Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

On November 4th, 2008, 8,538,559 more people voted for Barack Obama than did for John McCain, giving Obama a landslide victory in the Electoral College. Mr. Obama won this election by doing what most other campaigns try to do: run against the establishment on a message of ‘change’, not just in the superficial and artificial sense, but in a meaningful and profound way. Among other commitments, Obama promised to restore the rule of law and our cherished Constitutional principles. Touting his career as a Constitutional lawyer and law professor, Obama gave some hope to civil libertarians by denouncing torture, domestic spying, and Guantanamo Bay. He danced around these issues all the while voting for the FISA amendment and perpetuating his double-talk; saying one thing, and doing another.

Now that he’s been President for several weeks, Obama has begun to deal with an issue that is very dear to my heart: civil liberties. Throughout every one of his executive orders President Obama gave the appearance of reversing the policies of George Bush. However, he has left, and continues to leave, loopholes that allow for torture and extraordinary rendition. He is even open to “modified military commissions.” He will take over a year to close Guantanamo and he will allow the CIA to operate our empire overseas despite the predictable blowback that would result from this. He will continue to allow our troops to be stationed in over 135 countries across the globe. He will continue giving money to dictatorships. Essentially, the product was not as advertised. Barack Obama will not significantly change US policy. The deception continues.

The use and abuse of executive branch powers under Barack Obama will apparently be used no less than they were under his predecessor, George W. Bush. The office of the President of the United States of America, over the past 60 years, has grown increasingly and progressively more powerful and aggressive. This power has been taken forcefully by presidents over the years, each adding his own contribution and helping to set unfortunate precedent. Each president has used a ‘crisis’ to usurp more power from the Congress and the Legislature; Bush used the 9/11 attacks and Obama will use the economic crisis. The use of executive orders with almost no oversight from Congress or the courts will continue with Obama.

All of these culminate into one large disappointment for civil libertarians who believe in civil liberty, non-interventionism, and sound Constitutional principles. More and more it is becoming apparent that the vast majority of politicians in Washington are two sides of the same coin. More important and more worrisome, is the complete media blackout about important issues such as the Federal Reserve, our national sovereignty, third party candidates, monetary policy, and our foreign policy blow back.

Many Obama supporters may become disillusioned with their leader and may turn to a third party. Many Republicans may tire of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity and may do the same. Both Democrats and Republicans may become so disillusioned with their leadership in Congress that they may look to real alternatives, like Ron Paul. He represents more than himself; he represents a large swath of patriots in this country who reject the two self-serving corporate parties.

Now is the time to grow the Ron Paul movement. Spread the message! From 2009 and into the future, the Ron Paul Revolution lives on.

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Ron Paul was reelected as Congressman for the 14th District of Texas. He did not have an opponent.

Montana

John McCain: 50.1% (236,513 votes)
Barack Obama: 46.7% (220,301 votes)
Ron Paul: 2.2% (10,230 votes)
Ralph Nader: 0.8% (3,570 votes)
Bob Barr: 0.3% (1,300 votes)

Louisiana

John McCain: 58.6% (1,147,603 votes)
Barack Obama: 39.9% (780,981 votes)
Ron Paul: 0.5% (9,353 votes)
Cynthia McKinney: 0.5% (9,184 votes)
Ralph Nader: 0.4% (6,991 votes)
Chuck Baldwin: 0.1%

Why was Ron Paul on the presidential ballot in these states?

In Montana, the Constitution Party of Montana used to be an affiliate of the national Constitution Party until July 2006. Since then, it has been an independent party. This year, they selected Ron Paul and Michael Peroutka as their presidential candidates.

In Louisiana, a group of Ron Paul supporters founded the Louisiana Taxpayers Party and selected Ron Paul and Barry Goldwater Jr. as their presidential candidates.

In California, Ron Paul was nominated as a write-in candidate by Gail Lightfoot, a former Libertarian candidate for U.S. Senate.

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CNN: Whoever wins the presidency today, he will face a lot of challenges. With a look at some of the obstacles facing the next President I’m joined by former Republican presidential candidate, Congressman Ron Paul. He joins me from Clute, Texas this morning. Glad you’re up with us, great to see you this morning

Ron Paul: Thank you, thank you very much.

CNN: As we take a look at how things are shaping up today, what are you thinking of, what are some of the things that stick out in your mind today?

Ron Paul: Well, I think the obvious is, what’s it going to be like with the new president, because we are going to get a new president. But the old problems are still going to be there. We’re still going to have to deal with the Middle East. We have the policy now where we’re going into Syria, we’re going into Pakistan, we’re threatening Iran, we’re having bad conditions in Afghanistan and Iraq, so, those problems are getting bigger by the day.

And also the financial situation is, you know, both candidates have supported the same old policy of pumping in 5 trillion dollars worth of new money, trying to prop up all the mistakes made over the last 20 or 30 years.

So, the American people have a lot to think about, and we do have a lot of concerns. Let’s hope things improve, but right now I don’t see any significant change in policy on the horizon.

CNN: Do you think that there’s a lot of promises that have to be made during an election cycle that one side, either gentleman, finally gets to the Oval Office, perhaps a lot of the things that have been promised aren’t necessarily going to be realistic to happen in this current environment?

Ron Paul: Well, I think that happens just about all the time. You noticed that neither candidate has talked about balancing the budget, but they sure have promised a lot of spending. No, nothing to be cut, spending is going to continue. And if deficits do matter, which I happen to believe, I mean, how can we expect any changes? Government is going to get bigger, more intrusive into our private lives, the foreign policy is going to remain the same, we’re gonna be the policeman of the world… So, really there’s no offer of solutions.

Obama talks about change, but what is he going to change? He and McCain agreed with the total bailout package, they don’t disagree on foreign policy, really, so the American people are going to be frustrated. They’re enthusiastic now and they’re hopeful and we all should be. But what’s going to happen after a month or two if each of these problems I’m talking about are much worse?

CNN: One of the things Congressman, as you talk a little about what we could see coming down the road, and whether things will change, there’s probably more of a chance of legislation at least being passed under an Obama administration if we do see the House and the Senate both go to a majority of Democrats, perhaps even a veto-proof majority.

Could single party rule actually be more detrimental to the country?

Ron Paul: Oh, I don’t think there’s any doubt about it. I think that’s one of the strongest arguments for voting for McCain. What this country needs is a little bit of gridlock on new legislation. You know, I think the only laws that we should be passing now, are laws that repeal legislation, repeal previous legislation, that’s what we need. So, no, I think it’s going to be sad if we don’t have any gridlock or any debate, I mean, if everything gets rubber-stamped, of course I wouldn’t mind a little bit of movement to get rid of the PATRIOT Act, that wouldn’t be too bad.

If they were doing the right things it wouldn’t be a problem, but right now there’s no evidence that we’re all of a sudden going to see a shift, that we’re going to see new policies, that we’re going to have a deep concern about the Constitution, that we’re going to talk about a non-interventionist foreign policy, that we’re going to talk about the Federal Reserve, the culprit in this whole financial mess. Nobody is talking about that, so, yes, I think if we rubber-stamp and see no gridlock and one party power I think it’s very bad for our country.

CNN: Alright, Congressman Ron Paul, it’s great to talk to you this morning, thanks for your take today.

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The buzzword of the campaigns has been “change”. Obama wants to enact change to help the middle class, McCain wants to change the Republican party back into what it once was, and both candidates vow to change the greed and excess on Wall Street and in Washington.

It’s troubling that McCain now supports a lot of socialistic policies, such as spending $300b of the $700b bailout package on rescuing homeowners, thus giving a reward for a horrible decision. But what about the topics neither candidate has addressed? What about the policies and programs that won’t be touched under either campaign? Such as…

The Federal Reserve. A growing number of voters are starting to recognize the perils of allowing the Fed to manipulate our currency. But there’s still a lot of work to make everyone aware of the dangers the Fed poses to our country.

There is a real threat to our very dollar as inflation continues to eat away at the average American’s purchasing power. Let’s let the market decide when it comes to money. If people want to trade in gold, we must allow them to. We need to take back the power of the people in this country.

Allowing the Fed to increase the money supply just saps more and more power from the millions of Americans who make our country what it is. We need a real debate on whether the Fed is necessary (it isn’t), and how its actions directly relate to our current economic crisis. (More on that here.)

War on Drugs. No one even mentions this anymore, it’s pretty much a given that your tax dollars are going to be spent housing “criminals” who get caught using and/or selling drugs, sometimes in laughably small quantities that are less dangerous than a pack of cigarettes.

Education. Competition is what drives people to do great things. It gives incentives to produce and go above and beyond the basics. Right now our broken system simply feeds more money to schools and teachers unions, many of which are underperforming. Let’s cut them out and become more efficient, which is what the market demands.

That’s just a partial list. We could also go in depth about restrictions on gambling, foreign policy, the IRS, and many other topics. The bottom line is that instead of looking at the differences between the candidates, we should be examining the similarities. It’s counterintuitive, but effective. By recognizing these similarities, we can get a clearer picture of where we are headed as a country: the status quo will remain intact and citizens will continue to see their choices and freedoms erode.

The bailout is another great example of how Americans don’t really have a choice in the upcoming election. No matter who gets elected, they both supported the bailout. So it’s now a given that we will simply save companies that make risky, bad decisions? Where does it all end? Do we bail out homeless people with government sponsored food? What about the precedent we are setting?

Unemployment is a topic that many Americans have misconceptions about. In most people’s minds, jobs going overseas is a horrible tragedy. Never mind the fact that most economists agree that jobs don’t belong to the employee but rather to the employer, who by cutting his costs will save his company, and ultimately society as a whole, valuable resources. There are always new jobs and opportunities.

In the 1800s, most Americans were employed simply to bring food to the tables of the country. With improved farming technology, that number is down to something close to 3/100 people. What did the other 60/100 people do when faced with a job loss? They now work maintaining websites, trading stocks, researching medicine, designing new fashions, testing video games, and on and on. So there is both a cost (lost job here in America) and a benefit (frees up valuable resources and saves money) to this situation. But both candidates only want to focus on the cost side, which is troubling.

A “reliance on foreign oil” is also discussed by both candidates. Don’t they realize that people are choosing to spend their income on this oil? The oil only flows here because there are dollars waiting for it, in other words, people are voting with their money that yes, they want oil. And it doesn’t matter where the oil comes from. People are demanding it, they want to power their cars and SUVs with oil and don’t mind sending money overseas if that’s what has to happen. There is no difference between a barrel of oil from Canada and one from Russia.

If we want to reduce the amount of money we send to these other countries (some of whom, apparently, “do not like us” which is just buttering us up for the next great American war), we should develop our own energy technologies and/or drill here. But the people (who comprise the market) have decided they will risk the energy efficiency and environmentalism for something more convenient.

And that’s fine. Eventually there’s a point where preferences will shift. If oil hits $250/barrel, people will shift to something else. We already saw it earlier this year when gasoline was around $4/gallon. Miles driven plummeted. People switched to less bulky vehicles, etc. So the market is the best way to get us “on” or “off” of oil (foreign and domestic oil are both the same product, a fact that escaped McCain in the last debate when he said oil from Canada was “fine” but foreign oil wasn’t. Tell that to someone who wants to fill up his tank but can’t because we restricted “foreign” oil).

Taxes are a hot topic that both candidates will go into. Unfortunately, neither is in favor of fixing the broken system. We might lower taxes on one group of people, but raise them on corporations (I always wanted to ask Obama who runs these “evil corporations” and if he thinks robots are in charge or do real live people benefit when corporations get tax cuts? CEOs are people, too. And they spread their capital around very efficiently. That’s how they got to the top, by making smart choices.)

But neither candidate wants to simplify our tax code. No one knows their true tax rate. It’s basically impossible to figure out how much of your salary you actually get to spend how you see fit, without the government reaching its hands into it. Gas taxes, “sin” taxes, income taxes, and the list is basically endless. Let’s look into something simpler that encourages people to make choices with their money.

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In Louisiana, a group of Ron Paul supporters founded the Louisiana Taxpayers Party and selected Ron Paul and Barry Goldwater Jr. as their presidential candidates. Watch their commercial below.

In Montana, the Constitution Party of Montana used to be an affiliate of the national Constitution Party until July 2006. Since then, it has been an independent party. This year, they selected Ron Paul and Michael Peroutka as their presidential candidates. Watch Montana governor Brian Schweitzer talk favorably about Ron Paul.

If you live in Louisiana or Montana, please vote for Ron Paul and spread the message that he is on the ballot.

If you live in any other state, help break the two party monopoly and vote for Chuck Baldwin, who was endorsed by Ron Paul on September 23, or for any other third party candidate of your choice.

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