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Rand Paul Vs. The World

Rand Paul says the darndest things. Especially about privacy, government surveillance, ISIS and himself. Three recent examples from last week: filibustering Patriot Act reforms; saying that GOP hawks created ISIS by sending arms into the Gulf region; and accusing his foes of wanting another terrorist attack in the U.S. so they could blame the carnage on him. That last remark was such a piece of grandiose self-pity that no one wanted to respond. Why play into the Kentucky senators martyrdom shtick?

Paul first became a Republican sensation in 2013, when he used a filibuster to raise alarms about the CIAs drone program. This time around, Paul is a declared presidential candidate, and his filibuster this week against the NSAs bulk data collection program elicited within his party a scattering of wan support, but mostly criticism, much of it from rival GOP presidential contenders.

None of his moves this week shifted his poll numbers one way or the other.

Paul managed to procure some measure of backing from his fellow 2016-ers, with the strongest support coming from Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, who has shed the nice-guy conservative approach that won him Iowa in 2008 for an edgier, to-the-right-of-everyone strategy now. As CNN reported:

Huckabee said that the original [Patriot Act] was "hastily passed" in the wake of 9/11 without extensive debate. Public opinion has shifted now, he said. "Fourteen years ago, we were worried about terrorists. Now we're worried about our government," Huckabee said, singling out controversies around the IRS and Justice Departments.

Elsewhere, Dr. Ben Carson put himself firmly in the probably camp on NSA bulk surveillance reform, saying, "We really have to protect the Constitution, the Fourth Amendment, and there are aspects of the Patriot Act, such as the massive meta-data collection, which I think probably are not necessary."

The best Pauls fellow firebrand Ted Cruz could muster was this: I would note he and I agree on a great many issues, although we dont agree entirely on this issue, but I want to take the opportunity to thank the senator from Kentucky for his passionate defense of liberty. His is a voice that this body needs to listen to.

But that was about it from Pauls colleagues in the nomination hunt. For the most part, by weeks end, just about everyone else in the GOP had, in one way or another, suggested that the good doctor was naive, or a media grandstander (as if they weren't!), or a soft-on-terrorism isolationist who was afraid to confront a global Islamist jihad.

The rest is here:
Trail To The Chief: Rand Paul vs. The World

If anyone ought to be well positioned in the current, fractured Republican field, its Rand Paul. The Kentucky senators libertarian stances make him stand out from the pack, and his supporters were supposed to give him a solid base that he could expand by appealing to more traditional Republicans.

But instead, Paul seems to be flailing, and fighting for space in the crowded GOP landscape. Hes tied for fourth place in the average of national polls, fifth in Iowa, third in New Hampshire. His fundraising isnt going wellhes even been frozen out by the top donor to his father, the former Texas congressman Ron Paul. Hes struggling to earn the backing of his fathers rank and file supporters, as well. And while Rand Pauls recent maneuvers in the Senate succeeded in derailing renewal of the Patriot Act, they also served to highlight the unpopularity of his national-security positions within his partyand the stunt got far less buzz than the 2013 filibuster that made him a hero to many conservatives.

Inside and around the campaign, there is a sense that things are not going as well as hoped for Paul, multiple sources told me. They are in a challenging spot right now, said one Republican operative with knowledge of the campaign. They are having a hard time reaching out to new constituencies while keeping the base happy. The problem, the operative said, is that Pauls flip-flopping and triangulation have damaged his reputation for ideological purity. Senator Paul appears, in the minds of Republicans, to have gone from a guy who was standing on principle, who wanted to do things, to a politician who wants to be something, the operative said.

A different GOP strategist put it more succinctly to National Journals Josh Kraushaar, calling the Paul campaign a disaster.

Why is Paul having such a hard time? Partly it is because the crowded field he thought would give him an advantage includes several conservative candidates appealing to a similar pool of votersfrom the firebrand Ted Cruz to social conservative Mike Huckabee to neurosurgeon Ben Carson. Partly it is the shifting landscape of key issues, which has put foreign policy front and center. (National security and terrorism recently became the No. 1 concern of GOP primary voters, and 57 percent of them want an approach that is more aggressive, not less, according to a recent Pew survey.) And partly it is a matter of flawed strategic assumptionsa campaign that believed it could build a coalition of different kinds of voters based on the candidates various facets is finding it may instead be a zero-sum game.

Just a few months ago, some were calling Paul the early frontrunner for the nomination. The many moderate and establishment-oriented candidates, Paul himself theorized, would split the partys more traditional voters, allowing Paul to consolidate conservatives. Paul was by far the most aggressive candidate in building a campaign infrastructure, constructing a 50-state network that was in place more than a year ago. Meanwhile, he courted traditional big-money donors, schmoozing confabs like Mitt Romneys Utah donor retreat as he sought to prove he was less of a loose cannonsome might say gadflythan his father. In a March 2014 national poll of Republican primary voters, he placed first with 16 percent of the vote.

Paul started early because he was hoping to lock in support while other potential candidates were still making up their minds. He paid his first visits to Iowa and New Hampshire in the spring of 2013. He vigorously courted social conservatives with a message that linked personal liberty to religious liberty and emphasized his opposition to abortion. In the 2012 Iowa caucuses, Ron Paul came in third, with 21 percent of the vote; he came in second in New Hampshire, with 23 percent. Rand Pauls advisers figured he would naturally appeal to those voters as the closest thing in the field to Ron Paul, and could quickly vault to the front by building on that base.

But polling averages now put Paul under 9 percent in Iowa and around 12 percent in New Hampshire. Paul gets 9 percent of the Republican primary vote nationally, on average, the same amount of support as Carson and behind Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, and Marco Rubio. Polls at this stage arent at all predictive of how the race will actually shake out, but they are a barometer of Republican activists current sentiment. What they show is that, despite Pauls early organizational efforts and his supposed claim on liberty-minded Republicans, the percentage of voters ready to commit to him is smalland rather than building it up, he may be watching it shrink.

Ron Pauls supporters, a finicky and purist bunch, have proved less transferable to Rand Paul than the campaign assumed. In Iowa, several prominent former Ron Paul supporters, including state Senator Jason Schultz, are backing Cruz. This week, the New York Times reported that Rand Paul was beginning to win over some formerly leery Ron Paul fansa strikingly late conversion of a group he thought he could take for granted. Many Ron Paul supporters have been alienated by Rand Pauls gestures to the establishment, particularly his partnership with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whose reelection he endorsed and campaigned for last year. In blocking the reauthorization of the Patriot Act last week, Paul antagonized McConnell, but won points with libertarians for proving he could stand up to the leader.

Unlike Pauls 2013 filibuster against drones, which brought him wide acclaim and highlighted his political creativity, his speech on surveillance last week was largely viewed as a political stunt aimed at thrusting him into the spotlight and goosing his lagging fundraising. Thats perhaps inevitablePaul is a candidate now, as he wasnt the last timeand perhaps unfair, as he has a long track record on the issue. But it highlights how his image has changed, from that of a passion-driven truth-teller, like his father, to that of a politically minded triangulator. Confronted with the accusation, Paul displayed another unfortunate tendency by lashing out at his critics, saying that those who oppose him secretly want there to be an attack on the United States so they can blame it on me. (He later backed off and acknowledged that the statement was hyperbole.)

Continued here:
Rand Paul's Struggling Presidential Campaign - The Atlantic

It turns out that Republicans in Washington are united on one issue: their hatred of Rand Paul. John McCain says that he is the worst possible candidate ... on the most important issue. Marco Rubio opines that he has no idea what hes talking about. Lindsey Graham concludes that it would be devastating for the party to nominate him. Conservative commentators are even more vicious and ad hominem. The obsession with Paul is striking. In a Post op-ed last summer, then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry mentioned Paul 10 times. I cannot recall an instance in recent decades when so much vitriol has been directed against a leading political figure by his own party.

The attacks are almost entirely focused on Pauls foreign policy, which is routinely characterized as dangerous and isolationist. In fact, the real problem appears to be that Paul is trying to force Republicans and many Democrats to defend what has become a lazy, smug consensus in favor of an ever-expanding national security state.

I have read Pauls proposals and speeches on foreign policy. There are some bloopers, odd comments and rhetorical broadsides, but for the most part his views are intellectually serious and well within a tradition of what he (correctly) calls conservative realism. They are also politically courageous. Paul has taken positions and cited authorities that are deeply unpopular with his own party. Yes, of course, he craves publicity and engages in stunts. What politician doesnt? But what makes his opponents most uncomfortable is the substance, not the style.

Take the most recent example: his opposition to the blanket extension of the Patriot Act, which has resulted in some modest restraint on the vast expansion of government powers since 9/11. (The new checks and balances are close to ones recommended by a panel put together by the Obama administration.) In defending his position, Paul notes correctly that we would not even know of the existence of this system of metadata collection if not for Edward Snowdens revelations, that the FBI has been unable to cite a single terrorist plot disrupted by it and that the special courts in place have few checks and little transparency. He cites, glowingly, the 1979 dissenting opinion regarding the dangers of government collection of phone records by Thurgood Marshall and William Brennan, the Supreme Courts two most prominent liberals of the past half-century.

Or consider Pauls views on lifting the embargo on Cuba, on which he writes: The supporters of the embargo ... fall strangely silent when asked how trade with Cuba is so different than trade with Russia or China or Vietnam. This is not a path to primary voters hearts in Florida.

He has raised uncomfortable questions that no other politician dares raise about Anwar al-Awlaki, an al-Qaeda leader who was killed in a car on a road in Yemen by a U.S. drone strike. Paul has pointed out that since Awlaki was a U.S. citizen, this action creates an extraordinary legal precedent that the president of the United States can execute a U.S. citizen without trial. He cites approvingly the American Civil Liberties Union, which, he writes, has pointed out that in modern history, a presidential order to kill an American citizen away from a battlefield is unprecedented.

In the Middle East, Paul has called for caution before the next military intervention, suggesting that it is worth learning some lessons from the past decade. U.S. military interventions, he has argued, have destabilized countries and led to perverse consequences. As secular dictators fell in Libya, Egypt, Iraq, and now Syria, radical jihadists exploited the vacuum, he has noted.

In Afghanistan, he said, President Obama added 50,000 troops to the U.S. force and spent an additional $120 billion on the effort with little effect. Afghanistan today is by some measures as dangerous as ever after 14 years of continuous U.S. military intervention and $1 trillion spent, by one estimate. Surely this is worth pondering?

I dont agree with Rand Paul on many things, including foreign policy. I think some of his positions on civil rights are historically blind, cruel and dangerous. But in the arena of national security, he has time and again raised important, inconvenient questions, only to have them ruled out of order and to be told that he is a crank, far outside the mainstream. In fact, it would be useful and important for Republicans and Democrats to stop the name-calling and actually discuss and debate his ideas.

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Excerpt from:
Listen to Rand Paul - The Washington Post

The Capitol Hill impasse over federal surveillance powers continued Monday, as Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) refused to yield to pressure from the White House and fellow Republicans to step aside and allow the reinstatement of key USA Patriot Act provisions that expired early Monday morning.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) again showed agitation with Paul when he came to the Senate floor Monday afternoon to make a request, requiring unanimous consent, to move up a set of votes scheduled for Tuesday.

Everyone has had ample opportunity to say their piece at this point, said McConnell, who has endorsed Paul for president. Now is the time for action.

[Sun sets on some NSA surveillance powers as Rand Paul foils extension]

But Paul, as he has done on several occasions in recent weeks, objected: I think the bill could be made much better with amendments, and if we could come to an arrangement to allow amendments to be voted on, I would be happy to allow my consent.

On the night the Patriot Act expired, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) equated the collecting of Americans' phone records to "what we fought the revolution over." (Senator Rand Paul/YouTube)

That puts the Senate on a path to pass surveillance legislation known as the USA Freedom Act as soon as Tuesday, although pitfalls remain. McConnell has set up votes on three amendments, the passage of any of which would send the bill back to the House, where its fate would be uncertain.

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Monday reiterated his preference to have the Senate pass the already-approved House bill, without any amendments, so that it can be sent to President Obamas desk quickly. I still think the best advice for them is to pass our bill, he told reporters.

McCarthy declined several opportunities to say whether he would accept any changes by the Senate, which would require the House to reconsider the anti-terrorism legislation. The best option for the protection of this country is to pass our bill, he said.

McConnells amendments would tweak the USA Freedom Act, which was the product of months of intense negotiations between lawmakers, intelligence officials, civil libertarians and telecommunications companies.

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Frustration mounts as Rand Paul refuses to accelerate ...

"There has to be another way," the Kentucky Republican tweeted. "We must find it together. So tomorrow, I will force the expiration of the NSA illegal spy program."

The National Security Agency's authorities -- which, among other powers, allow the agency to collect telephone data on millions of Americans and store that data for five years -- will end at midnight Sunday unless the Senate approves an extension.

RELATED: What happens if the Patriot Act provisions expire?

Last week, Republicans were unable to find 60 votes to break a filibuster on either an extension of the existing law or a House-passed bill, the USA Freedom Act, that would have telecommunications companies hold the data and require the government to get a warrant to access it.

Paul and his allies are limited in their ability to derail the legislation altogether. But their opposition to any bill authorizing the programs would mean the Senate would be stuck in many hours of debate -- perhaps lasting days -- before anything could be passed by majority vote because of complex Senate procedural rules. By then, the authorities would have lapsed and the government would need time to get them back online.

In a statement, Paul explained why he was taking a stand in the Senate.

"The callous use of general warrants and the disregard for the Bill of Rights must end. Forcing us to choose between our rights and our safety is a false choice and we are better than that as a nation and as a people," he said.

Paul also acknowledged in his statement that there is a need for a "robust intelligence agency" to defend against terrorism, but added, "We do not need to give up who we are in order to defeat them."

If there is no agreement by Sunday, not only would the government need to stop its bulk collection of phone data, but also authorities would not be able to conduct surveillance of so-called "lone wolf" terrorists who are not American citizens and not believed to be part of an identified terrorist group. The government would also lose its ability to conduct "roving wiretaps," a program that gives the government the ability to track various phones used by the same person.

RELATED: Rand Paul seizes political moment with NSA protest

Read more:
Rand Paul warns of plan to derail NSA vote - CNNPolitics.com