Posted on 01/13/2012 7:26:17 PM PST by mnehring
Most people already know that Ron Paul refused to endorse John McCain in the 2008 general election. While I don’t necessarily agree with that decision, especially from a contender for the GOP nominee, I can certainly understand it. Lord knows I hated every nice thing I had to say about John McCain and wasn’t entirely pleased about pulling the lever for him (which is a dramatic understatement). Most people assume that Paul endorsed Libertarian candidate Bob Barr in 2008, which is partially true. However, that is not the entire story. Paul also endorsed three other candidates.
The first of those was Chuck Baldwin. I don’t really know a lot about Baldwin except that he has been on record early and often in support of the proposition that the South should have won the Civil War. This sort of thing would ordinarily disqualify most normal people from endorsing Chuck Baldwin, but Ron Paul is not most normal people. And given what most Ron Paul supporters seem willing to forgive, a little Confederate sympathy (or even a lot of Confederate sympathy) seems like small potatoes.
The second was Cynthia McKinney. Yes, you read that correctly, Ron Paul endorsed Cynthia McKinney in 2008. For those who do not know, Cynthia McKinney is a certifiably insane anti-American anti-Semitic lunatic. She first came to widespread public attention when she was arrested for punching out a member of the capitol police who tried to stop her when she wasn’t wearing her pin. Cynthia McKinney is so crazy that she got defeated in a primary by a guy who thought Guam might tip over and capsize. McKinney was once arrested by the Israelis while trying to give aid to Hamas and penned a bizarre anti-American and anti-Israeli screed. See more of her anti-Americanism here.
Now, I know that the above is not necessarily persuasive to the average Ron Paul fan – after all, if they were bothered by siding with terrorists, they’d have probably jumped off the Paul bandwagon already. What is perhaps more important is that Cynthia McKinney is also next door to being a communist in terms of her domestic policy. McKinney is an open and avowed enemy of free market capitalism, preferring instead Ghadaffi-style socialism. Seriously, she literally and openly favors dictatorial socialism. McKinney ran on the Green Party ticket, whose platform explicitly includes guaranteed open-ended welfare (at a living wage) for everyone regardless of their ability or willingness to work, among other quasi-communist and far-left economic policies.
The fourth and final candidate Ron Paul endorsed for President was Ralph Nader. Yes, the same Ralph Nader who was so far to the left on economic matters that he could see no difference between Al Gore and George W. Bush. The same Ralph Nader who also longs for the day when the last vestiges of capitalism have died in America. Nader, you remember was the guy who made running as the Green Party candidate famous.
Why, you might ask, would Ron Paul, champion of economic freedom and limited government, endorse two avowed socialists for President? Well, you see, they signed a document:
Paul will offer this open endorsement to the four candidates because each has signed onto a policy statement that calls for “balancing budgets, bring troops home, personal liberties and investigating the Federal Reserve,” the Paul aide said.
You see, despite a lengthy and public history of supporting massive government expansion and infringement upon personal liberties, and despite running on a party platform that explicitly calls for the massive expansion of Government welfare, these people would clearly have been better at shrinking the government than the Republicans on the basis of signing this absurd pledge. To be fair, Paul was probably just following the Golden Rule here – after all, Paul had just spent the last two years being a truther in front of truthers and denying trutherism in front of the media, so he doubtless was extending the sort of blind eye towards Nader and McKinney’s insanity that he wished everyone else would turn towards his.
For whatever his failings as a Presidential candidate and conservative (and they were legion), no reasonable person would say that John McCain was worse than any of these clowns. It was one thing for Paul to not endorse McCain – but we have to ask what sort of person affirmatively supports anti-American avowed socialists and confederate sympathizers over a Republican? The answer: Someone who, like Howard Dean, hates Republicans and everything they stand for.
Palin did not say embrace, she said don’t ignore his supporters.
Let’s look at our choices, Mitt Romney who the establishment basically tried to bully everyone of the race so we would have no choice, gives a good speech one night. The next morning compares his work as Bain Capital to Obama and Bush’s State run takeover of GM and Chrysler.
Newt Gingrich has been channeling Saul Olinski this week and has been sucked into Man Made Global Warming. Has also said he’s a progressive and that FDR was the best President in the last Century. Supported Mitt’s individual mandate and said Romneycare was a grest plan when it was passed.
Jon Huntsman, tried to be moderate in the race, Obama’s ambassador to China. no deal.
That leaves Ron Paul, Rick Perry, and Rick Santorum to pick from.
I guess we can also use that reasoning to support Paul’s contention that the gassing of six million Jews plus several million other people was something we should not have interfered with as it was an internal state matter.
What Palin and DeMint are basically saying is let's not alienate Ron Paul and his supporters because we're going to need them come November.
Palin realizes the danger a second Obama term would cause and is working to try to reduce friction and alienation.
She is far brighter that the moron who answers to the name Erick Erickson.
Ron Paul is a single person. He will never get nominated and he thus casts one vote. Like me. Like you.
His Paulbot followers are dominated by dopers who want legal marijuana and cocaine and probably think they might get it for free too. Some of these people will end up voting for the Republican no matter who it is, some for the Demovik no matter who it is, many won’t vote at all in November.
I hear and respect DeMint and Palin but they are wrong about coddling Paul or his Paulbots. There is almost nothing to be gained in catering to dopers. Why do you think they call it dope?
Fear him, because he is dangerous and no other reason.
No, Palin stated basically that the GOP if it ignored Ron Paul’s supporters, it did so at it’s own peril of winning the election.
I don’t see how since most of paulbots will vote for Paul. Since it is doubtful Paul will drop out noone else on the republican side will get those votes.
They Stand For
Thus the actual problem. What do they stand for? Is that not part of the rage felt by conservatives? That the GOP has no backbone or core beliefs? ie fiscal discipline, secure borders, free markets, bailouts, etc.
Why does Rience Priebus want this fight? Has he done the math if conservatives, being denied everybody EXCEPT Romney turn the table on the RNC and uses Paul to knock Romney out?
That’s about what’s going to happen. Especially with that VA judge being forced by Romney and the RNC not to allow Perry or Gingrich on the ballot.
I may be very willing to cut my nose off in spite of my face now. I’m so infuriated I may do it out of sheer revenge.
It may be a “wonderment” that people take him seriously, but this is the same public that ignored Obama’s strangeness and only heard what they wanted to hear about his ideas for the country. I imagine Hillary Clinton never dreamed that she could be beaten by an inexperienced, extreme-left guy who seldom even showed up to vote when he was a legislator.
The weird stuff about Ron Paul must keep being held up to the light, if the public is to make a more informed choice than they did in 2008.
What those who truly hate Ron Paul need to consider is that those who support him, support instead his IDEAS on things that conservatives want.
They truly don’t care that a screwball is advocating these very good ideas alongside his crackpot ideas.
His supporters point out that he is the *only* candidate calling for these logical, conservative, and constitutional things.
THE ONLY ONE.
Thus they are indifferent to Ron Paul the man, and Ron Paul the screwball. They are DESPERATE that someone, ANYONE in the Republican party endorse these LOGICAL, CONSERVATIVE, AND CONSTITUTIONAL THINGS.
And they aren’t. Why is that?
Why are Romney and Gingrich and Perry and the rest of them so at variance with logic, conservatism, and constitutionality? The best they can say is that they are conservative sometimes, depending on how the wind is blowing.
Why isn’t there a SANE conservative candidate running on the platform of:
1) Ending socialism in America.
2) Reducing the real size and power of the federal government? The presidency, the congress, the judiciary, and the bureaucracy?
3) Restoring our RIGHTS enumerated in the BILL OF RIGHTS, that have been curtailed and dismissed as unimportant by both political parties for a HUNDRED years?
4) Balancing the federal budget by not spending more money than the government takes from the people as taxes?
5) Limiting our foreign involvement to our national interests in a dozen places in the world, instead of the hundred we are now. And telling the worthless scoundrels at the UN to bugger off with their One World Government ideas.
6) Put a fence on our southern border with Mexico, without screwing around for decades. Increase penalties for foreigners who commit felonies while in the US illegally.
7) Return lands taken from the states by the federal government.
8) Demilitarize our federal police. We have over 100 federal police agencies, many of whom should be consolidated, and now non-police agencies are buying arms as well. The Department of Education does NOT need its own SWAT team.
9) End the Patriot Act laws that are NEVER used against terrorists, only against American citizens not implicated in any way with terrorists or terrorism. These laws are unconstitutional lies and must be ended.
Amen!
Last I checked, Fed State was neither in the running nor to be taken seriously. More conspiracy theories than the Fed has Republican teat suckers.
>> Ron Paul Hates Republicans and Everything They Stand For
A lot of Republicans are statists so maybe his alleged ‘hatred’ is not misplaced. Nonetheless, Paul’s portrayal of reality is tenuous.
Thanks mnehring.
OK,DeMint used the word “embrace” not Palin.
LOL! If you agree with supporting Cynthia McKinney or anybody else who would you’ve publicly decalared yourself to be an ignorant joke to be laughed at and ridiculed. Like most Ron Paul supporters. Do some research other than his political handouts. You’re making a fool of yourself supporting this racist egomaniac.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
