…if risky from a security perspective. After all, such installations can make lucrative targets for intelligence gathering.
The US State Department says it’s prepared to approve the sale of Patriot missile defense systems to Romania. The purchase is a further signal that Bucharest is concerned about the Kremlin’s role in the Black Sea area.
Aside from strengthening Romania, it’s also a good spot for us to gather intelligence.
Senator Rand Paul (R, KY) has said he will not vote for the latest Senate effort at beginning the repeal and replace process of Obamacare. He claims he can’t tell the difference between this offer and the Obamacare that exists because, in part, it leaves some of the Obamacare taxes in place.
Never mind that a critical difference between the offer and Obamacare is that the offer does repeal some of the Obamacare taxes.
The offer isn’t a perfect bill, but it represents progress, and it’s not a final answer—and I know of no one, other than a few Senators, perhaps, who are arguing that it is; that there will be, can be, no possibility of coming back next year to make more progress and coming back in the next Congress to make yet more in each of those two years.
Furthermore, there aren’t enough votes to get all of the Obamacare taxes passed in this bill. And, at least some Obamacare taxes must be repealed in order to be able to effect significant tax code reform.
Finally, the only politically possible alternative to passing a bill that repeals only some of the Obamacare taxes is to preserve the status quo and all of the Obamacare taxes.
Paul knows all of this, of course; he’s just virtue signaling.
I have to ask, then: on whose side is he?