The Ron Paul Thread!

[Stargazer]

the fact that I try to stress is that there is no sutch thing as actual
freedom. You will allways be "slave" to something.

A lot of political parties (at least here in Norway)
talk about how social services hinder freedom and liberty.
It might be true, but for the people that don't have a choice it's good
to have a offer for help.

[The Cook]

Ron Paul - what's so great about him?

I read the wikipaedia artice about Ron Paul, and I was aghast at what I read. This guy is an extreme libertarian who seeks to destroy the American social fabric.

Here's one quote from the Wiki:

"In 2005, Paul introduced the Sanctity of Life Act, a federal bill that would define human life as beginning at conception and remove abortion from the jurisdiction of the federal judiciary., effectively overturning Roe v. Wade.[10] Defining embryos and fetuses as persons would make abortion murder and outlaw fetal stem cell research and some contraception and fertility treatments.[77][78] He has also introduced a constitutional amendment which would also remove federal jurisdiction over abortion."

Anti free choice and against stem cell research...

He a also has racist tendencies:

"An article in a 1992 edition of The Ron Paul Survival Report (a newsletter Paul had published from 1985) contained disparaging comments concerning race and Paul's political opponents.[53] According to the Atlanta Progressive News, the newsletter accused President Bill Clinton of fathering illegitimate children and using cocaine, and called Representative Barbara Jordan a "fraud" and a "half-educated victimologist." The article said that government should lower the legal age for prosecuting youths as adults, saying: "black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such." The newsletter also said, "only about 5 percent of blacks have sensible political opinions," "If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be," and, "95 percent of the black males in Washington, D.C. are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."


He also opposes gun laws, even though they are weak in the USA.

I'm dismayed that anyone would want to support him...

[Craig de Tering]

Re: Ron Paul - what's so great about him?

... who seeks to destroy the American social fabric....

So say you. That's YOUR opinion of what his intentions amount to.
If anything, people from across the political spectrum are uniting behind him.
Indeed; from tree-hugging leftie vegans to keep-off-my-property rightist gun freaks. He's consistently garnering support from the most intellectual of folks around: book authors, IT professionals, university students and guess what, it's exactly these people who think outside the envelope and who seek unbiased information outside the mainstream media channels (internet). I've seen a YouTube clip of a black, single mom, Democrat teacher who's endorsing him. H1-B visa toting Indian IT pro's love him too.
:wink:

I think the reason not many african-americans and latino's have heard of him yet is because the former are too infatuated with Barrack Osama and the latter are afraid of the border being properly guarded and trade relations being normalized with Cuba. Both of which would be in their own interest once they understand the deeper ramifications. It's just common sense.
The latino's hate Castro, I do too. I think he's a misguided tyrant. But 40+ years of economic embargo haven't dented the communist regime and as Vietnam and China illustrate; it is TRADE that drives change.

Here's a nice example: Did you know that there's an internal struggle going on inside the echelons of power in China because the western world is demanding their poisoned product must adhere to stricter safety checks?
Why?
The chinese leaders are going out of their way to assure us their products are safe and that they'll introduce even stricter controls (whereas they had none before) but meanwhile what these scandals do is expose the typical ingrained corruption that the secrecy inherent to communism fosters.
*BOOM*
Trade slowly but surely twists the commies arms and MAKES them break down secrecy to find out what's really going on with lower government officials (who turn a blind eye to defective products for kickbacks) and once that comes out there's no going back to secrecy.
Remember that we DEMAND reassurance and no amount of promises will be enough. We want proof of their changing their ways, because continued exporting of poison products means their promises are worthless. And if there's ONE thing chinese culture doesn't tolerate it's the shame of being caught lying. Plus they get to face the firing squad :lol:
Layer by layer the commie apparatus will start shedding it's skin until one day their own people will start thoroughly questioning the purpose of a good-for-nothing central gov't full of aparatchiks.

Wanna break communism? Then trading with a commie country is a sure fire way to change their system.

As for the Latino reasons for supporting Paul; let me just say for now that even latinos themselves hate illegal immigrants. They themselves say illegals are stealing from them. That's their own voice and wallet speaking. Not Paul nor me.

As long as there is some handout, which is not available where a person is at that moment, that person will do whatever it takes to go to the location of said handout and qualify for that handout. It's really just simple supply and demand. Go somewhere, get money.
Heck if I could earn 10 times as much as I do now by moving a thousand miles I wouldn't be typing this and would start moving right away.

"In 2005, Paul introduced the Sanctity of Life Act, a federal bill that would define human life as beginning at conception and remove abortion from the jurisdiction of the federal judiciary., effectively overturning Roe v. Wade.[10] Defining embryos and fetuses as persons would make abortion murder and outlaw fetal stem cell research and some contraception and fertility treatments.[77][78] He has also introduced a constitutional amendment which would also remove federal jurisdiction over abortion."

Anti free choice and against stem cell research...

Relax dude.
I'm pro-choice too but you're missing a very important word in that snippet of text you quoted. FEDERAL
If it's not a federal prerogative then ofcourse the states would have to legislate abortion rights themselves on state by state basis.
Paul has indeed stated he is pro-life BUT he's more vehement about leaving that decision up to the individual states. So under his administration a traditionally conservative state like Texas might outlaw abortion but places like California would be allowed to legalize it. All a woman has to do is either move, book a flight or drive to the next state.

He a also has racist tendencies:

"An article in a 1992 edition of The Ron Paul Survival Report (a newsletter Paul had published from 1985) contained disparaging comments concerning race and Paul's political opponents.[53] According to the Atlanta Progressive News, the newsletter accused President Bill Clinton of fathering illegitimate children and using cocaine, and called Representative Barbara Jordan a "fraud" and a "half-educated victimologist." The article said that government should lower the legal age for prosecuting youths as adults, saying: "black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such." The newsletter also said, "only about 5 percent of blacks have sensible political opinions," "If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be," and, "95 percent of the black males in Washington, D.C. are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."

All I can detect here is his typical straight talk. Ron Paul might be a lot of things but politically correct he is not. Thank [insert deity]!
Perhaps you should hunt down the numbers he mentioned before you call him racist.

See here:

black males age 13 who have been raised on the streets and who have joined criminal gangs are as big, strong, tough, scary and culpable as any adult and should be treated as such.

Read my emphasis in BOLD again. He's referring to a subset of people explicitly.
I'm sorry if you feel offended but I can't help but agree. And wasn't 1992 the height of the Bloods and Crips gang violence problem in LA? the age of rap artists' scary cop killer lyrics?
Just a sign of the times of you ask me.

"only about 5 percent of blacks have sensible political opinions," "If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be," and, "95 percent of the black males in Washington, D.C. are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."

C'mon man, these are three loose sentences ripped out of their context. We'd both need the full text to disseminate and debate. Once again: context is needed.

As for gun laws; I used to be on the fence about guns. I used to have air guns as a kid. But never owned a real firearm.
As far as gun crime is concerned I'm not going to debate those as they are made completely irrelevant by a much more fundamental safegaurd.
The fact that a county's population has access to firearms means any government contemplating passing draconian control laws (which citizens might feel will take away their liberty) will think long and very hard about that because human nature is such that when push comes to shove people WILL take up arms against an unpopular regime they consider illegitimate.

Outlawing guns wholesale seems to me like prescribing chemotherapy to someone with the flu or shooting a cannon at a pesky fly.

[Coffey]

I don't want to cut and paste your whole post Craig, so all I will say is amen!

[Zero]

Re: Ron Paul - what's so great about him?

I read the wikipaedia artice about Ron Paul, and I was aghast at what I read.

What you have to understand is a few things.

1) Extremely powerful people are scared to death of Ron Paul and his popularity. At every turn they are spin-doctoring and twisting his words, mounting aggressive smear campaigns, taking his statements out of context, and completely making things up even.

2) His legislation and voting record are often also placed out of context, interpreting them in ways which are not Paul's intent.

Consider, for example, the abortion issue. The only substance to the legislation he proposed would be the acknowledgement of "life at conception". Otherwise, however, the law clearly proposes that it is also none of the Federal Government's business to make laws about abortion - either in support of or in opposition. So it doesn't matter what he personally thinks about it, his fundamental position is that he would not make the choice for people. That's about as good it can get, in my opinion.

The same goes, for example, for things like stem-cell research and net-neutrality. He doesn't oppose the legislation because he is in support of legislation to restrict those things, he opposes the legislation because he feels it is not the government's business to be writing laws about what scientists should and shouldn't be doing, or what internet service providers should or shouldn't be doing. There's no good reason why a communications company shouldn't be allowed to deliver censored content if they want to. If people don't like that, other companies are also free to deliver uncensored content and then the people can choose what they want from their service providers, for example.

As for the statements about blacks, it's total rubbish. First, it wasn't even written by him - it was written by a member of his team who was fired for doing so and the newsletter was never released. The full text was also, for the record :

"Opinion polls consistently show that only about 5 percent of blacks....etc[/b]"

Not much better, but it's citing an opinion, not presenting one. Also, this was in 1985, when DC was really, really bad for black-on-black crime. Even Dave Chapelle makes jokes about how bad it was in the 80s. So, talking about an opinion poll in the context of a serious social problem at the time is hardly the same as making just the second half of that statement. Again, it still wasn't even him and he still disagreed with the presentation to a degree that he sacked the woman who wrote it. Listen to the man speak, he's a hardcore egalitarian - all humans should be equal, like it says in the constitution.

Now, for the gun laws, again it's a constitution issue. And, really, as much as I'm a proponent of non-violence, I think it's actually not a bad idea to have legal guns. The last hope for America's future may turn out to be the fact that the populace is well armed - the whole point was to keep the population empowered such that they could resist a tyrannical government. It may yet come to that. Besides, owning a gun harms nobody. It has uses for defence and for hunting, but one is completely capable of owning a gun without causing trouble for anyone. Punish crimes, not innocent accessory behaviours to crimes. Stabbings are rampant in the UK, for example. Should we ban knives next? Look at the lunacy that has caused in Canada - treating school kids like damned inmates and insane panics when a kid tries to cut up an orange during lunch hour. This isn't the way to live.

So, yeah, beware what you read about Ron Paul - if it's negative, it is most likely an untrustworthy source. I haven't found any exceptions, anyways...

[Zero]

^ You'll notice that the bit about the blacks has also been removed from Wikipedia... it doesn't last long as a political sounding board there before they correct things.

[Coffey]

Although I didn't want to get into the gun thing, I think Zero raises a very important point. The simple fact that you own a gun doesn't make you a murder. My entire family, myself included, have always owned guns. None of us have ever killed another person. The other fact that Zero brings up about stabbings is also well received, people have found ways to kill other people since well before the creation of the firearm. Well it has been frequently said that America's gun laws aren't strong enough, the solution is not to create more laws, the solution is to enforce the phone book sized collection of laws we already have. For the most part, if a person is willing to go through the process of purchasing a firearm legally, their intentions are not to commit an illegal act.

[Zero]

^ to add to the gun thing, it's been mostly the same with me - whole family always had guns. I'd say it's a good thing. I grew up understanding and respecting them, and also learning how to handle them safely. In a situation where one may be attacked by an armed assailant, it helps to know how to use a gun confidently if you happen to get the thing away from your attacker, too. Fire, scissors, and cars can be deadly weapons as well, but we teach kids to let the grownups deal with those dangerous things until they're old enough to treat them with the respect of an adult. I guess the question is whether one wants the state to be one's mum or not... a mum with a fierce temper, tazers, torture prisons, and a psychotic case of narcissism. :shock:

[Coffey]

^ Lol! Good point about how much trust to put into your country. How does that old saying go? Those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither.

[jmcphail]

Re: Ron Paul, he is refreshing in his avoidance of jingoistic scare tactics and dog-whistle politics, it makes him seem open and straightforward.

However, I remain suspicious of anyone who claims to be willing to implement theories without compromise where people or societies are concerned. Either they're willing to ignore details or they don't really grasp the real-world issues of the implementation.

Basically, I usually don't trust simple solutions to complicated problems.

[Zero]

I don't know... I think he's just passionate about his ideals, but he seems realistic about policy too. He's always said that change has to happen slowly and that one needs to work with the people and the congress to bring about change. I think his campaign is more about showing the kind of person he is and what he believes in than what he's "going to do" should he become president. He's against abortion, but he's not against letting you choose for yourself. He believes in liberty, but he also believes in consensus and democracy. He has goals for eliminating some public services from the federal portfolio, but he acknowledges the need to, in the interim, support people who are currently dependent on provisions of the society as they are. If anything, he seems calm and rational - open to debate and strongly against unilateralism, authoritarianism, or otherwise any unchecked or non-transparent accumulation and exercise of power. That's enough for me, really - the proverbial "honest politician". In the real world, that's on the scale of like a blue moon, or when hell freezes over... that sort of thing. I mean, he can't possibly screw it up worse than it is and hell will reach absolute bloody zero before he makes it worse than the direction we're heading... i think

[The Cook]

Ouch! Craig fired with both barrels and Zero slipped a stiletto between the ribs! Last time I post here in this thread.

Seriously, I really don't believe the USA needs a man like Ron Paul. His libertarian stance is extreme, and I don't think the USA needs any more libertarianism, the States are libertarian enough as it is. Maybe that's just my view as a Canadian.

[Craig de Tering]

Re: Ron Paul, he is refreshing in his avoidance of jingoistic scare tactics and dog-whistle politics, it makes him seem open and straightforward.

However, I remain suspicious of anyone who claims to be willing to implement theories without compromise where people or societies are concerned. Either they're willing to ignore details or they don't really grasp the real-world issues of the implementation.

Basically, I usually don't trust simple solutions to complicated problems.

So pick a subject that's of interest of you and shoot. Maybe we can elaborate on it for ya.

Personally I just think most humans can't get their heads around simplicity and elegance anymore because for years upon years politicians have bombarded us with convoluted, indecipherable politispeak so now naturally people become apprehensive when concepts they hear actually make sense the first time around :-D

[jmcphail]

I appreciate your offer, but my use for Ron Paul is to make sure the people around me give enough of their attention to each of the eligible candidates.

So pick a subject that's of interest of you and shoot. Maybe we can elaborate on it for ya.

I believe people are more intelligent than this idea suggests.

Personally I just think most humans can't get their heads around simplicity and elegance anymore because for years upon years politicians have bombarded us with convoluted, indecipherable politispeak so now naturally people become apprehensive when concepts they hear actually make sense the first time around :-D

[Zero]

I don't think the USA needs any more libertarianism, the States are libertarian enough as it is. Maybe that's just my view as a Canadian.

eh? By "USA", we are talking about the United States of America? Our neighbour to the south? Libertarian as it is??? How on earth do you figure? Maybe in the 19th century that was true, but... today? You have a chance to shock me less by perhaps comparing Eric The Red to Ghandi.

The US is almost fascist at this point. They've destroyed most of the constitution and basic human rights, they've endorsed torture, heavily censor the media, are attacking academics and other free thinkers, arresting non-violent protesters of all kinds, continuing to spread global corporatism (which is *not* free-market stuff, but government-supported favourtism!!) with corrupt deals with the elites. The scary thing is the effort to start changing Canada in the same ways... if you don't see the disintegration of the fabric of US society going on then I am really scared. It means people probably won't notice when it comes to Canada either.

Everyone's life and economy, printed into a chip. The chip starts your vehicle, unlocks your doors, gives you access to your money, allows you to travel from place to place... and when you do something the masters don't like, they turn off your chip. Powerless. This is what's coming... boom and bust cycles moving all real assets, property, resources, and commodities into the hands of Bankers who will forever rent them out to us as a privilege. The real leeches aren't welfare bums, but the rent-seeking bankers who are trying to take over the world. They're on track and showing no sign of slowing down as it is :shock: