I am puzzled

Okay, in trying to keep this as non-partisan as possible, I am wondering what the big fascination is with romney and ryan. Romney says he will create jobs.  He says he will fix the economy.  He says he will strengthen the military.   He says... blah, blah, blah.
   But its been proven that if his policies are indeed put in place, taxes will go up.  And for people like me, (and there are a lot of us) that could be painful.  For example, eliminating the home interest deduction.  This is just insane.  I can see an immediate increase of at least $3000 a year if this happens.  Does romney care?  Of course not.  However, to be fair, he also said he will lower the tax rate.  So, will it be enough to offset this $3000 increase?  Probably not.  Its simple trickle down.  He figures that if someone gets a few more dollars in their paycheck, they will spend it.  Is he nuts?  In this economy, people who get more money in their paycheck will hang on to it.  No one knows if they will have a job tomorrow or not.  Besides, with others costs climbing, there won't be much left to spend.
     Now that brings me to my disappoint over the past four years.  Obama made several promises, yet few have come to pass.  I know that his heart was in the right place.  The car industry bailout.  Yes it was a good thing because it saved jobs.  Restructuring was not necessarily an option.  Bankruptcy affects more people that just GM.  It affects all of their suppliers, employees, etc.  It would have had far reaching consequences.  Further, any money loaned to manufacturers has been paid back with interest.  so that whole program is over.  Thousands of jobs have been saved and manufacturing is back up. So this was a good thing.
     As far as China is concerned, the US has been doing business with China for many years.  Getting China is a necessity for companies who want to do business in Asia.
     There are so many things to touch on here, but you get the idea.  Democrats see the glass as half full while republicans think they own the glass.  It seems to all come down to money.  They don't care if people lose their jobs or go without food, money, healthcare, etc.  They just want their share of the pie.  Democrats try their best to help the middle class maintain some balance.  And somewhere in the middle of all the political crap, there is a balance where things will work.  It just has to be discovered.

Is lying okay if you are a republican?

Okay, so according to fact checking, romney lied 27 times in 38 minutes.
Wanna see?  read on.

1) “[G]et us energy independent, North American energy independent. That creates about 4 million jobs”. Romney’s plan for “energy independence” actually relies heavily on a study that assumes the U.S. continues with fuel efficiency standards set by the Obama administration. For instance, he uses Citigroup research based off the assumption that “‘the United States will continue with strict fuel economy standards that will lower its oil demand.” Since he promises to undo the Obama administration’s new fuel efficiency standards, he would cut oil consumption savings of 2 million barrels per day by 2025.

2) “I don’t have a $5 trillion tax cut. I don’t have a tax cut of a scale that you’re talking about.” A Tax Policy Center analysis of Romney’s proposal for a 20 percent across-the-board tax cut in all federal income tax rates, eliminating the Alternative Minimum Tax, eliminating the estate tax and other tax reductions, would reduce federal revenue $480 billion in 2015. This amounts to $5 trillion over the decade.

3) “My view is that we ought to provide tax relief to people in the middle class. But I’m not going to reduce the share of taxes paid by high-income people.” If Romney hopes to provide tax relief to the middle class, then his $5 trillion tax cut would add to the deficit. There are not enough deductions in the tax code that primarily benefit rich people to make his math work.

4) “My — my number-one principal is, there will be no tax cut that adds to the deficit. I want to underline that: no tax cut that adds to the deficit.” As the Tax Policy Center concluded, Romney’s plan can’t both exempt middle class families from tax cuts and remain revenue neutral. “He’s promised all these things and he can’t do them all. In order for him to cover the cost of his tax cut without adding to the deficit, he’d have to find a way to raise taxes on middle income people or people making less than $200,000 a year,” the Center found.

5) “I will not under any circumstances raise taxes on middle-income families. I will lower taxes on middle-income families. Now, you cite a study. There are six other studies that looked at the study you describe and say it’s completely wrong.” The studies Romney cites actually further prove that Romney would, in fact, have to raise taxes on the middle class if he were to keep his promise not to lose revenue with his tax rate reduction.

6) “I saw a study that came out today that said you’re going to raise taxes by $3,000 to $4,000 on middle-income families.” Romney is pointing to this study from the American Enterprise Institute. It actually found that rather than raise taxes to pay down the debt, the Obama administration’s policies — those contained directly in his budget — would reduce the share of taxes that go toward servicing the debt by $1,289.89 per taxpayer in the $100,000 to $200,000 range.

7) “And the reason is because small business pays that individual rate; 54 percent of America’s workers work in businesses that are taxed not at the corporate tax rate, but at the individual tax rate….97 percent of the businesses are not — not taxed at the 35 percent tax rate, they’re taxed at a lower rate. But those businesses that are in the last 3 percent of businesses happen to employ half — half of all the people who work in small business.” Far less than half of the people affected by the expiration of the upper income tax cuts get any of their income at all from a small businesses. And those people could very well be receiving speaking fees or book royalties, which qualify as “small business income” but don’t have a direct impact on job creation. It’s actually hard to find a small business who think that they will be hurt if the marginal tax rate on income earned above $250,000 per year is increased.

8) “Mr. President, all of the increase in natural gas and oil has happened on private land, not on government land. On government land, your administration has cut the number of permits and licenses in half.” Oil production from federal lands is higher, not lower: Production from federal lands is up slightly in 2011 when compared to 2007. And the oil and gas industry is sitting on 7,000 approved permits to drill, that it hasn’t begun exploring or developing.

9) “The president’s put it in place as much public debt — almost as much debt held by the public as all prior presidents combined.” This is not even close to being true. When Obama took office, the national debt stood at $10.626 trillion. Now the national debt is over $16 trillion. That $5.374 trillion increase is nowhere near as much debt as all the other presidents combined.

10) “That’s why the National Federation of Independent Businesses said your plan will kill 700,000 jobs. I don’t want to kill jobs in this environment.” That study, produced by a right-wing advocacy organization, doesn’t analyze what Obama has actually proposed.

11) “What we do have right now is a setting where I’d like to bring money from overseas back to this country.” Romney’s plan to shift the country to a territorial tax system would allow corporations to do business and make profits overseas without ever being taxed on it in the United States. This encourages American companies to invest abroad and could cost the country up to 800,000 jobs.

12) “I would like to take the Medicaid dollars that go to states and say to a state, you’re going to get what you got last year, plus inflation, plus 1 percent, and then you’re going to manage your care for your poor in the way you think best.” Sending federal Medicaid funding to the states in the form of a block grant woud significantly reduce federal spending for Medicaid because the grant would not keep up with projected health care costs. A CBO estimate of a very similar proposal from Paul Ryan found that federal spending would be “35 percent lower in 2022 and 49 percent lower in 2030 than current projected federal spending” and as a result “states would face significant challenges in achieving sufficient cost savings through efficiencies to mitigate the loss of federal funding.” “To maintain current service levels in the Medicaid program, states would probably need to consider additional changes, such as reducing their spending on other programs or raising additional revenues,” the CBO found.

13) “I want to take that $716 billion you’ve cut and put it back into Medicare…. But the idea of cutting $716 billion from Medicare to be able to balance the additional cost of Obamacare is, in my opinion, a mistake. There’s that number again. Romney is claiming that Obamacare siphons off $716 billion from Medicare, to the detriment of beneficiaries. In actuality, that money is saved primarily through reducing over-payments to insurance companies under Medicare Advantage, not payments to beneficiaries. Paul Ryan’s budget plan keeps those same cuts, but directs them toward tax cuts for the rich and deficit reduction.

14) “What I support is no change for current retirees and near-retirees to Medicare.” Here is how Romney’s Medicare plan will affect current seniors: 1) by repealing Obamacare, the 16 million seniors receiving preventive benefits without deductibles or co-pays and are saving $3.9 billion on prescription drugs will see a cost increase, 2) “premium support” will increase premiums for existing beneficiaries as private insurers lure healthier seniors out of the traditional Medicare program, 3) Romney/Ryan would also lower Medicaid spending significantly beginning next year, shifting federal spending to states and beneficiaries, and increasing costs for the 9 million Medicare recipients who are dependent on Medicaid.

15) “Number two is for people coming along that are young, what I do to make sure that we can keep Medicare in place for them is to allow them either to choose the current Medicare program or a private plan. Their choice. They get to choose — and they’ll have at least two plans that will be entirely at no cost to them.” The Medicare program changes for everyone, even people who choose to remain in the traditional fee-for-service. Rather than relying on a guaranteed benefit, all beneficiaries will receive a premium support credit of $7,500 on average in 2023 to purchase coverage in traditional Medicare or private insurance. But that amount will only grow at a rate of GDP plus 1.5 percentage points and will not keep up with health care costs. So while the federal government will spend less on the program, seniors will pay more in premiums.

16) “And, by the way the idea came not even from Paul Ryan or — or Senator Wyden, who’s the co-author of the bill with — with Paul Ryan in the Senate, but also it came from Bill — Bill Clinton’s chief of staff.” Romney has rejected the Ryan/Wyden approach — which does not cap the growth of the “premium support” subsidy. Bill Clinton and his commission also voted down these changes to the Medicare program.

17) “Well, I would repeal and replace it. We’re not going to get rid of all regulation. You have to have regulation. And there are some parts of Dodd-Frank that make all the sense in the world.” Romney has previously called for full repeal of Dodd-Frank, a law whose specific purpose is to regulate banks. MF Global’s use of customer funds to pay for its own trading losses is just one bit of proof that the financial industry isn’t responsible enough to protect consumers without regulation.

18) “But I wouldn’t designate five banks as too big to fail and give them a blank check. That’s one of the unintended consequences of Dodd-Frank… We need to get rid of that provision because it’s killing regional and small banks. They’re getting hurt.” The law merely says that the biggest, systemically risky banks need to abide by more stringent regulations. If those banks fail, they will be unwound by a new process in the Dodd-Frank law that protects taxpayers from having to pony up for a bailout.

19) “And, unfortunately, when — when — when you look at Obamacare, the Congressional Budget Office has said it will cost $2,500 a year more than traditional insurance. So it’s adding to cost.” Obamacare will actually provide millions of families with tax credits to make health care more affordable.

20) “[I]t puts in place an unelected board that’s going to tell people ultimately what kind of treatments they can have. I don’t like that idea.” The Board, or IPAB is tasked with making binding recommendations to Congress for lowering health care spending, should Medicare costs exceed a target growth rate. Congress can accept the savings proposal or implement its own ideas through a super majority. The panel’s plan will modify payments to providers but it cannot “include any recommendation to ration health care, raise revenues or Medicare beneficiary premiums…increase Medicare beneficiary cost-sharing (including deductibles, coinsurance, and co- payments), or otherwise restrict benefits or modify eligibility criteria” (Section 3403 of the ACA). Relying on health care experts rather than politicians to control health care costs has previously attracted bipartisan support and even Ryan himself proposed two IPAB-like structures in a 2009 health plan.

21) “Right now, the CBO says up to 20 million people will lose their insurance as Obamacare goes into effect next year. And likewise, a study by McKinsey and Company of American businesses said 30 percent of them are anticipating dropping people from coverage.” The Affordable Care Act would actually expand health care coverage to 30 million Americans, despite Romney fear mongering. According to CBO director Douglas Elmendorf, 3 million or less people would leave employer-sponsored health insurance coverage as a result of the law.

22) “I like the way we did it [health care] in Massachusetts…What were some differences? We didn’t raise taxes.” Romney raised fees, but he can claim that he didn’t increase taxes because the federal government funded almost half of his reforms.

23) “It’s why Republicans said, do not do this, and the Republicans had — had the plan. They put a plan out. They put out a plan, a bipartisan plan. It was swept aside.” The Affordable Care Act incorporates many Republican ideas including the individual mandate, state-based health care exchanges, high-risk insurance pools, and modified provisions that allow insurers to sell policies in multiple states. Republicans never offered a united bipartisan alternative.

24) “Preexisting conditions are covered under my plan.” Only people who are continuously insured would not be discriminated against because they suffer from pre-existing conditions. This protection would not be extended to people who are currently uninsured.

25) “In one year, you provided $90 billion in breaks to the green energy world. Now, I like green energy as well, but that’s about 50 years’ worth of what oil and gas receives.” The $90 billion was given out over several years and included loans, loan guarantees and grants through the American Recovery Act. $23 billion of the $90 billion “went toward “clean coal,” energy-efficiency upgrades, updating the electricity grid and environmental clean-up, largely for old nuclear weapons sites.”

26) “I think about half of [the green firms Obama invested in], of the ones have been invested in have gone out of business. A number of them happened to be owned by people who were contributors to your campaigns.” As of late last year, only “three out of the 26 recipients of 1705 loan guarantees have filed for bankruptcy, with losses estimated at just over $600 million.”

27) “If the president’s reelected you’ll see dramatic cuts to our military.” Romney is referring to the sequester, which his running mate Paul Ryan supported. Obama opposes the military cuts and has asked Congress to formulate a balanced approach that would avoid the trigger. 

More coming from fact checkers who publish for both candidates.

he wants to be what?

So if I believe everything that I see, which sometimes I do, Paul Ryan did the worst possible thing that he could do.  He called Social Security an entitlement.  Really bad idea.  So, when a 71 year old veteran asked why he called it an entitlement when it was something that he had paid in to his entire life, he was removed from the room, thrown to the floor by the police and handcuffed.  Ryan simply said something about the old guy taking his blood pressure medication that morning... and then he laughed.  Completely and utterly inexcusable.  It goes to show the character of the person who wants to be vice president... and conceivably, president.  If this is how he feels about retirees, what does he think about the poor, the unemployed, the infirmed, people in nursing homes?  He seems to have shown yet again, that he just cares about getting more money in his pocket and protecting the rich.  He cares nothing about the middle class and only about those who can line his pockets.
     And this brings me to Mr. Sensitivity himself, mitt romney.  He says that he cannot be worried about the 47% of people who will vote for President Obama.  He says he can't be bothered  teaching people how to take responsibility for their lives.  Wow... another foot in his mouth.  First of a;;, romney can teach most people nothing because they are smarter than he is.  But consider that the 47% is made up of seniors, students, the poor, the unemployed, and the disabled who cannot work.  No, not those who are in their 20's and 30's on disability, I mean those who CAN'T work.   So lets see, what do we do with all those retired people who have paid into pension plans and social security all their lives?  Shall we just tell them that they need to go back to work?  Oh wait, they already are.  Damn.  Okay, students, shall we have them drop out of school because romney thinks they are lazy and are demanding to be supported by the government?  Many students continue to work while they complete their studies.  Then we have the poor or under-employed.  I guess that would include those who have worked full time in well paying jobs who have lost those jobs, but are now too old to be hired.  yes, its true... employers will not hire someone who is in their late 50's or 60's.  So I guess they would be collecting unemployment.  But thats only good for so long and then it stops.  And then these people are in real trouble.  That leaves us with the disabled.  Those pesky disabled people who are confined to a wheel chair, to a bed, to a walker, to crutches... how dare they ask for assistance.  well enough sacasm.
     Many disabled people are veterans.  Anywhere from 10% to 100%.  And yes, they get money from the government because its the government who put them in that position in the first place.  And now the government is doing what it can to help these veterans.  It may not be the best, but they are trying.  I am a disabled veteran and yes, the government sends me money every month.  They also give me free medications.  They also give me health care.  Oh, and Home Depot gives me a 10% discount on anything I buy there.  But the point is, that many people who are disabled have given something to the government before asking for something in return.
     Romney and Ryan are not good for this country.  They are lying about medicare and the $716 billion.  They lie about their budget plan.  Ryan said that it would take too long to explain it.  Give me a break!  They absolutely do not care about the middle class.
     So, my vote will not be going to them... either of them.  Ever.