Romney / Ryan?

[Gerry Clinchy]

going on to say that Catholic teaching "demands that higher levels of government provide help—"subsidium"—when communities and local governments face problems beyond their means to address such as economic crises, high unemployment, endemic poverty and hunger."

I never saw anything like this in my catechism.

[MrBrian]

Not sure why he's given so much praise or why he's being viewed as a "conservative"? He's the typical big-government Republican that many claim to despise e.g. Ryan voted for TARP, voted yeah for most of Obama's stimulus, voted for Bush's Medicare Part D expansion, No Child Left Behind act, etc? He voted with Bush 94% of the time...he's nothing new or refreshing within the Republican party. Just a "new face" with a record of doing everything in the past that's got us where we are today. He's everything voters should of expected from a Romney VP pick!

[Sundown49 aka Otey B]

Most straight forward speech I have heard from ANY politician in YEARS. Romney/Ryan 2012!!! WILL get this country back to the one I recognize.

[Gerry Clinchy]

Just watched an old clip (May 2012) of an interview with Ryan. They reprised the D ad of someone (who looked like Ryan) hurling an old woman out of her wheelchair over a clifff. So, one would have to say that Ryan is prepared for his vilification by the Ds.

Have to say, that the interview showed him as capable, informed and articulate.

While I don't like the idea that he has been so long associated with the DC culture, he has also held jobs in his life and his family has a small business. Maybe this can counterbalance the DC influences?

Wonder when they will really come down on Congress (the Senate, in particular) for not passing a budget in four years? Ask the man on the street, R or D, how they could operate their own lives on that kind of accounting.

[ARay11]

Just watched an old clip (May 2012) of an interview with Ryan. They reprised the D ad of someone (who looked like Ryan) hurling an old woman out of her wheelchair over a clifff. So, one would have to say that Ryan is prepared for his vilification by the Ds.

Have to say, that the interview showed him as capable, informed and articulate.

While I don't like the idea that he has been so long associated with the DC culture, he has also held jobs in his life and his family has a small business. Maybe this can counterbalance the DC influences?

Wonder when they will really come down on Congress (the Senate, in particular) for not passing a budget in four years? Ask the man on the street, R or D, how they could operate their own lives on that kind of accounting.

The Dems voters that they will mobilize on election day do not care about budgets. They never had one, never will. When you get everything for free, there's no need for a budget. They will bus them to the polls by the thousands. I am not sure R&R will overcome that kind of mobilization.

[Franco]

Wise choice, it had to be Ryan or Portman as both help in a key swing state. Now, lets see how big a knife he weilds.

[Gerry Clinchy]

The Dem reaction? They are gleeful ... believing that Ryan's budgetary positions on Medicare and entitlements will kill off Romney.

Ryan debating Biden will still be interesting. Even if Obama changed to Hillary, I think Ryan could hold his own against her.

[huntinman]

In the little reading I have been able to do since the announcement this morning, he appears to me to bring nothing to attract any of the folks who voted for Obama in the last election, and indeed greatly adds to the Dems ability to claim that the Republicans are callous, don't care about the poor, and intend to cast them loose. His position on medicare is going to scare a lot of folks and his tax policy is very easy to interpret as favoring "the rich." He is a practicing Catholic and yet even the conference of catholic bishops is castigating him: "The 2012 Ryan budget also received criticism from elements of the Catholic Church, specifically from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and from faculty and administrators of Georgetown University. In its letter to Rep. Ryan, the group of Georgetown faculty and administrators criticized the Ryan budget as trying to "to dismantle government programs and abandon the poor to their own devices," going on to say that Catholic teaching "demands that higher levels of government provide help—"subsidium"—when communities and local governments face problems beyond their means to address such as economic crises, high unemployment, endemic poverty and hunger." I fear this is just another case of the Republicans only listening to the base and that will just ensure another four years of Obama, and possibly even help the dems regain control of the house.

Ya'll think that he will be a great debater, but most of the folks that the Republicans have to attract don't have the attention span to really watch the debates. They will instead see a white bread conservative intellectual who neither understands nor cares about the problems of the average guy (which is how he will be portrayed in the little sound-bites that most people will actually see.)

Who did you want? Larry the Cable Guy?

[ARay11]

The Dem reaction? They are gleeful ... believing that Ryan's budgetary positions on Medicare and entitlements will kill off Romney.

Ryan debating Biden will still be interesting. Even if Obama changed to Hillary, I think Ryan could hold his own against her.

Has any incumbent ever switched VP's? curious to that thought... as ineffective as biden is.... of course, i'm sure he also never quarrels with prince obama

here's my own answer...lol

Some multi-term presidents were forced to have a new running mate due to the death or resignation of the Vice President:

1. James Madison ran with Elbridge Gerry in 1812 after the death of V. P. Clinton.
2. Andrew Jackson ran with Martin Van Buren in 1832 after the resignation of V.P. Calhoun.
3. After the death of V.P. Hendricks, Grover Cleveland ran with Allen Thurman in 1888 and won with Adlai Stevenson in 1892.
4. William McKinley ran with Theodore Roosevelt in 1900 after the death of V.P. Hobart.

(Other Presidents ran with a new running mate after the death of their Vice President, but it can't be said that they changed Vice Presidents because they lost their elections, so the new people never became Vice President.)


Now aside from cases involving death there were five times when the incumbent President was reelected with a new Vice President:

1. Thomas Jefferson was elected with Aaron Burr and reelected with George Clinton.
2. Abraham Lincoln was elected with Hannibal Hamlin and reelected with Andrew Johnson.
3. Ulysses S. Grant was elected with Schuyler Colfax and reelected with Henry Wilson.
4. Franklin Roosevelt switched twice, from John Nance Garner to Henry Wallace then to Harry Truman.

[HPL]

Who did you want? Larry the Cable Guy?

Hardly, Larry might appeal to the Repub base, but I doubt that he would be of much help with the communities we need. I heard a couple of days ago that 1/3 of the population is now either on straight out welfare or on some other kind of gov. assistance (not including social security or medicare as those are earned). I think the republicans can pretty much write those folks off outright. We need to attract some of the folks from the "minority" communities. I think the we can still mostly forget about attracting many blacks (too much racial pride involved and I can't really blame them) but you can't tell me that there was no one out there with a last name like Garza, Ramirez, Silva, Alaniz, or something similar that could have been chosen. Find someone who can present their speeches in fluent Spanish. Don't really care if they are currently well known, and a relative unknown might actually have been a plus. Someone who grew up hard scrabble and can convincingly portray him or herself as regular folks (I know, who really wants Joe average for president?). There are certainly smart, conservative, successful, hispanic businessmen and even legislators out there. I know that it seems shallow and manipulative to use that kind of strategy, but before we can put our ideas into action, we have to be in office. Perhaps Ryan will show something that will help bring the centrists into the fold, but he just looks like more of the same to me.

Foregoing the ethnic strategy, I have always liked Bobby Jindal, and although I don't think she was interested, I like Rice. Jindal seems to be fiscally responsible, not white, well spoken (once you get around that accent)and very bright. Rice is demonstrably brilliant, talented, a woman, and black.