A Preview of the Ron Paul Administration

David Weigel | April 25, 2007

Ron Paul dropped by Grover Norquist's notorious/legendary (depending on whether you're reading about it via Nina Easton or via the American Spectator) Wednesday meeting this morning. Phil Klein has details:

Paul, who just signed Norquist's taxpayer protection pledge, said that in order to win a candidate has to be able to put together a coalition of Christian conservatives and economic libertarians.

I attended a breakfast with Mike Huckabee about 48 hours ago, where he argued that, no, a socially conservative statist candidate is the best equipped to win the presidency for the GOP. Usually, I think Huckabee would be right.

On foreign policy, his main point of departure from the Republican base, Paul said that traditionally, the Republican Party has been one of peace and it has historical won elections by beating Democrats who got America too involved overseas. Republicans cannot win in 2008 by sticking with a position on Iraq that is opposed by 70 percent of Americans, he said.

That's why I said "usually." Of course the likelihood of the GOP nominating Paul or another candidate who opposes the mainstream GOP Iraq policy is basically nil.

In addition, Paul advocated talking to Iran and Syria, and said that the people who accuse those who oppose the war of being isolationists are actually "diplomatic isolationists." Paul also said that our current policy toward Israel does the Israelis no favors, and if we stopped sending them money it would encourage them to speak with "moderate Arabs."

From the way Klein tells it, it doesn't sound like Paul got the best reception. He should trot out some of these lines at a liberal coffee klatsch. You know, one that Bill Maher isn't at.

Comments

cls|4.25.07 @ 5:27PM|#

An alliance between "Christian conservatives" and "economic libertarians?" What about full libertarians and not just "economic" ones? I suspect thats he'll be redefining libertarianism more and more in a Right wing populist way. He already has his excuses in place to to be protectionist while claiming he isn't. He already has his excuses in place as why he's going after illegal immigrants. When people suck up the Southern Theocrats they end up betraying liberty and finding excuses for it.

|4.25.07 @ 5:29PM|#

Your link does not take me to Phil Klein's post.

|4.25.07 @ 5:31PM|#

Maybe Norquist is hoping that Paul is opposed to money laundering laws.

|4.25.07 @ 5:34PM|#

"Paul also said that our current policy toward Israel does the Israelis no favors, and if we stopped sending them money it would encourage them to speak with "moderate Arabs."

Yeah, the Israelis have never talked to moderate Arabs. I guess Ron missed that whole Camp David thing in the 1970s and the Oslo accords in the 1990s. Of course U.S. support of Isreal didn't stop the Israelis from making peace with Egypt and Jordan and giving everthing but the kitchean sink the Arrafat at Oslo.

Notice that Paul says nothing about getting the Arabs to speak to the Israelis. In Paul's world the entire conflict is apparently the fault of the Israelis who insist on living in a state of constant war with otherwise peace loving moderate Arabs. If only the Israelis would talk to the moderate Arabs, you know the ones in Syria and Saudi Arabia and Iran whose government approved Imams call for the death of all Jews daily during services, the whole thing would be solved. The entire thing is just those pesky Israelis fault for insisting on having a country I guess.

Paul is an ignoramous of monumental proportion. That statement is so stupid it doesn't even qualify as wrong.

|4.25.07 @ 5:36PM|#

I agree with Ron Paul that the U.S. should stop giving money to Israel. But those that think it will calm down Israel are saddly mistaken. It is the fear of losing U.S. backing that has kept Israel at the table so long. Since even the U.N. has arguably endorced the destruction of Israel, and that there is virtually nothing diplomaticly that anyone else could do to Israel that they haven't already done... pulling U.S. backing from Israel would be a licence to fuck up all it's neighboring countries before the Israeli military run out of spare parts for their fighter jets or whatnot.

I have to also agree with Dave... Economic Libertarianism is dead in the GOP. The Republicans have 100% abandoned any sort of concept of limited government or economic freedom. The GOP are pro-war socialists. On economic issues, such as allowing people to invest part of their SS withholdings, the GOP is somewhere to the left of the Swedish Social Democratic Party (and I am not being sarcastic).

|4.25.07 @ 6:03PM|#

"Paul also said that our current policy toward Israel does the Israelis no favors, and if we stopped sending them money it would encourage them to speak with "moderate Arabs."

"Yeah, the Israelis have never talked to moderate Arabs."

You know those statements aren't the same thing, right?

Jammer|4.25.07 @ 6:06PM|#

I just want to know why Ron was on the Alex Jones show a week or so back. Does he know who Jones is? I know candidates often have to deal with people they would rather avoid sometimes, but Alex freakin' Jones?

|4.25.07 @ 6:12PM|#

When talking about Israel's position, it's important to remember that it's a democratic government like ours, with open and often contentious debate among various factions about the peace process.

Talking about how to influence its policies isn't a matter of manipulating some dictator or the only legal party, like when we talk about Syria.

ktc2|4.25.07 @ 6:19PM|#

Re-creating Israel was a mistake.

Continuing to support it financially is a mistake.

Way past time to sink or swim on their own.

|4.25.07 @ 6:34PM|#

Paul, who just signed Norquist's taxpayer protection pledge, said that in order to win a candidate has to be able to put together a coalition of Christian conservatives and economic libertarians.

So Paul's message for libertarians who realize that "freedom" doesn't just mean gun ownership and lower taxes is "Fuck you."

|4.25.07 @ 7:01PM|#

I believe Paul's message is that one doesn't have to be a pot-smoking, atheistic *SouthPark* watcher in order to believe in liberty. Nor is it necessary to slap one's thighs and laugh hysterically whenever anyone expresses concern about the state of morality in the US. It isn't even necessary to spell "Jesus" as "Jeebus," or to assume that Thomas Aquinas and Isaac Newton were idiots because they believed in God.

|4.25.07 @ 7:29PM|#

I believe Paul's message is that one doesn't have to be a pot-smoking, atheistic *SouthPark* watcher in order to believe in liberty.

If expanding freedom is his goal, then what is Paul doing with "a coalition of Christian conservatives and economic libertarians...?"

Since you don't "have to be a pot-smoking, atheistic *SouthPark* watcher in order to believe in liberty," Maybe he should consider expanding his vote to the white supremacists and the Islamic fundamentalists too. We know how much they love freedom too, right?

Every little vote helps.

Nor is it necessary to slap one's thighs and laugh hysterically whenever anyone expresses concern about the state of morality in the US.

Then maybe the JEEZ-us 'tards should stop being so damn funny when they're out saving us from their temptation.

It isn't even necessary to spell "Jesus" as "Jeebus..."

Your right, we should be spelling it "Mythical Folk Hero Invented By A Two Bit Mystery Religion Who Would Have Faded Into Obscurity If It Weren't For The Fucking Romans And That Sexist Bastard Saul."

On second thought, Jeebus saves on bandwidth.

...or to assume that Thomas Aquinas and Isaac Newton were idiots because they believed in God.

Let's see, Old Tommy A. thought that heretics out to be put to death and that un-caused caused started the universe without a shred of evidence. Brilliant.

And while Newton could certainly put two-and-two together, he also bought into astrology, alchemy, and that powered unicorn horn could be used as an anecdote to poison. Proving that a broken clock only right twice a day and in spite of itself.

|4.25.07 @ 7:34PM|#

I think the US should give Israel a deadline by which they have to leave the occupied territories, partition Jerusalem, discontinue building settlements, offer right of return to Palestinian refugees and negotiate peace treaties with the Arab countries. If the deadline comes and Israel has not met those conditions, the US will supply their enemies with the same military hardware, technology and funding that we have given them. Perhaps if Israel faces a war against an enemy also equipped with US weapons and training they will voluntarily end their abusive, apartheid regime and deal honestly with the Palestinians and their Arab neighbors. If that doesn't work, then we take our cues from the Iraq war and enforce a policy of regime change in Israel and install our own puppet government. It is no longer in our interests to give special treatment to Israel at the expense of our own security.

|4.25.07 @ 7:37PM|#

akira,

It's almost embarrassing how easily you rose to my bait.

|4.25.07 @ 7:40PM|#

Seeing how the late 90's WAS a coalition of Christian conservatives and economic libertarians which led us to this awful place, for god's sake, don't get them back together. Fundamentalists hijacked the republican party and can sink into oblivion with it for all I care.

Ron Paul is making a mistake, but it hardly matters as no one was going to listen to him anyway.

|4.25.07 @ 7:42PM|#

I'd say it looks like Dr. Paul realizes that by following the Akira-endorsed method of insulting believers at every opportunity, instead of finding common ground, no candidate has a chance of success.

Does anyone here think that we will ever have a militant atheist president?

|4.25.07 @ 7:44PM|#

So Paul's message for libertarians who realize that "freedom" doesn't just mean gun ownership and lower taxes is "Fuck you."

Or he realized that if he didn't describe them as economic libertarians, the conservatives the message was actually directed at would crap their pants.

|4.25.07 @ 8:00PM|#

Lost_In_Translation,

Economic libertarians will sink into oblivion loooonnggg before Christian conservatives do. Not my doing, I merely foretell.

|4.25.07 @ 8:18PM|#

...following the Akira-endorsed method of insulting believers at every opportunity...

As opposed to coddling, to any degree, the same "logic" that leads these believers to bomb abortion clinics and gay night clubs (or, at the very least, vote to ban abortion and gay marriage), fly airliners into skyscrapers, violently oppress women, and teach Bronze Age myths as science along with tribal bigotries from the same era as "morality? "


Does anyone here think that we will ever have a militant atheist president?

Two points:
1) We atheists can't help that most Americans believe that the "Leader of the Free World" should have their strings pulled by a suspiciously-invisible, unelected, capricious, bigoted, tyrant.

2)Why do I suspect that your definition of "militant atheist" is an atheist who dares to open their mouth in the first place?

|4.25.07 @ 8:25PM|#

Or he realized that if he didn't describe them as economic libertarians, the conservatives the message was actually directed at would crap their pants.

An apt image given that the GOP is run by a bunch Depends-clad old farts.

|4.25.07 @ 8:33PM|#

Of course, why support Ron Paul when we could all work for freedom the Akira McKenzie way.

We're only 3,492 shopworn sacreligious jokes and 82,399 childish ad hominems away from libertopia!

|4.25.07 @ 8:33PM|#

You militant atheists are never going to get people to abandon their faith and join you in the ranks of the damned with that kind of attitude.

Anybody wanna drink to that?

|4.25.07 @ 8:49PM|#

An apt image given that the GOP is run by a bunch Depends-clad old farts.

Yup. But that's all we got in the Red column. I won't pretend Team Blue is much better, but I'm willing to give the Blues a little slack for the moment for the simple reason that they aren't Reds.

|4.25.07 @ 9:09PM|#

Team Blue is chock-full of Reds, at least if we're using the cold-war definition.

ktc2|4.25.07 @ 9:45PM|#

Akira,

Yes, they are laughable and pathetic but they also outnumber us about 9 to 1. The inmates are truly running the asylum.

The Wine Commonsewer|4.25.07 @ 11:11PM|#

Screw Ron Paul, let's vote for Obama, or that guy in Virginny, now there's a couple of real libertarians.

thoreau|4.25.07 @ 11:16PM|#

Eric, you gotta lift your filters for the last few posts. There's a drinking game twist here.

The Wine Commonsewer|4.25.07 @ 11:18PM|#

Seeing how the late 90's WAS a coalition of Christian conservatives and economic libertarians which led us to this awful place....

I know, man, it was so horrifying. Federal spending cut in half, abortion outlawed, and prayer in schools ruled as constitutionally protected speech.

Got dam Christian bass turds.

|4.25.07 @ 11:50PM|#

You militant atheists are never going to get people to abandon their faith and join you in the ranks of the damned with that kind of attitude."

I believe the preferred, politically-correct term is "soteriologically-challenged."

|4.26.07 @ 1:17AM|#

" if we stopped sending them money it would encourage them to speak with "moderate Arabs." "

I hope that will include the transfers to Palestinian Authority too.

|4.26.07 @ 7:26AM|#

if we stopped sending them money it would encourage them to speak with "moderate Arabs.

Please identify the moderate Arabs who are in positions of power in the "Palestinian territories", Syria, Lebanon, Hezbollah, Hamas, and/or Iran.

|4.26.07 @ 8:24AM|#

With the US sending aid to the PA, it's supporting both sides of a conflict.

|4.26.07 @ 8:36AM|#

2)Why do I suspect that your definition of "militant atheist" is an atheist who dares to open their mouth in the first place?

Well, I'm an atheist, and I see absolutely no point in constantly degrading the 90% of the country that does believe. Then again, maybe it's because I don't have to worry about compensating for an incredibly small penis or something.

|4.26.07 @ 8:50AM|#

"The entire thing is just those pesky Israelis fault for insisting on having a country I guess."

The entire thing is just those pesky Zionists who took land away from the former inhabitants.

robc|4.26.07 @ 8:58AM|#

Rattlesnake Jake,

Is there any place in the world where the current inhabitants didnt take the land away from the former inhabitants?

ed|4.26.07 @ 9:24AM|#

Aboriginal areas in Australia?

|4.26.07 @ 9:28AM|#

The entire thing is just those pesky Zionists who took land away from the former inhabitants.

So should the U.S. be working for the destruction of Canada as well? After all, they displaced way more former inhabitants than Israel! With far greater bloodshed.

(So did the U.S. of course, but in our case it was OK, "manifest destiny" and all!)

|4.26.07 @ 9:28AM|#

The first line of the above comment was supposed to be quoted.

|4.26.07 @ 9:37AM|#

"Is there any place in the world where the current inhabitants didnt take the land away from the former inhabitants?"

There's still the issue of the Palestinians being treated as second class citizens.

|4.26.07 @ 9:45AM|#

"So should the U.S. be working for the destruction of Canada as well?"

Ever hear of Nanavut?

You can't send everybody back to their corners, but you can try to work out a just settlement that recognizes the reality of existing conditions.

|4.26.07 @ 9:54AM|#

Despite his naive predictions about Peace in the Middle East (a staple of political discourse, unfortunately), the basic Pauline message is that America should look out for her own interests, just as Israel should look out for hers.

I mean, we can sympathize with small countries seeking to preserve their existence amidst evil enemies (eg, Switzerland during the Nazi occupatio of the rest of Europe in the 1940s) without becoming allies with all those countries.

|4.26.07 @ 9:55AM|#

occupation

|4.26.07 @ 10:02AM|#

Ever hear of Nanavut?

Ever heard of New Mexico? What is your point? That the last stolen by the white people has a local government?

|4.26.07 @ 10:08AM|#

"What is your point?"

I dunno, perhaps it has something to do with "you can try to work out a just settlement that recognizes the reality of existing conditions."

|4.26.07 @ 10:22AM|#

"There's still the issue of the Palestinians being treated as second class citizens."

While where on the topic of human rights in the Middle East, check out:

http://www.hrcap.org/ENGLISH.HTM

http://www.cpj.org/regions_04/mideast_04/mideast_04.html

I'm in favor of more civil liberties for ALL Arabs.

robc|4.26.07 @ 10:48AM|#

ed,

Aboriginal areas in Australia?

I think that may be it. But, if so, what was Midnight Oil always whining about then?

|4.26.07 @ 1:04PM|#

Ron Paul is a joke candidate. A real nutbag. Will he get a single delegate, No. Rudy all the way.

|4.26.07 @ 5:31PM|#

As long as libertarians actively reject anyone marginally more religion than Ayn Rand, they will continue to lose elections. Frankly, some of you sound like you would rather live under a theocratic tyranny than to allow a Christian to vote libertarian. "We don't need Christians", you say, but that's only true if you want to remain an obscure footnote in the history of obscure political movements.

Fundamentalist Christians used to be fairly libertarian in outlook. Then along came a few statists like Falwell and Robertson, and they got bamboozled into worshipping the state instead of God. Getting the religous right back to the libertarian quadrant is certainly doable. They may never view drugs and prostitution as moral positives, but they can definitely get over the hurdle that it's not the state's job to dictate morality.