Ron Paul Spam Traced to Reactor Botnet 506
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? writes "Ars is reporting that the Ron Paul spam has been traced back to the Reactor botnet. According to the SecureWorks report, which originally identified the spammer, someone calling themselves nenastnyj was behind it and their botnet control server has been shut down. The Ron Paul campaign has previously denied any connection with this spam campaign."
Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sure) (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sur (Score:2)
Re:Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sur (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sur (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sur (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sure Fire +5 Insightful (or -1 troll... not sur (Score:4, Insightful)
No, fall. The 2000 primaries were terrible to him, and he changed in agonizing increments since then from principled maverick to administration lapdog. I mean, this is a man who was literally beaten by a rumor that the kids he had adopted were really illegitimates. After having bled and fought for this country (and served it in many capacities) that has got to be devastating. After that, he started to listen to all the wrong advice, and lost his instinct for being different (since it punished him so much in the election and even afterward).
Every person has a breaking point beyond which disillusionment and cynicism are inevitable. Public service (no matter how much, or how deservedly we pile on to politicians) is a fairly dehumanizing and unforgiving profession. That the guy finally lost his way is no reflection of his "true colors" in any legitimate sense I can think of.
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McCain? If anything he is likely to let them go unpunished. He pretended that having to wear a flak jacket and be escorted by tanks and helicopters to grocery shopping is A-OK. Didn't he cave on torture ("allowing a 'just following orders' defense"), on habeas corpus, and on illegal detentions? Sad to see a good man fall.
You should watch BBC's Why Democracy Taxi to the Dark Side, a documentary on allegations of torture in US terrorist interrogation prisons. It repeatedly showed McCain arguing against the use of torture, and holding the military to account during hearings (it's not a pro-McCain documentary though, McCain was only mentioned a few times). They used it to make the point that if McCain, who was a Vietnam POW, doesn't think torture works he probably knows best.
Bush hijacked the 2000 platform (Score:5, Informative)
The e-mail excerpts are below:
Ron Paul isn't hijacking the party because he is closer to the 1996 Republican Party platform (and previous years) than any other Republican candidate. It was Bush and friends who hijacked the Republican Party in 2000. Here are some excerpts from the 1996 platform [cnn.com] that are either missing in the 2000 platform, watered down, contradicted by other portions of the platform, or just ignored by Bush and ultimately removed in the 2004 platform:
This is the Republican Party that I grew up with and knew and loved. I stopped calling myself a Republican in 1999 because, among other reasons, Bush refused to commit to a litmus test for Supreme Court nominees.
Ron Paul worked to nominate Reagan over Ford in 1976. Ron Paul is the torchbearer of what Reagan stood for (although Reagan did not live up to his words).
After the Democratic Party became the Communist Party at the turn of the century and went on to dominate the first half of the century, the Republican Party responded by becoming the anti-Federalist Party after WWII. Ron Paul is trying to steer the Republican Party back toward those days of 1952-1996. That's getting back on track, not hijacking.
The main difference between Ron Paul and Reagan is foreign policy -- the Reagan Administration, in its fight against communism, armed the most radical elements of Afghanistan and created the Taliban, which of course ended up harboring Osama bin Laden. Ron Paul wishes for the U.S. to not repeat that mistake.
Ron Paul is the
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The Federalist/Whig/Republican Party is the Party of Hamilton and represents central government and central banking. It is the antithesis of freedom. I call it the fascist party.
The Democratic Party was the Party of Jefferson and represented anti-Federalism and libertarianism. It got seduced by Communism at the turn of the century.
Thus, starting around 1900, the choice was between fascism and communism.
After
The Slashdot Moderation Game (Score:2, Funny)
Hello folks and welcome to today's second round of The Slashdot Moderation game where we take the long way of saying Mod Parent Down.
We've seen a lot of trolls, flamebaiters and thread hijackers today, but we work hard to only bring you the top-tier. Tonight's guest is explosivejared,
Explosive Jared writes:
I told you all Ron Paul was a saint. Ron Paul would never stoop to spamming.
A great start, will this turn into an Ironic statement, a joke, an insightful look into Ron Paul... mystery is afoot and my attention is gathered!
He is right on par with a god, in fact he may be a god (the tests are still being run).
oh, we may ha
it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:5, Funny)
... Yes, they do!
Re:it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:5, Funny)
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So who asked you? ;-)
Haven't you heard of "push polls"? I've been "polled" by at least three of them in the past year. They never will tell you who's paying them, either. But this story is just an "on the Internet" version of the same sort of dirty tricks. It's an old, old story.
Then there was my favorite trick: Soon after I moved to Bo
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RP's opponents can't find any actual scandal or issue to smear him with, so they've resorted to 'don't waste your vote on him because he can't win'. Or saying he's not a real Republican just because he didn't follow the recent GOP policy shifts that have them hemmoraging voters and congressional seats.
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"Also he seems to be one of the ONLY candidates who is for radically smaller government, something all the other politicians and corporate sponsors definitely don't want..."
The politicians might, but the corporate sponsors definitely want smaller government. I mean, smaller government inevitably means less powerful government, which means power vaccuum, and guess who's goin
Re:it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:4, Insightful)
Not really true... most small corporations want smaller government in the areas of their field... while the bigger corporations want bigger government, with more barriers to entry to help protect themselves...
Nephilium
Re:it's not like people don't play dirty (Score:5, Funny)
Gee, I hope they clear up this nasty business! I would hate to see it affect Ron Paul's chances of being elected President.
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I mean
Vote Smart in 2008 (Score:5, Insightful)
Clearly, this incident with the spammer supporting Ron Paul will be spun, by his competitors, into a gotcha.
Please do your yourself -- and your nation -- a favor. Avoid the above method of selecting political candidates. Ignore gotcha's, glamor, and glitz. Do not vote along party lines.
Instead, research the voting history, the policy proposals, and the honesty of the candidates in the 2008 race for president. You can easily find this information at the quality news sites like "The Washington Post [washingtonpost.com]". Hopefully, Rupert Murdoch will open the web site of the "Wall Street Journal" (WSJ) to the public before the election in 2008. The WSJ has some of the best in-depth reporting in the industry, but the WSJ web site is currently open only to subscribers.
On "voting smart in '08" .... (Score:3, Insightful)
By the same token, avid net users who read blog sites and news sites (like Slas
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As we did our best to document, the National Republican Congressional Committee was responsible for repetitive, often harrassing robo calls in more than two dozen districts across the country in the runup to the election.
Unless practitioners are criminally charged and exposed for this kind of behavior, any fines that are imposed will merely be written off as campaign expense.
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I actually hate him as much as 90% of the people on the internet and am sick of seeing stories about him, but I'm also not much for drawing loose connections.
Unfortunately... (Score:2, Insightful)
On another note, I am Canadian. To me, it does not make sense that an election should last 4 years and require the kind of funding only mega-corporations can provide. I am not only sick of Ron Paul, but of the whole 2008 election. I was sick of it back in 2006.
Canada has a minority government. It could go into an election at any time really. Most people are concerned about the
Re:Unfortunately... (Score:4, Informative)
Why shouldn't it last 4 years - or longer - and cost a large fraction of the GNP. Civil wars do.
Republics are designed to model civil wars accurately enough that they can be "fought" to their conclusion without all that nasty dying, burning of crops and towns, and so on.
They do a good enough job of it (except for assasinations B-( ) that the US hasn't had to hold a full-scale civil war in well over a century (though there hace been a few small ones when the the elections were corrupted or a significant power group was disenfranchised and oppressed).
See the "Battle of Athens" for one example.
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Re:Unfortunately... (Score:4, Insightful)
By your 'logic' the War in 1776 was also a Civil War. The difference is pretty obvious to anyone with a functioning brain and a basic understanding of the English language.
The US, an internationally recognized territory of the British Empire, wanted to be free of the Crown, thus making it a War of Independence. The CSA quit the Union, wishing to be recognized as an independent nation in exactly the same way as their forefathers had sent their Declaration of Independence to King George. The Union objected pretty much the same as King George did and for much the same reason (fear of losing a critical revenue stream, the North was very dependent on taxing Southern exports mixed with pride) and a War for Southern Independence was fought. The Union won, obviously and thus wrote the official histories.
Had it actually been a Civil War the CSA would have been trying to conquer the Union and thus win the right (through contest at arms) to control the whole of the United States and impose it's views.
> you sir are a fucking moron.
And thee are a foul mouthed twerp that needs to grow up and learn how adults discourse in public.
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It's just the press feeding the press at this point. We (the average people) know this. It's just people outside the US might have a harder time filtering it out.
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Ron Paul is the answer to America's problems in the same way that narcotics are the answer to life's problems. You have a wild and crazy trip, but then you crash hard when you wake up to reality biting you in the ass.
Re:Unfortunately... (Score:5, Insightful)
After you've elected your representatives, what they do is out of your hands; the only way you can change their behavior is to elect someone different next time. Therefore, agonizing over who to elect next time is, in fact, the only thing that makes sense if you live in a representative democracy. Worrying about day-to-day policies is pointless once you've made up your mind that you already don't like the current guys.
On another note, I am Canadian. To me, it does not make sense that an election should last 4 years and require the kind of funding only mega-corporations can provide.
If you're trying to imply that the Canadian political system is somehow immune to such excesses, you're wrong. The reason companies spend a boatload of money on US elections is because US elections matter a great deal to their bottom line; on the other hand, who governs Canada simply doesn't matter much to corporations or anybody outside Canada.
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If you're trying to imply that the Canadian political system is somehow immune to such excesses, you're wrong. The reason companies spend a boatload of money on US elections is because US elections matter a great deal to their bottom line; on the other hand, who governs Canada simply doesn't matter much to corporations or anybody outside Canada.
---
While you are correct that the interest in Canadian federal general elections are limited to the northern part of North America, the money tied to US elections is
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This year, things started so s
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as I thought (Score:2, Troll)
forgot to mention: SF Republicans cancel vote (Score:2)
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In Florida. Read your own article:
The Florida Republican straw poll, held last Saturday, became increasingly chaotic as Paul supporters sparred with those of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney over the amount of votes individuals cast.
Though individuals were allowed to purchase up to ten voting tickets for $20 apiece, Paul supporters actively displayed their single tickets while Romney supporters reportedly c
Real world people (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Real world people (Score:5, Insightful)
Your vote does not carry a passion multiplier.
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I don't seem to recall Mr. Dean's incredible support among the nutroots propelling him into the White House. Likewise I tend to doubt the Ronulans will do more than queer the race in some open primaty states in the same way McCain did in 2000. None (McCain and Paul for the Repubs, Dean for the Dems) are candidates normal party voters would vote for but attract plenty of crossover votes, nutballs, and diehards w
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It does matter in a country where the large majority of the elegible voters fail to vote. It especially matters when that "tiny minority" is comprised of a large majority of people who haven't voted in the past, or haven't voted in a long time. The number of people who are tired of politics as usual but are supporting Ron Paul is pretty astounding. The fact that the media needs to vilify his supporters in an attempt to stiffle the message goes to show
Great, more anti women supporters. (Score:2)
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Yes, I've read it. He's the only politician I can remember in my lifetime whose votes match his words 100%.
-jcr
If you actually look at his voting record:
http://www.vote-smart.org/voting_category.php?can_id=296 [vote-smart.org]
Just take the first item on the list, abortion. He's stated time and time again that abortion policy should be left up to the states to get a wider appeal, but as you can see, he continuously voted to have the federal government intervene in abortion policy.
He's a liar and flip-flopper just like the rest of them.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
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He's a liar and flip-flopper just like the rest of them.
Actually, you're the liar. Ron Paul's votes on this issue are consistent with his stated position: he votes against federal funding for abortion (since he votes against federal funding for anything not authorized by the constitution), and he votes to allow the states to set their own policy on the matter.
Here's the summary:
12/06/2006 Abortion Pain Bill NV
05/25/2005 Overseas Military Facilities Abortion Amendment N
04/27/2005 Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act N
10/02/2003 Prohibit Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
06/04/2003 Prohibit Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
07/20/2000 Abortion Funding Amendment N
07/13/2000 Family Planning Assistance Funding amendment N
06/22/2000 Prison Abortion Funding Amendment N
05/18/2000 Oversea Military Abortions Amendment N
04/05/2000 Partial Birth Abortion Act Y
07/29/1999 Abortion Funding Amendment N
06/30/1999 Child Custody Protection Act N
06/09/1999 Overseas Military Abortion Amendment N
06/08/1999 Prohibition of Chemically Induced Abortion Amendment Y
10/08/1998 Contraceptive Amendment Y
08/06/1998 Abortion Funding Amendment N
07/23/1998 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
07/15/1998 Child Custody Protection Act N
06/24/1998 Chemical Inducement of Abortion Amendment Y
05/20/1998 Abortion Private Funding Restoration Amendment N
10/08/1997 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
09/04/1997 International Family Planning amendment Y
03/20/1997 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
02/13/1997 Population Planning bill N
Here's the summary:
Yes, some are bans against funding, which is consistent with his position, but I'm going to cull to show the ones that specifically go to my point:
10/02/2003 Prohibit Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
06/04/2003 Prohibit Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
04/05/2000 Partial Birth Abortion Act Y
07/23/1998 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
10/08/1997 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
03/20/1997 Partial-Birth Abortion bill Y
Note that during these votes, the Roe v. Wade decision was in effect as the supreme law of the land due to the Supreme Court, rendering all of these yes votes a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Yes, they later upheld the most recent vote, but he knew he wouldn't get the votes until Bush's stacking of the Supreme Court
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That he voted against any facet of abortion is a violation of his position, which is to leave it to the states.
Nonsense. His intention to return jurisdiction over abortion to the states doesn't require him to ignore the fact that today, it's a matter over which the federal government claims power.
What? Huh? Is that your excuse? I'm in awe. He votes on everything else that the feds claim power over pretty consistently against, completely ignoring your logic above. For that I'm pretty impressed by him. That I found a pretty bad hole in his program doesn't mean those other actions are wrong. The feds are WAY too powerful, and I consider myself pretty far left (though, a decentralizationist left). In fact, he's probably the closest of any of the mainstream candidates to my positions for what th
Re:Great, more anti women supporters. (Score:5, Insightful)
I need no excuses. You're the one who's tried to tar Ron Paul as a liar, and failed to do so. Your claim, your burden of proof.
This is the third time I've repeated myself, in a slightly different way, just so that it's in the same post and that perhaps it might sink in if presented slightly differently. At this point, you can choose to believe whatever you want. I know that most reasonable people will look at your responses to my posts and ponder at how efficiently you've selectively quoted me and not even addressed my arguments. At this point, probably the majority just think you're trolling.
Consider the burden of proof as still being on me all you want, but if you want to convince people that I haven't proven it, then you should actually try rebutting them directly. In another post, you did try once, but you just created a huge contradiction with the rest of his program. As that's a contradiction, I'm not left with anything to argue against from your angle.
As anyone who knows QM can tell you... (Score:3, Funny)
They're supporters that look exactly like normal women, but explode in a burst of gamma radiation when they come into contact with a woman. Probably a lot like your typical Digg user
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Says the guy posting in a "news for nerds stuff that matters" site, within a "reactor botnet" story...
Oh... woops
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Its OK, Bots can vote too! (Score:2)
Maybe its form of spammer lobbying (Score:4, Interesting)
Not that Ron Paul is 'pro botnets' or anything absurd like that, but his policies and philosophy would be more hospitible to their business model than nanny-states and government-monitoring of all communications.
If I had a botnet, why wouldn't I use it to promote my candidate of choice during its free time?
Spammer lobbying for property rights (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Spammer lobbying for property rights (Score:5, Interesting)
Ron Paul is all for privacy in the sense that he would never authorize government to monitor citizens at large. But in the same breath he would never authorize government to regulate the communications other businesses, eterprises, or citizens would send to you either. Including advertisments, sales offers, unsolicited email, or spam.
Think I'm wrong? Remember the "Do not call list"? Well, when the FTC imposed it the telemarketing industry responded arguing that the FTC had no such authority to impose such a system, and a judge *agreed* with the telemarketing industry. So what do you think happened next?
Well, a bill was introduced in Congress to specifically authorize the FTC to create the do-not-call-list. It passed Congress 412-8, and it passed the senate 95-0. The 'people' had spoken, and our right to have dinner without being tele-offered a long distance plan was established!
Would it surprise you to know that Ron Paul, your champion of privacy, was one of those 8 that voted AGAINST authorizing the FTC to create the do-not-call-list? Don't beleive me? Look it up.
Here's some links to get you started - some background:
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/09/25/congress.no.call/index.html [cnn.com]
and
http://www.vote-smart.org/voting_category.php?can_id=BC031929 [vote-smart.org]
Section: "Technology and Communication", Date: 09/25/2003, Bill: "Do-Not-Call-Registry Bill"
Or you can take my word for it: He voted "No".
I'm quite confident he'd vote *against* any bill that proposed the government some how step in and regulate email of ANY kind, including spam.
Ron Paul and the content of speech. (Score:5, Informative)
The issue is that when run by the FTC, as the vote authorized, the government is judging speech by its content. The FTC - the Federal Trade Commission - would be judging whether or not the speech is commercial, ie: trade oriented. And judging speech by its content is a first amendment violation.
The FCC, by contrast, would only be judging what type of communication it is. The FCC has a long history of banning certain types of communication: broadcasting on certain frequencies, or using too much power, etc. These don't violate the first amendment.
A formal legal opinion was expressed by Judge Edward Nottingham ( after the vote ):
BTW, all of the above is from memory. I can't find anything on the net explaining why he voted against it.
PS: sorry about the 'crack' comment.
What was being spammed? (Score:4, Funny)
minor point (Score:5, Interesting)
IN the US as I understand the pertinent federal laws.
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russian origin (Score:3, Informative)
Eh? what about the donations? (Score:4, Funny)
Makes sense (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:2)
We need a real independent candidate.
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:5, Insightful)
Will he be an imperial president? No.
Will he be able to change the USA into some libertopia. No.
He can exercise veto power.
He can issue pardens.
He can bring the troops home.
That will be more than enough for me.
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm curious about what you mean by "principled" voting record. Is talking about leaving things up for the "states to decide" while trying to ban [loc.gov] abortion on the federal level principled? Is talking about the need to remove power from corporations while at the same time sponsoring bills to repeal worker safety laws [loc.gov], the minimum wage [loc.gov], and federal antitrust law [loc.gov], plus dozens of other laws, even including child labor and overtime laws, principled? What about his earmarks for the local shrimp industry while decrying those evil politicians wasting out money? What about proclaiming himself as a purveyor of libertarianism while trying to outlaw flag-burning?
I'd be all for the kind of candidate people think Ron Paul is, but this guy ain't him. Aside from that, you also have to take into account his lunatic economic theories, his stance regarding the Internet, and complete withdrawal from all international organizations. I mean, Jesus. I see all these people talking about how great he is, and then very fre of them seem to actually be aware of, you know, his actual record.
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Ron Paul is Pro Liberty and Individual rights! How on earth can you get "against homosexual rights" from that?! He wants to get the federal government out of the marriage business entirely!
In regards to religion, please show me one article written by Dr. Paul http://www.house.gov/paul/legis_tst.htm [house.gov]
where he puts religion above the law and the Constitution.
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:5, Insightful)
2597 and 1094: It's what the man believes, and it's consistent with basic biology (A fetus is alive, and it is unarguably human. You can legitimately argue whether or not it should have full legal protections identical to an adult, and that's a discussion we should have, but creating a mythical transformation point from non human to human somewhere between conception and birth is a laughable failure to grasp high school biology). He could argue the Constitutionality based on the Congressional power to conduct the census (The power to count a thing by necessity includes the power to determine what does and doesn't count as that thing). Regardless of your beliefs on the issue, a straight up or down vote on a bill like this in Congress (or my preference, state legislatures) is almost infinitely preferable to the current situation where 9 old lawyers answerable to no one decide whatever the hell they feel like and impose it on all the rest of us. Paul's bill, crackpot as it seems, would force a settlement of the issue so we could get on with other things in this country instead of this same tired fight coming up every election and dividing us yet again.
1095: Put an end to a blatant violation of the 10th amendment. Government should follow the law. Christ, you'd think the last 7 years would have made that PAINFULLY obvious to everyone.
300: See above, just change Article 3 for Amendment 10. State courts were supposed to be primary (read the Federalist papers and see for yourselves, even the big government Federalists promised that order of court supremacy in order to get the Constitution ratified)
We the People Act: See Amendments 1 and 10, especially 10. Not a power given to the federal government, courts or no courts. IIRC, 3 of the ratifying states had established state religions when the Bill of Rights was adopted, so it clearly was not intended to prevent states from making up their own minds on the subject. I'm not saying this is the way things should be, but unless there is an amendment to fix it, it's the law of the land and government should obey it.
"Against homosexual rights" and "supported laws to discriminate against homosexuality federally": More like against allowing the Federal government to have any say on or knowledge of the matter of who people sleep with one way or the other. Although I admit I haven't dug as deeply into this aspect of his record, so if you can contradict me on that interpretation I'd be interested to see your evidence.
Paul is a long way from perfect, but even the positions I violently disagree with him on are rationally argued and internally consistent with respect to his understanding of the Constitution, which overrides all other considerations for him. After 8 years of the Constitution being "just a goddammned piece of paper", I think restoring that principle to government is the absolute priority. We can sort out differences in opinion later, once our freedom to have differences in opinions is safe again. (Military Commissions Act, Homegrown Violent Radicalization act etc.)
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My understanding is that Ron Paul is against ANY laws that divide people into certain sub-classes and then grant those specific groups additional rights based on their minority class. He believes that all people are individuals with equal rights and that there should be no laws that give extra protection or financial benefit to specific groups.
Think about the following hypothetical statements:
Crimes against white people by non-whites should be punished more
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Really? Last I checked, plenty of economies have had trouble both with and without backed currencies. As far as I can tell, the recipe for a strong economy is sound political and economic policy. There is no magic, and no easy answers.
(I'm a Ron Paul supporter, but it's in spite of, not because of, his ridiculous gold standard ideas.)
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Every Federal Reserve Note is a Dollar that the US Government borrowed from the Federal Reserve Bank against your ability to pay taxes. Think of what it means for someone other than yourself to create debt that YOU have to pay? That makes you a slave in a way doesn't it? And that "deficit" thing? They ta
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:4, Insightful)
The fed artificially lowered interest rates by way too much. This allowed people to either drastically lower their monthly payments or be able to buy a much more expensive home for the same monthly payment. This became a national trend.
In areas with a limited housing supply, home prices rose drastically so that the higher price with the lower interest rate yielded the same monthly payment. Some people cashed out massive profits, but at the expense of the buyer who would see their home value plummet to it's previous value in five years.
In areas with plenty of builders and land to put homes on, people began building huge quantities of larger, more lavish homes. Individual home prices didn't go up, but median home prices did. Fueled by low monthly payments, people bought homes that they could never afford at the rates from just a few years earlier.
This, in turn, LED to the incredibly lax bank lending standards in some areas. Previously, banks required hefty down payments, good credit and proof of income to give a loan. But with homes appreciating at double digit rates (again, caused by artificially low interest rates), it looked like a sure thing that the outstanding loan would be under 80% in two years. Fifty year, interest only, reverse amortization, it didn't matter, the house would out-appreciate ANY loan.
Then the fed comes back in, raises the rates back up and BAM, people default like crazy because they can't refinance their ARMs at anything close to the old rate.
Yes, there was bad business practices and greed all around, but the root cause of the whole thing was bad interest rate manipulation by the federal reserve.
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I like their focus on the Gold Standard.
Hilarious.
There is not enough gold on the whole planet to cover the money now in circulation, much less the Nine Trillion dollar debt!
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod parent up (Score:2)
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:4, Insightful)
Fractional Reserve Banking. (Score:3, Informative)
Historically, inflation occurs regardless of whether there is a precious metal or other substance backing the currency.
Um... I suggest you look up "Fractional Reserve Banking". No paper currency in the western world has ever been 100% backed by gold, even under the gold standard. The banks have always issued more notes and coins than there is gold backing it and your government have allowed the practice. This causes inflation.
Incidentally, you are aware that there isn't enough gold for the government to buy enough for 100% backing of the currency, right?
Really, are you sure? At what rate? Doesn't that simply imply that the dollar's value has rather a long way to fall? How much gold is a bit of paper worth?
Ultimately there is just one magical attribu
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It's sad to see the state of affairs that make people hate/fear Ron Paul so much. Is he a perfect candidate? No, of course not! Is he more perfect than the others? This internet bot thinks so.
Re:I don't for a minute believe this was unofficia (Score:4, Insightful)
Supporting the abolition of affirmative action -- i.e., hiring, promoting or admitting into school, etc., on the basis of racial quotas -- as Ron Paul does is also not racism. If anything, the entire concept of affirmative action could arguably be viewed as racism since there is some underlying notion that minorities would otherwise be unable to gain schooling or employment were it not for racial quotas. I think that underestimates the abilities of minorities to the extreme.
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No examination of background occurs... If they really wanted to 'help previously disadvantaged people' then a white kid with two generations of family who worked the mines should be _just_ as eligible as a black kid from the same background.
Again, affirmative action exists to benefit people of specif races only and explicitly excludes other equally disadvantaged people purely on
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While I don't like the conservative approach, I do like the way Paul appears to be his own man with his own opinions. --Which, incidentally, is why I doubt he has any real chances in the American stage drama of politics. He seems like an idealist who doesn't play well with others. The military industrial complex doesn't want guys like that calling the shots. -Calling the army home from Iraq? No, that's not going to go over well with the Powers That Be, (and I'm not talking about th
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As opposed to his supporters very exaggerated, very uninformed, superficial analysis of reality?
"i don't see why it should matter to anyone that he doesn't have as many supporters as other candidates."
They don't call it an election for nothing.
"can anyone provide a more in-depth analysis of his beliefs?"
Take Article I, rip out the General Welfare Clause, and pretend that Section 10 applies to the