He accuses Newby of divisive attacks, and after reading his rebuttal, I was puzzled Ryan would label honest criticism and an alternative viewpoint as attacks. Of course, Newby did no such thing. What he did do was a classic kitchen table narrative pointing out several flawed elements in Ryan’s Roadmap, and he did it without rambling or making personal attacks. In short order, direct and with blunt accuracy, Newby rode the broken bridges, the U-turns and the detours of Ryan’s roadmap and discovered it led to a “dead-end.” For this, Ryan was offended.
But this is exactly how entrenched partisans operate. When they can’t kill the message or repudiate the claims, they usually ignore it. In this case however, Ryan chose to exaggerate Newby’s frustration as useless noise, and slammed his sources.
Another key element in Ryan’s response is the idea that Ryan developed his Roadmap Plan to encourage debate and alternative ideas, yet attempts to stifle any constructive criticism against it as “divisive,” and deriding alternative information as ‘unabashedly left-wing,” “deeply flawed” and “intellectually dishonest.” Remember, it’s Ryan, not Newby who is trying to pawn himself off as “not divisive” and “seeking alternatives.”
Ryan also elevates himself by presenting several lightweight assumptions. One, that to oppose his plan means “doing nothing,” two, those doing the criticizing are clinging to the status quo. And three, no one has yet to offer substantive solutions, except Ryan of course. How's that for encouragement? Don't be fooled.
This is just one of Ryan’s viewpoints from his rebuttal that I found intellectually offensive.
Ryan Not Divisive Excerpt:Is this the future destination of America? It is on Ryan’s map. Since Ryan became a U.S. Representative, all would agree the gap between the rich and the poor has widened dramatically. Before Ryan can claim he wants to narrow this gap, he needs to point out which votes in Congress he would take back(reverse) when he voted "Yea" with the GOP-led status quo, otherwise he is just spinning off on the same policies and direction that got us to this point in the first place.
With a generous standard deduction and personal exemptions, a family of four making $39,000 of income would pay no federal taxes.
I just don’t believe that the average American trying to raise a family would be satisfied or amused that after all the hard work, they are not a contributor in the security or welfare of this great country. That after it is all said and done, they could be scorned as freeloaders in Ryan’s world. Yet despite the appearance of a tax-free paycheck - local taxes, property taxes, sales taxes and all other income blind taxes and fees would balloon. Somebody has got to pay and it won’t be the rich, remember, they’re getting a huge tax cut too. But what does Ryan care? Those roads do not appear on his map.
Ryan’s Roadmap is riddled with potholes and round-a-bouts without an exit and is nothing more than an election year diversion to keep the discussion off of his congressional record.
Obviously, David Newby can defend himself and I assure readers here that no affiliation exists between us. In a way, I do offer an apology here to David Newby for taking up this defense so quickly against Ryan’s deceptive message. But this is what I believe, and I make no apologies for that.
Note: Unfortunately, both the Newby and Ryan articles are not available for on-line viewing. This is a recent development clearly demonstrating that if you want your message suppressed, only send it to the Janesville Gazette.
2 comments:
As always, nice work. But I find your note at the end most interesting. It does appear Ryan wrote that article as a U.S. Congressman and not as a private citizen. In that regard, his words are owned by the people of the United States and a newspaper such as the Gazette ought to know better than to suppress that information or try to turn a dime on it with subscription based web access only. Unless of course the Gazette commissioned Ryan for the article - then they own it.
Thanks. I won't post whole articles or letters without permission from it's author or without submission from a responsible source, and I try to limit excerpts as much as possible. I never gave much thought about ownership rights of articles written by public servants on taxpayer payrolls. You've made an excellent point with that. My note was directed at local citizen writers and others whose viewpoints are read only in the Gazette hardcopy only to die a quick death, or are pay for view in the Web edition. Obviously they don't receive royalties.
There are other ways to get a message out including on blogs like this, but the Gazette and their supporting cast want everyone to believe they are the only market in town. And most people believe it.
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