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Okay, So Sell Me On Your Guy
Now that Rand Paul is out if the race, I’m left with a big gaping hole. Not only in my heart, but in my ballot. Despite my disagreements with the man, I had intended to vote for him. But now that he’s thrown in the towel, I’ve got no Plan B, and the New York primary is in two months.
Ricochet member V the K asked what everyone’s big three issues were. Mine were:
- The police state
- War
- National debt
I consider our police state to be incompatible with liberty; war and national debt are the two things that tend to topple nations. The way I see it, Rand Paul was pretty good on two of those things, and poor, but not the worst, on one of them.
Now, I realize I’m swimming upstream here, but I don’t want it to ever be said that I’m inflexible, closed-minded, or unwilling to compromise. So now that I have an opening, I invite everyone who wishes to pitch their favorite candidate to me.
If you support Cruz, Rubio, Kasich, Christie, Trump, Bush, Fiorina, or, sure, what the heck, even Jim Gilmore, you’re welcome to try.
Please realize that I’m a very tough sell. I’ll listen, but I’m not guaranteed at all to buy what you’re selling. (Also, an argument that I should vote for an inanimate carbon rod with an R next to the name won’t fly with me.) But even if you don’t sell me — after all, I’m very stingy with my vote — maybe you’ll convince someone else reading your pitch.
Published in Elections, General
When he says that he would abolish the IRS, but then puts forward a tax plan that would require a bigger IRS, do you believe that he’s lying about the former, the latter, or that he’s not lying about either and has a plan that he has neither released nor hinted at to achieve this?
When he says that he would abolish the Department of Commerce, do you think he is being honest? Do you think he’d abolish the Census? Would he abolish the Patent Office? Would he abolish his old office (the Federal Trade Commission)? If not, and he’s never hinted that he would do these things, what does it mean to promise to abolish the DoC except to con people into believing that he’s a fiscal hawk without sounding like he’d cut anything that they care about?
Here’s a case for Trump.
Among your top 3 issues, war is the most straightforward. Trump has no designs for military conquest or adventures in the Middle East. He favors smashing ISIS, but that battle is already underway, and the best way out of that problem might be to go forward.
Reigning in the police state and the national debt, however, are both opposed by voters at every opportunity. Voters reliably favor stronger police powers, higher spending, and lower taxes. Demographically, the only groups that ever oppose high spending and low taxes are educated whites, and the only groups that oppose the police state are educated whites and a minority of activist blacks.
Trump, as the most anti-democratic candidate, through stronger control of the bureaucracy, through more stringent entry requirements allowing relaxation of intrusive anti-terror practices, through expulsion of the criminal aliens driving much of the desire for stronger policing, through removing cheating aliens from federal and state health care, welfare, and education expenditures, and through preventing voter demographics from taking a permanent turn toward Latinization*, might move national policy on policing and debt closer toward your position.
*Try getting a balanced budget passed in Venezuela.
Here’s a case for Bernie Sanders.
Sanders will increase spending. The United States will default on its debt and the economy will collapse. China will invade but the invasion will not be resisted, and a Chinese garrison will occupy Washington, DC. The Chinese will demand possession of California to forgive our outstanding debt. The police will be disbanded because there will be no budget. The US will not engage in war because there is no budget. The debt will be gone.
What about his tax plan requires a bigger IRS?
Why shouldn’t I take him at his word that he would abolish the Department of Commerce or any other department on the chopping block? Just because you are getting rid of a department doesn’t mean you are throwing out every single aspect of that department’s responsibilities. Killing the Department of Commerce doesn’t mean you have to abolish the Census Bureau. That is a false choice. The problem isn’t that these departments do nothing useful, its that their few useful functions are far overshadowed by massive government overreach.
I’m putting up a post about the IRS right now. I’ll put up another one about the DoC later. It’s not just the census; I don’t think he plans on getting rid of any of the major parts of the DoC. He might reform it, but portraying those reforms as elimination is peddling snake oil.
I put up a similar question in a post a while back and didn’t hear anything on any of these people either. It’s all Rubio/Cruz. I didn’t mind, since that is how the race is going.
I lean Rubio, but that is because of my convictions not yours, and I”m not sure I honestly argue he’s the candidate you’ll find most favorable. I’ll make the argument you should vote for him come November, but otherwise I won’t waste too much of my time or yours.
He might be the best on the debt. I think his nomination is the best shot of entitlement reform actually happening: if Republicans comfortably kept the Senate, Rubio and Ryan might actually get that done.
I do think he may be a once-in-a-lifetime political talent and that you may dismiss the idea of “electability” too lightly. (I thought Romney was more “electable” than Santorum or Gingrich, but I kind of always thought Romney was going to lose anyway. The fact that he lost does not actually prove that the people who said he was a less-weak candidate were wrong.)
But I’m not comfortable, myself, voting on electability alone unless all else is basically equal.
I’m guessing you’d prefer Cruz.