Rand Paul v. Bernie Sanders: Coming to a Town Near You?

Petition Could Lead to Paul and Sanders Facing Off in Debate

by Josh Guckert

In the past few weeks, Truth in Media has begun a petition to gather support for a town hall debate between two of the most interesting and principled 2016 Presidential candidates: Democrat Bernie Sanders and Republican Rand Paul. The petition has thus far garnered nearly 5,000 signatures, and Senator Paul has already agreed to participate “Anywhere, anytime.” Meanwhile, Senator Sanders has offered “no comment.”

In a cycle that has produced two Republican debates, both of which have centered more on celebrity than substance, an ideological sparring between a democratic socialist and a libertarian conservative would be more than welcome. In addition to clearly laying out the differences between two very different perspectives, it would give both campaigns the opportunities to shine in a well-publicized atmosphere, perhaps giving momentum to each in the process.

The two candidates have sparred already on Twitter, when Sanders live-Tweeted the second GOP debate. When Paul made the point that the corporate tax system has driven businesses abroad, Sanders Tweeted that Paul was wrong, and that instead, “We’ve lost millions of jobs because of our disastrous trade policies.” Paul responded the next day with a Tweet directed to Sanders, stating that “socialism requires force[. . .]for me[,] I’ll choose freedom.”

.@BernieSanders socialism requires force, for me I’ll choose freedom. #standwithrand

— Dr. Rand Paul (@RandPaul) September 17, 2015

Paul continued on a few days later at the Heritage Foundation candidates forum, stating in response to a question about Sanders that “there is no free lunch,” and then Tweeting the video clip to Sanders himself, asking “who’s going to pay for all of your ‘free’ stuff?”

.@BernieSanders who’s going to pay for all of your “free” stuff? https://t.co/1DNsnuzfgo

— Dr. Rand Paul (@RandPaul) September 21, 2015

If these two candidates take the opportunity to debate, it would give Americans the chance to see a rare discourse between opposing sides that is rarely seen in modern politics. As candidates over the years have focused more on messaging than substance, semantics have seemed to overtake ideas in confrontations on the merits of the appropriate size of government.

This would hope to be different. Neither Sanders nor Paul has ever cared as much about winning votes as they have promoting ideas. The two outsiders have consistently confronted their own parties (although Sanders is not actually a Democrat, he does caucus with them), and have never been afraid to challenge political orthodoxy in order to make a point.

While the two Senators are at odds on many issues, they also share similarities in areas like the War on Drugs, foreign interventionism, corporate welfare, and criminal justice reform. However, much more notable are their differences on the fundamental topics of taxes and spending.

On a more basic level, the largest point of disagreement between libertarians and socialists is the concept of ownership. While libertarians think that each individual owns him or herself, socialists seem to think that people could not exist or function without the assistance of the state, and therefore, the government is entitled to take back from citizens that which they could not have earned on their own, so that so-called “social justice” can prosper.

Conversely, libertarians recognize that any wealth earned should belong to the person who earned it, and that any taxation should be modest (if it is to exist at all). In addition, while socialists believe regulation is needed to “protect” consumers, libertarians believe that the “invisible hand” of the free market does a significantly better job without infringing upon freedoms.

There is plenty more time for the Paul-Sanders debate to come to fruition; but Americans of all political persuasions should hope that it does. While each are contending for the nominations of the two “major parties,” a discussion on some outside-the-box ideas could perhaps spur Americans to realize that there is more to political thought than “left” and “right.”