I disagree. His first target upon arrival in DC was the defense budget, which is constitutional, and absolutely necessary. But, like his colleagues, he has offered nothing serious in terms of the real budget problems, which are the unconstitutional New Deal and Great Society entitlement programs and the agencies that have grown up around them. They are what is breaking our back.
I hate to do it but I'll paraphrase James Carville: "It's the unconstitutional spending, stupid."
As far as Israel is concerned, we get more bang for our defense buck helping them than we do practically anywhere else.
No surprises here at all re Rand Paul. It's been clear all along that he's nothing more than a little slicker version of his father.
True. Ron Paul and Hutton Gibson could co-author a book on how to parent sons.
Just because defense is in the constitution doesn’t mean everything we do in the name of it is necessary, let alone constitutional. I hardly see how subsidizing Israel is defense at all, except through the contortions and back flips of neoconservative logic, which isn’t very convincing.
In a perfect world all the various wealth redistribution schemes since the New Deal would die before one cent is taken from constitutionally empowered spending. But this foot-stamping of supposed conservatives should their favorite programs tighten belts sounds an awful lot like welfare for me and not for thee. We must be willing to sacrifice what we like, too, if we are ever to curb debt.
His first target is a globe spanning empire that we can't afford.
If you want to pay for Germany's defense, or South Korea's defense, or Kuwait's defense, or build an army in Iraq or Afghanistan, reach into your own damn pocket and use your own damn credit card.
This empire isn't necessary, it is a drain on us. It doesn't make us more free, it gets us dragged into more wars. We fight to keep kings on foreign thrones, with borders drawn nearly 100 years ago by dying European Colonial Empires. Supporting that policy is buffoonery we can't afford. The Japanese and Chinese loan us the money to keep their oil cheap and laugh at us while we bleed and pay the interest forever.