A few words from Keith Stern on Primary Day
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In A Bid To Beat An Incumbent Governor, Keith Stern Tacks To The Right By Liam Elder-Connors Aug 10, 2018 VPR News Keith Stern is challenging incumbent Gov. Phil Scott in the Republican primary. Stern says Scott has been a Keith Stern is challenging incumbent Gov. Phil Scott in the Republican primary. Stern says Scott has been a "huge disappointment." Liam Elder-Connors / VPR Listen Listening... 4:02 Beating an incumbent governor in a primary can be an uphill battle, but Keith Stern says his opponent in the Republican primary —Gov. Phil Scott — has been a “huge disappointment.” So, Stern is challenging the governor and seeking to sway voters on the right who feel let down by Gov. Scott. A week before the primary, Stern was making the rounds at the Addison County Fair and Field Days, stopping by every table inside the fair’s main exhibit hall to introduce himself. "We're going to cut taxes, we're going to make the state overall more affordable, we're going to have money to take care of the road." — Keith Stern He went up to a woman who was offering free estimates for shower installations. He handed her a pamphlet that read ‘smaller government, bigger economy’ and he laid out his plans. “We’re going to cut taxes, we’re going to make the state overall more affordable, we’re going to have money to take care of the roads,” he said. “That would be wonderful,” said the woman. “Yes it would,” Stern replied nodding his head. “We’re not going to waste money like it’s being wasted, hundreds of millions right now.” Stern said goodbye and headed over to the next table to talk to more potential voters. Keith Stern walks around the Addison County Fair And Field Days, handing out campaign flyers. Credit Liam Elder-Connors / VPR “This is outside my element,” Stern said with a small laugh. “I’m a very shy person and this is quite a challenge, it really is.” Besides being on a local zoning board, Stern has never held elected office, though he has run statewide campaigns before. He's run for U.S. Senate once and the House of Representatives twice. This time he's running for governor because he says the state needs to be saved. “I love Vermont but it's not going to be Vermont much longer,” Stern said. “We now have an individual mandate law that's forcing some people to buy health insurance that they can't afford. We have gun legislation that doesn't do anything to make anybody safer, but they wanted gun legislation for the sake of passing gun legislation. It's issues like that.” More From Vermont Edition — Keith Stern Challenges Gov. Scott In Republican Primary [July 18] Stern is a life-long Vermonter. He and his wife run a produce store in White River Junction. Stern announced he would challenge Gov. Scott last July and run as a Democrat. Stern said he thought his goal of making Vermont more affordable would align with the Democrats. But he says he feels Democrats don't want to shrink the size of government so he moved right, to the Republican ballot, to challenge an incumbent governor. According to a VPR-Vermont PBS poll released last month, 72 percent of respondents had never heard of Keith Stern. “I mean that's extraordinarily high and it's a high bar to overcome,” said Matthew Dickinson, a professor of political science at Middlebury College. Dickinson says Stern has an uphill climb, but he might be able to capture support from Republicans who feel Scott has drifted too far from the party’s base, specifically on issues like guns and immigration. "If Scott's stance on guns is perceived by a significant number of gun owners as a betrayal and they're motivated enough they could turn out." — Matthew Dickinson, professor of political science at Middlebury College Dickinson says Scott’s support of this year’s gun legislation might motivate some people to turn out. “If Scott's stance on guns is perceived by a significant number of gun owners as a betrayal and they're motivated enough they could turn out and in enough numbers that it in a low turnout primary, sure that could that could help Stern,” Dickinson said. One of those voters might be Terry Phillips. At the Addison County Fair and Field Days, Phillips recognized Stern and asked for a lawn sign, which Stern happily handed over. Then Phillips asked where Stern stands on “secure borders.” “Oh I stand with Trump,” Stern said. “I mean the law is the law." Phillips replied he was curious because “ many people that are Republicans, same as the one we got in the office in the state of Vermont now, mention all the good things that come about and never mentions Trump in name.” Stern told Phillips he “wouldn’t be running for governor, if the governor was doing his job.” Stern said goodbye to Phillips — who said he’ll give his coworkers Stern’s lawn signs — and gets ready hand out more campaign pamphlets. After a day at the fair, Stern will drive back home and he says he’ll make plenty of stops along the way to introduce himself to more potential voters. Vermont’s 2018 primary election will take place on Tuesday, Aug. 14. The Vermont Secretary of State’s website has election-related information regarding voter registration, where your polling place is and more. Find VPR’s candidate interviews and profiles here.
Having your cake and eating it too sounds nice. If you look at states like Kansas, tax cuts and spending cuts wreak havoc on the economy, and destroy public services. To quote George H.W. Bush, it's "voodoo economics." It NEVER works, anywhere, any time! It will not work here!
ReplyDeleteOver the past decade, 19 states that aren't Kansas have cut their individual income taxes. That Kansas is always the one cited shows pretty clearly that most states haven't had disastrous results from cutting taxes.
DeleteIf a state is considering a tax cut that amounts to more than 10 percent of the general fund, that kinda sounds like Kansas. But if a state is considering modest reductions in corporate and individual income taxes over a multiyear period paired with base broadening, that's more like the District of Columbia’s 2014 tax reform than Kansas in 2012.
There is no correlation between tax cuts and economic growth. None. "Base Broadening" is nothing more than raising taxes somewhere else to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy; usually regressive consumption (sales) taxes that hurt the poor and working class. Kansas is not the only state that cut taxes and had major problems, but is is the best example of how tax cuts for the wealthy do NOTHING for the rest of us. For the first time in U.S. history, children born today WILL NOT do better than their parents. Does that sound like economic growth?
ReplyDeleteFrom an 2013 article, National Public Radio:
DeleteSince taking office, Obama has struggled with the aftermath of a global financial crisis and a home foreclosure meltdown. Even after nearly five years in office, he presides over an economy stuck with a 7.3 percent unemployment rate and a disappointing growth rate well below 3 percent.
In contrast, Kennedy enjoyed a nearly miraculous economic turnaround. At the time of his death in November 1963, an employment boom was beginning. Stocks were soaring, swept up in the emerging "go-go" era on Wall Street — a time when investors were falling in love with mutual funds and conglomerates.
So, what exactly did Kennedy do?
That boom came after Kennedy got Congress to try to stimulate the economy by passing a "liberal" agenda that included:
Increasing the minimum wage.
Expanding unemployment benefits.
Boosting Social Security benefits to encourage workers to retire earlier.
Spending more for highway construction.
But Kennedy also did something that conservatives have been praising ever since: He pushed for much lower tax rates.
Kennedy's biggest tax cuts were aimed at average wage earners in hopes they would spend more. Boosting the demand side of the economy "gave us the widest prosperity and longest unbroken run of growth in history" up to then.
In contrast, conservatives focus on "supply-side" cuts, which target the marginal tax rates for wealthier individuals. The goal is to encourage them to invest more and expand output.
More:
https://www.npr.org/2013/11/12/244772593/jfks-lasting-economic-legacy-lower-tax-rates
I don't see how that refutes what I said, rather, it reinforces it. After Eisenhower's recession, tax cuts for working people, along with wage increases, infrastructure projects, and expansion of government benefits were the cornerstone of our prosperity in the 60's, to be sure. Supply-side economics is THE EXACT POLAR OPPOSITE OF THAT. Thanks for proving my point, though!
DeleteI'll add one more thing to my 8:15 response. Yes, Kennedy proposed lowering the top tax rate, which was 92% at that time. You know who talked him out of it? THE REPUBLICANS, who were worried that tax cuts for the wealthy would wreck the economy! Whatever happened to them? So, JFK lowered taxes for working people, and increased government spending, and kept taxes on the wealthy high to pay for it. AND IT WORKED! Again, thanks for proving my point!
Delete8:15, I hope you're active in Springfield's civic life.
ReplyDeleteApparently dopey C Gregory is confusing the DATE of the post with the TIME of the post. You may need to put on your free Obama-glasses there Chuckster!
ReplyDelete