2025 New Year’s Resolutions for DC, Pt. One

By Ron Paul

​When the end of another year rolls around it is not a bad idea to think about how we might improve ourselves and perhaps even improve the lives of others given the clean slate of a New Year. Many people resolve to exercise more, eat better, spend more time with their families. These are all worthy goals, but shouldn’t our elected officials and the bureaucrats who run DC be making some resolutions of their own? Here are a few suggestions.

First up is Congress. Next month the 119th US Congress will be sworn in, with Republican majorities in both Houses. With every opinion poll we see how the US public holds Congress in contempt. How about doing something about it? What about returning to the Constitution? That means no more 1,500 page omnibus spending bills which hide countless unconstitutional surveillance, censorship, and police state measures behind convoluted legislative language. Return to the normal legislative process and pass individual, clean appropriations bills with open rules that allow maximum participation from each Member or Senator.

Then spend the rest of the year renaming post offices, if you want. The American people will thank you for it.

Americans are rightly furious that President Biden has sent as much as $200 billion to fund Ukraine’s futile war with Russia, but where did Biden get that money? From Congress. The Founding Fathers gave Congress the ability to check the Executive branch’s foreign adventurism with the power of the purse. Every US foreign policy fiasco of the 21st century could have been prevented had Congress only had the courage to say “no” when the President and the military-industrial complex demanded money for a new overseas conflict.

Next, the Executive Branch. On January 20th we will begin the second Trump Administration. Trump appealed to war-weary American voters by promising no new wars and an end to the current conflicts we are involved in overseas. A good place to start would be an announcement on day one that US troops would be removed from Syria. We learned only last week that the Biden Administration had been lying to us about the number of troops in Syria, but the real question is why do we have troops there at all? Trump rightly said it is not our war, so why not just march home?

Likewise, Ukraine. As a parting “gift” to the American people, President Biden just announced another six billion to Ukraine. Most of that money – like the billions before – will end up in the hands of the US military-industrial complex, with a few billion stolen by the corrupt Ukraine government. Even the US mainstream media admits that Ukraine has lost the war. So why are we draining the US treasury and draining the population of Ukraine for a lost cause? President Trump: end the funding and end the war.

We should be cautiously optimistic that should Trump’s nominees to head the FBI and the Intelligence Community make it through the Senate we might finally be able to see the deep state lose its grip. That’s the best news possible. We need to rein in the CIA from overseas conflicts and end the FBI’s wars on our civil liberties at home.

Keeping just a few resolutions like these above will produce a more peaceful and prosperous New Year!