“The idea that more government involvement in health care is the solution, especially at a time when the nation is dealing with record deficits and debt, is preposterous,” he writes. “And the promised effectiveness of forced mandate health care is easily disproven by looking at how such a system has worked in Massachusetts.”
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Aaron Blake writes in the Washington Post:
No longer is Paul the outsider that everyone else simply ignores, both on the campaign trail and in face-offs like Thursday’s Fox News GOP debate (he’s mixed it up with Rick Perry more than once). Paul is polling a clear third in most recent surveys– ahead of Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) and her fellow second-tier candidates – and while many still doubt he can win, there is something to be gained from knocking him down a peg or two, because his supporters have to migrate somewhere.
Paul’s third place with 10-15% of Republican votes puts him in a great position to pursue the head of the pack. If Perry suddenly drops in the poll, Tea Party Republicans who have been at war with Mitt Romney, will most certainly direct their attention to the Congressman from Texas. Tonight will be an important night for Ron Paul.<>
Mary Stegmeir reports on Paul’s attack on Obama with the following words:
While Ron Paul spoke with voters across the state Tuesday, his campaign released an open letter the GOP presidential candidate addressed to the current Commander in Chief.
In the note, Paul asserts that the tax increases proposed as part of President Obama’s jobs and deficit reduction plan would result in cuts to veterans’ benefits.
Here’s the letter:
“Dear President Obama,
“As a Doctor, an Air Force Veteran, and Congressman, who serves on the Foreign Affairs Committee and has always fought for the best interest of our troops, I was deeply concerned to learn that our military retirees are now facing benefit cuts under your proposed $1.5 trillion dollar tax hike.
“Our military men and women have fought bravely. In exchange, our country made a promise to them, and we must honor it.
“There are trillions of dollars in unwise and unconstitutional spending we must cut. There are few other leaders in Washington willing to cut spending as deeply as I am and truly balance our budget. But, we must make sure we take care of our Veterans who fought to take care of us.
“We have put our troops in harm’s way, and we must honor our promises. And, our troops have paid a heavy price these past ten years. Over 5,000 have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan, 40,000 have seen crushing injuries, and hundreds of thousands more suffer from brain injury and post traumatic stress disorder
“Failing to meet the promises we have made to our troops would be unjust and immoral. The cuts you announced yesterday, combined with the rumored cuts in benefits reported in publications like Army Times, have our soldiers and Veterans deeply concerned.
“Mr. President, instead of cutting our Veterans benefits, I call on you to support our troops. Support them by bringing them home to our shores, to protect our borders and defend our country. Ensure that they are rested and equipped to repel any real credible attack. Re-unite them with their families. And, make sure they no longer play policeman in dangerous foreign civil wars.
“Cutting the benefits of our Veterans benefits while we subsidize the security of other wealthy nations like Germany and Japan and play World Policeman makes no sense. The money we would save extracting our fighting men and women and our equipment from overseas conflicts and regions will more than offset the savings you seek by upending the manner in which veterans receive care.
“Bringing our troops home would ensure that we keep the promise to our Veterans, strengthen our national defense and secure our borders.
“Do not mistake me for a pacifist or a person solely focused on the economics of the unsustainable global security and state-building that has helped our country arrive at the shores of financial ruin. On the contrary, I consider my military service as an Air Force flight surgeon during the Cold War to be among my highest personal and professional achievements.
“Authentic, Constitutionally-sound national security – a strong national defense – begins with guarding our borders and not the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
“Mr. President, I call upon your to support our troops, honor our Veterans, and ensure our wounded get the care they deserve. To do so, we must end these protracted, trillion-dollar wars and bring them home.”
In Liberty,
Ron Paul<>
Paul Mulshine hits another home run. He writes:
Among my least favorite clichés is that one about “speaking truth to power.” It’s easy to speak truth to powerful people. There aren’t many of them and they don’t care what you say. What really takes nerve is to speak truth to knuckleheads. There are tens of millions of them. And they get to vote.
That is the charm of Ron Paul. I think I can say, without fear of contradiction, that no politician in recent history has irritated so many knuckleheads in so few words.
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I am a Trinitarian Christian. I believe in God’s rule over all things. Yet, many people ask me why I would support a libertarian candidate. Just recently someone posed the following question:” Do you like Rothbard? His writing seems thoroughly secular.” I had previously stated how Jonah Goldberg from National Review found Rothbard to be consistent in his views of personal liberty, which consequently led to Goldberg’s positive assessment of Ron Paul’s policy on similar issues. In light of my support of Rothbard on this matter, the questioner then assumed that Rothbard and I have the same agenda. We do not. However, we have similar principles. Here is my answer:
I don’t know if you have read Paul’s analysis of von Mises…his analysis is overall positive, but in the end he critiques their secular pessimism. I would have the same reaction to Rothbard and Ayn Rand. My neo-conservative friends would agree with Christopher Hitchens’ fanatic defense of the U.S. wars in the Middle East, but again, they would strongly disagree with his overall religious system or lack thereof. Rothbard pursued a free society for the sake of secularism…I pursue a free society for the sake of Lordship.
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In a fascinating piece, LA Times writes that Paul is now officially third place:
Quietly, and very much under the radar, Ron Paul, the Texas congressman who no pundit believes has a serious chance of winning the Republican presidential nomination, is staging a bit of comeback, returning to his position as a solid No. 3 candidate in the GOP race.
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They’ve been accused of rampant thievery, spending billions of dollars like drunken sailors, groping children and little old ladies, and making everyone take off their shoes.
But the real job of the tens of thousands of screeners at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is to protect Americans from a terrorist attack.
Yet a decade after the TSA was created following the September 11 attacks, the author of the legislation that established the massive agency grades its performance at “D-.”
“The whole program has been hijacked by bureaucrats,” said Rep. John Mica (R. -Fla.), chairman of the House Transportation Committee.
“It mushroomed into an army,” Mica said. “It’s gone from a couple-billion-dollar enterprise to close to $9 billion.”
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“Unless you understand the motivation of your enemy…you will never their ability to recruit in future generations.”
–Michael Sheuer<>
Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, who’s making his third run for the White House, is at 12 percent. Every other candidate is in single digits.
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In the HuffPo commentary section of last night debate there were two interesting comments worth mentioning. First, it was Ryan Grim’s observations that Audit the Fed has become largely mainstream in the Republican Party. He writes:
The bruised relationship between the Republican Party and the Federal Reserve was on dramatic display in response to a question about whether the Federal Reserve should be audited. Such a look-see into the workings of the central bank was considered radical just a few years ago; it was only over the staunch opposition of Wall Street and the leadership in both parties that a watered-down measure to partially audit the Fed became law in 2010. But the policy now seems to be uniformly backed by the GOP’s presidential contenders.
“Of course we should see what the Fed is doing,” Romney said.
Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain and Rick Santorum all backed a Fed audit, as well, while arguing that it should no longer focus on increasing employment, restricting its focus to inflation.
Rick Perry stood by his controversial Fed comments from earlier in the campaign, when he said that Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke would be treated “ugly” in Texas and that his monetary policy was “almost treasonous.” Perry slightly softened the charge, saying that Bernanke himself wasn’t a traitor, but that using the Fed for political purposes was “almost treasonous.” Bernanke is a Republican.
Secondly, was John Ward’s summary of Paul’s critique of Perry’s job growth program:
The second key moment in the debate tonight, as it relates to Rick Perry’s fortunes, came when Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) went after the Texas governor. Paul was asked if Perry should get credit for Texas’ job growth. Not only did Paul say no, he said that under Perry, his taxes have doubled, the state’s debt has tripled and 170,000 of the state’s new jobs were government jobs.
That came moments after Romney had gotten in a nice jab at Perry, saying that under the previous two governors, Democrat Ann Richards and Republican George W. Bush, job growth per year was higher: 2.5 percent for Richards, 3.5 percent for Bush and 1 percent for Perry.
Perry is looking good overall, but the shots from Paul will bloody him a little. Maybe a reason why Perry should have avoided going after the Texas congressman in the last debate.
Overall, this was a fine debate for Paul. Paul took the opportunity to make some salient observations on a variety of issues and once again had the opportunity to defend his consistent record against the interventionist foreign policy.<>
Kuyperian Commentary Podcast
