Hmm don’t know why the link didnt go through, I’ll try html.

If you copy+paste it, it works

Paul 37 Obama 41

The you are citing a Democratic polling firm to prove that Ron Paul is not a Republican…

In any event, Bachmann hardly has a “lock” on tea party support. If you discount a 1-month old Quinnipiac poll (which I assume you’d be open to doing as apparently you are discounting an old poll from June which had Paul beating Perry in Texas), Paul would be at about 9% nationally with Bachmann in the high 12′s. Hardly a blowout.

And in a Florida primary poll released today, Paul is tied for 3rd place with Palin, only 4 points behind Perry, and is actually beating Bachmann who only gets 6 percent of the vote to Ron Paul’s 9! Florida is an important state.

I can understand if you like Perry, but he is undoubtedly a more “Status quo” candidate, atleast relative to Ron Paul. Some people think a moderate is a better choice in a general election, but polling has shown that Ron Paul does only worse than Romney (who I definitely admit is a moderate), but better than Perry, Huntsman, Pawlenty, etc. in the general election matchup with Obama.

Also, you said Perry isn’t an establishment candidate, but then went on to say he was backed by almost the entirety of Texans in Washington. Doesn’t add up!

What is it about Ron Paul’s voting record that should change my mind about supporting him?

4th if you include Perry. I highly doubt Palin and Giuliani will be running, but if they do, Paul is still at 9 percent which puts him closer to the first tier than the second tier (Pawlenty, Huntsman, Santorum, Gingrich) which all poll around 4 percent or lower.

I can understand why people would be upset because some Ron Paul supporters were rude last cycle. But if you go to Paul supporters’ websites, you see that the vast majority consist of kind and thoughtful discussion. Certainly nothing justifies calling every supporter a ‘Ronulan that should be banned on sight”

Look at what you just typed 1 post up.

He’s a non-interventionalist. By the way, Reagan never went to war.

Now, Reagan did engage in what could be called acts of war but never all-out war with a country like Bush did.

Paul would not have gone to war in Iraq, a war which has cost thousands of American lives, a trillion dollars, and was primarily fought against Saddam Hussein when we could have focused on Afghanistan!

Exactly how is it in America’s best interest to lose the lives of our men and women in the military as well as trillion dollars of American wealth, just so we can build infrastructure for Iraqis for 10 years?

The Republican party needs to be the Republican party again, and stop mimicing the foreign policy of Lyndon Johnson.

When I say “principles” I am in no way hinting that Ron Paul shares principles with the Green Party’s candidate…I’m saying this was just to highlight the problems with the two candidates (McCain and Obama) and in no way hurt McCain in the general election..

And I realize the “not” is more likely,

I was a McCain supporter in 2008. Since then, my views have changed. But back then I was offended by the term “neocon” and was annoyed when I saw Hannity being heckled by Ron Paul fans.

But what I hope you realize is, this behavior is not representative of most Ron Paul supporters. Yes, there are a few that will wear masks and yell. But most of us are just trying to build support for Ron Paul because we are excited about his candidacy, and we know that kind of behavior doesn’t help. I maintain that if you went to a Paul website to have a discussion, people would try for the most part to persuade you rather than criticize you for being a “neocon”. I myself don’t even use that term.

I actually thought you had some modicum of sense in you until you just wished a terrorist attack on me.

Your claims of how Paul supporters feel about military service men and women are baseless, disgraceful, and completely untrue.

You tell me why Ron Paul is the only candidate running who has served in the military.

You tell me why Ron Paul received more than twice the donations from military service men and women then all other Republican candidates combined.

You can’t support the troops by sending them into harms way for the sake of building a foreign country who was NOT a threat in any way to America. That is acting against the troops, who swore to protect America and its Constitution, not Iraq.

What a despicable post you just made, claiming that Ron Paul supporters, more of which are active military men and women than supporters for any other candidate in the Republican field combined, would spit on returning military men.

You just made a disgusting attack on many people who are actively serving in the military, and you should be ashamed of yourself.

These two characteristics seem to be mutually exclusive.

endorsing the 2008 3rd-party field. Reagan himself could have endorsed the 3rd-party field and would have been ineffective. That doesn’t contradict the fact that Ron is right on the issues, and is polling 3rd nationally out of announced candidates (which seems pretty effective to me)

…considering the Ron Paul supporters in this topic have been the most civil ones in the discussion. Meanwhile, I have

1. Had someone wish a terrorist attack on me
2. Been called “effing stupid”; a “Ronulan”
3. Been called a monkey escaped from a zoo with a laptop
4. Had someone suggest I would treat returning troops as the Vietnam vets were treated
5. I think someone suggested that I have a bedtime.

Slightly immature if you ask me.

Additionally, I think the recent debt debate has shown that Washington D.C. “consensus” is just part of the problem.

I would rather have more congressmen who have never voted for a tax increase or debt limit increase…

is that he thinks his dog has a better chance of being President than Paul and that I’m “effing stupid” (without giving any evidence, of course). He doesn’t seem like a very effectual advocate for his positions.

You are equating “ignoring” a question with not paying close enough attention to every position in this thread where I have posted to catch every post targeted at me within the last 10 minutes.

And again with the name-calling. What is this, gradeschool?

Acat was saying I, myself had considered Paul an ineffectual candidate when in reality I had only mentioned one thing that Paul wasn’t “effectual” on.

(I highly doubt Paul was expecting a third party to make any kind of dent in the 2008 race, his “endorsement” seemed like a protest of the two-party system to me)

These posts aren’t about all the positives and negatives about Paul but rather if I had contradicted myself in my support for him, which clearly I had not.

In fact, the only “point” of mine that you’ve “refuted” was the use of the word “release” instead of “escape”. How kind of my captors at the zoo.

I also find it telling that rather than contribute to the discussion on RP, you just throw in dismissive lines like “no one takes you seriously”. Quite an effective counterpoint, I’m so disappointed in myself for not seeing that one coming as I was forming my arguments!

By the way, I can see atleast two new posters since I last checked this thread yesterday supporting RP and concepts such as the gold standard.

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

Cain and Bachmann would also be disqualified from running.

And to say Ron Paul hasn’t done anything to decrease the size of government is laughable. He’s done everything in his power as a Congressman. House members don’t actually control what goes on with a bill in the Senate or at the President’s desk.

In fact, most congressmen in Paul’s own party have increased the size of government consistently over the last 12 years. So yea, I’d say he’s better than the alternatives.

He’s voted (which is what Congressmen do, they vote, apparently you are looking for someone who has wielded the power of a dictator at some point, but I don’t think Kim Jong Il is in the race yet) against every debt ceiling increase and every tax increase.

Voting against debt ceiling increases would force the executive branch to spend only the revenues that come in rather than borrowing more money.

Additionally, as I have already pointed out to you, he’s gotten an audit of the Federal Reserve through the house, which hadn’t been done before and was pretty significant.

Now, if you are looking for someone who can vote for legislation, then vote for it again in a different legislative body, then singlehandedly get said bill through conference and sign it as president, you are probably looking for someone with the power of a dictator.

Has nothing to do with spending money. This is one of the first things you learn if you ever study Congress. Your “fiscal restraint” argument isn’t even relevant here, and if anything this is an area that demonstrates Paul’s fiscal restraint.

Paul in fact votes against authorization (spending) bills. If he was not to appropriate the money going to his district, it would not be “saved”. It would be spent by the Executive branch. So what if Obama has only been in office 2 1/2 years? Are you saying you would rather have money (which has already been spent) at the command of Bush or Clinton than your Congressman?

Even if I was to suspend my disbelief and imagine that the money would be appropriated in good faith by the Executive Departments, I doubt they know enough about any specific district to appropriate the money wisely.

Not Ron Paul. In fact, you’ve gone from advocating for “effective legislators” in your last post to governors. If you prefer a governor over a congressman, that’s one thing. But to focus the “Congressman” attack only on Ron Paul when we have 3 or 4 congressmen (and women) in the race just shows me you are displaying blind hatred toward the man for no reason.

And sadly, just when I thought you were going to hold to a respectful conversation, you revert to gradeschool name-calling. How sad.

The Constitution delegates the power of the purse to House. This power has only been partially delegated by Congress to the Executive branch by requiring the President to “submit a budget” every year, which the Congress then reviews, rather than drafting it itself. If there is no “pork” in the house, there is “pork” in the Executive branch.

Paul is as against “pork” as you can be. Apparently you are not against pork, you just prefer it to be allocated by the department of education or the EPA rather than your Congressmen. Doesn’t seem very principled for me. I’d rather shill for Paul than Obama.

The fact is, the Congressmen who choose to give the EPA and department of education “pork” instead of appropriating money themselves are going against the spirit of the Constitution, and are actually doing a great disservice to their constituents, who pay federal taxes.

You better believe I hope my Congressman appropriates, even tho I prefer he doesn’t spend to begin with (I understand this concept can be hard to understand, but it’s better to try than to laugh).

How is it remotely possible that you draw that conclusion from the premises?

Are you trying to misrepresent me or just being intellectually lazy?

Dr. Paul, and I, are against authorizations. That means we are against spending. If you are against Constitutional appropriations by members of congress, you are supporting appropriations by executive departments like the EPA, and big government.

I’d watch what you try to argue.

Federal taxpayers paying for shrimp marketing in SE Texas.

I don’t know how I would appropriate the money in Paul’s district, I know nothing about it.

I would actually prefer to appropriate NO money, because I would be voting against the spending bill to begin with. However, who you must understand is, if the authorization bill passes, and as a congressman you don’t appropriate, you are just letting the money be appropriated by Executive departments.

The pork shifts from the congressional districts to the EPA. If you continue to fight against the Constitutional responsibility of Congressmen to appropriate money that has already (!) been spent, you are inadvertently increasing the budgets of big executive departments like the EPA, not fighting big government.

The fight against big government happens at the authorization level, not (for the most part, because money can be appropriated stupidly) by shifting money from the districts to the agencies and departments.

Goodnight, by the way.

When RP votes against authorization bills, he is voting against spending the money that would go to his own Congressional District as well as all other districts.

What about that don’t you understand?

If Ron Paul didn’t appropriate money that is already spent, the “pork” would just shift to executive agencies and departments such as the EPA, etc. That right there is true big government. The spirit of the Constitution is for House members to appropriate money that is already spent, not for all moneys to be shifted to the executive branch. That’s big government.

If you want to fight pork, the ONLY way to do so is at the authorization level. Which Paul does, every time.

Of the Constitution is where it talks about Appropriation of Money. It does not give that power to the Executive branch, nor was that the spirit of the constitution. The Executive branch is only given the power of appropriations when delegated by Congress.

For a Congressman to refuse his Constitutional duty to appropriate money which has already been spent is to delegate said money to executive departments such as the EPA. That is pork. That is big government.

Ron Paul always opposes pork in authorization.

You can’t oppose pork in appropriation. It can’t be done. If you refuse to appropriate to your congressional district, the same money goes straight to the EPA and other places to be appropriated there. After authorizations, pork is pork.

Really not a hard concept to grasp