Posted on 03/30/2008 4:19:25 PM PDT by anymouse
Down here in Galveston County, the Ron Paul bots tried to hijack the convention using subterfuge and tactical advantage of surprise, that would have made al Queda proud (high-placed sleeper, multiple coordinated attacks with a goal of causing a larger scale effect at the State convention and later at the National convention.
Unfortunately for them it was discovered and thwarted for the most part by perceptive Republicans that took action and alerted others to help block their efforts. But it did make for a long and chaotic mess.
Like jihadists, they took advantage of a weak Party leadership in transition and general apathy of Party activists and precinct delegates.
A high level trusted elected official used the opportunity of a sick convention coordinator, a lame duck Party chairman and an honorary convention chair that did nothing but show up to give a speech at the start of the convention, to appoint weak commitee chairmen and pack key committees (Nominee, Credentials and Platform) with Paulbots, who had never been active in the Party before. To cover the obvious, a few "go-along" follower types were added to the committees to ensure the Paulbot block vote would not be challenged.
I sat in on the Resolutions/Platform committee after seeing some disturbing planks in the draft Platform. I witnessed a shocking railroad job of a Libertarian platform pushed through with highly questionable planks voted through with little opposition. Including one listing a list of complains against Sen. McCain and stating a no confidence in him as the Party's nominee. This was later removed in a heated floor fight.
Also the trusted official tried to get a change to the rules to allow people that had not voted in the Primary to be allowed to considered as State delegates. Supposedly to allow his daughter who had just turned 18 to go to State as a delegate (an understandable excuse.) But because I had been alerted to the plot to stack the nominations and Credentials committees, I knew that this could also be used to let Libertarians, who had not voted in the Republican Primary to be rammed through as sleeper Ron Paul delegates, merely by swearing to a worthless Party loyalty oath. The Parliamentarian eventually figured out that it was against State Party rules and it was withdrawn, before I could get my turn at the mic to explain the potential hazard of our entire SD delegations being disqualified at the State convention by the Credentials committee discovering that some of our delegates had not voted in the Primary.
They even had the audacity to add Bob Smither to the Nominating committee. Spither ran in the 2006 General election as the Libertarian Party candidate for CD 22. He didn't show up to the convention, but it was a clear evidence of a concerted Libertarian plot to hijack the Nominations process.
Eventually things worked out in a long and painful floor fight.
Most of the State delegates and alternates ended up being known Republicans, but there were a few that made it, that I didn't recognize as well as quite a few known Ron Paul supporters. So don't be surprised if other Paulbots make it to the State convention in Texas and elsewhere and try to infiltrate the State committees and attempt other mischief in a vain attempt to push Ron Paul as a viable nominee over McCain.
Although we are not thrilled with McCain as the presumptive Republican nominee, we cannot allow the resulting Party angst and apathy to be exploited by another Party, the Libertarians (and their radical Left and Right Paulbots) to hijack our State and National conventions.
If you doubt my observations, check out some of their stated plans:
"Delegates must VOID McCain's wins !!!" http://www.ronpaulforum.com/showthread.php?t=307129
: The delegates in these states need to file the motion at their conventions : for Mccain to be revoked of all his delegates in those states for failure : to comply with election ballot state law requirements.
"Republicans have choice - Ron Paul supporters tend to fall into two camps. Some believe he may still pull off a David vs." Ron Paul Topix forum http://www.topix.com/forum/us-house/ron-paul/TJQJFHLSRLIGG4PJA
: We held down the fort in Texas. Delegates at the least representing : Paul's platforms are in place.
: Ron Paul Supporter, : Dr. Aaron Benfield : Austin, Tx
I can see why you are proud of your state party.
And protective.
You need to be protective.
From your post #1:
"He needs to keep the Paulbots focused on further disruptive hijinx, not so much because he thinks that they will work. But for the same reason OBL keeps putting out video messages - to keep $$ flowing in to his war chest."
That is not attacking RP?
I think that is attacking RP.
It left me in 1996. (I'm starting to see payback with McCain as their standard bearer. They deserve each other. It's just too bad that they're taking good Americans down with them in the process.)
And the problem with this is.... ?
[... I find the anti-Iraq attitude very disturbing...]
Please read Ron Paul’s ENTIRE statement about foreign intervention. He is dead wrong about about Iraq, but now that we have actual WMD evidence I hope to see an adjustment in his reasoning. The rest of his platform makes sense to me because it follows the Constitution, annuls the power of the UN over our sovereignty and focuses on national security.
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/war-and-foreign-policy/
The war in Iraq was sold to us with false information. The area is more dangerous now than when we entered it. We destroyed a regime hated by our direct enemies, the jihadists, and created thousands of new recruits for them. This war has cost more than 3,000 American lives, thousands of seriously wounded, and hundreds of billions of dollars. We must have new leadership in the White House to ensure this never happens again.
Both Jefferson and Washington warned us about entangling ourselves in the affairs of other nations. Today, we have troops in 130 countries. We are spread so thin that we have too few troops defending America. And now, there are new calls for a draft of our young men and women.
We can continue to fund and fight no-win police actions around the globe, or we can refocus on securing America and bring the troops home. No war should ever be fought without a declaration of war voted upon by the Congress, as required by the Constitution.
Under no circumstances should the U.S. again go to war as the result of a resolution that comes from an unelected, foreign body, such as the United Nations.
Too often we give foreign aid and intervene on behalf of governments that are despised. Then, we become despised. Too often we have supported those who turn on us, like the Kosovars who aid Islamic terrorists, or the Afghan jihadists themselves, and their friend Osama bin Laden. We armed and trained them, and now we’re paying the price.
At the same time, we must not isolate ourselves. The generosity of the American people has been felt around the globe. Many have thanked God for it, in many languages. Let us have a strong America, conducting open trade, travel, communication, and diplomacy with other nations.
Since when did genuinely wanting to be involved in the process become a desire to hijack the process?
A-men to all of you, for being some voices of reason on Free Republic. For someone to post a thread about active, Constitutional citizens trying to get involved in a process that has become eerily similar to the backroom deals of yesteryear...and then have the nerve to say that they are “attempting to hijack” the party is beyond me. I don’t know whether to laugh loud at the thread poster’s lunacy or cry for our country. Again, to those I have responded to here, thanks for some sanity.
Of course it is. Oh did I say is? Gee that dependents then. :>}
Bush was itching to get us in Iraq before 9/11 happened but he has not took even so much as a stern word of warning to the nations actually behind 9/11. We owed Yemen for example a huge payback. Not a peep from W was heard. Bush's handling of the Iraq war is insanity at it's worse. The man is LBJ the second. The ongoing ridiclous Court Martials of U.S. finest says as much. Again not a peep on that matter either from Bush or his two clueless Sec of Defense.
Smart money would have hoped or even encouraged Iran and Iraq would go to war with each other again and kept both their thirst for bloodshed satisfied. Instead we have united those two enemies against us.
The GOP is fixing to collapse in on itself and be Whigged. I've seen far more Ron Paul for POTUS yard signs {on private property} in my state {Tennessee} than I saw for all others running combined including Fred. I see no McCain signs or stickers. People are fed up with Fat Cat elitist in the RNC being our political overlords. The GOP will likely loose quite a few seats in both houses and likely the White House to boot. Why? Because clueless ones can't think for themselves any more and must have their daily dosages of party propaganda from Rush, Hannity, etc so they know what they are supposed to think this week.
You can dislike Ron Paul that is your right. But at least the ones who understand him and will vote for him know that he actually has some real answers to real problems beyond Iraq other than the globalization of North America as their sole agenda for running like McCain.
AND I own a pencil!!
what exactly is so distasteful to you - the point he makes in the post youve made are all agreeable in light of a porous border.....that makes the lives lost all the more wasteful
Mine are still up.
Yeah, an anti-Big-Government platform being pushed through today's RINOcan Party is almost as shocking as a squadron of flying pigs.
Try decaf.
That being said, Paul's supporters include libertarians who are social liberals. I attended a county Republican convention in Texas where the Paul supporters alienated sound elements in their candidate's platform with issues like legalizing marijuana and withdrawing condemnation of homosexuality from the Texas GOP platform. These positions were about as popular with the mostly Christian delegates as vegan advocacy would be at a meeting of a cattlemen's association. In 1968, supporters of Eugene McCarthy's antiwar Presidential candidacy went "clean for Gene". The Paul supporters should have done something of that nature.
The same old lies repeated over and over by Democrats and Paulistas. When the Iraqis signed the cease fire agreement in Aswan in 1991, they agreed to allow inspectors inspect all WMD sites and verfy destruction and documentation of destruction of all Iraqi WMD.
The Iraqis reneged on that agreement by intimidating inspectors, bugging their offices and hotels, and denying them access to many of the places they wished to inspect. This repudiation of the 1991 cease fire agreement was a causus belli. At that point the US not only had a right but a duty to restart hostilities againts Iraq just as in 1936 the British and French had a duty to intervene against NAZI Germany when Hilter illegally sent military forces into the Rhineland in violattion of the Treaty of Versailles.
Also the requirement wasn't just to destroy the stockpiles and production equipment, it was aslo to destroy all the documments from their research program to develop WMD. What happened to those? Were they shredded or burned? Even if the physical copies were destroyed what about digital copies of the documents. It would be pretty easy to archive the entire program on just a few CD's or DVD's. It would be pretty easy to restablish a WMD program from a digital archive of the documents.
You ask where are the WMD? Well so do I. Whatever the Iraqi govnement did with them, they did not document their destruction. Did the Iraqis move them to a third country like Syria with the help of the Russians? Who knows? In any case, their wilfully violation the ceasefire agreement they signed after their defeat in 1991 was sufficient to restart hostilities.
Yup! Agree with you completely.
However, I am convinced the WMD are in Iraq.
[... Since when did genuinely wanting to be involved in the process become a desire to hijack the process?...]
Great point!!!
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