The Ryan Rescue, Rhetoric And Reality
By nearly all accounts, Paul Ryan delivered a rousing and effective speech at the RNC, eviscerating a failed Obama administration with lethal oratory while simultaneously managing to come off as the Boy Scout next door who grandmas love and the hipster nerd who has a respectable iTunes playlist in one pocket and a calculator in the other.
Ryan’s speech gave Team Romney a bounce, but it would’ve been bigger and better if his rescue matched his historical reality; conspicuously absent from a speech that blasted Obama for out-of-control spending, big government and fiscal irresponsibility was any reference to Ryan’s own record, which includes voting for both the TARP and auto bailouts, supporting No Child Left Behind and Medicare D, supporting the PATRIOT Act, warrantless electronic surveillance, and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and supporting CAFTA and myriad other so-called free trade agreements.
The question then becomes, has Ryan learned enough from his missteps to provide adequate footing moving forward on a path to prosperity? And if he has, how much sway would his role as vice president carry?
On the surface, Ryan certainly seems to offer a more realistic rescue from the country’s current fiscal calamity than anything coming from the Obama administration; even if some of Ryan’s prior positions and votes are in part responsible for helping to dig that ditch, his plans and promsies at least take a stab at trying to address the realities of entitlement spending and healthcare reform, cutting income tax rates while simplifying the tax code, and reducing federal spending by nearly $6 trillion over the next decade.
So would a Romney/Ryan term mark a substantive improvement to another four years of Obama/Biden, or a near repeat with only marginally varying degrees? Is Gary Johnson worth a vote to find out?
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