Thurston Howell Romney

[Benny B]

September 17, 2012
Thurston Howell Romney
By DAVID BROOKS

In 1980, about 30 percent of Americans received some form of government benefits. Today, as Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute has pointed out, about 49 percent do.

In 1960, government transfers to individuals totaled $24 billion. By 2010, that total was 100 times as large. Even after adjusting for inflation, entitlement transfers to individuals have grown by more than 700 percent over the last 50 years. This spending surge, Eberstadt notes, has increased faster under Republican administrations than Democratic ones.

There are sensible conclusions to be drawn from these facts. You could say that the entitlement state is growing at an unsustainable rate and will bankrupt the country. You could also say that America is spending way too much on health care for the elderly and way too little on young families and investments in the future.

But these are not the sensible arguments that Mitt Romney made at a fund-raiser earlier this year. Romney, who criticizes President Obama for dividing the nation, divided the nation into two groups: the makers and the moochers. Forty-seven percent of the country, he said, are people “who are dependent upon government, who believe they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to take care of them, who believe they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it.”

This comment suggests a few things. First, it suggests that he really doesn’t know much about the country he inhabits. Who are these freeloaders? Is it the Iraq war veteran who goes to the V.A.? Is it the student getting a loan to go to college? Is it the retiree on Social Security or Medicare?

It suggests that Romney doesn’t know much about the culture of America. Yes, the entitlement state has expanded, but America remains one of the hardest-working nations on earth. Americans work longer hours than just about anyone else. Americans believe in work more than almost any other people. Ninety-two percent say that hard work is the key to success, according to a 2009 Pew Research Survey.

It says that Romney doesn’t know much about the political culture. Americans haven’t become childlike worshipers of big government. On the contrary, trust in government has declined. The number of people who think government spending promotes social mobility has fallen.

The people who receive the disproportionate share of government spending are not big-government lovers. They are Republicans. They are senior citizens. They are white men with high school degrees. As Bill Galston of the Brookings Institution has noted, the people who have benefited from the entitlements explosion are middle-class workers, more so than the dependent poor.

Romney’s comments also reveal that he has lost any sense of the social compact. In 1987, during Ronald Reagan’s second term, 62 percent of Republicans believed that the government has a responsibility to help those who can’t help themselves. Now, according to the Pew Research Center, only 40 percent of Republicans believe that.

The Republican Party, and apparently Mitt Romney, too, has shifted over toward a much more hyperindividualistic and atomistic social view — from the Reaganesque language of common citizenship to the libertarian language of makers and takers. There’s no way the country will trust the Republican Party to reform the welfare state if that party doesn’t have a basic commitment to provide a safety net for those who suffer for no fault of their own.

The final thing the comment suggests is that Romney knows nothing about ambition and motivation. The formula he sketches is this: People who are forced to make it on their own have drive. People who receive benefits have dependency.

But, of course, no middle-class parent acts as if this is true. Middle-class parents don’t deprive their children of benefits so they can learn to struggle on their own. They shower benefits on their children to give them more opportunities — so they can play sports, go on foreign trips and develop more skills.

People are motivated when they feel competent. They are motivated when they have more opportunities. Ambition is fired by possibility, not by deprivation, as a tour through the world’s poorest regions makes clear.

Sure, there are some government programs that cultivate patterns of dependency in some people. I’d put federal disability payments and unemployment insurance in this category. But, as a description of America today, Romney’s comment is a country-club fantasy. It’s what self-satisfied millionaires say to each other. It reinforces every negative view people have about Romney.

Personally, I think he’s a kind, decent man who says stupid things because he is pretending to be something he is not — some sort of cartoonish government-hater. But it scarcely matters. He’s running a depressingly inept presidential campaign. Mr. Romney, your entitlement reform ideas are essential, but when will the incompetence stop?

[Benny B]

I worked in the aerospace industry most of my working years after spending four years in the AF during the "Korean Police Action." I worked for Lockheed, Douglas, Hughes and others, so does that make me one of Romney's moochers, or takers as the conservative sociophobes like to describe those of us who paid in SS for 52 years?

My mother worked for GE during WWII, and then worked for the Navy and AF in civil service the rest of her working years never getting above GS5, but paid for her house, car and invested well, and retired debt free. So to you conservatives and miserable people like Romney, that made her and me dependents on government largess.

But what really ticks me off, is all these little know nothing conservatives that live in red states, that get more government support than they pay in taxes, while those of us in the progressive states pay more than we get back.

What we see from the little demagogue Romney and his sycophants is just plain ignorance of the social system, how people live and under what conditions. He and you look down on the great mass of ordinary people as though you were superior beings possessed of some superior knowledge, which only you and your fellow lemmings can understand.

But the evidence is your hero is a coward who avoided serving his country when he had the opportunity. When I see his DD214 and ones for his little cowardly children, then he might get some credibility.

He deserves to be relegated to the dustbin of history.
David Underwood
Citrus Heights


Mr. Brooks, Romney's inept commentary won't stop because he's preaching to a Conservative choir and that choir doesn't want to be told documented realities of modern economic America anymore than they want to hear that somehow Noah missed getting the dinosaurs onto the Ark.

Take for example your opening:
I"In 1980, about 30 percent of Americans received some form of government benefits. Today, as Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute has pointed out, about 49 percent do."

What happened in those 32 years? Well, let's see, Ronald Reagan, George H. Bush, and George W. Bush quadrupled debt and blamed it all on Democrat unwiilingness to do their bidding.

Middle class income stagnated and then fell; consumer cost rose, including having, feeding, educating, and housing families; taxes remained constant in terms of overall taxation for the middle class, but fell drastically for the wealthy; total U.S. income and wealth have been sequestered by the smallest percentage of Americans since 1928.

It gets worse.

But Romney's choir doesn't care, and Romney can't afford to lose that choir if he wants to have a snowballs chance of getting elected.

Maybe as you say he is a decent guy. But I don't get to know that listening to him. I get to know he agrees with the Koch brothers that 47% of us are free loaders, the furthest fact from the truth.

And because he won't or can't stand up for the truth he does not deserve to be our president.
John McBride
Seattle, WA


So, Mitt finally got caught doing the 1% shtick with his cronies, and David Brooks is in full compassionate conservative damage control mode.

He pretends to play Bad Cop. How crass of Romney to trade in the standard dog whistles and buzz words for the full monty of GOP disdain for half the population of the United States! Of course, we must not offend the elderly Floridians on whom he desperately relies to have even the merest ghost of a chance. These people are not Mittster's Moochers, Brooks reassures us. Your Medicare and Social Security are safe, everybody!

On to the troops, much needed by the GOP to fight their wars. You're no moochers when you lose your limbs or your minds! Ditto for the students taking out loans to go to those for-profit colleges. The loan sharks need the dough, and the party of old white men needs the youth vote. Must not alienate the Millennials. They are our future. Our future of unpaid interns and maids and golf caddies.

Then, just when you think Brooks has developed a heart, he lets loose with the dreaded long-term unemployed and lazy disabled folks stuck in their cultures of dependency. These people will never, ever vote Republican. Chances are they won't vote at all, given that they lack mobility and gas money. It's safe for Brooks to offensively declare them a big moochie loss.

So, Mitt is a kind and decent man who pretends to be cold. This, from a cold columnist who pretends to be kind and decent.
Karen Garcia
New Paltz, NY

[Benny B]

The Real Romney Captured on Tape Turns out To Be a Sneering Plutocrat

Sneering Plutocrat Caught on Tape: Secret Recording Reveals Romney's Candid Feelings About Half of America -- LEECHES!

[flipper5470]

Romney is 100% correct...about half of the people in this country don't pay income taxes and they've been bred to look at government as the solution to problems they should be looking to fix themselves.  For them governemnt aid isn't the "safety net" it should be, it's a nice warm blanket that they wrap themselves to fend off cold reality...

[Benny B]

Romney's contempt for the '47 percent'
By Steve Benen
 -
Tue Sep 18, 2012

Just 24 hours ago, Mitt Romney was already in a rough spot. With the presidential election seven weeks away, he was coming off a bad week in which he cravenly tried to exploit the deaths of Americans abroad for partisan gain, watched President Obama solidify his lead in the polls, and found his aides sniping at one another in the press.

By mid-morning yesterday, Team Romney was determined to get back on track, signaling shifts in strategy, a new ad campaign, and a renewed focus. Nothing to worry about, hand-wringing Republicans, campaign aides said, everything is just fine.

And then David Corn reported that Romney trashed half the country in a secretly-taped fundraiser, and fleshed out additional details with Rachel last night.

In case you haven't seen the damaging quote itself, Romney, talking casually to some wealthy supporters, presented this argument:

    "There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what.... These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn't connect. So he'll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean, that's what they sell every four years. And so my job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

The Romney campaign does not deny the legitimacy of the video or the accuracy of the quote.

Presidential candidates can get away with quite a bit during a campaign, but when a multi-millionaire talks trash about half the country while hobnobbing with other multi-millionaires, it's safe to say that candidate has a rather dramatic problem on his hands. Indeed, keep in mind, this wasn't a gaffe or an accident -- this was Romney speaking his mind in ways we don't usually see.

As this relates to tax policy, it's true that nearly half the country has no federal income tax burden (though they pay plenty of other taxes). But while Romney sees this 47 percent of Americans as lazy moochers who refuse to "take personal responsibility," the truth is we're talking about millions of seniors who've left the workforce, Americans with disabilities who can't work, students who have not yet entered the workforce, millions of low-income families, and middle-class families who take advantage of tax credits Republicans have traditionally supported.

In other words, Romney is not only expressing contempt for nearly half of the American population, he doesn't even seem to understand those he's condemning. On the contrary, the Republican candidate seems to believe these Americans are indolent schemers trying to get away with something, which is demonstrably ridiculous.

For that matter, Romney doesn't even understand the politics of the issue. In his mind, all of these people are Obama supporters, which doesn't even make any sense.

But what makes this scandal so devastating is the scope of the offense.

Romney accuses Obama of being divisive, especially when it comes to class, but here's a video of Romney castigating nearly half the country based on class. Romney's rhetoric says he wants to bring people together, but the clip shows him saying he considers it his job "not to worry about those people."

And for my money, the most damaging phrase of all is, "I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility." Half the country, in Romney's eyes, is made up of slothful and pathetic losers.

As Jim Messina, the campaign manager for Obama for America, put it, "It's hard to serve as president for all Americans when you've disdainfully written off half the nation."
It's also worth keeping in mind that Romney has been accused of going years without paying federal income taxes himself -- a charge that, if true, would put him in this lazy 47 percent himself. We don't know for sure, however, if the allegations are accurate because Romney refuses to release his tax returns.

[doison]

Romney is 100% correct...about half of the people in this country don't pay income taxes and they've been bred to look at government as the solution to problems they should be looking to fix themselves.  For them governemnt aid isn't the "safety net" it should be, it's a nice warm blanket that they wrap themselves to fend off cold reality...

Yup

[Benny B]

Romney is 100% correct...about half of the people in this country don't pay income taxes and they've been bred to look at government as the solution to problems they should be looking to fix themselves.  For them governemnt aid isn't the "safety net" it should be, it's a nice warm blanket that they wrap themselves to fend off cold reality...

lol

"Who are these freeloaders? Is it the Iraq war veteran who goes to the V.A.? Is it the student getting a loan to go to college? Is it the retiree on Social Security or Medicare?"

"As Jim Messina, the campaign manager for Obama for America, put it, "It's hard to serve as president for all Americans when you've disdainfully written off half the nation."

[Hulkotron]

"Willard" and "Mitt" are very strange names, I would never saddle my child with such a thing.

[wild willie]

I would never name my child Barack "Hussein"!!!!!!

[Benny B]

Romney’s theory of the “taker class,” and why it matters
By Ezra Klein , Updated: September 17, 2012

“My job is not to worry about those people,” Mitt Romney said of the 47 percent of Americans who are likely to vote for Barack Obama. “I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

There will be plenty said about the politics of Romney’s remarks. But I want to take a moment and talk about the larger argument behind them, because this vision of a society divided between “makers” and “takers” is core to the Republican nominee’s policy agenda.

In his comments, Romney says that “these are people who pay no income tax,” but they are people “who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it.”

In other words, Romney is arguing that about 47 percent of the country is a “taker class” that pays little or nothing into the federal government but wants to tax the productive classes for free health care, food, housing, etc.

Romney is not alone in this concern. “We’re dismayed at the injustice that nearly half of all Americans don’t even pay any income tax,” Texas Gov. Rick Perry said when he began his presidential campaign. “We’re coming close to a tipping point in America where we might have a net majority of takers versus makers in society,” Rep. Paul Ryan said at the Heritage Foundation. “People who pay nothing can easily forget the idea that there is no such thing as a free lunch,” warned Rep. Michelle Bachmann.

For what it’s worth, this division of “makers” and “takers” isn’t true. Among the Americans who paid no federal income taxes in 2011, 61 percent paid payroll taxes — which means they have jobs and, when you account for both sides of the payroll tax, they paid 15.3 percent of their income in taxes, which is higher than the 13.9 percent that Romney paid. Another 22 percent were elderly.

So 83 percent of those not paying federal income taxes are either working and paying payroll taxes or they’re elderly and Romney is promising to protect their benefits because they’ve earned them. The remainder, by and large, aren’t paying federal income or payroll taxes because they’re unemployed. But that’s a small fraction of the country.

Behind this argument, however, is a very clever policy two-step that’s less about who pays taxes now and more about who is going to pay to reduce the deficit in the coming years. Here’s how it works.

Part of the reason so many Americans don’t pay federal income taxes is that Republicans have passed a series of very large tax cuts that wiped out the income-tax liability for many Americans. That’s why, when you look at graphs of the percent of Americans who don’t pay income taxes, you see huge jumps after Ronald Reagan’s 1986 tax reform and George W. Bush’s 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. So whenever you hear that half of Americans don’t pay federal income taxes, remember: Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush helped build that. (You also see a jump after the financial crisis begins in 2008, but we can expect that to be mostly temporary.)

Some of those tax cuts for the poor were there to make the tax cuts for the rich more politically palatable. “Do you think we wanted to include a welfare payment to people who don’t pay taxes and call it a tax cut?” A top Bush administration official once asked me. “No. But that’s what we needed to do to get it done.”

But now that those tax cuts have passed and many fewer Americans are paying federal income taxes and the rich are paying a much higher percentage of federal income taxes, Republicans are arguing that these Americans they have helped free from income taxes have become a dependent and destabilizing “taker” class who want to hike taxes on the rich in order to purchase more social services for themselves. The antidote, as you can see in both Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney’s policy platforms, is to further cut taxes on “job creators” while cutting the social services that these takers depend on. That way, you roll the takers out of what Ryan calls “the hammock” of government and you unleash the makers to create jobs and opportunities.

So notice what happened here: Republicans have become outraged over the predictable effect of tax cuts they passed and are using that outrage as the justification for an agenda that further cuts taxes on the rich and pays for it by cutting social services for the non-rich.

That’s why Romney’s theory here is more than merely impolitic. It’s actually core to his economic agenda.

[bike nut]

Anything to change the subject from Obama's piss poor performance.

The Muslim religion is declaring WW III on the U.S. while the Obama administration sympathizes with them. Romney is 100% correct.....stop all forms of affirmative action and let the Bunny B's (Alex23) of the world fend for themselves against the evil white man that supports them.

[flipper5470]

OK Benny...let's raise the tax rates so the bottom earners pay more.  The top end rates are fine..those people are paying the vast majority of the taxes now.  But you're right, lowering taxes on the bottom earners created this situation.  We need to raise the taxes of those 47% that are "free-riders"

[bike nut]

OK Benny...let's raise the tax rates so the bottom earners pay more.  The top end rates are fine..those people are paying the vast majority of the taxes now.  But you're right, lowering taxes on the bottom earners created this situation.  We need to raise the taxes of those 47% that are "free-riders"

Stop the handouts and the tax revenue issue goes away. To collect welfare you have to do 40 hrs of public service work per week, and submit to a piss test for drugs.

You watch how quick the dark tint leeches find work.

[Heywood]

The 1040 has exemptions, credits and deductions built in that decide who shall pay and who shall not.

The retired couple living in a nursing home on Social Security don't pay income taxes, even if they are middle class.  Exemptions, medical deductions, etc, preclude them from paying. 

They were voting for Romney.  Now, I don't know. 

Romney evidently lacks a "filter" of what NOT to say.

[Coach is Back!]

He's right Benny...100% right.


Yet another Benny backfire..hahaha.

[Soul Crusher]

David Brooks?   He is the guilt ridden white panzie who thought ghettobama was going to be a good potus based on the crease in his pants. 


FAIL

[SF1900]

But War Veterans receive FREE services from Veteran Affair Hospitals all the time. I guess we should just cut these freeloaders off, huh? Do you realize how many veterans rely on government help? Why should they? They did their time. They got paid to be in the military while they were serving their country. Why should they continue to reap the benefits? They are not fighting for our country any more. They got paid for their duty.

I obviously do not believe this to be true. But do you see how ridiculous his statement is? Romney is speaking from someone who was born into money. In order to say a statement like he did, you really need to study ALL the facts. To really understand social conditions, etc. I am not saying that people don't use the government. Of course they do (unfortunately). But saying that people are just lazy is not a thought out comment.

Then again, I know absolutely nothing about politics, so I may be way off.

[Coach is Back!]

But War Veterans receive FREE services from Veteran Affair Hospitals all the time. I guess we should just cut these freeloaders off, huh? Do you realize how many veterans rely on government help? Why should they? They did their time. They got paid to be in the military while they were serving their country. Why should they continue to reap the benefits? They are not fighting for our country any more. They got paid for their duty.

I obviously do not believe this to be true. But do you see how ridiculous his statement is? Romney is speaking from someone who was born into money. In order to say a statement like he did, you really need to study ALL the facts. To really understand social conditions, etc. I am not saying that people don't use the government. Of course they do (unfortunately). But saying that people are just lazy is not a thought out comment.

Veterans earned it, they should be entitled to it and I have no problem for it. It's the ones who milk the system that think THEY'RE the ones entitled. People like Tbombz. When I was watching that car chase last week where the bank robber was throwing money out the window and all of those "people" were running out to pick up off the ground like they deserved it, in front of pile of shit of a house was a damn near brand new Benz. White people don't drive cars like that in neighborhoods like that. Makes me wonder how in the fuck they got a car like that. Point being is, they can drive a car like but at 11:00am when most are working, they're stealing......THAT"s your typical Obama supporter. Romney is 100000% correct.

[SF1900]

Veterans earned it, they should be entitled to it and I have no problem for it. It's the ones who milk the system that think THEY'RE the ones entitled. People like Tbombz. When I was watching that car chase last week where the bank robber was throwing money out the window and all of those "people" were running out to pick up off the ground like they deserved it, in front of pile of shit of a house was a damn near brand new Benz. White people don't drive cars like that in neighborhoods like that. Makes me wonder how in the fuck they got a car like that. Point being is, they can drive a car like but at 11:00am when most are working, they're stealing......THAT"s your typical Obama supporter. Romney is 100000% correct.

Yes, but dont republicans also want to cut out pensions? People work 30+ years in a job to get their pensions. Just like military personnel earned free services from the VA, people earn pensions from their jobs.

[Soul Crusher]

Yes, but dont republicans also want to cut out pensions? People work 30+ years in a job to get their pensions. Just like military personnel earned free services from the VA, people earn pensions from their jobs.

Defined benefit Pensions are ponzi scams and unless curtailed are going to implode.   

[240 is Back]

Veterans earned it, they should be entitled to it and I have no problem for it. It's the ones who milk the system that think THEY'RE the ones entitled. P

Romney should have clarified this.  He didn't.   He said 47% of people don't pay taxes and always vote obama.  The truth is that 46.4% of people don't pay taxes (Romney is right about this part) - BUT this group also include the retired and military.  It's a big deal to overlook these two key groups which vote republican in a big way. 

He should clarify. 

[SF1900]

Defined benefit Pensions are ponzi scams and unless curtailed are going to implode.   

Yes, but they earned it, just like military personnel earned their free services at the VA. Can you imagine the billions of dollars that would be saved if we got rid of all VA's?

[Soul Crusher]

Romney should have clarified this.  He didn't.   He said 47% of people don't pay taxes and always vote obama.  The truth is that 46.4% of people don't pay taxes (Romney is right about this part) - BUT this group also include the retired and military.  It's a big deal to overlook these two key groups which vote republican in a big way. 

He should clarify. 

What did i tell you two years ago about obama's voting base?  % and make up?  

Was I wrong or right?  

[Necrosis]

Veterans earned it, they should be entitled to it and I have no problem for it. It's the ones who milk the system that think THEY'RE the ones entitled. People like Tbombz. When I was watching that car chase last week where the bank robber was throwing money out the window and all of those "people" were running out to pick up off the ground like they deserved it, in front of pile of shit of a house was a damn near brand new Benz. White people don't drive cars like that in neighborhoods like that. Makes me wonder how in the fuck they got a car like that. Point being is, they can drive a car like but at 11:00am when most are working, they're stealing......THAT"s your typical Obama supporter. Romney is 100000% correct.

how do you explain the fact that red states receive more welfare and pay less taxes?

he is not correct, he is blatantly wrong, no 47% of people are not dependent on the government, no 47% are not free loaders and no not 100% of that 47% are liberal.

fucktard.

[240 is Back]

What did i tell you two years ago about obama's voting base?  % and make up? 

Was I wrong or right? 

You said he had a base of 47%  -  correct.
Romney said this base of 47% doesn't pay taxes.   INCORRECT.

Many of the 47% that don't pay taxes are retired & military - very much republican voters.

Romney didn't have it right here.  Sorry, you did, but he did not.