Party of ideas?

As I was piecing information together about Paul Ryan's foray into plagiarism, I realized that I am always a day late and a dollar short. I work a mid-shift so by the time I read the initial postings, the updates are already out on the inter-web. But that doesn't take away the fun of discovery and putting a bit of "personal" spin on the story. I'm just glad that others have jumped on this and publicizing it.

Both Raw Story and HUffPo have updated this incident and there is an interesting back story to all this.

Maurice and Schroff subsequently began meeting for lunch every Monday, developing a family-like relationship, which they discussed on Fox News host Mike Huckabee’s show in January 2013.

“Here I was, and this 11-year-old kid was teaching me things,” Schroff told Huckabee. “He taught me the definition of lunch in a paper bag. The bag is only brown paper. But what you put into it is something we all call love.”

[,,,]
At the time of their appearance on Huckabee’s show, Schrock and Maurice promoted the Share Our Strength No Kid Hungry campaign. Two months later, the campaign released a statement opposing Ryan’s House budget proposal, which included cutting the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) Program by $125 million.

I think SmotPoker, referring to Ryan's statement about the GOP being the party of ideas:  "The party of ideas eh? Sure, sure, they aren't THEIR ideas, but ideas nonetheless"

HuffPo in their report was able to make contact with An Invisible Thread author Laura Schroff who added her thoughts on the matter,,,

[Jonathan] Chait [of NYMag.com] writes, "It's also interesting that Anderson's conclusion from the...story is that the school lunch program makes parents into lazy slackers, while Ryan's conclusion is that it robs children of their soul." Of course, there's one party whose conclusions haven't been fully explicated within the context of Ryan's appropriation yet -- Laura Schroff,,,

Suffice it to say that Paul Ryan might be better at understanding the plights of poor people if he actually went out and attempted to meet some, instead of roughly trading second-hand accounts.

,,,If there's one ambition Schroff doesn't have, it's getting her work caught up in the Beltway hurlyburly.

"The one thing I'll say about 'An Invisible Thread' is that it's not a political book in any way." Schroff says her intention is to cross across boundaries like race and class. "When I go to public schools to talk about the book, it helps the kids have hope. When I talk to kids at private school, they feel grateful."

In responding to today's news, she was exceedingly charitable to those involved.

[,,,]
"But Maurice describes being hungry as being punched in the stomach," she countered, "And given the choice between a free lunch and not eating at all, he would choose the free lunch."

Schroff very politely rejected Ryan's "full stomachs, empty souls," construction, explaining that her life's work is about showing other people, especially children, that kindness makes a huge difference in the lives of both the giver and the recipient. "When you give a small act of kindness, expecting nothing in return, the rewards are great."

"I want people to think about what they can do to make the world a kinder world," she said. "I don't care about Republicans and Democrats. But we are talking about children that need to be fed. Cutting school lunch programs doesn't accomplish that."

Paul Ryan at CPAC: Free school lunches mean poor parents don’t care about kids | The Raw Story

I know that CPAC will be well covered and not sure what I could possibly add to the conversation. I won't be remaining silent, just focusing more on some of the idiocy coming from our "officials" in the GOP.

Although the target of this article is his comment regarding "brown bagging it" versus the school lunch program, the clip (and I do realize this is just a clip) starts in with his false claim (or interpretation) concerning the recent CBO report.

No, it will not discourage people from working, it will allow people in the same boat as I (working 2 and in some cases 3 jobs) to reduce work hours from 62+/week to 40. What the CBO report actually says according to FactCheck:

The estimated reduction stems almost entirely from a net decline in the amount of labor that workers CHOOSE to supply, rather than from a net drop in businesses’ demand for labor, so it will appear almost entirely as a reduction in labor force participation and in hours worked relative to what would have occurred otherwise RATHER THAN AS AN INCREASE IN UNEMPLOYMENT (that is, more workers seeking but not finding jobs) OR UNDEREMPLOYMENT (such as part-time workers who would prefer to work more hours per week).

But the kicker concerning this clip, besides being totally detached from realty, from the comments section:

“Miss Laura,” he said, “I don’t want your money. I want my lunch in a brown paper bag.”

“Okay, sure. But why do you want it in a bag?”

“Because when I see kids come to school with their lunch in a paper bag, that means someone cares about them. Miss Laura, can I please have my lunch in a paper bag?”

According to commenter "jimmyblair" this is a passage from a book by Laura Schroff, An Invisible Thread: The True Story of an 11-Year-Old Panhandler, a Busy Sales Executive, and an Unlikely Meeting with Destiny The story summary is generally accepted to be about the unbreakable connection between those destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstances. Ryan seems to have misinterpreted it to give an anti-government slant that isn't at all a part of the original story.

So I did a bit of searching to see if "others" had picked up on this tid-bit and they have - yea rah! Wonkette, in their usual snarky style picked up the story from a different posting and ran with it:

Wonker Tallmutha caught TPM commenter Ottnott sexplaining that the whole story was STOLED from the book An Invisible Thread, which is about … GIVING CHILDREN FREE FOOD AND HOW THAT IS THE BEST!

And then there is this, Ryan's lame excuse:

Today at CPAC, I shared a story I heard from Eloise Anderson, the secretary for children and families for the state of Wisconsin. She mentioned it in her testimony for a House Budget Committee hearing last year. I have just learned that Secretary Anderson misspoke, and that the story she told was improperly sourced. I regret failing to verify the original source of the story, but I appreciate her taking the time to share her insights.

So what started as a post about how devoid of humanity Paul Ryan is has turned into something much more interesting.

Oh and one final thought, if Eloise used this stolen anecdote in testimony, isn't that perjury?

Paul Ryan at CPAC: Free school lunches mean poor parents don’t care about kids | The Raw Story