Topic: Ron Paul
Ron Paul Versus Mike Gravel Radical food for thought.by Jim Hines
(Libertarian)
Friday, March 28, 2008
Gravel running as a Libertarian is no different than Ron Paul running as a Republican. Both are round pegs in square holes.
The impending energy crisis is going to force all of us into rethinking our political ideologies. Peak oil is real and it's consequences will be nothing short of cataclysmic if we continue to ignore it. Whether it is here now or ten years from today, it is real and no one who knows anything about oil disputes that. Peak Oil has not yet been factored into the price. When it is the weeping will transform into wailing. Look for $300 oil in two years or less. We have been wasteful, selfish and spoiled for far too long. It's time to take a hard look at our civilization. Is it possible that we are not collectively the good people that we believe we are? Much human suffering throughout the planet takes place each day for us to enjoy the standard of living we have grown accustom to. Do we really need so much more than others? Do more things equate to more happiness? Regardless, we still need copious amounts of energy for the basic creature comforts like food and shelter. It's a matter of national security to develop a national energy strategy to deal with the end of low cost oil. Time is running out and a misguided belief that the free market will come to the rescue is suicide.
The free market is dead, if it ever existed at all. The Bear Stearns bail out (One step shy of nationalizing the mortgage market.) should be the smoking gun evidence for anyone who believes there is still such a thing as the free market. It's all been a lie to keep us in our places. Abandoning that naive belief will free us up as a nation to embark on an alternative energy initiative in order to mitigate the consequences of transferring untold sums of wealth from this country to the oil producing countries. This can only be successfully accomplished on a nationally mandated level.
What there are and always have been are powerful people protecting their interests. Using concepts like free trade or free markets as smoke screens to maintain their advantage. And to keep the disadvantaged thinking there must be something they are doing wrong. Something they are doing that is preventing them from rising out of poverty. There isn't. The truth is they are being held down to a level that helps to maintain the status quo. This is the only explanation possible for the disparity between the CEO's salary and benefit package in relation to the laborers. Particularly when you measure the earnings of a CEO of a failed corporation like an airline to those of the rank and file. In an educated society this kind of unfairness should not be tolerated. Instead of debate about minimum wages there should be laws passed to cap executive salaries. If it's good enough for professional sports it's good enough for corporate America. Savings should be passed first to labor and next to consumers. Shareholders should be satisfied with reasonable returns. Growth for the sake of the shareholder at the expense of the rest of the world should be outlawed. Usury is a word that needs to be revisited.
The simple truth is that there are and always have been far more people who are chronically poor or who have subsistence incomes. Without them, who would serve the rich and powerful? An extremely small percentage of people in the world are obscenely wealthy and drive the agenda. They are the ones who can afford to pay to maintain power and guarantee that their interests will be served. That is the truth. The religious dogma of hard work, education, ingenuity and free market capitalism only serves as an excuse to keep those who must lose, losing, in order for the powerful to keep winning. This will never change on a voluntary basis. The disparity of wealth between a very tiny percentage of those on top to the massive amounts of those on the bottom was the cause of the Great Depression and will soon be the cause of the next.
No individual, family or group should own the forests or the oceans or the resources beneath the earth. No amount of ingenuity, hard work or simply getting there first should entitle anyone to exclusivity when it comes to the planet we all live on. These lands and resources should be public domain and used for the benefit of all. It's time to nationalize our energy companies. It's time to rethink the scope of private property. One mans liberty becomes another mans source of misery and enslavement.
I'm reconsidering my support of Ron Paul. I agree with him on many issues but disagree that business men can be trusted to do what is right by their neighbor. This is the concept that separates him from Gravel. Greed is basic human nature. It may work for some but ultimately it hurts more than it helps. Also, having given it much thought I'm not convinced gold should back our currency. There are too many ways to manipulate or corner that market and mining gold is a filthy, ecologically unsound business. I think currency should be backed by time. We all have it but the supply is equally limited to 24 hours in each day. Work and you eat. This would be as close to a free market as one can get. Work, research or study as many hours in one day as you see fit and be rewarded accordingly. I also disagree that the government state or federal should have any say in the matter of human reproduction. People are not property. The liberties of ones own body and mind should be sacrosanct.
Somebody has to step up to the plate. Dismantle the empire. Surrender the war on drugs. Eliminate the IRS. These are valid reasons to vote for Gravel. On top of which Gravel will be a greener president than Paul and this is the major, transcendent issue of our time. There are no perfect candidates who subscribe in total to their parties' platforms.
The two major parties are beyond repair. If I were in the insurance business I would declare them totaled. They have rendered themselves irrelevant. This is a time for real leaders to step forward. Use the vehicle at their disposal and tell it as they see it. Mike Gravel is just such a man. Are the Libertarians just such a group of free thinkers? Or are they hopelessly stuck in their intransigent ideology?
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2008 Jim Hines, all rights reserved.
Published: Friday, March 28, 2008
Last modified: Friday, March 28, 2008
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I see a lot of negativity stemming from this article, but I for one applaud you for your bravery in posting it. I have been a supporter of Gravel since the beginning, before I knew of Ron Paul.
Heh, I believe what you just described is communism. Really, nationalize all the industries.....Everything belongs to "the people".......all the poor people who exist to serve the rich.....Really. If you believe these things I suspect that you are just scared to compete in a free market, and furthermore I doubt you ever supported Paul in the first place. I believe what you are looking for is a nanny.
There is no such thing as the free market. Period. I suspect you're suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. Either no one is subsidized or everyone is. Mary Poppins is preferable to Mr. Burns.
WE WOULD HAVE A FREE MARKET IF WE RESPECTED AND FOLLOWED OUR CONSTITUTION TO DETAIL. I DON'T WANT JIMMY'S COMUNIST AMERICA. I LIKE MIKE GRAVEL BUT I THINK DR. PAUL HAS A BETTER GRASP OF WHAT OUR ECONOMY IS SUPPOSED TO BE AND HOW THE AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS CYCLE WORKS ON A FREE MARKET.
GREED WILL ALWAYS BE A PROBLEM, WHETHER IT COMES FROM PRIVATE HANDS OR THE GOVERNMENT (EVEN THOUGH THE GOVERNMENT IS OWNED BY PRIVATE BANKERS).
THANKS BUT NO THANKS JIMMY, THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT HAVE THE AMOUNT OF POWER YOU WANT IT TO HAVE. NO NANNY STATE FOR ME.
Right now you have a facist corporatocracy. The end of oil is going to force a government down your throat unless you choose one now. We will have a military dictatorship if we continue on in this direction. Hard choices now will prevent untenable situations later.
Okay, now you're really splitting hairs. Because you might have some possible disagreements over a few points, you're reverseing your entire position? What are you thinking? Ron Paul still has the most consistent track record and the most researched, well thought out plan out there. He's the one who has brought most of these issues beyond the fringe and to the common fields of debate. Do we need to re-explain to you what the Ron Paul Revolution is? It's about changing the issues and focusing on what no one is paying attention to, such as the corruption behind the Federal Reserve. I support Libertarians, but that's a waste of your vote. If you want to vote your conscience, and be smart, then do what I'm doing. WRITE RON PAUL IN NO MATTER WHO GETS WHAT NOMINATION !!!! SEND A MESSAGE FOR CHANGE!!!!
A write in vote for Ron Paul will not be counted period. It won't be mentioned on any news cast and no one will ever know you did it. There are rules surrounding write in voting. The Paul campaign has not pursued this option and anyone believing they are making a statement by writing in Ron Paul's name in November is sadly mistaken. No one will ever know about your statement. It won't be recorded and it won't be reported.
The federal reserve epitomizes the current state of our supposed free market economics. Private businessmen bankers, elected by no one, dictating monetary policy and looking out for the interests of the too big to fail multi-national corporate rapers. Labor and long term viability of the planet be damned.
Mike Gravel was a far more accomplished Senator than either of the remaining Democratic contenders, yet one of them openly laughed at him on stage, and Democratic voters ignored him. He single-handedly helped end the Vietnam war and the draft, something all freedom lovers should celebrate.
I think Libertarians should welcome his candidacy, and consider how closely he matches their philosophy and how well he might do in November. I don't expect the LP to give him the nomination, though.
They will tolerate people who vary from the libertarian party line by 5%, or even 10%, but not someone like Gravel who is 30 or 40% away. Aaron Russo would have been a great candidate in 2004, but he couldn't win the nomination, and he was probably only 15 or 20% away from being a consistent libertarian.
The claim "Peak Oil is real" is expression of your false belief.
Perhaps, those Anglo-American Power Wealthy enmeshed in controlling the U.S. are running out of oil they control through contracts.
Yet, two false beliefs get parroted by the global idiocy:
[1] The earth is running out of oil
[2] The easy oil has been pumped from the ground
Another often parroted phrase by the idiocy is "the free market".
No monolithic market exists.
Many markets exist. None are free that have regulatory agencies of the Power Wealthy enforcing rules which rig outcomes.
Your wet dream of $300 oil stems from your self-loathing programmed into your head by your Elite Masters using Public Education (schooling paid for with taxes absconded from your parents) and reinforced by TV sit coms.
Rather than looking for bogeyman around every corner -- "we" have been wasteful -- look to truth.
Pushing aside the rhetoric of democracy, liberty, Americans as the freeist on earth, you must come to truth.
There are rulers and the ruled.
Had many learned about paper money schemes instead of living debauched, corrupt lives with petty pursuits, many know why gasoline prices are up.
When money is specie, you own it. You can melt into bars or ingots. When times look better, you can mint it into coins.
When money is paper, those in Power own it. What you have in your wallets, your purses is not your money. It's theirs. What you have in checking accounts is not your money. It's their promises.
Specie money lets you control your futures. Paper money lets those in Power control your futures.
When their paper money that you hold falls in relative value to other money (Euros, Yen), prices of all stuff goes up, including gasoline.
When you transact, they take a toll, as slice of each trade you made with another. When you transact, they control the outcome by establishing the rules.
The American Republic died in 1913 with changes to the rules that generate the USA of Freedom. Since then only a U.S. of Officialdom has existed.
You, your parents and their parents gave up Freedom for this scheme back in 1913. You, your parents and their parents have begged to leech off fellow citizens for crumbs of welfare. You, your parents and their parents fell for the sweet lies of Utopian Socialist Statist schemes.
Until you change your ways and give up your surrogate daddies who tell you what to do and how to live, you will suffer.
Jim Hines,Did you fake the answers to the questions in order to rate 'libertarian'? What you are calling for is full-fledged communism. It's not the free market that has caused the problems we have. It's state intervention and favortism to large corporations. Ron Paul does have the answers to corporate pollution. http://grist.org/feature/2007/10/16/paul/ If you are a libertarian, so was Joseph Stalin.
Wow smack you sure typed a lot just to say nothing.
If you think you're putting the genie back in thepre 1913 bottle you are sorely mistaken. Just today they are talking about increasing the power of the FED.
No peak oil huh? The bible tell you that?
What do you think the Iraq war is all about. WMD? Spreading our goodness?
Look at the numbers. Pumping 75 million barrels a day world wide since 2005 and using 85 million barrels a today worldwide. You really think demand is going down? Exxon/Shell both came out recently and said they can't keep up with their declines. Unconventional oil does not have the same flow rates or energy used to energy made returns. Based on inflation oil is more expensive now than it was during the last oil shock in 1979 but things are much different now. Middle east has been pumping furiously for 30 years since then. Those fields are old. Gawhar needs massive injections of water to keep the pressure on. North Sea is peaked. England took our approach and pumped it as fast as they couldn now it's in decline and now they are net importer. Mexico's Cantarel has peaked and decline rates are +25%. Canada's oil sands are a total waste of resources and money. It costs 14 billion to get 100,000 barrels per day. Boone Pickens (famous oil investor) was on CNBC the other day said the major oil companies are in liquidation. He's putting 15 billion of his own money into wind power. The entire oil infrastructure is falling apart and in disrepair. Don't blame the eco lunatics because there just isn't any more Giant fields left in the US. Those few billion barrels up in Adnwar won't last more the a few weeks on the market. According to the CIA Factbook there are 41 years of "proven" oil reserves left to pump. That's total oil. Peak means your just at the point when production plateaus and then steadily declines. That is including oil sands which if you read about them you'll see they aren't going to solve the problem for a variety of reasons.
You don't think 5% of the worlds population (us) using 25% of the worlds energy resources everyday is wasteful?
Gold doesn't solve anything. There is only so much gold. If gold is money whomever has the gold has the power. If you're not one of the lucky ones with the gold mine then you're sh** out of it. No problem hoarding or cornering that market it's been done plenty of times throughout history. Another problem is shaving it. Lot's of ways to beat the gold standard.
Funny how you guys all agree the Fed having so much control is one if not the major problem ordinary working folk face yet you want to place your trust into some other non elected body called the "head of the company". What makes you think the guy who owns the company gives a flying F*** about you? They never have they never will.
You all cry "communism" but you're living pretty close to it now. Right now. What you have is a corporate welfare state. And if you are a working person you aren't getting any of the dividends. All the money and power are being concentrated in around 1-5% of our total population. Everyone else is on the outside. And plenty are so far outside you can't even see them. It's called a plutocracy. I don't know how to fix it so more people share in the largess but my article is entitled "radical" food for thought. Runnning around screaming FREE MARKET isn't helping.
@ Maggie
Ron Paul is not concerned with the environment. When he talks about it he sounds like McCain talking about the economy. Not his strong suit.
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2008 Jim Hines, all rights reserved.