Photo via The Atlantic Wire
Paul Ryan is this year’s conservative golden boy. He’s a blue-collar raised, young gun, budgetary pen wielding, economic whiz kid who’s not afraid of a little hard work, has a family at home and a — as politicians go, anyway — squeaky clean record. He’s not even hard on the eyes, and he’s a hunter, which is always a bonus. Because, you know, we conservatives like that kind of thing.
In fact, save a little brown skin, he’s got everything the GOP needs — and they know it. Nothing’s fair in love and war and nothing’s an accident in politics.
Romney is an old, rich, out of touch, white guy who has the sense of humor of a rock, a political career that’s operated under the guise of being Republican but certainly not conservative, and a bad rap with people who don’t think dogs belong on top of cars — which is pretty much everyone.
And now, while the two pairing up certainly can’t hurt Romney, it’s entirely unclear what such a close affiliation with America’s newest presidential booby prize will really accomplish for Paul Ryan. While the seven-term Wisconsin congressman has the potential to win the Oval Office for Mitt, I’m inclined to believe Mitt has an even better chance of ruining Paul’s career before it has a chance to toddle off to Capitol Hill’s equivalent of eighth grade. And that? Is a crying shame.
Diana Prichard is a red-leaning freelance writer and hog farmer who lives and works in a blue state. She authors Righteous Bacon and can be found on Twitter.
Agree completely.
Diana, Is he really from a blue-collar background? Some of the information coming out about him suggests he’s a millionaire through family investments.
Joanna,
The GOP establishment just wants you to think he was born as a hard-knocks, blue-collar, average Joe, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
MM
i’m just so concerned that there’s no moderate republican who can win the support of right-wing backers. what happened to someone who supported fair taxes, slight decreases in spending all-around, and people who were slightly more centered on social politics? it seems like mitt & the powers that be think that the way to win more support for lowering taxes is to pick up the mantle of abolishing federal government near completely!
Joanne, I think you may be right. Prior to writing this I’d only heard about his family construction business, and that when he was fresh out of college his parents worried he’d never make anything of himself. As more comes out it looks like that construction business was a couple of generations back with more white collar endeavors nearer in his lineage and his record in high school and college is a little more shiny and “typical prom king”-ish than we’d previously heard.
Not that there’s a problem with his family being successful, but they are trying to pain him as a blue-collar kind of guy. Though I do see on his Wikipedia page that he used to have a job driving Oscar Mayer’s Weinermobile. That would be a fun summer job!
I agree. It’s disappointing when it’s hard to get a clear picture.
I also think it’s becoming increasingly hard to define the difference between blue collar and white collar. There was a time when that distinction was largely monetary, but I know a lot of blue collar workers who are not poor by any stretch of the imagination. I think, anymore, it largely comes down to relate-ability and Ryan may end up having that regardless of his bank account.