I was reading this in the huffington Post and thought it was pretty good. As you’ll see they build a pretty point of saying that Mit Romney is the best logical choice. Republicans will probably end up nominating him not because they like him but because of other reasons: While former Massachusetts governor Mitt [...]
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I saw thins article and I thought it was pretty good. So the question is does it really matter what religion a candidate is? For me it doesn’t but I’ll be there a lot of people out there who it does matter for. I guess the answer is it WILL matter to some people. So [...]
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I never really thought much about this, but I found this video really interesting. I didn’t think black people really went out to attack (rape, murder) white people but the figures they present in this video are pretty alarming.
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“Half of those we questioned say that the country would be worse off under the GOP Medicare proposals and 56 percent think that GOP plan would be bad for the elderly,” says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. “Opposition is highest … Continue reading
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Sometimes it is hard to figure out just what the American people really want? MEDICARE From jobsanger.blogspot Unfortunately, a new Washington Post/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard University poll contains some puzzling information and may well create as many questions as it answers. The poll surveyed 2,054 adults between September 22nd and October 3rd, and has a margin of error of 2.5%. I don’t think there’s any doubt that if asked whether they support a smaller federal government, a clear majority of Americans would probably say yes. And a couple of the polls answers would tend to support that.
ARE THE FOLLOWING
PROGRAMS IMPORTANT?
Important………………..96%
Not very important……………4%
SOCIAL SECURITY
Important………………..95%
Not very important……………5%
DEFENSE SPENDING
Important………………..90%
Not very important……………9%
FOOD STAMPS
Important………………..82%
Not very important……………17%
FOREIGN AID
Important………………..62%
Not very important……………36%
FEDERAL AID TO SCHOOLS
Important………………..91%
Not very important……………9%
UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS
Important………………..91%
Not very important……………9%
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
Important………………..89%
Not very important……………10%
About 55% of respondents think the federal government is focused on the wrong things and another 52% believe the governments impact on their daily lives is mainly a negative one, while only 7% believe they get more value from the government than they pay in taxes (and 55% say they get less value).
Those beliefs would make someone think the majority of Americans would be in favor of drastic cuts to the federal government.
However, when they are asked about individual government programs, the poll responses shows that Americans think those programs are important and don’t want to see cuts in them. Consider the response results in the table right:
Those are all the programs that cost the government the most money. It would be impossible to think of cutting the size of the federal government without also drastically cutting most or all of these programs, and yet a clear majority in each case doesn’t think these programs should be cut.
It’s no wonder that the Republicans, while preaching cutting government, can’t name a single thing they would cut. It’s one thing to talk about cutting government in general, but quite another when it comes to cutting specific (and popular) programs. Americans may say they want a smaller government, but they only want it in theory — not reality.
In fact, reality may not enter into people’s view of the federal government very much. About 50% of the people said they believed that the federal government budget could be balanced just by eliminating wasteful spending.
But where is that wasteful spending? And could there possibly be trillions of dollars in wasteful spending? Frankly, it is amazing that half of the population could believe that.
While there is undoubtedly some wasteful spending, it is extremely unrealistic to believe it could even come near the federal deficit. [With defense spending nearly 60% of the total discretionary budget that is the best category of spending to trim back, but even that seems to be off the table.]
Another question also pointed out this schizophrenic nature of Americans. About 77% of the people believe that the United States has the best system of government in the world.
But then when asked if the government is run for the big special interests or the benefit of all citizens, a full 65% said it was run for the big special interests. How can those two statements be reconciled? Are all other governments in the world even worse than a government run for big special interests?
I’m amazed. Evidently we need a smaller government, but this must be accomplished without cutting programs. Where is reality?
The Republicans like to talk a lot about how horrible our national debt is, but when they are in power they are the worst contributors to increasing that debt. Isn’t it time to stop listening to what they say and pay attention to what they do?
And, by the way, under the leadership of Republican Gov. Rick Perry and a Republican controlled legislature the Texas budget deficit is now billion in the hole!
