one can imagine.”

That's funny. Against all odds since then, Gingrich has been slowly gaining on the other so-called conservatives running for the gold in the GOP presidential primary. Actually, Gingrich is now considered the front-running candidate among the pack of ghouls that speak in favor of Ryan's frontal attack on seniors, even pulling way ahead of Mitt Romney.

Union Leader Excerpt:
Sununu said, “What he did to Paul Ryan is just the latest in a pattern of anti-principled actions that really irritated his own leadership and produced 88 percent of the Republicans voting for his reprimand” in 1997.

The above statements from the bombastic Sununu says it all. Why should Newt Gingrich or any presidential candidate care a rat's ass about Paul Ryan? Think about it. Who is Ryan? Second and even more telling, how could criticizing Ryan's proposal be self-aggrandizement if it's so good?

The truth is, they all know Ryan's budget proposals are fictional, unworkable, radical and vicious - you have to be a goose-stepping single-file Randroid to believe in them. You have to be trained and "principled." They're sympathetic to Ryan and defend him because he was the only one evil enough to propose such a dastardly plan. They wouldn't dare propose the same so they translate Ryan's ideologically engineered insanity as courage. I'm guessing here that Gingrich isn't one of them.

Union LeaderExcerpt:
He said Gingrich's occasional “off-the-cuff” comments are “a reflection of the off-the-cuff thinking that he goes through to deal with the issues and that is not what you want in the commander-in-chief.”

People want to hear the truth and they know the truth when they hear it. Gingrich spoke the truth when he called Ryan's proposals "right-wing social engineering." Everyone knows that. When a politician like Sununu thinks telling the truth is not what people want in a commander-in-chief, I highly doubt it. But that statement should give pause and further thought about the truthfulness of the GOP candidates Sununu did not direct that statement at. Sununu should back-fire in their faces.

The best part is Romney, Sununu and rest of the cast of Ryan defenders don't know what to do next. They were going to bombard Gingrich with more garbage and venom aimed at drawing a greater contrast between themselves and the former House Speaker. But the
latest report out of Politico shows somebody may have connected Newt's surge to his criticism of Ryan so Romney skipped several chances to attack Newt Gingrich on Friday — an abrupt change to his campaign’s aggressive approach to draw that contrast.

But this is funny. They’re trying to undermine Newt Gingrich, not that I care, but the fact that Gingrich has surged past Romney seems to have gotten their underwear all bunched up. THEY were the ones preparing to aggrandize themselves by resurrecting Paul Ryan's proposals, but now they're not so sure. Yet, they accuse Newt of self-aggrandizement because he derided Ryan's proposals.

In the meantime, Gingrich surges ahead. Beauuutiful.

Sidenote: The Janesville Gazette, Ryan's hometown newspaper, published a mainstream media version of this story in the local section of the print copy. As of this posting, they have not opened the article to the Web for open commenting. Are they worried about self-aggrandizing constituents or protecting their political endorsement?

Ryan tries to stuff ballot box for PolitiFact 'lie of the year'

2011-12-09T11:34:00.001-06:00

Paul Ryan is trying to stuff the online ballot boxes in the national PolitiFact "lie of the year" voting, which ends Friday, Dec. 9.

One of the finalists is a claim by Democrats that Ryan's budget plan ends Medicare. the claim is 100% true. Think Progress explains:

Here is why: Ryan’s plan ends traditional fee-for-service program and forces seniors to ultimately enroll in private coverage. Under his proposal, beginning in 2022, people turning 65 will receive a pre-determined “premium support” payment to purchase private coverage. The insurers will offer a basic package of benefits, but traditional Medicare — the program that President Lyndon Johnson enacted in 1965 — will literally stop enrolling new beneficiaries.

Rather than paying health care providers directly — and using its market clout to secure better bargains and other efficiencies for enrollees — the government would now pay multiple private health insurers pre-determined amounts per beneficiary to act as middle men between patients and providers. It will no longer guarantee seniors a defined package of benefits, but will instead only offer a defined contribution towards their health care costs.

As the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis of Ryan’s proposal explains, “the payment for 65-year-olds in 2022 is specified to be $8,000, on average, which is approximately the same dollar amount as projected net federal spending per capita for 65-year-olds in traditional Medicare.” However every subsequent year, as health care costs increase, the government’s contribution “would grow at a slower rate,” inflation, and the age of the enrollee. By 2030, under the proposal, the premium support would “only cover 32 percent of a typical 65-year-old’s total health care spending” and would decrease every subsequent year. PolitiFact concedes that this is, in fact, “a huge change to the current program.”

But it’s more than that. Capping costs to beneficiaries, closing the traditional fee-for-service program, and forcing seniors to enroll in new private coverage, ends Medicare by eliminating everything that has defined the program for the last 46 years.

America Blog tells of Ryan's efforts to stuff the online ballot box:

It's pretty atrocious that Politifact is even letting people vote on this. Online votes aren't real votes. And for an organization that supposedly puts facts above whim, how can they honestly choose the "lie of the year" based on whether Dems or Republicans are able to get in more votes?... Here's GOP Congressman Paul Ryan's attempt to rig the vote, with an email to his PAC supporters:
From: Paul Ryan

contact@prosperitypac.com

Date: December 7, 2011

To: xxx

Subject: Vote now - "Lie of the Year"

Reply-To: Paul Ryan contact@prosperitypac.com

Dear xxxxx -

I need your vote. Politifact, a non-partisan, fact-checking website, is now taking votes for the 2011 “Lie of the Year,” and one of the nominees is the Democrats’ “Pants on Fire” lie about Republicans voting to “end Medicare.”

Click here to vote now and ensure the Democrats’ lies about the Path to Prosperity are exposed. Remember, our budget is the only plan that actually saves Medicare. We know the stakes are high in 2012 – it’s a chance to take our country back and get us back on a path to prosperity. We can’t let lies by Democrats about our conservative solutions go unchecked.

Help me fight the lies, falsehoods, and attacks of the Left by casting a vote to show the Democrat’s lie that Republicans voted to “end Medicare” is the worst political lie of 2011. Click here to cast your vote now at Politifact.

Thanks, Congressman Paul Ryan

Newt Was Right About One Thing: Paul Ryan's Plan Is Right Wing Social Engineering

2011-12-07T13:17:00.002-06:00

The big Ryan news today might have been how he's running around the country endorsing right-wing candidates who back his plan to end Medicare and make the tax system even more skewered towards the wealthy. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) got the kiss of death against teabagger Clark Durant in the GOP primary this morning. But in terms of real importance, the video above, ultimately, will mean far more.

Have you ever visited Stop Paul Ryan? It's the page Blue America uses to try appeal for contributions to help defeat the most dangerous Member of Congress. We just switched out an old Blue America ad with the video above. That video was released by Rob Zerban's campaign yesterday-- Rob the first plausible candidate to have ever run against Ryan since he was first elected in 1998. The DCCC has given Ryan a free pass-- more than a free pass; they have consistently sabotaged every good candidate who has tried to run against him, fixing the primary process so that Ryan would wind up with absurd primary opponents like John Heckenlively who was unable to raise any money against Ryan's massive Wall Street warchest-- and wound up with 30% of the vote.

Oh, so it must be a deep red district, useless to even try in, right? That's what the DCCC has tried very hard to help Ryan get across. But it's anything but a deep red district. It's a true swing district and, in fact, Obama beat McCain there in 2008 51-48%. (And that was while Ryan was racking up a 64% win without breaking a sweat.) Last year Ryan raised $3,922,760, while the candidate the DCCC installed-- and then never helped at all-- raised $12,066.

This year, all that is changing. Kenosha County Supervisor Rob Zerban has the very energized Wisconsin Democratic Party behind him and he's running a real grassroots campaign-- and a very effective one. Zerban sums it up pretty simply himself: "The Republican Party, led by Paul Ryan, is on a destructive mission to destroy the middle class. The sad truth is, Ryan's ideas have led Congress and our economy nowhere. Unlike Paul Ryan, I have real business experience and do not believe in trickle down economics." Please watch that video up top again. And then keep this in mind-- the spread between Ryan's 68% of the vote last year and Heckenlively's 30% was 38 points. The new poll that is being released tomorrow shows that the spread between Ryan and Zerban is 6 points. Think about that for a second. And then help us close that gap.

Ryan policymaker of the year? Scott Walker public employee of the year?

2011-12-07T11:58:00.001-06:00

As noted here earlier, Paul Ryan will be honored by Politico as the health care policymaker of the year for 2011, despite not making one iota of policy in 2011, and almost none in 13 years in the House.

Ari Berman of The Nation writes:

Blogger Digby jokes that “To honor [Ryan] for his work on healthcare policy is akin to honoring Governor Scott Walker as Public Employee of the year.”
The Politico award is reminiscent of a similarly ridiculous “fiscal responsibility” honor bestowed upon Ryan earlier this year by three leading deficit hawk groups.

Details here.

Video: The truth about Paul Ryan

2011-12-07T10:24:00.001-06:00

New video from Ryan's challenger, Rob Zerban, has a few zingers.

Ryan to endorse consevatives in primaries; What's that mean for Tommy Thompson?

2011-12-06T11:23:00.001-06:00

The Daily Caller reports:

Republican House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan says he’s on a mission to help elect “more conservatives in Congress to save the country” and plans to endorse in congressional races where there are “clear cut cases between reformers and career people.”

“We’re going to try to get behind people who are coming here to save the country and fight for limited government and economic freedom,” Ryan said in an interview with The Daily Caller about his political action committee, Prosperity PAC.

In a memo obtained by TheDC, the Wisconsin congressman plans to ask supporters to donate to his Prosperity PAC to help elect members of Congress “who aren’t afraid to make the tough, but necessary, decisions to secure our fiscal future, and, when necessary.”

In Wisconsin, what will that mean for Tommy G. Thompson, the career politician who is the most moderate candidate in a Republican U.S. Senate primary that includes Mark Neumann and Jeff Fitzgerald, both well to the right of Thompson.Fitzgerald's announcement used Ryan's template and the same buzz words:

"In Wisconsin I led the Assembly to a balanced budget in face of fierce opposition from the status quo," Fitzgerald said in a statement. "I would be honored to lead a new reform movement in Washington."

Thompson already has drawn fire -- and negative television commercials -- from the national right wing Club for Growth organization, which finds him far too liberal. Will Ryan join the right wingers trashing Tommy?Or will he duck an endorsement, as he's doing in the race for the GOP presidential nomination, saying his fund-raising role for the party keeps him from expressing his opinion?

That's not what a courageous conservative would do, is it?

Another Unholy Alliance With Paul Ryan. When Will Some Democrats Learn?

2011-12-04T12:16:00.001-06:00

Down With Tyranny graphic

Rock Netroots blog :

Another Unholy Alliance With Paul Ryan. When Will Some Democrats Learn?

This time it's Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) teaming up with Ryan on a proposed line item veto.

In the past, even Russ Feingold has taken the bait and stood with Ryan on the same issue.

Rock Netroots, based in Janesville, hometown of both Ryan and Feingold, thinks Feingold got snookered, too. More here.

Down With Tyranny blog also blasts Van Hollen, but has some kind words for Rob Zerban, Ryan's opponent, who opposes the line item veto. (Among other problems, the Supreme Court found it was unconstitutional in 1998.)

If you want to make believe the Republicans in Congress aren't fighting a vicious and concerted class war against working families on behalf of Big Business, Wall Street and the 1%, you can work with them towards bipartisan solutions. But then you'd have to be an idiot since, through words and deeds, the Republicans in Congress have shown, indisputably shown, that "bipartisan" always means the same thing for them: support the dogmatic right-wing approach/strategy. Former DCCC chair Chris Van Hollen ought to know better; maybe he does.

.
Read the rest of DWT's commentary here.

Ryan Projects the Propaganda by taking the "Moral High Ground."

2011-12-03T11:48:00.000-06:00

Paul Ryan’s fear campaign continues unabated, obscured by the usual “I know you are but what am I” tact, and a whole lot of conservative projection. In fact projection is the GOP’s primary offensive weapon; “where a person subconsciously denies his or her own attributes, thoughts, and emotions, which are then ascribed to the outside world, usually to other people.”

While Ryan accuses the Democrats of fear mongering his cost shifting health care reform plan for Medicare, where care is controlled by insurance companies and the free market, he actually does them one better by warning typically paranoid conservatives we’re about to “lose our country.”

Big Government:“We can be like Republicans in the past–trim the edges, slow things down, make things more affordable, buy time. Or we can do what is necessary to save our country. We’ve got to understand that there are core principles involved here–that if we compromise too far, we can win but we will still lose the country.”

Scared yet? Thank god we have Ryan to ease our worries and to take the "moral high ground." He'll talk some sense into us…via propaganda. Or as Ryan puts it, “educate” the public with corporate Prosperity PAC money.

Rep. Paul Ryan, chair of the House Budget Committee, also leads the Prosperity PAC, a political action committee … Prosperity Action is trying to change the premise of the debate about spending, to help educate the country, to educate grassroots activists … if we win that kind of an election, then we will have the moral authority to make the changes needed. I believe that President Obama is going to campaign on the idea that he offers the country a kind of security, that the Republicans will feed Americans to the wolves to help their rich friends. He’s going to use resentment, fear, and envy.

Ryan convincingly denies the truth by portraying the wealth disparity as resentment, fear, and envy, when nothing could be further from the truth.

Projection? Sure. The funny thing is, Ryan ignores or denies legitimate criticisms of his “free market” plan of self-rationing. The insane notion that insurance companies and hospitals will lower rates and cut their profit margins, while taking Ryan’s taxpayer premium support money in a supposed free market, is pure lunacy. To add insult to injury, Ryan also wants insurers to dump those with pre-existing conditions into a costly taxpayer supported high risk pool. Ryan socializes the risk, and privatizes the profits.

Besides appealing to conservative’s willingness to play the picked on victim of their misunderstood ideology, Ryan positions himself as one of the few wonkish numbers crunchers the party is willing to tolerate. That’s why the following string of big words sounds so impressive to Republican voters:

We must reject that substantively–statistically and quantitatively, but also seizing the moral high ground.

And when you seize the moral high ground, like Scott Walker has, you can do anything you want.

Donald Trump: Ryan's 'a lousy poker player'

2011-12-02T10:02:00.001-06:00

The Blaze blog:

In his new book “Time to get Tough,” (Regnery Publishing) America’s favorite game show host Donald Trump (pictured, on a bad hair day) says for America to get better, Republicans need to get smarter. He uses Rep. Paul Ryan as an example and not in a good way. From the book:
I’m sure Congressman Paul Ryan is a nice guy, but I can tell you this much: he is one lousy poker player. In an effort to talk about how he would balance the budget and rein in Washington’s spending addiction, he came out with his plan to overhaul Medicare. It was an absolutely unbelievable blunder… I’m talking about his total lack of negotiating skills.
Trumps book is set for release Monday.

Ryan, 'policymaker of the year,' made zero policy

2011-11-30T18:03:00.001-06:00

Politico announces that Paul Ryan is one of four "policymakers of the year" to be honored at an upcoming event.

Looking at the list of winners, it's sort of like the old "Which one of these doesn't belong?" game.

The three other winners actually made some policy. All Ryan made was noise.

The others winners are Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson, for energy, who "has been a forceful advocate on environmental issues and has held the line against intense Republican attacks on her agency," Politico says.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, and Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican, are the policymakers of the year in technology. The lawmakers' America Invents Act became the only major piece of tech legislation signed into law in 2011 — a rare instance in which a bipartisan effort bore fruit.

And Ryan? He's credited with changing the debate on health care with his Road to Ruin proposal, which the GOP House rubber-stamped, but it then died a predictable death.

Typical of Ryan, who has not passed a single significant piece of legislation since he's been in Congress. He has two minor bills to his "credit" in 13 years.

Policymaker of the year indeed. Why not the decade?

A Dubious Achievement Award would be a better fit.

A voucher by any other name is still a voucher, Mr. Ryan

2011-11-29T16:58:00.001-06:00

DuffyInk cartoon.

There is a campaign underway to rewrite recent history -- and Paul Ryan's Medicare voucher plan -- and pretend Ryan propose something called "premium support," which, we're told, is now attracting some Democratic support.

Ryan was right after all, the story line goes. One conservative even thinks that progressives owes Ryan an apology for dumping on his plan.

Kevin Drum sets the record straight in his Mother Jones post:

It's a free country and Paul Ryan can call his plan anything he wants. But that doesn't make it so. The fact is that liberal wonks didn't object to Ryan's plan because it included premium support, they objected to it because it's not premium support. It's a voucher with a very slow rate of growth that (a) does very little to actually rein in healthcare costs and (b) within a couple of decades would leave seniors paying enormous out-of-pocket expenses for medical care. It was that stingy rate of growth and unwillingness to tackle cost growth that turned off liberal wonks from the start. There are still plenty of us willing to support variations on genuine premium support plans that genuinely try to rein in medical costs and insure that seniors can continue to receive reasonable care at a reasonable price.

So I think I'll hold off on any apologies for now. Paul Ryan's plan was never either serious or courageous. It was a meat axe designed to get him applause from true believers and headlines as a "bold" thinker. But if he ever does get serious, I imagine he'll find plenty of support from liberals. We've been there for a while.

What's A Bigger Wisconsin Problem-- Scott Walker Or Paul Ryan?

2011-11-23T10:29:00.001-06:00

Howie Klein at Down With Tyranny:

Something over 100,000 signatures have been counted on the recall petitions for Wisconsin Koched-up fascist Scott Walker... in just 4 days. No doubt that's why right wing thugs have taken to threats of violence to protect their gains against the forces of democracy.The fight to recall Walker and the battle to keep retiring Senator Herb Kohl's seat blue-- by electing Tammy Baldwin-- are taking up all the oxygen in the room.

But we can't lose track of how crucial it is, not just for Wisconsin, but for all of America to stop Paul Ryan. More than anyone else, he is the political spokesperson for the 1% and Wall Street has every intention of seeing him all the way to the White House. There can't be anything in American politics more important that ending Ryan's career.

Read it here.

'Don't put me in coach' said Monday morning quarterback Ryan on debt

2011-11-22T13:02:00.000-06:00

Paul Ryan says it's frustrating that the Congressional supercommittee couldn't agree on a solution to reducing national debt.“It's another missed, wasted opportunity,” he said in Oklahoma, where he was raising money for a GOP candidate.

Ryan, the high profile chairman of the House Budget Committee, surely could have been a member of the supercommittee if he had wanted to be. But he said he had asked Speaker John Boehner not to appoint him. Why? There are several theories, including that Ryan knew from the start the group was doomed to fail.

Ryan offered his own spin on the committee's failure to the Oklahoman newspaper:

The problem was the Democrats could never agree with each other as to what they would agree to, so they kept trying to negotiate with each other. And that was just tough negotiating with people who are still negotiating with each other.

Actually, there were reports that one of the Republicans was ready to agree to a Democratic proposal but backed off at the end, The New York Times reported.

Whatever the reasons Ryan decided not to serve on the committee, his comments now certainly smell of Monday morning quarterbacking by a guy who asked the coach not to put him in the game.

Sensenbrenner says Ryan 'burying head in sand' or 'trying to score political points' on balanced budget amendment

2011-11-21T17:26:00.001-06:00

Big Jim Sensenbrenner (pictured), the Congressman from Wisconsin's reddest district, had this to say in a recent column on Brookfield Patch:

The House considered a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution, which requires a two-thirds vote in each chamber of Congress to pass. With opposition from the tax-and-spend left, the amendment did not pass.
This Balanced Budget Amendment closely mirrors the same one that passed the House in 1995 — with broad bipartisan support — and failed by only one vote in the Senate. Since then, our debt has nearly quadrupled.

My colleagues ... who voted against this amendment are either burying their heads in the sand or trying to misrepresent this effort to score political points. But ignoring our debt crisis won’t make it go away.

The ellipsis replaced the words "across the aisle," since Sensenbrenner was using the column to attack Democrats.

Thing is -- and this has got to be somewhat embarrassing for Big Jim -- one of the "no" votes was from his side of the aisle. A guy from Wisconsin. A buddy of his. A guy named Paul Ryan.

Three other Republicans also voted no.

On the other hand, Rep. Ron Kind, a Wisconsin Democrat, voted yes. Go figure.

What Will Happen To Paul Ryan If The GOP Really Does Provoke A Revolution?

2011-11-19T17:04:00.002-06:00

This post comes from a much longer one at DownWithTyranny today. And, among other things, it deals with an assertion by Paul Ryan ally Jim Jordan (R-OH) that “It would be difficult” to win passage of a supercommittee plan that includes more taxes. “If it’s a net tax increase, this is the most fundamental principle within the Republican Party,” Jordan said. “This is a sacred trust I think we as Republicans have with voters.”

Sacred? Really? Sacred? Can you even be a Republican these days without absolutely loathing the message of Jesus Christ? I can't see how it would be possible to embrace Jesus and the GOP message. Their actual object of worship-- Ayn Rand and her adolescent philosophy of selfishness and greed-- is the basis of the religion of Republicanism and... Christianity it's not. Paul Ryan, more than most, has been willing it publicly embrace it-- and it's reflected in his hate-the-poor legislative agenda.

In yesterday's Washington Post moderate Ezra Klein examined Ryan's latest thrust against ordinary working families on behalf of those who have financed his political career and have promised to make him president. Klein views Ryan's "Inequality Report" charitably and treats it as a serious policy statement-- even finds some worthwhile points.

But more broadly, Ryan’s paper tries to create a false choice between reducing income inequality, encouraging economic mobility and accelerating growth. Toward the end, Ryan actually says the debate over inequality breaks down into two groups:

1. Is the problem simply that some households make more than others, in which case policymakers should be focused on closing this income gap by any means at their disposal, indifferent as to whether government policies aimed to close relative inequality result in lower absolute levels of income?

2. Or is the problem that incomes for households in the middle- and lower-quintiles are not rising fast enough, in which case policymakers should focus first and foremost on creating the conditions for income growth and job creation?

If there actually is anyone out there who believes we should be focused on closing the income gap no matter the cost to growth, I’ve never met them. Conversely, there actually are people who focus on what they think to be pro-growth policies without heed to the income gap. People like, say, Paul Ryan.

In 2010, the Tax Policy Center released a detailed analysis of the tax provisions in Ryan’s Roadmap for America. If you were in the top 1 percent, they found, Ryan’s plan would save you $350,000 a year. If you were in the middle of the income distribution, it would cost you $152 a year. And if you were in the bottom 20 percent, it would cost you $393 a year. That would undoubtedly increase inequality.

And there’s good evidence that increasing inequality is, ultimately, bad for growth. Over at the International Monetary Fund, Andrew Berg and Jonathan Ostry recently published a paper looking at the relationship between inequality and growth across the world. In a sense, they were testing Ryan’s proposition exactly. “Some dismiss inequality and focus instead on overall growth-- arguing, in effect, that a rising tide lifts all boats,” they write.

Berg and Ostry found that “high ‘growth spells’ were much more likely to end in countries with less equal income distributions.” Moreover, “the effect is large .?.?. closing, say, half the inequality gap between Latin America and emerging Asia would more than double the expected duration of a ‘growth spell.’?” And it was robust: “Inequality seemed to make a big difference almost no matter what other variables were in the model or exactly how we defined a ‘growth spell.’?”

Ryan also plumps for his Medicare reforms as a solution to inequality. As you’ll remember, his budget proposes converting Medicare into a voucher system where seniors would be given a check and sent into a regulated private market to purchase insurance. The plan saves money because the check would grow at the rate of inflation, while health-care costs often increase three times faster than inflation, so, quite quickly, the check would cover only a small portion of an individual senior’s costs.

For rich seniors, this wouldn’t much matter. They could easily afford the cost of private insurance. For middle-income seniors, or lower-income seniors, it would be a disaster. Ryan offers them some subsidies, but not nearly enough. The cost of coverage would quickly outpace the resources many of them have to pay for it.

I mention this because Ryan’s paper emphasizes the difference between “absolute” and “relative” inequality. “A century ago,” Ryan writes, “the average American lived a life that was dramatically different, in terms of what he or she could experience and obtain, from an elite like Rockefeller. In many important respects, the difference between ultra-elites and average Americans is less pronounced today.”

But that difference is less pronounced in large part because of programs like Medicare, which ensure that poor and middle-class seniors have access to health care of similar quality to that of richer seniors. So where Ryan’s analysis suggests the need to means-test Medicare and control health-care costs to ease inequality, the core of his health-care plan, the very plan he touts in the conclusion to his paper, would dramatically increase absolute health-care inequality for seniors.

So it’s good that Ryan has started thinking hard about inequality. But it would be better if he thought harder about what policy could do to address it, or at least to avoid making it dramatically worse.

As for the rest of us, it's time-- past time-- to start thinking seriously how we're going to stop this dangerous threat to America and to social harmony in our country. Replacing him with Rob Zerban one year from now is the most obvious-- and least stressful-- way.

Palin Rips Millionaires In Congress For a Life Of Entrenched Corruption

2011-11-19T15:42:00.002-06:00

Mail Online News Excerpt:
Nearly half of Congress are millionaires - a status shared by only one per cent of Americans. According to a new study, at least 249 out of Congress’ 535 members are millionaires.

The analysis — released by the Center for Responsive Politics — is based on the average value of each lawmaker’s assets and liabilities, which members are required by law to report every year.

Granted, some members of Congress were born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Others were millionaires in their own right before they were elected. But in a recent op-ed column in The Wall Street Journal, Sarah Palin took exception to those elected officials who arrived under modest means and now find themselves to be in the 1 percent. That is a select group.

NewsMax Excerpt:
“How do politicians who arrive in Washington, D.C. as men and women of modest means leave as millionaires?” Palin asks in her column. “How do they miraculously accumulate wealth at a rate faster than the rest of us? How do politicians’ stock portfolios outperform even the best hedge fund managers?”

Palin’s answer: “Politicians derive power from the authority of their office and their access to our tax dollars, and they use that power to enrich and shield themselves.”

Who pray tell would fit that description? Why none other than our very own Paul Ryan.

No question, when Paul Ryan arrived in Washington, D.C., he was considered a young man of modest means from a solid middle-class family from Janesville, Wisconsin. His earlier story at the time was that his mom was worried he would be a lifetime beach bum. Until age 18, he collected Social Security survivor's benefits, which he put away for college. Later, he started out working as a restaurant waiter and with insider connections, moved up to office staffer for politicians such as Sen. Sam Brownback before being elected in 1998. In 2004, Ryan pointed out that since entering Congress he has had no ties to a cousin's firm, Ryan Central Inc., a construction and earth-moving company headquartered in Janesville.

Yet according to the latest report on wealth in Congress from the Center For Responsive Politics, Paul Ryan is listed in the millionaires club with an average net worth of $2,068,050.

So how did Paul Ryan become a millionaire while collecting a government paycheck?

Well, at least Sarah Palin knows.

Center For Responsive Politics - Members of Congress Enjoy Robust Financial Status, Despite Nation's Sluggish Economic Recovery

Download the full list of disclosed wealth on all current members of Congress here.

Ryan's bold new plan: Same old same old

2011-11-19T10:52:00.001-06:00

Paul Ryan’s solution to inequality helps the rich, does nothing for poor, says Greg Sargent at Washington Post.

Are we surprised?

Ryan's still offering the same old trickle down solution to the incredib le disparity in the distribution of wealth in this country.

Slog is less kind:

Unsurprisingly, it's full of the same old Republican talking points, gussied up with a few more misleading smarty-pants graphs. It's the same shit sandwich, though: Trickle-down economics, lowered taxes for everyone, and fixing the loopholes in the tax code.

"Ryan's mother was a hamster?'

2011-11-14T18:15:00.001-06:00

"Criticism of policy proposals is not the same thing as an ad hominem attack.

"If I say that Paul Ryan’s mother was a hamster and his father smelt of elderberries, that’s ad hominem. If I say that his plan would hurt millions of people and that he’s not being honest about the numbers, that’s harsh, but not ad hominem."

-- Paul Krugman has more on Truthout.

And Ryan's mother wears combat boots.

Ryan Almost Last In Time's Person Of The Year Voting

2011-11-13T21:07:00.000-06:00

The editors still make the choice, but in the magazine's beauty contest balloting, Ryan is almost dead last.

Behind Charlie Sheen and even Kim Kardashian, and here's what's really gotta hurt: tens of thousands fewer votes than the current people's pick, the 99%.

Person Of The Year?

2011-11-13T14:15:00.002-06:00

Time is looking for the 2011 Person of the Year. They asked their readers to help them pick one. Who could imagine that Paul Ryan would get any votes? But he did. Wall Street's own Wisconsin congressman, got 261 votes. And 3,771 people went to the trouble of voting against him. That was smart of them. Wall Street is determined to make him president someday. Ending his career sooner rather than later would help avert an existential threat to the American people. Ryan is far worse than just being the mouthpiece for the move to end Medicare. Please consider helping Rob Zerban beat him at the polls in 51 weeks. You can do that right here

Romney Endorses Radical Ryan Budget

2011-11-08T12:27:00.002-06:00

Ari Berman in The Nation:

When Paul Ryan introduced his radical budget plan this year—which would turn Medicare into a voucher system, privatize Social Security and massively redistribute income upward by drastically cutting taxes for the wealthiest one percent while severely slashing programs for low-income Americans—Mitt Romney heartily applauded.

“I applaud Rep. Paul Ryan for recognizing the looming financial crisis that faces our nation and for the creative and bold thinking that he brings to the debate,” Romney said in April 2011. “He is setting the right tone for finally getting spending and entitlements under control. Anyone who has read my book knows that we are on the same page.”

Now Romney has gone a step further, actively incorporating Ryan’s ideas into his own plan to reduce the social safety net, which he outlined at the Koch Brothers–funded Americans for Prosperity convention on Friday. Romney would raise the eligibility age for Social Security and Medicare, cut $100 billion from Medicaid and allow seniors to pay for health coverage through vouchers for private insurance (a shrewd way to undermine the immensely popular government-run Medicare program).

After the speech, Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin wrote that Romney “has found his inner Paul Ryan.” Ryan, in turn, told Rubin that Romney’s plan was “a great development…. This tracks perfectly with the House budget.” The Wisconsin congressman gushed to National Review: “It shows we’re all singing from the same hymnal.”

Given the unpopularity of the Ryan budget, Romney may come to regret this endorsement. It may help him win the votes of Tea Party conservatives in the GOP primary, but it will almost certainly become a liability in a general election campaign against President Obama.

Ryan Keeps Pretending Imaginary Health Care Plan Is Real

2011-11-04T17:37:00.004-05:00

New York magazine:

At a recent town hall meeting, House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan was confronted by a 53-year-old man with end-stage renal failure, who pointedly told him that, under Ryan’s plan, he will die ...

Ryan’s response was to reassure the man that he would be taken care of...

Contrary to the impression he left at the town hall, Ryan knows full well that his budget plan does nothing for the uninsured.

Read it here.

'Just shoot me,' constituent tells Ryan

2011-11-03T10:12:00.003-05:00

Poor Paul Ryan just can't win for losing. After dodging constituents all summer, he breaks down and holds some town hall meetings, and what do they do? Criticize his Grand Plan.
Think Progress reports:

Kenosha resident David Drath, 53, told Ryan he is a kidney transplant patient who relies on support from Medicare and Social Security. “I could not survive on the proposals in your policy,” Drath said. “If they’re put in place, you might as well put a gun to my head.”

Balloon Juice blog piles on:

Paul Ryan was booed (again) at a town hall meeting in Kenosha, Wisconsin last week, after one of his constituents pressed him about the GOP budget. As you may recall, Paul Ryan’s Very Serious Budget would turn Medicare into a voucher program, and amounts to little more than a decimation of the programs (Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security) on which the elderly and poor rely on to… you know… not die.

Maybe he'll get a better reception on Nov. 9 when he meets with the Tea Party at a Racine country club.

Townhall Report Pt.2: Provocative Congressman Earns 30 Police Officers At Townhall

2011-11-01T00:28:00.003-05:00

I've been to plenty of Paul Ryan's so-called "listening sessions" in hometown Janesville over the years and knowing that those in attendance were mostly his committed supporters (hundreds of cousins) sprinkled with a few free thinkers like myself, the crowd reactions were often enthusiastic. But something was very different at his most recent listening session held at the Pontiac Center in Janesville.

When I arrived at the event, there were several police officers directing vehicles in the parking lot while there appeared to be two more watching the dozen protesters carrying signs on the nearby public sidewalk of the facility. After talking to a friend in the lot for a few minutes, I entered the facility a few minutes late passing a couple more plainclothes police officers in the lobby. Unfortunately, I missed the very beginning of the session where, according to the Janesville Gazette, a Janesville police official took the stage and gave district constituents a verbal warning that anyone speaking out of turn or ignoring their warning would be escorted out.

That explains why I felt constituents seemed to be raising their hands sheepishly like small children do in school after they have been scolded by a paddle waving teacher. Even the GOP's south-central propaganda machine and one of Ryan's most powerful media enablers in the district seemed surprised that there were no angry outbursts and only "smatterings" of polite applause, both for and against. These subdued and shackled reactions coming soon after Ryan proposed the starvation and eventual dismantlement of Medicare and Social security and his connections to hedge fund managers on Wall Street did not seem right, even from a typical Ryan majority Townhall. As reported in the Gazette, it turns out somebody deemed it necessary to assign 30 police officers for the event and also had a "wagon" bus ready to hold multiple arrests. That explains everything.

When people feel like they might be targeted by the local police if they utter a boo, move or say something they may not like or agree with at a Townhall - something is desperately wrong with our democracy. Clearly, many law-abiding citizens and peaceful protesters felt extra-conscious and unnerved by the heavy police presence. On the other hand, the Janesville police must know the obnoxious congressman provokes outrage. Why else would they think they needed 30 officers assigned to this event? For the twelve protesters peacefully assembled outside the door? Oh please.

Ironically, the penny-pinching conservatives at the Janesville Gazette made no mention about who will foot the bill for the estimated 60 man-hours of police security for the townhall meeting hosted by Ryan, who often detaches himself from local issues by referring to himself as a federal guy.

Unfortunately, if squelching dissent and natural public discourse was their goal, they've accomplished it in aces. However, this is no way to hold a townhall meeting where constituents attend and attempt to speak their minds freely without being in fear of being arrested. This will not likely change until Paul Ryan is removed from occupying our congressional district office.

Quote From The Gazette Comment Section...

YKM - "If only Paul Ryan would not have spent the last twelve years in Congress sponsoring and voting for tax exemptions, credits, loopholes, subsidies and tax shelters, he would not be here today under heavy police guard blaming government for leveraging winners over the losers with tax exemptions, credits, loopholes, subsidies and tax shelters."

Additional:

Rock Netroots - Janesville Townhall Report

The Paul Ryan Watch - Elkhorn Townhall Report by Dave, Down With Tyranny

What Does Paul Ryan Tell The Folks In southeast ScottWalkerstan?

2011-10-31T13:32:00.001-05:00

Last week, Paul Ryan, Wall Street's very own Wisconsin cat's paw, sent out a fundraising letter on behalf of the RNC but instead of the usual adolescent Ayn Rand gibberish he wows his speaking audiences with, he took on the mantle of the protecter of, of all things, the 99%:

America is at a tipping point. 14 million Americans are unemployed and 9.3 million are underemployed. Our debt has grown over $4 trillion in less than three years and will be above $16 trillion before the end of 2012. The safety net for the poor is coming apart at the seams and no one in Washington seems to care.

No one seems to care? So Paul Ryan, author of the GOP plan to end Medicare, a congressman who helped force through Bush's T.A.R.P. Wall Street bankster bailout while consistently voting to dismember Social Security... he cares?

Unfortunately for Ryan, major media these days does more fact checking than his carefullu woven web of lies can stand up to. Like this little whopper be squawked out Oct 27 on CNBC's Squawk Box: "You have 219 new regulations coming out, costing over $100 million each.”

the source of the [219] figure-- Susan E. Dudley, director of the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center-- decided to do a deeper examination of the data. She found that the number of pending regulations that met the $100 million threshold in the database she examined was actually 158. There were also limitations in the database.

It is also worth noting that Bloomberg News this week reported that “Obama’s White House has approved fewer regulations than his predecessor George W. Bush at this same point in their tenures, and the estimated costs of those rules haven’t reached the annual peak set in fiscal 1992 under Bush’s father.”

Paul Ryan needs to get his talking points updated. He gets Three Pinocchios.

You can't blame anyone from watching Ryan from K Street and Wall Street perspectives. They are, after all, his world. However, DWT has a secret weapon in southeast Wisconsin, our man Dave, and we agreed that it was time to see what line of bullshit Ryan is feeding his constituents these days. So Dave decided to brave a very restricted town hall meeting.

Observations from a Ryan Town Hall meeting

-by Dave

I attended Ryan's Elkhorn, WI listening session Friday. Right after his big speech at the AEI. I hoped to get the chance to ask a question or two and get a feel for the level of support of attendees. Sadly, I was not called on to ask a question (no surprise, it appeared he only called on people he knew, or may have been screened).

Let me paint a picture. White older to middle aged audience, no minority's to be seen. No young people (other than his pages). More people than I ever saw at one of his meetings in Elkhorn, standing room only (about 200). Mostly huge supporters, true believers. Plenty of security, the sheriff and a half dozen deputies and the local police. No signs were allowed in the room (dumb rule here; they would have been supporters signs).

The last time I attended one of these it was after Ryan's solution to the Social Security and Medicare "crisis" was proposed. There were half as many people and a few of us carried signs demanding no cuts to these programs. The event went down about the same. Ryan opens with a power point presentation describing the imminent collapse of our country because of the uncontrolled costs of social programs. He goes on to explain the only problem is spending and we need to make drastic cuts to save the free society we live in. Lots of references to that. What kind of country do you want to live in? Europe? Because those people are not free. Government takes all their money and makes all the decisions. No American dream there.

He has brainwashed these followers to believe that the freedom to be homeless is a good thing, the freedom to die from lack of health care is a good thing, and the ability to be screwed by mega corporation out of your money is also a good thing. American freedoms we should protect and treasure.

These are not by and large wealthy people. I'm sure some of the farmers are and a few others too. But they have bought into the idea they are. To arrogant or ignorant to realize they are one major health problem or job loss away from living in their cars. That kind of thing only happens to other people they don't care about; undocumented aliens, people of color (other than white), trailer park trash. Why help them? Oblivious to the fact bad luck is any equal opportunity destroyer of lives.

Back in the session a local banker Ryan knows asks about killing the Dodd Frank bill, says it is hurting small banks. Ryan agrees, say it needs to go because it picks winners and losers ( Huh? I thought he did that by bailing out the big banks.) Goes on later to say he is all in for drill baby, drill in response to another softball question. Then on to endorse the amazing new drilling technology that is safe and opening up vast new gas reserves in this country (fracking).

Any question asked is replied to with a talking point. Regulation is killing this country, and all these government programs are taking away our freedom. Obama is a divider because he (accurately) describes repukes as anti environment and anti women and against everything-- which is just not true! We must repeal Obamacare (his words), because it forces private insurers to meet minimum requirements for coverage and mandates its purchase. Doesn't mention we will all still be buying insurance from private insurers, but won't be able to be screwed by them. Not one question about jobs. Crazy.

A postman came prepared and asked if Ryan would support a number of bills to bail out the post office by changing the 75 year pension funding requirement. Ryan says that this is commonly done???? And actuarialy sound. He will not discuss specific bills claiming ignorance and says he will know more once the bills are marked up. He goes on further to say he is confident Rep. Issa is going to put together a good piece of legislation. The topic is changed and the postman is left out to dry. No sounds of support from the crowd for him.

In fact a lot of silence. Passive silence. A lot like church services, with Ryan as the preacher. Until one gentleman asked why hasn't Obama been impeached yet. The crowd roars. Ryan politely says until Obama commits a high crime or misdemeanor they can't impeach him.

The meeting was wrapping up so I slipped out the back thinking our best chance of defeating him, Ron Zerban will never win over these (ignorant or nasty?) lemmings. His only hope is huge majorities in the hurting bigger cities and with young people. The voter suppression laws passed in WI are going to be a problem for Ron. He will need to get out the vote and produce some hard hitting TV ads showing what a shameless corporate/wall street shill Ryan is. Take off the gloves and go medieval on his ass.

I don't think Ryan has anything to brag about in his record. The economy? Landmark pieces of legislation? His budget? Wanting to gut Social Security and Medicare? Bailing out the Wall street banks? Slashing spending and not willing to raise taxes on millionaires? I don't see any winners there. And he's been there long enough to be considered part of the problem with Congress.

He does have those Eddie Munster good looks though...

The Washington Post Finds A Grumpy Paul Ryan

2011-10-30T20:48:00.000-05:00

Thank you, Occupy Wall Street, and President Obama, for putting a frown on Paul Ryan's face.

Want some candy?

'Ryan and GOP are like OJ -- they're the real killers'

2011-10-30T10:31:00.000-05:00

“For Paul Ryan or any Republican to talk about the President inciting the politics of division is much like OJ Simpson saying he’s going to devote his life to finding the real killer– they’re the real killers!” -- former Rep. Alan Grayson on MSNBC with Ed Schultz.

Read more and watch it here.

Townhall Report: Paul Ryan In Damage Control Mode?

2011-10-29T13:09:00.003-05:00

I attended Ryan's Townhall in Janesville and for the most part walked away with nothing new or substantive to report from his presentations.

But Ryan has changed his demeanor somewhat. Not that he's done an about-face from his usual brash and cold snark-poopery, but he has backed away incrementally from his heavy partisanship and demagoguery of President Obama and Democrats in much of his presentation. At least that is how it appeared in Janesville.

He did however answer almost every question with a long and drawn out explanation oftentimes deluding its core premise to the point where few people probably remembered what the question was in the first place.

For the most part, he was playing to the audience and each questioner individually, giving them exactly what they wanted to hear but without offering a clear answer. For instance, he was asked whether he thought corporations are people. Instead of giving a simple yes or no with a supporting reason, he attempted to teach the audience why corporations should be treated the same as people.

Only one question was handled short and swift by the congressman. It happened early in the session when a constituent asked Ryan about whether his oath to Grover Norquist was before or after he entered office. Ryan replied he's been in office since 1998 and signed the pledge later. End of story. Next!

Another interesting question, or statement, came later on from someone who thought it was unfair that public sector workers make 30% more and usually have better benefits than private sector workers. Ryan replied that he agrees, that it's not right taxpayers are funding employees compensation and benefits better than what the taxpayers get. Of course that's nuts. But soon afterwards came a question about his speeches referencing class warfare, resentment and class envy.

He replied...

"I don't think it's healthy for us to be stoking the flames of envy and resentment, I don't care about rich people, because they are already rich. What I worry about is making it easier for people to become successful, who's never seen it before... -- Paul Ryan

Doh! So, it's okay to fuel wage envy, resentment and division between taxpayers and public sector workers, but not okay if one of the sides is rich? He wants to make it easier for people to become successful, but is a proud member of the anti-union party? Oh well. This is typical Ryan.

But it doesn't end there. Ryan said he doesn't care or worry about the rich. Then why does he worry about their feelings?

"Don't tax them so much and don't regulate business so much, because that causes uncertainty, and that feeling keeps them from creating jobs." -- Paul Ryan

Oh poor dears.

In between, Ryan mockingly complained about the run-around he recently got from hospitals and insurance providers on costs and billing after one of his kids had their tonsils removed. Soon after again, in response to a question about how he intends on turning patients into consumers shopping around for a double by-pass, he brags about how his health care proposal would help that because everyone would have the same plan he now enjoys as congressman. So you wouldn't really have to shop because hospitals would be competing for your business automatically with costs and prices set by a shopper's consumer market. Like Best Buy. That's about how most of the Townhall went. His responses were loaded with simple hypotheticals and overly agreeable answers loaded down with deliberately convoluted talking points that were often irreconcilable with each other. In other words, his answers were double-loaded. That's Paul Ryan in a nutshell.

Lastly, possibly an extension from his recent Heritage Foundation speech, Ryan takes on a populist tone by explaining that government rigged a system of tax shelters and exemptions in favor of the 1% and the only way to correct this outrage is to "broaden the tax base and lower the rates," as outlined in his proposals.

Hmmm. It's mirror time!

SodaHead Excerpt:
Ryan has also opposed efforts to close offshore tax loopholes, a record 51 times since he took office. He voted against an amendment in 2006 that would have barred funding for government contracts with U.S. companies incorporated offshore to avoid paying U.S. taxes. In 2004, he opposed an amendment that would have prohibited the Export-Import Bank from approving direct loans to U.S. companies incorporated offshore to avoid U.S. taxes.

He's like a broken record.

He backed away from the heavier rhetoric about his schemes to destroy Social Security and Medicare. However, any support Ryan gives these programs seems to come providing only if they are transformed into pure welfare programs for the destitute. But as far as an actual jobs plan? Ryan doesn't have one unless you think the rich need the certainty of more taxcuts and deregulation so they "feel" better about creating jobs - is a jobs plan.

The more I thought about this townhall, the more I realized that there was absolutely no reason for Ryan to have one unless he wanted to divert public opinion away from his Kill Medicare proposal and the damage he incurred at his recent Rotary Club Townhall where seniors were tackled and handcuffed for speaking their mind. Which seems to be the only logical conclusion.

Note: The Janesville Police Department had 30 officers assigned to work Ryan's Townhall at the Pontiac Convention Center. There were about a dozen protesters carrying signs outside at the parking lot entrance. No seniors or demonstrators were arrested

'There's absurd, then obscene, then Paul Ryan'

2011-10-29T11:18:00.001-05:00

Ryan roundup:

There's absurd, then obscene, then Paul Ryan on Pantheos blog.

Paul Ryan and the 1 percent: Ryan money-blind to social contract by Joe Conason.

RNC discovers the safety net in a fund-raising pitch from Ryan. From Washington Monthly.

Ryan's precious millionaires

2011-10-27T19:47:00.006-05:00

A pretty thorough take-down of Paul Ryan's idea that taxing millionaires simply isn't worth the trouble appeared this morning in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Community columnist Chuck Bayton simply nailed it, although I must admit that his sophisticated insights probably would go right over the heads of a goodly number of Ryan constituents. Here's a taste:

Quick Latin lesson: Reductio ad absurdum. That's what you've been reading. Ryan's argument is that if you can make a small segment's potential contribution to the whole seem small, then you shouldn't press for more from that segment, regardless of how little it gives now. If that were legit, then the Baynton-Bachmann argument for nothing from Baynton would be legit, too. Preposterous.

But wait. What about the idea that enough money to run the government for four months isn't very much? Four months is one-third of the year, and Ryan's hypothetical case raises it from about 1/400 of personal tax returns. So his example actually shows that even if you taxed the top 1/400 at a lower, reasonable rate and then asked profitable corporations to bear a significant proportion of the whole, the contribution of those two segments would be substantial. The tax burden on the rest of us, even assuming present spending levels and a balanced budget, would be far lower than what happens with those two segments making small contributions.

If you still think Ryan believes millionaires lack the potential to contribute in a big way, ask yourself this: When it's time to finance his next campaign, will he bother with the millionaires?

More at:
http://www.jsonline.com/news/opinion/paul-ryan-and-the-millionaires-132660988.html

Wall Street's Paul Ryan Takes The Stage For The 1%

2011-10-27T17:12:00.000-05:00

I wonder if the residents of Janesville, Racine, Kenosha, Muskego and Oak Creek ever wonder who's looking out for their interests back in Washington when "their" congressman is primping and preening in the national media spotlight for his Wall Street paymasters and singing Ayn Rand's sweet anti-Christian tunes for the one-percenters. Paul Ryan was puked up onto the national stage primarily because of his proposal to end Medicare, a priority for Wall Street for decades. And yet if Ryan's plan were to pass it would be catastrophic for the people who have been sending him to Congress year after year. Ryan's plan would have adverse impacts on seniors and disabled individuals in the district who are currently enrolled in Medicare. It would:

• Increase prescription drug costs for 9,700 Medicare beneficiaries in the district who enter the Part D donut hole, forcing them to pay an extra $95 million for drugs over the next decade.

• Eliminate new preventive care benefits for 112,000 Medicare beneficiaries in the district.

The Republican proposal would have even greater impacts on individuals in the district age 54 and younger who are not currently enrolled in Medicare. It would:

• Deny 550,000 individuals age 54 and younger in the district access to Medicare’s guaranteed benefits.

• Increase the out-of-pocket costs of health coverage by over $6,000 per year in 2022 and by almost $12,000 per year in 2032 for the 127,000 individuals in the district who are between the ages of 44 and 54.

• Require the 127,000 individuals in the district between the ages of 44 and 54 to save an additional $29.7 billion for their retirement-- an average of $182,000 to $287,000 per individual-- to pay for the increased cost of health coverage over their lifetimes. Younger residents of the district will have to save even higher amounts to cover their additional medical costs.

• Raise the Medicare eligibility age by at least one year to age 66 or more for 70,000 individuals in the district who are age 44 to 49 and by two years to age 67 for 419,000 individuals in the district who are age 43 or younger.

Yesterday Ryan gave one of his puffed-up, self-aggrandizing, big flashy speeches at the right-wing-financed Heritage Foundation. The Washington Post, aghast but right on the mark, labeled it Misleading, out of touch, and filled with tired talking points.

Ryan: "Just last week, the President told a crowd in North Carolina that Republicans are in favor of, quote, “dirtier air, dirtier water, and less people with health insurance.” Can you think of a pettier way to describe sincere disagreements between the two parties on regulation and health care?"

Yes, I can: The entire premise of this very speech. The accusation that Obama and Dems are sowing “envy” and ”class warfare” because they’re taking modest steps to slow trends that have severely exacerbated inequality for decades is as petty and small minded as it gets. Politics is a tough business, and it’s supposed to be all about an aggressive clash of visions. Deal with it.

Ryan's Democratic opponent, Rob Zerban dealt with it by live-tweeting Ryan's fatuous speech:

Ari Berman summed all that up in just one tweet:

Protect Your Care wasn't nearly as forgiving of Ryan's myriad shortcomings:

Paul Ryan decrying partisanship is as credible as a guy standing in front of a burning house with a can of gasoline and matches whining that the firefighters response time is too slow.

We understand his frustration and sense of isolation but it’s his own fault for proposing a massively unpopular plan to end Medicare while giving away massive tax breaks to millionaires, big oil companies and private jet owners. We also understand how his frustration must have gotten even worse when vast majorities of the public also are now supporting President Obama’s plans to protect Medicare and create jobs while ensuring that millionaires pay their fair share of taxes.

But if he wants to have less partisanship he may want to consider availing himself of some of the mental health care options available under the government provided, tax payer funded, health care he accepts instead of projecting his anger into his obsession with taking away Medicare from seniors.

And Brian Beutler at TMP pointed out that what the Republicans are doing is pit "conservative darling Paul Ryan against liberal hero Elizabeth Warren, with Ryan serving as a tribune to wealthy Americans and Warren as a populist fighter for working people."

This may seem like an odd choice for the GOP. Ryan’s the Republicans’ top budget guy, and the person most responsible for tying his party to a plan to phase out Medicare and to use the savings to reduce taxes on wealthy Americans. That vision has proved disastrously unpopular, and the GOP has spent months trying to dig themselves out from under the avalanche of ensuing public opinion polls. But Ryan ironically remains the GOP’s preferred spokesman on these issues, and he tackled Warren head on after a speech at the conservative Heritage Foundation, in which he defended wealthy Americans from growing calls for higher taxes on their income, and attacked President Obama and Democrats for engaging in what he calls “class warfare.”

Warren, who’s hoping to defeat Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) in 2012, has made the most digestible case for this sort of plan-- to shore up the social safety net and fund jobs programs with higher taxes on the rich, who’ve seen their incomes skyrocket in recent years. She took this case to voters several weeks ago and it set the Internet ablaze.

...Ryan’s counterargument... isn’t just that Warren’s wrong about who should pay, but that she’s wrong about what they and the government should be paying for.

But Ryan isn't running for national office, isn't running for the U.S. Senate and isn't running against Elizabeth Warren. He's trying to hang onto his seat in southeastern Wisconsin after consistently selling out the people who live there-- and in a district won in 2008 by Barack Obama. And this year, for the first time ever, the DCCC isn't protecting him by inserting a weak and implausible opponent. Rob Zerban understands real people and understands the pain and anguish that has spawned the 99% movement in Wisconsin and across America. He's going to give Ryan a run for Wall Street's money. After the speech Ron told us that Ryan was "unable to escape his extreme proposals and divisive language, even in today’s speech which was supposedly about bipartisanship."

"Voters realize that Paul Ryan is at the helm of one of the most failed, divisive, and disappointing Congresses in American history. His plan in the Budget Committee advanced a radical agenda that endangers programs Americans trust and support including Social Security and Medicare. He is demonstrating a failure to listen to the will of the vast majority of Wisconsinites.

"His language today reflected the same stubborn and unproductive attitude that has crippled our government. He attacked the President, saying he is a 'pyromaniac' and accusing him of 'sowing class envy and social unrest' in his attempt to create jobs and renew America’s crumbling infrastructure. Paul Ryan has labeled Social Security, a program that generations of Americans have relied upon, a felonious, Bernie Madoff-style Ponzi scheme. Ryan also repeated his opposition to Medicare as we know it by calling it a 'boondoggle.'

"In short, we saw the same old ideas for the economy and familiar partisanship that led me to run for Congress.”

The DCCC isn't actively trying to protect Ryan this year-- finally-- but so far they're spending all their money on helping anti-Choice Blue Dogs rather than progressives like Rob. He can use some help from the grassroots and you can help him right here

Does Paul Ryan have Dissociative Identity Disorder?

2011-10-27T00:32:00.007-05:00

Paul Ryan, you know the progressives are a cancer, labor unions are like Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party, and not voting for TARP would usher in Barack Obama's liberal fascism Paul Ryan, was reportedly accusing Obama of “preying on the emotions of fear, envy and resentment” in a bizarre speech at the Heritage Foundation.

Imagine that.

Nearly every Ryan quote posted in this Politico article was mind-blowing introspective identity transference - that is, he accused Obama of the very economic, social and political transgressions Ryan himself has perfected to a fine precision against the wage earning class for the past decade.

Politico Excerpt:
[...] said the class warfare that threatens the U.S. is “[a] class of bureaucrats and connected crony capitalists trying to rise above the rest of us, call the shots, rig the rules, and preserve their place atop society. And their gains do come at the expense of working Americans, against entrepreneurs, and that small businesswoman who has the gall to take on the corporate chieftain.”

Just imagine if you can, that the one congressman whose legislative record demonstrates an eager willingness to use government power to rig a system of trade, credit, capital and taxation to the advantage of connected crony capitalists, made the above statement. Had Michael Moore, Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders made that statement - fine. But completely preposterous coming from Paul Ryan unless of course it was part of a confession.

Even more so, Ryan accused Obama of setting up straw men and scapegoats (have you ever been to a Ryan townhall?), and engaging in intellectually lazy arguments, as he tries to build support for his jobs plan.

Intellectually lazy arguments? Have you checked out the latest Politifact editorial where they laughingly analyze a wildly hypothetical statement from Ryan? Seriously, the JS Politifact is now fact-checking his hypotheticals. Just wonderful. Ryan, who rarely makes reality-based non-fictional statements to support his ideological-based schemes to defraud trillions out from Social Security and Medicare recipients, leaves his enablers at Politifact with grudgingly little more than fabrications in their effort to prop up and defend him from statements made by those evil democrats.

Politifact gave Ryan a "half true" rating when he claimed that a 100% tax on millionaires would fund only four months of government operations. But get this, Politifact even goes so far as to bolster Ryan's misfire by stating that had he drawn his hypothetical from more current data, his point would have been stronger showing government would run for an even shorter period.

Of course nobody ever suggested taxing millionaires at 100%, so their editorial was little more than low-grade windbaggery masquerading as a fact-check analysis, but Ryan constantly draws on this kind of class-based rhetoric to, you guessed it, to set up straw men and scapegoats.

After keeping a watchful eye on our congressman for almost ten years now, I'm more convinced than ever that he either has Dissociative Identity Disorder (multiple personality) or he is a very cunning liar. He can't see the Paul Ryan in Congress that rigs the system against the wage earning class with his wrong-headed proposals and votes, to the one he wakes up to everyday. How can anyone make those statements without first looking in the mirror and seeing themselves? Unless of course he has no reflection.

Others Have Noticed

Crooks and Liars Ryan Blames President For trying to put out fire set by Ryan

The Paul Ryan Watch Ryan Loves Everyone, some restrictions apply.

Think Progress Ryan Wrong on Income Inequality

Paul Ryan Loves Everyone* (some restrictions apply)

2011-10-26T09:25:00.002-05:00

Paul Ryan (R-Wall St.) is giving a speech today boldly rejecting the politics of division. The congressman from Janesville, WI, likes to give his "speeches" anywhere but WI and will be giving this "colossal" speech at Heritage Foundation.

Ryan (R-Ending Medicare)who is taking time off of from his very busy schedule, will denounce division and profess his "love for everyone."*

* Does not apply to college graduates, retired constituents, constituents who can not afford college, the environment, President Obama , the middle class, Janesville, WI, unsolicited questions from constituents, the truth, cheap wine , and the future of our country!

Cross Posted at Blogging Blue

Rob Zerban: "The Slash And Burn Philosophy Of Paul Ryan And Conservatives Is Leading Us Off A Cliff!"

2011-10-21T23:32:00.000-05:00

Rob Zerban, taking on Paul Ryan and the 1%

Mitt Romney has thrown his lot in with Paul Ryan's Big Business-conceived plan to end Medicare and turn back the clock on a progressive society. His own healthcare plans are a misleading, confused, jumble of contradictions that leaves his listeners nonplused, at best. So now he's just all about "What Paul Ryan says."

And you know what Paul Ryan says... end Medicare and Medicaid, end Pell Grants, and privatize Social Security so the wealthy can pay even fewer taxes. Ryan's even more dangerous than just another Ayn Rand-infatuated wonk. Wall Street isn't financing his career-- and keeping him on a path to the White House-- because they want a wonk. He's out to change the world-- and that's very bad. Both he and Romney are part of what's being called the austerity class.

The unholy alliance between the austerity class and supply-side conservatives, who talk a good game about deficits but in fact care principally about cutting taxes and government spending, has shifted the debate over the economy and the deficit far to the right since Obama took office. By promoting an age of austerity, the deficit hawks have enhanced the power of “starve the beast” conservatives like Grover Norquist, whose goal for years has been to shred the New Deal. The austerity class’s infatuation with Representative Paul Ryan is a prime example of this addled love affair.

In 2008, when Ryan introduced his radical budget road map-- which called for turning Medicare into a voucher system, privatizing Social Security and redistributing income upward by drastically cutting taxes for the wealthiest Americans and largest corporations-- MacGuineas praised his “tremendous courage and leadership.” When Ryan reintroduced his plan in 2010, the CRFB lauded his “thoughtfulness and courage.” The CRFB failed to mention that Ryan’s plan would increase the deficit, from a debt-to-GDP ratio of 60 percent in 2010 to 175 percent by 2050. “Paul Ryan added a huge amount to the deficit,” says John Irons, policy director at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). “To call that even remotely fiscally responsible was not a correct analysis. It’s almost as if they said, We don’t care what your plan does-- as long as you talk tough on deficits we’re going to support you.”

Indeed, in January the CRFB, the Concord Coalition and the Comeback America Initiative (all funded by the Peterson Foundation) gave Ryan a cherished fiscal responsibility award, despite his deficit-exploding budget, hostility to tax increases and votes in favor of the Bush administration’s deficit spending. Bob Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, introduced Ryan by quoting Time magazine: “The irony of Ryan’s rise is that he has vaulted to popularity by embracing historically unpopular ideas.” Said Bixby, “And I thought to myself, now there is a deficit hawk…. If we limit ourselves to popular ideas, we’re never going to solve the problem.”

MacGuineas said the award honored Ryan for being the first politician to put forth a budget plan in 2011, which she called “the most fiscally responsible of any of the plans.” Technically, that’s true. Ryan’s budget, a modified version of his road map, achieves a modest $155 billion in savings over ten years by proposing what the CBPP calls “the most severe and wrenching budget cuts in US history-- two-thirds of which would come from programs for people of low or moderate incomes” (i.e., Medicaid, Pell grants, food stamps and low-income housing).

The award to Ryan illustrates just how dangerously obtuse the austerity class’s definition of fiscal responsibility is. The deficit hawks succeed by making the debate over the deficit a pure accounting game, with no acknowledgment of the adverse impact a plan like Ryan’s would have on the broader economy and on so many Americans if it became law. “If [you’re] willing to slash spending so that long-run deficits are brought under control, then it’s fiscally responsible,” Jim Horney, vice president for federal fiscal policy at CBPP, says of the Ryan plan. “But if by fiscally responsible you mean putting the budget on a sustainable path but making sure that government is able to meet the needs of the people of the United States, then I think it’s a terribly irresponsible plan.”

These are reactionary men with stultifying, dark, crippled visions, visions that will never move our country forward-- in fact, quite the contrary. Conservative philosopher Michael Oakeshott could have been describing Paul Ryan crabbed little world when he defined conservatism as "to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limited to the unbounded, the near to the distant, the sufficient to the superabundant, the convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss."

And I've watched in dismay for years as the DCCC and to some extent the Wisconsin Democratic Party have protected and enabled Ryan. Obama won his congressional district but the DCCC has always made certain that he would never have a credible opponent. And he never has. This year, though, the DCCC may not help-- I doubt they will-- but they were unable to slip in the usual incompetent who would give Ryan a free ride to reelection. Rob Zerban is a Kenosha County Supervisor who is more in touch with the zeitgeist than the clueless and pampered Ryan could ever hope to be. This past weekend he spent the day at OccupyMilwaukee... talking with the folks there and tweeting his experiences. He has a progressive perspective on the place of government in society-- the polar opposite of Ryan's reactionary one. Yesterday, in an e-mail to people in the district he reminded them that "Ryan authored the destructive and heartless Republican plan to destroy Medicare and Social Security. He is wrong about what our country needs, and that is why I am running to set our nation on a new, responsible course." He went on:

I understand how the government can help Americans achieve their dreams. I grew up in a family that struggled to make ends meet. I ate government cheese and had free lunch in school. My single mother was able to provide for us because of the help of the American government. I was able to attend school because of grants and loans. This is the kind of help tea party conservatives want to take away from millions of Americans who need our help now more than ever.

Because America invested in me, I was able to start two small businesses and created 45 jobs. I always took care of my employees and provided them with excellent wages and benefits. From creating jobs in the private sector, I know what our economy needs and am ready to go head-to-head with the tea party to show America a better economic vision.

Our nation needs a new direction. The slash and burn philosophy of Paul Ryan and conservatives is leading us off a cliff!

I can do a better job.

Blue America thinks he can do a better job too-- which is why we're urging progressives to step up and do what the DCCC will never do: Stop Paul Ryan.

Paul Ryan tells College student with crushing loan to get 3 jobs...like he did?

2011-10-21T15:51:00.001-05:00

Rep. Paul Ryan has resorted to just making things up now. With no regard for facts or actual dollar amounts, he's getting lazy, BS'sing his way through town hall sessions like a street vendor selling knock off watches.

Think Progress came up with this gem, where Ryan tells a college student to get three jobs if he's having a hard time paying for his student loans. In fact, Ryan would do away with the grant altogether and simply dump people into private banks (another gift to bankers).

In an economy with lower wages, benefits, high tuition's, crushing college loans, and fewer and fewer jobs, Ryan's 3 jobs advice is cruel.

LOWE: I come from a very middle-class family and under President Obama, I get $5,500 per year to pay for school, which doesn’t come close to covering all of the funding, but it helps ease the burden. Under your plan, you cut it by 15 percent. I was just curious why you would cut a grant that goes directly to the middle- and lower-class people that need it the most.
RYAN: ‘Cause Pell Grants have become unsustainable. It’s all borrowed money…Look, I worked three jobs to pay off my student loans after college. I didn’t get grants, I got loans, and we need to have a system of viable student loans to be able to do this.
The second concern I have is, in the health care bill — people don’t know this — for budgetary gimmickry reasons, the administration and Congress at the time, took over the student loan industry. So they had the federal government, the Department of Education, basically confiscate the private student loan industry.

Ryan leaves out how much money the government saves not paying banks for processing government backed Pell grants.

Ryan worked 3 jobs to pay for his student loans? That’s doesn’t mesh with this interesting part of Ryan’s bio:

Ryan's father died when Paul was only 16. Using the Social Security survivors benefits he received until his 18th birthday, he paid for his education at Miami University in Ohio, where he completed a bachelor's degree in economics and political science in 1992.

Let’s see the proof of these jobs, Paul. How much was the loan? In reality, Ryan never had to look too far for work or worry about being unemployed:

Ryan worked as a marketing consultant for his family's construction business before being elected to Congress. Ryan Incorporated Central began as an earthmoving business created by his great-grandfather in 1884.

Booting Wall Street Ryan Should be Job One

2011-10-21T01:27:00.001-05:00

Why Paul Ryan? You have to ask?

For one, Ryan's hometown of Janesville is typical of the capital exhausted industrial communities in the 1st congressional district of Wisconsin that have had their wealth and potential legislated out from their pursuit of prosperity over the past 30 years.

Last year, local business, labor, education, governmental and health care leaders gathered together and scheduled a once in a lifetime presentation about what they need for economic recovery from the federal government. They proposed a list of eight items totaling $40 million and turned it over to the White House counsel of community recovery, Dr. Ed Montgomery. Rep. Paul Ryan was not present at this event. Instead, he was elsewhere promoting his hyper-partisan GOP recruitment booklet "Young Guns." Yet at Townhalls, he begins his presentation by claiming he's the area's "federal guy," and those are issues he wishes to discuss. I bring this episode up primarily as an example of Ryan's concern and response to the economic suffering and injustice occurring on the Main Streets of his district. Apparently, he's got other priorities.

If you consider Ryan's overall congressional voting record against the working poor and the middle class, his misguided personal ideology based on the fictional writings of anti-American Ayn Rand, his harsh polluting hyper-partisanship, his sycophancy for old money and his ideologically calculated proposals that would turn Social Security and Medicare over to Big Insurance and the capital markets on Wall Street - Paul Ryan is easily the Number One Wall Street Congressman.

Now it is true that Democrats and Republicans have both taken campaign donations from Wall Street just like they have from labor unions, but how many congressional's political philosophy and even further, their entire reason for congressional existence is built on the wealth expansion of the private Wall Street merchants (the few) at the expense of everything public (the many)? Two or three perhaps. But make no mistake, Paul Ryan is at the top. He is it! Pat Toomey might be a distant second. Timothy Geithner is up there too but he's not an elected congressman.

Ryan also voted for TARP. But he did so against the 100 to 1 wishes of his district constituency and instead voted with the 1%. People wanted a market based solution, not a government solution to the crisis. He not only voted for it, but he was one of the GOP's top point men pushing for its passage on the Hill.

Ryan is also the guy who rubber stamped party-line annual deficits totaling almost $6 trillion during the Bush error and who boldly, almost mockingly so, defies everyone in his district except the top 5%. Yet, he wins re-election again and again. By comparison, Russ Feingold not only voted against TARP, he voted to end it twice afterwards and authored the Control Spending Now Act, which would have taken unspent Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds and use them to pay down the debt. Hello Tea Party? Feingold, far more fiscally responsible than Ryan can ever dream to be and courageous enough to cast principled Constitutional votes that frequently rankled Wall Street and his own party, lost to a corporate driven empty suit by the name of Ron Johnson. It doesn't defy logic because once an elected official takes a balanced legislative approach in dealing with the rigged Wall Street status quo - they're finished politically. Alan Grayson was another one. Toast. Wall Street and their corporate media enablers crushed Feingold and Grayson with the help of the Tea Party, of all people. Ryan in the meantime appears to freewheel on by.

So Ryan voted for and promoted the Big Bank bailouts. Some might argue that TARP was justified. Perhaps so, but only providing that the same level of economic justice was distributed across Main Street America. It wasn't. In addition, not a single person has been indicted or convicted for destroying over twenty percent of our personal net worth, so there was a gaping absence of social justice as well, and those are just two of the many reasons why we have ongoing protests today. Again, Paul Ryan seems to get a pass on this.

After Ryan completed his now infamously known ideological manifesto "Roadmap for America's Future," he submitted it first to the barons on Wall Street for their approval before presenting it his constituents. Now, I can understand some might not read too much into that, but his "Roadmap" deals with our most important personal health and national economic stability programs - Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare. These three cornerstones of American Exceptionalism belong to the American people - not the profit-takers on Wall Street to decide their fate over. But Ryan belongs to Wall Street. In my view, Ryan submitting his Roadmap proposal to Wall Street for approval before to his constituents was extremely symbolic of where his loyalty is placed.

In fact, Ryan belongs to Wall Street so much that when the U.S. Government was teetering on default due to the crisis fabricated by Republicans, he went again straight to his masters on Wall Street for advice and consent. He, along with Eric Cantor, issued a report that Wall Street would be just fine with the US flirting with default for a few days. Never mind the wishes of the American people.

But his ideologically-driven budget manifestos take the cake. I can't think of any other congressman out of the House or the Senate that has proposed to legislate more theft of private capital under the conveyance and auspice of the U.S. Government to the merchants on Wall Street than Paul Ryan. No one. So, this is where the Occupy Wall Street/99 Percent movement should come into play. Crack pot ideas designed to sell out America should be exposed and their authors should be called out and banished, not applauded. Time is of the essence.

Related Reading:

Let's Put Paul Ryan Back Into The Wisconsin Backwoods Where He Belongs

If Paul Ryan takes Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Plan Seriously, should we keep taking Paul Ryan Seriously?

2011-10-13T20:42:00.000-05:00

The Chief, an Oshkosh blogger who deserves a wider readership, asks:

If Paul Ryan takes Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Plan Seriously, should we keep taking Paul Ryan Seriously?

It's entirely possibly that there has never been a more ridiculed and completely dismissed domestic policy proposal than Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Tax Plan. Democrats hate it. Conservatives hate it. Even Grover Norquist hates it. Bruce Bartlett says of the plan:

At a minimum, the Cain plan is a distributional monstrosity. The poor would pay more while the rich would have their taxes cut, with no guarantee that economic growth will increase and good reason to believe that the budget deficit will increase.

Even allowing for the poorly thought through promises routinely made on the campaign trail, Mr. Cain’s tax plan stands out as exceptionally ill conceived.

Even conservatives are quick to point out that the plan increases the tax burden on the middle class:

But now that every ones living up to take a whack at Cain's policy pinata, who should come to the rescue but ... Paul Ryan?

House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan says he “loves” presidential candidate Herman Cain’s signature “9-9-9″ tax plan.

Much more here and well worth a read.

Ryan has voted against the environment 100+ times this year

2011-10-12T12:23:00.001-05:00

During this session of Congress, Republicans have cast 115 votes against environmental protection. Paul Ryan voted against the environment on 113 of those votes.

Rep. Henry Waxman, ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, unveiled a new, searchable database of anti-environment votes by the 112th Congress.

"This is the most anti-environment House in history," said Rep. Waxman.

Here's the database.

Hat tip: Ryanwatch.

Ryan Commits Class Warfare and Division by Blaming Obama of Class Warfare and Division.

2011-10-11T01:00:00.001-05:00

Paul Ryan likes to divide us by bringing up and blaming others for class warfare and division! But its really the old game of, "I know you are but what am I."

Paul Ryan is a master of this game. His use of talking point cliches, like a Klingon cloaking device, hides many of his plans major flaws. The formula Ryan uses looks something like this:

Ryan: "(wonky sounding numbers), cliche, (wonky sounding numbers), cliche.

Studying Ryan's Reactions: Looking past the condescending leadership style of Paul Ryan, you'll see him falter a little with Meet the Press' David Gregory, and then spew his formulaic answer. He makes the false claim Obama's stimulus failed, deflecting attention away from his own daja vu policies that ended up crashing the global economy.

Gregory: "Aren't you vulnerable to the charge Republicans are only looking out for the rich, isn't that divisive?"

Ryan: "(gulp) Well, people make the charge, what I would simply say is...(scrambling for something) I don't worry about people who are already rich, I'm worried about getting people to become successful...when you keep raising all these tax rates, all these regulatory barriers on successful small businesses, how are we going to get the jobs of tomorrow?"

So which is it Paul, you don't worry about the rich, but you do worry about barriers for the successful rich? Doh!

The Baseline Lie: Ryan's whole economic plan depends on believing small business will be devastated by Obama's tax on the wealthy, but:

IRS statistics indicate that only 3 percent of small businesses would be subject to the higher tax, and many studies of previous tax increases suggest that it would have minimal impact on hiring.

Just as bad, a recent book about entrepreneurship disputes the idea individuals worry about rules and regulations that might hinder their ability to thrive:

NYT: According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, 97 percent of all businesses owners do not earn enough to be subject to the higher rates. Even among the 750,000 businesses that would be subjected to the higher rates in 2011, many are sole proprietors — a classification so amorphous it can include everyone from corporate executives who earn income on rental property to entertainers, hedge fund managers and investment bankers.

Is it any surprise he's protecting the wealthy who don’t have employees to begin with. That's “job creation.” Ryan’s plan will actually make everything much worse because it blocks "job creation:"

But much of the research over the last two decades has found that increases in top tax rates can lead to an increase in the formation of small businesses, as wealthy individuals apparently begin start-ups to avail themselves of the more generous tax breaks offered to businesses, according to a report released by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, which surveyed more than 20 studies on the effects of taxes on hiring.

It's obvious that Ryan is no genius, just a sincere looking hustler breathlessly trying save face. He’s lashed out and made panicky statements in the past, and he will again, like in the video here. And the GOP, without Ryan’s wonkish credibility, makes them completely irrelevant.

Seniors: Have You Had Your Paul Ryan Moment Yet?

2011-10-09T00:02:00.003-05:00

Can it be a cartoon if it really happened? Watch it come to life in this video.

Paul Ryan says Tax Cuts Appear to be disappointing because "growth occurs on the margin." Beyond human sight?

2011-10-07T11:42:00.002-05:00

This guy cannot be taken seriously ever again. Rep. Paul Ryan can't answer the tough questions without injecting ideological theory and fabricated economic outcomes that could only happen in Bizarro World (as seen in Superman comics, where everything means just the opposite).

For ten years the highly touted Bush tax policies have been in place, deregulation has not been reigned in, yet jobs aren't being created and the economy has stalled. So we should make it worse, according to Ryan, by continuing these failed policies?

The Atlantic: Rep. Paul Ryan blasted the Democrats' plan to raise taxes on millionaires … In (an) interview at the Washington Ideas Forum with David Leonhardt of the New York Times, Leonhardt questioned the idea that lowering taxes was a panacea for growth. Taxes increases didn't prevent growth in the 1990s, he said, and tax cuts produced disappointing growth in the 2000s.

In his weakest come-back to date;

Ryan responded that "growth occurs on the margin" and when you raise taxes on work, savings, and investment, you get less work, less savings, and less investment -- and less growth.

On the margin? Does he mean out of sight for the common man, or beyond human understanding?

And finally, let’s put a stake through the heart of the “say it enough and it’s true” BS that taxing work, savings and investments discourages anything…at all. It’s a Paul Ryan lie, used to market voodoo economic snake oil. What is it with the press too?

Leonhardt started with common sense math, and never followed up with a question about the mythical “penalizing success” hokum. Caught in a place called "reality," Ryan actually blamed other factors for the roaring 90’s, factors brought about by Clinton’s tax increase. Doh!

In the 1990s, Ryan added, other factors such as stable interest rates and a productivity boom helped to compensate for higher tax rates on income and capital.

Has it ever been more obvious that Ryan is now just spinning his psycho babble wheels?

Ryan wants to send seniors back to the poor farm

2011-10-05T10:37:00.000-05:00

Dave Zweifel in the Capital Times:

When Social Security was enacted as part of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal reforms in 1935, about half of U.S. senior citizens lived in poverty. Many had to live out their lives in shameful places that people at the time called the “poor farm.” It was forever a family’s shame when during the Depression, grandma and grandpa had to go off to live in one of the county’s makeshift homes for the elderly because they couldn’t afford their own places and their children couldn’t afford to help them.

Today, fewer than 10 percent of America’s elderly live in poverty. More than 53 million Americans receive Social Security benefits to at least cover the basics of life. And as Bernie Sanders said, in the more than 75 years since, the program has never failed to pay out every nickel it owed.

Now Ryan and his compatriots want to mess with that success story. They want to begin the privatization of Social Security by turning over part of the funds that America’s working people pay into the program to Wall Street investors — yes, the same investors who have such a great track record, like blowing up the economy and requiring federal bailouts to save them.

Two-Faced Ryan Still Scamming With Old Tricks

2011-10-04T00:25:00.002-05:00

Ryan’s newest scam involves eliminating tax breaks for employees who are enrolled in their employer’s group health care plans and give workers the tax credit to buy health insurance on an individual basis.

In my humble opinion, this really is nothing new from the two-faced congressman. Embedded in his "Roadmap for America's Future" were provisions offering employees a "choice" to eat a baited T-bone by giving them a tax credit to buy health insurance on an individual basis. This credit would be paid for in part by shifting healthcare tax breaks away from the employer to the worker. Of course this would likely encourage most companies to drop their employer-sponsored group plans. This self-cannibalizing slow-death baiting of American workers is a popular gimmick from Ryan's bag of old sucker tricks. What is new however, is that he's now trying to pawn it off as a replacement for Obama's health care reform package.

PoliticusUSA Excerpt:
According to Ryan, his plan will give consumers the needed incentive to demand more value from their healthcare. He said, “Giving patients and consumers control over health care resources would make all Americans less dependent on big business and big government for our health security; give us more control over the care we get; and force health care providers to compete for our business.”

Okay, we know that Ryan wants to end our employer sponsored healthcare. But what about his own employer sponsored health care from the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program? Although he boasts that his proposals offer insurance plans to individuals the very same standard health benefits Members of Congress enjoy, he doesn't address how Congress and Federal employees would fit under his individual privatization mandate or have the incentive to opt-out.

But to use Ryan's own words then, IF giving ~~consumers~~ Congress and Federal employees individual control over health care resources would make all of them less dependent on big government for their health security and give them more control over the care they get; and give them more incentive to demand more value from their health care - why hasn't Paul Ryan lead the way and opted out of his employer's group health plan?

Nothing was more telling than when Democrats proposed a simple House resolution requiring members of Congress to publicly disclose whether they will continue to participate in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program. The entire Wisconsin Republican House delegation including Ryan voted "NO." Mind you, that wasn't a vote to opt-out of the Federal Employee Program, it was merely a request to publicly disclose their current status.

With that minor disclosure they couldn't even muster the courage to stand with their own convictions.

Scammers.

Ryan's Medicare plan poses real problem for Wisconsin GOP Senate candidates

2011-10-03T09:51:00.000-05:00

Paul Ryan opted out of running for Herb Kohl's Senate seat next year. But he left a little something behind. His Medicare plan -- to end Medicare as we know it and replace it with a type of voucher plan that would cost seniors more -- is very much going to be a part of the 2012 Senate race in Wisconsin.

The problem for GOP candidates, who are fighting in the primary to win the party's conservative base, is that while Republican voters tend to like Ryan's plan, most other voters don't. It will take some careful positioning to finesse the problem Ryan has created for them.

Craig Gilbert .in the Journal Sentinel:

Here’s a brief look at what two Republican Senate hopefuls – declared candidate Mark Neumann and all-but-official candidate Tommy Thompson – are saying on this subject at the very outset of the race.

Medicare is “driving us into bankruptcy,” Thompson said in a recent interview with the Journal Sentinel. The former governor and health secretary says “Paul Ryan is on the right track,” but stops short of fully endorsing the Ryan plan, which would end the guaranteed Medicare benefit for future beneficiaries (people now under 55) and replace it with a lump sum payment to help them buy private insurance. Thompson hasn’t put out his own Medicare plan yet (he’s not a declared candidate).

But he says he would so some things differently than Ryan. He says people now under 55 should be given a choice when they reach eligibility. They could choose private insurance with a government subsidy (as Ryan is proposing). Or they could remain in the current Medicare system, but with higher-out-of-pocket costs than seniors pay now because the system “is going broke.”

He calls his approach “Ryan Plan Plus.”

“Medicare is going broke, which will result in dramatically higher out-of-pocket costs for services. People will choose the private insurance option. A market-based solution like this will win out over government-run health care, which I’ve always opposed,” he said. That sounds like Thompson is endorsing Ryan’s shift to a much more privatized Medicare system for future retirees, without formally ending traditional Medicare.

Neumann, businessman and former congressman, said he’ll produce a broad fiscal plan that addresses Medicare later in the campaign. Like Thompson, he says he’s supportive of Ryan but will offer his own set of policies. “We will be using parts of Paul’s plan … including on Medicare, but it may be different in some respects,” said Neumann.

Though Neumann is running full-bore against government spending and deficits, he comes across as more guarded on the subject of Medicare than Thompson does. He emphasizes the need to look at other entitlements besides Medicare and Social Security, such as Medicaid. He says he agrees with Ryan’s argument that current Medicare policies are fiscally unsustainable in future decades. But Neumann says his campaign will focus more on the immediate and near-term budget crisis, because if that isn’t solved, “our long-term problem problems don’t make any difference.”

We’ll have to wait for his plan, but he did little in the interview to signal that big Medicare changes will be a prominent feature of his campaign.

Of course, Neumann doesn't need to prove his conservative bona fides. It's former governor Tommy T who's getting flak about being too liberal for 21st Century Republicanism.

Maybe to prove himself Tommy will come out to the right of Neumann on Medicare and Social Security. But that could kill him in November.

This little dance could be fun for Democrats to watch.

Ryan's New Plan To Scam Millions Of Americans Out Of Their Healthcare

2011-10-01T20:01:00.000-05:00

Politicus USA:

Ryan’s newest scam involves eliminating tax breaks for employees who are enrolled in their employer’s group healthcare plans, and instead give a tax credit to buy health insurance on an individual basis. According to Ryan, his plan will give consumers the needed incentive to demand more value from their healthcare. He said,

“Giving patients and consumers control over health care resources would make all Americans less dependent on big business and big government for our health security; give us more control over the care we get; and force health care providers to compete for our business.”

Ryan’s statement sounds suspiciously like his Medicare privatization scam, and if it reaches fruition, will result in 170 million Americans facing the same consequences as the elderly who will end up paying higher costs for less coverage.

If the plan is adopted, it could encourage employees to drop employer health plans and move to individual plans that are prohibitively expensive for less coverage. One of the benefits of group plans are that a larger pool of policy holders results in lower premiums and more coverage. Ryan claims insurance companies would be “forced” into providing better coverage for less money, but a report on Tuesday showed health insurance costs are climbing for companies and their employees, and family premiums are increasing at a pace triple that of last year. Mr. Ryan either does not understand how insurance works or he knows and does not care that individual policies are much higher-priced than group plans.

There is no reasonable explanation for why Ryan thinks that an individual plan is less costly than a group plan, or that individual consumers will be better equipped to force the insurance industry to give more value for policyholder’s dollars. If Americans know one thing about the insurance industry, it is that they are never going to be influenced by consumer complaints or demands for better value...

Paul Ryan’s plan will most likely fail because Americans are getting wise to the Republicans’ tactics of rewarding corporations and the insurance industry at the expense of every class except the wealthy. His plan would affect 170 million Americans who get their health insurance from their employers’ group plans whether in the private or public sector. The beneficiaries of Ryan’s largesse are big business who will eliminate health insurance benefits and the insurance industry that will get to charge whatever they please. Although Ryan will most likely embark on a propaganda campaign to tout his plan’s benefits, most Americans understand that their bargaining power will be diminished if they are forced to buy insurance on their own.

Read it all here.

Elsewhere, Democurmudgeon says: With Ryan we're closer than ever to health care bankruptcy-- all of us.

Is Paul Ryan's 'class war' lighting the fuse for social explosion?

2011-09-29T07:26:00.000-05:00

Roger Bybee, longtime editor of Racine Labor newspaper, now a freelancer, writing for In These Times, uncorks a devastating analysis of what Paul Ryan sees as class warfare. Highlights:

In his severely distorted view of the “class war” currently splitting America apart, House Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who represents southeastern Wisconsin’s crumbling factory towns, reflects a juvenile embrace of the view of his heroine Ayn Rand (required reading for his entire staff).
Like Rand, Ryan interprets any move toward easing America’s crushing inequality as showing ingratitude toward those he worships as the “job creators.” This view is repeated incessantly by Republicans.

However, the fact remains that, it’s been some time since the "job creators” actually created any significant number of jobs in the United States. ..

A vast torrent of dollars, rapidly shooting upward in a jet-stream, has given the top 1% more political power than at any point in the last 90 years. The super-rich have gained more surplus wealth to contribute more massively to candidates who serve their interests and to hire lobbyists to advance policies of tax-cutting, deregulation, privatization and “free trade. "

These are all policies that detach the ruling class further from a commitment to strong public institutions (e.g., schools, healthcare, access to higher education), American workers and the nation itself.

On the other side of the class divide stands a fragmented, atomized, and—until the Wisconsin labor rebellion earlier this year—badly demoralized majority of working families. They face a constant and totally one-sided bombardment by corporate and government policies that undermine their economic security, take away rights to unionization, and make their survival ever more precarious.
Without cohesiveness and organizations, families scramble simply to survive, with political involvement often falling as a priority despite its potential for relieving their suffering...

Of course, Ryan is opposed to increasing the minimum wage, in the same way that he has voted to oppose extended unemployment benefits, foreclosure assistance and expanded S-CHIP healthcare to children. He's been pushing to end taxation on the overseas operations of U.S. corporations.

With a lifestyle reminiscent of Marie Antoinette and his contempt for the plight of workers and the poor, Ryan and his allies may well be lighting the fuse for a social explosion.

There's more. Read it all here.

CNN Puts Lipstick On Ryan's Pig

2011-09-29T00:28:00.004-05:00

In what I describe as one of the lamest interviews ever put on by a "professional" news organization, the CNN newsroom participated in what can be accurately described as little more than a image enhancement and calibration campaign masterfully scripted by Rep. Paul Ryan.

CNN Newsroom Sub-title
Rep. Paul Ryan has become popular by pushing the unpopular stance on entitlements. CNN's Gloria Borger profiles him.

No doubt about it, Ryan gave them a tube of lipstick and CNN knew exactly where to apply it.

During the interview, Ryan discombobulated as he described himself as a "messenger" and then claimed he gave up "fear" for Lent. Let me explain.

The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer — through prayer, repentance and self-denial — for the annual Christian commemoration beginning on Ash Wednesday and culminating with Easter. During Lent, modern day practicing Roman Catholics oftentimes will make a personal sacrifice such as fasting or temporarily give up a treat or habit they might usually enjoy. But here's the trick. Ryan says, "I gave fear up for Lent this year." But how does one give up "fear" as a sacrifice? Even CNN's Bolger curiously asks, "how do you do that?" In Ryan's case however, much of what he can show for in the political arena has been built on demogoguery and fearmongering. Ryan thrives and relishes in it so much that had he said he was giving up "fearmongering," people who know his bully style would understand his loss and not question his personal Lenten sacrifice.

Ryan now appears to be in the midst of re-booting his Randian-corrupted Christian morality by dropping hints of his religiosity in recent interviews. The NY Times reported that Ryan is reading the “Read and Learn Bible” to his 6-year-old son and during this CNN interview, he subtly dropped another hint by announcing his sacrifice for Lent. Beyond Ryan's purposely religious remarks, he then frames himself as a fearless "messenger" courageously defending himself against undeserved attacks by Democrats and the Left.

CNN Excerpt:
"There's sort of a shoot-the-messenger strategy these days," he added. "I'm the messenger, and you can't fear that if you are who you are." It's a pattern for Ryan, who has grown in popularity by pushing the unpopular, a fairly unconventional route.

We know who Ryan is. No one in Congress has fear mongered, mocked and demagogued our safety nets or mischaracterized the American Way more than Congressman Ryan. No one. Before he embarked on his crusade to destroy Medicare, previous messages he delivered over the past five years were...

Ryan equated American labor unions to Saddam Hussein's brutal Ba'ath Party.

He joined Glenn Beck in calling progressives a cancer.

Ryan also admitted to voting for TARP not on the nuts and bolts of the proposal, but claimed by supporting it, he was saving capitalism from a hallucinatory fascist liberal statist agenda he channeled onto President Obama. Wow, demagoguery - thy name is Paul Ryan.

Interestingly, CNN left these few minor inconveniences out of their select profiling of the congressman.

Yet, through all of these unprovoked public declarations of war against Progressives, Labor and the President, it is Ryan who paints himself up not as a remorseful perpetrator of demagoguery, but as a victim of his target's push back and then sympathetically refers to himself as the "messenger."

Masterful.

Excerpt:
Ryan (R-Regressive) -- "What I'm trying to do is indict the entire vision of progressivism, and its important to flush progressives out into the field of open debate."
Beck (R-Regressive) -- "I love you."

Ryan Gets the Band Back Together for His Plan to End Medicare

2011-09-28T17:31:00.000-05:00

David Dayen at Firedog Lake:

Paul Ryan is desperately trying to resuscitate his failed plan to end Medicare by offering it as the replacement element in the long-sought “repeal and replace” strategy for the Affordable Care Act. [The one the GOP calls Obamacare - Xoff.]

“Giving patients and consumers control over healthcare resources would make all Americans less dependent on big business and big government for our health security; give us more control over the care we get; and force health care providers to compete for our business,” Ryan said.

Ryan argued that a tax credit in lieu of Medicare, Medicaid and government-credited employer-sponsored healthcare would commoditize healthcare costs, enabling individuals to choose their coverage and allowing the free market to drive down prices and make care more affordable — and generous — for all.

So if you liked getting a coupon instead of your Medicare and being pushed out on your own onto the individual marketplace, you’ll love getting the same coupon for Medicaid and for any coverage you get from an employer. It would basically spell the end of risk pooling, the end of collective bargaining for lower costs in health care. The costs would get shifted from government to the individual, and overall health costs would rise, as the insurance industry would be unburdened by the need to negotiate down prices with powerful coalitions of potential customers. This just replaces public debt with private debt, and grows that private debt larger.

This is the fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives on health care: the argument of rugged individualism versus the argument of collective responsibility and the power of bargaining. It’s pretty clear from the available evidence that putting more “skin in the game,” the linchpin of Ryan’s strategy, ends up raising health costs. The health care marketplace simply does not act like a real marketplace.

Read the rest.

' Paul Ryan’s lack of popularity means he’s popular' - Just ask CNN

2011-09-26T14:07:00.001-05:00

Hotspyer:

Remember how hard Rep. Paul Ryan tried to spin his disastrous budget with its scheme to end Medicare? Back during the spring recess, he insisted that the constituents booing him at his town meetings loooooved his Medicare plan, saying the “crowds are overwhelmingly supportive.”

When that didn’t really work, he shifted his spin saying that, really, the plan wasn’t unpopular, it was just misunderstood. People would love it, really, once the Republicans figured out a way to talk about it that didn’t terrify people.

Meanwhile, there were the polls. Like this PPP poll done in June in North Carolina, finding that voters were opposed to the plan by an almost 2:1 margin. In North Carolina. There are any number of polls demonstrating just how unpopular it is.

Undaunted, Ryan has kept up his happy talk, and finally found a buyer. Check out the headline from CNN’s Gloria Borger and Kevin Bohn: “Paul Ryan: Popular by pushing the unpopular.”

More here.

GOP Picks Third Most Unpopular Republican For Fund Raising

2011-09-24T00:01:00.000-05:00

USA Today Excerpt:
House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, considered a rising Republican star, has been tapped to lead a high-profile party fundraising group tasked with raising money for the GOP's 2012 ground game.

Hot Air Excerpt: (June, 2011)
The poll also found Ryan is now the nation’s third most disliked Republican, with net unfavorable ratings that trail only former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Obviously the GOP has no chance or use to campaign for piddly $20 donations from working class wage earners, so it's only logical to choose a connected Wall Street crony capitalist.

But these appear to be more signs that the Republican Party is preparing for a major war to defend the wayward class war congressman's House seat in 2012. They know we know Ryan has absolutely nothing to show for in 14 years, so they redrew his district boundaries by throwing in chunks of GOP-infested Walkersha County and now the party gives him a confidence boosting empty title to what amounts to a publicity stunt befitting an empty suit.

They are pulling out all the stops.

House Budget Guy Ryan, to Fundraise from Corporate Elite to defeat Obama. Big Surprise?

2011-09-23T16:56:00.000-05:00

Taking pay-to-play to a new level, the guy pulling the nations purse strings, Paul Ryan, is the GOP’s special interest front man for presidential fund raising. Nothing like in-your-face corporatism.

WAOW: U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, Chairman of the House Budget Committee, will be spearheading the GOP's fundraising effort to win back the presidency. Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus announced Friday that Ryan will serve as chairman of the RNC Presidential Trust.

Ryan says in a statement that raising the money necessary to win the presidential election will be the difference maker.

Big brother corporations, otherwise known as “job creators,” just put a face on creeping fascism; Paul Ryan.

2011-09-23T15:18:00.001-05:00

Below, the full text of a self-explanatory letter sent to Paul Ryan by economist Dean Baker:

September 21, 2011

The Honorable Paul Ryan
1233 Longworth House Office Building
United States House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Representative Ryan:

During a recent interview, you made a number of remarks about Social Security, among them, characterizing Social Security as a “Ponzi Scheme,” that would yield a negative rate of return, and saying, “…[Social Security] is not working, it is going bankrupt, and that current seniors will be jeopardized the most by the status quo.” None of these statements are accurate.

Almost no one will get a negative real return on their Social Security taxes. This issue has been researched extensively and assuming a 2 percent real discount rate, even as late as 2030, most new retirees will receive more in benefits than they paid in taxes. There is simply no basis for the claim that beneficiaries will receive negative returns on their taxes as the value of scheduled benefits actually rises in later years since life expectancy, and therefore the expected period of retirement, will continue to increase. The only way we would see negative returns would be if Congress voted to cut benefits.

In fact, if Congress makes no changes at all to the program, the latest CBO projections show that Social Security will remain fully solvent through 2038 and would pay about 80 percent of full scheduled benefits from then on, indefinitely. It is quite difficult to make the case that a system that pays full benefits for the next 27 years is not working or is going bankrupt, let alone claim that it jeopardizes the retirement security of current seniors.

As a member of the House Budget Committee charged with making recommendations about our nation’s budget, I hope that you will be careful to present the situation more accurately in future public statements. If you would like any additional background on the program, I would be happy to assist you.

Best regards,

Dean Baker

Dean Baker, Co-Director, Center for Economic and Policy Research
Cc: www.cepr.net

Ryan supports putting the unemployed to work -- for free

2011-09-22T15:53:00.000-05:00

Video at Crooks and Liars

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) isn't a fan of President Barack Obama's American Jobs Act, but he does like the idea of allowing people who are receiving unemployment benefits to work for free.

The plan is based on a program called Georgia Works which matches job seekers with employers. Under the plan, employers agree to provide up to eight weeks of on-the-job training. Workers, who can only work for 24 hours a week, continue to receive unemployment benefits instead of getting paid.

"The Georgia plan sounds pretty interesting," Ryan told Fox News' Chris Wallace Sunday. "I think that's something we are looking at, which is unemployment reform."

Ryan's remarks echo House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's (R-VA) support of the idea. "We stand ready to work with [President Obama] if there is interest in implementing a similar program on the federal level," Cantor said.

According to data the Georgia Department of Labor provided to The Huffington Post's Arthur Delaney, the program isn't very successful. Between 2003 and 2010, only 16.4 percent of people that participated in the program found work, about the same rate as those who were not participating. As of late August, there were only 19 trainees enrolled in Georgia Works.

The top weekly unemployment benefit in Georgia is about $330.

Colbert shows why Paul Ryan math doesn't add up

2011-09-22T15:42:00.000-05:00

Class warfare? Killing jobs?We yield the floor to Stephen Colbert:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Hat tip: Dane 101

Ryan agrees with Perry: Social Security is a Ponzi scheme

2011-09-21T15:07:00.000-05:00

Maybe Paul Ryan really does want to be the vice presidential candidate. What else explains this lunacy?

On Laura Ingraham’s radio show, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) agreed with Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) that Social Security resembles a Ponzi scheme. “It’s not a criminal enterprise, but it is a pay as you go system where earlier investors, or say taxpayers, get a positive rate of return and the most recent investors, or taxpayers, get a negative rate of return,” said Ryan. “That’s how those schemes work." -- Washington Post.

"For being such a self-proclaimed expert on economics and finance, it is telling that Paul Ryan deliberately confuses what Bernie Madoff did to the Social Security benefits milllions of Americans have earned by the sweat of their brow," Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Mike Tate said Wednesday. "It looks like the author of the plan to end Medicare is creating the rhetorical conditions under which, to finance tax cuts for the super-rich, Social Security can be ended as well."

Doubling Down On The Stoopid

2011-09-21T08:46:00.002-05:00

Even after being told that calling SS benefits a Ponzi Scheme is killing GOP electability, Pompador Paul just can't help himself.

“Paul Ryan’s belief that Social Security works like a Ponzi scheme proves —
once and for all — that House Republicans have really declared war on seniors,”
DCCC spokesperson Jesse Ferguson told the Huffington
Post.

Paul Ryan's Class Warfare Moment...

2011-09-20T20:11:00.002-05:00

The Washington Post put together this short but true Paul Ryan video:

Ryan works on his image: Just a regular guy, up to his elbows in deer guts, grinding venison sausage to feed his kids

2011-09-20T13:41:00.000-05:00

Frank Bruni in the NY Times, in a column titled, "Deer hunts and dirt bikes:"

Paul Ryan may not be running for president this time around, but if you have any doubt about his ambitions for a long, prominent future in government, just look at his comments in a Q. and A. published in Sunday’s Times. They’re a minor masterpiece of image calibration.
In the span of two dozen sentences, Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, mentioned the Bible, or rather a beginner’s version of it, which he said he was reading aloud to his 6-year-old son. He mentioned his truck and his appetite for hard rock, thus establishing automotive and musical affinities that balance his wonkier, number-crunching bona fides. He mentioned hunting — with a bow, no less.
Then came the capper. He mentioned his talent for what I’d like to call venison charcuterie, just because he so clearly wouldn’t. “I butcher my own deer, grind the meat, stuff it in casings and then smoke it,” he said, making clear that Sarah Palin in all her moose-eviscerating glory has nothing on him.
And thus his self-portrait as an outside-the-Beltway guy’s guy with grime (and maybe guts) under his fingernails was complete, and he had discharged one of the more ridiculous obligations of the contemporary politician. He had asserted that he was just like the rest of us, even though there’s no such thing as one uniform us and if there were, it would be buying its Bambi sausages in bulk at Costco.

Bruni goes on to bemoan the fact that politicians feel forced to play the "I'm-just-a-regular-person" gambit and dumb themselves down (well, some like Michelle Bachmann and Rick Perry don't have to do that). But if that's the game, deal Ryan in.

He may be a millionaire who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, but the image he projects is that of a guy up to his elbows in deer guts.

Ryan Opposes Millionaires' Tax; His Home County Constituents Pull In About $12 Hourly

2011-09-20T08:51:00.000-05:00

To help find Paul Ryan's hometown millionaire constituency, I put some data over at The Political Environment.

Annual per capita income in Rock County, where Janesville is located: $24,135.

Unemployment in the County: 10%.

There are roughly 2,080 hours in a working year, so wages in Rock County average a tad under $12 an hour.

Probably not too many local millionaires there banging down Ryan's door for a tax break and a glass of $350 wine.

Video: 1st Congressional District Do-It-Yourself Townhall

2011-09-20T00:02:00.008-05:00

After previously being subjected to police action under orders from Rep. Paul Ryan, constituents from Kenosha and Racine gathered together without the congressman in attendance for a townhall meeting in safety and with the knowledge that they would not be subjected to arrest for voicing their concerns.

Did someone say class warfare? Was it Paul "Silver Spoon" Ryan?

2011-09-19T12:01:00.004-05:00

Paul Ryan says President Obama's proposed tax increase for millionaires is nothing short of class warfare.

If a class war breaks out, we know which side Paul Ryan will be fighting for -- the entitled class into which he was born.

L. S. Carbonell on LezGet Real blog:

If you would like to know what shaped Paul Ryan’s economic philosophy, Google Ryan Incorporated Central. The company was founded by his great-grandfather and is responsible for the fact that when Ryan’s father died at the age of 55, Ryan was able to bank his entire Social Security survivor benefits for college instead of living on them the way my siblings did when our father died at the same age...

Ryan’s big “real business” experience was working for one branch of the family conglomerate as a “marketing consultant.”

He actually has a B.A. in economics and political science from Miami University, but some people are never capable of letting book learning override personal experience. Ryan is apparently one of them. He ended up in politics at his mother’s urging because she was afraid he was going to end up “a ski bum.”

Paul Begala says it better in a CNN opinion piece:

Mr. Ryan won the genetic lottery. There is no doubt that his great-grandfather worked hard to build that company. But a century and a quarter later, young Mr. Ryan -- who estimates his net worth at up to $2.4 million -- has no calluses on his hands. Just on his heart.

Ryan For The Rich: We've Heard This Fine Whine Before

2011-09-19T09:23:00.000-05:00

He's come a long way from Janesville.

Ryan Claims Class Warfare on 1 Percent of Americans!!

2011-09-18T22:34:00.004-05:00

In an amazing example of projection, Paul Ryan accuses Democrats of doing just what Republicans have been so successful at doing for the last decade, using “fear, envy and anxiety.”

(Paul Ryan) accused President Obama of appealing to Americans' "fear, envy and anxiety" by pushing a new tax rate on people making more than $1 million annually, saying the "class warfare path" will only hurt the economy.

Can you imagine starting a “class war” with opponents so wealthy that they could buy enough influence and power to crush you like an ant? Who would be that dumb? Paul Ryan thinks we are. Fox 47:

Like all Humpty Dumptyisms, where “you can make words mean so many different things,” Ryan tests the bounds of credulity with every pronouncement.

"If you tax something more, you get less of it," Ryan said.

Is that supposed to make us sad? The rich get less? For the last 20 years, the middle class got less in wages. Polling says yes, tax the richest 1% for gods sake, the ones who have enjoyed the lowest percentage of taxes ever.

In a string of idea’s that can’t possibly make sense, Ryan starts with a doozy.

"If you tax job creators more, you get less job creation. If you tax their investment more, you get less investment."

The job creators have already got their tax cuts, nothing has changed since the Bush tax cuts, and they did nothing. As for the investor class; Is Ryan saying the wealthy will stop trying to make more money? Someone should ask Ryan if investors will be willing to give up on their already fat incomes. I'm guessing not.