Posted on 09/16/2007 8:53:29 AM PDT by 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.
You need to read it again. I wrote, at the end of the comment, that I would NEVER vote for rudi.
I don’t need for you to comment to me again. Have a nice life.
1. Does the government have the authority to do this when they decide it's necessary? (One assumes so, else it wouldn't have happened and we wouldn't be talking about this)
2. Are people in the reserves aware of this possibility, or ought they be?
Not sure what else there is to discuss.
Are you one of the reserves who was affected in this way? If not, it would seem we have yet another case of a person doing complaining in inverse-proportion to the effect something's had on him. What is it about Iraq that causes this inverse-complaining anyway?
Our present situation is our own fault.
What "situation"? Anyway, okay, sure, it's our own fault. Not sure what that proves.
Bush and Rumsfeld had years to increase the size of the military and they should have done it at least three years ago.
Oh right, because of that provision in the Constitution that says that the President and Secretary of Defense dictate how big the military shall be. Congress has nothing to do with it. Also, it's very easy to change the size of the military; all the President would have had to do - "three years ago" - would have been to say "Let's make the military have N instead of M people in it" and then it would have happened. And therefore no reserves would have been necessary in Iraq today.
Could have fooled me. The way some act, they won't be happy until that part of the world has a big stamp on the map that says USA Approved.
The Muslims started this conflict
They did? I thought it was a terrorist group called Al Qaeda that started this latest battle. Now it's the whole Muslim world? Are we going after the whole Muslim world next? Suppose we have to since they're going to establish a caliphate here pretty soon....
What are they grousing about? they’d still be bedouins had we not showed them they were rich with oil.
'We' didn't show them anything. For the record the a Brit discovered it IIRC. And I'm not exactly sure how you believe they thought they would be 'rich with oil' considering the Brits and the French already had plans by 1916 on how the ME was going to be split up with the oil companies owned for the most part solely by Western companies. Think they should be thankful of the creation of territorial lines that didn't exist before? Damn ungrateful Arabs. The French and the British tried to bring 'civilization' to them and they wanted to throw it off eh? (here's an interactive map of the region if the other one is too hard to understand..)
They want war? I say give them bloody red war
The West has only been mucking about in the region for the past 500 years trying to.....what were they trying to do again, oh yes, 'civilize' them...it just doesn't even cross your mind that perhaps as a people they want to be left alone or treated as perhaps not equals but business partners of a sort.
What is it with nations that believe everyone should act as they do, have the same standards as they do, even down to the same form of government, and its citizenry becomes upset when some in said territory don't want the same?
Yes we have been, and it wont end anytime soon. Ron Paul may wish it away but the western world has been embrioled with this since Saladin waged war on the west.
Oh, we have tried to live in peace, but these aholes just dont stop. Hand them their asses
Do you refer to me as having shit-eys because of that, or do you dispute that they were death camps?
I'm disputing that the quote shows that he was "a Chamberlain".
Adios bozo, don't waste by time with soundbites.
If all that Americans want is security, they can go to prison. - Dwight D. Eisenhower
Bill, I used to think I knew you. Some society's suck
You sure do hate getting busted.
That Night Train’s a mean wine.
Yes because Saladin invaded the West so many times. Oh that's right he didn't did he? To get this straight, Crusaders came to the Holy Land, embroiled themselves in a war that was not their own, but Saladin 'waged war on the West'. Gotcha.
Oh, we have tried to live in peace, but these aholes just dont stop
I agree!! Repeatedly invading their region for the past 800 years. Seriously!! What could they be upset about?
And yet, all these FReepers who go on and on about how terrible they think Ron Paul is, let Hyde's betrayal of his oath to the Constitution go by with silence. It doesn't matter to them one bit.
My only point is occupation has been tried multiple times. Perhaps Rep. Paul is not completely off track that perhaps trade could work better
And people think I’m nuts for supporting Ron Paul...
“All of us have heard this term ‘preventative war’ since the earliest days of Hitler. I recall that is about the first time I heard it. In this day and time... I don’t believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn’t even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing.”
Could there be a time when a pre-emptive strike is absolutely necessary in order to prevent an imminent strike against us? I believe it possible.
With this in mind, if there were credible evidence that Iran was building nuclear weapons, and I MEAN CREDIBLE, then should we make surgical pre-emptive strikes on such facilities in any nation that is threatening the destruction of these United States? I believe we should.
I don’t think Islamists are like the russians. Islamists share no mutual regard for human life. Islamists live to die for allah and his promise of virgins. Begs the question, are there no virgins in Islam that they can enjoy now? Or is it that male islamists are greedy little pigs who have a policy of virgins only for their pompous romps?
So now, how can I justify my support for Ron Paul who is against pre-emptive strikes? Well, it’s one thing to be against them, it’s another thing to refuse to act when there is credible evidence of an imminent strike. I believe RP a reasonable man inspite of the childish rants we witness here. He was reasonable when it came to getting OBL wasn’t he?. He voted to “authorize” the President to go get OBL in Afghanistan. No doubt this was a just cause. I believe he still wants OBL like the majority of us. But I don’t think he is convinced the current administration shares the same desire with the same passion as many of us.
Would a Pres Paul throw anyone out who came to him with credible evidence of an imminent strike against our nation?
I don’t think so. His service to our nation in the Air Force, his congressional record, his committment to this nation, and our Constitution says he would do what is in the best interest of this nation under the prevailing circumstance of an imminent threat. Since even RP has admitted Iran may be something we have to deal with.
I trust RP to do the right thing based on his life’s experience, his trust in God, his devotion to family, his education, and his unrelenting and unrepentant service to our nation in the Air Force and to our Constitution in congress.
That’s how.
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Throw Momma From The Train!
A thread, another opportunity to mix with the gods of Olympus!
I will now eagerly dig through the multitude of blessed posts and divine enlightenment.
Dwight Eisenhower, for all his rambling amiability, was capable of vehemence. He showed it memorably at a news conference on August 11, 1954. Ray L. Scherer of NBC asked him about "increasing suggestions that we should embark on a preventive war with the Communist world, some of these suggestions by people in high places." Scherer was talking about Red China, which was rattling its sabers at Taiwan (then called Formosa) and would soon begin shelling Taiwanese forces in what would rapidly become a full-fledged crisis.
In those days, Communist China was the closest thing to today's Iran: a rising regional power, radical, ideological, antagonistic, and increasingly bold. Ike's secretary of State called the Chinese "an acute and imminent threat," and compared their "aggressive fanaticism" to Hitler's. Hawks clamored for action, saying that if the U.S. failed to defend Formosa, it would have to defend San Francisco later.
Reason Magazine - Learning From Ike
Q. Ray L. Scherer, National Broadcasting Company: Mr. President, there seem to be increasing suggestions that we should embark on a preventive war with the Communist world, some of these suggestions by people in high places. I wonder, sir, if you would care to address yourself to that proposition.
THE PRESIDENT. All of us have heard this term "preventive war" since the earliest days of Hitler. I recall that is about the first time I heard it. In this day and time, if we believe for one second that nuclear fission and fusion, that type of weapon, would be used in such a war--what is a preventive war?
I would say a preventive war, if the words mean anything, is to wage some sort of quick police action in order that you might avoid a terrific cataclysm of destruction later.
A preventive war, to my mind, is an impossibility today. How could you have one if one of its features would be several cities lying in ruins, several cities where many, many thousands of people would be dead and injured and mangled, the transportation systems destroyed, sanitation implements and systems all gone? That isn't preventive war; that is war.
I don't believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn't even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing.
Dwight D. Eisenhower: The President's News Conference of August 11th, 1954
My post to someone came after they wanted to know why didn’t Bush repudiate Saudi Arabia. Hence, my question was fair even if annoying.
Thank you, GWB. Nice work.
The only thing that muslims understand is force.
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