[Kaj]

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This seems to be the classic example of an Ivory Tower philosopher, who opposes something good on the grounds that it's not perfect. He's more interested in maintaining his own ideological purity than he is in supporting someone that could actually help the cause of liberty.

This self-indulgent navel-gazing ignores the fact that any real change is likely to come about precisely because of people like Ron Paul (or, in the words of the author, the "rich white male", as if voting for a poor black woman would be any more or less statist lol). The fact is that the world is not suddenly going to wake up, have an epiphany, and discover how evil the state really is. If they were, they would have done so years ago. Nor is failing to vote going to cause this to happen. People will just assume the low voter turnout is due to laziness, not principled opposition to the state.

No, if anything is going to lead to the ultimate demise of the state, it will be gradual reductions in state power, that allow the people to see that they don't really *need* the state to survive. This is what Ron Paul is fighting for, and this is why he remains our best hope for real change. Rothbard understood this, which is why he advocated not only a radical philosophy, but also practical political action. Unfortunately, many of Rothbard's epigones seem to be too busy lecturing to get down off their soapbox and actually do anything constructive, choosing instead to criticize those who do as "fake anarchists" or "closet statists". If you ask me, the ones who are truly "fake anarchists" are those who talk about how much they love freedom, but scoff at doing anything to promote it.

In case you're wondering, this comes from someone who hasn't voted since '96. Some might say this makes me a hypocrite, but the truth is that there haven't been any candidates that have seemed to be worth voting for. But now, Ron Paul has changed all that. I don't agree with him on every single issue, but that's not the point. The point is that Ron Paul is dedicated to the cause of liberty, and that's a very rare thing these days. Obviously, if you don't want to vote for him, that's your decision to make, and I can respect that. But please, don't insult my intelligence by claiming that a vote for Ron Paul is a vote for statism, because nothing could be further from the truth.

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