Ron Paul Tied for Second Nationally in New ABC News/Washington Post Poll

It isn't so much that Ron Paul is rising as that Gingrich is falling, but a new ABC News/Washington Post poll out today has Ron Paul solidly tied for second with Gingrich at 16 percent, among Republican-leaning registered voters. (Paul's Real Clear Politics average over past 12 days nationally is just 13.4 percent.)

Paul only rose one percentage point since December 18 in that poll, but Gingrich dropped 14 percentage points. Santorum gained 9 and Romney 6 percentage points since that December 18 version of the poll.

Paul's next challenge: picking up votes from Santorum and Gingrich as they drop. I believe he ought to have the tax and spending and limited government bona fides to do it. A shame to that GOP vote, I guess, that Paul doesn't want to start some more wars, as we learned in South Carolina last night.

My forthcoming book Ron Paul's Revolution.

UPDATE: You might note the link to the poll above now has many of the questions and answers "held for release." You will have to take my word for now that when I made the post, that link lead to a more complete set of questions and answers that had the data I reported above. Why the Post changed the link for now I am not sure. The State also reported on those results.

UPDATE UPDATE: The link again leads to the more complete set of poll results, including the GOP presidential questions.

Comments

[Tim]

The war whores always attract substantial support.

[Episiarch]

I'm continually surprised by the number of people who really, actively want people they've never met who live in a foreign land to get bombed. I just don't get it.

[SugarFree]

Just stroke me on my war boner. Just a little. We don't have to tell anybody. It's only gay if you make it gay.

[Episiarch]

Look, I'm getting turned on. Stop it.

(Don't stop)

[Tim]

We fired our cannon 'til the barrel melted down.
So we grabbed an alligator and we fought another round.
We filled his head with cannon balls, and powdered his behind
And when we touched the powder off, the gator lost his mind.

[Chorus]

Yeah, they ran through the briars and they ran through the brambles
And they ran through the bushes where a rabbit couldn't go.
They ran so fast that the hounds couldn't catch 'em
Down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico.**

http://www.cowboylyrics.com/ly.....14929.html

[CE]

So why didn't Newt sing that when he was singing Andrew Jackson's praises?

And why didn't Ron Paul counter with the fact that Andrew Jackson shut down the Bank of the United States, and would roll over in his grave if he knew he was on a Federal Reserve Note.

[.]

For what that sonofabitch did to the Cherokee his portrait ought to be on every sheet of asswipe sold in this country.

[Loki]

I'm uncomfortablw with touching someone else's war boner, so how about a dutch rudder instead?

[Joe M]

They like people that aren't "wiffly-waffly".

In Rochester, a former mill town of 30,000 people, John Tibbets, 71, voted for Newt Gingrich "because he's going to straighten out America. He ain't like these other wiffly-waffly guys." Tibbets' priorities: "Secure the border and be tough on terrorism. ? If Iran gets nukes, I think we should nuke them. Because if we don't, I think they'll do it to us."

[Episiarch]

The wiffly-waffly shit is just their authoritarian fetish. The war boner is separate. Or maybe it isn't; maybe the dirty foreigners need to respect America's authoritah.

[AlmightyJb]

We should just nuke every country that currently doesnt have nukes before they get them and can retaliate..

[Episiarch]

Dude, you should run in the GOP primary. With a platform like that, you couldn't lose.

[AlmightyJb]

Plus, everytime I deport an immigrant I'll make them take a gay citizen back home with them.

[Episiarch]

Dude, you could be King of the Republicans.

[AlmightyJB]

I'll make all those promises and than when I win, I'll pull out my tophat and monocle and laugh maniacally.

[Jon]

LOL You, sir, have my vote!

[CE]

We should just nuke every country that currently doesnt have nukes before they get them and can retaliate..

This I fear is the real reason for the rush to war on Iran. The neocons are afraid that if they wait much longer, Iran actually might develop an effective deterrent weapon.

[GOP War Boner]

If Iran gets nukes, I think we should nuke them.

Splooge!

[Discount Double Choke]

It's sobering to realize there are millions of people out there who think just like John re: US foreign policy.

[Episiarch]

Sobering? It has the opposite effect on me: it makes me not want to be sober.

[Lost_In_Translation]

thats the problem, you have to drink more to make the thought go away.

[Cytotoxic]

John is actually already (relatively) sober compared to people here who must get off every time they get to type WAR MONGR or IMPERIALIST11. For his flaws, John can actually think and enunciate a viewpoint.

[?]

Careful, Cyto. The wits here will start calling you a griefer.

[Cytotoxic]

Oh I know. I take some comfort knowing that they've got nothing.

[Cytotoxic]

I'm continually surprised by the number of people who really, actively want people they've never met who live in a foreign land to get bombed. I just don't get it.

I'm continually surprised that people here think things like this constitute some deep thinking or trenchant remark.

[Episiarch]

That's because you're a psychopath.

[Cytotoxic]

Sure Dr. Phil I'm psycho. This doesn't make your faux-profound statement any less weapons-grade stupid.

[Blast from the past]

B+

[Pajamas]

It amazes me that these people almost always identify themselves as "Christians".

Religion of peace my ass.

[.]

Religion of Peace? Thought that was Islam.

[Joe M]

Maybe Paul could start lying and say yeah maybe we really do need to blow up more brown people. Then he can go back on his word when elected. Voters apparently love that.

[Tim]

Apparently it has something to do with Andrew Jackson...

[Fist of Etiquette]

Tied with Gingrich? Yuck.

[Joe M]

With Santorum behind.

[Tim]

Human Centipede 3 : The GOP contenders.

FEED HER NEWT! FEED HER!

[Tim]

Man I grossed myself out. I'm calling it a day.

[Lost_In_Translation]

dude, sounds like you need to self-medicate.

[Ken E.]

One letter from the Comments section on this FrontPage Magazine article:

Ron Paul demonstrated two utterly horrifying principles, tonight...

(1) Openly proclaiming he would pick and choose what qualifies as 'military spending' and 'defence spending'. An utter and total lack of comprehension that the Department of Defence administers ALL military activities.

This is especially worrying, since it confirms the consequences of his earlier debate statements, where he's been very open about how "the Defence Department needs to learn what defence means" and has, effectively, stated that all means of force projection would immediately be trashed: ANYTHING with a primary mission of force projection would be scrapped and the associated specialists mostly given retirement or, for a minority, retrained to completely different technical fields.

Things like that can't simply be built up at a moment's notice. Look at China's attempts to build a carrier force. You can't just dump a load of sailors and pilots on it and expect the thing to work. There are very specialist areas you need to first build up experience in - and this takes years. That's why the our Royal Navy, here in the UK, is having to keep pilots and such constantly deployed on US carriers, so that those skills don't go to waste while we build our carrier capability back up.

And yes, that means Ron Paul would, in effect, scrap carriers - as well as their associated escorts. He doesn't believe in force projection, after all. He wants to lock the US military into a purely border defence role. Possibly keeping a few ISBNs on, but I'm not sure he'd even do that much (and if that IS the extent of it, it means he'd be forcing himself and any future President into an option of doing nothing or unleashing nuclear war against an aggressor). After all, he only refers to the money which can be saved when speaking of withdrawal of all global military assets. Not national security concerns.

And since he wants to do that, this likewise demonstrates no appreciation for how the US Navy polices sea lanes for trade.

One is reminded of an earlier debate where he openly stated a similar state of confusion about why US troops are stationed in South Korea. Effectively saying he thought they, too, should be 'brought home'... Some might applaud that on impulse, but the logical conclusion of this is that he would TEAR UP TREATIES WITH STRATEGIC ALLIES, essentially stabbing them in the back and putting financial greed ahead of pragmatic responsibility.

This statement, alleging a supposed difference between 'military' and 'defence' spending (and saying it in such a way as he expected the moderator to be aware of this) means, if implemented, he would be completely at liberty to classify any military asset he wanted to be rid of as 'military spending', scrap it, make the personnel unemployed and then claim he was being 'consistent'.

(2) The other alarming statement I noticed was in not realising why the Taliban were fought against. He stated a belief that they're somehow different to Al Qaeda, not realising (or showing a worrying lack of memory) how they were allied to and supported/housed Al Qaeda for years. They're wrapped so closely into one another that they're more or less the same entity. For him not to understand this is, to say the least, highly puzzling. His view of the Taliban is that they should be left alone and that they're merely resisting outside influence... Makes me wonder what he thought they were up to before September the 11th.

Things like these are as bad as his response on a previous debate, stating opposition to a security fence with Mexico, not on a principled moral stand of some sort, but on the rather bizarre ideal that he felt it would be use to somehow imprison citizens within the US if the economy collapsed... Yet, surprisingly, none of his opponents challenged him on this.

[Jon]

Apparently "offensive" and "defensive" are now synonyms. That's it, I'm suing my grade school teachers for teaching me they were antonyms.

[Mr. Chartreuse]

The letter writer also seems to think you can't use carriers in a defensive role, which come as a surprise to the US carrier force at the Battle of Midway.

[CE]

Sort of like how the War Department became the Department of Defense, but now it's really more like the war department again?

[Spoonman.]

I like how Expert-Man here can't spell "Defense."

[Lost_In_Translation]

my god, limeys are invading!!!

[pmains]

Not to mention, I think he means ICBMs. Either that, or he is terribly concerned a Ron Paul presidencies what abolish the "International Standard Book Number" system. That actually wouldn't surprise me give many of the hysterical memes going around.

[sasob]

I like how Expert-Man here can't spell "Defense."

He spells it correctly for a Britisher.

[LilDebbie]

underlying this entire comment is the unstated assumption that attacks against our "strategic interests" aka vassal states is an attack on the homeland.

and you know what, i'd be right there with that dumb hick if our vassals actually paid some gorram tribute, but we decided to one up rome in foreign policy failure by invading other countries in order to give them money. christ, how stupid are we?

[OWS VPS]

Just when you thought climate denial hadn't already pervaded every arena of public and private life...

Texas and Louisiana have introduced education standards that require educators to teach climate change denial as a valid scientific position.
The LA Times story has more:

Although scientific evidence increasingly shows that fossil fuel consumption has caused the climate to change rapidly, the issue has grown so politicized that skepticism of the broad scientific consensus has seeped into classrooms.
Texas and Louisiana have introduced education standards that require educators to teach climate change denial as a valid scientific position. South Dakota and Utah passed resolutions denying climate change. Tennessee and Oklahoma also have introduced legislation to give climate change skeptics a place in the classroom.

...

NCSE, a small, nonpartisan group of scientists, teachers, clergy and concerned individuals, rose to prominence in the last decade defending evolution in the curriculum.

The controversy around "climate change education is where evolution was 20 years ago," said Eugenie Scott, executive director of NCSE.

At that time, evolution ? the long-tested scientific theory that varieties of life forms emerged through biological processes like natural selection and mutation ? was patchily taught. Teaching standards have been developed since then, but it's unclear how widely evolution is taught, given teachers' fear of controversy.

Studies show that teachers often set aside evolution for fear of a backlash. Scott worries this could happen with climate science too.

"The question is self-censorship and intimidation. What you have to watch for is the 'hecklers' veto,' " she said. "If a teacher ignores a particular topic, it will likely go unnoticed."

One thing I've noticed is that a small minority of voices, when well positioned, can stymie the voices of reason. Conservative ideologues have been filling the school boards, city councils, etc. for too long---it's a stealth campaign that's been going on for years now, and it's working. They're changing the curriculum in schools, funding priorities in cities away from public institutions and public services (say, public transit), etc.

There's two direct responses (and many more indirect responses) to this sort of action:

1. Run for elected office. Yeah, it's crazy, but why not? I'm talking about starting small: school board, city committees, city council, maybe even mayor.

2. Talk about climate change. Talk about energy problems. They're counting on the silence of the 63% of Americans who know the planet is warming.

This latter point bears some repeating. Denialists of basic, established science like evolution and climate change are counting on us to not speak up. They're looking to muddy the waters, to make the issue seem taboo, without consensus or merit. Everyone knows the old argument---we don't "teach both sides" of the theory of gravity.

There was a good piece at Climate Pirate making the case that speaking up is the most important step:

Let's circle back to Climate Change. Many are worried about it, as well we should be. But we're also too quiet. Nearly all of the non-experts I know who care about Climate Change avoid it for fear of feather-ruffling. Even many experts keep quiet.
A key point is that those who want action on Climate Change outnumber those who don't, and it has been so for years. This means the pro-action side can dominate if we choose. We have only to raise our voices.

So the most important thing each of us, as individuals, can do is speak up and convince others to as well. This goes especially for everyday folks who aren't already considered partisans. Everyone expects Al Gore to talk Climate Change, so that's nothing new, but if someone who's never spoken up before suddenly starts, ears will perk.

Beware: others will try to discourage you, often with good intentions. I recently listened to a marketing pro tell a sustainability group to avoid mentioning Climate Change because it's too divisive. It's common marketing advice and it's wrong. Creating change isn't like selling widgets. The obstacles to success are different. Pepsi lovers don't feel pressure to avoid talking about or drinking Pepsi in the presence of Coke drinkers, for example. Marketing pros aren't aware of the silence problem so they give bad advice.

The silence problem can only be fixed through exposure. Every time I speak plainly, a listener feels freer to follow suit. Our silence allows deniers to advertise their beliefs and implies to the undecided that there's no problem.

[AlmightyJb]

Also. ManBearPig.

[kilroy]

Fuck off slaver.

[Mike M.]

A Storm with Historic Potential: A storm of possibly historic proportions is crashing into the Pacific Northwest. Seattle could see more than six inches of snow...

Keep in mind, average annual snowfall is only 2.4" in Portland and 5.9" in Seattle, so these amounts are very significant for these metro areas! According to the National Weather Service in Seattle, Wash., snow amounts from this storm could exceed anything seen since November 1985 at Sea-Tac airport.

[Mr. FIFY]

Fuckin' Occutards. How do they work?

[LilDebbie]

the climate hasn't changed in 15 years.

[Rich]

22. (ASKED OF LEANED REPUBLICANS) Are there any of these candidates you would definitely NOT support for the nomination for president? (MULTIPLE RESPONSES ACCEPTED.)

1/15/12
Ron Paul 26
Newt Gingrich 23
Rick Perry 16
Rick Santorum 11
Jon Huntsman 9
Mitt Romney 8
None of these 32
No opinion 7

So, Paul is tied with Gingrich in another way.

This is a "scientific" indication of what I have found anecdotally: Many people are apparently genuinely afraid of a Paul presidency.

[Pro Libertate]

As well they should be.

[ryan]

People like routines, even if that some times means doing the same stupid thing repeatedly.

Also, the past tense of "lead" is "led", Brian.

[CE]

Or in other words, 74 percent is Ron Paul's real ceiling, and he could in fact win the nomination.

[LilDebbie]

in other words, 26% of republicans cling to their defense contracts and agricultural subsidies.

[.]

Well hell, that's because they support free enterprise and capitalism. /sarc

[underpants gnomes]

Step 3 ????
Step 4 drive a prius

[Mr. FIFY]

HuffPo brings forth the stoopid, Reich-style:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....o&ir=Yahoo

[Old Mexican]

A shame to that GOP vote, I guess, that Paul doesn't want to start some more wars, as we learned in South Carolina last night.

Leave aside the fact that the GOP just wants to kill brown people, they are also into Marxian semantic rearrangements, to wit:

Bill O'Reilly just said on television that drug dealing IS a violent crime, pretty much redefining the meaning of the word "violence" just to criticize a presidential candidate's stance on the drug war.

[genie's ass]

Do you really think the GOP cares whether they are brown - or black or white? Besides - "little brown people" have been doing a pretty good job of killing each other for centuries. So have the black and the white peoples.

[wink]

I am seeking the right man who can give me a real love, so I joined in the Seekcasual*com.(user name winklin)It's the first and best club for man and woman finding their intimate encounters. Well, you do not have to be lonely ,for you can meet the Mr. or Miss. Right there!!

[Nathan]

Second place doesn't mean much in this even as it does in Miss America. If Miss America drops out, the runner up gets her crown. If Mitt drops out, it goes to convention (sooner) or his VP nominee (later) -- neither resulting in a Paul nomination.

Now, for the long game this is good for Paul and his movement, but it means nothing for the 2012 race.

[womanforpaul]

Ron Paul, a patriot, who has honorably served his country, defends both the constitution and civil liberties, and is for peace and prosperity. Dr. Paul has the wisdom, foresight, honesty and integrity to be president.

Dr. Paul believes spending and deficits are destroying this country. Dr. Paul's budget plan would save $1 trillion in the first year. Besides the spending cuts, there are other issues of importance to voters. For conservatives, Dr. Paul scores an A+ on all of them: Second Amendment protection, pro-life record, right-to-work, pro-business, anti-tax, states' rights, you name it.

Dr. Paul also believes America should have the strongest national defense on earth ? which he believes begins with not trying to constantly police the earth. Right now, our government puts our best and bravest in harm's way on a regular basis for questionable reasons and with no discernible notion of victory. This is not supporting the troops. It's abusing them. Dr. Paul wants an end to this absurd, costly policy.

The voters have declared Dr. Paul the alternative to the liberal, flip flopping Mitt Romney. The other candidates are simply irrelevant. In the New Hampshire Primary, Dr. Paul received more votes than all the supposed Anti-Romney (Santorum, Gingrich, and Perry) candidates combined.

The question for Republican voters is not whether they can afford to vote for Dr. Paul - it's whether they can afford not to.

America Needs Ron Paul.

[Mike D]

America will become irrelevant. Hosts of examples where America cannot 'win'. I'm amazed Americans think 1.5 billion Muslim people living by the standard of get out! America or anyone else.. can be defeated in a military manner. How ignorant do people need to be of any view other than their own..
We cannot 'defeat' Afghan anymore than N. Vietnam. Try and get it, they have all the time, we have little, and little money left.
All through history Imperial countries have failed, ALL have failed. We will fail, it does not work just because your in the biggest one yet.
It's time people understand the the rest of the world(85%) loves America but the whole world(85%) hates American Imperialism.

America thinks it can mainain it's relavance at the point of a gun no matter what it costs, completely ignoring history for thousands of years showing sooner or later a country goes broke, its Imperialism fails.MSM doesn't care to explain History, just how much koolaid can be drank.

It used to be, "the more you pay attention, the less you actually know". Thus it's important to watch this clip.Realize you are being directed on your vote..The directors are not about you.
Because where you pay attention is all that matters now. 6 companies own the MSM.
Every single person should review this clip, then take measure once again.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_lYGyIaK80