Category: Paul Ryan

Once In A Lifetime

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by Smitty

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack. . .
This essay pinpoints the systemic problems with the Federal government, surveys the current approaches, and offers a concise outline of What I Would Do.
The problem is centralization. Pournelle’s Iron Law has birthed a Ruling Class that delivers speeches, debt, laws by the pallet, transient Socialist programs, and propaganda, while knee-capping liberty in the process. Power is increasingly held in DC, and increasingly gathered, unconstitutionally, within the executive.

And you may find yourself in another part of the world. . . Continue reading Once In A Lifetime →

The Ryan Budget

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I’m tempted to call it “The Savage Young Ryan Budget,” but seriously, folks: House Republicans did the smart thing yesterday, and don’t let worry-wart Allahpundit tell you any different.

Not a single Democrat voted for it, and DCCC Chairman Steve Israel’s boast that this will help Democrats recapture the House is nonsense. Let the Democrats spend the next 18 months trying to demagogue entitlement reform all they want — the pressure is now actually on Senate Democrats for 2012.

The willingness of the House GOP to lay down a marker — take a vote on a definite proposal for fixing the entitlement mess — shows they’ve learned the lessons of 2005-06, when Republicans botched the entitlement-reform debate.

Here’s what most people miss about that: The Republicans controlled the House, and Tom Delay could have rammed through any proposal that the White House wanted. But the GOP wanted to play defense, so it was decided that the thing to do was (a) to send Bush out giving a lot of speeches about entitlement reform, and (b) let the Senate do a lot of debating about entitlement reform.

Talk, talk, talk — and the Senate never passed anything, so there was never any specific plan on the table, with numbers and stuff, that people could look at see what was actually being proposed. Democrats got an opportunity to do their usual demagoguery — “Those evil Republicans want to take away Granny’s Social Security check!” — without ever being forced to vote up-or-down on anything.

The House vote to approve the Ryan budget changes that. Now the Democrats who control the Senate have before them a specific plan, already approved by the House, upon which they can now be pressured to act. And with Democrats defending lots of vulnerable Senate seats in 2012, the question becomes: Where’s Harry Reid’s budget?

No more “talk, talk, talk,” you see. Reid can’t just kick the can down the road like he did last year, when he and Nancy Pelosi decided not even to pass an FY 2011 budget, because they wanted to play politics instead. Paul Ryan and the House GOP just called Harry’s bluff.

Obama’s gimmicky and unrealistic “framework” for deficit-reduction won’t work as actual legislation. Harry Reid and the Democrat-controlled Senate are going to have to come up with an honest-to-goodness budget, and the House is going to be sending over appropriations bills that will require senators to take votes, if the federal government is to be funded for FY2012.

Actual legislation. Actual votes.

The fun-and-games of just talk, talk, talking is over. And I’m convinced that Harry Reid can’t match the determination of the House Republicans, so there’s no way the Democrats can “win” this part of the process.

The American people aren’t as stupid as Democrats think.

Rep. Ryan Pulls Weekly GOP Address Duty

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by Smitty via (No Sheeples Here)

Government has not been telling us the truth? Really?

We need to get behind Paul Ryan and demand accountability, both from our government and ourselves.

And when you’ve had your fill of sobriety, Iowahawk shreds Lindsey Graham.

My experience has only served to underscore Miss Buelah’s perspicacity, for I have seen that convivial manners always provide a welcome lubricant to social intercourse; whether it takes place in a fraternity bunkroom, the JAG officers barracks, or the late-night well of the Senate.

Update: linked by That Mr. G Guy and The Lonely Conservative!

Trog Summarizes Ryan, And Had Me Until The Last Sentence

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by Smitty

TrogloPundit does a fine job of summarizing thoughts of Ace and Hot Air on the Ryan budget. He wonders what Ryan has to do to get past some of the underwhelmed response in the conservative blogs. I understand you’ve got to cheer for the Representative from your own state, but really, Trog: this is far more of a going-in position than anything else. It still concedes too much of the federal over-reach to Washington DC as legitimate.
I applaud Ryan. In its way, like ObamaCare’s individual mandate was a stepping stone to single payer, Ryan’s budge merely points out that the status quo is unacceptable. The real machete and meat cleaver action on the budget has to come another day. “Y’all cain’t get there from here”, but a start with a plan like Ryan’s begins to move you in that direction.
Where Trog loses me is his last sentence:

One more thing: you know what the real flaw in this plan is? It requires future Congresses to stick with it.

No, Trog, Congress has a century of “relief in the round” that has got us here. Who has to stick with it? We The People, as driven by the Tea Parties. The beltway goobers are only going to be as faithful as their gnawing anxiety about the pitchforks back home.

Isn’t It Cute When Progressives Pause From Raping The Poor Long Enough To Express Concern About Them?

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by Smitty

Alan Colmes triggers the laugh track as he suddenly remembers that when Republicans speak, it’s time to remember the little guy.

Ryan’s plan will also propose tax reforms that lower corporate and upper-income tax rates, while eliminating certain loopholes. The details of that part of his plan are unclear, but if they adhere to his Roadmap for America’s Future, the GOP budget will propose to overhaul the tax code in a way that reduces the burden on the wealthy and increases it on the poor and middle classes.

Come on, Colmes. American Glob has a chart of the national debt that is almost a cross-section of a hypodermic needle. Progressivism has been all about eating our seed corn for decades.
Now we’ve got somebody who is packing the gear to propose real ideas,
and all these feckless Progressives can do is bleat like the sheep they’ve been shearing for decades. Time to double down, ye patriots. Liberty and self-interest will be the incoming tide that lifts all boats. Don’t let these social safety net pretensions dissuade you from supporting leaders who do the Right Thing.
A great related post title at Protein Wisdom.

Update: Linked at That Mr. G. Guy.

Update II: Linked at POWIP.

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Large Pair)

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The gentleman from Wisconsin steps up:

The Republican chairman of the House Budget Committee said his party’s budget proposal for 2012 would cut deficits by more than $4 trillion over the next decade, vowing to tackle costly entitlements like Medicare and Medicaid.
The proposal, set to be unveiled Tuesday, would serve as the Republicans’ official response to President Obama’s proposed $3.7 trillion budget for 2012. The White House claims its plan would cut deficits by $1.1 trillion over a decade.
But Ryan, R-Wis., in an interview with “Fox News Sunday,” accused Obama of “punting” and said Republicans’ plan would exceed the fiscal goals set by the president’s fiscal commission — which issued a report calling for $4 trillion in cuts. That report never made it out of committee.
“We can’t keep kicking this can down the road,” Ryan said. “The president has punted. We’re not going to follow suit.”

The Beltway spin on this: By proposing large cuts for the fiscal 2012 budget, Ryan’s plan gives House Republicans political “cover” if negotiations over the remainder of the fiscal 2011 budget require them to accept smaller levels of cuts for the current year.

Ryan admits that proposing big cuts — including a proposal to block-grant Medicaid funding to the state — will expose the GOP to Democrat demagoguery. Via Cubachi, here’s video of Ryan explaining his plan on “Fox News Sunday”:

Kudos to Ryan for having sufficient testicular fortitude to get serious about cutting the deficit.

UPDATE: Jazz Shaw on Twitter: “Nobody can hear Paul Ryan’s budget message. Why? Drowned out by the clanging of his enormous brass balls.”

Rep. Paul Ryan Delivers 3:20 Of Lucidity

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by Smitty (via Gateway Pundit)


Emphasis mine:

Hello – I’m Paul Ryan – I work for the people of Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District and I serve as the top Republican on the House Budget Committee. Yes, Congress does have a budget committee, but I’m afraid it hasn’t been very busy this year. In fact, this week the House Majority Leader announced that Democrats are canceling this year’s budget. Instead of reining in out-of-control spending that has pushed our total national debt past $13 trillion, Democrats have made clear their intention to raise taxes on middle-class families to fuel their continued spending spree.
Talk about a recipe for disaster: Democrats are offering no budget, no priorities, and no restraints – yet all their taxing, borrowing, and spending continues unchecked. With this budget failure – a first in the modern era – Democrats are missing a critical opportunity to provide the fiscal discipline economists say is needed to create private-sector jobs and boost our economy. This unprecedented budget collapse also sends a clear signal to American families struggling to meet their own budgets that Washington still doesn’t recognize the severity of its spending problem.

Or maybe the Pelosi crew does, and all this is an exercise in “smoke ’em if ya got ’em”.

Democrats say their decision is about what’s best for the future of our country. It’s not. With the political season upon us, Democratic leaders believe it is better to take a pass than to pass a budget. While Americans ask ‘where are the jobs?,’ they seem content to simply run out the clock and let their borrowing binge continue to drain resources from our economy.
The debt is on track to exceed the size of our entire economy in the next 18 months. We have run out of road to kick the can down. If this is really about the future of our country, then leaders should make the tough choices they promised they would, put moral obligation before political expedience, and focus on what’s in the best interests of the next generation, not the next election.

Aw, c’mon, Paul: our system punishes leadership and rewards avoidance behavior. Sure, go after the symptoms of the current budgetary crisis, but we also have to attack the Constitutional decay that is the context for the dilemma. New names on the doorplates is necessary, but not sufficient, sir.

This is a time to make tough choices, not run from them. To that end, Republicans on the Budget Committee have already identified $1.3 trillion in specific spending cuts we could implement right now to make Washington do more with less and help small businesses put people back to work. These are specific, common-sense ideas, such as canceling unspent TARP bailout funds and ‘stimulus’ money, that would help us focus on creating more jobs, not more debt. We also propose reducing federal employment and freezing government pay. Instead of growing government, we need to restart the engine of economic growth. Of course, this is just a starting point. Much more needs to be done to set our nation on a sustainable economic course. We need to start reining in unnecessary spending now so that we can boost the economy and work together to address our nation’s long term fiscal challenges.
It is our shared responsibility to take on the challenges before us to make sure that our kids and grandkids have a better life. Let’s begin this important work today. Let’s make certain we do not simply retreat to the same failed policies. Let’s make the tough, forward-looking choices that will restore the promise and prosperity of this exceptional nation – and let’s do it together.
Thanks for listening.

Again, cuts are fine, but we need to amputate the system that buries liberty in reams of legislation to support un-Federal tasking.
God bless you, Mr. Ryan, and grant you grace and strength to keep up the fight. I support what you’re doing, insofar as it’s a good start.

Paul Ryan Is Great, Even If His Ideas Need Work

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by Smitty

Rep. Paul Ryan is that absolutely rare political animal who manages to be at once wonkish and likeable.
In a system geared by election frequency toward myopia, he has had the unmitigated gall to offer something like a tangible plan to work on the most pressing fiscal problems besetting the country. Note that I don’t say ‘fix’ or ‘solve’: the ‘F’ and ‘S’ words are indicators that whoever has the floor is either (a) stupid or (b) thinks you are stupid.
Here he is on Fox on 21Apr10:

Ryan’s plan is important. Its very existence belies the claim that the GOP has no ideas. Also, it argues an evolutionary change. Whereas many, for example, me, would argue that we should just admit that Federal entitlements are a 10th Amendment violation and boil them down for glue, Ryan’s plan is a far more realistic compromise in favor of something workable.

This admission does not mean that pressure to kill Federal entitlements should be removed. It doesn’t mean that chucklehead Brooks has won a new pair of nicely creased chinos. Rather, that the admission that there is merit in Ryan’s plan means it’s OK to club the beast on a variety of levels to bring about the necessary demise. Get bent, Brooks.
Via the Barracuda Bridage, Newsmax did a Ryan interview that his fans may find interesting. This rather friendly interview elaborates on the topics from the Fox clip in a little more detail. At the end, the interviewer throws out the executive branch bait, which Ryan refuses to admit giving any thought. Ryan is not thinking about it now, but fell well short of a Sherman denial. And why should he not?
For all I like and would support Ryan, individual entitlements are not a Federal issue. The sooner we overcome the cranial rectalitis on this point, the sooner we can set about un-baking the situation.