The immediate reaction of Republicans, about rape

After the buzz created by statements  of Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin,  Republicans responded by creating an internet site on the rape. The website details the actions republican policies for victims of rape. Besides stories of women reported, and ways, of which a woman can find nursing, described.
 

The website is:

http://www.republicansforrape.org/

One of the stories reported is:

Medicare in focus as Paul Ryan, mom appear in Florida

Vice presidential hopeful Paul Ryan says his family relied on Medicare to take care of his grandmother, and his mother now counts on the program in retirement.

Ryan on Saturday told a mostly older audience in a large Florida retirement community that Republicans will protect those in or near retirement from Medicare cuts if Mitt Romney wins the White House.
Ryan pointed to his 78-year-old mother who joined him. He says he isn't going to hurt his mother's financial security and wouldn't hurt others, either. He says he saw first-hand Medicare's benefits as a child when his grandmother, with Alzheimer's, moved in with his family.
However, the 42-year-old congressman says the program needs to be overhauled during his generation so his children will be able to count on it, too.
Betty Ryan Douglas was on stage with her congressman son Saturday at the world's largest retirement community as the Republican campaign tried to blunt withering criticism from President Barack Obama and his allies. The Democratic team charges that presidential candidate Mitt Romney and Ryan would gut programs for older people.
Obama planned to dig in on that point Saturday in New Hampshire. Aides say he will cast the voters' choice as one between two fundamentally different approaches to government's responsibility to its citizens and who pays the bill.
Romney's schedule had him raising money in Massachusetts.
The Romney-Ryan ticket is betting big that voters' worries about federal deficits and the Democrats' health care overhaul have opened the door for a robust debate on the solvency of Medicare, one of the government's most popular and costliest programs. Obama has welcomed the conversation, which has temporarily taken attention from the weak economic recovery.
The Democratic campaign, trying to reach female voters, released an ad Friday that sought to undercut Romney by pointing to Ryan's voting record on funding for Planned Parenthood and abortion. "For women, for president, the choice is ours," the ad says. The ad was airing in Colorado, Nevada, Virginia, Ohio, Florida and Iowa.
In the week since Romney announced Ryan as his running mate, Medicare and Social Security have appeared as a driving issue. Florida, Pennsylvania and Iowa are among the top five states in the percentage of people 65 and over, and all three are closely contested this election.
Polling generally shows that the public places more trust in Democrats' ability to handle Medicare than they do Republicans. People also generally oppose plans to replace the current program with one in which future seniors receive a fixed amount of money from the government to be used to purchase health coverage, according to polls.
At the same time, polling shows the public strongly believes the financial security of Medicare as well as Social Security must be guaranteed for the long term. Government reports for years have warned of a looming shortfall if something isn't done to change course.
The GOP ticket's challenge is to convince seniors, who reliably vote, that the GOP ticket is best positioned to cure the ailing system for them and their grandchildren.
"We will not duck the tough issues. We will lead," Ryan said Friday in Virginia.
Ryan's stop Saturday at the gated retirement cluster known as The Villages is familiar ground for presidential candidates. Florida has the highest concentration of voters over 65 in the country. Some 17% of Floridians fall into that group.
New Hampshire, where Obama will campaign later in the day, has 14% of its residents over 65.
While residents of this Florida cluster of retirees make this a conservative stronghold, its builder is H. Gary Morse, a wealthy developer who is backing Romney. But the appearance could be tricky for Ryan, Congress' chief advocate of significantly restraining entitlement programs.
Put simply: Voters like their Medicare and Social Security.
Looking to connect with this group, the 42-year-old Wisconsin lawmaker told CBS' 60 Minutes that the issues hit close to home.
"My mom is a Medicare senior in Florida," he said.
Betty Ryan Douglas spends part of her year in Broward County's Lauderdale-by-the-Sea community and has been registered to vote in Florida since 1997.



By Philip Elliott / Associated Press

Paul Ryan Got Federal Funds To Help With Bush-Era GM Plant Closure He Blames On Obama

GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan took a swipe at President Barack Obama on Thursday for failing to rescue a General Motors factory in his Wisconsin congressional district, calling it "one more broken promise" on the Democratic administration's record.

"I remember President Obama visiting it when he was first running, saying he'll keep that plant open," Ryan said during a campaign stop. "One of the reasons that plant got shut down was $4 gasoline. You see, this costs jobs. The president's terrible energy policies are costing us jobs."

The attack has already received a fair amount of ridicule because the Janesville, Wis., plant actually closed during the last year of George W. Bush's presidency. What hasn't really been emphasized is whether Ryan clearly knew this and made the charge nonetheless.

According to a rudimentary LexisNexis search, Ryan made multiple public pleas to GM, including op-eds in his home state newspaper, to keep the plant open. He and fellow Wisconsin lawmakers went to the automobile company's headquarters to present plans to extend the plant's life. When the Bush administration itself called the decision to close the plant evidence that the auto industry was trimming fat and improving its bottom line, Ryan called the news "gut-wrenching."

And as it became clear in early-fall 2008 that GM wouldn't relent, Ryan publicly touted the federal tax money he secured to help displaced workers -- a use of funds that would seem at odds with his limited-government, fiscal conservative image.

The timeline is worth recounting now that it has popped up in Ryan's stump speech.

In April 29, 2008, it was announced that 750 workers at the GM plant in Janesville would lose their jobs. Ryan, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, said he would "work closely with those in Janesville facing uncertainty in the months ahead and do all that I can to ensure that they get the assistance they need."


On May 1, 2008, then-Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), along with Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) and Ryan, sent a letter to Rick Wagoner, then GM CEO, urging the company to join government, community organizations and employers to help the affected workers.

"We ask that you give every consideration to maintaining GM's presence in Janesville, as well as taking future steps to ensure the continued success of the Janesville plant, including considering the assignment of new production models at the plant," the lawmakers wrote.

On May 4, 2008, Ryan wrote an op-ed in the Journal Sentinel calling for a comprehensive energy plan in light of the news that the GM plant was firing 750 people.

"As a fifth-generation native of Janesville, I grew up learning the old saying, "As GM goes, so goes Janesville,'" Ryan wrote.

It was announced in early June that GM would indeed close the Janesville plant and three others. Ryan said it was "gut wrenching."

Later, he joined Feingold and Kohl in writing another letter to Wagoner. "On May 1 of this year, we wrote to you asking that GM take future steps to ensure the continued success of the Janesville plant, including considering the assignment of new production models at the plant. We renew that request now," the letter read.

On June 4, the Bush administration framed GM's decision as evidence the troubled automaker was getting its finances in order.

The Bush White House spokeswoman, Dana Perino, said it was "a sign that Detroit continues to adapt and evolve and address the change in consumer tastes and attitudes. ... They're adapting well and they'll make these changes and hopefully be able to pull themselves up out of what has been a rough several years."

Then-Sen. Obama, who had visited the Janesville plant in February, issued a statement.

"My heart goes out to the workers and families affected by the closing of these GM plants," he said. "Today's news is a painful reminder not only of the challenges America faces in our global economy, but of George Bush's failed economic policies." He finished by pledging to help domestic automakers "with the funding they need to retool their factories and make fuel-efficient and alternative-fuel cars. And we'll invest in efforts to make sure that the cars of the future are made where they always have been -- in the United States."

Ryan was quoted in a Detroit News article that day. "Growing up and living in Janesville, this is something we've always feared," the congressman said, calling the closure "a big psychological and economic blow to our community and our state; but Janesville will survive this, because we simply have to survive this."

By September of 2008, Ryan, who supported the auto bailout so long as the funds didn't come from the financial sector bailout, was still working aggressively to get GM to change its mind. He, along with Feingold and Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), met with company officials in Detroit and "made clear what a tremendous asset the people of Janesville's GM plant are to GM, and how important GM jobs are to the Janesville community." On Sept. 13, the Herald Times Reporter said Ryan and then-Gov. Jim Doyle (D) had presented an "aggressive incentive plan" to GM leaders.

But by then, GM's shutdown plans were set. On Oct. 11, 2008, the Journal Sentinel reported that GM would announce it would close the Janesville plant around Christmas, "at least a year earlier than the company had initially projected."

Less than a month earlier, Ryan was making preparations to help the displaced workers and using federal funds to pick up the tab. On Sept. 18, his office put out a statement that it had joined forces with the U.S. Commerce Department's Economic Development Agency to secure a $450,000 grant to support economic initiatives for the Janesville area.

"This has been a gut-wrenching summer for southern Wisconsin," Ryan said, "and today's announcement provides our community with much-needed support. I remain firmly optimistic that Janesville's best days are ahead."

On Oct. 2, Ryan announced that the U.S. Department of Labor had awarded a $1.6 million national emergency grant to the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development. The money would help "dislocated workers in Rock County's automotive industry, including workers at General Motors, Lear Corporation, Logistics Services Inc., and United Industries."

By Sam Stein /  Huffington Post

Ryan is the Romney' s failed pick

by Jeffrey M. Jones

Mitt Romney's standing in the presidential election campaign has not changed materially in the immediate days after his announcement of Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan as his vice-presidential running mate. 

The first four days of Gallup Daily tracking after Romney's announcement show 47% of registered voters saying they would vote for Romney and 45% for Barack Obama if the election were held today. The four days prior showed Romney at 46% and Obama at 45%.

While the initial indication is no increase in Romney's support after naming Ryan, the data suggest the possibility that Romney may get a delayed bounce, as he fared slightly better in Aug. 13-14 Gallup tracking than in Aug. 11-12 tracking.
The lack of an immediate increase for Romney is consistent with Sunday's USA Today/Gallup poll that found a generally tepid reaction to the Ryan pick, especially in comparison to past vice-presidential choices.

Like this year, Gallup also did not find any significant change in voter preferences for the 2008 election after Obama and John McCain each named his running mate. However, in the 1996-2004 campaigns, the vice presidential choice seemed to have a more noticeable impact on voters.

Gallup cannot accurately assess the effect of vice presidential announcements on voter preferences prior to 1996, given the timing of polls and other campaign events in those years. Specifically, in many earlier elections, the vice presidential choice was made during the party's nominating convention, so it is not possible to isolate any change in voter preferences due to the vice presidential choice from changes associated with the party's conventions, which usually produce a bounce for the nominee.