Where’s Paul Ryan these days? Well, he’s always in the last place you look, which could be anywhere because I certainly haven’t been looking for him. One place Paul Ryan is not: at a podium answering questions, because he canceled his weekly press conference to avoid talking to reporters about why he endorsed a man responsible for a “textbook definition of a racist comment.”
Paul says that he cancelled his time with the press because Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is visiting. But what a weird state of affairs — politicians are incapable of talking to the media for a week when a foreign head of state makes a visit? Sure, okay. (To be fair, Modi actually sounds like a pretty fun guy. addressing Congress, he said of Indian Americans, “They are among your best CEOs, academics, astronauts, scientists, economists, doctors — even spelling bee champions.” Lol.)
Anyway, Nancy Pelosi wasted no time in getting in a good zing: “Speaker Paul Ryan will not be available to answer your questions today about his surrender to Donald Trump,” her office wrote. “Speaker Ryan has cancelled his regular Wednesday press conference so you don’t ask him about Donald Trump’s racist commentary against a federal judge, and why, ahead of their national security agenda rollout tomorrow, the House GOP wants to hand the nuclear codes to a person who engages in textbook racism.”
Haha, good one. Who do you think is a funnier politician, Nancy Pelosi or Narendra Modi? (It’s a trick question, neither one of them is funny because like all actors someone else writes their material.)
Earlier this week, Paul did his best to get out from under his Trump endorsement by creating a momentary diversion in the form of an anti-poverty plan. Alas, that’s far too boring to compete with any news involving Trump. And also, it’s possibly one of the worst anti-poverty plans since “let them eat cake.”
For example, tucked away in Paul’s proposal is a repeal of a law that requires financial advisors to offer advice in the best interests of their client, rather than in their own best interests. “It looks more like an agenda for creating poverty than reducing it,” wrote America’s cool best friend, Elizabeth Warren.
How could it possibly combat poverty to give poor people bad financial advice? Paul must have a good answer to that question, but it probably involves shouting “look over there” and throwing a smoke bomb before falling through a trap door concealed in the stage.
He also just released a national security plan, one phase of which is simply entitled “Defend Freedom.” It doesn’t get much more detailed than that. (Defend the freedom of financial advisors to rip off their clients?)
In addition to releasing plans about poverty and security, the GOP is preparing to release plans for the economy, tax reform, health care, and “The Constitution.” Uhhhh what? What’s their plan for The Constitution? “Coming this month,” is all that a GOP website says. Can’t wait.
What we’re probably seeing with this barrage of plans is a race to get out ahead of Donald Trump, and to establish a GOP agenda before he can trample through the party and tell them what they stand for. Maybe that’ll work — but it’s hard to see how the party can maintain any control over its nominee if the Speaker of the House’s strategy is to use any excuse he can to hide from reporters.
