{"id":3756,"date":"2013-04-02T12:18:22","date_gmt":"2013-04-02T16:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eportfolios.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/?p=3756"},"modified":"2013-04-02T12:18:22","modified_gmt":"2013-04-02T16:18:22","slug":"standwithrand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/2013\/04\/02\/standwithrand\/","title":{"rendered":"#StandWithRand"},"content":{"rendered":"

On March 6, #StandWithRand was the hashtag trending worldwide on Twitter.\u00a0 On that day, Senator Rand Paul, the junior Senator from Kentucky, pulled off a 12 hour and 52 minute filibuster of the nomination of President Obama\u2019s candidate for CIA Director, John Brennan. \u00a0\u00a0While some have called Senator Paul\u2019s filibuster a waste of time, many others believe it may have been a watershed moment for the Republican Party and American politics as a whole.<\/p>\n

The filibuster a tactic used in the Senate to prevent (or in this case, to delay) a vote on a particular piece of legislation or senatorial duty such as confirming presidential appointees.\u00a0 Simply put, a senator or a group of senators get up and talk until they can\u2019t talk anymore. \u00a0The only way to end a filibuster is by invoking cloture with a 3\/5 majority vote (60 Senators.)\u00a0Most filibusters, such as Strom Thurmond\u2019s record-setting 24 hour and 18 minute filibuster of the 1957 Civil Rights Bill, are filled with time-filling gimmicks such as the reading of long documents.\u00a0 However, Senator Paul\u2019s filibuster was a real dialogue that captured the attention of the nation, brought to light key constitutional issues, and declared war against the Washington establishment.<\/p>\n

So what in the world did John Brennan do to warrant an almost 13 hour debate on his nomination?\u00a0 The answer is nothing, and the filibuster had very little to do with Brennan at all.\u00a0The issue at hand was the Obama administration\u2019s drone program.\u00a0 The drone program started by President Bush and expanded by President Obama has been an effective tactic in hunting down al-Qaeda\u2019s top leaders, but has caused a great amount of controversy.\u00a0The killing of U.S. citizen Anwar Al-Awlaki in Yemen on September 30, 2011 brought forth a series of important questions that no one seemed to be able to answer. If an American citizen can be killed on foreign soil without a trial if they are simply deemed a terrorist, what exactly are the criteria for determining who is a terrorist?\u00a0 Will these drone attacks make their way to America?\u00a0 Could they be used against an American citizen on American soil without due process?<\/p>\n

Brennan repeatedly dodged questions about the drone program during his February 7 hearing and left many liberty-minded Americans outraged.\u00a0To the rescue came Senator Rand Paul, who demanded an answer from the Obama administration on these questions.\u00a0 Senator Paul began his filibuster of the nomination at 11:47 A.M. on March 6. He demanded that either the Senate pass a resolution saying that it is the opinion of the Senate that drone strikes in America would be unconstitutional or Attorney General Eric Holder issue an official response to the question.\u00a0Rand would get neither until the next day, when Holder responded to the question with a simple \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here is perhaps the most memorable quote from Senator Paul\u2019s filibuster:<\/p>\n

\u201cI will speak until I can no longer speak. I will speak as long as it takes, until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial by jury are precious, that no American should be killed by a drone on American soil without first being charged with a crime, without first being found to be guilty by a court.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Senator Paul, who was later joined by Senators such as Mike Lee (R-UT,) Marco Rubio (R-FL,) Ron Wyden (D-OR,) and Ted Cruz (R-TX,) held the floor for nearly 13 hours.\u00a0 A memorable moment during the filibuster occurred during its later hours, when Senator Cruz read from Ronald Reagan\u2019s 1964 \u201cA Time for Choosing\u201d speech.\u00a0 This speech lifted Reagan from a washed-up Hollywood movie star to a rising star in the Republican Party.\u00a0I think it is fair to ask if this filibuster was Rand Paul\u2019s \u201cA Time for Choosing\u201d moment.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As a libertarian, Rand has certainly beaten the odds in becoming a rising star in the party.\u00a0The relationship between libertarians and the powerful Republican establishment has been hostile over the years, cumulating in the GOP throwing out many of Ron Paul\u2019s delegates at the 2012 Republican National Convention and refusing to officially put the congressman\u2019s name up for nomination. Ron\u2019s son Rand hasn\u2019t backed down from his principles, but he has carefully crafted his message to appeal to the party\u2019s base, powerful conservative talk radio personalities, and various television pundits.\u00a0 With many of his father\u2019s former \u201cenemies\u201d on his side, Rand will have a fantastic shot at winning the Republican nomination in 2016.\u00a0 With the exception of perhaps Marco Rubio, no one in the party today has come even close to generating as much buzz as Senator Paul has since the election.<\/p>\n

In December, I wrote about the GOP\u2019s growing \u201clibertarian problem\u201d<\/a> and how the party should welcome libertarians with open arms and build a coalition.\u00a0 I also wrote that the party must find the next Ronald Reagan, as I believe success in presidential elections has much more to do with \u201cwho is the better candidate\u201d than ideology.\u00a0Could a coalition of liberty-minded conservatives and libertarians win over the Republican Party?\u00a0Could Rand play the part of Reagan and win over democrats and independents who rarely vote Republican?\u00a0 Are we headed for an ideological revolution in the GOP and eventually in America?\u00a0 Only time will answer these questions, but it is clear that Senator Paul can\u2019t and won\u2019t be ignored like his father was.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On March 6, #StandWithRand was the hashtag trending worldwide on Twitter.\u00a0 On that day, Senator Rand Paul, the junior Senator from Kentucky, pulled off a 12 hour and 52 minute filibuster of the nomination of President Obama\u2019s candidate for CIA Director, John Brennan. \u00a0\u00a0While some have called Senator Paul\u2019s filibuster a waste of time, many…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":703,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[42,524,529,685,809,913,974,1133,1172,1244,1331,1415,1569,1596,1808,1849,1887,1888,1966,2167,2372],"class_list":["post-3756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nation-and-world","tag-standwithrand","tag-confirmation","tag-conservatives","tag-drones","tag-filibuster","tag-gop","tag-hashtag","tag-john-brennan","tag-kentucky","tag-libertarian","tag-marco-rubio","tag-mike-lee","tag-obama","tag-opinions","tag-rand-paul","tag-republican","tag-ron-wyden","tag-ronald-reagan","tag-senator","tag-ted-cruz","tag-vote"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/703"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3756\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}