Ward on Words

It was a convention that began in turmoil, disrupted as it was, by an act of God named Isaac. An association with a hurricane was likely not what the Republicans were looking for. There were too many voices from the GOP base pointing the finger of blame at godless NOLA after Katrina hit. GOP president, GW Bush, was on vacation when Katrina hit. (He loved his vacations! Oh God how GW Bush loved his vacations!) When the President finally showed up to see the devastation wrought by Katrina, he assured the nation that Brownie was doing one "heck of a job," leaving much of the nation outside of his administration scratching their heads about his ability to process critical information about the worst national disaster to hit our shores. So beginning the 2012 Republican National Convention under the gloomy God-forsaken, storm-tossed skies brought by Hurricane Isaac was off-script indeed. (Making some wonder, what, exactly, was God trying to say to the GOP by sending Isaa...

Peggy Noonan has written some wonderful speeches in her day, but her columns in the WSJ are so married to ideology as to be fiction, rather than commentary. Here I express my alarm that such a prominent conservative voice pointed the finger of blame for the BP oil spill at Obama, instead of at BP, the hugely profitable, multi-national corporation that made the error-ridden business decisions leading up to the spill. Today, Noonan's word of the day is " unsustainable ." "The American establishment, on both sides of the political divide, is admitting as never before that we are in an existential challenge. And this is progress. It was not always so! It wasn't so two years ago." As Noonan acknowledges, many Americans outside of the "American establishment" recognized back in 2008 that it was time for a change - that the challenges facing America were severe, painful and absolutely needed to be addressed. That it's taken the "establishmen...

[ Yes, there is the intentional hint of Ayn Rand in the headline, for those who are wondering. Because why not evoke John Galt when talking of Paul Ryan?]  But it's a fair question to ask - this "who is Paul Ryan" question, since he seems to have seized control of the GOP's platform of late. He's so out in front of the curve that Newt Gingrich, a man who aspires to be the GOP nominee for president, slammed Ryan's Medicare reform plan, which has been adopted by the GOP-dominated House. Referring to the Ryan plan, Gingrich said he was "against a conservative imposing radical change." [ Why do I believe that Newt's campaign is not long for this world? ] A Product of America's Dairyland What we know about Ryan: that he comes from Wisconsin - a Midwestern state with an economy that wears its cheesehead proudly. Yes, there's a mix of agricultural, industrial and dairy in its economy, but Wisconsin brands itself as "America's D...

Lots of hullabaloo over Paul Ryan's op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal, you know, the one with the headline that reads: The GOP Path to Prosperity. Given how devoted the GOP is to their very rich base, I shudder to think about how they define prosperity. And since their path prior to this has led to much of the nation being placed on rickety life boats in danger of being swamped by the wake of the big yacht sailing majestically away on rising tides, I don't have much hope this path will be built for the likes of me. But the scariest sentence ever seen in the WSJ is not found in Ryan's op-ed piece. Doesn't mean his piece isn't scary - it's actually very scary to think we will get rid of this massive post-recession deficit by apparently gutting Medicare for those of us not old enough to need it right now.   [Can we really say, as Ryan does, that Medicare has a flawed incentive structure that "rewards states for adding to the rolls?" Or are sta...