Ron Paul Revealed
I absolutely do not expect Ron Paul, as a Republican, to surpass a fourth place showing in any state primary. If he broke off to run as an Independent or Libertarian, he could never draw 10% of American voters. But I do get concerned by the amount of consideration granted hm by Libertarians and liberals. So Dave Neiwert’s detailed breakdown of the Ron Paul voting record should be required reading for all.
Granted, being for a quick troop withdrawal, against torture and against wiretapping immunity gives him appeal the rest of the Republican presidential candidates lack. But his positions on all the issues Dave has highlighted should help end the romanticism about his possibilities. If he sounds saner than the other republicans, I won’t try to disabuse you that notion. After all, none of them deserve ten percent support of the American electorate.
The sad fact is, the GOP is the weakest I’ve ever seen it. If the party wants to survive, it had better get a sense of where the middle is, because most of it teeters on the edge of suicidal extremism.
November 12th, 2007 at 9:07 am
Never believe any article that lists more than three specific ideas. The whole goal is a type of propaganda, that lists so many facts, that they are too numerous to really check, or construct a detailed argument against and then makes a single statement analysis of them. The point is to give the appearance of a well researched article, but without really thinking about what the “facts” mean.
For example, the article implys that if you want to eventually eliminate social security, you are against old people widows and orphans, without a willingness to discuss how well social security really works.
There is a link to some militia site about the gold standard, but it leaves out things that Greenspan himself said about that, and it leaves out the Von Mise institute, to try to make the idea look Kooky, when in fact it is a well founded economic concept. (apparently the Author slept through ECON 101)
November 12th, 2007 at 10:27 am
I’m very familiar with Neiwert’s research skills. He’s very methodical and rarely errs. If you wish to, try and find two points he raised and rebut them if you think he’s in error.
Your rebuttal so far barely qualifies: if you think there’s a well-founded economic concept there, make that concept clear with appropriate cites.
November 12th, 2007 at 11:23 am
Kevin, Kevin, the troll calls himself “John Galt”. Do not feed the Randian libertarian, please!
November 12th, 2007 at 11:48 am
Drive-by trolls don’t bother me, Emma. They shoot something inane once, depart and that’s all the effort their brains can manage in one day.
I’ll gladly engage Paul’s supporters. It shaerpens my skills for my debates with sixth graders.
November 12th, 2007 at 12:16 pm
[…] Others: Liberal Values, Crooks and Liars, MoJoBlog, The American Street, The Impolitic, Making Light, Campaign for America’s Future and The Mahablog Technorati Tags: Ron Paul , Politics , Republicans , Deomcrats , Opinion SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: “Liberals Slamming Ron Paul”, url: “http://thepopulistblog.com/2007/11/12/liberals-slamming-ron-paul/” }); […]
November 12th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
Kevin, one cannot rebut a non-argument. Dave does little more than present a list of bill titles with some prefacing assumptions about Paul’s intent. There’s a sense of implied “Q.E.D.” despite doing nothing of the sort.
“Research” would, at a minimum, have entailed covering Paul’s stated reasoning behind his votes (all readily available on the web). It certainly doesn’t seem very “methodical” to set up and knock down strawmen over the gold standard.
November 12th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
Uh, Kev — “Neiwert’s research skills”, which, I agree, are impressive, are not really relevant here, since this list was put together by someone called “Trefayne”, and only posted by Dave. Sadly, Dave has been obsessing about Paul’s alleged links to the far-out loonies that Dave specializes in covering, when front runners like Benito Giuliani are openly and proudly and officially tied in their campaigns to outright warmongers on the far fringe of the neocons.
Yes, the domestic Eliminationists are very bad, but Giuli might win and take in with him international Elimiationists who really are panting to nuke Iran. I can’t fault Dave’s concern for rats peeking out of their holes (whether Paul welcomes them or just tolerates their venom without denouncing it), but there is a raging rabid bull elephant in the room, which worries me even more.
November 12th, 2007 at 10:55 pm
I’m slightly familiar with Neiwert’s imm.-related ramblings, such as in 2005 when he falsely implied that a bill would be retroactive. Many of his other ramblings are simply retransmissions of SPLC smears. Let me know if he’s ever disclosed that that group is indirectly linked to the MexicanGovernment.
As for the current smear, even Glenn Greenwald has debunked part of it.
November 12th, 2007 at 11:56 pm
Go figure, He introduces bills to make a point. But wait, how did he vote on the bills, I notice that little tidbit of information is mentioned. It’s a nice way to smear and obfuscate a candidates position. So, how about a little more research instead of OMGLOOKATIT he’s eeeeeeeevillllllllllll!
Right,
Next thing you know, you’ll be telling us that Hillary Clinton doesn’t plant questions in the audience, that Bush Never lied to us about the war, and somehow, Up is down, War is Peace yadda yadda.
Yeah, the last part is snarky, but if you’re going to sit here and not take the time to get the rest of the story, and simply look for something that has zero context and zero understanding is less than meaningless, it’s utter crap.
November 13th, 2007 at 12:00 am
and in my haste to snark… I totally messed up the post *sigh* (remember, look down at the bottom and hit… no wonder, there’s no preview button, Get a preview button, even slashdot has a preview button!)
Please note that the following quote “I notice that little tidbit of information is mention.” should read, “I notice that little tidbit of information is NOT mentioned.”
sigh. Such a good point to be made, lost because I forgot a NOT.
back to you telling everyone how eeeeeeevilllllll ron paul is :-p
November 13th, 2007 at 8:32 am
Did you guys know that Rangle is for reinstating the draft? He introduced a bill just for that purpose!
In addition, Orcinus leaves other important bills off. What about the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act - which prohibits transporting minors to other states for the purposes of having an abortion. Surely, Paul being so pro-life and ignoring states rights would’ve been for this? Except, he voted against it because it failed the test: it encroached on state rights and therefore was not compatible with the federal government.
While I can clearly see a lot of research was put into the list, it wasn’t an unbiased “I want to know where Paul really stands” approach but apparently a “let’s get liberals fired up against Paul.” Let me trot over to Red State to find a similar opposite list.
I do believe Paul represents the middle ground, the moderate choice. The realization that federal government isn’t the answer and suddenly the extremism that makes red states and blue states at odds melts away if they each have the right to run their communities they way they wish.
November 13th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Dave Neiwert’s motives in writing this piece should be questioned, not to mention the inaccuracy of much of what he implies. Neither RP’s reasoning or voting record are examined. Example: Q: Why did RP bring up an amendment about flag burning? A: Because it would put everyone on record in respect to their support of the 1st amendement….not to mention that an amendment to the Constituion is really the only permissible avenue to restrict the right of anyone to burn the flag. Did he vote for it? No!
Neiwert just throws out a lot of BS and lacks any credibility whatsoever.
November 13th, 2007 at 9:40 am
Whoever wrote this still believes there is a difference in main steam Democrats and Republicans. They are all the same lying, cheating people who have never accomplished much but robbing poor unsuspecting and uneducated Americans.
The information to make good decisions is available. I don’t think watching main stream news is the place to get educated. Unfortunately, too may people think they are being educated by the main stream news.
Ron Paul offers the only choice for change. Rudy, Mitt, Hillary, and Obama are the exact same person with a special interest difference or two.
Read it all yourself and make a responsible decision. If you research it, you will change your mind and support Ron Paul. So far I (or actually the data and history did) have coverted 90% of my friends and family. I have the other 10% leaning Ron Paul’s way.
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/
November 14th, 2007 at 4:56 pm
I don’t expect Paul to get near the nomination or make any significant independent showing. Still, it’s really amusing how elements of both parties (as in the linked post) have already latched onto him as a threat and have started their smear machines.
It’s even more amusing to me that these folks can’t just say, “Yeah, he’s a libertarian - doesn’t that make him too weird to be president?” in order to disparage the guy. I don’t know whether it’s just political ignorance or because they’re afraid most people just don’t find his politics all that weird, but both the likes of “Trefayne” and their GOP counterparts seem desperate to throw out lies in hopes of making people think that Ron Paul is an unacceptable “hard” member of the other side. We see how Trefayne painted him, and it’s outright hilarious how chest-beating right-wingers try to pigeon-hole him with Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore. (When they’re not alternating between calling him a “terrorist sympathizer” who blames America for 9/11 and a “9/11 Truther” who, er, doesn’t think America was attacked - I’ve never gotten one to explain how that works.)
Yeah, Ron Paul is outside of the political mainstream. If you don’t like his actual positions, don’t support him. But why cheer along partisan smears that benefit the status quo, if you don’t like the status quo?