It’s time to be contrarian and puncture the Paul Ryan mania.
Yes, the Wisconsin congressman is a very interesting pick for vice president. And, given the state of modern politics, he might even qualify as a bold and risky choice. But that only shows how desperately unserious modern politics has become.
Consider the huffing and puffing over his budget plan. Cato’s Chris Edwards notes that it’s hardly the radical document Democrats desperately want us to believe it is:
In sum, Ryan’s proposals would make modest reforms to the giant federal welfare state. By Washington standards the Ryan plan is bold, and Paul Ryan certainly deserves his reputation as the sharpest and most energetic budget reformer on Capitol Hill.
By Washington standards, it’s as out there as it can be. But the federal budget won’t be balanced until around 2040…long after some of us have faced life’s final curtain. Until then, the debt would continue to pile up. It will be slightly smaller than that projected to accumulate under Mr. Obama’s plans. But a deeper fiscal hole is still a deeper fiscal hole. Good luck explaining to the debt markets how your pit is less perilous than the other guy’s.
I’ve no doubt whatsoever that Mr. Ryan is not only serious about his proposals, but is, and has been, willing to absorb an enormous amount of punishment from the left for daring to propose even a modest tapping on the fiscal brakes. Remember this gem?
Utter BS. But that’s the kind of stuff Ryan has had to endure in order to even discuss proposals that would make modest changes to the current welfare state…proposals that do not dismantle it, but actually seek to preserve it.
For a truly radical solution to our nation’s spending problems, we have to look outside the uniformly lackluster House of Representatives and cast our gaze on the Senate. Yes, the Senate, that august body largely populated by folks better suited for retirement communities.
A small group of Senators — Rand Paul, Jim DeMint and Mike Lee — put forward a budget proposal that would balance the federal books within five years. Unlike Ryan’s proposal, it would actually cut, slash and toss out whole portions of the federal government. Washington Post seat warmer Dana Milbank called it “quite a nasty piece of work.”
High praise, indeed. Milbank was downright horrified that such a budget could even find its way to the Senate floor — where it was summarily crushed.
As Gene Healy wrote, “don’t believe the hype” about Ryan and his evil plans to toss grannie over a cliff. He intends to give her, and grandpa, all the benefits we can no longer afford well into the future.
The few, true fiscal radicals were down the hall in the Senate. They still are. And one day, perhaps about the same time the bond market decides the good ‘ol USA is really just Greece with more arable land, the “nasty piece of work” Lee, Paul and DeMint proposed will become not a point of derision, but our only hope.
