Daily Archives: July 29, 2012

Economy — No Comments
29
Jul 12

Poverty in America: Why Can’t We End It?

Source:

RONALD REAGAN famously said, “We fought a war on poverty and poverty won.” With 46 million Americans — 15 percent of the population — now counted as poor, it’s tempting to think he may have been right.

Look a little deeper and the temptation grows. The lowest percentage in poverty since we started counting was 11.1 percent in 1973. The rate climbed as high as 15.2 percent in 1983. In 2000, after a spurt of prosperity, it went back down to 11.3 percent, and yet 15 million more people are poor today.

Transcripts — No Comments
29
Jul 12

‘Face the Nation’ Transcript (7-29-12)

JAN CRAWFORD: Well, Governor, one of your aides said this morning that you would respect Israel’s decision to take military action against Iran on its own. Does that mean you’re giving the green light to Israel to bomb Iran?

MITT ROMNEY: Let me– I’ll use my own words, and– and that is I respect the right of Israel to defend itself, and– and we stand with– with Israel. We’re a– a nation– two nations that come together in– in peace and that want to see Iran being dissuaded from its nuclear folly, so let me use my own words in that regard.

JAN CRAWFORD: But what does that mean to you, then, that you respect their decision? I mean can you explain that a little more?

MITT ROMNEY: Well, I think– because I’m on foreign soil, I don’t want to be creating new foreign policy for– for my country or in any way to distance myself in the foreign policy of– of our nation, but we respect the right of a nation to defend itself.

JAN CRAWFORD: But would you or would you not then support Israel’s bombing of Iran?

MITT ROMNEY: Well, again, that would be a– a statement which would be a– of a different nature than what our nation has already expressed with regards to Iran. What we have said and– and– and with which I concur is that we should use every diplomatic and political vehicle that’s available to us to keep Iran from becoming a nuclear capability state. Those actions should be executed with– with the– the greatest speed that we can– that we can muster. If all those options fail and they’ve not all been executed, they’ve not all failed entirely at this stage, if all those option fail– options fail, then we do have other options and we don’t take those other options off the table. But that’s as far as I’m– I’m willing to go in– in terms of discussing this matter while on foreign soil.

via “Face the Nation” transcripts, July 29, 2012: Mitt Romney, Rep. Wasserman Schultz, Rodney Erickson – CBS News.

Transcripts — No Comments
29
Jul 12

‘State of the Union with Candy Crowley’ Transcript (7-29-12)

Full Transcript. Excerpt below:

I’m Candy Crowley, and this is State of the Union.

A slew of disappointing report signals a nation still in economic distress and an incumbent president still in political peril. Consumer confidence which measures optimism about the economy fell to the lowest level this year and personal spending cooled as shoppers cut back on items big and small from cars to groceries. And the broadest measure of economic health, the Gross Domestic Product, grew at an anemic 1.5 percent in the second quarter.

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Politics — No Comments
29
Jul 12

‘Fareed Zakaria GPS’ Transcript (7-29-12)

Full Transcript. Excerpt below:

Well, it turns out, again, that there’s some recently released data that contradicts the claim. The Pew Foundation released one of its global surveys in June, soliciting opinions from several countries around the world.

When asked if they have some or a lot of trust in President Obama, the numbers are overwhelmingly positive across most of the world. In Britain, for example, which was Romney’s first stop on his foreign tour, 80 percent of people trust Obama, compared with 16 percent who trusted George W. Bush. Most countries surveyed have much higher approval ratings of America in 2012 than they did in 2008, when Bush was President. And, by the way, consider the reasons Obama’s ratings are low in one area in particular, the Arab world.

The two strongest justifications given by people in every Arab country that was surveyed were, first, that he has not been fair in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian issue, and second, that he has used drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan to go after terrorists.

In other words, the reason Obama has lost some of his global popularity is that he is perceived as too pro-Israeli and too hawkish. Think about that, Mitt Romney.