Posted on 04/18/2011 8:39:50 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
CNN’s Candy Crowley interviewed Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) on the debt-ceiling increase and the issues of government spending, and got perhaps a mild surprise for an answer. Yes, Paul will vote to raise the debt ceiling — but only in exchange for a balanced-budget amendment that ends deficit spending in Washington. Furthermore, Paul rejects the notion that a compromise on the budget involves raising taxes. A compromise means that conservatives will have to give up some defense spending as liberals give up some social-policy spending. Under no circumstances should Washington be trusted with even more money:
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
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CROWLEY: I want to just add that the president has said in recent interviews that his vote against raising the debt ceiling was a political vote by a novice senator and he regrets it. But moving you along here, if — it just seems completely unlikely to me that there will be a vote for a constitutional balanced budget amendment. It seems unlikely to me that the president would agree to just use existing funds to pay off the interest on the debt. Seems to me that the only way this is going to go is that there will be the prediction (ph) of a bill to raise the debt ceiling. So if there is that, could you see yourself just voting no and letting it go at that, or would you stop at any means?
PAUL: I think we haven’t yet determined what our strategy will be, but I can tell you that the people of Kentucky elected me to shake things up. They didn’t elect me to raise the debt ceiling. They didn’t elect me to pass budgets that add — you know, the president’s budget will add $7 trillion to the debt if you believe his numbers. But whatever the numbers are, our government and our leaders are still adding enormous amounts of debt, heaping this burden on our kids and our grandkids. It is precisely why I was elected, to oppose this type of behavior.
CROWLEY: As you know, there is a so-called gang of six on the Senate side, three Republicans, three Democrats, trying to come together to come up with a bill that could pass, that would deal with the debt that you’re talking about here. Because the president has a plan, House Republicans have a plan, there’s not a lot of middle ground there other than everybody thinks — everybody says we’ve got to cut the deficit. I want to read you something that Senator Tom Coburn, a fellow Republican from Oklahoma said about these negotiations and about how to bring down the deficit — the debt. And he said. “I agree that we ought to cut spending. But will we ever get the spending cut to the level that we need without some type of compromise?” He’s talking tax increases here. Can you see yourself agreeing to a tax increase to help with this debt that you’re so concerned about?
PAUL: Yeah. I think there is a compromise. But the compromise is not to raise taxes, the compromise is for conservatives to admit that the military budget’s going to have to be cut. We’ve doubled military spending. I believe in a strong national defense, but conservatives will have to compromise and we will have to cut military spending. Liberals will have to compromise and we will have to cut domestic welfare. The compromise is where we cut, not where we raise taxes. The problem is, if you give them more money in Washington, they’re not to be trusted. I mean, there was $100 billion in last year’s budget that is unaccounted for. They don’t even know where the money was spent. Recently when we bailed out the banks in our country, guess who got bailed out? The Libyan National Bank. It was a pass-through. AIG became a pass-through for foreign banks. We don’t know where all of our money is going to be spent.
When I want to turn in money for my office, I want to turn a couple hundred thousand dollars back in that I’m not going to spend? It is unclear where that money goes. We cannot even be confident that the couple hundred thousand I want to give back goes towards the debt. Our government is out of control. They don’t need more money, we need to give them less money.
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Expect to hear more of the argument that Republicans agree with Barack Obama — circa 2006, though, not 2011, on debt ceilings. Crowley notes that the White House now says that Obama regrets the vote, and it’s clear that he does, but for all the wrong reasons. Republicans have a good argument in this case that a vote against a debt-ceiling hike is a mainstream and not extreme position, but that enabling trillions more in deficit spending is not just extreme but also extremely dangerous. For the White House to argue otherwise is to admit that Obama really was the emperor who wore no clothes in 2006, just a year before he claimed to have all the expertise necessary to be President of the United States.
“raise the debt ceiling in exchange for a balanced budget”
is this completely retarded or am I just stupid? If the budget is balanced, why would the debt ceiling need to be raised?
What is this guy smoking?
Becaue an ammendment (he is talking constitutional) does not happen overnight.
Raising the debt ceiling -- an action which may (or may not) be taken by the US Congress.
Constitutional Amednments -- an action which may (or may not) be taken by two-thirds of the several states. These take years and years.
Talk about apples and oranges! You cannot hope to make a deal whereby they get this if we get that.
It’s called “negotiating”.....he knows the DEMS will NEVER sign on to a balanced budget.
Because the budget that would be balanced, presumably, would not by until FY2012, at the earliest. They may put something into the ammendment about when it officially becomes effective that might delay that further.
In before someone calls Paul a RINO.
Desperate times will yield us the noisiest nominee who can both deliver the message and competently take out the Obama math machine. This election is all about money.
It takes a lot of money to turn the US into marxists and they’re winning. Defunding these usurpers is the only real ticket to maintain freedom. Cut off the spicket.
for one thing, you CAN’T have a balanced budget every year. You are going to have a bad year now and then. What you can do though, is have a balanced budget on average over the long run. But I don’t think there’s a way to codify that into law.
Oh, the Dems will sign onto a balanced budget in a heartbeat, if they get to raise taxes.
The balanced budget agreement must also fix or reduce taxes.
RE: is this completely retarded or am I just stupid? If the budget is balanced, why would the debt ceiling need to be raised?
What he means is he will allow the debt ceiling to be raised JUST THIS ONCE and NO MORE, in exchange for a balanced budget law.
With the law passed, we will not have to raise the debt ceiling in the future.
That’s the way I see it.
Re-read the Constitution. One way for the Constitution to be amended is for the House and the Senate to vote for an Amendment, 2/3 in each house (290 Reps and 67 Senators), and then for 3/4 of the States (38 out of 57) to ratify the Amendment.
Until 2015, at the earliest, 67 Senators can’t agree on where to have lunch. It would probably take 72 “Republican” Senators to approve this amendment. If Senator Rand means what he says, he will vote “No” on raising the debt ceiling.
is this completely retarded or am I just stupid? If the budget is balanced, why would the debt ceiling need to be raised?
It will take time TO BALANCE the budget. Most of what he is saying is poking fun of the other party and the President, as they justify raising the debt ceiling as so important, so Rand Paul shoots back, tongue-in-cheek, saying sure, we’ll do what you wish, if you are willing to pass a balanced budget.
Yes, I know....I’m NOT a proponent of a Balanced budget...but it makes for good PR.....
We may require a tag team -- one candidate who focuses on destroying Obama, dragging out all the dirty laundry for the country to see. This may not endear that candidate to the media or to the general public, and it may destroy their presidential hopes, but it would be a valuable service.
Meanwhile, another candidate can stay above the fray, demonstrate good character, respect for the Constitutuon, and love of the country. This candidate can lay out a principled approach toward bringing back our core values and solving our problems the old-fashioned way, rather than some crypto-Marxist way.
The tag team of Trump and Palin seems to be doing pretty well. I don't see Trump as either president or veep, but I do think he is helping someone else take the place of Obama.
17 days ago the newly elected tea party republicans gave it their all and managed to cut almost 300million from the budget...a budget with a deficit measured in TRILLIONS. if you don’t know, a million is one millionth of a trillion.
They aint gonna balance SHIT!
just this once my ass
Because the debt ceiling is the mechanism that allows you to pay for what you've already spent. The Balanced Budget Amendment wouldn't allow you to spend more than your projected tax revenues, so there would be no need for a debt ceiling increase next year.
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