'MDA' ('My Darling Ann' for newcomers to this blog unaware of my deep and on-going passion for all things Ann Coulter) makes us (or me, at any rate) look at presidential candidate Mitt Romney in a new light:
Any Republican governor of a blue [= Democrat, for my Brit readers] state who manages to balance the budget without raising taxes should be a nominee for Mount Rushmore, to say nothing of president.
Mitt Romney was governor of a state so blue, it's North Korea with more Irish people, and he balanced the budget without raising taxes.
"it's North Korea with more Irish people" - oh God! that is the most perfect summation of Massachusetts I have ever read, wish I had thought of it first! Anyway, Romney somehow became Governor and did what it said on his tin, he balanced the budget every single year he was in office, and, when he departed he left the State's emergency fund over triple the size of the one he inherited. He did all this without cutting income taxes! As 'MDA' points out, he failed to cut them because he couldn't:
And yet, Romney balanced Massachusetts' budget each year he was in office and left the state with a surplus, without raising taxes. To the contrary, every single budget Romney submitted included income tax cuts -- all of which were rejected by the 85-percent Democratic Legislature. (The last time Massachusetts legislators approved an income tax cut was when it was attached to a bill raising their own salaries by 55 percent.) [My emphasis]
As she reminds us, Romney's 200-seat legislature in Massachusetts had only 29 Republicans! He achieved these remarkable, against-the-odds results by doing it the hard way, what Arthur Laffer, Reagan's economics guru, called the "green-eyeshade" budget way in which you spend many, many long hours going through budgets line by line slashing, cutting or trimming. That is what Romney did in Massachusetts and in the circumstances I would describe it as 'heroic'!
I confess that I have found Romney a rather dull, almost mechanical, candidate. How much more exciting it would have been if 'MDS' (My Darling Sarah) had been running! But that was not to be and now it looks as though Romney is the man. I have said before, and being prone to the old man's habit of repitition I shall say it again, don't pay too much attention to what a man says but watch like a hawk the things he does or has done!
As a post-script it is worth noting that 'MDA' tells us that :
his successor, Deval Patrick, Democrat and friend of Obama, with a "rainy day fund" of $2.1 billion, more than tripled from $640 million when Romney took office. (Of course, as soon as Romney was gone, Patrick raided the rainy day fund, increased government spending and raised taxes.)
Why am I not surprised? Read her article, it's a breeze!
"But that was not to be and now it looks as though Romney is the man."
Surprised to see ol' JK coming in to spray a little water on your's and YDA's camp-fire prognosticatin' David? No. I suppose not:
http://www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/from-different-angles-romney-and-the-primary-vote/
Massachusetts does not a Nation make.
Posted by: JK | Wednesday, 28 March 2012 at 19:17
Not enough water?
Well then. Piss on it!
http://www.people-press.org/2012/03/22/top-one-word-reactions-to-gop-candidates/
Posted by: JK | Wednesday, 28 March 2012 at 19:52