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Monday, August 13, 2012

Media Paul Ryan Isn't an Activist?

Posted by Charles Mudede on Mon, Aug 13, 2012 at 2:45 PM

Rep. Paul Ryan was met by a small group of hecklers Monday when he tried to deliver a speech during his much-anticipated first solo stop since becoming Mitt Romney's running mate.

Speaking to a crowd from the soap box at the Iowa State Fair, Ryan had his remarks disrupted by activists, one relentlessly shouting "Stop the war on the middle class."

Activists? Defending the middle class? Not the poor, not the homeless, not immigrants. The middle class. And what is Ryan? He is as radical as they get. In fact, a person on the left who is as far from the "center" as Ryan is, wouldn't have a chance at becoming a running mate for the highest office in the nation. Imagine that! The defenders of the middle class are activists.

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Imagine Barney Frank running with Obama. That would get my vote.

Posted by watchout5

on August 13, 2012 at 3:25 PM

"Activism" appears to be keeping pace with "active" when it comes to lowering the bar for American lifestyles.

"Oh, yeah, no, I'm definitely not sedentary. Yesterday I walked around the corner to the Subway for lunch. I'm a pretty active person, really. I also, like, registered to vote, so I'm pretty active politically, too, I think."

Posted by balderdash

on August 13, 2012 at 3:41 PM

Black has become white, up is now down, war is peace, freedom is not to be trusted to the citizens, the market is social security, big government is small government, increased military spending is austerity, ...

Posted by treacle on August 13, 2012 at 4:34 PM

No op you are wrong. Perhaps you've heard of fascists? They are the radicals on the far right, just as you are on the far left. Thankfully neither of you has much chance of being nominated, because people know just how ruinous these ideologies are.

Ryan is quite conservative, which is different than a fascist, and Biden is quite liberal, which is different than a Marxist.

I know your ideology blinds you to all this...just as it would a neo-Nazi.

Posted by ryanmm on August 13, 2012 at 5:28 PM

It's pretty clear Obama is going to have give Biden the bum's rush.

Posted by Supreme Ruler Of The Universe

on August 13, 2012 at 8:01 PM

@4, you're setting this up as if it's a definitive one-dimensional spectrum, and you're just wrong.

Fascism is strong authoritarianism, but it's not really particular about the social policies it dictates, only that they're absolute and mandatory and stringently enforced. It's not really compatible with Ryan's laissez-faire, Objectivist positions. In fact, in many ways it's directly opposed. It's only by convention and the long association of certain terms with positions that have changed substantially over the course of decades that fascism and deregulationist capitalism have been lumped together as "conservative." You can see this fracture line quite clearly in the current divide between the teabaggers and the old-money rich white guys who run the Republican institution.

You also don't know what "Marxist" means. Go read something.

Posted by balderdash

on August 13, 2012 at 10:20 PM