Pawlenty and Cain fell short. Santorum and Ron Paul won. We need to hear more from Gary Johnson. by Natalie Schultz
(libertarian)
Sunday, May 8, 2011
I am a Ron Paul supporter, and in a perfect world Ron Paul would be the next President of the United States. However, we do not live in a perfect world and I refuse to view the Republican Primary through rose-colored glasses. Sadly, Ron Paul will not win the nomination because his negatives from the last election cycle are too high, and quite frankly, at age 75 he is too old. His high negatives are due to negative media attention last election, and nutty Ron “Paul-bots” who flooded the web with endless nonsense; that really ticked a lot of GOP people off. Honestly, some of the immature nonsense ticked me off, but I never took it out on Ron Paul himself.
Before the first Republican debate on Fox News I was both hopeful and nervous. I was THRILLED that there were only five candidates debating. Last time there were too many people and not enough time to hear from all of them. Mostly I was thrilled that I wouldn’t have to restrain myself from ripping my eyes out and pouring concrete in my ears just to get through Romney’s obnoxious self-absorbed bloviating and lies. Contrary to the “wisdom” of the beltway, I believe Romney has NO CHANCE of winning the nomination. If he does win it only proves that Republican primary voters are idiots. I’m quite confident that McCain killed the “tradition” of nominating the former runner-up. The best way to guarantee that Conservatives, Independents and Libertarians don’t bother voting in 2012 is to nominate Romney. Gee, ObamaCare or RomneyCare? I think I have some sleep to catch up on; besides the future foretells that I need to ration my gasoline usage, so driving to the polling place is a waste of money.
I was nervous that all the questions would be about Osama Bin Laden; thankfully that was not the case. I was also worried that Cain, Paul and Johnson would not get the same number of questions as Pawlenty and Santorum. Sadly this was the case as far as Johnson was concerned, a TOTAL BUMMER for me because he was the one I was pinning my hopes on. That being said, overall the debate was much better than I expected, and we should have more “Second-Tier” candidate debates in the future. After all, is there REALLY anything we need to learn about Romney that we didn’t learn four years ago? It’s not like he’s done ANYTHING over the past four years except vacation in New Hampshire and Iowa.
My serious analysis is that Pawlenty flat-lined. I (and everyone else) expected him to give canned, professional politician answers and he delivered. No surprise there. The ONLY thing he has over Romney is that he is not an obnoxious self-absorbed flip-flopper. Actually, Pawlenty is NOT the most skilled politician; Romney would have jumped at the chance to wipe Pawlenty across the floor over his Cap-and-Trade flip-flop. Pawlenty was handed Romney’s head on a platter by the moderators, and he had every RIGHT to wipe Romney across the floor over RomneyCare, but he didn’t. Welcome to the real world Bucko! You think Obama’s going to lavish you with “Midwest Niceties?” The Clintons and Geraldine Ferraro can sure teach you a lesson or two!
The best debater, in my opinion, was Rick Santorum - I was SHOCKED! Having seen him numerous times on Greta, I thought he was a pointless, snobby politician wasting our time. But, it must be said that he answered every question with unreserved passion, intensity and honesty. Too bad I disagree with him on the issues. But I do respect that he stood firm. He was not boring. He loses points for trying to pull a Giuliani and attacking Ron Paul on Afghanistan. Thankfully the moderators nipped that in the bud. He totally redeemed himself by defending Gingrich; on that point I agree with Santorum 100%.
Cain - He was one of the three I was looking forward to. He lost my vote, so the debate was worth it just for that. I have no interest in electing a babysitter who wants to censor pictures. As for his answers, he is a talk-radio host, so his succinctness was to be expected and left MUCH to be desired - he gave no real answers. History proves he has no chance - Ross Perot lost once it came down to the nitty-gritty.
Ron Paul - Surprised me! He was much more straight-forward than he usually is, and the heroin quip was a riot! I was shocked that the uber-conservative crowd reacted positively; that alone was worthwhile - we NEED to reassess the waste of resources the War on Drugs has cost us, not to mention the National Security problems coming from Mexican Drug Cartels. He fumbled his closing statement, but otherwise he was the winner. But, he can't win because his negatives from the last time around are too high.
Gary Johnson: BIG DISAPPOINTMENT. He was WAY TOO NERVOUS. A total BUMMER for me because he has one of the BEST records of any governor our country has ever seen. He would definitely make the best President, and he COULD have carried on Ron Paul's torch. He doesn't have to overcome Paul's high negatives, so he is truly our country's best hope. This was only the first debate, so he still has time to redeem himself, but the podium will be over-flowing with professional politicians from here on out, so he has a STEEP hill to climb. He has got to get out there and expose his great record as governor and explain his stances clearly to the public, but he'll have to make an effort to go on TV to do this.
Reality TV? OK, I must admit that question came out of left-field and stumped me at first as well. Let’s face it – it was a POLITICAL POLICY debate, and Johnson was expecting a question about his record as governor, just like all the other candidates received in that round of questioning. I don’t really fault Bret Baier – it was a slick way to get Johnson to show off his mountain climbing experience. Too bad it fell flat. I knew Johnson had summited Everest, Kilimanjaro and McKinley, but even I was stumped when Donald Trump’s “The Apprentice” was given as an example of reality TV. My thoughts immediately went to “Jersey Shore,” not “Man vs. Wild.” BTW: Man vs. Wild is an awesome show! And, I really hope Johnson makes it all the way because I know a bunch of gun-toting, mountain-climbing, mountain-biking, kayaking, ski-bums who would jump at the chance to vote for him. Oh yeah, and they’re all hard-core Republican pot-heads! Heck, some of them rival Rick Santorum when it comes to being “More Catholic, Pro-Life than thou!”
So, for now I’ll keep hoping that Johnson can redeem himself and get his real record as a TRULY SUCCESSFUL governor AND businessman out to the public. If that happens HE WINS, HANDS-DOWN! And I don’t mean the Republican nomination; I mean Gary Johnson is the ONLY PERSON who can blow Barack Obama out of the White House faster than the Navy Seals took down Bin Laden and fed his bumm to the fishes!
And, well, if the media prevents Johnson from getting his message out, then I’ll keep Ron Paul on standby and watch the GOP destroy the country YET AGAIN.
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Posted By: malcolmkyle
Date: May 8, 2011 06:30:30 AM
It's time for us all to stop being ignorant hypocrites and start being TRUE conservatives!
Pragmatic libertarians (minimal-statists) and "true" Conservatives agree that many, if not most, of society's problems are caused by government usurping choices that could better be made by individuals and that government is just about the worst way of doing almost anything. Where libertarianism normally parts company with "fake" conservatism is over moral issues. But a true conservative would have no problem with agreeing, that what people do with their own bodies, and especially in the privacy of their own home, should be supremely their business, and that anything else would entail ignoring the basic tenet of limited government.
Fake-Conservatism on the other hand has much in common with socialism; Both Leftists and Fake-Conservatives appear to harbor the belief that nature does not exist and that any human can be anything he wants to be, or can for the "greater good", be "re-educated" into being. Leftists therefore think little boys can be conditioned into preferring dolls over toy soldiers, and similarly Fake-conservatives believe that adults can be coerced into choosing alcohol over marijuana. A true conservative, just like a pragmatic libertarian, would immediately reject both ideas as nonsense.
If you support prohibition then you are NOT a conservative.
Conservative principles, quite clearly, ARE:
1) Limited, locally controlled government.
2) Individual liberty coupled with personal responsibility.
3) Free enterprise.
4) A strong national defense.
5) Fiscal responsibility.
Prohibition is actually an authoritarian War on the economy, the Constitution and all civic institutions of our great nation.
It's all about the market and cost/benefit analysis. Whether any particular drug is good, bad, or otherwise is irrelevant! As long as there is demand for any mind altering substance, there will be supply; the end! The only affect prohibiting it has is to drive the price up, increase the costs and profits, and where there is illegal profit to be made criminals and terrorists thrive.
The cost of criminalizing citizens who are using substances no more harmful than similar things that are perfectly legal like alcohol and tobacco, is not only hypocritical and futile, but also simply not worth the incredible damage it does.
Afghani farmers produce approx. 93% of the world's opium which is then, mostly, refined into street heroin then smuggled throughout Eastern and Western Europe.
Both the Taliban and the terrorists of al Qaeda derive their main income from the prohibition-inflated value of this very easily grown crop, which means that Prohibition is the "Goose that laid the golden egg" and the lifeblood of terrorists as well as drug cartels. Only those opposed, or willing to ignore this fact, want things the way they are.
Posted By: Quixotic Cavalier
Date: May 8, 2011 04:00:55 PM
I think your assessment of why Ron Paul will not get the Nod is superficial and very bigoted toward septuagenarians -
There are WW2 vets I would not step in a ring with- and to discount based on age is wrong-
You printing that exacerbates and perpetuates that attitude-
Next: Ron has been a media darhling of ALL news outlets over the last 2 years as a pundit on the economy and asked for his opinion on how we can fix it---
Republican higherarchy had to give in to Paul being selected to head the financial committee he now is chairman of,
All of these things and more--- deemed impossible,
Ron disserves better from his supporters- if you ate one, don't do him any favors with quips about superficial reasons why he cannot be president --
Use your powers of obsevatikn and opinion for good "true believer" and you will truly be an agent for REAL CHANGE
Posted By: windwardtack
Date: May 9, 2011 12:36:55 AM
The same day as the debate, CNN came out with a nationwide telephone poll showing that Ron Paul has the best polling against Obama of any of the GOP field, including Huckabee, Romney, Palin, Gingrich and Trump.
Maybe your assessment of his 'high negatives' is incorrect.
Posted By: Natalie Schultz
Date: May 9, 2011 11:18:54 PM
I do not think Ron Paul's age is an issue, HOWEVER, AGE IS ALWAYS brought up during campaigns - this is a FACT! It was used against McCain (but he had plenty of REAL problems), and Ron Paul is older than Reagan, so you cannot dismiss that the media WILL use this against him. This is just a fact - superficial stuff drives the media and voters. Why do you think they all love Romney? Because they say he is good looking and has great hair (I completely disagree).
What "ALL" news media have YOU been watching, Quixotic Cavalier? SERIOUSLY! MSNBC has gone WAY OVERBOARD in Ron Paul / Rand Paul bashing. Fox News and Fox Business have been more pro-Paul since the whole Tea Party thing, but lets face facts, Fox News is STILL dominated by Neo-CONS, and unless they dump Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer, when it comes down to it Ron Paul will NOT get a fair shake when the election season really gets going. I watch Fox because they are the only ones providing honest news, especially about the economy, and they are the only network fair to the Tea Party, but that doesn't mean I think they will do a 360 degree turn from last time around. During the 2008 cycle they actually BANNED mentioning Ron Paul's name - Brenda Buttner was talking with Jonathon Hoenig and asked who he thought would be the best Republican nominee and he said "Ron Paul" and she said "Oh no, you can't say that, who else?" And his reaction was like WHAT?!?!? So he said "No one else." This was not during her regular show, it was just a small segment during an afternoon program - that was the last straw for me.
Also, you must realize that the majority of voters do NOT watch cable news all the time - they only tune in when it gets closer to the election, and I can GUARANTEE that NONE of the media will be giving Ron Paul a fair shake. ALL the media (cable and network) are in the tank for Obama except for Fox, therefore they will do WHATEVER IT TAKES to destroy Ron Paul. That's what they did last time when Ron Paul started attracting the anti-war Left - the Left-Wing media really went after Ron Paul, calling him a racist and stuff; it only continued and got even worse when Rand Paul ran for the Senate. They will only continue in this vain this time around. That's why I think Gary Johnson has a better chance - he doesn't have any negatives that I know of, and his record as Governor is MUCH better than any other Republican considering running, and blows Obama out of the water. Yes, they will use marijuana legalization against him, but they'd do the same to Ron Paul, so it's a moot point.
As for the CNN poll, that shocked me, and I'm not sure how it was conducted, so for now I am discounting it because there are lots of other polls that say Romney has the best chance (Yikes!). I watch Fox and force myself to watch some MSNBC (know your enemy), and one thing I always notice is that the polls they show are complete polar opposites; the polls Fox cites show Obama in the 40's, and the same day MSNBC will show a poll with Obama at 60% popularity. And usually the polls are independent from those networks. So, I don't really trust polls since you can choose which poll to acknowledge and which poll to ignore.
Anyhow, I was very active watching the goings-on in the primaries last time, and I know for a fact that Ron Paul was cheated out of votes in many states (LA, NV), and I KNOW that Romney had hired thugs in the Maine Caucus locations. His showing in New Hampshire truly shocked me, so either NH has gone down the drain with NYC and Boston transplants just like Vermont has, or something fishy went on there. Afterall, Pat Buchanan won New Hapshire, so how Romney can win is well beyond me.
So, my article was written with a view of reality - how the media and bloggers will bash Ron Paul, and the very important fact that Romney will stop at nothing to win. Even Huckabee can attest to that!
Posted By: Logical Premise
Date: May 12, 2011 09:23:30 AM
A surprisingly pragmatic analysis. Nice.
As to the age question -- please. Youth in this country who are not part of the Ron Paul movement dismiss him as an old man. It doesn't matter what is real or right or wrong -- in politics, perception is reality. With all of the youth-worshipping in this country being done, the perception of being old is tantamount with being disconnected. I don't believe Natalie is saying he's a senile old fool , rather that his age is a liability that will be used against him. Obama isn't going to win the over 65 vote in any case -- too many racists, too many people upset with his changes to Medicare,etc -- so he has nothing to fear from attacking Ron Paul's age anyway.
From a statist point of view, Pawlenty is intriguingly full of BS, Romney is worthless, and Gary Johnson has no chance whatsoever with Washington insiders. Cain is so hilarious that I almost hope that he gets elected just so I can watch Obama take him completely the hell apart in debates.
