From RationalWiki

Ron Paul can smell gold at ten kilometers.

Dr. Ronald Ernest "It's Happening" Paul (born 1935) was a Congressman from the 14th Congressional District of Texas and is an honorary lifetime member of the Libertarian Party.[2]

Paul is closely associated with the Austrian school of economics. Long-time Paul associate and staffer Lew Rockwell founded the Ludwig von Mises Institute, which runs columns by Paul. This is the reason for all of his goldbuggery and other crank economic ideas. Paul first proposed legislation to return to the gold standard in the early 80s,[3] but after Paul Volcker proved that inflation could be killed,[4] Paul bolted from the party and ran against Reagan as the Libertarian Party candidate for President.

Paul is perhaps best-known for his social media presence, particularly on anonymous message boards like Reddit.[5] Truth be told, Reddit was never that big into Ron Paul, he just had a lot of spammers. (At least 150 of his bots were banned from Digg ; no doubt those same idiots migrated over to Reddit.)[6] Most Americans have, by now, seen the rabid shrieks of "RON PAUL 2008 2012 2016 2020!!1!!!" at least once on the Internet. He also did a bunch of speaking tours, mostly targeting universities. Even back then, Ron was predicting an economic crash.

Having ended a bid for the Republican Party's nomination in the 2008 U.S. Presidential Election on 8 March 2008 after obtaining only 15 delegates out of 2,360 (although he did garner 5.7% of the vote in the Republican primaries that year), Ron Paul loitered around the fringe before throwing his hat into the 2012 Presidential race. It got him absolutely nowhere, unless you count winning the Virgin Islands. In early January 2013, Ron Paul announced his retirement from politics.[7] He has a son, Rand Paul, not[8] named after Ayn Rand.

Political positions [ edit ]

“ ” Pat [Buchanan] is less committed to free trade than I am, but we share so much in common that this can be worked through. —[9]

Ron Paul is frequently described as a small government conservative[10] with some libertarian ideas, though it is more accurate to call him a paleolibertarian.[11] He is not so much interested in reducing governmental powers as shifting them from the federal government to the states.

He is a strict constitutionalist – though his interpretation of what the US Constitution is is somewhat inaccurate, to politely say the least, to the point of abolishing the IRS and the income tax, slashing most federal spending, reintroducing the gold standard, and abolishing the Federal Reserve. We don't have to tell you what the consequences of either of those are.

For some reason, he seems to not like the idea of jus soli – the granting of citizenship to those born in America.[12]

So domestically he's shit, but even in matters of foreign policy, Paul has demonstrated that he is not to be trusted; a month after 9/11, he proposed H.R. 3076, which would place a $40 billion bounty on top Al Qaeda members who were brought to the government dead or alive. Essentially, it would hire a group of private mercenaries to handle the Afghanistan War their own way.

Ron also voted against the Darfur Accountability and Divestment Act of 2007,[13] which would have banned federal contracts with firms doing business with the Janjaweed ("Devils on Horseback") militia of Sudan.[14] He was the only Congressman to do so.

Stopped clock [ edit ]

Hey, if you're categorically against everything the government does, you'll be right sometimes. He wants to end the War on Drugs, supports medical marijuana, and opposed the U.S. war in Iraq. Which is more than can be said of his spawn.

Regarding the TSA act, Paul was the one standing up and saying the unsayable: that taking nude photos of passengers and feeling up their grandmothers is not making anyone safer.[15] He proposed a simple law which would essentially say that government officials have to go through the same screenings the rest of us do, in an effort to wake them up. He has even spoken in defense of WikiLeaks, a whistleblowing website that has among other disclosures exposed government corruption.[16]

Paul, along with his son's future enemy Bernie Sanders, were the driving forces behind the audit of the Fed that revealed its so-called "backdoor bailouts" during the financial crisis of 2008.[17]

Extremism [ edit ]

“ ” A politically-protected disease thanks to payola and the influence of the homosexual lobby... The largest blood bank in San Francisco succumbed to political pressure and holds blood drives in the gay Castro district; where the people give at three times the usual level. Either they are public spirited, or they are trying to poison the blood supply. —For a physician, he sure sounds like a dick.[18][9]

Homosexuality and the Religious Right [ edit ]

It's whispered that Paul is in league with the Dominionist and Christian Reconstructionist movements.[19] Paul introduced the We the People Act into the House of Representatives twice. This bill would strip federal courts of jurisdiction in cases involving abortion, same-sex marriage, privacy related to sexual behavior, and Establishment Clause issues, leaving them to the states... which is exactly what the Religious Right wants to do. He has engaged in outright dishonesty in support of this agenda, for instance claiming that prayer has been prohibited in schools.

How does Ron Paul reconcile dominionism with libertarianism?[20] It seems he wants the church to be strong and the state to be weak:

The Founding Fathers envisioned a robustly Christian... America, with churches serving as vital institutions that would eclipse the state in importance.[21]

Astute readers might recognize the first part of that statement as an outright lie.

Ron Paul's radical views on "states' rights" also extends into homosexuality. Ron Paul believes that these rights include the ability to regulate sex, specifically arresting homosexual individuals for having sex. This is another case where he abandons the right to privacy for a group he doesn't like:

Ridiculous as sodomy laws may be, there clearly is no right to privacy nor sodomy found anywhere in the Constitution. There are, however, states' rights — rights plainly affirmed in the Ninth and Tenth amendments. Under those amendments, the State of Texas has the right to decide for itself how to regulate social matters like sex, using its own local standards.[22]

While he wants to abolish the death penalty at the federal level, apparently it doesn't matter when supporting pastor Phillip Kayser advocates the death penalty for gays.[23][24]

In short, cross-examining both Paul's explicit positions and proposed legislations, his program would result in the strengthening of a theocratic agenda, not by passing laws in Congress (downright impossible due to secular opposition), but by preventing the federal government from stopping establishment of religion or anti-gay legislation at the local level.

His associates have included such Dominionist kooks as Gary North (a former Paul researcher back in the 70's). North was appointed Director of Curriculum Development for Paul's new homeschooling program.[25]

Libertaryan [ edit ]

“ ” He holds some positions that free-market people agree with (taxes, quotas, foreign aid, etc) but he is also an adherent of the violent philosophy of the KKK. So he was a perfect target for liberals. —On David Duke[9]

Ron Paul, Don Black, and son Derek Black in New River, Florida

Paul is a figurehead for the majority of tax protester and neo-Nazi (such as Stormfront) groups in the US.[26][27] Stormfront.org administrator and noted white nationalist Don Black donated $500 to Paul's campaign.[28] Paul's campaign has expressed dismay over these associations, although critics hold that he has not adequately distanced himself from them.[29] Edward and Elaine Brown, a married couple identified as sovereign citizens by the FBI, were arrested in 2007 for refusing to pay taxes. Ron Paul, in an interview with Fox News, applauded the couple's efforts to defy the Sixteenth Amendment (which Paul holds was illegally passed and seeks to totally abolish). He went further comparing them to Gandhi & Martin Luther King.[30]

In February 2012, during his last attempt to gain the nomination for presidency, Ron Paul appeared as a keynote speaker at a four-day conference in Irvine, California held by Freedom Law School; it specializes in encouraging the use of pseudolaw to "lawfully" disengage from obeying government and to resist it. The group has held events attracting libertarians, tax protesters and sovereign citizens. Ironically the announcement he would be a speaker came shortly before the FBI posted their official warning on the sovereign citizen movement of which some members did appear at the event.[31]

Ron Paul uses his notability to endorse candidates for office on the local level. One of the candidates he initially endorsed, Bill Johnson, turned out to be a white supremacist[32] who had written a proposed constitutional amendment that would have deported people based on racial criteria.[33] He endorsed the fundamentalist loon Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party in 2008[34] and in turn was endorsed by noted crank Arthur Robinson.[35][36] He was also supported by neo-fascist Willis Carto.[37] In the 2014 North Carolina Senate race Paul endorsed Greg Brannon,[38] an associate of League of the South.[39]

Economics [ edit ]

“ ” You see, Mr. Powers, I love goooooold! The look of it! The taste of it! The schmell of it! The texture! I love gold so much that I even lost my genitalia in an unfortunate schmelting accident. — Goldmember Ron Paul

When Ron Paul was on the Colbert Report, he insisted that gold was a superior currency because if you lost $1 million worth of gold at sea, then it would be a lot harder to replace. (Which is weirdly applicable to Bitcoin: they're arbitrarily assigning value to things that are extremely difficult to produce, then using word-of-mouth to track ownership. In other words, gold is a blockchain made of physical blocks). Ron Paul should consider the Yap and the Island of stone money.[40]

He doesn't just want to audit and end the Fed, but also to audit Fort Knox's gold reserves, juuuust in case someone replaced them with metal bars that are merely painted gold.[41] In August 2012, the U.S Treasury, at the behest of a German court, began doing just that.[42] Don't expect anything big.

Science [ edit ]

“ ” Government officials shot to death a man who was determined to provide education in his home and not send his children to public school. —[9]

Dr. Paul neither knows nor cares about science. He believes that a lack of understanding of basic science shouldn't matter in choosing a doctor president. Although an MD, he has said evolution is "just a theory" and that he does not accept it.[43] The thing that is even more strange is as a doctor, he should be familiar with the antibiotic resistance of bacteria as antibiotic resistance results from natural selection [44] He's also a climate change denier [45] [46].

Paul has taken umbrage with NASA: an organization invaluable in helping America get to the moon, expand humanity's knowledge of space and innovating new technologies. During the 1988 presidential race, Paul criticized the government's direct involvement. Apparently, due to the government having any control over it, Paul went into anti-federalist mode claiming the agency was "dead" and not producing good results. His bold solution: NASA should be privatized completely and left to unaccountable businessmen to run the free market to handle.[47][48] He has consistently held this view recently, relating it again during the 2012 GOP nomination period.[49]

Health "freedom" [ edit ]

“ ” Already, Paul introduced a bill (The Health Freedom Protection Act) that would strongly and positively affect Mercola.com and many other natural health organizations and advocates, along with the field of natural health in general. —Dr. Joseph Mercola[50]

“ ” Only Ron Paul believes in genuine Only Ron Paul believes in genuine health freedom . He's the creator of the Health Freedom Protection Act, a bill that would reestablish Free Speech provisions for makers of superfoods, herbs, nutritional supplements and other natural remedies. —Mike Adams of NaturalNews[50]

In other words, Paul, who is an actual MD, supports freeing the chains that bind the sellers of quack remedies and unproven nostrums from lying to their potential customers. And you wonder why laissez-faire has so many critics.

In a 2012 primary debate, Paul tacitly endorsed the notion that the federal government should "let him die" when it comes to someone without health insurance, refusing to counter jeers from the crowd.

Teabagger [ edit ]

“ ” …even in my little town of Lake Jackson, Texas, I’ve urged everyone in my family to know how to use a gun in self defense. For the animals are coming. — Ned Stark Paul[9]

Ron Paul was the first to start using the "Tea Party" iconography back in 2007 during their "moneybomb" days. In a massively ironic move, the Teabaggers ran multiple candidates against him in the 2010 midterms.[51] In the 2016 race, Rand Paul tried to bridge the gap by commandeering the "Tea Party Express", but within months the party leadership was conclusively sick of his shit and switched their allegiance to Ted Cruz.[52]

The Ron Paul (insert descriptor here) Report [ edit ]

“ ” At least 39 white woman have been stuck with used hypodermic needles — perhaps infected with AIDS — by gangs of black girls between the ages of 12 and 14. —[9]

Soon after his election to Congress in 1978, Ron Paul & Associates began sending out fundraising letters, some of them warning of a "coming race war." Originally entitled the "Ron Paul Freedom Report", then the "Ron Paul Political Report",[53] and finally the "Ron Paul Survival Report", it was full of homophobia, racism, sexism, and paranoia. The Ron Paul Report was roughly equivalent to the John Birch Society or Executive Intelligence Review in its kookishness. TRPR particularly seemed to hate Barbara Jordan, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela.

Most of the articles did not have a byline, but they all bore Ron Paul's signature. He made some nice money from them (a cool $1 million). And he never once raised the issue or denied them while they were published. Once Paul started gaining traction in presidential elections, the newsletters and fundraising letters resurfaced. He claims that he didn't write them (which is, itself, problematic, as he was happy to put his name on it), only read them "on occasion", and "disavows" them. Needless to say, no one else has claimed ownership. The Washington Post Fact Checker gave him 3 PINOCCHIOs for "It’s hard to believe that a man who wants to oversee the entire U.S. government — albeit a smaller version — would provide zero oversight of his publications, or even bother to read them from time to time." [54]

Movement libertarians tend to finger Murray Rothbard and/or Lew Rockwell as the ghostwriter. Rockwell, predictably, denies authorship but he has defended several of the statements as both being written by himself and being "statistical" instead of racist.[55][56] R&R were both angling for positions in the Paul Administration if he somehow got elected, which could explain the omerta.[57][58]

Ron Paul has made noises which suggest that he has backpedaled from the racism he embraced previously, but still sounds a bit like Ayn Rand:

Racism is simply an ugly form of collectivism, the mindset that views humans strictly as members of groups rather than individuals. The true antidote to racism is liberty. Liberty, a limited, constitutional government devoted to the protection of individual rights rather than group claims.[59]

Reconciling this with his views on homosexuality is left as an exercise for the reader.

All of this, and considering he's an opponent of the Civil Rights Act, leaves us with a couple of explanations as to why Ron Paul seems to be a magnet for nuts:

He's pandering to the gun-toting, anti-tax racists of the rural South, like his guru von Mises He's horribly ignorant of who he has ties to; or He's a gigantic bigot and just doesn't want to admit it.

Operation Blitzkrieg [ edit ]

“ ” In January 1990, I predicted major race riots before this decade ends. I may have to move up my timetable! —Libertarian minority outreach continues apace.[9]

Turns out #2 can be crossed off the list: data leaked by a 2012 anonymous hacking campaign against Neo-Nazism links Ron Paul at the hip with American Third Position.[60] So that means Ron Paul, at worst, is a full blown racist, and at best was complicit in an attempt to bring about a race war.

Checkmate, statists [ edit ]

See the main article on this topic: Friend argument

“ ” Opinion polls consistently show that only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions. —[9]

Nelson Linder, former president of the Austin Powers division of the NAACP, has known Ron Paul for over twenty years and vehemently denies that he is a racist, and in fact admires his work in defense of blacks in the criminal justice system.[61] Naturally, the existence of a single African-American who thinks Ron Paul isn't a racist proves that he indeed isn't.

Electoral "success" [ edit ]

“ ” Indeed, there’s sex at the Grove: female prostitutes outside the camp (and inside, in the past years, we’re told) and... “frequent invitations from gay Bohemians." —[9]

Ron Paul enjoyed significant support from the Rebel Alliance during his 2008 Presidential campaign.

Ron Paul ran for President on the Libertarian ticket in 1988, and obtained about 0.5% of the popular vote. His running mate Andre Marrou ran again in 1992 and obtained 0.28% of the popular vote. After this poor showing, Ron Paul went back to the GOP with his tail between his legs.

Ron Paul attempted to run for the Presidency a third time in 2012, and gained more media attention than the first two times. Unfortunately for Paulbots, he only won two caucuses (Minnesota and Maine), though his supporters insisted he was second in delegate count. While it became statistically impossible for him to grasp the nomination, his supporters hoped to win a plurality of delegates in at least 5 states to allow him to carry his campaign all the way to the Republican convention. Cue the Paulbots singing hosannas: "Ron is spreading the message!" and "He has stealth delegates!" and he will "win the nomination with a floor speech at the RNC!" [62]

While his domestic policy views were hard to stomach (which is why Rand Paul ran toward the middle in 2015; in doing so, he became just another turd in the GOP punchbowl), it was amusing to see other Republican candidates getting owned on some matters of foreign policy in the debates. Supporters were able to garner a majority of the delegates in 6 states by the time of the convention, so the RNC changed the minimum requirement to 8 states, finally ending his long-shot campaign. After Ron got turned away at the velvet rope,[63] his supporters were so outraged, only 80% went out and voted for Romney [64]

When it became evident his bid was hopeless and Mittens' nomination was inevitable, a number of Paulbots amazingly discovered the true Master Plan behind Paul's campaign: to garner enough sympathy and support for Paul's son, Senator Rand Paul, to be chosen as Romney's running mate. Strangely, that pipe dream also turned out to be nothing but a dream.

Ron's decision to not run for re-election in 2012 may have been politically motivated as well: he probably cannot get re-elected there anymore, not for his raving hypocrisy, but because his district has changed:

... this year, the Texas Legislature redrew the district to include a swath of Democratic-leaning Jefferson County and larger parts of Galveston County. Paul's turf, once predominately rural, now must draw more conservative votes from the metastasizing Houston suburbs around League City... many voters in those places look to the government to provide quality roads, public schools, and law enforcement.[65]

He never polled above 2% nationally;[66] that's the funniest part. The Pauls have never done well outside their safe areas: Kentucky will vote for anybody with an (R) next to their name, and Paul retired as soon as Texas redrew his territory of suburban/rural Houston/Galveston. (Now that's what we call a marketplace of ideas!) He knew he'd be forced to actually run a real campaign to impress more urban voters in Houston who hadn't benefited from his years of pork barrel spending.[65]

Ron Paul will be remembered as a failed Senator and Presidential candidate who sold less than 500 books. To be fair, he did make a decent chunk of change from his campaigning and convincing gullible bastards that gold was the way to go, conveniently leaving out that it was best for his wallet. Plus the legion of Redditors who will cry "media blackout!" and defend his honor to this day.

Everybody laugh at him [ edit ]

Welfare queen FOUND! [ edit ]

“ ” Tax dollars are the foundation of the New World Order, the international equivalent of the domestic welfare state. —[9]

Now, there is general irony about the fact that a person who is anti-government is working for the government at all, but with Paul it gets a little... deeper. From 1999 to 2009, the spending in Paul's district has quadrupled.[67] And it isn't like other Congressmen are doing this to him against his will, he's doing this. He has this thing about taking wildly popular bills that are going to pass regardless of what happens, and sticking in an earmark, funneling money to beneficiaries in his district. Then, he votes against it knowing it doesn't matter. (Additionally, in 2010 the GOP decided that they voluntarily not use any earmarks. The reasons for that are another matter entirely, but Paul was one of four of the nearly 200 GOP Congressmen who did not do that.)

The projects he's got out of it? He claims to be against public transportation, but got the Congress to spend $750,000 on a public transit center in his district. He's against federal emergency management, but got the Feds in 2008 to build houses for those in his district displaced by Hurricane Ike (completed in 2011). And remember the time he bitched that House Speaker Tip O'Neil would drive around Washington in a government Lincoln Towncar? He currently drives a Lincoln Towncar.

Basically, Ron Paul is the same as every asshole in every other district.

Campaign finance violations [ edit ]

“ ” In polo clubs and bank boardrooms, those who want to keep big business in bed with big government have set their goal for 1984 – “get Ron Paul out of Washington." —[9]

Jesse Benton, Ron Paul's former campaign manager, and two others associated with the 2012 Ron Paul campaign were indicted in 2015 on campaign finance charges.[2] This poses a challenge to Mr. Paul's claim to play by a different set of rules and not give into politics-as-usual. As with so much else with Ron and Rand, this one runs in the family. The same Jesse Benton is now running a super PAC supporting Rand Paul.

The sad tale of RonPaul.com [ edit ]

“ ” As a special thank you, if you subscribe before the Presidential Convention on September 5, you may have my newsletter for an unprecedented 50% off ($49.50)! —[9]

Following his failure to get the GOP nomination, and subsequent retirement from Congress in January 2013, Paul wanted to get a website off the ground. In March 2013 he tried to buy RonPaul.com: a site run since 2008 by his supporters. Paul had once owned the site but lost it in August 2012 after failing to pay renewal fees. The site's current owners soon after acquired the rights to own the site.[68]

In response to his request to buy the site, the owners very nicely offered to give Paul RonPaul.org, another domain name they own, absolutely free. As for RonPaul.com, they offered to give him that for 250,000 USD. Instead, he refused both offers and went to the World Intellectual Property Organization (a United Nations agency) to lodge an intellectual property complaint in an attempt to control both without paying a dime.[69]

That's right, Ron Paul went to the United Nations: a global organization that he has constantly said America should renounce and leave.[70] Paul isn't so hateful of it after all or he wouldn't use it to get involved in a matter that he apparently has no faith in the free market to handle.

The WIPO dismissed the complaint. In a hilarious twist, they also found Paul guilty of "reverse domain name hijacking" for ignoring the very reasonable offers the site owners gave him. Furthermore, Paul's attempts to lie about the site being used to benefit from his name and likeness were shot down. It was apparent the domain owners were obviously using the site to help spread news and information about Paul as opposed to exploiting him for personal gain as he claimed.

Following this damaging legal haymaker, Paul abandoned the attempt to seize the site and instead launched a website with a different domain name: something he should have considered doing in the first place. [71] Despite destroying practically all his credibility in claiming to support a free market, Ron still uses his site as a soapbox to preach about the wonders of a free market based on compromise, volunteerism, and non-aggression.

As to be expected, many of his supporters still attempt to justify his underhanded behavior.[72] Sadly, no amount of deflection or justification can disprove that this incident shows Paul lacks any principles and consistency where his ideal free market is concerned. This indisputably makes him no less respectable or honorable than many other American politicians in office who he accuses of using the same tactics he did to get what they want.

In a textbook case of denial, the owners of RonPaul.com still refuse to accept Paul could treat them like crap.[73]

Keeper of the Lame [ edit ]

“ ” ... every piece of anti-discrimination legislation passed over the past few decades ignores one of the basic, inalienable rights of man — the right to discriminate. —Rand Paul[74]

His son, Rand, is a Junior Senator and failed Presidential candidate from Kentucky. He, too, is a firm advocate for state's rights, shrinking the federal government's power, ending the War on Drugs—and is such a cheap trick that he betrayed each of those issues with one signature[75] (because opioids, or something).[76] He does a little dance to prove he is worthy of getting past the gatekeepers, he's an insider. He's whatever you want him to be.

Not a patch on his old man:[77] Ron was the anti-establishment Republican candidate in 2008 and 2012. In 2016 we had Cruz, Trump, and Carson. Plus you had Sanders sucking up a lot of the youth vote that Ron relied upon.

In 2014, Ron Paul endorsed a variety of conspiracy theories: 9/11 Truther, JFK Assassination conspiracy and Martin Luther King conspiracy theories. He made these endorsements despite it being "politically very risky to talk about it" vis-a-vis Rand Paul's chances of being elected President.[78] Was Ron Paul trying to sabotage Rand Paul's chances or is he just trying to consolidate the wingnut base? It's anyone's guess.

Athletics [ edit ]

Ron Paul is also the only person to ever hit a home run out of the park in the Congressional Baseball game.[79]

Paulbots [ edit ]

"Paulbot," a portmanteau of "Ron Paul" and "robot", is an affectionate for drone-like supporters of the former Congressman (also known as "Paulbots," "Paulites," "Paultards," "Ronulans," or "Ronpauloompas"). They usually scan online platforms for mentions of Ron Paul and then descend on those discussions with hostile invective and over-the-top praise for him, accompanied with various rude behavior including shouting down disagreement and accusing anyone who disagrees with them of being a statist or fascist. Despite being real people (with real cognitive issues) they have been called 'bots' because their comments often have the non sequitur-like quality of computer-generated spam. Many Paulbots are often conspiracy theorist cranks as well, and believe that Paul was the only "hope" America had of not going down the path of the New World Order, but since the American sheeple were too distracted by Obama and his bread and circuses to consider reading up on and hence voting for the almighty Paul, the NWO will now be inevitable.

See also [ edit ]

Videos [ edit ]

What drug debates looked like in the 80's. - The irony is that Downey was sucking down a pack of cigarettes per day, and Paul predicted his imminent death. Just Say No!

"I should've punched Bruno."