[Route66]

I will hand it to the Paul supporters for organizing and supporting their candidate. They apparently have been organizing this turnout and those for other straw polls for a long time. They coordinate on line and offer to pool transportation and get people to sign up to pay other people’s tickets when they are required. They spread the word through their network. This is more of a Dem kind of organization structure than a typical Republican one, but then most of the Paul support hinges on his antiwar stance which has drawn the left to his campaign. Heaven knows, none of the front running Dems has taken the kind of antiwar stance Ron Paul has and the antiwar crowd knows how to turn out people for "demonstrations" which is in essence what they are doing here.

We all know that 115 warm bodies voting in a straw poll does not necessarily translate into the same percentage of real voters and real votes at the time of the real election. That’s why most voters have come to ignore and not participate in straw polls anymore. Still, this tactic of utilizing the mostly abandoned straw polls has managed to get Ron Paul supporters some of the attention they seek. Those of us who support other candidates might consider doing a little more of this ourselves.

[ironweed]

Agreed.

I don’t know how much of the Ron Paul fan base is “anti-war” or “pro-capitalism” or “anti-Fed” or “anti-NAFTA/WTO/U.N.” or “pro-Constitution”.

Many of these issues overlap with various voting blocs. Some of Ron Paul base are holdovers from the Buchanite wing of the GOP (Pat warned of empire-building in a 1999 book and condemned it in a 2004 book). Others are libertarian purists of the Ayn Rand/Ludwig von Mises persuasion. Still others are musty old John Birch Society conspiracy cranks.

The anti-war group is hardest to read, insofar as the GOP is so wedded to the “world safe for democracy” idea, that most Americans are dubious of any Republican claiming to oppose that vision.

Inasmuch as Ron Paul’s small government agenda is so at odds with almost everything the radical left espouses (save for foreign policy), I have a hard time believing lefty hard-liners are flocking en masse to RP just to monkeywrench the GOP... But I tend to want to be optimistic...

Regardless, while Ron Paul won’t get the GOP nomination, it will be interesting to see in a couple decades if this seeds a movement, or if it is a one-time phenomenon.

[traviskicks]

This is more of a Dem kind of organization structure than a typical Republican one

I disagree, it is a bottom up, completely individual campaign with no marching orders, no 'strategy', no 'focus group polling', all unpaid, just Ron Paul offering a message of freedom and his supporters doing the rest however they are able, even chipping in to buy radio ads and flyover planes and whoknows what else. It embodies the libertarian and republican philosophy of personal responsibility completely. Someone in our meetup group for instance spent $500 of her own money on a booth and manned it herself with a few other volunteers, they reached thousands of potential voters. A Rudy McRomneyThompsonite campaign would have bought the booth themselves and manned it with paid 'volunteers', paid for in part by lobbyists/washington insiders, who expect something in return, like 'access' or favorable legislation. Paul volunteers belong to no special interest groups and want nothing in return besides their freedom and are willing to work their butts off for it anonymously. So, IMO, I think the reality is actually the opposite from what your previous post suggested.

FYI:

Bringing Politics Back to the People - The Do it Yourself Campaign of Ron Paul