Posted on 05/20/2015 6:41:13 AM PDT by wagglebee
PHILADELPHIA, PA, May 19, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Rand Paul wants to be president – but abortion is less of an issue for him than the national debt, the senator said yesterday.
Paul had completed a campaign stop at Philadelphia's National Constitution Center, where he attacked both Bill and Hillary Clinton with relish, when a local media personality asked him about abortion.
“I will answer the question as honestly as I can,” he said. “I didn’t run for office because of this issue. It wasn’t what got me to leave my practice” to enter politics.
Instead, it was the nation's ballooning debt that made the younger Paul run for the open Senate seat in Kentucky.
“I ran for office mainly because I became concerned that we’re going to destroy the country with debt – that we would borrow much money, that we would just destroy the currency,” he said.
The national debt has exploded from less than $1 trillion in 1980 to a staggering $18 trillion and climbing. President Obama, whose annual deficits have exceeded $1 trillion, has added more to the debt than every president from George Washington to Bill Clinton combined.
Pressed on abortion, Paul told the audience that, under the Constitution's federalist principles, abortion would be handled “best by the states.” Conservative jurists have debated whether the Constitution gives the federal government the right to regulate abortion.
To make national policy, the nation needs to decide “when life begins,” he said, according to The Daily Caller. “I think we go down all kinds of rabbit holes talking about other stuff.”
He referenced his own history as an ophthalmologist who treated premature newborns. “If someone were to hurt that one-pound baby in the neonatal nursery, it’s a problem. That baby has rights,” he said. “But we somewhat inconsistently say that seven-pound baby at birth or just before birth has no rights.”
His remarks echoed his rejoinder to a reporter last month to ask Democratic National Committee chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, “Is it OK to kill a seven-pound baby in the uterus?” Congresswoman Schultz replied that there should be no legal restrictions on late-term abortion. The Democratic Party platform currently calls for taxpayer-funded abortion through all nine months of pregnancy.
Deciding when Constitutional protections and the right to life apply is the key goal to advancing pro-life legislation, Paul said yesterday.
“We just have to figure when we agree life begins,” he concluded.
The first-term senator, who will also run for re-election in Kentucky next year, has a strong pro-life voting record – as strong as anyone can in a chamber where pro-life legislation was bottled by former Majority Leader Harry Reid until this year. In 2013, he introduced the Life Begins at Conception Act.
The previous year, he had been stopped by TSA agents while en route to address the annual March for Life. “I don’t think a civilization can long endure that does not have respect for all human life – born and not yet born,” he has said.
He has, however, said he supports the use of Plan B, a potentially abortifacient method of "emergency contraception," as birth control.
His concern over the proper role of the government under an originalist reading of the Constitution has caused Paul, an outspoken personal supporter of life and marriage, to question whether the government should withdraw from marriage contracts and establish alternate legal arrangements.
Framed by Independence Hall, Paul touted his libertarian credentials as someone who could attract unconventional support to the Republican ticket, including minorities who support his opposition to militarizing local police forces. Such opposition exploded in the city during riots in nearby Baltimore.
“I see no reason why a 20-ton mine resistant ambush protection vehicle should ever roll down any city in our country,” he said on Monday. “There is no reason that the police force should be the same as the army.”
Paul also stated he would oppose reauthorization of the Patriot Act, although he conceded the votes did not exist to impeded final passage.
He was particularly incensed over the NSA's broad interception of phone calls without a warrant.
“That's what we fought the Revolution over!” he said. "Our Founding Fathers would be appalled to know that we are writing one single warrant and collecting everyone's phone records all the time.”
Yes, he should.
ALL senators swear an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution and the Constitution explicitly states that NO PERSON shall be deprived of life without due process. Since 1973 over 60 MILLION have been deprived of life without due process.
So yes, elected officials SHOULD adhere to their oaths and follow the Constitution rather than the whims of nine unelected judges who aren't even alive anymore.
that's a disqualifying comment.
Sorry Rand, you just lost any chance you ever had of getting my vote.
A “republic” by definition does not permit MURDER.
The Constitution mandates that each state shall have a “republican form of government.”
So abortion is FORBIDDEN by the U.S. Constitution.
Ron and Rand must have not read it.
If you are a single issue voter and this is your issue then I guess you will get what you have always gotten....nothing.
Scott Walker and Rand Paul are both making crystal clear that they are running away from abortion.
They are both dead to me.
And, of course, Jeb Bush murdered Terri Schiavo.
Jeb Bush would never get my vote. Because of Terri Schiavo....he showed an absolute void in the moral courage aspect of things. We cannot afford a soulless President in the WH for another eight years.
Actually, I am a single issue voter.
I vote for candidates who will obey the Constitution and the Constitution says NOTHING about any state having the "right" to declare persons to be "nonpersons" in order to facilitate their murder. Our Republic experimented with this for the better part of a century and was nearly destroyed as a result.
The Pauls and their libertarian ilk are wed to the absurd idea that states have the "right" to circumvent the Constitution. They are the epitome of statists because their will condone all levels of tyranny that are carried out at the state or local level.
Libertarians pretend to adhere to the Constitution, but as far as I can tell, their true devotion is to the writings of a Russian atheist.
He’s a typical libertarian. Tight with his money but having no moral compass.
So, you believe that it is constitutional for individual states to have the authority to declare who is and who isn't a person?
Are you familiar with what happened the last time this was done?
It's federal judges that are destroying the nation culturally and morally.
Federal judges are among the most inherently impotent of all government officials. They have ZERO power to enforce their dictates. The destruction of America is brought about by the spineless politicians who choose to ignore the Constitution in order to prostrate before their black-robed masters.
He entered politics because there’s money in it.
Ron and Rand must have not read it.
They've read it, but chosen to reject it in favor of the rantings of a Russian atheist.
“the Constitution says NOTHING about any state havin....”
Apparently you forgot the penumbra envisioned by SCOTUS. Roe v. Wade under cuts your argument whether you like it or not
Nonsense.
The appellee and certain amici argue that the fetus is a "person" within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support of this, they outline at length and in detail the well known facts of fetal development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant's case, of course, collapses, [p157] for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the Amendment. The appellant conceded as much on reargument.In the opinion of Roe v. Wade itself Justice Blackmun flatly declares that you can't kill a person or declare a person to be a nonperson in order to kill it.
-- Roe v. Wade
Well I’m agains’t gay marriage and abortion but as a firm states righter I have to say I agree with Rand Paul that both of those things are states rights issues. Otherwise this activist SCOTUS is likely to push gay marriage on all 57 states just like they did abortion.
Why do you believe that each state has the "right" to declare a person to be a nonperson and kill them?
Where does this "right" come from?
Do you realize that states such as New York, California, Illinois, etc. will NEVER abolish abortion if they have a choice and that the end result of this pro-choice-by-state approach to infanticide will result in abortion continuing unabated?
You either believe in the 10th amendment or you don’t. Its not just for easy choices. Right now you have Roe v Wade which is considered “settled law” The chances of it getting overturned are practically zero. Which would you rather have abortion in a few states or abortion in all states? Its nice to dream about everything being perfect but that’s not how it usually works.
With gay marriage. We don’t want it in GA. NY I don’t care.
Great Rand. You care if they spend too much. You care if they snoop on people.
But you don’t care if they’re killing folks????
Rand isn't running for Governor, Rand is a Senator voting on federal law, and is running for president> Paul is running to head the executive branch, that means federal policy on abortion on military bases, federal hospitals, in contracts for millions of federal employees, in foreign aid and foreign policy, and he will be occupying the single most important seat in America, in affecting public policy and public opinion on abortion.
Rand is pro-choice, and he is running to be the head of the Executive branch of the federal government.
What are you even talking about. Your comment makes no sense in relation to what I said. Oh I forgot its you. Nevermind. :-)
Of course I believe in the 10th Amendment, though I am also acutely aware that the word "right" NEVER appears in it. People have rights, governments have powers granted by the people.
Nevertheless, I also believe the rest of the Constitution, to wit:
No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
- Amendment VNor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
- Amendment XIV
You seem to believe that each stated DOES have the "right to deny a person due process and deprive them of their life.
Right now you have Roe v Wade which is considered “settled law” The chances of it getting overturned are practically zero.
It doesn't need to be "overturned" if we have elected officials who will actually abide by the Constitution.
I suggest you read Justice Blackmun's opinion in Roe, few people actually have and it is quite illuminating on "settled law" and what it says about killing persons.
Which would you rather have abortion in a few states or abortion in all states?
This was the same argument put forth a century and a half ago, "would you rather have slavery in a few states or slavery in all states?" It was a morally and unconstitutionally untenable proposition then and it remains so today.
Your "solution" would mean that the only thing standing between a person's life and death was the location of its mother and her willingness to travel if necessary.
The pro-choice-by-state approach is nothing more than the libertarian version of "I'm personally opposed, but..." They know full well that well over 95% of abortions are performed in states that fully intend to keep it legal if given the option.
The "right" that Rand Paul, and it would appear you, want to enshrine is "settled law" that essentially states, "You can kill all the babies you want, but you might need to drive a couple hours to do it."
With gay marriage. We don’t want it in GA. NY I don’t care.
"I don't care" is basically the mantra of libertarianism. Libertarians are reluctant to show open support for the left's agenda, so they cloak it by claiming to not care.
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