okay...back on topic...
Nuklear wrote:
Forgot about this thread.
agent420 wrote:
...inconsistent voting record...
I should just stop here because if the person that wrote this can't even get his voting record right than it probably says a lot about the rest of his material. Paul's voting record is one of his staples. He is consistent with the Constitution.
http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/71/to simply state that ron paul's voting record is consistent with the constitution suggest that there are candidates whose voting record is not...that is absurd and without foundation...it's all in interpretation...ron paul is just out of step with the reality of our times...his popularity(limited and unsustainable as it is) is in large part a consequence of an unpopular president an unpopular war and shrinking disposable income...his isolationist ideas will solve none of these in the long term...so while paul is an honorable man he's just wrong on most issues...name one serious challenge to our freedom our sovereignty or our identity as a nation that was solved by hiding in the corner and hoping someone else would solve them for us...we didn't win the cold war by waiting for france to meet the challenge of the soviet union and we won't defeat islamic extremist by retreating to the 1920's...sometimes while unfortunate in terms of treasure and blood you have to stand up to the bullies of the world...
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
...and archaic 19th century worldview...
That statement is abhorrently disrespectful to our founding fathers. It basically says they were wrong and this guy knows better.
our founding fathers warned us to avoid foreign entanglements whenever possible but also recognized the reality of the world they lived in( as suggested by the second amendment)to be prepared for any eventuality...foreign aid even in the time of our founding fathers was an important part of our national identity and while we may disagree on the distibution there is no question among reasonable people that it is still a vital part of our role in the world...
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
...it's also the fact that his hordes of extremist followers have been collectively crapping their pants over him for the past several months now. It's admittedly refreshing to see an anti-war Republican on the stage, but that doesn't justify the cult of personality being built around him, especially when you factor in the fact that his policy initiatives run the gamut from returning to the gold standard and phasing out public education to demolishing the FBI and privatizing the military. Just Google Ron Paul and you'll find a wealth of bizarre, Stalinist devotion, often manifested in slavish praise on Youtube comment boards.
He wouldn't be getting so much praise if his views weren't well receive or on the verge of isolation from the political norm. This person fails to see we're praising the message, not the messenger. He just happens to be the only one giving it, or one of little.
we should all praise mr pauls dedication to his beliefs...almost every election cycle introduces us to a candidate that distances him/herself from main street america...ross perot and more recently ralph nader are some of the best examples but there are others...the temptaion is to rally to their side simply because they are so different and because our collective frustration is so high...they want to take us back to a time when the world was less complicated...some might even say to the "good old days"...but for better or worse those days are gone...some people still prefer rotary phones and newspapers...at a personal level this can be charming even quaint...as a nation it is dangerous.
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
A quick look at history disproves the claims I've heard made by Ronpaulogists: food and drug companies wouldn't self-regulate if we destroyed the FDA (in fact, they were dumping snake oil and arsenic into their goods with impunity before it existed)...
He's basically saying that if the FDA was taken away tomorrow that companies would get rid of established guidelines and start treating their customers like shit. Retarded. Part of why consumers could be taken advantage of long ago was one part a lack of science, another part too much trust in their fellow man. There's lots of reasons this stuff would be very rare in a free market, ie no govt regulation.
you put alot of faith in corporate america...the same corporate america that just this past holiday season sold childrens and baby toys coated in heavy amounts of lead (which, if i recall, was brought to consumers attention by the fda).it doesn't matter what year it is, companies will always try to take advantage of the consumer, especially if it will help profits, because that is all that big business cares about...money. most companies don't even care about their employees(mass layoffs, bad work conditions, and third world outsourcing), so what makes you think they care about us? one of the biggest problems facing america today is crystal meth (which, if the wonderful dr. paul got his way, would be legalized). the main ingredient in meth is ephedra. until the fda stepped in and placed huge bans and regulations on ephedra, companies (like the ones you put so much faith in) were selling it on every 7-11 counter across the nation with no age requirements.
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
the gold standard isn't some magical inflation-proof cure-all (in fact, gold standard currency undergoes sporadic, wild spasms of inflation and deflation)...
I could care less about a metal standard as well. I do want the federal reserve abolished and our currency at least backed by gold. I don't know what his guy is smoking with gold being inflated. I'm pretty sure gold has remained about the same price as in 1913 but our dollar is only a couple cents compared to that of 1913 (I'm too lazy to look up official #'s.) Also, the definition of inflation:
A persistent increase in the level of consumer prices or a persistent decline in the purchasing power of money,
caused by an increase in available currency and credit beyond the proportion of available goods and services.
That doesn't happen with gold, much, fyi.
so...gold is the same price it was in 1913? in 1913 gold cost about $5-$6 an ounce. today, it is about $950 an ounce. my problem with gold is that, like all commodities, it can be falsly inflated and deflated by over and underselling in open market. most of the financial world actually look to rising and falling prices of gold to tell when more inflation will hit. whenever the stock market is down, gold goes up. that tells the average person that there is more confidence in the american industrial base than there is in a precious metal commodity.
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
...and a lack of public schools left much of the population too illiterate to perform most of today's jobs.
A lack of the Dept of Edu. does not equate to dismantling public schools. It just means the power goes back to where it belongs, close to or at the parents hands.
i feel the dept of education is a great thing because it forces us all to get the SAME education. if we were to govern schools on a local level, then education would become regional. this would pose major issues when students reach the college level since people would have recieved different educations in california and new york. who would set standard levels of education? my parents? they would want me to have a totally different education than billy bob's parents in podunk south dakota. would football become a graded class in texas? the dept of edu might be overpaid beurocrats, but they do give us the chance to get an equal education!
Nuklear wrote:
agent420 wrote:
Actually, when I said that the 19-year-old idealists were the worst offenders, I left out the white supremacists and conspiracy theorists, who have flocked to the nutty Dr. Paul like a messiah. David Duke, a former governor of Louisiana and the nation's most prominent KKK member and neo-Nazi, is a fervent supporter of Ron Paul and his 19th century ideals, and rants on his official website about the vast Zionist media conspiracy against the man he literally calls his "king." If it was just this guy supporting Paul, I wouldn't make a big deal about it, but I've had a hard time finding a single white supremacist, 9/11 truther or any other that doesn't rally behind the only presidential candidate to claim that the 1964 Civil Rights Act "increased racial tensions while diminishing individual liberty."
So the next time someone in a sandwich board waving a bunch of pamphlets around tries to talk to you about Dr. Ron Paul, just remember that the guy is supporting a certifiable nutcase.
So what if retards support someone? The money they might donate goes towards furthering the message of freedom and not what they could spend it on.
On the Civil Rights issue:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul188.htmlyou are placing your allegiance in someone that is backed and accepts money from the scum of our country. are you a racist? a bigot? because that is who rp is affiliated with. if he gets into office (and hell freezes over) do you think he will hold clan meetings on the white house lawn? because the last time i checked, when someone gives money to a politician, they usually want something in return!
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