The Thurston Mittens the 3rd Veep Megathread

[Admiral Yi]

No, I mean I liked it.  What I do find interesting, though, is Ryan's political works just doesn't seem to jive with the concept.

You went to Georgetown, you know where I'm coming from.  YOU TOOK THE SAME FUCKING COURSES  TOO

My bad.

Not sure what you're getting at.  Fully socialized medical care in old age is a right given by God?

[DGuller]

I was under the opinion that the concept of "Natural rights" was a central tenet of Common law.

Don't really have an opinion on the matter, but a tip of the hat to you for not just dog-piling Seedy's Ryan bashing.

Raz, how does Yi's back of the hand feel like?

[CountDeMoney]

Not sure what you're getting at.  Fully socialized medical care in old age is a right given by God?

That there's an implicit moral obligation by man within nature to pursue the good, and the good of the society. So yeah, St. Thomas Aquinas would agree that God would want fully socialized medical care for old people.  He sure as shit wouldn't cut them a check for $6,000 and say, here, you're on your own the rest of the way.  Enjoy your cancer treatments.

But it was very smart of Ryan to hit the topic today, because it's chock full of heady Teabaggery goodness for the Dumbfuckistanis that think natural law applies to abortion, the 2nd Amendment, and barring niggers from voting.

[Admiral Yi]

<snip>

Ah, the old positive rights argument.

[Razgovory]

I was under the opinion that the concept of "Natural rights" was a central tenet of Common law.

Don't really have an opinion on the matter, but a tip of the hat to you for not just dog-piling Seedy's Ryan bashing.

Raz, how does Yi's back of the hand feel like?

Not to bad.  I treasure all of Yis words.  Then I print them out and paste them to my wall.

[CountDeMoney]

<snip>

Ah, the old positive rights argument.

Can't spout bullshit about natural law on the stump, and then use Ayn Rand for your budget.

[alfred russel]

Honestly, I think he'd have been better off with Pawlenty.
Sure, a boring white dude, but at least when he speaks publicly on the stump, he actually connects with people with that folksy-aw-shucks shit that worked for Huckabee.
Pawlenty would've been a natural counterbalance to Mittens' Close-Encounters-of-the-Country-Club-Kind lack of humanity and personality.  I KNOW NASCAR TEAM OWNERS I LIKE TREES HARDWARE STUFF

The only benefit Ryan provides for Romney is if he actually wins:  as a Vice President, driving the agenda in the Congress he knows, he'd work wonders.  But not a candidate.

Personally, with picking Ryan, I think they just gift-wrapped Florida for the President.

If they lose Florida, they can't win.

I'm not saying you are wrong on Pawlenty, but I see the reason to pick Ryan. I don't think Romney's problem is so much that he is rich--lots of candidates including Obama are really rich too--but that he rather transparently doesn't stand for anything. The fact he won't talk about his religion, his time at Bain, or what he did as governor really leaves him as just an old rich guy with good hair wanting your votes. Ryan at least gives the impression that some part of the ticket cares about doing something other than getting elected.

Also, mentioning all of Ryan's bad ideas will sort of undermine the Obama campaign's characterization of republicans as the party of no that were simply obstructionist.

[Admiral Yi]

Can't spout bullshit about natural law on the stump, and then use Ayn Rand for your budget.

The only people who are going to buy that line are the people that already believe in the right to free money.

[The Minsky Moment]

If you mean that it's not just Democrats that would prefer to cut the deficit through a mix, I don't disagree (although I would argue that Democrats are still more interested in kicking the can down the road).  That's not the same thing as saying Ryan's plan is not "real."  Disagreeing with something doesn't make it unreal.

Ryan's plan is not real.
The lack of tax increases is not what makes it unreal.  What makes it unreal is that it is not properly specified, and hence not a plan at all.  The plan just says that future domestic discretionary spending (including military) must be reduced to certain numbers, without any specification of how to achieve that.  The problem is that under any reasonable projection of entitlement spending even under Ryan's proposal, domestic discretionary spending plus defense spending approaches zero after about 20-30 years out. 

The only way to avoid an absurd result is the postulate massive savings from Ryan's medicare reform even though there is no change in medicare in the first 12 years and the replacement vouchers after than are supposed grow faster than GDP.

This is magical thinking not a serious plan.

[Jacob]

Not sure what you're getting at.  Fully socialized medical care in old age is a right given by God?

Never mind god, it's the mark of a civilized society.

[Admiral Yi]

Ryan's plan is not real.
The lack of tax increases is not what makes it unreal.  What makes it unreal is that it is not properly specified, and hence not a plan at all.  The plan just says that future domestic discretionary spending (including military) must be reduced to certain numbers, without any specification of how to achieve that.  The problem is that under any reasonable projection of entitlement spending even under Ryan's proposal, domestic discretionary spending plus defense spending approaches zero after about 20-30 years out. 

The only way to avoid an absurd result is the postulate massive savings from Ryan's medicare reform even though there is no change in medicare in the first 12 years and the replacement vouchers after than are supposed grow faster than GDP.

This is magical thinking not a serious plan.

Lack of specifity is a knock, but not a damning one.  With entitlement reform it makes absolutely no sense to talk about a reduction in spending without a change in the rules, because the rules determine how much you spend.  That's not true of budget areas like defense.  You can say knock a couple billion off defense spending and hash out the details later.

You seem to be contradicting yourself in the part about overall discretionary spending amounts and reaching zero in 20-30 years.  Either he provides hard numbers for discretionary spending, including zero, or he specifies discretionary spending as whatever residual is needed to meet deficit targets, in which case it could reach zero but then the unspecified caps make no sense.

I assume what you're saying is that he builds in unrealistic growth factors in entitlement spending into his plan.  That's fine, but I think it invariably leads to the tiresome issue of who is making this determination and what their methadology is.

And then even if his plan is smoke and mirrors, so what?  It's a low bar to meet, somebody else put a plan on the table that uses realistic growth factors.  Hopefully a plan that's a little more proactive than raising taxes on millionaires and billionaires and appointing another commission or "reexamining the issue when the economic recovery is not so fragile."

[Admiral Yi]

Never mind god, it's the mark of a civilized society.

Seedy is the one who raised the rights argument, not me.

[CountDeMoney]

Never mind god, it's the mark of a civilized society.

Seedy is the one who raised the rights argument, not me.

Fine.  It's also the mark of a civilized society.  So there.

[DGuller]

I have a plan for tackling deficit.  Basically, my plan calls for the reduction of difference between revenues and expenses.  I don't have the details yet, but that can be worked out later.  What I have now will already pass Yi's muster.

[Admiral Yi]

I have a plan for tackling deficit.  Basically, my plan calls for the reduction of difference between revenues and expenses.  I don't have the details yet, but that can be worked out later.  What I have now will already pass Yi's muster.

This is not clever even by your standards.