Posted on 05/15/2025 10:32:56 AM PDT by RandFan
@tomselliott
Sen. @RandPaulon @SpeakerJohnson's "obscene" spending bill: "No conservative should support raising the debt ceiling $5 trillion. So, that alone is enough for me not to support the bill, even though I support large segments of the bill."
(Excerpt) Read more at x.com ...
Doesn’t right have any relation to the possible? I think we can do better than to call out politicians and virtue signal. Right in my book implies a workable solution.
Whether spending for Sec 8 HUD or DEI or a big beautiful wall, we need to realize that we just cannot afford everything we wish we had.
If we expect the left to cut their pet spending project, we should be willing to cut our pet spending project also.
Sorry.
“What is possible” a decade ago didn’t include eliminating DEI from the military or overturning Roe v Wade or ending forever regime change wars or gutting USAID or implementing tariffs to get other countries to change their behavior or eliminating birth right citizenship or any number of other things Trump is working on.
It simply takes enough people in the right places being convinced to do the right things.
That doesn’t happed by Republican’ts saying “It’s too hard. It will never work. It’s not realistic. There is nothing we can do about it.”
No it happens by being open minded and analyzing the plans being offered. Something Paul is not doing. Paul has never convinced other senators nor should he because he has no plan other than reducing spending. That is not a viable solution. It’s wishful thinking.
So were all of those things I mentioned in my last post. It's only now in retrospect that you can say..."Oh, those things were inevitable."
My hope is that PEOPLE LIKE YOU hold your representatives to account and let them know that you expect them to vote like Paul and Massie do so that in 10 years from now, cutting spending, restoring the economy and saving the country will be viewed as inevitable outcomes in retrospect.
Thank you for a respectful disvourse. I believe we may be closer in outlook than it seems on the surface. It is not that I think the emphasis on spending less is wrong. I am fully on board with decreasing the size of Gvt, eliminating waste, fraud, abuse etc. I just believe that the way forward necessitates some priming of the pump and that the money spent will be rpaid many times by the increased accountability & efficiancy.
That said I distrust Paul 100%. Just as a complement raises my hackles and I suspect the motivation, Rand Paul’s siren song appears to serve his own purposes not the Nation’s. He appears a fiscal hawk but has not accomplished anything in all his time in Congress. That suggests to me that it is all a charade to maintain his seat & solicit donations. He is not alone. Many politicians tell us what we want to hear. IMO all of those politicians are corrupt.
What I hope now is that with Trump & his cabinet on one side & the American people raising Cain on the other ride the essential legislation gets passed, the fraud and redundancy gets cut and the prosperity Trump is spearheading will right our ship.
I think that has less to do with Paul and more to do with the other 99 Senators.
If instead of having 1 Paul and 1 Massie in Congress, we had 99 Pauls and 435 Massies, we would be in a lot better shape than we currently are. Instead of Republicans trying to decrease the number of Paul/Massie type congressmen, we should be trying to increase the number of them.
I would argue that continuing to vote for increased spending and increased spending limits thinking that somehow that will end up decreasing spending...would fit more into the “doing the same thing over and over expecting different results” category than shutting down the government until the other side agrees to a reasonable budget.
It also just occurred to me that I am defending Rand from attacks by J. Galt.
LOL
Nightmare IMO
There is only party in America and Trump is not a member, at least a welcome one.
Rand Paul is a card carrying member of the uniparty despite however he grandstands his positions.
Trump cannot sign an executive order on a budget.
The legislative branch and executive branch have a separation of power as it should be.
Trump backed McCarthy and he backed Mikey.
What were his alternatives?
McCarthy represented a majority of the House Republican caucus as did Johnson.
The 2024 Presidential election was a win for the people.
The 2024 Congressional elections were not.
America First controls the executive.
The uniparty controls both the legislative and judicial branches.
Trump and the America First platform were sabotaged NOT by Democrats but by McConnell and Ryan.
Does anyone really think that Thune and Mikey are much better than them?
Both guys are representative of the Republican wing of the uniparty.
Trump deserves ALL the credit for ANYTHING achieved in this term.
The uniparty congressional Republicans are not pulling on the same rope that he is nor will the uniparty justices Roberts and Barrett likely be pulling on the same rope either.
Those are the facts.
Trump is trying to restore the shell of a republic and he is getting no help from the Republican wing of the uniparty entrenched in the legislative and judicial branches.
We can certainly have different takes. Shutting down the GVT has never worked in the past. It’s just grandstanding and has never accomplished a thing. It never will IMO. It can’t because the left is much more willing to weaponize the pain inflicted on the American people.
This take makes me grin. You give no responsibility to Rand Paul. If he needs senators to be like him to accomplish anything he is incompetent. An effective person works with reality not in a vacuum.
I am reminded of Trump’s description of the 2 different ways of saying that we want to enact a tariff...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wN7KHWdyrbI
There will certainly be different outcomes when Republicans go into a shutdown with the aura of...”Yes, we understand this is all our fault. As soon as our extremist members come to their senses we can end this and get back to the work of the American people.”
Compared to....”Listen you moth%$#%$. WE are here to save our country. YOU are the ones being unreasonable. YOU are the ones destroying the country. YOU are the ones who are going to agree to a reasonable budget that spends 10% less than last year’s budget. The American people are going to hold YOU responsible for this shutdown. PERIOD!”
We have never tried that because every shutdown we have Republicans saying what you are saying now.
Rand Paul entered the Senate in 2011. It seems that you are saying that because he has not been an author of much legislation that was passed in that time, he is not good.
In that time, our debt has ballooned from $14T to $36T. He has gone on the record as being against nearly all of that deficit spending.
The Republicans that you seem to think are the “good guys” have helped pass all of those CRs and budgets to get us to this spot AGAINST THE ADVICE OF PAUL.
Who are all of these heros in the Senate who if we had one more of them in Rand’s seat, it would have saved us from spending so much over the past 15 years?
Would you say that since Lindsay Graham has his name on lots of legislation in the past 15 years, you would prefer him over Rand?
I don’t 100% agree but what woukld be different this time. You have the same cast of characters.
It reminds me of my son who didn’t want to admit that his career choice doomed him. Finally I said, “You play poker. You don’t bet on a poor hand even if there is a small chance that aces will emerge. Your life is even more important than money wagered on a poker hand. Sure, there is a chance that the VP will see you and recognize your worth. How big is that chance. How long has your manager worked to get an extra 10k a year? Play your life like you play poker and put your energy into the path that has the best odds of getting you where you want to be in 10 years.
He is on wall street now after a graduate degree. The best decision he has ever made (other than wife). The path under consideration infinitesimal odds. I would say betting the Country on such a path is treasonous. Trump’s plan, even though it has an initial investment has good odds. Even better if Musk uncovers corrupt congress critters and we can clean out the stable substituting people chosen to continue shrinking GVT, prosecuting fraud, eliminating lobbyist donations.
My take, this is the WRONG time to stand up and block a bill.
He’s had 15 years to cut spending and this may be the last chance ever to pass Trump’s initiatives.
Pass the bill with a caveat that they can come back and CUT MORE when they have the votes.
The revolt of the characters against the author. I loved Ayn Rand’s books as a young adult and view the world through her frame of reference to this day.
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