Progressives find hope—in Ron Paul.
By Michael Tracey | September 28, 2011
It’s no secret that Ralph Nader has held the Democratic Party establishment in low regard for decades now: the marginally more palatable alternative in an ugly duopoly, he claims, is still quite ugly. But lately Nader’s disdain has reached a new high. “It’s gotten so bad,” he tells me, “that you can actually say a Republican president—with a Democratic Senate—would produce less bad results than the present situation. That’s how bollixed stuff has gone.”
Not that he was ever particularly optimistic about the Obama administration, especially its potential to make headway on curtailing corporate welfare, now Nader’s signature policy objective. But in that, as with so many aspects of Obama’s presidency, the adjectives “disappointing” or “inadequate” don’t even begin to capture the depths of progressive disillusionment. Looking ahead to the 2012 presidential race, one might assume that Nader has little to be cheerful about.
Yet he says there is one candidate who sticks out—who even gives him hope: Rep. Ron Paul of Texas.
That might sound counterintuitive. Nader, of course, is known as a stalwart of the independent left, having first gained notoriety for his 1960s campaign to impose greater regulatory requirements on automakers—a policy act that would seem to contravene the libertarian understanding of justified governmental power. So I had to ask: how could he profess hope in Ron Paul, who almost certainly would have opposed the very regulations on which Nader built his career?
“Look at the latitude,” Nader says, referring to the potential for cooperation between libertarians and the left. “Military budget, foreign wars, empire, Patriot Act, corporate welfare—for starters. When you add those all up, that’s a foundational convergence. Progressives should do so good.”
I thought I’d bring up the subject of Ron Paul with Nader after seeing the two jointly interviewed on Fox Business Channel in January. Nader had caught me off guard when he identified an emergent left-libertarian alliance as “today’s most exciting new political dynamic.” It was easy to foresee objections that the left might raise: if progressives are in favor of expanding the welfare state, how well can they really get along with folks who go around quoting the likes of Hayek and Rothbard?
“That’s strategic sabotage,” Nader responds, sharply. “It’s an intellectual indulgence. … If they’re on your side, and you don’t compromise your positions, what do you care who they quote? Franklin Delano Roosevelt sided with Stalin against Hitler. Not to draw that analogy, I’m just saying—why did he side with Stalin? Because Stalin went along with everything FDR wanted.”
There may be an insurmountable impasse between the camps on social-safety-net spending. “But,” Nader says, “you could get together on corporate entitlements, subsidies, handouts, giveaways, bailouts. Ron Paul is dead set against all that. So are a lot of libertarian-conservatives. In fact, it’s almost a mark of being a libertarian-conservative—in contrast to being a corporatist-conservative.”
“Do you read all these right-wing theoreticians?” he goes on. “Almost every one of them warned about excessive corporate concentration. Hayek did, [Frank] Meyer did, even Adam Smith did in his own way.” He leaves the mechanics of a left-libertarian political coalition to be sussed out later.
If the issues around which progressives and libertarians can coalesce, I ask Nader, are the most intractable, deeply entrenched problems, is he proposing that such a coalition would be more tenable than the one currently cobbling together the Democratic Party, with its many Blue Dogs and neoliberals?
“Exactly,” Nader says. “Libertarians like Ron Paul are on our side on civil liberties. They’re on our side against the military-industrial complex. They’re on our side against Wall Street. They’re on our side for investor rights. That’s a foundational convergence,” he exhorts. “It’s not just itty-bitty stuff.”
Nader cites opposition to “the self-defeating, boomeranging drug war” as another source of common ground, in the face of both parties’ indifference—with the scant exceptions of a few House Democrats who favor decriminalizing marijuana—to drug prohibition’s many ills. Ron Paul’s rejection of the very notion that personal drug use should be a criminal offense is something that has resonated with younger supporters, often catalyzing their first moment of political consciousness.
“This is one place where conservatives and liberals can get together,” Paul tells me. “Because it’s sort of a nullification approach—a states’ rights approach.” California attempted to legalize marijuana outright via ballot initiative “because they have millions and millions of people who are using it, yet the federal government’s position—Obama’s position—is still to go after people even if it’s being used for medicinal reasons, and putting sick people in jail.”
“But of course,” Paul goes on, “the conservatives are very weak on states’ rights when it comes to marijuana, which I find rather ironic. Why don’t they just stick to principle and say, ‘Well, we’re for states’ rights. Let the states do this.’ But no, they come down hard and say, ‘We need a federal law’.” He sounds exasperated. “I think both sides should work harder at being consistent.”
Some critics allege that Paul himself has proven inconsistent on states’ rights when it comes to the Defense of Marriage Act, which created federal criteria for the recognition of marital unions. Campaign literature distributed by the Paul campaign, under the header “Barack Obama’s Assault on Marriage,” asserts that the administration has shown “a profound lack of respect for the Constitution and the Rule of Law” by no longer defending one of DOMA’s provisions in federal court. “As President,” the literature reads, “Dr. Paul would enforce the Defense of Marriage Act, stopping Big Government in Washington, D.C. from forcing its definition of marriage on the states.”
The flyer’s aggressive tone suggests it may have been written with an eye towards appealing to Evangelical voters. In our interview, Paul offers a nuanced position. He wasn’t in Congress in 1996 when DOMA was approved, but says he “probably” would have voted for it. “Looking back,” Paul tells me, “I believed it protected the states over the federal government’s dictates.”
How sharp is the divide on social issues between progressives and Paul’s more conservative supporters? I ask for his opinion on the central role religion has seemingly taken in the Republican presidential contest, something that has distressed progressives and libertarians alike. Texas Governor Rick Perry preceded the announcement of his bid with a massive Evangelical prayer rally in Houston, just miles from Paul’s congressional district.
“It certainly is his judgment call,” Paul says of Perry’s decision to convene a stadium-sized worship event. “There’s nothing that says he should not do it. But whether it’s the wisest thing to do? For me, I would consider it unwise.”
Paul is typically demure about his own belief in Christianity—willing to speak about it when prompted, but never ostentatious. “It might be the way I was raised. We weren’t ever taught to carry religion on our sleeves.” He references New Testament admonitions against going “out on the sidewalk” to “make a grandstand.” “You’re supposed to go quietly into your closet to pray,” Paul says, “and not be demonstrating in any particular way. So I think I have followed that more than others.”
I ask him at what point journalists should be entitled to press candidates on their personal doctrinal views. Ordinarily, Paul says, it’s inappropriate. “But if you start using religion precisely to gain political advantage,” he adds, “then I think it’s much fairer to ask those questions.”
Nader takes a grim view of Perry, who polls indicate is the Republican frontrunner. “It’s easy to say he may self-destruct, but he’s starting to get some of that Reagan teflon. The Republican Party is going to self-destruct with Perry. I don’t think he’s like Reagan. He’s too cruel and vicious.”
There are nascent movements underway to bring disaffected progressives into Ron Paul’s fold. A new organization called Blue Republican, advertised on the Huffington Post and elsewhere, urges Democrats to pledge their support for Paul. While Nader isn’t willing to endorse Paul’s candidacy at this point, during our interview his praise grew increasingly effusive. “Ron Paul has always been anti-corporate, anti-Federal Reserve, anti-big banks, anti-bailouts,” Nader says. “I mean, they view him in the same way they view me on a lot of these issues. Did you see the latest poll? He’s like two points behind Obama.”
“That’s where the hope comes from,” Nader continues. “Because the left will reach out. I mean, they’re already reaching out. They want as many allies as possible. It’s the right-wing that is being split, and that’s historically been the case—the corporatists make sure authentic conservatives are vectored in other directions. They’re vectored on the social religious issues, abortion, more recently on raising the debt limit. ‘Keep going after the libs,’ the corporatists say. Because otherwise, authentic conservatives may develop a cooperative effort with the ‘libs’ on other issues, which are our issues,” he concludes. “The big issues.”
Michael Tracey is a writer based in New York. His work has appeared in The Nation, Reason, Mother Jones, and other publications.
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This is a very good commentary to get people to start gaining some perspective on what we’re all up against. Good idea to send liberals and libertarians here for a bit of a common-ground primer.
I’m surprised more people aren’t getting behind this left-libertarian alliance. It makes a ton of sense. The key, I think, is the anti-war issue, but of course there are many others, as Nader suggests. I consider myself, on some days a Marxist, on others an anarcho-communist, and I’m backing Ron Paul.
[...] Matt Welch | September 28, 2011 Michael Tracey, who wrote about restrictive teen-driving laws in the June issue of Reason, catches up with the consumer crusader for The American Conservative: [...]
Ron Paul’s position on letting states restrict or outlaw abortion rights for women, makes him unacceptable to me.
Like Ron Paul, Ralph Nader seems to understand that many of the core issues in the upcoming election are not Left/Right, Liberal/Conservative issues. They are issues of national survival. It would be interesting to see what Nader and Paul would say about ending the mass outsourcing of American jobs and the mass insourcing of foreign labor via immigration. If those issues are not addressed soon, the others will all be moot.
So Richard, better to help the American Empire’s Warfare State kill hundreds of thousands of adult innocents overseas, as long as American women are free to kill babies, or if you wish, fetuses at home.
Rossbach
Ron Paul does speak at great length about outsourcing of American jobs in several of his books. He is also a big fan of the book, “Blowback”, which also details the causes for this and how it can be fixed. When Paul gave McCain a reading list in the last election that was one of the books he recommend. Loss of jobs according to Paul is a combination of bad economics, bad foreign policy, and a lust for American imperialism at all costs. I believe, as does Paul, that if we get over ourselves as being the ruler of the world, become more peaceable with other nations, and focus more on the problems at home we can strengthen the economy, thus leading toward more jobs. One thing Paul does stress is the fix will not come overnight. Be wary of candidates who promise that. We have 100 years of empire making and bad economic policy under our belt that needs to be fixed. But it will be like ripping a bandaid off. Hurts more at first but feels better in the long term. Paul has stated if we truly discipline ourselves and make the changes he suggest to our country, the economy should start to net positive effects within about a year.
I like the idea of pogressives and libertarians coming together. I for one shun labels. It’s time for us to come together not divide. Stop the name calling. Let’s come together and make the hard decisions together to make things right. If we don’t we are in for a HARD fall in terms of our economy and influence on this beautiful rock we call earth.
As a self described “Liberaltarian” this article is hardly surprising but it was a good read nonetheless. I have been encouraging all of my most liberal/progressive friends and family to vote for Paul, and without exception every single one of them has become a supporter upon learning more about him.
Every time I listen to Ron Paul I disagree with 50% of what he says. But you know what? I disagree with 95% of what other Democratic and Republican politicians say. I am not very optimistic that Paul will actually get the Republican nomination, but I am going to continue doing everything in my power to help him.
Let see what issues we are complete polar opposites? Welfare, minimum wage, public union collective bargaining, card check, regulations, health care, education, housing, free trade, gov involved in marriage, social security, 2nd Amendment, Free Speech, Affirmative Action, taxes, etc, etc, etc…
I forgot a big one: Tobacco. Nader wants to legalize weed and all other drugs like they should be, but put people in jail for using tobacco. Aligning ourselves with these fools would set us back decades!
How the racist, homophobic newsletters that came out for twenty years under Ron Paul’s name? I don’t think progressives can swallow the lie that he somehow didn’t know what was in them. And why doesn’t anybody ever mention them?
I support Herman Cain for his consistent support for the Federal Reserve and for the TARP bail-outs. His endorsement of Romney in 2008 also impresses me. All of these issues are important to Black voters. Cain will also continue the Iraq and Afghanistan wars; continuing these wars just like Obama has done is hugely important to the middle class. Obama or Cain, we must never stop the wars and we must always bail-out the banks.
You forgot an important similarity:
Ralph Nader (b.1934)
Ron Paul (b.1935)
Not an alliance with much future, is it?
I like Ron Paul, I voted for him in 2008. I’ve voted for R. Nader once as a protest vote. The trouble I’m having now is, I think the country is past the point of no return. The disaster of the housing boom was nothing more than a fake economy. Give mortgages to anyone to keep the economy rolling, and hope for the best. Suburbs and strip malls and feeder roads = traffic jams and more money for fuel costs.
One economist wrote an article for TAC magazine stating that this last housing boom was the worst allocation of money and resources in American history! Any presidential candidate who says he or she can repair our economy is just spitting into the wind. I don’t think any one has a clue how to repair the damage. What I find really disturbing is I’ve always been an optimist, but this economy has me scared! Heaven help us!
A Ron Paul nomination would be realignment moment in U.s> politics.
[...] Tracy has an article up at The American Conservative on Ralph Nader’s quest to get progressives to align with [...]
Every so often, a presidential election has the chance to be something much more than that. It becomes a paradigm shift for a whole new compassionate and aware way of thinking. Sure most of the country is still in a slumber but every day the consistent and faithful 10-15% of Ron Paul’s supporters are growing every day, and with a movement recruiting all peace-loving democrats to become Blue Republicans, those numbers could skyrocket with so many Dem’s diluting the Republican nomination. Don’t call Ron Paul off yet. He is up against a lot but we are still over almost a year and a half away from the election. If we start now, that is plenty of time to grow the Revolution to 20, even 30% of the Repub. nomination. That’s the hard part. Ron Paul just beat Obama by 2% in a general election poll!
Source:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Ron-Paul-Bests-Obamain-Latest-bw-3821734650.html?x=0&.v=1
After he gets the nomination, winning against Obama would probably be easier than achieving his nomination. Real change is coming, only if you help Ron Paul keep his momentum going! Spread the message of freedom and liberty and tell all your liberal and progressive friends or even anyone who is against the war to register Republican in 2012 to vote for Ron Paul
But, will the liberals hold still for the Free Market? Do they really want people to succeed or fail on their own, or do they want a massive command-and-control economy where freeloaders get bailed out and the working stiffs are taxed into poverty?
Progressives and Libertarians agree that it is…
wrong to rob the poor for the sake of the rich.
more than time to make major changes in the status quo.
time to stop militarism which is just more corporate welfare.
time to end the racist, failed, and pernicious drug war.
Progressives and Libertarians disagree that…
the government can ever be captured to do what we want it to do (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_choice_theory).
the well intentioned end justifies the coercive means.
whenever someone suffers thru no fault of their own, that the application of life boat ethics is thereby appropriate.
the nature of wealth is open summed rather than fixed summed.
If you want the troops home from overseas now, the drug war over now, the debt addressed now, real change now, rather than kicking the can down the road for our children to deal with, then there is only one choice this election. Ron Paul 2012.
For more information please read “Healing Our World, The Other Piece of the Puzzle” by Dr. Mary J. Ruwart (http://www.ruwart.com/Healing/rutoc.html)
If Dr. Paul is on the Republican primary ballot next year, I will take that ballot. If — mirabile dictu– he becomes the nominee, I will vote for him in the General Election. Otherwise? I cannot vote for Mr. Obama, because I seriously suspect he hates the Commoner’s Right to arms. I cannot vote for Mr. Perry, Mrs. Bachmann, or Mrs. Palin, because I believe any one of them would give back-of-the-left-hand approval to hatred for my Faith (I am Wiccan).
@Richard: Regarding the abortion issue, Dr. Paul believes (rightly) that the federal government has no authority under the Constitution to regulate our personal liberties. Therefore, the federal government has no say in abortion. All rights that are not specifically given to the federal government under the Constitution are left to the States. Now, I believe very strongly in a woman’s right to choose. We all have our pet issues. I understand. But I’m voting for Dr. Paul because to my mind, the most important issue — by far — is PEACE. Dr. Paul is the only candidate – including Obama – who will end the wars, and bring our troops home. As commander in chief of the military, he won’t need Congressional approval to do it. On his first day in the Oval Office, he will bring the troops home, ending all of our wars. This one simple act will save tens of thousands of lives, save trillions of dollars, thereby balancing the budget, and restore our international good will. With one simple command, he will save our country’s future, and our children will inherit true hope, instead of death and debt, which is what all of the other candidates offer. It’s that simple: Ron Paul for peace and freedom? Or anyone else, for death and debt? At this instant in history, no other issue should matter more, to anyone.
[...] Click on Ralph Nader’s Grand Alliance for an article in The American Conservative on a possible left-libertarian alliance. [...]
@Richard – Even in the odd chance R vs. W is overturned, that same position would prevent the federal govt. from outlawing abortion in a state where it is legal. Correct?
The point of this article, which you seem to have missed, is that we need to put aside our pet peeves and exploit our common ground. Had you not noticed, the economy is in a depression. When (not if, under current conditions) the economy and monetary system completely implodes, what will your biggest concern be? Will it be abortion rights or eating daily?
That’s what we’re facing here. This is about the public vs. banking and military complexes. Which side are you on?
@moonmac, you must be one of those “Educated” liberals that reads nothing but liberal sites. My GF currently has the same problem and I don’t understand how you educate yourself by going to one-sided websites.
Don’t forget regulations were implemented that caused the Housing bubble…
Don’t forget welfare has gotten us into this HUGE thing called DEBT!
You need to read more unbiased sites and books.
Mike
War is over, if you want it. Yes, 99% of Austrian economics, as it applies to a failed empire wanna be, like the USA system we currently have in place, is about peace, shining a very bright light on congress, the FED, the DEA, the IRS, coporatism, the Military Industrial Complex, and liberating our own people from the federal system without using drones. The undeclared wars on countries and the declared war on drugs are both wars against the poor – typically, young, male minorities, because they are easier to catch than rich, white guys in their condo or private homes.
I have little confidence in Ron Paul’s ability to counter the huge special interest lobby however I do agree with his wanting to do something about it. Blanket elimination of all regulation would be economic suicide, because some regulation should be in place to deal with corporate greed and corporate welfare. Penalty regulation that increases risk to the populace in general should be given a lot of thought. I agree with him about the things he could do on a singular basis such as getting us off of foreign soil and protecting our sovereignty. The major economic killer is fuel costs and its imports and price manipulation. This affects everything from farming, transportation costs to grocery prices. Corporate subsidies, alternative energy subsidies, and many other government spending are wasteful and should be eliminated as well.
@Richard,
Sorry man, but you’re either for states rights or you aren’t. Paul has a consistent principled position here. He’s personally opposed to abortion on a moral ground, but he wants to get the federal government out of it and let it be a state issue as it should be. The Constitution doesn’t give the federal government jurisdiction over abortion in the states.
Ron Paul 2012! We can’t afford anyone else!
The issues Nader and Paul can agree on outnumber those that divide them. Such an alliance makes sense. As for their age, you will recall that, in his 80s, Adenauer became chancellor in Germany after the war and was instrumental in rebuilding and denazifying the country. Smart and principled old guys can do more good than younger and shifty ones, who will only deepen the crisis the US and the world are going through.
Interesting idea and theory. There is much common ground, voter anger at BO and the establishment in general. Paul and Nader’s ideas on the economy could easily take hold if the US economy is in a Great Correction.
Something interesting to watch going forward.
@Richard… really? With all the current war and economic issues, letting states set their own rules on abortion like they do on murder makes/breaks it for you? You know murder is not a federal crime, right? If you don’t trust your state on freedom of choice, why do you trust them to set their own penalties for murder and other violence?
If anyone would like to find out just who started regulations and who supports them most should check out a book by Gabriel Kolko “The Triumph of Conservatism”. It may surprise you.
Not too many people like to put in the effort it takes to do research and find books that challenge the status quo, but isn’t that our duty as citizens? I think that in large part the reason we’re in the position we are today is because we have ceded our ability to make our own opinions and to reach our own conclusions to the media/establishment/authority. They give us the opinions they want because they are owned by huge corporations who then lobby our government for laws and regulations. We go along with it because the media tells us “this is right” and the government comes out with press releases that say “this is right”.
We all know that corporations spend ungodly amounts of money lobbying the government, how do we convince ourselves that some new law is in our best interest and not some corporation’s? I mean when have any of these large multi-national corporations gone out of business because some new regulation drives them out? It only happens to the small mom and pop business who doesn’t have millions in reserve capital to buy the new equipment or pay the new fee. We are so worried that some large corporation will rape the environment or poison us that we crush any chance for a small start up to do things better and drive the ‘evil’ corporation out of business or force them to start doing things ‘the right way’.
It’s like we’re collectively creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. We focus so much on the negative things that could happen that we create the environment that makes them happen. If an individual only focuses on their problems they tend to always have them. There will always be problems to over come but that doesn’t mean our sole focus in this world should be to try to eradicate every single one of them because then how much time will we have to tend to the good things? Or in our quest to remove all hardships will we just remove all the good things as well?
There was a time, not so long ago, when politics was about working with political opposition, not crushing your enemy. There was a time when liberal republicans could find common ground with liberal democrats. Liberal Arts used to be an honorable course of study. In short, there was a time when the word liberal was anything but an insult, and “works worthy of free men” was known to be the opposite of teaching slaves what to think. Lets make that time today.
I appreciate that Ralph Nader can get behind many of the ideas Ron Paul supports. It’s not about party, but about common sense thinking, fairness, and taking back this country from those who’s sell it for profit. I don’t agree with all of Ron Paul’s positions, but I’ll vote for him – even if it’s a write in ballot. No other candidate has the record of consistency Paul has (as did Nader), nor hasn’t been bought by “special interests”. They’ll all say what they need to to get elected (like Obama did), and nothing will change- except the country will continue to slide down the drain.
Remember, Ralph Nader years ago proposed that government ban (for starters) those little toys in cereal boxes because they are “irrelevant to nutrition”. We’re not talking philosophical nuances here.
Yes, because the protecting the rights of cereal companies to bribe little kids into begging parents to buy their products is SO much more important then the lives being lost in the foreign wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya and the domestic war on drugs, and the lives that will be lost when the current batch of politicians drives the economy into the Second Great Depression.
The point is pretty obvious to me. We have more principles that we agree on that should bring us together. Ron Paul is correct. ‘Freedom doesn’t divide us, it brings us together.’
@moonmac, you couldn’t be more wrong about Nader and tobacco:
Q: Do you think that cigarettes should be illegal?
A: No. You never prohibit an addiction because what you do is you drive it underground and a huge black market occurs. …
Source: David Frost interview Oct 21, 1994
http://www.ontheissues.org/celeb/Ralph_Nader_Drugs.htm
With Obama a lock and therefore no race on the D side, this type of coalition could enable Paul to sweep every caucus and open primary. He’ll never win a closed primary, true, but he might not have to win any to get the delegates he needs. How bizarre that he could go from being banned from the Republican convention in 2008 to being their nominee in 2012. My guess is they kill him – literally – before they let that happen.
moonmac – Libertarians support decriminalizing drugs and are aginst the drug war
Ron Paul and Ralph Nader are men to be admired for their honestly and integrity, rare commodities in politicians ANYWHERE. I would gladly support such a ticket
Diogenes extinguish your lamp, we have found an honest man!!!
“Ron Paul’s position on letting states restrict or outlaw abortion rights for women, makes him unacceptable to me.”
Just as his support for permitting states to guarantee abortion and other reproductive rights for women makes him unacceptable to most people in the pro-life movement.
But to me, it makes eminent sense. Most citizens would eventually gravitate towards states that better reflected their own social and moral values.
Ron Paul will never be elected in the next 20 years and is too astute a politician to NOT know it. Ron Paul campaigns solely to keep his moneymaking PAC machine “well funded”.
The truth is most Americans don’t want “legalized drugs”. Although the idea of a potheaded America appeals to the usual dirty cops (who deal drugs), the usual youth pothead activists and the aging hippie crowd, most hard working Americans see illegal drug users for what they are — neer do wells who bust your headlight ($100 Cha-Ching!) spend their lives on welfare and subject their neighbors to periodic pyschotic episodes. There’s nothing “freedom” or “American” about living next door to a “pothead”. Americans don’t want “more drugs” in order to have less government. Americans want less government (drug dealing pigs and Coast Guarders) so they can have less drugs.
Learn it. Live it. Love it.
Have a Nice Day!
America is a Christian Nation!
For all of you people that want more government and more policing of your life, dont vote for Ron Paul. He stands for freedom, individual responsibility, and for the states to govern themselves at the local level. For the ones who are informed and understand that this is not about Republicans, democrats, liberals, etc, its about restoring Freedom from the US government sponsored tyranny at home and abroad.
Ron Paul as a starting point is my end point.
Libertarians are interested in an alliance only if it means liberals abandon their positions and submit to libertarian ideology. I have seen zero flexibility from that side, hence their inability to get elected dogcatcher.
my fear is a ron paul victory. ron paul isn’t a libertarian. he isn’t even a classical liberal. he is a classical conservative. he wants to corrupt the free market in gold by having government declare it to be legal tender. i doubt he’ll get his wish, but i’m sure he’d love to deregulate banking and privatize everything. he’ll sell america to the highest bidder and let the foreign corporations steal our infrastructure and land tax free while he applies a regressive income tax to pay down debt while the money supply contracts domestically, causing worse hyper-stagflation than what we already see. it would be redcoat austerity. i’d love to see a left libertarian who tries to correct some of the economic injustice in a sound and honest way, like the honest kucinich greenback plan to pay off the national debt and fund government without taxation, the need act of 2011. perhaps the nation would be better served if ron paul endorsed kucinich.
Both Nader and Paul have been extremely consistent over the years, warning the US populace what would happen if the MIC, Wall St., Big Oil, Big Pharma and Big Media morphed into FedGov.Inc. We were too stupid to listen and now we reap the whirlwind of third world levels of corruption as well as “War without End Amen”. Not too mention our laws are selectively enforced. The O’BushBama continuity plan, continues TARP / QE, FraudClosure, Naked Short Selling and Front Running. Now, VIA QEx the Pin Striped Bandits have plenty of cash to fund the best candidates money can buy and continue the Naked Short on the US standard of living. Ralph and Ron should stand up and say ” We told you so.”
@ James.
You are wrong. The Constitution gives the federal judiciary, and specifically the Supreme Court, the right to decide what the Constitution requires and doesn’t require. At least this has been the law since Marbury v. Madison in 1803.
The Supreme court has decided the law protects a person’s right to privacy and that right includes the right to have an abortion.
Until a different Supreme Court decides otherwise (which one could do), that is the law.
If you want to argue there is no right to privacy in the Constitution, you are also wrong about that. It is true the Constitution does not use these exact words but it is clear that such a right to privacy exists. The third amendment forbids the government from forcing an individual to quarter soldiers in one’s home. That amendment certainly acknowledges that there is a right to privacy. Of course there are others such as the fourth amendment regarding search and seizure and the fifth amendment right to counsel.
@ Uncle Sim: You are wrong as well. No matter how hard people try, abortion and murder are not equal in concept. You do not have a privacy right to harm other people, but you do have a privacy right with respect to your body. You should not be forced to give up a kidney or lung (just because you have two and can live without one) to save the life of someone else. Likewise, you should not be forced to carry a fetus term just because it will save the life of the fetus.
I’m usually of similar mind to Ralph Nader, but I have 2 problems voting for Ron Paul:
1. Paul is an ideologue, not a tactician (like FDR was with Stalin). I don’t imagine him saying, “let’s fight on common ground and put aside the Austrian economics.” Aside from being a pro-peace president, which would be fantastic, he’ll go with easy, corporate-friendly wins like deregulation and moving more lawmaking to the state level, not fighting against corporate welfare.
2. We’re in a real physical crisis, and we need an Abraham Lincoln. Paul is an Andrew Jackson – who cares if he ends the Federal Reserve and you’re still living on Ramen noodles? We need federal credit and multinational cooperation for infrastructure and industry. Paul will leave everything to “the market”, which means JP Morgan Chase and Goldman Sachs.
What the f–k happened to Pat Buchanan? The closest thing to an old-school republican in recent memory has been Donald Trump. Paul is great on some issues, and nation-endingly awful on others. If it’s down to him and Obama, maybe I’ll vote for Paul just to watch the world burn in a more entertaining fashion. I just hope a real leader jumps into the fray or we’re all totally f–ked.
I agree 100% we have to start working on the biggest issues and the only way to get them under control is with a coalition. Take the wedge issues out of the equation and you should be able to see more common ground than division. Think of it like a bell curve. Forget about the 5% on either side. Worry about the 90% in the middle. The far far right or far far left stuff will never get passed anyway.
I don’t hear Dr. Paul supporting Nader’s views and I don’t think Dr. Paul is a full-blown Libertarian. He’s a Republican. There was a time many generations ago when Liberal meant Libertarian but, like Nader is doing now, the activist control addicts saw the popularity of the movement and jumped on the bandwagon. In time the distorted desire to get what you want by controlling others through laws and more government has proven too overwhelming. The experienced Libertarians know this tendency well and know that in time true Libertarians will have to find and adopt another name to distinguish themselves yet again from the control addicts/activists like Nader.
No two people agree on everything. The point is that Nader and Paul are both motivated by doing what they believe to be right, rather than power or greed. They do have many similar beliefs, and since they are concerned with the truth, they can come to the table and honestly hash out differences through friendly debate and discussion when necessary. This is a great idea. I’m all for it.
@ Joe Blow: we are not a christian nation, the Bible says the body of believers is the nation of Heaven. Besides that, read the treaty of Tripoli and you will see that even John Adams claimed that this nation is in NO WAY RELATED TO OR BASED UPON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, not that it would matter if he felt otherwise.
The u.s.a is based upon the ancient Greek and Roman systems. You worship men whom you call Founding Fathers even though Jesus COMMANDED that you do no such thing. You worship the new Rome, and if you’ve actually read the Bible (which is doubtful given you’re lack of knowledge on the subject) you would no what the new Rome is.
That ‘great expirament’ is a constitution that bound the seperate states together like the u.n. charter does to the seperate states of the world. What happens if you don’t want to partake? You get the civil war, or on the world scale, our current wars.
However there is one problem.
“Libertarians seek freedom from the state. Progressives seek salvation through the state.”
The issue of government regulation needs to be looked at by liberals from a different perspective. Government regulation does more to serve corporate interests than protect the people. Regulation limits corporate liability and deminishes peoples lawful redress. Mr. Nader’s endorsement doesn’t suprise me in the least. I don’t always agree with Mr. Nader, but he is a man of honesty, character, and integrity that is only matched by Ron Paul.
I don’t think Ron Paul is a pure libertarian. He believes the constitution is the supreme law of the land and he will abide by the rule of law above all other considerations.
A vote for BO was a vote for change, but we got more of the same. The next time I won’t waste my vote; I’ll vote Green!
What do you mean, right to have an abortion. We don’t have the right to kill eachother do we? We aren’t dogs!
Anyway, abortion is killing a living human being no matter how old it is, it’s still growing. Why don’t those who are pro, grow a conscience????
“Do they really want people to succeed or fail on their own, or do they want a massive command-and-control economy where freeloaders get bailed out and the working stiffs are taxed into poverty?”
Always with the false dichotomies from the Paul/libertarian crowd. I’m frankly sick of the underhanded insults that we “just don’t get liberty”, “are afraid of freedom”, or “want cradle to grave nanny state to take care of our every need”.
These are supposed allies? Who won’t even acknowledge the left’s positions in an honest manner? My experience has been that compromise to libertarians means accepting their platform and belief system.
No thanks!
[...] circles, ultimately I see that alliance as stillborn in any meaningful electoral sense. It is an “intellectual indulgence” which is fine. On some issues progressives and libertarians are aligned, no doubt. The war on [...]
@Markus,
you said: “But to me, it makes eminent sense. Most citizens would eventually gravitate towards states that better reflected their own social and moral values.”
If you want to talk about original intent, then you hit that nail squarly on the head. The founders understood that each state had a unique community and appraoch to life and society and every thing they did served to foster that and enable that various state communities to maintain their uniqueness, while agreeing on a common framework to be together as a nation.
Yet. we have grown so far away from this, both through the expansion of government, the enforcement of commonality, and the wealth distributive tax systems, which requires the wealthier states to pay for those less wealthy, ort unwilling to pay for themselves, that the concept of States’ Rights is now nothing more than an empty campaign slogan.
It would be wonderful to get back to what those Rights should mean and offer people true choice to live in communities that align to their own values, and not turn the whole country into generic Vanilla.
What’s the use in being a progressive in a country that has fallen to ruins? What’s the use of being liberal if there’s nothing left to be liberal about? Ron Paul would do the one thing that could save the country: bring the troops home. All of them, everywhere. Unless the $1.2 trillion per year military-industrial-rule-the- world complex is ended there will soon enough be no medicare, social insurance, or education system anyway. That’s reason enough for progressives to back this man.
I’ve been saying it for months: if Ron Paul and Bernie Sanders would run together on a platform of massive reform, promising to work only on stuff that they agree on, I would vote for them. I think something good could happen, and then maybe we lefties and righties wouldn’t fight so much. It’s certainly better than four more years of business-as-usual.
You boys can outlaw all abortion after you outlaw all warfare. Not holding my breath.
If Ron Paul were a true libertarian, he would support a woman’s right to choose whether to continue her pregnancy and he would support gay rights. But he has to get theocratic Texans to reelect him so he panders. If theocrats were really anti abortion, they would address the demand side and support free contraception and government stipends for mothering & childcare like they have in democratic socialist economies.
That said, Americans could afford such pro-life social engineering if we stopped the banksters and the warmongers from looting the US Treasury.
If America were run by Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich, and Ralph Nader, our country wouldn’t be in the state it is in.
Abortion shouldn’t me anyones decision except the person with the child and morales that are tied with it.
Ron Paul 2012 because abortion isn’t the main issue…
We fight for our
Freedom,liberties and America
[...] there be common ground between the Tea Party and OWS movements? Tracey recently wrote for TAC about another possible left-right alliance, one between consumer advocate Ralph Nader and libertarian Republican Ron [...]
I find it amazing that Mr. Nader believes in a Republican President with a Democrat Senate would get more done.
That’s already what you have.