Chronicling Mitt Romey's Lies

[dalem]

I want to read more about Mitt Romney's lies.

-dale

[McFire]

Here's a few --


Household incomes and spending (February 2009 – June 2012 data):
Real Personal Income +5.5%, Real Disposable Income +4.4%, Real Private Consumption Expenditure +5.9%, Real Household Durable Goods purchases: +22.5%, non-durables +5.2%, services +3.8%, savings +13%. Source: Search Results - FRED - St. Louis Fed

- - - - -

Weekly new unemployment claims:

Jan 31, 2009 _ _ _ 631,100
Jan 30, 2010 _ _ _ 483,000
Jan 29, 2011 _ _ _ 419,000
Jan 28, 2012 _ _ _ 373,000

From the week after inauguration to the latest figures, this is the greatest reduction – numbers or percent – of any president since the data were first collected back in 1967. Source: Office of Workforce Security, Employment & Training Administration (ETA) - U.S. Department of Labor

- - - - -

Reduced taxes on 3.5 million small businesses to help them afford employee health care insurance
Tax credits for 29 million individuals to pay for health insurance
Expanded Medicaid to cover everyone under 133% of Federal poverty level
Enacted legislation providing healthcare to 11 million children
Reversed ban on federal funding for stem cell research
Cut prescription drug cost for Medicare recipients by 50%
Established Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Required lenders to verify applicants’ credit history, income and employment
Gave FDA the authority to regulate the manufacturing, marketing and sale of tobacco
Endorsed same-sex marriage equality
Credit card Bill of Rights prevents arbitrary rate increases
Signed the anti-discrimination Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
Signed a new START nuclear arms agreement with Russia
Signed Weapons Systems Acquisition Reform Act
Ended state-approved torture

and, provided travel expenses to fallen soldiers’ families to be there when the body arrives at Dover AFB, and reversed the policy of banning the media from reporting such events.

Thanks for the info...but...I wanted wmncd1959 to answer without assistance.

[Double Edge]

Does it even mean anything?

Revealing someone's tax returns is not really revealing anything other than what someone may or may not have done with 'all their money'. Even if they had done something dodgy, it would prove them to be no more or less than what any other may or may not have done.

Looks like a DOR question.

Was it Washington that said their was no easier thing that otherwise good men fall into than defrauding the government?

Wise words

If people are dirty these hoops don't mean much. It might even contribute to creating a false impression to the contrary. So its a potential white wash too.

[Chunder]

Does this little exercise mean they are clean ? no

Does it even mean anything?

Was it Washington that said their was no easier thing that otherwise good men fall into than defrauding the government?
People employ accountants to look for every little dodge they can possibly get.
The super wealthy just move assets around, even overseas.

Revealing someone's tax returns is not really revealing anything other than what someone may or may not have done with 'all their money'. Even if they had done something dodgy, it would prove them to be no more or less than what any other may or may not have done.

[Double Edge]

What is the obsession with this in the USA?

In Australia, my Tax return, and all it's details are very highly confidential, and it's my right not to have them disclosed.
Apparently in the Land of the Free, home of the Brave, with all the bravado about constitutional rights foisted upon the rest of us lesser countries - it's your right, but we are going to treat you as a liar due to omission for lack of disclosure.

Like bugger me, if it didn't occur to anyone that you had to be pretty damn wealthy to run for president.

Creates the illusion that the leader is above water. I think its a recent thing.

In India anyone running for office has to file their assets worth as well. The joke is the politcos just sign over their assets to their immediate family and even extended family. And we see laughably small amounts declared in their bank accounts or vehicles etc.

Does this little exercise mean they are clean ? no its a mere formality.

[JAD_333]

Is this a lie or just plain sleaze?

Forward Back Across the Bridge to the 21st Century | RedState

[dalem]

What is the obsession with this in the USA?

It's the Dems and their press doing the howling and obsessing. No one else cares.

-dale

[JAD_333]

krugman had a post today (linking to another which made the statement).

asking the question "are you better off today than you were four years ago", is like a journalist asking a firefighter who just put out a fire, "is the house in better shape than when you got here?"

Krugman comes through, for once. I might end up liking him. He had another revelation recently. See my last post.

not really. the market cycle can be influenced heavily by policymakers; see europe again.

Then I didn't get your statement.

fairly long; decades in both japan and europe before effects were finally felt.

not that even the most-stout keynesian advocate would ask for decades-long worth of heightened spending; even krugman is quick to point out that Keynesianism also demands government cuts when times are good. of course, worrying about the next crash when we're IN a crash now strikes me as a bit hasty.

There must be a calculated limit to how much government can spend to try to stimulate economic recovery, or are you just being imprecise to mimic the Democrats.:)

indeed i am very fortunate. but my portfolio would be rather the worse for wear had it not been for the partial recovery brought on by the stimulus, which reflected greatly in the stock market.

The stimulus has little to do with the market recovery; companies hoarding cash and cutting overhead get more of the credit ...created more equity for shareholders.

moreover, another round of QE would make buying a home even cheaper for me, as interest rates go down (and i need all the help i can get, given that arlington's house prices have fully recovered-- 450K for a 700 sq ft one-bedroom, you have got to be kidding me).

Incredible financing opportunities out there. But 700 sq.ft. $560/sq/ft. Are you nuts? Come out my way...I can build you a 3,000 sq.ft. house on 2 acres for a mere $380k with top of the line amenities and... only a 90 minute commute each way...

and given what i've seen of romney's economic plans, i'm also convinced that his policies would do nothing but deepen the long-term deficit issue, with the possibility of slowing the economic recovery;

To be candid, I question whether your conviction is on solid ground. What specifically would Romney do to make the deficit issue worse in the long run? If you believe it's his tax cuts then you believe he would cut taxes without bringing in offsetting revenues which would be the case as employment rises. What you're really saying--I think--is that you believe Romney can't succeed in creating jobs faster than Obama.

[Parihaka]

Yes, thanks!


At the end of the Bush Administration, over 600,000 people were filing new unemployment claims every week. Today, that number is below 375,000, a 36.2% improvement.

Disposable personal income is 18.3% higher than at the end of 2008; on a per person basis, that’s a difference of $3,040.

Household debt service ratios are below 11% for the first time since 1994.

When Mr Obama took office, the S&P 500 was 600 points below where it is today, or more than 70%. During a president’s first 15 quarters in office, that’s the best performance since Eisenhower!3

How’s the economy doing? If you like the way Europe has coped with the aftermath of the worst financial crisis in 75 years, you’re going to just love Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s plan to drive us down that same road!


By the way, what’s with the refusal to reveal tax returns for more than a couple of years? What are these guys hiding?

So taking the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 as a pre-Obama initiative, what would these numbers look like if Obama had done precisely nothing more?

[Chunder]

By the way, what’s with the refusal to reveal tax returns for more than a couple of years? What are these guys hiding?

What is the obsession with this in the USA?

In Australia, my Tax return, and all it's details are very highly confidential, and it's my right not to have them disclosed.
Apparently in the Land of the Free, home of the Brave, with all the bravado about constitutional rights foisted upon the rest of us lesser countries - it's your right, but we are going to treat you as a liar due to omission for lack of disclosure.

Like bugger me, if it didn't occur to anyone that you had to be pretty damn wealthy to run for president.

[JAD_333]

Yes, thanks!

Glad to hear it.

At the end of the Bush Administration, over 600,000 people were filing new unemployment claims every week. Today, that number is below 375,000, a 36.2% improvement.

Well, of course. Job loss has slowed since the bubble burst. The credit goes to the man at the wheel, but the wind at his back
wasn't entirely his making.

Disposable personal income is 18.3% higher than at the end of 2008; on a per person basis, that’s a difference of $3,040.

I've been waiting for that one. That's the average, for sure, but if you take out the top 1% of income earners, the average is closer to zero.

Richest 1 Percent Account For Nearly All Of U.S. Recovery's Gains: Report

Technically, the economy has been in recovery for two years. But it turns out the rich have been doing most of the recovering.

In 2010 -- the first full year since the end of the Great Recession -- virtually all of the income growth in America took place among the country's very wealthiest people, says an economist at the University of California, Berkeley. The top 1 percent of earners took in a full 93 percent of all the income gains that year, leaving the other 7 percent of gains to be sprinkled among the vast majority of society.

---
(Your school, by the way.:)

Household debt service ratios are below 11% for the first time since 1994.

Surprised you put that one in there. If you and I decide to cut our credit card debt, how does Obama get credit for it. Or if you went bankrupt and have no more debts and hence pay no more interest on discharged debt, is that good?

When Mr Obama took office, the S&P 500 was 600 points below where it is today, or more than 70%. During a president’s first 15 quarters in office, that’s the best performance since Eisenhower!3

:). Big corporations earning big profits by not investing in plant and jobs so as to have cash on hand to weather any further downturn makes them a good value for investors. Of course the market is going to go up. That's a case where a high market is a bad sign, companies are not confident that the recovery has taken off.

How’s the economy doing? If you like the way Europe has coped with the aftermath of the worst financial crisis in 75 years, you’re going to just love Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s plan to drive us down that same road!

Let's be honest. Ryan nor Romney is proposing European-style austerity AS A WAY OF COPING WITH THE CURRENT DOWNTURN. Why I put that in caps is so we'll be clear that their plan to cut government spending in earnest comes AFTER economic recovery, and then they would gradually make cuts. In fact, Ryan's plan calls for 3% increased government spending over the next 3-5 years. Romney has said over and over he doesn't intend to make severe cuts immediately nor all at once. Their near-term goal is more jobs, faster. BTW, the difference between Ryan's budget and Obama's budget is that Ryan would cut $4 trillion from the debt by over the next 10-20 years while Obama would cut $3 trillion. Read my lips...they both plan to cut government spending. Both austere?

By the way, what’s with the refusal to reveal tax returns for more than a couple of years? What are these guys hiding?

Sorry, no stock tips for you.:) Whatever they are hiding, I am sure the IRS is good with it. What you guys want is 8 years of 6-inch high tax returns so you'll have enough cannon fodder to question every detail in sinister fashion until election day so you can distract people from Obama's lousy economic record...remember he gets the credit for what-isn't as well as what-is whether or not it is his fault. If you guys were 10 points ahead and the economy was booming you wouldn't give a hoot about his returns...admit it.

[dalem]

krugman had a post today (linking to another which made the statement).

asking the question "are you better off today than you were four years ago", is like a journalist asking a firefighter who just put out a fire, "is the house in better shape than when you got here?"

You and Kruggy are putting Obama in the role of the fireman and not the fire.

"It could be worse" is not going to win Obama back the White House, and is truly a sad position to stake out. Use the list of actual accomplishments DOR mentioned earlier.

(As a semi-related aside that always cracks me up - Repubs lie to seem more conservative, Dems lie to seem more conservative, and people still have the balls to claim that we're not a conservative nation. Who are these clowns lying to then?)

-dale

[astralis]

krugman had a post today (linking to another which made the statement).

asking the question "are you better off today than you were four years ago", is like a journalist asking a firefighter who just put out a fire, "is the house in better shape than when you got here?"

in this case, the worst recession since the Great Depression, one that was worldwide and involved trillions of dollars across an ever-more-tightly-interlaced world economy.

JAD,

That was pretty much the understanding all along, wouldn't you say?

not really. the market cycle can be influenced heavily by policymakers; see europe again.

But the question has to be asked, how long and how much can we spend pursuing the Keynesian model before we lose airspeed and altitude and crash?

fairly long; decades in both japan and europe before effects were finally felt.

not that even the most-stout keynesian advocate would ask for decades-long worth of heightened spending; even krugman is quick to point out that Keynesianism also demands government cuts when times are good. of course, worrying about the next crash when we're IN a crash now strikes me as a bit hasty.

You are among the fortunate, but nothing you are doing was made possible by Obama's policies. Right?

indeed i am very fortunate. but my portfolio would be rather the worse for wear had it not been for the partial recovery brought on by the stimulus, which reflected greatly in the stock market. moreover, another round of QE would make buying a home even cheaper for me, as interest rates go down (and i need all the help i can get, given that arlington's house prices have fully recovered-- 450K for a 700 sq ft one-bedroom, you have got to be kidding me).

and given what i've seen of romney's economic plans, i'm also convinced that his policies would do nothing but deepen the long-term deficit issue, with the possibility of slowing the economic recovery; say greece tanks and europe starts its terrifying slide into a breakup and full out depression, which in turns starts infecting the US....do you really believe Mitt Romney will face down his party-- and his own professed line-- to order either additional stimulus or fed action?

[DOR]

“Are You Better Off Than You Were at the End of the Bush Administration?”

Yes, thanks!


At the end of the Bush Administration, over 600,000 people were filing new unemployment claims every week. Today, that number is below 375,000, a 36.2% improvement.

Disposable personal income is 18.3% higher than at the end of 2008; on a per person basis, that’s a difference of $3,040.

Household debt service ratios are below 11% for the first time since 1994.

When Mr Obama took office, the S&P 500 was 600 points below where it is today, or more than 70%. During a president’s first 15 quarters in office, that’s the best performance since Eisenhower!3

How’s the economy doing? If you like the way Europe has coped with the aftermath of the worst financial crisis in 75 years, you’re going to just love Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s plan to drive us down that same road!


By the way, what’s with the refusal to reveal tax returns for more than a couple of years? What are these guys hiding?

[JAD_333]

also note that economic recovery is not automatic,

That was pretty much the understanding all along, wouldn't you say?

and as such obama should be given some credit for some of the growth

.

He gets credit for what he's done and what has been accomplished so far, but, as in the construction business, half way done and a year behind schedule is a not good enough, especially if you're paying interest on a construction loan and low on money. Among all the downsides of a slow recovery is the cost of being slow, more debt, more interest, more entitlement spending.

The Obama people are now in their convention mode, trying to sell the people that they are better off now than when Obasma took office. It will be true for someone who was out of work then and has since found a job, but not so for people still looking for a job. As a nation we are not much better off since 2008--8.2% still unemployed. He has a tough sell.

europe is a good instance of this.

many parts of europe right now are demonstrating the effects of austerity during a severe recession; the only difference is, most of them did it out of sheer necessity by orders from above, vice a conscious decision by their policymakers (the UK being the big exception to this).

I understand the principle of increased government spending to offset the affects of an economic downturn. Europe is perhaps a case where the opposite is being tried. But the question has to be asked, how long and how much can we spend pursuing the Keynesian model before we lose airspeed and altitude and crash?

greece is now very close to defaulting. on a personal level, i've shifted my market allocation to 80% US bonds, 10% stocks, and 10% cash reserve. i'm sure i'll miss out on some of the short-term gains here at home, as i expect the fed to execute another round of QE fairly soon....but on the other hand, i'll be gaining quite a bit as i'm buying a new house during these record-low interest rates...and i can sleep better at night.

You are among the fortunate, but nothing you are doing was made possible by Obama's policies. Right?