Ron Paul Blimp Flying Over Raleigh

Raleigh Chronicle ^ | 12/14/07 | Elliott West

[this is my name not yours]

RALEIGH - No, you're not imagining things. That really is a Ron Paul for President blimp flying over the City of Raleigh today.

Organizers for the blimp took off this morning at 8am at the Airship Management Hangar in Elizabeth City, North Carolina and they are on their way to Chester, South Carolina where they will make their first stop.

This afternoon, the blimp will be flying over north Raleigh and will most likely be visible from Interstate 540 at some point, said Bryce Henderson, a media coordinator for the effort.

Organizers say the current schedule has it passing over Raleigh at 1 pm, Greensboro at 3pm, Charlotte at 5pm and landing in Chester, SC around 6pm. The blimp will spend the night in Chester and then head to Columbia, South Carolina in the morning.

Organizers say that the public can follow along on the inaugural trip as the blimp’s coordinates are relayed to www.ronpaulblimp.com via GPS and a live camera feed will also be inside the blimp’s cabin, broadcasting events in real time to www.justin.tv.

Organizers cautioned that the are assuming weather conditions are agreeable.

"Simply to take the blimp out of the hanger requires the wind speed to be under 15 knots," said orgnizers in a statement to the media.

Supporter for Ron Paul, who is running for President on the Republican ballot, raised the close to $300,000 necessary to place the advertisement on the blimp. Ron Paul has been in the news quite a bit lately as a candidate who has gained much momentum via the Internet. His supporters recently made over $4 million in campaign donations in one day at his website.

Trevor Lyman, who was one of the key figures behind the massive Ron Paul fundraising effort, also helped organize the blimp trip and will be on board.

[Rick.Donaldson]

One of your own posts from back in November says it: “I don’t know if they’re real or not, but I’m seeing an awful lot of Ron Paul signs in people’s yards around where I live - and these are not crack neighborhoods either - regular middle-class homes.”

Same story here in Virginia. The only signs I see in people's yards are Ron Paul signs and I see them in respectable middle class neighborhoods. Also the only bumper stickers I'm seeing are Ron Paul and Obama and RP outnumbers Obama by roughly 3 to 1. Lots of military with RP stickers on their cars, too. From where I stand, the Ron Paul thing is for real.

[Puddleglum]

They also made a Romney blimp, but it has to ask a team of lawyers which direction it should go.

[this is my name not yours]

Don’t insult our intelligence

Oh good. I was afraid you were insulted. /sarc

And I admit I’m an A-hole

Then let's part ways in agreement :)

[Dan Middleton]

"I wasn’t supporting Fred on November 11. Never said I was."

O RLY?

"I used to be a Thompson supporter, but after the poor showing at the debate, I've had enough of him. It now seems obvious to me that the only one I will be able to stomach voting for is Ron Paul."

You were clearly a Paul supporter back on November 5th when you were participating in and cheerleading for his fundraising. So are we to believe that you switched your support to Fred at some unspecified date after that and then just recently switched back to Paul? Could we get a timeline on this, please?

[Rick.Donaldson]

The big government republicans only rebuttal is often personel attacks, insults etc... so they attack the messanger, because they cannot touch the message of liberty.

Dead wrong. I'm not "insulting" anyone or making personal attacks. The that started the thread started the insults with the "I used to be...". Secondly, 99% of us who are "Republicans" are for SMALL government, me especially. I've said over and over, Ron Paul has some good ideas. If he could only keep his mouth shut over other things that are STUPID he'd do very well. HOWEVER, he is NOT for small government, he is for "NO GOVERNMENT". His actions as a Congress critter have shown that he wasn't to ELIMINATE pretty much everything -- means eventually chaos, anarchy.

The ULTIMATE goal of every, single Libertarian is the complete removal of government eventually. No controls on anything, no laws at all. That, folks in anarchy.

Other than that, I've got no problem with Ron Paul, I DO have a problem with posters who say things that are blatantly untrue.

[Helotes]

Thanks for the pic. That’s the coolest picture ever!

[Designer]

Doug from upland wrote: "The most important issue in this campaign is defending this nation from the Islamofascists."

Oh?

to read some other posts, one might conclude it could be the issue of abortion.

Or some others woudl say it is illegal entry.

Or gun control.

Or "conservative" judges.

or marriage

or the economy

inflation

better schools

health care

Socialist Insecurity

anybody but Hillary

etc.

etc.

[lormand]

"Ron Paul is the only one"

What follows after this opening is always steaming BS.

[mnehring]

Ron Paul is the only one who seems to be in touch with what's wrong with our country and what needs to be done to make America once again the "shining city on the hill".

Really? I thought immigration was the #1 issue on our side, followed by Iraq. We know where Paul stands on Iraq, but until you do some digging, you may not be aware how bad he is on immigration. Besides voting against securing our borders over and over and over, he says things like : The US should not have a national immigration policy and "should welcome everyone who wants to come here and work."

We don't call him Fraud Paul down here in Texas for nutin.

[traviskicks]

Blimp aloft! (story about campaign finance of it)



Libertarian ping! To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here.

[BlackElk]

I wouldn’t speculate on Romney but paleoPaulie’s blimp probably cannot fly without the crack team of Al Qaeda engineers who are in charge of him and his campaign.

[billbears]

To claim to once be for Thompson and for what he stands and now to be for Ron Paul is preposterous

Really? I talked with several family members, middle age and older, that supported Arthur Branch, I mean Fred Thompson. After listening to him drone on endlessly about nothing at all and after being introduced to Dr. Paul they now support him. A couple have even donated to his campaign.

[Larry Lucido]

“I WAS for Thompson, I’m NOW for Ron Paul” = I don’t know WTF I believe in.

[mnehring]

Allegra, did you see the photos of the ‘massive’ turn out for the blimp launch (btw, only had a banner on one side and that banner had a big hole in it..)

I’ll post in a minute, for some reason their forums are down...

...anyway, they are PISSED OFF over there (RonPaulForums) about how it looks, that it isn’t flying where they wanted, and the delay (not to mention cost).. a lot are asking how to get a refund.

[Rick.Donaldson]

No, we won’t be parting ways, my friend. You’re a plant if I ever saw one. LOL!

[darkwing104]

You said it better then I would have done....

[Rick.Donaldson]

Forgive my ignorance... I’m going to ask. Who is Arthur Branch?

[traviskicks]

You accused a poster of lying without evidence. That is a personal attack in my book. Until proved otherwise, I think a poster deserves to be given the benefit of a doubt.

Paul is not an anarchist, he wants to shrink government domestically, really shrink it, and many on here disagree with him on a lot more than just foreign policy.

[Allegra]

[Roses0508]

My husband reported it to me about 2:30 - he was traveling between Greensboro and Raleigh. I saw it sometime after 3:00 over Greensboro.

The woman standing next to me in the parking lot had not clue....... :-)