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View Full Version : Interesting article: STRATEGY For Ron Paul




tsetsefly
12-05-2007, 06:13 PM
This article might of been posted already but I thought it was a interesting article on strategy for a dark horse campaign. its from the buchanan blog, http://buchanan.org/blog/?p=829


How A Dark-Horse Can Win The Nomination
posted by Linda

By Thomas F. Roeser - The Wanderer Press

CHICAGO — Two weeks ago I played political strategist for Ron Paul. In the old days of my mis*spent youth, when I was a hired gun political strategist working for the Minnesota Republican Party, nobody asked whom I was for. They didn’t care. My boss just showed me a candidate and or*dered me to devise a strategy for him/ her at lowest possible cost. And because I liked to continue eating, I did it.

It didn’t work out too badly. Af*ter a few of us got the hang of it, the GOP, once locked in the dark ages of Hubert Humphrey, Eugene McCarthy, and a Democratic ma*chine governor, won the governor*ship and two Senate seats.

So in that spirit, I seized upon the darkest of dark horses in the Republican column, Cong. Ron Paul of Texas, and sketched out a plan of attack for him. That doesn’t mean I’m for him: It means that pursuing a definite strategy he can come close to winning — and maybe win if fortune smiles. Be*lieve it or not, I’ve heard far and wide from people who say it makes sense. Of course it does! It’s the only way for a candidate with little money who is fighting those with big media budgets.

The strategy: The bunch up of primaries on February 5 should produce a candidate winning the Northeast, one winning the Mid*west, and another the South (maybe the same guy). Paul should strive to come in second somewhere (I sug*gest the Northeast as most favorable to his candidacy). The winner would probably be Rudy Giuliani. Paul would then have every right to de*mand a debate with Giuliani where he would have the chance to appeal to more conservative Republican voters and thinking liberals.

I urged Paul to campaign in non*traditional GOP circles in the Northeast — following the style of Eugene McCarthy in New Hamp*shire — visiting universities, cof*feehouses, editorial boards, talk*radio programs; and specifically going to every liberal group imag*inable: anathema to a regular Re*publican campaign. In that way he could grab national media atten*tion and have a shot.

Because I heard from a lot of Ron Paul Wanderer readers who felt this was the correct strategy, let me now outline a low cost media approach.

Absolutely no money ought to be spent on TV commercials or expensive multicolored brochures. Not very much should be spent on staff either. Expensive consultants want candidates to buy TV so as to benefit from a commission rake*off. So, no TV.

Volunteers ought to do most of the work. The only staffer I would pay good money to should be the candidate’s driver, the one who drives him around New Hampshire safely and carefully. A good driv*er is the most important member of a presidential primary cam*paign.

But there are perils with candi*dates’ drivers. Hence I suggest Paul’s drive ought to be a mute. Physically impaired. One congen*itally deprived of the use of speech. An individual condemned to permanent silence. Incapable ofspeech and utterance. Unable to emit a sound of any kind. Under*stand I do not mean one who is la*conic. I mean “ mute: from the Old French mu, the Middle Englishmuet, from the Latin mutus.” I mean characterized by absence of speech. As with the line from Emily Dickinson: “ The words stopped at his lips unsounded.”

With the candidate held prison*er in the back seat, a garrulous, know-it-all driver can take advan*tage of the candidate’s weakness and pour a good deal of nonsense into his ears. Worse, the candidate in extreme fatigue can be led to imagine that the driver speaks for the common man. So mute he must be.

The driver will be the best paid; the second highest paid should be the scheduler. When I covered McCarthy in New Hampshire, he had a perfect one. All schedulers are victimized by friends who im*portune themselves to get the can*didate to their favorite church pic*nics. Not so McCarthy’s schedul*er who was an autistic savant. He was distant from friends and as*sociates, single-minded on only a map. He was the best schedul*er I ever saw. Sadly he is not available — but an autistic sa*vant as scheduler, similar in style to Dustin Hoffman in the filmRain Man, should be available somewhere. Paul should pay him well.

Running the campaign on vol*unteers saves money for paid communications. By which I mean radio. A decade ago a guest at my political science class at De Paul University was Michael Deaver ( who died recently). Everyone be*lieves Ronald Reagan was the most popular governor California ever had. Not so. He won his sec*ond term by only 52% in 1970. But he still wanted to run for pres*ident.

He turned to Deaver, who under*stood the governor was a conser*vative ideologue ( as Deaver de*cidedly was not). Radio, he rea*soned, was for the philosophical*ly committed, the people Reagan had to appeal to. So he put Reagan on the radio across the country — radio exclusively.

Each radio message of only a few minutes in length had him deliv*er small bits of conservative phi*losophy in bite-sized morsels. At the end he would say, “ This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listen*ing.”

While Reagan was known na*tionally from his films, his ideas — aside from California — were not. Radio got ex-radio announc*er Reagan across to the country.

Making Points And Raising Money

Ron Paul is no Ronald Reagan nor is he a nationally known com*modity but he doesn’t have to be. Radio talks on small stations — radio exclusively — will do the job. With the first bunch- up of presidential primaries on February 5, 2008 (to which Arizona has now been added), Rudy Giuliani is sup*posed to do well on that day in New York, New Jersey, Connecti*cut, and Delaware.

Paul’s goal should be to con*centrate on being second in any of those Republican contests. And don’t worry that these states look like distinctly hostile country to conservative Republicans. With artful three-minute radio talks with a contributions request at the end, Paul can make his points and raise money for them at the same time.

What should the commercials deal with? The first should be on the Iraq War where he says he vot*ed against the war resolution, add*ing that if war is sought it must be fully approved by Congress with a complete declaration of war allowing total resources dedicated to victory; unlike the original au*thorization of 2002, where the president received an okay to use military force against Iraq to attain only two objectives: “ defend the national security against the con*tinuing threat posed by Iraq” and “ enforce all relevant UN Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq.” Paul authorized a “ sunset provision” to the original autho*rization.

It should conclude with the fact that previous Congresses limited past presidents from either waging war or extending it — which this Democratic Congress has failed to do. When was that? Paul should say: “ I’ll tell you next week. Un*til then this is Ron Paul saying thanks for listening.”

The second commercial should list them, including: Nixon had to obey a congressional order in 1969 not to send troops to Laos or Thailand. Gerald Ford was forced to accept a ban on excur*sions to Angola. Reagan had to obey a limitation on use of troops beyond Lebanon in 1983. Bill Clinton was banned from extend*ing military operations in Soma*lia in 1994. And George W. Bush has complied with limitations on the number of military and con*tractor personnel sent to Colom*bia.

Ron Paul can use these prece*dents to score the Democrats who talk big but who haven’t acted. In that way he could call their bluff and get Democrats to switch to him in the primaries. Liberals could become disenchanted with the Democrats running since they failed to do this and come over to Paul.

His third would be on immigration. Unlike other libertarians, Paul opposes illegal immigration because of the toll illegal immi*grants take on welfare rolls and worsening an unready unbalanced federal budget.

A fourth would state his opposition to any viola*tion of habeas corpus to protect against possible unlawful impris*onment, triggering a liberal cross*over.

Fifth would be immensely pop*ular — his opposition to reintro*duction of the military draft.

Sixth should state his support of the Second Amendment, the purpose of which was to put a check on government tyranny, not merely to grant hunting rights.

Seventh:there should be no federal control over education.

Eighth: his plans to reduce health care costs for families — particularly waiving the employee portion of Social Security payroll taxes for those with serious illnesses and suspend*ing such taxes for primary caregivers with a sick spouse or child.

Ninth: his opposition to abortion and his following a con*sistent life ethic: opposition to the death penalty. Tenth: his reform of the tax code which would replace the cumbersome tax process with a simplified tax form — where he also spells out substantial tax sav*ings.

All these ideas, incidentally, have been proposed by Ron Paul earlier. Of course as with every other candidate, there are hot but*ton libertarian issues I would not stress: his criticism of the federal war on drugs ( states should deter*mine the extent of opposition) which could be twisted to sound too permissive; support of income tax resistance in the form of peace*ful disobedience ( easily twisted to endorse violence); his vote against a constitutional amend*ment to ban desecration of the flag ( a red flag to most conservatives).

These broadcasts should not ex*ceed three minutes in length and should be spelled out in simple words with instructions on how to contribute via the Internet. Begin*ning in mid- December in the Northeast, if popular there with donations coming in, they could be run in the Midwest. And if they’re lousy with money, try Cal*ifornia which is jaded by same*same programs advocated by the two parties.

Follow This Formula

This strategy can’t be used by other dark- horse candidates ( Mike Huckabee, Duncan Hunter, Sam Brownback, et al.) since to some degree they echo the regular Republican establishment bloc. The big three establishment ones are still Giuliani, Romney, and Th*ompson. If Paul runs second to any one of them, the situation is ripe for a debate.

I promise not to give further un*solicited advice to him in the future. I have other things to do. But if he follows this formula, Paul might one day thank me — if only for the blessed silence he would enjoy as he rode in the back seat of a car driven by a professional driver who was also mute. And by a schedule concocted by one im*pervious to beseeching special de*mands from political pals.

When liberal Democratic candi*dates hit stinging blows, you can always count on the so- called es*tablishment “ mainstream media” to sit on the story. Last week, Michelle Obama, wife of Sen. Barack ( D., Ill.), took a wicked cut at Hillary Clinton. If you haven’t heard about the story on the net*works or read about it in your newspapers or on the wire servic*es, remember that what Mrs. Obama said was detrimental a) to the Obama campaign, with Michelle Obama hurling mud*balls and b) to the Clintons. Nei*ther big metropolitan daily in Chi*cago has referred to it, although they have special correspondents traveling with the Obamas. Rea*son: too negative to the Obamas and the Clintons. Nevertheless this is what really happened: Campaigning in Iowa, the Obamas have come cheek to jowl with the reality that a hefty polit*ical machine built by Bill Clinton is currently topping Obama. The young Illinois senator is 46 years old and is only three years out of the Illinois legislature. He is strug*gling to make voters feel confi*dent with the idea of him as commander-in-chief. All the while, Hillary is trading on her own ex*pertise beginning with the role she played as first lady and a so-called “ two-fer,” a co- partner with her husband in the White House.

Last week, Mrs. Obama had had enough of the Clintons. She had this to say about Barack’s top op*ponent, Mrs. Clinton: “ If you can’t run your own house, you can’t run the White House!”

It was a vicious cut, referring to the nation’s number- one philanderer who embarrassed his wife with an affair with intern Monica Lewinsky.

The skewering from Michelle Obama was doubly well-aimed.

First, at Hillary’s so- called lack of attention to her roving husband and second to the fact that Hillary has a big lead over Obama due to Bill Clinton’s political network of wealthy fund- raisers and big- city machine types.

If this charge had come from a Republican you can bet the net*works would be breaking into their programs with “ we interrupt this broadcast to bring you. . . .” But as it came from a liberal me*dia favorite’s wife, the story was suffocated.

Primbs
12-06-2007, 01:11 AM
Looks good. We could use some TV, but most conservatives do listen to radio.

slowmotionjones
12-06-2007, 01:42 AM
Perfect.

coboman
12-06-2007, 02:15 AM
Great! Another great advice for the official campaign to ignore.

foofighter20x
12-06-2007, 02:40 AM
OOOOOoooooold :p

JosephTheLibertarian
12-06-2007, 03:44 AM
we should inform the campaign of this

Freedom
12-06-2007, 06:49 AM
It’s the only way for a candidate with little money who is fighting those with big media budgets.


I disagree with this statement - Ron Paul is breaking fund raising records left and right.
After December 16th he will have the most cash on hand of all Republican candidates and most Democratic candidates.

idiom
12-06-2007, 06:59 AM
More Money and more grassroots than anybody else. That whole strategy would need to be rejigged.