Paul Ryan: technocratic whiz kid

Paul Ryan self-promotes as a kind of technocratic whiz kid of the modern medievalism known as the Republican Party. His ideological compatriots love to propagate the whiz myth, hence political monasteries of the very right kind of thinking, such as the Heritage Foundation, originally financed by Rocky Mountain suds money and partially directed by unholy scandalmongers such as Richard Mellon Scaife, also love to host this unctuous ass of a U.S. representative. 

And Ryan gets unctuous-er every day, or morning, as the case may be, which it was today, in a speech, yep, at Heritage. There, this Wisconsin (wouldn't you know it) Republican accused President Obama of "sowing social unrest and class resentment ... [and] preying on the emotions of fear, envy and resentment." How? By advocating a jobs program, in the midst of nearly unprecedented joblessness. Oh my.

Who knows? Did it occur to Ryan that in accusing the president of sowing all that undesirable stuff, in addition to fear-mongering, that he himself was sowing some rather nasty business and doing a bit of fear-mongering, too? I'd like to think so, but only because I like my whiz kids to possess at least half a wit. But to watch Ryan in action, one wonders.

I don't mean to suggest he's stupid. Not at all. He is, however, stunningly obvious in his arguments -- and that sort of thing tends, in my book, to subtract from one's proper reputation for whiz kiddism.

Obama "is going from town to town," charged Ryan, "impugning the motives of Republicans, setting up straw men and scapegoats, and engaging in intellectually lazy arguments, as he tries to build support for punitive tax hikes on job creators." Well, there you go: a script as intellectually lazy and scapegoating as a political script can get. In said midst of said joblessness, the president is pressuring Congress to aggressively penalize job creators?

To me, what's most frightening about ideological twits like Ryan is not, in fact, their frightening ideology. It is, rather, their seeming disloyalty to any authentic ideology and their extravagant randiness instead to simply say anything that they think will politically harm Obama. These boys have no core, no -- egads, sorry for the cliche -- "authenticity," no soul. 

Comments

[Peter G]

There's whiz kid and there's cheese whiz kid. If you know what I mean. Ryan is the cheesy sort.

[RC]

It's ok to suggest he's stupid. There's ample evidence of that. He's certainly not very bright.

[Robert Lipscomb]

This reminds me of the "Andy Griffith Show" episode about the town drunk, Otis Campbell. Barney taught Otis to paint as therapy for his alcoholism. Then, everyone was stuck with encouraging Otis by heaping praise on his "art" which resulted in an ever increasing flow of more paintings.

Whoever first told Paul Ryan he is an honest intellectual should summarily be beaten and shot.

[AnneJ.]

He's intellectually lazy and like other republicans today, is increasingly insulting peoples' intelligence. I don't know whether to get angry or just laugh at these jerks. More and more they show their true contempt for the American people by throwing out meaningless terms like "class warfare" and "job creators". In the face of record income inequality and high unemployment. I don't know who's votes he's trying to win with that hackneyed speech, or maybe the republicans don't need votes anymore to win?