About
Learn More about our progressive online community for the Granite State.

Create an account today (it's free and easy) and get started!
Menu

Make a New Account

Username:

Password:



Forget your username or password?


Search




Advanced Search


The Masthead
Managing Editors


Jennifer Daler

Contributing Writers
elwood
Mike Hoefer
susanthe
William Tucker

ActBlue Hampshire

The Roll, Etc.
Prog Blogs, Orgs & Alumni
Bank Slate
Betsy Devine
birch, finch, beech
Democracy for NH
Live Free or Die
Mike Caulfield
Miscellany Blue
Granite State Progress
Seacoast for Change
Still No Going Back
Susan the Bruce
Tomorrow's Progressives

Politicos & Punditry
The Burt Cohen Show
John Gregg
Krauss
Landrigan
Lawson
Pindell
Primary Monitor
Primary Wire
Scala
Schoenberg
Spiliotes
Welch

Campaigns, Et Alia.
Paul Hodes
Carol Shea-Porter
Ann McLane Kuster
John Lynch
Jennifer Daler

ActBlue Hampshire
NHDP
DCCC
DSCC
DNC

National
Balloon Juice
billmon
Congress Matters
DailyKos
Digby
Hold Fast
Eschaton
FiveThirtyEight
MyDD
The Next Hurrah
Open Left
Senate Guru
Swing State Project
Talking Points Memo

50 State Blog Network
Alabama
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin

A Few Quick Words About Small Government

by: fake consultant

Fri May 21, 2010 at 20:15:44 PM EDT


We don't have a lot of time for a big discussion today, but I wanted to take a second and talk about basic Federal Government economics as they apply to Rand Paul.

It is his stated vision to reduce the size of Government...and it is an undeniable reality that the vast majority of the Federal Budget is focused on only a few areas of spending.

Today, we'll quickly run through that economic reality, and we'll challenge Dr. Paul to tell us where he stands.

fake consultant :: A Few Quick Words About Small Government
So it's about as basic as this: the four biggest items in the budget are Medicare/Medicaid, Social Security, the Department of Defense budget, and interest on the Federal debt.

Those four items are 80% of the total 2011 budget.

What does that mean?

That means you can get rid of every other thing that Government does--no more people overseeing oil drilling, no food inspections, or border security, no FBI or ATF or DEA or CIA, or OSHA or MSHA, no National Guard or air traffic control or Coast Guard or NASA...or Department of Agriculture or food stamps, either--you can get rid of all of it, and government will still be 80% of what it is today.

And that means that the only way you can really make the Federal Government smaller...is to cut one or more of those four core activities that Government is performing.

So which one will it be, Dr. Paul?

Are you against Medicare and Medicaid?
Should it be ended today?

What about Social Security?
Are you ready to tell Kentucky voters that Social Security should end, today?

Are you ready to tell Kentucky voters that you do not believe that the US should be the world leader in military technologies?

Do you think China should be the preeminent military power?

Let's get these questions in front of Dr. Paul, and even as he tries to dodge questions about the right of Woolworth's to keep its lunch counter white, let's make him face these questions as well...which are neither abstract nor obscure.

Poll
liberterian beliefs?
never compromise
try to never compromise
run away when questions come up
blame the media
blame sarah palin

Results

Tags: , , , , , , , (All Tags)
Print Friendly View Send As Email
oh, i hate reality... (4.00 / 1)
...when it screws up a good philosophy.

--we are making enemies faster than we can kill them

If you think that the role of government is to run (0.00 / 0)
people's lives, then having direct contact with them is, obviously, a help.  In other words, what you prefer is the maximum amount of power in the smallest pond -- i.e. political jurisdictions that don't have to answer to anyone else.

the problem with devolving everything down... (0.00 / 0)
...to the lowest level is that a lot of what a federal government needs to do is done poorly by dozens or hundreds of smaller jurisdictions.

everything from standard time to compatibility standards for the electrical grid, national defense and foreign policy, customs and border control (!), environmental and safety standards...all of that is better administered federally than by 50 individual states.

canada does administer health care as a provencial program, so obviously there is the potential to do large national programs on a state-by-state basis...but i would suggest that canada is more likely to have 10 provinces willing to offer a good health care program than the us would, and as a result the disparities, province by province, are nothing like what we would have in the us under similar circumstances.

--we are making enemies faster than we can kill them


[ Parent ]

Connect with BH
     
Blue Hampshire Blog on Facebook
Powered by: SoapBlox