Improving Economic Prospects May Bring Minorities to the Polls
October 22, 2012
The Republican Party has hit rock bottom when it comes to appealing to black voters, according to recent polls. An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll taken in late summer found zero percent black voters supporting Mitt Romney’s candidacy.
That’s no typo. Republican support in the African-American community has dwindled to negligible levels, down from the 4 percent won by John McClain, President Obama’s 2008 opponent.
This isn’t just about the nation’s first African-American president cementing overwhelming support from his own ethnic group, although that…
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Typical Households Lose Deductions in Romney Plan
October 17, 2012
“Mitt Romney: “I’ll pick a number – $25,000 of deductions and credits, and you can decide which ones to use.”
Tax analysts haven’t passed final judgment on Republican nominee Mitt Romney’s tax plan, which he says will cut everyone’s tax rates by 20 percent, lower taxes on the middle class and hold wealthier citizens’ tax payments constant without increasing the deficit.
The only way to accomplish this fiscal jujitsu is by limiting tax expenditures, which the Tax Policy Center has said would sharply increase taxes on the middle…
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Romney: Americans Don't Die because They're Uninsured
October 11, 2012
Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney told the Columbus Dispatch yesterday that “we don’t have people that become ill, who die in their apartment because they don’t have insurance.” “We don’t have a setting across this country where if you don’t have insurance, we just say to you, ‘Tough luck, you’re going to die when you have your heart attack,’ ” he told the newspaper’s editorial board. “No, you go to the hospital, you get treated, you get care, and it’s paid for, either by charity, the government or by the hospital.”
Here’s what the medical literature says…
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Emanuel’s Effective Triptych
September 05, 2012
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago was last night’s forgotten man.
The star of the evening was Michelle Obama, of course, with her perfect-pitch rendition of an ode to her common husband. His strength of character allowed him to steer through the myriad crises he’s confronted during his first term in office while delivering on promises like health care, gay rights and ending the war in Iraq, she said.
San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro delivered an impassioned keynote address that highlighted the stark contrasts between the…
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How Romney Would Prop Up a Dying Industry
August 31, 2012
Every reputable budget analyst recognizes that dealing with the long-term budget deficit depends on holding government health care costs in check. One line in Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s speech last night not only ignored that reality, it posed a direct threat to efforts already underway to return to fiscal sanity.
The threat wasn’t in his repetition of his campaign’s factually challenged claim that the president’s “$716 billion cut to Medicare to finance Obamacare” will hurt today’s seniors, which has been panned by numerous fact-checking…
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The Uncertainty About Uncertainty
August 03, 2012
The debate over policy uncertainty’s effect on the economy breaks down along ideological lines.
Leading Republicans and their economic advisers say the uncertain economic environment created by President’s Obama’s push for higher taxes on the rich and stricter banking regulations is forcing businesses across America to sit on their hands rather than invest and create new jobs. “Job creators in America basically are on strike,” House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told the Washington Economics Club last fall.
New York Times columnist and Nobel…
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