Posts filed under 'political'
Ron Paul’s Mythology
Myth #2: Supporting Ron Paul increases the chance Hillary will be elected.
Hillary-haters, fear not. If Paul gets the nomination, the shrinking and divided number of Republican diehards will still happily vote Republican no matter how much they don’t like the nominee because of how much more they don’t like the Democrats, particularly of the Clinton variety. To their numbers will be added the a) reinvigorated Republican dropouts who feel betrayed by the party leadership, b) jaded citizens who rarely (if ever) find reason to vote, c) new young voters who have never cared, d) Independents, e) Libertarians, f) Constitutionalists, g) anti-establishmentarians, and h) anti-war Democrats (I stood beside one at a rally). These are the people who are not currently being polled in the “likely primary goer” surveys. It is safe to assume that other Republican candidates will not garner much support from these groups and will have to wage the general election battle against the Democratic nominee with the decaying core of pro-war big-spending Republicans who are still loyal after eight years of Bush.
Myth #3: Ron Paul believes in a false North American Union conspiracy.
As far as I know, he believes in a legitimate North American Union plan. I was told about this before I became a supporter of Ron Paul from my brother-in-law’s father who has worked in Army intelligence for several decades. The Texas state legislature seems to have voted against a trans-North-American interstate in recent years. I’m sure the nations of Europe would have thought of the EU as a zany idea twenty years ago.
Myth #4: Ron Paul wants to isolate us from the world economically.
Quite the contrary, Ron Paul promotes free and fair trade with the world. It is the coercion of economics by threat of embargo and war that he opposes. Our current policies promote special treatment of countries and goods which are currently advantageous to special interests. Can you imagine a store in your town that would say, “We don’t serve Iranians” or “Half off for British”? Yet that is essentially what we do on a national scale. There is good historical reason to trust the invisible hand of a global free market to deliver the best value of goods and services.
Myth #5: Ron Paul callously wants to dismantle government welfare and send poor people on the street.
This is completely false. He is one of the few representatives who has never voted to spend any of the Social Security fund. Who can claim to be for the needy while siphoning from the money set aside for them? As a doctor, he never accepted Medicare/aid yet never turned away patients in need of treatment. He believes that family and community volunteerism is the best solution to poverty rather than government confiscation and redistribution of funds. “Society prospers,” he says, “when people look to their own resources first and to the government last.” In the end, one must choose to trust in the ethics and efficiency of local organizations or the bureaucrats in DC.
“Compassionate” Americans have fallen into the apathetic stance of demanding someone in DC to do their dirty work—just make those poor people disappear! Paul realizes that our root issue with poverty is not that our government does too little, but that it does too much. He observes rightly that our representatives have carelessly broken the welfare system. He knows first hand that healthcare costs are rising due to government regulation. He is bold enough to say what we all know: that our income tax code is a cruel joke which punishes achievement and rewards irresponsibility. He is aware, as no other candidate seems to be, that the government’s unbridled printing of money devalues the few dollars in poor peoples’ pockets. When the poor have enough to save, even the best savings account cannot keep up with inflation.
Despite the flaws of the welfare system, Paul is well aware that so many are dependent on it and will not leave anyone out. He has the only feasible plan for fulfilling our obligations to the poor: drastically scale back our spending overseas. At the same time, he would allow young people to opt out of social security. As great as this problem is, he more loudly deplores the practice of corporate welfare: tax-payer money given to bail out Wall Street from the consequences of its greedy practices. Now that’s unethical.
Myth #6: The United States has an obligation to be militarily involved in other countries.
Again, we’re back to the “we’re good, they’re evil” rationale. If DC has a hard time discerning how to best govern Townsville, USA, what makes it able to determine what’s best for Villageburg, Humanistan on the other side of the planet? This is not an issue of whether or not Americans should care about what goes on there, we know we must, it is an issue of how we must care. Must we always use our military to care? How has benevolence become synonymous with military presence!? Paul is a supporter of the wide variety of other options like communication, commerce, private charity, setting a good example, and allowing nations the sovereignty to determine their own fate. If humanitarian aid was America’s biggest concern, we would have mobilized in the African plains, not the Mideast oil fields.
Consider the a recent action of one of the world’s richest investors, Warren Buffet. Last year he saw good reason to invest $20 billion of his estate in the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to help solve global malaria, HIV, and illiteracy. I wonder why such an astute investor didn’t see the US government as an effective means to help solve such problems. He could have effortlessly left a giant inheritance to Uncle Sam via estate tax! It seems one of the world’s wisest investors agrees in the premise that private charity and volunteerism has the power to bring about more benevolent change in the world than a state institution using coercion.
When the state declares itself at war, especially an unending global war against an undefinable enemy, any action previously unthinkable can be justified for the sake of the cause, ethics disappear as seen in Abu Ghraib, and financial obligations are left to mount with no consideration of who will pay for it. Perhaps there are extreme situations when the state needs to intervene militarily, yet we’ve taken that option far too often in the last 50 years. The decision to send our troops into harm’s way is very important and that’s why the Constitution limits it to a Congressional declaration. Dick Cheney’s 1994 explanation of why we chose not to take out Saddam Hussein in 1991 is enlightening.
Maybe we should ask the military what they think. Dr. Paul has received more donations from military personnel than any other candidate by a wide margin. Here’s a list of just 357 soldiers and their quotes.
Myth #7: Ron Paul can’t win the GOP nomination.
This is usually said by someone who wants to make sure they’re rooting for the favored team so they can feel good about themselves for being affiliated with victory. Cherry-picking was petty in middle school sports conversation, but when selecting a national leader, it’s disgraceful. It should simply be a matter of voting for the person who will do the best job.
And I believe many who will do just that. He has more exuberant supporters in every town across the country organizing themselves to turn out the vote. He has won the majority of GOP straw polls across the nation by a wide margin. He has fourth quarter donations of $20 million (equal to Hillary’s) and is poised for a Super Tuesday nation-wide campaign. His competition is a divided field of candidates who are all fighting for the same slice of the small established GOP base. It’s not so impossible anymore.
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