Ron Paul's got it just about right

Rep. Ron Paul has offered up one of the boldest plans for returning the nation to constitutionally limited government I have seen in my lifetime.

It's better even than what Ronald Reagan proposed in the 1980s.

Paul notes correctly that the U.S. government is spending in excess of $1 trillion more than the revenues it takes in from income taxes, gasoline taxes, Social Security taxes, tariffs, fees, interest and every other source.

Paul's solution is simple. Instead of borrowing more and more to keep up with government growth, cut spending to keep up with revenues.

Many have suggested it's a radical idea – extremist, irresponsible. They say it will result in Americans dying in the streets. They paint all kinds of dire imagery – people starving, children begging. You get the picture.

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For my part, I say, it's a good start. I can't wait for phase two.

Government isn't saving people's lives; it's ruining them. The bureaucracies have become self-perpetuating by encouraging government dependency, by persuading citizen and non-citizens alike they are entitled to food, health care, housing, education and every other blessed thing just because they are breathing.

That only works for a little while. Then government decides whether you can breathe or not.

We are very close to the tipping point in America today.

And that's why Ron Paul's initiative is so refreshing and welcome.

I hope it becomes the source of intense debate in the Republican presidential campaign. I hope it weeds out the men and women from the boys and girls.

There's just no denying Paul is right about this, and, no matter what disagreements we might have with Paul on other issues, we collectively owe him a debt of gratitude for proposing the only viable solution for Washington's political incontinence.

By the way, if you don't realize how bold this solution is, consider this: House Republicans alone could have enacted cuts this deep all by themselves by simply voting no on raising the debt limit last summer. If they had simply done that, Barack Obama himself would have had no choice but to cut $1 trillion in spending this year or, I suppose, declare martial law and name himself fuhrer.

Ron Paul was on the right side of that debate, too – but only 21 other Republican House members, including Michele Bachmann, voted no.

That's how close we were to getting our country back – not in 2013, but in 2011. The Republicans in the House alone could have done it. But instead they voted to give Obama hundreds of billions more to keep on spending recklessly and irresponsibly. They literally have no one to blame but themselves.

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That's why whatever happens in the 2012 presidential election, the Republicans are going to need new leadership in both houses of Congress. John Boehner and Eric Cantor and even Paul Ryan need to go. They are not conservatives – not at all. They are part of the establishment that supported continued borrowing – now and for the future as far as the eye can see.

I've been critical of Ron Paul from time to time because I disagree with him about important matters like national security.

But I want to take time out here to thank him publicly for standing up for constitutionally limited government with these cuts. I can even quibble about where to make the cuts. But he got the big number right. We're overspending by at least $1 trillion a year right now. That can mean only one thing – you've got to eliminate $1 trillion in spending.

It sounds simple. Maybe it's just too simple for Washington to understand.