Well, he isn't wild about your or my right to be a citizen without his approval (he wants to eliminate clause 1 of amendment XIV).

He also isn't happy with many other parts of the constitution (article I & article II) that deal with the creation and funding of departments in the executive branch (specifics upon request).

Bearing in mind that the constitution is a check on government that acts as an idirect - and only - guarantor of your rights, and here's a man who claims to be a "constitutionalist", but attacks the constitution in every speech, I think I can live without the good doctor as anything more than a hick representative from Texas.

What he said.

Update on Google search for the term Conspiriocracy: now leads off with two hits from The cellar.

Well, I don't agree with his positions on any of those things, but he IS a Libertarian, and Libertarians (the ones on the conservative end of the spectrum, like him) are all about not restricting freedoms, especially corporate freedom. They tend to believe less in personal freedom though. Although, he does talk about repealing drug laws and getting rid of the IRS. And I've heard him say we should get out of other countries and stop our imperialist tendencies around the world. I knew he was against abortion, but I didn't know he was against freedom for gays. I kinda thought he would be more about personal freedom as well, from the interviews I've seen with him. Like I said though, I don't know a lot about him. Thanks for the links. I will educate myself more.

There is no such thing as corporate freedom.

OK. No rules for corporations. No regulations. No government interference. Better?

1. Other way around.

2. There ain't no such thing as government interference. This is a provable fact.

Not according to republicans...

:eek:

Yeah, but they still believe that rich people get that way through hard work and perseverance, that the military is defending America in Iraq, and that supply-side economics works.

It's true, and even more obvious today, what with the government buying up all these banks.

Interference means to disrupt a system from the outside. The government is, and always has been, an intrinsic part of the market, to some degree. The government regulates and taxes, and the market basically owns the government (again, just look at a recent newspaper, and tell me I'm wrong. I dare ya). Therefore it cannot interfere with the market any more than you can interfere with yourself.

But merc interferes with himself a lot...

Looking at the newspaper....

You are wrong. Being and intrisic part of a process and regulation does not equate into control. Our government has moved into the area of control in the last 2 months.

Markets don't work without states providing requisites. Laws, courts, monopolies on the use of force, stable mediums of exchange and various non-market goods, though of course people disagree about what they precisely are.

All of that strikes me as interference. The only way to have a truly free market is with anarchy, and, well....given the vast range of difference between Actually Existing Anarchy (Somalia, Afghanistan) and Anarchy as Imagined by 19th Century Philosophers, that does not seem an especially enticing idea.

The thing is, if you are for corporate freedom, then you are de facto against personal freedom, due to the vast power disparities between the two. The relationship between corporate and individual interests is a zero-sum game and it is my opinion that the Vulgar Libertarianism of Ron Paul swings that relationship even further in favour of the already powerful corporate elements.

Ron Paul is actually somewhat creepier than the people who were in charge during the Bush admin. Sure, Cheney was an evil fuck...but he was pretty indiscriminate in who he is was being an evil fuck to. Ron Paul's associations with the militia movement is...disturbing, given the prevalence of fundamentalist Christian, sexist and racist sentiment amongst those organizations. He is close friends with Gary North, for example, who thinks America should be under Biblical law (such as stoning adulterers to death and barring public office from anyone insufficiently Christian - which amusingly includes most mainstream Christian groups). And there are disturbing themes in the Ron Paul Survival Report, which he either knew about or was too incompetent to check on, neither of which looks good.