Rand Paul Warns That GOP Risks Extinction Unless It Becomes More Libertarian

Why yes, it does

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who's known for his libertarian leanings, cautioned Tuesday that the Republican Party could meet the same fate as animals that went extinct millions of years ago.

"I think my party, the Republican Party, is shrinking. We're in danger of becoming a dinosaur," he said on CNN's "Newsroom." "We're not competitive on the West Coast, we're not competitive in New England."

Paul joins a chorus of Republican voices offering criticism of their own party in the wake of Mitt Romney's presidential loss earlier this month. The first-term senator, elected with strong tea party support in 2010, said change is in order.

Comments

[Greg]

Nice example of delusion/ostrich ignorance in the comments

Only if they stop supporting wars, religious fanaticism, and violations of civil liberties can they truly become the Grand Ole Party once again."........in other words, if the GOP stops representing everything they stand for, they can truely become the GOP again! LOL, how about just supporting the party that ALREADY thinks like that?

Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm assuming he thought he was talking about the Democrats in that last sentence.

[JeremyR]

While he's right, at the same time, I think essentially it's a battle over "free stuff". People want it. The Democrats will always be able to offer more government goodies, so what can the Republicans really do?

What the Republicans need to do to appeal to this free stuff part is attack laws that restrict things that should be free, like IP laws. Go back to the original method of having to register copyright, and have it expire after 28 years. Imagine how much money and business an IP like Lord of the Rings would generate if it was public domain? Look at how many Dracula movies there have been.

[BarryD]

Why would libertarianism be popular in death-spiral states?

See this Forbes article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ba.....ral-state/

The same states make a lot of money off arbitrage and lawsuits enabled by excess regulation (New York), and our IP laws (California).

This is a serious maker/taker problem, though I like what Rand Paul is saying.

[Russell]

" Paul... argued an increase in tax rates would be futile while the government spends "$300,000 a year on robotic squirrels"

Fox TV and the Koch brothers find robotic squirrels make excellent TV presenters- why shouldn't the Feds try to find out why ?

[Joe M]

That article is piss poor in a number of ways. Not least of which is this gem towards the end:

To make his case, Paul cited examples of what he considers wasteful spending and argued an increase in tax rates would be futile while the government spends ... $2 million "on how we can convince Chinese prostitutes not to drink so much on the job." ...

Paul also wasn't too far off on the Chinese prostitution claim, though it happened in the George W. Bush administration.

What fucking difference does it make which administration it was? Congress passed that shit, and it's an example of recent wasteful spending.

[RWolff]

Mr. Rand Paul,

This is why one is called the Republican Party and the other the Libertarian Party. It would just be easier to leave the Dinosaurs behind and simply join the Libertarian Party, however, this might be too simple of a solution for a politician who supported Mittex Romneysaurus for President.

They always have to complicate simple solutions in D.C., don't they? Must be all those DC round-a-bouts that get everyone all dazed and confused as to what direction they are heading. LOL