Ron Paul Rises

[Demosthenes11]

It just seems rather silly to me. For 200 years atheists in this country have been saying, "Yes, I am an atheist but don't judge me by my belief system, judge me by my track record." Now the pendulum has swung the other way and I think if we can't judge someone by their track record rather than by their beliefs then we are no different from those who would refuse to vote for an atheist (or mormon, or hindu, or w/e).

The bottom line is that not very many policies are influenced by someones belief system. Things like gun control, attacking Iran, bailing out banks, and campaign finance reform have nothing to do with that. And of the things that do (gay marriage, abortion, etc) Ron Paul has been playing the 'states rights' card for awhile so he wouldn't really have any sway there either. I'm not ready to vote for him just yet. But it just feels like he is the only one on stage that isn't completely owned by Exxon and Haliburton and if that ends up being the case I'm not going to vote for someone else just because the guy goes to church on Sundays.

first off, attacking Iran is heavily influenced by religious beliefs right now.

second, a creationist is a clear mark of a lack of critical thinking. It's literally being told what to think, and not change your mind even with a mountain of evidence in front of you. You can still be a christian and not believe the earth is 6k years old. Nobody can or can't prove there is a god at this point, so nobody is arguing that you can't vote for them because they believe. You can't vote for someone that looks at modern science and says "no" however. What happens when they get in office on a platform of attacking north korea, and then they get access to the actual information that says "wow, north korea is not a threat at all and it's retarded to attack them" ? If ideology wins out on the most stacked argument (creationism vs. actual facts), then you have very little capacity to problem solve and critically think

[barber2006]

With that statement you realize you are speculating rather than looking to his track record to extrapolate what he would most likely do right......?

[Kuya]

Creationist beliefs are the least of my worries. Paul is a free market fag; fuck that.

[Rhinox]

Free market fagtism is the least of my worries. His far right policies wouldn't get out of committee

[Demosthenes11]

With that statement you realize you are speculating rather than looking to his track record to extrapolate what he would most likely do right......?

I just addressed that. The fact that he has ignored the biggest mountain of evidence possible against his position means that he is not to be trusted when making decisions. period

[Kuya]

I suppose i should have said Crazy Market, since free market is nominally what we get from democrats and republicans.

[Pirian]

My main con with Paul is that he wants to cut Taxes. In fact, all of the Republicans do. Economically this isn't a sound idea.

Actually, economically, to fix a recessionary gap, you need to cut taxes and increase transfer payments.

The problem? Neither party likes doing both of them. This is why it takes us so much longer than necessary to get out of a recession. It amazes me how such a simple and fundamental economic idea is so easily lost in politics

[Kuya]

Neither party likes those things? Republicans love tax cuts, and democrats are warm to tax cuts. Tax cuts are rarely unpopular. Transfer payments are also a popular policy instruments, whether it be welfare or subsidies. It's not that they don't like any of those things, it's that they're busy trying to stick it to one another, especially the republicans.

[Demosthenes11]

Neither party likes those things? Republicans love tax cuts, and democrats are warm to tax cuts. Tax cuts are rarely unpopular. Transfer payments are also a popular policy instruments, whether it be welfare or subsidies. It's not that they don't like any of those things, it's that they're busy trying to stick it to one another, especially the republicans.

BOTH SIDES BOTH SIDES

[Mazmaz]

Anyone else ever think Demos and Rhinox are like the exact same person?

[Demosthenes11]

Anyone else ever think Demos and Rhinox are like the exact same person?

you should read the sports threads. TWINS

[Rhinox]

Wtf is this mazmaz person and why is it comparing me to rain man

[Pirian]

Neither party likes those things? Republicans love tax cuts, and democrats are warm to tax cuts. Tax cuts are rarely unpopular. Transfer payments are also a popular policy instruments, whether it be welfare or subsidies. It's not that they don't like any of those things, it's that they're busy trying to stick it to one another, especially the republicans.

Republicans are almost constantly trying to cut transfer payments except in election years, lol. If you'll remember back to the depths of the recession, the Democrats wanted to increase taxes on the rich to pay for lots of new transfer payments - which is wrong, and Republicans wanted to cut taxes and transfer payments - which is wrong. The problem is that the government must go into debt in order to pay for the tax cuts and increased transfer payments needed to fix the recessionary gap, and people don't realize that this debt will be paid for when correcting the inflationary gap, so they panic at the thought of that debt. Not to mention that in order to fix the coming inflationary gap, we would need to cut those transfer payments back and increase taxes, which neither party will agree upon, either.

[Byrthnoth]

If there was a Tea Party politician that took the various official "Tea Party" opinions and carried them through to their logical endpoints, that person would be a clone of Ron Paul.

The fact that his world view is logically coherent (unlike the Tea Party, Democrats, or Republicans) is what makes him appeal to people. The problem is that his positions, opinions, and viewpoints are only infrequently supported by reality.

Imma quote myself, because it has been 7 pages and we're still spiraling around this truth.

Fact of the matter is, there's no reason to believe Ron Paul's economic policies would be any more effective than the stupid shit the other candidates propose. Also, libertarianism is a god damned joke when looked at from a historical perspective. Heck, you don't even need to take a long-term view of things. Just look back five years and try to figure out whether we need more or less regulation.

So he has clear core principles that he applies in a logical manner. This doesn't make his viewpoint correct. It just makes him logical given his starting assumptions. His starting assumptions are dumb, but he's unapologetic about them in a way that only a cute ~80-year-old man can be.

[Kuya]

Republicans are almost constantly trying to cut transfer payments except in election years, lol. If you'll remember back to the depths of the recession, the Democrats wanted to increase taxes on the rich to pay for lots of new transfer payments - which is wrong, and Republicans wanted to cut taxes and transfer payments - which is wrong. The problem is that the government must go into debt in order to pay for the tax cuts and increased transfer payments needed to fix the recessionary gap, and people don't realize that this debt will be paid for when correcting the inflationary gap, so they panic at the thought of that debt. Not to mention that in order to fix the coming inflationary gap, we would need to cut those transfer payments back and increase taxes, which neither party will agree upon, either.

What i am telling you is that people love tax cuts and they love transfer payments, and politicians are happy to give it to them if they think they will gain from it. What you're telling me is that the debt has become a popular topic, and politicians are under the impression that resolving the debt is going to win them more votes in the long run.

None of these things contradict eachother, because they all relate to what democrats or republicans think voters want, even if they're wrong. If they thought voters wanted tax cuts most of all, and that the consequences of doing that would be offset by the benefits, they would be all for it.

What both parties are proposing now has to do with the fact that the debt has become the issue that they think is most important right now, it's not because demcrats hate tax cuts or because republicans hate transfer payments (like i said, they love oil and farm subsidies). Now, republicans do hate poor minorities though.

[Pirian]

I wasn't talking about now, I was talking about what happened a few years ago. You can't really argue what they will do when I'm talking about what they did do. I certainly agree that politicians will pander to their voting majority, though.

[Elvis]

what does that president have to do constantly? make decisions based on large amounts of evidence. Being a creationist is literally like believing there is an invisible unicorn that runs around the streets and causes car accidents to me - There's no evidence for it and we know why accidents happen. It's such basic logic and problem solving that I can't trust you if you believe that way.

Are you fucking kidding me? Large amounts of evidence? You mean like how we went to war on politicized intelligence?

How can people say that outside forces shape policy. As in lobbies, long-standing regional strategies, MONEY, etc.

And then you imply Ron Paul is just going to make shit up as he goes along? You are dwelling on this creationism issue when you could instead question his actual foreign policy plans or the economy.

I still haven't heard anyone in this thread apply the same standard to the other republican candidates. Not you for sure.

They are almost all True believers. And people like Newt are intellectual frauds.

Ultimately, people will vote on the economy. Our foreign policy will still be as war-mongering as ever. Ron Paul should be judged in relation to his contemporaries.

[Greatguardian]

Just because he's better than Shitty Candidate #542 doesn't make him a good candidate that I would want running this country.

[Elvis]

Oh i know.

Theyre all uniquely shitty in their own way, but the notion that because he is a creationist that he is going to declare mondays, "rub a porcupine"-day, is dumb.

Shouldnt religious nuts be war-mongerers? The other candidates sure as hell are. How does his creationism influence his other political views. Im in agreement on stuff like stem cell research - i could see the issue there. But what else? And in the present, not when he is in office.

[Demosthenes11]

Oh i know.

Theyre all uniquely shitty in their own way, but the notion that because he is a creationist that he is going to declare mondays, "rub a porcupine"-day, is dumb.

Shouldnt religious nuts be war-mongerers? The other candidates sure as hell are. How does his creationism influence his other political views. Im in agreement on stuff like stem cell research - i could see the issue there. But what else? And in the present, not when he is in office.

If you can't reason your way out of creationism with all of the evidence there is, you are not to be trusted with reasoning your way through anything. I don't understand what is hard to get here.

you sound an awful lot like a creationist though