http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/inside-politics/2011/feb/10/trump-ron-paul-has-zero-chance/
Trump sees Ron Paul as having zero chance of being elected.
I don’t know if I’d say zero (I mean, aliens could abduct everyone else or something), but it is vanishingly small.
I’m OK with that.
Says the douche who benefitted from Statist policies like Rent Controls and easy credit. People like Trump would be broke if Ron became President.
If Ron Paul became President, he would have power and thus would be forced to compromise his principles.
I used to think that Newt Gingrich had zero chance of ever winning an election. And he’d get on the TV, clueless to his own lack of popularity. Saying this and that with the type of presumption you’d never expect from a guy who has been irrelevant for more than a decade.
But now that Trump is on TV pandering to the GOP and making ‘if I run…’ promises, as if anyone cares, I’m starting see Newt as almost a superstar compared to Trump.
Didn’t that already happen?
Not really.
Okay, then what power would he have as the president which would make him “compromise his principles”?
Say he wants to get rid of the Fed. He says to Congress, “Hey, let’s get rid of the Fed.” Congress will either reply:
a) No. In this case Ron Paul can maintain his principles ("I tried!) but has no power.
or
b) Yes–but only if we create an even better kind of monetary cartel that gives us even more control over the economy. He gets his power, but his principles go bye-bye.
Essentially, if he wants to get anything done, he will have to make compromises with people who have very different principles and goals. You think Obama likes the health insurance companies? You think he thinks sugar tariffs and farm subsidies are great ideas? You think he sits in the Oval Office thinking, “Hey, I wonder how I can advance corporatism and promote the special interest groups over the general welfare”? He does what he does because that’s the incentives politicians face. One of the oldest lessons of classical liberalism is that WHO is in charge is much less important than what they can do and to what extent they bear the consequences of their actions.
Oh, and he’s a politician. He steals for a living. He’s part of the system. He’s a slaver. He rules others. He wants power. How is he not a monster? It must be nice to be able to give grand speeches about how great freedom is while bending others to one’s will.
Wait, why exactly would he agree to creating “an even better kind of monetary cartel”?
Right–either principles or power. They’re mutually exclusive.
So you’re not saying that he would be forced to compromise his principles?
No. He just wouldn’t accomplish anything. At best he would retain the status quo–which would make him a corporate sell-out anyway.
Principles and politics don’t mix.
I watched part of Trump’s embarrassing speech (I was waiting to listen to Rand Paul). From what I heard, he seems to be ignorant of the most basic principles of economics. Trump went on a tirade against OPEC, accusing them of raising oil prices and criticizing Obama because he allegedly refused to pressure OPEC to sell oil below the market price. Trump also complained about how oil prices go up whenever there is a disruption in the supply of oil.
As we know, oil prices have been going up because of Ben Bernanke’s printing press and because of disruptions in oil production (such as the BP oil spill and the demagogic reaction to this oil spill by environmentalists and pro-environmentalist politicians). What was disturbing is that some of the “conservatives” at the CPAC conference actually cheered for Trump (I guess because they hate the “Islamo-Fascists” in the Middle East, are economically ignorant, and because Trump was taking shots at the “towelheads”).
I think Trump is wrong regarding Ron Paul’s chances. I believe Ron Paul can win, although his supporters will need to make sure to pack the caucuses and he will need to pick up some narrow wins in “winner-take-all” primary elections. The alleged “frontrunner” Mitt Romney is very vulnerable, due to his Romneycare health care law, which is virtually identical to the one that nearly 100% of Republican voters want repealed. His record as governor of Massachusetts is remarkably similar to the record that Barack Obama would have if he was governor of Illinois. Romney has been running from most of his record for 4 years now, but he still refuses to admit that he was wrong on his health care law. His “No Apology” attitude means that he probably won’t be the nominee. Sarah Palin would be a strong candidate, but everybody, including most Tea Partiers, knows she can’t win a general election (the argument with Ron Paul is that he “can’t win” the nomination; nobody makes the case that he can’t beat Obama). The rest of the field will likely include a long list of candidates that will siphon off votes from one another. I can see Herman Cain and Mitch Daniels (among others) competing for the moderate fiscal conservative votes, while the likes of Huckabee, Palin, and Rick Santorum will splinter the Christian Right vote. The most bloodthirsty of Neo-Cons will likely vote for either Romney or Rudy Giuliani or John Bolten or some other warmongering big government Neo-Con. Some of them might support Palin or Santorum.
If the libertarian movement is unified around Ron Paul, I think it is possible that he can narrowly win a number of “winner-take-all” primaries. If he were to win in the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary (as far as I’m concerned, this is make-or-break for the Free State Project, which needs to prove its effectiveness at doing something more significant than getting arrested for such “civil disobedience” as having an illegal couch in the yard or “disrupting” city council meetings), then that would give him momentum. Once Ron Paul proves that he “can win,” I think many more people will be willing to support him. As far as I’m concerned, there is no valid excuse whatsoever for anybody who claims to be a libertarian to not vote for Ron Paul. Those holier-than-thou “left-sectarians” (Murray Rothbard created this term, but it is ironic that the “left-sectarians” usually call themselves “left-libertarians”) who consider the act of voting to be a violation of libertarian principle are just as bad as the Beltway libertarians (“right-opportunists” in Rothbardian terminology) who slandered Ron Paul in 2008.
Gipper, can you expand? Are you saying he would have used the low interest rates to give sub-prime mortgages, and then he somehow got rid of them through a bailout with whatever bank he uses?
Why is expecting Ron Paul to be different from everyone who came before him not like expecting Obama to be different from everyone who came before him?
No. He just wouldn’t accomplish anything. At best he would retain the status quo–which would make him a corporate sell-out anyway.
Isn’t a sell-out someone who has compromised?
Because Ron Paul and Obama have two completely different philosophies. I’m not too much into the politics thing either, but you can’t tell me you wouldn’t prefer a president who has some background in Austrian Economics and radical libertarianism, vs just some other neocon or democrat?
Because Ron Paul and Obama have two completely different philosophies. I’m not too much into the politics thing either, but you can’t tell me you wouldn’t prefer a president who has some background in Austrian Economics and radical libertarianism, vs just some other neocon or democrat?
It doesn’t matter. The power and the incentives are the same. Those of the liberal tradition should know that it’s not a question of electing the right guy.
Put another way, Obama is really smart. Wouldn’t you rather have someone smart in charge, rather than someone like Bush, who’skinda dumb? And yet, the policies are no different. Does intelligence not affect one’s view on what is wise public policy? Or does it not matter?
Isn’t a sell-out someone who has compromised?
Yeah–he’s a politician. He lives by robbing others. He uses force to make people do things they don’t want to do. Being President of the United States would make him Head Honcho of the biggest criminal gang in history.
I see no difference between the libertarian affection for Ron Paul and the liberal worship of Barack Obama.
Track record?