y ThinkProgress War Room on Sep 22, 2011 at 6:06 pm
Questions for the GOP Presidential Candidates
The Republican presidential contenders are meeting in Orlando, Florida this evening for their third debate of the month.
Here are the questions we’d like to see asked and answered tonight.
- Social Security: There are 3,994,280 Floridians between the ages of 40 and 54. They’ve been paying into Social Security for decades based on the promise that they too will receive benefits later. You all support privatizing Social Securityand some of you believe it is unconstitutional and may want to abolish it altogether, so how can you guarantee that these workers will receive the benefits that they’ve been promised?
- Medicare: Republicans said the Affordable Care Act would destroy Medicare Advantage because it achieved $500 BILLION in savings by cutting wasteful overpayments to private insurance companies; however, Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) noted today that Medicare Advantage premiums in Florida have dropped 26% and enrollment has increased 20% since the Affordable Care Act was passed. Isn’t this proof that the Affordable Care Act is working?
- Taxes: In 2009, 1,470 households with incomes above $1 MILLION paid ZERO in federal income taxes and 40,000 millionaires pay a tax rate of 4.2 percent or less. Why should many millionaires pay a lower tax rate than middle class families?
- Let Them Die? Florida has the fifth highest rate of people without health insurance in the country, with 3.8 MILLION Floridians lacking health insurance. Do you agree with the Tea Party audience at your last debate that society shouldlet these people die if they become sick and cannot afford care or do you think they have a right to health care?
- Rebuilding America: President Obama visited a bridge today to highlight his plan to spend $50 BILLION to rebuild our crumbling bridges, roads, and transit systems which will also create hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country. The president’s infrastructure plan would immediately invest more than $1.5 BILLION in Florida and create at least 20,500 local jobs. Why shouldn’t we take the $40 BILLION in wasteful tax giveaways to Big Oil and instead spend that money putting Americans back to work rebuilding America?
- Immigration: Nearly one-quarter of Florida’s population, some 4.2 MILLION people, is Hispanic. Does the GOP’s virulently anti-immigrant rhetoric and policy positions risk alienating this large and growing segment of the electorate in Florida and elsewhere?
- Voting: Florida, like many states under Republican control, has passed a strict new voting law that will make it more difficult for millions of students, elderly, minority, and military voters to vote and actually have their votes counted. Since there is almost no evidence of actual voter fraud, do you support these laws even though they are likely to disenfranchise millions of Americans who have the right to vote?
Evening Brief: Important Stories That You May Have Missed
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Is House Speaker John Boehner getting tired of the Tea Party?
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