Posted on 07/16/2007 8:31:51 PM PDT by JTN
Among the other firsts of his campaign, Ron Paul is probably the only presidential contender to be compared to a Samuel L. Jackson movie. The Texas congressman, a dark horse candidate for the Republican nomination, was being lightly grilled by Kevin Pereira, a host on the videogame-oriented cable channel G4. "Young people online, they were really psyched about Snakes on a Plane, but that didn't translate into big ticket sales for Sam Jackson," Pereira said. "Are you worried that page views on a MySpace page might not translate to primary votes?"
The reference was to the Internet sensation of 2006, an action movie whose cheesy title and premise had sparked a burst of online creativity: mash-ups, mock trailers, parody films, blogger in-jokes. Hollywood interpreted this activity as "buzz," and New Line Cinema inflated its hopes for the movie's box office take. When the film instead did about as well as you'd expect from a picture called Snakes on a Plane, the keepers of the conventional wisdom declared that this was proof of the great gulf between what's popular on the Internet and what sells in the material world.
Ron Paul is popular on the Internet, too, with more YouTube subscribers than any other candidate, the fastest-growing political presence in MySpace, a constant perch atop the Technorati rankings, and a near-Olympian record at winning unscientific Web polls. Like Snakes, he is the subject of scads of homemade videos and passionate blog posts. When Pereira mentioned the movie, he was making a clear comparison: Yes, your online fans are noisy, but will their enthusiasm actually translate into electoral success?
It's an interesting analogy, because the conventional wisdom about Snakes on a Plane is backwards. The reason the online anticipation for Snakes didn't translate into big ticket sales is because there actually wasn't much online anticipation for the movie. Yes, some of those parodists were interested in seeing the finished film, whose notoriety has given it minor cult status. But the others couldn't care less about the studio's product. Their online activity was an end in itself, a great big belly laugh at the expense of goofy high-concept movies. Their riffs and spoofs were far more entertaining than any actual feature about airborne reptiles was likely to be. Those fans weren't waiting for a show. They were the show.
That's one difference between Snakes and Paul: The congressman's fans really do want him to do as well as possible in the polls. But victory isn't the only thing on their minds. For many of them it isn't even the topmost thing on their minds. Like those Snakes on a Plane spoofs, the grassroots activity around Paul's campaign is interesting and valuable in itself. Here are three reasons why:
It's transpartisan. Paul's fan base stretches all the way from Howard Phillips to Alexander Cockburn. His libertarian message has resonance, as you'd expect, among free-marketeers dismayed by the GOP's love affair with federal spending. It is also attractive, as you'd expect, to lefties who like his opposition to the Iraq war and the post-9/11 incursions on our civil liberties. But the race has no shortage of anti-spending conservatives and antiwar liberals. Paul is especially appealing to people who don't fit the narrow stereotypes of Blue and Red: to decentralist Democrats, anti-imperialist Republicans, and a rainbow of independents.
The Internet makes it easier for such dispersed minorities to find each other, and the congressman's candidacy has given them a new reason to seek each other out. When Pittsburgh's Paul backers gathered via the MeetUp site, which arranges get-togethers for users who share a common interest, the blogger Mike Tennant attended. He found at least one Democrat, at least one anarchist, several disillusioned Bush supporters, a member of the Libertarian Party, a member of the right-wing Constitution Party, "and a whole roomful of folks disillusioned with the two-party duopoly... The one thing that unites us all is a desire to have a president who actually believes in liberty and has a record to match his rhetoric." Paul fans have been arguing forcefully for their candidate at both the conservative Web hub FreeRepublic and its liberal counterpart, Daily Koswhere, to be sure, they are met by angry opposition from more conventional Republicans and Democrats.
It's idea-driven. Were you wondering how Paul answered that question about Snakes on a Plane? He said, "I don't worry much about that at all. I worry about understanding the issues and presenting the case and seeing if I can get people to support these views." Some politicians are in this race because they really want to run the country. Some are in it because they want to be vice president, or be secretary of state, or extract some other prize from the eventual nominee. Paul is in it to inject ideas into the campaign. He wants to get votes, of course, but like Henry Clay he'd rather be right than be president. (Unlike Clay, he really is right most of the time.)
For Paul, it's a victory just to be on stage with Rudolph Giuliani arguing for a non-interventionist foreign policy, because it serves as a reminder that it's possible to be a fiscal conservative with bourgeois cultural instincts and yet oppose the occupation of Iraq and the effort to extend that war into Iran. That novelty, coupled with his fans' online activity, has earned Paul a rash of TV interviews: In the last two months, he has appeared on This Week, The Daily Show, Tucker, Lou Dobbs Tonight, and The Colbert Report, among other venues, raising his profile far above the other second-tier candidates. Each appearance is an opportunity not just to ask for votes but to express his anti-statist ideas, spreading a message rarely heard in the context of a presidential campaign.
It has a life of its own. After Jesse Jackson's populist campaign did unexpectedly well in 1988, many of his supporters hoped the Rainbow Coalition would become an independent grassroots force. But Jackson was more interested in his own political career, and he opted to make it a smaller group he could control. Similarly, Ross Perot resisted every effort to make the Reform Party something more than a vehicle for his presidential ambitions. When it slipped out of his control anyway, and in 2000 gave the world two competing presidential nominees, he stiffed both and endorsed George Bush instead.
A different fate befell the left-wing "netroots" that embraced Howard Dean in 2004 and Ned Lamont (among others) in 2006. They've maintained their decentralized character, and they're obviously larger than any particular pol. But unlike the Perot movement or even the Rainbow Coalition, which included left-wing independents as well as Democrats, the netroots aren't larger than one particular party. They may hate the Democratic establishment, but they're still devoted Democrats.
The Paul movement is different. Unlike the Jackson and Perot campaigns, it is open, decentralized, and largely driven by activists operating without any direction from the candidate or his staff. Unlike the netroots, it has no particular attachment to the party whose nomination its candidate is seeking. Paul himself left the Republican fold in the '80s to run for president as a Libertarian, and he still has friendly ties to that party. When he returned to the GOP and to Congress in the election of '96, the national party establishment threw its weight behind his opponent in the primaries, an incumbent who had originally been elected as a Democrat. Paul turned to independent sources to fill his campaign coffers, raising substantial sums from the libertarian, constitutionalist, and hard-money movements. Those have always been his chief base of support.
Barring a complete meltdown of the party gatekeeping apparatus, Ron Paul will not be the Republican nominee next year. And he says he has no plans to run as an independent. But you can't erase all the traces of a self-directed, transpartisan, idea-driven movement. Long after Snakes on a Plane was relegated to the cult-movie shelf, the people who spoofed it online are still writing blogs and editing mini-movies, applying the skills they honed mocking an action flick. Howard Dean is just a party functionary today, but the troops who assembled themselves behind him are still active in the trenches, their original leader nearly forgotten. I suspect that Paul will have a longer shelf life than Dean or Snakes. But whatever becomes of him after this election, his fans will still be there, organizing rallies, editing their YouTube videos, launching their own political campaigns, and spreading ideas.
Yes, it was, after all the U.S who attacked inself over the past 10 odd years in order to justify going to war against Islamo-facist who didn’t exist until after 9/11/01, right? And, after all, these Islamo-facists will lay down their weapons and go away if only the U.S. would ___________ (do what, do you think? Disappear off the face of the Earth?) So, the U.S. and the rest of the world that’s been subjected to terrorist attacks are suppose to ________ (what?). Not fight back? Sue for peace? Turn the other cheek? Bend over and take it up the tailpipe? Wait until the next 9/11/01 style attack? Wait until a nuclear weapon or dirty bomb destroys an entire city or kills tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands? This is what the goal of the enemy is, is it not? Or, has someone on the other side given you information noone else has been privy to? Has all the attacks from Bin Laden and his minions been just a joke played upon us in order to get the U.S. and most of the rest of the world embroiled in an never ending war? That they don’t really have some end game already planned out? Perhaps cowards wish that this country would stop defending herself, but I’m ready to give my all in defense of liberty and freedom no matter how long the war takes or where the war is being fought. And you? What are you prepared to do to defend your family?
Ron Paul’s 11/15/00 diatribe entitled “Our Foolish War in the Middle East” can be found at http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2000/cr111500.htm .
Paul repeatedly states that U.S. involvement in the Middle East is all about oil, not Islamic radicalism, and that they are essentially justified in attacking us.
I think if it weren't about oil at some level, we'd just let the Muslim terrorists kill each other off (kind of like we handle to murderous scum in Africa).
I wonder if that's because the elected leader of that party, Jorge Bush, recently insulted and gave the bird to the base of that party.
OMG, Buckley is clearly a liberal who belongs at DU!
The Howard Government has today admitted that securing oil supplies is a factor in Australia's continued military involvement in Iraq. Defence Minister Brendan Nelson said today oil was a factor in Australia's contribution to the unpopular war..... Dr Nelson said defence was about protecting the economy as well as physical security. Dr Nelson also said it was important to support the "prestige" of the US and UK.
~ The Melbourne Age (July 5, 2007)
One scarce knows where to begin to respond to your post. It’s such a target-rich environment. First, your “policeman to the world” comment: One question: where does the Constitution for the United States specifically authorize such activity by the Federal Government? (In your rush to read the Constitution and other founding documents, start with the Tenth Amendment.)
As to your derogatory comments about Dr. Paul, you’re entitled to your opinion, I suppose, but it would be lovely to have you express it in a less vitriolic fashion... and calling him part of the “Blame America First” crowd is pretty incendiary in many circles, for the primary reason that it is a LIE outright. It has NO basis in fact, as some basic research would reveal to you. Dr. Paul is about defending AMERICA, not about building “democracies” in third world cesspools like Iraq. Our troops should have been out of there the same day that Bush declared the mission accomplished.
And another homework assignment for you: Find the Constitutional authority for our (in your words) interventionist foreign policy. (Again, start your search with the Tenth Amendment.) Since it is essentially the same as “policeman to the world,” you’ll find the lack of such authority in the same place.
Our Constitutional Republic and its safety and well-being are much more important than anything else going on right now. Period. Because if we give up our liberty for the illusion of security, we condemn ourselves and our children and grandchildren to eons of darkness before mankind can climb back into the light of liberty... and I will NOT be a part of such a travesty as that. I want MY kids and grandkids to be even MORE free than I am. That is the most VITAL thing there is. No islamist can enslave free men and women, ever. They can only kill us. Only if we enslave ourselves in the name of security can these seventh century morons waltz in and take over our once-free nation. With the help of fifth columnists such as you who refuse to recognize what’s important and what is secondary at BEST.
What on earth does this have to do with anything I wrote?
It’s almost like you’re beginning to get it.
I long ago realized that the economic security of this country is heavily dependent on oil. It is actually necessary for this country to protect its economic interests on foreign soil. Of course, there is the curious fact that our economic interests seem to need a lot more protecting in Muslim states. Canada, Brazil, and Norway produce more oil than Iraq, yet we don’t have to depose their leaders. Why? Because they have relatively stable governments and essentially free people. Somehow, it seems strangely like the Muslim countries in the Middle East are the ones who are most prone to explode.
And yet you just claimed Paul was a kook for acknowledging the economic incentives to war.
I joined back on OrthodoxPresbyterian's very first thread.
Wow! It would seem one would have a hard time figuring out how to respond to your post. (Reading your post, I don’t expect civil discourse in the future - feel free to continue with your ad hominem attacks.)
For example, I conclude my post with an open-ended question regarding America’s status as world police; You take this to mean I’m the figurative dispatch - quite a large jump to say the least. I’m well aware of what the Tenth Amendment says, by the way, so you don’t need to say pretty much exactly the same thing twice.
Second, Paul has said over and over again that U.S. policy, not radical Islam, is to blame for terrorist attacks against us. As some research might reveal to you (homework: read Paul’s statements on his U.S. House of Representatives website) Paul does, in fact, repeatedly blame American policy. It’s the simple truth. Until Ron and the Paulbots acknowledge that there are bloodthirsy Muslims who want to kill us regardless of what we do (outside, presumably, of converting to Islam) I cannot take them seriously. (Paul is most certainly not about defending America when he plays the role of suicide-bomber apologist.)
Your last paragraph is great, though - especially with gems like “No islamist can enslave free men and women, ever. They can only kill us.” Ignore the fact that I said nothing at any point about the topic. I’m merely pointing to the fact that Paulbots seem to either ignore the Islamists or would rather let them kill us instead of us killing them. (Forgive me if your “thinking” was hard to follow.)
No, I didn’t - or at least I didn’t intend to. My position is that it’s a combination of many things, one of which is oil. The world today is a prime example of why. Iraq isn’t even a top ten producer of oil. They did, however, have a violent and unstable government in a violent and unstable region. They aren’t the only ones there, for certain.
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