Economy and Fiscal Conservatism

McCain uses a question about the IRS to attack Ron Paul's "isolationism."  McCain draws an extended applause when he claims that Ron Paul's attitude is what allowed us to let Hitler rise to power.  He may win some popular points for his Wilsonian revisionism, but I'm not impressed that he totally missed the question.

Romney flatly refuses to abolish farm subsidies and Giuliani quickly agrees.  Then, Rudy is questioned on accounting details and why funds for NY police officers were diverted to little-known offices.

Environment & Consumer Protection

This question about import regulations really sounds like populist protectionism to me.  Tancredo wants to completely re-negotiate trade with China, and Hunter flatly says China is "cheating at trade" and invoking the specter of a cold war by referencing China's arms buildup.

Out of the Norm

This is good - a question from Texas asking Ron Paul if he believes in conspiracy theories like the Council on Foreign Relations and the North American Union. Ron Paul answers quite well that the CFR does indeed exist and that the trend toward regionalism and global governance is not some covert conspiracy but a simple reality of 21st century global politics.  It would have been nice to hear the other candidates weigh in on this question, but they quickly go back to McCain.

I'm watching the debate now and I'll have some analysis of interesting points as they develop.  If you have a comment or question please feel free to add it!

8:10 -  Its ten minutes in and they haven't asked a single question yet.  This is probably the most gimmicky debate I've ever seen - and they even wasted a few minutes trying to dispel that image by showing the silly questions they won't ask.

The Difference Between Individualism and Populism
...And why it fundamentally doesn't matter who his supporters are.

 

Unable to find logical arguments to support the status quo of ignoring the constitution (ESPECIALLY the 10th amendment), quite a few media and web publishing outlets have found a new way to attack Ron Paul:  Attack his supporters.   

 

And considering Ron Paul's broadbased appeal, this hasn't been very hard to accomplish.  He brings in the anti-war left and he brings in die-hard fiscal conservatives - he's even taken flak for being simultaneously supported by Jews, Muslims, and neo-nazis.

 

But why do so many groups of radically opposite ideology support Ron Paul's campaign, and what's the lesson here?  Well, Ron Paul rejects the populist theory of competing group interests.  He hasn't promised anything to the Zionists, and this makes Muslims happy.  But he hasn't promised anything to the Muslims OR Zionists, so this makes neo-nazis happy.  Of course, he hasn't promised anything to the neo-nazis either, because he isn't in the business of pandering to group-think. 

Since this war is so freaking expensive, we have a team of federal accountants whose job it is, apparently, to keep up to date tabs on how much we've used destroying, and rebuilding, and destroying, and rebuilding Iraq.  And the results are in:  We'll spend $1.6 trillion before the next president takes office.  Where's this money going to come from, you say?  Well, if history is any guide, we will just cut interest rates and print more!

Fred Thompson (eventually) entered the race and brought up quite a following among Southern Republicans, but he just can't seem to get any traction at the national level.  His numbers in Iowa and New Hampshire are coming down quickly off his post-announcement highs.  At the debates, he played it safe, even referring the most controversial issues to federalism, but when he spoke about the economy and social security, it wasn't very convincing that he had put much thought into it.

 

Giuliani is proving to be extremely resilient - regardless of the controversy, he maintains his national lead.  I have a feeling Giuliani isn't very popular on the internet, because I do not meet a lot of his supporters in online political debate.  I believe a lot of Republicans see him as a "sure-fire" compromise candidate who can soundly defeat Hillary, but if they go against each other do they have enough policy differences to make it a substantive debate?  

 

Of course, my favorite candidate, Ron Paul, is up a few points in this week's election polls.  Accordingly, the media instinct is to attack.  If his support can continue to go up despite the name-calling over at CBS and charges of racism over his campaign's policy of not returning legal campaign contributions, Ron Paul's ideas of a Constitutional Republic and the abiding by the 10th amendment may not be so crazy after all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dates are popular with historians and parade-planners.  And although today, November 7th, is a celebrated political holiday in Russia, the actual events of the "October Revolution" spanned many years.  Today is sort of the climax of the revolution, the actual day when the provincial government palace in the Russian capital fell to revolutionaries.

 
90 years later, the world would do well to remember the authoritarian state that was born out of class war-fare rhetoric and a promise to abolish tyranny.
 
Its also wise for Americans to realize that socialism isn't a completely foreign philosophy in our own elections, or that socialism in itself is any better or worse than other types of totalitarianism.

Sean Hannity's forum moderators don't like the fact that discussion supporting Ron Paul spontaneously erupted at their political website.  Now, these contributors were not first time posters, many of them had thousands of posts and titles that would assume a respected member of the community.

They say those who don't understand history are doomed to repeat it.  The fact is, understanding history doesn't prevent you from re-living it either.  Unless, I suppose, you are a dictator.  But if you were, then you would be in the middle of one of history's great mistakes and probably repeating many of the seemingly avoidable problems you got yourself into.

But the fact is no one really understands history because the picture is incomplete.  Some patterns seem to become predictable, but even as the cycle completes no new solution to the fundamental problem has been found, or some new variable makes reptitition inevitable.  I think history is the closest a strategist will ever get to a crystal ball, but if you're hoping things go differently this time, do you really know what you're asking for?