Ed Gillespie, a senior advisor to Mitt Romney, talked to Wolf Blitzer yesterday and was asked when the Romney-Ryan budget plan would balance the federal budget. Gillespie didn't have the foggiest idea.
As it happens, the question didn't just come out of thin air. Blitzer raised the point yesterday, but on Tuesday night, Fox News' Brit Hume asked Rep. Paul Ryan, Romney's running mate, the same question. Ryan was also stumped, saying, "We haven't run the numbers on that specific plan."
I honestly don't know what that means. The Romney-Ryan ticket has presented a budget plan, based in part on the Ryan budget plan that's already been voted on in Congress. Romney and Ryan are making plenty of promises based on their expectations of how effective their plan would be if they're elected.
But they "haven't run the numbers" on it. Hmm. If they "haven't run the numbers," how do Romney and Ryan know their numbers add up? How do they assure voters they have a credible plan to balance the budget?
When, exactly, do they think they might get around to running the numbers? Do they realize there's a presidential election coming up in a few months?
Of course, we know the reason the campaign can't answer the question -- it would require a level of specificity Team Romney is uncomfortable with. Indeed, Romney himself has said his plan "can't be scored."
I hate to break it to the Republican ticket, but a budget plan that can't be scored isn't a budget plan.
Romney's numbers don't add up. They can either admit that or start providing evidence to the contrary, but "we haven't run the numbers" isn't much of an answer.
Benjy Sarlin had a good related piece on this yesterday, explaining that Romney's positions "have become even more confusing since Ryan joined the ticket," though many hoped the opposite would happen, and the campaign's positions on taxes, spending, and debt reduction are now even harder to pin down than they were a week ago.
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Two moving positions rather than one. Divide and conquer or daze and confuse, what great candidates they are. snark
Shhhh....I'm trying to concentrate on that new shiny object.
"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullsh!t."
Romney interview:
Trust us. We're Republicans. The numbers add up just like they did when Ronnie the Ray-Gun ran them.
He could have said " at least a million years before President Obama's budget wou~~ Oh wait that is right President Obama has never passed a budget, He doesn't need one! He works with Imaginary numbers".
Hey Ray of hope, you should try to help your party instead of just cutting the other one for only being a little bit better than yours.
Right now I see the Republican party as poison, but hopefully it is the poison that will stop the cancerous growth called the democratic party. Once the cancer is put into remission then we can see if it is possible to get healthy, I hope its not too late.
Are there people still confused on that budget thing. Darn. I'm here to help. Check it out:
- http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=155
- http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/apr/06/mitt-romney/romney-says-obama-failed-pass-budget/
As anyone who's passed a civics class knows, it is the Congress which passes a budget. All the President can do is veto it or not.
So no, Obama hasn't passed a budget. Neither did Bush or Clinton or Bush or Reagan or Carter or Ford or Nixon or Johnson or Kennedy or Eisenhower or Truman or Roosevelt or....DUH.
Obama proposed budgets. The congress hasn't passed one.
chemdmd, How many years did the GOTP have the control of the Presidency & Congress, and in that time exactly what year was the budget balanced? Chirp, chirp...What's that crickets that I hear?
Yes a pox on both their houses, however, a return to the profligate policies enacted since Ray-gun (deregulation & tax cuts for the rich, cutting gov't services for the needy) are the very definition of insanity for this nation. Deregulation is what got US bailing out: the S&L crisis of the 1980's, Enron, WorldComm, Adelphia, and that last bit of bankster fraud that we're are still suffering thru.
I get that you don't approve of democrats, but unless you are part of the 1% exactly what have rethugniCons done for US lately?
Amen, DWIA - why people let themselves be so easily played for a fool by the GOP, I don't know. All you have to do is go over to the White House website, or just plain Google, to find out if it's true as to whether Pres. Obama has put forth a budget proposal or not. And BTW, Chemdmd, it's up to Congress to pass the budget - not the President. I've decided to keep this at hand for posts such as Chemdmds - all of the below links lead to the President's budget proposal (yes, with real numbers!) for every year of his administration (note: the 2009 budget was done under Bush and is not included below):
Fiscal Year 2013, Budget of the U.S. Government:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2013/assets/budget.pdf
Fiscal Year 2012, Budget of the U.S. Government:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BUDGET-2012-BUD/pdf/BUDGET-2012-BUD.pdf
Fiscal Year 2011, Budget of the U.S. Government:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BUDGET-2011-BUD/pdf/BUDGET-2011-BUD.pdf
Fiscal Year 2010, Budget of the U.S. Government:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BUDGET-2010-BUD/pdf/BUDGET-2010-BUD.pdf
Office of Management and Budget:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/
The President doesn't even sign the budget resolution.
On the one hand, we have the mean-spirited, cruel, Gilded Age Ryan or Romney or the Romney/Ryan plans that doesn't balance the budget till 2040 or 2050 or 2060 or... and on the other hand we have an intelligent, reasonable, compassionate plan from the Congressional Progressive Caucus called The People's Plan that balances the budget in 10 years.
http://cpc.grijalva.house.gov/the-peoples-budget/
Check out the heady praise at the bottom.
Disclaimer: I am NOT one to think the deficits and debt are the most serious problem we face. The most pressing problems we face are the demand slump, unemployment, a crappy private health care system, our refusal to acknowledge and do something about climate change and renewable energy, and our government for, by and of the plutocrats. Nevertheless for the Republican charade that aims to fool people they are serious about deficits and debt (when they caused it in the first place), you can see just how serious they are by reading the analyses of the fraud plans from the Republicans.
Bottom line: Republicans want to destroy the 20th century and they're not above lying to get the job done.
If the Democrats are cancer, then the Republicans are like the Ebola virus...
Hey, chiz, I think you're on to something!
/sarcasm off/
Chemdmd, your name is apt as it's clear you have chemical dependency issues. I suggest you start detoxing by first turning the channel from Faux News.
Yeah, the confusion is rampant. There should be remedial civics game show like "are you smarter than a 5th grader?" that is informing those in very basic American Civics facts in bite size pieces.
Really, we need more education with truth instead of bs.
Poor Mitt!. It's a disgrace how things have deteriorated, since forelock tugging went out of fashion!
Next thing the Left will be telling us we live in some sort of "democracy", where "all men are created equal!"
"We have a budget plan. It cuts some things, and puts that money other places. We have no idea what this will do to the actual budget, because that's not part of the plan. The plan is that we have a budget that cuts some things, and puts that money other places. That's the plan."
And my head goes 'splode...
I think we just found who writes Romney's Speeches!
NEVER!
They lie, lie, and lie again and expect the voters to trust them. This strategy worked twice for Bush and Rove. The Romney campaign hopes the voters learned nothing from the Bush era. Apparently they haven't seen Bush's poll numbers.
They are simply waiting for the new TPS reports/cover sheets to be delivered.
Did you get that memo?
Rachel,
I was watching "Squawk Box" on your sister station CNBC this morning and saw the last 10 minutes of the interview with Asher Edelman the legendary banker and financier. I am attaching the link to his segment. You need to have him on your show! You'll understand why after you watch the video.
http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000108628
Thanks for that link, Michael - that was a very engaging conversation - Edelman truly comes off as being the only grownup at the table.
Agreed - get Edelman on TRMS. He gets it on levels Romney/Ryan wouldn't dream of ever understanding.
They could put out a "fact sheet" typed by monkeys and claim that a GOP economist has proven the number out. It then becomes a "disagreement among economists" instead of "nonsense".
They're probably working on that right now.
The Romney people will run the numbers. The second week of November. And then they will keep those numbers secret just like Romney's Federal Tax returns for the very same reason.
Sorry, Mitt, you cannot get credit for your 'solution' if you do not show your work.
What, seemingly, was Voodoo economics under the guise of Reaganomics has morphed into Zombie economics under the guise of the Romney/Ryan Plan! -Kevo
Making a plan and running the numbers requires "facts"; since Romney keeps the facts secret and Ryan doesn't want to know any facts personally, this could be the stumbling block!
They won't know the numbers until after the election, of course, because then they will know "the number" of GOP reps and senators that get elected, and only then they will know "the number" of poor kids they can throw under the bus.
Im laughing at Barack ODumbass with his lies saying he hasn't tried to divide America....all this idiot has done is try to use Alinsky's 'divide & conquer' strategy, along with Chicago thug politics to try and win the election. This morning, the polls are showing that the gap is closing and that President Romney & Vice President Ryan are moving ahead of ODumbass in the swing states! I'm LOVING watching the idiot, Barack ODumbass, implode! And now, President Romney is about ot unload a sh*tload of cash, taking ODumbass to the woodshed and beating his sorry a$$! Prominent, African American Democrats are coming out this morning and voicing criticism over the 'chain' remarks from the idiot Biden and are saying ODumbass should be denouncing what the idiot said. The fight has begun.."We the People" in order to form a more PERFECT union, will be kicking Barack ODumbass OUT of the White House in November! FIREUP, PATRIOTS, FIREUP! The Revolution has begun and we have the DemWits and their messiah, Barack ODumbass cornered! NO PLAN...NO CLUE...NOBAMA 2012!
In reading your post for both content and grammar, I declare Romney/Ryan to be the ideal ticket for you, David.
While you were diligent in including "patriots", "Demwits", and "Nobama" in your post, I was sorry to see you have neglected to invoke God. You see, all points must be present on the Euclidean plane before one can computate the minimum circle of your knowledge. Please remember Him in future.
Breathe, and then take your meds.
You can always tell a Beck fan . Any reference to Saul Alinsky is the dead giveaway. Beck has a Man Crush on him but if you ask a 100 people on the street I bet a 101 would say who?
Talk about playing fast and loose with the numbers on the part of the GOP: Apparently, Paul Ryan forgot to disclose his and his wife's inheritance on his required filings:
"Paul Ryan and his wife inherited between $1-5 million in 2010 and whoopsie daisy, he forgot to disclose it for two years. You’d almost think it was on purpose, well, some people do think that, since Ryan didn’t remember it until he was being vetted by the Romney campaign."
http://www.politicususa.com/busted-paul-ryans-1-5-million-trust-left-disclosure-forms-vetted.html
Are we really having this conversation about a presidential candidate and his running mate? Is there a whole brain between them?
Philidelphia judge UPHOLDS the voter ID laws and now its gaining support across America! WOOOOHOOOOO!!!!! America, the sleeping giant has awaken, and looks like ODumbass and the liberal DemWits are about to be kicked out of Washington! No Plan...No Clue....NOBAMA 2012!!!!!!!!!!!
I assume this is what they mean by "conservatives are happier"?
david .... Perhaps you might want to take a look at the electoral map at www.electoral-vote.com. Despite all of the voter suppression, PA seems to be pretty much in Obama's column at this point.
Incidentally, why do you root against democracy? Wait. You don't have to answer. I think we already know.
You must be Shooter's "smarter" brother...
Can anyone tell me if ANY federal budget/program ever came out even close to what was predicted spending and "savings" wise?? It seems that they are vague forecasts that in actuality are usually way under - I mean way under - what is really spent. Both parties throw up numbers in the "best case" scenarios that NEVER actually happen.
Almost anything that involves the feferal government has cost overruns and wildly overpriced components, like hammers that may cost hundreds of dollars. When I was in the Navy in the 70s our unit would routinely drive off base to local hardware stores to buy simple things like screws and small tools because they would cost a ton more if we ordered it through the supply chain.
Uhhhh Clinton .........................
Budget proposals, no. Actual budgets, yes.
The problem with proposed budgets, roadmaps, etc, is that you have to take all of their ideas and reality has to hit all of their assumptions or the numbers fall apart. Then they can make excuses to the effect of "they didn't approve the hole package" or "we didn't anticipate the downturn." Or whatever.
Both sides do it, and it doesn't particularly bother me that these things aren't put in to practice as written. They show the candidates' priorities. And it is clear from the Romney/Ryan plan, that helping the rich get richer is their only priority.
skip, you realize now that by driving off base and buying tools and supplies at the local hardware stores you were hurting a defense contractor's bottom line, right? That's very un-Republican of you (yes, I know you are neither red nor blue).
You might be lucky you didn't get a DD or Court Martial...but I do applaud your sense of reasonableness and practicality.
They just don't want to come out and say they want to cut taxes more (forget the debt for NOW) and cut Social Security and Medicare. Romney wrote on that white board No Change under Romney- so what is it you're going to cut? The people want to know what it is, but you want to hide that.
This is a trend in Repub-land… blur the lines and say stuff like big government and Obamacare ooohhh scary scary socialism, but nothing about what they'd do. That's because they don't know what they'd do. Governing is something they hate. They love running and winning, but once they win, they're just out to cut aaanything they come across their inbasket.
He didn't know that question was going to be asked? 'Give me some time and I'll get back to you.' And Snow Cub let it slide. Can you imagine if Axelrod had made such a statement? The media would have been all over it. I can't wait to watch a few minutes of Joe 'spokesperson for the GOP' Scarborough, who loves to taunt his 'bipartinship' not say ONE word about that comment on Friday morning. I mean, ya know, he's so bipartisan and all.
Wasn't Ed Gillespie supposed to be the big time expert they were bringing in to get things on track with this campaign? He's sure not doing a good job holding up his end of the bargain.