manix163, I'm glad that you have looked into Ron Paul. Please visit this forum to learn more about him: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ronpaulforums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=2">http://www.ronpaulforums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=2</a><!-- m -->
In addition, manix163, who would you support for president besides Ron Paul? (seeing that you truly detest him)
First off, he voted against net neutrality. I don't care what he tells you about how unsure he is about it, but he must of been pretty damn sure if he voted against it.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv30n2/v30n2-4.pdf">http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/reg ... 30n2-4.pdf</a><!-- m -->
"Despite the fact that the current net neutrality debate has drawn the attention of many academics and consultants, it is
hard to find a precise definition in the literature of what “net neutrality” means.
In layman’s terms, net neutrality is about the politics of envy: if a website cannot
afford certain bells and whistles, then its rivals should not be allowed to acquire such enhancements. In economic terms, net
neutrality represents the prohibition of any contracting for enhanced service or guaranteed quality of service (QoS) between
a broadband service provider and an Internet content provider. Such a prohibition would unwind existing contracts for
QoS between broadband service providers and content providers. The anticompetitive harms that would be allegedly
spared from such a prohibition pale in comparison to the efficiencies made possible by such contracting. Accordingly, net neutrality legislation should be rejected."
More reading:
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/18/kahn_net_neutrality_warning/">http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/18 ... y_warning/</a><!-- m -->
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200606/msg00014.html">http://www.interesting-people.org/archi ... 00014.html</a><!-- m -->
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://netcompetition.org/index.php/go/pro-net-competition-studies-and-reports/">http://netcompetition.org/index.php/go/ ... d-reports/</a><!-- m -->
Dr. Paul admits that he is not "tech-savvy." However, what he DOES know is the dangerous precedent that would be made if you started regulating the internet. Right NOW, the internet is free and neutral...BECAUSE there is no government interference. The big internet companies have no incentive to somehow form a conspiracy and start censoring or shutting down websites. Small time websites like Maddox, which you might've heard of, generate a lot of money for those companies. It is NOT in their corporate interest to abolish net neutrality!
As a big internet service provider....imagine the worst thing you can do to your business.....alienate your customers...who are the millions of website makers and website visitors. Now why in the world would the internet companies WANT to impose this big, scary censorship/discrimination against "mom and pop" websites? Is it because they are corporations and thus by default they are bad for the people?
Dr. Paul follows the traditional conservative view that the government that governs least, governs best. If you let the government to start regulating the internet....guess what happens.....lobbyists and special interest groups will be flying into Capital Hill to start getting lawmakers to vote/draft/etc. more and more bills to favor their own agenda.
Dr. Paul is for a free and competitive internet, not for a heavily regulated internet!
He opposes the separation between Church and State. To all you guys who like Ron Paul, you are basically saying hello to prayer in school.
Incorrect. Dr Paul does not want to BAN prayers in schools if your child wants to pray. Dr. Paul supports religious tolerance and freedom....thus he wants any student to be able to pray on their own if they wished to without being harrassed by the government.
Are you against religious freedom and tolerance? Do you not want anyone to pray in public schools?
Dr. Paul is a champion of the constitution: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://youtube.com/watch?v=FG2PUZoukfA">http://youtube.com/watch?v=FG2PUZoukfA</a><!-- m -->
"Paul sponsored a resolution for a School Prayer Amendment:
H.J.RES.52 (2001), H.J.RES.66 (1999), S.J.RES. 1, H.J.RES.12, H. J. RES. 108, & H. J. RES. 55:
Nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to prohibit individual or group prayer in public schools or other public institutions. No person shall be required by the United States or by any State to participate in prayer . Neither the United States nor any State shall compose the words of any prayer to be said in public schools.
H. J. RES. 78 (1997):
To secure the people's right to acknowledge God according to the dictates of conscience: Neither the United States nor any State shall establish any official religion, but the people's right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs, heritage, or traditions on public property, including schools, shall not be infringed. Neither the United States nor any State shall require any person to join in prayer or other religious activity, prescribe school prayers, discriminate against religion, or deny equal access to a benefit on account of religion."
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ontheissues.org/2008/Ron_Paul_Education.htm">http://www.ontheissues.org/2008/Ron_Paul_Education.htm</a><!-- m -->
He also wants to eliminate all public schools including Public Colleges by making them into private schools. That means, you gotta pay for your education in elementary school.
Cite your source. Where does Dr. Paul say that he is advocating for eliminating public schools?
He is an advocate for smaller government and more efficient and responsible spending. He is an advocate for more tax utility at the state and local level. He has said that he wants to abolish the Department of Education. While this will probably not come to fruition, this will allow tax money to be funneled towards State governments and the local people can choose how they want to spend that money.
MR. Paul is also against giving students in colleges loans from the gov. Goddam. We know a lot of people don't go to college because of the money, but when grades K-12 require money to get in...good bye high literacy rate.
Cite your source.
Also, Dr, Paul is an advocate for individual liberty and prosperity. He does NOT want to hand out blank checks and establish a welfare nation. He wants to eliminate the income tax and let you keep the money you earn.
I am currently attending an expensive college and I have received very LITTLE federal funding (single parent home, below average household income). I obtain my loans from private companies and I do just fine.
I have NEVER heard of a student who was able to pay college with breeze just on federal money. Student loan companies does not require you to pay while you are in college.
And what of the environment? With all that global warming stuff going on? Well, Ron Paul has a great INDIRECT answer to that which could be found in his idea on where we get our oil. He wants to go to Antarctica and drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Very environmental conscious, this man is.
Cite your source. Where does Dr. Paul say that he wants to drill Alaska for oil?
What else can i dig up on Ron Paul you may ask? Well, the guy made some racist comments in a magazine about how black people are: ""If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be." He also said, "I think we can safely assume that 95% of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal." What else? He said that the Civil Rights Act reduced "individual liberties" and says it was a mistake. I read somewhere that the segregationalists and the deep south slaveholders in the old days said the same thing in the Senate against the amendments...
Cite your source.
I can talk about some of his other ideas I don't agree with, like anti-abortion and pro-gay, but I can understand why people would agree with him. What I can't understand is why he wants to GET RID OF the minimum wage. Why would someone want to do that? What else?
Cite your source.
Also, he wants the State government to decide on abortion issues. He is not "pro-gay." He opposed a government bill that would define marriage as specifically between a man and a woman.
Dr. Paul is an advocate for personal liberty and freedom. He does not care whether or not you are gay or if you like abortions. He does not want the federal government meddling in your life.
His isolationist views wouldn't really help us. I can imagine another 9/11 and we just sit there pretending it never happened. Everyone knows about Darfur. The genocide that is happening there. Well, Ron Paul voted against a bill that would stop America from trading with the murderers there.
So you want to attack Iran and Saudi Arabia and all the other countries which may harbor radical Islamic terrorists?
He is a non-interventionist.
Who is pretending that it never happened? Dr. Paul wants to trade, travel, and hold diplomacy with nations....NOT form entangling alliances.
I don't really support the idea of illegal immigration, but I am not an extremist on it. Ron Paul calls illegals, even the ones who have been living here for decades, aliens. What else about this? He wants their U.S. born children to not have education and for their whole families to be taken out of the country. Funny how he called the legal immigrants Natives, because the last time i checked, nobody except the Native Americans were the natives. That man is a immigrant too! And I bet you anything, that his great great great great great great grandfather came here illegally, since at that time, most of the people coming to America just came. Wouldn't that mean that he should be expelled from the country? (I sure hope so)
Do you know what alien means? It simply means foreigner....whether they are illegal or not.
And speaking of illegal immigrants....you do realize that they are....well....illegal????
Now, the part that he never said, but is implied. Ron Paul is libertarian. Libertarians don't want government to interfere with ANYTHING. They will take the age limit off alcohol, guns, and weed. What will this bring? Freshmens coming to school high and drunk? More Columbine incidents? Is this man okay in the head? And libertarians support NAMBLA. The organization of man-boy lovers. To all you people against gay marriages, this will serve to you as a shock. It's old men having sex with little kids. If Ron Paul is even nominated, what kind of message are we giving the world?
Do you know why alcohol and weed are such a huge problem here in America? Because they are seen as a taboo.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/LegalDrinkingAge.html">http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/LegalDrinkingAge.html</a><!-- m -->
Go look at the rest of the world, where they have lax alcohol and weed laws. The people grow up with alcohol and weed...and guess what? It's no big deal. They don't want to get drunk just to get drunk or get high just to get high. It's a part of their normal culture...they have no need to abuse it.
Oh and by the way, if you think getting tougher on alcohol and weed is the solution....look at prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s. It created a black market, and crime and murders went up by a ton. Also, I'm guessing you are for banning tobacco too?
Also, regarding NAMBLA....Ron Paul is running as a Republican and he has served in congress for decades as a Republican, not a Libertarian.
So let me get this straight......
You want the government to regulate the internet, but you don't want religious freedom in schools.
You want to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to invade Iran/etc., but you also want to the government to subsidize college education AND illegal immigrants AND keep up the costly drug war.
It sounds like you are true socialist. You want the government to take care of everything for ya, no?
Ron Paul's position is the opposite of the socialism; if you agree with socialism, then you are diametrically opposed to Ron Paul's view of small government. You see, in socialism, the government pays for things like school, health care, abortions, contraceptives, environmental research grants, college eduations, housing, etc... using tax payer money. Everybody chips in. Its called socialism. "The government has nothing to give except what it takes from others."
Also, as soon as you get the Government involved with everything, you have to take the church out of it, which is an attack on the religious fundamentals of the nation. Just imagine as soon as they're involved with health care, church run hospitals will vanish off the face of the planet. Thats just absurd.
The answer, in the ideology of the free republic, is to get the government out of our schools, out of our hospitals, out of our churches (thats the reason for separation of church and state), and out of our lives as much as possible. Then instead of paying tax money to send your children to a non-religious, liberal government policy controlled school, you can use that money to send your children to a religious private school, or home school, if you wish. Its about choice, and responsibility.
If you think the government has to provide everything for you, then truely you are a socialist.
Another rebuttal:
Quote:
First off, he voted against net neutrality.
He voted against giving government any say in the matter. Giving government monopoly power to regulate the net so it can be made "neutral" also gives it the power to regulate the net for whatever purposes. It's a choice between monopoly control that you think you have a say in (government) and market control that you at least have economic say in (private sector).
Quote:
He opposes the separation between Church and State.
He's against the politically correct war on religion that wouldn't let kids say prayers in school, but he wouldn't make them say prayers. It's about choice and the real intent of the 1st Amendment: to keep government from establishing a state religion. Really, Dr. Paul probably has the best civil libertarian track record in Congress in a long time.
Quote:
He also wants to eliminate all public schools including Public Colleges by making them into private schools.
He's for getting rid of federal involvement in the issue and letting states and communities decide for themselves. As far as I know, he's also sympathetic to home schooling and school choice, and I'm sure he would never support anything short of a transition away from public schooling, considering how many people have paid for it with their tax dollars.
Quote:
He wants to go to Antarctica and drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
You mean Alaska. And yes, he he's not opposed to that, because the evidence hasn't been "slam dunk" for it being environmentally problematic. Also, he probably prefers returning the land to Alaskan control anyway and letting them decide what to do with it. Same reason he opposes dumping nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain.
Quote:
Well, the guy made some racist comments in a magazine about how black people are:
Long since discredited. Nothing in his career or comments he has ever made anywhere could give you the same impression that article did, especially considering his crusade against all forms of collectivism, including racism. Someone else wrote that in a newsletter he lent his name to years earlier. Trust me, politicians never write such periodical publications on their own.
Quote:
He said that the Civil Rights Act reduced "individual liberties" and says it was a mistake.
He's against the affirmative action components that tells private citizens who they must or must not associate with. His positions all come from a consistent philosophy of libertarianism, classical liberalism, or traditional conservatism (take your pick, the terms themselves don't mean anything). He's not concerned with what it appears like on the surface.
Quote:
What I can't understand is why he wants to GET RID OF the minimum wage.
If there is to be a minimum wage, it should be at the state level (almost all states have one) so people can match that wage to their local economies as well as "shop around" the various states for those with policies they like. That's the grand democratic experiment, after all.
And economists, even those on the left, generally agree that the minimum wage isn't very effect for a number of reasons, including the fact that most of those affected are already dependents and that it prices many working poor out of the market since employers can't or won't employ as many people with higher labor costs.
He's also more concerned about government spending money it doesn't have, which drives up inflation rapidly and hurts the working class and poor the most.
Quote:
I can imagine another 9/11 and we just sit there pretending it never happened.
9/11 did not happen because we were isolationist. It happened because we had been playing war games in the Middle East for years, from supporting al-Qaeda and bin Laden when it fought the Soviet Union to buddying up with and putting bases in the Muslim holy land of Saudi Arabia, which coincidentally infuriated an exiled Saudi prince by the name of Osama bin Laden. Even now, we overlook that he's probably hiding in Afghanistan (which is backsliding to Taliban rule) or Pakistan (which is armed with nukes and is a populous military dictatorship yet we subsidize and are friends with), and instead are preoccupied with the occupation of what was a stable secular country with less terrorists and terrorist ties than many of our regional allies but is now crawling with terrorists and is destabilizing the entire region.
Quote:
Ron Paul voted against a bill that would stop America from trading with the murderers there.
He doesn't believe we should tell the American people who they can or cannot trade with. If the crisis is worrisome enough, people can boycott, although I doubt depriving them of economic activity will help the situation much. Poverty drives people to desperation.
Quote:
Ron Paul calls illegals, even the ones who have been living here for decades, aliens.
They are. It's a technical term meaning "one who comes from a foreign land."
Quote:
He wants their U.S. born children to not have education and for their whole families to be taken out of the country.
I don't know if he favors deportation on the spot, but he's a big believer in following and enforcing the law (which is why he's such a critic of the Bush administration's abuse of executive power and Congress allowing the president to go off on undeclared wars). I think denying automatic birthright citizenship is a perfectly mainstream (not that that matters) and reasonable position. He's for a welcoming immigration policy, but also for tight border security to make sure only law-abiding people who aren't going to drain the system get in (weren't you just complaining about his post-9/11 foreign policy?).
Quote:
Funny how he called the legal immigrants Natives, because the last time i checked, nobody except the Native Americans were the natives.
Even they're immigrants (from Asia). Really, anyone from here is a native.
Quote:
at that time, most of the people coming to America just came.
And now we have something of a welfare state and there are people out there (as even you admit) who seek to do us great harm. Different times call for different border policies. It's well within the rights of a sovereign republic to make decisions on who can enter their homeland (which it is, whatever demographics existed or injustices occurred in the past).
Quote:
They will take the age limit off alcohol, guns, and weed.
Where did you get this? Paul wants the issue to be decided at state or local levels, and he probably would still personally favor limits on how any of those could be used, as even many libertarians probably would (laws against children drinking, or drinking and driving, for example). Anarchy and limited government are very different things.
And the war on drugs has not only helped the erosion of our civil liberties, not only are its roots in racist or xenophobic policies, but it has had the same counterintuitive effects, especially on violent crime, that alcohol prohibition had.
Quote:
And libertarians support NAMBLA.
First, support that claim (since most libertarians that I know of don't think children have the same rights of free association and ability to sell their bodies that adults have). Second, justify its place in an anti-Paul argument, since I KNOW Paul doesn't "support" them or their "right" to practice what they preach.