Romney/Ryan

[MichaelWeston]

[quote name='Numbers' timestamp='1344967948' post='1146187']
Not a problem. I don't argue with the resident psychologist
[/quote]

LOL..would you agree though.....I keep hearing the economy is bad...then that my friends are getting promotions....

[|Numbers|]

[quote name='MichaelWeston' timestamp='1344971032' post='1146210']
LOL..would you agree though.....I keep hearing the economy is bad...then that my friends are getting promotions....
[/quote]

Depends, are your friends named Romney, Ryan, Obama, or Biden ? If they're getting promotions I think that's great. An individual's performance is acknowledged every now and then...

[img]http://forum.go-bengals.com/uploads//1296837605/sml_gallery_1479_52_298.jpg[/img]

[|BlackJesus|]

[font=trebuchet ms,helvetica,sans-serif][size=7][b]With Ryan now ... It might be time to "Rise" ?[/b][/size][/font]

[img]http://cineramaetcetera.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/batman-movies-bane-batmobile-the-dark-knight-rises-2560x1600.jpg[/img]

[Jamie_B]

[url="http://www.salon.com/2012/08/14/paul_ryan_didnt_build_that/"]http://www.salon.com/2012/08/14/paul_ryan_didnt_build_that/[/url]

[quote]
[b] [url="http://www.salon.com/2012/08/14/paul_ryan_didnt_build_that/"]Paul Ryan didn’t build that![/url][/b]

[b] His family built its fortune on the public-works projects that Romney's "You didn't build that" campaign mocks[/b]


[color=#000000][size=4]
When Paul Ryan took to the stage in Mooresville, North Carolina, as Mitt Romney’s running mate, he attacked President Obama’s “you didn’t build that” remark about the role of government in supporting private innovation. But while Republicans have been clamoring to make this election a false dichotomy between the private sector and the public sector, Paul Ryan — heir to a private fortune made by building public highways — is a gaping pothole in that plan. Paul Ryan is a living, breathing GOP example of how public infrastructure and private entrepreneurship work hand-in-hand.[/size][/color][color=#000000][size=4]
Paul Ryan’s great-grandfather started a construction company to build railroads and, eventually, highways. According to the Web site of Ryan Incorporated Central, the company was “[url="http://bit.ly/OUFU2E"]founded in 1884[/url]with a single team of mules building railroad embankments in Southern Wisconsin.” And in the 1800s, railroad construction was subsidized by the federal government. Mid-century, President Lincoln signed the Pacific Railway Act into law, providing taxpayer dollars to fund the construction of a transcontinental railway. All railroads thereafter connected to, and benefited from, that public investment.[/size][/color][color=#000000][size=4]
At the turn of the century, Ryan Inc. turned to road building. A subsidiary family corporation, Ryan Incorporated Southern, [url="http://bit.ly/OUHnWK"]states on its Web site[/url], “The Ryan workload from 1910 until the rural interstate Highway System was completed 60 years later [and] was mostly Highway construction.” The [url="http://1.usa.gov/OUIaXH"]$119 billion spent by the federal government[/url] on the Interstate Highway System was, [url="http://1.usa.gov/OUHPo0"]by one account[/url], “the largest public works program since the Pyramids.”[/size][/color][color=#000000][size=4]
And, according to the Ryan Inc. Web site, [url="http://bit.ly/OUFU2E"]the company completed[/url]“some of the original work at what would become O’Hare Airport” in Chicago. Originally, O’Hare Airport was a manufacturing base for World War II transport planes. In other words, it’s likely that construction project, too, was paid for by tax dollars. A current search of Defense Department contracts suggests that “Ryan Incorporated Central” has had [url="http://bit.ly/OUNzOG"]at least 22 defense contracts[/url] with the federal government since 1996 , including [url="http://bit.ly/OUNCKc"]one from 1996 worth $5.6 million[/url].[/size][/color][color=#000000]
[size=4][background=transparent]
When President Obama said that we succeed in America “because of our individual initiative but also because we do things together,” he was actually speaking in more general terms — about manufacturing companies that ship their goods on our railways and highways and thus indirectly benefit from that public infrastructure. With a net worth of up to $3.2 million and ranking as the 124th richest member of Congress, Paul Ryan very directly and very significantly benefited from the federal spending he now rails against.[/background][/size][size=4][background=transparent]
Or does he? What’s funny is that Mr. Anti-Spending secured millions in earmarks for his home state of Wisconsin, including, among other things, [url="http://nyr.kr/OUJ8Do"]$3.3 million for highway projects[/url]. And Ryan [url="http://bit.ly/PeoTEB"]voted to preserve $40 billion in special subsidies for big oil[/url], an industry in which, it so happens, Ryan and his wife hold ownership stakes. Yet Ryan wants to [url="http://bit.ly/PeoTEB"]gut financial aid [/url]for college students,[url="http://bit.ly/Pep8j2"] food stamps for hungry families[/url], [url="http://politi.co/Pepiae"]Medicaid[/url], [url="http://bit.ly/PeoTEB"]Medicare[/url] and [url="http://bit.ly/PeoTEB"]Social Security[/url] — the very things that have, historically, helped poor families climb the ladder of opportunity in America.[/background][/size][size=4][background=transparent]
And this is precisely the problem with the Romney-Ryan vision for America: It takes the ladder of opportunity and public infrastructure that helped the previous generation and yanks it up for the next generation. Your grandfather went to college on the GI Bill? We’re not even going to give you measly Pell Grants! Your grandmother lived independently thanks to Social Security? We’re giving yours to Wall Street to crash with the rest of our economy! Your great-grandfather got rich building public railways and roads? We’re going to cut taxes for the rich to historic lows and raise taxes on the struggling middle class to barely cover the cost of plugging potholes![/background][/size][size=4][background=transparent]
It’s “I Got Mine, Now Screw You!” economics. This kind of hard-heartedness may appeal to the extreme fringe base of Republican voters, but it is as repulsive to mainstream voters as it is corrosive to the American dream. The Romney-Ryan budget focuses 62 percent of its cuts on programs that help the poor — in order to pay for more tax breaks for the already-rich and, incidentally, [url="http://bit.ly/Pes3Iy"]raise the deficit[/url].[/background][/size][size=4][background=transparent]
“Of course we believe in government,” [url="http://nyr.kr/OUJ8Do"]Ryan said to the New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza[/url]. “We think government should do what it does really well, but that it has limits, and obviously within those limits are things like infrastructure, interstate highways, and airports.” In other words, the government spending that helped Ryan’s family get ahead falls within the proper role of government. The government spending that helps other families get ahead …? Fortunately, Ryan Inc. also builds landfills, so we’ll have somewhere to bury all that wasteful spending on the poor and middle class.[/background][/size][/color]

[/quote]

[color=#000000]

[/color]

[Jamie_B]

Oh look I'm posting something from a Republican

[url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8"]http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8[/url]

[quote][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]REPUBLICAN DAVID STOCKMAN: Paul Ryan's Budget Is An Empty Fairy Tale[/size][/font][/color]

[color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]The former director of the Office of Management and Budget for the Reagan administration, David Stockman, [/size][/font][/color][url="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/opinion/paul-ryans-fairy-tale-budget-plan.html?_r=1"]blasts Paul Ryan's budget plan in a New York Times op-ed[/url][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3].[/size][/font][/color]
[color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
Stockman calls[url="http://www.businessinsider.com/paul-ryan-budget-2012-8"] the budget[/url] an "empty conservative sermon" and "fairy tale" and says it will "do nothing to reverse the nation's economic decline and arrest its [url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#"][font=inherit][size=1][background=transparent]fiscal[/background][/size][/font][/url] collapse."[/size][/font][/color][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
Stockman's main complaint about the Ryan budget, which reflects broader frustration with today's Republican party, is that it preserves massive and unnecessary spending on Defense and other programs while screwing people who actually need help by cutting food stamps, Medicaid, and other poverty-mitigation efforts.[/size][/font][/color][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
Stockman also rails against the new "Wall Street-coddling" bailout Republicans like Ryan, who stand by and let the Federal Reserve fix [url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#"][font=inherit][size=1][background=transparent]interest[/background][/size][/font][font=inherit][size=1][background=transparent] [/background][/size][/font][font=inherit][size=1][background=transparent]rates[/background][/size][/font][/url], encourage speculators, crush savers, encourage overconsumption, and punish thrift.[/size][/font][/color][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
Specifically, Stockman observes, Ryan's "phony" budget plan:[/size][/font][/color][list]
[*]Maintains Defense spending that is nearly twice the $400 billion (adjusted for today's dollars) that General Eisenhower spent in the 1960s
[*]Shreds the safety net provided by $100 billion in food stamps and $300 billion in Medicaid
[*]Does not cut one dime from Medicare or Social Security for another decade
[*]Includes no serious plan to create jobs
[*]Radically cuts [url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#"][font=inherit][size=1][background=transparent]taxes[/background][/size][/font][/url] on the richest Americans while eliminating tax breaks that mostly help the middle class
[*]Fails to even consider a "value-added sales tax," which is the only way the country can begin to climb out of its budget hole
[/list][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
In short, Stockman says, Ryan's plan is "devoid of credible math or hard policy choices."[/size][/font][/color][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
Harsh words coming from a fellow Republican.[/size][/font][/color][color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]
But then, today's Republican party doesn't look much like it did in Stockman and Reagan's day.[/size][/font][/color]
[/quote]


[color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]Read more: [url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#ixzz23ZVxtxTq"]http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#ixzz23ZVxtxTq[/url][/size][/font][/color]

[|Numbers|]

[quote name='Jamie_B' timestamp='1344992976' post='1146331']
Oh look I'm posting something from a Republican

[url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8"]http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8[/url]

[color=#000000][font=arial, helvetica, sans-serif][size=3]Read more: [url="http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#ixzz23ZVxtxTq"]http://www.businessinsider.com/david-stockman-paul-ryan-budget-2012-8#ixzz23ZVxtxTq[/url][/size][/font][/color]
[/quote]

The same guy who said:

After Stockman's first year at OMB and after "being taken to the woodshed by the president" due to his candor with Atlantic Monthly's William Greider, Stockman became inspired with the projected trend of increasingly large federal deficits and the rapidly expanding national debt. On 1 August 1985, he resigned OMB and later wrote a memoir of his experience in the Reagan Administration titled The Triumph of Politics: Why the Reagan Revolution Failed (ISBN 0060155604), in which he specifically criticized the failure of congressional Republicans to endorse a reduction of government spending as necessary offsets to the large tax decreases, in order to avoid the creation of large deficits and an increasing national debt.

“I invest in anything that Bernanke can’t destroy, including gold, canned beans, bottled water and flashlight batteries."

He is an expert at recognizing failure. Please check his track record and also criminal charges brought against him.

[Homer_Rice]

If you are going to do a copypasta, it's generally polite to cite it.

[MichaelWeston]

With this all said....I really do think raising the debt is scary. What has Obama been spending the money on? I ask these questions and don't tend to get answers.

[Homer_Rice]

[quote name='MichaelWeston' timestamp='1345003559' post='1146462']
With this all said....I really do think raising the debt is scary. What has Obama been spending the money on? I ask these questions and don't tend to get answers.
[/quote]

Here's a decent starting point:

[url="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tentrillion/"]Ten Trillion and Counting[/url]

[Jamie_B]

[quote name='MichaelWeston' timestamp='1345003559' post='1146462']
With this all said....I really do think raising the debt is scary. What has Obama been spending the money on? I ask these questions and don't tend to get answers.
[/quote]

Homer's link is a bit more serious, mine is more snark but is explained at the end of the clip.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-august-14-2012/democalypse-2012---wait--don-t-leave--here-is-a-picture-of-taylor-lautner-edition

[|Numbers|]

[quote name='Homer_Rice' timestamp='1344997574' post='1146398']
If you are going to do a copypasta, it's generally polite to cite it.
[/quote]

Doing it from a smart phone makes those type of things difficult. A little from here and a little from there. Easy enough to do research on Stockman. He's repeated himself over and over many times before.

[Jamie_B]

Say what you will about Stockman, he's one of the only Republicans telling the truth.

[Orange 'n Black]

It doesn't bother me in the slightest to levy low tax rates on capital gains and investment income. That money has to be invested somewhere to generate growth. It doesn't magically deposit $25 million into Mitt Romney's bank account every year just for existing.

I think the class warfare is childish, and distracts from the real debate. In this case, the republican campaign hit the bullseye. This election is about the present and future of the American economy, and the Ryan pick forced this debate into the spotlight. No more infantile mudslinging about birth certificates or tax returns.

For the record, it's going to be impossible to fix the economy without catering to the demands of global industry. People complain about vanishing jobs and tax havens - but our country is the only in the world with a marginal corporate tax rate over 30% that also taxes foreign-earned income when it is repatriated. Commerce is truly global and the game has changed - it's difficult to properly apply historical scenarios to the current situation.

Bottom line, it's hard to compete with countries like China who are willing to throw grants and tax subsidies at industries while offering them the least desirable tax environment in the modern world.

[Jamie_B]

[quote name='Orange 'n Black' timestamp='1345044981' post='1146531']
It doesn't bother me in the slightest to levy low tax rates on capital gains and investment income. That money has to be invested somewhere to generate growth. It doesn't magically deposit $25 million into Mitt Romney's bank account every year just for existing.

I think the class warfare is childish, and distracts from the real debate. In this case, the republican campaign hit the bullseye. This election is about the present and future of the American economy, and the Ryan pick forced this debate into the spotlight. No more infantile mudslinging about birth certificates or tax returns.

For the record, it's going to be impossible to fix the economy without catering to the demands of global industry. People complain about vanishing jobs and tax havens - but our country is the only in the world with a marginal corporate tax rate over 30% that also taxes foreign-earned income when it is repatriated. Commerce is truly global and the game has changed - it's difficult to properly apply historical scenarios to the current situation.

Bottom line, it's hard to compete with countries like China who are willing to throw grants and tax subsidies at industries while offering them the least desirable tax environment in the modern world.
[/quote]

I would suggest to you the "global economy" argument is bunk, and entirely an excuse for the oligarchs and plutocrats to do what they have done throughout our history. Exploit labor.

[Jamie_B]

Chris Hedges has it right here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuuT6y8IVzk

[Vol_Bengal]

Give me "Other", or the 3rd candidate, for $1000 Alex.

It won't do shit, but if enough people went that route maybe, eventually the two corrupt ass major parties MIGHT wake up and smell the smokey fire.

Pretty sad that four more years of Obama makes me shutter... and 4 years of Romney makes me shutter... pathetic really.

[Orange 'n Black]

[quote name='Jamie_B' timestamp='1345045493' post='1146535']


I would suggest to you the "global economy" argument is bunk, and entirely an excuse for the oligarchs and plutocrats to do what they have done throughout our history. Exploit labor.
[/quote]

Do you have rhetoric-free proof?

It's an irrefutable point that fiscal policy dictates the behavior of global commerce. I'll borrow this point from a Prestowitz article: Intel just opened a new high tech manufacturing plant in China. There is no difference in the quality, production cost, or productivity between China and US locations - Intel makes the majority of its chips in America. They chose China because China was willing to provide economic stimuli such as land grants, tax abatements, and subsidies. These are high-paying, high-tech jobs that exist in China as a direct result of US fiscal policy.

Canada is about to reduce corporate marginal tax rate to 15%. The UK hovers around 25% (and both countries manage to provide public health care). You can't simply wish away the fact that the US is at a competitive disadvantage. Before the Internet and e-commerce, it wasn't possible to do business globally the way it is done today. This is unprecedented in history and the rules are not the same. (If you're China, there are no rules except screw everyone who is not China)

[Orange 'n Black]

Re: the point about labor: in high tech, manufacturing, and skilled white collar professions - jobs the USA is supposed to be a leader in - the difference in labor cost is negligible globally.

[Jamie_B]

Yes it's called slavery which was done for the purpose of picking America's cash crop. Cotton.

It's called using children as labor because they are cheaper, before child labor laws.

Are you really so naive to think the free trade agreements we enter into arent done so that the multinationals can move their factories to areas where labor is so much cheaper? Or where safety regulations are that much more lax?

Really?

[Jamie_B]

[quote name='Orange 'n Black' timestamp='1345046437' post='1146546']
Do you have rhetoric-free proof?

It's an irrefutable point that fiscal policy dictates the behavior of global commerce. I'll borrow this point from a Prestowitz article: Intel just opened a new high tech manufacturing plant in China. There is no difference in the quality, production cost, or productivity between China and US locations - Intel makes the majority of its chips in America. They chose China because China was willing to provide economic stimuli such as land grants, tax abatements, and subsidies. These are high-paying, high-tech jobs that exist in China as a direct result of US fiscal policy.

Canada is about to reduce corporate marginal tax rate to 15%. The UK hovers around 25% (and both countries manage to provide public health care). You can't simply wish away the fact that the US is at a competitive disadvantage. Before the Internet and e-commerce, it wasn't possible to do business globally the way it is done today. This is unprecedented in history and the rules are not the same. (If you're China, there are no rules except screw everyone who is not China)
[/quote]

The internet and e-commerce doesnt move products in new ways, they still have to ship in traditional ways.

I would suggest that the reason Germany is doing so well is because they have protective tarrifs on their industries, much in the way that Hamilton and Franklin suggested we do. I would say the same about China. They are both doing pretty well following our model, that we dont even follow anymore.

[Jamie_B]

Further addressing it from a purely white collar perspective ignores the notion that much of our labor force isnt going to be white collar, nor when we were our strongest from an economic standpoint was it. It expects that all should be educated to levels that many cant afford with the costs of school, and in some cases just arent really made for.

We need a strong labor class.

[Orange 'n Black]

[quote name='Jamie_B' timestamp='1345046672' post='1146548']
Yes it's called slavery which was done for the purpose of picking America's cash crop. Cotton.

It's called using children as labor because they are cheaper, before child labor laws.

Are you really so naive to think the free trade agreements we enter into arent done so that the multinationals can move their factories to areas where labor is so much cheaper? Or where safety regulations are that much more lax?

Really?
[/quote]

And are you so cynical to believe that's why they exist? FTAs exist to open markets that were inaccessible or undesirable. I won't debate the point that it has happened. My point is that it's irrelevant. Labor costs are not a primary driver as you would illustrate.

[Orange 'n Black]

[quote name='Jamie_B' timestamp='1345047033' post='1146550']


The internet and e-commerce doesnt move products in new ways, they still have to ship in traditional ways.

I would suggest that the reason Germany is doing so well is because they have protective tarrifs on their industries, much in the way that Hamilton and Franklin suggested we do. I would say the same about China. They are both doing pretty well following our model, that we dont even follow anymore.
[/quote]

The sort of global organization and communication that creates viable global commerce was impossible before the Internet. It existed, but not to the widespread eztent it does today. Shipment is again a negligible cost.

China is the opposite of our model. Free market versus state controlled market. They own industry, control the value of their currency, and blatantly commit economic bribery to achieve their master economic plan. They are still communists, remember?

[Jamie_B]

[quote name='Orange 'n Black' timestamp='1345047746' post='1146553']
And are you so cynical to believe that's why they exist? FTAs exist to open markets that were inaccessible or undesirable. I won't debate the point that it has happened. My point is that it's irrelevant. Labor costs are not a primary driver as you would illustrate.
[/quote]

India was not inaccessible or undesirable, unless you can show me a FTA that includes labor and work conditions on it, I'm inclined to believe what history tells me regarding the exploitation of labor.

[Orange 'n Black]

[quote name='Jamie_B' timestamp='1345047378' post='1146552']
Further addressing it from a purely white collar perspective ignores the notion that much of our labor force isnt going to be white collar, nor when we were our strongest from an economic standpoint was it. It expects that all should be educated to levels that many cant afford with the costs of school, and in some cases just arent really made for.

We need a strong labor class.
[/quote]

White collar was just one of the professions I pointed out. Manufacturing is a blue collar profession with the sort of jobs that can be created with intelligent fiscal policy.

This is the point I'm making here. Paul Ryan forces this debate to happen. I personally won't have a real opinion on a candidate until each side goes in on it.