A PIG IN A POKE...

   Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan missed his true calling.  He is the ultimate used car salesman.  On the front page of the Wall Street Journal he promises if he and Romney are sent to the White House, they will negotiate a deal with the Democrats to cut taxes by 20%.  How would you pay for such a cut?  How could you avoid increasing the deficit?   How much of a cut would the 1% really receive?  Ryan and Romney both say they will close loopholes and end many deductions to pay for the cut.  Oh, one more thing...they won't tell you which loopholes or deductions until after you elect them.  You have seen the ad which ends with the phrase, "...show me the Carfax"?  Ryan's answer is just buy the car and find out later if it runs or not...always a recipe for good business.

     This is just hubris and disrespect for the American voter.  It's also desperation.  As Bill Clinton said, the Tax Policy Institute confirmed, and Ryan and Romney know, they cannot cut taxes by 20%, cut capital gains taxes, cut corporate tax rates, end the inheritance tax, while increasing the military budget by at least $1 trillion, and not add to the deficit or raise taxes on the middle class.  In this case it's not the economy, but rather the arithmetic stupid.

     Think about Ryan's offer.  If you just elect them on the come...on faith...as a sign of trust, they will tell you afterwards all the various ways the 1% will benefit and the middle class will be had.  Who would go for such a deal?  Are there really Americans who would ignore Ryan's budgets or Romney's 47% comments and elect them without requiring they spell out their plan?  Are there really voters who would pretend Ryan didn't vote for two wars and a prescription drug benefit without paying for them, and letting future generations come up with the cash, while at the same time cutting the taxes of the top 1% by trillions of dollars?  Both Romney and Ryan have supported privatizing Social Security and Medicare.  They would turn Medicaid over to the states forcing millions of poor Americans to go without medical care.  Romney supports Ryan's budget plan which would decimate food stamps, affordable housing grants, Head start and virtually every aspect of the social safety net.  Do you think if they are elected they will abandon all of these principles and plans?  Who among you believes a party, which refused for 4 years to compromise, will suddenly want to come to the table in the spirit of what's best for the nation?  A candidate, like Romney, who is the darling of the Koch brothers, Sheldon Adleson, Richard Mellon Scaife and all of Wall Street is going to offer a proposal which raises their tax burden?  I'm ready to offer some beachfront property in Arizona.  Will there be takers?

     These comments by Ryan should insure his and Romney's defeat.  They think we are fools or dunderheads.  They have no respect for average Americans.  They think we can be conned.  They actually are running for office without offering any details about how they would govern in office...and they honestly believe this is something American voters will embrace.

     Taxes are not the only place where this chutzpah shows itself.  Despite all the heat they are trying to generate about the attacks in Libya, when pressed by Joe Biden, Ryan could not articulate any specific differences between his and the administration's position.  This is equally true with Afghanistan, Iran, Israel and the Arab Spring.  While attacking Obama, they offer nothing of substance to differentiate how they would act differently.  In the same breath, as Romney and Ryan claim they will repeal Obamacare, Romney says his alternative will keep the most popular parts of Obama's plan, but offers no details as to how he could pull that off.

     The reason for all this vagary and lack of detail is plain to see.  Ryan and Romney cannot win the election if they tell the truth.  If they tell the American people they will raise taxes on the middle class, and end Medicare and Social Security as we know them, reduce taxes on the rich, pour trillions into a military budget which already spends more than all other military budgets in the world combined...if they admit they will gut the Dodd/Frank financial reform legislation and let Wall Street return to its profligate ways, hamstring the Environmental Protection Agency so it can't regulate coal, oil or natural gas (particularly when it comes to fracking and ground water contamination)...if they come clean about their intentions to destroy unions, cut Pell Grants for middle class college students, block the new consumer protection agency from regulating banks, credit card companies and internet privacy and are willing to start another ground war in the Middle East....if they stay true to their promise to end abortion, appoint more Scalias to the Supreme Court, deny women access to most contraception and end a woman's choice over her body and reproductive health...do you think they can win?  It would be a massacre.

     Ryan's plea to elect them without knowing what they will do in office is tacit admission they can't tell the truth and are hoping Americans will vote for them just  because...

     I didn't think it was possible to be more insulted by two candidates than it was when they essentially said they don't care about half the electorate and won’t be representing them if elected, but I was wrong.  Ryan and Romney have so little respect for the average American, they think they can promise everything and reveal nothing and be elected.  Perhaps it isn't Ayn Rand who is their patron saint...in reality its P.T. Barnum.