Word: america
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...main reason that Ryan has become the GOP's man of the moment. A telegenic supply-side conservative, Ryan cut his teeth as a speechwriter for Jack Kemp and Bill Bennett in the mid-1990s. Even back then, says Wehner, for whom Ryan worked at Empower America, "it was clear that he was a bright star in the constellation." After serving as legislative director for Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, Ryan mounted a successful bid for Wisconsin's First Congressional District seat in 1998, at age 28. Now 40, the avid outdoorsman is ensconced in a district that shares...
...irony of Ryan's rise is that he has vaulted to popularity by embracing historically unpopular ideas. For obvious reasons, slashing entitlements doesn't play well with the over-65 crowd - America's most faithful voting bloc - and House Republicans have conspicuously stood apart from the plan. But Ryan is betting that the looming threat of fiscal insolvency will help him marshal a case for the urgency of sweeping changes to entrenched social safety nets. Even raising taxes, he says, wouldn't do enough to address the problem. "Look, I don't see these things as third rails anymore...
Wehner calls Ryan's "Roadmap for America's Future" an "intellectually honest document. It has real numbers and it puts forward real proposals. It grapples with the reality of the situation we are in, which is a fiscal nightmare." Being intellectually honest, of course, is often politically dangerous. With Republicans "still skittish," Wehner says, about jeopardizing their political momentum at a time when mere opposition to the President seems to be enough to propel them to gains in this year's midterm elections, Ryan may be forcing a conversation his party is unwilling to have. That's a risk that...
...document is light on policy specifics and heavy on freedom-loving boilerplate. Defining themselves as supporters of Founding Fathers is hardly risky; had the authors attempted to codify principles more controversial than "honor[ing] the central place of individual liberty in American politics and life" or "support[ing] America's national interest in advancing freedom," their interests could have clashed. For a movement whose social conservatives, fiscal warriors and national-security hawks have been roiled by infighting in the past, affirming common bonds may well have been the paramount concern...
...their heels against efforts to remake a party they've helped build. "It's the last stand of the old guard," he says. "It looks to me like an attempt to reassert that the politics of the Reagan coalition can continue to win elections in 21st century America." By harking back to the past, he argues, the authors are also resisting the efforts of more-moderate conservatives (such as himself and the New York Times's David Brooks) to nudge the party closer to the political center...