Senator Rand Paul's Personal Entitlement

Senator Rand Paul obviously likes to talk.  He's like a mirror attracting light, going anywhere he can find a television camera.

A 13 hour rambling filibuster, staged to underscore his objection to President Obama's nomination of John Brennan to head the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was doomed; but he wasted everybody's time, anyway.  Of course, he succeeded in gaining the attention a 3 year old would garner by creating a tantrum.

By occupying so much wasted time, preaching to practically nobody on the US Senate floor, Senator Paul still absorbed a salary paid for by the American tax payer. In other words, Senator Paul took an entitlement, because he produced nothing in exchange for the wasted time. He filibustered about a nominee who will be approved, regardless of his tantrum. Moreover, the filibuster was supposed to be a protest against a policy on drones, about which Senator Paul has no expertise, whatsoever.

Throughout Senator Paul's attention grabbing filibuster, he didn't ask the Central Intelligence Agency to produce data about how many lives drones saved while tracking and killing terrorists.   Drones protect US military forces who are on the ground fighting terrorism.  Nevertheless, Senator Paul filibustered 13 hours in protest of Mr. Brennan's nomination, just because he could, but didn't ask any productive questions in the process.  He was paid while engaged in a meaningless filibuster.

Senator Paul wants proof that the CIA won't use drones against American citizens in our own country.  Yet, it doesn't take a George Smiley style spy to figure out there are weirdo vigilantes engaged in sedition against our own government.  I vote for drones to seek them out, before they produce another Timothy McVeigh, who was executed for bombing the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, a domestic terrorist act driven by anger at the US government.  McVeigh killed 168 people and injured hundreds more in his domestic terrorist attack. Drones can, possibly, deter terrorists like McVeigh from doing harm to our own citizens by their ability to monitor seditious movements.

Of course, Americans should ask how drones will impact our everyday lives, but their  technology could provide extra security against unforeseen threats from foreign and domestic terrorism.

Filibustering Brennan's nomination to lead the CIA, because of a nebulous administration policy, is no way to evaluate the morality of using drones.  Rather, it's an example of how one US Senator continues to receive a tax payer entitlement, in the form of his salary, for the purpose of wasting time.  

If the Occupy movement had staged a protest of this nature on the Senate floor, the Capitol security guards would have thrown them all out and into jail.  

When Tea Party activists stage protests against the government, we call them right wing extremists.  

When Senators wastes time, it's called a filibuster.