Go Ron Paul!

August 3, 2007

What a great time we had in San Antonio last weekend. An enthusiastic bunch of Texans thronged the Alamo for a rally, and then there was a fundraising dinner at an historic museum. More than a thousand people attended one or the other.

San Antonio is a military town. Indeed, I served there myself in the Air Force, and lots of soldiers and airmen came up to offer their support. Some were Iraq veterans, some were headed there, and all supported getting us out.

As I told the crowd, with our non-interventionist foreign policy, there would be 3,600 young Americans still alive, and 25,000 more not badly wounded. It got the biggest response of the evening.

Then a 14-year-old girl told me she was helping the campaign so her daddy, a soldier, would not have to go to Iraq. I told her there are many thousands of us working to that exact end, to keep him and all the others safe. What an outrage that we are accused of not supporting the troops. What a scam when the warmongers claim to be pro-soldier.

Lots of military people turned out to be aware that our campaign got more donations from soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines than any other. Funny, that made a big impression in Congress too. Many of my colleagues were amazed and encouraged that you can be against this unconstitutional and disastrous war, and get military support.

This weekend I meet with family, high-school classmates, and local friends and supporters in Pittsburgh (http://www.ronpaul2008.com/events/pittsburgh-area-rally/). We are really looking forward to it!Then it’s a full week in Iowa. On Sunday, there’s the ABC debate (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=3437758%26page=1), and next weekend is the Ames straw poll. Other campaigns seem to be pulling back, to try to lower expectations. We are stepping things up, with more staff, another office, and a significant TV and radio buy. This all costs a lot of money, of course, as does our continuing work in New Hampshire, South Carolina, Arizona, and other states.

But I have been thrilled by the support among Iowa Republicans for our issues—on the war, on pro-life, on fiscal conservatism. This is fertile territory for us. Now we just have to work harder than our opponents at recruiting supporters, organizing them, and getting them to the straw poll.

Some media have hinted that a good showing by our campaign would be a bombshell. I don’t make predictions, but I am cautiously optimistic about our chances. However, I very much need your help.

We got a lot of good publicity earlier about our prudence in spending. Indeed, I treat every donation with care, since it comes from a good American who shares our hope for the future, and who had to work hard to earn that money.

But all that publicity about our non-spendthrift ways had a “blowback” effect—if you will excuse the expression. It made some people feel the campaign did not need support, right at the very time we especially need it.

Stand with me in Iowa. I very much need your support. Please, send the most generous donation (https://www.ronpaul2008.com/donate/) you can, as soon as you can.

Sincerely,

Ron

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Ron Paul's Plan to Get Osama Bin Laden

Wise, not wacky

On October 10, 2001, Congressman Ron Paul led the effort in Congress to give President Bush the tools he needed to capture, dead or alive, Osama bin Laden and the other terrorists responsible for September 11th. Dr. Paul introduced on that day H.R. 3076 - The September 11 Marque and Reprisal Act of 2001.

If passed, that legislation would have given President Bush an additional weapon against bin Laden. If Dr. Paul's legislation had passed in 2001, it is likely bin Laden would not still be at large six years later.

But today, John Bresnahan of Politico.com describes Congressman Ron Paul's effort to capture Osama bin Laden as "wacky." Wacky? Let's see.

Letters of marque and reprisal would:

Improve chances to capture Osama bin Laden and others more quickly.
Decrease the risk of American military being wounded or killed.
Decrease the risk of a larger war developing.
Decrease the number of innocent civilians killed.
Reduce the cost of U.S. military operations.

Article I, Section 8, Clauses 10 and 11 of the U.S. Constitution grant Congress the power to offer a bounty and appoint stealth warriors, private companies and individuals, to capture or kill an enemy such as Osama bin Laden and his fellow terrorists, as well as seize their property.

In 2001 when Congressman Paul introduced his legislation to grant letters of marque and reprisal against Osama bin Laden, he said, "The founders and authors of our Constitution provided an answer for the difficult tasks that we now face. When a precise declaration of war was impossible due to the vagueness of our enemy, the Congress was expected to take it upon themselves to direct the reprisal against an enemy not recognized as a government."

Dr. Paul's marque and reprisal legislation did not pass in 2001. But Osama bin Laden is still at large. Therefore, Dr. Paul re-introduced his legislation a few days ago.

In a letter dated July 21, 2007, Dr. Paul states:

I opposed giving the president power to wage unlimited and unchecked aggression. However, I did vote to support the use of force in Afghanistan. I also authored H.R. 3076, the September 11 Marque and Reprisal Act of 2001. A letter of marque and reprisal is a constitutional tool specifically designed to give the president the authority to respond with appropriate force to those non-state actors who wage aggression against the United States while limiting his authority to only those responsible for the atrocities of that day. Such a limited authorization is consistent with the doctrine of just war and the practical aim of keeping Americans safe while minimizing the costs in blood and treasure of waging such an operation.

Ron Paul's leadership is wise -- not wacky.

Kent SnyderChairman, Ron Paul 2008
"Ron Paul brings back a wacky post 9/11 bill" by John Bresnahan, The Politico, 07/30/07

Friday, July 27, 2007

RON PAUL AND THE GREASED PIG

Gary North's REALITY CHECK
http://www.garynorth.com/ www.snipurl.com/subscribenow

Issue 671 July 27, 2007
RON PAUL AND THE GREASED PIG

Presidency, noun: The greased pig in the field game of America's politics. -- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" (1911)

I generally avoid discussing national politics. I alwayshave. That's because I don't think democratic involvement makesmuch difference except at the local level. The size of thepermanent national bureaucracy is so enormous, in every largenation, that political activities are capable of changing verylittle. Except in times of enormous crisis -- mainly national wars -- political change is marginal. War centralizeseverything. This is why national politicians lie their countries into wars. This is a bi-partisan practice. It rarely fails. If you doubt me, click here:
http://mises.org/story/2622

What can national politics accomplish? The Americangovernment's bureaucracy is protected by Civil Servicelegislation which goes back to the 1880's. The system's archetype institution is the United States Postal Service, which recently raised the price of postage. It does that frequently,as you know. We grimace and bear it. If it were not for e-mail, Federal Express, and UPS, we would suffer a lot more.

My professor, Robert Nisbet, once commented that in the yearof his birth, 1913, the only contact that most Americans had withthe Federal government was the U.S. Post Office.

My father-in-law, R. J. Rushdoony, born three years later,once commented that 1913 was the last year of the golden age ofAmerica: after indoor plumbing but before the income tax. Thatwas a long time ago.

Leonard E. Read, the founder of the Foundation for EconomicEducation in 1946, used to say that Americans live in a countryin which various levels of government extract over 40% of their productivity, yet they call this system freedom. "They don't know the difference between freedom and coercion."

So, I do not pay much attention to national politics. Politics always reflects the understanding of the voters, and thevoters cannot tell the difference between freedom and coercion. Worse: they are unwilling to surrender coercion for freedom.

It is not just America. Citizens all over the world arepersuaded of the grand illusion of the 20th century, namely, thatgovernment coercion provides personal security: a safety ne tagainst hard times. They look at the government's net and think"safety." I look at the net and think "entrapment." Voters say,"Don't take away the net. We paid for it. We deserve it." They do, indeed.

A fish caught in a net may get away if it is at the outeredge of the mass of fish caught in the net. It may wigglethrough a gap. There are more gaps than rope. But inside thatmass of fish, there is no way to escape. Professional fishermenknow this. They do not worry about the one that got away.

THEN THERE IS THE CFR

The Council on Foreign Relations was established in 1921. It was a deliberate imitation of the old Round Table group of Great Britain. The Round Table was made up of academics, politicians, and bureaucrats who ran the British empire abroadand hoped to run the domestic political order in the same way. These were the best and the brightest men in Great Britain. Theyled the country into two world wars, thereby bankrupting the British empire by 1945. They were too clever by half.

Members of the Council on Foreign Relations are just as clever.

In 1935, the Round Table ran the British Empire. The Great Depression had enabled them to gain dominance in the domestic political order. It looked as though they were invincible. In asense, they were. Tony Blair was only the latest representative of that highly educated hierarchical order. They still presideover the domestic political scene. But voters, year by year, arebecoming Muslim. Birth rates determine this.

If this continues, the heirs of the Round Table will be replaced. There is no sign that this will not continue. Demography is destiny unless the national confession changes. Britain's national confession is, "I'm all right, Jack." They aren't.

The CFR has maintained similar control. Within three years of the CFR's founding, one of the founders, a New York corporatelawyer named John W. Davis, got the Democrats' nomination for President. Today, no one gains the nomination who is not a CFR member.

The Presidential election is therefore a contest between CFR Team A and CFR Team B.

In 2004, the race narrowed down not just to members of the CFR. It narrowed down to a pair of Skull & Bones members. Boneslets 15 people a year into its ranks. What are the odds against two members gaining the joint nomination of the highest office in the land? Did the media dwell on this? Of course not. Thepublic would not have known of the existence of The Order, hadnot George H. W. Bush been a member. So, to turn it into aperipheral matter in 1980, Bonesman Gary Trudeau make light of it-- featherweight light (his image of Bush, Sr.) -- in a series of"Doonesbury" cartoons.

How did Bush get the nomination for Vice President in 1980? Reagan had beaten him, and Reagan said he would not put him onthe ticket. Then he reversed himself.

The following story I believe is true. It was told to me byW. Cleon Skousen ("The Naked Communist," "The Naked Capitalist"). Immediately prior to Reagan's smiling announcement of Bush as hisVP running mate, Reagan had spent the weekend at a large estatein Leesburg, Virginia. At that meeting was one of Skousen'srelatives (not Mark or Joel). He witnessed two CFR members, veryprominent, who cornered Reagan for the weekend. According tothis third-hand, unverifiable testimony -- which Skousen relayedto me a few years later -- they presented Reagan with a choice: Bush as VP with media neutrality or someone else with media skewering. One of these figures was a talking head with enormousinfluence. The other was a Rockefeller hireling with enormous influence. They are still alive. One of them still has influence.

Did this event take place? I think it did. But even if itdidn't, the implied threat was always there. The media had wipedout Goldwater's campaign in 1964. It can do this at any time,just as it can raise concern about any of two dozen wars that aregoing on at any time, merely by focusing on one of them. What isthe difference between Darfur and Rwanda? Media attention.

If you look at Reagan's cabinet, the difference between itand Carter's in terms of CFR membership was minimal. James Bakerran Reagan's White House whenever Reagan wasn't personallycommitted to a non-CFR project. Baker was then and remainsclosely associated with George H. W. Bush. He actually had farmore influence over Reagan's White House than he has over GeorgeW. Bush's, where Cheney seems dominant.

The overall direction of politics remains the same: toward centralization.

The CFR is in a position to deny both funding and mediasemi-neutrality to any candidate who does not toe the bipartisan Party Line on taxes (no major changes), on regulation of the economy (more), on foreign policy (Superpower intervention in 100+ countries at 700+ bases), on the United Nations, and on themilitary-industrial-oil-banking complex. The only political question is which special interest gets its hands on a largershare of the loot.

Only one candidate breaks ranks on all of these issues: RonPaul.

1976 VS. 2007

When I joined his Congressional staff in June, 1976, he wasthe most junior Congressmen, having been sworn in only two monthsearlier. The Democrat incumbent had been given a position in theFederal bureaucracy, and he had resigned his office. Paul won the special election.

I wrote his newsletters. I also did research on issuescoming before Congress. In my three-person tiny office was Dr.John W. Robbins, a former student of Hans Sennholz in economicsand of Gottfried Dietze in political science. In the main officewas Bruce Bartlett, who later became one of the leading defendersin Washington of supply-side economics. This was a high-poweredstaff for a Congressman with two months' seniority.

Unlike every other Congressman, he had no administrative assistant. That meant he ran a decentralized office. Staffersreported to him, not to some professional screener.

When I joined the staff, little did I suspect that threedecades later, he would be a candidate for President, with acampaign bank account with a couple of million (depreciated)dollars in it. There was no Web in 1976. There were no desktop computers other than the Altair, a brand-new gadget for techies.

There was no Alexa Web traffic ranking. To use Alexa, Iused Google to search for these names: Ron Paul, Mitt Romney,John McCain, and Rudy Giuliani. I then selected the top Googlelink for each name. One by one, I entered these onhttp://www.alexa.com/. Oddly enough, I had selected the names in orderof their Alexa rankings.

http://www.ronpaul2008.com/, 23,600
http://www.mittromney.com/, 65,500
http://www.johnmccain.com/, 106,500
http://www.joinrudy2008.com/, 108,500

Barack Obama's site ranks 21,000. Hillary Clinton's is22,000. John Edwards's is 59,000.

Ron Paul is #3 in the digital race. Everyone else is an also-ran.

Political pundits are employed by two relentlessly shrinking sectors of the economy, network TV and paper-based newspapers. They seem unaware of all this. Anyway, they remain silent.

Ron Paul has come out of cyberspace, which is where the future is, according to everyone except the political pundits. How was this possible? What does this mean? The pundits' response: "Don't ask. Don't tell."

THE SCREENERS WILL SCREEN

The American political party system has had only threesuccessful outsiders in American history: James Polk in 1844(won), William Jennings Bryan in 1896 (lost three times), and Barry Goldwater in 1964 (lost overwhelmingly).

Reagan was twice elected as a governor. He had been analmost-ran in 1976. He was a semi-outsider with an insider as his VP.

Reagan got his shot because of new technology: his famous TV speech, late in the Goldwater campaign, which was paid for by the Goldwater campaign. It has been known ever since as "TheSpeech." It is a good speech on paper. On radio, it waspowerful. I have not been able to locate a full version of theTV version, but it was riveting. The audio version is here: http://GaryNorth.com/snip/232.htm

The Republican Party in 1964 paid to have a version of thatspeech shown locally with paid-for TV time. I recall no otherspeech ever used this way. The Republican Party's professionals fought this decision, but Goldwater insisted.
[Note: The speech did not stick with Hillary Clinton, a "Goldwater girl" in 1964. Her parents sent her to Wellesley. Too bad.]

Reagan won in 1980 because of Richard Viguerie's direct-mail techniques, 1965-80, based on 12,000 names and addresses of Goldwater campaign donors.

Bryan won the nomination because of a speech, arguably the most important political speech in American history. Reading ittoday, we wonder why, apart from the famous "cross of gold" line. That speech lost the Democratic Party for the gold standard, low-tax wing that had dominated ever since Andrew Jackson's era. Itturned the party into the high-tax, interventionist party it hasbeen ever since Woodrow Wilson took office in 1913. Bryan'sbrother Charles mastered the technology of direct mail. He laterwas Davis's running mate as VP.

Technology matters.

I am not persuaded that technology can overcome thescreeners' ability to raise funds in 2008. The major politicalparties since at least 1912 have been controlled by the bankinginterests and their allies. There is no candidate in Americanhistory more hostile to the existing anti-gold banking systemthan Ron Paul. He also opposes all tax-funded foreign aid, whichincludes foreign aid to the State of Israel.

The screeners will screen.

But Paul, at age 71, represents a fundamental break with the existing system. By surfacing on the Web, he has identifiedhimself as a representative of people who do not trust theFederal government. There are a lot of them.

GRASS-ROOTS POLITICS

For over 40 years, I have heard conservatives talk about howimportant grass-roots politics is. This is rather like listeningto guys at the corner bar talk about the how much they respectthe work of Alcoholics Anonymous. It looks great on paper. Thenit's "Bartender, hit me again."

Grass-roots politics is what is needed. But its focus mustbe on local politics.

There are 3,000 counties in the United States. They possessthe property tax, which was the broadest-based tax prior to 1914.

Most counties are dominated by a single political party. So, only masochists or visionaries get involved with the minority party.

What if someone with a huge mailing list, or a series ofmailing lists, were to create a below-the-radar movement fortraining citizens in the techniques of high-tech, low-cost political mobilization techniques. The target? Precincts.

You say, "That's boring. Nobody cares about the localprecinct."

Exactly.

In most careers, you start at the bottom. But because money talks, and media talk, only those with connections and money getaccess to the voters. They do not start at the bottom. Theywant to start as a state representative or even higher.

They do not want to pay their dues.

So, the American political system is geared to state and national politics. Yet technology is moving toward decentralized communications: cheaper, faster, easy to master by non-techies.

Technology today is doing what the free market began doing in 1780: broadening the market through price competition.

This is the #3 threat to the screeners. The #2 threat is the power of ideas. These ideas now can get out to the public without printing presses or ten-storey transmission towers. The screening gatekeepers stand guard at the gates, but the walls arecrumbling from the acids of digital technology. The #1 threat isthe nature of society. The French conservative Lamennais described it in the 1820's:

Centralization produces apoplexy at the center and anemia at the extremities.

On all fronts except higher education, the screeners in America are in retreat.

What the silent digital minority needs in order to become ascreaming electoral majority are the following:

1. A decades-long vision of victory
2. Programs of privately funded welfare
3. A readiness to de-fund the state
4. Technologies of communication
5. Technologies of local mobilization
6. Patience
7. A willingness to labor under the radar
8. A leader who believes in grass-roots politics

If you want a slogan, try this: "Replacement, not capture."

Conservative politics made a series of mistakes, beginning no later than 1948.

1. A defensive vision of stalemate
2. No programs for private welfare
3. A goal of capturing the state
a) Education b) Welfare c) Bureaucracies
4. No local political mobilization
5. Replacing Communism's empire with America's

It had an operational slogan: "Capture, not replacement." It got co-opted every time. Speaker of the House Sam Rayburnlured them all in with his slogan: "To get along, you've got togo along." They went along.

The Federal government got larger.

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CONCLUSION

Ron Paul's campaign offers a unique opportunity, just not towin the Presidency. It will be interesting to see what hiscampaign organization does with all those email addresses aftermid-2008.

I know what Richard Viguerie did with 12,000 names and addresses of Goldwater campaign donors. Nobody else wanted those names. Anyone could have walked onto Capitol Hill and writtenthem down. Only Viguerie saw the opportunity.

For me, this is mostly hypothetical. I watch from adistance as an interested observer. I enjoy stories of entrepreneurship.

I also recall the words of George Washington Plunkett of Tammany Hall a century ago: "I seen my opportunities, and I took'em."

That's what opportunities are for.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Paul Campaign Gaining Speed --NPR

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12224561

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Ron Paul Rocks South Carolina

http://www.autodogmatic.com/index.php/sst/2007/07/22/america_supports_ron_paul_a_report_on_to

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Ron Paul's Weekend in California

July 17, 2007

What a day and half in northern California! On Friday, my first appointment was at 6:00 am, and my day ended at 11:00 pm. I did radio and tv interviews in San Francisco, followed by a meeting with the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle. The questions were tough but fair: my favorite! Meanwhile, more and more interview requests pour into the campaign. There is a real hunger for our ideas, even in the mainstream media. The message of liberty is popular!

Then I headed for Google, one of America’s great businesses. Some of the young stars who populate that company took me on a tour of a firm that seemed like a university student union. I saw where everyone works, eats, and exercises. Next I did a political YouTube interview with questions submitted from the web. I was told that never had Google, in the entire history of this series, received the sheer number of questions that it had for my interview. People care about freedom.

Then I spent an hour answering questions from Google employees, crowded into a large room with overflow rooms overflowing too. Next was fascinating briefing from some of the technical heads of Google Earth, Google Maps, Google Apps, and other extraordinary innovations. Then there was a press conference for the media gathered in a company courtyard, and then a fundraising reception that a group of Google employees had organized off-site. In the evening there was another successful fundraiser.

Saturday morning was the Silicon Valley Meetup in a park right next to Google. A huge and enthusiastic crowd was there to hear about our ideas, and the diversity was astounding. There were bikers in leather and hippies, young parents and grandparents, high-tech workers and business owners, and so many young Americans.I talked about all our ideas: marching out of Iraq just as we marched in; no more meddling in the Middle East; bringing the troops home, from hundreds of expensive bases all over the world, so that we could have the money we need for the transition to freedom in social programs, and to abolish the personal income tax and the IRS. They are not compatible with a free society.

In a Ron Paul administration, we would also repeal the Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act, restore habeas corpus and stop the spying on Americans. No more eavesdropping on our emails and bank accounts, our phone calls, home and businesses. No national ID -- just the bracing freedom of the Constitution.We must have sound money, and not a giant counterfeiting machine called the Federal Reserve that causes recessions and inflation. We must have private property rights, with no pollution or other attacks on property. We should enforce the Second Amendment, and all the Bill of Rights. We can have privacy for us, not secrecy for a corrupt bureaucracy.

It is all within our grasp, the restoration of the republic and our sovereignty—no UN, no North American Union, no Nafta, no WTO, no World Bank, no IMF. Just federalism, free enterprise, peace, prosperity, and the kind of future we all want for our families, ourselves, and our fellow Americans.

The dream can be a reality. You can help make it so. Please: make your most generous donation to this effort for America’s future (https://www.ronpaul2008.com/donate/). Instead of wars and inflation and spying and poverty, we can have peace and freedom and the blessings for our children and grandchildren of doing better than we have, of secure retirements and childhoods. No more theft -- of our savings or our liberty.Please -- give to this campaign, for all our futures (https://www.ronpaul2008.com/donate/).

Sincerely,

Ron

Monday, July 16, 2007

Majority of US Armed Forces and Veterans Donate to Ron Paul Campaign

While Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, John McCain, and other GOPers brag about their military credentials and strong on terror rhetoric. The US armed forces vote with their wallets for the only man among the GOP field with sensible foreign and domestic policies that favor liberty and a reinstatement of the Constitution...

http://ronpauldelaware.wordpress.com/2007/07/16/military-favors-ron-paul-over-mccain/

and,

http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/3609/Antiwar_Ron_Paul_Rakes_in_Military_Donations

"[Ron Paul]... the antiwar Republican received nearly 50% of the money donated by employees of the US military." BAM!

Neoconservative warmongers will be losing sleep over this one...

How long can the mainstream media continue to marginalize Dr. Paul?