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Who is Paul Ryan? What are his political views and positions?

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Let’s see whether Paul Ryan has what it takes to push the Tea Party agenda in a debate situation.

Paul Ryan vs Barack Obama:

Paul Ryan vs Debbie Wasserman-Schultz:

Paul Ryan vs Tim Geithner:

Paul Ryan against MSNBC leftist Chris Matthews:

Paul Ryan can really debate economic issues – he is the Chair of House Budge Committee, after all. The focus of this election will now be on the economy, where it belongs, and the Democrats will be forced to discuss specifics.

Not only can he debate, but he explains our economic situation well:

He can explain this stuff to you and I. He can explain this stuff to Democrats and Independents.

By the way, Paul Ryan has a perfect score on the pro-life issue, and he has even written about his pro-life views on his Congressional web site.

Here is an excerpt in which he contrasts the Supreme Court decision on abortion with the Supreme Court decision with racial discrimination:

Twice in the past the U.S. Supreme Court—charged with being the guardian of rights—has failed so drastically in making this crucial determination that it “disqualified” a whole category of human beings, with profoundly tragic results.

The first time was in the 1857 case, Dred Scott v. Sandford. The Court held, absurdly, that Africans and their American descendants, whether slave or free, could not be citizens with a right to go to court to enforce contracts or rights or for any other reason. Why? Because “among the whole human race,” the Court declared, “the enslaved African race were not intended to be included…[T]hey had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” In other words, persons of African origin did not “qualify” as human beings for purposes of protecting their natural rights. It was held that, since the white man did not recognize them as having such rights, they didn’t have them. The implication was that Africans were property—things that white persons could choose to buy and sell. In contrast, whites did “qualify,” so government protected their natural rights.

Every person in this country was wounded the day this dreadful opinion was handed down by this nation’s highest tribunal. It made a mockery of the American idea that human equality and rights were given by God and recognized by government, not constructed by governments or ethnic groups by consensus vote. The abhorrent decision directly led to terrible bloodshed and opened up a racial gap that has never been completely overcome. The second time the Court failed in a case regarding the definition of “human” was in Roe v. Wade in 1973, when the Supreme Court made virtually the identical mistake. At what point in time does a human being exist, the state of Texas asked. The Court refused to answer: “We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man’s knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer.” In other words, the Court would not “qualify” unborn children as living persons whose human rights must be guaranteed.

Who wrote that? Scott Klusendorf? No – Paul Ryan!

He actually opposes focusing only on fiscal issues at the expense of social issues – this man is a man who social conservatives can get behind.

He is also solid on national defense.

Excerpt:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) gave a speech Thursday to the Alexander Hamilton Society in Washington. If one is looking for clues as to Ryan’s interests beyond chairing the House Budget Committee, a speech, as he put it, to “a room full of national security experts about American foreign policy” would merit attention.

…Ryan delivered an above-the-fray talk on the subject of American uniqueness (a less loaded term) and the myth that American decline in inevitable. He posited, “Our fiscal policy and our foreign policy are on a collision course; and if we fail to put our budget on a sustainable path, then we are choosing decline as a world power.”

Ryan contends that the debt crisis is not a bookkeeping problem or even simply a domestic problem; it is about maintaining our status as a superpower and about American values.

[…]He plainly is not with the cut-and-run set on Afghanistan. “Although the war has been long and the human costs high, failure would be a blow to American prestige and would reinvigorate al-Qaeda, which is reeling from the death of its leader. Now is the time to lock in the success that is within reach.” Nor can he be accused of wanting to “go it alone.” “The Obama administration has taken our allies for granted and accepted too willingly the decline of their capacity for international action. Our alliances were vital to our victory in the Cold War, and they need to be revitalized to see us through the 21st century.”

As for China, he bats down the idea that we should go along to get along… He’s clear that China has “very different values and interests from our own.”

And finally on defense spending, he rejects the sort of penny-pinching isolationism of Jon Huntsman or Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.).

I have blogged about Paul Ryan continuously over the life of this blog – probably second only to Michele Bachmann. Definitely more than my other favorites Marco Rubio and Bobby Jindal. I think it’s telling that Romney chose one of my 4 favorites.

So we are basically getting a full spectrum conservative (social, fiscal, defense) who can debate calmly and confidently, and with the support of evidence. Ryan also has a solidly middle-class background. I now predict a Romney-Ryan victory in November.

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U.S. GDP growth slows to 1.5% in second quarter

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Remember, Democrats took the House and Senate in 2007
Democrats took the House and Senate in January 2007

From CBS Marketwatch.

Excerpt:

The U.S. economy slowed sharply in the second quarter, growing just 1.5% as consumers slashed spending and businesses grew more cautious about hiring and investing, underscoring that an already wobbly recovery is losing even more steam.

In the U.S., though, new government figures showed that growth in gross domestic product, the broadest measure of goods and services churned out by the economy, slowed sharply from the first quarter’s 2% annual rate and the fourth quarter’s 4.1%.

That downward slope in growth is worrisome to economists. As the economy loses steam, a pullback can become self-reinforcing as businesses and consumers worry about the future.

The slowing economy, along with government data showing the recovery has been weaker than thought, raises the specter that a sudden shock—such as an escalation of Europe’s crisis, or next year’s looming tax increases and spending cuts—could shove the U.S. back into recession.

[…]One of the biggest obstacles to recovery is a dearth of consumer spending, which accounts for two-thirds of demand in the economy.

Spending rose 1.5% in the second quarter, lower than 2.4% in the first, reflecting weaker demand for cars and big-ticket items. A big reason is the stagnant labor market. Employers added fewer jobs in the second quarter than they have since the labor market began recovering in 2010.

“The economy is kind of being strangled,” said Bob Baur, chief global economist at Principal Global Investors. “We underestimated how much uncertainty may have contributed to a lack of desire to expand and hire.” Mr. Baur expects 2% to 2.5% growth in the second half of the year but has “grown more cautious,” he said.

[…]Businesses, meanwhile, appear to have grown more cautious about spending. The new GDP report showed that nonresidential fixed investment expanded 5.3% in the second quarter, less than the 7.5% in the first, though spending on equipment and software was healthy. Joseph Carson, an economist at Alliance Bernstein, said: “Uncertainty surrounding U.S. tax laws has created confusion and concern among companies, which has probably depressed investment spending.”

Remember, the Obama administration thinks that higher government dependency “stimulates” the economy:

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that food stamps and unemployment insurance are the two “most stimulative” things you can do for the economy.

During a pen and pad briefing with reporters on Capitol Hill, Hoyer was asked if any Democrats are “reconsidering the wisdom” of letting the Bush tax cuts expire at year’s end for the top income earners given the still struggling U.S. economy.

“I haven’t talked to any who are of that mind,” said Hoyer. “If you talk to economists, they will tell you there are two things that are the most stimulative that you can do — one’s unemployment insurance, the other’s food stamps, okay?”

Of course, all that spending on unemployment and food stamps costs money, so they just borrowed that money from future generations of Americans – your children. The national debt is nearly $16 trillion, but they just keep borrowing. They don’t know what else to do, because they have no idea how jobs are created in the first place.

Republicans think that the best way to stimulate the economy is to create jobs by encouraging businesses to risk their capital in business ventures. But the Republicans aren’t in charge, so we are following the Democrat playbook. Many companies have responded to the Democrat plan to punish “the rich” by expanding their businesses in other countries that are less hostile to job creators. When you introduce burdensome regulations (EPA, Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, etc.) and high corporate taxes (35% – highest in the world!), that means that businesses can hire fewer people at home, and they are forced to expand elsewhere.

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Democrat Steny Hoyer: unemployment checks and food stamps stimulate the economy

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Why are we in a recession? Maybe it’s because the people running the country believe that unemployment checks and welfare are better than earned paychecks for “stimulating” the economy.

Here’s CNS News to explain what Democrats are trying to achieve:

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that food stamps and unemployment insurance are the two “most stimulative” things you can do for the economy.

During a pen and pad briefing with reporters on Capitol Hill, Hoyer was asked if any Democrats are “reconsidering the wisdom” of letting the Bush tax cuts expire at year’s end for the top income earners given the still struggling U.S. economy.

“I haven’t talked to any who are of that mind,” said Hoyer. “If you talk to economists, they will tell you there are two things that are the most stimulative that you can do — one’s unemployment insurance, the other’s food stamps, okay?”

“Why is that?” he said.  “Because those folks who receive those resources must spend them. And they’ll spend them almost upon receipt. Most economists with whom I talk believe that those with significant discretionary income, that that’s not the case.”

Unless action is taken by Congress, the Bush tax cuts will expire on Jan. 1, 2013.  Originally enacted in 2001 and 2003, President Barack Obama and Congress renewed the cuts for all income-brackets for two years in 2010.

[…]The Congressional Budget Office (CBO has projected that if the Bush tax cuts are allowed to expire at the end of 2012, coupled with the defense cut sequester, it will lead to a 1.3 percent contraction in GDP after Jan. 1, 2013.

If the Bush tax cuts are allowed to expire, it is expected that 710,000 people will lose their jobs. This will achieve the Democrats goal of “stimulating the economy” with higher unemployment and more food stamps. This continues the Democrat plan of increasing the record number of people on welfare and food stamps. They will pay for this “stimulus” by adding more debt to the $8 trillion they have already run up since January 2007. The debt will be paid by young people and children. The real plan behind making millions of people dependent on government is, of course, to be able to buy their votes and to control them. Democrats are the anti-freedom party. You have too much freedom when you have a job. It leads to “inequality”. If everyone received their daily bread from the government, and rode on mass transit to labor camps instead of driving in cars, and slept in identical apartments with identical furniture and identical television programs to watch, then the world would be more equal. And equality is what Democrats want most.

So what is the Republican alternative plan for the economy? To let job creating businesses keep their own money and hire people to do work. Republicans want to stop taxing and regulating job creating businesses so that people can be put back to work, and have the confidence to spend money. That’s how you stimulate the economy – we know this because it has worked for Reagan and Bush before. Obama’s approach has never worked. The Democrats have been running the show since January 2007. And that’s why we are down 5 million jobs since Steny Hoyer became the House Whip in January of 2007. This is not going to end until the Democrats are voted out.