Paul Ryan

Progressives Say ‘Good Riddance’ To Paul Ryan: ‘Coward Who Sold Our Economy to Highest Bidders’

  “The charade’s up. Good riddance.” By Jake Johnson Common Dreams (12/19/18) As House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) delivered his farewell address on Wednesday after 20 years of relentlessly working to gut social programs for the poor and successfully ramming through “one of the biggest transfers of wealth to the richest one percent in U.S. history,” progressives made sure to let the outgoing congressman know what they think of his legacy. With the hashtag #GoodRiddanceRyan, progressive advocacy groups and commentators denounced Ryan for spending his 10-term tenure in the House pushing an agenda that rewards wealthy corporate donors at the expense of the American working class. “He’s…

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The Crass Hypocrisy, Cynical Mendacity & All-Around Fakery Of Our Very Own Paul Ryan

His record of accomplishing virtually nothing. By Andrew O’Hehir Salon (12/1/18) There’s considerable pathos and dramatic irony to the end of Paul Ryan’s political career — if you are able to view him from a distance, like a character in a Jonathan Franzen novel or a Netflix drama set in Norway. He’s a guy who believed he was out in front of history and positioned to shape it, but wound up being dragged behind the emperor’s chariot while the populace laughed at him and threw unpleasant objects. Until a few years ago, I bet he didn’t even know what “cuck”…


Oh, Screw You, Paul Ryan: Internet Rips ‘tone-deaf jackass’ Paul Ryan For Father’s Day Tweet About His Kids While He Stands By As Immigrant Families Are Torn Apart

By Bob Brigham The Raw Story (6/16/18) House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) was soundly scolded on the internet after wishing “all of the dads” a happy Father’s Day as Republican President Donald Trump separates families at the border.  Speaker Ryan is a father of three children. “My life changed the day I became a father. Liza, Charlie, and Sam are my highest priority,” Ryan tweeted. “Wishing all of the dads out there a happy early Fathers Day.” The ensuing uproar was quick and passionate. As a father who clearly cares for his children, Speaker Ryan should think of the agony…


Suddenly Gun Shy: The NRA Dropped Lawmaker Ratings From Their Website, But They’re Not Saying Why

  By Hunter The Daily Kos (6/12/18) Over the weekend, reporters noticed an odd thing about the National Rifle Association’s website: The NRA “ratings” for lawmakers, giving them letter grades for their willingness to block new gun restrictions and weaken existing ones, had vanished without explanation. Was it a glitch, or something else? The nation’s largest domestic terrorism lobby is clamming up about the change, but the Washington Post’s Phillip Bump was able to pry the barest hint of information from an unnamed NRA staffer when he called for an explanation. “I think our enemies were using that,” he said. He…


‘Morning Joe’ Rips Paul Ryan For Standing By While His GOP Sets Fire To The Constitution For Trump

“At what point does Paul Ryan stop worrying about the Republican party and start worrying about the republic? We are at that point now.” — Joe Scarborough By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (5/24/18) MSNBC’s Morning Joe host — and former republican congressman who has now left the party — went after Wisconsin’s Rep. Paul Ryan Tuesday (5/22) for failing to stand up to Donald Trump’s power grab and failure to defend the Constitution and the role of the congress. “Paul Ryan is the speaker of the House, while constitutional norms are being ripped to shreds,” Scarborough said. “Are…


House Chaplain Who Prayed For Fairness In GOP Tax Bill Fired By Paul Ryan

  By Jennifer Bendery The Huffington Post (4/26/18) WASHINGTON ― House Chaplain Patrick Conroy was suddenly forced out of his job last week by Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), and while it’s not clear why, Democratic lawmakers and Hill sources say it was driven by Ryan’s distaste for one of Conroy’s prayers about the GOP’s tax bill. As first reported by The Hill, Conroy was clear in his resignation announcement that it wasn’t his choice to go. It was Ryan’s. “As you have requested, I hereby offer my resignation as the 60th Chaplain of the United States House of Representatives,” reads Conroy’s…


Paul Ryan Is Just Two Years Away From Collecting A Federal Pension — Here’s How Much We’ll Be Giving Him

Ready to suck up his share of benefits. (Editor’s Note: After Paul Ryan’s father died when he was a teenager he received Social Security survivor benefits. That did not stop him from trying to gut Social Security for others. As with so many doctrinaire right wing ideologues, Paul Ryan has no trouble cashing in on federal benefits for personal gain. He will now enjoy a generous taxpayer funded pension. — Mark L. Taylor) By Robert Schroeder MarketWatch (4/12/18) Retiring House Speaker Paul Ryan hasn’t said much about his future, but, like other members of Congress, the soon to be former “weekend…


The Young Turks: The Real Reason Paul Ryan Is Retiring & It Had Nothing To Do With Spending More Time With His Kids

The Young Turks (4/12/18) “US House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan will not run for re-election this year, in a big blow to Republicans with mid-term elections looming. Congress’ most powerful lawmaker said he would not stand for another term in his Wisconsin district this November. Republicans already face a tough challenge from Democrats to keep control of the lower chamber. Mr Ryan joins nearly 30 House Republicans who have announced this year they are retiring outright. Democrats need 23 seats to take over the House. In a Wednesday morning news conference, Mr Ryan said the decision was family-related. “You…


Ryan’s Real Legacy: Trumputin & The Enabling Russpublicans

He could have stood up to Trump. He chose not to. By Matt Fuller The HuffPost (4/11/18) WASHINGTON ― House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) announced Wednesday that he would not seek re-election in November, prompting the normal convulsions of Washington praise for Ryan and his “legacy.” President Donald Trump tweeted that no one could question Ryan’s “legacy of achievement,” and Ryan himself said he was proud of all the things he had accomplished as speaker, namely the tax cuts he helped push through last year and the big increases to military spending he oversaw last month. But aside from a…


SURPRISE! New Analysis Of The Paul Ryan / GOP Tax Scam Shows “Corporate Cheapskates” Hoarding The Windfall From Workers

By Jessica Corbett Common Dreams (4/10/18) Bolstering poll results and expert analysis indicating that the tax plan Republicans forced through Congress last year is primarily benefiting big businesses and wealthy Americans, a new report finds very few corporations are raising workers’ wages or giving them bonuses, despite receiving billions of dollars in tax cuts. As President Donald Trump signed the tax plan into law just before the New Year, he proclaimed, “Corporations are literally going wild over this, I think even beyond my expectations,” just moments after touting the legislation as “a bill for the middle class.” But while corporations are getting about $60.8 billion in tax cuts,…


With Lyin’ Ryan Gone, Race Opens For Randy Bryce, The ‘Iron Stache’

Randy ‘Iron Stache’ Bryce: A Democrat who stands for workers & their families.   By Tim Murphy Mother Jones (December 2017) Randy Bryce was looking for another hit. On a weekday afternoon in August, the Democratic candidate for Congress in Wisconsin’s 1st District sat at his kitchen table, staring into the camera lens of his laptop. Bryce is a union ironworker when he is not running for office, and he was surrounded by traces of his craft. Four pairs of heavy high-topped work boots were scattered across the cluttered apartment he shares with his 11-year-old son on the second floor of…


One Of Wisconsin’s Own: Guess Who Is The Number One NRA Bloody Money Grubber In Congress…

By Jacqueline Leo Who.What.Why (2/28/18) Changing America’s anything-goes gun control laws is now the goal of many high school students across the nation who have banded together under the slogan, #NeverAgain. Chances are they’ll be joined by many of their millennial peers (millennials are the largest generation and voting group in the US) and their parents when they march on Washington on March 24. The movement was ignited on February 14 in Parkland, Florida, when a disturbed former student shot and killed 17 people, including 14 students. The surviving students’ reactions have been reminiscent of the Divergent Trilogy, where young people living in…


Scarlet Letter: What The NRA ‘A’ Rating Is Really All About

  “Lives Over Bribes” — Gun control rally sign. By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (2/22/18) The recent mass shooting — the latest bauble on the bloody necklace of American exceptionalism — has ignited the recent episode of national gun cult debate we have all grown numbingly use to. There are the predictable laments of “never thought it could happen here”, the candle-lit vigils, prayer services, grieving families, parades of ambulances and the empty thoughts and cynical prayers of the nation’s supposed ruling class. A ruling class that just can’t bring itself to even consider a tiny less wealth…


School Shooters Love Wisconsin’s Bipartisan Congressional Accomplices

  By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (2/19/18) School and other mass shooters do not act alone. They are assisted by politicians on the take to the National Rifle Association. Through their indifference and coldly calculating, never satiated hunger for campaign cash and other benefits, these pols ignore the wishes of the majority of Americans to bring some legislative sanity to our gun cult. When the shooters begin their rampages they have been legislatively protected, coddled and assisted by those who are supposed to represent us. The National Rifle Association loves to splurge their cash — including donations from…


Paul Ryan Makes A HUUUUUUGE Mistake: Now Here’s How To Make It Stick

  By Scott Wittkopf Frame4Future,.com (2/5/18) On Friday [2/2], Paul Ryan made a huuuge mistake in messaging and framing – a rarity. While he’s been called out on it so much that #crumbs trended on twitter, this gaffe opens the door for progressives and Democrats to make it stick. In doing so, people’s perception (frame) of the economy could change significantly – and help win elections in November. Most people have seen the story that went viral over the weekend. Paul Ryan tweeted the following, in support of the recently passed GOP tax scam: “A secretary at a public high school…


Paul Ryan: Secretary Getting A Whole $1.50 More A Week Shows Effect Of GOP Tax Cuts

By Daniel Marans The HuffPost (2/3/18) House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) really wants you to know how great the Republican tax cuts are. Worried that the partisan Nunes memo released Friday will undermine the FBI’s ability to do its job? Ryan is happy to remind you, ”The tax cuts are working.” On Saturday, Ryan outdid himself again with a tweet bragging about the extra $1.50 a week that a Pennsylvania secretary is making thanks to the GOP legislation. Ryan and his Republican allies are deeply opposed to increasing the minimum wage or making it easier for labor unions to organize.  “A secretary…


Paul Ryan Collected $500,000 In Koch Contributions Days After House Passed Tax Law

  By Mary Papefuss The HuffPost (1/20/18) Just days after the House passed its version of the federal tax law slashing corporate tax rates, House Speaker Paul Ryan collected nearly $500,000 in campaign contributions from billionaire energy mogul Charles Koch and his wife, according to a recent campaign donor report. Koch and his brother David spent millions of dollars to get the tax law passed and are spending millions more in a public relations campaign in an attempt to boost support for the law, The Wall Street Journal reported. Koch Industries, one of the largest private corporations in the nation, operates refineries and manufactures a variety of products. The new…


Are Scott Walker & Paul Ryan Next? Dems Score Big Upset In State Special Election

  By Jon Queally Common Dreams (1/17/18) The win by a Democrat for a state senate seat in Wisconsin’s special election on Tuesday is being seen as the latest sign that traditional Republican strongholds, including districts where Donald Trump beat rival Hillary Clinton handily in 2016, could be up for grabs as the nation eyes this year’s mid-term elections. The victory by Patty Schachtner, the chief medical examiner at a local hospital, over Republican Adam Jarchow, who currently serves in the State House, in Wisconsin’s 10th Senate District—where Trump triumphed over Clinton by 17 points—was an indication to many Democrats, as…


The Astounding Self-Serving Hypocrisy Of Paul Ryan

“But my favorite has to be Paul Ryan, who regularly proposes budgets that cut taxes on the rich and the corporations to the bone, while cutting any kind of support to the poor or middle class lest they be “coddled” to the point where they have no incentive to work. This is all done, by the way [Ryan claims], because the rich and corporations are the “engines” of growth and creators of jobs, while the poor and middle-class recipients of government favors like unemployment benefits are just lazy no-gooders who won’t get off their assess. “Ryan got where he is…


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Wisconsin Fascist: Republican Challenger Calls For Murdering Paul Ryan With A Fascist Helicopter ‘death flight’ Just Like Political Killings During Pinochet Regime

Image tweeted by Paul Nehlen, who is challenging Rep. Paul Ryan in the Wisconsin first district Republican primary.   By Bob Brigham The Raw Story (12/20/17) An alt-right candidate running a primary challenge against House Speaker Paul Ryan has posted an image on Twitter showing the Republican congressman falling from a helicopter. The meme posted by Paul Nehlen (R-WI) refers to South American practice of dropping political opponents out of helicopters. “’Free Helicopter Rides’ refers to extrajudicial killings known as ‘death flights,’ in which military forces throw people from aircraft into large bodies of water. Online, the phrase is often used…


Good Riddance To Paul Ryan – The Biggest Fake In American Politics

By Charles P. Pierce Esquire (12/14/17) Ring and run, you wretched cur. In what passes for a genuine scoop, Tim Alberta and Rachael Cade broke the news in Politico on Thursday that Paul Ryan, the zombie-eyed granny starver from the state of Wisconsin, may well be hanging them up at the end of the 2018 midterms. Of course, Ryan—and various People Who Are Familiar With His Thinking—has a number of deeply pious, and unquestionably phony, reasons for his departure. “On a personal level, going home at the end of next year would allow Ryan, who turns 48 next month, to keep promises…


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Paul Ryan’s Primary Challenger Pushes Ugly White Nationalist Ideology & Coded Nazi Language

  (Editor’s Note: While his ideology and racist language may be crude, don’t underestimate the potential impact of far right Paul Ryan primary challenger Paul Nehlen. In the 2016 election he produced a powerful campaign video and his campaign website is slick. Clearly he has a lot of money behind him – his or others. – Mark L. Taylor) By Christopher Mathias The HuffPost (12/16/17) HuffPost asked Paul Nehlen three times by email this week if he considers himself a white nationalist. Twice Nehlen dodged the question. The third time he didn’t respond. The Wisconsin Republican is running to replace House Speaker Paul…


Warren & Sanders Deliver 3-Minute Takedown Of GOP’s Pro-Billionaire & Corporate Tax Cut Scam

  Wisconsin’s very own Rep. Paul Ryan campaigns in Delavan, Wisconsin for GOP tax scam to siphon off the last nickles of wealth from the middle-class and poor to give even more to corporations and the super wealthy.  By Jake Johnson Common Dreams (11/2/17) In a video released shortly after House Republicans unveiled a tax plan they claim “is for the middle class families in this country who deserve a break,” Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) argued—consistent with independent analyses—that the GOP’s proposals would in fact primarily reward large corporations and wealthy individuals while slashing programs low-income and middle class…


Yellow: The Cowardice Of Paul Ryan & Mitch McConnell

  By Ezra Klein Vice (10/31/17) Earlier this month, Speaker Paul Ryan told what was, in theory, a joke. “Every morning I wake up in my office and I scroll through Twitter to see which tweets I will have to pretend I didn’t see later on,” he said at the Al Smith Charity Dinner, to appreciative chuckles. Monday, however, was a reminder that Ryan wasn’t kidding. Appearing on WTAQ, a Wisconsin radio station, he was asked what he thought of the indictments Robert Mueller had issued. “I really don’t have anything to add other than nothing is going to derail what we’re…


Mendacious: Paul Ryan’s Duplicity On Gun Violence, Mental Health, And, Well, Everything

  By John Nichols The Nation (10/6/17) Paul Ryan, the shameless political careerist who has surrendered the US House of Representatives to campaign donors and lobbyists, has a well-documented history of doing everything in his power to prevent meaningful debate about gun violence. But it’s getting harder for the speaker of the House to game the system on behalf of his benefactors. Ryan knows that his traditional “thoughts and prayers” response to mass shootings does not work any longer. People are on to the fact that his pious pronouncements in the aftermath of massacres are never followed up by meaningful action to…


Oh, No! Pious Pauly Ryan Doesn’t Like It When We Get Angry

  (Editor’s Note: Oh yeah, lessons in manners from the pinhead-hearted Paul Ryan who won’t even accept phone calls or meet with his constituents about their healthcare concerns. Given the circumstances, I want to be as polite about this as I can: Screw you, Pauly. – Mark L. Taylor) By Mara Pellittieri Talk Poverty (7/20/17) In the past six months, this administration has pushed hard to dismantle the health care system. It is rolling back financial and environmental regulations, undercutting public schools, and hacking away at the legal system. It has been actively hostile to immigrants, tried to defund Planned Parenthood,…


The Ironworker Running To Unseat Paul Ryan Wants Single-Payer Health Care, $15 Minimum Wage

  By John Light Moyers & Company (6/28/17) A campaign ad went viral last week — something that, despite political consultants’ best efforts, doesn’t often happen. It begins with an elderly woman sitting in her living room in Wisconsin. As her middle-aged son listens, she describes her concern that she someday may not be able to pay for the drugs she needs to treat her multiple sclerosis. Her son, it turns out, is Randy Bryce, a first-time candidate for federal office. Bryce’s opponent in 2018 will be one of the Republican health care plans’ most prominent advocates, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. As…


Donald Trump’s ‘Eunuch-ique’ Cabinet

  Seth Meyers: Is There ‘Anything Creepier’ Than Donald Trump’s Cabinet Meeting? “Even Kim Jong Un is like, dude, have some self-respect.” Link to 10-Minute Video (Commoner Call cartoon by Mark L. Taylor, 2017. Open source and free to use with link to www.thecommonercall.org ) ***** Never Has There Been A President … So Damn Weird: ‘Didn’t Know You Could Broadcast Full On Circle Jerk!’  By Abbey Zimet Common Dreams (6/12/17) Okay, so we really don’t wanna write again about our appalling Trash Monster, but things just keep getting weirder. On Monday, Trump held his first full Cabinet meeting, a surreal,…


Paul Ryan Leads House Republicans In Setting Course For Our Next Financial Collapse

  By Jon Queally Common Dreams (6/8/17) The Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed the Financial CHOICE Act on Thursday afternoon in a move critics—who call it the #WrongChoiceAct—say puts the U.S. economy on a path towards the next large-scale financial meltdown. With a final vote of 233 to 186, only one Republican joined with Democrats in voting “nay.” The final roll call is here. As the Washington Post notes, “Democrats and progressive groups, who argue banks need more oversight, not less, are preparing to use the issue to animate supporters still angry that Wall Street banks have not paid a bigger…


Paul Ryan Peddles Lame Old GOP Lies About Effects Of Inheritance Tax On Super Wealthy While Real Data Reveals The Truth

  By Cezary Podkul ProPublica (6/7/17) Does the estate tax really hurt small businesses? House Speaker Paul Ryan thinks so. He revived this longstanding debate in a May 17 column in the Kenosha News, in which he defended the Republican plan to abolish the levy on inherited wealth. Ryan wrote that the “death tax” can “result in double, and potentially even triple, taxation on small businesses and family farms, both of which are prevalent in Wisconsin.” President Trump made a similar claim in his budget proposal a few days later, calling for repeal of the estate tax on the grounds that…



Crowd Boos & Screams “F@#$ You” At Paul Ryan Over Healthcare Disaster

“Health care for all, not just Paul!” David Packman Show (5/11/17) House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) is booed and heckled outside of Success Academy Charter School in Harlem, New York by a crowd gathered to protest the Republican health care plan. Link to 6-Minute Video ***** Editor’s Note: Paul Ryan benefited from Social Security benefits after his father died and on top of that he has been working in government – soaking up taxpayer money – most of his adult life. How did he afford that big plush mansion in Janesville? Like his teat-sucking buddy Sen. Ron Johnson, Ryan married…


A Closer Look: Seth Meyers Takes Paul Ryan Apart Piece By Dishonest Piece

  By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (5/11/17) Late Night host Seth Meyers sliced and diced Rep. Paul Ryan’s cynical dishonesty in a “Closer Look” segment. Meyer’s was responding to an emailed objection Ryan sent about anther piece that Meyers had done the week before. “And unlike Republicans and their health care bill, we actually read the whole email,” Meyers said. Masterfully employing a series of clips of Ryan objecting to the Obamacare debates, Meyer’s deftly displays the brazen hypocrisy of Ryan and House Republicans. “Everything that Paul Ryan claimed to hate about the Obamacare process in 2009, he’s…


How Paul Ryan’s Muse Ayn Rand Helped Turn The U.S. Into A Juvenile, Mean Spirited Nation

  By Bruce E. Levine AlterNet (12/10/14) “Ayn Rand’s “philosophy” is nearly perfect in its immorality, which makes the size of her audience all the more ominous and symptomatic as we enter a curious new phase in our society….To justify and extol human greed and egotism is to my mind not only immoral, but evil.” — Gore Vidal, 1961   Only rarely in U.S. history do writers transform us to become a more caring or less caring nation. In the 1850s, Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) was a strong force in making the United States a more humane nation, one that would…


Run, Hide & Threaten Citizens: Fragile Republican Snowflakes Paul Ryan & Ron Johnson Bully Constituents

By Capper Crooks & Liars (3/1/17) Like many Republicans around the country, Wisconsin’s Republicans have been doing their best to avoid their constituents and not have to listen to their anger or how they are not representing them. But since this is Wisconsin, our snowflakes tend to be bigger and uglier, even though we are going through an unseasonable warm spell. Even Lyin’ Paul Ryan is no exception. Ryan’s office stopped taking phone calls from his constituents. (Don’t worry, he gave his personal phone number to all of his wealthy friends and benefactors – y’know, the people he truly represents….


CARTOON KNOWLEDGE: What’s A ‘Snollygoster’? We Have Three Prime Examples In Wisconsin

By Mark L. Taylor The Commoner Call (2/27/17) Commoner Call reader Richard Smith sent in a note the other day alerting me to probably the best word I have ever seen to describe a politician. It is one of those words that sounds exactly like what it means: snollygoster. It’s perfectly suited to a particular brand of politician citizens on both sides of the American political chasm have come to loathe. Truly, snollygoster is a tag with bipartisan applications. While all politicians have to occasionally stretch the truth or compromise on some campaign promise or utter some meaningless BS to…