Archive for the ‘Herman Cain’ Category

OUR UN-PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES

Friday, October 28th, 2011
The Wall Street Journal

  • OCTOBER 27, 2011, 4:37 P.M. ET

Michael Vick went to prison for staging dogfights, but for presidential debates, it’s legal.

  • By DANIEL HENNINGER

    Politics, like any guilty pleasure, breeds nightmares. One of late is that we’ll soon elect an American president based mostly on what people know from reading Yahoo! headlines and the three lines below them.

    The nightmare got worse. The Yahoo! headlines started to look like a deep dive after Twitter’s 140-character tweets started to define the political debate.

    This being politics, it got worse yet. After watching umpteen debates, it looks as if the Republican Party may choose someone to run for the presidency of the United States based on who can explain the world and all its troubles in 30 seconds.

    The TV debates create buzz and interest, and that’s good. But most people don’t eat seven appetizers and call it a meal. The debates are producing half-baked versions of candidates running for the presidency.

    WL1027

    Chad Crowe

    Did I say candidates? I misspoke. The U.S. has a long tradition of fringe candidates like Dennis Kucinich or Ron Paul, but no previous system forced us to endure them once the laughing stopped. Two debates ago, I started surfing over to ESPN whenever Ron Paul talks. Yeah, let Iran have its own bomb. (more…)

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    LOSING THE ECONOMIC BATTLE

    Wednesday, October 26th, 2011
    Published on The Weekly Standard (www.weeklystandard.com)

    The global debt apocalypse approaches.

    David M. Smick

    October 31, 2011, Vol. 17, No. 07

    On the issue of public debt, Washington is experiencing what psychologists call “learned helplessness.” The financial news is so relentlessly terrible that people have become numb to it and assume nothing can be done to regain control over our fate.

    Today the world’s public and private debt exceeds an incredible 300 percent of GDP. We are at risk of succumbing to an ugly, downward, global mark-to-market in asset prices. Yet the discussion in Washington fails to reflect the immensity of the threat.

    Some money managers have a theory that this mark-to-market process has been under way for some time. Stage One was the 1990s Asian crisis. Global financial markets concluded that Asia’s debt was dangerously high and its banks’ balance sheets not reflective of reality. Global traders pounced. Interest rates soared, equity markets plummeted, banks failed, and currencies collapsed.

    Stage Two is happening in Europe today.

    Stage Three will eventually hit the United States. Washington policy-makers seem confident America’s public debt risk is years away. They believe that the U.S. economy, with the dollar the reserve currency, enjoys some immunity from these concerns. The central bank, moreover, can buy bonds to keep interest rates from rising in response to growing debt. Yet these are risky assumptions. (more…)

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    STEVE FORBES – THE FLAT TAX

    Monday, October 24th, 2011
    Updated: Sun., Oct. 23, 2011,  home

    Feeling flat

    By STEVE FORBES

    Last Updated: 12:27 PM, October 23, 2011

    The nightmare on Main Street — the federal income tax code — is ending, which is fantastic news for our beleaguered economy. Dramatically simplifying this monstrosity would unleash a powerful wave of prosperity and job creation.

    Thankfully in 2012 we will get a mandate to make this happen. Presidential contender Herman Cain vaulted to the head of the Republican pack when he proposed his 9-9-9 plan — a flat 9% income tax, corporate tax and national sales tax. Even better, Texas Gov. Rick Perry will, in a few days, unveil his version of a flat tax, a concept that I have long advocated.

    To put things in perspective: Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, which defined the character of the American nation, is only 272 words; the Declaration of Independence, 1,500 words; the Constitution with all its amendments, 7,200 words; and the Bible, which took centuries to put together, 773,000.

    The federal income tax code and all its attendant rules and regulations — almost 10 million words and rising.

    The code has been changed 14,000 times since 1986; last year alone there were 500 changes. The cost of compliance is horrific. The IRS itself calculates that we spend more than 6 billion hours a year filling out tax forms, the equivalent of almost 3 million full-time jobs. The Tax Foundation calculates that by 2015 annual compliance will be costing the American people some $483 billion a year. (more…)

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    ART LAFFER: CAIN’S 999 PLAN

    Saturday, October 22nd, 2011
    The Wall Street Journal

    • OCTOBER 19, 2011

    Cain’s Stimulating ‘9-9-9’ Tax Reform

    A new sales tax could be raised in the future—but so can any other tax. And the low marginal rates would jump-start the economy.

    It used to be that the sole purpose of the tax code was to raise the necessary funds to run government. But in today’s world the tax mandate has many more facets. These include income redistribution, encouraging favored industries, and discouraging unfavorable behavior.

    To make matters worse there are millions and millions of taxpayers who are highly motivated to reduce their tax liabilities. And, as those taxpayers finagle and connive to find ways around the tax code, government responds by propagating new rules, new interpretations of the code, and new taxes in a never-ending chase. In the process, we create ever-more arcane tax codes that do a poor job of achieving any of their mandates.

    Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain’s now famous “9-9-9” plan is his explicit proposal to right the wrongs of our federal tax code. He proposes a 9% flat-rate personal income tax with no deductions except for donations to charity; a 9% flat-rate tax on net business profits; and a new 9% national tax on retail sales.

    Mr. Cain’s 9-9-9 plan was designed to be what economists call “static revenue neutral,” which means that if people didn’t change what they do under his plan, total tax revenues would be the same as they are under our current tax code. I believe his plan would indeed be static revenue neutral, and with the boost it would give to economic growth it would bring in even more revenue than expected. (more…)

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    VIDEO – HERMAN CAIN – LIBERALS’ GOAL IS TO DESTROY THIS COUNTRY

    Monday, October 17th, 2011

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    THE GOP’S SOLYNDRA PROBLEM

    Saturday, October 15th, 2011
    The Wall Street Journal

    • OCTOBER 14, 2011, 9:17 A.M. ET

    Republicans have their own green baggage.

    • By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL

    • On Friday Rick Perry delivers his first major policy address, unveiling an aggressive energy and jobs plan. It will no doubt be good. It will no doubt address serious problems. It will no doubt be ignored.

    That’s because, unfortunately for Mr. Perry, drilling isn’t the energy topic du jour. The buzz is the bankrupt Solyndra, which is why the only energy question that came to Mr. Perry at Tuesday’s New Hampshire debate was this: How, exactly, is his state’s vaunted “Emerging Technology Fund”—which has dumped some 200 million taxpayer dollars into private companies—any different from Obama programs that subsidized the likes of Solyndra?

    It isn’t, of course, and that’s a problem for Mr. Perry. The political merit of Solyndra is that it perfectly illustrates the failed Obama economic mentality—that politicians should allocate capital, that government creates industries. Nothing should be further from a free-market mentality, and Solyndra ought to be providing Republicans a potent contrast with the president. Instead, candidates like Mr. Perry and Mitt Romney are dragging green baggage.

    Congressional Republicans are now investigating the solar panels out of Solyndra, and rightly so. But no one should forget it was Republicans who in 2005 created the loan program that Mr. Obama would later expropriate to funnel stimulus dollars to his green boondoggles. This was the height of the Bush-era spending craze, when the GOP had come to see green energy as a slick way to funnel yet more pork (ethanol, nuclear, wood chips) to their states. As a side benefit, it offered cover against charges that Republicans were stooges of Big Oil.

    Where the handouts really got rolling was at the state level. It used to be that Republican governors competed for business by lowering taxes and regulations. Then some genius worked out that it was easier to flat-out bribe companies to relocate by offering cold, hard taxpayer cash. And with green energy all the rage, a lot of state tax dollars Enlarge Image

    PW1014

    Associated PressTexas Gov. Rick Perry

    (more…)

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    THE UNSINKABLE MITT ROMNEY

    Saturday, October 15th, 2011
    The Wall Street Journal

    • OCTOBER 13, 2011

    This candidate will have to be pushed a lot harder to make him a good president.

    • By DANIEL HENNINGER

    • Watching Rick Perry in the Republican debate at Dartmouth say that the answer to every aspect of economic revival is to “get our energy industry back to work,” and watching Herman Cain say that the answer to virtually anything is “my 9-9-9 plan,” one’s thoughts of course turned to John Belushi’s immortal Greek diner owner, Pete Dionasopolis, who defined his world in three words: “Cheeseburger! Cheeseburger! Cheeseburger!”

    Perhaps destiny brought these GOP candidates to Dartmouth. After the debate, Gov. Perry attended a Dartmouth frat party. A Dartmouth fraternity was of course the inspiration for “Animal House,” an apt metaphor for the GOP nomination process.

    Newt Gingrich’s variation on cheeseburger is to repeatedly attack Ben Bernanke. This is slightly weird, but the former House Speaker apparently has decided that if he talks too much about Washington, he’ll be fingered as one of them. So his strategy is attacking the Fed.

    WL1013

    Associated PressPolling in the low 20s, Mr. Romney gives new meaning to front-runner.

    (more…)

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    NATIONAL FEDERATION OF REPUBLICAN WOMEN’S CONVENTION IN KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI, ON SEPT 30 – OCT 2, 2011

    Wednesday, October 12th, 2011

    Herman Cain, Presidential Candidate speaking at the convention

    Rick Santorum, Presidential Candidate, speaking at the convention

    Newt Gingrich, Presidential Candidate,  speaking at the convention

    Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker Speaking at the Convention

    Arizona Governor Jan Brewer was a guest speaker at the convention

    Sue Lynch, President, National Federation of Republican Women

    Dena Barnes, President, North Carolina Federation of Republican Women and winner of the Ronald Reagan Leadership Award

    Sue Lynch, Governor Scott Walker, and Dena Barnes

    Valerie White, Theresa Esposito and General Al Esposito, Ret. Air Force

    North Carolina Delegation to the convention - Martha Jenkins, Lind Petrou, Nancy Clark, Rachel Orstad, Ceil Wasserman, Zan Bunn, Pat Smith, Ann Huggins, Brenda Formo, Cornelia Groce, Pat Bryan (sitting) and Mary Frances ForresterJamie Sawyer, Vicky Born and Kitty Staskelunas, Republican Women of Pitt County, NC

    Rachel Orstad, President, Chapel Hill Republican Women, NC, and Zan Bunn, Wake Republican Women and NCFRW Capital Region VP

    Rick Santorum and Debbie Wall, San Antonio, Texas

    Newt Gingrich and his wife, Callista, at a book signing

    Rachel Orstad, and Nancy Clark, Chapel Hill Republican Women

    Sandye Kading of Rapid City, South Dakota and Susan Pisani of Spearfish, South Dakota

    Sylvia Morales of Oklahoma City, OklahomaSylvia Morales of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

    Pat Smith, Anne Huggins, Cornelia Groce, Mary Frances Forrester Zan Bunn, Cornelia Groce, Rachel Orstad, Linda Arnold, Nancy Clark and Matt Arnold at Jack Stack BBQ

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    THE VERY DIFFERENT LIFE LESSONS OF OBAMA AND HERMAN CAIN

    Wednesday, October 12th, 2011
    Published on The Weekly Standard (www.weeklystandard.com)

    Raising Cain

    The very different life lessons of the president and his challenger.

    Fred Barnes

    October 10, 2011, Vol. 17, No. 04

    Both President Obama and Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain went to graduate school. Obama got a degree at Harvard Law School. Cain did his graduate work at Purdue and Burger King University. That doesn’t tell you all you need to know about the difference between Obama and Cain, but it explains a lot.

    Obama and Cain are African Americans, but there the likeness ends. Obama is a liberal, Cain a conservative. Their parents, their upbringing, their education, their careers, the lessons they learned from life—these are as dissimilar as where they’ve wound up, Obama in the White House and Cain as a successful corporate executive.

    Until recent months, there was no reason to consider the contrast between the two. But now Obama’s presidency is crumbling. His reelection in 2012 is in jeopardy. The economy is weak, and Americans disapprove of his handling of it by a two-to-one margin. Even in the Democrat-controlled Senate, there aren’t enough votes to pass his new jobs bill.

    Cain’s campaign is surging. After strong performances in four nationally televised Republican debates last month, he jumped into third place in the GOP race in a Fox News poll at 17 percent, close behind Rick Perry (19 percent) and Mitt Romney (23 percent). A Rasmussen poll of likely voters in late September found Cain trailing Obama, 39 percent to 34 percent. (more…)

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    HOW TV DEBATES HAVE CHANGED THE RACE

    Tuesday, October 11th, 2011
    The Wall Street Journal

    • OCTOBER 9, 2011, 8:27 P.M. ET

    The also-rans get free publicity and have no incentive to drop out. Meanwhile the media pits all candidates against each other, giving Obama a pass.

    Neither fund raising nor the building of grass-roots organizations in key primary states is driving the Republican presidential race. Endorsements haven’t mattered much either. Stump speeches have been of minimal importance. And policy papers—such as former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s 59-point economic plan or ex-Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman’s proposal for tax rate cuts—have been largely overlooked.

    By far the biggest influence on the Republican contest has been the series of nationally televised debates. There have been more debates than ever—six so far—and they have attracted record audiences. The most recent debate on Sept. 22 on Fox News drew more than six million TV viewers, plus another six million watching on streaming video.

    The debates have overwhelmed the Republican race. “They are about all there’s been to the campaign,” says Fox political commentator Brit Hume. After each debate the campaign has been frozen until the next one, except for arguments over issues spawned by the debates themselves.

    barnes

    Associated PressFrom the left, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, Ron Paul, Herman Cain and Jon Huntsman before the debate at the Reagan Library, Sept. 7

    (more…)

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