By Doug Bandow
Say it ain’t so! Rep. Ron Paul votes against corporate welfare. And the Chamber of Commerce marks him down.
My friend Tim Carney explains in the Washington Examiner:
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has issued its 2009 congressional scorecard, and once again, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Tex. – certainly one of the two most free-market politicians in Washington – gets the lowest score of any Republican.
Paul was one of a handful of GOP lawmakers not to win the Chamber’s “Spirit of Enterprise Award.” He scored only a 67%, bucking the Chamber on four votes, including:
- Paul opposed the “Solar Technology Roadmap Act,” which boosted subsidies for unprofitable solar energy technology.
- Paul opposed the “Travel Promotion Act,” which subsidizes the tourism industry with a new fee on international visitors.
- Paul opposed the largest spending bill in history, Obama’s $787 billion stimulus bill.
(Rep John Duncan, R-Tenn., tied Ron Paul with 67%. John McHugh, R-N.Y., scored a 40%, but he missed most of the year because he went off to the Obama administration.)
It’s too bad that the national Chamber of Commerce puts the interests of business before that of the free marketplace and liberty. Thankfully Rep. Paul puts the interest of the American public before that of the Chamber of Commerce.
Doug Bandow, American Conservative Defense Alliance