In a May 11 online chat, hosted by RCJ's Kevin Woster, a participant asked GOP House candidate Noem if she supported the budget proposed by Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. Noem immediately said she did.
In an August 11 debate, Rep. Herseth Sandlin pointed out that Ryan's budget would privatize Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. (Some commentators substituted verbs like destroy, decimate and exterminate. Ryan would also eliminate CHIP.)
Noem went homina-homina and said she'd never said that. She and the conservarazzi very quickly tried to portray her support for privatizing the prorgams senior voters love as a "fake" issue... although I'm pretty sure Woster didn't fake that May interview, and Noem didn't fake her response.
A group of senior citizens quickly called on the House candidates to pledge not to privatize Social Security and Medicare. Herseth Sandlin signed on immediately. Noem's people wrote up her own little pledge to sign, saying she won't privatize Social Security. Privatizing Medicare à la Ryan, apparently, remains on the table.
So what are we to make of Noem's flip-flop on the Ryan budget? There are a few possibilities, all of which expose Noem as an amateur:
- Noem is playing Sharron Angle, pandering to the primary extremists to get picked in June, then running scared from her stated positions when her Washington handlers point out such radical positions will lose the election.
- Noem is suffering political schizophrenia, wanting all the cultural cachet of a GOP-Tea crusader but not able to get beyond the slogans and take a firm stand on really cutting government, eliminating the deficit, and turning everything over to the free market. (Don't take this one personally, Kristi: my gal Steph has a hard time making the case for the core principles of her party, too.)
- Noem's May chat was a Palin moment. She had no idea what was in Ryan's budget; she just tried to buffalo readers with a quick answer to make herself sound smart.
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Bonus Noem no: Kristi Noem sacrifices what used to be a core conservative issue, telling a roomful of educators that school vouchers aren't right for South Dakota. She's perfectly right about that—vouchers are unnecessary when open enrollment provides most South Dakota kids all the choice they need—but the right wingnuts who helped her win the primary must be groaning at having been hoodwinked into supporting yet another RINO.
Noem, a bad week? Keep dreaming your socialist fantasies. Herseth Sandlin is having a bad year.
ReplyDeleteNoem is obviously running political and intellectual rings around all you socialists--including Herseth Sandlin.
Since part of the effectiveness of the strategy involves you not catching on, I won't clue you in to what it is and why it's working so marvelously. :-) But you and your Leftist cohorts continue to make it obvious that it's working flawlessly.
Keep it up, and keep on dreaming! (Because you only have about 2.5 months left before your nightmare comes)
Wow: the absence of effective strategy is effective strategy? Is this something like the absence of evidence of a conspiracy is proof of a conspiracy? That's sheer nutty talk, Bob. Noem got beat up this week, and she's scrambling to recover. I point to actual text; you point to wishes.
ReplyDeleteYou point to your own text and the text of other liberals, and wish it were true.
ReplyDeleteLiberal wishful thinking is like drinking: you feel good at the time, but there's a heck of a hangover coming.
Cory, ip is soliciting Democrat-owned businesses as part of directory to be published at a later date.
ReplyDeleteThank you for letting me interrupt Mr. Ellis. Hi Bob; sorry.
Have a nice day. Carry on.
Have you ever seen a little kid trip on her untied shoelaces, fall flat on her face, then look up and say, "I meant to do that!" That's what Bob is saying.
ReplyDeletehttp://dakotawarcollege.com/
ReplyDeleteGuess Stephanie wears flip-flops too! Go to the above site to read the whole post as regards Stephanie's position in 2000.
"Goals for 2010
--Honor our commitment to seniors by ensuring the future solvency of Social Security and Medicare.
--Make structural reforms in Social Security and Medicare that slow their future cost growth, modernize benefits (including a prescription drug benefit for Medicare), and give beneficiaries more choice and control over their retirement and health security.
Source: The Hyde Park Declaration 00-DLC7 on Aug 1, 2000
"Sounds like that’s creeping pretty close to what she’s accusing her opponent of doing. What makes this really interesting is that these were goals set forth for 2010 by the Democrats, such as Stephanie and Al Gore who signed on to the memo, which you can read in it’s entirety here."
http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=128&subid=174&contentid=1926
Hm, Linda, let's see... maybe a change in position from ten years ago, before she even stood for election. Her record since election to Congress has been consistently in favor of protecting Social Security and Medicare from the privatizing predations of folks like Ryan and Noem.
ReplyDeleteNoem, on the other hand, committed her full flip-flop on Social Security this year, during the campaign, telling primary voters she supported a budget privatizing SS, Medicare, and Medicaid, then doing a 180 at the prompting of one line from little old Stephanie. Sounds to me like SHS is still debating from the position of strength here, and Noem has been driven to damage control.