Mitt Romney hints he won’t adopt severe Paul Ryan-style austerity

Saturday, August 11, 2012 -- Source

WASHINGTON—Less than a day after redrawing America’s political battle lines with the surprise choice of a budget-slashing running mate, Mitt Romney appears to be backing away from Paul Ryan’s austere fiscal prescriptions.

As the Romney/Ryan duo test-drove the ticket through three increasingly enthusiastic Republican rallies in Virginia on Saturday, senior Romney aides signalled that the candidate would put forward his own plan rather than endorse wholesale the government-shrinking blueprint for which Ryan is best known.

The strategy of embracing Ryan, but not necessarily his controversial budget proposals, hints at the delicate political tightrope Romney walks as he seeks to reinvigorate his stalled campaign to defeat President Barack Obama in November.

The choice of Ryan, a fiscal warrior from Wisconsin, comes fraught with risk that Democrats will unpack and reframe his remedies as inherently dangerous to some of the older voters Republicans are depending on to win the election.

Widely regarded as a next-generation lightning rod of American conservatism, Ryan takes the vice-presidential slot steeped in controversial budget policies that would place some of the country’s most cherished social programs, including Medicare and Medicaid, on the chopping block to solve the American fiscal crisis.

Ryan’s unveiling came with a somewhat false start early Saturday in Norfolk, Va., as Romney accidentally introduced his vice-presidential running mate as “the next president of the United States.”

But Ryan, at 42 a seven-term congressman, swiftly seized the mantle, vowing tough action to solve the “debt, doubt and despair” of the Obama era.

“It is our duty to save the American dream for our children,” said Ryan. “We are running out of time . . . we can’t afford four more years of this.

“We are on an unsustainable path that is robbing American of our freedom and security. But it doesn’t have to be this way . . . we won’t duck the tough issues, we will lead. We won’t blame others, we will take responsibility. And we won’t replace our principles, we will reapply them.”

Romney, in his introduction, emphasized Ryan’s “character and values,” noting the Wisconsin congressman “internalized the virtues and hard-working ethic of the Midwest.

“He’s a person of great steadiness” who “doesn’t demonize his opponents,” said Romney. “He appeals to the better angels of our nature.”

Ryan, a father of three who commutes home from Washington to Wisconsin each weekend, brings youthful vigour to the Republican ticket. And, conveniently, it’s a turning of the page after weeks of negative attention paid to Romney’s club-footed foreign gaffes and the wealthy candidate’s continuing refusal to release more than two years of personal tax returns.

But Ryan’s laserlike focus on America’s balance sheet comes with serious shortcomings, including a background bereft of any foreign policy experience. Or any working experience outside Washington, where he has spent his adult life as a congressional aide, think-tanker and, for the past 14 years, an elected Wisconsin member of the House of Representatives.

Yet Ryan is also seen as a genial, even guileless figure by many on Capitol Hill, despite the severity of his budget remedies. And unlike Sarah Palin, who rocked the American political landscape four years ago with her arrival as John McCain’s running mate, Ryan speaks in complete sentences — even if those sentences involve a complete remaking of the American social safety net. Then it was Mama Grizzly, this time it’s the Friendly Reaper.

With Ryan’s budget plan now central to the presidential debate, Democrats were already beginning to pounce.

“What exactly is ‘bold’ about making Medicare beneficiaries pay more and more out of pocket for fewer services and making college less affordable for millions and shortchanging veterans out of the services they deserve?” said Tom McMahon, executive director of Americans United For Change. “That sounds like the road map to middle-class extinction.”

Ryan, whose debut four-state tour alongside Romney includes a whistle-stop Sunday in his native Wisconsin, was already having an impact on fundraising for both parties. Republicans reported an immediate spike of $1 million in donations, while Democrats reached out with new appeals to counter the surge.

Reaction from U.S. political chattering class ran the gamut, with many concluding the Ryan choice reflected Republican desperation that without a dramatic shakeup Romney was on a trajectory to lose in November.

Others warned against Democratic complacency, noting the parallels between the arrival of Ryan and that of Ronald Reagan when he first arrived on the Republican ticket.

“Democrats rubbed their hands gleefully at the prospect of facing Reagan in the general election . . . but the result was that the national conversation moved rightward for the following 30 years,” said Sean Trende of RealClearPolitics.