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Are you willing to give Speaker Paul Ryan a chance? — 24 Comments

  1. I would be thrilled to be proven wrong about Ryan. Currently, I estimate my chances of being so proven to be less than winning the lottery. He’s fully aligned with the GOP establishment and, in being so the good of the country is a distant consideration.

    Which makes him politically, far from a decent man. As placing personal aggrandizement and special interests above the nation’s common welfare are by definition, indecent.

  2. We’ll be fighting in the streets with our children at our feet
    And the morals that they worship will be gone
    And the men who spurred us on sit in judgment of all wrong
    They decide and the shotgun sings the song

    I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution
    Take a bow for the new revolution
    Smile and grin at the change all around
    Pick up my guitar and play, just like yesterday
    Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
    We don’t get fooled again

    The change, it had to come, we knew it all along
    We were liberated from the fold, that’s all
    And the world looks just the same and history ain’t changed
    ‘Cause the banners, they are flown in the last war

    I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution
    Take a bow for the new revolution
    Smile and grin at the change all around
    Pick up my guitar and play, just like yesterday
    Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
    We don’t get fooled again, no no

    I’ll move myself and my family aside
    If we happen to be left half alive
    I’ll get all my papers and smile at the sky
    Though I know that the hypnotized never lie
    Do ya?

    There’s nothing in the streets, looks any different to me
    And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
    And the parting on the left is now parting on the right
    And the beards have all grown longer overnight

    I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution
    Take a bow for the new revolution
    Smile and grin at the change all around
    Pick up my guitar and play, just like yesterday
    Then I’ll get on my knees and pray
    We don’t get fooled again
    Don’t get fooled again, no no

    Yeah
    Meet the new boss
    Same as the old boss

    Pete Townend

  3. Ryan is a dyed in the wool member of the gope. Trusting him to do what is best for the future of the country is not easy, in fact it is difficult. Before being picked for the VP slot, and now speaker, Ryan was touted as the go to guy on budgets and deficits. His 2011 budget was IMO pure unadulterated BS. What is troubling is that he’s smart and knowledgeable so he had to know his projections were a fantasy.

  4. I’m a fan of GOP members like Ryan and Rubio. No one’s perfect (meaning, “agrees with me 100%”) but representatives like these are intelligent and engaged. I’m a BIG fan of Cruz in the senate, who is whip-smart and principled. There’s a lot of good GOP blood in congress right now and I’m rooting for them to coalesce and start to direct policy. Ryan has the potential to be a big part of that. Biden was astonishingly rude and condescending to him in the VP debate and I am gob-smacked that so many people think Biden “won” that debate when he was boorish, to Ryan’s candor and intelligence.

  5. wrymouth,

    It is not 100% agreement that we demand. All that is required is that, they say what they mean and mean what they say. Ryan and Rubio and others of their ilk fail on both counts, they obfuscate and betray basic principles. When “political expediancy” repeatedly leads to betrayal of principle, it cannot honestly be characterized other than as traitorous behavior. The state of the nation is far past the point of being able to give politicians the benefit of the doubt.

    “Biden was astonishingly rude and condescending to him in the VP debate”

    Yes. When your opponent repeatedly hits below the belt and you insist upon fighting by the ‘Marquis of Queenbury’ rules, only a clear victory by you will retain observer’s respect. In his polite deference, Ryan came across as a softball player ‘unready’ for “hardball”.

  6. Of course. What is the alternative? Whine, bitch, moan?

    Commented just now on another forum about how sick I get of those who have never entered the arena, but stand on the side lines and throw offal at those who do.

    One wonders, if governing a huge, complex, diverse–and deeply divided–Republic is so easy, why more of the vocal critics aren’t in the game.

    I believe Ryan is a good, and capable man. I may not agree on every issue, but let’s see what he can do. Progress against the forces arrayed against will be difficult, and will be incremental. Patience. Let’s really hope that he is working with a Republican President come 2017. (Of course, how many of the electable candidates will find approval?)

  7. What do you mean with Will I Give Ryan a Chance?
    Moi?
    I’m one of the powerless, one of the millions who is pissed upon and told it is raining by the GOP.
    Where is the evidence that he is a good and capable man? In his voting record? in his House legislative achievements? What has come out of Ways and Means since he became Chair in January 2015? Where is the “capable”? Are wonks automatically capable, or do they just root around in the dust?
    He is Mama Ryans good little boy, and he likes family time. Family time almost kept him from agreeing to be Speaker. Big deal.We shall see, but my expectations are as low as with Tearful John. Different processes, same products.

  8. Ryan is a capable communicator, a rarity in the Republican Party. I’m encouraged that he says he wants to go on the offensive with policy. He is not timid, and he displayed an easy assertiveness in the first, televised, meeting of Congressional representatives with Obama on the the subject of healthcare in 2009. He was prepared and not intimidated as he made his case by Obama’s cold angry stare on the other side of the table. If you recall, it was clear that Obama, with his new status, did not expect that sort of confrontation.

    For me, for now, Ryan represents hope, even if the Dems get the presidency again.

  9. Oldflyer,

    With all due respect, you puzzle me. You seemingly equate Rubio’s appeal with that of bho; but you sing praises for Ryan. Google his 2011 budget proposal in depth and tell me where you find a tiny slice of reality in his projections.

    BTW, I do not whine, bitch, or moan. I am what I am and that is all that I am and I call it like I see it. I have no grudge against Ryan, on a personal level I am sure he is the perfect neighbor. I simply see him as a disciple of Kemp; a well intentioned person with a head in the clouds and barely a little toe on the ground.

  10. It would be great for GOP pols to defund Planned Parenthood, and have on their smartfone a video of PP.

    Then, when asked about it by media, say ” I could say how bad Planned Parenthood, but instead let me show you. Here’s a video.” [play vidoeo and put it for the camera] “I don’t think your org has shown this video, has it? Why don’t you tell the truth about Planned Parenthood? Have you seen the video? And you support these terrible human fetus killers, don’t you?”

    “You know, when you close your eyes to the truth, it’s no wonder you don’t know why they’re terrible. You don’t want to know. You don’t want to see, so you close your eyes, you don’t show the videos, you don’t show the truth.”

  11. Hey, Oldflyer, you share your opinions here. I merely do likewise.
    I am a conservative thoroughly disenchanted with the Establishment GOP. I see little to like in Ryan’s ascension. He is not a Constitutional conservative. He will be another Boehner. He and Priebus are undoubtedly buddies. He’ll do deals with Barack Hussein, which is the same as doing Hussein’s bidding. Obstruct Obama? Did Boehner? Will Ryan? Will Ryan see to it the House exercises its Constitutional power of the purse? Like Boehner just did?
    Ryan is a small bully; Obama is bully #1. Ryan is a loser in that tete-a-tete .

    Neo: I didn’t like Lennon then, or now!

  12. Parker, I did not sing praises for Ryan. Unless the faint praise of “good and capable man” is considered excessive singing. I said I would give him a chance–not that it matters. He has been elected Speaker, he is the only Speaker we have; so why wouldn’t I give him a chance? I do note that unlike Rubio he does have more than one term of experience at the federal level; and he has been Chairman of a very important Congressional Committee. He has also been in the arena of a national campaign–and should by any measure be VP now. Unfortunately, the conservative base shot itself in the foot, and we have Biden again. I am glad that you do not w,b & m. There is too much of that in the conservative base already.

    Frog, have your say. I would not think of depriving you of the opportunity, even if I could. However, I also reserve the right to comment on comments. For instance, who knew that Ryan was just a “small bully”, and was an anti-constitutionalist?

  13. Oldflyer:
    re “small bully”, I meant to refer to his preconditions before agreeing to be nominated for Speaker. Overturning the Jefferson rule was part of the package.
    re Chairman of a Very Important Congressional Committee: He’s been chair only since January 2015; what does he have to show us for that?

  14. Why don’t you jump in and add your expertise to government?

    The Tea Party tried to do exactly that, but the IRS nuked them. While people like you, Old, started talking about your old generational values. That doesn’t exactly work in the new era.

  15. Parker, I did not sing praises for Ryan. Unless the faint praise of “good and capable man” is considered excessive singing.

    http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/trsorbonnespeech.html

    Such ordinary, every-day qualities include the will and the power to work, to fight at need, and to have plenty of healthy children. The need that the average man shall work is so obvious as hardly to warrant insistence. There are a few people in every country so born that they can lead lives of leisure. These fill a useful function if they make it evident that leisure does not mean idleness; for some of the most valuable work needed by civilization is essentially non-remunerative in its character, and of course the people who do this work should in large part be drawn from those to whom remuneration is an object of indifference. But the average man must earn his own livelihood. He should be trained to do so, and he should be trained to feel that he occupies a contemptible position if he does not do so; that he is not an object of envy if he is idle, at whichever end of the social scale he stands, but an object of contempt, an object of derision. In the next place, the good man should be both a strong and a brave man; that is, he should be able to fight, he should be able to serve his country as a soldier, if the need arises. There are well-meaning philosophers who declaim against the unrighteousness of war. They are right only if they lay all their emphasis upon the unrighteousness. War is a dreadful thing, and unjust war is a crime against humanity. But it is such a crime because it is unjust, not because it is a war. The choice must ever be in favor of righteousness, and this is whether the alternative be peace or whether the alternative be war. The question must not be merely, Is there to be peace or war? The question must be, Is it right to prevail? Are the great laws of righteousness once more to be fulfilled? And the answer from a strong and virile people must be “Yes,” whatever the cost. Every honorable effort should always be made to avoid war, just as every honorable effort should always be made by the individual in private life to keep out of a brawl, to keep out of trouble; but no self-respecting individual, no self-respecting nation, can or ought to submit to wrong.

    Attributing to Ryan that he is a “man in the arena” is a kind of praise, as well as defense and castigation of his critics.

    Commented just now on another forum about how sick I get of those who have never entered the arena, but stand on the side lines and throw offal at those who do.

    An indirect criticism is still a criticism. It goes back straight to you.

    But if a man’s efficiency is not guided and regulated by a moral sense, then the more efficient he is the worse he is, the more dangerous to the body politic. Courage, intellect, all the masterful qualities, serve but to make a man more evil if they are merely used for that man’s own advancement, with brutal indifference to the rights of others. It speaks ill for the community if the community worships these qualities and treats their possessors as heroes regardless of whether the qualities are used rightly or wrongly. It makes no difference as to the precise way in which this sinister efficiency is shown. It makes no difference whether such a man’s force and ability betray themselves in a career of money-maker or politician, soldier or orator, journalist or popular leader. If the man works for evil, then the more successful he is the more he should be despised and condemned by all upright and far-seeing men. To judge a man merely by success is an abhorrent wrong; and if the people at large habitually so judge men, if they grow to condone wickedness because the wicked man triumphs, they show their inability to understand that in the last analysis free institutions rest upon the character of citizenship, and that by such admiration of evil they prove themselves unfit for liberty. The homely virtues of the household, the ordinary workaday virtues which make the woman a good housewife and housemother, which make the man a hard worker, a good husband and father, a good soldier at need, stand at the bottom of character. But of course many other must be added thereto if a state is to be not only free but great. Good citizenship is not good citizenship if only exhibited in the home.

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