Posted on 08/09/2007 10:44:11 AM PDT by CenTexConfederate
Ron Paul Quietly Converting GOP Believers
By John Fout TheStreet.com Political Correspondent 8/9/2007 12:20 PM EDT
Why haven't conservatives leaders embraced their own ideals and come out to support Ron Paul in public?
I pondered this issue in an article in June. I saw Paul as the one second-tier candidate who might have a chance of a breakout from the pack. It turns out I might have got it right. He has remained the most popular GOP candidate on the Internet. This genuine outpouring of support is rivaled only by that for Barack Obama.
(Excerpt) Read more at thestreet.com ...
I'm not a single issue voter and never have been and I agree with RP on a lot more issues than anyone else (scope and size of federal government, tax issues, etc).
Because I can't embrace my ideals(?) and a embrace someone like Ron Paulat the same time.
Ideals? Ideas?
LOL! Separated at birth, perhaps?
He won’t win the presidency. I just hope he uses his internet popularity like Dean did, to springboard into the Chair of the GOP!
I dont smoke marijuana but dont care if people do in the privacy of their homes. I prefer alcohol (which from my experience is far more problematic in 1 year than marijuana does in 10 years).
You and the Ron Paul campaign should play that up at every opportunity. Just like Justin Raimondo.
Tuesday, August 07, 2007
Is 2008 The New 1964? [John Derbyshire]
There’s a Pro-Ron-Paul meme going around, to the effect that 2008 is the new 1964; i.e. that on the premise—debatable in itself, of course—that the GOP has no chance of winning the presidency next year, conservatives should run a Goldwater-style insurgency to remind the party we’re here & set up some influence for 2012. Bruce Bartlett floated the meme here.
I got a thought-provoking e-mail along similar lines (one of dozens like it I’ve had on that Paul column) from Ben Novak, who lists himself as “founder of the Americans in Europe for Ron Paul Meet-up Group in Bratislava, Republic of Slovakia.” Blimey. Well, here’s what Ben says.
“Mr Derbyshire—-Recently you wrote an eloquent article titled the ‘Ron Paul Temptation ,’ about how tempted you were to support him. However, you concluded by fighting off the temptation, writing that ‘[Ron Paul’s] candidacy belongs in the realm of dreams, not practical politics. But, oh, such sweet dreams.’ A Ron Paul candidacy does inspire sweet dreams. But, rather than writing Ron Paul off for that reason, I suggest that there are a multitude of reasons why you—and a lot of other Americans—should follow your dream.
“Let us begin with the worst case scenario, which is that Ron Paul, if nominated, has no chance of winning the election. I suggest that this is one of the strongest reasons to make him the Republican nominee.
“There have been at least two times in the history of our Republic when the losing candidate for president has had a greater effect on subsequent history of his party and country than the winner. Such was the case in 1928 when the Democratic party had the guts to nominate Al Smith; and again in 1964 when the Republican party nominated Barry Goldwater. Both changed the face of American politics for generations after.
“In regard to Ron Paul, I suggest that his candidacy, like the hopeless candidacies of Smith and Goldwater, would do more to focus the debate about the importance of our founding principles—about who we as a people are, and what our real interests are—than any other Republican or Democrat running.
“Let’s consider the stifling bureaucracy that you so clearly describe in your article. Not one of the other candidates can do a thing about it once elected, without a real campaign discussion of it. Indeed, despite all the rhetoric, under Reagan, Bush I and Bush II, the size of government, its intrusion into our lives, the entangling web of federal programs and the budget deficit all grew immensely. Only a Ron Paul candidacy has any hope of focusing on fundamentals again, cutting through the web of confusion surrounding them, and eliciting any new, creative thought. All the others will just complain about it, but accept it as the only way to do business in Washington—which is the main point in your article. But only a Ron Paul candidacy has any chance of challenging and bringing into question the ‘business as usual’ attitude of the K Street lobbies, pork-barrel congressmen, and the spiraling bureaucracy.
“That brings us to another issue about why Ron Paul’s candidacy is important. Consider the nature of the people in Washington politics today. What we have is an army of office seekers making their best bets on who will provide them with berths in the bureaucracy after the election. Their only real principles are getting power and making whatever cabinet post or bureaucratic niche they are rewarded with grow bigger. Only Ron Paul has the ability to bring a new group of people into politics, people who are committed, like the Goldwater activists of 1964, to taking a different approach to government. Only a Ron Paul candidacy has any hope of bringing new blood and new ideals into politics.
“Now let’s talk about foreign policy. There is not a dime’s worth of difference among any of the current candidates—Republican or Democrat—over the general direction of American foreign policy. They only disagree over the details of how to get there. Only the candidacy of Ron Paul will open the debate on fundamentals, about who or what we want to be in the world, and about what America’s role ought to be. Without him in the race, there will simply be no debate at all—just as there was no real debate in 2004.
“Then there’s immigration. Whatever happens concerning the ‘illegals’ so ardently argued over in the recent immigration bill, there are still tens of millions of recent, legal immigrants who have never seen the ideals of American government in practice. The closest thing to it they have ever heard of is ‘compassionate conservatism’—which has been nothing but a fig leaf for the spoils system, a pork-barrel Congress, group entitlements, and politicians for sale. Only a Ron Paul candidacy will remind them (and us older immigrants) of the things that made America so great to begin with. Only Ron Paul offers any ideals that could possibly overcome the racial, ethnic, and group-entitlement politics that are currently tearing us up.
“Finally, let’s talk about the biggest reason why Ron Paul probably has no chance to win. Your article makes it very plain that all the money sources who believe that politicians can be bought and sold at will, all the K Street lobbies, all the millions of bureaucrats on the federal payroll, and all the tens of millions beneficiaries of increasing government largess will be against him. But, would it not be worth it to make them sweat a little, knowing that a man of principle, who can’t be bought, is setting a very different example for Americans to follow?
“Now let’s talk about the best-case scenario: that Ron Paul wins both the nomination and the election. Suddenly, the rest of the world will ask: has America given up its recent ‘imperialism’ and returned to the principles that once made it the beacon of liberty around the world? Only a Ron Paul presidency will allow the United States to write on a clean slate.
“Ron Paul may not be able to get many of the things he stands for enacted, but he will cause a rethinking of basics that will cause a thinning out of the bureaucratic nightmare that is in our system of laws today.
“If Ron Paul were president, congressmen and senators would be less worried about what special interest is going to fund their next campaign, than whether they appear to be bought and sold. We just might get some honest legislation for the good of the country. Billions of dollars that now flow into lobbies to influence government might begin flowing into the non-profit sector instead, where they can not only actually help people, but earn their donors some respect.
“All of the current crop of power-seekers spurning the Ron Paul campaign in hopes of power, jobs, and largesse in a Giuliani, Romney, Clinton, or Obama administration, will have to start looking for honest work. Instead, we will get a new generation of idealists eager to start cleaning up the mess.
“Thus, Mr. Derbyshire, when you turn your back on the Temptation of Ron Paul, all you are doing is expressing despair that the Gordian knot of money, power, influence, and bureaucratic paperwork that is currently strangling Washington and the country can ever be challenged. President Bush used to speak of the ‘soft bigotry of low expectations.’ When you relegate Ron Paul to only a dream, you are only confessing the lowest expectations for any vision of America other than the status quo. “
“I suggest that you find the courage to follow your dream. I know I can say without the slightest chance of contradiction that you will never find a man with more honesty, courage, decency, or integrity to hitch your dreams to than Ron Paul.”
[Me] Whew. While I am generally resistant to romantic gestures in politics, and I don’t believe the Giuliani, Romney, McCain, etc. camps are TOTALLY devoid of idealism, or unacceptably short on honesty, courage, decency, or integrity, still... the guy makes a case.
Of course it isn't. Your conspiracy mongering is hilarious.
As I said, keep digging - keep spouting David Duke's favorite 9/11 theory, ghost dancer.
“Libertarians” are not Conservatives.
They don’t want to conserve what’s good about our society... they are blinded by dogma.
I hate even replying to another of these
DOG PAUL SPAM POSTS!
If your efforts are very successful - DOG will run as a Libertarian - siphon votes from the GOP - and Hillary will win, as her husband, with less than a majority of votes.
How much is she paying y’all?
Yep. The cut-and-run crowd is getting nervous because the tide has turned in Iraq.
Not just in Iraq....it looks like there's a sea change at home, too?
I had not seen the CFR mention in a Paul thread in a while...
We have reached conspiracy level Alpha...
It is sad when a bunch of people are more afraid of a country club Washington think tank than Islamic radicals who have proven their abilities to hit us and are on the path to if not already have major weapons...
Rovian Storm I need the cartoon...
Well so do I, but not to the right of John Birch folks...
While some of RonPaul's ideas may be plausible, his methods are ridiculously impossible.
“”Question for the Paulistas: How exactly does a “congressional authorisation for the war” NOT count as a “declaration of war”, if the process of congressional deliberation and the end result are both the same?””
The Congress can not delegate its responsibility to another party because the Congress alone is granted sole authority. They essentially voted that if and when Bush jolly well pleases and HE thinks it is in the best interest, that he can go to war. What this does though is gives Congress members an out so they can deflect criticism of the war by say that “Bush led us into war”.
The argument is similar to the IRS having the power to announce “rule changes” that are not authorized by Congress. Congress gives blanket authorization to the IRS to make up rules, but if the rules turn out bad, then Congress members are not held accountable and can claim that they didn’t vote for a particular unpopular “rule” or law. It transfers that law making authority (or declaration of war authority) to another body or person who does NOT have Constitutional authority to act.
Anyone else tired of the Paulistinian spam?
You have nothing to ad to any discussion. All you do is smear people with lies and BS. This will be my last reply to you. I’m too old to deal with such a low class character.
He has, as I have memtioned before, no prayer, no hope and no obvious Republican principles.
Slow turns, slow turns...
Yet you champion uberscumbag Ron Paul. What a paradox.
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