Rand Paul is out-of-step with the Republican Party on foreign policy, national defense, military spending, illegal drugs, and global surveillance, but his positions on those issues are a decent fit with the younger generations.
“Young people, they don’t really associate with Republicans on taxes and regulations. Not that they oppose us, they just don’t have any money so they don’t care much about those issues,” Paul said over the summer on “The Laura Ingraham Show.” “But they’ve all got a cellphone, they’re all on the Internet, they’re all concerned about Internet freedom — and they’re concerned about privacy. And these are precisely issues where we can grow our youth vote.”
I don’t think Rand Paul can win the Republican nomination but, if he did, he would deeply erode the Democrats’ advantage with younger voters. That actually could make him an attractive running-mate for whatever troglodyte actually does win the GOP nomination. Isolated in the Naval Observatory, Paul’s foreign policy opinions would not matter, but his presence on the ticket could make it seem like the Grand Old Party has something to offer to young people.
Except, of course, he’s a serial plagiarist, as if that matters in Republicans circles anymore.
I don’t know, I’m skeptical. I can see what the pitch is: “They’re bugging your cellphone and making you buy health insurance! Rand Paul is here to liberate you!”
But at the same time he takes it for granted that young people don’t have any money. What about that? Now that it’s becoming socially acceptable to talk about inequality, what will Rand Paul have to offer? Plus he’s a moron, a plagiarist, a bigot, and notably think-skinned.
And when you think about it, what is he even offering when it comes to internet freedom and privacy? Abolish the NSA? That would be a popular position, but what’s he going to do about Google and Amazon?
Are you trolling your own blog?
The first rule of Veep Club is “Don’t become the story. Don’t become the distraction.”
See: Palin, Sarah. Eagleton, Thomas.
You’re right that Paul has a certain cache with a certain segment of young glibertarians. But no one votes for the Veep, though they might vote against one.
And I would argue that we need to wait and see what sort of changes occur in the NSA over the next three years. Change under Obama is always an incremental thing that seems paltry and then you wake up and millions of Americans have health insurance and we are out of Iraq and Afghanistan.
And unlike Palin and Eagleton, Paul is a very well-known quantity: he’ll never get the nomination unless he promises to stick to the GOP platform on national security subjects (i.e., he’ll never get the nomination, and if he does by some chance he will make himself unattractive to that same demographic). Also I’m sure you’re right about Obama and Democrats will be able to dominate the “left” side of the issue.
Yes
SATSQ.
what’s the offer..
you can smoke pot and roam the internet?
outside of libertarian unicorn dreams, what does Paul have to offer, and who buys that, other than a subset of young White men?
what does he have to offer to anyone who isn’t White?
Why limit that question to just non-white people? How about white people who aren’t rich? white people who aren’t male?
I’d also ask what does he offer to white people who aren’t his donors and aren’t simpletons?
I don’t see the “deeply erode” thing. It takes about 30 seconds to show how insane this guy is, whether or not his positions on one or two niche issues align with younger voters. And, you know, it shouldn’t take a genius on the Democratic side to point out that valuing “privacy” is all well and good, but the Republican party has no use for privacy in the context of women’s control over their own bodies. In the end, he’s just a doofus huckster.
I dunno – like almost the entire 2016 GOP crop, Rand Paul doesn’t strike me as a particularly savvy or effective politician. They are all basically knuckleheads who got in, or remained in, office based on flukes of the electoral cycle/system. A lot of them rode the 2010 Tea Party wave, and therefore got elected in large part on random political conditions rather than their own merit as pols. Paul? Walker? Rubio? Please. None of those guys impress me. Ted Cruz is… Ted Cruz. Jeb Bush… is named “Bush”. Rick Perry is “duh”. I doubt Paul Ryan will seriously contend for the nom – at this point he looks like a Congresscritter for life.
The only one who seems like a genuinely ok pol to me is Christie. But as we’ve discussed here at length he may well not survive outside of the warm bath that is NJ politics. I have a hard time seeing how most of these guys will avoid imploding in the national spotlight. They are going to clusterfuck their way to a 2016 nominee again, but this time there isn’t even a generally acceptable candidate like Romney.
In short, it’s not even 2014 yet and they already look (deservedly) screwed.
You don’t seem to understand that the only division in American politics is urban/rural. The Republican Party is the peasant party; go back to Eastern Europe in the inter-war period if you want to see how vile a thing a peasant party can be.
Just as urban civilization depends upon privacy, rural civilization depends upon the absence of privacy. This is why urban and rural civilzations cannot be governed under a single system of laws — and that is our problem, and our only problem. Everything else flows from it.
Specifically with reference to Rand Paul, who purports to be a libertarian, but who lacks the intellectual equipment to grasp even so threadbare a pseudophilosophy as libertarianism: note well that no libertarian wants anyone else to have any liberty or privacy.
Interesting.
That’s a really interesting thesis. One possible objection: they’re not just the peasant party, the country club roots are still there, and supplying the most of the money in spite of the peasant Koch Brothers. The country clubbers allow the peasants to do what they like on matters they don’t give a shit about, like abortion, and the reason they don’t give a shit is that their privacy is not threatened.
And it’s only a problem because our political system is rigged to give grossly disproportionate power to rural voters.
Meh. Doesn’t seem like anything that couldn’t be handled by a Democrat on the ticket who knows how to speak up in favor of privacy-rights concerns. Besides, a Republican who was moderately non-anti-gay would also be more in line with younger people’s views, but (1) there’s the small matter of the rest of the party’s revanchist views on all subjects including that one, and (2) are any of these issues really determining a Presidential vote? Like, “well, I was going to vote for the party that tries its best to help downtrodden people whatever their background, but instead, because I don’t like the idea of a database of my phone calls, I’m going to vote for the party of plutocracy and intolerance!” Seems unlikely.
And why is the Democratic Party against internet freedom and privacy? Someone should ask Obama and Durbin that question.
I repeat myself: In what universe could Rand Paul possibly get elected Prez … or Vice Prez?
Paul is a walking time bomb of non sequitors, mis-speakings and flat out head scratching bullshit. His interview with Rachel Maddow should have been instructive. He CANNOT keep his mouth shut.
Currently, Panetta and Co. are planning how/whether to screw with veterans pensions. Paul has already given them political cover.
It’s one thing to vote to deny extension of unemployment benefits … but Rand Paul has to gild the lily and call the benefittors permanently unemployed if they don’t have a job one day after the initial period.
Ignoring the millionaire food stamps and the stamps = slavery , he maintains that food stamps will “Lull” people into a life of generational welfare.
Like I said: The sumbitch can’t keep his mouth shut. Ask Rick Santorum, Rick Perry and Sarah Palin how that works out.
Elected — nowhere. But he’d finish second in a DKos primary — no worse than third — on the back of his positions on “…foreign policy, national defense, military spending, illegal drugs, and global surveillance.”
yeah.
That and a primary win in New Hampshire will get you …
a Primary win in New Hampshire.
One thing that goes unmentioned in the “young voter” narrative is that the relative popularity of democrats (and conversely, the unpopularity of republicans) with these voters may have a lot more to do with racial demographics than age.
Not a chance. Marginally erode in some purple states, maybe.
Deeply – no way. Not even if he was caught smoking a medicinal joint on vacation in California.
Yes, yes. And I remember how Sarah Palin was going to peel off a lot of women voters from Obama.
The thing is, a lot of women voters, not just PUMAs, did take a hard look at Palin and were appalled. In the end Obama’s margin of 7% matched the consensus prediction before any VP was selected.
Similarly, if Rand Paul were selected (and he won’t be – you can be sure that after the 2008 debacle the party powers aren’t going to risk that kind of disaster again) that Democratic voters who liked his positions on a few libertarian issues would take a closer look – then run away as fast as they could after discovering his white supremacist and extreme xtian roots.
Yes.
Cruz/Paul 2016.
I’d almost really want HRC to run just to utterly destroy their party on a national level for 20 years.
Let something that sounds good to the Republican faithful allow actual progressives to start infiltrating offices usually held by a centrist Democrat.
I do get tired of always having to pick between oligarchs.