Mark Palermo

Ron Paul:He Makes Too Much Sense

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Ron Paul can’t win… Pass it on. Ron Paul is a moonbat… Pass it on. Ron Paul might be a racist, I think… Pass it on.

How strange that with the county in a conservative mood, the guy that gets treated like a leper is the very one that most closely follows classical conservative principles of individual freedom, small government, non-intervention and limited taxation in the fashion of Barry Goldwater. Could it be that what is collectively understood nowadays as “conservatism” is really something else?

The debates are all scripted of course, the agenda set to preclude any out-of-bounds topics, and so serve as a showcase for selected New World Order candidates. If you doubt this assertion, just look at the two guys who came out finalists in 2004. Out of 300 million people, they just happened to be two rich Yale guys who just happened to be members of Skull and Bones.

So it was no surprise when Fox News denied Ron Paul a seat in the televised debates prior to the important New Hampshire primary. The reason given was pretty lame; he was not a major candidate. But the month before, in a 24-hour period on December16, Ron Paul’s campaign raised a staggering $6.026 million dollars, surpassing the all time one-day record. And in Iowa Ron Paul took 10 percent of the votes, way ahead of Giuliani's 3 percent and slightly behind McCain's 13 percent.
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Ron Paul has several positives. He’s an M.D, a veteran, and he has received more campaign contributions from active military personnel than any other candidate including John McCain. A strict constitutionalist, he has never voted to raise taxes in his 33 years in congress, which has earned him the nickname “Doctor No.” Never taken a taxpayer funded junket. Never voted for a congressional pay raise. And, are you ready for this? He has pledged not to accept his congressional pension when he retires. (How did this guy ever end up in politics?)

Some of his ideas are unconventional. For example, he wants to abolish the Department of Education, an idea worthy of consideration. After thirty years of teaching, I have no idea what the department does. Over coffee, I asked some colleagues. Someone said it would be irresponsible to abolish the Department of Education, but none could explain what the department does nor how the department supported their students.

Congressman Paul, a member of the House Finance Committee, wants to abolish the Federal Reserve. Of course this is a shocking idea to some. But have you ever been able to understand what the Fed does? Not just the fluff they teach you in high school. You know, like “they regulate banking” or “they control interest rates,” or the best one of all, “They print money and sell it the Treasury.” How’s that? They sell their printed money to the government? Why doesn’t the government print its own money like other countries do? Why doesn’t congress appoint a committee to control interest rates? The fact is nobody really knows. I attempted to plow through William Greider’s “Secrets of the Temple,” but it was a tedious read. Most people don’t even have a handle on whether the Fed is a government bureau or a private corporation- and I think the Fed wants it that way. I would love to see it taken up on national TV, but with Ron Paul marginalized as I predicted he would be last summer in this column, that’s one debate you will never see. Real debates can lead to the unacceptable risk of real democracy breaking out.

The one thing that has angered his detractors more than anything else is his use of the term “empire” to describe US foreign policy. Let’s see. We have 700 military bases in 130 countries, which, by the way, are being run on borrowed money from China. The British didn’t have a problem with using the term “empire” when they had an empire, so what’s the fuss? Maybe if we started using the word, people might just arrive more easily at the obvious conclusion that empires don’t benefit those who must pay for their sustenance with blood, tears and their children’s lives. According to Ron Paul, the military is for the defense of one’s homeland, not for globe policing or nation building. Imagine if all that money were diverted into tax reduction, medical research, business development, housing, health care, technology…

Whether you like him or you think he’s nuts, you have to admit- he’s not a bore like all the others mouthing stale platitudes about “change.” (No substantive change will ever come to this country until all lobbying is made illegal.) Of all the political analysts I have listened to, my mother said it best when I asked her opinion of Congressman Paul: “Oh that guy will never win,” she said, dismissing his candidacy with a wave of the hand. “He makes too much sense.”

January 2008