Compare And Contrast
Home - by IOTW Reports - March 20, 2011
BEHOLD: Gov. Luis Fortuno, from Puerto Rico, who is basically like the photo negative of Obama. I mean, yes, they are similar in that they came into office at exactly the same time, and they both faced seriously troubling economic issues. The U.S. had a 7.6% unemployement rate when Obama was sworn in, and Puerto Rico’s unemployment rate was 9.4%. But the way that Fortuno responded to Puerto Rico’s fiscal woes was the POLAR OPPOSITE of how Obama responded.
Fortuno, the first Republican governor in PR since 1969, didn’t call for a gigantic stimulus the moment he took office. He didn’t ask for a bailout. Nope – instead, he cut government expenses by 20%, including a salary reduction for himself of 10%. He cut government perks (cars, cell phones, credit cards) by 10%. He eliminated 17,000 government jobs, and he streamlined services by making more of them available on line. He cut the corporate tax rate from 41% to 30%, and it’ll go down another 5% in 3 years. He’s cutting individual tax rates by 29% starting in 2013.
And in just two years, the deficit in PR has shrunk from 44% of revenues to only 11%. Compare that to Obama, who’s managed in that same time to increase the deficit and debt by TRILLIONS of dollars, by growing government.
Fortuno is interested in making PR our 51st state, and scoffs at the notion that this would result in a lot more Democratic voters. He says that there is a “misconception that we will be electing people from one party or another at the national level. Well, I don’t know what you call me, but certainly a governor with two-thirds of the legislators willing to cut the size of government by 20 percent in two years, slash taxes across the board significantly, and streamline the permitting process — I call that a Republican.”Yup. And the results of his Republican actions speak for themselves. As do the Democratic actions of Obama.
Compare and contrast.
Home - by IOTW Reports - March 20, 2011
BEHOLD: Gov. Luis Fortuno, from Puerto Rico, who is basically like the photo negative of Obama. I mean, yes, they are similar in that they came into office at exactly the same time, and they both faced seriously troubling economic issues. The U.S. had a 7.6% unemployement rate when Obama was sworn in, and Puerto Rico’s unemployment rate was 9.4%. But the way that Fortuno responded to Puerto Rico’s fiscal woes was the POLAR OPPOSITE of how Obama responded.
Fortuno, the first Republican governor in PR since 1969, didn’t call for a gigantic stimulus the moment he took office. He didn’t ask for a bailout. Nope – instead, he cut government expenses by 20%, including a salary reduction for himself of 10%. He cut government perks (cars, cell phones, credit cards) by 10%. He eliminated 17,000 government jobs, and he streamlined services by making more of them available on line. He cut the corporate tax rate from 41% to 30%, and it’ll go down another 5% in 3 years. He’s cutting individual tax rates by 29% starting in 2013.
And in just two years, the deficit in PR has shrunk from 44% of revenues to only 11%. Compare that to Obama, who’s managed in that same time to increase the deficit and debt by TRILLIONS of dollars, by growing government.
Fortuno is interested in making PR our 51st state, and scoffs at the notion that this would result in a lot more Democratic voters. He says that there is a “misconception that we will be electing people from one party or another at the national level. Well, I don’t know what you call me, but certainly a governor with two-thirds of the legislators willing to cut the size of government by 20 percent in two years, slash taxes across the board significantly, and streamline the permitting process — I call that a Republican.”Yup. And the results of his Republican actions speak for themselves. As do the Democratic actions of Obama.
Compare and contrast.
