The Real Mitt Romney

[Adak]

More fun facts about socialism in action:

Here's what to expect from your new Socialist President, France:

From the BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19814806

It has not been a great week to be French. Unemployment has just hit three million, growth for next year is estimated at barely above zero, and the popularity of (Socialist) President Hollande has plummeted.

...unemployment here just hit the three million mark and is going to keep rising.

Every week sees a new announcement of large-scale lay-offs. Just this week the last blast-furnace in Lorraine - once
the crucible of the French steel industry - has closed.

Taxes are going up, and no matter what the socialist government says, it is not just the rich who will be affected.

Business-creators are furious because the new rules mean that people who build up an enterprise from scratch will lose more than 60% to the government when they try to sell it on. More and more of the brightest and the best are thinking of moving abroad.

London! is now the sixth largest "French" city.

============== End of BBC Report ================

Why do I dislike Socialism? Because it doesn't work at all well, but liberals keep telling you it will work, and before long, they bring the gov't into EVERY part of your life, and your freedom and rights, go right down the drain.

It's time to Wake Up, about socialism!

[Adak]

Meanwhile, despite lies from extremists talk show hosts, Reagan increased (did not decrease) taxes.

The Congressional Budget Office, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the FHFA, and the IRS are "extremist talk show hosts", now?

You're in deep lying waters, and you have a 40 lb. tool belt of lies strapped around your middle. I suggest you lose a few of them.

So you REALLY believe that a strong military, and a strong economy, somehow combine to make us weak?

Please... that is THE MOST pathetic argument, I've heard all year.

Why don't you prove it to me, that taxes were higher in 1980 , when Reagan took office, than they were in January 1988, (or Dec. 1987), when he left office.

You can adjust for inflation if you like. It's only 8 years here, but the stats including adjustment for inflation, as well as nominal, are available at the url I posted with the data.

I'm sure if you dig around, you can find SOMEBODY whose tax loophole was closed by Reagan, and then had higher tax liability, as a result. But go ahead, it will be fun.

Because the basis of your belief system is a lie. Our country was founded on individual freedoms and opportunity - not gov't hand outs. The gov't will NEVER be nearly as efficient as the private sector. Not even the military is that efficient.

You should read up on just what our private sector has done for us:
http://www.economist.com/node/21555532

it's the kind of thing you won't see in ANY Hollywood movie, where the wicked corporation tries to take over the world, unleash biological weapons, destroy the moon, etc.

Again, it's just a fact. You can run away or slander them or whatever, but they're still THOSE DAMN FACTS.

Read it and weep!

[tw]

Originally Posted by Adak

You're in deep lying waters, and you have a 40 lb. tool belt of lies strapped around your middle. I suggest you lose a few of them.

So you REALLY believe that a strong military, and a strong economy, somehow combine to make us weak?

So the B-1 Bomber, Nimitz carrier, Ohio and Los Angles submarines, 600 ship Navy, etc all made the American economy stronger? History says just the opposite. Why are you no longer defending those weapon systems once their value was better defined? And why are you imposing extremist talk show myths to misrepresent what I posted? That misrepresentation is a classic debating trick used when the many previous claims were too far from reality.

Since those 'big dic' military claims are bogus, you are now running to blame socialism for economic malise. Nonsense again. Strong economies are not created by "deregulation verses socialism". Or conservative verse liberal. Or "them verses us". Or 'big dic' inspired wars. Strong economics occurs due to innovation found in all free market economies, including France. Political spin does not explain what makes or undermines economies. Closing tax loopholes did not end the economic disaster created by a conservative and wacko president Nixon. A president who is slightly more socialist did not suddenly create a massive recession in France.

Posting mockery does not prove knowledge. It only proves you cannot defend those myths in previous posts.

A country prospers when better educated people do not promote the extremist political agendas that you have posted. Innovation is not defined or promoted in your accusations. Innovation is the reason for America's strength. Innovation is the kind of thing you won't see in ANY Hollywood movie where the evil liberal destroys corporations, unleashes biological weapons, and creates massacres. The real threat is someone who blindly preaches half truth propganda and the resulting hate from those extremist political concepts.

A real threat is one who sees solutions in 'big dic' concepts. As we learned from useless and unnecessary deaths in Vietnam and Iraq. But no. Extremists politic, rather than logic and reality, proves 'them verses us' justifies destruction. "Conservative verse liberal" rhetoric even justified hate of Muslims in Lower Manhattan.

It is sad that your politics rather than well proven historical concepts explain the world. Those politics historically justified waste, stilfled innovation, hate, environmental disasters, fear, and even words such as nigger.

Meanwhile, other terms not found in your politics (ie STEM, R&D, education) explain what makes an economy and nation prosper. 'Big dic' military and conservative agendas did not make America prosper. A tolerant society that even welcomes immigrants does. A society not polarized by rediculous "liberal verse conservative" hate is prosperous. Your extremist politics is a serious threat to what made America great.

[DanaC]

You should read up on just what our private sector has done for us:
http://www.economist.com/node/21555532

it's the kind of thing you won't see in ANY Hollywood movie, where the wicked corporation tries to take over the world, unleash biological weapons, destroy the moon, etc.

Again, it's just a fact. You can run away or slander them or whatever, but they're still THOSE DAMN FACTS.

Read it and weep!

This caught my eye. I won't dispute the details of Herman's study; I don't know nearly enough about that period of history for my own country, let alone anyone else's. But...

Alarm bells always sound for me when I see someone cite a historian's findings as bald fact. That just isn't how history works as a field. His analysis will be replete with individual facts, but taken as a whole no analysis, no piece of research, no academic study (within humanities/arts/ social sciences) should ever be taken as the last word on a given topic.

I'm currently teaching historical skills and historiography to 1st year undergrads, and one of the first things they learn is that, unlike at school and college, the texts they read are not to be treated as unassailable fact. They are not to be approached in the same way as a school text book, where the word on the page is what you learn to be true.

[Sheldonrs]

Originally Posted by DanaC

...I'm currently teaching historical skills and historiography to 1st year undergrads, and one of the first things they learn is that, unlike at school and college, the texts they read are not to be treated as unassailable fact. They are not to be approached in the same way as a school text book, where the word on the page is what you learn to be true.

Does this scare anyone else?

[DanaC]

Mmm. There are several other factors that are probably more important to that picture than 'socialism' . Actually you already alluded to them in an earlier post about the soviet block. One of the key factors in communist states becoming stuck in a war communism paradigm was the absolute opposition of the USA to anything seen as a threat to capitism and the democratic economy. Opposition which was interventionist, aggressive and far reaching. Up to and including involving themselves in postwar French elections when it looked possible a communist party win was on the way.

There are lots of reasons communism failed. But being permanently on the defensive and ever actually getting to a stage where the state wasn't under overt and covert attack from a powerful enemy most certainly did not help.

As for Cuba, alongside all the above. I suspect longstanding sanctions, economic isolation and coastal waters full of mines may have affected their economic development.

[BigV]

Yes, Adak, you continue to outpace me by a wide margin.

I see we've strayed far from "the real mitt romney", fine, fine. But I still have some questions about some buzzphrases you keep using. You've still not helped me understand what constitutes "true conservative". And I've noticed another recurring theme in your posts. You keep decrying "a government hand out", and you contrasted it to "a government hand up" at one point. A couple questions--what is the difference between a hand up and a hand out? And what are these government hand outs you're so bothered about in the first place?

---

Thank you for the inclusion of the links in your previous posts, I appreciate that. I have some suggestions for improvement, but I must first acknowledge this first big step. Nice work!

[DanaC]

So, what, France's economic woes are a result of socialism?

As opposed to the near collapse of global finance?

Socialism may or may not be the solution to their ills. But it certainly wasn't the cause. It staggers me that with such a clear demonstration of the dangers and downside of capitalism as we have seen in the last couple of years, still the bogeyman is the red under the bed, rather than the financial wizards and global corporate culture that have crippled whole countries and regional economies.

[Adak]

Tw: You keep using the "N" word, and I'll have to ignore your sad and racist posts.

Originally Posted by BigV

Yes, Adak, you continue to outpace me by a wide margin.

I see we've strayed far from "the real mitt romney", fine, fine. But I still have some questions about some buzzphrases you keep using. You've still not helped me understand what constitutes "true conservative". And I've noticed another recurring theme in your posts. You keep decrying "a government hand out", and you contrasted it to "a government hand up" at one point. A couple questions--what is the difference between a hand up and a hand out? And what are these government hand outs you're so bothered about in the first place?

---

Thank you for the inclusion of the links in your previous posts, I appreciate that. I have some suggestions for improvement, but I must first acknowledge this first big step. Nice work!

I thought you'd get a real idea of Mitt, by watching the debate. He did a very fine job.

A hand up is any program that includes a central core protocol that stresses giving people a lift upward, in their ability to earn a living. Job retraining for disabled vets, is a good example.

A hand out is any program that lacks a central theme of lifting people upward in economic mobility, leading to regular dependency on the part of the recipient. Typically, they aren't even making an effort to get off the dole. Why should they?
Welfare recipients who could work but don't, living off welfare for decades, are a good example.

I'll post up something defining a true conservative, when I have more time to write.

The highly anticipated jobs stats for September came in this morning. Our "phoney" unemployment rate is now down a little bit, to 7.8%. Our real unemployment rate (which includes those who would work, but have now quit looking), is estimated by the WSJ (Wall Street Journal), to be 11.1% in preliminary estimates. (which are frequently revised).

Can you see the Presidential race, as a baseball game? It's the bottom of the ninth inning, and you NEED a double to bring around the winning score. Who will you send up as the designated hitter?

Obama, who has a dismal .190 batting average? Or Romney who has a huge .350 batting average?

Despite everything else, YOU KNOW that Romney runs RINGS around Obama, when it comes to business, and Ryan runs RINGS around Biden, without even trying, (as most of us do, <cough, cough>). You have to choose a batter, which one is your choice?

Mitt Romney is the only real choice for President. As I've said before, I'd like to have seen Obama have a great two terms, but he got hit by this recession, and he just hasn't been able to handle it.

Obama has no plans to handle it, if he is re-elected. Did you hear any new plans from him, during the 90 minute debate? Anything that sounded good to get us out of this economic downturn we've been caught up in for years now? Obama has nothing - nothing new, and he can't repeat the throw money at it solution he tried before, because we can't afford it.

BigV, thanks, and I know that some of those websites I linked to aren't the best for research, but others had the data in Excel spreadsheets and other formats, that I can't handle on this computer.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Adak

Tw: You keep using the "N" word, and I'll have to ignore your sad and racist posts.
--snip

What the heck are you talking about?

[infinite monkey]

Originally Posted by BigV

What the heck are you talking about?

Blah blah blah cherry pick cherry pick blah blah blah rhetoric be afraid blah blah, that's what!

[BigV]

Got to take these one at a time...

Originally Posted by Adak

BigV, thanks, and I know that some of those websites I linked to aren't the best for research, but others had the data in Excel spreadsheets and other formats, that I can't handle on this computer.

You're welcome. What I had in mind was this link:

The problem with Socialism, in a picture:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi..._1790-2009.png

The "CBO's Extended Baseline Scenario", is something for your pipe dreams. The "CBO's Alternative Fiscal Scenario", is much more likely.

I offer this constructive criticism of this link. It is just a picture. It has a title, but there's little there to go on, not a link back to the article, no legends on the axes, nothing. I did follow up on this picture's title, "Publicly held federal debt 1790-2009", and read some material though.

You say it is an picture of the problem with Socialism. That's not what I found.

Here's a link that has much more actual information than just that picture. It's a CBO report titled The 2012 Long-Term Budget Outlook. Here's the money shot:



Let me break that down for you. First of all, the graph, the report, nothing at all has anything at all to do with Socialism, or its supposed problems. I *suspect* that scare word came from some partisan bloviator who saw a report and then took the six or seven words in it that suited his panicky mood at the time, and mashed up that graph and slapped the label Socialism somewhere in the title of the blog post. I think you cribbed it from something like that.

Now that that is out of the way, let's talk about what the CBO is actually saying. They consider two scenarios, they call them extended baselines because they look at their projections for the budget for the next twenty-five or so years.

Originally Posted by Congressional Budget Office

What Is the Budget Outlook Under the Extended Baseline Scenario?

Under the extended baseline scenario, which generally adheres closely to current law, federal debt would gradually decline over the next 25 years—from an estimated 73 percent of GDP this year to 61 percent by 2022 and 53 percent by 2037. That outcome would be the result of two key sets of policy assumptions:

Under current law, revenues would rise steadily relative to GDP because of the scheduled expiration of cuts in individual income taxes enacted since 2001 and most recently extended in 2010, the growing reach of the alternative minimum tax (AMT), the tax provisions of the Affordable Care Act, the way in which the tax system interacts with economic growth, demographic trends, and other factors; revenues would reach 24 percent of GDP by 2037—much higher than has typically been seen in recent decades—and would grow to larger percentages thereafter.
At the same time, under this scenario, government spending on everything other than the major health care programs, Social Security, and interest—activities such as national defense and a wide variety of domestic programs—would decline to the lowest percentage of GDP since before World War II.

That significant increase in revenues and decrease in the relative magnitude of other spending would more than offset the rise in spending on health care programs and Social Security.

******

What is the Outlook Under the Extended Alternative Fiscal Scenario?

The budget outlook is much bleaker under the extended alternative fiscal scenario, which maintains what some analysts might consider “current policies,” as opposed to current laws. Federal debt would grow rapidly from its already high level, exceeding 90 percent of GDP in 2022. After that, the growing imbalance between revenues and spending, combined with spiraling interest payments, would swiftly push debt to higher and higher levels. Debt as a share of GDP would exceed its historical peak of 109 percent by 2026, and it would approach 200 percent in 2037.

The changes under this scenario would result in much lower revenues than would occur under the extended baseline scenario because almost all expiring tax provisions are assumed to be extended through 2022 (with the exception of the current reduction in the payroll tax rate for Social Security). After 2022, revenues under this scenario are assumed to remain at their 2022 level of 18.5 percent of GDP, just above the average of the past 40 years.

Outlays would be much higher than under the other scenario. This scenario incorporates assumptions that through 2022, lawmakers will act to prevent Medicare’s payment rates for physicians from declining ***; that after 2022, lawmakers will not allow various restraints on the growth of Medicare costs and health insurance subsidies to exert their full effect; and that the automatic reductions in spending required by the Budget Control Act of 2011 will not occur (although the original caps on discretionary appropriations in that law are assumed to remain in place). Finally, under this scenario, federal spending as a percentage of GDP for activities other than Social Security, the major health care programs, and interest payments is assumed to return to its average level during the past two decades, rather than fall significantly below that level, as it does under the extended baseline scenario.

*** the kind of reductions in payments to providers that comprise the hotly debated $176 billion dollars "stolen" from Medicare, according to Ryan/Romney.

So, you say that the problem with Socialism is ... something, but you point at the "extended alternative baseline scenario" as the scary bogeyman. It IS scary I agree. But if you read the CBO's own words, that scary prospect is what they project will happen if the tax cuts are permitted to stay in place.

...

Come on, Adak. This is Socialism? If you want to AVOID the "Socialist" outcome, fine--just keep extending the temporary Bush era tax cuts. This is what Comrade Romney has proposed, hasn't he? He won't increase anyone's taxes. "Absolutely." that was his *exact* statement on the issue, right? Socialist bastard. In fact, if you listen to him further, he says he will LOWER THE RATES. REALLY???? That scary graph was scary because the rates only stay the same, imagine how much faster and higher the Taxapolyse will hit if the rates are lowered? Oh, sure, Romney's gonna pay for them by eliminating funding for Big Bird and some other hand waving, but even taking him at his word, he's only aiming to make the changes "revenue neutral". He doesn't want to bring any more revenue to the Federal system. All cuts. No revenue increases.

You read the report. You look at the graphs. You listen to Romney's words. Then you come back and tell me which scenario his plan would take us to. And be prepared to substitute some numbers for his pitiful and unconvincing hand waving. You've shown your willingness and ability to support your statements to a degree far exceeding Romney's. Go on, convince me. I might vote for you.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by BigV

snip--

You read the report. You look at the graphs. You listen to Romney's words. Then you come back and tell me which scenario his plan would take us to. And be prepared to substitute some numbers for his pitiful and unconvincing hand waving. You've shown your willingness and ability to support your statements to a degree far exceeding Romney's. Go on, convince me. I might vote for you.

Adak's conspicuously ignoring this position too.

[Adak]

The fiscal details in Romneys Administration, will be undoubtedly written in large part (probably the larger part), by his Vice President, Paul Ryan.

As the head of the House Budget Committee, Ryan has an excellent and detailed knowledge of what changes should be made, and the order they should be made in.

That's one reason I'm so pleased with this pairing, because the President may want to work on the economy and fiscal matters, but no President has the time to dig into all the details. Here, Ryan already KNOWS a lot of the details, and has plenty of time to research the matter.

A perfect choice in a running mate, imo.

@@: I thought it was obvious that the poor needed a helping hand. But no, they don't need a monthly check for decades, if they're able-bodied.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Adak

The fiscal details in Romneys Administration, will be undoubtedly written in large part (probably the larger part), by his Vice President, Paul Ryan.

As the head of the House Budget Committee, Ryan has an excellent and detailed knowledge of what changes should be made, and the order they should be made in.

That's one reason I'm so pleased with this pairing, because the President may want to work on the economy and fiscal matters, but no President has the time to dig into all the details. Here, Ryan already KNOWS a lot of the details, and has plenty of time to research the matter.

A perfect choice in a running mate, imo.

@@: I thought it was obvious that the poor needed a helping hand. But no, they don't need a monthly check for decades, if they're able-bodied.

Let me get this straight. Your complaint, at least the complaint coming from Romney's campaign and their surrogates about Obama's lack of qualifications to guide the economy is his lack of experience in the private sector--never run as much as a lemonade stand, is how the bumpersticker reads, is it not? I think YOU may have repeated it. Got it.

Ryan is your ace in the hole for the fiscal details for an imagined Romney Administration, right? The guy who'll be at the Executive helm for the economy. He's good because he's been the head of the House Budget Committee. Got it.

So... just curious... what is Ryan's private sector experience? Any lemonade stands? Well, no. He did drive the Weinermobile though. cite.

Private sector experience:

• Ryan moonlighted on Capitol Hill as a waiter at the Tortilla Coast restaurant & as a fitness trainer at Washington Sport and Health Club.
• One of Ryan’s summer jobs in college was as an Oscar Mayer salesman in Minnesota, peddling turkey bacon and a new line called “Lunchables” to supermarkets – he even drove the “Wienermobile” once.
• Ryan worked as a marketing consultant for his family’s construction business before being elected to Congress. The company — Ryan Incorporated Central — began as an earthmoving business created by his great-grandfather in 1884.

His substantive work: Public service. Government worker to you.

• Currently serving seventh term as a member of Congress.
• Ryan was little known outside Janesville when he ran for Congress in 1998 (age 28) and captured 57 percent of vote.
• Ryan’s first budget plan, which he called “Roadmap for America’s Future,” was released in 2010.
• Early in his career as a representative to Congress, Ryan held office hours in an old truck he converted into an office.
• Ryan was the legislative director for Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas, 1995-1997.

Now I have to say, I don't believe this disqualifies him for executive office. I don't think this is a useful measure, it's too incomplete. But you can't say Obama's unqualified because of the dearth of his private sector experience and then tout Ryan who has far less private sector experience and be expected to be taken seriously. Your double standard is unconvincing. You might be happy with him because you like him and be unhappy with Obama because you dislike him--fine. But your reasoning is unsound.