As Goes Maine, So Goes the Country

Well, this is more like it.  After Ron Paul supporters won the Maine State Republican convention by thoroughly planning and preparing and following Roberts Rules of order strictly, we walked away with some well earned confidence and a major win for the Ron Paul campaign.  We had never won anything, or been allowed to win anything.

The national Republican Party however, would have none of it.  At their expensive little party down in Tampa the Maine delegation was not allowed to take their rightfully won seats.  This group that we sent is made up of poor fisherman, farmers, single mothers, etc. who paid a lot of money to travel to FL and participate in the convention.   The classic example of the rich, connected bully changing the rules at the last second to exclude an opinion they don't like.  The Republican party is that rich bully.  In the following clip, there are many examples of the microphone being cute just before Ron Pauls name is mentioned.   Its cartoonish really.  They were willing to lie and cheat to prevent him from having his rightfully won 15 minute speaking slot.

I wonder had RP run as a democrat, would he have been treated the same way at their convention? (barring of course the fact that theirs is an incumbent.)

Reader Tim writes   "You must be very pleased with how everything unfolded down there. I can't say that I'm surprised that the rules were changed at the last minute--the interesting thing for me is to see what happens next. Where do you see Paul supporters going at this point? I don't see anything on the Republican ticket that would appeal to them. This Ryan guy is a complete fraud--he's no fiscal conservative, though he and others try to make him out to be one. And, he's certainly no libertarian, though he and others try to pain him that way. That's at least how I see it."

I suppose some will begrudgingly fall in behind Gary Johnson (who's not that bad), while others will write in Ron Paul if he doesn't go third party.  Hopefully they just don't vote.  Or write in Frank Zappa.  

You are spot on about this worthless hack

Ron Paul wins Maine Republican Convention

5/5/12 - 5/6/12

Saturday morning at the Maine State Republican Convention the ordinarily simple procedure of voting in a Convention Secretary and Convention Chair took over four heated hours, pushing back the schedule and setting the tone for the remainder of the event with both slots being filled by pro Ron Paul candidates.  

The vote for the chair ended with a very slim margin of victory for the Paul backed Brent Tweed with 1,118 to the Romney supporter, Charles Cragin's 1,114.  The tabulation of these two votes took hours, with each of the 16 counties in the state counting the raised hands of their delegates and reporting the numbers to Maine GOP chair Charlie Webster.  A move was put forth by a Romney supporter to suspend the rules and do a written vote just prior to the lunch recess, and was addressed by Webster upon return.  For this to pass, a two thirds majority was needed, and the motion failed overwhelmingly.   

The Ron Paul campaign came into this event highly organized and with months of statewide preparation under their belt.  Pro Paul delegates were directed to the Paul booth to pick up a folder which contained a welcome letter, and lists of Paul backed candidates running for various positions.  Stapled to the inside of the folder was a sticker with the 15 names of the candidates that Paul supporters wanted to send as delegates to the Republican National Convention in Tampa on August 27.

When it came time to cast votes for delegates, Oxford county was able to complete the voting process and get the ballots sealed and handed in to the county chairman, at which point a number of delegates left for the day.  Unfortunately, individuals from the Romney camp were seen and caught on camera handing out fake slates of names to Ron Paul supporters that looked exactly like the stickers from the Paul campaign, but with pro-Romney names.  A list of pro-Paul delegates that supporters would recognize, but differed from the campaign sanctioned list was also handed to Paul supporters with the clear intention of diluting the vote.  It is my understanding, that as a result of this, that convention chair Tweed deemed the ballots corrupt, and called for a retaking of the vote.  

The counties were instructed to break up into county caucuses and ballots would be distributed for a revote.  Oxford county delegates, who were two thirds in favor of Romney, were frustrated with the process and after discussion among the county, as well as discussions with other counties, decided to ignore the chairs request to retake the vote and hand in the previously completed ballots, attached with the note, as read by caucus secretary Glen Holmes, "Take it or leave it."  It turned out that the chair decided to leave it as Oxford was the only county that did not fill out the new ballots and thusly no votes were counted from that county.  

Early on Sunday morning, the unofficial list of delegates elected to the national convention was posted on the large monitor, announcing that all 15 of the Ron Paul delegates were elected.  Rumors began circulating of a team of Romney lawyers being present as a result of the previous days proceedings and that the votes would be overturned by the end of the day.  However, as the day progressed, all the attempts to challenge the delegate list were shut down by chairman Tweed.  On more than one occasion, he had to tell speakers that they were out of order and if they did not stop speaking, they would be escorted from the building.  In response to calls of out of order from Tweed, vociferous and misled Romney supporters shouted down to him, "Your out of order!"  

Late in the day on Sunday, an attempt was made to oust Tweed with a vote of no-confidence, but was overwhelmingly voted down.  This resulted in an escalation of contentious remarks from the balcony area and ultimately caused a number of Romney supporters to leave, disgruntled and angry.  

After the First and Second District caucuses adjourned, the six remaining committed delegate slots were awarded to the Paul campaign, making for a highly successful weekend for Ron Paul in Maine, taking 20 of the 24 available delegate slots to the National Convention.  The passion and organization of the Paul supporters was evident as soon as we arrived two hours early to the convention on saturday morning, to see a line filled with hundreds of Ron Paul fans waiting to get into the convention.  The line would eventually stretch to the end of the parking lot and contain over a thousand people.  There was a strikingly similar outcome at the Nevada state convention this weekend with 22 of 25 delegates being pro-Ron Paul.  As he continues to rack up these overwhelming victories in caucus states throughout may, it seems more and more likely that he will be allowed a speaking slot at the National convention as well as the possibility of effecting the party platform as a whole.  Ron Paul supporter Ashly Ryan was elected Republican National Commiteewoman as a 21 year old.  With more and more individuals like this being elected to state and national positions, it seems that Ron Paul is starting to legitimately effect the national dialogue.  

   

Define Terror Please

Looking at some articles today regarding the horrific terrorist attack in the Belgian city of Leige, I am wondering if only people that have dark colored skin can perform terror.  For example;

"Interior Ministry official Peter Mertens said the attack did not involve terrorism..."


And then a couple of paragraphs later, the psychotic individuals wretched actions are played out;


"Officials said Amrani left his home in Liege with a backpack, armed with hand grenades, a revolve and an FAL assault rifle. He walked alone to the central square, then got onto a platform that gave him an ideal view of the square below, which was bedecked with a huge Christmas tree and crowded with shoppers.

From there, Amrani lobbed three hand grenades toward a nearby bus shelter, which serves 1,800 buses a day, then opened fire upon the crowd. The explosions sent shards of glass from the bus shelter across a wide area."

 From wikipedia, part of the definition of terrorism is, "and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilian)"  


Wether to be randomly motivated, or politicly, or somehow convinced by some magical boogyman in the sky (Jesus, Alla, Budda, Mohommad, so on and so forth) to commit devastating acts like this, you are a terrorist.  As far as I can tell, the bulk of humanity seems to believe that only islamists can commit terror.  At least in the media.  What do you think?  Have you seen anything that would make you think I'm way off base here?

Tax Money at Work in Iran

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Iran's revolutionary guard has posted video of two of their officials inspecting a U.S. Sentinel drone which was captured after being taken from the sky by the Iranian military.  Of course, the U.S. government claims that it is a result of a mechanical or satellite failure, and not Iran's government.  The drone was on a mission to gather data regarding Irans growing nuclear program and to drum up some evidence for the justification of the seemingly imminent war with the poverty stricken third world nation.  The cost of this particular unmanned aircraft is unknown, but I can promise that it wasn't cheap.  State of the art spy technology is now in the hands of an "enemy" who is allies with both Russia and China.  Both of these governments have deep pockets and certainly wouldn't mind possessing some of this technology.  It wouldn't surprise me to see a Russian drone cruising around over the States before to long.

This infuriating waste of cash-strapped American tax-payer dollars is a perfect example of why a Ron Paul presidency is crucial at this point.  Obama's foreign policy is proving more insidiously hawkish than even the Cheny/Bush/Vader administration, with some new attack on a sovereign nation happening daily.  Like how we just paid to kill 24 Pakistani troops.  This simply is not good for business.

Keep it up Mr. President.  We have loads of money to spend on these military expenditures, and we don't mind at all making more and more enemies around the world with each passing hour.  Just go ahead and use the impending terror threats as excuses to take away even more of our dwindling freedoms as Americans.  Perfect.


RON PAUL 2012!!!  Leave Iran alone!  

What If?

From: MilitaryEducation.org

Iran Storms British Embassy

Iranian student protesters have stormed the British embassy in Tehran in response to sanctions placed on their country by the British and American governments.  The purpose of the sanctions is allegadly to dissuade the Iranian government from pursuing the creation of a nuclear weapons program.  The sanctions are the first step in the seemingly unavoidable new war with Iran that President Obama is determined to start with the weak, impoverished Middle East nation.

President Obama scolded the Iranian government in response, saying that "they have a responsibility to protect diplomatic outposts," and "we expect to seem some sort of definitive action quickly, on the Iranian governments part."

What a joke!  Protesters are reacting to sanctions that will specifically affect them negatively against a foreign governments unwanted occupation of their sovereign nation.  This is a text book step by step process of war drumming by Britian and America and is unbelievably transparent as such.

It is so very hypocritical for two nations who have a combined stockpile of doomsday weapons large enough to kill all humans on earth three times, to scold and condemn another sovereign nations attempts at defending themselves.  I don't believe that Iran has benevolent intentions in their nuclear program, but in comparison to Americas checkered history of foreign invasions and occupations, it is laughable.

Occupy Wall Street, Then the FED!

 Black out Ron Paul by donating tonight at midnight, October 19th

I like what has been happening with the Occupy Wall Street protests that started in New York and has spread around the country/world.  I also think that most of the folks camping out and holding signs are a little misguided in directing their anger towards the vague evils of Wall St. and faceless corporations.  These entities have the economy crippling power they do because of the dubious relationship between giant corporations and the federal government through corrupt lobbyists and even more corrupt legislators.  The secret leviathan that is the Federal Reserve should be receiving the brunt of peoples fury for creating out of control inflation and allowing the federal government to grow beyond anyone could have imagined.  I hope these people start picking up what Ron Paul putting down about this out of control corporate socialist system before more heads get cracked.

Donate

I don't have much hope for this though, as every single major media outlet, be it red/blue, is cartoonishly ignoring Ron Paul's campaign and its victories and poll standings.  I've just watched the newest sham debate on CNN and it is literally laughable how they ignore the intellectual giant on stage, not even mentioning his name or showing his face after the debate.  Help draw attention to this phenomenon by donating to the black this out moneybomb on the 19th of October.  Lets show those fools!

Dubious Assassination

The recent killing of Anwar al-Awlaki by a U.S. drone strike brings to light some constitutionally dubious actions taken by the Obama administration.  The killing of this U.S. born American citizen without the due process of a trial is, in my opinion a very troubling step down a slippery slope of despotic executive action.  Jake Tapper thinks so as well as he grills press secretary Jay Carney in this video.

I am in no way defending the evil acts of al-Awlaki and I think he needed to be put away.  Its the process, in this case, that I take exception to.  I love how Tapper asks Carney at the end of the video what he thinks constitutional law professor Barak Obama would think of these actions.

Ignore Ron Paul!!!

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To mark the opening of his New Hampshire campaign headquarters, Ron Paul paid a visit to the Granite State this evening.  Though this event was posted only 48 hours ago, hundreds of supporters showed up to the office park where the HQ is located.  Expecting a much smaller crowd, the organizers were scrambaling to meet the BBQ caterers needs as well as parking for the throngs of supporters pouring in.  As one employee of the NH campaign told me when I asked him about the large and vociferous turnout, "This is a good problem.  I'm glad there are so many more than we expected."


This last weekend, Ron Paul was voted into a statistical tie with Michelle Bachman in the Iowa Straw poll, and basically ignored by the media.  As he said at the beginning of his speech this evening in Concord, "Right before we were supposed to go on or the evening before that (one of the network shows) called and said you've been canceled!"

I think that this is the spark that grassroots needs at this point in the campaign.  Until now, Dr. Paul, has been treated with the respect he deserves by the cable news shows, and that is not what his base is used to.  In '07 '08 he was treated like a leper on a merry go-round in the media, and as a result, his base support became rabid in their quest to get the name RON PAUL out there.  Now that he is back to being ignored for a huge victory in Iowa, the fire has been lit in the belly of grassroots supporters.  The turnout tonight shows that the base in New Hampshire is ready to knock on doors make phone calls.  There are an army of supporters ready to put in the time and effort to make this campaign a success.  So keep ignoring Ron Paul.  It only helps.  

Jon Stewart Defend Ron Paul!

This is a great analysis of the blatant ignoring of Ron Paul's tie for first place in the Iowa straw poll by Jon Stewart on the Daily Show last night.  I absolutely love this.  The ordinarily left leaning media is catching wind of this principled anti-war legislator's attempted burial.

The Daily Show - Indecision 2012 - Corn Polled Edition - Ron Paul & the Top Tier
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Also, take a look at the great Glen Greenwalds write up of the straw poll and the coming circus.

Iowa Won!

In Saturday's straw poll in Iowa, Congressman Ron Paul of Texas was voted into a statistical tie for first place with Michelle Bachman.  The purpose of this poll is to figure out who the potential nominee for the Republican presidential candidate may be.   This is an absolutely astounding victory in Iowa for the most anti-war, pro-civil liberty, strait principled politician of all time. 

In spite of Paul's result, the two big stories are Bachman's (an Iowan) win and the seething simp Pawlenty dropping out.  Almost no mention of Pauls tie for first.  Several sources who traditionally may not agree with Ron Paul have picked up on this and come to the defense of the Congressman, like Politico, and the Huffington Post.

And this little gem put together from CNN clips does a fair job at pointing out the confusing mass ignoring of Ron Paul



I would like to know what it is about Ron Paul that causes the media as a whole to ignore his campaign and victories like the one in Iowa this past Saturday.  Is it his consistent and clear anti-war message of a non-interventionist foreign policy?  Is it his encyclopedic knowledge of the federal reserve and Americas fiat currency that makes him a terrible threat? 

If you have read any of my previous posts, you will get that I am no conspiracy theorist, but hot damn, whats going on?  It seems like maybe I should make myself a tinfoil hat, because something just aint right. 

Ron Pauls going to be in Concord NH this Wednesday, the 17th.  Come see him and help him open his New Hampshire Campaign office in style. 

Bye Bye bin Laden

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Osama bin Laden is dead, nearly a decade after the US government set out to get him, as Mr. Bush famously pronounced, "dead or alive."  After masterminding the most deadly terrorist attack on American concrete, it was clear that bin Laden needed to pay for his crimes.  He was a bad guy.  (Albeit the fact that he once was our "friend" and received weapons from the US when the Afghans fought the Soviets)  The government's path to bin Laden, however, leaves much to be desired.

Over the past ten years, we have spent two trillion dollars, ten thousand plus American troops, and hundreds of thousands of Afghan, Pakistani, and Iraqi citizens - all the while turning al qaeda from a small fringe group into the recruiting monster they are today. There was a better option.

Shortly after the attacks on 9/11, Ron Paul introduced the Marque and Reprisal Act of 2001 before Congress with the intent of creating an elite special force to hunt down and capture or kill bin Laden.  From wikipedia:

The issue of marque and reprisal was raised before Congress after the September 11 attacks^[30] and again on July 21, 2007, by Congressman Ron Paul. The attacks were defined as acts of "air piracy" and the Marque and Reprisal Act of 2001 was introduced, which would have granted the president the authority to use letters of marque and reprisal against the specific terrorists, instead of warring against a foreign state... However, the bills Congressman Paul introduced were not enacted into law.

Of course it wasn't. Bin Laden is seen on several video tapes explaining his strategy of death by a thousand cuts to the US government.  His master plan, it seems, was to drag the US military into many small un-winnable conflicts in an attempt to bleed America dry and topple the Empire. I have to say, if indeed that was the plan, that it's kind of working.

While it's good that bin Laden is dead, we certainly haven't won.  He knew he would die a martyr to the thousands of religious nuts who looked up to him and were willing to die for him.  As reader Sam quoted, "he hasn't been on the run, he's been on the relax!"  Sadly, the death of Osama bin Laden does not mark the end of terrorism, or even the end of al-qaeda.   

My Breakfast With Ron Paul

On the morning of April 26, several newspapermen and economists gathered in New York City to hear Ron Paul talk about his upcoming presidential bid, and I was fortunate to be in attendance. The event, an editorial breakfast hosted by the New York Sun, was held only hours before Paul headed to Des Moines, Iowa to officially announce the formation of his presidential exploratory committee. (This step is a prerequisite of participation in Fox's May 5th presidential debate.)

The congressman fielded a variety of questions regarding the upcoming campaign and specific policy issues, but a large part of the discussion revolved around monetary policy - on a day when the dollar's value fell below one 1,500th an ounce of gold. It was suggested that as more and more people become aware of the dubious nature of the Federal Reserve, a push to abolish America's central banking system could prove quite useful in a race against President Obama.

At one point, the conversation turned to China, and I loved what Dr. Paul had to say about the pervasive anti-Chinese sentiments being thrown around in the media and by elected officials. From the New York Sun article written about this meeting: 
  

He suggested voters will not finding him focusing his attach on the Chinese Communists, who have been widely criticized for keeping their currency in what critics deem to be an artificially weak state so as to protect their export industries. “Don't you think it’s demagogic to accuse the Chinese of manipulating their currency when we've  been manipulating our currency forever,” Dr. Paul said.

After the breakfast, I spent a couple hours with the congressman and his campaign manager, Jesse Benton - also the senior vice president of the Campaign for Liberty. At the dinner I attended with the congressman a year and half ago, I felt lucky to be sitting at the same table with him.  Now, here I was, walking around midtown Manhattan, candidly chatting! My goodness. I followed the pair to Fox studios and sat on the set of Freedomwatch during Judge Andrew Napalitano's interview with Dr. Paul.  After the interview, I spent ten minutes explaining the process of making maple syrup to Ron Paul. I then wished Paul and Benton well on their trip to Iowa and gave each a little mason jar of my own homemade syrup. I wonder if the syrup made it through airport security.

Photo by David Pietrusza

As someone stated directly to Ron Paul near the conclusion of the breakfast Tuesday morning, "Your time is now, Mr. Paul. Good luck."  Here we go.  Never before has the political climate been so ready and primed for a principled libertarian-leaning candidate like Ron Paul.  Four years ago, when we started hanging signs on highway overpasses and taking over televised presidential debates, few people had even heard of Texas Congresmen Ron Paul.  one of our slogans was, "WHO IS RON PAUL? RONPAUL2008.COM."  We don't have to do that anymore.  The day after the breakfast with Dr. Paul, I was eating a bagel in Brooklyn,  flipping through the New York Times in hopes of finding a tiny blurb about the congressman's announcement in Iowa the previous day.  I was pleasantly surprised to find nearly half a page devoted to the event. And it was primarily positive. What a change.

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Lets take advantage of this momentum and raise some money!  Vote with your dollars: click here to donate on May 5, the day of the first presidential debate (and check out debateday.com for info on the moneybomb).  Send a message to the establishment: End the wars now! End the FED! Donate any amount of money (no more than $2,400). Let's tell Ron Paul he can win!

DEBATE DAY!

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It's time raise some money in opposition to war!

Click on the above picture to donate!  Just a little is something!  Every cent counts.

Libya, Fibya

I know it's kind of a stretch on the title there.  Micheal Sheuer hands two interviewers their heads in this great interview on CNN.  Mr. Sheuer is a former CIA agent who is one of the most outspoken and articulate anti-war TV talkers.  In this segment, he explains some of the many problems associated with America's invasion of Libya. Take a look:
 

Japan Disaster

While watching the news coverage of Japan's horrific earthquake, I saw that the Prime Minister of Japan is quoted in saying, "This is the worst disaster in Japan since World War II."  I guess he means, but does not say, since America dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing nearly half-a-million civilians.  Yes, this earthquake is devastating and terrible, but it's no atomic bomb.  At least the earth wasn't being evil when it attacked Japan. It was random. God Bless America.

Inexcusable

During a speech in which Hillary Clinton condemned the actions of totalitarian governments in the Middle East, peace protester and former CIA analyst Ray McGovern was tackled and dragged from the room.  His crime was standing up and facing the back of the room while everyone else sat and faced the speaker.  He was bloodied and bruised, handcuffed, and put in a little cell.  Why was this not a bigger deal?  Did Jon Stewart talk about this? Democracy Now! covered the incident and interviewed McGovern. Watch it here. It's really chilling to watch the whole thing caught on tape: Clinton rattles on without missing a beat as an old man is violently accosted ten feet in front of her. She terrifies me. 

RUN RON RUN

 

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Ron Paul 2012?

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On the final day of this month's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Ron Paul won the presidential straw poll. He beat out mainstream Republicrat Mitt Romney with 30% of the vote (to Romney's 23%). In spite of his growing popularity among the American people and the talking heads on cable news, Paul's victory was discounted as meaningless because his "rabid" supporters "commandeered" the conference. At least this was the portrayal of the event, despite the fact that Paul supporters paid for their own tickets and managed their own conference transportation - a stark contrast, indeed, to the members of Romney's camp, who were bussed in and wined and dined.  Jack Hunter covers this nicely in his weekly video essay:



Regardless of the validity of the straw poll, I think the question now is: Will Ron Paul make another run for president in 2012; and, more importantly, should he?  My understanding, based on information coming from the Paul camp, is that if enough money can be raised by a specified date, they will make a go at it. They seem off to a strong start, with over 700,000 dollars raised on George Washington's birthday last week.

As one of those "rabid" supporters from the '08 campaign, if Paul says "I'm in," than I'm in and ready to go to work, making signs from shower curtains and harassing people at local fairs all over again.  But, I wonder if a Ron Paul run for president is not the most effective strategy in the larger effort of spreading of liberty and freedom. As much as I would love to see it, I don't think Ron Paul will be president. Still, a run at the presidency, at this point, would serve as a gigantic education campaign and could trigger the viral spread of the message of liberty. And therein lies the crux of my ambivalence. I am torn because as the chair of the Monetary Policy Subcommittee overseeing the Federal Reserve, Ron Paul is now in a unique position to make legitimate changes to the terrible central banking system and America's fiat money failures. A run for Senate in 2012 could realistically yield a victory, and with his son now a senator, the two of them could team up to make some serious headway in transforming our corrupt government.

If you are like me, you are incredibly rich and have tons of extra money right now. If you are interested in helping Ron make the choice to run, make a donation here.

Take a look at this great speech of Ron's at CPAC:

Evolution of Fairness

Micheal Shermer is the editor in chief of Skeptic magazine and  the author of the 2007 book Mind of the Market. He is pro-market and an atheist, and he is very close to the ideal spokesman for Austrian economics. (Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to quite get the anti-war thing, but perfect is the enemy of the good, no?)

In this video he explains the concept of the evolution of fairness.  Shermer draws his economic conclusions from his study of evolution and natural order; I really like the chimp examples he uses, as these so closely relate to human behavior.



I find that a number of the best Austrian school economists are overly-religious and are into pseudo-science and quack medicine (homeopathy, anti-vaccination, conspiracy theories, and so on). Conversely, I find that most scientists tend to be in favor of legislative solutions to problems that concern onlytheir own areas of study.  I like Shermer because he is a charismatic spokesperson for rational, pro-market types who happen to not believe in a boogieman in the sky who's gonna get us if we're bad.