From: Judy Miriga

Wake up people……..wake up…….Voter suppression and luring old and seniors (talk radio and landline phone calls to seniors, lying and twisting Obamas’ Medicare and Medicaid to lure votes) may be the game changer for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan to win the election……there are advance plan for last minute victory for GOPs Mitt/Ryan tickets………Looks like they are not ready to give up and by hooks or crooks Mitt Romney/Paul Ryan must do their things for the interest of Corporate Business Special Interest who are extremely desparate to take the Government to serve their selfish and greed.

Very very sad indeed…….

For America to move forward in a progressive manner where all have an opportunity to play by the same rule and improve lives and survival, bi-partisan good leadership must replace the Obstructionist with leaders who keep blocking facilitation of Bills for serving and progressing public needs and interests to move forward.

Electing good people is the answer we must all engage for peace and unity and for the sake of good for all………..

Judy Miriga
Diaspora Spokesperson
Executive Director
Confederation Council Foundation for Africa Inc.,
USA
http://socioeconomicforum50.blogspot.com

– – – – – – – – –

The ED Show – Paul Ryan gets booed at AARP convention

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 21, 2012
Rep. Paul Ryan talked Medicare at the AARP Convention in New Orleans, but the crowd wasn’t receptive to his ideas. Ed Schultz talks to Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., about the Ryan speech and more.

THE LAST WORD w. LAWRENCE O’DONNELL (September 20, 2012)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRtQ4m_i1j0
Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Lala MAN
No description available.

The ED Show – Breaking down Romney’s tax returns

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 21, 2012

Mitt Romney chose to release his 2011 tax returns today, along with a “summary” of his taxes from the past 20 Years. Romney used a few tricks to fool around with his rates, and ended up paying way more taxes than he should have. David Cay Johnston joins Ed Schultz to break down the numbers.

The sense of entitlement help by the rich makes me sick.?

ZombieWombles4 hours ago

Fucker paying low taxes yet benefits from the roads, power? lines and system my ancestors built.

Pay your share filthy pig!
syntaxed29 hours ago

Rachel Maddow – Romney plays tax games with 2011 return

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 21, 2012
Rachel Maddow notices that Mitt Romney paid more in taxes in 2011 than was legally required (an act that should disqualify him from the presidency according to his own standard), and explains why Romney effectively picked his own tax rate for political reasons, having spent his whole life mastering tax avoidance.

Martin Bashir – Boos for Ryan’s AARP appearance, Romney’s tax returns

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 21, 2012
Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., joins Martin Bashir to discuss why seniors booed Paul Ryan and his talk of “vouchers” at today’s AARP convention, and whether Romney’s release of his 2011 tax return only ramps up talk of fixing America’s tax code.

Martin Bashir: Mitt Romney Has The Heart of a Serial Hypocrite

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by politicalarticles
Stench of a Losing Campaign: ReTHUGliLOONs Begin To Turn on Rom-BOT Romney: http://www.politicalarticles.net/blog/2012/09/21/stench-of-a-losing-campaign-…

Martin Bashir Exposes Republican Joe Walsh – Owes Back Child Support
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC7WWV1VVJs
Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Don Kihot
Martin Bashir Exposes Republican Joe Walsh – Owes Back Child Support

Rachel Maddow – Americans care about taking care of veterans

Published on Sep 21, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 21, 2012
Rachel Maddow shows how the disproportionate online reaction to the story of Republicans defeating the veterans’ jobs bill should show members of the media that the story is worth amplifying.

The ED Show – Undercover video sheds new light on Romney’s crisis reaction

Published on Sep 19, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 19, 2012
A donor in that undercover fundraising tape asked Mitt Romney how he would show American strength if he were faced with a situation like Reagan’s Iran Hostage crisis. Romney answers candidly that he would “take advantage of the opportunity”. Ed Schultz talks with Jon Soltz, Chairman of votevets.org, and Sam Stein, political reporter for the Huffington Post.

The ED Show – Romney’s real view of workers

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
The Romney campaign is out with a misleading new commercial on the coal industry. Ed Schultz sets the record straight on the ad and takes a deeper look into Mitt Romney’s view on workers by looking at yet another clip from the “47 percent” video. Communications Workers of America President Larry Cohen weighs in

Rachel Maddow – ‘Dead voters’ exposed as phantom scandal

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
Veronica Degraffenreid, elections liaison for the North Carolina State Board of Elections, talks with Rachel Maddow about the burden on the election boards in her state to address the frivolous claims of dead voters on the rolls by a tea party group called the Voter Integrity Project.

Martin Bashir – Ryan helps GOP farm for gridlock in return to Capitol

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., joins Martin Bashir to discuss Paul Ryan’s two-fold mission in his return to the Capitol; press a false attack about President Obama removing welfare work requirements and help rally House members around a losing ticket.

Martin Bashir – Romney fumbles delivery of 1998 ‘redistribution’ attack on Obama

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
MSNBC analysts Jonathan Alter, Matt Miller and Michael Eric Dyson debate whether the Romney campaign is reaching into the bottom of the ammo bag with a 1998-era attack about President Obama being in favor of “redistribution” — an attack that pales in comparison to Romney’s “47%” video.

Martin Bashir – Romney, Ryan home states may vote Obama

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
MSNBC contributor Jimmy Williams and Lehigh University’s Dr. James Peterson pick apart a slew of new polls — nearly all bad for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan — and discuss why conservatives are suffering buyer’s remorse in what was supposed to be a “can’t-miss” election.

Rachel Maddow – Republicans kill veterans’ jobs bill

Published on Sep 19, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 19, 2012
Patrick Murphy, former U.S. Representative from Pennsylvania and Iraq war veteran, talks with Rachel Maddow about what kind of men Senators John Boozman, Mike Johanns, Richard Burr and Pat Toomey must be to turn their backs on U.S. veterans and kill a bill design to help them – a bill that is not only bipartisan, but which these four senators helped write

The ED Show – Obama hits Romney on 47% while Republicans flee

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
On the fourth day of Mitt Romney’s 47% comment controversy, Republicans continued to distance themselves from Romney, while President Obama stayed on the offensive. The Huffington Post’s Howard Fineman joins Ed Schultz to analyze the damage done to the Romney campaign.

Rachel Maddow – Romney’s ‘47%’ remarks more blunt statement than misstatement

Published on Sep 19, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 18, 2012
Dan Rather, anchor and managing editor of “Dan Rather Reports” on AXS TV, talks with Rachel Maddow about new revelations in the undercover Mitt Romney fundraiser videos and the truth revealed in Romney’s remarks – that he doesn’t know what a dirty bomb is, and he thinks the middle and lower classes should pay higher taxes.

Martin Bashir – Romney doubles down on ‘47%’ amid conservative jitters

Published on Sep 19, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 19, 2012
Mother Jones’ David Corn, MSNBC analyst Richard Wolffe, and Democratic strategist Bob Shrum debate why Mitt Romney is choosing to own his “47%” remarks, and why many Republicans are distancing themselves from Romney.

Martin Bashir – No apologies from Romney for 47% comment

Published on Sep 18, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 18, 2012
MSNBC’s Krystal Ball, The Grio’s Perry Bacon and Democratic strategist debate why Mitt Romney refuses to admit that his “47%” comment was wrong, and how his comments in front of donors may confirm some voters’ opinions of Romney.

Lawrence O’Donnell – The Truth – MSNBC

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by daemperialist
MSNBC, POLITICS, OBAMA, NEWS, LAWRENCE O’DONNELL

The ED Show – Brown and Warren debate starts with cheap shot

Published on Sep 20, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 20, 2012
Sen. Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren had their first debate for Brown’s U.S. senate seat in Massachusetts. Boston City Councilor Felix Arroyo joins Ed Schultz to discuss the substance of the debate.

THE LAST WORD w. LAWRENCE O’DONNELL (September 17, 2012)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaE3MZ1ueyc
Published on Sep 18, 2012 by Lala MAN
No description available.

Wow. Way to go Romney. Next, you will make fun of Americans? that have just one underwear.
vincedeporter3 days ago

Martin Bashir – Romney campaign now with 47% more hole to dig out from

Published on Sep 18, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 18, 2012
MSNBC’s Jonathan Alter, The Hill’s Karen Finney and Lehigh University’s Dr. James Peterson join Martin Bashir to debate how Mitt Romney can dig himself out of a whole after his comments on “47%” of America — and why the election may now get a lot uglier.

The ED Show – Secret recording catches Romney’s comments about Obama supporters

Published on Sep 17, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 17, 2012
A secret recording from a fundraiser obtained by Mother Jones catches Mitt Romney saying “shocking things” about 47 percent of the electorate. Former Ohio Governor Ted Strickland and Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne discuss the tape with Ed Schultz.

I think Mitt also forgets about the 280 major U.S. corporations who paid no Federal? Income Tax between 2008 and 2010 with another 30 actually getting a refund on billions of dollars of net profits. When you’re a millionaire it’s a “tax cut for job creators”. When you’re not a millionaire it’s “welfare” and a “hand-out” and a “entitlement”.
racerx9963 days ago 5

How Many times is Romney going to shoot himself in that silver foot of his? Seriously! Cameras are everywhere nowadays. Thankfully? enough this was recorded before the election so people can see what he really is like when he thinks he can be himself.
ajsanime3 days ago 2

I think Mitt Romney’s chances of President i think maybe? sinking like the Titanic.
TitanicBismarck19871 day ago

The ED Show – Romney campaign struggling with strategy

Published on Sep 17, 2012
Sept 17, 2012
The Romney campaign is in disarray, and a new article reports that the campaign in suffering from infighting and other issues. Democratic

Martin Bashir – Team Romney infighting as campaign hits ‘reset’ button

Published on Sep 17, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 17, 2012
CNBC’s John Harwood, Chicago Tribune’s Clarence Page and The Guardian’s Ana Marie Cox discuss the new Politico report detailing dysfunction and infighting in Mitt Romney’s campaign. then debate why the newly “reset” Romney campaign looks the same as the old Romney campaign.

Martin Bashir – Why Romney’s errors are symptomatic of a lack of policy details

Published on Sep 17, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 17, 2012
MSNBC host Steve Kornacki, The Hill’s Karen Finney and MSNBC contributor Maria Teresa Kumar dig into the “Saturday Night Live” take on Mitt Romney; why Mitt Romney’s many unforced errors are a symptom of him trying to avoid giving detailed policy speeches.

Rachel Maddow On Why Republicans Are Out To Destroy Unions

Published on Sep 16, 2012 by HipsterBlood
Why union-busting helps Republicans, President Eisenhower on unions, what unions have given you.

Rachel Maddow – Paul Ryan shares billing with ‘former terrorist’ at fringe conference

Published on Sep 15, 2012 by Licentiathe8th
Sept 14, 2012
Rachel Maddow reports on how misunderstanding and wild conspiracy theories are fomenting violent public outbursts across the Middle East, and notes that Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan is scheduled to speak at a conference featuring right wing conspiracy theorists and is billed alongside a self-described “former terrorist.”

Rachel Maddow on Harold Simmons

Published on Apr 8, 2012 by TheCrossroads2012
Harold Simmons has given Millions of dollars to GOP candidates so that he can continue to dump nuclear waste into an aquifer that supplies 1/3 of the water that irrigates land in America.

Americans are screwed. ?
Rodney925 months ago

Congress exits Washington to hit campaign trail
By ANDREW TAYLOR | Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The most partisan, least productive Congress in memory has skipped out of Washington for the campaign trail.

The Senate shuttered the Capitol soon after sending President Barak Obama stopgap spending legislation that will make sure the government won’t shut down on Oct. 1. It passed early Saturday morning by a 62-30 vote.

Left behind for a postelection session is a pile of unfinished business on the budget and taxes, farm policy and legislation to save the Postal Service from insolvency.
The GOP-controlled House had beat its retreat Friday morning after taking one last, futile slap at Obama — passing a bill entitled the “Stop the War on Coal Act.” The measure, dead on arrival in the Senate, was aimed at boosting the coal industry in its battle against new environmental regulations while hurting Obama’s political prospects in coal states like Ohio and Virginia.

The Democratic-controlled Senate’s middle-of-the-night session came after a spitting match between Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and the chamber’s Republicans over Reid’s insistence on advancing legislation by Sen. Jon Tester of Montana to boost access to public lands for hunting and fishing. Tester is perhaps the Senate’s most endangered Democrat and Republicans protested that he was being given special treatment in a nakedly political move to boost his reelection chances. The measure eventually cleared a procedural hurdle on a sweeping 84-7 vote.

The votes came at midnight to give senators who had scattered from Washington time to return. Democrat Claire McCaskill was in Missouri Friday for a debate, while Michael Bennet, D-Colo., had been in the southwest portion of his state to attend a ceremony celebrating the new Chimney Rock National Monument. Tea party star Marco Rubio, R-Fla., was venting his frustrations with American Airlines on Twitter.

The only must-do item on the get-out-of-Dodge agenda was a six-month spending measure to fulfill the bare minimum of Congress’ responsibilities by keeping the government running after the current budget year ends on Sept. 30.

The spending measure permits spending on agency operating budgets at levels agreed to under last summer’s hard-fought budget and debt deal between Obama and Capitol Hill Republicans. That’s 0.6 percent increase from current spending rates, which represents a defeat for House Republicans, who had sought to cut about 2 percent below the budget deal and shift $8 billion from domestic programs to the Pentagon.

Reid also relented to a monthslong demand by tea party Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., for a vote on suspending foreign aid to the governments of Libya, Egypt and Pakistan. Paul only got 10 votes. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., however, won sweeping approval of a nonbinding resolution supporting steps to make sure Iran doesn’t develop a nuclear weapon.

It’s the earliest pre-election exit by Congress from Washington since 1960, though lawmakers will return in November after the election to deal with its stack of unfinished work.

The approval rating for the current Congress in a Gallup poll earlier this month sank to just 13 percent, the lowest ever for an election year. The GOP-controlled House and Democratic Senate managed to come together with Obama to enact just 173 new laws. More are coming after the election, but the current tally is roughly half the output of a typical Congress.

Even so, political pundits say Republicans are strong favorites to keep the House while Democratic chances of keeping the Senate are on the upswing with Obama’s rise in the polls.

The exit from Washington leaves the bulk of Congress’ agenda for a postelection session in which it’s hoped lawmakers will be liberated from the election-year paralysis that has ground Capitol Hill to a near halt.
Topping the lame-duck agenda was dealing with the so-called fiscal cliff, which combines the expiration of the Bush-era tax cuts on Dec. 31 and more than $100 billion in indiscriminate, across-the-board spending cuts set to strike at the same time as punishment for the failure of last year’s deficit “supercommittee” to strike a deal.

Also left in limbo is the farm bill, stalled in the House due to opposition from conservative Republicans who think it doesn’t cut farm subsidies and food stamps enough and Democrats who think its food stamp cuts are too harsh.
The current farm act expires on Sept. 30 but the lapse won’t have much practical effect in the near term. Still, it’s a political black eye for Republicans, especially those from farm states like North Dakota and Iowa.
The lack of productivity of the 112th Congress was the result of divided government and bitter partisanship. Die-hard GOP conservatives eager to roll back Obama’s agenda barreled headlong into an official Washington still largely controlled by Democrats — and oftentimes seemed to limit the options of their own leadership with their intransigence. The looming presidential and congressional elections caused top leaders in both parties to play it safe and stick to party positions.

The result: Congress’ major accomplishments tended to be legislation that mostly extended current policies, like a highway bill passed earlier this year and bills demanded by Obama to renew a 2 percentage point payroll tax cuts and extend student loan subsidies.

Even this Congress’ signature accomplishment — a budget and debt deal enacted last summer to cut $2.1 trillion from the budget over 10 years — punted most of its difficult decisions to the future by tasking the supercommittee with finding at least $1.2 trillion in deficit savings.
And, after the supercommittee cratered, House Republicans walked away from the budget deal by pressing for further cuts to domestic appropriations and reversing some on the pact’s Pentagon cuts.
Meanwhile, in the Senate, Reid worked closely with the White House to use the Senate schedule for Obama’s political advantage, repeatedly forcing votes on closing tax breaks for oil companies and raising taxes on upper bracket earners.
But Reid failed to schedule floor debates on any of the 12 annual appropriations bills and the Democratic-led chamber, for the third year in a row, failed to pass a budget.
Republicans also point to almost 40 items of House-passed jobs-related legislation sitting stalled in the Senate.
“They haven’t passed a budget in more than three years. They have no plan to save Medicare, no plan to stop all the tax hikes, and no plan to replace the sequester,” Boehner said. “This isn’t leadership. It is negligence.”

Democrats defending the Senate point out that the balky chamber managed several bills that the House would not, including a renewal of farm programs and legislation to overhaul the Postal Service and give it an infusion of cash to stave off insolvency.

“The reality is for as closely as divided as this Senate is, we passed a large number of bipartisan bills this year, very important bills, but as you all know, it takes two chambers to pass a law,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. “On the other side, too many of the Congress members, particularly the tea party folks, think compromise is a dirty word.”

Romney releases 2011 tax return, paid 14.1 percent

By Olivier Knox, Yahoo! News

White House Correspondent

Looking to blunt relentless Democratic attacks, Mitt Romney on Friday released his 2011 tax return, a summary of his effective tax rates for the past two decades and, for good measure, two doctor’s notes attesting to the good physical health of the candidate and his running mate, Paul Ryan.

The tax return was released at 3 p.m. ET on the website www.mittromney.com/disclosure. Ahead of the release, the former Massachusetts governor’s campaign released a blog post summarizing the document.
Releasing information on a Friday afternoon is traditionally a way to reduce the amount of media exposure.
The move fulfills a promise Romney made earlier in the 2012 presidential campaign. But it was unlikely to quiet Democratic criticisms that Romney has failed to live up to a standard set by his father, former Michigan Gov. George Romney, who released 12 years of tax returns when he ran for president in 1968.

The Romneys paid $1,935,708 in taxes on $13,696,951 of mostly investment income for an effective tax rate of 14.1 percent. (The Obamas paid an effective tax rate of 20.5 percent in 2011, a lower rate than the president’s secretary, according to the White House.)
Romney, who is thought to have a personal fortune in the neighborhood of $250 million, gave $4,020,772 to charity, 30 percent of their income. (The Obamas gave 21.8 percent of their income to charity.)
The blog post, written by the manager of Romney’s blind trust since 2003, R. Bradford Malt, said the Romneys had filed their 2011 tax return with the IRS Friday morning. It also indicated that the Romneys’ tax preparer, PricewaterhouseCoopers, would provide a letter summarizing the tax rates that the Romneys paid from 1990 to 2009.
The Romneys paid an average annual effective federal tax rate of 20.2 percent, with the lowest rate coming in at 13.66 percent. Over that same stretch of time, they gave an average of 13.45 percent of their adjusted gross income to charity.

And Romney paid a far lower rate than the top 35 percent tax rate levied on the largest salaries because most of his income came from investments, which are taxed at far lower rates.
“During the 20-year period covered by the PWC letter, Gov. and Mrs. Romney paid 100 percent of the taxes that they owed,” the blog post read.

Democrats led by the Obama campaign have repeatedly hit Romney over his refusal to disclose his tax returns—a fight that has helped to keep Romney’s vast wealth in the media spotlight at a time when the president is trying to paint him as an out-of-touch millionaire bent on helping the wealthy.
Romney paid a price—literally—for saying that he paid at least 13 percent in federal income taxes over the past decade. He and his wife did not take the full deductions to which they were entitled for their charitable giving.

“The Romneys’ generous charitable donations in 2011 would have significantly reduced their tax obligation for the year,” Malt wrote. “The Romneys thus limited their deduction of charitable contributions to conform to the Governor’s statement in August, based upon the January estimate of income, that he paid at least 13% in income taxes in each of the last 10 years.”

Team Obama showed no sign of letting up in its attacks, with deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter saying in a statement that Romney paid a lower tax rate than some middle-class families “because of a set of complex loopholes and tax shelters only available to those at the top.”

Cutter charged that the 2011 return “continues to mask Romney’s true wealth and income from Bain Capital, leaving the American people in the dark about critical details about his finances.”

“Why does Mitt Romney not just release the full returns, instead of the bare summary he has provided of the last 20 years, so voters can make their own judgments about Mitt Romney’s finances?” Cutter asked.

Romney rips Obama on ‘can’t change Washington’
By Olivier Knox, Yahoo! News

White House Corresponden

The Ticket –

Mitt Romney pounded President Barack Obama for saying, “You can’t change Washington from the inside” at a rally in the sweltering Sarasota heat on Thursday. And he proudly promised Florida voters that he would “get the job done” where the Democrat did not.

“We face a Washington that’s broken, that can’t get the job done,” the former Massachusetts governor told some 4,600 supporters. “The president today threw in the white flag of surrender again. He said he can’t change Washington from the inside. He can only change it from outside.

“Well, we’re going to give him that chance in November! He’s going outside!” Romney said to cheers from the crowd. “I can change Washington, I will change Washington! We’ll get the job done from the inside! Republicans and Democrats will come together!”

Romney was riffing on a comment Obama made Thursday at one of two town hall-style events hosted by Spanish-language network Univision at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Fla. (Romney was at the network’s first one, held on Wednesday.)

At the forum, Obama had said, “I think that I’ve learned some lessons over the last four years. And the most important lesson I’ve learned is that you can’t change Washington from the inside—you can only change it from the outside. That’s how I got elected, and that’s how the big accomplishments, like health care, got done. … We mobilized the American people to speak out. That’s how we were able to cut taxes for middle-class families.

“So something that I’d really like to concentrate on in my second term,” the president continued, “is being in a much more constant conversation with the American people so that they can put pressure on Congress to help move some of these issues forward.”
Romney painted the comment not as a testament to grass-roots activism, but as a betrayal of the “Hope and Change” vision and “Yes We Can” slogan from Obama’s history-making 2008 run for the White House.
“His slogan was ‘Yes We Can,'” said Romney. “His slogan now is ‘No I Can’t.’ He went from the president of change to the president who can’t get change.
“The president of the United States says he can’t change Washington from the inside,” continued Romney, who repeated that line more than once during the rally. “Isn’t that amazing? No wonder he’s had such a hard time over these last four years.”
Lis Smith, an Obama campaign spokeswoman, said in a release that Romney is “once again” taking the president’s words out of context. “What the president said today is no different than what he has been saying for many years—that change comes from outside Washington, not inside,” said Smith. “Mitt Romney apparently doesn’t believe that change comes from the American people. Maybe that’s because he has written off half the country in this election.”

Obama: Romney hasn’t ‘gotten around a lot’
By KEN THOMAS | Associated Press – Thu, Sep 20, 2012

MIAMI (AP) — President Barack Obama said rival Mitt Romney hasn’t “gotten around a lot” if he believes that 47 percent of Americans consider themselves victims and entitled to government help. Addressing a large Latino television audience Thursday, the president also said his “biggest failure” was an inability to win an overhaul of the immigration system.

In an interview with Spanish language channel Univision, Obama says the country has gone through a challenging time and that people “want a hand up and not a handout.”

In suggesting his GOP rival was out of touch, Obama was reacting to secretly taped remarks by Romney in which the Republican declared that the 47 percent of voters who support Obama represent Americans who don’t pay income taxes and “who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them.”

Obama said Americans pay payroll taxes, gas taxes and state and sales taxes. He noted that those who don’t pay income taxes include workers who don’t make enough money to qualify, older Americans and students.

“When you express an attitude that half the country considers itself victims, that somehow they want to be dependent on government, my thinking is maybe you haven’t gotten around a lot,” Obama said.

The forum gave Obama a rebuttal of sorts. Romney spoke Wednesday at the Univision forum, where he said his campaign was about “the 100 percent in America.”
The president faced tough questions on why he hadn’t accomplished comprehensive immigration reform, an important issue for Hispanic voters. Jorge Ramos, one of the moderators, put it bluntly: “You promised that and a promise is a promise and with all due respect, you didn’t keep that promise.”

Obama said he accepted responsibility but that he faced an economy “on the verge of collapse” in his first year and blamed Republicans for abandoning support for comprehensive immigration reform. He said there was “the thinking that the president is somebody who is all-powerful and can get everything done.”

Obama said he only leads the executive branch. “We have to have cooperation from all these sources to get something done,” he said.

“What I confess I did not expect, and so I’m happy to take responsibility for being naive here, is that Republicans who had previously supported comprehensive immigration reform, my opponent in 2008 who had been a champion of it and who attended these meetings, suddenly would walk away,” he said. “That’s what I did not anticipate.”

Asked later in the interview to name his biggest failure, Obama cited a lack of comprehensive immigration reform, but added: “It’s not for a lack of trying or desire.”

Obama: GOP walked away from immigration overhaul
By KEN THOMAS | Associated Press – Thu, Sep 20, 2012
MIAMI (AP) — President Barack Obama is telling a large Latino television audience that Republicans walked away from comprehensive immigration overhaul and says he has not wavered in his support for changes in immigration law.
In an interview with the Spanish language channel Univision, Obama said he didn’t offer an immigration reform package because he had to deal with the financial crisis. But he said he shouldn’t be blamed because he is not “all powerful” and wouldn’t have been able to win the 60 votes necessary in the Senate to succeed.

He pointed to administrative efforts he has taken to permit some young people who came to the United States illegally to avoid deportation

Mitt Romney fact check: Is he actually against redistribution?
Mitt Romney is treating ‘redistribution’ like a dirty word. But while he might like it less than Democrats do, Romney clearly believes in redistribution, too.
By Liz Marlantes | Christian Science Monitor – 16 hrs ago

Scrambling to change the subject from his now infamous remarks calling 47 percent of the population “victims,” Mitt Romney has jumped on a newly uncovered (though actually very old) tape of then-Illinois state Sen. Barack Obama saying he believes in “redistribution” of wealth. Excerpts from the Obama tape first ran Wednesday on The Drudge Report – and at a fundraiser Wednesday in Atlanta, Mr. Romney went all-in on the attack:

“There are some who believe that if you simply take from some and give to others then we’ll all be better off. It’s known as redistribution. It’s never been a characteristic of America. There’s a tape that came out just a couple of days ago where the president said yes he believes in redistribution. I don’t. I believe the way to lift people and help people have higher incomes is not to take from some and give to others but to create wealth for all.”

Let’s put aside the fact that the Obama tape is 14 years old – though, as The New Republic’s Timothy Noah points out, back then Romney was “still pro-choice, still pro-gun control, still pro-stem cell research, and still in favor of gays serving openly in the military.”

RECOMMENDED: Mitt Romney gaffes: 11 times the button-down candidate should have buttoned up

The real reason Romney’s attack is likely to be a flop is that the president’s remarks – when examined in full – aren’t likely to be seen by most Americans as particularly controversial. In fact, it’s clear that Romney himself essentially agrees with much of what Mr. Obama said.

Here’s the complete text of Obama’s comments (as opposed to the shortened clip circulated by Republicans), which was tracked down by NBC News:

“I think the trick is figuring out how do we structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some redistribution – because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level – to make sure that everybody’s got a shot. How do we pool resources at the same time as we decentralize delivery systems in ways that both foster competition, can work in the marketplace, and can foster innovation at the local level and can be tailored to particular communities?”

First off, Obama’s statements about decentralizing delivery systems and fostering competition sound practically Republican (he was specifically criticizing the inefficiency of Chicago public housing and public schools). In context, he’s actually arguing for a more streamlined system of government that employs free-market efficiencies and makes redistribution more effective – and by implication, more economical.

More to the point, however: In his attacks, Romney is treating “redistribution” in general as a dirty word – “He believes in redistribution. I don’t” – when, in fact, it’s abundantly clear that Romney, too, supports redistribution, “at least at a certain level” (to use Obama’s own phrasing).

What would Romney call it when the government takes in tax dollars and uses them to pay for things like health care for poor folks? Is he saying he would eliminate Medicaid? We think not. Likewise, although Romney would tax the rich at a lower rate than Obama, his tax plan is still progressive.

As The New York Times’s David Firestone wrote Wednesday: “The government has long redistributed wealth, and … the country expects it to do so. That’s the point of a progressive income tax, which has been in effect for nearly a century…. The progressive tax remains so popular that Mr. Romney has promised to keep it, and he also insists he doesn’t plan to eliminate the safety net.”

Or as CNN’s Erin Burnett put it: “Mitt Romney, no matter what words he wants to use or what America he says he wants to believe in, believes in a progressive taxation system…. That is redistribution.”

Obviously, the real question – and a very legitimate one – is, how much redistribution is fair and best for society? In general, Democrats tend to want a little more, and Republicans tend to want a little less. But for Romney to pretend to be opposed to the entire concept of redistribution is totally untrue, based purely on what he himself says he would do as president.

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