Ron Paul-itics
by Matt Simon | April 15, 2008 at 3:49 pm
Posted in baltimore politics
He has no shot at winning the presidency. But, Ron Paul is still hitting college campuses across the country.Last night, he was at Goucher College in Towson. b followed him from the time he pulled up in his Chrysler minivan to the book signing after his speech. He had tremendous support inside the auditorium. Check out the video for an off-beat look at the event…
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
April 15th, 2008 at 9:56 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
For some reason, nobody remembers all the horrible racist and bigoted remarks Ron Paul has made in the past. He is insane.
Paul reported on gang crime in Los Angeles and commented, “If you have ever been robbed by a black teen-aged male, you know how unbelievably fleet-footed they can be.”
“Given the inefficiencies of what D.C. laughingly calls the `criminal justice system,’ I think we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal,” Paul said.
Paul also wrote that although “we are constantly told that it is evil to be afraid of black men, it is hardly irrational. Black men commit murders, rapes, robberies, muggings and burglaries all out of proportion to their numbers.”
Stating that lobbying groups who seek special favors and handouts are evil, Paul wrote, “By far the most powerful lobby in Washington of the bad sort is the Israeli government” and that the goal of the Zionist movement is to stifle criticism.
April 15th, 2008 at 10:11 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
Why is this even news? This crackpot is as irrelevant as the ideology he championed.
Take a look at the economy. This is booming compared to what Ron Paulenomics (i.e. Libertarian/Randian crackpottery) would do to it.
If b is looking for interesting people to follow and talk to, there are any number of homeless downtown that have better insights than this guy.
April 15th, 2008 at 10:19 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
What exactly do you both think the big appeal is of this guy? In the video, you see a little bit of the reception he got last night at Goucher. Your comments are interesting given the fact that a lot of college students last night called themselves liberals who just like Ron Paul's message.
How do you explain his popularity among the college crowd -- a demographic typically viewed as liberal?
April 15th, 2008 at 10:24 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
1) He's against the war in Iraq and would immediately pull out.
2) They think that being a gold bug will somehow fix the dollar, social security, and the federal deficit without causing a massive constriction of the economy and skyrocketing unemployment.
Those are the reasons I get told time and time again by the collective noise and fury of the Internets.
In short, he gives an unadulterated populist message that sounds fantastic until you rub two brain cells together and realize that it's all completely untenable.
April 15th, 2008 at 10:26 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
Because even though many college students identify themselves as liberal, they are also still naive and do not follow politics to an extent where they actually investigate the candidate they select.
It is easy to make the past go away when you are pandering to a crowd of idealistic hopefuls who still don't know how the world actually works.
April 16th, 2008 at 2:40 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
hombre,
Thanks so much for that education and definition. Not really sure of its relevance, however. Nowhere did I try to pretend that my video would be an objective account of Ron Paul's visit to Goucher. I think the line, "Check out the video for an off-beat look at the event..." sort of acts as a disclaimer.
But, thanks for the comment and definition, nonetheless.
-Matt
April 16th, 2008 at 2:43 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
Also, in the future, if you're going to copy and paste from wikipedia, you should say as much.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzo_journalism)
"Plagiarism is the practice of claiming or implying original authorship of (or incorporating material from) someone else's written or creative work, in whole or in part, into one's own without adequate acknowledgement. Unlike cases of forgery, in which the authenticity of the writing, document, or some other kind of object itself is in question, plagiarism is concerned with the issue of false attribution." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagiarism)
April 16th, 2008 at 2:48 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
As a working journalist for a credible publication, this discussion is heartening.
Journalism, in it's rarest and most most honorable of forms, doesn't employ news judgment based on cynicism or pandering to what people want to hear or who they want to hear about.
Among other purposes, journalism serves as a platform to facilitate an exchange of ideas. It highlights different ideologies, a practice that helps societies form their own. It covers the crackpots, the liberals, the conservatives, the honest and the corrupt-- all for the purpose of informing the public and promoting dialogue.
Objectivity is subjective...as are a reader's or viewer's assessment of it.
In that respect...seems like this video worked.
April 16th, 2008 at 2:58 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
And that definition was an original compilation based on my knowledge of the subject..not an unattributed definition presented by a not-so-credible source.
April 16th, 2008 at 6:59 pm | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
Hombre -
To your posts which have been completely without any conversational qualities but merely a cut and past job from wikipedia, I have to quote the following...
"Mr Madison, what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I've ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response was there anything that could even be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."
Principal from the 1995 hit movie, "Billy Madison"
April 18th, 2008 at 12:22 am | Please log in to reply. | Log in to rate this comment | report this comment
Nice hit blog on the Good Dr. Paul. Too bad none of you morons make any sense. 10 Trillion dollars worth of debt, 60 trillion dollars of outlays. Social Security doesn't even have a penny in it thanks to politicians who've ran it dry. Our jobs have been outsourced to China and Ron Pauls a crazy racist. Give me a break!