Ron Paul "lambastes" Obama:

[whottt]

http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2009/01/ron-paul-obama.html

Ron Paul: Obama Hiding Big Govt. Ambitions
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Share January 21, 2009 12:54 PM

ABC News' Teddy Davis reports:

Former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul has recorded a YouTube video warning libertarian-minded Americans that Barack Obama's inaugural address amounted to an effort to camouflage his big government ambitions.

"If you are honest with oneself," said Paul, "you have to say, 'I'm for more government.' Or: 'I'm for less government.' But he would like to avoid trying to be blunt and saying, 'I'm for a lot more government.'"

Watch it here.

Paul, a Texas congressman who raised $35 million during last year's presidential run, says that if Obama's views on government are not "socialism," they are "fascistic."

During Tuesday's inaugural address, Obama entered a long-running debate over the role of government in American life by attempting to position himself between a view held on the right that "government is the problem" and a leftist view that "government is the answer."

"The question we ask today," said Obama, "is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works -- whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end."

Paul's video says that Obama's pledge to move past old dogmas masks his own dogmatic views about the capacity of government to create prosperity.

"They talk about getting rid of the ideologues and people who believe strongly in something," said Paul. "But they themselves believe in something very strongly. They believe in government, and though it is camouflaged by his saying whether government might be too big or too small, we know what is coming: it is ideological.

"It is a strong ideological position," he continued, "to believe that government can run things, because if it isn't socialism, it's fascistic and it's inflationary and it's control and it's loss of liberty.

"So, we should not be feeling reassured," he added, "by any fancy words that we heard today in the inaugural address."

Paul's video was recorded Tuesday in Texas. The YouTube link was distributed by Jesse Benton, the senior vice president of Paul's Campaign for Liberty, who encouraged reporters to "turn the volume to max" due to "a small glitch in our microphone."

[SnakeBoy]

LJZwLuoY71Q

[timvp]

:lol @ those who leaped from Ron Paul to Obama who won't admit it was a gigantic ideological leap.

[mookie2001]

like who?
Connor Marriott

[MannyIsGod]

:lol @ those who leaped from Ron Paul to Obama who won't admit it was a gigantic ideological leap.

Socially? Not a huge leap at all. Libertarianism is very liberal outside of economic issues. On financial issues, it is a pretty big leap, but I don't know of many smart libertarians who at least have some questions of the free market and I've seen a lot of them have serious doubts about it all together.

I know personally I've always voted more with my social half. I'm sure you can dig up a post or 2 of me calling myself a social or left leaning libertarian (libertarians sometimes get upset over the term social libertarian - they don't believe it should exist).

In any event I think you're going to see the country as a whole moving much more to a place where social issues garner a more liberal stance and financial issues require more regulation but smart regulation. I simply have no faith in a pure free market system because the people don't make the best decisions (hello homes we cannot afford and hello companies offernig those loans).

PS - Whottt loves to complain about Obama's followers who voted for him with no logical reason yet he's going to sit here and put Paul on a pedestal? There's some serious irony in that.

[Winehole23]

Obama's so called post-partisan appeal to competence is a dodge that seeks to immunize his own policy commitments, while demonizing opponents as partisan demagogues.

Only an administration as incompetent and stridently ideological as GWB's makes it credible to lodge one's own political commitments as mere "competence", as Obama has done.

The comparison to fascism strikes me as hyperbole, but the nationalization of finance and heavy industry superficially resembles the main historical example. There's no doubt the USG holds some main levers of the economy and is attempting to steer it. IMO this makes us more like present day China than 1930's Italy. Some will also say there is an Obama leader cult, but to me it more resembles the first flush of victory after a long march in the political wilderness, than a nationalistic cult a la Mussolini.

The seriousness of the national emergency, we are told yet again, requires sweeping and unprecedented governmental measures. The question becomes, once the emergency passes do the emergency powers also subside?

If they do not, certain structural elements of right-wing socialism will be in place; but the fascistic mythology of the state that mobilizes violent, nationalistic mobs to do its bidding in the streets, is nowhere in evidence yet.

Obama is an obvious left-winger. His emphasis on competence is a dodge. Government that "works" in the present context is big government. Much bigger. If the opposition to bigger government is ideological, so is insisting on it as the answer.

[Winehole23]

i hope he means itYou hope who means what?

[ChumpDumper]

I hope his administration is competent. It would be a nice change from the last eight years.

[whottt]

PS - Whottt loves to complain about Obama's followers who voted for him with no logical reason yet he's going to sit here and put Paul on a pedestal? There's some serious irony in that.


Exactly how have I put him on a pedestal? I'm not Paullite. I think he's excellent at identifying certain problems, and further out there than Nbadan on some of his solutions.

Furthermore, his platform is virtually identical to the KKK manifestro and they comprise a majority of his suporters(actually, I believe the storm front guys even support him and they make the KKK look like a lapdog).

I won't say that I disagree with everything Paul says, indeed, I agree with what he said here about Obama being full of shit...

But I do think it's funny that he's often considered as outside of the typical political realm and here he is playing politics with the best of then.

In answer to timvp's question, the reason so many Paul supporters jumped to Obama is because of Paul himself...he himself painted the big name Republicans as the worst to party/people to vote for, although he did it subtley, even if it took throwing people who agreed with him on many things, like John McCain and Sarah Palin...under the bus.

And here he is now...fully turning on Obama.

Welcome to the wonderful world of mainstream American politics my dear Paulists, and President Obama.


I posted this article to see the response of the Paul supporters Manny...

timvp got it.

[Winehole23]

I've said it before but I'll say it again. I agree with about 50% of what RP says. Like DR, I think he's spot on about currency and and out of control militarism, and in itself, that made him the most attractive political candidate in my lifetime. Otherwise I agree more with the political tendency he represents than his actual positions.

Ditto with RP's constitutionalism, which clearly goes back to the Lochner era and even before. I'm skeptical the constitution can ever be dialed back that far, but that doesn't make RP's emphasis on the constitution wrongheaded. The US Constitution is an indispensible check against the ambitions of state power.

Nor am I a believer in free markets as a harmonious status naturalis -- it's actually more like the law of the jungle, and the government needs to be there to restrain amoral and short-sighted commercial interests. Unlike RP, I'm not an unalloyed and unreconstructed libertarian.

Should government be smaller? The question should be can we afford its continued growth?

[Winehole23]

What RP most resembles in American conservatism is the Taft Republicanism of the pre-WWII era, minus the "good government" bullshit.

[Bob Lanier]

http://www.dkimages.com/discover/previews/769/225809.JPG

[Cant_Be_Faded]

Something tells me 2009 is going to be The Year of MannyIsWrong.

[FreeMason]

"The question we ask today," said Obama, "is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works --

I lmao at this part during his speech. Just come out and say it, you pussy.

[BacktoBasics]

:lol @ those who leaped from Ron Paul to Obama who won't admit it was a gigantic ideological leap.We leaped to the lesser of two evils. However I didn't leap I chose not to vote but had I voted I would have likely chosen Obama.

I'm hoping I speak for a lot of the others when we say that we're well aware of the lack of consistency or really anything comparable between the two.