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Stories tagged with “Republican National Committee Convention”

LGBT

RNC Convention Star Clint Eastwood Reaffirms Support For Marriage Equality

By Josh Israel on Sep 18, 2012 at 5:19 pm

Clint Eastwood

Clint Eastwood

Actor/director Clint Eastwood, whose controversial “surprise” Republican National Convention conversation with an empty stool ranked as the convention’s highlight for a plurality of viewers, reiterated his support for marriage equality Monday. On Ellen, he told host Ellen DeGeneres that he does not share Mitt Romney’s anti-LGBT views:

DeGENERES: I like — you have, your stance on gay marriage is you don’t have any problem with that, which I greatly…
EASTWOOD: It’s part of the libertarian idea: leave everybody alone.

Eastwood notes that in the face of the struggling economy, there is “a lot to think about” more important than worrying about whether same-sex couples are marrying.

Watch the video:

Eastwood has previously expressed this inclusive view. He told GQ magazine in 2011, “I don’t give a fuck about who wants to get married to anybody else! Why not?! We’re making a big deal out of things we shouldn’t be making a deal out of…Just give everybody the chance to have the life they want.”

His favored candidate, Romney, however takes a starkly opposite view on the subject and has signed a pledge promising to support a federal marriage inequality constitutional amendment. The Republican party’s platform, adopted at the same convention, includes an anti-LGBT plank, stating “we believe that marriage, the union of one man and one woman must be upheld as the national standard, a goal to stand for, encourage, and promote through laws governing marriage.”

Election

Romney Campaign Embraces Eastwood’s Speech: ‘Classic,’ ‘Descriptive,’ ‘Spoke From The Heart’

By Igor Volsky on Aug 31, 2012 at 1:52 pm

The Romney campaign is defending Clint Eastwood’s Thursday night’s baffling endorsement of the one-time Massachusetts governor at the Republican National Convention, insisting that the actor “spoke from the heart with a classic improv sketch which everyone at the convention loved.” Eastwood has been widely criticized for talking to an empty chair with an “invisible Obama,” during his 10 minute address. (Watch ThinkProgress’ highlight reel here.)

“[It was] an honor that a great American icon would come and talk about the failure of the current president and the promise of the future one,” senior aide Stuart Stevens, one of two advisers to clear Eastwood’s appearance, insisted to the New York Times. On Friday morning, Romney’s wife Ann also came to the actor’s defense, telling CBS, “He’s a unique guy and he did a unique thing last night.”

The effort to justify Eastwood’s rantings did not stop there. During an appearance on MSNBC, Romney adviser Tara Wall even sought to connect the actor’s critique to the campaign’s official message, explaining that the empty chair that was supposed to seat Obama symbolized the president’s failed policies:

WALL: The chair emphasized, I think what many Americans are asking themselves four years later, where is President Obama relative to his promises made and promises not kept. So I think that that was pretty descriptive of the fact that president Obama four years ago said we would be at 6 percent unemployment if we enacted what he believed were his policies that would work.

Watch it:

The Romney campaign provided Eastwood with talking points, but did not equip him with prepared remarks. “They simply turned the podium over to an iconic superstar and expected him to stand and deliver.”

Update

Stevens said “Mitt Romney himself didn’t seem to mind.” “I was backstage with him and he was laughing, and he enjoyed it,” Stevens said, adding that the candidate thanked him for coming.”

Security

Romney’s RNC Speech Spent 202 Words On Foreign Policy, Made False And Misleading Claims

By Zack Beauchamp on Aug 31, 2012 at 1:49 pm

Mitt Romney’s speech to the Republican National Convention on Thursday night was riddled with misleading claims and critical omissions. In no section was this more true than Romney’s discussion of foreign policy. The GOP presidential nominee devoted only 202 words to national security and while his speech completely ignored the war in Afghanistan and any homage to American servicemembers, it contained a shocking number of misstatements and false and baseless attacks on President Obama:

1. Obama and America: “I will begin my presidency with a jobs tour. President Obama began with an apology tour. America, he said, had dictated to other nations. No Mr. President, America has freed other nations from dictators.”

THE FACTS: The notion that Obama went on an “apology tour” has been repeatedly and conclusively debunked, though it remains a staple of Romney’s post-truth campaign. The “dictated” line is likely of a similar provenance, but there’s an irony to the second half of that sentence — Obama has “freed other nations from dictators,” as he helped form and lead an international coalition that toppled Muammar Qaddafi in Libya. Romney’s position on the Libya intervention, by contrast, was something of an incoherent muddle.

2. Iran: “Every American was relieved the day President Obama gave the order, and Seal Team Six took out Osama bin Laden. But on another front, every American is less secure today because he has failed to slow Iran’s nuclear threat. In his first TV interview as president, he said we should talk to Iran. We’re still talking, and Iran’s centrifuges are still spinning.”

THE FACTS: There’s a reason the President decided to talk to Iran — the Obama administration is quite aware of the consequences of a nuclear weapons-equipped Iran, if its leaders decide to go that route, and has determined that diplomacy presents the “best and most permanent” means of resolving the crisis. Moreover, the diplomatic approach has produced concrete dividends. While Iran hasn’t capitulated, signalling that America was willing to talk to Iran helped build international support for significantly stepped-up sanctions. Contra Romney, the new sanctions imposed by Obama’s coalition have unequivocally slowed Iran’s nuclear progress by limiting its ability to acquire critical materiel, according to the U.N. and the Pentagon. Perhaps that’s why, when they’re not hinting at starting a devastating war, Romney advisers and surrogates have been unable to differentiate their candidate’s policy from the status quo.

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Climate Progress

Republican Convention Recap: As Experts Warn ‘The Door Is Closing’ On Climate, The GOP Mocks The Problem

By Stephen Lacey on Aug 31, 2012 at 12:38 pm

A national political convention is the first real chance for a political party to introduce its ideas and leaders to the country. Even though this election has been gearing up for 18 months, it’s only around now that Americans start paying attention.

The Republican National Convention is now over. The speeches have been made, the platform introduced, the balloons have been dropped. And if it hasn’t been obvious over the months, Americans now have a clear window into the GOP’s scary policies on energy and climate.

Let’s start with what some of the leading international energy experts and climate scientists are saying about the impending global warming tipping point we’re facing:

NASA climatologist James Hansen:

“Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding. Economic losses would be incalculable. More and more of the Midwest would be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food prices would rise to unprecedented levels. If this sounds apocalyptic, it is.”

Fatih Birol, chief economist with the International Energy Agency:

“The door is closing. I am very worried – if we don’t change direction now on how we use energy, we will end up beyond what scientists tell us is the minimum [for safety]. The door will be closed forever.”

Will Steffen, executive director of the Australian National University’s climate change institute:

“This is the critical decade. If we don’t get the curves turned around this decade we will cross those lines.”

In the lead up to the Republican National Convention, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported that the U.S. had just experienced the hottest 12-month period on record and the hottest July ever recorded. So far this year, more than 27,000 high-temperature records have been broken or tied, beating cold record temperatures by 10 to 1 — five times the ratio of the last decade (if there were no warming, we’d see the same number of hot records and cold records). And throughout the summer, America faced record drought, record wildfires, and freak storms — all things that climate scientists warn will happen with increasing frequency and intensity.

Topping it all off, the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported this week that Arctic sea ice had reached record lows — with temperatures in the region rising at twice the rate of the rest of the globe.

But as the evidence mounts and experts issue increasingly dire warnings about the need for immediate and swift reductions in carbon pollution, the Republican party dug its heels in on promotion of carbon-based fuels. Almost every speech on energy was devoted exclusively to increasing production of coal, oil, and gas — with the only mentions of renewable energy used to politicize the failed solar company Solyndra.

The only mention of climate in the party’s platform was to mock President Obama for including climate risk in national security planning:

“The strategy subordinates our national security interests to environmental, energy and international health issues, and elevates ‘climate change’ to the level of a ‘severe threat’ equivalent to foreign aggression. The word ‘climate,’ in fact, appears in the current President’s strategy more often than Al Qaeda, nuclear proliferation, radial Islam, or weapons of mass destruction. The phrase ‘global war on terror’ does not appear at all and has been purposely avoided and changed by his Administration to “overseas contingency operations.’”

In fact, a military advisory board under the Bush W. Administration concluded in 2007 that climate change “acts as a threat multiplier for instability in some of the most volatile regions of the world” and “will add to tensions even in stable regions of the world.” The Pentagon agreed with that assessment, concluding that climate change will “place a burden to respond on civilian institutions and militaries around the world.”

There was one other mention of climate change during the convention. Mitt Romney finished his acceptance speech by mocking Obama’s earlier promises to deal with the problem:

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Politics

9 Important Omissions From Romney’s Convention Speech

By Igor Volsky and Pat Garofalo on Aug 31, 2012 at 9:31 am

Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech at the Republican Convention was long on biography but short on policy. The former Massachusetts governor reminded the national audience about his family’s background and business career, reiterated his critique of President Obama, and promised a better future.

But for a candidate who chose Paul Ryan as his running mate to signal a willingness to take on big challenges, Romney spent precious few — if any — words discussing some of the country’s most pressing problems and even less time explaining how a Romney/Ryan administration would solve them:

– 0 mentions of Financial Reform: Even as millions of Americans struggle with the effects of the Great Recession caused by Wall Street malfeasance and scores of others continue to deal with the fallout of the foreclosure fraud scandal, Romney has said that he will repeal the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law, but has yet to detail what, if anything, he would put in its place.

— 0 mentions of Climate Change: “President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet,” Romney said to loud laughter. It’s too bad that he and most of the GOP delegates don’t believe in the very real threat of global warming.

– 0 mentions of Immigration: “We are a nation of immigrants,” Romney said, without explaining how he would help the 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. Romney has not said if he would rescind Obama’s temporary directive permitting young undocumented immigrants to work in the country, though his advisers have suggested that he would.

– 0 mentions of Romneycare: The convention speakers didn’t tackle Romney’s greatest accomplishment as governor, the enactment of universal health care coverage in Massachusetts. Romney promised to repeal Obamacare, but did not say what he would replace it with.

– 0 mentions of Afghanistan or Syria: Romney did not mention how he planned to address the nation’s largest ongoing wars or one of the most important ongoing humanitarian crises on Earth. This may be because the Romney campaign has been unable to meaningfully distinguish its policies from those of the Obama administration on either of these crucial issues.

– 0 mentions of Social Security: Romney’s running mate, Paul Ryan, has proposed Social Security privatization schemes that would have cost retirees dearly if they had been in place during the financial crisis.

– 0 mentions of Veterans: Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time Romney has ignored veterans issues. After he spoke to the Veterans of Foreign Wars last month, veteran advocates said they were “still waiting for Romney to spell out how he would do better than his opponent.” “We haven’t … heard any specific plans yet from Governor Romney or his campaign,” said Bob Wallace, executive director at the Washington office of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, echoing the sentiment of many advocates.”

– 1 mention of Medicare: Romney criticized Obama for cutting $716 billion from Medicare — reductions that are also included in Paul Ryan’s budget. But he did not explain his own controversial reforms or mention that the “premium support” plan would force seniors to spend significantly more for health care.

– 1 mention of Housing: Romney did say, “when the realtor told you that to sell your house you’d have to take a big loss” — but that’s all. The Federal Reserve bank of New York anticipates that millions of Americans will face foreclosure this year and next, but Romney has yet to release a housing plan, beyond telling homeowners in foreclosure-battered Las Vegas “don’t try and stop the foreclosure process,” just “let it run its course and hit the bottom.”

Election

RNC Delegate Offended By Presence of ‘Mexican’ At Disney’s Epcot Center

By Aviva Shen on Aug 31, 2012 at 8:46 am

During a trip to Epcot at Disneyworld, Pennsylvania delegate Mark Harris and his wife were shocked and offended to find a Mexican employee working at the amusement park’s American pavilion, which showcases the different cultures in the United States. According to the couple’s blog, Harris complained to staff that he was “highly offended” that a “person from Mexico” was working in the American pavilion when other nations’ pavilions were staffed by people from each respective country:

The local GOP in Snyder County, Pennsylvania has rushed to disavow Harris’ overtly racist comments. County Commissioner Malcolm Derk told The Daily Item, “Americans are people of any race, color or heritage. Cheers to the individual working at Epcot for showing what a true American looks like.”

According to their website, “Mark and Irene are both pro‐life, believe marriage is between one man and one woman, are for open records and transparency, believe in very conservative principles and the Republican platform.”

The RNC has been marred by racist incidents this week; on Tuesday, two delegates had to be escorted out after throwing peanuts at a black camerawoman and called her an “animal.” Harris told the AP at the beginning of the convention that he liked how Romney was “hitting all the conservative bells” and “has the potential to be a great president if he keeps going in that direction.”

Election

VIDEO: The Best Of Clint Eastwood’s Surreal Convention Speech

By Jeff Spross on Aug 30, 2012 at 11:13 pm

As it turns out, Clint Eastwood was the mystery speaker tonight at the Republican National Convention. In a strange interlude that was part speech and part comedy bit, the always gruff Eastwood argued with a theoretical Obama purportedly seated in an empty chair, made some off-color jokes, almost forgot to praise Mitt Romney, and finally lead the audience in a repetition of his signature line from the “Dirty Harry” films.

As Jamelle Bouie put it on Twitter, “This is a perfect representation of the campaign: an old white man arguing with an imaginary Barack Obama.” ThinkProgress has the highlight reel. Watch it:

You can read the full transcript HERE.

NEWS FLASH

‘Surprise’ Clint Eastwood Speech Features Bizarre Conversation With Empty Chair | In what was a poorly kept “surprise” appearance, actor/director Clint Eastwood gave a highly bizarre speech at the Republican National Convention in Tampa Thursday. Eastwood blamed President Obama for getting the U.S. into a war in Afghanistan without talking to Russia first (though George W. Bush began that war seven years before Obama took office), repeated told an empty chair he pretended was Obama to “shut up,” and said we shouldn’t have attorneys as president (though Mitt Romney has a law degree from Harvard).

Watch the video:

Politics

ThinkProgress Live Blogs The Republican National Convention

By ThinkProgress on Aug 30, 2012 at 7:00 pm

Welcome to ThinkProgress’ primetime Thursday coverage of the Republican National Convention. We’re here all night to fact check and debunk the claims of the GOP’s brightest stars. Here is our guide to Thursday’s speakers.

11:40: Castellanos on Eastwood’s bizarre speech: “If you thought Republicans had a gender gap yesterday, wait until tomorrow.”

11:38: Former Romney adviser Alex Castellanos on CNN: “He didn’t answer the question that is on everybody’s mind, which is he didn’t offer anything new. He just wanted to go back to Bush. And at some point, Candy Crowley is going to be moderating a debate. Barack Obama is going to turn to MItt Romney and say, ‘here is what I want to know: you’ve said nothing new tonight.’”

11:30: The Romney campaign has issued a statement explaining that Eastwood’s performance “can’t be measured through a typical political lens.” Meanwhile, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) told CNN that the actor was “absolutely terrific.”

11:29: On CNN, former Reagan adviser David Gergen said Romney’s speech lacked substance. “If there were any tough choices laid out tonight, I didn’t hear them. I think they skirted that.”

11:36: Two people were escorted out of the convention hall holding Code Pink signs and one reading, “Democracy is not a business.”

11:25: Upworthy has the word cloud of Romney’s speech:

Read more

Politics

The Ultimate Viewer’s Guide To Mitt Romney’s Convention Speech

By Igor Volsky on Aug 30, 2012 at 3:14 pm

Politicians from both parties twist facts or spin policy, but Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign has had a particularly strained relationship with the truth, repeating false claims with impunity — even after fact checkers, mainstream media organizations, and blogs have all debunked their assertions.

From saying that “Obama gutted the welfare work requirement” to insisting that his own policies won’t deregulate Wall Street, Romney has led a post-truth campaign. A top adviser even admitted earlier this week, “We’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers.”

As Romney prepares to deliver his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, ThinkProgress has compiled a Viewer’s Guide comparing what Romney says with the facts.

Below is just a small sampling of our full report:

“What the president is proposing is therefore a massive tax increase on job creators and on small business. Small businesses are overwhelmingly being taxed not at a corporate rate but at the individual tax rate. So successful small businesses will see their taxes go up dramatically, and that will kill jobs.” [Los Angeles Times, 7/9/2012]

REALITY: President Obama’s plan to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire on income in excess of $250,000 would affect exceedingly few small businesses. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that the expiration would affect only three percent of individuals with any business income, from a business large or small. [Joint Committee on Taxation, 7/12/2010]

Read the full report HERE.

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