The Year of Moving Forward

The Year of Moving Forward
At our 4 person wedding reception in DC

Friday, September 23, 2011

Clown fest 3

Republican presidential candidates held their third debate last night.  I watched.

For those who missed it, here is the debate in 100 seconds.



Remember how President Obama was criticized for not holding his hand over his heart during the National Anthem? This picture was taken during last week's debate.


Can we assume that Rick Perry is un-American?  Is his patriotism questionable?

And Joe My God points out what we've heard from the three debates.

CHEERS for the death penalty.
CHEERS for letting people die without insurance.
BOOS for active duty gay soldiers.
I cannot believe that Republicans would boo an active duty soldier who is putting his life on the line every day for our nation. Of course, last week I couldn't believe they cheered for letting an uninsured 30 year old man in a coma (hypothetical) die, or that they would cheer because Texas murders a lot of it's citizens.

Seriously, though, while the president is out promoting his jobs plan around the country, his foes are not offering any solutions to the problems the country faces. All they can do is bash the administration. And they can't even be honest while doing it.

Some statements from last night's debate; there are more from this source.

BACHMANN: "President Obama has the lowest public approval ratings of any president in modern time."

THE FACTS: That's true, if you leave out Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, Lyndon Johnson, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Gerald Ford. All of them at some point in their terms dipped lower than Obama's low point of 38 percent job approval, according to Gallup's comparison.

ROMNEY: "I don't support any particular program that he's describing," he said, disputing Perry's claim that Romney favors some of President Barack Obama's education initiatives, specifically the Race to the Top program.

THE FACTS: Romney was reluctant to tell Republican primary voters he doesn't hate every Obama policy. Romney does indeed support some of the specific policy changes encouraged by the Race to the Top program and said as much earlier in the week. Speaking in Miami on Wednesday, he praised the president's education secretary, Arne Duncan, for the program. And during the debate, Romney acknowledged supporting elements of the initiative, including teacher evaluations and charter schools.

BACHMANN: "I didn't make that claim nor did I make that statement," she said when asked by a moderator if she stood by her comment that the HPV vaccine against cervical cancer was "potentially dangerous."

THE FACTS: Bachmann can't escape the tape. Bachmann used that exact phrase during the last debate when she criticized Perry for trying to order pre-teen girls to get the vaccine in Texas. "Little girls who have a negative reaction to this potentially dangerous drug don't get a mulligan. They don't get a do-over," Bachmann said then. Bachmann has tried to distance herself from remarks she made after the debate linking the vaccine to mental retardation — a claim debunked by scientists. She said then and now she was relaying the story of another mother whose daughter had the shot.

PERRY: It's not the first time that Mitt has been wrong on some issues before. And the bottom line is, we never said that we were going to move this (Social Security) back to the states."


ROMNEY: "Well, it's different than what the governor put in his book just, what, six months (ago), and what you said in your interviews following the book. So I don't know. There's a Rick Perry out there (who) ... says that the federal government shouldn't be in the pension business, that it's unconstitutional. Unconstitutional and it should be returned to the states."

THE FACTS: In his book Perry heavily criticized Social Security, advocated states' rights and suggested federal entitlements were unconstitutional in general, but he never tied these beliefs together as succinctly as Romney claimed.
Even so, he danced close to branding Social Security as unconstitutional. He called Social Security the best example of a program that tosses "aside any respect for our founding principles of federalism." He also lamented: "If only the New Dealers had been kind enough to allow workers to make their own choice about whether to participate." And he said the program was introduced "at the expense of respect for the Constitution and limited government."

Republicans will have to choose one of these clowns as their candidate (or someone who has not entered the race yet). But American's will have the final choice, and surely we will not be fooled.  We must re-elect President Obama.

4 comments:

Dale said...

Joe, nobody was boooing the soldier, they were booing repealing DADT. And nobody wants to see ANYONE die. The problem with what's going on is that this president who ran on "CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE" has not changed ANYTHING for the better. If his repealing of DADT is his biggest accomplishment, well what a joke that is. People want to go to work, want to pay LESS taxes, want gas prices to go down, unemployment to go down, want to feel better about national security. He hasn't done ANYTHING to help us in ANY of those areas. I hope this next election puts someone into office (democrat OR republican) who WILL INDEED actually help LEAD the country. You and I BOTH know that the president cannot do ANYTHING himself, but a true leader can make things happen. Obama has not made ANYTHING happen. Worst president we have EVER had.

Joe said...

Dale,
Obama lowered taxes for 95% of Americans and in fact, the only taxes he's raised are cigarette taxes and tanning bed taxes. Do you pay those? also, gas prices are down, have you bought gas lately? And if killing Osama isn't good for national security, I don't know what is.

It's your kind of statements that make us believe you just don't like the man for who he is, not because of his policies or accomplishments (or lack of there of).

And booing DADT repeal while a gay soldier is talking about it is pretty much booing the gay soldier.

And yes, those audience members applauded when Ron Paul was asked if the uninsured man should die.

Quit twisting things.

Dale said...

Joe, gas prices have been up almost his ENTIRE term.
Personally, I don't know ANYBODY, republican or otherwise, who wants to see ANYBODY die. I DO however, know a lot of people who do NOT want to see one segment of America taxed for the specific purpose of using those funds to pay for healthcare for those who won't try to work and get their own insurance.
You never EVER hear this president talk about going out and working hard and living the American dream. He has never encouraged the American people to roll up their sleeves and try to better themselves. Instead, he wants those who HAVE "made it" to foot the bill for those who won't get off their ass and get a freaking job.

Joe said...

Dale, go to this link and click on the 6 year chart. Notice the similarity between the Bush time and the Obama time. It cycles, get used to it. http://gasbuddy.com/gb_retail_price_chart.aspx

And Dale, it's the corporations that are sitting on their money and not creating the jobs. And the Republican led house has not done a thing to create jobs either. At least the President has a plan.