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Has Ron Paul Quit?
Lally Singh sends us to the inside-the-Beltway blog Wonkette for a quick take on a letter Ron Paul sent to his supporters. In this analysis, Dr. Paul has basically called it quits. "Late Friday night, Dr. Congressman Ron Paul posted a letter to his fans basically saying it's over, but he will continue talking about his message, and plus it would be completely embarrassing for him if he also lost his congressional seat."
FTA:
"Let me tell you my thoughts. With Romney gone, the chances of a brokered convention are nearly zero. But that does not affect my determination to fight on, in every caucus and primary remaining, and at the convention for our ideas, with just as many delegates as I can get. But with so many primaries and caucuses now over, we do not now need so big a national campaign staff, and so I am making it leaner and tighter. Of course, I am committed to fighting for our ideas within the Republican party, so there will be no third party run. I do not denigrate third parties -- just the opposite, and I have long worked to remove the ballot-access restrictions on them. But I am a Republican, and I will remain a Republican.
I also have another priority. I have constituents in my home district that I must serve. I cannot and will not let them down. And I have another battle I must face here as well. If I were to lose the primary for my congressional seat, all our opponents would react with glee, and pretend it was a rejection of our ideas. I cannot and will not let that happen.
In the presidential race and the congressional race, I need your support, as always. And I have plans to continue fighting for our ideas in politics and education that I will share with you when I can, for I will need you at my side. In the meantime, onward and upward! The neocons, the warmongers, the socialists, the advocates of inflation will be hearing much from you and me.
Sincerely,
Ron"
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
I'm an avid Ron Paul supporter, and voted for him in the primaries. That said, reality cannot be ignored or distorted, McCain will be the nominee. Focus should now be reshifted to helping Dr. Paul keep his seat in the House.
Let's learn from our lessons this time around. (Money bombs -can- work, Internet support doesn't necessarily translate to high election numbers, the power of the MSM to shape opinion, etc..) Next time around, if we have another candidate who supports liberty, with a voting record to back it up, we can try again. I may be an old man by then...
"Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies." -Thomas Jefferson
Having read the Ron Paul letter, he's not dropping out: he's just admitting that his Presidential campaign is simply going to be a platform for his ideas, and that the real focus will be on his re-election to Congress. Here are some important bits:
But that does not affect my determination to fight on, in every caucus and primary remaining, and at the convention for our ideas, with just as many delegates as I can get. But with so many primaries and caucuses now over, we do not now need so big a national campaign staff, and so I am making it leaner and tighter. Of course, I am committed to fighting for our ideas within the Republican party, so there will be no third party run. I also have another priority. I have constituents in my home district that I must serve. I cannot and will not let them down. And I have another battle I must face here as well. If I were to lose the primary for my congressional seat, all our opponents would react with glee, and pretend it was a rejection of our ideas. I cannot and will not let that happen.In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
Lew Rockwell is not the founder of the Austrian School. He is the founder of a think-tank that advocates that particular school of thought.
The Austrian School was founded by Ludwig von Mises and (Nobel Prize Winner) F.A. Hayek, among others.
Opinionated Law Student Strikes Again!
The "fight on" or the "every primary and caucus and at the convention" part?
You can't take the sky from me...
I am not in the cult, but I am very happy Ron Paul is running.
I saw my father change his political affiliation for the first time since he originally registered at the age of eighteen because of Ron Paul's message. That in itself is worth a lot.
I wouldn't necessarily have voted Paul, but I am glad my dad found a message to break through his increasingly jaded and hopeless view of American politicians.
That's good. Now, if only we can get Reaganomics recognized as the science that it is.
Maybe the astroturfing and spam can finally end now. Ron Paul definitely gets the award for most annoying campaign ever. I've never received spam in my inbox from any of the other candidates. And if I have to ignore one more invitation to a Ron Paul supporters group on facebook I'll scream.
One question though: what happens to all the money he raised? I'm sure he hasn't burned through all of it, and he raised a lot from what I've read. Now that he's running a "leaner" campaign he will be using it even slower.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
I've always thought the Soviet Union failed because it expected human nature to change. While it was saying, "From each according to his ability and to each according to his need," the people were saying, "As long as they pretend to pay us, we'll pretend to work." Guess which slogan had more power.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
Considering the economic wreckage that "science and empiricism" have delivered to the door, I wouldn't be too proud of traditional economic schools of thought right now. Measuring economic progress by the state of the stock market is a complete bust. The middle class and below are in pretty severe trouble right now. and have been for some time. A doctor's visit that cost $5 when I was a kid (the 60's) is now $90 (18x); fuel is up from 30 cents to three bucks (10x), cars from a few thousand to tens of thousands (10x to 20x and more), houses... houses are insane. In the face of all of this, minimum wage has risen from $1.25 in 1965 to $5.85, an increase of 4.7x altogether.
Maybe it is time for money to be backed by something tangible and valuable, instead of the federal nothing-in-reserve notes we have now, backed only by the printing of nothing-in-reserve notes on the one hand, and the incineration of nothing-in-reserve notes on the other. Maybe it is time for infinitely corrosive tax schemes like the income tax to go away. Maybe it is time we stopped trying to be the world's police presence, and shut down all those foreign bases. Maybe it is time for us to stop borrowing money, pay back our debts, and begin to spend only those monies that we can afford to spend.
Not that anything like this will happen. The US is going to find out what continuing these policies far past where they even appear to be doing any good takes us, because very few people are willing to disturb the status quo.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The reason is that tech people and libertarians tend to overlap as demographics. There are more of the former than the latter, but if you know what a Venn diagram is, you won't have problems understanding that.
For the record, Ron Paul is a REPUBLICAN with some libertarian ideas - NOT a "libertarian", even though he ran once or twice on the Libertarian Party ticket. He's more of what they call a "paleoconservative" than a "libertarian". There is a wide variety of "libertarians", both left and right. The ones that end up in the Libertarian Party tend to be, as Bob Black once said, "Republicans who smoke dope."
And his support didn't come from "white supremacists" - that was bullshit media spin based on a couple donations.
I'm an anarchist myself, so I couldn't care less, but it was fun to see him skewer the other Republican candidates with their militarism and economic stupidity.
If McCain becomes President, we'll be at war with Iran AND Pakistan within six months - and the US economy will completely collapse as China dumps the dollar because they were cut off from Iranian oil and gas. Electing that senile old fool is a vote for the destruction of the United States.
Unfortunately, electing either Obama or Clinton will end up in the same place - it will just take a little longer as they screw around with "diplomacy" before starting their wars. Neither of them, let alone McCain, have any clue about US foreign policy.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
http://www.politicalcompass.org/usprimaries2008 actually lists all three of the as conservative.
I put the 't' in electrical engineering.
Backed by something? Other currencies aren't backed by anything tangible either. That's not the reason the US dollar is crapping out.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Gold is tangible, gold is scarce, but valuable? The high value of gold is built on intangible desires just like the value of paper and ink that we place on money. It's metal. I don't have gold, I don't have any use for it, and I don't want the metal. I want the cash value of gold though.
A gold standard is just changing one object for another as a unit of exchange. You can use deer skins, rocks with holes in them, it's still money. If you want serious value behind the unit of exchange, exchange a valuable unit like a car or piece of machinery. Except those don't fit so well into a pocket. So you exchange cash. But cash makes your pocket fat, so we carry credit cards.
The real goal of a gold standard is to combat uncontrolled money expansion. There are a number of ways to accomplish that without arbitrarily pivoting on some random and irrelevant metal.
Ron Paul has some good ideas I'd support, but the gold standard isn't one of them.
No matter who wins this race, it is NOT the same old entrenched politics.
My personal preference, in order of who I think would be best for the country, is Obama, Clinton, and McCain to win. Now, having said that, I have to admit, I don't see McCain winning as all that bad.
Yes, he will continue the war in Iraq. But you know what? Unlike George Bush, I think he has the competence to continue it in a manner in which we don't alienate the entire world and look like idiots to those who want us all dead. Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against our troops fighting the war. In fact, I have an immense respect that I could never convey adequately. But when I think of how Bush has misused them... Well, being a Vietnam War prisoner, I don't think McCain will take our soldiers' lives so capriciously for the sake of building "political capital."
You know what I think is most exciting about John McCain? He hasn't kowtowed to the Jesus Crispies, and he's cleaning the clocks of people who do. If he can successfully show Republicans with brains (yes, contrary to popular belief, there are some) that you can be a conservative without being a sycophant to the religious nuts out there, that would represent anything BUT entrenched politics.
So yeah, I hope Obama wins. And barring that, I hope Clinton wins. But if neither of them do, unlike I've ever felt about George Bush, if John McCain wins, he'll have my support as President and Commander-in-Chief. Unlike the last two elections, I don't see this country as being a miserable failure at everything in the next four years no matter who wins.
I was elected to be a delegate on Feb. 5 for my precinct in Colorado, and I plan to go through with representing Ron Paul to the county level March 2 (and then possibly also to the state level on May 31) so that he does not lose any of the projected 42 delegates nationwide he is counting on.
There is one last additional hope to further spread the message this cycle, and that is if Ron Paul can get first place in four states (he has no first place finishes so far, at least according to official tallies), then he will be allowed to speak at the Republican National Convention. And perhaps if that happens, some of the "limited government" planks of pre-2000 Republican party platforms can be reinserted. Not that a Republican president elected in 2008 would honor that, but it would ensure that in the 2012 debates that a small-government candidate can score points by quoting the platform and criticizing the neocons.
While I am sure you are right, if "empathy" in politics lead to censorship, war, torture, and injustice -- I think I will stick to Dr. Paul's libertarianism.
One small adjustment...
Sufficient time spent studying causes them to realize the world is not such a scary place after all, and that they are capable of running their own lives without incessant nannying from the State, making an ideology like Libertarianism very appealing.
There, much better.
It failed because they overspent on their imperialist boondoggle in Afghanistan, just like we're doing in Iraq.
That you even ask the question is surprising to me. Minimum wage sets the floor at which jobs create an earner's ability to interact with the economy. Minimum wage also sets the base cost of anything that requires workers to create, be it product or service. From there, costs and wages go up as skills become scarcer. So minimum wage is a critical issue for both earners and job providers. Furthermore, minimum wage, by setting the earning level for the very lowest earning class of people who actually work within the system, places a hard line that cannot be crossed with regard to what such a worker can obtain within the system. You can't get below it, because you can't be paid less. An hour of labor gets you a minimum of $5.85, period. No less. About ten hours of work gets you one very short, very cursory doctor's appointment. An hour of work gets you about two gallons of gas. And so on. Earlier, you would have gotten more product or service, for less work on your part. This is a direct and concrete measure of economic conditions for the lowest class of earner, which is what I was talking about above.
This is irrelevant; there *is* one and there has been for some time, so we can use it to measure available standards of living at the lowest participating tier at any point during the period which it has been enforced. You want to argue economic issues based on a situation that does not exist. I am simply pointing out the situation that actually *does* exist. My observation is that given the demonstrated effect on earning and buying power that our current economic system has had at the base level, we are going backwards. What one would hope for is that purchasing power would increase, not decrease. It has, however, decreased in real terms, and because of that, I think change is called for.
Minimum wage *is* the actual wage paid for the lowest levels of people participating in the system. It has been since the 1930's or thereabouts. This gives you a direct lever, at the bottom, to relate an hour's work to the purchase of various goods and services. That's what I'm telling you: At the lowest economic level, it took less work to see the doctor in 1965 than it does today. That's going backwards. It took less work in 1965 to buy a house. That's going backwards. It took less hours of work in 1965 to buy a car. That's going backwards. It took less hours of work to buy a gallon of fuel. That's going backwards. It took less hours of work to put your kid through college or trade school. That's going backwards. It took less hours of work to buy heat for your home. That's going backwards. Life is getting more difficult for these people, not less difficult. That's going backwards. It is as plain as the nose on your face if you'll just stop and think about it for a minute.
There are areas in the economy where people get more for their hour of work (electronics is one such instance) but in general, and especially for the basic requirements of day to day life, the ratio of hours worked to products and services obtainable are all going the wrong way.
Proceeding in a course of action(s) that continues to make life more difficult for the lowest levels will eventually result in a situation where life within the systems is perceived as too difficult and people will turn to alternative means of making money; this is where black markets, under-the-counter wages, illegal products and services all gain a foothold in the economy. When working within the system fails to provide people with a tolerable lifestyle, they will look outside the system for relief. And furthermore, they will inevitably find such relief in a society that encourages out of bounds earnings mechanisms with laws that insist upon characterizing all manner of consensual acts as crimes.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
You can't take the sky from me...
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
Maybe other people didn't want to vote for Ron Paul.
Presupposing that the reason he didn't win is to flatly state that if everyone were informed and voted their hearts, Ron Paul would have won.
Did you ever just stop to think that maybe a majority of people don't agree with you? That if the world was well informed, they wouldn't necessarily come to the same conclusions as you?
Only an egotist would put forth their choice of candidate as the only valid one.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
I cannot believe no one has mentioned the contributions yet! Is Ron Paul going to keep the tens of millions in contributions that he barely spent? Is this going to disillusion a whole generation of politically active geeks?
Ron Paul should donate a large portion of that money to the EFF, ACLU, and anyone else staying in the fight for our civil liberties! We did not contribute for his reelection to congress!
We shouldn't spend money we don't have. Not for infrastructure, not for social programs, not for anything. Any money left over by a budget surplus should go directly to paying down the national debt.
There is nothing wrong with a limited amount of debt. I will leave the Slashdot "philosopher-kings" to sort that one out.
Consider the following example, which basically is my world right now: You owe about $150,000 in a 30-year mortgage at a rate between 6%. Do you pay off the mortgage, or do you invest the money?
If you said pay off the mortgage, you fail.
If you can find an investment that pays more than 6% on average (nothing is guaranteed) you put your extra dollars above and beyond the mortgage payments into that investment. Why?
1) liquidity. Investments are liquid, easy to cash out on a moments' notice the value of your house is not (the sale price and sale time of your house is tied to the market). Plus if you sell your house, you have to spend some of that money for future housing. In the same way, there are certain things the government can spend money on that have a higher return-on-investment than paying off debt.
2) time value of money. If you sock away even a little bit of money each month, over 30 years you have a whole lot of money. If you pay down your house in 15 years and then spend the next 15 years saving, you would have to invest a lot more of you own money to match what you could have had, if you were just investing a little bit since day 1 and paying the default amount on your loan. In the same way, the government setting up infrastructure now is often cheaper and more cost-effective in the long run than waiting to pay off debt.
3) the value of debt. Some loans are cheaper than others. In your mortgage's case, you can use it as a tax writeoff, which effectively lowers the interest rate an additional few percent. There are similar 'features' to the national debt. The value of the dollar is almost directly related to the amount of debt we have
The dollar has only started to drop in very recent history, and we have held a high amount of debt for a long time. It has much more international implications than just the national debt.
Oh noes! Their traditions are different! THE HORROR! , the far too narrow streets, Oh noes! Their streets were made long ago in no-car times with very limited land area for the population! THE HORROR! the high price of food and fuel and rent Oh noes! They don't have an empire keeping the price of fuel (and therefore food) artificially low! And they have a higher population density! THE HORROR! I remember being shown a tiny little stove that one young couple in London used as their entire heating system. Their kid was buried in a ball of flannel every hour of the day. It was bloody *cold* in that flat. They have poor people? There's none in the USA! THE HORROR! I starkly remember being driven to nausea over the smell of the water in the canals in Venice and in the alleyways of London. Never been to New York, huh? When Europe's standard of living catches up to ours, then you can talk to me about how your economic policies are all that. Done.Does it? The last time I went to Europe (and mind you, I was traveling through fairly prosperous countries — England, France, Germany, Italy), I was appalled at the public squat toilets
Man, I can't believe you threw in the toilet style in your complaints.
You can't take the sky from me...
You are really missing his point entirely. Stop, stop, stop. Let me try give you a concrete example: I do similar work to my dad. At my age my dad was able to support a family of several kids and buy a reasonable sized house. I live on my own and can only afford a much smaller place.
Look around in the real world - this is a common pattern for just about EVERYONE. THINGS ARE GETTING HARDER. I can see this with my very own eyes, or are you trying to convince me that somehow I indeed have it 'better' than my folks? You have to work much harder/longer to be able to afford the same amount of 'stuff'. Also in the older days usually only the male worked, now it takes two working professionals as a couple to be able to get a similar amount of household wealth. We get less "wealth" for the same amount of work, when intuitively it should be the opposite due to leaps in technology.
3rd world countries are complete irrelevant to this, unless you're suggesting that somehow that is where my wealth is going now.
They already have that: It's called Alan Keyes, and he really hasn't been all that successful.
As much as Paul supporters would like to believe otherwise, Paul hasn't been successful largely because not that many people like his ideas. I'm not saying that he hasn't been somewhat marginalized (as is any candidate who is not seen as a leading candidate), but many people also just don't happen to share his views. It's just that those who do share them are very vocal and energized. My own opinion is that Paul represents a form of Republicanism that has been all but killed by neoconservatives (really beginning with Reagan).
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
The problem with the Republican Party and racism is that Republican strategists decided to campaign towards racists back when Nixon ran for president. This may sound terrible to say, but the electoral victories of the last 30 years may not have happened without candidates pandering to racism. Unfortunately this decision made 30 years ago is destroying the party. Every decent Republican leaves the party because they can't stand the bigotry. And every time a decent Republican leaves, it makes the bigoted faction more and more important. Expel the racists from the Republican Party, and you will see that the party will become a lot stronger, since many of its principles appeal to a wide demographic. They just don't become Republicans because of the GOP's bigotry.
His decision seems fairly logical to me when the main goal of an on the ground campaign is to get out the vote and most of the elections are over (there are still some late caucuses left though) that he should lean up his machine (less votes to get out).
Bah, people say that the media was totally fair with Dr. Paul. These people weren't paying attention. When the media did cover him, they only questions they asked him were whether or not he planned to run as a third party candidate or to paint him as a racist. Of course when the chairman of the NAACP refuted the claim that Dr. Paul was a racist, you didn't see that on the news.
I am just disgusted with this whole political process. You have both parties that are leading us down the path of a corporatist/fascist police state and the one man who calls a duck a duck is the crazy whacko. The one candidate who won't take corporate donations and he is called nuts and un-viable. Guess who are the ones calling him not-viable...the ones he won't take donations from...but whatever.
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
Well in the current United States, largely apathy is king.
...Rome...
Ppl want to be entertained, bread and circuses and all, much like
So when ppl mention that the Federal Reserve really isn't federal, they
think your a nut job by default and don't bother to even read about it.
http://www.libertydollar.org/ld/federal-reserve/
It is all verifiable.
It is all true.
But they dismiss it with a wave, so they can get back to the Computer, TV,
and watch their sports, boink their significant other, or read a book
about some made up shit that does not even exist.
In the meantime, the Fed loans the government its own money at 'interest'.
It is boring though, doesn't really entertain ppl, so it doesn't get much brain time.
My grandfather when I was a small child decades ago warned us about how bad
this would get, and I didn't really understand him then.
After many years, and a fair bit of reading and discussing with very intelligent
ppl in and out of the united states, I now see the shell game for what it is.
Some of the ppl that backed Ron Paul felt much like those ppl in V for vendetta
and are sick of blood sucking bastards that are ruining our country, and
charging us interest to do it to boot !
When the collapsing dollar dies, and the Amero is brought in to replace it,
the NAU is formed, the RealID and DNA database, and it suddenly dawns on you
that all of this was mentioned, you were warned and it was all in writing
by government officials in plain sight.
Lou dobbs covered the NAU forming, and the fact that there was no vote.
The Trans Texas Corridor was to be paid for by US tax dollars, but sold
to a Spanish billionaire who would run it as a for profit toll road
that we paid to build.
Fortunately the good ppl of Texas caught this and killed it, but it will
be back, and Rick Perry governor of Texas is in on it with them.
If you get a chance watch 911 press for truth to get a good Idea just how
bad things are getting, for the non religious folks also watch Zeitgeist the movie.
Also money as debt is a good primer for the Federal Reserve banking system.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9050474362583451279
Most ppl will ignore this and plod on, just another brick in the wall.
Ex-MislTech
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
The plain fact is, people want to vote for a 'winner' and allow the MSM to dictate who that should be. Ron Paul was excluded from debates when Guilanni was not because he was deemed 'not viable'. Turns out, they had that backwards. I have NEVER felt more jaded towards politics as I do right now. Observe:
1) For a candidate to win, MSM support is required
2) MSM is in favor, some directly and others indirectly, of 'news worthy' wars and other events
3) The best interests of the average American ARE NOT in line with the best interests of the average MSM corporation
Therefore: Allowing the media to select our election candidate is nothing short of complete insanity. Anyone that didn't vote for Paul ought to be committed, as they cannot form simple value judgments without the support of the idiot-box.
And, by the way, if we ever want this to REALLY change, we're going to have to bring the word 'revolution' back to an earlier meaning. Those powerful people are entrenched, folks, and it's all YOUR fault.