http://www.salon.com/...d_the_ron_paul_fallacies/

good RP article. one of the best ive seen yet explaining why his candidacy is the most relevant of them all, regardless if hes wins or loses.

i'm probably supposed to click on the link before i make an informed opinion about it, eh?

'What Ron Paul adds to US political debate'

What is laughter, Alex?

Ru Paul 2012!!!!

wonder how they got their last names anyway... The Rock, eh?
part of the rock....
hmmm, Mutual of Omaha? no, well, maybe...
ugh, i'm getting senile.

Did anyone else think "verbal diarrhea" upon reading the title of this thread?

It is almost verbatim of the article title. What don't like about it?

Ron Paul is just a racist old crank.

He's not a libertarian, he's just an outspoken dude who acts the same as everyone else. He is in fact the HEAD of the domestic monetary policy and technology committee.. but he hasn't actually done anything [as measured by passing or tabling a bill] substantive ever.

In the hearings after the 08 meltdown, he had a chance to destroy Bernanke, but pulled his punches 100% of the time. For example: He could have demanded Bernanke name the specific MBS that he was accepting at par, he could have demanded the text of the "closed-door" session in which Paulson asserted there'd be "tanks on the streets" if Congress didn't pass the bridge loan that we call the bailout, he could have demanded the specifics of the analysis that continues to assert that the big problem facing the US is "inflation" even though inflation continues to be under 2% as measured by the Fed's own numbers.. etc.

But, hey, he did co-sponsor a bill [with Barney Frank] to legalize marijuana. So he's got that going for him.

Unsympathetic: I agree with you on many points. The article is not actually pro-Ron Paul as much as it points out the debate points he brings to the table. It does not extensively talk about his short-comings as a legislator but it does make many observations about his racist tendencies and history.

Just shows that he's not stupid enough to jeopardize the financial system by trying to undermine the Fed during a time of crisis.

I think the article is good. Too many candidates in the US are on the wrong side of issues that quite a few people would like them to be on the other side of. Even if Ron Paul is crazy and unelectable, hopefully the next democratic candidate will start to realize that some of these views are actually ok and they should be carried out in practice. Instead of just having the "lesser evil" get elected every time.

I agree with it, definitely, and I don't support about half of what he stands for; that said, I do agree with a good chunk of it; it's interesting, being somewhat left of the debates there (being from canada) it pretty much sounds all bad from the republican side other than ron paul... and that's because he actually seems like a reasonable guy who presents actual policies that he has thought about for a long time

now mitt romney with his gov'nor of massachusetts viewpoints.... that would be possibly somewhat more reasonable


I particularly like his viewpoint on trying to restore freedoms lost under the patriot act; that seems like the opposite of typical republican thinking, but is a good start; and it's unfortunate obama hasn't done anything about that =/

Obama did do something about it -- he expanded it

What strikes me as a bit odd about Ron Paul is his opposition to abortion vs his anti drug prohibition stance.

In my mind, at least, there are many common threads between being pro-choice and pro drug legalization. In any case, that's just my opinion.

Paul justifies his pro-life position by arguing that there is no greater assault on liberty than the denial of life. The most defenseless among us are those that most need the government to protect their liberties.

If abortion is murder, than miscarriages are manslaughter; throw (1/4 ?) of women in jail!

@klown: I've heard his justification. However to me it's seems somewhat bizarre.
A pro-choice argument can run almost in parallel to a pro-legalization argument in a way.. That and the rich will always have access to abortions regardless of the law. (Chriton makes an argument about this in "A Case of Need").

yah, only the rich can get abortions because poor people can't afford da clothes hangers.

Imagine shoving a clothes hanger up your fluff Dibs. Your comments are crude at best and consistently ignorant. You act entitled but don't even read the articles you are commenting on. Truly, that is acting in ignorance. Yet you do possess the skills to do otherwise. I suspect that your attitude is preventing you from reflecting on your own foolishness.

Quoted for stupidity...

I don't see it. His position is pro-liberty both ways. It comes down to whether or not you recognize a fetus as a person. If you recognize it as a person you have to ask yourself which right holds more value - since abortion is a zero-sum game - the right of all people to live or the right of a woman to get an abortion.

IMO if you accept a fetus as a person you must be pro-life if you are pro-liberty because the right of all people to live is a more valuable right than that of the right of a woman to get an abortion. Accepting a fetus as a person is a philosophical position entirely independent of your position on drug legalization.

If you believe a fetus is not a person, pro-choice and liberty can, I suppose, be reconciled.

?

Klown: Martian was talking about legalization and not liberty. You misread what he said completely.

Also, there is a HUGE negative factor on society when women are forced to bear unwanted children. Those mother's are likely to have a lower education, earn less money, and be more dependent on government programs. Their children are also likely to have a lower education and are more prone to criminal behavior as they grow up in a non-nuclear family.

if america still kills criminals, why would they have trouble with preventing the existence of the demographic most likely to become criminal...

america is so full of contradictions it's nuts ;)

Good fiscal policy.

Bad monetary policy.

lol. try dealing with reality some time instead of just words on a page. it doesn't require literacy.

The articles are about reality? Participating in a Democracy does require literacy? Stop projecting?

fantasies of the educated minds.

the best way to get me to quit posting would be to quit responding to my posts.

In no way is this a contradiction. You are saying someone who supports the death penalty should support (say) killing all members of any demographic more likely than average to commit crimes or they are a hypocrite. Qzjul, your logic is quite "interesting" I will say in many posts and discussions. This relates to both real-world politics and EE matters.

As for the Dibs/aponic debate: (To aponic)If abortion were not legal, then what method would rich people have access to, that the poor would not. I'd always assumed in such a case most illegal abortions woudl be of the clothes hanger variety in which case Dibs post seems to be the quite obvious reply?

ron paul's 2012 campaign has so little to do with abortion though. personally, i am a huge paul fan, maybe even a paulbot at times, yet I still disagree with a number of his positions, like abortion.

the point is the US(western) economy is at stake. its not fear-mongering anymore. we've got a 15 T debt racked up, likely to be 17-18 T in a year if left unchecked as is. given four years time with another spend-first, Keynesian, war-hawk, we're going to be in a hole we cant get out of without utter economic collapse. think about the global implications, this is even if europe cant get things ACTUALLY figured out in this same timeframe. we need a man who isnt bought out, to actually come in and cut the spending/end the wars and theres only one person who i have any trust in to do that.

don't even get me started about the media and their top down blackout orders on him. thats all i even need for a reason to like this guy.

They're called plane tickets and passports.

What are you talking about? He said that a pro-life and pro drug legalization position is inconsistent. I explained that it isn't. No idea what you are talking about "legalization and not liberty".

Close Hanger scare really, like there isn't a pill made. And we have proven how good we are at stopping illegal Drugs. And yes airplane ride what it will add a couple hundred to the cost. Guess they'll be some city in the world that will have Abortion Tourism business booming.

And Abortion is about the most mute political point as to change the current status quo drastictically would require a Constitutional change which with the populous split near perfect 50-50 (and even less against total Ban) on the issue that willn't happen. That goes with most other "MAJOR" Social issues the Left and Right both use as Scare away the Boggy man tactic to get your vote. which is why we vote those that can't do a thing that is important and needs done, Because we voted for people who only understand issues that they willn't be able to do.

So how about we actually worry about issues that are important and can get done like Stop useing the chain-saw on our jugular, and start worrying about actually Cutting spending, and having some organized taxation that pays the bills. Maybe spend wisely on all programs.

Why though is it anytime we have a somewhat independent, willing to change the status quo he never is someone that can come across as whiney, tripping on his tongue, and always has to take all the positions to a dramatic extreme.

Notice how in attacking Ron Paul on moving more isolationist the answer is lets start more wars. For real we're barely out of Iraq still in Afganistan, and the Smart answer is lets attack Iran, I guess its cost effective as we still have a large build up in the area. Why is it Iran has a Gov't we can't get along with...... Oh yes thats right they had a Democracy and we over threw it to install a Dictator, Because it was in British Petroleum's interest. And now we can get along with the extreme religious ideology there, but we can be good friend with the just as extreme ( if not far more extreme) in Saudi. we racing to be buddies with the Brotherhood in Egypt, while their basic spin-off in palestine Hamas we will still condemn.
Apperently the area is changing and our lets stay blind and think spending 1/2 the entire worlds spending on defense isn't really getting our way to Keep the status quo. Especially when in most of those place the STATUS QUO is against every ideal we claim to believe in.

The best part of Ron Paul is he will stay running probably all the way till the Convention, and living in Indiana where the primary is so late it never matters anyway.... I'll probably vote for him.

Oceana: It wouldn't take a Constitutional change, just a change in the Supreme Court. Roe v Wade was based on a so-called right to privacy which the Court drew from the 9th amendment. The 9th amendment, if you read the text, is clearly up for interpretation. A different Court could certainly find that a right to privacy is not consistent with the 9th amendment, or that abortion is not consistent with a right to privacy.

Yes, The court created NATIONAL LAW. Abortion wasn't illegal in the US before that ruling it was up to the States. And if the court was handed a case that they agreed to listen and decide on again, then abortion would be back to all the states to decide what THERE people wanted to do, and we would have but a rare few states that could actually fully ban ( I would say I doubt any ruling from The Supreme court would even come close to giving States the power to Completely Ban abortions anyway.) but this isn't the 50's early 60's. if a state blocked abortion it would be a tourism business in the towns surrounding that state.

BobbyATA: my logic is simply that if you're willing to kill humans for crimes, why wouldn't you be willing to eliminate a cluster of cells that has the potential to develop into a human... especially if they are of the demographic most likely to develop into the criminal that you'd later kill anyway

because if i rape and kill a six year old girl, i deserve to die.

being born into the cluster of cells that has the potential to develop into a human that may or may not do good or bad is not doing anything to warrant punishment.

if you're willing to murder the cluster of cells to possibly prevent bad things from happening then you'd support the killing of yourself in case you one day decide to do something bad?

i 'murder' clusters of cells every time i go the toilet; we 'murder' hundreds of thousands of actual living animals so we can eat them; i lose more cells off my body when I shower than we're talking about for an abortion.

Just because something has the potential to grow into something doesn't mean they actually are that. Technically we could use the cells lost when showering, copy out their DNA, put them in an egg, and grow them into a human (clone); so there is always the potential. It makes no sense from any scientific POV.

BobbyATA: Changing the law (making abortion illegal) does not change public opinion. Some doctors would still conduct abortions in accordance with their belief system but as all things illegal, the price would drastically increase. Some doctors would do it for a reasonable sum, which would now include a house call, increased time demand on the doctor, etc. Others would want incredible amounts of money. In the end, the rich would be able to afford clean, safe, abortions while the poor would be forced to often revert to old self-performed methods. This could be as crude as a clothes hanger or as dangerous as eating poisonous substances.

I thought this was obvious and so I did not post it previously.

aponic I seriously doubt that would happen. Sure lots of people sell drugs b/c anybody can do it and it makes good money, but abortion is way different. This is because someone with the skills to perform an abortion would have skills to make money in many other legal ways. They'd have to be a huge fan of risky living and/or abortion to continue performing abortions...

The point about a plane ticket and a passport by Mr Snow is much more of a point. I'm curious how other nations deal with this issue. Do they not even try to police it? The nations in the EU have different abortion laws so I'm curious how it works there, but too lazy to go google it:P.

well, does the US police laser eye surgery, or removing a tumor? abortion is treated much the same. No need to police it.

love how quickly this thread degenerated to being about a complete non-issue

It's cause it's what the US public likes to talk about =/

so true, i tried to marginalize the abortion issue. because if were talking ron paul, that should be an after thought to the economy.

A Canadian brought it up

BobbyATA: Do some research about places where abortion is illegal. My point is 100% valid and history backs me up.

Agreed.

There are a lot of dead end debates. Religion, Abortion, Political stance, Canadian beer being good given the fact that they sleep with meese.

There are just things that can't be figured out.

So suck it up you heathen baby killing, left wing, northern drunk.

now pointless finger pointing

bonus