Greenwich Village for Ron Paul
Fed up with the Trotskyite takeover of the Republican party, Americans hopefully elected scads of Democrats to Congress last session in order to upend that nonsense. But lo and behold, the Dems dutifully responded to the mandate first by allowing more American troops sent to Iraq, then by boldly agreeing that soon, maybe, unless it’s decided to invade Iran, or Syria, or some other difficulty pops up, why then they’ll favor deescalating, at least until American troops are back to the same number they were when those Dems got elected. Not that our elites don’t respond to the electorate’s concerns, however, they do, which is why to compensate for ignoring them we are granted ever increasing doses of la rhétorique anti-war.
Well yes, quite predictable and the rest, but despite all that, it’s been a delightful summer for the paleocon contingent here in Greenwich Village – which I am happy (and amazed) to report isn’t comprised solely of me – for indeed, the honorable thrill of patriotism has resonantly captured the heart once again! Ron Paul’s the inspiration of course, and though there seems some small possibility he won’t actually win the White House – unless Bush does go after Iran – nonetheless when a window of this kind opens it seems best to ignore the elites just like they ignore us.
And what a window! I mean anybody with an honest brain, not to say soul, understands the aspiring caliphs struck over here because l’USA was being so helpful over there: but for a politician to say that, and in a Republican debate, and in (no longer) Calhoun’s South Carolina no less, well, it was all more than just the pleasure of seeing Rudy’s knickers pucker, seemed instead rather like a thing impossible in American politics. Until then I was vaguely for Paul, but assumed the entire campaign season would be as interesting and as fun as watching Rudy’s wife torture those dogs. Instead, it suddenly became something – of real possibility.
So in response I first decided I had to get a Ron Paul button, then thought, you know, other people would want one too, and then realized that if lots of people were sporting Ron Paul 2008, it would be as accessible an anti-war, anti-Empire public statement as could be made. If the buttons started popping up all over New York, who knows, maybe even Hillary would notice. Thus inspired, quite independent of the campaign itself, solely as an entrepreneur, I bought 1000 of them, and made a big, colorful and laminated sign that read:
Pressure your candidate.
Wear
Ron Paul 2008.
Shake up Bush-Rudy
and
the Democrats.
Get our troops home!
Whereupon, more or less every day, I’d take the sign and buttons out with my American flag lawnchair to that prime real estate on the corner of West 4th and 6th Avenue, and sell the buttons at a dollar a pop – six for five bucks! My hope was to get the money back and then buy some more and, ah, now it’s time to buy some more after those!
Hey, it’s a lucrative business, so I recommend it even if you’re just a cynic out to clean up. All right, not that lucrative, but a 6-hour stint’ll sell more than 50 every time, all helped along in my case by a New York summer that wasn’t nearly so brutal this year. The thing is, the last time I did anything even remotely political like this was back in the jail days after joining Operation Rescue at the abortion mills; but this time it came easy. Left, right, queer, straight, and – pardoning the expression – everything in between, people not only from the Village, but the rest of New York and far-flung places like Georgia and Oklahoma were grabbing up the buttons. And, how to put it, talking sensibly, intelligently, unlike anything you ever hear in the media – save when Congressmen Paul gets his five minutes of course.
Allow a summation of what they’ve said: the Republicans are nuts, every one of them is but offering endless war, yet the Democrats are only marginally better. They won’t run the Empire quite so incompetently, but incompetent enough to drag our resources, not to say our sons and daughters, into a black hole for as long as necessary until the Empire implodes. Like the Republicans, they don’t care about Americans at all, but only in interests that have a financial stranglehold on public discourse. Just listen to the debates: only Paul talks with any respect for his listeners, all the rest do little better than insist America needs a president who loves puppy dogs and flowers in the spring as much as they do.
More than one customer noted that after the fight with Giuliani, other Republicans stayed away from Paul in those debates, fearing how deep the response would be toward his call to restore the Republic: and wisely so perhaps, since not a few Repubs told me they’d had some hope for Huckabee against Hillary after the Iowa caucuses, until his pathetic performance against Paul in the recent debate. Again and again I heard the confidence that America’s strengths are not just formidable, but would be more formidable still if we brought our troops back, and back not only from Iraq, but from Korea and Europe and wherever NATO might wish to send them next week. I was surprised by how often I heard this, but probably shouldn’t have been when you consider that the actual American soldiers in Iraq have sent more money to Paul’s campaign than to any other candidate; in fact, take McCain from the equation, and according to the Federal Election Commission Paul’s got more contributions from our soldiers than all the other candidates combined!
Occasionally I’d get some pro-war snarls, though what really struck me was how few. In response to one of them, a Paul partisan snapped back:
“If you want an Empire you’ve got a whole gaggle of stooges ready to carry water for it, so you shouldn’t complain just because a patriot has also entered the race.” That came early, so I’ve had it in my arsenal for the rare occasions, but I’m happy to report the summer passed without fistfights. Doubtless that’ll change when Paul wins in Iowa and New Hampshire next January, though then I suppose the thing to worry about will be novel interpretations of the Patriot Act.
One last tale is, for me, the happiest. With a group of supporters buying the buttons, a partisan expressed dismay that Paul really had no chance, and that even if he did, the elites would cut him down before ever letting him restore the republic. Maybe. But another then remarked that though Paul has no chance, neither did the Romans when Hannibal the Great – the glory of Baal! – occupied Italy for eighteen long years. Throughout that occupation, Hannibal never lost a major battle, rarely lost even a skirmish, and in the meantime devastated the Roman armies again and again, and again.
That’s how you win wars, the fellow continued, when the enemy knows he is defeated. And the Romans were defeated, they had lost, everybody knew it, everybody but the Romans. Over and over the window against them seemed absolutely closed, or all but, yet with only that sliver of a caveat, against odds quite impossible, they fought on, they kept it open, until finally it closed only when, not republican Rome, but Carthage was destroyed.
So granting that Paul’s chances are better then Rome’s certainly were, you can still find a fellow pushing Ron Paul buttons on the corner of 4th & 6th in Greenwich Village, usually in the evenings now that the school year has recommenced. You can buy a few, 6 for $5 remember, or better still, you could try pushing the window open a little further yourself. Lots to be done no doubt, but if nothing else, buy a thousand and have some fun pushing them at the mall or wher’er the local folks hang about, with the surprise of discovering how much more interesting they all are than you thought. Better do it before New Hampshire, though, while it’s still legal.
Richard Cowden Guido is the author of The Battle for Vatican II and other historical works. Image of Washington Square courtesy of Wikipedia and GNU.
Comments
Me favorite RC writer, “And the dead arose and appeared to many!” Where have you been, lo, all these years since publishing The Battle for Vatican II?
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Having both Hillary and Rudy as candidates adds new meaning to New York’s motto: “The Empire State”.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Two things trouble me about Ron Paul: his support of reregulation of rail freight rates, which was done away with by the 1980 Staggers Act, and a recent fund raiser letter I received which made no mention of the Iraq war. It is a given that the oil-dominated Republican Party will do anything to destroy our fuel-efficient rail systems; reregulation may be their latest way. A for the letter, why was his position on our illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq absent? Ron Paul supporters, I welcome your responses.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Mr Paul seems a decent and honorable man. What troubles me about him is his libertarianism, a system of thought which, if carried to its logical conclusion, would not protect, for example, an adolescent boy from being raped by a homosexual. Far-fetched you say? Then you aren’t paying attention.
Libertarianism is just another false philosophy which begins with an flawed premise and will end with a flawed solution. Freedom uber alles is not what anyone should be fighting for.
It is easy to get enthused about Mr Paul and the libertarian idea given a deranged war-monger in the white house and the party of sodomy and abortion as the opposition. But neither of these three stooges - Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians - will even come close to solving the problems we now face.
There is only one place these problems will be solved, and it ain’t Washington. It’s Rome.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Roland, I cannot speak for the campaign, but I too have been disappointed to see Paul’s opposition to the Iraq War (and the Empire) deemphasized in some
of the campaign literature. I don’t know why. I am surprised that Paul would be in favor of the regulation that you mention. You may want to confirm this and
read his rationale for his vote.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Dan, libertarians would not support the rape of anyone by anyone else. Rape violates the non-agression axiom which is fundamental to that system of thought.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Funny (ha ha) how all the anti-Paul posters I see in various forums seem to have to resort to grossly misinterpreting either him or libertarian philosophy to make their “points”. Is it that they’re really that stupid, or simply that they’re so desperate to find a negative that they’ll resort to flat-out lying? Maybe they can fool some of the people, but more and more are waking up, and they look like idiots.
I suppose I could come up with some minor negatives about Ron Paul if I tried, but considering that he’s really the only hope for America to avoid a catastrophic collapse that will make the 1930s seem like a happy memory, I wouldn’t waste my time. I haven’t bothered to vote since 1988 (guess who I voted for then), but I’m going to do the formerly unthinkable (as a hereditary liberal Democrat turned libertarian) and register Republican.
Actually, even with President Paul the collapse will come; we’ll just have a bit of a head start on dealing with it—even if only because we’ll finally have somebody in the White House who tells us the truth. But that’s enough better than nothing to make any effort worth it.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
The remarks about Dr Ron Paul’s stance on “social issues” miss the point. Under the US Constitution, such issues are the proper realms of the state governments, not the national government. Dr. Ron Paul would push the national government back to within its constitutional bounds, leaving the state governments with their powers intact to provide protections of life, liberty, & property.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
I remember meeting Ron Paul over 30 yrs ago as a young student intoxicated with the perfume of libertarianism. He is a good man who speaks truth to the power of the neocon. I wish him well.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
This apple has a few blotches but the others are rotten straight through!
Click to flag this comment as abusive
I thought this website was filled with intelligent, thoughtful people. It surprised me to learn some folks believe the state is in a position to prevent crime. Sorry, it can only deter crime. Unless we want a minority report world.
I also mildly support Ron Paul. After all, while honorable, he is going to have to deal with 535 establishmentarians. I fail to see what good a libertarian can do singularly in whatever position of power he is in.
And to correct the error in the past couple generations of political leaders, the dollar must be once again linked to the gold standard. I don’t see Paul doing such a thing.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Dr Paul will likely win the NH primary with what will be considered a stunning margin of victory. As for you naysayers, why not just for fun vote for the one candidate who’s not beholden to Lobby/Corporate influence and see how things go, can’t be any worse in my mind.
Then
Ron Paul vs. Hillary Clinton
That would be an easy win for Dr Paul.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
1. The re-regulation of rail freight rates is NOT something Ron Paul would ever propose.
2. Ron Paul proposes to give us a solid currency by allowing other, commodity-backed currencies to exist and compete with the Fed’s fiat currency. Read his book, “The Case for Gold: A Minority Report of the United State Gold Commission” for an understanding of how this would work.
3. Ron Paul is the only candidate of either party that would end the war in Iraq quickly. The choice is between him and [fill in name here], who are virtually indistiguishable.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Couldn’t resist responding to Dan’s absurd smear of libertarianism as somehow leading inexorably to “an adolescent boy ... being raped by a homosexual.”
The kicker is he says “Rome” is the solution. Would this be the same “Rome” in whose employ are a number of the afore-mentioned homosexual adolescent-rapers?
Click to flag this comment as abusive
It’s old proverb time.
Dan Guenzel: God helps those who help themselves (St. Tom calls this Operative Grace responding to Co-operative Grace).
Your gripers: Noting assures the victory of evil than when good men do nothing, said Ed Burke (or something like that). Don’t want to register Repub to vote for our Ron? Then you’re one of Ed’s nothing-doers. Remember where Dante put in Hell the “lukewarm”. Don’t like Ron Paul? Find a better candidate and get him in the race. Or run yourself. Want a 3rd party? No one’s stopping you from founding one.
Don’t like liberty? There plenty of places with less than here. Go there and get out of our way.
Choose ye this day for whom ye shall vote. For me and my house, we shall vote for Ron Paul.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
The Ron Paul haters love beating up on Straw Men.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
some sad news for non-Republican Ron Paul supporters, If you live in NH or NY you only have till the 12th of October to change your party affiliation. This move-up in dates appears to be a tactic to stall the Paul NH campaign. Don’t let the jerks jerk you around, get your affililation changed now please.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
For Dan Guenzel:
“What troubles me about him is his libertarianism, a system of thought which, if carried to its logical conclusion, would not protect, for example, an adolescent boy from being raped by a homosexual.”
This is a false and inane comment.
I would counter that the current system doesn’t protect the adolescent boy from being raped either-- Go look up sexual assualt information and you will see what I’m saying is true.
Neither a the libertarian, democrat, republican, green, or reform party has the perfect solution to sexual assault or crime-- so please don’t make silly comments. If you’re going to make stupid statements like this, please at least explain your position.
For the record, libertarianism is about liberty. To uphold the rights of the individual and to be free of government coersion.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Homosexual rape of children would only occur under a
Libertarian regime you say?
BULSHIT!
Let’s not forget the horrifying case of Jesse Dirkhising
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=14837
Later.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
I suppose this is getting towards beating a (brain-)dead horse, but I for one would love to hear exactly how Dan Guenzel came to this ‘logical conclusion’ of his, because apparently I’ve missed something in my 5 year study of libertarianism. What is false premise of which you speak?
Then again, doesn’t that kind of thing (this particular rape scenario, I mean) happen everyday in this statist world of ours already? What does that have to do with coercive theft, market interference, aggressive war, debasement of our currency, loss of property rights, privacy rights, legal rights, etc, etc, ETC, ETC! These are the issues that are of concern to Ron Paul and libertarians everywhere.
Mr. Guenzel, please keep your red herrings to yourself.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Sir;
As I am a paleocon living in (hipster) Williamsburg, Brooklyn, your story cheered me, for I have long feared I might be the only one in New York. Maybe someone should start a paleocon NY club, or something. I still might be the only paleo in Williamsburg though!
All the best.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Richard Codwen-Guiodo,
Glory Be To God. Twenty Five years ago, you were my favorite journalist --= next to Pat Buchanan and Smoken Joe. I quit my subscription to the Wanderer about the time you quit, were fired or jailed. Now after all those years you appear again, from only God knows where, on another favorites, TAKI’s TOP DRAWER , where all the journalist “fit to print” are represented. God Bless you, Richard. You haven’t changed a beat--and were always pretty damn good.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“1. The re-regulation of rail freight rates is NOT something Ron Paul would ever propose.”
Dwight:
I didn’t say he propsoed it; I said he supported it, and I obtained that information from a railroad-oriented magazine to which a friend subscribes. I will try to find which one and which issue.
Roland
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Libertarianism is not about liberty, it is about selfishness. The inability of individuals to control their behavior caused by the absence of a moral compass has resulted in the state assuming the responsibilities that properly belong to individuals. Individuals having children out of wedlock, neglecting elderly parents, people spending money they do not have are all behavior which were formerly regarded as sins but are now viewed as obstacles to personal growth.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
@ Stan: While I would agree in general with your analysis of the present state of human society—except that I would replace “inability” with “unwillingness”— your definition of libertarianism is far off the mark. You appear to be suffering from the common confusion of “libertarian” with “libertine”, which is constantly fostered by the media and other ruling class tools in the interests of keeping the masses ignorant and childish, i.e. easily ruled.
See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertinism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism
Libertinism is the divorcing of liberty from responsibility. Libertarianism is the understanding that true liberty is impossible without responsibility. An adult is responsible; a child is not.
Or perhaps you are simply the sort of knee-jerk moralist/collectivist who believes that everyone should sacrifice, i.e. make himself unhappy, for the sake of everyone else? Thus any concern for ones own happiness is “selfish”, i.e. evil. How does that scenario lead to anyone being happy?
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“Occasionally I’d get some pro-war snarls, though what really struck me was how few.”
Richard,
Come on, the Village is not a place congenial for Patton-types, save the few who dress-up in uniform during the Halloween Parade.
While, I’m on board with Paul, I can’t help make a distinction between those who are genuinely anti-war and those who just are too tired to fight. In NY we have no shortage of lefties who are already buying prayer mats and getting ready to follow Cat Stevens to Mecca. Standing next to them feels...creepy.
Great to see you’re back and fighting Moloch. Hope to see you on 4th and 6th next week.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“In NY we have no shortage of lefties who are already buying prayer mats and getting ready to follow Cat Stevens to Mecca.”
Our ancient enemy, callow and cynical Mohammed, is the catalyst for White Western rebirth. All whites who submit to Allah are pathetic slaves of Asiatic transgressors. Weak and worthless self-hating whites will find themselves prostrate on the anvil of history.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Hey BSHT,
Surely your florid prose is best delivered in battle dress. Is tonight’s uniform from the Ernst Rohm collection?
Click to flag this comment as abusive
GO RON PAUL! GO RON PAUL! GOD BLESS RON PAUL FOR PRESIDENT 2008!
I’m a 48 year old grandfather who’s greatly appreciating the Ron Paul Presidential campaign! The BIGGER story however is, that Ron Paul has $5.3M cash on hand and that he’s NOT going to take matching funds! America is sick and tired of “BIG Brother” government breathing down our necks and I personally deplore working 5 months out of the year to pay my income tax obligation that goes 100% strictly on just the “interest payment” on the national debt to the “ultra-private” Federal Reserve Banking Corporation! Of course, I detest our current “pack of beaurocrats” who are spending our tax dollars like a “junkie waiting for his next fix!” I am extemely delighted as to the way Ron Paul has shown his frugal fiscal responsibility regarding his personal campaign - Let’s compare that with any other presidential candidates finances and review their “donations vs. expenditures” ratios? Then ask yourself this important question - Who do you really want running our economy for the next 4-8 years? A fiscal conservative that thinks our dollars should be backed by something other than printing money out of “thin air” and who would replace the IRS & the Federal Reserve with NOTHING! Or the same ‘ole same ‘ole ... This may be our last chance ... The choice is yours ... GOOGLE Ron Paul for yourself
and get the WHOLE story on the man many believe to be an American Hero!!!
“None are more enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”
-- Goethe
Click to flag this comment as abusive
GO RON PAUL! GO RON PAUL! GOD BLESS RON PAUL!
RON PAUL FOR PRESIDENT 2008!
Best Ron Paul video - (Reply: WRONG!...Best Presidential Candidacy Video EVER!!!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFfdB5OzlyQ
Click to flag this comment as abusive
The resistance grows;
“Roman Catholic Archbishop Raymond Burke, who made headlines last presidential season by saying he’d refuse Holy Communion to John Kerry, has his eye on Rudy Giuliani this year.”
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20071004/D8S24K980.html
Click to flag this comment as abusive
This website is a refuge for the weary. It is mind-numbing to peruse the “Sir Rudy is our only hope” drone on Townhall. Joseph Goebbels would be humbled by the neocon spin machine.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Mr. Cowden-Guido, thanks for all you do for Ron Paul’s campaign. Just make sure you tell those who purchase your buttons that if they wish to vote for RP in the Feb. 5 New York primary, they MUST change their party registration to Republican by Oct. 12 or they will have no chance to vote for him. Thanks.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
I’ve been a Republican my whole life and finally someone to vote for. Go Ron Paul!!!
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Ron Paul is a man we can trust.
An impeccable voting record for liberty;
MY liberty (I live in his congressional district.)
A genuine hard working American who believes
like our founders that liberty is the best
socio-political-economic policy.
Not only is he correct, but there is still a majority
of Americans who agree.
Ron Paul ‘08!
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“In NY we have no shortage of lefties who are already buying prayer mats and getting ready to follow Cat Stevens to Mecca”
Stupidest thing i’ve ever read.
Anyway, Derek, there’s more real-cons than you’d imagine in NYC. I’m on the LES>
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“Stupidest thing I’ve ever read.”
You live in NYC and haven’t heard rationalizations for ritual slayings, or genital mutilation defended as a legitimate cultural expression by the very same people who resent “In God We Trust” tarnishing their dollar bills?
Companies in NY are allowing Muslim employees to wash their feet in lavatory sinks, while asking Christian prayer groups to meet off company premises. This is news to you?
The self-hate that leads one to condemn his entire cultural patrimony, while offering excuses for the Death Cult of militant Islam is such a common wide-spread phenomenon, maybe remarking on something so obvious qualifies as stupid.
Or, maybe you don’t mind finding common cause with such people.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
“The BIGGER story however is, that Ron Paul has $5.3M cash on hand and that he’s NOT going to take matching funds!”
Hurrah!
The big mistake of the Buchanan campaign was going after
those damned matching funds via the Reform Party.
It just brought in a lot of unsavory types like the whore,
Lenora Fulani and her attempt to mug us on the eve of the
convention.
Let them keep their blood money. We will make up for it
with pure, unadulterated enthusiasm!
Run Ron Run!
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Papists will find that nothing complements, a Paul for President button than one of these;
http://www.catholicsforanend.org/sticker.php
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Is Ron Paul another Feliks Dzhershinsky? I quote below from a September 15th, 2007 article in The Washington Times, as reproduced in the Tarheel Telegrapher, East Carolina Chapter, NRHS, Inc.
“Democratic Rep. James Oberstar of Minnesota is using his post as chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to push through Congress a bill that could strangle the railroad industry under the pretense of promoting market competition. Next week, the committee holds a hearing on H.R. 2125, a bill disengenuously named the Railroad Competition and Service Improvement Act. The bill would re-regulate the railroad industry by effectively forcing price controls on a market that was flailing prior to the 1980 deregulatory Staggers Rail Act, which then allowed the industry to revive itself into a healthy and flourishing field. Now it appears this effort to turn back the clock on the Staggers Act would create new bureaucracies and punitive regulatory bodies.
“...it is rather astonishing that nearly a third of the members who have signed onto this legislation are Republican - including Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, the self-crowned libertarian prince of the free market.”
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Roland,
Say it ain’t so. Ron Paul supports H.R. 2125 - The Railroad
Competition and Service Improvement Act. This is the
ultimate betrayal of all of us who expect unthinking
adherence to the Party line on trains, planes and
steamboats.
The shame.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Dr. Paul’s opening position in Des Moines (remember the snub by the Iowa Tax People and the Iowa Christian Alliance?) was one of pro-life. And he reasoned that if we keep the baby alive, we can deal with whatever comes after that. Imagine that! The crowd was noticeably much noisier on his second point--something about the draft and conscription. But he had me from point number one.
Click to flag this comment as abusive
Post a Comment
By submitting this form, you give Taki's Magazine permission to publish this comment. Comments will be published at our discretion, and may be edited for clarity and length. Personal attacks, ethnic slurs, the riding of hobby horses and the beating of dead ones will be deleted as soon as they are detected by our small but alert staff. Repeat abusers of this policy will be barred from leaving comments. All comments reflect only the views of those posting them and not necessarily those of this website, its editors, or authors. For best formatting, please limit your response to one paragraph and don't hit "enter" to force line breaks.
Commenting is not available in this section entry.