ROMNEY AND RUIN: THE ABDICATION OF AMERICAN MORAL RESPOBSIBILITY!

Aug. 16, 2012  By Jack Jodell

The recent Mitt Romney announcement of Paul RUIN as his running mate (that’s my term for Paul Ryan, as I believe his economic ideas will ruin and destroy all semblance of fairness and economic justice within our borders) was typically hypocritical of the now very reactionary, Tea Party -infested Republican Party. It should surprise no one that the ultimate 1%-er Romney, the Outsourcer-In-Chief who wants to further reduce taxes on the rich and is in favor of even more deregulation of Wall Street and big business, would select such an eager yuppie-puppy disciple of the notorious Ayn Rand to be his running mate. After all, their economic philosophies are nearly identical and are equally misguided.  Both view government as a major impediment to their notion of free enterprise capitalism, even though that notion actively leads to an even greater disparity of wealth and fosters inequality. Both favor increasing George W. Bush’s ridiculous tax cuts for the rich, claiming dishonestly that doing so will increase investment in America and lead to the creation of 12 million new jobs. (We have heard this bogus argument before, and have seen the results of it being put into practice: very FEW jobs beiong created, with the vast majority of them being lower-pay, part-time, service-sector tasks, or slave-labor ones being created abroad). Both men want to reduce government oversight over the economy, even though it was the reduction in government oversight which enabled Wall Street speculators and mortgage banks to plunge us into the Great Recession of 2008. Although both deny it, each favors huge cuts in Social Security, Food Stamps, Medicare, amd Medicaid, and Ruin has even advocated a preposterous voucher program for Medicare and would turn Medicaid completely over to state control. All of these crazy notions would decimate the poor and ultimately enrich big insurance companies. Both men are also millionaires; Romney many times over and Ruin through inheritance and insider trading. If elected, these two would implement economic disaster for the overwhelming 99% MAJORITY of American workers whose income is far below theirs!

There has been a lot of hoopla in the mainstream, corporatist American media concerning Paul RUIN. He  has been described as having working-class roots by some. This, of course, is a lie.  For he was the son of an attorney, and that is hardly a working class upbringing! As a boy, it was not uncommon for his entire family to take winter ski trips to ski  resorts in the Rocky Mountains. Such trips, while not necessarily always luxurious or extravagant, are seldom cheaply made. So to describe Ryan as being of working class roots is ludicrous, and an insult to millions of currently economically-stressed, underpaid, underemployed, and/or unemployed Americans whose distress was caused by reckless and irresponsible 1%-ers in the first place.

Where this nonsense may have had its origins comes from the fact that Ruin’s father died suddenly when Ryan was only 16. To his credit, the Social Security survivor’s benefits he received he put toward his college education and were not wasted frivoloisly. But herein lies the  most fundamentally aggravating and hypocritical aspect of his reactionary economic philosophy: while it was apparently perfectly ok to use public Social Security funds for HIS needs, he now wishes to deny such a benefit to others! It is the typical, self-centered and arrogant Republican attitude that “I’ve got mine, and to hell with you and your needs!” Talk about biting the very hand that has fed you…

RUIN has described the President’s attempts to use government resources to help unemployed workers and those in need as offering ” a future in which we will transform our social safety net into a hammock, which lulls able-bodied people into lives of complacency and dependency.” Funny how that never happened to him or his family after they received Social Security, isn’t it? It is an indication of how myopic and downright callous his philosophy truly is. It is WRONG, too! He has consistently voted against extending unemployment benefits to millions who remain unemployed, and has voted against women (voting against equal pay for equal work, and vowing to de-fund Planned Parenthood). Likewise, he has strongly supported many anti-union measures, making him anti-worker; and has even come out in opposition to BIRTH CONTROL! This guy is extreme, and not at all in touch with the values of regular Americans!

His is a philosophy influenced heavily by Ayn Rand, as Ryan himself has even admitted.”The reason I got involved in public service, by and large,” he has said, “if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand.” This, too, is typically hypocritical, in that Ayn Rand herself, while publicly adopting a posture opposed to Social Security and Medicare, actually was a recipient of both programs in her later life! Again, “as long as I get mine, that’s ok, but to hell with you!” RUIN has even insisted that his interns read Rand’s blatantly pro-wealthy trash. The ridiculous naivete found in the beliefs of each of these people – Rand, Romney, and RUIN – that huge tax cuts for the rich will miraculously help everybody else prosper – has been proven repeatedly to be pure bunk! It boggles the imagination that this trio has ever been able to get away with arguing such foolishness for so long.

Naturally, as an advocate of a much smaller federal government, Paul RUIN has become very popular with the extremist Tea Party. He, like Romney, rejects the fact that the federal government has definitely created gainful employment for millions of his countrymen over the years, from defense contractor personnel to road construction crews to teachers to firefighters to mail carriers to policemen, as well as many millions of others whose work provides valuable and necessary products and services which support private industry. They both also reject the fact that American businesses do not simply rise up out of nothing, and were created as a direct result of having access to public roads, public schools, government loans and subsidies, and protection provided by the government-run military as well.

RUIN also loves to boast that he is a socially conservative Roman Catholic and that his faith helped him draft the drastic budget he submitted earlier this year. He has even claimed that his budget was consistent with Catholic teachings. This young overly-eager-beaver should slow down a bit, though. For no less than the U,S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has been strongly critical of the Ryan budget, because it makes severe cuts in food stamps and other government assistance programs which aid poor people. They have even said his budget fails to meet specific “moral criteria” by disproportionately axing programs that “serve poor and vulnerable people.”

To that,  I would add that both candidates’ aims to reduce taxes for the very wealthy while simultaneously raising them on the poor and middle class, and cutting entitlement spending as well, represents a very real  abdication of American moral responsibility. Clearly, we can and MUST do better than electing these uncaring monsters!________________________________________

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, I PRESENT YOUR 2012 TEA PARTY / REPUBLICAN NOMINEES FOR PRESIDENT AND VICE PRESIDENT: MITT ROMNEY and PAUL RUIN. GOD HELP US ALL IF THEY WIN THE ELECTION!