Sen. Rand Paul's plan for cutting $500 billion from the federal budget is more parlor game than serious proposal, as evidenced by its lack of co-sponsors.
You can learn a lot from games, though. So let's imagine the country we'd have if Kentucky's freshman senator were in charge.
Start with education. Paul wants to de-fund everything except Pell Grants for college students.
If his plan had been in place in 2007-08, the year before the Great Recession, Kentucky's public schools would have been $711 million poorer. Fayette County schools would have lost $31 million and the schools in Warren County, Paul's home, $11 million.
As Paul points out, federal money can't be used any way local districts choose and comes with "red tape." Indeed, federal dollars are largely targeted at leveling the playing field for poor and disabled children.
Kentucky last year received $147 million through the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, money that educates disabled children and that would go away if Paul had his way.
Also lost to Kentucky would be $435 million for schools with high percentages of low-income students and $7 million through the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, named for a Kentuckian in Congress whose values could not have been more different than Paul's.
To read the complete editorial, visit www.kentucky.com.