Posted on 09/05/2007 11:17:42 AM PDT by Hurricane Bruiser
ANNAPOLIS— After eleven days of presidential straw poll ballots cast at the Maryland Republican Party’s State Fair booth, Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas) was announced last night as the winner.
The Maryland Republican Party’s first-ever presidential straw poll at the State Fair resulted in nearly 1,000 Marylanders casting a vote for their favorite Republican candidate for president.
(Excerpt) Read more at mdgop.org ...
If it makes you happy, I won’t say he’s against earmarks. He’s against pork government spending, of which earmarks are but a minor symptom that would die out, if the government would actually put into action the policies that he proposes.
Making me happy isn't the issue. It doesn't matter how you explain away his position; he's a fraud. I don't care how you define it. Period.
Perhaps the government would more seriously consider his stance if he were 100% true to his commitment, and voted 'NO' both before and after the bills go to committee.
Hmmmmmm?
The Hell there aren't. There are plenty of Zell Miller Democrats out there who believe in border security and the erosion of our sovereignty.
Paul has a coalition of people from all over the political spectrum supporting him. Ignore his candidacy at your own peril.
No different. His stance on the WOT is a killer. Period. Paragraph.
Here we are in a fight for our country's survival. And here you Paulistas are, trying to align yourselves around definitions of 'declaration of war', etc. It's a pathetic argument, one that does disservice to this great nation and those who have given their lives for its existence, and you are shameful.
Does that answer your question?
What people send to the Federal Treasury from each State and how much returns in the form of one program or another to each State are very uneven. That is one of the choices involved in where people choose to live, I suppose.
Maybe it is worth the security of our whole continent to have the land of Alaska populated. I bet Louisiana is a net recipient also. Probably 25 states are net recipients and 25 are not donots.
I think Dr. Paul simply misspoke in regard to 9-11. He did not clarify what he meant, I presume.
Clearly they skewed the results.
He did NOT misspeak. That was well over a month ago. He has since made no attempt to clarify his remarks nor retract them. He meant what he said and he should be held accountable.
What about them. I have no problem with Paul's earmarks because he at least acknowledges the system stinks and that government should be limited so earmarks won't exist or occur rarely.
Get back to me when Paul supports out-and-out pork barreling and liberal social programs like Murtha and Hunter does.
Actually.... no it's not. Dr. Paul thinks we should fight a War as a War and not as Bush is doing with his "democracy building police action". The ROE are deplorable and Bush is doing nothing to halt the subversion of the war effort by Leftist a-holes like Upchuck Schumer.
Ron Paul's statements are clear. Fight a war if need be. Use ALL of the tools, including Privateers. And then get the hell out. With the sheer amount of destructive capacity we have at our disposal there is ZERO good reason we aren't done over there. Smash them, flatten everyththing, then get the hell out. If other ME countries want to send their troops in to stir the pot, smash them too. Enough of our boys dying because Bush won't so much as wag a finger at Achmedinijad.
If not... you are just wasting lives and tax payer money.
Yep, it sure does. It’s most fortunate for you that you were able to discern a percieved imperfection regarding earmarks to buttress your earlier opinion. It would be fascinating what you would have said if whichever candidate your supporting has allowed earmarks through. As a matter of fact, he probably has.
Wrong. It means that there are some good Democrats left who believe that their Rat leaders are selling America down the drain with issues such as amnesty for illegals and stabbing our troops in the back after voting to authorize the use of force, and trying to play both sides of the field with it.
Actually...yes it is!
He may have disagreements with how Bush is managing the war, but Ron Paul IS NOT commander in chief. Bush is. If Ron Paul is so Constitution centric, then he should realize that it's the Executive Branch that has control of the military; not Congress. And if he fails to agree with how the war is being fought, then he can vote against its funding (which he has). But that is it.
And what you have to understand is that many (I'd say most) conservatives agree that, regardless of the fact that the war has been mismanaged in some instances, it is still worth fighting, and winnable, and Ron Paul is going to get nowhere with us. NOWHERE! Verstehe du?
We're not discussing other candidates. We're discussing Ron Paul. And we're not discussing a 'perceived' imperfection in the topic of earmarks but a real and central one. Don't try to obfuscate the discussion by bringing in other candidates. The topic is Ron Paul and only Ron Paul. Live or die by it (and thus far, you're dying by it).
That’s it. I’m done. It’s been fun and enlightening, but I have other obligations to fulfill now. See you again (perhaps) tomorrow.
And on the subject of earmarks, Ron Paul does not absolutely oppose them. No student of history could possibly take the position that the Founders did either. Earmarks characterized all the budgets of the early congresses. They had no armies of bureaucrats to distribute pork and redistribute wealth. So if it was done, it was done directly by the Congress, the House specifically with its sole power of the purse. Including some of the Founders.
As Recess Begins, Spending Spree Continues
August 6, 2007
These last few weeks the House has been in a rush to pass spending bills before August recess. In fact, visitors walking the hallways of Congress become immediately struck by the apparent spending battle between the “conservative Democrats” of the so-called “Blue Dog Coalition,” and the Republican Study Committee, or RSC, generally representing the more conservative bloc of Republican House members. Members of each of these groups place large posters on easels outside their offices. The purpose behind this seems clear, to point the finger at the opposite party for the current budget mess that continues to threaten America’s future.
When Republicans had control of the Presidency and both houses of Congress, very little was done to stem the tide of federal spending. In fact, spending increased every year over the past decade. New programs such as “No Child Left Behind,” and entitlements like the Prescription Drug Benefit, were added at great cost to federal taxpayers.
During this period, the Blue Dogs continued to make the rhetorical point of government financial misdeeds. Now that Democrats control the House, the RSC is highlighting the increases in spending and debt that will occur based on bills passed this year by the new majority.
While both sides continue attempting to score political points, the country goes further and further into debt, because neither side is really willing to make the tough decisions necessary to halt the run away train of federal spending. Several Republicans go to the House floor with amendments to stop spending directed by Congress, often seeking to cut projects that total $100,000 or less. While it is true that hundreds of thousands can and do add up, the same people who argue for these spending cuts think nothing of spending billions more in Iraq. At the same time, basically every spending bill that comes to the House Floor would have the majority spend more, even over and above the increases requested by the Administration.
Current arguments over spending really have no connection to the idea of the overall reduction in the size and scope of government. The Democrats who argue that tax cuts are a form of spending are just as misleading as the Republicans who say they can make a serious dent by changing congressionally directed spending into administration directed spending.
The federal government has a spending problem. Each year our current accounts balance gets worse and worse, and the amount of foreign held government debt has skyrocketed. Both Republicans and Democrats; conservatives, liberals and moderates, indeed nearly every single-member of the Washington political establishment, is addicted to one form of federal spending or another.
Only when the American people absolutely demand that the spending spree be stopped, will their representatives in Washington stop using this issue as a political football to score public relations points, and finally face-up to the fact that we are a nation in a very precarious financial position, which demands real spending cuts in order to avoid bankrupting our next generation.
Unlike the rest of you, we oppose these corrupting influences and the growth of government by both parties. We don't have to wait until the Wife Of Clinton becomes president before we suddenly discover that the powers of an ever-expanding big-government liberalism in both parties is a menace to liberty and the pockets of taxpayers.
Earmark Victory May Be A Hollow One
June 18, 2007
Last week's big battle on the House floor over earmarks in the annual appropriations bills was won by Republicans, who succeeded in getting the Democratic leadership to agree to clearly identify each earmark in the future. While this is certainly a victory for more transparency and openness in the spending process, and as such should be applauded, I am concerned that this may not necessarily be a victory for those of us who want a smaller federal government.
Though much attention is focused on the notorious abuses of earmarking, and there are plenty of examples, in fact even if all earmarks were eliminated we would not necessary save a single penny in the federal budget. Because earmarks are funded from spending levels that have been determined before a single earmark is agreed to, with or without earmarks the spending levels remain the same. Eliminating earmarks designated by Members of Congress would simply transfer the funding decision process to federal bureaucrats rather then elected representatives. In an already flawed system, earmarks can at least allow residents of Congressional districts to have a greater role in allocating federal funds - their tax dollars - than if the money is allocated behind locked doors by bureaucrats. So we can be critical of the abuses in the current system but we shouldn't lose sight of how some reforms may not actually make the system much better.
The real problem, and one that was unfortunately not addressed in last week's earmark dispute, is the size of the federal government and the amount of money we are spending in these appropriations bills. Even cutting a few thousand or even a million dollars from a multi-hundred billion dollar appropriation bill will not really shrink the size of government.
So there is a danger that small-government conservatives will look at this small victory for transparency and forget the much larger and more difficult battle of returning the United States government to spending levels more in line with its constitutional functions. Without taking a serious look at the actual total spending in these appropriations bills, we will miss the real threat to our economic security. Failed government agencies like FEMA will still get tens of billions of dollars to mismanage when the next disaster strikes. Corrupt foreign governments will still be lavishly funded with dollars taken from working Americans to prop up their regimes. The United Nations will still receive its generous annual tribute taken from the American taxpayer. Americans will still be forced to pay for elaborate military bases to protect borders overseas while our own borders remain porous and unguarded. These are the real issues we must address when we look at reforming our yearly spending extravaganza called the appropriations season.
So we need to focus on the longer term and more difficult task of reducing the total size of the federal budget and the federal government and to return government to its constitutional functions. We should not confuse this welcome victory for transparency in the earmarking process with a victory in our long-term goal of this reduction in government taxing and spending.
Shh..Freepers still think the Iraq war is going well and popular.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.