GOP Ron Paul - Five Million Dollar Man? (Paul increases campaign funds by 1,000% in 60 days to $5M!)

Ron Paul Campaign | June 7th, 2007 | FreeMarketNews.com

[Remember_Salamis]

GOP Ron Paul - Five Million Dollar Man? Thursday, June 07, 2007 - FreeMarketNews.com

Congressman Ron Paul’s donations have moved up - not by hundreds of thousands - but by millions as a result of his debate performances and groundswell of support on the Internet and in New Hampshire, observers close to the campaign say.

The move is especially impressive since as of March 31, 2007, he had perhaps $500,000 on hand (see candidate estimates below).

FMNN had previously reported – after the GOP presidential debate in South Carolina - that candidate Ron Paul’s (R-Tex) donations, large and small, had nearly doubled.

http://www.freemarketnews.com/WorldNews.asp?nid=42336

Now observers close to the campaign are revealing – with some astonishment – that donations to the campaign in recent weeks have pushed the total up to perhaps $4 or $5 million.

“That’s a huge number at this stage,” says one observer. “That starts to put him in a position where he can compete – state by state, anyway – with the major candidates.”

And this source added, “Of course, it’s hard to tell because the numbers keep changing – and thus nobody at the campaign has a firm count, at least not hour to hour. But the numbers are big. It’s definitely over three, probably over four, and if it hasn’t hit five yet, it will soon.”

At this rate, say observers, Ron Paul could have something like $10 million in his coffers inside of several months, and the total could keep growing – so long as he continues to hit on themes that Americans support – how to return the country to a true, small government, constitutional republic and how to end the war in Iraq.

To be sure such amounts are somewhat speculative. But to put the amount of money Ron Paul is said to have raised recently in perspective, here are the figures of cash on hand for GOP candidates as of March 31, 2007:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/money/gop.html

Sam Brownback cash-on-hand: $806,626

Jim Gilmore cash-on-hand: $90,107

Rudy Giuliani cash-on-hand: $11,949,735

Mike Huckabee cash-on-hand: $373,918

Duncan Hunter cash-on-hand: $272,552

John McCain cash-on-hand: $5,180,799

Ron Paul cash-on-hand: $524,919

Mitt Romney cash-on-hand: $11,863,653

Tom Tancredo cash-on-hand: $575,078

Tommy Thompson cash-on-hand: $139,723

Source: CNN

Staff Reports - Free-Market News Network

[Remember_Salamis]

Most “ideological” grassroots campaigns have very little money. Buchanan’s impressive ‘96 run ran on rhetoric and a shoestring budget.

I can’t recall an ideological campaign with money!

[pissant]

It was certainly declared. Where in the constitution does it say HOW a declaration of war is made? That’s right, it doesn’t.

[who knows what evil?]

Your post has great insight...Paul’s candidacy is actually CREATING the “big tent” that the Republican Party claimed was their biggest desire. Now that Paul is drawing people in from all points on the political spectrum; the RNC wants to fold the tent. ROTF!

[Remember_Salamis]

Congress relinquished authority to the executive branch.

A declaration of war is an order to go to war. What Congress did is tell the President “it’s up to you.”

Congress Punted.

[SCHROLL]

hard to say that’s the case when all he spouts is we shouldn’t be in Iraq and votes against the supplementals

[SoCalPol]

The only good thing out of this R. Paul is a never was.
The news had on an intersting segment, about the Muslim enemy posting on U.S. forums as regular citizens to
demoralize American citizens and against the war.
The Paulites are part of the same ilk.

[Publius]

A few weeks ago, I engaged in a colloquy with NCSteve, a supporter of Dr. Paul, and I posed certain questions to him. I’d like to pose the same questions to you to get a better idea of where Dr. Paul is coming from. Up to now, I have concluded that Dr. Paul’s ideal is to return to the America that existed before the Civil War -- minus slavery, of course.

The America we lost was defined by a Constitution written for a republic of farmers. But long before the Civil War, the nation had industrialized, and most of its basic concepts had changed, thanks to the work of Webster and Clay. We are the America that Hamilton created, not the one that Jefferson wanted to preserve. If I understand what a Paul administration would look like, we could expect the following:

• The restriction of the federal government to the 5 explicit powers and 7 implied powers granted it by the Constitution. That means only 3 federal crimes -- treason, piracy and counterfeiting. All other responsibilities would devolve to the states. Entitlements would either be run by the states -- or handed over to churches, charities and benevolent associations.
• The end of federal taxation as we know it and a return to excises, imposts and dunning the states for their share of the federal budget. With most items devolved to the states, the federal budget would be small, and Congress would meet for 6 weeks a year and then go home.
• The end of the fiat dollar, paying off of the national debt, and a return to the gold standard. The London Bill Market, closed since 1914, would be reopened, and real bills maturing to gold coin would circulate along with gold coin itself.
• The end of our large standing army, which the Constitution permits to exist for only a 2 year period anyway. We would have a Coast Guard to protect our shores and some kind of air defense system, but the Army would return to the state militias that existed before the National Guard system was created in 1910.
• American foreign policy would be somewhat isolationist. We would come home, close our borders, guard our shores, expel the UN and mind our own business. We would no longer use our dollars or military to take over various sectors of the planet. We would have a much smaller global footprint and would end any dream of an American Empire.

I find this very seductive. But although the US has shipped its manufacturing capabilities abroad to the Third World and we now make our money moving piles of electronic currency around, I can't see us returning to what we had before the Civil War, much as I would like it. The changes sought by Hamilton and wrought by Webster, Clay and Lincoln are irreversible. So I’d like to pose some questions in line with my previous points:

• Corporations were strictly regulated by the states before the Civil War. Afterward, we were pretty much governed by Big Business in general and the railroads in particular. With the states' rights position discredited by the Civil War, Jeffersonians turned to using Lincoln’s powerful federal government for the people, i.e. using Hamiltonian means to achieve Jeffersonian ends. This was what the Progressive agenda was all about. Franklin Roosevelt built on that to define a whole new paradigm of democratic socialism -- using government as the tool of the people's will to control the forces of the market. This raises the question of a power vacuum. Should the federal government retreat to only those powers granted by the Constitution, then who gains control? In a global marketplace, the states are going to find themselves fairly powerless in regulating corporations. One would probably end up with some form of corporate fascism, sometimes referred to humorously as "Proctor and Gamble with the death penalty". This would indicate that even under a Paul administration, it would be necessary to utilize a loose construction of the Interstate Commerce Clause to prevent the undermining of democratic rule.
• With the American people believing that only Big Government can protect them from Big Capitalism and that Big Government is the proper means by which the American people take care of each other, how does one convince the American people to go back to the good old days? We have lost the ancient American trait of self-reliance, as Hurricane Katrina proved. How do you convince the American people to give up the protections they have relied upon from their federal government? (Most people have based their retirement on those government checks.)
• You would need a worldwide financial crash and the involuntary imposition of a worldwide gold standard to get people to rethink the role of the modern state in their lives. How do you return to a hard money standard without inflicting massive pain? (If you divide the value of the world economy by the amount of gold in the world, you end up with gold at $350,000 per ounce!)
• After the War of 1812, even President Madison decided we needed a standing army.
• Power, like nature, abhors a vacuum. If America comes home and minds its own business, who steps into our shoes to run the planet? Macchiavelli says someone is going to try. The European Union? Russia? China? Iran? The United Nations (after relocation to Geneva)? It's a question that has to be answered.

As one who has specialized in our history after the Revolution and before the Civil War, I'd love to see a return to those less complicated days of Monroe and Jackson, but it's not something that is going to happen on its own. And I fear the events that could force it to happen.

These questions have bedeviled me for a long time. Returning to original intent sounds like a great idea, and it's certainly the purest definition of conservatism. But how do you get there from here, and how do you lead the American people to change their collective -- and "collective" is the right word! -- mindset?

[pissant]

I said AFTER Pearl Harbor. We were not threatened significantly prior to that. FDR was anti WWII before Pearl Harbor. Youre theory is incorrrect.

In Vietnam, Nixon’s hand was FORCED by the anti war crowd, just as they are trying to do to Bush. Difference is Bush has more balls and no Kissinger wormetongue whispering in his ear.

SOrry charlie. Your history is not so good.

[SoCalPol]

It also colored Hitler’s.
thank good my relatives support America.

[Remember_Salamis]

Paul said it should have been declared. However, he has said that he would had voted against a declaration of War.

Paul is of the (correct) opinion that Declared Wars tend to be successful (WWI, WWII) while undeclared ones aren’t (Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War) and have open-ended outcomes (the DMZ in Korea, Iraq in the 1990s, etc.).

[pissant]

COngress authorized war, based on a set of conditions. THere is zilch in the constitution about how to declare war. Ron Paul is just being stupid when he mumbles such nonsense.

[George W. Bush]

Its substantial. Just read the left wing wing blogs.

It's also the online gamblers and all the internet folk. And his appearances on Bill Maher and the Daily Show have helped with the under-thirties, some of whom have a lot of money to throw around. And he's very popular with the Slashdot crowd, a very large bunch with libertarian tendencies, in fact, Ron Paul is the only person some of them consider as a candidate at all.

Beyond all that, Ron Paul is actually considered the 'hip' candidate, screwy as that is. He's so conservative and anti-government, it almost doesn't register with some of these people or they say that's irrelevant to them. You should read it sometime. I understand why they like him but they surprise even me with their vehement Paul support.

Of course, this is a big-money election where Fred Thompson probably just raised $10 million in, like, two days. So the Big Four aren't in any trouble just yet. But the fact that Ron Paul could suck up that kind of money is going to make them look hard at his record and appeal and how to siphon off his voters. It always happens.

[Remember_Salamis]

Are you calling me a Nazi because I disagree with you? I guess you really are a lefty.

[CPT Clay]

This will be interesting when the 30 Jun money figures come out.

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

Post #111 well said, clapping hands.

[SoCalPol]

I guess that is why I worked in Reagan’s first campaign when he ran for gov.

[fieldmarshaldj]

"Paul is the one who is inspiring young people all over the country. His base is in their early-to-mid 20s, like me."

I'm close to a decade older than you. I saw this same hysteria with McCain 7 years ago, and Dean 3 years ago. These were flash-in-the-pan loons that appealed to a narrow and vocally disproportionate percent of the base, and came up very short, and for good reason. But, you're young and entitled to a youthful indiscretion that you'll be laughing about years from now with a "What was I thinking ?" moment.

Hey, I had that when I vocally supported Jesse Jackson and Fritz and Tits for President in 1984. But I was only 10 years old and just spouting lines to impress my Red Grandma and my GOP-hating teachers. When I became a Republican at 12, they didn't like me anymore. It's a tough thing to do the right thing over what is necessarily popular. Occasionally, it's nice when the two collide. That's why I'm supporting Fred. If you haven't seen it, go take a look at the 30-second clip of him responding to Michael Moore in the same manner you'd squash a mosquito. Tell me that doesn't look like the man who should be our next President, I dare ya. ;-)

[George W. Bush]

I love these Paul threads.

Me too. They just get funnier and funnier. I think we should hold a contest for Top RP Trolls and give out nice prizes.

[SCHROLL]

so he’s like Kerry-he wanted to vote for it before he voted against it?

[fieldmarshaldj]

"I finally registered."

Congratulations.

"I have been reading freerepublic for a long time."

Took me 3 years before I registered. Started reading it the first day I was online, Halloween, 1998.

"I consider myself to be very conservitive."

So do I.

"The first time I was old enough to vote, I voted republican because I valued my freedom."

Sensible.

"Since 9/ll we have lost a lot of our freedoms."

Thanks to our Mohammadan friends.

"As I searched for a canidate the only one interested in protecting rights is Ron Paul."

That's a loaded phrase, y'know. In wartime, unlimited rights can have deadly consequences.

"The more I listen to him the more he makes sense."

Funny, I have the polar opposite response. His naivety on foreign affairs is shocking in someone who has served in Congress on and off for 30 years.

"He says follow the Constitution and the people on freerepublic call him a loon."

He says America caused 9/11, and that is a lunatic position.

"I only wish instead of judging him take the time and listen to him. He may not win. My hope is that his message gets out."

I've listened, and he is certifiably dangerous, both abroad and domestically. He's fiscally Conservative ? Whoopee. Try seeing if that matters a damn when his isolationist position will force us to live in caves in Montana, however many Americans are left after the Mohammadans drop a few dirty bombs from coast to coast.