TheBlackPeterSchiff
04-25-2011, 10:51 AM
Hi guys. I just finished this today and would like to get your thoughts, critiques, etc. I just wanted to create something so when you guys approach a black person about RP, this could be somewhat of a guideline. As a black man myself, I know it can be hard getting through. But you have to start somewhere, and I am a big believer that Ron Paul could get a larger percentage of black votes than any Neo-con the Repubs try to put up there. So here are things I described that I think a lot of black folks can see eye to eye with.
10 reasons black people should consider voting for Ron Paul
1. War on Drugs - No group of people has suffered more from the failed War on Drugs that those of dark complexions, specifically black (African-American) and brown (Mexican) people. It is widely understood that since the beginning of the federal government's initiation of the prohibition of illegal substance, the enforcement of this policy has largely focused on poor neighborhoods, inner cities, and people who "fit" a certain description. First, we have to understand the nature of the war on drugs. Ron Paul believes, as do libertarians, that you own your own body. It is up to you to decide what you put in you body, and it is up to you to deal with the consequences of that decision. Ron Paul believes that the government should not be in the business of "deciding what is best for you." He also understands, that once the govt. decides to ban, over-regulate, or over-tax a specific good that is demand, the govt. unintentionally creates an underground economy or "black market" so that product can be traded. Black markets are beds for criminal enterprise, organized crime, govt. corruption, violation of human rights, etc. How come everything else in the world gets sold without everyone killing each other? But, this is what happens once a product that is in demand is pushed into an underground economy. A lot of the crime and violence that black people experience in their own neighborhoods are the consequence to drug prohibition. Drugs like opium, heroin, cocaine, marijuana have existed for centuries, all without ghettos rife with crime and violence. Cocaine could be purchased in drug pharmacies. Marijuana could be grown and cultivated in one's own garden without any interference. Also, the drug war has caused the large disproportion of imprisoned blacks, more specifically black males. Comprising 12.4% of the general population, blacks accounted for 38.2% of the prison population in 2009. Most for non-violent drug crimes. Federal, state, and local police flood and raid black neighborhoods not because drugs are prevalent there, but because they know poor people aren’t afforded equal rights in the eyes of this countries justice system. They know poor black's rights can be abused without suffering the consequences of lawsuits and public protest. Ron Paul understands this, as evident in this video. (http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Do8S8N2OG7sU&sa=X&ei=tKW1TdWTLYWbtwe1-P3pDg&ved=0CCMQuAIwAA&usg=AFQjCNFiBIc_SvsgByOpnE8LkRU09aoFWQ) Black people should support Ron Paul on this issue, as he is the only politician in either party willing to confront it head on and speak the truth. He understands the drug problem is a public health problem, not a criminal one. He also understands that the biggest beneficiaries of the drug laws are the illegal drug cartels, the mafia, the private prison industry, and the government. The government gets to employ hundreds of thousands of policemen, agents, lawyers, etc and waste tax payer money. The federal govt has spent over 300 billion on the War on Drugs since the 1970's, and an incalculable amount of human suffering.
2. Education - Ron Paul advocates getting the federal government out of the education industry. Abolishing the Department of Education, and freeing up the resources spent on building a large federal bureaucracy that's only existence is to perpetuate government's power and entanglement in our daily lives. The thing people often ask is, "Why abolish the Department of Education?" or "Is Ron Paul anti-education?" Of course not, it's the opposite; Ron Paul is a huge advocate for education. But, he understands that the federal government is not effective at education, nor is it constitutional for it to be involved in education. The word "school" or "education" is no where in the constitution. Ron Paul is an advocate for the RE-introducing the free market back into education. Education has existed long before government run schools. A lot of schools were started by companies that provided grants to open schools to create a more educated working base.
In a free market, you would have genuine competition, companies, businesses, actually competing to teach your child. Some might offer a free ipad, some free lunches, some might offer free pick up and drop offs, some might just offer a stellar education, but you would get ultimate quality over time, as the schools that fail children will go out of business and the schools that produce smart and successful children will prosper. You'd also have more choices, you would have schools for bad kids or mentally ill, schools genius kids, small schools, large schools, technology schools, agricultural schools, schools focused on the arts, cheap online schools for home training, etc. In all honesty, the educational system would be much much much better.
Of course, the first question is going to be "what about the poor?" The very fact that most people ask the question should tell you that most people are generous and caring, and will do what is possible to get education offered to lower income people. It doesn't take 1 million dollars to teach a child. It just takes a person that cares about teaching kids to make it happen. I often tell people about Marva Collins . She was a black teacher in inner city Chicago, who taught at a public school that was failing the kids. She became disillusioned with government schools...she quit her job, turned her house into a school, and approached all the parents of the kids that the public schools have deemed "unteachable" and offered to teach them for a small fee. She worked with the poor parents who couldn't afford much, and did what she could. Those kids she taught wound up having better test scores than the government school children. Of course the government hated this, and tried to shut her down with stupid zoning laws and regulations, but she eventually opened up her own large school that produced hundreds of educated kids that come from poor communities. She didn't have money to do this, but using simple free market economic philosophies, she was able to make it happen. Now imagine if this happened on a larger scale, without all the taxes, without all the government red tape and bureaucracy? It would be unbelievable. Education would also be cheaper simply due to competition and less overhead to support a bloated bureaucracy of administrators, teachers unions, and stupid laws.
Ron Paul advocates turning the educational powers back to the people and the states. The Department of Education was not formed until 1979. Didn’t we education people before then? America was the leader in education before the federal government was involved, not it's lagging behind countries like Sweden, who, although socialist, have instituted a free market approach to education. Allowing for-profit companies and individuals to build their own schools, and teach children using the voucher system. We must have free market competition and shrink the bloated bureaucracy in education so parents have the freedom to choose how to best educate their children.
3. Police Brutality - Ron Paul is a staunch defender of individual rights, due process, and he is believer in non-violence and non-aggression. Ron Paul believes that the 4th Amendment should be obeyed by the government. If you live in a lower-income black neighborhood, or just happen to travel through the area, you will be subject to police profiling, harassment, unwarranted search and seizures and in some cases violent attacks. Most politicians take the side of the government, saying "Police are just doing their job" or "Police are just acting aggressively because their lives or on the line." This is bull. Ron Paul knows Policemen a first duty is to the constitution. Unwarranted search and seizures are illegal. Ron Paul is also and advocate for the surveillance of govt officials and policemen. How many images have we seen on YouTube or the news, of police over stepping their bounds and actually violently attacking people, and in some cases killing them without warrant or being in danger? As in the brutal murder of Oscar Grant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BART_Police_shooting_of_Oscar_Grant), a young black male who was detained for an unknown reason by Oakland Bay Area Rapid Transit authorities, and shot while face down in submissive position. This was seen on video from a cell phone camera. Some governments are passing laws to outlaw private individuals from video taping policemen on duty. Ron Paul is against this as he feels government should always be watched. Or what about the 7 year old, Aiyana Jones (http://reason.com/blog/2010/05/17/detroit-girl-7-killed-in-swat) who was killed by a Detroit SWAT officer who was engaged in a man hunt. These policemen entered this house unjustly and opened fire. What about the thousands of stories that goes unreported, that happen in the darkness of the night? This must be stopped and Ron Paul is the only politician who will stand against it.
4. Foreign Policy - There has been no one is Congress who has valiantly and consistently stood up for the U.S. Constitution and against the U.S. Military Industrial Complex, than Congressman Ron Paul. The U.S. government has been involved in "preventive" wars, propaganda, regime manipulation, foreign interventionism, and nation building for over 50 years now. The wars in the Middle East are nothing new, we've been having involvement there for decades, starting with the installation of the Shah of Iran and coming to a head this past decade with our invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the spreading of military bases in over 150 countries around the world. So called terrorism is nothing more than a byproduct of blow-back, from all the interventions in foreign issues. Ron Paul believes we should not be the world’s policeman, and we should not be putting American lives at risk in order to build an American Empire. African-Americans are 12 percent of the general population but make up 21 percent of military personnel and 30 percent of Army enlistees. Most black Americans enter the military to take advantage of the GI Bill, good benefits, or to get training to later look for stable unemployment. Many come from broken homes or poor neighborhoods. How many lives must be lost before we realize that these wars are futile and pointless? Ron Paul believes Americans will be safer if we stay out of other nations' business, and set a good example by having a strong economy, free trade, strong individual liberties, and having healthy diplomatic dialogue with our international partners. Ron Paul's record reflects his stance. Why do we have bases in countries like Korea, Japan, and Germany? These countries are wealthy and more than capable of defending themselves. Ron Paul is also against torture and the imprisonment of so called "enemy combatants" without due process of the law. He is a strong believer that we should have a strong military for national defense, but not for aggressive wars and he is also against the Public-private partnership that has grown from the increasing size of the Military Industrial Complex. Companies like Halliburton, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, etc make BILLIONS of dollars off the tax payer through having partnerships with politicians who back these wars. Oh yes, Ron Paul is the Neo-conservative's worst nightmare.
5. Foreign Aid - When one thinks of foreign aid, you think of helping the poor in third world countries, supply food and medical services for the needy around the world. Sounds good right? The fact is, USAID, the department that handles all foreign aid is one of the most corrupt institutions in government today. Foreign Aid (which is funded by tax payers) has been used by dictators across the world to enslave and massacre people in the countries we are trying to help. Aid is government to government loans with strings attached. We use this aid to manipulate multinational contracts, win favors with dictators or war lords, and control nations into doing our biding. Americans are a generous people as we have donated the most charitable organizations that an other nation on the planet. This is how you help the poor of the world. Not by dropping bombs and food, as we did in Somalia. Dambisa Moyo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambisa_Moyo), a Zambian born economist and author, details this in her book "Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There is Another Way for Africa." She's witnessed the atrocities caused by govt foreign aid and says it should be phased out.
6. Free Speech - Black people have had their 1st Amendment rights trampled on a lot through history. From the COINTELPRO (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) operations under FBI Head J. Edgar Hoover, who used illegal wiretapping, infiltration, discrediting and disruption of black free speech during the Civil Rights era. People like Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Marcus Garvey, Huey Newton and the Black Panther Party were victims of a government so big and powerful, using and abusing its power to limit free speech. Ron Paul is staunch defender of the 1st Amendment and believes it is of the most vital laws in having a free country. Ron Paul believes that it is your natural right to liberty, life, and property. As long as you commit no act of violence toward anyone, what you say is your right. You should have the right to speak out against the government, no matter what your message is. So many so called "Black Leaders" and social conservatives have tried to squelch free speech, saying there should be a federal ban on the N-word, sponsoring legislation banning "saggy pants" and even trying to prevent musicians from distributing there music. Ron Paul would never stand for this.
7. Economic Freedom - The free market viewpoint understands economic liberty as the freedom to produce trade and consume any goods and services acquired without the use of force, fraud or theft. Blacks have historically been prevented from having economic freedom due to slavery, Jim Crow laws, and ramped discrimination in government. Many black "leaders" indicate that it is capitalism that is hurting black people today, that the government needs to force economic equality by wage controls and huge government programs. This is disastrous and counteractive to the progress blacks have had over the generations. Economic freedom and liberty is vital in the black community, so blacks may start their own businesses, invest in their own neighborhoods, invest in their own education, and grow wealth prosperity. When someone is successful and builds wealth, this helps everyone. If a millionaire saves his money in the bank, that money is used to finance capital for business creation or expansion, creating jobs and new opportunities. In America, unfortunately our economic freedoms have decreased slowly but surely in the past 100 years.
Ron Paul predicted the housing market crash in 2008 (http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DA3sUtmoMxSQ&sa=X&ei=BKa1TeK3E5SWtwenv9zpDg&ved=0CCMQuAIwAA&usg=AFQjCNGMQE6rt4KyMlYuSESJLC4REA2Mzg)and the after effect (unemployment, inflation, etc). Ron Paul understands how economies work, and how the Keynesian economists and politicians what ran our country into the ground with taxes, regulation, a weak currency and unsustainable debt. Ron envisions a day when we are free to trade and transact, and keep our money. The government operates under the assumption that the money you have belongs to the govt, and you are allowed to keep a portion of while the govt takes the rest to finance political pet projects and endless wars. Ron Paul wants to take us off the road to serfdom and on the road to prosperity, for ALL Americans.
People often confuse the economic system today as Capitalism. This is not a capitalist nation by far, we are more fascist than capitalist. We literally take money from the middle class of the country and give it to large corporations who do the bidding of the government, while sprinkling crumbs to the poor to maintain their dependence on the government. The welfare system of food stamps, public housing, and unemployment has created a large segment of Americans, and particularly African Americans dependent on government hand-outs. This is a very dangerous position for anyone to be in. It has created a permanent class of people either unwilling or unable to strive for prosperity and economic independence. What happens when the well dries up? As evident by our 1.6 Trillion dollar deficit, our 14 Trillion dollar national debt, the well has been dry. The only reason the government is able to sustain itself today is due to the Federal Reserve, and the fact that the U.S. dollar is the global reserve currency. The government finances it self by printing money out of thin air and borrowing from countries like China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. What happens when they don’t want to loan us money anymore? That day is here. And when the Federal Reserve creates money out of thin air, or inflation (also called Quantitative Easing) it causes prices to rise. No one feels this pain more than the poor, as evident in oil prices, food prices, etc. Ron Paul would like to eliminate the income tax, and give Americans the choice to OPT out of failing programs like Social Security and Medicare. This would give blacks the power to save and grow their wealth, and take on opportunities such as furthering education, investing in businesses, etc.
8. Real Healthcare reform - If you don’t already know, the healthcare system in America is a mess. Over the last 40 years prices have skyrocketed. Insurance premiums are at an all time high and even upper middle class people are having a problem affording healthcare. So what is the problem? Shouldn't ObamaCare solve the issue of healthcare and offer access of affordable healthcare to every American rich or poor? Unfortunately, no. What ObamaCare does is force people to purchase health insurance from companies it deems fit, if you don’t, you will be subject to fines. This is not "free" healthcare. But why should healthcare be free? Is any other service or good we demand free? Of course not. Other countries that have enacted national health care plans are in danger of debt crisis, even they haven’t been able to curb the cost of medical spending.
How does Ron Paul approach this? It's simple, make the healthcare market free again. For the past 40 years, the U.S. govt has been involved in the health care industry in some shape or form, from Medicare, Medicaid, subsidies for drug manufacturers, tax breaks, regulations, etc. All these things distort markets and force prices higher. What Ron Paul wants is a free health care market, where individuals can negotiate their insurance costs, and medical costs directly with the hospital, he wants to eliminate tax breaks for companies that offer health insurance through employment. Why is that we get health insurance through our job? We don’t do that with car insurance, home insurance, or anything else. The only reason is because government gives tax breaks to companies that do this. We also need to de-regulate the industry and allow people to purchase insurance from any where in the country, or the world for that matter. This would give people an abundance of choice and force prices down through competition. But, what about the poor? The poor will be treated as they were in years past, by charity and church hospitals, teaching hospitals, etc. Ron Paul, a physician himself ran his own OBGYN practice for decades, treating the poor and charging them little to nothing. People will get the service they need. Today, the costs are bloated and inflated due to the fact that hospitals don’t have to deal with the consumer, only the insurance company. With technology today and the amount of people in the industry, healthcare should be cheap enough so even the working poor can afford to have health care service.
Ron Paul also understands that a lot of elderly and very poor people are now dependent on systems like Medicaid and Medicare, so he does not want to pull the rug from under them. He just wants to give people a choice, specifically young people who will carry the burden of these mega-entitlement programs, a chance to OPT out.
9. Housing - With the Housing market collapse of 2008, we were reminded of the consequences of government involvement in industries by operating programs that start off well intentioned (promoting home ownership) but end up hurting not only innocent bystanders, but the very people that those programs were intended to help to begin with. Government backed corporations like Freddie and Fannie Mac were create to allow lower income people, and people of less credit worthiness the chance to take part in the so called "American Dream" ala Home Ownership. Through sub-prime mortgage programs, easy lending standards, government guaranteed loans, tax credits, and cheap money created by the Federal Reserve, the government bid up the price of housing to create phony GDP growth. This unintentionally forced Americans to go deeper into debt and made owning a home seem like an investment, when it shouldn’t be.
The ripple effects of these programs were spread by derivative dealers, and the mortgage backed securities markets, causing the "cheap money" to infect banking institutions around the world. With the recession finally hit, as Ron Paul warned it would, people were caught off guard and didn’t understand why something like housing would effect employment and the economy as a whole. Ron Paul wants to get the government out of the housing markets, so housing can fall to prices that are affordable for Americans. Why is it that working class families in the past, were able to afford owning a home, and now you would have to be upper middle class to afford these bloated home prices? This is what happens when government gets involved in an industry and dilutes those markets with cheap money and artificially low interest rates, you get price inflation.
10. Racism - Ron Paul is incapable of racism, or promoting racism because he is a staunch defender of individual rights, natural rights and is against collectivism and government oppression of all kinds. As MLK stated, prejudice plus power equals racism. The power comes from the government. When the governments passed Jim Crows laws, this created institutional racism to view blacks as second class citizens. Ron Paul is against this and will always oppose racist laws. What he does believe is individuals have a right to associate with who they like, as long as it is voluntary and not forced by the government. Ron Paul is opposed to laws the affect blacks disproportionately such as Federal Mandatory Minimum laws (http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul686.html), Federal drug laws, racial profiling and police brutality. Ron Paul believes as King did that person should be judged by the content of their character, not the color of one's skin. He believes everyone should be viewed as an individual and not as collective (black people, white people, illegals, etc.). His opponents have tried to smear him by trying to paint him as a racist due to some ole newsletters that appeared under his name from decades ago. These letters were proved fraudulent and Ron Paul has denied every writing such letters. He has spoken against the Civil Rights Act of 1964, particularly the section that forces private businesses from choosing who they want to service. He opposes this because he believes the government should not be forcing private individuals and businesses to associate with people they choose not to. It has nothing to do with racism, but government interfering with our lives. Let the free market handle racist businesses. If someone owns a restaurant, and only wants to serve whites, then that restaurant will eventually suffer. And why would a black person want to patronize a business operated by someone who hates them, or doesn’t want to associate with them? In the 1960's most businesses voluntarily began to integrate and pull the "No Coloreds Allows" signs off their buildings. It is Ron's belief that institutional racism could have eventually been eradicated through peaceful protests, boycotts, and a general respect for individual rights, not through the heavy hand of government. Once you let government interfere in you life just a little bit, even if you think it's for a just reason, you open the door to what we have today in which the government is entangled in literally every part of our daily lives.
Thoughts?
10 reasons black people should consider voting for Ron Paul
1. War on Drugs - No group of people has suffered more from the failed War on Drugs that those of dark complexions, specifically black (African-American) and brown (Mexican) people. It is widely understood that since the beginning of the federal government's initiation of the prohibition of illegal substance, the enforcement of this policy has largely focused on poor neighborhoods, inner cities, and people who "fit" a certain description. First, we have to understand the nature of the war on drugs. Ron Paul believes, as do libertarians, that you own your own body. It is up to you to decide what you put in you body, and it is up to you to deal with the consequences of that decision. Ron Paul believes that the government should not be in the business of "deciding what is best for you." He also understands, that once the govt. decides to ban, over-regulate, or over-tax a specific good that is demand, the govt. unintentionally creates an underground economy or "black market" so that product can be traded. Black markets are beds for criminal enterprise, organized crime, govt. corruption, violation of human rights, etc. How come everything else in the world gets sold without everyone killing each other? But, this is what happens once a product that is in demand is pushed into an underground economy. A lot of the crime and violence that black people experience in their own neighborhoods are the consequence to drug prohibition. Drugs like opium, heroin, cocaine, marijuana have existed for centuries, all without ghettos rife with crime and violence. Cocaine could be purchased in drug pharmacies. Marijuana could be grown and cultivated in one's own garden without any interference. Also, the drug war has caused the large disproportion of imprisoned blacks, more specifically black males. Comprising 12.4% of the general population, blacks accounted for 38.2% of the prison population in 2009. Most for non-violent drug crimes. Federal, state, and local police flood and raid black neighborhoods not because drugs are prevalent there, but because they know poor people aren’t afforded equal rights in the eyes of this countries justice system. They know poor black's rights can be abused without suffering the consequences of lawsuits and public protest. Ron Paul understands this, as evident in this video. (http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Do8S8N2OG7sU&sa=X&ei=tKW1TdWTLYWbtwe1-P3pDg&ved=0CCMQuAIwAA&usg=AFQjCNFiBIc_SvsgByOpnE8LkRU09aoFWQ) Black people should support Ron Paul on this issue, as he is the only politician in either party willing to confront it head on and speak the truth. He understands the drug problem is a public health problem, not a criminal one. He also understands that the biggest beneficiaries of the drug laws are the illegal drug cartels, the mafia, the private prison industry, and the government. The government gets to employ hundreds of thousands of policemen, agents, lawyers, etc and waste tax payer money. The federal govt has spent over 300 billion on the War on Drugs since the 1970's, and an incalculable amount of human suffering.
2. Education - Ron Paul advocates getting the federal government out of the education industry. Abolishing the Department of Education, and freeing up the resources spent on building a large federal bureaucracy that's only existence is to perpetuate government's power and entanglement in our daily lives. The thing people often ask is, "Why abolish the Department of Education?" or "Is Ron Paul anti-education?" Of course not, it's the opposite; Ron Paul is a huge advocate for education. But, he understands that the federal government is not effective at education, nor is it constitutional for it to be involved in education. The word "school" or "education" is no where in the constitution. Ron Paul is an advocate for the RE-introducing the free market back into education. Education has existed long before government run schools. A lot of schools were started by companies that provided grants to open schools to create a more educated working base.
In a free market, you would have genuine competition, companies, businesses, actually competing to teach your child. Some might offer a free ipad, some free lunches, some might offer free pick up and drop offs, some might just offer a stellar education, but you would get ultimate quality over time, as the schools that fail children will go out of business and the schools that produce smart and successful children will prosper. You'd also have more choices, you would have schools for bad kids or mentally ill, schools genius kids, small schools, large schools, technology schools, agricultural schools, schools focused on the arts, cheap online schools for home training, etc. In all honesty, the educational system would be much much much better.
Of course, the first question is going to be "what about the poor?" The very fact that most people ask the question should tell you that most people are generous and caring, and will do what is possible to get education offered to lower income people. It doesn't take 1 million dollars to teach a child. It just takes a person that cares about teaching kids to make it happen. I often tell people about Marva Collins . She was a black teacher in inner city Chicago, who taught at a public school that was failing the kids. She became disillusioned with government schools...she quit her job, turned her house into a school, and approached all the parents of the kids that the public schools have deemed "unteachable" and offered to teach them for a small fee. She worked with the poor parents who couldn't afford much, and did what she could. Those kids she taught wound up having better test scores than the government school children. Of course the government hated this, and tried to shut her down with stupid zoning laws and regulations, but she eventually opened up her own large school that produced hundreds of educated kids that come from poor communities. She didn't have money to do this, but using simple free market economic philosophies, she was able to make it happen. Now imagine if this happened on a larger scale, without all the taxes, without all the government red tape and bureaucracy? It would be unbelievable. Education would also be cheaper simply due to competition and less overhead to support a bloated bureaucracy of administrators, teachers unions, and stupid laws.
Ron Paul advocates turning the educational powers back to the people and the states. The Department of Education was not formed until 1979. Didn’t we education people before then? America was the leader in education before the federal government was involved, not it's lagging behind countries like Sweden, who, although socialist, have instituted a free market approach to education. Allowing for-profit companies and individuals to build their own schools, and teach children using the voucher system. We must have free market competition and shrink the bloated bureaucracy in education so parents have the freedom to choose how to best educate their children.
3. Police Brutality - Ron Paul is a staunch defender of individual rights, due process, and he is believer in non-violence and non-aggression. Ron Paul believes that the 4th Amendment should be obeyed by the government. If you live in a lower-income black neighborhood, or just happen to travel through the area, you will be subject to police profiling, harassment, unwarranted search and seizures and in some cases violent attacks. Most politicians take the side of the government, saying "Police are just doing their job" or "Police are just acting aggressively because their lives or on the line." This is bull. Ron Paul knows Policemen a first duty is to the constitution. Unwarranted search and seizures are illegal. Ron Paul is also and advocate for the surveillance of govt officials and policemen. How many images have we seen on YouTube or the news, of police over stepping their bounds and actually violently attacking people, and in some cases killing them without warrant or being in danger? As in the brutal murder of Oscar Grant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BART_Police_shooting_of_Oscar_Grant), a young black male who was detained for an unknown reason by Oakland Bay Area Rapid Transit authorities, and shot while face down in submissive position. This was seen on video from a cell phone camera. Some governments are passing laws to outlaw private individuals from video taping policemen on duty. Ron Paul is against this as he feels government should always be watched. Or what about the 7 year old, Aiyana Jones (http://reason.com/blog/2010/05/17/detroit-girl-7-killed-in-swat) who was killed by a Detroit SWAT officer who was engaged in a man hunt. These policemen entered this house unjustly and opened fire. What about the thousands of stories that goes unreported, that happen in the darkness of the night? This must be stopped and Ron Paul is the only politician who will stand against it.
4. Foreign Policy - There has been no one is Congress who has valiantly and consistently stood up for the U.S. Constitution and against the U.S. Military Industrial Complex, than Congressman Ron Paul. The U.S. government has been involved in "preventive" wars, propaganda, regime manipulation, foreign interventionism, and nation building for over 50 years now. The wars in the Middle East are nothing new, we've been having involvement there for decades, starting with the installation of the Shah of Iran and coming to a head this past decade with our invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the spreading of military bases in over 150 countries around the world. So called terrorism is nothing more than a byproduct of blow-back, from all the interventions in foreign issues. Ron Paul believes we should not be the world’s policeman, and we should not be putting American lives at risk in order to build an American Empire. African-Americans are 12 percent of the general population but make up 21 percent of military personnel and 30 percent of Army enlistees. Most black Americans enter the military to take advantage of the GI Bill, good benefits, or to get training to later look for stable unemployment. Many come from broken homes or poor neighborhoods. How many lives must be lost before we realize that these wars are futile and pointless? Ron Paul believes Americans will be safer if we stay out of other nations' business, and set a good example by having a strong economy, free trade, strong individual liberties, and having healthy diplomatic dialogue with our international partners. Ron Paul's record reflects his stance. Why do we have bases in countries like Korea, Japan, and Germany? These countries are wealthy and more than capable of defending themselves. Ron Paul is also against torture and the imprisonment of so called "enemy combatants" without due process of the law. He is a strong believer that we should have a strong military for national defense, but not for aggressive wars and he is also against the Public-private partnership that has grown from the increasing size of the Military Industrial Complex. Companies like Halliburton, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, etc make BILLIONS of dollars off the tax payer through having partnerships with politicians who back these wars. Oh yes, Ron Paul is the Neo-conservative's worst nightmare.
5. Foreign Aid - When one thinks of foreign aid, you think of helping the poor in third world countries, supply food and medical services for the needy around the world. Sounds good right? The fact is, USAID, the department that handles all foreign aid is one of the most corrupt institutions in government today. Foreign Aid (which is funded by tax payers) has been used by dictators across the world to enslave and massacre people in the countries we are trying to help. Aid is government to government loans with strings attached. We use this aid to manipulate multinational contracts, win favors with dictators or war lords, and control nations into doing our biding. Americans are a generous people as we have donated the most charitable organizations that an other nation on the planet. This is how you help the poor of the world. Not by dropping bombs and food, as we did in Somalia. Dambisa Moyo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambisa_Moyo), a Zambian born economist and author, details this in her book "Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There is Another Way for Africa." She's witnessed the atrocities caused by govt foreign aid and says it should be phased out.
6. Free Speech - Black people have had their 1st Amendment rights trampled on a lot through history. From the COINTELPRO (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) operations under FBI Head J. Edgar Hoover, who used illegal wiretapping, infiltration, discrediting and disruption of black free speech during the Civil Rights era. People like Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Marcus Garvey, Huey Newton and the Black Panther Party were victims of a government so big and powerful, using and abusing its power to limit free speech. Ron Paul is staunch defender of the 1st Amendment and believes it is of the most vital laws in having a free country. Ron Paul believes that it is your natural right to liberty, life, and property. As long as you commit no act of violence toward anyone, what you say is your right. You should have the right to speak out against the government, no matter what your message is. So many so called "Black Leaders" and social conservatives have tried to squelch free speech, saying there should be a federal ban on the N-word, sponsoring legislation banning "saggy pants" and even trying to prevent musicians from distributing there music. Ron Paul would never stand for this.
7. Economic Freedom - The free market viewpoint understands economic liberty as the freedom to produce trade and consume any goods and services acquired without the use of force, fraud or theft. Blacks have historically been prevented from having economic freedom due to slavery, Jim Crow laws, and ramped discrimination in government. Many black "leaders" indicate that it is capitalism that is hurting black people today, that the government needs to force economic equality by wage controls and huge government programs. This is disastrous and counteractive to the progress blacks have had over the generations. Economic freedom and liberty is vital in the black community, so blacks may start their own businesses, invest in their own neighborhoods, invest in their own education, and grow wealth prosperity. When someone is successful and builds wealth, this helps everyone. If a millionaire saves his money in the bank, that money is used to finance capital for business creation or expansion, creating jobs and new opportunities. In America, unfortunately our economic freedoms have decreased slowly but surely in the past 100 years.
Ron Paul predicted the housing market crash in 2008 (http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DA3sUtmoMxSQ&sa=X&ei=BKa1TeK3E5SWtwenv9zpDg&ved=0CCMQuAIwAA&usg=AFQjCNGMQE6rt4KyMlYuSESJLC4REA2Mzg)and the after effect (unemployment, inflation, etc). Ron Paul understands how economies work, and how the Keynesian economists and politicians what ran our country into the ground with taxes, regulation, a weak currency and unsustainable debt. Ron envisions a day when we are free to trade and transact, and keep our money. The government operates under the assumption that the money you have belongs to the govt, and you are allowed to keep a portion of while the govt takes the rest to finance political pet projects and endless wars. Ron Paul wants to take us off the road to serfdom and on the road to prosperity, for ALL Americans.
People often confuse the economic system today as Capitalism. This is not a capitalist nation by far, we are more fascist than capitalist. We literally take money from the middle class of the country and give it to large corporations who do the bidding of the government, while sprinkling crumbs to the poor to maintain their dependence on the government. The welfare system of food stamps, public housing, and unemployment has created a large segment of Americans, and particularly African Americans dependent on government hand-outs. This is a very dangerous position for anyone to be in. It has created a permanent class of people either unwilling or unable to strive for prosperity and economic independence. What happens when the well dries up? As evident by our 1.6 Trillion dollar deficit, our 14 Trillion dollar national debt, the well has been dry. The only reason the government is able to sustain itself today is due to the Federal Reserve, and the fact that the U.S. dollar is the global reserve currency. The government finances it self by printing money out of thin air and borrowing from countries like China, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. What happens when they don’t want to loan us money anymore? That day is here. And when the Federal Reserve creates money out of thin air, or inflation (also called Quantitative Easing) it causes prices to rise. No one feels this pain more than the poor, as evident in oil prices, food prices, etc. Ron Paul would like to eliminate the income tax, and give Americans the choice to OPT out of failing programs like Social Security and Medicare. This would give blacks the power to save and grow their wealth, and take on opportunities such as furthering education, investing in businesses, etc.
8. Real Healthcare reform - If you don’t already know, the healthcare system in America is a mess. Over the last 40 years prices have skyrocketed. Insurance premiums are at an all time high and even upper middle class people are having a problem affording healthcare. So what is the problem? Shouldn't ObamaCare solve the issue of healthcare and offer access of affordable healthcare to every American rich or poor? Unfortunately, no. What ObamaCare does is force people to purchase health insurance from companies it deems fit, if you don’t, you will be subject to fines. This is not "free" healthcare. But why should healthcare be free? Is any other service or good we demand free? Of course not. Other countries that have enacted national health care plans are in danger of debt crisis, even they haven’t been able to curb the cost of medical spending.
How does Ron Paul approach this? It's simple, make the healthcare market free again. For the past 40 years, the U.S. govt has been involved in the health care industry in some shape or form, from Medicare, Medicaid, subsidies for drug manufacturers, tax breaks, regulations, etc. All these things distort markets and force prices higher. What Ron Paul wants is a free health care market, where individuals can negotiate their insurance costs, and medical costs directly with the hospital, he wants to eliminate tax breaks for companies that offer health insurance through employment. Why is that we get health insurance through our job? We don’t do that with car insurance, home insurance, or anything else. The only reason is because government gives tax breaks to companies that do this. We also need to de-regulate the industry and allow people to purchase insurance from any where in the country, or the world for that matter. This would give people an abundance of choice and force prices down through competition. But, what about the poor? The poor will be treated as they were in years past, by charity and church hospitals, teaching hospitals, etc. Ron Paul, a physician himself ran his own OBGYN practice for decades, treating the poor and charging them little to nothing. People will get the service they need. Today, the costs are bloated and inflated due to the fact that hospitals don’t have to deal with the consumer, only the insurance company. With technology today and the amount of people in the industry, healthcare should be cheap enough so even the working poor can afford to have health care service.
Ron Paul also understands that a lot of elderly and very poor people are now dependent on systems like Medicaid and Medicare, so he does not want to pull the rug from under them. He just wants to give people a choice, specifically young people who will carry the burden of these mega-entitlement programs, a chance to OPT out.
9. Housing - With the Housing market collapse of 2008, we were reminded of the consequences of government involvement in industries by operating programs that start off well intentioned (promoting home ownership) but end up hurting not only innocent bystanders, but the very people that those programs were intended to help to begin with. Government backed corporations like Freddie and Fannie Mac were create to allow lower income people, and people of less credit worthiness the chance to take part in the so called "American Dream" ala Home Ownership. Through sub-prime mortgage programs, easy lending standards, government guaranteed loans, tax credits, and cheap money created by the Federal Reserve, the government bid up the price of housing to create phony GDP growth. This unintentionally forced Americans to go deeper into debt and made owning a home seem like an investment, when it shouldn’t be.
The ripple effects of these programs were spread by derivative dealers, and the mortgage backed securities markets, causing the "cheap money" to infect banking institutions around the world. With the recession finally hit, as Ron Paul warned it would, people were caught off guard and didn’t understand why something like housing would effect employment and the economy as a whole. Ron Paul wants to get the government out of the housing markets, so housing can fall to prices that are affordable for Americans. Why is it that working class families in the past, were able to afford owning a home, and now you would have to be upper middle class to afford these bloated home prices? This is what happens when government gets involved in an industry and dilutes those markets with cheap money and artificially low interest rates, you get price inflation.
10. Racism - Ron Paul is incapable of racism, or promoting racism because he is a staunch defender of individual rights, natural rights and is against collectivism and government oppression of all kinds. As MLK stated, prejudice plus power equals racism. The power comes from the government. When the governments passed Jim Crows laws, this created institutional racism to view blacks as second class citizens. Ron Paul is against this and will always oppose racist laws. What he does believe is individuals have a right to associate with who they like, as long as it is voluntary and not forced by the government. Ron Paul is opposed to laws the affect blacks disproportionately such as Federal Mandatory Minimum laws (http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul686.html), Federal drug laws, racial profiling and police brutality. Ron Paul believes as King did that person should be judged by the content of their character, not the color of one's skin. He believes everyone should be viewed as an individual and not as collective (black people, white people, illegals, etc.). His opponents have tried to smear him by trying to paint him as a racist due to some ole newsletters that appeared under his name from decades ago. These letters were proved fraudulent and Ron Paul has denied every writing such letters. He has spoken against the Civil Rights Act of 1964, particularly the section that forces private businesses from choosing who they want to service. He opposes this because he believes the government should not be forcing private individuals and businesses to associate with people they choose not to. It has nothing to do with racism, but government interfering with our lives. Let the free market handle racist businesses. If someone owns a restaurant, and only wants to serve whites, then that restaurant will eventually suffer. And why would a black person want to patronize a business operated by someone who hates them, or doesn’t want to associate with them? In the 1960's most businesses voluntarily began to integrate and pull the "No Coloreds Allows" signs off their buildings. It is Ron's belief that institutional racism could have eventually been eradicated through peaceful protests, boycotts, and a general respect for individual rights, not through the heavy hand of government. Once you let government interfere in you life just a little bit, even if you think it's for a just reason, you open the door to what we have today in which the government is entangled in literally every part of our daily lives.
Thoughts?