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Title: Rand Paul Has the Most Dangerous Economic Views of Any 2016 Candidate
Source:
newrepublic.com
URL Source: http://www.newrepublic.com/article/ ... s-make-him-very-dangerous-2016
Published: Feb 8, 2015
Author: Danny Vinik
Post Date: 2015-02-08 16:49:24 by Gatlin
Keywords: None
Views: 3564
Comments: 20
Kentucky Senator Rand Paul has had better weeks. On Monday, he suggested there could be a link between vaccines and autism in a CNBC interview. Later on in that interview, he actually shushed— as in, pressed one finger to his lips—the female CNBC anchor. On Tuesday, a New York Times article linked him to a medical group that promotes anti-vaccine theories. But Paul’s dumbest comments came in Iowa on Friday night—and they show why Paul has the most dangerous economic views of any presidential candidate. Speaking in front of more than 150 Iowa activists, Paul ripped into the Federal Reserve and promoted his “Audit the Fed” bill, which he introduced earlier this week. “I think there needs to be some sunshine,” he said, according to reports of the event. “I’m going to fight ’em, and we’re going to get a vote on audit the Fed.” I’m not sure if Paul will get that vote—ultimately, that’s up to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. But I do know that “Audit the Fed” is a terrible idea. First, the Fed already is extensively audited by the Governmen t Accountability Office (GAO), the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) and even private sector auditors like Deloitte. Each week, the central bank also releases its b alance sheet and even has an inte ractive guide of its balance sheet available for further explanation. However, the GAO and OIG audits exclude a few parts of the Fed’s policymaking, including transactions by the Federal Open Market Committee. Paul’s bill removes those exclusions and requires “recommendations for legislative or administrative action" from the Comptroller General. Sounds innocuous, right? It’s not. That would significantly damage the Fed’s independence, which exists so that politicians cannot influence the central bank for their own political purposes. In other words, “Audit the Fed” would lead legislators to interfere with monetary policy matters and put the entire economy at risk. For further explanations why the legislation is so dangerous, see the Roosevelt Institute’s Mike Konczal and the Washington Post’s Catherine Rampell. With President Barack Obama in office, Paul’s legislation stands no chance of becoming law. It’s hard to imagine it overcoming a filibuster in the Senate, and even if it did, the president would veto it. If Paul were to win the presidency, "Audit the Fed" would still face long odds in the Senate since, even in the best case scenario, Republicans likely won’t have a filibuster-proof majority in the next Congress. So while “Audit the Fed” is theoretically dangerous, it’s not much of an actual threat to Fed independence. But a Paul presidency would still have disastrous effects on the U.S. economy, for other reasons that were on wide display in Iowa on Friday night. “Once upon a time, your dollar was as good as gold,” he said. “Then for many decades, they said your dollar was backed by the full faith and credit of government. Do you know what it’s backed by now? Used car loans, bad home loans, distressed assets and derivatives.” Paul’s comments make very little sense. When Paul asks what backs the U.S. dollar now, he’s effectively asking what makes it valuable. When the U.S. used a gold standard, it meant that a dollar was worth a certain amount of gold. Economists overwhelmingly agree that that was a terrible idea, but the connection seemed to explain why dollars had value. The real reason dollars had value is the same today as it was back then: It’s the only currency the government accepts to pay taxes. Businesses and consumers thus have an incentive to carry out transactions using dollars. Paul's quip about dollars being backed by "used car loans, bad home loans, distressed assets and derivatives" may sound good to Iowa conservatives but it betrays an incredible ignorance about the economy. What Paul and his followers are concerned about is the purchasing power of the dollar. They want to return the U.S. to the gold standard to ensure that inflation doesn’t undermine the actual purchasing power of the dollar. Over the long run, a gold standard would guarantee that price stability. But over the short run, prices would still fluctuate violently, as happened when the U.S. used the gold standard. In terms of current policy, goldbugs, as they are often called, think the Fed’s recent decisions—its zero interest rate policy and bond-buying program—will cause skyrocketing inflation and reduce what you can buy with dollars. Those warnings look more foolish by the day. Inflation over the past year was just 0.7 percent, 1.3 percent if you remove volatile food and energy prices. Inflation expectations for the next 10 years are also very low. You would think that these low inflation rates would convince Paul and his followers to rethink their economic theory. Paul’s economic ignorance doesn’t end there. “[The Fed’s] liabilities are $4.5 trillion; their assets are $57 billion. Do the math,” he said in Iowa. "They are leveraged 80-1. They are leveraged three times greater than Lehman Brothers was when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt. Why do we give ‘em a pass? Because they’ve got a printing press, and they can print up some more money.” Paul apparently can’t read the Fed’s balance sheets, because as of November, its assets were $4.487 trillion and its liabilities were $4.430 trillion. Where did the $57 billion figure come from? That’s its total capital. But as Cullen Roche, the founder of financial services firm Orcam Financial Group, points out, Paul also ignores the fact that the Fed remits most of its profits to the Treasury Department. In 2013, they gave Treasury nearly $80 billion. “The Federal Reserve isn’t just a profitable entity,” Roche writes. “It is perhaps the most profitable entity on the face of the planet.” As all this shows, Paul’s views on monetary policy are profoundly misguided. As long as he's in the Senate, that doesn’t really matter. He can spout his nonsense without having any effect on the Federal Reserve. But if he became president, he would be responsible for choosing the next Fed Chair when Janet Yellen’s term expires in 2018 and for nominating board members to the FOMC. That doesn’t give Paul unlimited power, since the Senate would still have to confirm his nominees. But as president, Paul would be the leader of the GOP, with an even greater ability to dictate its position on monetary policy and convince Republican senators to support his nominees. Of course, the Republican Party itself has an incredibly misguided position on monetary policy. In 2012, its platform included returning to the gold standard. That’s a good reason why just about any Republican nominee would be a dangerous president. But Paul is far more open about his disdain for the Fed, and given his ideological bent, he's far less likely to listen to conservative economists who reject his monetary policy views. At least on the economy, that makes Rand Paul by far the most dangerous candidate in the 2016 field.
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#1. To: Gatlin (#0)
Here you go boy, a picture of your hero.
Here you go, girl,right back attcha with a picture of your crazy hero:
Lol, Rand Paul the great boogyman....hilarious! When Canarys attack, the target is one usually in the right, and one who really cares about the direction our Country is headed. Canarys love the 'statist' quo... Yes, a play on words, not a misspelling. Makes me like Rand more.
Wrong guy boy, all you anarcho-libertarian and Keynesian crack addict refugees from LP have been busy spamming LF with your crappy flame wars after you killed LP. I'm a nationalist, neither your hero Rocky, nor your bête noire Ron Paul are nationalists.
The Keynesian crack addict helped kill LP (and probably Goldi too) with his spamming, now it's out to kill LF too.
It's unfortunate. Rand, IMHO, would be the best direction, economically.... but his minority view social platform will squash his popularity like his father before him. Until he's elected, he needs to downplay the "fed" talk and continually squash all questions about heated social issues and tell the press he would like to see those issues solved by each STATE. Then once elected, he can spin a more libertarian wheel.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Yeah, more liberty and less government are such unpopular issues with Americans. Of course, neocon pricks like you and Gatlin want just the opposite.
I've said on more than one occasion I favor Rand more than any other candidate. In fact, if Ronald Reagan was reincarnated, and ran against Rand, I'd probably still vote for Rand. I don't agree with everything Rand platforms... but I'm very much sold on reducing the size of government, including all federal police agencies. The stuff I dont 100% agree on, I could care less about. The most important issue we face is our economic status and the size of government payroll.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
Which is to say, it would return monetary policy and control of the money supply and budgetary process to the Legislative Branch, where the Constitution puts it.
The Constitution, the Keynesian crack addicts hate it. Their inflation agenda violates the Constitution, the framers knew where to place responsibility, and their judgement was proved sound by the record of the dollars value up to 1913, when the dollar held its value over the long term, even when allowing for events that stressed the value of the dollar such as the Civil War. The dollar of today is worth but a few pennies of the dollar of 1913, since the beloved Federal Reserve of the Keynesian crack addicts was established to usurp the supreme law of the land, without amending the Constitution. Their record regarding the dollar would be like the erosion of weights to where a pound was now worth perhaps an ounce or two, rather than sixteen. Money is a medium of exchange, and it started out as a weight of precious metal. The English pound was once just that, equal in value to sixteen ounces of silver coins. Once banks are allowed to control the money supply their record is to debase the money and inflate the money supply, to the benefit of certain politically connected groups at the expense of the nation. The Keynesian crack addiction of Gatlin is all about defrauding others, it violates US law and it also violates God's law. A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight. - Proverbs 11.1
Until he's elected, he needs to downplay the "fed" talk and continually squash all questions about heated social issues and tell the press he would like to see those issues solved by each STATE. Then once elected, he can spin a more libertarian wheel.
The Italian lira also. "Lira" is Italian for "pound". It's the equivalent of the French "livre", which also means pound. The reason that the initial for the British pound is "L", is because it was originally a French term, "livre", which was Anglicized. Look at the Italian lira before it was dissolved into the Euro and think that, once upon a time, the Lira and the British pound were the same thing. Fiat currency run amok will turn a lira - a pound - of silver into something that, by the end, was 400,000 lira to the actual pound of silver.
Ron Paul has been out of office for several years now, and still his ideas about freedom and liberty scare the piss out of neocons like Gatlin. Sad really
Why are people like Gatlin so invested in foreign interventionism? That is really what this is all about - they don't come right out and say it - but this kind of Republican and or Conservative loves to stroke it over wars or buying weapons or sending money overseas to fight some proxy war. At the end of the day I wonder if it is all about Israel - pretend its about keeping America strong but they want to make sure America is invested in militarily supporting Israel. If the USA retreats from one country they fear the slippery slope theory and this will mean the USA is withdrawing everywhere.
Gat likes to brag about his stock market expertise. Perhaps he is heavily invested in the military-industrial complex.
I see them on Freeper land as well they always seem to hate Paul because he is against militarism and to them they think it means don't support Israel. It's werid relationship of people who ar einto sort of militarism and the holy rollers who think Israel will start a war with Iran and usher in Jesus' second coming.
That could be a big part of it - I do recall Gatlin and some of the other members of the Canary Clan over at LP calling Ron Paul an anti-Semite for being against aid to Isreal. It didn't matter to those yahoos that Paul was against ALL foreign aid.
I don't think you could describe Gatlin as conservative, I think of conservative as wanting to conserve something. With Gatlin it all about consumption, his addiction to Keynesian crack from his drug dealer Ben Bernanke consumes America, and finances his beloved Islamic insurgencies. Gatlin's hero John McCain helped deliver Libya to Al Qaeda, and I would not be surprised if that Jordanian pilot was actually shot down with a handheld SAM that was formerly part of Qaddafi's arsenal.
Interesting, I did not know that. In more recent history, back in 1964 our coinage had been silver, but due to the early stages of Gatlin's Keynesian crack addiction our coinage was debased. Just think of it, back when Gatlin's heroes stabbed Barry Goldwater in the back at the Cow Palace a silver dollar was actually worth the metal it was stamped from. Many drug addicts finance their addiction through theft, Gatlin's addiction to Keynesian crack is no different. Those who save their money are robbed of purchasing power, for example a kid who mows lawns all Summer and saves the money is defrauded of the stored value of his labor month by month as Gatlin's beloved Federal Reserve artificially inflates the money supply to advance favored groups, large banks and Wall Street speculators above all, while cheating the American wages earner out of their earnings. No wonder they are so hostile to Christianity, it condemns their practices. That is why they equate the Bible to the Koran.
#2. To: nativist nationalist (#1)
#3. To: nativist nationalist (#1)
#4. To: Gatlin (#2)
Here you go, girl,right back attcha with a picture of your crazy hero:
#5. To: Dead Culture Watch (#3)
When Canarys attack, the target is one usually in the right, and one who really cares about the direction our Country is headed. Canarys love the 'statist' quo... Yes, a play on words, not a misspelling.
#6. To: Gatlin (#0)
#7. To: GrandIsland, Gatlin (#6)
but his minority view social platform
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#8. To: Deckard (#7)
(Edited)
Of course, neocon pricks like you
#9. To: Gatlin (#0)
The D&R terrorists hate us because we're free, to vote second party
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#10. To: Gatlin (#0)
In other words, “Audit the Fed” would lead legislators to interfere with monetary policy matters and put the entire economy at risk.
#11. To: Vicomte13 (#10)
Which is to say, it would return monetary policy and control of the money supply and budgetary process to the Legislative Branch, where the Constitution puts it.
#12. To: GrandIsland (#6)
It's unfortunate. Rand, IMHO, would be the best direction, economically.... but his minority view social platform will squash his popularity like his father before him.
#13. To: nativist nationalist (#11)
The English pound was once just that, equal in value to sixteen ounces of silver coins.
#14. To: Gatlin, nativist nationalist (#2)
Here you go, girl,right back attcha with a picture of your crazy hero:
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#15. To: Deckard, Gatlin, nativist nationalist (#14)
#16. To: Pericles (#15)
Why are people like Gatlin so invested in foreign interventionism?
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#17. To: Deckard, Gatlin (#16)
Why are people like Gatlin so invested in foreign interventionism? Gat likes to brag about his stock market expertise. Perhaps he is heavily invested in the military-industrial complex.
#18. To: Pericles, Gatlin (#17)
I see them on Freeper land as well they always seem to hate Paul because he is against militarism and to them they think it means don't support Israel.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.
Paul Craig Roberts
#19. To: Pericles (#15)
Why are people like Gatlin so invested in foreign interventionism? That is really what this is all about - they don't come right out and say it - but this kind of Republican and or Conservative loves to stroke it over wars or buying weapons or sending money overseas to fight some proxy war.
#20. To: Vicomte13 (#13)
The Italian lira also. "Lira" is Italian for "pound". It's the equivalent of the French "livre", which also means pound. The reason that the initial for the British pound is "L", is because it was originally a French term, "livre", which was Anglicized.
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