Tag Archives: Paul Ryan

national news, political news

The 2016 GOP presidential nominee will be . . .

Pelosi-Ryan-jpg

. . .  Speaker of the House Paul Ryan.

OK, I didn’t just make that up. I read about such a scenario in Roll Call, which has put together an analysis that makes a Ryan nomination a distinct possibility.

Ryan had to be dragged kicking and screaming — or so he would have us believe — into the race for House speaker after John Boehner quit abruptly this past autumn. Boehner had grown weary of fighting with the TEA Party insurgents within his House GOP caucus. So, he quit the top job and quit his congressional seat, too.

Ryan emerged as the speaker after laying down some rules for how he wanted to become the Man of the House. He stipulated that he wanted every Republican to want him to take the job.

So, how does this guy become the 2016 nominee?

Roll Call thinks the Republicans might get a brokered convention in Cleveland next summer. None of the candidates still running will have enough delegates to secure the nomination outright. A floor fight will ensue. Someone will come up with the idea that they need a unifying candidate.

Enter . . . Paul Ryan.

There’s one way to look at this: Ryan at one time wanted to be president. He was, after all, the 2012 GOP vice-presidential nominee on the ticket led by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. I’m going to presume that Ryan agreed that he could serve as president if by chance Romney got elected and something were to happen that would require Ryan to step into the top job.

It’s not beyond reason, thus, to believe Ryan still harbors latent presidential aspirations. Right? Right.

But apart from how Republican convention delegates settle this madhouse contest this summer, the very idea of a political convention actually being tossed into pandemonium intrigues the daylights out of me.

The closest a major-party nominating convention came to that level that I can remember was in 1976, when former California Gov. Ronald Reagan mounted a challenge to President Ford’s expected GOP nomination. The president prevailed, but only after some serious dickering on the convention floor.

Will this year’s Republican convention become the circus that the parties used to experience?

I hope so. It’s great political theater.

national news, political news

Meanwhile … a budget deal comes forth

budget

While the Republican presidential horde was cackling Tuesday night in Las Vegas about how much better they could govern the country than the man who’s been doing it for nearly eight years, GOP and Democratic congressional leaders were hard at work.

They produced a budget to fund the government well into 2016.

Republicans got a lot of what they wanted; Democrats got some of what they wanted. Republicans control Congress, so that’s to be expected.

I believe that’s what we call “legislating.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., announced a tentative deal that spends $1.1 trillion through most of the upcoming election year.

It’s not a perfect deal. Then again, when you have two parties grappling for their preferences, one cannot expect perfection. One gets what one can get. You seek to make the best of it and then you line up and support a deal that does what it’s designed to do: run the massive federal government that is supposed to serve the people who pay for it — that you be you and me.

One of the more intriguing elements of the deal is that it ends the nation’s ban on exporting oil. Fascinating, yes? We’re now the world’s No. 1 producer of petroleum, so we have a surplus of what we could call “Texas Tea” to share with our trading partners and allies.

We’re not out of the woods just yet. The government is scheduled to shut down tonight. Leaders from the both parties have to engineer yet another stop-gap measure that would keep the government functioning through Dec. 22.

In the meantime, they all can work out the details of getting this bigger deal done. They need to wrap it up before they all head out of town for Christmas.

Get busy. Go home. Spend some time with your loved ones.

Then get back to work. We pay you folks to govern.

 

national news, political news

A congressional breakthrough … maybe?

Pelosi-Ryan-jpg

A single dinner involving two political leaders of opposing parties likely doesn’t signal much all by itself.

It might portend a potential thaw in relations on Capitol Hill. I reiterate … it might.

Newly elected House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., invited House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to his Capitol Hill office for a two-hour get-together. They had a meal in the office and talked a little shop and got to know each other a little better.

What does this mean?

It might be a precursor to some actual progress in Congress between political leaders who’ve been fighting each other — often using some intemperate language to describe the other sides’ motives and intentions.

Democrats and Republicans are battling at the moment over a new budget. They did manage to cobble together a five-day stopgap measure that keeps the government running … but only for a short time. More bargaining is due in the next few days for everyone to agree on a $1.1 trillion federal budget that funds the government through most of next year.

Oh yeah. It’s also an election year.

Ryan and Pelosi reportedly don’t know each other well. This meal in Ryan’s office was billed as sort of an ice-breaker.

Where do we go from here? That remains anyone’s guess.

Congress, though, needs to figure out a way to assert its constitutional responsibility to actually govern. There’s been too much fighting between the parties, not to mention between the majority party — that would be the Republicans — and the White House.

The president must share responsibility in this ongoing inability to find common ground. However, just as members of Congress want to take credit for the good things that happen, they also need to take responsibility for the negative occurrences.

Ryan and Pelosi likely aren’t going to become best friends forever — aka BFFs. A dinner, though, well might set the stage for a new working relationship that restores the concept of good government to Capitol Hill.

national news, political news

One more, and final time, for State of Union speech

obamaSOTU2015

Barack H. Obama is going to get one more chance as president of the United States to lay out his vision of the state of our Union.

On Jan. 12, he’ll take the podium in front of a joint session of Congress and tell us how he thinks we’re doing, where we’ve been, where we’re headed and likely will propose a laundry list of legislative solutions to the nagging problems that never seem to get cured.

This is it, Mr. President. My advice to you, though, is this: Don’t expect to change any minds or sway anyone’s view of the job you’ve done.

Republicans will continue to say the president has all but destroyed American greatness — single-handedly. Democrats will hail the achievements and the rescuing of the nation from a financial collapse.

I happen to belong to the latter category of Americans. Yeah, it’s a shock, I know.

This final State of the Union speech by President Obama will produce the usual applause dominated by the Democrats in the chamber. Republicans will sit on their hands … for the most part while their Democratic “friends” cheer and holler.

While there’s no denying that the world is in difficult straits right now in this fight against international terrorism, there also can be no denying that the American ship of state has corrected its course in the seven years since Barack Obama took the presidential oath of office.

The economy is in far better shape than before. Our annual budget deficit has shrunk by two-thirds. Energy production is up; energy imports are down. Housing has rebounded. Banks are lending money. More people are working today than they were in 2009. Millions of Americans have health insurance now who didn’t have it before.

And oh yes, we’ve been kept safe from terrorists. There’s that, too.

That’s not the view of those who oppose the president.

But what the heck? It goes with the territory.

House Speaker Paul Ryan was correct in his letter inviting the president to speak. They have a duty to find solutions together, he said. Yes, Mr. Speaker, you do.

It’s time to get busy.

Meanwhile, the president will get one more shot at telling the country he leads what many of us out here already know.

The state of our Union truly is strong. We’ve got work to do, but our footing is a lot firmer than it was when the president took office.

 

national news

Speaker’s parting gift to country? A budget deal

boehner

John Boehner is about to leave the House of Representatives’ speakership, but he also is set to leave the country with  thoughtful parting gift.

A two-year budget deal he and the White House hammered out.

What does this mean? It means that President Obama won’t have any more threats of government shutdowns during the remainder of his time in office. It also means — with Congress set to approve the deal — that Boehner is sticking it in the eye of the TEA Party cadre of legislators who have bedeviled him and the White House.

Deal averts crisis

Perhaps the best part of the deal is that is recognizes the need for the United States to honor its debt obligations by increasing the debt ceiling. This is sure to anger the TEA Party folks, who keep insisting on fighting with others in Congress — including the so-called “establishment Republicans” — over whether to honor our obligations or default on them.

Boehner has made no secret of his disdain for this tactic. The pressure from the far right of his party, though, got to him. He packed it in.

The presumed next House speaker, Paul Ryan, is on board with the deal.

Well, I and millions of other Americans will accept the speaker’s parting gift gladly.

 

national news, political news

How about other families, Mr. Speaker-to-be?

family_leave

Paul Ryan wants to be speaker of the House on the condition he be allowed to spend ample quality time with his family.

Agreed, young man. You deserve it. So does your family.

But here’s a snippet of a Facebook post by left-leaning former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich about whether Ryan believes all American families deserve to spend that kind of time together:

“Paul Ryan has made a condition of his taking the House Speakership that he get enough time with his family, including three school-age kids. ‘I cannot and will not give up my family time,’ he says. I commend him for his dedication to work-life balance (years ago I left Bill Clinton’s cabinet because I didn’t have enough time to spend with my then teenage sons). But I wish Ryan felt other Americans deserved the same. Members of Congress have paid sick leave, but Ryan has repeatedly voted against legislation to give federal employees paid parental leave. And he and his fellow Republicans have blocked legislation that would provide all workers with paid maternity leave and paid sick leave. Ryan’s 2014 budget would have cut federal funding for child care subsidies for low-income families.”

Well, congressman? Will you change your tune?

 

national news, political news, State news

Who's going to jump in '16?

It’s getting fun watching the prospective candidates for president in 2016 start hedging whether they’re actually going to make the plunge.

The latest apparently is Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, who might run for the Republican nomination in two years.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/219692-rubio-decision-to-run-in-2016-wont-depend-on-bush

Rubio says his decision won’t depend on whether former Florida Gov.Jeb Bush decides to run. Rubio says he hasn’t talked to the former governor, but the fact that he’s talking about it at all suggests — to me, at least — that he’s got Jeb on his radar.

So, let’s ponder these other possibilities:

* U.S. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan says he likely won’t run if his 2012 Republican presidential nominee running mate Mitt Romney jumps in. No word from Romney what he plans to do if Ryan goes ahead with a run.

* Vice President Joe Biden likely will consider backing out of the Democratic contest if former senator, former secretary of state and former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton decides to go for it.

* Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas wants to seek the GOP nomination, but will he go if another talkative Texan, lame-duck Gov. Rick Perry jumps into the race?

* And is Perry going to make the leap if Cruz decides it’s his time to run?

Of all the fascinating what-ifs to ponder, I’m interested mostly in the Texas two-step that might play out between Perry and Cruz.

Perry’s been to the well once already. He flamed out badly before the first primary took place in New Hampshire. He’s trying to re-craft his brand. Cruz is the still-quite-new junior senator from Texas who entered the upper congressional chamber in January 2013 with his mouth blazing away. He hasn’t shut his trap since.

Both of these guys have never seen a TV camera they didn’t like. Cruz is especially enamored of the sound of his voice and the appearance of his face on TV.

It’s going to be tough for both of them to run for president, each trying to outflank the other on the right wing of their already-extreme right-wing party.

Who will jump in first? And will the other one back away?

And what about Ryan and Romney, Biden and Clinton, and Rubio and Bush?

This is going to get tense.

Intgernational news, national news

Let's hear plan? No, wait … that'll tip off the bad guys

These guys are killin’ me.

Critics of the president of the United States now say they want to hear his plans, in detail, on how he intends to “finish off” ISIS, the terror group running rampant in Syria and Iraq.

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/215847-ryan-wants-to-hear-obamas-plan-to-finish-off-isis-militants

Do you get it? They want Barack Obama to reveal to congressional Republicans the precise manner in which he intends to battle the hideous terror organization. Then what? Will they blab to the world whether the president is on the right track or wrong track? Will they reveal to the ISIS commanders what they’ve learned? Will they tip our hand, giving the bad guys a heads up on where we’ll attack and how much force we’ll use?

I get that the critics want to be kept in the loop. I also get that they need to some things about how an international crisis is evolving.

There seems to be a limit, though, on how much a commander in chief should disclose to his political adversaries — let alone his allies — on how he is deploying military and intelligence assets to do battle with a sworn enemy. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., noted that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey are speaking out, but he wants to hear directly from the president.

Mr. Chairman, the defense boss and the Joint Chiefs chairman are speaking on behalf of the president. I’m betting they’re saying what he wants them to say.

 

 

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Chairman Ryan must avoid code words

When you mention people who live in what’s called the “inner city,” you’re generally referring to Americans of African descent.

That’s a given in today’s political culture.

And when you suggest that the “inner city culture” doesn’t honor work, you’re insulting a whole race of Americans.

That’s what U.S. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan was told after he made some, um, intemperate remarks on talk-show host Bill Bennett’s radio show.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/first-read/paul-ryan-confronted-over-inner-cities-remark-tense-exchange-n57636

And one of Ryan’s Wisconsin constituents called him out on it at a town hall meeting this week in Janesville, Wisc.

Ryan said on Bennett’s show that there is a “tailspin of culture, in our inner cities in particular, of men not working and just generations of men not even thinking about working or learning to value the culture of work.”

An African-American man, Alfonso Gardner, challenged Ryan for that remark, saying he was using code words to describe black citizens. Ryan’s response? “There was nothing whatsoever about race in my comments at all, it had nothing to do with race.”

Actually, Mr. Chairman, it had everything to do with race, even if you didn’t say it overtly.

That’s the point Gardner is making and it is something the possible 2016 Republican presidential candidate may need to clear up if he jumps into the next national presidential campaign.

Ryan already has more or less apologized for using what he described as “inarticulate” verbiage when talking to Bennett. Indeed, as the link attached here notes, Ryan has become an advocate for immigration reform while many of his GOP House colleagues have balked at the notion. He told the town hall crowd he is entirely sensitive to the plight of minorities.

Code words can be perceived as hurtful if they’re put in the kind of context Ryan was addressing in his radio interview. One of the young congressman’s constituents construed it that way. It doesn’t matter what he intended to say or meant to imply.

Words have consequences, Rep. Ryan.

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Kumbaya moment? Forget about it

Well, that was a brief moment of “Kumbaya” for congressional Republicans and Democrats.

Now we’re apparently back to business as usual over the Affordable Care Act and whether to increase the federal debt ceiling.

Such madness is hard to eradicate.

http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/193408-mcconnell-says-gop-preparing-for-debt-ceiling-fight

U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., says Republicans are ready for a fight over raising the debt ceiling. They want to make changes in the Affordable Care Act in exchange for increasing the nation’s borrowing limit.

Sound familiar? It should. We’ve been through this already. It’s as tiresome as ever.

The Kumbaya moment was supposed to have occurred when a bipartisan committee of House members and senators approved a two-year budget and spending plan that would forestall another partial government shutdown. The House voted overwhelmingly to approve it and it appears headed to an equally decisive “yea” vote in the Senate.

It was nice while it lasted, albeit briefly. Now congressional Republicans are threating — once more — to hold the debt ceiling hostage and threaten to force the U.S. government to renege on its financial obligations. Why? Because they just cannot stand the Affordable Care Act.

The government will reach its debt ceiling early in 2014. The fight will commence shortly. Democrats will tell us once more than defaulting on our debts would be catastrophic, a point that many economists agree with. Republicans will insist on concessions before lifting the ceiling.

Here we go once more.

The Grand Old Party should listen to one of its own: House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, one of the architects of the just-completed budget deal. Ryan said that compromise means no one gets everything they want. Yet compromise is what’s needed to get things done, he said.

Chairman Ryan also conceded that his party lost the 2012 presidential election and that “elections do have consequences.”

Don’t do this, GOP.