Who Supported Ron Paul and Does Not Support the Tea Party Movement?

So just to recap, I didn't misread anything and the key point here is in fact that corporations will be able to spend on campaign advertising directly. Not just labor unions like you were trying to assert.

Once I clarified that for you your position then became that it doesn't matter because no matter how much large corporations spend on ads it won't matter anyway? Because it won't sway public opinion?

I'd like to address your 3 points individually.

1) Campaigns didn't suffer for campaign dollars from influential and partisan parties from both sides of the aisle under the previous rules of engagement.
Were you paying attention to the last presidential election when the winning candidate outspent the loser by 3 to 1 in the critical final quarter leading up to the election?

Ask any politically involved person on the hill (or hell just pay attention to politics in general) and they'll tell you it's gotten so bad that elected officials immediately begin raising money for reelection as soon as they enter office. Why do you think that is? Because they don't really need it?

Could that naivete of yours be rearing its ugly head again?

2) Voters make up their minds based on many factors, advertising often being the least of those factors.
And where precisely do you think those voters are getting the information about these factors from? What sources of information are they using to form those conclusions?

Check out these news watcher numbers. Fact is most Americans do not watch or even pay attention to national news. But guess what they are watching... Prime time television (and pretty much everything else on television besides news) where political campaigns are focusing their ad spend.

Advertising being the "least" of those factors? Sorry but I'm gonna have to call bullshit and challenge you to prove you didn't make that up...


3) The idea that Corporations and deep pockets contributors would all want people to vote the same way on any election issue is ridiculous.
Yeah it's ridiculous to believe that a lobby syndicate representing the interests of a particular industry (health insurance) would want to back a particular candidate in any state or national election.

The fact that you used the word "ridiculous" is ridiculous. And as for that statement, the fact that you really believe that stands on its own. I didn't really have to respond to it but I didn't want you to think I purposely avoided it.

 

Gee George, given the amount of time it took you to post, I'd figure your reply would have more meaningful content

Actually, I just threw labor unions in there because you were busily trying to claim corporations would own the election cycle. I'm glad to see you were able to admit Big Labor would be every bit as happy about the SCOTUS decision as any corporate interest.

Correlation. You wouldn't happen to have solid evidence of causation, would you? No, I didn't think so. It is equally plausible that the lack of campaign contributions was an effect, caused by a crappy candidate(McCain), not the other way around. Looking at campaign contributors as investors, people are less likely to invest in a dog. By the way, I never claimed advertising has no effect on elections. I simply put forth the proposition that advertising does not an election decision make.

As your link points out, it depends on the voter. Nothing in your link backs any of your claims about advertising buying elections.

You are the one claiming advertising will buy elections. Why don't you prove your point first, instead of making ridiculous assertions with no evidence.

To back my claims, I'll refer you once again to the Bush vs. Kerry election. I've already covered cocaine use and drunk driving, but with the Kerry election, they had the claim that he had "stolen" the 2000 election via the Supreme court, on top of which they piled the unpopular Iraq war. Spending by each campaign varied by less than 9%, but Bush won both the electoral and popular vote counts handily. What put him well over the top were the Swift Boat Vets for truth, a group whose campaign spending didn't even count towards the total. Probably more important than the ads put out by the Swift Vets was the content of those ads. I'm sure we all remember the footage of Kerry standing before congress claiming to have been illegally in Cambodia and to have witnessed war crimes of all sorts. The book "Unfit for Command" was a great read. By the way, Fahrenheit 911 also did extremely well at the same time, and didn't count towards Kerry's advertising dollars. The uneducated voters who let only the media guide their decision were left a choice between a dullard slacker and a traitor who had sat in a room where communist sponsored conspirators discussed killing US Senators to effect change.

Straw man. That isn't what I claimed. I said every special interest may have a candidate that they would prefer, but the chances of all the special interests preferring the same candidate are slim to the point of being ridiculous. Bush/Cheney had Haliburton, Kerry/Edwards had the trial attorney's lobby. The trial attorney's lobby is also the reason you didn't see tort reform in any of the Democratic health care proposals and this was all BEFORE the change in corporate campaign advertising laws.

Respond. Don't respond. Its all the same to me. I personally love it when people put forward the more partisan statements that are absurd at their face value. I used to spend some of my spare time on forums posting exactly this type of absurdity because I suspect most voters recognize the idiocy of it when they see it. In that spirit, let me thank you now for bringing the subject up.

P.S. I miss Zibblu.

 

I found myself writing this just now:

Bill Clinton Gives Credit to the NRA
Perhaps 2012 will be a replay of 1994, as the Republican Party hopes. If it is, however, I hope that the Republicans have learned some important lessons from their post-1994 experience. The “Republican Revolution” was betrayed from within by overspending, overtaxing, and overreaching. If the Republican Party regains Congress, they had better deliver a balanced budget, term limits, a major reduction in the size and scope of government, and a return to the Constitutional principles of our founding fathers. This is very likely the last chance which the American people will give, to either party.
​

I am probably "too Republican" to be welcomed in the tea parties, and I haven't seen or heard anyone in a tea party group be as willing as I am to discuss the end of the republic. In a strange way, I am both too radical and not radical enough for the tea parties.

 

Did you finally learn what libertarian means?

 

It means, "not Ron Paul."

Ron is just as much of an enemy of liberty as Barack Obama.

 

Yeah no shit, Ron's not a true libertarian but he's closer than any other elected official. In fact, you can't be an elected official and call yourself a real libertarian, it's impossible.

 

In that case I would recommend not even bothering to vote.

 

Well first off it shocked me that you're not the forum mascot anymore. What happened to your clown act? You know, the one where you go around pretending to be a liberal only through a vehicle of sarcasm. I suppose I was a bit put off because you not being a joke that isn't to be taken seriously I'm still adjusting to.

lol the fact that you don't see the irony here is starting to make me think you're joking again You're trying to proclaim that I was purposely leaving out labor unions as if they are some big important ah ha factor... Labor union contributions compared to what corporations are capable of... yeah, I was trying to hide that. Darn ya got me.

Sorry bud. I'm not gonna get into the semantics arguments I see a lot of you wasting time on here when I check in from time to time. My point was simply that Barack outspent McCain on advertising by a non-negligible amount and to take it even further and turn your semantics argument on its head -- had the candidates been equal and neither was "crappy" to use your own term, I suppose you'll still say 1 candidate having 3 times the amount to canvas battle ground states leading up to the election won't matter then either right?

Don't bother to answer that one, we both know you knew exactly the point I was making and you tried to argue with a strawman then later accuse me of using one.... Good one clown guy

Perfect quote to immortalize. Republicans think this is all OK because huge amounts of advertising dollars dumped on to an already money corrupted election system won't have any effect.

We have a credibility problem caused by money and everyone thinking everyone is bought off. So let's allow MORE money into the mix. This is really simple stuff man. Semantics and obfuscating clear facts with rambling can only get you so far.

There you go with the word ridiculous again... What's ridiculous is that you actually believe that political advertising doesn't sway public opinion. I laid my case out with the news numbers and the fact that the advertising is targeted during shows that people are actually watching... You actually furthered my argument when the only answer you had was "well well, McCain Sucked!". All that did was allow me to point out that with an evenly matched candidate base advertising would be even MORE important. Thanks.


So what's your counter other than to pretend I didn't just make a strong case and keep asking me to make a case? Oh Obamanation, you're my clown again

Also, I noticed you didn't dare touch my challenge to prove you weren't making shit up. (because you can't) So before you go asking me to prove anything, you first.

Sir I'll close by thanking you kindly for proving my point again. With the advertising dollars being close in that election you're basically helping me make the case that had say John Kerry increased the difference in ad spend to where he outspent Bush and had professional, researched, targeted, focus group based ads in the type of campaign that only corporate dollars can achieve (not labor unions lol) there could have quite easily been a different outcome in oh, say, Florida?

Thanks.

What? That didn't even make any sense.

A - Because thanks to laws being in place to keep it from happening, neither haliburton nor trial lawyer lobbys could buy all of the candidates ads if they wanted to. Why are you trying to pretend that Bush/Cheney "had" Haliburton? For what? Moral support? Because anythign outside the max campaign contribs for corporations back then would have been illegal. Not anymore though, way to rub it in asshole.

B - Because it only takes one special interest stronger than the rest to make the difference. The 2 biggest being health care and the banks. I guess it would be a toss up which candidate those 2 would support in obamanation-world.

C - We're talking about elections not bills that get passed after elections. LOL why are you trying to make them seem like one in the same? Like they're the same process? You do know that greasing politicians pockets to affect legislation is completely different from a political election... don't you??

And thanks for making my point AGAIN.... If the trial lawyers have that kind of affect on legislators in the off season, imagine what power they'll have when they threaten to bank role a politician's opponent's campaign ad spend in their next election.

Yeah he was easy wasn't he? I miss nehemiah.

 

I don't. What an utter waste of a day if I did. But let's not get sidetracked from the issue as I know that's the tendency when this subject comes up.

 

George, had you introduced even one(1) new fact in your last post, I would feel compelled to respond. If you are going to rework the logic of your argument using facts that have already been presented, your argument would have to be logical to someone besides yourself. I think you see where I am going there.

I thought this quote was precious:

You realize the Bush-Kerry election was 2004, not the 2000 Bush-Gore Florida recount debacle right? Bush won Florida in 2004 by 400,000 votes or 5% of the voting population. Your implication that somehow or other if Kerry had spent more money, or spent money more wisely in Florida, he could have picked up 5% would obviously require you to present some facts to back that claim. That's how presenting a legitimate argument works.

I would argue that Kerry might have picked up the extra 400,000 votes in Florida had he not perjured himself to congress in an effort to promote himself, smear his own country, end the Vietnam war at the behest of the communist party, all in one action. Of course that has more to do with merit and less to do with advertising dollars.

You'll do a lot better in these little discussions when you stop using left wing talking points sites as your only source of information. It might not hurt you to pose as a right winger for a while and try arguing things from their point of view for a while. I still have active accounts on several other forums in my liberal persona, and I'd dare say I make better arguments for your cause than you do. Then again, most of those other forums don't tolerate the cartoonish hyper-partisan BS talking points based nonsense Zibblu and I were famous for (and you at times), so I find myself trying to legitimately defend leftist positions. It is an educational experience.

 

I don't think it's sidetracking, because if neither tea nor Ron are the solution, then what is?

 

The solution is to first identify what the problem is. Obama and his followers won't agree with me that government is the problem, so my solution isn't their solution.

If you believe government is the problem it doesn't make a whole lotta sense to seek change through the government. I see the world as 6 billion or so individuals, channeling their frustrations and immature desires through a body known as government of which they've come to depend many aspects of their life upon. The system isn't just broke, the philosophy is too.

The solution is education foremost, as well as communication and cooperation with like-minded fellows. Ideas have power; bullets, bombs and ballots are the hallmark of slavery.

 

I do agree with that. The problem is people fall for the paradigm. Left, right, libertarianism, communism, all of the nice sounding names created to keep people busy arguing. The issue is IMO that the Federal Reserve is draining the American tax payer and that the governments have ever since JFK worked to their advantage. Paul claims to want to go against them, but many indications exist he may indeed be controlled opposition. In that case it would be a success. It appears people feel such a need to follow someone and are so afraid to think for themselves, 1 shepherd disappoints, they look for a new one.


Another thing would be the CFR http://www.theworldsprophecy.com/cfr which has been created to control the 25 biggest media outlets in the U.S. and with that the mindset of the people.

Overall IMO the system is going to destroy itself over time. Operating within this very system will not work.

In addition, the U.S. no longer officially exists. It's now the North American Union:

http://www.theworldsprophecy.com/u-s-a-rip/


The banks win. We lose. Who do we vote for? It will not matter.

 

No one associated with the Mises Institute would be controlled opposition. And if he were, it doesn't matter, the idea itself is what matters.

I wouldn't concern yourself with the details of who exactly is taking away your freedom. It's a fruitless endeavor. What requires immediate concern instead is the system that allows for freedoms to be stripped away in the first place.

 

Changing "the system" is not going to happen as far too many people idolize one or the other party.

Therefor there is not likely to be an agreement between the people. And as things start heading into the wrong direction more and more, I see chaos on the horizon.

 

Disagreement is good, it's truly a signal of individualism. Politics/parties are just a subsystem of government.

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root."

-Henry Thoreau