At least, so says the New York Post‘s Charles Gasparino:
The president and the Democratic Party apparatus, including its friends in the media, are sure to demagogue Ryan’s bold solution. Yet the very people looking to lead the charge against Obama and his bizarre economic theories in the 2012 election, the GOP presidential candidates, appear to be running for cover.
Sure, the candidates offered vague praise for Ryan after the plan’s release on Tuesday.
Mitt Romney said Ryan is “setting the right tone for finally getting spending and entitlements under control.” Tim Pawlenty cheered Ryan for “offering real leadership.”
In other words, nobody was willing to embrace the details. The closest was probable noncandidate Sarah Palin, who tweeted that it’s a “serious & necessary reform proposal.”
What makes this really disappointing is that I’ve been trying to get the GOP candidates to give their own views on how to grow the economy and tackle spending.
Pawlenty didn’t return about a half dozen of my calls pleading for some sign that he has an inkling as to how to address these overriding issues. His “campaign” couldn’t even muster a flack to offer up some sort of an outline as to how their boss would fix the economy.
Nominal front-runner Romney wasn’t much better. A spokeswoman actually e-mailed me back, saying her boss is “not really doing any one-on-one interviews right now, but feel free to stay in touch as things ramp up.” Thanks for that.
Other putatively pro-growth Republicans, including Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, have yet to comment publicly on Ryan’s plan.
Of course, there may be some brilliant political strategy to account for the Republican hopefuls’ head-in-the-sand approach to one of the most far-reaching plans to fix the economy since the Reagan era. Maybe they don’t want to get blamed for a budget impasse that leads to a government shutdown; maybe they’re afraid of getting tarred as wanting to end Medicare.
Thing is, they’ll be hard pressed to come up with anything better than what Ryan has produced. And sitting on the sidelines makes them look like diminutive little wimps, while their would-be opponent uses the presidential bully pulpit of his office to distort and smear the Ryan plan.
They don’t seem to see how public opinion has shifted on taxes and spending. Even liberal economists I speak to openly fret that Obama’s massive spending will eventually lead to a run on the dollar. At a recent Wall Street research conference I attended, most of the talk centered not on the rising stock market but on how the Chinese are looking for investments in “hard assets” instead of US Treasuries because they fear the dollar will implode unless we change course under a plan like Ryan’s — one that cuts spending and the growth in entitlements.
[…] Reagan economic adviser Arthur Laffer points out that recent lefty efforts to impose taxes on the so-called rich have failed thanks to a shift in public opinion. Laffer cited the failed soak-the-rich referendum in Washington state, supported by the father of Microsoft founder Bill Gates — not to mention Obama’s cave on the issue when he extended the Bush-era tax cuts after his shellacking in the 2010 midterms.
Laffer thinks people are starting to realize that “the rich” employ working-class people — and the more you tax them, the less they employ. What does register with voters is the notion that “we are spending on wasteful things, and it goes back to President Bush,” Laffer says.
In other words, Ryan’s plan might actually be good politics as well as wise policy. The smart thing for Obama to do, Laffer says, is to pull a Clinton and claim many of Ryan’s proposals as his own.
It would be a masterstroke that a smart politician like Obama just might try — while Romney, Pawlenty and the rest of the Republican contenders run for cover.
Sticking a wet finger into the political wind isn’t a leadership strategy, folks. It’s an election strategy — and it’s one that hasn’t proven too effective for conservatives, who seem to do best when they advocate principle rather than compromise, when they evince fidelity to ideology rather than a transparent feint to populism. And that’s what they need to do here, because Obama is too much an ideologue — and far too ego-driven — to tack to the center, as Laffer suggests.
— He said, stinkbombing illogically and radically.
It’s not important whether you lose big or lose narrowly. It’s not important whether you communicate clear and convincing principles. It’s especially not important that you put the nation on a sound footing for the future.
No, what’s really important is that the Sunday morning chat shows describe you as “moderate” and “reasonable,” and that you get invited to the good Beltway parties. That’s the sort of thing that you can parlay into a very lucrative career as a lobbyist or speaker.
For as much as we complain about Obama being all about Obama, it’s dispiriting that nobody else offers an alternative.
You’re spreading hate again, aren’t you?
Yeah, I don’t see it. it must be a real brilliant MFer.
Here’s an idea, ya dumbasses. How about every mothers son of ya SELL the fucking plan directly to the people. Do Reagan, and mock the media while you’re doing it. Get your squishy asses out there and educate the country, all of ya all the time.
Can you hear the words I’m saying to you?!
OT: Might have just picked up 7,000 Prosser votes. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/264209/breaking-computer-error-could-give-prosser-7381-more-votes-victory-christian-schneider
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/264212/prosser-miracle-daniel-foster
I see bh beat me to it.
I can’t wait to see the libs start whining about voter fraud.
I am ever the pessimist,however, I’m sensing a very chaotic confluence of events that just might implode the Obama administration. I really believe the steady drip-drip-drip evidence of Obama’s fatal combination of failure, egoism, inexperience and loathing for America is becoming harder and harder for many members of the media to bear. They may still be believers, but do they believe that much that they’d continue to be complicit in this disaster? A full Monty meldown of the U.S.? I think some are getting scared, really scared. As they should. This cavalier shut down– a three minute phone call to the House before shuttling off to NYC to sniff Sharpton’s ass– cannot possibly be lost on even the most ardent hopefuls in the media. Gas prices. Libya. Jobs. We know the list. If the GOP does not crack and can get the word out, the real word, I think there will be a few brave souls in the media willing to declare that the emperor has no threads. I really do have hope that a shut down will become a takedown. Real hope. Or it’s the three fingers of Knob Hill I just had waiting for dinner.
I think the 2012 election is there for Hillary to take, if she’s willing to do a bold move — and if BO declines re-election for ‘health reasons’, or is thrown overboard by the press/Soros/rational Dems.
The bold move: adopt Ryan’s plan or something even more ambitious.
Reasoning: the populace is ripe for a Fiscal Conservative, but the clueless middle would rather vote for a Dem, all things being equal, because Reps are just evil. (“Everyone knows that!”) She’s been out of the spotlight long enough that she could plausibly reinvent herself as a financial hawk… (to the American Idol crowd at least, which is to say a sizable majority.)
Witness Christie’s success/popularity in NJ. I think Christie is for nearly all purposes an old-school Democrat; pretty sure he’d be happy to spend,spend,spend if NJ still had any money left.
Only Nixon could go to China – only a Dem can reform entitlements.
Note: I don’t want any of that to happen. Looking forward to President Palin, personally. Just saying that IF a Dem went all-in on the “we’ve got to fix this before there’s no safety net for anybody” thing, I think they’d be unstoppable.
“I think the 2012 election is there for Hillary to take”
except for the libyan quagmire you could be right
Shit, obama is just a younger, hipper, blacker Hillary. He hasn’t done anything she wouldn’t do, she would just work at it harder.
Hillary in 2012 would probably be the worst of all worlds.
A-fucking-men.
[…] SmittyAlternate title: “GOP Hopefuls Note Budget Gallipoli, Neglect To Engage”. Via Protein Wisdom, we have Charles Gasparino in the New York Post:Sure, the candidates offered vague praise for Ryan […]