Is the hardcore minarcy content in Ron Pauls speaches a bad strategy?

[Nielsio]

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You're assuming he can, if elected, make all the changes he advocates. Congressional resistance would slow his progress getting much actually done. Changes will still be slow. It would be sweet, though, to see blanket pardons for nonviolent drug users and tax evaders...

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yeah. Wait till issues like this ROAST him in the general election if he pulls a miracle win in the primary.

Pretend for a minute that he does win the primary. Suddenly the news will be scrambling to find out what he stands for and what libertarianism stands for. The drug issue alone will kill him, unfortunately.

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..and we'll have a national debate about liberty. Which is exactly what we need.

[Richard Tanner]

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You're assuming he can, if elected, make all the changes he advocates. Congressional resistance would slow his progress getting much actually done. Changes will still be slow. It would be sweet, though, to see blanket pardons for nonviolent drug users and tax evaders...

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yeah. Wait till issues like this ROAST him in the general election if he pulls a miracle win in the primary.

Pretend for a minute that he does win the primary. Suddenly the news will be scrambling to find out what he stands for and what libertarianism stands for. The drug issue alone will kill him, unfortunately.

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..and we'll have a national debate about liberty. Which is exactly what we need.

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No we won't.

Cody

[troymclur]

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You're assuming he can, if elected, make all the changes he advocates. Congressional resistance would slow his progress getting much actually done. Changes will still be slow. It would be sweet, though, to see blanket pardons for nonviolent drug users and tax evaders...

[/ QUOTE ]

yeah. Wait till issues like this ROAST him in the general election if he pulls a miracle win in the primary.

Pretend for a minute that he does win the primary. Suddenly the news will be scrambling to find out what he stands for and what libertarianism stands for. The drug issue alone will kill him, unfortunately.

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..and we'll have a national debate about liberty. Which is exactly what we need.

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I don't think there will be much debate. Just look at how people reacted to his statements about 9/11. A small handful of pundits and reporters actually heard him correctly, and an even smaller group gave his ideas proper thought. Just imagine the fallout of a man wanting to "Surrender our children to the Cartels".

[ShakeZula06]

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Personally, I think it's a battle of ideas. And in that regard, I think he isn't radical enough. But we're in tricky waters here, because the path he's going might be the only one to stop imminent fascism/another war.

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All I'm rooting here is exposure of libertarian ideas. The fact is no one is excited about Rudy McRomney. When Ron Paul came out and spoke the truth about our foreign policy, and about other issues such as the inflation tax people have gotten excited about it. People are talking about this guy and his libertarian principles and other then those who have completly bought into the MSM he is getting support (let's remember by text message he won the Republican debate).

Whether he wins the nomination or not (don't count on it, if all else fails I'm sure they can just rig the election) getting his principles out there to the drones that only watch the MSM is good for libertarianism, decentralization, and liberty.

[Richard Tanner]

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Whether he wins the nomination or not (don't count on it, if all else fails I'm sure they can just rig the election) getting his principles out there to the drones that only watch the MSM is good for libertarianism, decentralization, and liberty.

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Damn, that's cynical even for me. The won't rig it because they won't have to, a large portion of Red voters don't text, but they do vote. No way he wins the Nom, but hopefully he can get some votes and inspire people like him to run in the future.

Cody

[hmkpoker]

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I personally do think he's radical enough...the implications of everything he argues is for anarcho-capitalism. He has to dress it in minarchy to be allowed on the stage.

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It's all very very tricky.

On the one hand he is saying: stop believing in government. On the other hand he is saying: believe in government again (and support me as I use government to make the world a better place).


Personally I'd like to know if he actually is an anarchist. It could be that he is a 'decentralist', which is what a number of Mises fellows call for.

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I agree.

I'm not sure what Ron Paul actually believes. He is a strong, outspoken defender of the constitution, but he's also very well-versed in Austrian economics. I have difficulty believing that he didn't encounter the anti-liberty constitutional dilemmas when he was hanging out with Murray Rothbard.

However, I think that, even if he is strongly anarchist-leaning, he is smart enough to realize that a true "strike the root" campaign will get him and the cause of liberty absolutely no attention. (He has to have some knowledge of campaigning, because he's an elected official.)

He may not be up there calling for a dissolving of the federal government, but he is getting the message out that we need less government and not more. That's an important paradigm shift, and probably the most important first step for the status quo. It is much easier to turn them against being taxed, counterfeited, overregulated and oppressed than it is to turn people against a nebulous concept like statism or collectivism.