Harry Reid, the Democrat Senator from Nevada who is the Majority Leader of the US Senate said this about Congressional Republicans opposition to President Obama in an interview yesterday:
“It’s been obvious that they’re doing everything they can to make him fail. And I hope, I hope — and I say this seriously — I hope that’s based on substance and not the fact that he’s African-American.”
Republicans are the ones who appointed the first two African-Americans to serve as Secretary of State (Colon Powell and Condoleezza Rice), elected the first African-American to the US Senate (Tim Scott), and appointed an African-American as US Ambassador to the UN (Alan Keyes) and the US Supreme Court (Clarence Thomas), to name a few African-Americans who have served their country as Republicans.
So I say to Harry – and I say this seriously – I hope your idiotic statement is based upon your being severely addled when you said that and not the fact that you are a complete and utter idiot.
Tampilkan postingan dengan label Republicans. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label Republicans. Tampilkan semua postingan
Bill Clinton blasts Mitt Romney over proposed tax cut lies
8:55AM EDT October 16. 2012 - Bill Clinton is going to bat again for President Obama, cutting a video blasting Mitt Romney over his proposed tax cut.
Clinton says Romney's tax cut proposal adds up to $5 trillion, and can only add to the national debt unless they are accompanied by massive budget cuts or the elimination of tax deductions that benefit the middle class.
The tax cut issue is very likely to surface in tonight's second Obama-Romney debate.
"In the first debate," Clinton says in the video, "Governor Romney said that he wasn't really going to cut taxes on upper income people -- he only wanted to cut taxes for middle class people. That's not true."
In a statement accompanying the video, the Obama campaign says: "President Clinton explains Mitt Romney's $5 trillion tax cut and how middle class families with children will get an average tax increase of $2,000 to pay for $250,000 in tax cuts for multi -millionaires."
Romney says his proposed tax cut will not add up to $5 trillion because it will be offset by eliminating tax deductions and loopholes. He also notes that Obama wants to raise taxes by eliminating George W. Bush-era tax rates for Americans making more than $250,000 a year.
Responding to the Clinton video, Romney spokesperson Amanda Henneberg said:
"They are trying to hide the fact that President Obama is the only candidate running on a plan to increase taxes. In tonight's debate, the choice on taxes will be clear. President Obama wants to raise taxes on small businesses and job creators, which will make our recovery even more difficult. Mitt Romney will lower tax rates across the board, make our businesses more competitive, and bring a real recovery to the American people."
The Source
The Source
Bill Kills - Clinton Brilliant At Convention GOP Cries!
Clinton summarizes the GOP platform as:
and..."Their campaign pollster said, 'We're not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers,'" Clinton said.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -– Bill Clinton made the nation a big promise Wednesday night, pledging to those still struggling that their economic fortunes will turn around if they reelect President Barack Obama.
“A lot of Americans are still angry and frustrated about this economy," Clinton told a spellbound audience of delegates at Time Warner Cable Arena. "If you look at the numbers, you know that employment is growing, banks are beginning to lend again, and a lot of housing prices are even beginning to pick up.
“But too many people do not feel it yet,” he said, and then vowed: “If will you renew the president's contract, you will feel it. You will feel it.”
He paused, and then added, “Folks, whether the American people believe what I just told you or not may be the whole election. I just want you to know I believe it. With all my heart I believe it.”
The rest of Clinton’s nearly hour-long speech was a detailed litigation of the main charges that Republicans have made against Obama.
But those few sentences -- an acknowledgment that the nation is still stuck in an economic slump, a promise that a second Obama term will bring better times, and a quick, sly slip into analyst mode -- were the key moments of the speech.
It was an honest, forthright appeal to the voters who will, by all accounts, decide the election -- those who voted for Obama in 2008, but who have found themselves disappointed, wanting to believe in the president they supported four years ago, but not sure they will. Strikingly, Clinton's line about the possibility that Americans may not put their faith in the president was not in his prepared remarks.
Clinton only mentioned Republican Mitt Romney a handful times, but laid out a framework that he said defines this election. “If you want a winner-take-all, you’re-on-your-own society, you should support the Republican ticket,” Clinton said. “But if you want a country of shared opportunities and shared responsibility -– a we're-all-in-this-together society -- you should vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.”
Clinton, whose mastery of the stage left him several possible ways to attack Romney, notably did not skewer the Republican's record at Bain Capital, or his other weaknesses, instead focusing his argument in general against the GOP philosophy. (Clinton worked a stint for the consulting and private equity firm Teneo Capital. Co-founder Doug Band is a close Clinton adviser. Clinton listed his income from Teneo on a recent disclosure form as greater than $1,000, though it gives no upper limit.)
Holding fire on Bain left the speech absent a zinger to sum up Romney. Instead, Clinton saved the zinger for tax cuts for the rich, warning that Romney will "double down on trickle-down."
He paraphrased Ronald Reagan: "As another president once said, 'There they go again."
In reframing last week's GOP message, he employed equal parts mockery, wonkery and plainspeak.
In short, he said, the Republicans came to Tampa to deliver a simple message about Obama: "We left him a total mess, but he hasn't cleaned it up fast enough, so fire him and put us back in."
Clinton hit Paul Ryan in the same style. The GOP vice presidential candidate had attacked Obama for cutting $716 billion from Medicare, when his own budget proposal included those same cuts.
"You gotta give him one thing. It takes some brass to attack a guy for doing what you did," Clinton said.
He also slashed at Romney's charge that the president had undermined the work requirement in welfare reform. "Their campaign pollster said, 'We're not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers,'" Clinton said. "Now, finally I can say that is true. I couldn't have said it better myself –- I just hope you remember that every time you see those ads."
Beyond making the broad case for Obama’s reelection, Clinton's job Wednesday night was to make Democrats forget the terrible afternoon they had just endured.
After party leaders, and eventually the president himself, decided it had been a bad idea to omit from their party platform any mention of God as well as an assertion of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, they attempted to change it quickly in a late afternoon voice vote on the convention floor.
After party leaders, and eventually the president himself, decided it had been a bad idea to omit from their party platform any mention of God as well as an assertion of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, they attempted to change it quickly in a late afternoon voice vote on the convention floor.
Embarrassingly, convention chairman Antonio Villaraigosa, the mayor of Los Angeles, had to ask for three voice votes, and each time the nays got louder. He eventually ruled that there was two-thirds support for the changes, despite the clear lack of such a majority.
The snafu led to a series of embarrassing TV interviews for Democratic National Committee Chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who told CNN there was “no discord” during the vote, only to have Anderson Cooper mock her comments as belonging to “an alternate universe.”
Organizers also decided to move the final day of the three-day convention indoors, rather than having Obama accept his party's nomination at the 65,000-seat Bank of America outdoor football stadium. The threat of rain forced the decision, but it was another disappointment for a convention that at one point was envisioned as four-day event in four different cities, and has been beleaguered by fundraising woes and now downsized to a three-day event in the same arena.
For Clinton and for the assembled Democrats, it was a chance to relive his glory days. Clinton showed little interest in letting the moment end. And with the balloon drop canceled, there was some question whether Clinton could ever be urged off the stage.
Obama joined him onstage for a brief moment after Clinton finished speaking, causing the crowd to erupt. Clinton bowed to the current president as Obama walked out, the two men embraced, waved to the crowd, and then walked toward backstage.
But Clinton shook hands with nearly every person in sight on his way out, disappearing into the backstage tunnel once only to reemerge for one last final hug and handshake with one of his many friends. Finally, Obama simply walked through the curtain without him, and Clinton followed a few seconds later.
Mitt Romney names Paul Ryan as running mate
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney introduced Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin as his vice presidential running mate on Saturday, turning to the architect of a deeply conservative and intensely controversial long-term budget plan to remake Medicare and cut trillions in federal spending.
In the campaign to come, Republicans will present economic solutions “that are bold, specific and achievable,” Mr. Romney said as he presented his political partner to cheering supporters. “We offer our commitment to create 12 million new jobs and bring better take home pay to middle class families.”...
(And this key point) Mr. Ryan and other supporters say the change is needed to prevent the program from financial calamity. Critics argue it would impose ever-increasing costs on seniors.
Other elements of the budget plan would cut projected spending for Medicaid, which provides health care for the poor, as well as food stamps, student loans and other social programs that Mr. Obama and Democrats have pledged to defend.
In all, it projected spending cuts of $5.3-trillion over a decade, and cut future projected deficits substantially.
Romney May Have Paid No Federal Income Tax From 1999 to 2001
are guessing that Romney may have paid near zero federal taxes in 2009 due to losses on his investments resulting from the financial crisis. They probably have the right idea, just the wrong year.
It is true that Romney suffered capital losses on his investments in 2009 that might act to shield much of his income in that year from taxes, but he would have to be a complete idiot to allow his tax planners to file a return showing no income taxes paid just as he was gearing up for a presidential run. But, then again, we are talking about someone who waited until 2010 to close his wife's Swiss bank account.
Much more likely to this writer is that Romney probably does have one or more years in his recent history where he paid near zero taxes, but the year in question is probably not 2009. Much more likely candidates are the tax years 1999 to 2001 when he supposedly left his high paying job at Bain and accepted a smaller $275,000 salary to head the winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. It is reported that once the Olympics showed a profit, Romney ended up donating his salary to charities, thus further lowering his reported income for tax purposes.
His lower salary and loss of some board member compensation would mean less current income to shelter from 1999 to 2001. But, his tax shelters would have lost none of their potency. He was already utilizing IRAs and 401(k)s to shelter much of his investment income, possibly worth as much as $100 million today, from taxes. He was already making use of numerous off-shore tax havens in the Cayman Islands and other foreign locations and admits to having had a Swiss bank account in his wife's name. He admits that he had a trust established for his children to shelter as much as $100 million more of his wealth from taxation. And much of his income came from Bain Capital private equity investment funds located offshore so much of their profits could be deferred for ten years or limited to a maximum tax rate of 15 percent, a special tax provision only available to private equity and hedge fund managers.
Also, the leveraged buyout business took a big hit in 1999 and 2000 as the country entered a recession so he likely had significant capital losses to deduct. This was followed in 2001 by the dotcom collapse. As a large wealthy investor it is likely he was being put into numerous IPO's available only to the well-connected and many of these high-tech investments most likely soured in 2001 leading to further tax deductible capital losses.
Some may argue that someone who donates his salary to charity or has investment losses deserves to pay no taxes. But, they are missing the point. Romney's vast personal fortune of between $100 million and $200 million at the time was accreting at some 20 percent per year so how should he able to avoid paying taxes on the $20 to $40 million of dividends and interest income and profits and capital gains he must have been receiving on his investments? Donating a $275,000 salary to charity is chump change compared with avoiding taxation on tens of millions of profits each year.
Of course, some will argue that this is all just speculation. What else are concerned citizens to do when a candidate for president, running on a platform of being business smart and the man to fix the economy, refuses to tell us how he made his money and whether he paid his fair share of taxes along the way?
Some may argue that this is all legal. That our laws allow for the wealthiest to accumulate $400 million plus fortunes and pay little to no taxes. But, that is exactly the point. Who do you think is writing our tax laws? It is the wealthiest of our country that are lobbying our government for tax breaks and making large campaign contributions to elected officials to ensure these tax breaks not only continue, but are amplified and extended. And who is their boy, Mitt Romney.
John R. Talbott is a best-selling author and economic consultant to families whose books predicted the housing crash and the economic crisis.
David Frum...shines a light on republicans The Party Of No
Recently, Tablet magazine ran a profile of me by Michelle Goldberg that remarked, "These days the former Bush speechwriter sounds more and more like a Democrat."
Michelle had in mind items like this blogpost, in which I enumerate the ways the GOP is wrong about the present economic crisis.
That latter post prompted a rejoinder from Scott Galupo at US News. Galupo's comment is especially noteworthy since he's a former staffer to Speaker John Boehner and a writer for the Washington Times. Galupo says of my "GOP is wrong" list:
"This is, to put it mildly, an exhaustive and damning litany. But the actual point of Frum's blog post was that former Gov. Mitt Romney kinda-maybe-sorta doesn't agree with this consensus, and therefore offers the best hope (but only a "slender" hope!) that the Republican candidate will be on the right side of the 'most urgent economic issue of the day...'
"I have to ask: Dude, why are you over there? You just more or less said you're going to vote for the guy who might agree with you and not for the guy who definitely does.
"As someone who's working through these issues myself, I'm being sincere here; I'm not playing 'gotcha.' This seems like an awfully risky bet.
"David: What's the dealbreaker for you?"
Galupo's question is one I hear a lot, both from puzzled Democrats and from annoyed Republicans.
My answer begins on this basis:
Yes I am dismayed that my party is wrong on the most urgent issue of the day. But in addition to what is most urgent, I am guided by concerns that if less immediate remain very important -- and on which I trust the GOP more than I trust the party of Barack Obama.
The Republicans are the party of American nationalism. We live in a world in which powerful economic, demographic and cultural forces are breaking down the concept of the nation altogether. But if nations don't matter, why should rich Americans care about the distress of poorer Americans -- who, after all, remain inconceivably wealthy by the standards of poor Africans? The flag-and-country themes of the GOP can be kitschy. They also are the indispensable basis of any idea of social cohesion across the vast continent.
Republican policies of lower taxes, less regulation, and restrained social spending may be poor medicine for the immediate crisis. But they remain the best formula to support the longer-term growth of the economy -- way better than the Democratic preference for high taxes and opportunistic economic interventions. The difference between the U.S. growing at an average of two per cent vs. three per cent over the next decades will determine not only the life-chances of the next generation of Americans, but the power balance of the planet between the U.S. and China.
Like the late Herb Stein, my preferred approach to federal budgeting starts with national defence. Defence and national security are the supreme priority of the state. Only after fully funding defence can you then worry about the appropriate level of spending for everything else, and the appropriate level and form of taxation to pay for that spending.
I intensely oppose any aid or subsidy to particular companies or firms except in cases of the most extreme national necessity, e.g. TARP. Solyndra is only the latest example of the zeal of Democratic administrations dating back to Jimmy Carter's to solve America's energy problems by inserting government into the business of "picking winners." Now as in 1977, I say no, no, no.
The omnipresent system of racial preferences built since the late 1960s in hope of compensating for the effects of slavery and segregation is not only a moral inequity, but also a practical disaster. The gap in wealth between white and black families -- 10 times greater than the gap in income -- has widened under affirmative action. As the Pew Foundation's research shockingly demonstrates, the children of the black middle-class experience frightening downward mobility, discrediting the most basic assumption on which the racial preference system has been built. And this system is one of the most basic political commitments of the modern Democratic party.
I remember that from Teddy Roosevelt and the national parks to George HW Bush and acid rain, real progress on the environment almost always comes under Republican presidents.
Public sector unions rank as one of the most important obstacles to the improvement of public services from education to transit. And the Democrats are the party of the public-sector unions.
Democrats were wrong on crime from the 1970s through the 1990s, and I'm still mad about it.
I believe that the elected prime minister of Israel is a better judge of Israel's national security than the assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs. Democratic administrations typically seem guided by the opposite theory.
I admire business people, and the GOP is the party more sympathetic to business concerns and challenges.
Modern democracies generate a choice between one party offering more public services and higher taxes and another offering fewer services and lower taxes. Under the pressure of the current crisis -- intoxicated by anti-Obama feelings and incited by talk radio and Fox -- Republicans have staked out an extreme position on the role of government. They are expressing opinions they have never acted on in office and won't act on if returned to office. They're talking to relieve their feelings, always a big mistake. I remain convinced that the Tea Party moment is a passing infatuation, a rhetorical over-indulgence, that will fade as soon as Republicans re-encounter the responsibilities of governing -- just as the Democrats' over-heated MoveOn.org type rhetoric about the war on terror was quietly retired by President Obama in favor of continuing most of the anti-terrorism policies of the Bush years. In a more normal kind of contest between the party of less (not zero) government and the party of more and bigger government, I'm with the party of less government. Especially because I feel confident that as the passions of the current crisis fade, Republicans will return to the kinds of ideas we've been advocating at my website, FrumForum.
For three years, my political party has veered in a direction I cannot follow. And if the GOP insists on framing the 2012 election as a ballot question on fiscal and monetary austerity, or if they nominate somebody manifestly incompetent to do the job of president, they're going to lose me -- and a lot more people beside me.
But I don't believe they will do either of those things. I believe that as the election draws closer, the GOP will recover its bearings and its good sense.
Those of us who publish at FrumForum have taken a stance -- not against the Republican party, but in favor of what we regard as the party's true nature, best traditions, and highest ideals. We remain confident that the party will rediscover those ideals, and as it does so, we'll be here, waiting.
GOP jostling : Prime time : SunNews Video Gallery
Michelle had in mind items like this blogpost, in which I enumerate the ways the GOP is wrong about the present economic crisis.
That latter post prompted a rejoinder from Scott Galupo at US News. Galupo's comment is especially noteworthy since he's a former staffer to Speaker John Boehner and a writer for the Washington Times. Galupo says of my "GOP is wrong" list:
"This is, to put it mildly, an exhaustive and damning litany. But the actual point of Frum's blog post was that former Gov. Mitt Romney kinda-maybe-sorta doesn't agree with this consensus, and therefore offers the best hope (but only a "slender" hope!) that the Republican candidate will be on the right side of the 'most urgent economic issue of the day...'
"I have to ask: Dude, why are you over there? You just more or less said you're going to vote for the guy who might agree with you and not for the guy who definitely does.
"As someone who's working through these issues myself, I'm being sincere here; I'm not playing 'gotcha.' This seems like an awfully risky bet.
"David: What's the dealbreaker for you?"
Galupo's question is one I hear a lot, both from puzzled Democrats and from annoyed Republicans.
My answer begins on this basis:
Yes I am dismayed that my party is wrong on the most urgent issue of the day. But in addition to what is most urgent, I am guided by concerns that if less immediate remain very important -- and on which I trust the GOP more than I trust the party of Barack Obama.
The Republicans are the party of American nationalism. We live in a world in which powerful economic, demographic and cultural forces are breaking down the concept of the nation altogether. But if nations don't matter, why should rich Americans care about the distress of poorer Americans -- who, after all, remain inconceivably wealthy by the standards of poor Africans? The flag-and-country themes of the GOP can be kitschy. They also are the indispensable basis of any idea of social cohesion across the vast continent.
Republican policies of lower taxes, less regulation, and restrained social spending may be poor medicine for the immediate crisis. But they remain the best formula to support the longer-term growth of the economy -- way better than the Democratic preference for high taxes and opportunistic economic interventions. The difference between the U.S. growing at an average of two per cent vs. three per cent over the next decades will determine not only the life-chances of the next generation of Americans, but the power balance of the planet between the U.S. and China.
Like the late Herb Stein, my preferred approach to federal budgeting starts with national defence. Defence and national security are the supreme priority of the state. Only after fully funding defence can you then worry about the appropriate level of spending for everything else, and the appropriate level and form of taxation to pay for that spending.
I intensely oppose any aid or subsidy to particular companies or firms except in cases of the most extreme national necessity, e.g. TARP. Solyndra is only the latest example of the zeal of Democratic administrations dating back to Jimmy Carter's to solve America's energy problems by inserting government into the business of "picking winners." Now as in 1977, I say no, no, no.
The omnipresent system of racial preferences built since the late 1960s in hope of compensating for the effects of slavery and segregation is not only a moral inequity, but also a practical disaster. The gap in wealth between white and black families -- 10 times greater than the gap in income -- has widened under affirmative action. As the Pew Foundation's research shockingly demonstrates, the children of the black middle-class experience frightening downward mobility, discrediting the most basic assumption on which the racial preference system has been built. And this system is one of the most basic political commitments of the modern Democratic party.
I remember that from Teddy Roosevelt and the national parks to George HW Bush and acid rain, real progress on the environment almost always comes under Republican presidents.
Public sector unions rank as one of the most important obstacles to the improvement of public services from education to transit. And the Democrats are the party of the public-sector unions.
Democrats were wrong on crime from the 1970s through the 1990s, and I'm still mad about it.
I believe that the elected prime minister of Israel is a better judge of Israel's national security than the assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs. Democratic administrations typically seem guided by the opposite theory.
I admire business people, and the GOP is the party more sympathetic to business concerns and challenges.
Modern democracies generate a choice between one party offering more public services and higher taxes and another offering fewer services and lower taxes. Under the pressure of the current crisis -- intoxicated by anti-Obama feelings and incited by talk radio and Fox -- Republicans have staked out an extreme position on the role of government. They are expressing opinions they have never acted on in office and won't act on if returned to office. They're talking to relieve their feelings, always a big mistake. I remain convinced that the Tea Party moment is a passing infatuation, a rhetorical over-indulgence, that will fade as soon as Republicans re-encounter the responsibilities of governing -- just as the Democrats' over-heated MoveOn.org type rhetoric about the war on terror was quietly retired by President Obama in favor of continuing most of the anti-terrorism policies of the Bush years. In a more normal kind of contest between the party of less (not zero) government and the party of more and bigger government, I'm with the party of less government. Especially because I feel confident that as the passions of the current crisis fade, Republicans will return to the kinds of ideas we've been advocating at my website, FrumForum.
For three years, my political party has veered in a direction I cannot follow. And if the GOP insists on framing the 2012 election as a ballot question on fiscal and monetary austerity, or if they nominate somebody manifestly incompetent to do the job of president, they're going to lose me -- and a lot more people beside me.
But I don't believe they will do either of those things. I believe that as the election draws closer, the GOP will recover its bearings and its good sense.
Those of us who publish at FrumForum have taken a stance -- not against the Republican party, but in favor of what we regard as the party's true nature, best traditions, and highest ideals. We remain confident that the party will rediscover those ideals, and as it does so, we'll be here, waiting.
GOP jostling : Prime time : SunNews Video Gallery
Trump challenges Obama to produce birth certificate...
Trump
Donald Trump is potentially going to run for the Republican Nomination for President. Yep. Donald Trump. Host of the American version of “The Apprentice.” That’s the equivalent of Alan Sugar going for Prime Minister.
I can see no reason why he wouldn’t be a great President. I mean he recently bankrupted his own casino company. A casino. His own casino. Only a very special person could do that.
He also gets on with the common man. Recently saying in an interview:
“You know the funny thing, I don’t get along with rich people. I get along with the middle class and the poor people better than I get along with the rich people,”
He probably makes these friendships with comments like: (From the same interview) “Part of the beauty of me is that I’m very rich.”
Word of advice Trumpy. Don’t call them poor to their face and don’t bang on about how rich you are. They tend not to like that, the poor. Apart from that I’m sure you get on great.
Extra Trump
One more thing on DT. Donald the Trump has been doing interviews all over lately. My personal favourite was this one which included the opening gambit of:
“I mean this is very serious, I always take things seriously but, I’ve never taken it seriously like this, this is a very serious time in my life.”
Sound serious.
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