Posted on 02/20/2007 8:59:49 AM PST by OrthodoxPresbyterian
Ron Paul, the Real Republican?
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
By Radley Balko
When you read about a vote in Congress that goes something like 412-1, odds are pretty good that the sole "nay" came from Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas. He so consistently votes against widely popular bills, in fact, that the Washington Post recently gave him the moniker "Congressman 'No.'"
Paul isn't a reflexive contrarian--he doesn't oppose just to oppose. Rather, he has a core set of principles that guide him. They happen to be the same principles envisioned by the framers of the U.S. Constitution: limited government, federalism, free trade and commerce -- with a premium on peace.
When most members of Congress see a bill for the first time, they immediately judge the bill on its merits, or if you're more cynical, they determine what the political interests that support them will think of it, or how it might benefit their constituents.
For Paul, the vast majority of bills don't get that far. He first asks, "Does the Constitution authorize Congress to pass this law?" Most of the time, the answer to that question is "no." And so Paul votes accordingly.
This hasn't won him many friends in Congress, or, for that matter, his own party. It hasn't won him influential committee assignments or powerful chairmanships, either. Those are generally handed out to the party animals who vote as they're told. An incorruptible man of principle in a corrupt body almost utterly devoid of principle, Paul is often a caucus of one.
Paul recently announced his intentions to run for president in 2008. For the few of us who still care about limited government, individual rights, and a sensible foreign policy, Paul's candidacy is terrific news....Continue reading
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
No, actually we can still be attacked by a bunch of funded and trained terrorists.
Wouldn't it make sense then to follow the advice of Dr. Paul and others who suggest that securing OUR country and OUR borders might be a good idea? Instead of what is being done at great expense now?
"For Paul, the vast majority of bills don't get that far. He first asks, "Does the Constitution authorize Congress to pass this law?" Most of the time, the answer to that question is "no." And so Paul votes accordingly."
Does the Constitution allow Congress, individually or collectively, to be Commander-in-Chief of the American Armed Forces? The answer to that question is "no." And so Paul voted for a bill that fails to meet his stated criterion for voting "yes."
Time to send him to political retirement. If he will violate his principals once, he will violate them whenever he finds it convenient to.
And then there's the other unintended consequence of the Iraq war. There was a major problem with intelligence failures with respect to another ME country. This country had an active nuclear program which we did not know about. But because of the invasion of Iraq, they surrendered that program and we were lucky that they did.
Name the country.
Nope. The Embassy Bombers were tried and convicted in absentia. I already posted all this, you know.
You are correct. Here's a link to the house vote on 10/10/2002.
http://www3.capwiz.com/c-span/issues/votes/?votenum=455&chamber=H&congress=1072&state=tx
Ron Paul voted 'NO'!
You said the Iraqi Governemnt is "dominated by convicted Islamic Terrorists who attacked our Embassies and murdered hundreds of United States Marines in cold blood" in making a case for Ron Paul abandoning Iraq.
I think you overstated the case which might be why you decided to drop the word "convicted".
That is good since I've found only one convicted terroist in the Iraqi governemnt, Jamal Jafaar Mohammed.
One convicted terrorist will never convince me to abandon good Iraqis like MP Iyad Jamal Al-Din.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzLnMk-bO8w
Ron Paul will never get my vote.
Where do you get articles from the 1980's? Algore hadn't invented the Internet by then.
Nope. He revealed himself in 2001, and in 2002 the Saddam regime killed him.
Yes, thank you. OrthodoxPresbyterian is too much of a damn liar to admit though. No wonder he favors a coward like Ron Paul.
"So becasue the methods of delivery you cited are still very real threats, what would this suggest about the effectiveness of efforts being made to date?"
Well, since Saddam has no active nuclear program, being that he is dead and the methods of production (and the uranium produced thereby) are now in our hads, our efforts, so far have been very effective.
Now, on to Iran to finish the job.
Iran, being a state sponsor of terror, can't get much worse, if we allow it to fall into chaos.
Ergo, we can just blow means of production up and not worry about occupation.
Their own words condemn the Radical Terrorist Al Dawa Party, the Ruling Party of Iraq.
read your own posts.
Your source says that 4 of 19 were convicted in absentia.
Are the other 15 ruling Iraq from their jail cells, or from beyond the grave?
Spin all you want but only the people here who want to see our troops fail are going to support this traitor.
Apparently, you have never heard of Al-Hakim and his Badr Brigade....though technically this mass murdering "democrat" has never been convicted.
Even then, he doesn't have quite the expertise Bill Clinton does.
I should have added, he was the ONLY Republican from Texas to do so.
Pure propaganda. All discredited, and also irrelevant to the immediate point: how we went from having a secular Sunni strongman who was the enemy of both the Wahabbists and the Iranians to a fundamentalist Shi'ite government allied with Iran.
Keep in mind that Ron Paul could have voted "present" or not at all.
He didn't. He voted with Murtha.
Alright, that is ENOUGH.
Please observe the Rules of the Forum.
It would be a good start if we could define what "the job" is, since no one seems to have a clue except "supporting them in whatever they are doing."
Someone VERY dear and precious to me is stationed in Baghdad right now, a sgt in the 82nd, cleaning out the rat's nest of Sadr City. I applaud him and the kids with him, and can tell you that most of us are not worthy to untie the shoe latches of these fine young men. The fact that I am full of admiration, pride and love for these guys does NOT translate into thinking we have a freaking clue as to what we are doing. As another aside, I have a friend of 25 years who was recalled into active service after retirement in Special Forces. He is as good a man as I could ever hope to know. He is headed for Iraq. My support for the troops AND FOR THEIR MISSION is not some abstraction from a leftoid. However, I defy anyone on these threads to give me a clear, QUANTIFIABLE mission for which we are sending people. Regime change? over --Dismantling the Iraqi military? complete -- Free elections? done that-- Cleaning out the rats nest of terror in Fallujah? done with class, honor and courage
EVERY SINGLE TASK that our guys have been given to do, they have done. The problem is that no one from Bush on down has any concrete goals that says "when we are here, the job is over." I pray to God that Petraeus will develop some, and that he will have a secretary of State who will say "here is the checkbook" rather than trying to force him to rebuild an entire 3 nation state on the cheap.
It is against THAT backdrop that Ron Paul is voting, and to turn his principled vote into some flag waving rant about "abandoning the troops" is just plain stupid.
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