by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA
Birthplace of Independent Conservatism

It should surprise no one that republican Senator Susan Collins (D-ME) jumped out front and announced she doesn’t support Congressman Ryan’s plan to reduce the national debt by cutting 5.8 trillion dollars in spending over the next ten years. One of the Senate’s most “moderate” Republicans is in reality is a Democrat with an R behind her name.

While Collins commented that she respected Ryan for having the courage to put forth a detailed plan she immediately expressed her non support. For now Ryan’s plan is the only plan that in fact addresses the long term structural problems of entitlements and wasteful bureaucratic spending.

It seems to me that the prudent course of action for a supposedly republican senator to take would have been to wait until the issue came to the Senate floor for debate. At that time she could have debated her concerns with her colleagues in the Senate.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine.) said Friday that she will not support the 2012 budget passed by the House last week.

“I don’t happen to support Congressman Ryan’s plan but at least he had the courage to put forth a plan to significantly reduce the debt,” Collins said on “In the Arena” a program on WCSH 6, a local NBC affiliate in Portland, Maine.

Collins is the first Republican senator to state publicly that she will not support the Ryan budget.

The plan, crafted by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), would cut $5.8 trillion in spending over 10 years and transform Medicare into a sort of voucher system, among other measures, to balance the budget by 2040 without raising taxes.

The budget proposal passed the House last Friday but is expected to fail in the Senate. The House voted 235-193 to pass the proposal, with only four Republicans voting aginst it. No Democrat voted for the plan. {Read More}

I’m thinking RINO for sure. And as they say in Maine, “Ya can’t get thar from here.” Certainly that is true with respect to the President’s non-plan. Ryan’s plan at least offers a plausible road to reduce the debt without confiscating more of the fruits of the people’s labor.

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Cross posted to Rational Nation USA

Via: Memeorandum