Ron Paul: Republicans Should Oppose Perpetual War and Unsound Money

Just like Republicans now oppose economic socialism and nationalized healthcare, they should also speak out against perpetual war and unsound money, is the message of Ron Paul’s latest video update.

Date: 6/29/2009

Ron Paul: Last week in the House of Representatives was not a very good time for the Republic. The big bill last week that was passed narrowly so, was the Cap and Trade. The vote was 219 to 212. There were 8 Republicans that voted for the bill and some people suppose that, oh if all of those Republicans only have voted correctly and voted against that bill, it would have gone down. But that’s not necessarily so.

There were 44 Democrats that voted against the package. And they were on line to switch their vote if they had to. So the only thing the 8 votes by the Republicans did to vote against the package was give more leniency to the Democrats who would have been in political trouble if they had voted for it.

So, this is a system that is generally known in Washington how voting works. But it was interesting. One Democrat talked to me, a friend of mine and he was I asked him, “Are you going to vote on this bill?” and he said, “I’m going to vote for the bill”. And he sort of whispered and said, “But I sure hope it doesn’t pass”. I asked, “What do you mean? You’re going to vote for it and you hope it doesn’t pass?” He said, “Yeah, I have to do that”. And I asked, “Are there any others Democrats who are going to be voting for it and they really don’t like the bill?” And he said, “Oh yeah, about 15 or 20 of them”. But that’s unfortunately the way the system works.

But I thought the Republican Party did a pretty good job in standing up against this bill. They were outraged over what Cap and Trade will do. It’s going to be a real detriment to our economy, it’s going to be very costly and push up energy prices and who knows how many unintended consequences that we’ll run into down the road. Of course, it has to pass the Senate, but if it does get past the Senate obviously Obama will sign this bill.

But the fact that the Republicans did a very good job proves the point that they are pretty good at trying to limit government size when they’re out of office, when they have no responsibility. Because a year or so ago this wouldn’t have been same message that they the Republicans revealed last week.

But they’re also gearing up for fighting against national health care, socialized medicine, and I think that is very good too. And they express this outrages which is very justified. But my problem with all this is that they don’t show any outrage in other areas.

Why is there no outrage with the perpetuation of war, the expansion of the war in Afghanistan, the movement of the fighting into Pakistan? Just last week we authorized $680 billion for the military, and believe me, very little of that will provide true national defense for us.

And there is no outrage over the national security courts. One of the outrages of the previous administration were the secret courts and permanent detention without court hearings, these military tribunals. They’re going to be continued and to me there should be outrage. It’s interesting that some Democrats who are outraged over this, they vote for the Cap and Trade, and the Republicans who were outraged over Cap and Trade vote for perpetual war and this permanent unlimited detention without hearings in court.

So that’s were our real problem is and we have to try to get the people to put this together. Now, the legal justification for unlimited detention which Obama is planning to perpetuate with an executive order is that the legal experts have explained that if there is no law prohibiting the president from writing an executive order, therefore it must be okay.

Now that is absolutely bizarre that a president can do anything he wants, unless the Congress writes a law that says you can’t do it. So everything is legal except that which is prohibited by law by the Congress. What good is the constitution? The constitution is supposed to hold Congress and the courts and the president in check. So this is the reasons it marches on and I would think there would be a lot of Democrats and a lot of progressives and a lot of anti-war people and civil libertarians that should be outraged over what Obama is doing in the military, foreign policy, civil liberties area.

And of course, I would like to see the day when the Republicans who are rightfully and truly outraged over the economic tragedy that we’re facing with this weak economy, and then the administration piling on with Cap and Trade and socialized medicine… why we can’t put that outrage together and say, “Look, why don’t we just follow the constitution and get back to our senses and balance our budget and have sound money.”

That is what we need, and hopefully we will wake up and the people in this country will have enough influence in Washington to finally bring this expanding government that literally is undermining our own liberties.

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