Topic: Ron Paul
Ron Paul Creams Rudolph Giuliani and Fred Thomson…Again How this effects conservatives, the right, and the left.by Grizzle Griz
(centrist)
Thursday, January 17, 2008
There is no question about it. Ron Paul absolutely smoked Rudolph Giuliani and Fred Thompson in Michigan, both for the second time. In fact, if you add Giuliani's votes to Thompson's the sum will be in the neighborhood of Ron Paul's total. All this Paul achieved with minimal campaigning in Michigan. Nonetheless, all three candidates put together wouldn't amount to a plurality of votes. Almost everything went to Romney, McCain, and Huckabee. Here's what this means:
The Republican Party is no longer conservative. Ron Paul and Fred Thompson are the only two small government conservatives in the race and they are plenty behind in the polls. Paul is the antiwar conservative and Thompson is pro-Iraq War. Paul takes his "marching orders from the Constitution" and Thompson only deviates in case of war. Paul abhors budget deficits and Thompson abhors them except for war.
The Republican Party is no longer neoconservative. Giuliani is the most ostensibly influenced by the neoconservatives, having recruited 'Axis of Evil' speechwriter, Richard Perle's coauthor, and Iraq War apologist, Mr. David Frum. Giuliani is doing horribly in the early states. Maybe his Florida-surprise strategy will pay off, but I think he's languishing in the polls and votes because America decided it doesn't need a daddy to protect it from terrorists.
The Republican Party is no longer theoconservative. Republicans have always loved Jesus, but the evangelical "base" has never been more than 30% of Republican votes. Baptist Minister Mike Huckabee had a strong showing in Iowa, but it isn't lasting. Anyway, if he wins, that will prove my final point:
The Republican Party is liberal. With Mitt Romney, John McCain, and Mike Huckabee drawing all the votes, the Party has become as liberal as Liberace. For years, Democrats wondered aloud how they could find liberal preachers, war heroes, and all-around handsome bastards. Now the Republicans have all three. Unfortunately for the Democrats, they'll use their liberal view of governmental powers to advance a completely right-wing agenda. McCain says he'll stay in Iraq for 100 years and he doesn't mind restricting trade. Huckabee is a human faith-based initiative. He says he will support a nationwide smoking ban and go drunken sailor on the federal budget. Mitt Romney says whatever you want. They all agree that the President doesn't need congressional approval to do anything.
The triumvirate is broken. Small government Republicans/strict constitutionalists/Goldwater conservatives/whatever have almost completely left the party. No one trusts the neoconservatives anymore and the holy rollers, who aren't conservative at all, have swung the party into a right-wing progressivism. They say it was good for the goose, so it's good for the gander. Now the left can only stand in horror as the liberal right forms an unholy alliance with moderate Democrats and go to work on America. It would be hard for them to cry "foul" by invoking constitutionalism now, wouldn't it? Yessir, the left brought this on itself.
The views expressed in this
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Posted By: Friendof Fred
Date: 2008-01-17 08:09:27
You haven't got a clue. Ron Paul is getting the vote of all the "Libertarians" which are no where near a majority. Although I respect those who are Libertarians, I strongly disagree with the isolationist positions they take. Ron Paul's candidacy is nothing more than a third party candidacy. Therefore, it is my opinion that he is having no effect on the Republican Primary. You can spend billions to put yard signs all over the country, however, I am afraid it is no guarantee that it will win you the presidency.
Frederick of Hollywood has no clue of how the economy works. Ron Paul has written about a dozen books on the subject and studies it deeply. During the debate when Ron correctly pointed out that the reason for our inflation and dollar crisis is that the Fed is printing too much money, all Frederick of Hollywood could say was "So we should just stop printing money, hyuk hyuk.."
The other candidates just make themselves look like imbeciles when on the same stage with Ron.
Intelligent people should discuss ISSUES, more than popularity or horserace positions.
You are somewhat right about the fact that the "Republican Party". If they select John McCain, Rudolf Giuliani, Mike Huckabee or Mitt Romney (liberal, essentially near democrat, to slightly left of moderate) the Republican Party has actually left those of us like Fred Thompson that are the true, consistent conservatives. I'm sorry, but I have to disagree totally that Ron Paul is conservative. Refusing to defend this country in the "War on Terrorism" so we will have more money to spend on federal government programs is far from a conservative position.
"Paul takes his "marching orders from the Constitution" and Thompson only deviates in case of war."
Question- For the Ron Paul supporters- would Jefferson's war against the Barbary Pirates also be considered as an "illegal" war that had no Constitutional basis?
Wondering in Florida.
Friend of Fred,
I am dismayed that you tout conservatism but you don't understand political theory. I think this is why we're in the mess in the first place: people who call themselves conservatives get people like you who don't know what that means to vote for them. Real conservatives have a limited view of the powers of government. They believe in devolutionary federalism and believe the best way to protect the minority is to limit what the majority can do. It has nothing to do with Jesus or defending the country. Therefore Ron Paul and Fred Thompson are the only conservatives in the race.
Also, Paul hasn't refused to defend us in the "war on terror". Attacking Iraq was not defense. It was stupid. If you know any soldiers that died, you should feel the same. Sorry, but you're just dead wrong about most of this.
To Vince who is wondering in Florida. Thomas Jefferson went to war with the Barbary pirates because they where attacking trade vessels in International waters. Since Iraq was driven from Kuwait there was no Iraqi presense outside their own borders. Also the United States did not stay in Tunis or Algeria for '100 years' and build a becon of democracy in the muslim world. Go Ron Paul !!
Your analogy doesn't cut the mustard. The attacks on our ships by the Barbary Pirateswere a direct act of war perpetrated against the United States, as was the attack on the U.S. Cole, and both demanded immediate retaliation.
On 9-11, we were attacked by a terrorist group that was aided and abetted by various nation-states. Where in the Constitution does it say that we cannot protect ourselves from potential threats, be they from non-state actors, or rogue regimes? And sorry, but finishing your answer with "Go Ron Paul" is hardly the definitive rhetorical smackdown that you think it is. Ron Paul's most prominent liability is that he is a complete ignoramus when it comes to geopolitics, and that is evidenced by not only his blame America first rhetoric, but also his complete ignorance about the growing nuclear threat emanating from a regime which is actively calling for the destruction of Israel, but of the Great Satan, the United States. Get your head out of the sand, and understand that evil exists in the world, and we need to confront it, otherwise it will confront us on their terms.
You are absolutely right that we need to confront evil. That's why Ron Paul wants to get Osama bin Laden using Letters of Marque. No one else seems interested in the mastermind of September 11.
Of course, invading random countries like Iraq has nothing to do with defense against terrorism, and has everything to do with aiding and abetting recruitment of terrorists. Despite Osama bin Laden's dream of worldwide domination, he couldn't possibly recruit terrorists to kill Americans if our government behaved like Switzerland. After all, jihadists don't attack the Swiss. You can pretend that this is a head-in-the-sand approach, but experts agree with Dr. Paul's foreign-policy, including authors of the 9/11 report, and the former head of the CIA's Osama bin Laden unit, Michael Scheuer.
I'm not a historian, but from what I've read about the Barbary Pirates, it was the corsairs of Tripoli who declared war on the US in 1801. That is why a state of war existed then - not because of anything the US congress or Jefferson did. However, because the US had not declared war, when an American ship (the Enterprise) captured a Tripolitan ship, they stripped it and sent it back to port, not sinking it or taking any prisoners.
Jefferson wrote "Unauthorized by the Constitution, without the sanction of Congress, to go beyond the line of defence, the vessel, being disabled from committing hostilities, was liberated with its crew. The legislature will doubtless consider whether, by authorizing measures of offence also, they will place our force on equal footing with that of its adversaries."
Congress then did authorize the appropriate measures of allowing the navy and the President to capture and make prizes of Tripolitan vessels. The authorization led to a war effort the lasted for four years.
There you have it. Authorization from Congress. No pre-emption. No attacks on other corsairs, only the Tripolitans, and only because they declared war on the US. In what way is this comparable with the illegal Iraq war?
I apologize for some of the rather harsh comments on here from fellow Ron Paul supporters. We really aren't that crazy, we're just so use to being poked at it makes you stay on the defensive.
Your commentaires are a both fair and honest. And they are straight to the point without any evidence of typical media bias.
"invading random countries like Iraq".
LOL. We didn't "randomly" invade Iraq any more than we "randomly" invaded Afghanistan. The Taliban gave refuge, as well as aid and comfort, to al-Qaeda, which is why they were rightfully attacked post 9-11. Al-Qaeda, along with other terror groups most certainly had connections to openly hostile regimes, including both Iran and Iraq, whom are both indisputably state sponsors of terrorism that has claimed hundreds of U.S. lives over the past several decades. The State of Iraq was implicated in providing material support to the terrorists that committed the first World Trade Center bombing as well. It is utterly laughable how Ron Paul and his supporters magically wipe the slate clean of all of these insidious connections, acting as if groups such as al-Qaeda act completely independent of active state sponsorship. It's this head-in-the-sand mentality which totally turns of the people to some of Ron's more orthodox opinions as they relate to the Constitution.
Vince, I see your point, but you are so wrong. Iraq had nothing to do with those terrorist attacks. Saddam Hussein, for all of his many faults, did not support religious extremists who would be a threat to his secular dictatorship. The fact that the Bush administration has been able to mislead you and so many other Americans into believing that there were connections between Iraq and 9/11 even after historian after historian and intelligence report after intelligence report have denounced such connections is testiment to their extraordinary ability to make something "true" just by repeating it enough times on television. Do your research. You might have some good points if you only knew the facts. The Taliban were a legitimate target (whether or not the decision to go to war was the right one is debatable, but the reasons were there); Iraq was not. Undoubtedly it was not a "random" attack, but there is absolutely no argument that you can make under either constitutional or international law that invading Iraq was legitimate.
Your reference to a "head-in-the-sand" mentality is also mistaken. Ron Paul is the only Republican candidate that acknowledges the broader geopolitical context of the 9/11 attacks. He is willing to explore the failures of U.S. policy in the Middle East without "blaming" the U.S. This kind of realistic approach to foreign policy is a breath of fresh air after the manichean viewpoint of the Bush administration. Whether an immediate withdrawal from Iraq is actually realistic is a question that could be much more usefully debated in fora such as this one.
Thanks for getting this discussion going, Griz. You have provided a great analysis of the current state of the Republican party. But as a liberal Democrat, I'm going to have to take issue with your statement that the left brought this on itself. If you want to flesh that out into a whole article, I'd love to read what you have to say.
Sorry, Elizabeth, it's you are so wrong. While Iraq probably had no operational ties to the direct attack, it's entirely possible that they knew something was in the works, even though they may not have had specific operational details about when an attack would occur. Irregardless, they were overjoyed by the attack, and they tried to exploit the act in a way which made Saddam look like he was behind it to his own people.
When you see propaganda that Saddam smeared all around his country like this, there is no mistaking that he wanted to be associated with the attacks- not to mention that he was in violation of an armistice which he himself signed from Gulf War I- and whether you admit it or not, that is grounds enough for war by any historical standard- except for Ron Paul of course. If you think these do not constitute evidence of the regimes' willful malicious intent towards the U.S., with the further goal to provoke other radicals in the region to committ to further acts of aggression, it is you who are deluding yourself as to the way rogue regimes will conduct their warfare in the future- not on the battlefield, but through assymetric attacks conducted by third parties.
We (Ron Paul supporters) really need to choose our opponents more carefully. We should be deconstructing Obama's candyland platform, plank by plank, not alienating Fred Thompson supporters.
It's time to act like a front runner by firing on the real competition and start offering the olive branch to the other underdog camps.
It's time to act like responsible adults who realize that the United States, in the name of self-defense, will always be committed to countering the proliferation of nuclear and biological warfare technologies, and elect a president who will not manipulate us regarding such grave national security matters.
We won't be able to do this by engaging in intellectual pissing contests with potential voters. So wise up, start looking for the ways that the other candidates are trying to offer some of the same solutions as Paul, and offer up Paul as a choice, not as an antagonist. Let's face it, it's not a democracy if you could force people to vote for your candidate, and a lot of supporters are using the verbal equivalent of force, not persuasion, in their misguided attempts to convert voters.
I merely stated my opinion and did not attack you personally. I take offense to you insinuating that I am nothing more than a puppet. I have studied political science and much more. Therefore, I think I have a pretty good understanding of "limited government". I also have a pretty good understanding of where and what our government is today. It can not be fixed overnight.
With regard to the Iraq, you may disagree, however, it is my opinion that our efforts in Iraq are part of and crucial to the "War on Terror". Regardless, we as a blessed nation owe it to our fellow man around the world to help improve their lives and give them the opportunity to live free. In fact, much of Africa could use more of our help as well. This has nothing to do with "conservative", "libertarian", "political theory" or any other buzz word you want to use. It is called "doing what is right". In case you have not taken the opportunity, go check out what Fred has to say about Africa (www.fred08.com).
Finally I take great offense to you insinuating that I do not care about those who have died in Iraq. God bless each and everyone who have ever fought for or died for the freedom of every man and woman.
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