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Rand Paul Is At It Again
Kentucky Republican Senate candidate Rand Paul, who drew wide attention this week for his reluctant embrace of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, said this morning that President Barack Obama’s criticism of BP has sounded “really un-American.”

Speaking on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” the libertarian iconoclast said the castigation of BP’s response to the oil gusher on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico was an attack on business and part of the “blame game,” where tragedy is “always someone’s fault.”

“What I don’t like from the president’s administration is this sort of, ‘I’ll put my boot heel on the throat of BP.’ I think that sounds really un-American in his criticism of business,” he said. “I’ve heard nothing from BP about not paying for the spill. And I think it’s part of this sort of blame game society in the sense that it’s always got to be someone’s fault instead of the fact that sometimes accidents happen.”

Paul’s overwhelming victory Tuesday over a Republican establishment candidate hand-picked by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R, Ky.) is rapidly turning into a contest of ideas over the reach of government.

Jack Conway, the Kentucky attorney general and Paul’s Democratic opponent for the Senate, said in an interview that Paul’s problems stem from “a narrow, rigid philosophy that government shouldn’t deal with businesses at all,” which will create a series of blowups until November, he predicted. In an interview with National Public Radio Wednesday, Paul expressed misgivings not just over the Civil Rights Act’s imposition of desegregation on private businesses but about the strictures of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Conway said his campaign would challenge Paul on whether the Food and Drug Administration, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and consumer safety agencies should exist.

“It’s one thing to say you’re in favor of limited government and against big government. Those are phrases that resonate,” said Rep. John Yarmuth, a Democrat who represents Louisville. “But when you bring that into the real world and say how you’re going to apply those, obviously you get into trouble.”

At rallies last week, Paul traced the expansion of government back to 1937, when, under pressure from President Franklin Roosevelt, a divided Supreme Court upheld a state minimum wage law, breaking a string of rulings that kept the government out of the marketplace.

Some Kentucky Republicans say Paul may have done Conway a huge favor with his initial challenge – since retracted – of some parts of the Civil Rights Act. The key to Democratic statewide victory in the state is to run up the margin in Jefferson County, where Louisville is. A debate over civil rights not only stokes the African American vote but might give pause to Republican business leaders around the city not interested in re-litigating such a sensitive topic.

Conway, a lawyer with deep Louisville roots whose father owns championship race horses, is tight with the business community, Kentucky Republicans and Democrats say.

In his “Good Morning America” interview with George Stephanopolous this morning, Paul asked when his honeymoon with the media would begin.”When does my honeymoon period start? I had a big victory,” he said.


Eric D. Schwerin
Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC
1010 Wisconsin Ave., NW
Suite 705
Washington, DC 20007
(202) 333-1880
eschwerin@rosemontseneca.com
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On May 21, 2010, at 1:40 PM, hbiden@rosemontseneca.com wrote:

What are they nailing him on today
Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

From: Eric Schwerin <eschwerin@rosemontseneca.com>
Date: Fri, 21 May 2010 13:40:05 -0400
To: Hunter Biden<hbiden@rosemontseneca.com>
Subject: Rand Paul

is like Manna from Heaven for the Democrats.....


Eric D. Schwerin
Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC
1010 Wisconsin Ave., NW
Suite 705
Washington, DC 20007
(202) 333-1880
eschwerin@rosemontseneca.com
P Consider the environment before printing this email.