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Showing posts with label Rand Paul. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rand Paul. Show all posts
Thursday, November 12, 2015
Friday, March 06, 2015
Paul and the Right’s Ideological Enforcers
Michael Brendan Dougherty comments on the silly reaction of some “pro-Israel” hard-liners to Rand Paul’s insufficiently zealous applause for Netanyahu:
Whether Paul is co-sponsoring the bill because he sincerely thinks Corker’s misguided legislation is a good idea or because he feels compelled to do it for political reasons doesn’t really matter, and the enforcers that viscerally distrust him won’t care anyway. Besides, the point of the exercise isn’t to force Paul to do this or that, since the enforcers already assume that Paul isn’t really on “their” side, but to remind all other office-holders and would-be candidates that they shouldn’t ever flirt with any remotely unconventional or dissident foreign policy views unless they want to be subjected to the same absurd degree of scrutiny and criticism. The fact that Paul rushed to dispel the “bad” impression he gave on Tuesday confirms that the enforcers got exactly what they wanted.
Read the entire article
And I understand the suspicion. If I ever exerted myself so frantically on behalf of a cause, if lobbying for it required investing so many millions of dollars, and if maintaining party discipline on it required “brutal” ad drops on congressional obscurities, I would worry that some of the response I sought was perfunctory and insincere. The sonnets you receive don’t sound as sweet. The applause seems forced. Almost like they are faking it.Unfortunately, this ludicrous ideological policing seems to work only too well. Paul’s response in the last two days has been to reaffirm how enthusiastically “pro-Israel” he really is. Even though the fixation on the intensity of his clapping at Tuesday’s disgraceful spectacle ought to have made clear that he will never be able to do or say (or clap) enough to satisfy his party’s hard-liners, he made sure to emphasize his “pro-Israel” bona fides by talking up his co-sponsorship of Corker’s Iran bill and the number of times (50) he has joined in standing ovations for Netanyahu. We can already hear the hard-liners’ response: “He gave only 50 standing ovations? He should have given at least 70.”
Whether Paul is co-sponsoring the bill because he sincerely thinks Corker’s misguided legislation is a good idea or because he feels compelled to do it for political reasons doesn’t really matter, and the enforcers that viscerally distrust him won’t care anyway. Besides, the point of the exercise isn’t to force Paul to do this or that, since the enforcers already assume that Paul isn’t really on “their” side, but to remind all other office-holders and would-be candidates that they shouldn’t ever flirt with any remotely unconventional or dissident foreign policy views unless they want to be subjected to the same absurd degree of scrutiny and criticism. The fact that Paul rushed to dispel the “bad” impression he gave on Tuesday confirms that the enforcers got exactly what they wanted.
Read the entire article
Monday, March 10, 2014
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Rand Paul & the Christian Right
Can Rand Paul make a case to the Christian right? The answer will have implications for the Republican Party far beyond the Kentucky senator’s hypothetical 2016 presidential campaign.
In the Bluegrass State’s 2010 Republican senatorial primary, Paul was the candidate of choice for Sarah Palin, Jim DeMint, and Concerned Women for America. James Dobson reversed course after initially endorsing Paul’s opponent. “Have you ever made an embarrassing mistake?” Dobson asked in an ad, before suggesting that endorsing against Paul fit the bill.
In that race, Paul was able to unite social and economic conservatives against neoconservatives and other hawks in the GOP. The party establishment’s attempts to portray him as weak on national security and liberal on social issues fell on deaf ears.
Early in his Senate tenure, Paul has managed to do much the same thing. He took a well-publicized trip to Israel to reassure evangelicals that his skepticism of foreign entanglements didn’t prevent him from being a well-wisher of the Jewish state. Paul targeted countries where American flags are burned and anti-Israel sentiment runs high for cuts in foreign aid.
Paul talked about the persecution of Christians that followed the Iraq war and could be expected after a similar military intervention in Syria. He also drew attention to the flight of Christians in Egypt, a major recipient of U.S. foreign aid. The campaign drew a rebuke from Michael Gerson, the former Bush speechwriter and leading evangelical interventionist. Gerson called the actual events on the ground a “caricature” while ending with an empty exhortation that we not “resign ourselves to a Middle East without Christians.”
Read the entire article
In the Bluegrass State’s 2010 Republican senatorial primary, Paul was the candidate of choice for Sarah Palin, Jim DeMint, and Concerned Women for America. James Dobson reversed course after initially endorsing Paul’s opponent. “Have you ever made an embarrassing mistake?” Dobson asked in an ad, before suggesting that endorsing against Paul fit the bill.
In that race, Paul was able to unite social and economic conservatives against neoconservatives and other hawks in the GOP. The party establishment’s attempts to portray him as weak on national security and liberal on social issues fell on deaf ears.
Early in his Senate tenure, Paul has managed to do much the same thing. He took a well-publicized trip to Israel to reassure evangelicals that his skepticism of foreign entanglements didn’t prevent him from being a well-wisher of the Jewish state. Paul targeted countries where American flags are burned and anti-Israel sentiment runs high for cuts in foreign aid.
Paul talked about the persecution of Christians that followed the Iraq war and could be expected after a similar military intervention in Syria. He also drew attention to the flight of Christians in Egypt, a major recipient of U.S. foreign aid. The campaign drew a rebuke from Michael Gerson, the former Bush speechwriter and leading evangelical interventionist. Gerson called the actual events on the ground a “caricature” while ending with an empty exhortation that we not “resign ourselves to a Middle East without Christians.”
Read the entire article
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Stand With Rand—Or Fall With Paul? His Awful, Stupid, Hispandering Speech Shows He’s Really Part Of Conservatism Inc.’s Cheap Labor Racket
During her tremendous CPAC address, Ann Coulter called out fake anti-Establishment Republicans who refused to stand against mass immigration. She said:
Paul has been blundering around on the immigration issue since the 2012 election. At one point, he appeared to couple Amnesty with a moratorium on future legal immigration, and at another he cited Milton Friedman on the incompatibility of mass immigration and the welfare state. But he’s also repeatedly endorsed the so-called Path To Citizenship, since at least last November. After an earlier Paul “plan,” VDARE.com Editor Peter Brimelow noted that Paul was apparently confusing citizenship with legal residence (the “Green Card”) and commented:
The scapegoat of a fake Republican Establishment which is allowing the real Republican establishment to plot and scheme undetected. My example of this is, 'What public policy will harm average Americans, drive up unemployment, change America permanently in negative ways, and on the other hand, is supported by businessmen who will never vote for a Republican anyway?' Amnesty for illegal aliens. And half of elected Republicans support it, as far as I can tell most talk radio and TV hosts support it.There is no better example of this “fake anti-Establishment Republican” than Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, the hero of the Tea Party movement, the “Liberty Movement” (not the same thing), and winner of this year’s CPAC straw poll. Paul recently cemented his putative anti-Establishment credentials by filibustering Obama CIA nominee John Brennan—to the indignation of John McCain who blustered that Paul was a “wacko bird.”
Paul has been blundering around on the immigration issue since the 2012 election. At one point, he appeared to couple Amnesty with a moratorium on future legal immigration, and at another he cited Milton Friedman on the incompatibility of mass immigration and the welfare state. But he’s also repeatedly endorsed the so-called Path To Citizenship, since at least last November. After an earlier Paul “plan,” VDARE.com Editor Peter Brimelow noted that Paul was apparently confusing citizenship with legal residence (the “Green Card”) and commented:
My impression of Rand Paul is that he literally hasn't thought about the immigration issue (not unusual for cloistered libertarians) and doesn't really understand it.Read the entire article
Thursday, March 07, 2013
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Thursday, March 29, 2012
$7, $8 Gas? Sen. Paul Tries to Blunt Bill That Would Push Your Gas Prices Higher
Remember $1.83 per gallon gasoline? Seems like a very distant memory? That was the national average price we paid for the precious liquid when President Obama took over the White House in January 2009.
Apparently not satisfied with helping to fuel a more than 100 percent increase in the gas price, the Obama administration and its congressional allies are pushing legislation that would penalize the domestic oil companies that are now producing new jobs in our struggling economy and providing much-needed energy that is making us less dependent on foreign sources. Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) has introduced S. 2204, which he has named the “Repeal Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act.” It might be more apropos to name it the “Prolong the Recession and Double Our Gas Prices Again Act.”
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) rose on the Senate floor on Tuesday, March 27, to challenge the wisdom of raising taxes on oil companies at this critical time, and to offer two amendments to the bill aimed at ending taxpayer-subsidized loans to the favored “alternative energy” sector, such as the $500 million loan to Solyndra, the failed solar panel manufacturer.
“Gas prices have doubled under this President,” said Sen. Paul, “so today this body will consider new legislation which the other side, I assume thinks will make the situation better. But the other side's solution is to raise taxes on oil companies, raise taxes by $25 billion."
“Any of you who have a business know that when you raise taxes on a business, it's simply a cost to doing business,” Sen. Paul continued. “When your costs increase from making your product, what do you do? You charge your consumer more.... I don't quite understand how raising $25 billion worth of cost on the oil industry is going to help gas prices. In fact, I think it's going to send gas prices even higher.”
Apparently not satisfied with helping to fuel a more than 100 percent increase in the gas price, the Obama administration and its congressional allies are pushing legislation that would penalize the domestic oil companies that are now producing new jobs in our struggling economy and providing much-needed energy that is making us less dependent on foreign sources. Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) has introduced S. 2204, which he has named the “Repeal Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act.” It might be more apropos to name it the “Prolong the Recession and Double Our Gas Prices Again Act.”
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) rose on the Senate floor on Tuesday, March 27, to challenge the wisdom of raising taxes on oil companies at this critical time, and to offer two amendments to the bill aimed at ending taxpayer-subsidized loans to the favored “alternative energy” sector, such as the $500 million loan to Solyndra, the failed solar panel manufacturer.
“Gas prices have doubled under this President,” said Sen. Paul, “so today this body will consider new legislation which the other side, I assume thinks will make the situation better. But the other side's solution is to raise taxes on oil companies, raise taxes by $25 billion."
“Any of you who have a business know that when you raise taxes on a business, it's simply a cost to doing business,” Sen. Paul continued. “When your costs increase from making your product, what do you do? You charge your consumer more.... I don't quite understand how raising $25 billion worth of cost on the oil industry is going to help gas prices. In fact, I think it's going to send gas prices even higher.”
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Thursday, December 01, 2011
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
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