Intermarkets' Privacy Policy Support
Donate to Ace of Spades HQ! Recent Entries
MSNBC Producer: Our Programming Is Indistinguishable From the Democrat Party; We Are Doing All We Can to Help Kamala Win; Our Audience Screams At Us If We Criticize Democrats, So Network Forbids Doing So
Joe Biden Calls His Friends in the Mob and Has the Longshoreman Delay -- Not Call Off, Delay -- Their Strike Until After the Election THE MORNING RANT: Democrats & Media, Who Keep Advising There Will Not Be a Winner Announced on Election Night, Oppose Georgia Ballot Integrity Measure Because It Will Delay Election Results Mid-Morning Art Thread The Morning Report — 10/4/24 Daily Tech News 4 October 2024 Everyone Loves The ONT Global Warming Cafe Our Liberal Media Betters: Make-Up Artist Alleges That Leftwing Country Music Has-Been Garth Brooks R*ped Her Liz Cheney Will Campaign With Kamala Harris In "The Symbolic Birthplace of the Republican Party" in Wisconsin Absent Friends
Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024 Captain Hate 2023 moon_over_vermont 2023 westminsterdogshow 2023 Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022 Dave In Texas 2022 Jesse in D.C. 2022 OregonMuse 2022 redc1c4 2021 Tami 2021 Chavez the Hugo 2020 Ibguy 2020 Rickl 2019 Joffen 2014 AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published.
Contact OrangeEnt for info:
maildrop62 at proton dot me Cutting The Cord And Email Security
Moron Meet-Ups
|
« Poll: The Public Hates Congress. But Media Is Less Willing To Note Crucial Fact: Hate 'Em Or Not, They Prefer Republicans To Hold Power. |
Main
| Old and Busted: Republicans Are Disrespectful Racists For Criticizing Obama New Hotness: Republicans Are Disrespectful Racists For Not Criticizing Obama » September 07, 2011
Is Perry Unelectable?Since I'm putting so many eggs in the "electability" basket I can't dismiss this out of hand. Perry has called Social Security a "Ponzi scheme" that "weakens American values." The usual math is that entitlements for seniors is the third rail of American politics -- seniors vote in great numbers, and are generally a swing-ish section of the vote, and tend to vote not quite as a single-issue bloc but largely based on entitlements. Here's Karl Rove, calling Perry's position on Social Security politically "toxic." On “GMA” this morning, Karl Rove noted that new GOP frontrunner has many strengths, but Rick Perry’s thoughts on Social Security are not among them. I know the convenient rap on Karl Rove is that he's an establishment shill who wants to knock down any sort of threat to his enabling power base, but in fact what he says is pretty much true. It is very dangerous to speak negatively of Social Security. This is not a new idea. It's been true since... well, since Social Security was proposed. Noted conservative intellectual (kidding) Joe Scarborough simply declares that Perry cannot win a general election, period. Without a doubt, it would be far easier for any Republican to win an election without mentioning entitlement reform, or to run on his own Mediscare-type campaign promising to not touch entitlements at all. That said... taking that thinking to its conclusion, a candidate could get elected doing that, but then, upon winning office (if he won), he'd have two options: 1) Once again punt on entitlement reform and doom America to bankruptcy. 2) Actually attempt entitlement reform, but do so after breaking a promise not to, without a mandate for it, as that public was never given the chance to consent on that policy through the normal method of hearing a proposal and then informing its vote in an election based on that proposal. For what it's worth, Michele Bachmann is fairly up-front about the need for entitlement reform. Most candidates do discuss it. Tim Pawlenty did. Sarah Palin endorsed Paul Ryan's Roadmap (which includes major reforms to Medicare). Chris Christie -- not a candidate, but piping up to argue for fiscal responsibility -- declares these issues must be addressed. Republican star and likely Vice Presidential nominee Marco Rubio is quite forward-leaning in announcing "entitlements weakened us as a nation." These programs actually weakened us as a people. You see, almost forever, it was institutions in society that assumed the role of taking care of one another. If someone was sick in your family, you took care of them. If a neighbor met misfortune, you took care of them. You saved for your retirement and your future because you had to. We took these things upon ourselves in our communities, our families, and our homes, and our churches and our synagogues. But all that changed when the government began to assume those responsibilities. I actually don't like this argument for several reasons, first among them, it's politically harmful. I don't like Rubio's or Perry's claim that it weakens us; I would focus on the fact that bankruptcy weakens us, and we need to change these programs to make them actually work, and continue into the future. So I actually do believe that while these issues are dicey, and yet most be spoken about, Perry (and Rubio) are actually addressing these dicey subjects in a dicier manner than is even necessary. You don't want to play the Senior Scare card... on yourself. Still, that's just verbiage. What ultimately counts is actual plans, actual proposals. And we can either do the responsible thing and attempt to change the math on entitlement reform, or we can continue down the path of financial ruin. I think it continues to be better politics to do that latter, but it's not as politically suicidal to take the responsible position as it has been in the recent past. If you don't support entitlement reform -- and entitlements were supposed to be sustained by the money collected from the payroll tax -- then you're in favor of general tax increases, and fairly large general tax increases, to pay for all this social safety net spending. If there is no effort made to bring entitlement spending more in line with entitlement revenue streams, the only remaining option is to simply start taxing the crap out of people. Which is not very conservative. Mitt Romney is probably playing this the cagiest by speaking so little about it. But... that's not really clever, because that's what's been done for decades. It's not some genius, novel move. That is SOP. Clarification: Romney may speak little about it, but it's not true that he doesn't speak about it at all -- he does. Let me further clarify that I'm not against the basic idea of soft-selling this. But the more you soft-sell it, the less of a mandate you'd be able to claim were you to actually win the office sought. It's my belief that Perry is too forward-leaning on this, as far as politics, but Romeny isn't leaning far enough forward, as far as likely ability to claim a mandate for needed reform. I think both need some tweaking in their positioning. And although the media now likes to pretend to forget this, even the SCOAMFOTUS promised entitlement reform during his campaign,* and was praised as an enlightened, courageous thinker for doing so. I think I'd have trouble supporting a Republican candidate who was less forward-leaning on entitlement reform in 2012 than Barack Obama was in 2008. Some things I'm not eager to gamble an election on; some things I'm more willing to do so. Entitlements are one of the areas I'm willing to gamble, because if we don't fix this, then we're really just arguing about which party will be the best administrators of the nation's bankruptcy proceedings. * I keep saying he said this during his campaign, but the articles I always find in google searches have him making this promise in the first month of his actual presidency, in Jan-Feb 2009. I still think he said it during the campaign. If I'm wrong about that, though, he at least got praised for his entitlement heroism in very early 2009.
| Recent Comments
Bacon Jeff:
"Yeah, that was such a monumental decision. Thanks, ..."
Anonosaurus Wrecks, Now With Pumpkin Spice! [/i] [/s] [/b] [/u]: "She sounds mad. Trump War Room @TrumpWarRoom ..." Jinx the Cat: "Casting off stale fishy sock ..." Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon: "Heh, I graduated from school today. Posted by: ..." L - If they'll do it with you, they'll do it to you, too : "229 Does Joe have mob ties? Posted by: Northernlu ..." Mark Andrew Edwards, Vote but also buy ammo: "Yeh I'm two hours north of the Ohio river in India ..." whig: "But they're kinda doing it already. If you do much ..." pawn: "Unsurprisingly, I think the Chinese are the leader ..." whig: "That's actually the next thing in my shooting regi ..." Puddinhead: "Heh, I graduated from school today. ..." Drummer for Def Leppard : "What we need to do is put container ships on rails ..." Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon: "December 2019 . . . covid Posted by: Li ..." Recent Entries
MSNBC Producer: Our Programming Is Indistinguishable From the Democrat Party; We Are Doing All We Can to Help Kamala Win; Our Audience Screams At Us If We Criticize Democrats, So Network Forbids Doing So
Joe Biden Calls His Friends in the Mob and Has the Longshoreman Delay -- Not Call Off, Delay -- Their Strike Until After the Election THE MORNING RANT: Democrats & Media, Who Keep Advising There Will Not Be a Winner Announced on Election Night, Oppose Georgia Ballot Integrity Measure Because It Will Delay Election Results Mid-Morning Art Thread The Morning Report — 10/4/24 Daily Tech News 4 October 2024 Everyone Loves The ONT Global Warming Cafe Our Liberal Media Betters: Make-Up Artist Alleges That Leftwing Country Music Has-Been Garth Brooks R*ped Her Liz Cheney Will Campaign With Kamala Harris In "The Symbolic Birthplace of the Republican Party" in Wisconsin Search
Polls! Polls! Polls!
Frequently Asked Questions
The (Almost) Complete Paul Anka Integrity Kick
Primary Document: The Audio
Paul Anka Haiku Contest Announcement Integrity SAT's: Entrance Exam for Paul Anka's Band AllahPundit's Paul Anka 45's Collection AnkaPundit: Paul Anka Takes Over the Site for a Weekend (Continues through to Monday's postings) George Bush Slices Don Rumsfeld Like an F*ckin' Hammer Top Top Tens
Democratic Forays into Erotica New Shows On Gore's DNC/MTV Network Nicknames for Potatoes, By People Who Really Hate Potatoes Star Wars Euphemisms for Self-Abuse Signs You're at an Iraqi "Wedding Party" Signs Your Clown Has Gone Bad Signs That You, Geroge Michael, Should Probably Just Give It Up Signs of Hip-Hop Influence on John Kerry NYT Headlines Spinning Bush's Jobs Boom Things People Are More Likely to Say Than "Did You Hear What Al Franken Said Yesterday?" Signs that Paul Krugman Has Lost His Frickin' Mind All-Time Best NBA Players, According to Senator Robert Byrd Other Bad Things About the Jews, According to the Koran Signs That David Letterman Just Doesn't Care Anymore Examples of Bob Kerrey's Insufferable Racial Jackassery Signs Andy Rooney Is Going Senile Other Judgments Dick Clarke Made About Condi Rice Based on Her Appearance Collective Names for Groups of People John Kerry's Other Vietnam Super-Pets Cool Things About the XM8 Assault Rifle Media-Approved Facts About the Democrat Spy Changes to Make Christianity More "Inclusive" Secret John Kerry Senatorial Accomplishments John Edwards Campaign Excuses John Kerry Pick-Up Lines Changes Liberal Senator George Michell Will Make at Disney Torments in Dog-Hell Greatest Hitjobs
The Ace of Spades HQ Sex-for-Money Skankathon A D&D Guide to the Democratic Candidates Margaret Cho: Just Not Funny More Margaret Cho Abuse Margaret Cho: Still Not Funny Iraqi Prisoner Claims He Was Raped... By Woman Wonkette Announces "Morning Zoo" Format John Kerry's "Plan" Causes Surrender of Moqtada al-Sadr's Militia World Muslim Leaders Apologize for Nick Berg's Beheading Michael Moore Goes on Lunchtime Manhattan Death-Spree Milestone: Oliver Willis Posts 400th "Fake News Article" Referencing Britney Spears Liberal Economists Rue a "New Decade of Greed" Artificial Insouciance: Maureen Dowd's Word Processor Revolts Against Her Numbing Imbecility Intelligence Officials Eye Blogs for Tips They Done Found Us Out, Cletus: Intrepid Internet Detective Figures Out Our Master Plan Shock: Josh Marshall Almost Mentions Sarin Discovery in Iraq Leather-Clad Biker Freaks Terrorize Australian Town When Clinton Was President, Torture Was Cool What Wonkette Means When She Explains What Tina Brown Means Wonkette's Stand-Up Act Wankette HQ Gay-Rumors Du Jour Here's What's Bugging Me: Goose and Slider My Own Micah Wright Style Confession of Dishonesty Outraged "Conservatives" React to the FMA An On-Line Impression of Dennis Miller Having Sex with a Kodiak Bear The Story the Rightwing Media Refuses to Report! Our Lunch with David "Glengarry Glen Ross" Mamet The House of Love: Paul Krugman A Michael Moore Mystery (TM) The Dowd-O-Matic! Liberal Consistency and Other Myths Kepler's Laws of Liberal Media Bias John Kerry-- The Splunge! Candidate "Divisive" Politics & "Attacks on Patriotism" (very long) The Donkey ("The Raven" parody) |