Like the profoundly dishonest criticism of President Obama for making a savings, not a cut, to medicare where Congressman Ryan made exactly the same cuts, but ones that would cost senior beneficiaries large amounts of money, the R-money / Ryan campaign is making a similarly dishonest criticism about the defense spending cuts that Ryan AUTHORED. These are RYAN's CUTS TO DEFENSE SPENDING:
Voting for defense spending cuts is NOT opposing those cuts in spending. Ryan and R-money need to shake their etch-a-sketch a little harder, or invest in a better dictionary to learn the meaning of the words vote for, and oppose.
from the HuffPo:
Mitt Romney Campaign Attacks Military Cuts Paul Ryan Supported
But what the statement leaves out is Ryan's leading role in crafting those cuts as chairman of the House Budget Committee. He also voted for the Budget Control Act that allowed the nation to raise its debt limit. Part of the deal was creating the "sequester" that requires $1.2 trillion in automatic budget cuts, including more than $500 billion from defense over 10 years.Speaking at the roundtable, Ryan also blamed Obama for the sequester despite his own vote for it."We opposed it then; we oppose it now," Ryan said.
Voting for defense spending cuts is NOT opposing those cuts in spending. Ryan and R-money need to shake their etch-a-sketch a little harder, or invest in a better dictionary to learn the meaning of the words vote for, and oppose.
from the HuffPo:
Mitt Romney Campaign Attacks Military Cuts Paul Ryan Supported
Mitt Romney's campaign Thursday criticized President Barack Obama for military budget cuts that Romney's running mate Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) voted for, and implied that government spending is a useful economic stimulus -- at least if it's defense spending.
The attack was launched in a press release that coincided with Ryan speaking at a roundtable discussion on defense in Fayetteville, N.C.
"President Obama’s devastating defense cuts are set to have a massive impact on Fayetteville and the rest of North Carolina," said Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul in the statement. "Because of the President’s lack of leadership, North Carolina could be hit hard with thousands of job losses and millions of dollars in lost economic activity. Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan will restore our military’s strength and ensure our armed forces have the resources they need."
But what the statement leaves out is Ryan's leading role in crafting those cuts as chairman of the House Budget Committee. He also voted for the Budget Control Act that allowed the nation to raise its debt limit. Part of the deal was creating the "sequester" that requires $1.2 trillion in automatic budget cuts, including more than $500 billion from defense over 10 years.
Speaking at the roundtable, Ryan also blamed Obama for the sequester despite his own vote for it.
"We opposed it then; we oppose it now," Ryan said.
The GOP has recently begun trying to reverse the sequester, laying the cuts at Obama's feet, but Ryan and 173 other Republicans voted for them.
The suggestion that government spending is a good economic stimulus also represents recent GOP revisionism, with leaders on the Hill who often deride economic stimulus promoting it as an argument for heading off the sequester.
The attack was launched in a press release that coincided with Ryan speaking at a roundtable discussion on defense in Fayetteville, N.C.
"President Obama’s devastating defense cuts are set to have a massive impact on Fayetteville and the rest of North Carolina," said Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul in the statement. "Because of the President’s lack of leadership, North Carolina could be hit hard with thousands of job losses and millions of dollars in lost economic activity. Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan will restore our military’s strength and ensure our armed forces have the resources they need."
But what the statement leaves out is Ryan's leading role in crafting those cuts as chairman of the House Budget Committee. He also voted for the Budget Control Act that allowed the nation to raise its debt limit. Part of the deal was creating the "sequester" that requires $1.2 trillion in automatic budget cuts, including more than $500 billion from defense over 10 years.
Speaking at the roundtable, Ryan also blamed Obama for the sequester despite his own vote for it.
"We opposed it then; we oppose it now," Ryan said.
The GOP has recently begun trying to reverse the sequester, laying the cuts at Obama's feet, but Ryan and 173 other Republicans voted for them.
The suggestion that government spending is a good economic stimulus also represents recent GOP revisionism, with leaders on the Hill who often deride economic stimulus promoting it as an argument for heading off the sequester.
I wish the politicians would read your post ... you are focusing on the issues and factually reporting them ... meanwhile Paul Ryan after pandering at the Partnership for Defense Innovation in Fayetteville, N.C, he went to join Mitt Romney for a rally in Michigan where he addressed important issues and explaining why he was different than President Obama :
ReplyDelete“Remember about four years ago when he was talking to a bunch of donors in San Francisco and he said people from states like ours, we like to cling to our guns and our religion?
I just have one thing to say. This Catholic deer hunter is guilty as charged and proud of it.”
That's the Republican approach to this election --- ignore the problems except for pandering that they will increase Defense spending and push emotional issues.
Personally, with the Nuns-on-the-Bus tour that hit Ryan's District and the protests from Catholic Bishops over the direction of the Ryan Budget, I gotta wonder if Catholics are proud of Paul Ryan ... or if he missed some of their teachings.
What does it say when President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, donated $172130 to a variety of charities in 2011, or 22 percent of their income ... meanwhile the Ryans donated $12,991 to charity in 2011, and $2,600 to charity in 2010 — which are 4 percent and 1.2 percent of his income, respectively ... and as a point of comparison, according to The Bureau of Labor Statistics' latest survey of consumer expenditure found that the poorest fifth of U.S. households contributed an average of 4.3 percent of their incomes to charitable organizations in 2007.
Gosh, it sorta makes you wonder what Paul Ryan thinks was the meaning of the Bible passage : For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in ... apparently Paul Ryan just does not see the least of these ... but he does see Defense contractors.
Of course, when Paul Ryan was asked why did the committee choose to go against the advice of the generals?
Ryan responded : We don’t think the generals are giving us their true advice. We don’t think the generals believe that their budget is really the right budget. I believe that the president’s budget by virtue of the fact that when he released his budget number of about $500 billion, the number was announced at the same time they announced the beginning of their strategy review of the Pentagon’s budget.
This Congressional mindset is not new ... for example, in the Navy’s fiscal 2011 budget request, sent to Congress Feb. 1, included $1.9 billion to buy 22 Super Hornets. However, based on a “programmatic requests” amendment to the budget by Todd Akin (R-MO), whose district is near Boeing’s defense headquarters in St. Louis, the approved budget includes 30 F/A-18 E and F Super Hornet strike fighters.
Simply stated the committee added eight additional Super Hornets. Previously, Congress added nine aircraft to the fiscal 2010 budget … that’s seventeen in two years.
Thus the question for Mr. Ryan is, will you listen to the Pentagon’s analysis or listen to the lobbyists representing the military industrial complex ? Mr. Ryan's track record is that the lobbyists will win ... and he will campaign based on emotion and pandering rather than confronting the realities of our spending.
Did you read the Sunday Observation column in the NYTimes ?
ReplyDeleteThe key take-aways are :
The centerpiece of Mr. Romney’s proposal is a promise to spend at least 4 percent of gross domestic product on military personnel, procurement, operations and maintenance, and research and development. That would add as much as $2.3 trillion to the defense budget over 10 years from projected 2013 spending levels, according to Travis Sharp of the Center for a New American Security analysis.
And yet for all these extra trillions, there’s no sense that this money would produce a more effective security strategy.
Mr. Romney is showing no restraint. Even though American forces are out of Iraq and withdrawing from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, his campaign Web site states that he would reverse President Obama’s plan to cut the Army and Marine Corps by 100,000 troops. Doing that, according to Mr. Sharp, would cost at least $41 billion over five years. Just what mission the extra troops would perform is unspecified.
Mr. Romney wants the Navy to increase shipbuilding from 9 ships per year to 15, at a cost of billions more. His position paper speaks of expanding the naval presence in the Western Pacific to counter China, which Mr. Obama is already doing. A campaign spokeswoman said many of the extra 100,000 slots would be used to staff the new ships, but that doesn’t begin to explain the need for sustained troop levels.
Mr. Romney also promises a “robust, multilayered national ballistic-missile defense system” to defend against nuclear attacks on the United States and its allies, even though the system has been under development for years and there is still no guarantee it will work.
And how would he pay for his huge new defense budgets? In an interview with Fortune, Mr. Romney spoke of “enormous opportunities for finding efficiency and cost savings in the military.” His targets, according to his campaign, would be the Pentagon’s civilian work force and reforms of the weapons procurement process.
The truth is that the added military spending would have to come from savaging most other federal programs, including those serving the most vulnerable Americans.
Hmmmm .... sorta brings to mind the words from A Few Good Men ... you remember Col. Nathan R. Jessep: You can't handle the truth!
I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it.
Thus the Romney-Ryan Administration will probably assign Col. Jessep to "handle problems ... much like President Reagan had Col. Oliver North to to "handle problems ... as such, the question falls to the voters : Can YOU Trust Romney-Ryan ? . My answer is NO.