Now you really didn’t think after raising millions over the Internet that Ron Paul was going to go back to being a semi-obscure Congressman from Texas did you? For Heaven’s sake, the guy didn’t even officially drop out until last week. But this is what Ron Paul’s former Presidential campaign appears to be turning its attention to:
Over the past 17 months you and I delivered a message of freedom, the likes of which American politics has not seen in decades. With the primary season now over, the presidential campaign has come to an end. But the Revolution has only begun.
Today I am happy to announce the official launch of the Ron Paul Campaign for Liberty. Please visit our new website and join us.
Over the next few months I will be developing a program, assembling a team, and announcing new and exciting projects. We will have a permanent presence on the American political landscape. That I promise you.
Right now, I need your patience and support. I want the Campaign for Liberty to be a grassroots campaign; so your energy, your creativity, your feedback, and your participation are essential.
Together, we will educate our fellow Americans in freedom, sound money, non-interventionism, and free markets. We will write commentaries and broadcast videos on the news of the day. And I’ll work with friends whom I respect to design materials for homeschoolers.
Politically, we will expand the great work of our precinct leader program. We will make our presence felt at every level of government. We will keep an eye on Congress, and lobby against legislation that threatens us. And we will identify and support candidates who champion our great ideas.
“In the final analysis,” I wrote in my new book The Revolution: A Manifesto, “the last line of defense in support of freedom and the Constitution consists of the people themselves. If the people want to be free, if they want to lift themselves out from underneath a state apparatus that threatens their liberties, squanders their resources on needless wars, destroys the value of their dollar, and spews forth endless propaganda about how indispensable it is and how lost we would all be without it, there is no force that can stop them.”
Our time has come to act on these words.May future generations look back on our work and say that these were men and women who, in a moment of great crisis, stood up to their politicians, the opinion-makers, and the establishment, and saved their country.
For liberty,
Ron Paul
At the website, he delivers much the same message but with one key addition:
Now what about the Republican Convention in St. Paul? Our delegates will attend, of course, and I expect our contingent to have a visible presence there. Without disruption, we will do whatever we can to influence the party and its platform, and return the GOP to its limited-government roots. This is very important.
Since certain people have already lumped me into the Ron Paul camp anyway, I decided to add my name to the e-mail list. Despite the fact I strongly disagree with the non-interventionist portion of Ron Paul’s platform insofar as fighting the Long War is concerned (and thus wouldn’t support him for President), any company I can have in the quest for limiting the scope and reach of our federal government/nanny state is quite welcome.
Dr. Paul also notes the number of young people who have been energized by his campaign, which isn’t too shabby for a guy who will turn 73 in August. While I believe that many of those young people were attracted to his non-interventionist (read: against the war in Iraq and Afghanistan) stance and the idea of limited government was secondary, it’s still a beginning and may draw them closer to being part of reinventing the Republican Party as a party which only considers Washington, D.C. a convenient place for Congress to meet, not the giver of largesse to those whom they favor.
I also particularly liked the CFL’s additional emphasis on homeschooled children, because I happen to think that there’s nothing wrong with homeschooling a child if you have the means and wherewithal to do so. Obviously there’s a sacrifice made monetarily because we all pay for public schools whether we use them or not but these folks who take the time to teach their own kids seem to put out many of the most learned children in our country.
Overall, there’s a lot of good that can be done with this group, and I look forward to much of what they have to say.
You know, I agree with him on a lot of what he says about foreign policy. That we have caused a lot of problem by funding any and everything around the globe. And that foreign aid isn’t always doing what we want it to do in terms of promoting peace or whatever. But if he had only formally recognized that what is done is done and mistakes or no mistakes we need to protect ourselves while keeping all this in mind for the future, I would have been quite supportive of him.