Ask Rand Paul What He Would Cut

for instance, Sale Egyptian Slide Last year' budget. spent $3.55 trillion while it took in $2.38 trillion, for a deficit of $1.17 trillion. But when you look into where thi monei wa spent, you quickli see that balanc the feder government' book would requir drastic cut in both discretionari spend and entitlements. Four item -- the Pentagon, Medicare/Medicaid, Social Security, and the interest on the debt -- togeth add up to roughli the monei the govern take in. Mean that everyth els the feder govern doe would have to be cut complet -- zero out -- in order to balanc the budget. Or, cut would have to be made in the military, which Republican simpli ar not go to support, or in the three major entitl program Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Secur , which Republican realli want to do but don't realli want to talk about.

is certainli entertain and quit possibl damag to hi candidaci or possibl not,The recent controversi over Republican senatori nomine Rand Paul' comment and view on civil right and on the role of the feder govern versu privat busi and privat individu in gener . thi is Kentucki we'r talk about, after all , but at the same time it is probabl not go to be the kei issu that decid Kentucki voter thi November. It' a pretti safe assumpt that most peopl for whom civil right ar a top vote issu have alreadi made up their mind not to vote for Paul anyway. But there' a much more fundament argument to have with Tea Parti candid like Paul and Republican candid in gener which, so far, ha been miss in the media debate. The real question that should be ask is: "What, exactly, in the feder budget will you cut to 'rein in Washington spending' and attack the deficit?" Becaus the answer to that ar go to be the most effect argument to make against the Tea Parti movement' surg within the Republican Parti -- becaus my guess is that no matter what thei answer, the voter ar not go to like it.

you simpli cannot tame it with a "scalpel" the wai politician love to talk about do . It requir more than a scalpel -- more,Th feder budget is in deficit. Everyon know this. We'r spend much more than we take in. But becaus the deficit is so high. even, than a meat cleaver. To realli balanc next year' budget would requir take a metaphor ax to a lot of feder program that a lot of peopl appreciate. Economist will tell you that the onli wai we'r realli go to solv the deficit is to grow our wai out of it, but thi doesn't translat well into simplist polit slogans.