In Cleveland, Ryan articulates optimistic* vision of upward mobility
“While the president is talking Big Bird, binders and birth control,” Jennifer Rubin writes, Republican Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan was “delivering a serious and substantive speech at Cleveland University”. The presidential nominee himself will be delivering “a significant speech on the economy Friday” in Ames, Iowa.
At least, one party would rather outline its vision than attack its opponents. In his Cleveland address, Ryan only once made mention of his opponents and then merely to chide them for not offering “an agenda for a second term.” He talked about real issues, the problem of poverty and the American ideal of upward mobility:
Mitt Romney and I are running because we believe that Americans are better off in a dynamic free enterprise-based economy that fosters economic growth and opportunity and upward mobility instead of a stagnant government-directed economy that stifles job creations and fosters government dependency.
He faulted the centralized top-down approach and heralded the bipartisan welfare reform of the 1990s, but lamented that today, ”we’re still trying to measure compassion by how much government spends not by how many people we help escape from poverty”, then put forward the “alternative approach” that he and Romney favor:
Well, to hear some tell it, we think everybody should just fend for themselves. That’s just a false argument. It’s a strawman set up to avoid a genuine debate.
The truth is Mitt Romney and I believe in true compassion and upward mobility, and we’re offering a vision based on real reforms for lifting people out of poverty.
He went on to note how how government’s excesses have undermined civil society – and to show respect for the work of private institutions who should be left “free to do the work that only they can do.” He promised to “restore those parts of the welfare reform law that have been undone or weakened” and “apply other lessons from welfare reform’s success.”
Michael Warren has a good write-up of the speech as does Rubin. Both merit your time. And does the speech itself. It shows that the Republican ticket has a genuine concern for those in need and a plan to help them. Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, in short, are putting forward a vision consistent with ideas of such luminaries of the American conservative movement as Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp.
And they’re articulating that vision in the middle of the campaign. Makes you proud to be a Republican this time around.
*conservative.
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“Mitt Romney and I want to apply this idea to other anti-poverty programs, such as Medicaid and food stamps. The federal government would continue to provide the resources, but we would remove endless federal mandates and restrictions that hamper state efforts to make these programs more effective.”
“In other words, Medicaid and food stamps will be block-granted… And since Medicaid, food stamps and the earned-income-tax-credit (extremely unlikely to survive a Romney administration attack on “tax loopholes”) were key working-poor supports underlying welfare reform, it’s unlikely welfare reform will exactly thrive, either.
And so, the entire Romney/Ryan “poverty” strategy is basically to consign poor people to the bracing independence of relying on an unimaginable boom in jobs that will supposedly be produced by tax and spending cuts. “
Comment by Passing By — October 25, 2012 @ 11:31 am - October 25, 2012
The hate and hostility that Obama syncophants like Passing By have towards even the concept of job growth and reform of welfare shows you their primary goal.
Passing By and Obama welfare mooches all believe the same thing — other people should be forced to work to pay their bills for them. They don’t want jobs or opportunity; they want welfare checks, Obamaphones, and food stamps so that they never have to bother with work or contributing to society again.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — October 25, 2012 @ 12:00 pm - October 25, 2012
“welfare mooches all believe the same thing —other people should be forced to work to pay their bills for them. They don’t want jobs or opportunity; they want welfare checks”
“The biggest problem with the denizens of Bullshit Mountain is they act like their shit don’t stink. If they have success, they built it. If they failed, the government ruined it for ‘em. If they get a break, they deserve it. If you get a break, it’s a handout and an entitlement. It’s a baffling, willfully blind cognitive dissonance best summed up by their head coach, in what is perhaps my favorite sound bite of all time.
CRAIG T. NELSON (6/2/2009): I’ve been on food stamps and welfare. Anybody help me out? No!”
Comment by Passing By — October 25, 2012 @ 12:49 pm - October 25, 2012
We can afford massive unchecked entitlement spending as long as we tax the rich at ever higher rates to compensate. Anyone who thinks otherwise is a racist.
Also, I resent success and anyone who has more money or happiness than I do. My solution is to use Government to bring their money and happiness down to my level.
Comment by Passing Gas — October 25, 2012 @ 12:54 pm - October 25, 2012
Let’s put it this way.
I didn’t see your ass in the classroom when I was graduating from high school.
I didn’t see your ass in the college classroom in your work uniform, coming in from working your lunch shift and getting ready to go back after class was finished for your evening shift to pay your tuition and bills.
I didn’t see your ass up at 6 AM today to take an important conference call.
I didn’t see your ass driving an hour and a half to work.
I didn’t see your ass finish and bill two major projects this morning.
I didn’t see your ass skip the Starbucks and drink the office coffee instead to save a bit of money.
I’m not going to see your ass at the front of the classroom tonight teaching for three hours, AFTER a full day at work, so that I have a few extra bucks to put in savings for my retirement.
And I won’t see your ass driving home at 10 PM to get up at 6 AM to do it all over again tomorrow.
Instead, where I DO see your ass is passed-out drunk in a store front, standing in line at the welfare office demanding your check, <a href="http://theweek.com/article/index/215403/only-in-america-the-adult-baby-who-collects-social-security”>sitting at home playing out your sexual fantasies in a diaper, or in the street whining that society isn’t giving you enough free health care and disability payments for your choice to have bareback sex and get HIV.
And in all these cases, you’re demanding that the money I earn be taken from me and given to you in the form of fat welfare checks, rent payments, free health care, food stamps, and Obamaphones. You and your fellow mooches sit there and scream that your choice to drop out, get drunk, and be promiscuous is just as good and “equal” as my choice to actually get an education, go to work, be sexually responsible, and pay my bills.
Guess what? It’s not.
I DID build that. I DID do that. And I’m paying taxes for every penny of it.
You didn’t do a damn thing, you haven’t paid a damn penny, and you are sitting here screaming that you “deserve” the same everything that I have worked for and done.
That’s what you and your fellow Obama supporters are — drunks, perverts, and moochers who throw screaming tantrums to berate and intimidate hardworking people. You are lazy, despicable, disgusting mooching scum who want society to pay for your bad choices by punishing those who were responsible.
So in short, we ARE better than you are. We make better choices. We are more responsible. And we are sick and tired of you and yours acting like three-year-olds throwing tantrums to get what you want.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — October 25, 2012 @ 1:26 pm - October 25, 2012
“I didn’t see your ass ”
“drunks, perverts, and moochers who throw screaming tantrums to berate and intimidate hardworking people”
” … It’s a baffling, willfully blind cognitive dissonance…”
Comment by Passing By — October 25, 2012 @ 2:17 pm - October 25, 2012
Typical. The welfare mooch can’t answer facts; he just screams and pisses and cries and tries to blame other people for the fact that he demands everyone else pay his bills so he can sit around, get drunk, and play with himself all day.
Maybe the lying mooch can do better explaining why he supports and endorses tax cheats and welfare frauds for high-level government positions.
Probably not, though. Liberals like Passing By really aren’t intelligent people; they’re just malicious, amoral little children who think that society exists for them to steal from. The easiest way to deal with them is to present their abuses and then watch them kick and scream and throw their childish tantrums, because they aren’t mentally capable of condemning these behaviors.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — October 25, 2012 @ 2:56 pm - October 25, 2012
“.. just screams and pisses and cries and tries to blame other people… sit around, get drunk, and play … aren’t intelligent people; they’re just malicious, amoral little children … The easiest way to deal with them is to present their abuses and then watch them kick and scream and throw their childish tantrums..”
“cognitive dissonance…”
Comment by Passing By — October 25, 2012 @ 4:11 pm - October 25, 2012
#8 – Passing By, are you sure you aren’t Levi in disguise? You’re cutting-and-pasting with his hallmarks.
Just sayin’.
Regards,
Peter H.
Comment by Peter Hughes — October 25, 2012 @ 6:30 pm - October 25, 2012
I don’t think Passing By is a person; I think it is some sort of robot that just collects useless information and just deposits it wherever and quotes people while linking to random Youtube videos.
Also, it should change its name to “Moving In.”
Comment by Rattlesnake — October 25, 2012 @ 8:05 pm - October 25, 2012
“are you sure you aren’t Levi in disguise”
“I think it is some sort of robot“
Comment by Passing By — October 26, 2012 @ 1:21 pm - October 26, 2012