Planned Ron Paul rally blossoms into three-day mini-convention (RNC Convention News!)

Minneapolis StarTribune (aka The Red Star) ^ | 7/22/08 | Bob Von Sternberg - Staff Reporter

[MplsSteve]

Supporters of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul have ramped up plans for a local counterweight to the GOP's national convention in September.

Not content with a planned rally at the University of Minnesota's Williams Arena on Sept. 2, the Paul forces now plan a three-day "Rally for the Republic" that will climax in a 10-hour extravaganza at Target Center in Minneapolis.

"It's getting exciting," said Marianne Stebbins, a longtime GOP activist who ran the Texas congressman's campaign in Minnesota. "We realized [Williams Arena] wasn't big enough for everything we wanted to do."

Although Paul was a long-shot candidate who came nowhere close to seriously competing for the Republican nomination, he was a potent fundraiser and attracted a fervent core of followers attracted to his libertarian views.

Working state by state, his supporters have managed to land a small number of delegates to the Republican Convention, which will be held Sept. 1-4 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul. Paul will send at least six delegates from Minnesota to the convention.

Despite that representation, Paul's supporters have given up on snagging a speaking slot for their candidate, Stebbins said. "We pretty much wrote that off when we figured out it wasn't going to be offered."

[MplsSteve]

Comments or opinions - anyone?

[MplsSteve]

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[Perdogg]

LOL!

[LesbianThespianGymnasticMidget]

Opinion...

$h1t 4 8ra1n$ bunch of idiots who couldn’t find their collective A$$es with both hands and a map.

(I am going easy on the comment because this is a civil forum. You don’t really want to know what I think in full)

[I see my hands]

To maintain a positive light I'll phrase it this way: I hate Truthers most of all.

[wideawake]

They announced it originally as a counter-convention months ago.

Now they are claiming that the counter-convention they originally announced is "blossoming" from a rally into a counter-convention.

We have always been at war with Eurasia.

[djsherin]

ping

[Perdogg]

Is Alex Jones going to be there?

[FFranco]

If Paul does not support McCain, he needs to be expelled from the Republican Party.

[BGHater]

Lol.

Your a funny guy.

[jmc813]

If Paul does not support McCain, he needs to be expelled from the Republican Party.

Seig Heil

[kenmcg]

For some reason Ron Paul reminds me of the late Don Knotts.

[sofaman]

Actually it's Run Paul who is buddies with Don Black, Mr. Sieg Heil Pants.

[MinnesotaLibertarian]

I haven't decided if I want to go yet. I'm an admirer of Dr. Paul and the ideas he promotes, but some of the more loudmouthed supporters are rather obnoxious. He has a real coalition of old-school conservatives, but they're upstaged by these younger anti-establishment types. Still, if they continue to hold onto libertarian ideas as they get older, that would be great.

[jmc813]

For the 1,763,819th time, Paul did not invite that guy and his gay-SRV-lookalike kid, nor did know who they are. This race-baiting crap is so 2007.

[MinnesotaLibertarian]

Yeah, it's really hard to get a photograph with a politician at a public event. </sarc>

[jmc813]

And it figures. Another Giulianite posting dishonest stuff about Paul. You haven’t made Luis’ gay ass site your exclusive Internet home yet?

[RedRover]

There once was a man named Dwight Eisenhower. He convinced Republicans that they’d have to accept Roosevelt’s New Deal. If not, they were doomed to be a marginal force in America.

That was the turning point.

Ron Paul missed that turn. He’s now everything the Left thinks a conservative should be: an ineffective nutbar. They’ll be rooting for him to peel away votes from McCain.

I will vote for McCain. It’s up to him to convince other conservatives to do likewise.

[jmc813]

There once was a man named Dwight Eisenhower. He convinced Republicans that they’d have to accept Roosevelt’s New Deal. If not, they were doomed to be a marginal force in America. That was the turning point. Ron Paul missed that turn. He’s now everything the Left thinks a conservative should be: an ineffective nutbar.

Correct me if I'm completely reading this wrong, but are you championing acceptance of the New Deal?

[djsherin]

So we have to accept statism and big government? That is not what America was founded on, nor will I ever support just to “fit in”.