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2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumSlate: Mitt Romney Praises Safety Net He Wants To Shred
http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/02/01/mitt_romney_praises_safety_net_he_wants_to_shred.htmlIm not concerned with the very poor. We have a safety net there, Romney told CNN. If it needs repair, Ill fix it.
There's a certain logic to that position. Except that if you read Romney's policy agenda what he appears to think about the social safety net for the poor is that it should be drastically curtailed. He proposes the following five points:
Immediately cut nonsecurity discretionary spending by 5 percent.
**Reform and restructure Medicaid as block grant to states.
**Align wages and benefits of government workers with market rates.
**Reduce federal workforce by 10 percent via attrition.
**Undertake fundamental restructuring of government programs and services.
In other words he wants to cut the safety net, cut the health care part of the safety net, muck around with the federal workforce, and then cut the non-health care part of the safety net. To further clarify, he states that he "will immediately move to cut spending and cap it at 20 percent of GDP" while increasing defense spending. Which is to say he wants to cut social safety net spending. What's more "as spending comes under control, he will pursue further cuts that would allow caps to be set even lower so as to guarantee future fiscal stability," thus cutting social safety net spending even further.
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Slate: Mitt Romney Praises Safety Net He Wants To Shred (Original Post)
Laura PourMeADrink
Feb 2012
OP
Enrique
(27,461 posts)1. they asked him about LIHEAP at one of the debates
he said, send it back to the states. Which means poor people in Georgia and Mississippi will freeze their asses off in the winter.
zbdent
(35,392 posts)2. when he says something like that, maybe someone should ask him about medical
marijuana ... which usually is being considered as an issue states can decide ...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1170204
butterfly77
(17,609 posts)3. I don't think he..
even realizes that a lot of those poor use to be middle class.