* Do you really want to go back in a Republican time machine and revisit the Bush years of Wall Street hanky panky, losses to retirement funds, and massive tax breaks for the rich and outsourcers? I don't.
The Republicans have released their agenda and now we have an idea what would happen if (a) Republican Steve Stivers, a former bank lobbyist, won the election in Ohio's 15th congressional district, and (b) Republicans gained control of the House and the Senate.
We know that Stivers has stated his individual goals:
1. Repeal the health care reform bill
2. Repeal the 16th Amendment to the Constitution
3. Repeal the 17th Amendment to the Constitution
4. Eliminate the Department of Agriculture
5. Eliminate the Department of Education
6. Eliminate the Department of the Interior
7. Eliminate the Department of Housing of and Urban Development
8. Eliminate the Department of Transportation
9. Eliminate the Department of Energy
Add that to what the Republicans released today, and we'd be looking at a complete disaster for average, hardworking citizens.
What is the Republican plan? I'm so glad you asked!!!!
Brad Bauman has provided highlights from the new Republican plan:
The 21 page "Pledge to America", which outlines Republican plans for America's future contains the following:
* Tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires by borrowing $700 billion we can't afford.
* Tax hikes for 110 million middle class families and millions of small businesses.
* Cutting rules and oversight for special interests like big oil, big insurance, credit card and mortgage companies, and Wall Street banks.
* Doing nothing to stop the outsourcing of American jobs or to end tax breaks that are given to companies that ship jobs overseas....
This Republican plan would add trillions and trillions of dollars to the national debt...
So while Steve Stivers talks out of one side of his mouth about how the national debt impacts his family, he talks out of the other side of his mouth about how the rich need more tax cuts, how we must end regulations for his special interests (banks, oil, insurance, finance, mining, major polluters), how Wall Street reform should end, and, most importantly, businesses should be able to do whatever they want to make a profit.
The Republican candidates in Ohio have been compared to being like Gordon Gekko in this piece from Andy Richards:
Some of you may remember Gordon Gekko, the unscrupulous Wall Street trader from the 1987 Academy Award-winning film “Wall Street.” Gekko—played by Michael Douglas and returning this Friday in a new sequel “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”—uses unethical and deceitful tactics to amass an immense amount of wealth on the backs of working families. “Greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works,”[1] says Gekko, a phrase that has become part of popular usage.
Flash forward more than 20 years and you can see the spirit of Gordon Gekko channeled by candidates right here in Ohio. These Wall Street cheerleaders—John Kasich, Rob Portman, Steve Chabot, Tom Ganley, Bob Gibbs, Jim Renacci and Steve Stivers—have voting records that would make Gekko drool. Whether it’s direct ties to corrupt Wall Street corporations, taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions from Wall Street firms or general unethical and greedy business practices, these candidates rightfully earn the title of Gordon Gekkos of Ohio....
Check out the rest of the lowdown on Kasich, Portman, Chabot, Ganley, Gibbs, Renacci, and Stivers at this LINK.
> Here is one last thing to think about that I found in a comment written by Ohiodem1 in August at Dailykos:
The Federal debt doubled under the Bush/Cheney administration's watch. I will say that again, the Federal debt doubled in the 8 years of the Bush/Cheney administration's watch. When Bush took office, the national debt was $5.727 Trillion. When Barack Obama took office, 8 years later, the national debt was $10.62 trillion. This is a fact. There is no dispute that this is the case.
(You might want to e-mail the previous paragraph to Stivers and the rest of the Republicans who blame the debt on President Obama.)
I do not want to revisit the mess of the Bush years on the Republican time machine. We need to tell the Republicans that we've been where they want to take us, and we are not going back there again.