Posted on 09/05/2007 11:17:42 AM PDT by Hurricane Bruiser
ANNAPOLIS— After eleven days of presidential straw poll ballots cast at the Maryland Republican Party’s State Fair booth, Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas) was announced last night as the winner.
The Maryland Republican Party’s first-ever presidential straw poll at the State Fair resulted in nearly 1,000 Marylanders casting a vote for their favorite Republican candidate for president.
(Excerpt) Read more at mdgop.org ...
Fred is a descent enough guy. I have no intention of voting for him in the primary but he's certainly 10 times better than Hilderbeast and I vote for him in the general election without feeling nausinated.
That being said, the problem isn't with Fred, the problem is many of his loudmouth supporters here on FR. Again, they demand perfection from their Senators and scream RINO if everyone doesn't get aboard their "purge Senator Jon Kyl" purist bandwagon, yet if anyone complains when Fred has taken the wrong position, they cry about it.
These guys can really dish it out but they sure can't take it.
How they can justify lynching a 95% conservative Senator for "betraying" them on one issue but worship Fred when he took the same stance (and has a less impressive 80% conservative record), I'll never know.
Not saying every Fredhead is a flaming hypocrite, but from my experiences, the vast majority on FR are. You and I differ on immigration, so obviously you are not of the mindset that we should have Lindsey Graham's head on a platter for supporting a "path to citizenship" for illegal aliens while giving Fred a pass on HIS support of it.
I’m not a Rockefeller Republican on anything. And you’re probably right about Bush—he isn’t anything, except the nonsensical “compassionate”, i.e., “NOT” conservative.
We don't have a perfect candidate. We shall have to choose from what we have.
I was permanently spoiled by having the privilege of supporting Ronald Reagan and of living in the nation he governed savoring every moment, spending 16 years (even before he was CA governor) with Reagan for President stickers on my cars, working as a driver "for the California delegation" for his brief but interesting candidacy at the 1968 GOP convention in Miami, being graced as a citizen by his optimism, his decency, his kindness, but also by his backbone and his dedicated and principled leadership. He was not perfect either but he was as close as I expect to witness in my lifetime. I miss him very much.
Personal decency is not a matter of ideology. Few of us would be eager to be governed by the ideology of the late Hubert Humphrey. When Hubert Humphrey died long and hard of bladder cancer, Bill Buckley wrote an obituary in National Review that reasonably reviewed Humphrey's personal qualities of decency, an obituary that should have been cherished by Humphrey's bereft family. I won't try to recount the obituary here but Bill Buckley did what few do nowadays as he paid a sincere tribute to a man with whom he had few political agreements but for whom he had substantial respect. In an age of Dick "Eddie Haskell" Durbin and of Mr. and Mrs. Arkansas Antichrist, it is hard to imagine even a rejuvenated Bill Buckley being capable of writing such obituaries for a political opposition totally devoid of redeeming qualities.
It was apparently Fred Thompson as a young lawyer for the GOP minority on the Watergate Committee who had the temerity and the talent to formulate and to ask the most important question: "What did the president know and when did he know it?" Fred was man enough to shoot his own dog. Candor counts. So does a willingness to do the right but uncomfortable (within GOP circles at the time) thing.
Later, in private practice, he represented a woman on the Tennessee parole board who was being fired for not going along with pardons for those who had paid off a corrupt Democrat governor who, through Fred's efforts, wound up removed from office and residing in the federal hoosegow while the woman retained her job. Integrity is not ideological but it counts too.
Fred exudes a certain quality of being a grown up that is not often seen in today's politics. When he does the right thing against the grain of conventional wisdom, Fred is credible and does not appear to be a grandstander, embracing eccentricity for its own sake, but rather a genuinely principled man willing to take a punch to do the right thing. He also knows how to counterpunch as Michael Moore can attest.
One problem with the internet phenomenon is that each of us gets to issue opinions without much personal risk of even personal embarrassment. If I make a complete fool of myself here, I retire the screenname of Black Elk and return under a new and unrelated screenname to fight another day. If Lindsay Graham or John Kyl or Rick Santorum deviate from orthodoxy, they do not get to do that. In politics as in real life: friends come and go but enemies accumulate.
I agree with you that we cannot be utterly rigid in our orthodoxy and purge those public officials who deviate on few or insignificant issues. OTOH, there are issues for each of us that ARE dealbreakers or litmus tests. My imperfect adherence to the Roman Catholic Faith does not allow me room for supporting pro-aborts. My adherence to my idea of American citizenship and of the duties of that status requires me to support the troops and their mission. Fortunately, the GOP is unlikely to nominate a pro-abort or a candidate who wants to undermine and betray the troops and their mission.
We post what we please on the internet restrained only by the standards of our hosts like JimRob. In my most active years, we gathered in halls or hotel function rooms and debated face to face. We could study each other's faces and body language, take one another's measure and incorporate those factors in the debate usually somewhat subtly, sometimes quite effectively. On the internet, people are more free to scream in indignation at one another for the slightest deviation. As you have intuited, this does not bode well.
I think Fred is a lot more likely to try to restrict immigration than you fear. He is not perfect on this issue from my point of view or from yours. I don't think he will succeed at reversing immigration any more than any other candidate will. He may well succeed at closing the open border and qualifying future immigrants.
One thing we would all do well to recognize is that steady if gradual implementation of more conservative policies is more likely than the magic wand theory of electing the perfect candidate and never having to worry about issues again. That was the mistake we made when we elected Ronaldus Maximus and defeated the cream of the radical Demonrat Senate caucus all in one glorious 1980 election. History will not end until God decides that it will end. When I was very young, I questioned why National Review often criticized ideology. Now that I am very much older, I think I understand.
At about the some time that I was questioning National Review's opposition to ideology (and thinking that opposition an evidence of gutlessness), the movie Dr. Zhivago hit the theaters. It contains the very best scene IMNSHO in the history of movies. Seeking the hand in marriage of luscious teenaged Lara, young Pawel Antipov (later to be the red general Strelnikov) has an exchange with a middle-aged corrupt lawyer/bureaucrat Komarovsky who (though himself Lara's lover) is standing in for Lara's probably dead father (since he is also the lover of Lara's mother). Lara asks Komarovsky's opinion of Antipov in Antipov's presence. Komarovsky observes that Antipov is very young (although he is certainly older than Lara) and, pressed. says that the young are intolerant. Antipov replies: "The young are intolerant because they have so much less to tolerate in themselves." Being young at the time, I figured that Pawel Antipov sure told that Komarovsky a thing or two! Now that I am older I am not as sure that it was a fair fight. Virtues may come and go but, absent the grace of God and His forgiveness, bad habits and bad history accumulate.
Fred Thompson is no Reagan but, if he will just be the best Fred Thompson he knows how to be, that is pretty good too. He is one of several very fine potential nominees and I suspect he will be the nominee. I also suspect that he will be president.
The ad hominem attacks are a result of the phonycons like paleoPaulie trying to usurp and ruin the good name of conservative by claiming that antiAmerican antiwar faux "constitutionalist" eccentricity and hysteria coupled with an embarrassing worship of the almighty buck over all other considerations or an unseemly revival of "ein volk" is somehow conservative. You may not like such truthful observations but I don't have to care what you like or don't like or have to live in "paleo" fantasyworld for that matter and I won't.
I forgot to ask: Are you in the shrimpin’ bidness or are trolleys or buses your game?
So, if it came down to Hillary Vs. Paul.... Hillary can count on your vote?
Anyone can just pop numbers up on a screen. Your claim of a 163 IQ is contradicted by your idiotic argumentation. Plus, Mensa is for vain misanthropes. Try this one...
Maybe you should start here first.
I don't vote for pro-aborts either. All the Demonrats are pro-aborts. PaleoPaulie is ohhhh soooooo paleofussy in a faux "constitutional" way that a mere thirty-four years of Roe vs. Wade being crammed down our throats with 50+million sliced, diced and hamburgerized innocent victims and counting does not phase him. Looking out from under his three-cornered tin foil hat, the surrender monkey sees no federal jurisdiction. Unless, of course, he is filing a pro-life bill to occasionally pose for holy pictures. Federalism does not solve the abortion question. Recognition of the personhood of the unborn from conception does. If he does not believe in personhood and/or refuses to actually DO something about it, he is NOT pro-life.
I do not vote for two-faced liars. PaleoPaulie poses for holy pictures regularly next to his actually neglected copy of the constitution. This is unconstitutional, That is unconstitutional, The other thing is unconstitutional. Meanwhile, the two-faced little twit is cramming earmarks into appropriations bills to beat the band for such obviously constitutional programs as shrimpin' subsidies, Galveston trolleys, Galveston buses, Galveston nursing scholarships. THEN the two-faced little twit pulls out his constitution, strikes his "fiscal conservative" holy pictures pose and votes against the appropriations bill safe in the knowledge that the federal pork will flow to his buds back home. If paleoPaulie owned a Chinese restaurant, you would not have to choose betwen egg (pork) rolls and shrimp rolls. His would serve porked shrimp rolls.
Finally, if paleoPaulie were the last candidate on the ballot, Hillary, by definition, would not be on the ballot. The only way paleoPaulie would be the last candidate on the ballot would be because his puppetmaster ObL was already in charge. That ain't gonna happen. Nor is paleoPaulie going to be the GOP candidate, as you well know. His GOP candidacy is as dead as, ummmm, a corpse.
Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.
IOW... up yours retard.
Or are your meds wearing off again?
>> Despite a media black-out <<
Hah, ha, ha, ha, Ho, Ho, HO, HO-ho!
That’s the funniest thing I’ve read since “Candorville” complained about the “bad press” Obama is getting. Ron Paul is the DARLING of CNN, the big three networks, and LIBERAL talk radio. Meanwhile, Tancredo is used merely as a punching bag, and Hunter is completely unmentioned. The only reason CONSERVATIVE talk radio doesn’t mention (much) him is the same reason they don’t mention Dennis Kucinich, Chris Dodd or Mike Gravel: there’s little interest among their core audience, and he’s no threat. Except, unlike Kucinich, they don’t really have an appetite for ridiculing the guy because he holds some views they admire.
“””The straw poll was open to all voting age adults regardless of party affiliation.....”””
Score one for Soros and Moveon.org!
“””While most campaigns did not have a representative present, the Ron Paul campaign had full representation for all eleven days.”””
yet.....
“””Congressman Ron Paul came in first place with 263 votes, Mayor Rudy Giuliani was second with 220 votes, and Senator Fred Thompson received 188 votes, which garnered the third place spot”””
His staff was there in full force for 11 days and he only managed to net 43 votes more than Guiliani who did not participate?
But wait.....
“””There were also a number of spoiled ballots that were not counted.”””
CONSPIRACY!!!! <—— of course those “spoiled” ballots were all for Ron Paul.
a Paul candidacy is Hillary’s worst nightmare
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
That is an absolutely astounding statement.
Maybe it is his witty repartee? Nah!
Or his classy language? Nah!
The substance that characterizes his posts? Nah!
His absolute frustration that the reality of actual caucuses and primaries is looming just ahead and will destroy the fantasy that anyone actually Republican takes Dr. Demeto seriously. Probably.
Perhaps the way he would not recognize the truth if it jumped up and bit him? Maybe.
Or the fact that he thinks that a press conference and a bill filing make a two-faced Congresscritter a pro-life activist while the same critter is simultaneously claiming that, bill or no bill, the constitution precludes stopping the abortion holocaust altogether or even 80% of it? Probably.
Or the fact that he supports the alleged constitutionalist porkmeister paleoPaulie for POTUS? Probably.
Or the fact that as a paleo, he cannot allow himself to occupy reality because it is reality that smacks the paleophonies up side the head every time. Yep, that's certainly one.
I actually did things that accomplished saving lives unlike Dr. Demento. I represented 1100 arrested "Rescuers" and 1070 walked without penalty. Planned Barrenhood's Alan Guttmacher Institute claims that 10% or more of the kids scheduled to be slaughtered on Rescue days are not subsequently aborted. Each of the lives saved is infinitely more valuable than the lies of the paleopipsqueak. In Rescue, we had no problem recognizing pro-lifers. Your surrendermonkey wonderboy is a cynic taking advantage of a vitally important issue. Thanks, but no thanks.
He tried to intimidate me once by telling me "Keep a civil tongue in your head."
I'm still laughing.
Seems you’re beating a Dead Corpse...
Odd, seems that’s what the Paulettes are doing as well...
At least you are making sense and having fun though...
Well... considering I'm rooting for Duncan Hunter to win the Nomination, I'd say that makes you a complete moron...
2. Duncan Hunter is a great Congressman and a throughly respectable and patriotic and pro-life and honest American as paleoPaulie is NOT! Hunter much be so very ashamed to have his good name undermined by your expressed support. He deserves a far better fate than to have you as a supporter. He should be SecDef in any event and a darned good one I would bet.
That’s all hell of a thing to say about Ross Perot...
He was a good nut..
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