Ron Paul - time to change tactics

[Libertarian_Rebel]

I'm a 31 yr old bleeding heart anti-establishment libertarian. I found out about Ron Paul days before the money bomb tea party and immediately realized he was someone in politics I've been wishing for a for very long time. In fact 15 years long!!! I did send in $100 and felt a reborn American spirit in my heart! Ron Paul has cured my apathy as I never see ANY good of those corporate cookie cutter-bought off candidates that will never do what they pitch to us. Its always talk the good-smooth-diplomatic talk and end up being empty and broken promises along with a surprise or two when they get in the White House. I feel really genuine about Ron Paul and relate to his ideas on the issues.

However I think that he just isn’t getting his message out correctly to the masses as they see his views as just too radical – a view that FOX and other mainstream media like to promote. Ron Paul needs to be more explicit and spell things out so the average voter can grasp his ideas.

If we the people want Dr. Ron Paul as our President as a reality--he's really going to need to COMPROMISE and come to a middle ground. We can't be like the 1800's again!! It is a modern day society! You can't dismantle and eliminate all agencies of the government. As much as I don't like some of them (DEA especially) others serve a purpose in this modern day society. All I’m saying his ideas are a great bold new direction to go forward in, but I get the impression with all the reaction I've seen and heard that they are way too radical to implement in modern day mainstream America and the average person doesn’t want to go along with it.

He needs to clarify his position and make mainstream America understand and convince them that he is not going to take the country in a radical direction back to the stone age of a strict constitutionalist. He's not going to stand a snowballs chance in he** with the main stream citizen if he can not figure out a middle ground or happy medium approach they can agree to and convince them thats he's not doing away with vital welfare programs some people have no choice but to depend on.. So if WE the people and HE is all ears to US, then this thread is FOOD FOR THOUGHT for this Ron Paul community to digest and to see a different strategy of getting the MAIN STREAM VOTERS on our side!!!

To see his ideas on the issues and convince them he is their best and most HONEST choice there is running THEN he just may turn and capture those ANTI PAUL'S as well..!!!!! He just has to tone it down enough and present some sort of MIDDLE/NEUTRAL medium for them all to understand where HE is coming from. Why insist having policies and issues that most main stream Americans will not accept in this day and age with radical Islamic’s on the war path.

The average voter may consider something that’s not too radical, with some government and spending to be eliminated – but not almost everything. Don't bring every last troop home, bring MOST of them home! See my point... Hey its worth a try...... Do we really want an all or zilch approach to this campaign???

It would be a crying shame to say "we don't want to compromise our position to get more of MAIN STREAM AMERICA on our side....YES I KNOW its about the "message" but if what a lot of us have seen such as aka Freedom to Fascism actually comes true to reality.... are we going to have another opportunity for a Ron Paul?? Who knows??? But are we willing to take that chance to be stubborn, to insist on everything to get nothing and snub mainstream America now?

Maybe I’m all wrong and off-base, but to me compromising at this point seems like a lot better strategic chance at actually winning the nomination/ election to get our objective which is freedom and liberty and to end the elitist plans. I want Ron Paul to win, but he will not win the mainstream citizens over (I don't think its as important with LAME STREAM MEDIA) unless he presents his platform and issues in a happy medium mainstream fashion versus taking a strict radical approach that the average voter is too scared to even consider with "security of terror" constantly being ingrained in their minds!

Of course the congress/senate will not even work with him even if he does gets elected if there are no compromises on the issues between them. So he might as well start now with those compromises while its still early to win over those undecided/swing voters to get our victory. Well I can only hope this community will ponder this over and this seed I've planted could change the outcome altogether. .
THINK IT OVER PEOPLE!!! Discuss ideas amongst yourselves and try to come up with a consensus, then try to urge Ron Paul to adjust/tweak it a bit so that its down to more of a main stream level of comprehension. Then the uninformed main stream citizen might see Ron Paul has the BEST ideas over the Huckster and company without being too radical for their taste and winning them completely over. Otherwise most are/will not accept Ron Paul and embrace him with open arms with lame stream media portraying him as being way too radical for the good of the country and its national security.

All I can say is I thought this is worth a shot to throw suggestions out here while there is still time and won't be ridiculed as a troll for anti-Paul. Thanks for taking the time read any ideas that may help us WIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ron Paul is the BEST choice for America period!

[justinc.1089]

Paul's positions are not radical though. For example you said getting rid of social security that many people depend on is radical, but thats not Paul's position. And he doesn't want to get rid of all the government agencies either.

If you want radical, look back to him running as a partisan libertarian candidate in the 80's. He was radical then lol. I guess he was being more partisan towards the libertarians then and kind of running more as a libertarian than as himself idk. Or maybe he has calmed down some over time lol. I know his debating style has calmed down with time.

[hueylong]

Funny how all this "concern" seems to come from people who register for the forum and spew with their first post.

[Enzo]

I don't think Paul's positions are too radical.

The major hurdle to overcome is actually getting Paul's message and views to people.

Many people hear short snippets about how

1.) Ron Paul is crazy

2.) Ron Paul has no chance of being elected

While both are completely false, it's all the exposure many people have had to Ron Paul.

And Unfortunately it's all many people need to turn them off to a candidate.

People think "he's unelectable and crazy.. I don't want to associate with or support that"


People are deciding against Paul before they even hear or understand his positions.

Paul is not radical. Unless you find the constitutional principles this country was founded on to be radical.

We need to change people's preconceived, incorrect notion of Paul....

His strength is that his positions and policies remain consistent.

[CraigC]

I am a huge fan of Dr. Paul and pretty much everything he stands for. And yes, this is my first post to the forum.

I agree with the poster on this - if Ron Paul wins the GOP primaries then it will become a non-issue. He will have all the time he needs to explain his philosophies in detail, and explain that he is pushing for a change in policy and a MOVEMENT towards more limited government.

Unfortunately, what many people are assuming is that he wants to end the war on terrorism, and screw over the poor/elderly by abolishing medicare and social security. The reality is that he has the only realistic way to actually solve these problems! But that isn't what people think.

I agree that this is a problem for the campaign.

[literatim]

Why are you telling us?

Ron Paul will not pander.

[Created4]

Unfortunately, what many people are assuming is that he wants to end the war on terrorism, and screw over the poor/elderly by abolishing medicare and social security.

How do you know that is what people are "assuming"? Did you read this somewhere? If you have been out talking to people about Ron Paul, as most of us have been, you will quickly find out that most people don't even know about him yet, let alone have any intelligent thinking about his views. Those who know a little bit about him just think he is a fringe candidate who is not electable. Even the other candidates he is running against don't know much about his views, although some are slowly starting to adopt some of them.

What is needed at this point is getting his views out to the public, and I heartily disagree with you (as would Dr. Paul) that his views are too radical. What is radical is continuing on with the current philosophy of government which WILL result in the collapse of our economy in short order. Most people can understand these things once they hear Dr. Paul, others just won't get it until things start getting bad enough and people really start to suffer.

[Elwar]

Which campaign did you work on that you helped win?

[CraigC]

How do you know that is what people are "assuming"?

Ummm...you're joking, right? IMHO every single person who criticizes Ron Paul's ideas on foreign policy is assuming that he wants to end the war on terrorism. Because, they don't understand that he simply has a much better way to deal with it.

Regardless, I've spoken directly with no fewer than 20 people who have told me that Ron Paul wants to get rid of (either) medicare or social security. Each time I've explained that he doesn't want to acomplish this by putting anyone out on the street and his main goal with social security is to give younger people a chance to opt out. Of those 20 people I mentioned, about 10 were personal friends and family of mine (most of my family is republican), about 5 people at my office, and another 5 complete strangers. You are correct, however, in that MOST people I've talked to didn't know who Ron Paul was at all.

Another thing that bothered me was an article posted on abcnews.com during the "Facebook Debate" on saturday evening. Below is a direct quote from an article they published while the democratic debate was still being broadcast live:

On Facebook's "Soundboard," an electronic bulletin board, Pamela Geller Oshry, in her 40s and from New York, asked "Will any candidate be brave enough to lay out a strategy to fight the global jihad?"

Reached by phone by ABC NEWS.com, Oshry, described Paul's position as "scary and soft on terrorism." She said she was supporting Giuliani, but found former Sen. Fred Thompson's positions "stronger and stronger" and would elect "anyone capable of beating the Democrats."

[shasshas]

good suggestions

[Ara825]

We need to work on getting these people on SS to understand that he doesn't intend to take away the SS income that many depend on now to survive. My husband worked the same job for 30 years, then had to take early retirement when the peripheral neuropathy caused by exposure to agent orange crippled him. We live on SS and VA disablity and a much smaller than we planned on retirement check due to early retirement. We aren't in the least concerned about losing the SS if Ron Paul is elected. We understand what his plan for SS is. Unfortunately, the majority of people on SS don't understand his plan so it scares them. We would be afraid too, but we were fortunate to have someone explain it to us.
We need to get the SS issue clarified.

[CraigC]

We need to work on getting these people on SS to understand that he doesn't intend to take away the SS income that many depend on now to survive..

Excellent point Ara825. I guess I spoke up on this topic without explaining myself very well. I am dedicated to getting the word out about Ron Paul; I just get frustrated when I talk to people who missunderstand him.

If you watch any in-depth interview with RP, he explains his ideas extremely well. But when he only has 30 seconds to talk about something (for example, in a televised debate that gets a ton of voter exposure) he doesn't have that kind of time and his message can easily be missunderstood. I just wonder if it might be a good idea to try to address this problem better in future debates. That's all, and it's only a suggestion that stems from my own desire to see Ron win!