On balance, I view Ron Paul as a good thing.
I view myself as a libertarian and, in many ways, my criticisms of Ron Paul are that he is a more consistent libertarian than me. I want to see government provide health and welfare services, and run natural monopolies.
But much more importantly, Ron Paul is infinitely more consistent than the vast majority of those who label themselves “libertarian” in the UK and US, but are in fact just extreme right wingers with no concern at all for civil liberties, and who support the idea of a massive military force controlled by the government to annex foreign resources. Their “libertarianism” amounts to no more than a desire to be allowed to make money unscrupulously, without interference or tax. Paul Staines is the prime example of a false libertarian.
Ron Paul is not a false libertarian. His 21% showing in Iowa is going, for a while at least, to make it impossible to maintain the usual near total exclusion of anti-war and pro-civil liberties voices from the mainstream media. That is a great achievement. Having been given vastly less mainstream air time than Bachmann or Perry, that will now change for Paul – and even as they strive to limit that change, the establishment will hate that.
So, on balance a very good thing indeed. There are whispers about past racial attitudes. I have met Ron Paul, and am obliged to say I did not like him very much. But for a spell Americans are going to be able to hear someone question the trillions spent on foreign wars while US families suffer – and even a raising of the billions given to Israel. That outweighs a great deal of baggage.
The world is ageist, so it doesn’t matter what Ron Paul says, he’s finished. Obama is acting the part of an old man to give respectability to his crimes, but he has many mischievous plans in store for the future, same as our leaders. Otherwise why the need for a law to incarcerate critics indefinitely without charge or trial? In fact he’s hardly got going. As for libertarianism. nobody can increase or diminish the God-given right to freedom.
A lot of hot air is normally talked by politicians.
Spot on re Staines – complete posh boy Tory lickspittle trying to masquerade as a sexy libertarian.
I can never figure out how a medical doctor can be a ‘creationist’.
Glenn – I think you are right about this. Ron Paul may sound sensible if you listen to the bits about personal freedom and not fighting unnecessary wars. But then he starts talking about the constitution and the Bible and he sounds like a dangerous nutcase. What’s so sacred about the US constitution, anyway? It’s a 200-year-old document and very difficult to amend so can’t provide all the answers today. Dito the Bible but add a zero. Perhaps 200 years ago it made sense for citizens in The US to arm themselves with whatever weapons were then available. But that doesn’t mean people today should be allowed to buy machine guns. And he’s all into individual freedom until it comes to abortion and then he says life begins at conception and forget about a woman’s freedom to choose. He’s no real defender of gay freedoms, either. Or if he does respect gay freedoms then he also respects others’ freedom to beat them up…
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Craig – Maybe you should go with your first impression when you met the guy. He’s not very likeable.
“Obama Seeks to Distance U.S. from Israeli Attack”
by Gareth Porter
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/03-7
Maybe Obomber has killed any chance of becoming president??
I think what Obama’s election showed beyond doubt was that the President holds very little real power. The lobby groups, via both Houses, rule the USA. Therefore, as we know who those are, the efforts of the lowest-common-denominator media to interest us in this cheap and easy story can safely be ignored. Meet the new boss…same as the old boss…we’ve just been fooled again (power chords, end)
Glenn uk wrote:
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The ‘racial whispers’ are not some rumours – they are articles that he wrote and published to raise money, and contained really nasty racial slurs.
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Could you provide evidence that he wrote them, despite his denials? Or are you just lying in support of some twisted agenda?
well put Ned “didn’t Obama sound to be an anti war initially and pro Guantanamo closure candidate. Somehow, i have no trust in american political prostitutes.”
well put indeed, equally Azra, they are nothing but puppets, if they do not perform or have their strings in tangles, they are cut off, just as JFK.
Mary, thanks for the great news for Germany’s voters, I’m sure they will high five the decision to move US troops to Israel, finally and good riddance. It shows once again that the CFI’s obsession with Israely arms was a pipe dream, the Iron dome does not seem to work, not in Gaza and not against the missiles of Hezbollah which will start flying, should Iran be attacked.
let me guess, they are setting up patriot missiles and readying themselves for a war which would subsume Israel, they have not come to police the illegal settlements are they? that would make Obama a shyster, not just a competent liar.
Now lets talk ourselves into a frenzy over US politics, just as the MSM exemplaries, the neocon megaphones, rather than concentrate on the state HERE, so much healthier to swim with the flow and bugger our domestic politics and services going up the spout. Ron Paul is the only candidate that still needs to be nobbled. Should he make it, which is very doubtfull, then this sprightly 74 year old calcified Texan will change his tune within 48hrs. flat, or be removed, just as JFK.
Now all together ‘die fahne Hoch, die Reihen fest geschlossen, SA marshiert’….. it all comes round in circles, but who will fight the fascists this time?
I don’t know whether Ron Paul is genuine, but I can’t help thinking of Lenin’s words: “The best way to control the opposition is to lead it.”
Most people don’t even get the concept of controlled opposition, let alone believe it happens in the West. Yet once the scales fall from your eyes, you see the truth: that democracy itself is a sham serving the agenda of the global power elite.
@”Press Junket” above – the racist journal articles were written under the name of Ron Paul, he certainly did nothing to disavow the entire series of them at the time, and he certainly has made no effort to find who really responsible for them, has he?
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My “twisted agenda” ? Hah! Do you know what the teabagger Paul’s agenda actually is? It’s not to give freedom and liberty to all, despite your (probably youthful) delusions.
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You do understand that Paul’s idea of a social safety net is to let the Church look after people. That there should be no healthcare at all for anyone who can’t afford it. This is a guy who doesn’t like to use the bathroom of someone who might be gay. Who thinks AIDS patients enjoy the pity that they get. This isn’t a rumour – it went out all over the country in the “Ron Paul Survival Report” newsletter. See the twitter feed @RP_newsletter (http://twitter.com/RP_Newsletter) – here’s a sample:
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Quote: “Hmmm. I hate to agree with the Rev. Al, but maybe a name change is in order. Welfaria? Zooville? Rapetown? Dirtburg? Lazyopolis?”
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Quote: “A mob of black demonstrators, led by the “Rev.” Al Sharpton, occupied & closed the Statue of Liberty recently…
“But Al, the Statue of Liberty? Next time, hold that demonstration at a food stamp bureau or a crack house.”
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Quote: “Homosexuals, not to speak of the rest of society, were far better off when social pressure forced them to hide their activities.”
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Quote: “[Dr. M.L. King], the FBI files show, was not only a world-class adulterer, he also seduced underage girls and boys.”
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Quote: “The black leadership indoctrinates its followers with phony history & phony theory to bolster its claims of victimology.”
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Craig praises Paul’s “consistency”. An individual stood up at a Des Moines, Iowa, and asked a simple question – “Why do you hate gays?” His answer was a cackled “Heh heh heh, freedom of speech, isn’t it wonderful? Heh heh.” The guy is not only a sickening bigot, but he’s too cowardly to confront the issue.
Glenn,
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I agree with you completely about the unacceptability of those quotes. I don’t know if we’ll find out whether Ron Paul actually wrote them, but he did put his name to them as far as I can tell. But @Derek above puts forward an article from Glenn Greenwald, in which he asks whether Left support for Obama would do worse damage than a Ron Paul presidency. As much as I fear the destruction of the welfare state that the latter would attempt, I think it is a difficult call. Supporting Paul of course would require one to vote Republican, and I think that is dangerous in itself – but the American left have some very difficult questions to ask of themselves.
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If we assume that Ron Paul does indeed hold some despicable views (on race and sexuality) then I don’t think we should be averse to using his anti-war views to jemmy open some space in the MSM. Incrementally, lives may be saved or lost depending on how much progressive views are allowed out into the open – and the ways in which that is done may not be ideal.
Paul’s Hobbesian-Malthusian style liberatarianism is an ideology I personally cannot support.
Daniel – that’s absolutely it, and I feel most of the contributors here (including Craig Murray himself) just don’t “get it” – this Ron Paul libertarianism is not liberal or liberalism, no more than Germany’s 1930’s “National Socialism” was a left-leaning or socialist ideology.
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This is someone who does not believe in society. His demented son, Rand Paul, was named after Paul senior’s heroine, Ayn Rand. Ayn Rand and Ron Paul’s philosophy of Objectivism held laissez-faire capitalism is the only morally acceptable system – that any form of welfare or assistance (including all aspects of health, transport, education, the lot) is an actual evil. Ayn Rand’s hero – the “perfect man” – was multiple murderer and child killer William Edward Hickman, a total psychopath. She wrote glowing testimonies about this hero to her, and sent love-letters to him in prison. Rand also took social security money (under a false name) and got her lung cancer treated on public money – actions that should be beneath contempt under her dictates. Ultimately, she demonstrated that her philosophy didn’t work and that she herself was a total hypocrite.
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This is not, in any semblance of the term, a liberal approach to government. Leaving aside Paul’s bigotry, his philosophy for government is terrifying.
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It’s pretty astonishing that good people here – particularly Craig – are lending support without having apparently having the faintest idea of what Ron Paul stands for.
So if Paul and his supporters don’t make inroads in the GOP, then the likes of Santorum will continue to be in the ascendency. This has massive global implications, it isn’t just about the United States. So like it or not, and I am in the latter camp, he is currently the only game in town when it comes to restraint of US adventurism. That’s the sad reality. Glenn Greenwald’s article linked to above is yet again an example of him hitting it out the park.
I’ve just read the most excellent commentary on Ron Paul I have ever come across:
http://www.moonofalabama.org/2012/01/iowa-primary.html#c6a00d8341c640e53ef01675fefb251970b
According to a New York Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/06/us/politics/06paul.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all):
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“As a teenager, he [Rand Paul] studied the Austrian economists that his father revered, as well as the iconic free-market novelist and philosopher, Ayn Rand (she was not the inspiration for Rand’s name, which is short for Randal; he was called Randy growing up).”
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So he was apparently inspired by mad bat Ayn Rand although not actually named after her. Just to get the facts straight.
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Although the question really ought to be: where are the Democrat challengers? Why are we only be hearing alternatives from Ron Paul when it comes to reversing Obama’s systematic undermining of human rights and his expansion of the nonsensical “war on terror”? (And if you check back you’ll see that Obama was already advocating an expansion of the Afghan war into Pakistan before his election.)
Wall Of Controversy
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How does “he studied … the iconic free-market novelist and philosopher, Ayn Rand”
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become “So he was apparently inspired by … Ayn Rand”
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I’ve studied uninspiring people. Perhaps Senator Paul has been luckier?
Glenn uk
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the racist journal articles were written under the name of Ron Paul
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And he has said he did not write them. You claim he did. Where is your evidence?
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he certainly did nothing to disavow the entire series of them at the time
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You said he wrote them. He has said he did not write them. Where is your evidence to the contrary?.
he certainly has made no effort to find who really responsible for them, has he?
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I don’t know, and I suspect you don’t either. But he has said he did not write them. Where is your evidence to the contrary?
Glenn uk
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His demented son, Rand Paul, was named after Paul senior’s heroine, Ayn Rand.
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More made up ‘facts’, eh? Randal, actually.
http://thepassionateattachment.com/2012/01/05/iowa-caucus-result-for-dummies/ 🙂
Glenn,
Thanks for that. You are, of course, on the button. I was beginning to think it was ME. Murray’s perception of Paul is about as wrong as it’s possible to be. Murray is wrong about many things as are many of his seemingly uncritical adoring fans.
“I believe the free market is the only humane system that can provide the maximum benefits to the maximum number of people.” – Ron Paul.
Hmmm, over to you, Craig Murray.
Isn’t it sad for our US commenters here, it turns out that there is no choice amongst this group of candidates for anyone to vote for, they are all bigots of sorts, all of them mirroring their antithesis, the excesses of liberalismn, in all its religious shades and bigotted varieties, what an awefull choice and not a woman amongst them. I fear for the future of the republican movement, if you’re not religious, gay bashing, or some moose hunting woman with not much ideas of anything outside Alaska, you have no chance of winning a nomination, what a pratting party of doomsters.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oD-R_OeP6tU
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Here is Rand Paul talking about his great admiration of the works of Ayn Rand: “I am a big fan of Ayn Rand, I’ve read all of her novels… [and] read a lot of the different free market Austrian economists, who were sort of fellow travellers with Ayn Rand… But no, I was not named after Ayn Rand although I do have a great deal of respect for her.”
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@”Huh?” – It’s fair to judge that Rand Paul was far from uninspired by his study of Ayn Rand.
What “baggage” are you referring to exactly, Craig?
Are we talking about the neocon Kerchick-twice-reported “special newletter” NOT written by Paul wherein racially insensitive remarks were found that somehow “prove”, by act of admitted publisher negligence, that Paul is a “racist”, (having nothing else to criticize him for)?
THAT’S “baggage”?
Wow.
I’m gonna go ahead and post a “criminal propaganda” alert on this one, if you don’t mind.
Shill.
Libertarian is a 2 sided coin. Individual freedom on one side and individual responsiblity on the other. The 2cd side doesn’t get as much mention. It should.
Ron Paul is the ONLY candidate in either party to publicly state that Isreal has 200-300 nuclear bombs. Name me ANY other politician who has said that?
Ron Paul didn’t write those racial articles and he disowned them once he found out about them. At worst he is guilty of a lack of editorial oversight and letting his name be attached without keeping a closer eye on things.
Ron Paul has also said to have a year to transition he would default ONLY on the 1.7 trillion dollars of bonds that the Federal Reserve has bought.
As to those who think companies can pollute and not have any governmental oversight they will be beaten back on 2 fronts quickly. First if you pollute you can be sued and forced to clean it up due to property rights. Second a Libertarian government’s ONLY role is to “protect the people” and yes that would include making sure standards are in place and adhered to. What is not required is a government department that can’t be fired but CAN be paid off like the USDA and the FDA for just 2 examples.
Relax, Reggie. Those letters have been out more than 20 years and the criminal propagandists as you say haven’t been able to nail him with them yet. Don’t let these tools bring you down.
Just vote Ron Paul.
1)Ron Paul admitted writing some of the racist statements in his newsletters (see homosaps.net blogs or do a google search).
2)Ron Paul has stated he would have voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act and would have allowed discrimination against blacks.
3)Ron Paul consistently lies about issues such as the Departments of Energy, Education, Commerce etc., being unconstitutional.
4)Ron Paul intends to eliminate Social Security, the Minimum Wage, Medicare, Student Loans, believes unions are unconstitutional, etc. His proposed budget would dismantle the American society. Just check out a critique of his proposed budget by Webster Tarpley (http://tarpley.net/2011/12/28/critique-of-ron-pauls-austerity-plan/) and see homosaps.net blogs for a documented analysis of Paul’s plans to dismantle America and an expose of his lies about the U.S Constitution.
The devotion of all the little Ronulans suddenly showing up here is impressive. Obviously they want to act as apologists for that filthy racist newsletter of his, but they seem altogether more coy when it comes to the more concrete principles of which Paul is very proud.
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What about the right to kick black or gay people out of your business, and refuse to serve blacks should you wish to discriminate? That one tied Rand Paul up in knots on the Rachael Maddow show not long back – he couldn’t bring himself to say that he’d make such discrimination illegal. Because he believes such discrimination to be a right.
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What about Ron Paul’s stated aim abolishing all public schools, highways, health clinics (and everything else), and turning them over to private corporations? Come on, little Romulans – cat got your tongue on that subject? Suddenly you all want to talk about something else, eh?
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How about eliminating US social security and Medicare, implement total free trade and unlimited immigration – why aren’t you saying ANYTHING about all that? What about deregulating the FDA?
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That’s what pisses me off about you gutless cowards – you all want to deny that his very own newsletter’s blatant bigotry reflects badly on the saintly Ron Paul, pleading that he was just a blithering incompetent and it had nothing to do with him. But when it comes to the actual policies mentioned above by myself and other posters, you have NOTHING to say about them. Just scurry off back into the shadows.
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I’ll give Paul credit for being dead right on a number of policies – foreign military adventurism, insane drug laws, generally hypocritical puritanical laws, fawning to Israel’s genocidal madness – Ron Paul is absolutely right in his opposition to all these things. In fact, as far as the rest of the world is concerned, Ron Paul for POTUS would probably be a good thing.
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But as far as people of the US itself are concerned, many for whom I care deeply, it would be an utter disaster. Apart from the super-super rich of course, they’ll be vastly better off than even they could imagine even under current policies.
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Come on – look at the real policies, don’t just let your eyes glaze over at the few good policies, look at the whole picture, and stop buying into the hype!
This deserves a mention, because the Ronulette “Press Junket” thinks it to be a killer point. Sure it’s denied that “Rand” Paul’s name has anything whatsoever to do with Ayn Rand. Of course. It only happens to coincide with the philosophy both adhere to by complete chance, and just about everyone named Randal gets it abbreviated to “Rand”, right? We can think of loads of examples!
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I’m grateful to “Press Junket” for highlighting the matter – it shows how selectively an apologist for US-style libertarianism becomes exercised, for this and the Ron Paul bigoted newsletter. No such reaction when called on for highlighting Paul’s wanting to end all welfare, and every social programme of every description. Not a word. These Ronulans, these self-styled neo-Libertarians, they don’t believe in anything but the law of the jungle. But they’re too cowardly to admit that in open forums, so they want to fascinate on how they can’t _quite_ be pinned down their racism and homophobia instead (arguably). But the core issue, that society shouldn’t exist – that we should all be rugged individuals that should survive or die? Run and hide, they won’t discuss it.
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Here’s a few tough questions for Ron Paul enthusiasts, that they won’t want to answer –
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– Do you think there should be NO publicly funded education?
– Do you think health care should NOT be freely and publicly funded, available as required to all citizens?
– Should there be NO social safety net whatsoever (leave it to the Church)?
– Should there be NO social programme funded by the public at all?
– Should I be able to discriminate against people using every bigotry possible, and ban the target from my restaurant/hotel etc. as my personal right? (EG, gays, lesbians, blacks, Asians, scousers -c’mon admit it guys!)
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The honest Paul supporters will say yes to every point above. But as mentioned in the previous post, they’re mostly too cowardly to admit it. The rest don’t realise what idiots they sound while making their arguments.