The Rand Paul sideshow

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Fri May 22, 2015 12:08 pm

If you're operating as a public accommodation, you can't refuse service based on the litany of illegal reasons, but you certainly don't have to provide it for any reason. There are already laws to cover this. He's trying to strawman the entire argument. No one arrests hotel operators for turning on the No Vacancy light.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Fri May 22, 2015 12:09 pm

Moliere wrote:
hepcat wrote:Any chance there was that I would give him even the slightest consideration is now slim to nil. He's a bit dumber than I like.
He's making the point between claim rights and liberty rights. If you have a right to food then someone has to provide it. What if they don't want to provide it? Are they to be arrested? What if they resist arrest? Now you have the hypothetical situation of someone getting shot because they didn't want to provide you food. He's a Doctor. Is he obligated to provide you healthcare?

Ditto for common defense, but I don't see him making that argument.

Jaymann · Post by **Jaymann** » Fri May 22, 2015 12:10 pm

Actually I want him to be a healthcare slave. Especially if if he will be chained up and mocked. Where do I vote for that?

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Sat May 23, 2015 2:30 pm

So far so good.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Tue May 26, 2015 1:02 pm

Roll them eyes!

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Wed May 27, 2015 10:39 am

Rand Paul on the Daily Show

Such a frustrating candidate. He says things that are really good and then he takes biazzaro world positions on same sex marriage and vaccines.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Wed May 27, 2015 12:49 pm

Jindal lashes out at Paul, saying he’s ‘unsuited’ to be president

The "don't forget about me" non-candidate has a few choice words about Rand Paul's lack of war enthusiasm.

“This is a perfect example of why Senator Paul is unsuited to be Commander-in-Chief,” Jindal said in a statement. “We have men and women in the military who are in the field trying to fight ISIS right now, and Senator Paul is taking the weakest, most liberal Democrat position.”

“It's one thing for Senator Paul to take an outlandish position as a Senator at Washington cocktail parties, but being Commander-in-Chief is an entirely different job,” he continued. “We should all be clear that evil and Radical Islam are at fault for the rise of ISIS, and people like President Obama and Hillary Clinton exacerbate it.”

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Wed May 27, 2015 1:13 pm

Oh, Bobby.

I'm pretty sure "Don't forget about me!" is Jindal's 2016 campaign slogan.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Wed May 27, 2015 1:14 pm

El Guapo wrote:Oh, Bobby.

I'm pretty sure "Don't [you] forget about me!" is Jindal's 2016 campaign slogan.

FTFY

Jaymann · Post by **Jaymann** » Wed May 27, 2015 2:42 pm

Wait, didn't Obama keep the war going for another 7 years (if it is indeed over) and hunt down Bin Ladin in the process? WTF?

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Fri May 29, 2015 11:56 am

Sunday. Sunday. Sunday.

Enough · Post by **Enough** » Fri May 29, 2015 1:11 pm

Moliere wrote:Sunday. Sunday. Sunday.

Just came here to post that. Good stuff.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 11:59 am

Rand Paul blasts PATRIOT Act Surveillance on Senate Floor During Last Minute Debate

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) took to the Senate floor Sunday afternoon as debate wrapped up to reiterate, very, very loudly, his opposition to renewing the mass data collection authorities of Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act. He had argue with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) over Senate procedures first to get permission to speak. McCain, for his part, argued that the increase in terrorism (he said the Middle East is literally burning) is proof that we need Section 215 "more than ever," despite the lack of evidence that the mass collection under Section 215 actually contributed in any successful efforts to halt terrorist attacks.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 12:28 pm

Rand's not trending enough to push his numbers up. I expect more in the coming weeks. It won't be enough to win him a spot on the ballot, though.

msduncan · Post by **msduncan** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 1:47 pm

Hats off to Rand Paul for taking a stand against domestic spying g on Americans. Hats off to ANY ONE that takes a stand against this.

GreenGoo · Post by **GreenGoo** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 2:00 pm

msduncan wrote:Hats off to Rand Paul for taking a stand against domestic spying g on Americans. Hats off to ANY ONE that takes a stand against this.

+1.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 2:09 pm

msduncan wrote:Hats off to Rand Paul for taking a stand against domestic spying g on Americans. Hats off to ANY ONE that takes a stand against this.

Agreed. It is to our great shame that people can write this with a straight face about it:

Whether or not it was his prime motivation, as Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) suggest, Paul will earn a lot of money for his presidential campaign. But his chances of becoming the 2016 Republican nominee just went from unlikely to long-shot.

Shutting down American espionage and surveillance capabilities, even for a few days, is too off-brand for the GOP — especially at the moment.

It's "too off brand"??? "done for money"?

What about doing what's right? What about actually having an actual debate over all the power we the people handed over to the Government in a knee-jerk reaction to 9/11? McConnell and most Senators didn't want that at all. Nevermind that the reason these provisions had a sunset was precisely so that it could be debated and fixed (or revoked) as necessary.

The fact of the matter is that when a real US Court has been allowed to hear and rule on the Constitutionality of the Act (and Section 215 in particular), it has been found to be illegal and Unconstitutional.

Even this USA Freedom Act (nice bit of double-speak there) has a lot of things which should be actively debated and are still probably Unconstitutional.

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 2:14 pm

Pyperkub wrote:
The fact of the matter is that when a real US Court has been allowed to hear and rule on the Constitutionality of the Act (and Section 215 in particular), it has been found to be illegal and Unconstitutional.

If I'm not mistaken I believe that the court just ruled that the NSA's programs were not authorized by Section 215, not that they were unconstitutional.

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 9:53 pm

No politician wants to be "soft on crime" or the one who "let the terrorists win." With sound bites prevailing in politics, image replaces substance -- even for Rand Paul.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 9:55 pm

El Guapo wrote:
Pyperkub wrote:
The fact of the matter is that when a real US Court has been allowed to hear and rule on the Constitutionality of the Act (and Section 215 in particular), it has been found to be illegal and Unconstitutional.
If I'm not mistaken I believe that the court just ruled that the NSA's programs were not authorized by Section 215, not that they were unconstitutional.

Fair enough, though in the decision they also reference that while they have found that the NSA program exceeded the scope of what was authorized and thus don't need to rule on the Constitutionality, that recent Supreme and District Court decisions are pointing towards 3rd-party collected metadata being covered under the 4th amendment:

Because we conclude that the challenged program was not authorized by the statute on which the government bases its claim of legal authority, we need not and do not reach these weighty constitutional issues. The seriousness of the constitutional concerns, however, has some bearing on what we hold today, and on the consequences of that holding...

...We reiterate that, just as we do not here address the constitutionality of the program as it currently exists, we do not purport to express any view on the constitutionality of any alternative version of the program. The constitutional issues, however, are sufficiently daunting to remind us of the primary role that should be played by our elected representatives in deciding, explicitly and after full debate, whether such programs are appropriate and necessary. Ideally, such issues should be resolved by the courts only after such debate, with due respect for any conclusions reached by the coordinate branches of government.

The section they seem to agree with the appelants is here:

As appellants note, however, five of the Justices appeared to suggest that there might be a Fourth Amendment violation even without the technical trespass upon which the majority opinion relied. Four of the Justices argued that the Court should have applied the Katz “reasonableness” test, and that the surveillance would not survive that test. Id . at 957 ‐ 58, 964 (Alito, J., concurring). Justice Sotomayor noted in another concurring opinion that “the majority opinion’s trespassory test may provide little guidance” for certain modern ‐ day surveillance techniques, for which physical trespass is often not necessary. Id . at 955 (Sotomayor, J., concurring). Consequently, she observed that “it may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties,”

I think that the court would have gone with that if it hadn't found that the program was overstepping what Congress had authorized, at least based on that reading.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 9:57 pm

Does anyone else suspect that the NSA's gonna do what the NSA's gonna do regardless of legal niceties?

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 10:38 pm

Pyperkub wrote:
I think that the court would have gone with that if it hadn't found that the program was overstepping what Congress had authorized, at least based on that reading.

Sure, that three judge panel of the Second Circuit might well have ruled that the program is unconstitutional. That's not even going to slow down any subsequent court that thinks otherwise.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 11:07 pm

Kraken wrote:Does anyone else suspect that the NSA's gonna do what the NSA's gonna do regardless of legal niceties?

At least the TSA caught almost 5% of the tests to get a bomb past them, as far as we know (and this they've admitted), the NSA program has never stopped a terrorist attack on US soil (just as the TSA has never actually caught a terrorist).

Rip · Post by **Rip** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 11:33 pm

Kraken wrote:Does anyone else suspect that the NSA's gonna do what the NSA's gonna do regardless of legal niceties?

I am pretty much certain of it. It will however at least curtail them sharing that data. When they redact things and talk about it being to protect sources and methods, what they really mean is to disguise the illegal methods we use to get info.

The information the NSA has access to is immense. What they are able to actually analyze in a timely matter is another thing.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 12:27 am

Apparently McConnell is watering down the bill even further and not allowing debate or votes on any other amendments.

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 1:35 am

Pyperkub wrote:Apparently McConnell is watering down the bill even further and not allowing debate or votes on any other amendments.

Although if he changes the bill said bill would then presumably need to be passed by the House, which just passed the Freedom Act by a sizable margin.

GreenGoo · Post by **GreenGoo** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 10:23 am

Kraken wrote:Does anyone else suspect that the NSA's gonna do what the NSA's gonna do regardless of legal niceties?

Of course. I'm sure they've got a pile of contingency plans in case someone tries to make them obey the constitution.

Combine that with a bunch of "I didn't know that, I didn't see that" testimony and again no one is held accountable. Normally I'm all for fixing the problem first and accountability second, but in this case, at least one of the two would be nice.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 8:15 pm

El Guapo wrote:
Pyperkub wrote:Apparently McConnell is watering down the bill even further and not allowing debate or votes on any other amendments.
Although if he changes the bill said bill would then presumably need to be passed by the House, which just passed the Freedom Act by a sizable margin.

Watering down amendments defeated, going as is to the Prez:

The Senate passed the USA Freedom Act today by 67-32, marking the first time in over thirty years that both houses of Congress have approved a bill placing real restrictions and oversight on the National Security Agency’s surveillance powers. The weakening amendments to the legislation proposed by NSA defender Senate Majority Mitch McConnell were defeated, and we have every reason to believe that President Obama will sign USA Freedom into law.

Hopefully just a beginning.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 10:47 am

Jon Stewart on Patriot Act expiration

Pretty funny to hear people call Rand Paul selfish for taking on the NSA.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:00 am

The New Randroids

So when Paul goes to South by Southwest to break out his #DisruptingDemocracy hashtag and preaches privacy to Silicon Valley, who exactly is Paul—or a future candidate like him—trying to reach? While it’s always hazardous to generalize about a diverse community, I’ll try to construct a portrait, based on my years working in the tech industry, of the kind of tech worker whose background and beliefs might prime her to support a candidate with libertarian leanings and tough things to say about issues like surveillance and military overreach.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Fri Jun 05, 2015 2:05 pm

Reason interviews Rand

tjg_marantz · Post by **tjg_marantz** » Fri Jun 05, 2015 11:08 pm

Any self avowed democrats here that would vote for him? Not carrying judgment, really curious. He intrigues me as a candidate and I'm wondering if anyone is buying what he is selling.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Sun Jun 07, 2015 11:40 pm

Not a Democrat myself but I caucus with them. In a match between Paul and Hillary I would be open to persuasion.

My gut tells me that Hillary is destined to be a tragic figure and will not get the nomination. A scandal or health crisis will take her down. I don't know who the D nominee will be, but I doubt that Paul will be the R.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jun 08, 2015 12:04 am

tjg_marantz wrote:Any self avowed democrats here that would vote for him? Not carrying judgment, really curious. He intrigues me as a candidate and I'm wondering if anyone is buying what he is selling.

His economic policies are IMHO, really bad.

Privatization of Social Security would be a huge giveaway to the brokerages and stock owners.

The Flat Tax would only make this country even more of an oligarchy.

YMMV. I would likely benefit in the short term with both policies, but the long term effects would be really damaging, IMHO.

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Thu Jun 18, 2015 3:39 pm

google the URL to view the whole article: (wsj.com/articles/blow-up-the-tax-code-and-start-over-1434582592)

Blow Up the Tax Code and Start Over

Some of my fellow Republican candidates for the presidency have proposed plans to fix the tax system. These proposals are a step in the right direction, but the tax code has grown so corrupt, complicated, intrusive and antigrowth that I’ve concluded the system isn’t fixable.

So on Thursday I am announcing an over $2 trillion tax cut that would repeal the entire IRS tax code—more than 70,000 pages—and replace it with a low, broad-based tax of 14.5% on individuals and businesses. I would eliminate nearly every special-interest loophole. The plan also eliminates the payroll tax on workers and several federal taxes outright, including gift and estate taxes, telephone taxes, and all duties and tariffs. I call this “The Fair and Flat Tax.”

I'm sure tax lawyers and accountants will be all for this idea of simplifying 70,000 pages of tax code.

El Guapo · Post by **El Guapo** » Thu Jun 18, 2015 3:53 pm

It doesn't need to be flat to be simple. You could have five levels of tax rates - 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, and 50%, kicking in at different income levels, with no exceptions. Progressive and simple.

The "flat" part is just a giveaway to the rich.

NickAragua · Post by **NickAragua** » Thu Jun 18, 2015 4:28 pm

El Guapo wrote:It doesn't need to be flat to be simple. You could have five levels of tax rates - 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, and 50%, kicking in at different income levels, with no exceptions. Progressive and simple.

The "flat" part is just a giveaway to the rich.

+1, but there needs to be an exemption for people whose internet nicknames sound Spanish.

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Thu Jun 18, 2015 8:39 pm

Flat tax is a pipe dream. First, every time we have simplification, Congress adds exceptions and special interest provisions. I posted many times about how the Republican Congress during President W. Bush added hundreds of loopholes and exceptions without discussion during the holidays (Christmas and Summer). Many of those provisions have to be renewed every year. I have no doubt this behavior would continue.

Second, there will still need to be thousands of pages dedicated to defining what is taxable -- that's not going to change. Even a short law will not end up short -- assuming the IRS gets the money to explain the law.

Third, the tax lawyers and accountants will lose 50+ years of legal authority explaining how to administer the tax laws. Odds are high that a Republican President and Congress don't fund the IRS to finish the job. I have no fear about becoming unemployed.

Fourth, imagine the hubris of trying to pass a whole scale rewrite of the tax law through Congress. It would make the "cram down" in passing ACA/Obamacare look like a friendly amendment. Anyone who complains about the procedure and working in ACA/Obamacare but supports a flat tax is a hypocrite. Then, the next 10 years would be spent just trying to repeal or poke holes in its functioning, and that's assuming the law is well-written (and it won't be).

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Thu Jun 18, 2015 8:57 pm

You forgot about the tax software companies who make a killing off of taxes being complex and spend a lot of money lobbying to keep it that way.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Tue Jul 21, 2015 3:31 pm

The Detroit Republican?

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/p ... /30459045/

I really wish I could like him. He talks such a good game.