they are trying to play off against elites because they know that one of the things that made republicans popular is when you dump on elites, dump on the beltway. all this stuff is super, you know, inside baseball. what is relevant is that they have taken on this unbelievably popular program. and tried to kill it. that s a fact. that s not spin. the ryan plan privatizes medicare. so the question is, can they get away from the ryan plan the way mitch mcconnell is running way as fast as he can from the ryan plan. it is hard when all republicans except four in the house of representatives already voted for it. they are stuck with this. even if there s a big budget deal, the budget deal would only last ten years and the ryan plan starts at year 11, so they will still be wedded to this plan in the fall of next year when they run for reelection. just remember to get our
take a stand on whether or not they support the plan which is deeply unpopular. i think paul ryan has put the house of representatives back in play for the democrats singlehandedly. what has newt done? he knows how this thing pulls. he is running for president. what is interesting is i think newt is running way from it because he wants to survive in a general election, even though he won t get to a general election. there is not another republican in the presidential field who endorsed the paul ryan medicare plan. because presumably they have done their polling and understand how unpopular and how unfair this plan is. to add to this craziness, and i can t even follow on this, i can usually follow sarah palin s fairly basic brain at work. here she is knocking newt for apologizing for what he said. at the same time defending him against the tactics of what she calls the lame-stream media. if you follow her logic, she says keep it up newt, keep it up even though you are destroying o