Thread: Ron Paul on the Issues

Armed Chinese Troops in Texas!

This talk is called "Imagine" and it was given by Ron Paul on March 11, 2009. The original text of the talk is below:

Imagine for a moment that somewhere in the middle of Texas there was a large foreign military base, say Chinese or Russian. Imagine that thousands of armed foreign troops were constantly patrolling American streets in military vehicles. Imagine they were here under the auspices of "keeping us safe" or "promoting democracy" or "protecting their strategic interests."

Imagine that they operated outside of US law, and that the Constitution did not apply to them. Imagine that every now and then they made mistakes or acted on bad information and accidentally killed or terrorized innocent Americans, including women and children, most of the time with little to no repercussions or consequences. Imagine that they set up checkpoints on our soil and routinely searched and ransacked entire neighborhoods of homes. Imagine if Americans were fearful of these foreign troops, and overwhelmingly thought America would be better off without their presence.

Imagine if some Americans were so angry about them being in Texas that they actually joined together to fight them off, in defense of our soil and sovereignty, because leadership in government refused or were unable to do so. Imagine that those Americans were labeled terrorists or insurgents for their defensive actions, and routinely killed, or captured and tortured by the foreign troops on our land. Imagine that the occupiers' attitude was that if they just killed enough Americans, the resistance would stop, but instead, for every American killed, ten more would take up arms against them, resulting in perpetual bloodshed. Imagine if most of the citizens of the foreign land also wanted these troops to return home. Imagine if they elected a leader who promised to bring them home and put an end to this horror.

Imagine if that leader changed his mind once he took office.

The reality is that our military presence on foreign soil is as offensive to the people that live there as armed Chinese troops would be if they were stationed in Texas. We would not stand for it here, but we have had a globe-straddling empire and a very intrusive foreign policy for decades that incites a lot of hatred and resentment towards us.

According to our own CIA, our meddling in the Middle East was the prime motivation for the horrific attacks on 9/11. But instead of re-evaluating our foreign policy, we have simply escalated it. We had a right to go after those responsible for 9/11, to be sure, but why do so many Americans feel as if we have a right to a military presence in some 160 countries when we wouldn't stand for even one foreign base on our soil, for any reason? These are not embassies, mind you, these are military installations. The new administration is not materially changing anything about this. Shuffling troops around and playing with semantics does not accomplish the goals of the American people, who simply want our men and women to come home. 50,000 troops left behind in Iraq is not conducive to peace any more than 50,000 Russian soldiers would be in the United States.

Shutting down military bases and ceasing to deal with other nations with threats and violence is not isolationism. It is the opposite. Opening ourselves up to friendship, honest trade and diplomacy is the foreign policy of peace and prosperity. It is the only foreign policy that will not bankrupt us in short order, as our current actions most definitely will. I share the disappointment of the American people in the foreign policy rhetoric coming from the administration. The sad thing is, our foreign policy WILL change eventually, as Rome's did, when all budgetary and monetary tricks to fund it are exhausted.

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Ron Paul Attracts More Than 1,450 Supporters at CMU Rally

Capacity crowd plus more drawn to ‘Soldiers, Airmen and Sailors for Ron Paul’ rally to see the sole GOP candidate to have served in the military

ANN ARBOR, Michigan – 2012 Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul again drew a capacity crowd to one of his campaign rallies, this time attracting more than 1,450 people to a military-themed rally at Central Michigan University.

The “Soldiers, Airmen and Sailors for Ron Paul” took place at 6:00 p.m. EST at CMU’s Plachta Auditorium in Warriner Hall, located on the campus in Mount Pleasant, MI 48859. Event organizers noted that the venue was filled to capacity with more than 1,300 people, while an additional 150-plus people in the hallways listened via speakers to a speech given by the 12-term Congressman from Texas.

Ron Paul addresses the capacity crowd of 1,300 at CMU.
Others listened via speakers from the campus venue’s hallways.

Ron Paul Attracts More Than 1,450 Supporters at CMU Rally*|*Ron Paul 2012 Presidential Campaign Committee

Impartial Analysis Finds Only Ron Paul Would Cut US Debt Burden


Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/23/2012 20:11 -0500

When one puts aside all the histrionics, all the melodrama, all the irrelevant secondary bullshit such as appearance, charisma, ability to tele-evangelize, all the irrelevant policies such as what planet the US should colonize or how women should procreate, and focuses on just one thing: which presidential candidate (not to mention president) will do the right thing for America, which is to make sure that it doesn't collapse under a record debt load, there is just one answer. And it is not even ours: it comes from the impartial Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget Project, aka US Budget Watch ("U.S. Budget Watch neither supports nor opposes any candidate for office. Its reports are intended to promote understanding and discussion of the federal budget and how specific policy proposals would affect the deficit") which today released an analysis on debt sustainability titled "The GOP Candidates and the National Debt." The answer is in the chart below.




That's it. That's all that matters. The rest is noise.

Full report below (pdf)


Impartial Analysis Finds Only Ron Paul Would Cut US Debt Burden | ZeroHedge

Santorum vs. Paul - Pass It Along!

Submitted by Dither on Mon, 02/13/2012 - 17:01Ron Paul 2012


I typed this up after a family member told me he was leaning towards Santorum (he listens to talk radio). Feel free to use it with your own family, friends, etc.
Rick Santorum helped bring about the fiscal calamity that is destroying the United States. He was, and is, as much a part of the problem as Obama and the Democrats. Ron Paul, meanwhile, was and remains the lone, consistent voice of opposition to the big-spending, government-expanding schemes of both Republicans and Democrats. Santorum's path has led the country to ruin. If Dr. Paul's prescription had been followed, all of this could have been avoided. Here is the record.

As a U.S. Senator, Rick Santorum voted to raise the debt ceiling FIVE SIX TIMES. Ron Paul has opposed EVERY debt ceiling increase, and has NEVER voted for an unbalanced budget or tax increase.

Santorum voted to DOUBLE the size of the U.S. Department of Education. Ron Paul has always advocated ABOLISHING the Department of Education, as Ronald Reagan promised but never succeeded in doing.

Santorum supported the largest expansion of the welfare state since the 1960s, the Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit, which added a $16 TRILLION UNFUNDED LIABILITY to the national debt. Ron Paul has always opposed ALL federal interference in medicine -- even as a doctor, when he treated patients for free rather than accept Medicare and Medicaid payments from the government.

Santorum supports foreign aid, the process by which the U.S. government borrows money from China and uses it to bribe and prop up foreign governments (including China's), while taxing Americans to pay interest on the loans. Ron Paul has NEVER voted for foreign aid because, as he points out, it is not permitted by the Constitution, it is a bad idea, and, anyway, the U.S. government is broke.

Santorum was a vocal cheerleader for war against Iraq and voted for the authorization to use force, which left the final decision of whether or not to go to war in the hands of the president. As a result of the war, more than 4,000 American service members were killed and more than 30,000 were wounded. Untold numbers of Iraqi civilians died and Iraq's Christian community was decimated. The war cost more than $700 billion in direct appropriations and much more when the indirect costs (long-term treatment of wounded veterans, etc.) are factored in. Now, after a partial American withdrawal from Iraq (an embassy larger than the Vatican remains, along with high-paid military contractors), the different ethnic factions of that country are embroiled in a civil war. And all of this because of fear-mongering over non-existent weapons, based on fraudulent information.

Ron Paul saw the push for war against Iraq beginning right after 9/11, and issued many articles and statements against it. On September 4, 2002, just months before the war began, Paul addressed the House of Representatives: "Mr. Speaker; I rise to urge the Congress to think twice before thrusting this nation into a war without merit — one fraught with the danger of escalating into something no American will be pleased with." When it became clear that war was imminent, Paul introduced a resolution calling for a declaration of war, as required by the Constitution, although he intended to vote against it. This was blocked by other members of Congress, one of whom told Paul, "That part of the Constitution is anachronistic. We don't follow it anymore."

Now, after all the needless death and destruction wrought by the Iraq war, Santorum is leading the charge for another war of aggression based on dubious claims about weapons. And Ron Paul is, once again, counseling restraint and a return to the neutral foreign policy advised by America's founders.

There's more, sadly.

Santorum sided with big labor unions in opposing a national right-to-work law that would have protected workers from being forced to pay union dues. He supported federal housing programs and government-sponsored enterprises like Fannie and Freddie, which inflated the housing bubble, while Ron Paul warned -- as far back as 2001 -- that a bubble was forming and would eventually burst, and proposed legislation to eliminate the line of credit from the U.S. government to Fannie and Freddie.

Ron Paul has never taken a government-paid junket, has refused participation in the lucrative congressional pension plan, and returns a portion of his office budget each year to the U.S. Treasury. Santorum, on the other hand, collected $100,000 in taxpayer funds from the Penn Hills School District between 2001 and 2005 to pay for online courses for his home-schooled children. He did this by fraudulently claiming residency in Pennsylvania while he and his family actually lived in Washington, D.C.

If you support Santorum, don't act surprised when you end up with more of the same -- more big spending, debt, wars, lies and corruption. If you want real change -- if you REALLY believe in the principles of limited government enshrined in the Constitution -- then the choice is obvious. Go with the only candidate who has ALWAYS stood for these principles, through thick and thin, and oftentimes alone: Ron Paul.

Santorum vs. Paul - Pass It Along! | Ron Paul 2012 | Peace . Gold . Liberty

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