Paul Ryan’s Conservative Policies and Ambitions
The story, by Jennifer Steinhauer, reported that “far-right media figures,” with encouragement from Tea Party extremists in the House, were on a “furious Internet expedition” to cover Ryan in “political silt” on account of his history of being “traitorous to conservatism.” To be sure, Ryan is on board with outlawing gay weddings and nearly all abortions, privatizing Social Security, voucherizing Medicare, abolishing Medicaid and replacing it with ever-diminishing block grants to the states, and ignoring global warming. His famously wonky budget proposals would shrink food stamps and college aid while cutting rich people’s taxes, in many cases by half. He requires his interns to read “Atlas Shrugged.” His treason consists solely of what Steinhauer calls “flashes of pragmatism,” such as questioning the wisdom of shutting down the government and/or forcing the Treasury to default on its obligations.
.. Ryan’s political business plan called for him to spend the next four years as the respected (among conservatives) chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, followed by eight triumphant years in the White House, followed by a comfortable retirement at the Ryan Presidential Library and Foundation. The prospect for him now is a short, harrowing, career-ending interval of misery on Capitol Hill followed by a lucrative but soul-killing job as a K Street lobbyist.