Capital Times Excerpt:But Scott Walker is NOT standing alone on this issue. His brand of local conservatism comes right out of the Paul Ryan playbook. While Ryan's media enablers painted his defense for TARP federal assistance for his Wall Street interests as "courageous," he's gone on record to bring home even less in Federal aid to his district constituents. Over the past three years, Ryan shortchanged his district an accumulative $3.1 billion in Federal dollars. It's no coincidence why Ryan's district boasts two of the worst locales for unemployment in the state of Wisconsin. Less Federal aid = fewer jobs.
Most Wisconsinites were not too concerned about Walker's stance, however, assuming he was all alone on this issue.
Bizarre as it seems, his district responded favorably to his jobless program, and gave him another 65 to 35 re-election landslide victory. You can bet Walker is following his lead.
Even in the highly contradictory perspective titled Beware of the Big government tipping point recently published in the Wall Street Journal, Ryan carelessly describes recipients of federal aid as "winners" and chose to use his congressional position to create losers of the Big 3 by denying them access to the TARP. He knows cutting off federal aid can have disastrous effects on those in need. Ryan as usual, continues to throw warnings around everywhere while positioning himself outside of the blame in his own analysis.
Read another viewpoint on Walker's job cutting position here.
Americans On Financial Bail-Out: Stop!!
2 comments:
At first I was skeptical about your "$3.1 billion shortchange" criticism towards Ryan. But after visiting OMB Watch and running the numbers myself, your case is good enough to warrant further examination. Before 2005, Ryan's district was collecting a fair average of Federal dollars, nothing high or outstanding - just average. Starting sometime after the beginning of Bush's second term, he dramatically cut down Federal aid to his district, which seemed to coincide with his appointment to the Appropriations committee and his later statement that he intends to bring home even less. You probably could add more depth and support to your argument by showing his previous years. Either way, yours is a sharp observation I have not seen elsewhere on the web. Kudos to you.
I intend to expand this report after Fedspending OMB releases the numbers for 2008. If current trends remain, the district will have lost another billion. Conservatives trumpet Ryan's "fiscality" while the results don't lie.
Thanks for the kind words.
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