It must be all that sun and sex with women that contaminated Ron Paul’s purity. Stay inside, champ. We can’t afford to lose you in this battle.
Why are you so certain that it wasn’t to maintain credibility and to prevent people from being scared off?
That’s precisely my point. Shrinking from the truth for popularity is exactly what weak-willed people do.
People are ready enough to call him and his followers insane crackpots without him directly endorsing anarchism.
And rightly so—statism is indefensible, and so when you get into supporting something as corrupt and inconsistent and lunatic as government then you might as well go mainstream. At least anti-statism can have powerful arguments. My point is that RP could have done things differently while making it clear that no government is preferable to government and less government is preferable to more. He could have waited until the last TV debate, he could still do it at his speeches. People still call his followers crackpots, and his followers are still a minority.
I’d prefer a world of minarchists and constitutionalists to the current situation.
I think Rothbard did one of the more respectable jobs of attacking the theory of constitutionally limited government. It’s a myth. A world of minarchists is a world of relatively intelligent people fierce enough to defend statism against liberty—meanwhile the state grows.
@ Groucho
I don’t get it, what was that reason?
Oh and speaking of old sitcoms, Drake and Josh is a classic in that department.
@ Neodoxy
Hey, I watch Wallace and Gromit and play Halo in my spare time. We’re both really cool.
Oh and by the way, while we’re talking about Ron Paul’s consistant contributions to libertarianism:
Lmao, oh, we were all fans 
What about Miranda Cosgrove-
Never mind.
Wow that video was intense… I wish that we could see debates like that nowadays… And smoke on TV and in buildings… I wonder how they host felt about libertarians after they made him put that one away. I also hope that the annoying (liberal? I don’t even know) bitch learned which way was up at some point in her life
Morton “Douchebag” Downey Jr died from lung cancer from being a chain smoker, which is something Ron Paul warned him about. And most of the people in the audience have since been institutionalized.
Pardon my french Hashem, but this is the dumbest criticism of Ron Paul I’ve ever heard.
Tricking his followers into believing that liberty is limited-government? Haven’t you heard the clips in which he endorses voluntarism? Has he ever disavowed anarchism? He frequently references murray rothbard and the ludwig von mises institute. You don’t think it’s possible that maybe he’s pushing people toward anarchism by referencing the premiere AnCap propaganda base? No certainly not, he’s pushing for strict minarchism by citing nearly exclusively material written by anarchists. If he had begun by ‘speaking the truth’ his audience would be maybe a millionth of what it is now. Who does more for anarchism: he who shouts ‘end the state!’ at the camera and never gets invited back to anything ever again, or he who consistently extols hard money, peace, and free markets and then gains a much larger audience who become philosophically inspired to investigate the logical conclusion of such recommendations?
The dumbest criticism of Ron Paul you’ve heard? I’d like to hear the better ones.
Haven’t you heard the clips in which he endorses voluntarism?
Oh, you mean the ones that only a tiny fraction of his supporters have ever seen or will ever care about? I know a lot of Ron Paul supporters personally. NONE of them are anarchists, NONE of them are likely to become anarchists any time soon, all of them endorse political actvism, and they’d be duly shocked if you tried to convince them RP is an anarchist. Why? Because his message is liberty is limited government.
the people he picks for his campaign staff? Putting his name on newsletters he didnt approve beforehand? Not taking a pension? Being too modest, and not talking about his record (elected to federal office ten times, gave a crap ton of money back, has the most consistent voting record, gets most money from military, gets his money from individuals, not lobbyists) more?
its not like Dr. Ron Paul the ob-gyn was going to get the 17 year old skater vote by being more radical anyway. When you run for public office, which you have made clear you hate the idea of, you have to appeal to a variety of people inorder to get elected, especially within a major party. He is also a social conservative, so whatever it is you want him to do, if its more radical than slashing medicare (Paul wants a gradualist approach starting with an opt-out) then I would like to see it.
the 17 year old vote
Did I miss something?
When you run for public office, which you have made clear you hate the idea of, you have to appeal to a variety of people inorder to get elected
I’m not opposed to anarchists running for office on anarchist principles. Yes, I’m opposed to whoring and selling out for political power.
so whatever it is you want him to do
He still has potential for a decent audience. Ron Paul needs to eat sleep and drink Molyneux for a couple months and take some debating classes. Then he needs to fiercely, relentlessly attack statism on moral, economic, and historical (practical) grounds until he stops being a public figure. There’s still a chance for him to salvage what’s left of his legacy.
I cant tell if youre putting me on or not
I acknowledge your surrender.
hashem you’ve probably got to admit that this is an idiotic thing to say.
Molyneux is not that great. Plus, he disagrees with your “running for office” sentiment, so I’m not even sure what people are to take away from it.
I feel like I’ve seen a lot of debates and lectures and speeches. Molyneux is absolutely brilliant at selling anarchism—downright the best, without exception to my knowledge. In my perfect world Ron Paul would get over himself, and drown in Molyneux’s arguments and counters and rhetoric and presentation charisma. Then he’d be honest and absolutely shock crowds with genius, the way that made him so great in the first place. Other than that I don’t know what you mean by the idiotic comment.
I’m not gonna bother debating you on Molyneux. His philosophic structure is weak and he thinks he can make the case for objective morals ( which is just absurd).
Hashem says:
Ahem. 'Nuff said.
Ya libertarians are ridiculous because they claim to want liberty and run for office to limit government. I’m not against someone who’s an outspoken anarchist running for office on anarchist principles—that he will do everything in his power to dismantle as much government as possible, not because less government is better, but because government is wrong, impractical, and uneconomic.
But would it not be fraud when they swear to protect and defend the Constitution yadayadayada?
Molyneux’s eloquent and intelligent for sure. But usually his arguments only work insofar as you let yourself be continually pigeon-holed by his narrow morality. For instance, with his Sam Seder debate he should have been stronger on economic points like social security. I know Uncle Milty was awesome at selling state-free-market capitalism, I wonder if his son is awesome at selling stateless capitalism.
Could you explain what you mean here?