Jim Rubens spoke to the Pemi Baker Valley Republican Committee dinner this evening, Saturday July 27, 2013. He spoke of his political experience which interested people can review at his web site, http://jimrubens.com/. Below are my notes and commentary.
He supports replacing Federal Income taxes with the FAIR Tax. He opposes the Senate Immigration bill because it depresses wages. He likes the approach taken by the House to have multiple immigration related bills including border security, and he understands that the children of illegals are rightly citizens. He opposes energy subsidies and corporate welfare. He supports the Second Amendment and would not restrict gun rights any more than NH currently does. He is concerned about our national debt and unfunded liabilities (I’m fairly happy with these positions except for citizenship for the children of illegals and questions on the details of his immigration bills) and believes he can work with others in the Senate to address healthcare, Medicare and social security problems (naïve).
He opposes Senator Lee’s proposal to pass a continuing resolution that funds all of government except Obamacare, he feels we have many healthcare problems to solve and apparently we should do it within Obamacare. He thinks the Federal Government’s share of GDP is appropriately about 19%. He is not sure about Senator Lee’s proposed Balanced Budget Amendment although I think he believes we should not spend more than we take in. He wants to impose a cap and trade system to restrict carbon emissions, so apparently he believes in man-made global warming (I didn’t get a chance to ask). (He lost my support when he admitted opposition to Senator Lee’s proposal and things didn’t get any better.)
Rubens talked about the high cost of our health care which according to the WHO only provides us with mediocre health care. He has fallen for the liberal arguments on this and didn’t realize that the WHO doesn’t measure quality of healthcare as rational people would measure it (at least in developed countries). The WHO values single payer universal healthcare without co-pays as better than a system with private insurance and co-pays that provides far superior healthcare results. Nor did Rubens apparently understand that different criteria are used in different countries in reporting healthcare results, few countries report based on our strict standards.
(It always amuses me when people condemn our healthcare based on the WHO ratings. If the WHO ratings meant anything meaningful, why would the world’s rich people come here for healthcare rather than Columbia which is ranked 14 places ahead of us, Greece which is ranked 22 places ahead of the US, or other higher ranking countries? Why didn’t Michael Moore, who so highly praised the Cuban healthcare system, go to Cuba when he needed medical care rather than get it here? Liberals and progressives denigrate our healthcare system for one reason, they want the control of money and people that comes with a single payer healthcare system.)
I don’t recall a discussion of any social issues, perhaps they, and details of his immigration plan, will come up when he speaks at the next Belknap County Republican meeting on August 14.
