Two interesting videos were released late yesterday, both of which involve 2012 candidates for national office. This one, published by the Huffington Post's Ryan Grim, and discussed in detail at the top of the show last night, strikes me as the more interesting one.
In the clip, we see Paul Ryan, speaking at an American Spectator event less than a year ago, explaining his distinctly Randian vision of American society. For those who can't watch videos online, here's the transcript of the clip:
"The point is we are reaching a fiscal tipping point. The moral tipping point is even worse. And the moral tipping point is before too long we could become a society that we were never ever intended to be. We could become a society where the net majority of Americans are takers not makers.
"Another great think tank, the Tax Foundation, runs lots of good numbers. Those of you who don't know me, I'm kind of a numbers guy. Twenty percent of Americans, according to the Tax Foundation, get 75 percent of their income from the federal government, they're dependent. Another 20 percent of Americans get 40 percent of their income from the federal government so their reliant. Today 70 percent of Americans get more benefits from the federal government in dollar value than they pay back in taxes.
"So you could argue that we're already past that tipping point. The good news is, survey after survey, poll after poll, still shows that we are a center-right 70/30 country. Seventy percent of Americans want the American dream, they believe in the American idea. Only 30 percent want the welfare state. What that tells us is at least half of those people that are currently in that category are there not of their wish or their will. They believe in that horizon they are shooting for. They're down on their luck, they're out of their job, they're back in school. They want the American idea and they want their kids to be better off. But slowly but surely if we don't watch this, if we allow all this government that is being stacked up, kick in, we will reach that moral tipping point."
If this sentiment seems offensive in a familiar sort of way, there's a good reason for that.
Mitt Romney's now-infamous "47 percent" remarks were striking for several reasons, but the most politically salient was the disdain the Republican showed for millions of Americans. In Romney's mind, nearly half the country is made up of parasitic freeloaders who refuse to "take personal responsibility and care for their lives."
Though the language is clearly different between Romney's video and Ryan's, the right-wing congressman's sentiment is eerily similar -- Ryan also looks at millions of his fellow countrymen and looks down on them. He sees those who rely, at least temporarily, on public institutions and the nation's safety net, and concludes that they don't believe in the American idea and have abandoned the American dream.
What's less clear -- and what deserves additional scrutiny -- is exactly which group of people Ryan disapproves of so strongly. Are America's seniors little more than overly-dependent "takers"? How about military veterans? The disabled? Students? Low-income families crushed by a recession generated by Paul Ryan's own policy agenda?
Can Ryan explain why he believes some or all of these Americans deserve his scorn? And why those who rely on corporate welfare generally get his praise?
For that matter, can he also explain who benefits from a debate in which far-right politicians divide Americans along these lines?
I get the sense the media is far more interested in the other video that caused a stir last night, and that's a shame. This Ryan clip is the one that actually tells the public something relevant about a candidate for national office's worldview.
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Why are Republicans like Romney and Paul Ryan so insistent on dividing up America into the deluded categories of "takers" and "job creators"? Why do these folks, who says they want to be president of all Americans, continue to use language that divides the country and drives us all apart? The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution have nothing in them excluding "47 percent" or "30 percent" from the same rights and obligations we all enjoy and take responsibility for. The founders did not envision future politicians slicing and dicing segments of the country into worthy" Americans and worthless Americans. This is incredibly vile and dangerous. - pp
Well Caesar did okay until he didn't
The maxims divide et impera and divide ut regnes were utilised by the Roman ruler Caesar
Let Rome burn!
Thirty percent of the country certainly believes in the welfare state, and most everyone here belongs to that group. Which part of that are you not agreeing with?
It's a "welfare state" until you actually need help. Then it's a "safety net," and I think the percentage of Americans who believe in it is far greater than 30.
Ah Blankman, which 30% are you referring to - would that be the military those wounded warriors that went into Iraq based on lies, would it be the elderly that receive SS - which they have paid into all of their working lives, would that be the working poor that receive food stamps so that they can continue in their lowly paid positions, or the disabled - who thru no fault of their own are disabled and not able to work, or the unemployed that haven't been able to find work?
You tell me, exactly how morally bankrupt are you? You have already shown yourself to be both ignorant (because you parrot the talking points), and selfish - because you feel that "you've done it yourself". So at what point will you actually open your mind to see the other side, the side of reality and at what point have you lost your compassion for the least of these, and at what point will you see that voting for the GOTP is a vote to disenfranchise yourself? And really how do you expect to have a "dialog" when you refuse to even consider that others might be right?
The elements of the safety net are called social programs because they benefit society as a whole. We weren't around 100 years ago, before there were any social programs. So we don't remember what it was like. But I don't need the Ghost of Christmas Future to show me what the country would be like without those programs. Epidemics of tuberculosis because of non-existent public health programs are a thing of the past. The incidence of desperate gangsters shooting up banks with Tommy guns is sharply down. We don't have the sorry spectacle of malnourished and physically underdeveloped children, kids with twisted limbs who will never be productive members of society, begging on the street.
Food stamps were originally included in a farm bill partly as a method of food price support. I doubt you'll find a farmer who's against food stamps. Farmers also get subsidies, price support, help with crop insurance, etc. Yet many farmers went bankrupt as recently as the 80's, losing their farms, their homes, their livelihoods. I guess Romney and Ryan would be OK with that. Reagan sure didn't seem to mind.
Read the first sentence of the US Constitution, which says that one of its goals is “to promote the general welfare.” Don't talk to me about “welfare queens.” True, the poorest person in our country with a roof over his head would be considered a prince in most of Asia and Africa, just because he has electricity and clean water. (BTW, we built that.) Go a few miles inland in China, the latest land of “economic miracle," and discover that in the rural west half that country of 1.5 billion lives on less than two dollars a day. Is this the criterion we wish to be judged on?
We all want a healthy, productive society. Social programs benefit us all. So I don't have to be a starry-eyed idealist to agree with Obama that we're all in this together. We find it easy to be united and to give to the country in time of attack or war; why is it so hard for us to be united and to give to the country in time of need? Send not to ask for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee.
Shooter . . . How many corporations are part of the "47%" that don't pay federal income taxes. After all, corporations are people, right?
How many corporations depend upon governmental largesse, making them believers in the "welfare state?" After all, if you receive any kind of federal payment, including Social Security or Medicare (that people pay into all their lives), Romney and Ryan consider you a taker, rather than a maker.
You do not know us, nor what our situations are. You act like you alone have built this country, that only Republicans have paid taxes and worked hard. That belief makes you an A$$ for making that assumption. There is an article in Bloomberg that states: "Almost 2,400 Millionaires Pocketed Unemployment Benefits" Should we presume that is you? Where are your insults for all those Millionaires who pay NO Federal Income Tax and where is the disdain for the Corporate Welfare? Wasn't there a report that most of the 47% or 30% reside in the Republican controlled South?
http://money.msn.com/business-news/article.aspx?feed=BLOOM&date=20121002&id=15624075
Ryan is a true believer in the Randian worldview. A bizarre feature of this is that business owners are "makers" even if they've never gotten their hands dirty, and workers who actually make the products (or work in distribution or support jobs that make them possible) are "takers" if they rely on public assistance because the glorious "makers" have squeezed their wages to the point where they can't support a family.
Twenty percent of Americans, according to the Tax Foundation, get 75 percent of their income from the federal government, they're dependent.
I wonder if that includes members of the House?
I wonder if that includes members of the House?
Ya beats me to it, ya rascal!
But , but Ryan is only collecting from the makers to ...
Put himself in a position to take even More !
Of course, Ryan worked for that gov't payout, by
passing legislation that helped build a better Americadoing nothing.I think it's only the right-wing media that care about the Obama video, and they are flogging it only half-heartedly. As for the Ryan video -- eh. It just tin-plates the tin man; even Chris Wallace knows that Ryan is a fraud.
It's true that Ryan is a fraud, in that his numbers don't add up. But I suspect that he and a lot on the right genuinely believe in the Ayn Randian makers/takers divide. This is really an honest, succinct summary of the right's governing philosophy. So I think it is important
By Ryan's definition, he is among the most egregious takers (a dependent). C'mon Wisconsin, yank him from the public teat and push him out the door.
... to take up a job as a lobbyist, or a "researcher" for a right-wing think tank (aka "wingnut welfare".)
^^Like Liz Cheney, the ultimate wingnut welfare queen!
They don't want to be President of all Americans because "others" don't matter.
They're not in favor of democracy either but then we've known that for awhile.
There you go America- there's your choice.
Romney/Ryan- Supporting only those who are rich enough to support us
Obama/Biden- Supporting Americans. All of them.
Over at Alternet George Lakoff
http://www.alternet.org/election-2012/george-lakoff-what-watch-presidential-debates
has an interesting piece. He says that 96% of all Americans get some form of government support.
-the remaining 4% are children, too young to participate.
Almost like a cooperative enterprise where every individual is responsible for providing efforts dependant upon the idea of an entity that depends on every part of itself . Best just kill it before it has a chance to upset an idea of grab every thing you can , I got mine . Who cared about the widows and children when the bonds went south from the Railroad expansion ? Why should we care about any one when we got ours ?
American dream dispersed by tax bracket? Is that not the same as the debunked trickle down?
"Today the face of capitalism uses a variety of economic tools at its disposal. First and foremost, the face takes advantage of a system where there is one set of rules for the moneyed class, and another set of rules for those who are not moneyed. With the playing field tilted, fairness and equal protection, the kind the constitution is supposed to guarantee, are put into serious question. Is that what Thomas Jefferson seemed to be complaining about way back when?"
Read more about The Face of Capitalism at
http://lifeamongtheordinary.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-face-of-capitalism-part-two.html
Being able to cherry-pick from statistical snapshots in time doesn't make one "a numbers kind of guy." But being unable to support your plans even when questioned by Fox News hosts makes you a clown type of guy. Chris Christie has to be loving that this campaign has exposed Ryay as nothing more than a fraud.
If he actually believes that there are people who want to be out of work and not a productive member of society, then he is more out of touch than we imagined. Every single person who is alive today considers themselves to be strong and a worthwhile human being. They may be struggling and trying to find their way, they may have gone down roads they shouldn't have, but, all in all noone wants to go hungry, noone wants to suffer, and noone wants to be pointed out as uneloquentally as Ryan mentioned, a leech. He needs to come and have dinner with us some time, ala Ramon Noodle delight. Apparantally, he has never had to use the bathroom in the dark in order to save on electricity. He is in denial about what he and the Republicans have done to the American People and our way of life.
...Every single person who is alive today considers themselves to be strong and a worthwhile human being...
I suppose that those who have an "I got mine" approach could be superfiicially included in the idea of strength , however it manages to finally disolve any real possibility for enduring strength .
A real problem with these giants of towering virtues is their fear . They fear an involvement from what they perceive as less than human , or less human than them. They dislike the power available to bring oneself into prosperity that they as king makers have not chosen themselves .
I think you two are fine examples of what can happen when too much time is spent in the echo chamber. It's like a sensory deprivation chamber where mental constructs are indistinguishable from reality.
Everyone may consider themselves strong and worthy, but it's obvious most here don't agree with that. They see large swaths of the country as weak, ineffectual, and stupid. Victims in need of protection from the cold cruel world and the rich who prey upon them.
Well, it's certainly true that half the country has below average intelligence, and I'm sure the majority of those vote Democrat. At least they're worth something every two years.
I'm surprised you even mention the right wing echo chamber you slither out of everyday, Blanks. Let's not forget that the states that collect the most and give the least are solidly RED.
As to their intelligence, rather ignorance, we'll see how that works out when those same RED states start teaching intelligent design instead of evolution. Then all those dumb Dems can be smart like the Repubs leading brainiac Todd Akin, huh?
The Glass Steagall act that kept our lust for more avarice , and rainy day funds seperate worked until the great Solon Phil Graham decided otherwise .
Can't do the clip, but the POV of the transcript is vicious! Such crystal clarity, deterministic tripe is more indicative of a forth grader taunting another that his daddy is bigger than all others!
And Jesus wept! -Kevo
So roll all of us over to the poor farm, beeeatch! And see how long all the self made GOP businessmen dependent on gubment largesse manage to stay in business.
You miss the point !
Gubbamint welfare for the chosen is not taking , it is discretion . Discretion of the most suitable type , for the most suitable .
Let's see, over 15% of Americans live below the poverty line and approximately 13% of Americans are over 65%. And 20% get 75% of their income from the government. So?
Is Paul Ryan claiming he is going to end poverty? Or that he is going to let poor people and senior citizens who don't have big nest eggs die of starvation while they live on the street? Just wondering.
The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed America / by Lemann, Nicholas, Professor, and Lemann
This book manages to provide a very good insight into how the government pulled a black middle class out of a desperate and "taker" peoples .
Ryan seems to be telling his audience, they're coming after us and unless we make changes, that 30% is going to keep growing. Funny how no one asks who the 30% are and would it matter if they knew?
I can't wrap my head around it and I'd like to know if this is just scare talk to drum up #'s for their base or do they really have a plan. Does he really believe the American people would allow the federal government to privatize SS and medicare? Do they already know who that contract would go to and are they already counting the billions they'd recieve with back door perks??
I'm dizzy already.
New and funny Ryan video!
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/10/02/parody-music-video-mocks-paul-ryans-anti-abortion-p90x-bod/
Ryan love's to tell his story about people getting gov.assistance turning it into a hammock.But take a close look at him.He's been in the government (I ca'nt say working) since he was 22 yrs.old.Now if anyone has turned government "assistance"into a hammock it's surely him.
Even before he started working for the government, Paul Ryan was a beneficiary of the "welfare state." He started getting Social Security survivor's benefit payments at 16 after his father died. He would have received them until he graduated from college.
Its almost if the GOP has turned into a Manichanean group. For those who don`t do theology its a simple Bushism ` if your not with us, your against us` that view stated by Bush re terrorism as morphed into an economic mantra. Increasingly it would appear those on state benefits as we describe them in the UK mostly wish they were not on them. I wonder if you have a situation in the US as we have in the UK sometime to be on benefits is better than to work as you can be crippled by tax and excluded from some assistance if you work. To state if you are on benefit you do not have the American Dream in view is morally offensive to students as surely they are studying to achieve it, to elderly people who have in the past built it for others and to the militiary and veterans who have enabled the whole of Americ to achieve their dreams. A question for the debate why none of the candidates have been involved active service a question more for Romney. If you have had a spoon in your mouth all your life or a career politician, oddly one who is partisan, you probably do not care about achieving the America dream because your born into BUT YOU DID NOT MAKE IT
I just want to point out to Mr. Grim that it is Unemployment Insurance. A person can only collect it if they have paid into it via an employer. The amount of your benefit is determined by how much money you earned.
In the end, we know who the "takers" really are. Congress, including Paul Ryan, who takes a paycheck every month from the American people, then DOES ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!
"..we could become a society that we were never ever intended to be." What does that mean? ..never ever intended to be - by whom? Who intended us ever to be anything?
it sounds as if Ryan as a metaphorical understanding of what American society should be, in essence he is suggesting that American society has no need of a safety net because if all Americans follow the American Dream they should all succeed the fact that is an idea that is in the realms of `Fantasy Island` for those of an older generation is a fact. As I suggested in a previous if you need help for whatever reason you have not succeeded because you have either not worked hard enough or in the GOP world-view are judged by GOD as deserving to be in this situation. This is one view that I am surprised as not surfaced in the Election the underlying Calvinist view that if you do not succeed financially you are among the damned but if you are succeeding financially it is due to being among God`s saved. I would be interested in comments on this view as it appears to a view that has slipped under the radar but is definitely a Tea Party and GOP extremist view
Everyone keeps talking about Ayn Rand and the idea that these people want to implement a new brand of laissez-faire capitalism and missing what I think is the more telling discussion on what sort of world that would create. The world these people want is a kind of Sinclairian neo-feudal state where people are once again forced sacrifice any kind of human dignity to take whatever is offered to them because it is all that is available. Where the driving forces of the economy aren't the American dream but rather the nightmare world of the company store and indentured servitude.
When you look at the sum effect of things like banning abortion, dismantling the mechanisms of public education, abolishing the minimum wage, and relaxing government oversight and regulation you see a world where you have a large uneducated populace who are forced to work in hellish conditions just to survive. The added bonus for these people is that under those conditions people have a tendency to turn to the only avenue toward hope that remains available to them which is religion and then fall under the sway of people who preach a brand of morality that is more based in bigotry than on charity.
This world view isn't just quaint or ridiculous its dangerous
Was anyone else surprised to hear that Rachel doesn't know how to pronounce Ayn Rand's first name? Of course Ed Shultz still can't pronounce "Maddow" properly. You'd think someone at MSNBC would point that out to him.
I'd like to know who the 70% who get more in benefits than they pay in taxes are. Does this include military? Teachers, police and firefighters supported by federal grants? The FBI? Farmers receiving disaster relief in a drought? Just who does Ryan want to take these federal funds away from?
I wonder how much of that 30-47% population of "takers" that Romney and Ryan enjoy bashing were actually pushed into that category by Bain and other big GOP donors trying to get rich by offshoring and automating jobs (or investing in companies that did), devastating a lot of local economies. And now in standard GOP fashion they blame the victims of their sociopathic greed.