Ron Paul And His Grand Plan

[et's daddy]

ive heard the name Ron Paul tossed around lately and found out he is running for President .. so i decided to check him out and see what he is all about ..... i have to say, some of what i found disturbed me

2 of his plans make no sense to me and seem to have little chance of working

1. his health-care plan .... seems one thing he wants to do is give nurses and pharmacists the power to prescribe medicine and see patients for various ailments .... sounds ok .. but just what will this do to cost .. just how many nurses and pharmacists do you think will go for it when they find out the cost of their new malpractice insurance

2. he wants to do away with Federal Income taxes ..... and some Federal Programs .... just how is it he plans to pay for the remaining Federal Government ? .... should the entire US military be volunteers without pay ... should we do away with Food Stamps and WIC ...... how about the FBI ?

[Dowdy]

Straight from Wiki.......

Health care relief

Paul has called for passage of tax relief bills to reduce health care costs for families:[178] He would support a tax credit for senior citizens who need to pay for costly prescription drugs. He would also allow them to import drugs from other countries at lower prices. He has called for health savings accounts that allow for tax-free savings to be used to pay for prescriptions.[179]

* H.R. 3075 allows families to claim a dollar-for-dollar tax credit for health insurance premiums.

* H.R. 3076 provides a dollar-for-dollar tax credit that permits consumers to purchase "negative outcomes" insurance prior to undergoing surgery or other serious medical treatments. Negative outcomes insurance is a novel approach that guarantees those harmed receive fair compensation, while reducing the burden of costly malpractice litigation on the health care system. Patients receive this insurance payout without having to endure lengthy lawsuits, and without having to give away a large portion of their award to a trial lawyer. This also drastically reduces the costs imposed on physicians and hospitals by malpractice litigation. Under HR 3076, individuals who pay taxes can purchase negative outcomes insurance at essentially no cost.

* H.R. 3077 creates a $500 per child tax credit for medical expenses and prescription drugs that are not reimbursed by insurance. It also creates a $3,000 tax credit for dependent children with terminal illnesses, cancer, or disabilities.

* H.R. 3078 waives the employee portion of Social Security payroll taxes (or self-employment taxes) for individuals with documented serious illnesses or cancer. It also suspends Social Security taxes for primary caregivers with a sick spouse or child.

Paul voted for the Medicare Prescription Drug Price Negotiation Act, which would allow the government to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to get the best price for drugs provided in the Medicare Part D prescription drug program.[180]

Paul rejects universal health care, believing that the more government interferes in medicine, the higher prices rise and the less efficient care becomes. He points to how many people today are upset with the HMO system, but few people realize that HMOs came about because of a federal mandate in 1973.[180] He also points to the 1974 ERISA law that grants tax benefits to employers for providing insurance but not individuals; he prefers a system which grants tax credits to individuals.[181] He supports the U.S. converting to a free market health care system, saying in an interview on New Hampshire NPR that the present system is akin to a "corporatist-fascist" system which keeps prices high. He says that in industries with freer markets prices go down due to technological innovation, but because of the corporatist system, this is prevented from happening in health care. He opposes socialized health care promoted by Democrats as being harmful because they lead to bigger and less efficient government.[182]

Paul has said that although he prefers tax credits to socialized medicine, he would be willing to "prop up" the current systems of Medicare and Medicaid with money saved by bringing troops home from foreign bases in places such as those in South Korea.[183]

He opposes government regulation of vitamins and minerals, including Codex Alimentarius (some proposals he opposes would require a prescription for vitamins).

Lower taxes and smaller government

Paul believes the size of federal government must be decreased substantially. He supports abolishment of the Internal Revenue Service, most Cabinet departments, and the Federal Reserve.[57] Paul's campaign slogan for 2004 was "The Taxpayers' Best Friend!".[58] He would completely eliminate the income tax by shrinking the size and scope of government to what he considers its Constitutional limits, noting that he has never voted to approve an unbalanced budget; he has observed that even scaling back spending to 2000 levels eliminates the need for the 42% of the budget accounted for by individual income tax receipts.[59] He has asserted that Congress had no power to impose a direct income tax and supports the repeal of the sixteenth amendment.[60] Rather, he prefers the federal government to be funded through excise taxes and/or uniform, non-protectionist tariffs.[61]

Paul has signed a pledge not to raise taxes or create new taxes, given by Americans for Tax Freedom.[62] Paul has also been an advocate of employee-owned corporations (such as employee stock ownership plans).[63] In 1999, he co-sponsored The Employee Ownership Act of 1999, which would have created a new type of corporation (the employee-owned-and-controlled corporation) that would have been exempt from most federal income taxes.

John Berthoud, president of the National Taxpayers Union, an organization that promotes lower tax rates, has said, "Ron Paul has always proven himself to be a leader in the fight for taxpayer rights and fiscal responsibility .... No one can match his record on behalf of taxpayers." Paul has been called a "Taxpayer's Friend" by Berthoud's organization every year since he returned to Congress in 1996, scoring an average percentage of 100%, tying Tom Tancredo for the highest score (1992–2005) among all 2008 presidential candidates from Congress.[64] National Federation of Independent Business president Jack Farris has said, "Paul is a true friend of small business.... He is committed to a pro-small-business agenda of affordable health insurance, lower taxes, tort reform, and the elimination of burdensome mandates."[65]

Paul has stated: "I agree on getting rid of the IRS, but I want to replace it with nothing, not another tax. But let's not forget the inflation tax."[66][67] In other statements, he has permitted consideration of a national sales tax as a compromise if the tax need cannot be reduced enough. He has advocated that the reduction of government will make an income tax unnecessary.[68] Paul would substantially reduce the government's role in individual lives and in the functions of foreign and domestic states; he says Republicans have lost their commitment to limited government and have become the party of big government.[69] He would eliminate many federal government agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Education[70], the U.S. Department of Energy, the Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Emergency Management Administration, the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Internal Revenue Service[59], calling them "unnecessary bureaucracies". Paul would severely reduce the role of the CIA; reducing its functions to intelligence-gathering. He would eliminate operations like overthrowing foreign governments and assassinations. He says this activity is kept secret even from Congress and "leads to trouble."[71] He also commented, "We have every right in the world to know something about intelligence gathering, but we have to have intelligent people interpreting this information."[72]

Paul's opposition to the Federal Reserve is supported by the Austrian Business Cycle Theory, which holds that instead of containing inflation, the Federal Reserve, in theory and in practice[citation needed], is responsible for causing inflation. In addition to eroding the value of individual savings, this creation of inflation leads to booms and busts in the economy. Thus Paul argues that government, via a central bank (the Federal Reserve), is the primary cause of economic recessions and depressions. He believes that economic volatility is decreased when the free market determines interest rates and money supply.[73] He has stated in numerous speeches that most of his colleagues in Congress are unwilling to abolish the central bank because it funds many government activities. He says that to compensate for eliminating the "hidden tax"[74] of inflation, Congress and the president would instead have to raise taxes or cut government services, either of which could be politically damaging to their reputations. He states that the "inflation tax" is a tax on the poor, because the Federal Reserve prints more money which subsidizes select industries, while poor people pay higher prices for goods as more money is placed in circulation.[75]

His warnings of impending economic crisis and a loss of confidence in the dollar in 2005 and 2006 were at the time derided by many economists, but accelerating dollar devaluation in 2007 has led experts like former Federal Reserve chair Alan Greenspan to reconsider hard money policies such as those of Paul.