Reason posts another oddly distant but not quite disdainful report on the Ron Paul rally in Washington–this seems to be some sort of journalistic pose that the editors are especially interested in covering libertarianism as their beat but they do not necessary favor the stuff–and it makes reference to a poster in D.C. that says: Mises Saves. I note this just because, well, it is notable!
Source link: http://blog.mises.org/8282/mises-saves/
Mises saves?
Previous post: Inflation Illustrated
Next post: Report from the Property and Freedom Society
{ 11 comments }
To be honest, i was really disappointed in the rally. I went, and the speakers they had lined up before Ron was scary at best. Woods and Griffin were great, but then they had a speaker arguing that there’s no law on the books that requires you to pay income tax (which is blatantly false), another speaker that claimed that the U.S. government was directly responsible for 9/11, and a few different people that filled their speeches with an uncomfortable amount of religious rhetoric. There was also an uncomfortable level of conspiracy-theory ranting about the NAU and the NAFTA Superhighway. And all these speakers got loud booming cheers from the crowd! The main coordinator of the event was also peddling ridiculous things like the “America: Freedom to Fascism” video.
Frankly, the amount of ignorance on display there was disturbing and I’m embarrassed to have attended. I’m glad this event didn’t recieve media coverage, as it would have tarnished Paul’s image to be associated with all of these loonies. I’d be interested to know what he thought of all these people speaking at a rally with his name on it.
Nate, thanks for the news post. You just reaffirmed my apparently good decision to avoid the event, for the reasons I had imagined.
Yeah. I think i was the only person who didn’t get the memo that it was going to be full of the lunatic fringe of RP’s support. I forgot to mention all the crazies giving speeches about closed borders and “buying american.”
In my opinion, the good far outweighed the bad. 10,000 people marched down Constitution Ave to the front lawn of the Capitol Building and told the government what was on their minds. Sure, there was some lunatic fringe, but it was a very memorable event. I do agree though, some of the speakers (especially the anti-immigration guy), were not very palatable. They could have dropped probably 4 or 5 of them. The speeches by Adam Kokesh and Thomas Woods were excellent.
The flag in question: http://www.flickr.com/photos/58372028@N00/2666789650/
Here is another very cool pic:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/58372028@N00/2665962083/
I agree with Benj. I didn’t like the 911 truther element but it was still a good time. Those people need to realize that most Ron Paul supporters don’t believe in that and need to respect their opinions by not representing their viewpoint at the rallies so boldly. If they want to have a truther rally somewhere that’s fine. But this was a Ron Paul rally. It was no more appropriate to have 911 truther signs than if someone was holding pro-war signs. It’s not Ron’s position.
but then they had a speaker arguing that there’s no law on the books that requires you to pay income tax (which is blatantly false),
Well, there are people offering tens (hundreds?) of thousands of dollars to anyone who can find such a law, and so far nobody’s claimed it…
(I don’t see why it matters. If there is a law, it’s Wrong, and you still don’t have to pay. Whether or not there’s a law, the govt is still going to make your life a living hell if they catch you not paying)
Mises saves… passes to Rothbard… Rothbard scores!
There are a lot of frustrated people out there.
The DC March was not an official effort by the Campaign for Liberty. It was organized by people who were trying to be creative about getting out the message of returning to those principles of classical liberalism that were the inspirational basis of the U.S. Constitution. Ron Paul was invited and accepted the invitation to be the main speaker.
The March organizers continued to try to develop the program so that it would be a full day event.
In reality the event was a symbol of the discontent out there, and it was a symbol of the good fortune of America to have a humble statesman who is also a scholar of classical liberalism and who stands ready and able to educate people (all around the world) about liberty and prosperity.
The discontented mentality alone cannot be equated to or confused with the willingness to take action to purge the system of the corruption of interventionism. Sometimes they are parallel and sometimes they are not.
There is a commonality which becomes manifest in action, the action to educate oneself about classical liberalism and to educate others about classical liberalism. Simplistic expressions of discontent by those who are not willing to study the philosophy of classical liberalism are unworthy of this great movement towards liberty and justice. At some point it becomes divisive due to a significant degree of ignorance.
We are called to be intelligent, truth-seekers who can persuade others to be intelligent truth-seekers.
Yes, “Mises Saves” is exactly the phrase that I recommended a while ago to put on sale as a t-shirt in the mises.org store.
So, Nate, would you care to point out the law requiring us to pay the income tax? I’m not necessarily saying you’re wrong, but I’ve never seen it.
Comments on this entry are closed.