The GOP Debate & Obama Jobs Plan
And in This Corner.....
With the new kid on the GOP block (Perry) threatening all the others, the gloves came off, and he said he felt like a piñata.
Jobs
Perry countered the moderator’s charge of Texas being low in education and poverty (but high in employment, so low-paying jobs) by touting creating a million jobs – some 90% above minimum wage [that’s good?]. Romney was charged w. low Massachusetts job creation and being a private sector “buyout specialist.” He countered with how Mass. was in freefall, turned around & created more jobs in Mass. Than Obama in the nation. And he started businesses & made other more successful. He noted Texas has more people, resources, favorable business climate & Republican legislature – none of which he had in Mass. And the zinger was that Perry taking credit for those jobs is like Al Gore saying he invented the internet. And when Perry said that Mitt’s predecessor Dukakis created 3 times as many jobs, Romney fired back that Perry’s 2 predecessors created more jobs than him.
I liked Cain’s comment that “if 10% is good enough for God, 9% (flat tax – personal & corporate) should be good enough for government." Huntsman said he topped Texas for job creation, with Utah being #1. Bachman noted Obamacare is killing jobs. Ron Paul said regulations should be at the state level. And Gingrich said that the president is so committed to class warfare, he can’t be committed to jobs.
Health Care
Romneycare was the piñata in this portion of the debate. Romney said it was a solution tailored to one state’s needs, and he’d repeal Obamacare because it’s not right for the nation. Perry said Romneycare didn’t work – especially the individual mandate (requirement to buy insurance). But it was noted that Texas was lowest in % with health insurance. So the question was, which approach was right?
Huntsman emphasized individual responsibility & no mandate, and that Utah reformed healthcare in other ways. Bachman again attacked Obamacare which took over 1/6th of the US economy, and said it will take strong leadership & more GOP in Congress to repeal it. Gingrich again went after the moderator (as in the last debate) for trying to get Republicans to attack & weaken one another, that all agree Obamacare is bad. Cain also repudiated the individual mandate. [Should that also apply to state-mandated car insurance, and penalties against uninsured motorists?]
Religion
Got short shrift, and surprisingly, Romney’s religion didn’t come up for a change. Maybe w. most candidates being religious, and 2 Mormons, it was not such a distinguishing factor. Santorum was reminded he’d said he can’t totally put his Catholicism aside, and was asked where do the poor come in. He’d worked poverty issues such as welfare reform – to break the culture of dependency, with time limits on welfare, and said we need to do the same w. food stamps, etc. Perry noted that Kennedy said that jobs are the most powerful welfare reform.
Miscellaneous
There was an email question to Romney – is $2 gas possible? He answered that we need to develop domestic energy. Bachman said pulling back regulations on energy production would create over 1 million jobs. Huntsman said that hidden costs like our military stabilizing the producers and lanes make the real cost $13 per gallon – like Ron Paul he wants us out of Afghanistan now. Ron Paul continued an apparent blood feud w. fellow Texan Perry noting that Perry supported Hillary Care, and that Medicare is a mandate, also. Perry countered that Ron Paul wrote Reagan to say he was leaving the party over huge deficits in the 1980’s.
Social Security
The moderator noted that in Perry’s book, “Fed Up,” he said Social Security was wrong from the beginning. Perry responded that realistically it can’t be repealed, but only made better/viable. But he did insist it’s a Ponzi scheme & failure, and a monstrous lie to tell our young that it’ll be viable when they retire. Taking issue more with tactics than strategy, Romney countered that we can’t win by telling the retired that it’s a failure when it hasn’t failed them [yet], and we must save it for the young. Funding of it isn’t the issue, but rather Congress raiding it, and options include raising the retirement age, personal accounts, etc. Cain liked the Chile model – younger people had a choice with an account with their name on it.
Executive Orders & Parental Rights
Ron Paul said Perry isn’t conservative – he forced 12 yr. old girls to be immunized against sexually transmitted disease by executive order. Bachman by contrast was interested in parental rights (being informed & having a say), educational reform. Perry said there was an opt out provision for parents, and he was very concerned about HPV being the cause of so much of women’s cancer, though he wished he’d done it differently now. Santorum was interested more in parental rights than states’ rights, and would rather have an opt in than opt out. Romney showed a bit of softer, understanding side by saying Perry’s heart was in the right place – that we’ve all made decisions we later regretted, and that we need to focus on getting Obama out – Obama hasn’t a clue how to get this country going again.
Security
Gingrich spoke of the need for national security to respond to WMD. Ron Paul said private industry would be better than TSA. He was asked what would happen if we removed FEMA, responding that FEMA conditioned people to (re)build in bad places. He said if we took the air conditioning out of the tents & Green Zone in Afghanistan, the troops would come home soon. Cain said we need to fix FEMA, DHS.
Education
Perry was charged w. cutting educational funding despite Texas’ poor education levels, but countered that under him they had the highest grad rate in Texas history, and have special challenges w. high immigrant population. Gingrich likes charter schools, agreeing w. Perry, Obama.
Immigration
Perry said we need to secure the border w. more boots on the ground as he’d requested, and that Obama lied or was misinformed when he was in El Paso & said it was safe there. Romney said we need a fence/technology & enough agents, and that we need to turn the magnet off – employers hiring illegals, sanctuary cities, amnesty. Gingrich wants a guest worker program. Bachman noted that narco-terrorism makes the need to secure the border more urgent. Cain wants to promote a path to citizenship, enforce laws & empower states. Huntsman said we need to keep in mind the human side of the issue. Ron Paul said we shouldn’t provide the benefits of citizenship to illegals, and that our drug laws drive the drug war.
Tea Party & Military
Romney was asked if he was a member of the Tea Party, and responded that there are no membership cards, but he believes in key principles of the Tea Party – smaller government, reducing spending, creating jobs. Perry is for cut, cap & balance. Bachman reminded us that Reagan was for $3 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increase. Huntsman was against blanket pledges, and said we need to strengthen the US, fix our core, not Afghanistan. Romney said the crisis in confidence was because of the absence of leadership – Obama is in over his head. His [Romney’s] proposals would get America back on track. Perry said America shouldn’t be in the business of military adventurism without clear reasons & exit strategy, and that Keynesian economics has been proven dead under Obama. Bachman said Obama weakened us militarily, and that new deficits will further weaken us. We shouldn’t have gone into Libya – not in our vital interest, and we didn’t know who the rebels were. Santorum voiced concern over the isolationist statements of some other candidates in the light of Reagan’s legacy.
Science & Climate Change
Hunstsman said the GOP can’t run from science, must bring in independents. Perry said science is unsettled on climate predictions – it’s nonsense to put US prosperity at risk. Bachman noted that even Obama recently suspended EPA rules that would have lost many jobs.
Gingrich would fire Bernanke, and the Fed – they worsened the recession. Romney said the fact that 47% pay no taxes is not the big issue – the focus should be on the middle class that has taken the biggest hit, and fire Bernanke – overinflated w. QE2 that didn’t work.
Compassion & Justice
The moderator cited Texas executing over 300 on death row under Perry, which evoked applause in the audience. When asked if he could sleep well with confidence none had been innocent, he said yes – the justice system is careful and has many opportunities for appeal. Ron Paul said that those against handouts ought not be painted as uncompassionate.
The Liberal Spin
After the MSNBC-hosted debate, their spin panel was entirely Left (Chris Matthews, Al Sharpton, O’Donnell, etc.) They ripped into Perry as anti-science (against climate change) & saying social security is a Ponzi scheme. And that Romney might consider personal accounts. But Steve Schmidt did note Romney’s poise & competence on economics. O’Donnell said “Romney lives, Perry failed,” and that Romney was on the side of Reagan on social security [they do cite Reagan when it suits them, but I don’t think they understand the unanimity in the GOP to overhaul social security – they just don’t like it being called a Ponzi scheme]. Eugene Robinson said Romney was best. Matthews said Perry did well enough as a good-‘ol-boy for the low IQ in the South to beat a Mormon there!
Robert Gibbs (former Obama press secy) said no new ideas – so what! All of Obama’s old Keynesian ones have been proven not to work, and the best GOP/conservative practices have proven themselves time and again – why keep pushing for something “new” that won’t work, or may not?
General consensus is it’s down to a 2-man race – Perry & Romney. Although it’s still early enough that even that could change.
Obama’s Jobs “Plan” Speech
I recorded it but couldn’t bring myself to sit through another jabbering speech full of oratory and no substance. I saw snippets of key points in the news. Apparently there were some token elements that have long been proposed by the GOP, incl. lower small business taxes, etc. But major elements were repeats of the already-failed stimulus with more “shovel-ready” infrastructure improvement projects. How can we justify more of that after there was nothing to show for the last round of that, and not even an attempt to explain that? That’s throwing bad money after bad. And there was no explanation of how to pay for it.
Again, no written, scrutinizable plan (the devil’s always in the details), but only fuzzy feel-good stuff that, just like Obamacare, we’d have to pass to see what was in it. And many times in the speech he insisted that it be passed immediately, and Congressional intransigence stopped. Here we go, again, with another last-minute rush job described in previous posts. He’s had 3 years to address unemployment that’s remained well above the 8% he promised was the maximum after the stimulus & Obamacare (which preoccupied his first year). But now he’s facing re-election, so there’s REAL urgency, now.
With the new kid on the GOP block (Perry) threatening all the others, the gloves came off, and he said he felt like a piñata.
Jobs
Perry countered the moderator’s charge of Texas being low in education and poverty (but high in employment, so low-paying jobs) by touting creating a million jobs – some 90% above minimum wage [that’s good?]. Romney was charged w. low Massachusetts job creation and being a private sector “buyout specialist.” He countered with how Mass. was in freefall, turned around & created more jobs in Mass. Than Obama in the nation. And he started businesses & made other more successful. He noted Texas has more people, resources, favorable business climate & Republican legislature – none of which he had in Mass. And the zinger was that Perry taking credit for those jobs is like Al Gore saying he invented the internet. And when Perry said that Mitt’s predecessor Dukakis created 3 times as many jobs, Romney fired back that Perry’s 2 predecessors created more jobs than him.
I liked Cain’s comment that “if 10% is good enough for God, 9% (flat tax – personal & corporate) should be good enough for government." Huntsman said he topped Texas for job creation, with Utah being #1. Bachman noted Obamacare is killing jobs. Ron Paul said regulations should be at the state level. And Gingrich said that the president is so committed to class warfare, he can’t be committed to jobs.
Health Care
Romneycare was the piñata in this portion of the debate. Romney said it was a solution tailored to one state’s needs, and he’d repeal Obamacare because it’s not right for the nation. Perry said Romneycare didn’t work – especially the individual mandate (requirement to buy insurance). But it was noted that Texas was lowest in % with health insurance. So the question was, which approach was right?
Huntsman emphasized individual responsibility & no mandate, and that Utah reformed healthcare in other ways. Bachman again attacked Obamacare which took over 1/6th of the US economy, and said it will take strong leadership & more GOP in Congress to repeal it. Gingrich again went after the moderator (as in the last debate) for trying to get Republicans to attack & weaken one another, that all agree Obamacare is bad. Cain also repudiated the individual mandate. [Should that also apply to state-mandated car insurance, and penalties against uninsured motorists?]
Religion
Got short shrift, and surprisingly, Romney’s religion didn’t come up for a change. Maybe w. most candidates being religious, and 2 Mormons, it was not such a distinguishing factor. Santorum was reminded he’d said he can’t totally put his Catholicism aside, and was asked where do the poor come in. He’d worked poverty issues such as welfare reform – to break the culture of dependency, with time limits on welfare, and said we need to do the same w. food stamps, etc. Perry noted that Kennedy said that jobs are the most powerful welfare reform.
Miscellaneous
There was an email question to Romney – is $2 gas possible? He answered that we need to develop domestic energy. Bachman said pulling back regulations on energy production would create over 1 million jobs. Huntsman said that hidden costs like our military stabilizing the producers and lanes make the real cost $13 per gallon – like Ron Paul he wants us out of Afghanistan now. Ron Paul continued an apparent blood feud w. fellow Texan Perry noting that Perry supported Hillary Care, and that Medicare is a mandate, also. Perry countered that Ron Paul wrote Reagan to say he was leaving the party over huge deficits in the 1980’s.
Social Security
The moderator noted that in Perry’s book, “Fed Up,” he said Social Security was wrong from the beginning. Perry responded that realistically it can’t be repealed, but only made better/viable. But he did insist it’s a Ponzi scheme & failure, and a monstrous lie to tell our young that it’ll be viable when they retire. Taking issue more with tactics than strategy, Romney countered that we can’t win by telling the retired that it’s a failure when it hasn’t failed them [yet], and we must save it for the young. Funding of it isn’t the issue, but rather Congress raiding it, and options include raising the retirement age, personal accounts, etc. Cain liked the Chile model – younger people had a choice with an account with their name on it.
Executive Orders & Parental Rights
Ron Paul said Perry isn’t conservative – he forced 12 yr. old girls to be immunized against sexually transmitted disease by executive order. Bachman by contrast was interested in parental rights (being informed & having a say), educational reform. Perry said there was an opt out provision for parents, and he was very concerned about HPV being the cause of so much of women’s cancer, though he wished he’d done it differently now. Santorum was interested more in parental rights than states’ rights, and would rather have an opt in than opt out. Romney showed a bit of softer, understanding side by saying Perry’s heart was in the right place – that we’ve all made decisions we later regretted, and that we need to focus on getting Obama out – Obama hasn’t a clue how to get this country going again.
Security
Gingrich spoke of the need for national security to respond to WMD. Ron Paul said private industry would be better than TSA. He was asked what would happen if we removed FEMA, responding that FEMA conditioned people to (re)build in bad places. He said if we took the air conditioning out of the tents & Green Zone in Afghanistan, the troops would come home soon. Cain said we need to fix FEMA, DHS.
Education
Perry was charged w. cutting educational funding despite Texas’ poor education levels, but countered that under him they had the highest grad rate in Texas history, and have special challenges w. high immigrant population. Gingrich likes charter schools, agreeing w. Perry, Obama.
Immigration
Perry said we need to secure the border w. more boots on the ground as he’d requested, and that Obama lied or was misinformed when he was in El Paso & said it was safe there. Romney said we need a fence/technology & enough agents, and that we need to turn the magnet off – employers hiring illegals, sanctuary cities, amnesty. Gingrich wants a guest worker program. Bachman noted that narco-terrorism makes the need to secure the border more urgent. Cain wants to promote a path to citizenship, enforce laws & empower states. Huntsman said we need to keep in mind the human side of the issue. Ron Paul said we shouldn’t provide the benefits of citizenship to illegals, and that our drug laws drive the drug war.
Tea Party & Military
Romney was asked if he was a member of the Tea Party, and responded that there are no membership cards, but he believes in key principles of the Tea Party – smaller government, reducing spending, creating jobs. Perry is for cut, cap & balance. Bachman reminded us that Reagan was for $3 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increase. Huntsman was against blanket pledges, and said we need to strengthen the US, fix our core, not Afghanistan. Romney said the crisis in confidence was because of the absence of leadership – Obama is in over his head. His [Romney’s] proposals would get America back on track. Perry said America shouldn’t be in the business of military adventurism without clear reasons & exit strategy, and that Keynesian economics has been proven dead under Obama. Bachman said Obama weakened us militarily, and that new deficits will further weaken us. We shouldn’t have gone into Libya – not in our vital interest, and we didn’t know who the rebels were. Santorum voiced concern over the isolationist statements of some other candidates in the light of Reagan’s legacy.
Science & Climate Change
Hunstsman said the GOP can’t run from science, must bring in independents. Perry said science is unsettled on climate predictions – it’s nonsense to put US prosperity at risk. Bachman noted that even Obama recently suspended EPA rules that would have lost many jobs.
Gingrich would fire Bernanke, and the Fed – they worsened the recession. Romney said the fact that 47% pay no taxes is not the big issue – the focus should be on the middle class that has taken the biggest hit, and fire Bernanke – overinflated w. QE2 that didn’t work.
Compassion & Justice
The moderator cited Texas executing over 300 on death row under Perry, which evoked applause in the audience. When asked if he could sleep well with confidence none had been innocent, he said yes – the justice system is careful and has many opportunities for appeal. Ron Paul said that those against handouts ought not be painted as uncompassionate.
The Liberal Spin
After the MSNBC-hosted debate, their spin panel was entirely Left (Chris Matthews, Al Sharpton, O’Donnell, etc.) They ripped into Perry as anti-science (against climate change) & saying social security is a Ponzi scheme. And that Romney might consider personal accounts. But Steve Schmidt did note Romney’s poise & competence on economics. O’Donnell said “Romney lives, Perry failed,” and that Romney was on the side of Reagan on social security [they do cite Reagan when it suits them, but I don’t think they understand the unanimity in the GOP to overhaul social security – they just don’t like it being called a Ponzi scheme]. Eugene Robinson said Romney was best. Matthews said Perry did well enough as a good-‘ol-boy for the low IQ in the South to beat a Mormon there!
Robert Gibbs (former Obama press secy) said no new ideas – so what! All of Obama’s old Keynesian ones have been proven not to work, and the best GOP/conservative practices have proven themselves time and again – why keep pushing for something “new” that won’t work, or may not?
General consensus is it’s down to a 2-man race – Perry & Romney. Although it’s still early enough that even that could change.
Obama’s Jobs “Plan” Speech
I recorded it but couldn’t bring myself to sit through another jabbering speech full of oratory and no substance. I saw snippets of key points in the news. Apparently there were some token elements that have long been proposed by the GOP, incl. lower small business taxes, etc. But major elements were repeats of the already-failed stimulus with more “shovel-ready” infrastructure improvement projects. How can we justify more of that after there was nothing to show for the last round of that, and not even an attempt to explain that? That’s throwing bad money after bad. And there was no explanation of how to pay for it.
Again, no written, scrutinizable plan (the devil’s always in the details), but only fuzzy feel-good stuff that, just like Obamacare, we’d have to pass to see what was in it. And many times in the speech he insisted that it be passed immediately, and Congressional intransigence stopped. Here we go, again, with another last-minute rush job described in previous posts. He’s had 3 years to address unemployment that’s remained well above the 8% he promised was the maximum after the stimulus & Obamacare (which preoccupied his first year). But now he’s facing re-election, so there’s REAL urgency, now.
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