Progressive me is happy with Romney's Paul Ryan pick

Thank you, Mitt Romney. You've eased my anxieties about Obama being re-elected.

I've been worried that you'd choose a running mate who would have a Wow! factor, someone charismatic moderates and independents would gravitate toward, who could juice up your campaign with a jolt of energy.

But Paul Ryan is an excellent choice... to us progressives. I suspect Obama's advisors engaged in some high-fiving when it became apparent yesterday that Ryan would be the vice-presidential pick. 

It didn't take long for a "The Go Back Team" website to pop up on www.barackobama.com, complete with horrifying facts about the Ryan/Romney embrace of Medicare vouchers, Social Security changes, big cuts to Pell grants for college students, tax reductions for the wealthiest Americans, and such.

Watch, if you dare.

 

It looks like Romney has caved to the right side of the Republican right-wingers.

Ryan says what they want to hear -- tax cuts! entitlement cuts! social program cuts! no cuts to defense! -- but this isn't what most Americans want. So Romney has guaranteed that from now on the nation's economy will be a secondary campaign issue to how wise and fair the Ryan/Romney deficit reduction plan is.

Revealing the disarray in Romney's campaign strategy, he already is trying to distance himself from Paul Ryan's extreme budget proposals.

This won't work, because (1) Romney has expressed strong support for Ryan economics, and (2) Obama will keep on reminding voters that the Ryan/Romney plan will make the rich richer and the middle class poorer.

Natt Silver of FiveThirtyEight, a savvy analyzer of all things political, considers the Ryan pick to be risky and a reflection of Romney's conclusion that he's running behind Obama.

When a prudent candidate like Mitt Romney picks someone like Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin as his running mate, it suggests that he felt he held a losing position against President Obama.

...Mr. Ryan’s controversial budget plan, which polls poorly, will obviously get much more attention than it had previously. The fate of the presidential race and the fate of Congressional races may become more closely tied together. Mr. Obama will no longer have to stretch to evoke the specter of Congress and its 15 percent approval rating. With Mr. Ryan on the opposing ticket, he will be running against a flesh-and-blood embodiment of it.

Taking risks like these is not what you do if you think you have a winning hand already. But Mr. Romney, the turnaround artist, decided that he needed to turn around his own campaign.

Ezra Klein also makes some astute observations about Romeny's choice of Ryan, some of which echo Silver's thoughts.

1. Both Democrats and conservatives are going to get the exact debate they wanted. I’m not so sure about Republicans.

2. This is an admission of fear from the Romney campaign. You don’t make a risky pick like Paul Ryan if you think the fundamentals favor your candidate. You make a risky pick like Paul Ryan if you think the fundamentals don’t favor your candidate. And, right now, the numbers don’t look good for Romney: Obama leads in the Real Clear Politics average of polls by more than four percentage points — his largest lead since April.

3. Related point: Two of the top contenders in the Romney campaign’s veepstakes were Ohio’s Rob Portman and Florida’s Marco Rubio. Given that there’s fairly good evidence that vice presidential candidates are worth at least a point or two in their home states, the Romney campaign’s decision to pick Ryan is evidence that they feel they need to change the national dynamic, not just pick off a battleground state.

So on the whole I'm happy with what Romney did. His presidential campaign has been going poorly. Picking Paul Ryan isn't so much a game-changer as an acknowledgement that the game needs changing.

For activist progressives like me the biggest downside of today's announcement is the flood of emails I'm getting from Democratic/liberal organizations. Each warns of the danger to truth, justice, and the American way if the Romney-Ryan ticket gets elected. 

And each wants money so they can stop this from happening. I gave a few bucks to MoveOn and Act Blue, then recognized that my VISA card would overheat if I responded to every donation request.

Anyway, I figure that Romney's choice of Paul Ryan is the best campaign "donation" Democrats will enjoy this year. It'll be a gift that keeps on giving, right up until election day.

Comments

[tucson]

Ryan is the one who created the budget that the Democrats hated so much and wouldn't pass.

However, let's look at other factors:

Gun Owners of America (the hard core org) gives Ryan a solid 'A'.

Wisconsin (10 electoral votes),
Indiana (11 electoral votes),
Ohio (18 electoral votes)

are all swing states that went for Ob*ma in 2008.

Ryan is from Wisconsin. Wisconsin had an epiphany 4 years ago. They got rid of their Democrat-controlled legislature, their Democrat Governor, and as a result, the corrupt Democrat Party-run government employees unions lost substantial clout.

After the voters swept the Democrats out of the legislature and governor's mansion, the Democrats acted like cry babies: they protested, rioted, trashed city halls across the state and graffiti'd the state capitol building. The Democrat state senators, upon losing their majority status, took a bus to Illinois to deny the Republicans a quorum so they could not conduct business. The Ob*ma-inspired thugs then held a recall election to get rid of the architect of all the change, Gov. Scott Walker. Walker survived the recall by a 6% margin. The Republicans therefore gained a bunker deep inside enemy territory (Minnesota and Michigan, Wisconsin's other neighbors, are big Democrat states, too).

By choosing Ryan, Romney has sent reinforcements to fortify this beachhead. Not only will this nail down Wisconsin, but also Indiana. Indiana went for Ob*ma by only 1% last election. Ohio, next to Indiana, went for Ob*ma by only 4% or so. There is an excellent chance for all these former Ob*ma states to go the other way this time -- for a pickup of 39 electoral votes. It is a bold statement that the Republicans want to win back the Midwest and are doing something about it. Had Romney chosen Rubio, the Republicans would have been guaranteed Florida, which is worth 29, but they would probably lose the Midwest. Florida may go for Romney without the Rubio pick...the Republicans are still having the convention in Tampa in a few weeks which shows they still value Florida.

Also, there is a sizable redneck population in the country who will now show up to vote for an ALL-WHITE ticket. The Democrats are going to make the issue entirely about race: "See! The Republicans are the party of old, tired, white males with old ideas." Let them try. I am glad the GOP has decided to throw political correctness out the window.

I am very comfortable voting for this ticket now.

[Willie R]

I do not vote. Some would say that is the reason why things are the way they are in politics - the apathy of so many of us. No doubt.
I am 63 years of age and on Social Security Disability plus Long-Term Disability paid for by my employer, which will cease when I turn 66, my normal retirement age. It sure would be nice to know that Social Security will still be intact as presently configured in three more years. I think Obama will be re-elected with ease, but if anyone could present a cogent reason why I would be better off voting for Romney, I might actually vote.

[Bob]

I personally don't have much faith in either party these days. They've both run this counntry into the ground with their poor financial ways and constant need to go to war with somebody.

[Robert Paul Howard]

An article/review of possible interest:

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/10/the-central-role-of-faux-republicans-in-the-anatomy-of-decline/

Robert Paul Howard

[Lango6]

@tucson, man are you grabbing at straw. Ryan will likely lose his own seat to a well-funded Democrat and he probably won't deliver Wisconsin like Al Gore couldn't deliver Tennessee. Ohio polling has Obama up by more than the 4% he won by in 08. And the GOP is "still" holding its convention in Tampa? Like they were going to move it? And the grand finale, the "White Power" strategy. I think this one sums up the desperation of a bad candidate and poor VP pick. When the best way to spin it reveals an appeal to racist motivation, you have lost. Thanks for confirming what Brian already knew.

[tucson]

Lango6,
I am offended by racism, but there is racism among some whites and blacks alike and it is a factor. When 95+% of blacks vote for O you can't tell me there wasn't just a teeny bit of racial preference in there. Yeah, I know, the old white RINO McCain wasn't exactly a thriller for blacks or anyone else for that matter. It's like the Republicans were trying to lose. Ob*ma was in the right place at the right time in '08 due to a convergence of a unique "perfect storm" of factors in his favor. This time it will be more difficult and not so much of a slam dunk for him. Ooops. Sorry for the racial stereotype.

[tucson]

Not one American who voted for McCain 4 years ago will switch to Obama. Not one in all the land. Well, maybe one. But many millions of people who voted for an unknown Obama 4 years ago are angry, disillusioned, turned off, or scared about the future. Voters know Obama now and that is a bad harbinger.

As for different voting blocks:

Black voters. Obama has nowhere to go but down among this group. His endorsement of gay marriage has alienated many black church-going Christians. He may get 88% of their vote instead of the 96% he got in 2008.

Jewish voters. Obama has been weak in his support of Israel. Many Jewish voters and big donors are angry and disappointed. I predict Obama's Jewish support drops from 78% in 2008 to the low 60's.

Youth voters. Obama's biggest and most enthusiastic believers from 4 years ago have graduated into a job market from hell. Young people are disillusioned, frightened, and broke, a bad combination. The enthusiasm is long gone. Turnout will be much lower among young voters, as will actual voting percentages.

Catholic voters. Obama won a majority of Catholics in 2008. That won't happen again. Out of desperation to please women, Obama went to war with the Catholic Church over contraception. He will be less popular among them.

Small Business owners. 40% voted for Obama 4 years ago to "give someone different a chance." They didn't see that he would pursue a war on capitalism and demonize anyone who owned a business..."You didn't build that business" and that he'd support unions over the private sector in a big way...that he'd overwhelm the economy with spending and debt. Four years later, small business owners are very worried about Obama.

Blue collar working class whites. Do I need to say a thing? White working class voters are about as happy with Obama as Boston Red Sox fans feel about the New York Yankees. This is not good news for Obama.

Suburban moms. The issue isn't contraception, it's having a job to pay for contraception. Obama's economy frightens these moms. They are worried about putting food on the table. They fear for their children's future.

Military Veterans. McCain won this group by 10 points. Romney is winning by 24 points. The more our military vets got to see of Obama, the more they dislike him..

Is there one major group where Obama has gained since 2008? Maybe hispanics for whom he is soft on immigration and he refused to support SB1070 in Arizona.

Few in America will wake up on election day saying, "I didn't vote for Obama 4 years ago, but he's done such a fantastic job, I can't wait to vote for him today." Does anyone feel that a vote for Obama makes their job more secure? Forget the polls. I sense this will be a historic landslide and a world-class repudiation of Obama's radical and risky socialist class-warfare agenda.