Romney's Smackdown of Teachers, Firefighters, Police Is No Gaffe

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from HuffPo: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/romney-gaffe-obama-gaffe_n_1582556.html

Mitt Romney, seeking to capitalize on a damaging mistake Friday by President Barack Obama -- the president's careless comment that "the private sector is doing fine" -- responded with a gaffe of his own.

"He says we need more firemen, more policemen, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin?" Romney said at a campaign event in Council Bluffs, Iowa. "The American people did. It’s time for us to cut back on government and help the American people. . . . more"

Romney and his republican counterparts in Congress have been fighting President Obama's efforts to defend and help increase the jobs of teachers, firefighters, and police his entire time in office.

In fact, the very same speech of the President's that Romney is criticizing was an appeal to his republican buddies to do SOMETHING to save these local and state jobs and to help keep our neighborhoods and communities safe and productive.

What's Romney's plan to stop the hemorrhaging of local and state employees? There isn't one. His political rhetoric calls for even more cuts in our social safety nets; even more draconian cuts in basic services and basic needs of our communities. It was no gaffe when he criticized President Obama's call for more stimulus funds to ailing regions of the nation still reeling from the economic meltdown his party's brand of on-your-own economics had fostered.

The first stimulus bill initiated, passed, and enacted by this President has been the main whipping post of the republican cabal working to unseat him since his first day in office. The Recovery Act took the focus away from their Bushian bank bailouts and invested in people and communities to help them maintain their grip and balance on those elements of government which actually sustain and enhance our lives.

It's not bank money (mostly spent and paid back) which they're harping on; it's the portion of the Recovery Act which gave aid and comfort to average Americans at a time of great need that they just can't countenance this President receiving the credit he deserves.

Consider the impact of that Act, passed shortly after President Obama assumed responsibility and control over managing and mitigating George Bush's economic meltdown. We don't have to look any further back than just yesterday where the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and the vast majority of economic experts have reiterated the degree that the Recovery Act has helped boost the economy.

from the WaPo:

On Wednesday, under questioning from skeptical Republicans, the director of the nonpartisan (and widely respected) Congressional Budget Office was emphatic about the value of the 2009 stimulus. And, he said, the vast majority of economists agree . . .

(CBO Director Douglas) Elmendorf’s testimony came in response to questions from Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.), a member of the tea party caucus. Huelskamp asserted that the stimulus was a failure because it did not keep the jobless rate below 8 percent, as the Obama administration predicted.

“Where did Washington mess up?” Huelskamp demanded. “Because you’re saying most economists think it should’ve worked. It didn’t.”

Most economists not only think it should have worked; they think it did work, Elmendorf replied. CBO’s own analysis found that the package added as many as 3.3 million jobs to the economy during the second quarter of 2010, and may have prevented the nation from lapsing back into recession.

Somehow, Romney is counting on Americans punishing this President for rescuing their communities from the tragic and continuing effects of the collapse of the Bush republicans' economic house of cards. Even as these communities are still reeling from the crash, Romney is arrogant enough in his frat-boy style campaign rhetoric to damn these teachers, firefighters, and police for even thinking about help from the federal government.

What would he spend the (borrowed) money on that he'd find upon assuming office? He'd devise even more ways to funnel more taxpayer money into the hands of 'investors' like himself.

here's a Politifact with actual facts:

Romney’s tax plan would affect what he personally pays in federal income taxes. With a fortune estimated at between $80 million and $250 million and 2010 earnings of around $21 million, Romney falls in the top tax bracket. That class currently pays a 35 percent rate. His plan would reduce that to 28 percent.

"The tax plan would cut taxes on the rich a lot," said Roberton Williams, an economist with the non-partisan Tax Policy Center, a joint venture of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution think tanks that published an analysis of Romney’s plan.

The 20 percent cut, Williams said, is "a huge savings for the people at the top end."

That's Romney's main concern; preserving, defending, and enhancing his rich buddies haul from the federal treasury. He has no concern for the nation's infrastructure or the actual needs of our communities. He's going to stick with his schtick that investing our hard-earned contributions to government in his wealthy industrialists' profit-making schemes will somehow trickle-down to the rest of America. He wouldn't accept that percentage of return on investment for himself; in any instance. You'll get your jobs (maybe, unlikely) when he gets his inflated share.

President Obama has our people and our communities at the top of his economic agenda. In fact, if the political pundits would put aside their gaffe game for a minute and actually report what the president said following his exploited statement about the private sector . . .

President Obama:

"Where we’re seeing weaknesses in our economy have to do with state and local government -- oftentimes, cuts initiated by governors or mayors who are not getting the kind of help that they have in the past from the federal government and who don’t have the same kind of flexibility as the federal government in dealing with fewer revenues coming in."

"And so, if Republicans want to be helpful, if they really want to move forward and put people back to work, what they should be thinking about is, how do we help state and local governments and how do we help the construction industry. Because the recipes that they’re promoting are basically the kinds of policies that would add weakness to the economy, would result in further layoffs, would not provide relief in the housing market, and would result, I think most economists estimate, in lower growth and fewer jobs, not more."

"The truth of the matter," said President Obama, "is that we’ve created 4.3 million jobs over the last 27 months, over 800,000 just this year alone.

That may not be 'fine,' but it's a whole lot of good. What's Romney's plan for preserving these jobs, again? A big fat tax cut for himself and his wealthy benefactors. I'll tell you what. He sure doesn't live anywhere near where the rest of us do.

[NotThisTime]

1. You only need to see he cut town aid in Massachusetts which led to teacher/police/firefighters being

laid off... came towards the end of his term.

[BlueToTheBone]

2. Thanks. That was a great summation.

[Tennessee Gal]

3. How is it possible to cut back on government and help the American people at the same time?

What is his plan to help the American people if he is elected President?

The President is part of the United States government the last time I checked.

Whatever policies he proposes will be government policies.

[Wounded Bear]

6. Help the American people?

When was that ever part of their plan?

[Tennessee Gal]

9. He said it.

"It’s time for us to cut back on government and help the American people. . . . more"

It is not possible to cut back and help more.

[sulphurdunn]

4. Yep,

we need fewer of the people who educated our children and protect our homes. Apparently, we need more bloated parasites like Romney who can buy votes from brain dead middle class morons who call themselves conservatives. That's the American way.

[treestar]

5. Rmoney is such a dope

Really. He should have said "bureaucrats." What an absolute ninny. Even I could run a campaign better.

[dkf]

7. If states can't afford them now, won't these jobs exist only for the duration of the stimulus?

If the point is that states needs these employees permanently they need to find the funding that keeps these jobs, i.e. they need to raise taxes.

Or is the argument that we only need them for a few years and then they will be terminated?

I don't get the purpose of temporarily funding something we find a necessity.

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10. it's like unemployment insurance payments.There's an expectation that their economy will stabilize

. . . along with the aggregate effect the dollars spent in the state have on their overall economy and the nation's overall economy. The purpose of the Act was an economic stimulus (national and local). It was constructed in a way which allowed state and local officials to preserve jobs which would have been lost in the leaner times of the economic downturn.

It's not as if the federal government was going to be able to dictate to the states which investments in their community they deemed appropriate. You can likely think of hundreds of ways to spend the money to suit your viewpoint, but it was the states which chose the projects and human infrastructure to receive the money. The expectation was that it would be a stopgap while they rebuilt their individual economies.

Thing is, here you are still arguing past the point. The stimulus bill had the effect that the president and economists -- including the non-partisan CBO -- intended it to have; and the results were an averted recession; a sustained and growing workforce; and an aid to the economy.

President Obama has echoed my own view that government isn't just about balancing the books. Their responsibility was to make certain that they not only gained a financial foothold, but that the economy continued to grow; that people in the way of the economic collapse in these states weren't left out of the beneficence of the recovery legislation.

[dkf]

12. The problem is the states were under the artificial boost of a housing bubble which taxed well.

That enabled hiring of local government workers but that money isn't going to be back anytime soon.

I guess the mentality is to fix things temporarily and leave others to figure out the long term. I just don't see anything other than postponement.

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13. It's not as if there's even a possibility that the federal government can support them

. . . indefinitely. That never was the proposition or expectation. The stimulus was a stopgap measure to allow these local and state concerns to get back on their feet without completely collapsing. The succession of CBO reports and analysis fro economists is that the effort worked. Just because it didn't solve every economic problem isn't a credible argument against making the effort in the first place. The federal government doesn't/didn't have the capacity to just put every disrupted economy in complete order, but it did have some influence, which this President exerted against republican opposition.

Of course, it's postponement, but you can see many of these economies making their way back. I don't think we should forget that these are real lives which were bolstered by this Act. Instead of looking at this like an actuary (where economists agree that the effect was productive and prudent), consider the real lives which were behind these jobs held in place by the President's stimulus legislation.

That's something that republicans regularly disregard when they complain about the President's spending. Romney laid it out just as he sees it. He doesn't believe the money spent on propping up these state and local concerns was worth it. He'd likely brush past the human element to 'balance the books.' He's harping about some irregular elements of the aid and assistance, but he's ignoring the lives affected.

They deserved the 'temporary' help and it turned out to be, as the president and economists predicted, fiscally successful in aiding the recovery of these local and state concerns; as well as add to the national economic progress. It wasn't a panacea, but it wasn't meant to be. Other important economic considerations have to be made going forward. I think President Obama has been clear about that.

[Mutiny In Heaven]

8. Hey, I doubt he needs police, firefighters or public school teachers

I'm sure he has the costliest education money can buy (REALLY fucking costly for anyone who'd have to live under him as President), private security and a sprinkler system that could leave Boston looking like Atlantis.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

11. Yes

I'm sure Obama meant that the private sector which is adding net jobs each month is doing fine IN COMPARISON to the public sector which is going in reverse. An omission of two words. Romney keeps talking about small government the way Grover Norquist does, the guy who wants to drown our country in a bathtub.

[malaise]

14. I think everyone missed Rmoney's other important line

in this ridiculous anti-worker comment.

It was that Wisconsin had spoken. Rmoney is representing the 1% publicly - he is profoundly anti-union and anti-worker.

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15. great point, malaise

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16. kick