The Gold Report: Doug, we are at your conference in Tucson, Arizona, the day after former Congressman and presidential candidate Dr. Ron Paul gave the keynote speech to a sold-out crowd. How did you two first meet?
Doug Casey: It was about 30 years ago. Ron used to attend my Eris Society—named after the Greek goddess of discord—meetings in Aspen, Colorado. Everyone from Sonny Barger of the Hells Angels motorcycle club to Burt Rutan, inventor of SpaceShipOne, would meet to discuss ideas.
TGR: In those 30 years, have Ron Paul's ideas changed much?
DC: Ron believes he was born a libertarian. He's right. I believe in Pareto's law—the 80-20 rule. I prefer to think that 80% of humans are basically decent, which is to say that they were born libertarian oriented. But it takes a while to crystallize what that means. Ron and I, and many others, have moved beyond gut libertarianism to a structured, intellectual libertarianism.
Some people see the same things we see through a totally different lens, however. Those people tend to be the other 20%, or perhaps 20% of that 20%, or even 20% of that 20% of that 20%. They range from being wishy-washy on ethical subjects to being sociopaths or even outright criminals. These people are at the opposite end of the spectrum from us in every way.
TGR: One of the things Ron Paul mentioned last night is that a true libertarian advocates for the freedom of everyone to do what he or she wants as long as it's not hurting someone else. This includes people who don't agree with your views.
DC: Exactly. As opposed to busybodies who want to tell everybody else what to do. They think they know best and are perfectly willing to put a gun to your head to make sure that you do what they think is right.
TGR: We are meeting in the midst of a government shutdown. Ron Paul called it a paid holiday for federal workers. Are we doomed to an endless cycle of these manmade crises?
DC: I would like nothing better than to see the shutdown go on forever, but unfortunately the government is only shutting down things that inconvenience people, like monuments and national parks—things that should not be owned by the government to start with. I wish they would shut down all their praetorian agencies, like the FBI, the CIA, and the NSA. Shut down the IRS. I am much more concerned about Silk Road being shut down than I am the US government being shut down.
TGR: Do you think regular people care whether government is shut down or not?
DC: Over half of Americans are living off the state, receiving more from the state than they're putting into it, which makes them receivers of stolen property. They see the government as a cornucopia and therefore a good thing so they want it to be open and sending them checks.
The situation is fairly hopeless at this point, and it's likely to get a lot worse before it gets better. Trends in motion, in whatever direction, tend to stay in motion until they hit a crisis, at which point they transform into something else. This trend is not only in motion, but it's accelerating in the wrong direction.
TGR: Ron Paul said that the charade on the American people is that the two parties are different, that actually it's not that we need a third party, but we need a second party. Your presentation compared the end of the Roman Empire to the state of the US today. Is the current political system doing a better or worse job of protecting freedom and liberty in the US compared to ancient Rome?
DC: The founders consciously modeled the US after Rome, everything from the way government buildings look to having an assembly and a senate. We are similar right down to the Latin mottos. When you model yourself after something, you eventually tend to resemble it. That partly explains why we are on the slippery slope of constant wars, less freedom, more power for the executive, destruction of the currency, and barbarians at the gate. Another part is the natural tendency of all empires to reach their level of incompetence and then decline. It's to be expected. Entropy dictates all things wind down and degrade.
As I pointed out in my speech, America has gone through periods of what paleontologists call "punctuated disequilibrium." Things evolve gently in one direction and then experience massive change very quickly. I'm afraid that the US might be approaching a phase similar to the one the Romans experienced before Diocletian made himself emperor. He completely changed the character of Rome; he believed that in order to save Rome, he had to destroy it.
As we go deeper into this crisis—of which we're just currently in the early stages—there's every chance that the American people are going to look for a savior, a strong man, probably a military person because Americans love and trust their military for some reason. I see the military as not much more than a heavily armed version of the post office, but I suspect that we'll find someone who is the equivalent of Diocletian, who will change the whole nature of society radically in the wrong direction.
TGR: Do you believe in changing from within the system, or just getting out from under the system? Would you ever run for public office?
DC: I think the situation is beyond retrieval at this point. People generally get the government they deserve. At this point, Americans are much more interested in freebies than they are in personal freedom. They are like scared little rabbits. They're much more interested in safety than they are in personal liberty. I think they're going to get what they deserve good and hard over the years to come. I would much rather watch what goes on in the US on my widescreen TV in the lap of luxury in another country than be in the epicenter of things here. The system is beyond the point where it can be reformed.
And, no, I have zero desire to run for office. Plus, anyone who runs for office disqualifies himself for being in a position of power by the very fact that he wants to be in that position. My friend Harry Browne always used to say that when he ran for president on the Libertarian ticket, the first thing he'd do if he were elected would be to quit—at least after rescinding all outstanding Executive Orders and recalling all the troops. Anyway, even if Ron Paul had been elected president and if he tried to make the necessary changes, the public would have rioted, Congress would have impeached him, and the heads of the CIA, FBI, and the military would have sat him down and subtly intimated that they have the power, and he shouldn't do anything they don't want done—or undone.
I don't think a change can be made at this point. I'm just interested in seeing what happens when we really get involved in a really big crisis, which I think is going to happen in the next couple of years, as we go back into the trailing edge of the economic hurricane that started in 2007.
TGR: One of the things that has come up as part of the shutdown debate is health care. Do you have health insurance? And, how would you control healthcare costs?
DC: First of all, I don't call it health insurance because it doesn't insure your health. That's something that you're personally responsible for, not some third party. I call it medical insurance. Just as I call the FDA the "Federal Death Authority," because it probably kills more people every year than the Department of Defense does in a typical decade by slowing down the approval and hugely raising the cost of new drugs and technologies.
Getting to back to your question, no, I don't have medical insurance. If anything goes wrong with my body, I'll treat it as I would if something goes wrong with my car. I'll find the best doctor elsewhere in the world where medical costs can be 20% of what they are in this country. I'll pay for it in cash. I don't want to have to fight with an insurance company, or the government, about what's covered or not.
The whole idea of everybody having medical insurance is a corruption that arose during World War II when companies used insurance to attract workers. Then we had Medicare and then Medicaid. These are the reasons costs have escalated. In a free-market society, medical costs should have collapsed and gone down in the same way as the cost of computers has collapsed and gone down even as they've gotten vastly better. People think they need the government in medicine, but it's been totally counterproductive. It's done the opposite of what was intended.
TGR: One of the things Ron Paul mentioned is that his speeches on college campuses, including UC Berkeley, have been some of the most well received. Do you have hope for the next generation?
DC: Yes, there is reason for hope over the longer term. Generally, older people in this country have voted all these "benefits" for themselves, and they don't want to have their rice bowls broken. The younger people are being turned into indentured servants to pay for these benefits. Young people are figuring this out.
Another worrisome thing is that a lot of young people have indentured themselves by taking on huge amounts of college debt; $1.2 trillion is the current number. They can't even discharge it through bankruptcy, although many are unable to pay it. More and more are deciding that doing four years in a college to experience indoctrination from wrongheaded professors is a complete misallocation of both their time and their money.
If I had to do it again, I definitely would not go to college. I recommend others skip college, unless they need to learn a specific technical set of skills, such as doctoring or lawyering or engineering or a science where you need lab work. Most kids today, however, are going off to college for things like gender studies, political science, and English. These are things you should learn on your own, on your own time, at no cost. Meanwhile, avoid the indoctrination of the creatures who hang out in university faculty rooms who teach because they are incapable of doing anything else.
TGR: Ron Paul intimated that we're in a middle of a revolution. You said that the solution to our problems would be less command and control and more entrepreneurs. Are the small business owners the real revolutionaries?
DC: They could and should be, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to start a business because of the regulatory and tax environment in the US. Smart people are leaving in droves. There just aren't enough left to change things. I'm afraid we're just going to have to let things take their course.
The main function that Ron Paul has served is educating people, which is necessary and laudable. But the odds of him succeeding in changing things are close to zero.
TGR: You talked about the role of education, and Ron Paul mentioned the power of the Internet to circulate new ideas based on the theory that ideas have consequences. Your ideas are having an impact thanks to the power of the Internet. Does that bode well for the future?
DC: It does. The Internet is the best thing that's happened since Gutenberg invented movable type and the printing press; it's a marvelous thing. That's exactly why the government wants to regulate the Internet. It sees it as a huge danger.
TGR: Does suppressing ideas ever work? Is it working in China?
DC: Actually, in many ways China is freer than the US, but that's not one of them.
If you are a businessman and you keep your nose out of politics, it actually is freer. You'll have less taxes, less regulation in China than you would in the US. But instead of emulating the free part of China, the US government is trying to copy the Internet restrictions because it sees the Internet as a danger to the existing order. And they're right.
TGR: But didn't the governments of Middle Eastern countries find out that ideas have a life of their own, and they find a way to spread despite attempts to shut them down?
DC: They do, so let's hope for the best.
TGR: Finally, Ron Paul said that things are worse than the government will admit, and the idea of economic growth this year is a dream. He said we need to be serious, but not despondent. Make financial plans, but have fun doing it. Do you agree, and are you having fun yet?
DC: I am having fun. I'm doing this not because I need the money, but because it's amusing and it's good karma to sow dissention in the ranks of the enemy.
TGR: Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
DC: Thank you.
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This isn't my truck, but it is my attitude:
http://enid.craigslist.org/cto/4119280944.html%3C/div%3E
Me and Doug would probably get along pretty good, but I'd still kick his ass if he got too mouthy with me after a few beers.
This interview highlights why Doug Casey has long been a highly sought speaker: he speaks his mind clearly, and has interesting ideas worth sharing. So it's no wonder that Casey Research Summits follow suit… and are sold out every year. Following Doug's lead, the company has a proven record of bringing together interesting and successful individuals, from investing to economics to technology and politics.
Lol, but don't worry - he's assured us he's not in it for the money.
DC: It does. The Internet is the best thing that's happened since Gutenberg invented movable type and the printing press; it's a marvelous thing. That's exactly why the government wants to regulate the Internet. It sees it as a huge danger.
Boy would Casey be angry if he ever found out that the internet was a DARPA project paid for with .gov grants!
"Lol, but don't worry - he's assured us he's not in it for the money."
That's about the point the ass-kicking would commence. Even over beers. Everyone's got an agenda, ESPECIALLY those who claim they don't. I have an agenda. You have an agenda. Doug's shit don't stink, though?
Look, if you don't have friends that will kick your ass just a litttle when you get too full of yourself, you're hanging out with the wrong people.
The Blowhard discusses the Idealist
There are 3 types of FSA troops in this debate ( free shit army)
DEM's
PUG's
Libertarian's
The only difference is that each is jealous of the other,... the only reason that the 'shutdown' ended, and a concession was made that all DEM&PUG get free shit.
The libertarians here on ZH are pissed asking 'where is mine?'
Not a man here is willing discuss the sheer hypocrisy that 60% of the US public gets a US treasury check everything, and if you cash that check, that makes you a member of the FSA.
Now the FSA don't even need the 40% anymore to pay tax, cuz the new model, is that the FSA can print paper-money the world will send food and toys forever.
The USA over 60% are a 'cargo cult' pure and fucking simple, ... and no doubt +60% of the folks here on ZH belong to that cargo-cult.
Don't hold back, tell us how you really feel.
Ron Paul, bless his heart and integrity, is too binary for government services. Government is self-effusive and is obsessed with its self-importance. Ron Paul has been lecturing the dumbest vretins in the world(US politicians) on responsibility and accountability. Heifht as well talk to a potted plant. boehner, Pelosi, Obama, Reid are all mentally retarded and self-obsessed. A perfect product of the US voter
Your last sentence is ridiculous.
Since you do not personally know every ZH member, then you cannot know with "no doubt' what % of them feel about anything.
I suggest you learn exactitude.
Nope.
Never been discussed at at. You are the first to think of it.
You are a genius.
Lucky us.
@James_Cole pathetic to attack someone who is not here and therefore can't respond and defend himself. But rest assured he would crush you in a debate.
I would buy that Jeep and drive it proudly.
Producers love Ron Paul
FSA fears Ron Paul
I love Ron Paul because he believes in freedom, dismantling the MIC, stopping of spying on Americans, ending the Fed, and smaller government among other things. I happen to own a business but most of where I disagree with RP has to do with things like allowing major corporations to run amok (they want to put little guys like me out of business, and RP would help them with further deregulation), and in believing that things like health care will somehow magically take care of themselves without a social safety net. If more people would focus on what we can agree on instead of the things we don't, maybe we'd be able to change things. The Founders had sharp disagreements over many things but they built a big tent for all of us that we are shitting in daily.
If more people would focus on what we can agree on instead of the things we don't, maybe we'd be able to change things.
I think most people do follow this as a general principle day to day. Most people I meet I find that we agree on a lot more stuff than we disagree on - there are only so many zealots out there. You'd never guess it from the press, but I doubt many countries are anywhere near as divided as the tv people suggest.
I hear you, but somehow people are so guided by tribalism that we can't even begin to have a serious third much less fourth or fifth party.
Tribalism is in it's ascendancy, not it's decline.
Totally agreed on that point. TPTB are expert at dividing us.
I bet the issue isnt tribalism so much as it is two other things, too much power in the executive and too much money in the race, those two issues go together hand in glove.
Get rid of the president (obviously not going to happen) I bet the two party system would start to melt away. Would also be much tougher to buy the whole thing, might actually have politicians accountable to their constituents instead of their party.
Thank both of you for your posts. For all we disagree with each other we actually have much common ground. I also am a small business owner but find that what hurts me the most is the regulation that is being employed at the large company level that sets vendor requirements so high that I can't qualify to bid it direct so it goes through a (lobbyist sponsoring) company that meets the ridiculous govt. approvals. I think if taxes were RP's these corporations that run amok might just move their asset back here and create a whole new opinion for you.
We all know that something must change and hopefully the vast majority of us can put away our differences and just agree on the things that matter most.
I agree that many regulations need to go away. Of course most of the regulations now in place are there precisely to favor the larger companies. What we need in my view is real enforcement of anti-trust laws and an end to favored tax status for the big boys, not to mention a complete overhaul of the tax code so that companies like ours are not bogged down by endless red tape and nuisance fees that affect our bottom lines (big corporations have compliance departments and the budgets necessary to avoid most taxation). This country was built on small business and it is being killed by multi-national corporations who have co-opted the government.
You simply don't get it. You do not understand freedom and free market capitalism. You prove that in many ways including the assumption that corporations are a product of capitalism (they aren't). You believe in statism because you distrust libertarianism and capitalism. For those reasons, to me, you are the same as the other statists in government. As long as people like you exists, there will be no hope for a better future.
Then you are mistaken Ron Paul for some dipshit Repug that tells a fancy story to get elected. Ron Paul is an Austrian, that means anti-Corporate if you know anything about Austrian school.
things like health care will somehow magically take care of themselves without a social safety net.
You must be either young or rich. I remember when health care was available to poor people without the extensive and expensive "social safety net" we have now. My mother paid for my hospitalization and surgery (tonsilectomy) at the rate of $5 a month until I was "paid for" which only took about five years. Doctors and others "volunteered" to provide care for the poor. Churches and other agencies (NGOs) provided food, clothing and emergency assistence when required. (When my father spent a whole summer in a hospital, my mother worked and the VFW would bring food by.)
The principle difference being that people VOLUNTARILY gave of their wealth for the care and feeding of the "less fortunate" ("the poor are always with us") instead of the government stealing our hard earned wages to give to people who aren't willing to earn a living, but would rather live off the labor of others. It's not charity if the government TAKES from the worker to GIVE to the lazy. It's theft by government - plain and simple.
I am utterly baffled LetThemEatRand why you are getting so many down arrows for you post here. Your position is perfectly reasonable in that you are stating where you agree and disagree with Ron Paul and are seeking a constructive dialogue. Unfortunately it seems of late ZH has become a den of too many True Believers that if you deviate one iota from their orthodoxy they will trash you. Ron Paul found common ground with people like Dennis Kucinich over reigning in the MIC so it disturbs me that there is not more intelligent dialogue on display here.
Ron Paul collect's 100X more than any average village idiot hair-lip in the FSA.
This idea that Ron Paul is an opponent of the FSA is the ultimate example of hypocrisy.
RP has the best medical and retirment package that bernanke bucks can buy, all at 'taxpayer expense'.
Of course now the USA doens't need the taxpayer anymore as paper money can be pulled out the ass, well so long as the 'world' is amused with grade-b ronny raygun theater.
banzai401
RP turned down his pension.
What would you have done?
http://web.archive.org/web/20070518101118/http://www.house.gov/paul/pres...
You are a fucking idiot.
B-401, you know nothing about Dr. Paul, why are you posting here, and who sent you to register on this site. AIPAC, I mean Israeli Megaphone? And why did they?
RP turned in most of his office expense budget every year unlike all the other reps.
Paid for his own transportation to and from home.
Yeah he absolutely doesn't there is reason veterans support Ron Paul and military in general besides the Libertarian ideas. He is also a vet, he served in the Air Force as a flight surgeon and also served in the Air National Guard. He served during Vietnam no less from 65 - 68.
I think our poster is one of them Occupy types, a misguided Marxist who thinks he is a Liberal.
Suggest you do a little reading first before opening your yapper.
https://www.opensecrets.org/pres12/candidate.php?id=N00005906
And the vet comment of yours who were his top donors for the 2012 presidential election cycle
https://www.opensecrets.org/pres12/contrib.php?id=N00005906
This why guys like use advocate for open information non-arbitrage in general. These things cut both ways.
'Producers' is Ron Paul as parasitical hypocrite.
The FSA see's Ron Paul as a role model on how to 'manage' the right.
Doug Casey speaks for Ron Paul. Now you do too -- who ever the fuck you are.
I'd like to hear Ron Paul speak for himself. It might be nice to hear what he really thinks. Until then, he's some sort of false god who stands for what ever each person wants to think.
Armed Texans to meet at the Alamo Saturday, October 19th at 10:00am.
San Antonio Police Chief General William McManus Antonio de Padua Maria Severino Lopez de Santa Anna threatens to arrest Texans at the Alamo for execising their constitutional rights:
http://americandictators.blogspot.com/2013/10/san-antonio-police-chief-s...
Lucky Doug, he has northern Argentina to hide out in.
Too bad Ron's son is a corporatist. Would have been nice to have a go to guy already in national office to replace RP. There's a reason RP was in the House and not the Senate (you can still get a House seat without submitting yourself to the oligarchs), and why he was soundly marginalized by MSM and both parties when he made his runs for Prez.
Still waiting for Rand to do something meaningful about the debt ceiling he is supposedly against raising but that his banker supporters wanted raised at all costs. Crickets.
Ron Paul only sucks to AIPAC in the dark, the son does it in the daylight, ... big difference.
I think you're wrong about RP. He wants to pull troops out of the middle east and stop funding endless wars which is the exact opposite of what AIPAC wants.
Thank you, LTER, for having an honest and intelligent discussion here regarding Ron Paul.
In the old days, you would have gone off half-cocked against libertarians in general. I am glad to see the evolution (for the better) in your demeanor here.
PS: Nothing in what I just said can be construed to mean that I deny that I can be a prick at times myself.
I've learned a lot over the last few years and though my core problems with pure libertarianism remain (especially my view that we NEED a strong government of elected representatives to be a check and balance to oligarchs), I have definitely come around to the idea that we need to move much further in the libertarian direction in many areas. The reason -- after watching the insanity of the last few years and the utter corruption of our system I am fully convinced we need a major reset. Smaller and leaner government and taking all corporate money out of politics would solve a lot of our problems too. And I'm humming Kumbaya and drinking a coke.
I disagree.
You are calling for strong government to remedy things caused by government.
There is a much better solution: KeepItSimpleStatist.
Did "Megaphone" send you over here?
Is that why the SPL and the AIPAC have both attacked him some supposed anti-Semitic comments in his old newsletter? Could have fooled me about him supporting AIPAC...
did congress cede control of the debt ceiling today with this deal?
I think so. As I understand it, the debt ceiling in the future will be raised automatically unless Congress affirmatively introduces and passes a bill to stop it. But the so-called conservatives really didn't like it. They said so right before they voted for it (with the exception of a handfull that were permitted to vote against it because they have close elections coming up and/or because they get to play the role of the supposed "outsiders" representin' the People while they accomplish exactly nothing).
Gosh... you people sound like you think the citizens need money and wealth to be happy. Look at North Korea! The people there are perfectly happy without either money or wealth! They don't even need food most of the time! It's a true worker's paradise! (If you don't believe it, just ask one of them... anytime... )
(/sarc - I wasn't going to post the /sarc, but then I reconsidered given that there are sure to be people on here who wouldn't "get it" unless it's spelled out.)
Yes. If you want me to say something other than yes, I will. But the answer is yes.
EVERYONE wanted that damned debt ceiling gone (everyone = the statists, which means "everyone" in government). They've taken a big step down the path to it's elimination with today's "compromise." We gonna PARTY now, bitch! Like it's fucking 1999 or something. Awwww, yeah!
All was theater, but outcome was always planned in advance
1.) no more debt ceiling
2.) no more opposition to obama-care
Wall Street will party like its xmas 24-7-365, until their bernanke bucks are only good for heating.
Fuck USA theater.
**
It's all about the GOLDEN-PENSION, and you got to be GUBMINT to collect, and Ron Paul collects, ... and the little folk that get taxed, ... its their job to make good on the golden-pensions, and if you understand this, then everything falls into place.
If your a little person, and you don't want to work to contribute to the gold-collar pension of the COP's ( yes ron paul is a cop ), then you can always go to prison at your expense, ... private prison;.
Are you a tax payer yourself , little fellow?
"Find the Cost of Freedom" C, S & N
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nlXmYVE_X8
A proposal to end the government shutdown and avoid default orchestrated by Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and Democratic Leader Harry Reid includes a nearly $3 billion earmark for a Kentucky project.- Drudge
Levin was talking about it on the radio tonight. I caught it on my way home. Time for the R's to start earmarking some "spreadin' around money" to buy them out of the hole they've dug for themselves.
Mitch the Bitch got a Ditch...A $3,000,000,000 Ditch....LMAO
how many turns do you get to speak at the senate.
Can two blokes do back-to-back filibusters for ever? (until they actually default)
Your turn, i am getting some sleep. See you for the next 12 hr shift.
i gather from the comments that perhaps Rand Paul (corporatist) will be an ideal replacement for Obama?
I agree blow-hards discuss idealists.
This is a major problem I have with 'libertarians'.
Sure back in the day Ron Paul, was a doctor, but for how long? Before he bailed and became a political whore for votes for 40+ years, my guess is that he did less than 5 years work as a doc.
Then you have the 'blow-hards' professional talkers.
I hold that the in the real world there are very few 'john galts', men who work, create companys and save, and build.
The majority of libertarians that I have met are losers, that embrace the libertarian 'frat' on the basis that they found out they could avoid taxes cuz the IRS ain't legal .... blah-blah
The notion that a man can dynamite-fish as he wishes is another 'libertarian idea', I say sure so long as you own that pond, and you stocked it, ... go ahead blow the fucking fish to hell.
The problem here with 'idealism' ( fairy tale thinking ), and real-men, and politics. Is that 95% of men and women in the USA really do belong to the FSA (free shit army), whether they be MIL, FBI, Judges, ... or welfare HO's, ... they're just looking for easy pensions and a soft life.
The shutdown is a 'threat' to the FSA class,
Most 'libertarians' also want FSA, ... only a minority of real men are opposed to FSA, I'm sure Ron Paul is setting pretty with his retirement bucks from his years of being a DC whore to Texas hair-lips.
> Ron Paul ... became a political whore for votes for 40+ years ... .
40+ years ... and outside of a wing-nut fan club, what is his legacy? What did he do? What did he change? He couldn't even get his own kid to buy his brand of shit (Jr.'s got bigger goal$ and idea$).
He helped wake my sorry ass up, and I think he did so for a lot of people. I disagree with many of his views but I would gladly have him at the helm and then we could have a real debate about the other stuff rather than the fake debate that occurs now between Teams who are all funded by the same owners.
If it took RP to wake you up, then you were never alive.
KILL YOUR FUCKING TV PEOPLE.
If I am dead, then I am a zombie. Perhaps that explains why my first thought in terms of showing the absolute conviction of my belief that both Teams work for the bankers and thus that the debt ceiling would be raised was to publicly proclaim that I would eat my own asshole if it was not raised. Come to think of it, maybe I should give it a taste anyway, see if I like it. Zombies prefer brains, but they (we?) are not very particular either and my wife claims she's using her brain (so she says) so my own asshole it is. I guess I shouldn't have cancelled those yoga classes after the vote tonight. I'll keep you posted on the outcome.
Excellent point every hair-lip I have ever known that adores RP is the biggest FSA parasite that I know.
Working MEN do not adore RP, only the FSA on the far right.
Guys too fucking ugly and living in mom's basement adore RP.
I have NEVER seen a special force guy in my life say any thing good about him, he reeks of a momma's boy. Which is why he attracts wing-nut losers with zits.
Wow
I don't know. I'm generally convinced to change my views when someone says that anyone who believes as I do must be ugly and live in a parent's basement. Pretty compelling and well-reasoned argument there that the entire political philosophy is flawed.
He certainly does have a "special force" about him. VERY special.
I bet he was a "special child" as well.
Banzai401, trying to pass as someone else, you've never seen "a special forces guy" because if you did and opened your mouth you wouldn't have been able to talk again, much less type your one finger message. Oh, and welcome to ZH.
Excuse me son, I'm a Ranger qualified Medical Retired Infantryman. I have donated to Ron Paul and have supported him for nearly 11 years now.
I'm likely as close as you have ever gotten to anyone in the Operations community, and you aren't even close to me.
All this from some smarmy little faggot that has just discovered ZH. You're 3 days old you foppish fucking twit. May be wise to shut your dick hole for a bit and let the grown folks talk.
60+ years of the commies infiltrating our gov is what it took to convince people to be sheeple. Why is it so hard to believe that changing the collective minds of people is a long, drawn out process?
Now, kindly shut the fuck up and sit down. The grown-ups are talking. You shit bags couldn't set yourselves on fire if I gave you matches and gasoline to start it off.
banzai401
RP turned down his pension.
http://web.archive.org/web/20070518101118/http://www.house.gov/paul/pres...
You come on this website for your third day and spout bullshit.
You are a fucking idiot.
> DC: "They think they know best and are perfectly willing to put a gun to your head to make sure that you do what they think is right."
I get called an extremist from time to time. My usual reply is to remind my conversational partner that the actual extremists are those deluded nutjobs who think its perfectly acceptable to grab peoples' johnsons at airports, spy on private communications, invade peoples' homes with SWAT teams and kill and imprison innocents with abandon.
There's nothing extremist about being repulsed by violent, nosy perverts on the public payroll.
Hope for the next generation? Are you fucking kidding me!
The next generation can't string words into a coherent sentence - all they care about is who Paris Hilton sucked off and how many tosser/friends they have on Facebook.
They spend their times stuck in front the latest reality tv shit - or committing murder on some bullshit gaming app.
The next generation is a product of a totally shit current generation of fat, lazy fucks and pschopathic bankers and corporate assholes - so why would anyone think they would be anything but a generation of total losers?
America is FINISHED. The next generation is going to find out what it's like to live like a diseased dog in a 3rd world country - because America is soon to join the 3rd world - with a sliver of wealthy cunts lording it over hundreds of millions living in slums.
Previous generations voted for the scum who enslaved the next generation. They are just as responsible.
While I agree with the sentiment, I disagree with the divisive nature of it. I do not think 'we' as in you and me here should hold the boomers responsible for what happened, when the socialists and communists started taking over the educational system they simply never had a chance. They were indoctrinated during an era when being the rebellious commie was considered the cool thing. Now most of them are so mentally strangled from the belief system required to establish that sort of indoctrination that they are likely to be mentally unstable.
While one should not blame the doe for being timid, if it the kind of PC scolding doe that pretends it has the moral high ground, while espousing cowardice as some sort of virtue, and one's boldness as thuggish, then it is time to blame the doe, in part.
They do exist if you bother go and spend some time among the great unwashed. I am seeing more and more of them around here. The young kids on their skateboards without helmets on are an example of it. They tend to be in the under 18 crowd but they are out there. The type of popular culture they tend to like is an indicator also. I'm seeing more H.S. young college kids around my area who actually know who Ron Paul is even if they don't 'get it' yet. They always seem to go out of their way to try to chat me up nibbling around the edges on the very topics we like to discuss here but in a more general way to feel you out. There is more of them waking up than the disinformation machine and the groomed willing victim attack dogs would like you to believe.
Ron believes he was born a libertarian. He's right. I believe in Pareto's law—the 80-20 rule. I prefer to think that 80% of humans are basically decent, which is to say that they were born libertarian oriented.
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People are born libertarian? That is some kind of 'american' thought.
'Americans' cant evade their nature. It always overwhelms them.
AnAnonymous propaganda is among the cheapest propaganda and in this Chinese citizenism driven world, it means something.
A failed experiment in roadside squatting.
My, this is really a messiah vs false messiah thread; we are back into religious beliefs.
As Nietzsche so aptly put it : If you want happiness you MUST believe; if you want truth you MUST doubt and look about and INQUIRE where truth lies.
That is part of the human conundrum; truth and happiness are ofter irreconcilable. A poet once said (Alfred de Musset) : the body and the soul are always in battle.
Libertarians are believers in an ideal; just like the statists; not same ideal, not same soul and body dichotomy and priorities. But thats humanity; very diverse.
Politics is always about compromise when we hit the "belief" vs "reality" asymptote. Being totally binary in their judgements makes humans miss the point : the solution is never black vs white.
Otherwise we would not be humans but ubermensch.
In times of crisis the situation does get binary from our limited perception, as we stay humans and pray for an Ubermensch to cut the Gordian knot in our collective names.
But not the libertarians...they are on the edges of the bell curve; unless they wear false beards like Banzai 401 would have it!
You have never read any Libertarian material, and it shows. Libertarianism is a conclusion from the work of Mises and Rothbard, actual Ph.D. economists that used axiomatic logical methods to derive their conclusions based upon examination of historical records and occurrences... Not some high fangled messiah BS from a philosopher name Marx.
Nietzsche would laugh at your feeble attempt to discredit a thought process that he himself used and implemented in his work. Even more so that his conclusions mirror those of Libertarian thought that is still being worked on today.
You also apparently missed the entire theory of Ubermensch completely, by a large margin.
Hmmm.
Anyone using asymptote in non algebraic discussions pegs my bullshit meter to 11.
Tom will explain.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mB97Qe2D4V0
Don't forget your parameters and paradigms too.
I didn't say I bought into Nietzsche's theory. I said I bought into Nietzsche's quote.
As for the PHDs of your academic heroes, don't make me laugh. Your closet economists have not understood one basic thing about Science : Natural sciences follow Newtonian Laws, they are deterministic and their results are universally repetitive.
Whereas SOCIAL Sciences are NOT deterministic and don't follow Newtonian Laws; by definition the human uncertainty principle governs these disciplines. So applying deterministic LOGIC to economics is like wishing a unicorn could sing Wagnerian songs!
Your whole premise is wrong. No wonder you don't understand a philosopher-economist like Marx who got the analysis of Capitalism right as social phenomenun but got the resolution of the conundrum wrong for the same reasons that you spout Rothbard: he had a deterministic view of history and how to resolve social issues; he was wrong. Marx's real and continuing impact on society, inspite of "right and wrong" dialectics, cannot be denied, which is more than can be said for Rothbard and miserly Mises, the closet economists.
As for Nietzsche, he truly proves the Peter's principle : brilliance of mind and intuitive thinking also can achieve their point of inefficiency, or philosophical incompetency. Nobody is perfect as Billy Wilder taught us so poetically.
It's punctuated equilibrium, not disequilibrium.