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SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Want to turn now to Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. Senator, good morning, welcome back to Meet the Press SENATOR RAND PAUL: Good morning, glad to be with you. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: You have a statement on your website stating that you are, quote, "Working tirelessly to end this government shutdown." Fact of the matter is, there is one way to end the shutdown right now, have Speaker Boehner put a bill, a clean budget resolution on the floor of the House, it would pa** with Republicans, it would pa** with Democrats. Will you call on Speaker Boehner to do that this morning? SENATOR RAND PAUL: We've been putting out clean C.R.'s, or Continuing Resolutions all week. We've been trying to fund government. We've been trying to reopen government. And at every point, Harry Reid said no. He doesn't want to open government. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: You've been putting on clean C.R.s? No strings attached? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Clean C.R.'s? Well, yeah. We've been trying to fund different parts of government all week. We've pa**ed bill after bill after bill. Harry Reid-- SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Okay, that's a piecemeal approach, no? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, no it's not. It's the same thing. These are clean C.R.'s, meaning that there's no strings attached. We've been pa**ing N.I.H. funding, veterans funding. And here's the thing that people don't realize. That's historically the way it's always been. You pa** small appropriation bills so you can look at them individually. It's actually a much better way to run government, because right now, you're sticking everything into one bill and that's why the leverage of shutting the government down occurs. But if you did things appropriately and you pa**ed appropriation bills one at a time, no one would be able to shut down government ever. So really if Harry Reid has done his job, we wouldn't be in this position at all. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Senator, you were one of the ones early on who said you didn't think a government shutdown was a good idea. However, when House Republicans made the defunding of ObamaCare or even the delay of ObamaCare their sticking point at which they would shut the government down if they didn't get it, didn't they basically make this result inevitable, by making that what they took a stand on? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, I think you've got it backwards. The House Republicans said they would fund all of government, and they did. They funded all of government short of one program. So they really were never wanting to shut down government over this. They were wanting to fund government and then have a debate over ObamaCare. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: But come on, they have tried to defund ObamaCare more than 40 times. They know what the result will be. They live in the real world too. They knew this action would lead to a shutdown, and it did. SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, I think that when you look at legislation, when you say the president wants 100% of ObamaCare or he will shut down the government, that's exactly what's happened. If he doesn't get 100% of his way, his way or the highway, then they won't do any spending bills that don't include everything that he wants. That's him unwilling to negotiate. That's him being unwilling to compromise. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: But why is it even a matter of a negotiation when it's pa**ed both houses of Congress, it's been signed by the president, it's been challenged in the Supreme Court, it's been upheld by the Supreme Court. It was a central issue in the 2012 election campaign, and the president won reelection. Why is that a legitimate point of negotiation right now? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, because it's Congress's job to oversee spending. The power of the purse resides with Congress and they fund programs every year. So it's not their obligation once something is law to never change it. For example, in 1983, we changed social security. It'd been around 50 years and the age of eligibility was 65. We changed it to 67 because social security was going bankrupt. We faced some of those same problems again and it isn't that it's set in stone that we'll never revisit Medicare or Social Security or ObamaCare for that matter. So I think it's a silly argument for Democrats to say, "Oh, the law has been pa**ed. We can't ever change it." Well that's what Congress's job to do it. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Well, of course you can change it. You can change it if you-- of course, but you have to propose something that can get through the House, the Senate, and be signed by the President. Back in the '80s, they didn't shut down the government to make that happen, did they? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, how do you know what will pa** until you propose something and vote on it? So we've proposed several compromises. Our initial position, and still our position is we think ObamaCare is a bad idea and will hurt the people it was intended to help. But when that didn't pa**, when the Democrats didn't accept that, we said, "Well, what about a one-year delay?" We've been offering compromise after compromise. But you hear from the president and his men and his women, "No negotiation." His way or the highway. They're the ones who are unwilling to compromise on any facet of ObamaCare. And I think that intransigence has led to the shutdown of the government. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: You talk about compromise a lot with regard to ObamaCare. I'm just curious what part of ObamaCare do you like and want to keep? Which half of it? SENATOR RAND PAUL: I don't really like any of ObamaCare. But I realize I'm not going to get my way. But we do control a third of the government. People did elect us to fight. Sixty-one percent of the people in Kentucky voted for Romney. Seventy percent of people in Kentucky don't like ObamaCare. So the thing is, is I'm supposed to go and fight to make bills either less bad or make them better if possible. So I think it is my job to stand up and provide oversight for legislation. It's precisely what Congress is supposed to be doing. This is Congress's job. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: The healthcare rollout this week, by many, many accounts, did not go that well. We just talked about it with Treasury Secretary Lew. And yet, all the headlines are about the government shutdown. Let me show you actually the front page of the Lexington paper. And you'll see the top headline says, "Feeling the Shutdown." And there, buried below the fold, talks about the healthcare glitches with the ObamaCare rollout. Did Republicans make a strategic error by instead of just letting this law go into effect and let the chips fall, let people really experience it and find out if it's as bad as you say, instead shutting down the government and now that's the subject? SENATOR RAND PAUL: It's always difficult to make decisions. But most of us ran for office. I ran for office because I was concerned about the overwhelming debt that our country's accruing. A trillion dollars a year, we're borrowing a million dollars every minute. So I'm worried about the overall financial picture of the country. And so whether or not it was a good strategic idea, I don't know. But when are we supposed to stand up and say, "Look, we're out of money and we're destroying this country by this burden of debt"? And so I think you've got to stand up, whether it's debt ceiling or whether it's continuing resolution. We have to talk about the big picture. And the big picture is not an immediate default. The big picture is this gradual bankruptcy that's occurring of this country.

SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: All right, Senator Paul, I'll ask you to standby. We'll have more with you in a moment. And I will ask Senator Paul about this open-mic moment this week. SENATOR RAND PAUL (ON TAPE): Well, I know we don't want to be here, but we're going to win this, I think. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: And later, the White House says millions are racing to sign up online for ObamaCare, but widespread problems with the website have some asking if the administration was ready for them. Plus, our political roundtable. Government by crisis? We'll ask the question is this any way to run a country. And did the administration miss its moment on Syria? My one-on-one conversation with the U.S. amba**ador to the United Nations, Samantha Power. We'll be back in one minute. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: And we are back with a few more minutes with Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. Senator, earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal quoted a senior White House official who said, "We don't care how long this shutdown lasts, we're winning." That infuriated Speaker Boehner. Take a look. SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER (ON TAPE): I get The Wall Street Journal out, and it says, "Oh, we don't care how long this lasts because we're winning." This isn't some damn game. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: All, and then here you are caught on an open mic with Senator Mitch McConnell a little bit earlier this week, take a listen. SENATOR RAND PAUL (ON TAPE): I think if we keep saying, "We wanted to defund it, we fought for that, but now we're willing to compromise on this," I think they can't-- we're going to win-- we-- I think, well, I know we don't want to be here, but we're going to win this, I think." SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Senator, I brought those two things up side by side for a reason. Winning, losing, battle of the talking points, dueling cable appearances. Do you in Washington, do all of you, have any idea how totally disgusted the American people are with these antics? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Yeah, no, I think these are all legitimate concerns. And I think really we should point back to where the root of the problem is. The root of the problem here is, is that we are not pa**ing appropriation bills like we should. We have 12 different appropriation bills. We should pa** them one at a time. Government should never shut down if we're doing our job appropriately. So really what we need to be saying is, why are we not pa**ing spending bills the way we should do it. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Do you take any responsibility for the tone, for your part in this? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Well, I think that in order to have compromise, the other side has to negotiate. We've been willing to compromise and negotiate. The other thing is, is we don't control the spending bills. The House has been putting forward spending bills and still continues to do so. It's the Democrats in the Senate who refuse to pa** individual spending bills. And that's what you're supposed to do is pa** individual spending bills. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: You're somebody who is an emerging national figure. The latest Quinnipiac poll had you actually winning the presidential preference poll among Republicans. Do you think this strategy, shutting down the government, which two-thirds of Americans don't like as a tactic, even if they don't like ObamaCare, do you think that's potentially undercutting the Republican Party's chances of winning something beyond the House of Representatives, either the Senate or the White House? SENATOR RAND PAUL: I think it's extremely bad for the president to shut down the government. And he's the one shutting it down because frankly he's unwilling to compromise. We are willing to negotiate, we're willing to compromise. The president says his way or the highway. So ultimately, I think it is bad for the president. I think it's bad for both parties. But the only way to get to a resolution is to negotiate. We're willing to negotiate. We're every day pa**ing bills to reopen government and every day Harry Reid's vetoing every bill we send over. We've sent over six bills this week to reopen government and he dismisses them out of hand. So we're the ones trying to open government. The Democrats say, "Keep it closed," because they like it being closed. They think they can beat up on us politically. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Well, if they like it being closed, why would you then fall into that trap? I mean, if they think it's actually hurting you more and polls suggest perhaps it is, why are you allowing that to happen? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Because they're important questions. ObamaCare's going to cost $2.6 trillion. We have a $17-trillion debt. We think these things are important and worth fighting over because they're not inconsequential. Some economists say that we're losing a million jobs a year just because of the burden of our debt. Is it worth standing up and saying, "It's emperor has no clothes, we're out of money," and that we should start to balance our budget and not spend money that we don't have? Yeah, it's absolutely important. And so sometimes you have to fight for what you believe in. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Very quickly, before I let you go, as you well know, there's a debt-ceiling vote on the horizon. Will Republicans let this country go into default? SENATOR RAND PAUL: I think it's irresponsible of the president and his men to even talk about default. There's no reason for us to default. We bring in $250 billion in taxes every month. Our interest payment is $20 billion. Tell me why we would ever default. We have legislation called the Full Faith and Credit Act, and it tells the president, "You must pay the interest on the debt." So this is a game. This is kind of like closing the World War II Memorial. They all get out on TV and they say, "Oh, we're going to default." They're the ones scaring the marketplace. We shouldn't scare the marketplace. We should never default. There's no reason to default. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Let's say your plan worked and you can pay the interest on the debt and you don't have a technical default. Wouldn't there be dramatic consequences on the economy anyway? It may not be the letter of the default, but the spirit of it? SENATOR RAND PAUL: Yeah, but look at what happened in 2011. Our credit rating was downgraded. But you know why? The reasoning they gave was because we have too much debt. That we weren't cutting enough spending. And so they downgraded us. It has to do with the big picture of how much debt we're accumulating. It isn't so much of these deadlines that the market's worried about. The market's also worried about a $17-trillion debt and that we're not acting fiscally responsibly and we're spending more money than we bring in. That's what the market's worried about. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE: Senator Rand Paul, it's always good to talk to you. Thank you for your time, sir. SENATOR RAND PAUL: Thank you.