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OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 10/15/12

Your official debate cheat sheet

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Don't tell anybody, but last Thursday my wife and I played hooky from work.   We are both gigantic Giants fans and the 10 A.M. game decided whether or not they would advance to the National League playoffs.   Thursday evening was the A's playoff game and Joe Biden was scheduled to smack-down Paul Ryan.   It was a good day here in Fairfield, sunny and cool, much too nice to go to work.   Joe and the Giants didn't let us down.  

During the debate, when Vice President Joe Biden heard "a bunch of malarkey" coming out of Paul Ryan's mouth, he smiled his big Cheshire Cat grin and called him on it.   When Ryan didn't have any specifics, Joe just kept asking for them.   When Ryan's math didn't add up, Joe schooled him.   And when Ryan complained about foreign policy, Joe pressed to find out what he would have done differently.   Ryan's answer was basically: Nothing.   Game.   Set.   Match.  

Hopefully, President Obama takes debate lessons from Joe for his round two tomorrow.   I'd hate to think that Romney might become President because he's good at telling people what they want to hear instead of the truth.   America is still struggling and we don't need some slick talker at the helm telling us he will pull 12 million new jobs out of his hat by slashing taxes for the rich, cutting regulations for Wall Street bankers, and gutting safety nets, services, and protections for everybody else.   "Here's your voucher, Granny.   Watch out for all that money that'll be trickling down, any day now."  

While most Fairfielders know malarkey when we hear it, some people still watch Fox and comment negatively about my articles.   So, to help you as you watch tomorrow's debate, here is a top-ten list of things to consider when Romney brings them up.   10. A "voucher" is not actual medical insurance.   9. Democrats created Social Security and Medicare while the Republicans have tried to destroy them from the beginning.   Who would you trust to continue them properly?   8. If you legislate that a fertilized egg is a "person," it means that all abortions and many common birth-control methods would be considered murder.   7. Saying that "The states should make their own decisions on medical insurance" means that most states won't offer insurance and those that do will have a massive influx of people with pre-existing conditions, bankrupting them.   6. If you start with a trillion-dollar annual federal budget deficit, take away another $480 billion with tax cuts for the rich, and add another $200 billion to defense spending, you will have to cut $1.7 trillion from the federal government's discretionary spending, or roughly three times what it actually is, in order to balance the budget.   5. If you say you will balance the budget by closing some loopholes in the tax code you need a better answer than, "It would take me too long" to explain which ones.   4. After you bomb Iran and invade Syria, then what are your plans?   That last Republican president started some Mid-East wars.   How did that work out?   3. After sending our troops into harm's way, don't you think we owe them adequate healthcare?   2. Does it make sense for Congressional Republicans to cut U.S. embassy funding by $500 million annually and then complain about inadequate security in Benghazi?   And the number one thing to consider is this: Do two economic wrongs make a right?   Do you think Romney can cure this recession using the same failed concepts that caused this economic mess in the first place?   Do you believe in malarkey?

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Mike Kirchubel writes a weekly Progressive/Economic column for the Fairfield, California Daily Republic and is the author of: Vile Acts of Evil, a look at the hidden economic history of the United States. Vile Acts of Evil almost wrote itself. (more...)
 
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