Keep in mind this was his Farewell Address. He was going to get his licks in, esp. that bit about "psychopathic authoritarians" (which I took to include the other members of Congress). There was absolutely no reason or incentive for him to make it shorter than the allotted time he had.
Ron Paul is the only US politician I've ever wanted to cross the street for. I'm hoping his youth movement produces more leaders who value freedom and liberty as much as he does.
Hopefully the Republicans let the libertarians take over the party by the next election, as that would probably be the only thing to make the Republican look good again. Otherwise, good riddance for the Republican party.
Do you have evidence that any form of libertarianism has a meaningful amount of support? And can it contend with the stigma developed by the insane and vocal form most people have seen?
He's one of the few politicians of that caliber where I think he's both batshit crazy while being a force for good (?) in the public sphere. I don't really know what to make of the man.
Precisely what part of Ron Paul's policies are "batshit crazy", hmmm?
Which policies, specifically? Not wanting to fund wars and nation-building in other countries? Not picking sides in foreign revolutions, operating drone wars in other countries, assassinating American citizens and maintaining a secret "kill list" without any congressional approval? Wanting to close down Guantanamo Bay? Vetoing legislation that is unconstitutional and which violates our civil rights like the PATRIOT Act and NDAA? Not wanting to maintain the security theater that is TSA?
Hell, if that's batshit crazy, then sign me up. In fact, open up one of my veins and mainline it right into my bloodstream. Because if that's crazy, America needs more of it instead of the status quo "sanity" that results in $16 trillion in unfunded liabilities, TARP, banker bailouts, Dodd-Frank, corporate welfare, the failed drug war, and continued violation of the civil liberties of ordinary citizens.
Getting red of the Fed is crazy? Wow. And a lot of those aren't policies, you know. You still haven't told me what policies I wrote about above are objectionable to you, and not preferable to the status quo.
You like the drug war? NDAA? Patriot Act? Massive debt and unfunded liabilities? Corporate welfare and bank bailouts? Constant war and policing of the globe? Secret kill lists? FBI raids of dairy farmers? Rendition and torture? Please explain to me how voting for Obama or Romney (and thus their support of those policies) is not crazy in comparison to Paul's policies. After you do that, I'll continue this conversation, but not before.
Yes, it's bananas crazy. Fiat money won everywhere because it outcompeted the gold standard just like mixed economies won everywhere because they outcompeted libertarianism. The story is the same for every single frontier town in the us, brazil and every other country -- more government or ghost town.
"And a lot of those aren't policies, you know. "
Those are all policy positions. Playing semantic games isn't going to change that.
""You still haven't told me what policies I wrote about above are objectionable to you""
Because the question was which Ron Paul policies are crazy. I answered that, don't move the goalposts.
"After you do that, I'll continue this conversation, but not before."
You seem to have mistaken my replies as leverage that you can take this subthread hostage for your tangent. I don't care if you continue. The fact that I don't like the Patriot Act and many other things the government does doesn't mean I'm ready to throw out the many good things it does which outweigh this by many orders of magnitude. I'm certainly not ready to chuck the mixed economy so we can go back to feudalism.
On top of being a clueless pie in the sky Randian, Ron Paul is a social issue troglodyte whose own newsletters and repeated ties to white supremacist groups should disqualify him from consideration for anything ever by any rational American.
The "feudalism" charge, as well as the Randian one, proves to me that you've got no bloody clue what you're talking about, either about Paul himself or economic theory. Paul is a disciple of the Austrian school and von Mises, not Rand's Objectivism. But those distinctions are lost on you and prove how little you know.
But it really doesn't matter much now, because this thread has dropped off the front page, so your ignorance and your advocacy of Federalism (and the federalistas who enforce it) can't poison the well.
Perhaps you should get back to me after you've read the books and are ready to engage in a real debate on the issues, but at this point you're wasting my time.
When your policy is to oppose absolutely everything, it sure is easy to make it sound good by listing unpopular policies, since those happen to be part of 'everything'.
But I somehow doubt that policy would stay the same if there was more than one (or now zero) of him. And I happen to like public roads, safety regulations, and currency that doesn't deflate.
The reason would be the message would be communicated better. I got lost in a few places down the page. This length might be better as the first few chapters of a book.
Ron Paul is the only US politician I've ever wanted to cross the street for. I'm hoping his youth movement produces more leaders who value freedom and liberty as much as he does.