Posted on 12/29/2011 7:02:41 AM PST by Kaslin
After the most recent GOP presidential debate, reasonable people can disagree as to who came out on top. It was abundantly clear, however, who was smothered beneath the pile.
As Ron Paul waxed naive from his perch in Sioux City, Iowa, on issues ranging from foreign policy to judicial activism, one could almost hear his campaign bus tires deflate. Although some polls indicate that Mr. Paul has surged in Iowa, most national polls suggest that, beyond a relatively fixed throng of blindly devoted “Paulbots,” support for the eccentric Texas lawmaker has a concrete ceiling.
Mr. Paul did himself no favors during the debate. Afterward, former Iowa House Speaker Christopher C. Rants blogged, “Ron Paul finally lit a match after dousing himself with gasoline.”
Putting aside for a moment Mr. Paul’s leftist policies on a variety of social issues ranging from his unwavering support for newfangled “gay rights” – to include open homosexuality in the military – to advocacy for across-the-board legalization of illicit drugs, Mr. Paul demonstrated that he has a dangerous, fundamental misunderstanding of the threat posed to every American citizen by radical Islam. This alone disqualifies him for serious consideration as our future Commander in Chief.
During the debate, moderator Bret Baier asked Mr. Paul: “Many Middle East experts now say Iran may be less than one year away from getting a nuclear weapon. … Even if you had solid intelligence that Iran was in fact going to get a nuclear weapon, President Paul would remove the U.S. sanctions on Iran - including those added by the Obama administration. So, to be clear, GOP nominee Paul would be running left of President Obama on Iran?”
Mr. Paul responded: “But I’d be running with the American people because it would be a much better policy.” (The only American people running with this policy risk running the rest of us off a cliff.)
He went on to reject a U.N. agency report that indicates Iran is within months of developing nuclear weaponry, calling it “war propaganda.” He then spouted the same anti-American talking points we’ve come to expect from the hard-left “progressive” establishment, blaming America for Iran’s efforts to go nuclear.
In defense of Islamic terrorists, not unlike those responsible for Sept. 11, Mr. Paul said, “Yeah, there are some radicals, but they don’t come here to kill us because we’re free and prosperous. … They come here and want to do us harm because we’re bombing them.
“I don’t want Iran to have a nuclear weapon,” he continued, all the while demonstrating to everyone watching that a President Paul would be unwilling to lift a finger to prevent it.
His pacifist ruminations prompted fellow presidential candidate Michele Bachmann to respond: “With all due respect to Ron Paul, I think I have never heard a more dangerous answer for American security than the one that we just heard from Ron Paul. … I’ll tell you the reason why, the reason why I would say that is because we know without a shadow of a doubt that Iran will take a nuclear weapon, they will use it to wipe our ally Israel off the face of the map, and they stated they will use it against the United States of America. Look no further than the Iranian constitution, which states unequivocally that their mission is to extend jihad across the world and eventually to set up a worldwide caliphate. We would be fools to ignore their purpose and their plan.”
Mr. Paul evidently is one of those fools. Iran is today’s version of Nazi Germany, and Mr. Paul’s obtuse strategy of reckless inaction affords him the dubious title of this generation’s Neville Chamberlain. Like Chamberlain’s fruitless appeasement, Mr. Paul’s similar strategy simply feeds the insatiable beast.
Don’t get me wrong. I personally like Ron Paul. He’s that affable - if not a little “zany” - uncle who has the whole family on edge at Thanksgiving. “Oh boy; what’s Uncle Ronny gonna say next?”
Still, you wouldn’t give Uncle Ronny the carving knife for the turkey, much less the keys to the Oval Office.
Mr. Paul is many things, but conservative is not one of them. He’s a died-in-the-wool libertarian. That’s one part conservative, two parts anarchist.
Ronald Reagan often spoke of a “three-legged stool” that undergirds true conservatism. The legs are represented by strong free-market economic principles, a strong national defense and strong social values. For the stool to remain upright, it must be supported by all three legs. If you snap off even one leg, the stool collapses under its own weight.
Mr. Paul is relatively conservative from an economic standpoint, but in true libertarian form, has snapped off the legs of national defense and social values.
The libertarian is a strange and rare little animal – a bit like the woolly flying squirrel. It spends its days erratically darting to-and-fro atop this teetering, one-legged stool in a futile effort to keep it from toppling. America witnessed Ron Paul doing this squirrelly libertarian tango on the night of December 15th. Cute but unstable.
Ron Paul never had a chance; but now, with the possible exception of his most committed devotees, I suspect most people will finally admit it. Regardless of what happens in Iowa, the Paul engine has run out of steam. During the debate it pulled into the station and released its final wheeze right alongside the Cain Train.
See, the big problem with Paul is that the actual good stuff Paul advocates such as massive and immediate cuts to domestic spending, eliminating cabinet agencies, etc, will never get through the congress. The very bad, naive and isolationist foreign and defense positions Paul represents he could actually do largely on his own. The net result is Paul's accomplishments would end up being a loony foreign and defense policy that would be far to the left of Obama.
No, I don't agree. His positions are his positions because he is a dogmatic libertarian and being such it is coincidental that Washington gave that speech. Libertarians are guided completely by Libertarian dogma. If you look into the Founding Fathers you will see that some of them were all for getting into "foreign entanglements".
Good response and I tend to agree that RP’s adherence to Constitutionality is reason enough for many to support him. I am amazed by how much defamation he has received from so many ‘Conservatives’...it is very disappointing as this will tend to drive a wedge between all who want to limit government.
I don’t know what a proper response to Iran should be however our previous non-response during the last Iraqi War was almost null even as Iranians actually killed US servicemen.
If that did not elicit a response then what would?
Where did you get any of that from the limited scope of the subject I commented about?
I believe on the newsletters he should establish that he must have been soft in the head when he wrote that and certainly doesn’t believe it today.
Gut the military? Well, if we don’t have foreign entanglements perhaps we can streamline some things, it can’t be any worse than what the current administration has ham-stringed the military with and the military has to watch its pennies just like everybody else, yes.
I highly question your inane assertion that Paul “supports” nukes for Iran, the “glee” issue I have never come across and I certainly doubt Paul “supports” destroying families and neighborhoods.
Sheesh, you can’t make this stuff up. Settle down. Take a warm bath and have some oatmeal or something.
“By the constitution. Period.”
Wrong! The United States Constitution says “provide for the common defense”. History has shown Ron Paul’s isolationist and appeasement crappola would be a national disaster and the number one duty of the federal government, as spelled out clearly in the Constitution, would be ignored. He is a crackpot.
The constitution is dead and meaningless without a moral, spiritual standard.
Something your idol obviously has yet to comprehend.
Kinda...
Can't blame you, Paulbots are seeing extremely short life spans here...
Nuttier than a California breakfast bar.
Ok, now as for being a “truther” the use of that word indicates you are perfectly satisfied with having in the White House an executive with all closed records, unaccounted time in Pakistan and no conceivable means of support....who published two obviously fake birth certificates in answer to demands for something I showed on behalf of my kid so he could play Little League.
And Manning releasing all those documents, I do not for one single solitary New York second believe that he did it on his own, he is the fall guy used by forces larger than him. Having been in the military myself, I am aware of haw absolutely powerless a PFC is and he doesn’t have the right clearance either.
The loud ‘cheering’ for Paul at the debates and other places could be the ‘phenomenon’ of fan chasers who follow him much like Broadway ‘stars’ giving them the longest and loudest applause. Ron Paul is an angry little man and that in its self is dangerous.
“I highly question your inane assertion that Paul “supports” nukes for Iran, the “glee” issue I have never come across and I certainly doubt Paul “supports” destroying families and neighborhoods.”
Perhaps much of the support comes from people like you who have not studied what Paul has said.
Iran Nukes: Watch and listen to the crackpot himself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN2gEixPvoA
“Glee” in White House: Watch and listen to the crackpot himself:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57340277-503544/ron-paul-9-11-prompted-glee-in-bush-administration/
On pushing drugs out to destroy even more families and neighborhoods; watch and listen to the crackpot himself talk about legalizing heroin, cocain, pot, prostitution :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qz6MEU4_HFs
A Paulitard named Dubie...
I am still LMAO...
Don’t twist it to spin Ron Paul being a Truther nut. It has nothing to do with Obama. He has blamed the United States for 9/11, appeared repeatedly on truther conspiracy nut shows, encouraged truther nuts with obscure answers to their questions about more “investigation” into 9/11 and said that there was “glee” in the Bush administration following 9/11.
And you dancing around the Paul calling Manning a hero sounds like some conspiracy crap that Alex Jones would come up with. Try again. Ron Paul called Manning a hero. Ron Paul is a crackpot.
OK, watched the Iran nukes video. What he says is that for a country surrounded by nukes, wanting nukes is natural. (I don’t see this as support for the Iranians getting nukes.) And that sanctions make it more likely we will fight them, which may have been true a few years ago, when we had them surrounded, but now that we have left Iraq, that danger is fading.
Then he says, just view foreign countries as trading partners and ignore their internal doings, bring troops home which dovetails with his no foreign entanglements position.
Ok, the “glee” video is not being happy 9-11 happened. He is saying the White House jumped on 9-11 as a reason to invade Iraq, which it did.
Absolutely. Paul is not my first choice, Cain is (I don't care if Cain dropped out, I'm still writing him in).
But Paul has many good ideas, particularly about strictly adhering to the Constitution. The Republican plank should it least reflect that.
“Ron Paul as far as I can tell uses the constitution just as our founding fathers intended. A guidepost for all legislation and policy.”
RPaul ‘cherry picks’ the constitution to support his positions. Like for example, when he proposed, as the only constitution response to 911, issing Letters of Marquis and Reprisal.
Yeah and your characterization of the getting rid of federal laws on drugs as “supporting destruction of neighborhoods and families” is FALSE. What Paul says is we don’t have enough prison space for all the drug offenders and he supports decriminalizing drug usage which has only been criminalized in recent years. He is primarily suggesting that these are states rights/jurisdiction issues and the federal government need not be involved.
I could support his stance. As he says, most, if not all of the audience is not going to run out to buy heroin the instant it gets decriminalized. But the decriminalization will have the effect of reducing drug murders, won’t it? And that would actually be good for neighborhoods and families, now wouldn’t it?
Quit muckraking.
Ron Paul is a complete wackadoodle. Creepy wackadoodle! And too old. I hope he just goes AWAY! That’s my sincere prayer.
LOL! Crazier is right!
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