Tonight's 60 Plus & Rainy Day Patriot Debate

The indicated format for the 60 Plus & Rainy Day Patriot Debate scheduled for tonight (6 p.m., Hoover Tactical Firearms)  is:

1. Introductory and closing statements by the candidates (2 minutes each)
2. Approximately ten "yes, no, or abstain" questions, such as.    

• Do you support full repeal of death tax?
•  Do you support a balanced budget amendment? 

3. Questions about topics such as below. First candidate answering has 90 seconds and each succesive candidate says what he would do differently..

• Obamacare
• Social Security Reform
• Spending
• Regulatory Reform
• Energy Policy
• Good government question

Emphasis for the debate is supposed to be solutions over talking points. 

MY ANSWERS IN ADVANCE

My position is that Congress is kaput and cannot do anything, and there is no indication that it will be able to do anything in 2015 or 2016. Thus, I consider most of the above questions academic.

Even though academic, let me indicate what I plan to try to say in my answers.

On Obamacare, the other candidates have exhibited a lack of appreciation of the politics of health care reform and how the realities of those politics will constrain and contort any ideas they have about repeal and replace. I have tried to educate them about this (see "Press release" re Rep. DeMarco's issue positions), but they continue in their obtuse ways. The other candidates are offering no solutions here, just talking points.

On Social Security reform, I have no idea what is going to be politically possible and have no specific proposals to make.

On spending, I do not have any expertise or knowledge that would lead me to put forth anything different from Congressman Ryan's Path to Prosperity budget. See "Press release"-- My discussion of Path to Prosperity. If the other candidates have something to put forth different from the Path to Prosperity budget, they ought to give some explanation of why voters should believe that the candidate's proposal is superior to the Path to Prosperity budget. Also, as indicated in the above link, I have no idea about the politics for Congressman Ryan's Path to Prosperity budget being enacted in to law, or about the chances of anything else that I would desire being enacted. If this debate is supposed to be about solutions over talking points, the other candidates ought to explain why they think their spending proposals can get enacted.

On regulatory reform, my analysis is that the regulators are part of the Washington political class, and that Republicans alone cannot overpower the regulators. My view is that average Democrats and average independents are as ill-served as are average Republicans by the regulators, and the regulators can be beaten back only if average Republicans, average Democrats and average independents temporarily unite to force change on Congress and on how Washington works. See MAKING SENSE OF THIS.

On energy policy, see MAKING SENSE OF THIS.

GOOD GOVERNMENT

My campaign has been all about fixing Congress and changing the way Washington works. For good government, Will Brooke has the three legislative bills he says he will introduce immediately if he goes to Washington. Some of the other candidates have talked about a term limits bill and maybe other bills. Representative DeMarco's first TV ad was about how Washington can be changed. I have been very disparaging of the other candidates and what they have been putting out to the voters relative to fixing Congress and "cleaning up" or "changing" Washington. See Dale Jackson says. For today, I will just call it "political hokum."

I point out that, to date, none of the other candidates (to my knowledge) have said anything about the Convention of States Project for fixing a broken federal government, and further Alabama has been an early actor on this. See Should AL06 be a wake up bell? Maybe the other candidates, in talking about good government tonight, will see fit to mention the Convention of States Project.
Gary Palmer has talked about pushing Federal government activities down to the State and local level. Gary was supposed to submit an essay to AL.com about this (see On to Palmer and Vignuelle), but I don't think he ever did. 

My answer regarding repeal of death taxes can be found at Re: death taxes and taxes generally.

On a balanced budget amendment, the national budget should be at least balanced over time, and Congress has egregiously failed to do that. Under my National Battle Plan, I think a balanced budget amendment is something Congress should consider as part of the grand reform plan it proposes to the American people for fixing Congress. If Congress should choose not to include a balanced budget amendment, I would revisit the matter at that time.