Ron Paul: Utah turnout wows candidate

Salt Lake Tribune ^ | 9/16/07 | Sheena McFarland

[George W. Bush]

Ron Paul: Utah turnout wows candidate

Before a crowd of 1,000, Republican hopeful speaks about foreign policy, war

By Sheena McFarland
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated:09/16/2007 02:38:49 AM MDT

More than 1,000 people gathered Saturday at the Union Pacific Depot in Salt Lake City to rally behind U.S. Rep. Ron Paul in his bid for the Republican presidential nomination.

    Paul, an obstetrician from Texas, was impressed with the turnout.

    "Wow. If they only knew you existed over in Washington, they'd change things over there," he said as he greeted the cheering crowd.

    Paul spoke fervently of his support of smaller government, including the abolition of agencies, such as the Internal Revenue Service, and of his support for strictly following the Constitution. He also spoke out against the war in Iraq and any pre-emptive military action.

    "Because of our careless attitude about foreign policy and how we go to war, we have allowed our government to build an American world empire," he said. "We are not an empire. We're a republic."

    Paul's stances on such topics are "clearly proven" in his voting record, which has earned him the nickname of "Dr. No" in the House of Representatives, said supporter Ronald Levine Saturday.

    "I tell people not to listen to what a candidate says before an election or what he does," he said. "I tell them to look at what he has consistently done for the past 20 years."

    That voting record is what drives his grass-roots supporters, said Mark Hudson of Syracuse.

    "He is the only candidate who attracts everyone from libertarians to constitutional conservatives to true conservatives," Hudson said.

    Paul visited Utah for the free rally and for a $1,000-a-plate brunch that drew fewer than 20 supporters and a $2,000-per-plate dinner. He is the eighth presidential candidate to visit Utah, the fourth Republican. Paul had raised about $13,000 in Utah as of the June 30 filing, according to the Federal Elections Commission.

    Though polls show Paul garnering an average of only 2 percent of potential voters, many of his supporters believe the polls don't accurately show how many people support him.

    "He's the only candidate I've seen homemade signs for," said Tom Salt, who is studying mechanical engineering at Brigham Young University.

    Salt sees many young people supporting Paul.

    "We look at his principles and we're too young to be cynical about his chances," Salt said.

    The mainstream media has not treated Paul fairly, said Jed Hardman of Springville, and neither have some of the other Republicans in the race, pointing to Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney "openly mocking" Paul after debates.

    "They're afraid because as soon as such a true conservative emerges, one who is anti-abortion and has conservative views on taxes, they're going to lose," he said.

    smcfarland@sltrib.com

[Tai_Chung]

I heard him say that he would not militarily support England if England were attack.

If we don’t support England, I doubt there is any country he would help.

[George W. Bush]

Produce the quote.

[George W. Bush]

Video of RP's Salt Lake rally. Very excited crowd!

YouTube - Ron Paul on KUTV2 Salt Lake City

[svcw]

I do not hate him I do not know him personally. I can not stand is anti-military defense of this country and our allies.
His position that we are to blame for 9/11 and his hostility over Israel.

[George W. Bush]

His position that we are to blame for 9/11 and his hostility over Israel.

He does not blame us for 9/11. He does point out, correctly, that our presence on the Arabian peninsula and our ongoing attacks on Iraq in the Nineties were a tremendous recruiting tool for Osama. The 9/11 hijackers said these things as well. So does Paul Wolfowitz who commented on the need to get our troops off the Arabian peninsula as quickly as possible after we invaded Iraq so we wouldn't be recruiting even more terrorists for Osama. And that's exactly what we did. That's not saying we're to blame. That's telling people about the root causes that help Osama to recruit terrorists.

He's also been pointing the finger at the Saudis for their sponsored terrorism around the world. Long overdue.

As for Israel, Ron Paul feels all foreign aid should be cut off. The usual hysteria erupts because that happens to include aid for Israel as well as Egypt, the $15 billion for Africa (now increasing to $30 billion), the nonsense of deploying our troops around the world to vaccinate children and even livestock, well, it's endless.

Now you may like the global empire thing and welfare programs for the Third World. We don't.

[Tears of a Clown]

Honestly, I would be the first to support Ron Paul IF I had some assurances that he would continue to fight terrorism and atleast send special forces in to continue hunting bin laden.

We’re in the middle of two wars in afghanistan and iraq, and terrorists are more determined to strike us than ever before.

So far, Paul hasn’t proved to me that he takes national security seriously AT ALL. Does Paul underestimate the willpower and the savagery of the islamofacists? I would think so..many of his supporters don’t even believe that 19 arabs hit the towers and the pentagon.

[Calvinist_Dark_Lord]

Honestly, I would be the first to support Ron Paul IF I had some assurances that he would continue to fight terrorism and atleast send special forces in to continue hunting bin laden.

In light of the fact that Paul voted for the use of force resolution in Afghanistan, and has spoken of the desire to bring bin Luadin to justice, i'd say that continued support and Special Operations actions would continue under his Presidency.

Apparently Paul believes that 19 (actually 20 if you count Moussai) involved in 9/11 (15 of them being Saudis) committed the crimes that they were accused of.

[Tears of a Clown]

I doubt that.

According to one his aides, Paul was strongly AGAINST the use of force of afghanistan. And only begrudgingly signed it when his staff threatened to resign.

That doesn’t sound like a person who takes the war on terror seriously. It DOES sound like a person who will sit on his hands like bill clintonm, look the other way when we are attacked again and again by islamofacists, and pass off another 9/11 to be dealt with by someone who is actually strong on terror, like Dubya.

[the tongue]

IF (and “if” is the biggest two letter word in the English language) young people will get out to register and vote, this part of the article means a lot:

” Salt sees many young people supporting Paul.

“We look at his principles and we’re too young to be cynical about his chances,” Salt said. “

THAT could be the tale of the tape.

[Tears of a Clown]

By “signed it” i meant to say “voted for it”

[the tongue]

All of the Paul bashing has a basis, and I agree that he wouldn’t be the best candidate regarding the WOT. BUT....he would be the best all around candidate. Scads better than that s**thead Guliani, the socialist Romney, the pretender Thompson, or any of the others, who I believe to have at least socialist leanings if not outright socialist credentials.
Say what you will, but Ron Paul comes down squarely on the side of our divine Constitution every single time, unlike the rest of the pack who pick and choose which parts they like, and that means a lot to me. And it should mean a lot to YOU, too.

[KDD]

Time to help Ron Paul spread his message of freedom.

[traviskicks]

will do

[George W. Bush]

According to one his aides, Paul was strongly AGAINST the use of force of afghanistan.

An aide who went flako, offended all the Republicans and Libertarians he once worked with, injects himself into a lot of different fights, then claims credit for other people's political work, alternates between trying to destroy Republicans and Libertarians. Oh, and he wrote a bogus language-learning book that's a laughingstock at Amazon and he advocates legalizing prostitution, especially for our overseas troops to enjoy, much as he brags about all the whores he patronized as a sailor. He also claims to be a combat veteran because a ship he served on was attacked after he had already been transferred elsewhere.

Eric Dondero. We're hoping he runs against Ron Paul.

Ron Paul voted for the authorization of action in Afghanistan. He also introduced a declaration of war and he offered legislation to issue letters of marque and reprisal against the Afghan warlords and against al-Qaeda's leaders. That doesn't sound too opposed to me.

Now, he certainly was against the war in Iraq although he did offer a declaration of war against them as well, to strengthen the administration's hand if we did go to war. It is the correct action.

[Jason_b]

"It appears there can be no conversation about his policies..."

Whose fault is that? When the RINO element started right off in the beginning with the ad hominems, that killed any hope for reasoned rational conversation right there and then.

Why do you feel the need to bring out the nut perjurative and use it against those with whom you disagree? You must know that it makes you look immature, and that it isn't going to make one of us change his mind. Call me a nut enough times and that tells me you don't want to talk. I'm going to walk away rather than let you insult me endlessly. If you really want to talk then grow up and learn to talk about the issues without tossing insults. I don't call you a nut for not agreeing with my view of things. I simply know and accept that you don't agree. At worst, I'll tell you that you are wrong and I'll try to tell you why. When you call me a nut, you don't have to tell me why I'm a nut and you get out of having to tell me why I'm wrong. That's not a conversation, it's a waste of time.

"I can not support a man who has such disregard for a stern/forceful forgein policy."

Then you wouldn't have supported G. Washington or a principle he held. Paul is only saying what Washington said, have commerce with other nations, otherwise stay out of their internal affairs and avoid entangling alliances. If you can't agree with that then we will just have to be resigned to permanent disagreement on that point.

"I can not support a candidate that does not support Israel."

Well then don't. It's just as simple as that. Paul is a constitutionalist and I will support him for that reason. He would attempt to find the clause in the Constitution that authorizes Congress to support our favorite pet foreign nations and directs the President to do so. He would not find it because it isn't there. Perhaps Congress could pass a constitutional amendment for supporting Israel. Otherwise we are exercising arbitrary government and arbitrary government is what we wished to get away from in 1776.

"I can not support a candidate who blames US for 9/11."

We have corrected this error before and we can go on correcting it as many times as we need to until those of you who are slow to get the news get informed. Paul never blamed US for 9/11.

Paul is citing, and quoting, CIA analysis (and the 911 commission) which concludes that certain foreign policies of certain factions that have control of the US government lead to increased radicalization and militization of peoples elsewhere who then go on to carry out terror attacks against us and our interests around the world. If you don't like what these conclusions suggest, you should take it up with the CIA, not Paul.

Paul is committing no crime by citing this CIA analysis. Yet people like you hear it the way you want to hear it and then you spread the disinformation that Paul thought the idea up all on his own to blame the entire US and everybody living here. That's just wrong.

[George W. Bush]

All of the Paul bashing has a basis, and I agree that he wouldn’t be the best candidate regarding the WOT. BUT....he would be the best all around candidate.

Fair enough. We don't expect universal support. And his presence in the race does keep alive small-government issues, border issues, etc. So, like Tancredo or Duncan, his candidacy can serve conservatives well even if he doesn't get the nomination.

[Calvinist_Dark_Lord]

I doubt that.

According to one his aides, Paul was strongly AGAINST the use of force of afghanistan. And only begrudgingly signed it when his staff threatened to resign.

Eric Dondero.

If you choose to believe the word of a wacko who has offended anybody he's had any prolonged dealings with and was fired by Ron Paul for offenses that Paul could not tolerate from staff, be my guest, you're beyond help.

That doesn’t sound like a person who takes the war on terror seriously. It DOES sound like a person who will sit on his hands like bill clintonm, look the other way when we are attacked again and again by islamofacists, and pass off another 9/11 to be dealt with by someone who is actually strong on terror, like Dubya.

Paul takes the supposed war on terror seriously enough to have serious objections to measures that may be an unconstitutional infringement on the liberties of American Citizens.

If you think that Bush is strong on terror, answer us as to why he has not moved on a stronger immigration policy, border security, and dealt decisively with the Saudi Government who gave us bin Ladin and 20 individuals who planned and committed the 9/11 atrocities.

Your statements are laughable.

[takenoprisoner]

“We are not an empire. We’re a republic.”

That was the original intent.

[George W. Bush]

If you think that Bush is strong on terror, answer us as to why he has not moved on a stronger immigration policy, border security, and dealt decisively with the Saudi Government who gave us bin Ladin and 20 individuals who planned and committed the 9/11 atrocities.

We should be posting more threads on the Saudis overall. See my last post on the Climb Aboard thread.

FrontPage.com (David Horowitz) and others have done some excellent reporting. There was a recent ABC news feature on it too, maybe it's available via YouTube.

Our Friends The Saudis - Google Search

[Calvinist_Dark_Lord]

i posted my reply to the wrong thread:

i meant to make this reply to you.

Sorry about the mixup.