Monthly Archives: August 2012

Aug 10 2012

Increasingly Libertarian Millennial Generation Rejects Obama’s Statism

My new article in Townhall.com. More young people are turning away from Obama’s statist ideas and embracing libertarianism: http://townhall.com/columnists/julieborowski/2012/08/10/increasingly_libertarian_millennial_generation_rejects_obamas_statism

Aug 9 2012

Audit the Pentagon!

Originally posted at FreedomWorks.org.

There is widespread public opinion that taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being spent. Making government transparent and accountable is an issue that transcends left vs. right politics. And all of us should work together to shed light on opaque government agencies and departments.

Take for example, the Department of Defense. Despite Congress passing a law in 1990 requiring all federal departments to complete an annual audit, the DoD has never been fully audited by the Government Accountability Office.  Every single federal department is audited yearly except for the Pentagon. That needs to change.

There is no good reason that the Pentagon shouldn’t be audited. It is just as susceptible to waste as any other government department, if not more. The Pentagon is the largest and most expensive federal government department but its spending has been isolated from any serious scrutiny. At a time when our national debt is quickly approaching $16 trillion, we cannot afford to neglect examining military spending.

The Department of Defense has made a decades-long promise to get its books in order for an audit by 2017. But according to some reports, the Pentagon is not on track to meet this deadline. This is inexcusable and must be fixed.

Senator Tom Coburn, along with a bipartisan group of 8 senators, has thankfully introduced the “Audit the Pentagon Act.” This would add pressure on the Pentagon to get their books in order by stalling the production of new weapons systems until the Pentagon can perform an audit.

According to Senator Coburn, “This bill ends the culture of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ budgeting within the Pentagon that says, ‘don’t ask us how we’re spending money because we can’t tell you.”

We applaud Senator Coburn for introducing this important piece of legislation and bringing attention to the secrecy of the Pentagon. Taxpayers deserve to know how the Pentagon is spending their hard-earned money.

Aug 6 2012

Ron Paul Hasn’t Been Barred from Speaking at RNC Convention

Many of my friends in the liberty movement are sharing an article on Facebook from Examiner.com (anyone can write for this website) titled “Paul Not Given Role at Republican Convention.”

The article says: “in a political move that defies logic, CNN is reporting that presidential challenger Ron Paul has not been asked to speak at the Republican National Convention in Tampa.”

Lew Rockwell sourced this Examiner article in his post titled “Ron Paul Barred From Speaking at Fascist RNC Convention in Tampa.“

But waaaaiitttt.

Look at his original source: CNN. The CNN article only lists some of the keynote speakers. It’s an incomplete list! The article even mentions that there are names that have not been announced in the first roll out of convention speakers. There will surely be more speakers that they haven’t announced yet.

The CNN article also says nothing about Ron Paul. Nothing about him being invited to speak and nothing about him being barred from speaking.

As far as I can tell, there is no solid evidence that Ron Paul is barred from speaking at the RNC convention.

I don’t know if Ron Paul will be invited to speak or not (I highly doubt he will endorse Mitt Romney which may be a prerequisite to speak) but I say we should hold our judgement until the full list is released to the public. And yes, Ron Paul should be on that list.

Edit: The CNN article says nothing about Rand Paul either. I would be very surprised if Rand does not get a speaking slot.

Edit: From the Washington Post: “Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus has announced an initial list of seven prominent Republicans who will speak at the party’s national convention in Tampa later this month. But the list, which includes five current and former governors, a U.S. senator, and a former secretary of state does not include either Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) or his son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.). The list will be built out in the coming weeks, but it’s still worth exploring where the Pauls – two figures with intense national followings – fit in at Mitt Romney’s nominating convention.”