Republicans Boost New Hampshire Hopeful Day After She Renews Call for Impeachment
National Republicans are putting their hopes to regain New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district behind extreme candidate Marilinda Garcia, just one…
Paul Ryan's Poverty Plan: Stop Being Poor
Five years to the day after our last national minimum wage increase, Paul Ryan is set to lay out a "new" six-pillared poverty plan. Ryan has long preached about how to tackle poverty and fashions himself as a serious politician and policy wonk. But if you believe that, I've got a 2 hour marathon time to sell you! Here are the six tenets of Paul Ryan's poverty plan, as told by his career rather than his rhetoric:
- Never Raise The Minimum Wage. Time and time again, Ryan has voted against raising the wage for hardworking Americans, and even argued that doing so would actually harm low income Americans.
- Oppose Unemployment Insurance. Since 2010, in the depths of the Great Recession, Ryan has voted at least six times against extending unemployment benefits for American job-seekers.
- Gut Medicaid, Leaving Low-Income Americans Uninsured. Ryan's most recent budget would take an ax to Medicaid, taking health care away from between 14.3 and 20.5 million low income Americans.
- Slash Nutrition Assistance Programs. The FY15 Ryan Budget would slash an astonishing $137 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps, which lifted 4 million Americans out of poverty in 2012. Almost half of SNAP recipients are children.
- Fight Against Protections For Low-Income Consumers. Ryan has consistently taken the side of big banks and credit card companies over Americans fighting to stay afloat, even after the 2008 financial crisis.
- Divisively Demonize The Poor For Their Situation. As if his policy attacks on low-income Americans weren't offensive enough, Ryan infamously blamed poverty in part on the "real culture problem" of "inner city" men who don't want to work.
Shot/Chaser: Speaker Tillis Goes To Washington
"[Tillis] previously told The Insider, a political newsletter, that there is a chance that the legislature would adjourn its 2014 lawmaking session without approving a budget, a prospect that would leave teachers without raises."
Rick Scott answers a question! And he hates the minimum wage
A miracle just occurred. Just when you thought it was never going to happen, after two weeks of ridicule and exasperation from Florida and national press, Rick Scott actually answered a question. For months, Rick Scott has refused to take a concrete position on raising the minimum wage, though his opposition was always pretty clear, having been caught saying: “When I hear a politician say that we have to raise the minimum wage so working families can make ends meet, I cringe.”
Georgia, Meet Mitt Romney Lite
When Mitt Romney got pummeled in the 2012 election, the GOP was forced to reboot and consider how to attract candidates who can be more competitive. In Georgia, the GOP's conclusion was to run an elitist millionaire with a checkered business record and an inability to understand the concerns of working families. Sound familiar? But don't worry, David Perdue isn't a total clone of Mitt Romney. While Romney was serving as Governor of Massachusetts, for instance, David Perdue was busy tanking a company called Pillowtex, leaving its 7,500 workers out to dry and pocketing a cool $3.1 million in the process. It wasn't the first batch of American jobs that was killed under Perdue's stewardship. From 1994 to 1998, Perdue served as a senior vice-president at Haggar. Under his leadership, Haggar implemented an enormous shift of company employment and operations overseas. Thousands of American workers lost their jobs, and nearly 50% of the company’s domestic workforce was laid off, but Perdue brushed it off as being "in the best interest of the company."
It Gets Worse: The Math on Scott Walker's Job Creation Pledge
With just a few short months left to go in Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s first term, his signature campaign promise — the creation of 250,000 new Wisconsin jobs in four years — is destined for failure. Months ago, PolitiFact noted that “most everyone agrees his promise of 250,000 new jobs in four years won’t be met,” due to the slow rate of job growth in the state. Fast forward to this week and Walker’s job creation prospects have gotten even worse. According to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics as reviewed by PolitiFact, Wisconsin actually had negative job growth in May and June, for a total of about -1,700 jobs. Not only has Scott Walker failed to add even half of the jobs he promised during his first term, job growth is backsliding in Wisconsin and significantly lags behind neighboring Midwestern states. We’re not math experts, but we do know that you can’t add jobs by subtracting them — yet Walker and his appointees have rewarded companies that outsource jobs out of Wisconsin, just one example of the misguided economic policies that make impossible the fulfillment Walker’s job creation promise. Politifact breaks down the latest BLS data on Wisconsin jobs — check out key highlights from their analysis after the jump.
Ted Cruz's Border Crisis Antics No Help to 2016 Ambitions
Ted Cruz's latest effort at cultural sensitivity - using the ongoing border crisis as an excuse to target DREAMers - is gaining notoriety both inside the beltway and far beyond, and not in a good way. If the Texas Senator with grander ambitions thinks Latino voters aren't paying any attention to his anti-immigrant proposal, he should take a good look at Spanish-language TV, where his antics have been covered on stations coast to coast, from DC to Texas to California. As Univision reporter stated succinctly, "The only thing [Senator Cruz's plan] will do is assure that people like him will never get to the White House." Watch the coverage for yourself above.
VIDEO: Christie Aide Testifies She Texted With Gov About Bridgegate, Deleted Texts
While Chris Christie is in Iowa trying to pretend the Bridgegate scandal is no big deal, the governor's incoming chief of staff, Regina Egea, testified this afternoon that she texted with Christie about his George Washington Bridge scandal last fall, but subsequently deleted the texts.
VIDEO: A Media Firestorm For The Very Appreciative Rick Scott
Local news. National news. Everywhere you turn, someone is either fuming or just plain reduced to laughter over Rick Scott's refusal to answer questions. The governor is entangled in scandal after scandal, and keeping voters in the dark on where he stands on key issues, but nobody can get an answer from him on any of it.
I Think They Love Me In Iowa Too, Diane!
In just over twelve hours, Chris Christie will make his first appearance of the day in Iowa in an attempt…