Obama has had three years to lay out a plan and hasnt done it!

ss,

President Obama has presented his plan to Congress (in person) three times. The entire nation has heard his plan many times as he has traveled to several States to reiterate parts of the plan.

ssmike

George W. Bush, who added just 1 million jobs in eight years. Bush had the the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records. And this is all before the 2008 Financial Meltdown.

I know we are not supposed to talk about Bush anymore because he's the past (thank God) but explain to me why are the Republicans picking Romney as someone who they feel is going to fix this??? 1) Romney failed in Mass - actually did so bad that he was 47 out of 50, and 2)he keeps vowing to go back to Bush-like policies????

Baylie are you at all familiar with the state of Ma?

ssmike-

Romney didn't raise taxes in MA, but he sure did raise fees. He also decreaseed Spendig to the cities and towns, who in turn raised property taxes torecord levels. There was also a Capital Gains Tax enacted prior to his election that went into effect during his term that helped balance the budget.

Overall, taxes increased for the residents of Massachusetts under Mitt Romney, who had a dismal 39% approval rating when he left office.

Campaign 2002: Romney refused to sign an anti-tax pledge put forth by Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform. Romney presented a plan to balance the budget without raising taxes. Romney also favored gambling as a way to help balance the Massachusetts deficit.

2003: A windfall in capital gains tax revenue caused by a previously enacted capital gains tax increase reduced the deficit by $1.3 billion.

2006: The combined state and local tax burden in Massachusetts increased during Romney's governorship. Romney cut spending by $1.6 billion, including $700 million in reductions in state aid to cities and towns. In response, cities and towns raised property taxes by five percent to their highest level in 25 years. In 2005, Romney signed legislation allowing local commercial property taxes to be raised, which resulted in $100 million more in property taxes from local business owners.

Romney created new fees and increased fees for many state licenses and services. In all 33 new fees were created and 57 fees were increased, raising $501 million in new income in the first year of the fee increase program - more than any other state in the nation. Romney increased a state gasoline “special fee” by two cents per gallon, generating about $60 million per year in additional revenue. This made for a total effective state gasoline tax of 23.5 cents per gallon.

Believe it or not, gaffes are part of the job of the President - as the Entertainer-in-Chief...

Mr. President, Thanks for all the laughs so far - please give us 4 more years of fun (and comic relief).

ssmike

Baylie are you at all familiar with the state of Ma?

actually ssmike, I live in Massachusetts, and I had the first class experience with Romney as my governor so that might explain my hate towards the hypocrite.

CAN SOMEONE EXPLAIN TO ME?

If the government decides to repair the infrastructure and contracts with a private company to fix a bridge, are those jobs private sector jobs or government jobs? The taxpayer is paying for them, so does that mean (according to Republican logic-Ann Coulter on This Week on Sunday) that they don't count? My understanding is that the purpose for taxes is to do things for the public benefit that individuals can't do alone. Fixing the infrastructure is something that needs to be done for the safety of the American people. According to Republicans, private industry should take care of that, but who do they think should pay for it? Or do they think it just should not be done? Then how do they propose to drive from here to there? Or do they fly? Then who do they think should pay to maintain the airport and direct their plane how to land safely? I just don't understand how Republicans think the country can run with no taxes and no government?

Heartlight3, Most likely if Romney is elected they will privitize Government. This means they will terminate all Government employees dismantle Government agencys and hire private corporations to do the work under contract the same way they did in Iraq with Haliburton and no bid contracts. The idea is to take all your taxes and turn it over to private industry or Republican sponsers if you prefer. Teachers would be employees of a private company with no accountablity to the people, Police would be hired trained and controlled by a private company again no accountablity to the people only the corporation they work for. Take this theme all the way to were you no longer have any say or control over any current government agency national or local.

Romney said in Iowa. “...It’s time for us to cut back on government and help the American people.”

No one could top even this one gaffe.

Before casting a vote for Norquist pledger Mitt Romney, you might want to ask Mitch Daniels how that privatization of government worked out for him in Indiana -

Got him named in some multi=million dollar law suits I understand, and the private service has not been so good...

Well maybe the citizens of Indiana had to suffer, but at least some big corporations made money!

silly teapublicans!

Tis the Season - but wouldn't they still be getting paid with taxpayer money? Halliburton in Iraq is still being paid with taxpayer money, it just takes more of it to accomplish the same job as the military used to do. I don't see how that is better.

Romney (06/08/12): “He [Obama] says we need more firemen, more policeman, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin? The American people did. It’s time for us to cut back on government and help the American people.” Even Scott Walker said yesterday that he disagreed with Mitt Romney on that point.

Romney proves once again that he is the one that is totally out of touch. As for Wisconsin Scott Walker’s crackdown on public employee bargaining rights which enabled him to “divide and conquer” labor exempted fire fighters and cops.

Jobs are not what Romney's about. Bain and Massachusetts showed that.

Since the public sector is shedding jobs, the Republicans should be so happy about it but they are not. Yet, they cry high unemplyment even though the unemploymnent has been going down.

Despite the GOP’s talk, historical data shows that private sector job creation is better when a Democrat occupies the White House - and under Republican presidents, more government jobs are created.

But they try to tell everyone black is white; bunch of lying hypocrites!

The hiring or retaining teachers, firefighters, and police are the responsibility of the state, and local governments. All have the power to raise taxes. It's up to the people in the states, and local communities to decide if they want to spend more money and if they do, then they will pass a tax increase to pay for them. Just throwing money at the problem does not solve the problem. The federal government does not have the money to keep priming the pump.

It's not up to governments (federal, state, local, etc.) to provide jobs just to keep the unemployment number down, the purpose of the governments is to prioritize and spend wisely. Why is it the the Democrats keep talking about police, firefighters and teachers, and not not other government employees, could it be that they have the largest public employee unions and make the biggest political donations?

The hiring or retaining jobs for teachers, firefighters, and police are the responsibility of the state, and local governments. All have the power to raise taxes. It's up to the people in the states, and local communities to decide if they want to spend more money and if they do, then they will pass a tax increase to pay for them. Just throwing money at the problem does not solve the problem. The federal government does not have the money to keep priming the pump.

It's not up to governments (federal, state, local, etc.) to provide jobs just to keep the unemployment number down, the purpose of the governments is to prioritize and spend wisely. Why is it the the Democrats keep talking about police, firefighters and teachers, and not not other government employees, could it be that they have the largest public employee unions and make the biggest political donations?

sfcret-

I agree that if the need and the revenues are not there we can't keep the same number of public jobs. What I disagree with is the reckless cutting of these jobs during a period of recession and high unemployment.

Targeted job levels could be determined and payrolls could be reduced through attrition, retirements, and job freezes. This is the "scalpel" approach versus the "hatchet" approach.

Local and state governments cut jobs - which results in higher unemployment, increased demand for social services such as food stamps, and higher rates of foreclosures and economic distress - then blame President Obama?

TNSEVOL - It is apparent that you have not been in a position where cuts in public jobs have to be made. Every time I was involved in negotiations on job reductions the first is through attrition, as you mentioned in paragraph 2, one tool we used was early retirement. If local governments do not have the funds then layoffs have to be considered and done across the board. This happens in most administrations in times of recessions or even minor down turns in the local economy.

As I said above, if the citizens what or feel they need more policemen, firemen, teachers or other public employees then they will need to pay for them through local taxes, not federal funds.

sfcret

if the citizens what or feel they need more policemen, firemen, teachers or other public employees then they will need to pay for them through local taxes, not federal funds.

yes that is correct, but every job in the public sector eliminated affects unemployment numbers. Private sector jobs have been created, public sector jobs have been reduced.

My point is that the Republicans want smaller governments (which historically they have increased) but keep whining about slow unemployment drop. I guess Obama should do what Bush did, create more government jobs to make himself look good.

Labor Department statistics show that the federal government has grown by 143,000 under Obama.

thetotas those are US Government employees not State and local. Now how about you tell us what those jobs were what departments like boarder patrol.

Jody - I'm not sure Romney's was a gaffe - I think that's what Romney believes - "we don't need "more firemen, more policemen, more teachers." He was saying what he actually believes - scary isn't it? The man (and I use the word loosely) is totally out of touch with reality. It's really frightening that many low intelligence people will vote for Romney - just because!

Obama/Biden 2012

Willards comment about firemen, policemen and teachers is certainly more damaging than the Presidents comment, but apparently the media will focus firstly on President Obama as if Willards' real (feelings) gaffes are an afterthought......

Loop for President Obama.....No-loop for Willard.

Remember the meeting at the charter school when Romney argued that class size is not relevant to student performance? I don't know if he really believes that or not---I expect that the prep school he attended as a child used its low pupil/teacher ratio as a selling point. If you want to privatize services, though, you always want to argue that you need less---teachers, firemen, police, etc. Helps the profit margin to have less people doing the services.

ss,

So, if elected, he will not make any appointments to the SC?

But ssmike, that's exactly what Bush did and Romney has proposed nothing different than the former president. Under the Bush administration, private sector had a net loss of 600M jobs while public sector grew by more than a million. I'll agree that Congress is polarized and ineffective, but I'm not ready to turn my elected government over to a bunch of Bain Capital types! Romeny's Bain experience may be good for corporations in trouble, but not living, breathing people...they're not the same thing.

ssmike

At least Romney understands that we can not afford to hire more people into jobs for life with insane retirement plans untill we trim the fat of government! What our government needs is for Bain capitol to come in and do the hard work. Cause the current crop of congress persons dont have the stones to do it!

Bain Capital??? What planet are you on? Do a little fact checking.

The Wall Street Journal reported that 22 percent of companies “Bain invested in while Mr. Romney led the firm” filed for bankruptcy or went out of business, and another 8 percent lost all of the money that Bain had invested.

http://factcheck.org/2012/05/gillespie-twists-the-facts-on-bain-capital/

BTW:The Republican Congress don't work. They spent more time off than on while collecting a tax payer salary that paids them for doing nothing more that sit on their hands.

ssmike

What our government needs is for Bain capitol to come in and do the hard work.

Bain Capital was never about creating jobs but about a short-term investing resulting in above average returns for the investors.

Again, private-equity firms are designed to create profits for investors - creating or eliminating jobs is just a by-product.

So please, before you make a statement like "what our government needs is for Bain capitol to come in and do the hard work" do some research.

I repeat We cannot afford to hire more layers of beaurocracy! We are in trouble financially! The seated president does not get that hiring more Harvard elites does not fix the problem! We are broken in so many ways!

Bayllie here is a fact for you! Ma has had three speakers of the house in a row indigted and convicted of felonies. All of them democrats! How was a republican governor supposed to do anything regarding reform in what is arguably the most corrupt democratic stronghold in the country? without sacrificing his integrity?

ssmike

How was a republican governor supposed to do anything regarding reform in what is arguably the most corrupt democratic stronghold in the country? without sacrificing his integrity?

ask any resident of Mass (and I'm one of them) about Romney's integrity and how he milked the taxpayer for his state police escorts while he was making connections most of 2006 for his presidential run in 2008. Don't talk to me about Romney's integrity because he has none. His approval ratings in 2007 were just as good as GWB's and there is a reason why Romney stays away from anything Massachusetts.

Don't tell me about Romney's integrity because while he took contributions from the Big Dig contractors, he did nothing to any of them even after a woman was killed in the tunnel. He just took a couple of pics getting down on his knees to "inspect" and did zero, nada, nothing to the hackers that should have paid for their incompetence criminally.

Romney raised fees on little people - including the blind so spare me about Romney.

The President looked pretty p---ed off when he said "I know the economy isn't doing 'fine,' that's why I called the press conference."

I wouldn't have his job for the world.

And I wouldn't give it to anyone else. I can't imagine Romney going a week without gaffing in that job.