Why Paul Ryan et al need the poor

THE CURRENT crop of Republican pols must count their blessings every minute of the day that there are poor people in America. Where else would they turn with what they describe as "bold and gutsy" proposed budget cuts?

There's no better evidence of the GOP's class warfare on the poor than Paul Ryan's budget that was quickly endorsed by McMitt Romney. It hones in on cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, education - these and other Federal programs that try to sustain a semblance of survival for the folks at the lower end of the economic ladder. But as the late Ohio Gov. Jim Rhodes was heard to say when he faced complaints about the state's shoddy underfunded mental health system - "Those people don't vote anyway."

But wait. People making more than $1 million would get a tax cut of $265,000 with an after-tax income rise of 12.5 pct. Need I add that people down the ladder would not enjoy relative benefits. Half of the those earning between $20,000 to $30,000, according to a report in Forbes, "would get no tax cut at all."

Corporate tax rates would be reduced to 25 pct. from 35 pct. But as Romney has told us, "Corporations are people". Unfortunately, the Republican tax proposals do not regard a lot of people as corporations.

While we're on the subject of Romneyana, when I hear his daily campaign gaffes, I always wish that I knew the first person who said:

"If you don't know anything, it's hard to learn anything else."

I know. You could say the same about the others in the crowd. But he may be headed for the nomination. Fair warning.

Slow down, the voters may have some other ideas

ONE OF THE MANTRAS that Republican congressional leaders have energized since the election is that the people have spoken. Well, yes and no, depending on whether it means that the GOP clones are now free to do whatever the hell they want to do to defeat President Obama in 2012. That would include the latest babble from Michelle Bachmann that Obama is "anti-American".

But the problem with all of this breast-pounding on the right may have shown up in the latest McClatchy Newspapers-Marist poll that blunts some of the notions that the pols want what Americans want. One of the findings, for example, is that a majority of voters (51-44 pct.) like Obamacare and some even want to expand it. (Are the two new guys on the block in Ohio, John Kasich and Mike DeWine, listening?) Unsurprisingly, voters in the higher tax brackets, Tea Partiers and conservatives want to repeal it. Likewise, a majority of voters would not complain if the Democrats allowed the tax cuts for the wealthy expire on Dec. 31

So where does this leave the next Congress that will be throbbing with newly-elected right-wingers operating in the midst of the established GOP lions? Hard yo say, other than it could be a the new version of Edward Lear's Jumblies, who went to sea in a sieve.

ot/