He only got four letters, (P-a-u-l), but my favorite candidate for president was mentioned in this article in the Economist (NO subscription required for this article) about the effect of the Internet on presidential campaigns.
The name appears in the chart showing prominence on the Internet on YouTube and MySpace. Most of the candidates are represented only on one or the other, and my man appears in the section for MySpace, where he is the leading Republican candidate, no less! His numbers on MySpace are below those of three Republican candidates who don’t need to be named over on YouTube, but he’s there.
I expect a lot of people will wonder who “Paul” is, and what his last name is. His last name, of course, is freedom.
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I have to be quite honest. I hate “The Economist”. Typical Holier-Than-Thou journalists… it’s almost as crappy as that Businessweek, but at least Businessweek gives itself away for free.
“I hate “The Economist”. Typical Holier-Than-Thou journalists…”-quote
…but the people who read it are the movers and shakers of this world (the CEO’s, ibankers, etc). I guess the magazine’s tone reflects the character of those who read it.
A quick search of youtube…
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Ron+Paul
…shows that videos focused on Ron Paul have had well over 200,000 views, showing that the Economist did their research poorly.
Ron Paul has also been featured dominantly on http://www.digg.com , a news website with more traffic than the New York Times.
Ron Paul. I love that phony speech by Davy Crockett he has on his website, Not Yours To Give.
http://www.house.gov/paul/nytg.htm
Such a famous speech that Crockett was so fond of he had hundreds of copies printed up, yet it isn’t from the only book Crockett helped co-author (he was illiterate and could not read or write until much later in life, and then only marginally). Nor is it in the National Register of Debates from the period at the Congressional Record:
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwrd.html
It’s only in a dime novel written by a man born long after Crockett died, Edward Sylvester Ellis.
http://www.niulib.niu.edu/badndp/ellis_edward.html
My favorite book by Ellis?
http://www.bigredhair.com/steamman/index.html
That’s just what we need. Another politician from Texas dumber than George Bush. What is it about American Libertarians? Dumber than mud.
You make us all look bad. Stop it.
He only got four letters, (P-a-u-l)
Actually, he got a full sentence, albeit not a very flattering one: “Their most popular candidate, by this measure, was Ron Paul, an obscure outsider from somewhere in Texas.”
Gee, way to pack in subtly disparaging epithets (“obscure”, “outsider”, and best (or worst of all), “from somewhere in Texas”).
I had no idea that this speech is a fake! I’ve heard about it for years.
Well, I would like to see a bit more proof. I did a quick search of the records and I find a speech in which he argues against a Treasury note issue–good rhetoric here–but for a national bank. I didn’t see the speech in question, but there are far too many records to go through in a matter of minutes. In any case, it doesn’t strike me as obviously fake. He could have given some version of that speech. Can someone please investigate this further? If this speech is a phony, the world needs to know. If it is real, we need to print the whole thing and not some fictionalized version of it.
“Stop it” while you may be correct that the speech posted on Rep. Paul’s website is a farce, I don’t think it demonstrates a lack of intelligence on his part.
Politicians and political activists (of all stripes) often misquote or misattribute comments and speeches to historical figures. However, when somebody we support does this, it’s an embarrassing but forgivable mistake, but when somebody we oppose does so, it’s clearly an example of his obtuseness.
Liberals, conservatives, and libertarians all make mistakes. How about we discuss actual issues instead of calling each other names?
Can we get 100 to give 100?
Let’s send a message to Washington and the media that this man and his message will not be ignored!
Sign up to the Ron Paul pledge at http://www.pledgebank.com/SupportRonPaul
Thanks for your help!
Jon Isaac
Just as it is said that the American system of government is awful, except for all the others, could it be that Ron Paul as a presidential candidate is awful, except for all the others?
AWC
We so often hear the famous Churchill dictum on democracy:
“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”
But can we really put much stock in it when a politician tells us that we have the best form of government? Is he going to tell us that our system stinks but get over it?
This mentality is probably the greatest barrier to anyone trying to bring about significant change. After all, if lots of people believe that we have the best system available, should we really mess with it, beyond maybe some tinkering around the edges?
The argument that “Not Yours to Give” is a fake is not made here (though, I for one, have an open mind). I know for a fact that a great portion of the early Congressional Record is not easily accessible. While working for Dr. Paul, I helped Larry Parks at FAME track down important monetary speeches (such as that by Warren Buffett’s father) that the CRS employees found only with great effort and difficulty even when we gave them the speaker and date.
The links listed offer no substaniation of his claim. He sites the Library of Congress (but not specifically the Congressional Research Service which is a part of the LOC) whose link says:
“While each volume consists of an index, more complete access to the information may be obtained indirectly by using the indexes of the House and Senate Journals during the relevant session of Congress, which provide the dates on which action was taken.”
and
“The Register of Debates is not a verbatim account of the proceedings, but rather a summary of the “leading debates and incidents” of the period.”
So his best “proof” here contradicts that such a claim could be made here disproving a speech was given. Any such argument is itself “dumber than mud.”
The other links offer no further proof that the alleged author of the spoof did indeed make it up and give false attribution.
There may be no resolution that will satisfy everyone.
As Stop It cites:
“The Congressional Record began publication in 1873. Printed by the Government Printing Office, it is the fourth and final series of publications containing the debates of Congress. (It was preceded by the Annals of Congress, Register of Debates, and Congressional Globe.) The Record is far more comprehensive than its predecessors in reporting Congressional debates”
In response to Saul, there are those who believe too much freedom is a bad thing. Scary thought! Should they be the ones who bring about change? The ideas on changing our system, which was not thrown together on a whim, run the gamut from the Marxist Collectivist idealogy to the Church- State partnership. From the attitude that the founding documents are archaic, to the belief they are timeless. As some have said, these documents are not to be taken literally, per say, but as a general rule book by which we may guide our societal evolution. Radical change can be damaging just as over/miss interpretation can be. I am not one to vote for the lesser of two evils, because that would be an admission I voted for evil. I would vote, however, to bring the inbalance back from the fringe to a more acceptable and advantagous place from which the most people could benefit. Otherwise, Hillary would be the best candidate for “change” if that’s all we are trying to accomplish. Frightening thought. I think I’ll stick to our “flawed” system a little longer until I see some statesmanship on the horizon.
AWC
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