Should be a push-over

It's always "the economy, stupid."

For that reason, President Obama is vulnerable to what happens in the job market, as well as to other economic indicators, in the coming months.

But, with the extreme positions and statements the Republicans are putting out, how could they possibly win an election this fall?  Unless the Democrats completely blow it.

First, there's the Paul Ryan budget, which doesn't even do what it claims to do -- reduce the deficit.    It will reward the wealthy, hurt the middle class and working people, and cut the needy off many vital programs in the safety net -- and increase the deficit.

But the House Republicans passed it, and Mitt Romney has enthusiastically endorsed it.

Is Pat Toomey trying to outdo them in the Senate?

Toomey (R-PA) is considered one of the budget mavens in the Senate.   In discussing the Senate GOP budget proposal, he declared that the number of people in the U.S. "who really need help" make up only a "small segment of our society."

That's a nice bookend to Romney's declaring the the $300,000+ plus fees he got for speaking engagements "wasn't a whole lot of money."

According to the census bureau, the number of Americans "living in poverty" has spiked to 49.1 million since the recession began.

Let's see, with a U.S. population of 300 million, that comes out to about 16% of us living in poverty.  OK, I guess that's really not so very many people.    So it should be just fine to cut social network programs way back.   We don't want to make all those folks dependent on the government, do we?

On the other hand, here are some countries, each of which has fewer than 49 million in their entire population:

South Korea, Columbia, Spain, Ukraine, Argentina, Poland, Canada, Australia, plus about 190 more.

In fact, only 24 out of the 242 countries, listed by Wikipedia with their populations, have more than 49 million.

It's the economy, stupid.   Yes.  But let's make sure we've got our figures in perspective.  Rich Republicans can't tell the difference between a little and a lot.   They're so used to having a lot.

I think our friends in Canada would say that 49,100,000 is a lot of people.  The 2011 census lists Canada's population at 33,476,688.   Our poor outnumber their total.  Still think that's a "small segment", Mr. Toomey?

Ralph