My Encounter With Ron Paul Fans, and Their Reality Distortion Field

Over on one of my tech blogs I have been sparring with more than a few rabid Ron Paul fans.

My latest post concerning the Libertarian-leaning contestant for the Republican presidential nomination explores just why Ron Paul's MySpace page draws so many views -- while his obviously dedicated online audience has not been able to convert the message into Republican primary votes.

I wrote that one of the obstacles seems to be that the online geeks that constitute so much of the Texas Congressman's advocacy camp aren't the type to go out to the larger world outside their den and (cough), win hearts and minds.

I've received more than 40 comments to that post. Several emails have come in to my email addy as well.

The Comments and emails make accusations all over the map.

Among the more common:

People ought to be able to manage their own lives, so if Rep. Paul doesn't believe in, say, helping solve the mortgage crisis, no problem. That's because the answer is in the private sector, not government "handouts." Hey, it's your fault you are being foreclosed on.

More or less in that vein, I received this from a disciple of St. Ron:

"Took you until the last sentence, but you revealed your true colors.

"Who's going to help [wonderful use of that word - straight from the socialist/collectivist playbook] the people whose homes are facing foreclosures? Oh, the poor babies! A-boo-hoo-hoo."

"In this country, sir, people are responsible for their own decisions, including financial decisions. If you want a government-controlled economy where no one is free to succeed or fail, there are plenty of nations like that around the world. I suggest you drag your frightened little vagina to one of them. Thanks for your time."

So in other words, if something bad happens to you, it is your fault.

Some other Paul fans commented that well, companies can do bad things to consumers, but in an unregulated free enterprise system such as Paul espouses, new competitors will sprout up and do the right thing.

As if.

I keep telling these Paul idiots that in an economy where megacorporations bury their fee-assessing, policy changing intent in microscopic fine print, only appropriately exercised government regulatory and judicial oversight can provide an adequate oversight.

But no-o-o-, this argument falls deaf on Ron Paul fans. Too many of them have not had personal or fiscal crises, and far too many of them have read that idiot Ayn Rand.

And then there's this other meme, in which Paul fans tell me their hero's single digit performance in most of the primaries is because the "corporate media" are afraid of the guy's message.

And to that I say, that if the corporate media sensed a groundswell for Ron Paul, they would go there. I mean, do you really think that, say, the same network (MSNBC) that features a marquee commentator (Keith Olbermann) who has called for Bush and Cheney to resign would shrink away from giving Ron Paul face time because they are afraid his anti-Iraq War stance would piss off the divisions of NBC owner and defense General Electric?

Comments

[BaltoAman]

I'm kinda bummed. Looks like I missed out on a great economics conversation here. The other HuffPo thread "Bill calls Obama a poopy-head" had me quite enthralled and I just couldn't tear myself away.

Anyhoo, the complex landscape of American economics cannot be summed up in simple sound-bytes like some candidates would like us to think.

I believe we can't just go back to the gold standard, neither can we abolish the IRS or income taxes at this point. We are simply too far in debt as a country. It is crucial though to reduce government spending as soon as possible.

I believe Dr. Paul to be the only remaining candidate that can achieve reduced spending. He has outlined a plan to remove the foreign bases, stop the occupation in Iraq, etc.

The other candidates are simply pushing larger government and higher spending, making more political promises that we can't afford.

Reduce government, put a lid on inflation, reduce the debt. That sounds like a plan!

[MoConnecticut]

I wonder if Mr. Shaw considered that the examples he chose to print represent a very narrow cross-section of Constitutionalists supporting 10-Term Congressman Dr. Ron Paul.

I am 52 years old, a Constitutionalist, and never once have I considered Adams, Washington, Madison, Paine, Franklin, et al to suffer from a "Reality Distortion Field."

But, then again, I suppose that picking a fight with the King of England might qualify. Does that make the Founders and Framers bad people?

I don't think so.

[diamndpeace]

Ron Paul wants to roll back Roe v. Wade.

Did you know that?

[acudoc]

Hillary and Obama and McCain and Huckabee will all raise taxes hundreds of billions of dollars to fund their bribes to the voters and all because they have unbounded faith in government solutions to our social problems (and of course a strong will to power and prestige). They love to propose more government programs to rectify all the perceived wrongs, no matter how many times government programs have missed their mark and have been an anchor on the economy, misallocating precious capital into untold numbers of hare-brained schemes. Could it be actually that they are coming from a faulty philosophical position regarding the purpose of government in the United States?

I read this trenchant statistic and insightful comment on a blog the other day: inner city black families are basically non-existent now and 8 of 10 black babies born in the inner city will be raised in fatherless homes. Two hundred and fifty years of slavery and discrimination, and even a Civil War, could not destroy the black family structure, yet government subsidies have managed to do just that inside of 40 years. When will we finally wake up and realize that the only purpose of our form of government is to ensure the rights of the individual to protection from aggression in the form of physical attack, theft, fraud, and breach of contract. Anything else the government gets involved in only increases its scope and power and the scope and power of its insinuated and politicized interest groups. We will soon find ourselves to be, in the words of Thomas Jefferson, nothing but serfs on the continent conquered by our forefathers. This prospect is what motivates Ron Paul's followers. They offer a wealth of refreshing information and viewpoints, if only people would have the courage to admit that they have been conditioned to turn to the government and to bureaucrats for solutions to the very problems they are helping to create.

[fumes]

say shaw, love your post! re: reality distortion fields, of which there are at least two at last count. one is identifiable by the golden rule that states he with the most gold makes the most rules, and the other is identifiable by the golden rule that states do unto others as you would have them do unto you. i'm a little confused buddy, to which reality distortion field do you refer when talking about us ron paul nuts? you know, just curious..

[kevinabt]

I find it interesting that the comments are more intelligent, articulate and meaningful than the article itself. Professional media people seem to not be in touch with the reality that most of us 'common' people live in every day.

[TomdeSabla]

Sometimes, when really confused liberals and conservatives say things, profound truths can be obtained by simply reversing every aspect of their statements. I will demonstrate:
"My Encounter With Ron Paul Fans, and Their Reality Distortion Field"
We may presume the author's implication is that Ron supporters are a far-out bunch who cannot perceive reality. Now let us reverse.
Instead of distorting reality, we are revealing and explaining it to all those we come in contact with, and that offends those who themselves are suffering under a distorted concept of reality.

I go to another "progressive" site, and have noted many posters and authors there have claimed that "the amount of capital in the world is finite." This is simply Marxist ignorance, and represents a distortion of reality - one which no Paul supporter would ever engage in.
Is it reality to claim that there is no inflation in the U.S. right now, as many liberals such as Barney Frank do, in order to demand more Fed rate cuts? Isn't it a distortion of reality to pretend that central banks can print money out of thin air forever and not destroy the currency?
Is it realistic to believe that government can fix itself with commissions as Obama has said? How about the "reality" of all Americans getting the same quality care as veterans now receive? No, my presumably well-meaning liberal friends, it is you who are living your entire political lives in your very own reality distortion field, and it is we who have "hacked into the Matrix" at great risk to provide the real truth for everyone's sake.

[Jason43]

I don't understand how you people think that it is morally justifiable to take money from me and bail out people who signed up for a bad mortgage. I have a mortgage and two kids and struggle to pay my bills.

These problems are caused by people being greedy. I don't support bailing out the people who signed up for bad loans (the Democratic 'solution') and I don't support corporate welfare to prop up these greedy banks and lending institutions (the republican response). Its not that I don't feel bad for these people, but why should the government continue to try to spend its way out of a problem caused by arificially low interest rates and spending problems by further lowering interest rates to bail out big business and devaluing our currency??? How can you justify this? I feel bad for these people. They should never have gotten these loans, but if you leave it to the banks and the people, the banks will have to renegotiate these loans or have 1000's of forclosures that lose them money.

Paul people are informed. They just don't agree with you. Your 'solutions' add to the problem. The problem is that the government, the banks and wall street are putting all of us in the poorhouse.

The rich people have thought the economy was going great the last 7 years. But to those of us on the bottom, prices have skyrocketed and our pay has stagnated. That is all inflation related. We have also all been raised to think that putting things on credit and financing everything is the way to do things financially and that is just not true. Our government has been doing the same thing, charging everything and then paying massive interest and printing more money to pay for things it can't afford. At some point the dollar is going to lose its standing as the world currency and we are also going to have to pay down that debt. When we do, it is going crush people used to having the government bail them out both businesses and individuals.

[W i l l]

Media blackout...the term ought to be redefined as meaning media prefers keeping it's head in the sand to preserve itself.

[W i l l]

Shaw:
"And to that I say, that if the corporate media sensed a groundswell for Ron Paul, they would go there. I mean, do you really think that, say, the same network (MSNBC) that features a marquee commentator (Keith Olbermann) who has called for Bush and Cheney to resign would shrink away from giving Ron Paul face time because they are afraid his anti-Iraq War stance would piss off the divisions of NBC owner and defense General Electric?"

For months I watched segment after segment devoted to objections by media and pundits alike barking at the Bush madministrations erosion of the Bill of Rights.

Since October 15, proposed legislation that would essentially reset the Constitution as was prior to madministartions assault on it...has been sitting pre-committee without one damn word from what I gathered are otherwise outraged media outlets.

The American Freedom Agenda Act 2007 , HR 3835, introduced by Ron Paul, is a serious proposal. It's legislation that liberal media ought to have jumped all over. So why hasn't it?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/naomi-wolf/finally-action-ron-pau_b_69042.html

[JohnFromCensornati]

They do love their online poll results.
Gotta hang on to something when your guy is getting 3% of the vote.

[grizzle]

You sound more hysterical than they do. I love the vitriol terms like "idiots" used to describe a generation of Americans who recently found libertarianism and free-market ism, but haven't had the time to think through all the implications. While I can excuse them for that, it's hard to excuse someone who thinks a sample of 40 out of the 300,000 people who have voted for Paul thus far, makes for an important story. Or someone who thinks that those supporters can possibly represent the more complex theories of free-market capitalism.

That said, I am sorry if some supporters sound unsympathetic to financial problems. But in their defense, you're not considering that this is a nation of financial illiterates and a lot of those took out dumbass mortgages. The Paul supporters' point is that they wouldn't have to take dumbass mortgages if prices were lower in a freer market.

Yes, the stary-eyed Paul supporters aren't perfect representatives of free market enterprise, but whining about them, while ignoring the mass of students who think that the Federal Government will solve global warming if they just wave enough Obama signs, smacks of myopia. Keep fighting those straw men, Shaw, and you'll make a nice bale of hay.

Finally, I won't explain libertarian theory to you for the same reason you won't learn it: It's too laborous, but I will note that among its tenets id a strong common-law tradition. Since contract law does not recognize microscopic fine print or any print intended to deceive a contractee, and since corporate courts are cracking down on the Business Judgment Rule, Paul would do a lot of good by letting courts do their jobs. Don't forget, corporations aren't as harmfull as corporatism. Paul has railed against that, but it will continue under another administration.

[websmith]

Paul idiots?

In a Constitutional world, per the 10th Amendment, appropriately exercised government regulatory and judicial oversight lies at the state level and the Federal Reserve would not exist to be able print an excess money supply resulting in the poor investments that led to the .com crash and the mortgage crisis.

Richard Parsons, the Chairman of the Board at Time Warner, is the grandson of a grounds keeper who worked on the Rockefeller Estate. Richard worked for Nelson Rockefeller when he was Governor and Vice President when he met Guiliani. His office is in Rockefeller Center. The Rockefellers are major share holders in the Federal Reserve Bank.

The Fox Corporate board includes war propagandist and Hillary fundraiser Rupert Murdoch; Viet Dinh, law professor and author of the patriot act; and Andrew Knight of Rothschild, international banker and large share holder in the FRB and the Crown.

GE has been selling aircraft parts to Iran in spite of embargoes. Disney/ABC is heavily invested in oil. Eugene Meyer, who bought the Washington Post Company out of bankruptcy, was Chairman of the FRB and served as the head of the War Finance Corporation for Wilson who signed the Federal Reserve Act into existence. CBS parent Westinghouse is headed up by Frank Carlucci of the Carlyle investment group which the Bin Laden family invested in heavily. If you do a little homework, you will find that all major media corporations have ties to the FRB. GE donated $1.1 million, MicroSoft donated $2.4 million, Disney donated $640,000, Time Warner donated $2.4 million, and Time Warner, through Phillip Morris, donated $2.9 million to the 2000 Bush campaign. There is much more but there's a 350 word limit.

Obviously, none of the major share holders of these companies and the FRB would want Ron to be elected or for the Constitution to be enforced.

As Fox News President Roger Ailes has noted, "Bias has to do with the elimination of points of view, not presenting a point of view".

It's better to have deaf ears than nothing between them.

[Sakshale]

It is interesting that the comments posted here don't seem to reflect your article's distain. Me thinks you may protest too much...

[diamndpeace]

The more educated Paul followers realize that large corporations are caused by regulation, not the other way around. Do some research into any large company abusing its powers (enron) and you'll find gobs of regulation and beurocracy.

This is taught by the nobel prize winning Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics.