Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Ryan and the Democrat Narrative



What’s New Today

Story # 1 is signs of desperation on why the left is terrified of Paul Ryan.  #2 is two videos capturing truth and spin by the Democrats.  #3 is a video commercial from the RNC with simple but devastating logic.  #4 Romney surges with young voters.  #5 shows you what is being cut by Obama in Medicare.  #6 is the Onions version of why the Democrats are scared of Ryan.  #7 is a comparison of Obama and Reagan and the economy they inherited.  It seems Reagan had the worse economy and the better results.  Finally #8 is reporting a new sex scandal in the DHS.  


Today’s Thoughts

Priorities:  Mother Jones:  Obama has attended, on average, one fundraiser every 60 hours while running for reelection.  He’s finally paying attention to jobs—his job.
 
The choice is yours.  You can vote for the party that is relying on “dogs on the roof” jokes or telling a black audience the other side wants you back in chains or the party that wants serious reform of Medicare and Social Security so that they can survive and wants to cut the deficit and balance the budget.  

Here’s the difference between Obama and Romney.  Obama says he doesn’t like the specifics of the Romney/Ryan Budget.  Compared to Obama’s plan….Oh, that’s right, he doesn’t have one. 
Morning Joe:  They were discussing David Axelrod and how he looked haggard and worried.  Their best guess was that Axelrod thought they needed to win this election before the conventions by burying Romney in negative advertising and completely outspending him.  This hasn’t worked and they know that Romney has more money than they do and will outspend them from the convention to the election.
 
Rasmussen Poll 8/15/12:  Romney leads 47% to 43% for Obama with 4% wanting someone else and 7% undecided.  Since undecideds tend to go to the challenger, I estimate the race is currently 52% Romney and 45% Obama.  


Lie of the Day

On Tuesday's broadcast of NBC's Nightly News, anchor Brian Williams took a look at Rep. Paul Ryan's first few days on the hustings as Mitt Romney's new VP pick. And what did he see? He saw a "not so warm welcome to the Big Leagues" for Paul Ryan.  


1.  Signs of Desperation

Why the left is terrified of Paul Ryan

Paul Ryan terrifies the American Left.

Which precisely explains the tones of hysteria coming from the Obama White House.
The real question is why the Chicago Thugs have suffered such a public meltdown over Mitt Romney's choice of the young Wisconsin Congressman to be his vice-presidential running mate.

And there is an answer. Three specific answers, actually.

• Ronald Reagan: President Reagan today is an American hero. Poll after poll has Americans placing him in the pantheon of great American presidents, and occasionally at the top of the list.

The admiration for Reagan has become such a part of American historical bedrock that even President Obama and likeminded professional leftists have essentially given up the ghost. When they mention Reagan at all, it is generally to play a sly game of casting Reagan as a moderate, pretending to salute him while taking a shot at some Republican for not being more like Reagan. Obama played this game four times in one speech back in April, effusively praising Reagan while casting Mitt Romney as some sort of wild-eyed extremist. 
No one is fooled.
Ronald Reagan was and remains the Left's worst nightmare.
Why?
Because it was Ronald Reagan who both understood conservative philosophy and was repeatedly turning it into effective policy. It was Reagan who began the massive historical deconstruction of a century's worth of the Left's ideas on everything from economics to national security -- repeatedly proving them as unworkable as they were dangerous. Not to mention that he trounced Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, and, through his vice president in 1988, Michael Dukakis. Three consecutive political landslides in which Reagan so changed America that by 1992 Bill Clinton ran as a "New Democrat" -- essentially portraying himself as Reagan-lite.


The game has changed with the addition of Ryan but contrary to the leftist media, not in Obama’s favor.  I really pity Biden when he debates Ryan.  He was bested by Sarah Palin in 2008.  He will be eviscerated by Ryan. 


2.  Videos: Obama Admits cutting Medicare and promised to cut benefit further if needed


It’s better from Obama’s own lips (watch the video above).  Of course Axelrod has said that it is a Republican lie which you can watch at the video below.



3.  Video: A simple reminder with rock solid logic



4.  Romney over 40% with Youth Vote for the first time

For the first time since he began running for president, Republican Mitt Romney has the support of over 40 percent of America's youth vote, a troubling sign for President Obama who built his 2008 victory with the overwhelming support of younger, idealistic voters.

Pollster John Zogby of JZ Analytics told Secrets Tuesday that Romney received 41 percent in his weekend poll of 1,117 likely voters, for the first time crossing the 40 percent mark. What's more, he said that Romney is the only Republican of those who competed in the primaries to score so high among 18-29 year olds.
"This is the first time I am seeing Romney's numbers this high among 18-29 year olds," said Zogby. "This could be trouble for Obama who needs every young voter he can get."

Zogby helped Secrets dig deeper into his weekend poll, which we reported on earlier. The poll had Romney and Obama tied at 46 percent.

Zogby has been especially interested in the youth vote this election. In 2008, 66 percent chose Obama over Sen. John McCain,the highest percentage for a Democrat in three decades. But their desire for hope and change has turned to disillusionment and unemployment. Zogby calls them "CENGAs" for "college-educated, not going anywhere."

In his latest poll, Obama receives just 49 percent of the youth vote when pitted against Romney, who received 41 percent….


This is huge.  The Democrats felt that Ryan’s addition to the ticket with some creative (read that as lying) ads about Medicare could peel off seniors from supporting Romney.  Not only hasn’t the happened, but it appears young people are susceptible to being peeled off Obama.  In 2008 he got 66% of the youth vote. 

5.  Medicare:  What’s being cut by Obamacare?

The Romney campaign has gone on the offense on Medicare, charging that the Affordable Care Act “cuts $716 billion” from the entitlement program.

That $716 billion figure is one you’ll probably be hearing a lot about during this election cycle. It’s worth understanding where it comes from and what the spending reductions mean for the Medicare program.

First, where it comes from. On July 24, the Congressional Budget Office sent a letter to House Speaker John Boehner, detailing the budget impact of repealing the Affordable Care Act. If Congress overturned the law, “spending for Medicare would increase by an estimated $716 billion over that 2013–2022 period.”

As to how the Affordable Care Act actually gets to $716 billion in Medicare savings, that’s a bit more complicated. John McDonough did the best job explaining it in his 2011 book, “Inside National Health Reform.”  There, he looked at all the various Medicare cuts Democrats made to pay for the Affordable Care Act.

The majority of the cuts, as you can see in this chart below, come from reductions in how much Medicare reimburses hospitals and private health insurance companies



The blue section represents reductions in how much Medicare reimburses private, Medicare Advantage plans. That program allows seniors to join a private health insurance, with the federal government footing the bill. The whole idea of Medicare Advantage was to drive down the cost of health insurance for the elderly as private insurance companies competing for seniors’ business.

That’s not what happened. By 2010, the average Medicare Advantage per-patient cost was 117% of regular fee-for-service. The Affordable Care Act gives those private plans a haircut and tethers reimbursement levels to the quality of care administered, and patient satisfaction….


The real issue is the IPAB.  It goes into effect in 2014 and they will be able to adjust reimbursements to reduce Medicare spending.  Now we all know what happens when you impose price controls (think of the 1979-1980 gas lines).  Now rather than simply freezing the cost reduce it. 


6.  Onion:  I scare the s*#t out of you

When Mitt Romney selected me as his running mate, I knew the Democratic attack dogs would come out in full force. They would say I’m a right-wing ideologue. They would say my views on entitlement programs are far too radical. They would say putting me on the ticket immediately kills Mitt Romney’s chances of becoming president because I’m a liability. But if we’re being honest with each other—if we’re able to put aside the talking points for a few minutes and say what we’re all actually thinking and feeling—I believe we can acknowledge the real truth here.

I’m young, I’m handsome, I’m smart, and I’m articulate. And that scares the ever-loving shit out of you. You can pretend like you have this thing in the bag, but you know good goddamn well that this race just got real interesting, real fast.

It’s okay to admit it. You’re frightened to death of me. It might actually be healthy for you to face your fears now rather than later, when Mitt and I are leading by a few points in the polls and it looks like this thing might end badly for you. Face it: I’m not some catastrophe waiting to happen, like a Sarah Palin or a Dan Quayle. On the contrary, you have the exact opposite fear. I’m a solid, competent, some might say exceptional, politician…


Sometimes the Onion will tell the truth that the MSM is trying to hide from you.


7.President Obama Campaign Narrative

The legend: that Obama began in 2009 from the worst financial hole since the Depression.
Not true. The economic hole in which Ronald Reagan began in 1981 was far deeper.

In January 2009, Obama inherited an unemployment rate of 7.6 percent. Average inflation for the previous year was 3.8 percent. The rate for a 30-year fixed-rate home mortgage was 6 percent.
In 1981, Ronald Reagan inherited an unemployment rate of 7.5 percent and on a steep uptick. The inflation rate was 13.5 percent. And the rate for a new home mortgage was 13.7 percent. The purchasing power of those on fixed incomes had fallen by 30 percent under Carter, throwing millions of seniors and others below the poverty line. There were gasoline shortages and long, long lines at filling stations. Carter himself described the mess the country was in as a “malaise.” Economists had to coin a new word for it, “stagflation”– a supposedly impossible combination of very high inflation with even higher unemployment. Carter based his presidential campaign on raising taxes on millionaires, crusading against “the three-martini lunch” (more likely among TV stars, agents, journalists, and others in the Manhattan crowd than among businessmen; it was a small and petty campaign based on resentment).

Closing out his fourth year in office in 1984, Reagan had brought the unemployment rate down to almost 7.3 percent. By the end of his second term, unemployment was 5.4 percent and the inflation rate had plummeted to 4.3 percent. During his full eight years, the economic incentives he put in place led to the creation of 16 million new jobs and the formation of some 2 million new small businesses. More Americans between the ages of 18 and 65 were employed than ever before, and the labor force had grown to historic proportions, partly because of an unprecedented number of women entering it….

…Closing out his fourth year in office, President Obama has an 8.3 percent unemployment rate, the lowest rate of participation in the labor force in 30 years (63.7 percent), and more Americans out of work and out of the work force than in any of the preceding 30 years. There are also over 7 million more persons in poverty now than when he took office, a jump from 39.8 million to 47 million. And yet he chose “Forward” for his campaign slogan.  

Reagan had an unusually high respect for incentives as a spur to job creation. Give people an incentive, they jump through hoops to earn it. They take the risk of forming small businesses by the tens of thousands, and they launch wholly new industries.

By contrast, President Obama seems to hold incentives in contempt. Imitating Jimmy Carter (with predictably similar results), he styles himself a “fairness president,” and sets up policies designed to punish those with incomes above $250,000.  His campaign is mostly against millionaires. He will reap less investment, fewer inventions and new job-creating industries, and lower tax revenues paid by the wealthy. He is already producing malaise…


Just about everything Obama and the Democrats say is not likely to be true. 


8.  Sex Scandal in DHS

Both Barr and Schriro are named offenders in the growing sex scandal within Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security.  DHS has gone from angrily denying that it has a sex scandal, to putting government workers on “voluntary” leave.
 
The top Homeland Security official accused of cultivating a “frat-house”-style work environment has “voluntarily placed herself on leave” amid an internal review, the department told FoxNews.com late Tuesday evening — just hours after FoxNews.com contacted the agency about new allegations against her.

The official, Suzanne Barr, is chief of staff for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Two more ICE employees came forward this week to complain about “lewd” conduct inside the agency, submitting sworn affidavits that depict graphic comments made by two top officials working under DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano.

The affidavits were given as part of a discrimination and retaliation suit filed earlier this year by James T. Hayes Jr., the head of the New York office for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.


Here’s another scandal brewing in the Obama Administration.  It appears that Napolitano gave unqualified people important jobs in DHS based on their personal relationships with her. 



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