Ron Paul: The Conversation Americans Need to Have ...

[primative1]

Run time: 13:34 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAt6Pf7jZjA   Posted on YouTube: May 25, 2007 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 25, 2007 By DU Member: primative1 Views on DU: 1331

 
Lets not let the conversation fade away ....

[aztc]

1. Why democrats hate Ron Paul

The Ron Paul FREEDOM PRINCIPLES

* Rights belong to individuals, not groups.
* Property should be owned by people, not government.
* All voluntary associations should be permissible -- economic and social.
* The government's monetary role is to maintain the integrity of the monetary unit, not participate in fraud.
* Government exists to protect liberty, not to redistribute wealth or to grant special privileges.
* The lives and actions of people are their own responsibility, not the government's.

Support Ron Paul for US President 2008
www.RonPaul2008.com

[slay]

2. Excuse me - I do not believe Democrats hate Ron Paul - an irresponsible thing to say

Why would Democrats think rights belong to groups not individuals?

Why would Democrats think property should be owned by the government and not individuals?

---You can not, and should not, generalize for all Democrats. I'm not sure what your agenda is here by insulting Democrats to promote Ron Paul. Personally I think Ron Paul is the only decent Republican running. Please consider a better way to promote Ron Paul for president than insulting all Democrats, if that is you agenda, which it looks like it is.

[Warpy]

3. All that stuff sounds good, doesn't it?

A closer examination points out a few serious flaws, though.

As for property being owned by people, and no government, that allows cartels of the rich and powerful to control essential services like water, power, and some other basic necessities in what wiser people have pointed out are "natural monopolies." How'd that work for you in 2001, California, when Enron closed power stations to drive the price up?

As for all voluntary associations being permissible, does that include those cartels of rich men actively working to keep the public powerless? If rights belong to individuals and not groups, why should these groups have any rights at all?

As for government existing not to redistribute wealth, do you really think you're going to be a lord and master and not a serf? Serfdom is what unregulated capitalism without wealth redistribution via taxes and social programs ultimately achieves. It's been proven again and again throughout history.

As for the right of individuals to be responsible for their own lives, how will this responsibility be assessed for those individuals who get rich quick through fraud or selling dangerous products? Shouldn't government intervene to limit such "rights" to protect the public from predators?

That's the problem with libertarians. They are dreamers who deny that public rights are often at odds with the individual rights of the rich and powerful, often to the point of blindness to the fact that the public exists.

That is why Democrats dislike Ron Paul's libertarianism. We've been down that road before in the latter third of the nineteenth century, and it was dreadful for the majority of us.

[slay]

4. I hear what you're saying

And I agree with most of it. I do not agree with the libertarian agenda and will not be voting for Ron Paul. I hope to vote for Al Gore. However, I do think Ron Paul to be more decent than most of the establisment Republicans who are running, and I do not hate Ron Paul.

Al Gore 2008!

[AlinPA]

5. ??? That's a jackass statement to make.

[whistle]

6. That is not an accurate statement, I am a democrat and although I

...would not agree with many of Dr Ron Paul's political libertarian positions I certainly support his right to represent his constituents the majority of whom elected him for those positions.

As for his statements during and after the republican debate in SC on opposing the Bush Administration's Iraq War policies and subsequent prolonging and expansion of the war in Iraq/Afghanistan and now neighboring countries of Iran and Syria and perhaps other countries, I agree fully with what Ron Paul had to say. To me he appears to obviously believe what he has repeated now in a number of public venues to his very core. I can only hope that his crusade will help turn both republican and democratic voters against the insane foreign policy of Bush/Cheney. I also hope that as more voters come to see the light by listening to Ron Paul and other like minded representatives that this in turn will persuade more elected congressmen and women to take a similar stand with Dr Paul against the war so we can bring our troops home and can again seek peaceful resolutions to foreign relationships and problems around the world.

As for that list of Freedom Principles, I would rather see democrats debate and negotiate differences with someone like Dr. Ron Paul then the Koolaid drinking brainwashed dimple headed freeper RW neocon theocratic fascist republicans that are now in the U.S. Congress as well as at the state and local level or who are being groomed as replacements in coming elections.

[primative1]

7. You Need To Widen Your Vision ...

You Wrote:

"I can only hope that his crusade will help turn both republican and democratic voters against the insane foreign policy of Bush/Cheney."

You are framing your thoughts in the manner prescribed by the elites, that an interventionist foreign policy is okay as long as it can be contained from going to the extreme (all out war).
Dr Paul is trying to get us to look at the concept more thoroughly.
He is saying that if we continue with our interventionist policies as we have for the past century under BOTH political parties than we will always be looking at the extreme in one form or location or another.

[whistle]

9. I don't agree with any interventionist foreign policies. Trade agreements

...infrastructure planning and development, fair price agreements, etc. over long term periods of 25 to 50 years, along with credit arrangements among trading partners and monatary exchange values much like what FDR developed under the Bretton Woods system*** and, this would be most essential, fair and equatable wages that bring trading partner pay scales up on a par with skill levels and development to the U.S. labor force, not take the U.S. down to the lowest denominator the way the repukes want to see it.


***NOTE
The Bretton Woods system of international monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the world's major industrial states. The Bretton Woods system was the first example of a fully negotiated monetary order intended to govern monetary relations among independent nation-states.

Preparing to rebuild the international economic system as World War II was still raging, 730 delegates from all 44 Allied nations gathered at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire for the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference. The delegates deliberated upon and signed the Bretton Woods Agreements during the first three weeks of July 1944.

Setting up a system of rules, institutions, and procedures to regulate the international monetary system, the planners at Bretton Woods established the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) (now one of five institutions in the World Bank Group) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). These organizations became operational in 1946 after a sufficient number of countries had ratified the agreement.

The chief features of the Bretton Woods system were an obligation for each country to adopt a monetary policy that maintained the exchange rate of its currency within a fixed value—plus or minus one percent—in terms of gold; and the ability of the IMF to bridge temporary imbalances of payments. In the face of increasing strain, the system collapsed in 1971, following the United States' suspension of convertibility from dollars to gold.

Until the early 1970s, the Bretton Woods system was effective in controlling conflict and in achieving the common goals of the leading states that had created it, especially the United States.
<MORE>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bretton_Woods_system

[uberllama42]

8. That's a nice use of the word "freedom"

I would have to say that freedom is my favorite buzzword. It just sounds wholesome and down-to-earth. By sticking the word "freedom" in a header, you instantly make me feel good about whatever is in the list. The last three are about responsibilities rather than freedoms, but that doesn't matter because the are prefaced with the most patriotic bromide in the American vernacular.

[GrimReefa]

10. You do a disservice to your candidate by picking a fight

As can be seen by how the majority of posts on this thread have nothing to do with the content of the video.

I'm no Libertarian, but I will say this: Ron Paul is ABSOLUTELY, 100% CORRECT in the statements he is making, and the fact that NO OTHER POLIICIAN is making these statements - and the silence is especially deafening on our side of the fence - is disheartening, to say the least.

The United States was attacked on September 11 because our troops were in Saudi Arabia. It is a violation of the Koran for armed foreign nationals to be on Arabian soil, and, on top of that, the US troops were seen as being there soley to prop up an unpopular government - the Saudi royals. As the Soviets learned in Afghanistan, hell, as the Christian army learned, over and over again, in the Crusades, the Muslims will defend every inch of their territory literally with their dying breath. Which is, of course, why the US has to stop this senseless war in Iraq.

The American people need to be told the real reason we were attacked on September 11. To not do so is to not only reenforce racist stereotypes (i.e., the Arabs are so fanatical they are willing to blow themselves to pieces because American women wear bikinis to the beach), but also to remove realism from American foreign policy. The US government has been living the lie of 9/11 for so long, it is becoming increasingly daunting to challenge that establishment, and therefore realistic solutions can not even be considered, let alone adopted.

[cboy4]

12. Why would I vote for a Republican for President?

Fuck that.

[pretty_lies]

11. We Need a Right-Left Antiwar Alliance

The Democrats and Republicans alike showed yesterday that they support endless war. They are opposed to the vast majority of the people.

If you believe that stopping the war, and imperialism generally, is the #1 priority, then it follows that you should take your allies as you find them.

Ron Paul, and other antiwar conservatives, like Pat Buchanan, William Lind and possibly Chuck Hagel, differ profoundly from the left in many respects. But from the point of view of quickly ending the war, it makes sense to set these differences aside for the time being.

These conservatives influence many people we cannot. Their language is important to us.

What do you believe?