Dr. Ron Paul's growing support threatens GOP plans -- so they move to stop him

[KurtNYC]

They say "A liar can be discredited but a truth teller must be destroyed" and as the wingnut closest to sane, Dr. Ron Paul is now the target of a character assassination on par with the manufactured "Dean scream."

Joan Walsh writing for Salon notes:

Paul has picked up support in other quarters, and that has some Republicans irritated. He's been Technorati.com's top search term much of this week; he's got more YouTube followers than any other GOP candidate, and he's apparently got savvy enough online supporters that he won the post-debate poll at MSNBC.com and came in second at Fox. The Iraq war hawks at Littlegreenfootballs.com are not amused; they banned Paul from their poll Tuesday night when they saw he was winning, claiming his supporters were "spamming" them. Over at Pajamas Media they banned Paul from their poll, too, citing his barely measurable support in major opinion polls like Gallup. The chairman of the Michigan Republican Party is trying to keep Paul out of future debates, according to the Associated Press, because of his remarks about 9/11. Big Bill Bennett agrees.

It's all led to a fascinating intra-right dust-up, with Brent Bozell's Cyber News Service publishing a piece today hyping Paul's online support. (That's where I learned about Littlegreenfootballs.com and Pajamas Media banning Paul from their polls.) "This is not a handful of people," Paul spokesman Jesse Benton told CNS. "This is a grassfire movement." I'm not sure that Paul's online support is as big as the CNS.com piece suggests, but it's certainly motivated, as the National Review's Byron York learned when he attacked Paul for his 9/11 remarks after the debate. York got "a groundswell of e-mails" from Paul supporters, leading him to concede, "Paul may not have a lot of supporters out there, but the ones he has are intense." Shades of Howard Dean's defense forces in 2003? Maybe, although Dean's defenders (who targeted me when I was insufficiently respectful of his candidacy) tended to be more polite than the e-mails York got from Paul's brigades.

Andrew Sullivan has been paying attention to the maybe-groundswell for Paul, as well as the shameful GOP effort to distort what he said about 9/11. I think he overestimates Paul's support, but he's right to do battle with conservatives who are smearing Paul about his opposition to the war, and what he said about the roots of the 9/11 attacks. It's worth noting that, as was the case with Howard Dean in 2003, the two candidates who've spoken most clearly against the Iraq war in the early debates -- Mike Gravel and Paul -- are getting the big surge of attention online. I don't think either man has a prayer of being nominated, but both candidates' online fan clubs show the hunger Americans in both parties feel for straight talk about the disaster of this war, as well as the foreign policy that led to it. Efforts to muzzle Paul are cowardly, and will backfire on the GOP.

One would hope so. Can you imagine what kind of leadership this country would have if we had a democracy? One that actually encouraged the exchange of facts and ideas? Instead of this charade.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/?last_story=/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2007/05/18/ron_paul/

[derby378]

1. Oh, goody, goody!

Ron Paul - the Howard Dean of the Republican Party! :rofl:

[Double T]

2. The rethug establishment ONLY wants neocons, dammit!

All other rethug persuasions need not apply.

[ThomCat]

3. Good that it's threatening the GOP. Recommended.

It's bad that they're going to try and silence him. Knowing the way the GOP operates, the party will pull out all the stops to silence him. Let's hope the hardball tactics forever alienate libertarians from the GOP.

[KurtNYC]

17. I noticed that during the first debate, they supered some candidates' names

and not others. I only started keeping track about half way through so I would really have to watch the first part over to know for sure... watch the first part over.. shudder. The big attack on smaller candidates the "they can't win" line. I googled "ron paul" during the first debate because they didn't put his name up. I was like "who let this half-sane guy in?" I googled my way, guess by guess through the "can't win" candidates. Took me 3 guesses to get to Paul.

[formercia]

4. Quick, someone throw another bucket of chum

the rethugs are having a feeding frenzy.

[Mabus]

5. I heard Andrea Mitchell say that the GOP wants to winnow down the field b/f next debate

My first thought was: "they really don't like Ron Paul, do they?" It doesn't surprise me though. Paul brought up facts/history and we know how the GOP doesn't want to talk about what really happened when they want to talk about fear.

[Peregrine Took]

10. "Winnow......" that's a nice word for what they are up to. How about smash

instead?

[primative1]

6. This has BY FAR ..

.. been the most interesting sequence of unplanned events in an otherwise dull and scripted campaign year. The Paul guys are under absolute assault .... sad for democracy.

[file83]

13. I've been watching Ron Paul for the last 3 years...he almost seems like

a Democrat to me. He's basically against everything Bush is for. Which is more than I can say for some of the "Top-Tier" Democrats. It's hard not to like a candidate like that.

[Beam Me Up]

7. Speaking of 'backfiring'

that isn't only going to happen to the GOP if the range of discussion is continued to be limited regarding the events of 9/11 and this country's response to them.

Democrats don't want to talk about 9/11 any more than the GOP does. Paul is careful not to venture where all politicians fear to tread -- which is to ask the hard questions like how can the laws of physics be suspended several times on one day in history?

Anyone who thinks what is going on is just "politics as usual" isn't paying attention and obviously the OP knows this. Kudos to you, KurtNYC!

[Bullet1987]

9. This just goes to show you how authoritarian the right-wing shilld are...

...They are SCARED TO DEATH of Ron Paul putting "top tier" candidates on the spot with irrefutable evidence. It's not about him winning the nomination, that's not going to happen, they're afraid of what he might say and that he RIGHT. They're not worried about him, or slightly afraid...they're cowering in the corner of a room because of RON PAUL!!

[Morgana LaFey]

8. barely measureable support at Gallup = name recognition, period

I'm just thrilled, THRILLED that Ron Paul is getting so much attention. He often makes a lot of sense to me, and I know other DUers as well. Yes, he's still a wingnut, and undoubtedly has some horrible views on a number of other subject, but dammit, he strikes me as someone you can work with, by which I probably more mean "reason with." There's something to be said, too, about a man of principle -- someone who stands up there and says the purportedly unpopular but true thing.

What thrills me is that so many Americans, presumably a bunch of them self-identified as Republicans, see and appreciate the sanity in his remarks as well.

Edit: forgot -- of COURSE they have to stop him, for the same reason the Democrats had to stop Howard Dean: to prevent him from winning, and thus taking the power away from those to whom power means more than anything else, including their very souls.

[Bullet1987]

11. What is a wingnut?

If anything, the only nuts of the party are the lying flip-floppers who condone torture...

McCain: "I'll follow him to the gates of hell."

[Beam Me Up]

12. Yeah, I don't think he is a 'wingnut' at all. Where do you get that?

Granted some of his views are extreme but they aren't INSANE -- unlike some people currently holding office that we all could name.

[unlawflcombatnt]

15. Many Good Ideas

And I doubt Paul's claiming we have an "economy that is strong, and getting stronger," like the other Republican half-wits. Paul has a far better grasp of reality, than to claim the economy is doing well with a 1st quarter GDP growth of only 0.96%.

Paul has his own well thought-out positions, which he's not going to change just because the Republican Party has changed it's positions.

[southerncrone]

14. Ron Paul is way too intelligent to be

a main-stream Repuke. That's why they must dispense with him.
Isn't he really a Libertarian?

[Supersedeas]

16. another independent doctor who the Party elite will try to crush

[ProudDad]

18. Don't make the mistake of considering ron paul "democratlike"!

* Rights belong to individuals, not groups.

There's no room for the "commons", the common good -- when it conflicts with individual greed.

* Property should be owned by people, not government.

No "commons", everything is private property...inevitably owned by a minority to the detriment of the majority.

* All voluntary associations should be permissible -- economic and social.

KKK, White Citizen's Council, collusion by oil companies -- no anti-trust legislation

* The government's monetary role is to maintain the integrity of the monetary unit, not participate in fraud.

He wants to return to the "gold standard"

* Government exists to protect liberty, not to redistribute wealth or to grant special privileges.

No welfare, no food stamps, no universal health care, no support for the poor or handicapped.

* The lives and actions of people are their own responsibility, not the government's.

"I've got mine, Jack now Fuck you, get your own!"

http://www.house.gov/paul/

He's a fine ally when it comes to the phony "war on drugs" and the phony "war on terror" or decriminalizing drugs or keeping government out of our bedrooms and bank accounts but the thought of him in the White House scares the shit out of me...