Ron Paul would not have cut social programs, until the economy picked up the slack.
and even then would have gone real slow he knows people depend on those programs.
He would have started with about a $500 billion cut to foreign spending and the military.
He would have followed that with cuts to corprate welfare.
Giving money to big Agrobuisness for example would stop.
Dept. of Education, Transportation, Homeland Security and Agroculture
amoungst others would all be getting a good looking at.
He would have vetoed any budget that was not balaced.
Social security he was going to allow young people to opt out.
Basicly put they SS withholdings into some sort of savings. (A real, personal SS lock box)
But people on Social security would still have gotten it.
IMO, he believes SS is a contract that government made with the people.
He would have figured out a way to cover them. (Libertarians are real big on contracts)
He said he wanted the budget cut to about what it was in 2000.
That would have ended the IRS and income taxes.
Money would have flowed into the economy big time creating jobs.
He was of the oppinion that people have been trained to think the government was going to hook them up.
He was not going to just cut everything and let them hang in the wind.
He was going to start weening people off the system,
To ween people off the government dole he was going to
encourage the market to provide jobs and servaces the government currently provides.
To get people off welfare you must provide jobs, to provide jobs you must free buisnesses to make jobs.
If for whatever reason the Market didn't provide jobs the programs would still have been there.
He was looking at a transitional period from the system we have now to a more libertarian system.
I trust him a hell of a lot more on medical matters then I trust Obama, He is a doctor. (A baby Doctor)
He never accepted government insurance at his practice (if I remember correctly)
But the Dems and Republicans could never rout him out of that district.
The Dems said it was because of the women voters.
He had delivered half the babys in the main town there and
the other half were delivered by his partner.
So he must have been doing something right.
So Med, Let me sum this up. He didn't believe in social programs as they are now.
But he would not have just cut the people off.
He would have looked for better ways to ween them off the system.
Let the system die a natural death instead of perpetual government.
He was about transition not just letting people hang out to dry.
The longer this system of debt based economics is allowed to go on
the harder the inevitable transition will be.
If this spending continues at this rate it will mean the end of all
social programs as the whole damn system falls apart.
Now I'm not a Ron Paul expert but I think this about sums up the thing.