Posted on 03/10/2011 9:50:31 PM PST by Arec Barrwin
Rand Paul: Hands off my toilet By: Darius Dixon March 10, 2011 02:28 PM EST
If the federal government can support abortion rights, why can’t it also support light bulb choice, Sen. Rand Paul asked Thursday morning.
And don’t even get him started about his toilet.
The Kentucky Republican began making the link between the personal, the political and the plumbing-related when he asked Kathleen Hogan, the DOE deputy assistant secretary on energy efficiency, “I was wondering if you’re pro-choice?”
“I’m pro-choice of bulbs,” Hogan responded.
“Actually, that’s the point,” Paul said, during an appliance efficiency hearing at the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
“The point is that most members of your administration probably would be frank and characterize themselves — and upfront — as being pro-choice for abortion,” he said, “but you’re really anti-choice on every other consumer item.”
Paul continued on a string of attacks against federal regulations and labeled the lighting efficiency standards set by a 2007 energy law as just another government overreach.
“Light bulbs, refrigerators, toilets, you name it. You can’t go around your house without being told what to buy,” Paul said. “You restrict my purchases. You don’t care about my choices. You don’t care about the consumer.
“Frankly, my toilets don’t work in my house, and I blame you and people like you who want to tell me what I can install in my house,” Paul said. He added, “I find it insulting.
“I’m all for energy conservation but I wish you’d come here to extol me, to cajole me, to encourage,” he said. “But you come instead with fines [and] threats of jail.” (For the record, at no point during the hearing did Hogan threaten to arrest Paul.)
Back to abortion, he said, “I think there should be self-examination from the administration on the idea that you favor a woman’s right to an abortion but you don’t favor a woman, or a man’s, right to choose what kind of light bulb, what kind of dishwasher.”
In the middle of her response to Paul’s line of comments, Hogan said, “My view is what you want —”
“Is to buy a toilet that works!” Paul interrupted.
Hogan replied: "I can help you find a toilet that works."
“I’ve been waiting 20 years to talk about how bad these toilets are,” Paul later said.
Chairman Jeff Bingaman responded, “Well, I’m sorry about your toilet.”
Wyoming Republican Sen. Mike Enzi, whose Better Use of Light Bulbs Act would repeal the lighting provisions in the 2007 energy law, didn’t attend the hearing.
After Paul's comments, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) called out her ENR colleague, saying that “it behooves us all not to engage in name-calling of those officials who are trying to carry out the work, as the chairman has so well pointed out, that Congress has asked them to do.”
You sir, are my paladin.
I hate low flow toilets. They clog on a whim and do not always “get the job done” in one flush. I lile the industrial “thrones” at work. When you flush, it sounds like a jet engine.
Rand Paul is great! This is the funniest, most brilliant discourse I have ever heard in the last few years! Someone with logic and reason....it is awesome.
Are you pro-choice?????????????????????????????? HA HA
I really it when these guys say what the rest of us are thinking. It almost never happens so this is a treat.
We finished our house in 2002, and my wife drove up to Canada to get us some decent toilets.
Should be “love it”.
When my husband and I built our new home 7 years ago, I told him I wanted toilets like the ones at WalMart because I’d never seen them clogged. He went into the men’s room and checked them out - Kohler with a Flushmate insert. They’re loud when you flush them, but they have never clogged!
I quote Al Bundy - “Bah-WHOOSH!
This from the Aqua Buddha man. LOL, I love it.
Check out Toto toilets. They actually work and meet code.
The work great if you flush them enough times.
Usually 4 times works for me. OK, five. Five and they work great.
“After Paul’s comments, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) called out her ENR colleague, saying that “it behooves us all not to engage in name-calling of those officials who are trying to carry out the work, as the chairman has so well pointed out, that Congress has asked them to do.”
Yeah, they hate that name-calling. Unless they’re the ones doing it.
After a hundred million innocent dead in the twentieth century, no liberal is entitled to the slightest consideration, courtesy, or civility. Liberals should be reviled, abominated, spat upon, even beaten, whenever they have the gall to show their faces in the presence of decent people.
“Check out Toto toilets. They actually work and meet code.”
Don’t forget to swing by your money bin and scoop out a few buckets.
I second that, standard parts too, nothing fancy, the good flush is in the design of the flapper hole, siphon and trap. I actually get about as good a flush on my Toto's as the old toilets.
For those that like the "Sloan type" vacuum breaker commodes, they won't work in a house, you don't have a big enough supply pipe, you need a 1.5 inch to 1 inch supply for these, anyway the 1.6 GPF low-flow types of these are just as nasty as home low flows. I know I unclog enough of them at work.
He needs to stand strong. I have an outdoor flood light and have found out the new flourescents with the ballast are not deep enough to reach the receiving end attached to the fixture. I called Home Depot and they said to adjust the receiver with a screw driver. What a government inspired ClusterF. This really pisses me off that I have to try and make something work that used to work perfectly.
I hate ‘em too, because I’m tired of this gov’t interfering in every minute aspect of my life, including how much water I’m allowed to crap into.
I’m always surprised at how few people I mention this to are similarly disgusted.
They just accept this control over them.
You don't need to spend 3 grand for the Neorests, they're for clean fanatics. Toto makes standard toilets starting around $175.00, these work fine.
Hear hear! I have to flush three times with the “Low Flow” toilet before it works.
That’s more water than once with old toilets that never failed to work with one flush.
“Toto makes standard toilets starting around $175.00, these work fine.”
Didn’t know that. Never saw any that cheap in Japan.
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.