78 replies to this topic

[china cat]

[TakeAStepBack]

I'm putting a lot of hope into Ron getting in and making the needed changes. After this election, he is gonna retire for sure. Which means we have no non-establishment contenders.

Game over this time if we can't put him in.

[Joker]

It would be nice but...

[TakeAStepBack]

yeah, I know.....

[beerzrkr]

Unfortunately he has no support so even if he does get elected into office, nothing will get done.

[TakeAStepBack]

commander and chief......at least he would end the wars.....

[vic]

It would be nice but...

look at who he's running against...it's a stretch but he has a chance...

[vic]

he should leave the republican party and run under the libertarian ticket

[TakeAStepBack]

He's done that before. If you dont run on one of the two party tickets, you stand zero chance.

[vic]

[vic]

He's done that before. If you dont run on one of the two party tickets, you stand zero chance.

lieberman (I-Israel) did it when he lost in the primary and ended up winning:dunno:

[TakeAStepBack]

!

[Julius]

What does "anti-war" even mean? Everyone except a few crazy generals and mercenaries are "anti-war."

It's just a matter of how much you'll let people shoot at you before you start shooting back.

[Royal]

Go ahead, throw away your vote!!!!

[TakeAStepBack]

What does "anti-war" even mean? Everyone except a few crazy generals and mercenaries are "anti-war."

It's just a matter of how much you'll let people shoot at you before you start shooting back.

Hardly. Every president since ww2 has found a reason to openly or covert run war operations on a foreign entity whenever they deem it "necessary".

Lets run a short list of coups/"Interventions" or covert ops we've run since 1953.

Iran 1953
Tibet 1950s
Guatemala 1954
Cuba 1959
Democratic Republic of the Congo 1960
Iraq 1963
Brazil 1964
Republic of Ghana 1966
Iraq 1968
Chile 1973
Afghanistan 1973-74
Iraq 1973-75
Argentina 1976
Afghanistan 1978-1980s
Iran 1980
Nicaragua 1981-1990
El Salvador 1980-92
Cambodia 1980-95
Angola 1980s
Philippines 1986
Iraq 1992-1995
Guatemala 1993
Serbia 2000
Venezuela 2002
Haiti 2004

You can read about these incidents in overview format here.

Covert action is most certainly acts of war. I can go on more if you like. But the fact is, America loves war.

[Joker]

Go ahead, throw away your vote!!!!

Or just follow along

[Tim the Beek]

Go ahead, throw away your vote!!!!

Curious how voting for the only candidate whose philosophy of government is close to mine and the only one who hasn't sold out to special interests is throwing my vote away.

Voting for more of the same (which we'll get from any of the "mainstream" candidates)? That's throwing your vote away...

[china cat]

What does "anti-war" even mean? Everyone except a few crazy generals and mercenaries are "anti-war."

It's just a matter of how much you'll let people shoot at you before you start shooting back.

yeah, look at the list of just a few of the crazy generals:

June 3, 1997

American foreign and defense policy is adrift. Conservatives have criticized the incoherent policies of the Clinton Administration. They have also resisted isolationist impulses from within their own ranks. But conservatives have not confidently advanced a strategic vision of America's role in the world. They have not set forth guiding principles for American foreign policy. They have allowed differences over tactics to obscure potential agreement on strategic objectives. And they have not fought for a defense budget that would maintain American security and advance American interests in the new century.
We aim to change this. We aim to make the case and rally support for American global leadership.

As the 20th century draws to a close, the United States stands as the world's preeminent power. Having led the West to victory in the Cold War, America faces an opportunity and a challenge: Does the United States have the vision to build upon the achievements of past decades? Does the United States have the resolve to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests?

We are in danger of squandering the opportunity and failing the challenge. We are living off the capital -- both the military investments and the foreign policy achievements -- built up by past administrations. Cuts in foreign affairs and defense spending, inattention to the tools of statecraft, and inconstant leadership are making it increasingly difficult to sustain American influence around the world. And the promise of short-term commercial benefits threatens to override strategic considerations. As a consequence, we are jeopardizing the nation's ability to meet present threats and to deal with potentially greater challenges that lie ahead.

We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan Administration's success: a military that is strong and ready to meet both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promotes American principles abroad; and national leadership that accepts the United States' global responsibilities.

Of course, the United States must be prudent in how it exercises its power. But we cannot safely avoid the responsibilities of global leadership or the costs that are associated with its exercise. America has a vital role in maintaining peace and security in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. If we shirk our responsibilities, we invite challenges to our fundamental interests. The history of the 20th century should have taught us that it is important to shape circumstances before crises emerge, and to meet threats before they become dire. The history of this century should have taught us to embrace the cause of American leadership.
Our aim is to remind Americans of these lessons and to draw their consequences for today. Here are four consequences:

• we need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global
responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future;

• we need to strengthen our ties to democratic allies and to challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values;

• we need to promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad;

• we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles.

Such a Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity may not be fashionable today. But it is necessary if the United States is to build on the successes of this past century and to ensure our security and our greatness in the next.


Elliott Abrams Gary Bauer William J. Bennett Jeb Bush

Dick Cheney Eliot A. Cohen Midge Decter Paula Dobriansky Steve Forbes

Aaron Friedberg Francis Fukuyama Frank Gaffney Fred C. Ikle

Donald Kagan Zalmay Khalilzad I. Lewis Libby Norman Podhoretz

Dan Quayle Peter W. Rodman Stephen P. Rosen Henry S. Rowen

Donald Rumsfeld Vin Weber George Weigel Paul Wolfowitz


WAR MONGERS

http://www.newameric...fprinciples.htm

[Uncle Coulro]

Unfortunately he has no support so even if he does get elected into office, nothing will get done.

As POTUS, he could, without any "support" immediately:

• Withdraw all troops based on foreign soil.
  
• Order any Executive Branch department or agency to stand-down.
  
• End most expenditures (beyond employee salaries and congressional reporting requirements) of any EB D or A.
  
• Refuse to sign any given legislation - forcing a united Congress to override.
  
• Fire any presidential appointee (i.e. non-Civil Service) - over 700,000 positions.
  
• Change all diplomatic relations to match the foreign policy he delineated in A Foreign Policy of Freedom: Peace, Commerce, and Honest Friendship.

Pretty impactful, if you ask me.

[TakeAStepBack]

Paul is a racist, a bigot and a homophobe. He will take away a woman's choice, ruin the environment, promote pure anarchy and allow the corporations to destroy the middle class. He will destroy diplomatic relations by seeking to end the US involvement in the United Nations, heavily damaging ALL close ally relations. He will also hand over the country to China at a fraction of the cost the dems and repubs are requesting.

[china cat]

!

thank you

As POTUS, he could, without any "support" immediately:

• Withdraw all troops based on foreign soil.
  
• Order any Executive Branch department or agency to stand-down.
  
• End most expenditures (beyond employee salaries and congressional reporting requirements) of any EB D or A.
  
• Refuse to sign any given legislation - forcing a united Congress to override.
  
• Fire any presidential appointee (i.e. non-Civil Service) - over 700,000 positions.
  
• Change all diplomatic relations to match the foreign policy he delineated in A Foreign Policy of Freedom: Peace, Commerce, and Honest Friendship.

Pretty impactful, if you ask me.

and thank you.

[TakeAStepBack]

BTW, Kris....excellent video....just super.

[TakeAStepBack]

I watched ALL of the OPs content......and i .....if only I could..... See ya'll at WT....

[TakeAStepBack]

FREEDOM....William....FREEDOM!

[china cat]

BTW, Kris....excellent video....just super.

agreed. extremely powerful. i do wish they left out the section revealing horrible conduct on the part of a couple of our military men (i.e.: rape case and puppy throwing). that didn't need to be there and only serves to offend our decent and patriotic servicemen and women.

FREEDOM....William....FREEDOM!

i'm losing hope, dave. the more i learn the more discouraged i become.

[china cat]

[TakeAStepBack]

http://www.thedailys...---the-top-tier

[tommacco]

what gets me is that most republicans think of this guy as a fruit-cake or the 'ralph nader' of their party and completely dismiss him in favor of dickheads like rick perry or mitt romney, when ron paul is in fact the only candidate that actually stands for just about every non-bigoted opinion your average conservative republican holds.

the only reason i can come up with as to why he isn't leading the race for the republican nod is because the evangelicals know he doesn't give a fuck about their agenda-he's just a text book conservative libertarian. that and the fact that he is only a 'republican' by loose political philosophy and not because he plays into party politics like romney and perry.

i've always considered myself a 'liberal' (though definitely not a democrat) and very much a libertarian... i do have strong reservations about laissez-faire capitalism and i do not think socialism is the enemy but i think i'd actually consider voting for ron paul as opposed to my usual practice of writing myself in (to me, federal politicians, ESPECIALLY the president, are just glorified dictators, and I have a philosophical objection to giving a dictator support or declaring that I want him/her to be my leader)

[bitrush]

Ron Paul does not believe in evolution. Thats where he loses me.

[vic]

Ron Paul does not believe in evolution. Thats where he loses me.

yeah that the elimination of minimum wage...

[TakeAStepBack]

Ron Paul does not believe in evolution. Thats where he loses me.

Yeah, I'm with you there. Seems pretty normal for a 76 yr old texan though. Furthermore, it really makes no difference on his ability to be president. Paul, along with the constitution, doesn't believe federal government has any authority over education. It's kind of a nonissue in that regard.

yeah that the elimination of minimum wage...

Price Floors
A price floor is the lowest legal price a commodity can be sold at. Price floors are used by the government to prevent prices from being too low. The most common price floor is the minimum wage--the minimum price that can be payed for labor. Price floors are also used often in agriculture to try to protect farmers.

For a price floor to be effective, it must be set above the equilibrium price. If it's not above equilibrium, then the market won't sell below equilibrium and the price floor will be irrelevant.

Drawing a price floor is simple. Simply draw a straight, horizontal line at the price floor level. This graph shows a price floor at $3.00. You'll notice that the price floor is above the equilibrium price, which is $2.00 in this example.

A few crazy things start to happen when a price floor is set. First of all, the price floor has raised the price above what it was at equilibrium, so the demanders (consumers) aren't willing to buy as much quantity. The demanders will purchase the quantity where the quantity demanded is equal to the price floor, or where the demand curve intersects the price floor line. On the other hand, since the price is higher than what it would be at equilibrium, the suppliers (producers) are willing to supply more than the equilibrium quantity. They will supply where their marginal cost is equal to the price floor, or where the supply curve intersects the price floor line.

As you might have guessed, this creates a problem. There is less quantity demanded (consumed) than quantity supplied (produced). This is called a surplus. If the surplus is allowed to be in the market then the price would actually drop below the equilibrium. In order to prevent this the government must step in. The government has a few options:

1. They can buy up all the surplus. For a while the US government bought grain surpluses in the US and then gave all the grain to Africa. This might have been nice for African consumers, but it destroyed African farmers.
2. They can strictly enforce the price floor and let the surplus go to waste. This means that the suppliers that are able to sell their goods are better off while those who can't sell theirs (because of lack of demand) will be worse off. Minimum wage laws, for example, mean that some workers who are willing to work at a lower wage don't get to work at all. Such workers make up a portion of the unemployed (this is called "structural unemployment").
3. The government can control how much is produced. To prevent too many suppliers from producing, the government can give out production rights or pay people not to produce. Giving out production rights will lead to lobbying for the lucrative rights or even bribery. If the government pays people not to produce, then suddenly more producers will show up and ask to be payed.
4. They can also subsidize consumption. To get demanders to purchase more of the surplus, the government can pay part of the costs. This would obviously get expensive really fast.
Although some of those ideas may sound stupid, the US government has done them. In the end, a price floor hurts society more than it helps. It may help farmers or the few workers that get to work for minimum wage, but it only helps those people by hurting everyone else. Price floors cause a deadweight welfare loss.

A deadweight welfare loss occurs whenever there is a difference between the price the marginal demander is willing to pay and the equilibrium price. The deadweight welfare loss is the loss of consumer and producer surplus. In other words, any time a regulation is put into place that moves the market away from equilibrium, beneficial transactions that would have occured can no longer take place. In the case of a price floor, the deadweight welfare loss is shown by a triangle on the left side of the equilibrium point, like in the graph. The area of the triangle is the amount of money that society loses.

http://economics.fun...price-floor.php

[TakeAStepBack]

Paul strongly advocates free markets. He is against federal government regulation and intervention.

[seany]

Which means he could give a shit if his campaign t-shirts come from Indonesia or if millions of U.S. jobs are off-shored...

[TakeAStepBack]

Well, that is happening now anyway. I guess I don't see how that matters either.

[seany]

I'm just pointing out that his free-market policies aren't necessarily conducive to creating good jobs at home, which is the number one way to fix the current deficit. Maybe it's just not possible to compete in the global marketplace on a level playing field anymore in many sectors of the economy and that is the new reality that we need to get used to.

While Ron Paul has some interesting ideas - some that I can embrace - for every one of those he also has ideas that I personally think would be disastrous to the overall health of the economy and people's lives.
Churches used to be the institutions to deal with the sick and uninsured? That's not much comfort for us un- or underinsured atheists. Not saying that the government should give hand outs, but there's got to be some regulations in place to try to give people a fighting chance to obtain or afford insurance.

Would Dr. Paul wipe out all environmental regulation? That's not free-market.

And if you think that he's going to totally shutdown our military-industrial machine by executive order, that's just dreaming. The day he took office he'd find the reality of doing so does not exist.

IMO, he's selling as much koolaid as any other candidate, because what he wants to do and what he would be able to do are probably very very different

[TakeAStepBack]

Well, that is one extremely inspriring post, seany.

Sounds like we should just declare Obama king and call it a day in this once democratic republic.

And if you think that he's going to totally shutdown our military-industrial machine by executive order, that's just dreaming. The day he took office he'd find the reality of doing so does not exist.

As president he would have the express authority to end all foriegn wars and occupations, bring home all military personel on foreign soils, shut down bases, and drastically overhaul our foriegn policy without much concern for congress.

If he can come in and get NOTHING else accomplished besides the above, that is FAR more than anything we would see from any other prospective candidate.

Or, we can all just take vic's advice, not vote and let the chips fall where they may.

[seany]

Yes he would have that authority. But I think it's foolish to believe that what he can do in theory is the same as reality.

[TakeAStepBack]

The authority is the reality. The theory is simply whether or not he would do it. He's a pretty consistent man, so my bet is on him keeping his campaign word.

[vic]

Or, we can all just take vic's advice, not vote and let the chips fall where they may.

[TakeAStepBack]

Just got 'Liberty Defined: 50 Essential issues that Affect Our Freedom'

I still need to read End the Fed. Although, I am doubtful it will provide new insight to this old school fed hater.

[china cat]

CHOMSKY DEFENDS PAUL'S COMMENTS AT DEBATE

[china cat]

!

[TakeAStepBack]

I feel, while he has maintained a strong position for many year, he is growing tired. in the long sense of the phrase.

[TakeAStepBack]

“Ideas are very important to the shaping of society. In fact, they are more powerful than bombings or armies or guns. And this is because ideas are capable of spreading without limit. They are behind all the choices we make. They can transform the world in a way that governments and armies cannot. Fighting for liberty with ideas makes more sense to me than fighting with guns or politics or political power. With ideas, we can make real change that lasts.”
― Ron Paul, Liberty Defined: The 50 Urgent Issues That Affect Our Freedom

[TakeAStepBack]

“The original American patriots were those individuals brave enough to resist with force the oppressive power of King George...Patriotism is more closely linked to dissent than it is to conformity and a blind desire for safety and security.”
― Ron Paul

[TakeAStepBack]

“When the federal government spends more each year than it collects in tax revenues, it has three choices: It can raise taxes, print money, or borrow money. While these actions may benefit politicians, all three options are bad for average Americans.”
― Ron Paul

[TakeAStepBack]

“Liberty is lost through complacency and a subservient mindset. When we accept or even welcome automobile checkpoints, random searches, mandatory identification cards, and paramilitary police in our streets, we have lost a vital part of our American heritage. America was born of protest, revolution, and mistrust of government. Subservient societies neither maintain nor deserve freedom for long.”
― Ron Paul

[TakeAStepBack]

“Setting a good example is a far better way to spread ideals than through force of arms.”
― Ron Paul



/thread

[china cat]

[TakeAStepBack]

!



I love the excuses and bias.

"Republican Establishment Support." 1:55 into it

Which means everyone besides half of the american people. Swell.