RAND PAUL: Trump is right to reconsider NATO and has the authority to Withdraw!

Good grief. There’s got to be some clouds where you live that you can yell at as well.

Rand is highlighting this on his X feed he called it “outrageous”

Thank you for posting RandFan.

He should propose a bill to repeal 2023 National Defense Authorization Act that requires a 75% of votes in Congress to withdraw from a treaty.

First, the Constitution puts a time limit on military spending.

Article I, Section 8, Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;

So the taxpayer dollars allocated for Biden's 2023 National Defense Authorization Act are constitutionally expired imo.

H O W E V E R...

Even though it can be argued that subsequent funding for Ukraine might still be in effect, the 2023 National Defense Authorization [& Democratic taxpayer dollars laundering imo] Act was arguably unconstitutional in the first place as per Justice Joseph Story's clarification that nothing in Section 8 authorizes peacetime foreign aid of any kind.

If the tax be not proposed for the common defence, or general welfare, but for other objects, wholly extraneous (as for instance [all emphases added], for propagating Mahometanism among the Turks, or giving aids and subsidies to a foreign nation, to build palaces for its kings, or erect monuments to its heroes,) it would be wholly indefensible upon constitutional principles. — Justice Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution 2 (1833).

Based on Story's clarification, the peacetime 2023 National Defense Authorization Act probably wouldn't have passed the Madison Test for Section 8-authorized federal spending.

Regarding the Madison Test, note that the 14th Congress in the time of President James Madison (4th pres.), Madison generally regarded as the father of the Constitution, had found some EXISTING tax revenues and got all happy about spending it. So Congress drafted the Bonus Bill of 1817 to use the taxpayer dollars to improve military readiness and commerce by authorizing the construction of roads and canals intended to facilitate moving troops and manufactured goods. But Congress had based the bill solely on the General Welfare Clause (GWC) which turned out to be a BIG mistake.

Article I, Section 8, Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States [emphasis added]; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

More specifically, while Madison AGREED with Congress that the bill would improve federal purpose transportation, he diplomatically clarified in his veto explanation that while the GWC authorizes Congress to tax and spend, he reminded Congress that the Constitution's drafters, Madison himself a major player, had intended for the clauses that followed it in Section 8 to limit what Congress could spend tax dollars for, no mention of roads and canals for Congress's purpose for the Bonus Bill. Madison also noted that the bonus bill didn't even pass Congress's traditional "wild card" excuse for justifying spending, the infamous "Necessary and Proper Clause."

The legislative powers vested in Congress are specified and enumerated in the eighth section of the first article of the Constitution, and it does not appear that the power proposed to be exercised by the bill is among the enumerated powers, or that it falls by any just interpretation within the power to make laws necessary and proper [emphasis added] for carrying into execution those or other powers vested by the Constitution in the Government of the United States. —President James Madison, March 3, 1817: Veto Message on the Internal Improvements Bill

In fact, note that the only roads that the Founders expressly gave Congress the specific power to authorize are postal roads.

Article I, Section 8, Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads; It is one of a few government agencies explicitly authorized by the Constitution of the United States. (non-FR)
From the accepted doctrine that the United States is a government of delegated powers, it follows that those not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from such as are conferred, are reserved to the states, or to the people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the Tenth Amendment was adopted. The same proposition, otherwise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited [emphasis added]. —United States v. Butler, 1936.

Again, the post-16th and 17th Amendment ratification Congress cannot justify peacetime foreign spending of any kind anymore that they can justify domestic roads for military support.

That slogan was popularized at the time by the John Birch Society but it was not, to my recollection, used by the Goldwater campaign.

I actually don't pay that much attention to handles.

Some people have erratic sleeping schedules. I'm retired, and I sleep whenever I feel like it. I'm sometimes awake 20 or 21 hours, then I might sleep 5 hours or 12. I keep no regular hours. I can be asleep or awake any time day or night.

That's not uncommon among college kids, the unemployed, and the retired. Not universal, but not uncommon.

I don't know how old Rand Fan is, but if he's retired, an erratic sleeping schedule wouldn't be all that unusual.

He must need an endorsement from Trump.

"Our weapons systems and military people should be able to work with each other’s.

Agree - they "should", but they don't. Plus, the UK, with a once mighty Navy can't even float one aircraft carrier. That's why Trump is barking at France, who isn't much, if any better. The EU has no capacity to help us now, or in the future during their great slide into self-inflicted oblivion.

Holy crap Rand says something sensible that constitutionally we can agree on.

Even a blind squirrel finds a nut every now and again.

RandFan is a piece of excrement. We should call this RandFanRepublic.

Aren't you lunar landing denier?

What?

No, I am not a lunar landing denier. Good grief.

Come on, you bring up some good points about trade and tariffs. Keep on point.

He can only withdraw for a year, handing his best bro, Putin, a major win.