Today marks four years that this author has been writing, almost always every day, on public affairs, politics and history.
3,172 entries have been put on this blog, and 1,742 responses by myself and my readers have been posted.
I thank all those who have read and commented on the blog, and I hope for many more years of commentary, and response by my loyal followers!
A side effect of Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan’s Vice Presidential candidacy if he and Mitt Romney lose the election to Barack Obama, but the Republican Party keeps control of the House of Representatives, is a challenge to the House leadership as it now stands!
That would likely lead to a move by Ryan, who can run for his Congressional seat while on the ballot for Vice President, to wish to be Speaker of the House, second in line to be President, and to challenge Barack Obama on his agenda much more than Speaker John Boehner!
It would also be a challenge to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who very much wishes to be Speaker, and would try to stop Ryan from reaching that office, but having run for Vice President and become a national figure as a result, Ryan would have the edge to overcome both Boehner and Cantor!
So the future of House leadership, if the GOP keeps control, will be very fascinating to watch!
Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan will NEVER be a minor, forgettable public figure ever again!
He will now have Secret Service protection during the upcoming campaign, and will still need some protection after, due to the controversial nature of running for national office.
Every Vice Presidential loser remains a national figure, and is often thought of as a future Presidential candidate.
Witness Sarah Palin, John Edwards, Joe Lieberman, and the earlier Presidential candidacies of Jack Kemp, Lloyd Bentsen, and Bob Dole as evidence, and also the later candidacies for President of Sargent Shriver and Edmund Muskie as further proof!
And being only 42, and even rumored to have thought of running for President from the House of Representatives in this year’s race, face the facts—Paul Ryan will be a major player in the future of American politics!
And finally, Franklin D. Roosevelt lost the Vice Presidency in 1920 and became President in 1932!
There are many odd and interesting points about Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan that have been gathered, and here are some of them!
Paul Ryan, like Mitt Romney, is handsome, and they look good together photogenically.
Paul Ryan looks as if he could be one of Mitt Romney’s sons, and actually is only 12 days older than Romney’s oldest son, Tagg!
Paul Ryan has spent his whole adult life in government, with no experience in the private sector.
Paul Ryan was affected by the narrow minded, selfish teachings of Ayn Rand, and he was involved in work with former Congressman Jack Kemp, one of the authors of what became known as Reaganomics, which started tripling the national debt in the 1980s, due to the theory of Supply Side Economics. Now, Ryan wishes to multiply what Reaganomics in the 1980s and Bushonomics in the 2000s brought about, most of the increased national debt, $7 trillion of the total $10.5 trillion debt that existed when George W. Bush left the Presidency in January, 2009!
Paul Ryan’s dad died when he was in high school, and he was supported by the social safety net of Social Security with survivors benefits while in college.
Paul Ryan has lived off the American taxpayer his entire life, and will receive better health care and pension benefits as part of the federal payroll, that he wishes to cut for everyone else in the middle and lower classes!
Paul Ryan alienated Catholic nuns when he came out for cuts in food stamps and other benefits to poor children, and called for privatizing of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, while wanting greater tax cuts for the top two percent!
Paul Ryan was booed in his own congressional district for the Ryan plan which passed the House of Representatives earlier this year, but with no Democratic support and ten Republicans voting against, as well.
Paul Ryan comes across as articulate, handsome, and charming personally, the latter much more than Mitt Romney, but he also comes across to many as arrogant, nasty, mean spirited, uncaring, hypocritical , uncompromising, and loved by the Tea Party and the right wing media which have declared war on women, senior citizens, the middle class, minorities, and the poor!
Paul Ryan has no foreign policy experience, and being only a Congressman, can be seen as not qualified to be Commander in Chief on Day One!
This is the 5th time in the past half century that a member of the House of Representatives has been selected as a Vice Presidential running mate—William E. Miller of New York with Barry Goldwater in 1964; Geraldine Ferraro of New York with Walter Mondale in 1984; Jack Kemp of New York with Bob Dole in 1996; Dick Cheney of Wyoming with George W. Bush in 2000; and now Paul Ryan of Wisconsin with Mitt Romney in 2012. Notice all four of the earlier choices LOST the election that followed, with the exception of Cheney with Bush, but remember that Al Gore actually won the popular vote in 2000 by 540,000 votes, and the Supreme Court decided the election, intervening for the first time in American history!
And as said in an earlier post, finally, this marks the fourth time in the past 60 years that the Vice Presidential nominee has been more than 20 years younger than the Presidential nominee—Richard Nixon with Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952; Dan Quayle with George H. W. Bush in 1988; Sarah Palin with John McCain in 2008; and now Paul Ryan with Mitt Romney in 2012.
Additionally, we have no one on either ticket for this upcoming election who is from the Sun Belt states, the growing part of the nation. Instead, we have a Midwesterner and an Easterner on each ticket–Barack Obama and Paul Ryan from the Midwest, and Joe Biden and Mitt Romney from the Northeast!
Also, there is no candidate with military experience on either Presidential ticket, the first time since the 1940s!
And we also have no mainline Protestant on the Republican ticket, a mainstay of the GOP, and instead have a Mormon and a Catholic.
If anything, the only true “Protestant” is Barack Obama, as Joe Biden is Catholic!
More oddities and trivia will probably arise as the campaign develops further!
The decision of Mitt Romney to select Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan, head of the House Budget Committee, as his Vice Presidential running mate, throws down the gauntlet clearly for all voters!
This election will be the most ideological election since the Lyndon B. Johnson-Barry Goldwater race of 1964!
It is a clear cut attempt of the right wing—-the Tea Party Movement, the social conservatives, and the economic conservatism of Fox News Channel, The Wall Street Journal, The National Review, and The Weekly Standard—to destroy the New Deal and Great Society!
It is a war on senior citizens, minorities, women, the poor, the middle class, in favor of the elite wealthy two percent, the corporations, the privileged, who want to destroy the social safety net of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid!
It is the triumph of Ayn Rand, who promoted selfishness, greed, and lack of concern for our fellow citizens, in the mad dash to only promote one’s own interests!
It is an attempt to bring back the Gospel of Wealth of industrialist Andrew Carnegie in the Gilded Age!
It is the promotion of arrogance, selfishness, greed, a mean spirited nature, and false claims of promoting the so called message of Jesus Christ as not caring about the sick, the poor, the disadvantaged! Catholic nuns and open minded Protestant groups have condemned Ryan’s call for ending food stamps and other assistance to poor children, and his push to privatize Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, while wishing to give more tax cuts to the elite wealthy!
So the battle is on, and the election, which seemed to have no focus, has become very focused, and it is a battle for the middle and lower classes, and it is a battle that cannot afford to be lost, because if President Barack Obama loses, the “American Dream” will be destroyed, as we allow an oligarchy, which already has too much power and concentration of wealth, to seize control of all wealth and property, and make us closer to Fascism than at any time since the defeat of Fascism in World War II!