Mitt Romney announces Paul Ryan as vice-presidential running mate 12th August 2012 US Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has announced Paul Ryan as his running mate in this November's election.
42-year-old Ryan, now in his seventh term, currently chairs the House Budget Committee and has played a major role in drafting and promoting the GOP's long-term budget plans. As an alternative to Obama's 2012 budget, Ryan introduced The Path to Prosperity, followed by The Path to Prosperity: A Blueprint for American Renewal. The New York Times described The Path to Prosperity as "the most extreme budget plan passed by a house of Congress in modern times." Ryan's proposals would involve massive cuts in government spending in an effort to reduce the deficit and national debt. He would slash discretionary programs by about $120 billion over the next two years and mandatory programs by $284 billion. The Economic Policy Institute claims this would suck demand out of the economy with 4.1 million jobs lost by 2014. Among his proposed changes would be a tax hike on the poorest, with tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans including a huge 12.5% cut for those earning more than $1 million. Corporation tax would be lowered from 35 to 25%. Ryan has criticised the Bush tax cuts for being too small and has stated that he would make them permanent. Ryan wants to reform Medicare by replacing it with "premium support" payments and increasing the age of eligibility to 67. Currently, seniors receive a guaranteed benefit. Under his new system, everyone going into retirement would receive a fixed amount from the government with which to buy insurance from competing private firms. If a retiree picks a plan more expensive than the government payment they receive, they must pay the difference themselves. However, this fixed amount would fail to keep up with the increasing cost of health care. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that by 2030, each new retiree could pay on average between $1200 and $2200 more each year compared to the existing system. By 2050, this figure would be even higher - up to $6000. His budget would also slash funding for Medicaid and child health insurance. Pell Grants - which help cover tuition costs for low-income Americans - would see a reduction of $170 billion over the next decade. More than 1 million students would lose their grants entirely, according to the Education Trust, while interest rates on loans would be allowed to double. One area of government spending that Ryan favours to keep at high levels is defence. Earlier this year, he supported a reconciliation budget to spare the military from mandatory cuts. This would be paid for by slashing Medicaid, benefits for federal workers, child tax credits for immigrant families, and food assistance programs. Two million families would be taken off food stamps. This prompted a letter from Bishop Stephen Blaire of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops who said the budget failed a "basic moral test." Paul Ryan is extremely anti-environment. He supports $40 billion in subsidies for big oil, alongside massive reductions in clean energy and other green technology. He denies the science of global warming - even as record droughts affect half of the US, Arctic sea ice is close to disappearing and despite a strong correlation between human CO2 emissions, atmospheric CO2 levels and global average temperatures (reinforced still further by a Koch-funded study last month). The National Academy of Sciences - widely regarded as the gold standard for objective scientific assessment - has stated the following: "Some scientific conclusions or theories have been so thoroughly examined and tested, and supported by so many independent observations and results, that their likelihood of subsequently being found to be wrong is vanishingly small. Such conclusions and theories are then regarded as settled facts. This is the case for the conclusion that the Earth system is warming and that much of this warming is due to human activities." Ryan also wants to outlaw gay marriage, abortion, some forms of contraception, invitro fertilisation and stem cell research. He has co-sponsored the Sanctity of Human Life Act which declares that a fertilised egg "shall have all the legal and constitutional attributes and privileges of personhood." He is an avid follower of 20th century philosopher Ayn Rand, who famously described selfishness as a "virtue", altruism as "evil," condemned Christianity for showing compassion for the poor, viewed the feminist movement as "phony," and called Arabs "almost totally primitive savages." His stance on these various issues will clearly appeal to the more radical followers of the Republican Party. When it comes to elections, however, independents and swing states are what matter. Florida, Iowa and Pennsylvania are home to large numbers of seniors who may feel uneasy about his views on healthcare. Opinion polls consistently favour Obama. Real Clear Politics - which combines all of the major polls in the media - shows his support only rarely dipping below Romney's, as you can see in the chart below. Although a lot can happen between now and November, FutureTimeline predicts that Obama's re-election is a safe bet...
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