Climb On Board The 'Ron Paul Revolution'

TheDay ^ | 9/16/2007 | Marc Guttman

[NapkinUser]

When Americans evaluate today's political landscape, most feel something between impotence and disapproval. So, while citizens shake their heads or shrug at the mainstream media's “top tier” presidential candidates, it is extraordinary how many are becoming overjoyed about one lesser covered candidate.

Tens-of-thousands have joined the appropriately named Ron Paul Revolution, joining Meetup.com groups, putting up signs, and crossing states to attend rallies. Congressman Ron Paul's genuine message and untarnished record of promoting individual liberty for everyone, a free-market economy of wealth and abundance, and a foreign policy of non-intervention, peace and free trade, has attracted vast support from diverse individuals. Inspired libertarians, Democrats, independents, and previous nonvoters have registered Republican so they can vote for Ron Paul in the primaries.

For those who watch mostly mainstream media sources, Paul is one of the most “searched” humans in cyberspace, has won several straw polls, has been the subject of dozens of blogs, and has an amazing number of entertaining, amateur Youtube.com videos promoting him.

Ron Paul, a medical doctor, worked as a flight surgeon for the U.S. Air Force before becoming an obstetrician. As a 10-term congressman, he has consistently promoted individual rights and kept his oath to defend our Constitution. In 1988, he was the Libertarian Party's nominee for president. As a supporter of Dr. Paul's for more than a decade, I enjoy watching people first learn about this great statesman and appreciate the universal benefits of liberty.

So just what is it that many of us think Ron Paul gets? Why do we want a president who does not want to run our lives nor our economy? How can we make our lives on this planet more peaceful, fairer, greener, and more prosperous? Let me discuss (too) briefly a few important, and recently highlighted, issues.

Our foreign policies have gone well beyond matters of defense. Regardless of whether our intervention in the affairs of other countries is altruistic or self-interest, it is a negative for everyone. Not only do we not have the right, we have created enemies who are now aggressors against us, making us less safe; we have supported those who would oppress many; we have militarized areas of conflict; we have unwisely spent borrowed trillions; we have created opportunity for large-scale graft; many well-intentioned Americans and innocents have been killed or injured and otherwise have had their lives disrupted.

Military is for protection

The only appropriate use of our military is to protect Americans. It is immoral and illegal to order U.S. soldiers into battle for any other reason. If we truly want peace, to be safer, and to not drain the pockets of our children, we should redeploy our military personel back to our shores and waters and trade freely with all nations.

Consumers have enjoyed the benefits of lower prices and better quality in products and services offered by the least regulated industries. Unfortunately, two of our most important services are the most heavily regulated. Public education has innovated little in 50 years and student performance is poorer. Patients find it more and more difficult to access affordable health care.

To provide quality health care to the greatest number of people, the costs for all levels of care need to be less prohibitive, so that near everyone can achieve a level of care to which they are comfortable. This is accomplished by deregulating the industry, re-establishing competition amongst health care insurers and providers, and allowing patients more freedom in their health choices.

Corporations benefit unfairly from favorable legislation that drives out competitors, harming the consumer. There is only one way to end this inequity and to get money and corruption out of politics. Take back the power from politicians by returning government to its constitutional limits.

There is no surer way to have the money you have earned for yourself and your family be used to support that which you do not value and given to those who have not earned it than by allowing the government to tax your income.

They say a frog thrown into a pot of boiling water will immediately jump out, while a frog in a pot of water that is slowly brought to a boil will remain to be cooked. Authoritarian usurpations of our freedoms progresses.

Laws prevent adults from making decisions for themselves every day. They decide when you must use personal protective equipment, what you cannot eat or drink, what you cannot sell and buy, how much you are to get paid for a service, who is not allowed to provide services, and what medical therapies you may choose for yourself.

Right now there are untold numbers of people being imprisoned, without due process, by the U.S government that have not been charged with a crime. The Real ID Act has been passed and soon Americans will have to present their papers to be allowed the privilege to travel domestically. Citizens are spied upon by government officials without legal warrant.

In our often well-intentioned attempt to solve more quickly the few problems suffered by any free society, we have created wider-spread, deeper-rooted and longer-standing ones by burdening ourselves with the heavy fist of government. Many of us think an effective way to advance liberty and enjoy the benefits of a free society is to elect Ron Paul president. So, order a yard sign and a bumper sticker, donate to the campaign, join a local Meetup group, register Republican for the primary, and join the Ron Paul Revolution.

Marc Guttman is an emergency doctor and vice chairman of the Libertarian Party of Connecticut. He lives in East Lyme.

[NapkinUser]

Besides, even if he did, why the concern? You bash Paul and his supporters but then expect them to hold their nose for the GOP nominee?

A better question would be: if Ron Paul is just a fringe one-percenter who's only real support is from Code Pink and MoveOn.Org, why such a concern about a third-party bid for the White House (which is he NOT going to do)?

[burzum]

It is possible for you to ignore them. I’ll give you a hint: don’t click on the link if you don’t want to read it.

Take some personal responsibility. Every story you read here on FR is because you chose to do so.

[George W. Bush]

Saudi Arabia has the most wealthy donators to al Qaeda, but at least the Saudi Royal family is jailing al Qaeda and killing them.

Such naivete is just jaw-dropping.

One of the biggest funders of al-Qaeda, identified as such by the U.S. and even the United Nations, remains free in Saudi Arabia.

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OUR FRIENDS THE SAUDIS

By Charles Johnson

Imagine my surprise to discover that our allies in the religious apartheid kingdom of Saudi Arabia are still playing a double game, smiling in our faces and taking our money, then turning around and giving that money to our enemies to wage jihad: Saudis Still Filling Al Qaeda’s Coffers.

Despite six years of promises, U.S. officials say Saudi Arabia continues to look the other way at wealthy individuals identified as sending millions of dollars to al Qaeda.

“If I could somehow snap my fingers and cut off the funding from one country, it would be Saudi Arabia,” Stuart Levey, the under secretary of the Treasury in charge of tracking terror financing, told ABC News.

Despite some efforts as a U.S. ally in the war on terror, Levey says Saudi Arabia has dropped the ball. Not one person identified by the United States and the United Nations as a terror financier has been prosecuted by the Saudis, Levey says.

“When the evidence is clear that these individuals have funded terrorist organizations, and knowingly done so, then that should be prosecuted and treated as real terrorism because it is,” Levey says.

Among those on the donor list, according to U.S. officials, is Yasin al Qadi, a wealthy businessman named on both the U.S. and U.N. lists of al Qaeda financiers one month after the 9/11 attacks. Al Qadi, who has repeatedly denied the allegations, remains free, still a prominent figure in Saudi Arabia.  Thursday, September 13, 2007

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog

FrontPage Magazine

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And the Saudis are re-importing the nuclear weapons technology that they paid to develop in Pakistan. They are, once again, the real face of the Islamic nuke. Not Iran. Given the Paki bomb, the Israeli bomb, and soon the Saudi bomb, Iran just awakened to what was happening in the neighborhood. Not to say they're all innocent or can be trusted. But it was the Paki/Saudi threat which is key to understanding Iran's desire to arm itself. They never did it when it was only America or Israel or Russia who had the nukes in the region.

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Saudi Arabia is clandestinely developing nuclear weapons, according to a report appearing Wednesday on a Saudi Arabic-language news website.

Pakistani nuclear scientists who secretly entered Saudi Arabia during the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca in 2003 have been the driving force behind the covert nuclear program, reported the Sawt Al-Salam website. Iraqi nuclear scientists were also said to have been recruited.

The Pakistanis reportedly instructed their Saudi hosts to construct their nuclear facilities under prisons to avoid detection. The website cited intelligence reports that indicated the Saudis are constructing a massive underground nuclear center and missile base south of the capital of Riyadh.

Saudi Arabia was widely believed to be a major financier of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program in the 1990s.

Saudis developing nuclear weapons - report

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[dusttoyou]

Hey that’s the RP “coo coo for cocopuffs” Express. Who would have thought it?

[billbears]

'You Have Liberated a People' Iraqis of all sects report progress, not "civil war" (Must Read)

Shocking. An article supportive of the police action in the War Street Journal. Remind me again. When did it become the business of this nation to go to war to 'liberate' people? Can they not liberate themselves? Mr. Adams was quite clear in this statement

She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force.... She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit....

And what's truly pitiful is 'conservatives' don't even care anymore.

[Petronski]

When did it become the business of this nation to go to war to 'liberate' people?

Who said that's the reason we went to war?

[Rush4U]

“I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation-building. . . . I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I’m missing something here. I mean, we’re going to have a kind of nation-building corps from America? Absolutely not.”

George Bush, Oct. 11 2000, in Winston-Salem, N.C.

[billbears]

Yes because we can’t believe polls unless they are supportive of our position. Unfortunately it’s becoming quite hard, practically impossible, to find a poll supportive of the police action. Maybe Fox could put out another one of their ‘fair and balanced’ polls huh...

[Big Guy and Rusty 99]

cue Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train”

[George W. Bush]

belated ping...

[dighton]

[Equality 7-2521]

That is your biggest error. Don't believe the polls on Iraq. The questions are worded to get the results they seek.

Then you neocons have nothing to fear. Your pro War-Against-a-Tactic, big Nanny-State candidate should win in a landslide even if there are a dozen 3rd party candidates. So why the big fuss on these meaningless Ron Paul threads?

[billbears]

Who said that's the reason we went to war?

Well it's not the first, or the second, or I don't even think the third reason. It has been used in the past year or so by those within the administration. Of course whatshisname did allude to it in his 2003 SOTU address

And tonight I have a message for the brave and oppressed people of Iraq: Your enemy is not surrounding your country -- your enemy is ruling your country. And the day he and his regime are removed from power will be the day of your liberation.

Note not a reason in 2003 but it was mentioned. I bet the Iraqis didn't even realize how much they needed to be liberated.

[Petronski]

Well it's not the first, or the second, or I don't even think the third reason.

Why do you insist there can only be one reason at a time? That's such a leftist tactic.

[Petronski]

So why the big fuss on these meaningless Ron Paul threads?

He is an amusing little pussbag.

[billbears]

Why do you insist there can only be one reason at a time?

There doesn't have to be. But usually your top reasons have some validity to them from the get go. Which in this case they didn't.

It's not conservative to lay out a list of reasons, having to continue striking them off not because they're finished but rather because they didn't exist in the first place. Rather that's piss poor intelligence and bad planning

[Iwo Jima]

Thank you for providing that source and in context.

[Equality 7-2521]

He is an amusing little pussbag

Are all of us war veterans who are opposed to nation building police actions pussbags in your little mind, or is that a title reserved for those of us who also believe in that anachronistic document, the Constitution of the United states of America?

[Petronski]

But usually your top reasons have some validity to them from the get go.

Just as they did in this case.

[Petronski]

L.Ron served a long time ago. These days he’s a nut. Don’t blur the two. As for the Constitution, poor L.Ron doesn’t understand it. Neither do many of the Paulbearers.