The Ryan Pick

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney's selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate clearly marks the direction his campaign will take.  Ryan, the House budget chair, is a true believer in cutting taxes for the wealthy and paying for them by slashing support for students, the elderly and the poor.  The Ryan pick will thus energize GOP Tea Party supporters and elate Wall Street but will alienate just about everyone else.

Representative Ryan (R-Wisconsin) is smart, well-spoken and looks like the guy next door.  What he stands for, however, is the same supply-side ideology that has served few others than the top 1%.  His famous proposed budget  envisions reducing the top tax rate from 35% to 25% and the capital gains rate charged on income like stocks to zero.  People like Romney would pay virtually no tax at all under Ryan's plan.

In order to still try to cut expenses in the face of such large revenue reductions, Ryan would put a cap on Medicare and turn it into a voucher program in which seniors would have to go out and try to find insurance for themselves.  Since the Obama health plan with its requirements that people be eligible for insurance regardless of pre-existing conditions would be repealed under a Romney-Ryan administration, you can imagine what luck the typical 80-year-old would have in trying to buy insurance on the open market.  According to the congressional Budget office, the plan would cost seniors an additional $6500 a year--all so that millionaires and billionaires could enjoy greater tax breaks. 

There would be other cuts too, to Medicaid, education, student loans, food stamps, infrastructure and much else.  He asks for many sacrifices from those who can least afford it in order to shower benefits on those who already have it made.  The upshot of Ryan's addition to the ticket is that it plays right into the Obama campaign's characterization of Romney as out of touch with the average American and concerned only with the welfare of the rich.  The President has already begun making these points and highlighting Ryan's other budget ideas on the trail in Iowa today.

Representative Steve Israel, (D-New York) chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign, is suddenly very optimistic about picking up House seats in November.  He said today that Democratic candidates should concentrate on three issues this fall: "Medicare, Medicare and Medicare."

It is difficult to see how Ryan's draconian outlook will help the GOP ticket with undecided and swing voters.  The dynamics of the election are starting to look a lot like 1996, when Bill Clinton won re-election over another Republican team featuring a lead candidate with a lot of shortcomings and a number two known as an idea man whose ideas upon examination proved to be highly unpopular.  In those days it was Bob Dole and Jack Kemp.  Nowadays the team of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, running against another Democratic incumbent, face many of the same problems.  It is likely Gov. Romney has hurt his chances more than helped them with this choice.