Congressman Ron Paul and his son, new Senator Rand Paul, together appeared on Fox News with Neil Cavuto, and after some joking between the Pauls about whether the House or the Senate was better, the conversation turned serious with the debt crisis. Neither Paul was in favor of raising the debt ceiling outright, but the two disagreed on what it would take for them to get on board and avoid the catastrophe warned of by Austan Goolsbee, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, if the debt ceiling was not increased.
Ron declared that he is not in favor of raising the debt ceiling saying “I never voted for any of the spending, so why should I raise the debt for the people who’ve been spending the money? For me it’s a very comfortable vote.” Ron admitted if the debt limit isn’t increased it will cause problems, but thought that the alternative of continuing to borrow and spend endless money is much worse, and instead would rather face reality today.
The younger Paul dismissed Goolsbee’s warning and claimed since President Obama voted against raising the debt ceiling as a senator, “it’s a little disingenuous for [his] people to say ‘oh the sky is falling if we don’t do it.'” However, Rand is a bit more pragmatic than his father, suggesting “I’ll vote to raise the debt ceiling if we attach a balanced budget rule to it. If they say no more debt will be added and from here on out we’ll balance the budget, I’ll vote one time to raise the debt ceiling.”
Ron says pretending to balance the budget is irrelevant and instead demands that our “whole philosophy has to be changed, monetary policy has to be changed, foreign policy has to be changed, our attitude about the welfare state has to be changed.” The debate about the debt rages on, but between the two Pauls, its interesting to see that the less alarmist, more realistic and eager to compromise Paul is the one who just started work in Washington today.
Watch the clip from Fox News below:
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