Paul Ryan Sure is Eloquent

Uh, yeah. About that.

My Republican friends have been sort of pissy about my pointing out just how new-found the fiscal conservatism of their heroes actually is. It's harder for them to go nuts on me because I have a ton of archives that show that I've been doing this a lot longer than they have. I was using phrases like "banana republic" to describe the United States as far back as 2004. I'm not aware of another blogger with a record on the issue of deficit spending that matches mine. And I read a lot of blogs back then.

When Paul Ryan first came to prominence in 2009, I was surprised to learn that he had first been elected in 1998. So I got really curious about how much of a "fiscal hawk" he was through the Bush years.  I wasn't surprised to learn that the answer was "not very." Of the Bush programs that exploded the debt (and continues to today,) Congressman Ryan voted for precisely all of them.

I don't dislike the man necessarily. It's just that I don't take him all that seriously. He had every opportunity to stand up for fiscal discipline during the Bush years and, if he had, he would've immediately become my hero. But it seems awfully expedient to wait until noon on January 20th, 2009 to discover your principles.

Because liberals are dipshits, they want to paint Ryan as an ideologue, when nothing could be further from the truth. If they were smart, they'd play him as the consummate opportunist, which is much closer to reality.

Conservatives are rightly distrustful of the human condition. We know that if you give somebody an opportunity to fuck up without consequences, they'll very likely do so over and over again. This is where the "law and order" part of the movement comes from, as well as the inflexible opposition to the nanny state.

But most of the movement never holds their own standard bearers to that standard. Republicans spent the whole of the 90s bitching endlessly about the relatively tight-fisted spending of the Clinton Administration. But they just couldn't wait to vote for the "compassionate conservatism" of George W. Bush, with his No Child Left Behind, Medicare schemes, gigantic tax cuts and plans to give federal money to church groups in ways that I'm shocked weren't found unconstitutional.

By 2004 it was clear just what these people were doing to America's future. The U.S dollar had already by then begun it's long slide into oblivion and the country was experiencing its weakest growth since the Depression. So what did these "fiscal hawks" do? They gathered around and worked their little hearts out to reelect George Bush.

It wasn't until the following year, during the Terri Schiavo mess, that I broke with those idiots forever, but I learned to keep a very close eye on what they said and did as it pertains to money. And I haven't gone wrong since.

I know that I'll likely catch endless shit from dishonest hacks for using a video from Chris Hayes and MSNBC, but watch that video. Watch the eloquence and passion with which he argues for Keynesian stimulus spending. He seemingly couldn't get enough of it. And if you think that his 2002 vote was a youthful indiscretion, know that he voted for the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008, which also helped accelerate the disintegration of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are political operators, who will say and do whatever plays well in the cheap seats, where nobody can see what's really going on. In my heart of hearts, I actually want to see them win with both houes of Congress because I know exactly how they'll govern. They'll pass their giant tax cuts, but no spendng cuts will follow. They'll always find some "emergency" to delay doing that.

And if you're thinking that they'll "repeal and replace" ObamaCare, you're fucking kidding yourselves. There's just no way for them to pay for the popular parts that they've promised to keep without the individual mandate. Besides, Romney's already passed an individual mandate. What makes anyone think that he'll repeal another one?

We already know that Paul Ryan is a giant pussy when spending is involved when he's in the majority. Why does anyone think that he wouldn't revert back to that as vice president?

Over the last several years, I've come to the painful conclusion that the truly "small, limited government" that I want in all respects (sorry, social conservatives) simply isn't possible in a democracy absent a fiscal disaster. Allegedly conservative politicians (such as the second Bush and Canada's Stephen Harper) will dilligently do whatever they can to buy voters with their own money, albeit in different ways than liberal politicians do. But the money's gone just the same.

But what I can do is insist that you actually pay for your vote buying schemes. Given that times are actually pretty dire, I'm of a mind that voters be presented with a bill for what they're projected goodies are gonna cost. Itemized and everything.

"You paid this much into Social Security and Medicare. Here's what we expect you to collect in benefits unless we get lucky and you die young. Here's the difference. And just because we're helpful, we adjusted the difference for inflation because your 1960s and '70s dollars were worth shit the second we collected them. Here's your share of our innumerable wars and the crippled kids that are going to require lifetime care as a result of them. Here's the projected cost of fixing the bridge that you very much not want to fal on your fucking noggin when you drive under it."

At the bottom, there would be several columns. One would be "What This Costs." The second would be "What You're Paying For It Now." The third would be "What You Would Pay For It Under Candidate A's Crazy Ass Tax Scheme." Then "Canadidate B's Crazy Ass Tax Scheme." and so on. Under each candidate's column, you'd see how much each scheme is going to cost your kids and grandkids in higher taxes, lower benefits and an expected lower standard of living.

I don't expect that'll make much of a difference (especially with Tea Partiers, who'll scream about "biased math") but it will stop idiotic voters from pleading ignorance about what their government costs as opposed to what they're paying for it.

In a perfect world, this tax notice would come a week before election day. In the following budget year, services would be apportioned exactly according to the election results. And the law would be written in such a way that no earmarks would granted to districts that voted to cut taxes and slash services. The federal government would be lawfully bound by the Budget Act to distribute more funds to a congressional district than they paid into federal taxes if said district also voted to cut taxes.

I would support a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution if it said the following "The Congress of the United States shall, under no circumstances, spend more money than it takes in." The catch is that there would be no loopholes. If a given president decides that he's absolutely hot to go to war with some country that three-quarters of the population can't find on a map, then he eliminates other shit from the budget to pay for it, including, if need be, Medicare and Social Security payments. If a hurricane wipes out a major city, no tax cut this year.

That would nicely prevent folks like Paul Ryan from demagoguing against stimulus money in public that he repeatedly ought out in private. But we know what Paul Ryan argues for when he's in the majority, don't we? By the way, why should defence contractors be operating in Wisconsin? Are they really in any imminent threat of invasion?

The only way to solve that horseshit is through my plan: Where you see what the government takes in, what the nonsense you want from it cost, and what the imbalance is.

If you want a generation of actual fiscal conservatives, as opposed to lobbyist tool Tea Party assholes, you'll get it really quick my way. Furthermore, nobody will be happy, which is the way it oughta be. If you're happy with the government, you're and asshole!